It's so much easier to talk about this sort of stuff to you guys, because I can have tears rolling down my face or be destroying small crunchy things, and it can take five minutes to type a single paragraph, and you folks can't tell. The illusion of coping is often as useful as the coping itself.

Cindy and JZ have new tags. I'm pretty sure I've announced Maria's new tag, but hey, I like Maria.

Much -ma to the husband, Connie.

Okay, lots of TV to watch tonight! And maybe I can stay up all night to catch up on thesis-writing. I am a bad Master's student. I'm actually afraid I'm going to end up writing crap that won't even be approved and I'll have to spend the whole summer revising it. Bah. I just want a degreeeee. Can't I just sleep with someone?

Sometimes, illusion is all you have left, Connie.

The great thing about writing is the ability to pause and edit, sometimes.

Oh, Connie, I'm sorry. You deserve a break from the health wonkiness.

So, after last night's fun "$2400? Oh shit!" freakout, this morning, while I"m waiting for my boss to actually schedule my annual review, she walks by where I'm talking ot some people and says "Mmm, you're really going to hate me...walk with me for a minute" and walks off towards the cafeteria. I start to panic. Dear lord, I'm thinking. She looks at me and said "Don't worry, you still have a job". I'm thinking "Oh, god, am I on some kind of probation? Shit shit shit!" And what does it turn out to be? Just that she wants me to take a day trip to South Carolina on Friday, instead of her, after I'd told her I wanted ot be in the office all week. SO not a problem. But god, I was petrified. I think I'm a little over paranoid.

And a catchup:

Is Captain Jack really a ghostly fish of bones?

Or he's sort of a Dread Pirate Jack in reverse: "Goodnight, sleep well, I'll likely be dead in the morning."

Hahha! I like that answer.

YAY P-C, that's AMAZING feedback! Whoot!

Yay hearing from Raquel--who I can't imagine so very pregnant! My mental image is stuck on the last time I saw her.

I read all of the freaking-out-over-parenting and I start to freak out over ever BEING a parent. Stop it!

I am a bad Master's student. I'm actually afraid I'm going to end up writing crap that won't even be approved and I'll have to spend the whole summer revising it.

Riiiight. That's why that retired science professor wrote you the other day, to tell you what a crappy science writer you are and how likely you are to write bad, bad crap for, like, ever.

Or not. You may end up flaking out and having to crank out great flipping wodges of words at the very last minute, but it won't be crap.

Much, much -ma to connie's DH, and to connie, both of whom should have long ago filled their lifetime quotas for sitting around waiting for test results. This is just unfair.

great flipping wodges of words

~ma, ~ma, ~ma to Connie's hubby and herself and their doc. And everyone else who needs.

P-C, you got amazing feedback, you have a degree and are working on another. You are gonna do just fine. And dandy. Says she who is utterly, utterly terrified at prospect of returning to a community college for an Associate's. Just because the other decade a stab at a Bachelor's at a rather demanding private college went bad due to health. Ignore all that, I know whereof I speak. You got the stuff, P-C. You are going to get the job done, and done well.

Yay hearing from Raquel--who I can't imagine so very pregnant! My mental image is stuck on the last time I saw her.

I know -- I remember her from the F2F, when I was just kind of stunned into speechlessness at how gorgeous she is.

Oh, connie. So much ~ma to you and your DH.

It should be noted that that picture doesn't even do Raquel justice.

WS, you're welcome to it, though I actually pinched it from the one episode of Blackadder I saw in my entire teenagerhood -- he was plotting something maleficent and gloatingly rubbing his hands and cackling over great flipping wodges of cash, and I have never forgotten the phrase or Atkinson's oily, eager, delicious delivery of the line.