Here's my dinner set. I have 8 of the dinner and salad plates, bowls, and the dessert bowls and plates (the flower shaped ones).

Whoa.

Yeah.

... so, how long before you can start networking for the job?

Yikes, flea.

M and I already had just about all the household items we needed when we got married, so we didn't register for anything, and indeed tried to ask that people not give us anything but donate either to our honeymoon fund or to Partners in Health instead. That idea got nixed by our parents, but we managed to get away with asking for either homemade/locally made gifts (many of our friends are very crafty) or donations as mentioned above, and then we slipped a very short list (vacuum cleaner, waffle iron, three or four other things) to our parents in case anyone called them up in indignation that they couldn't just buy us towels. So we got a waffle iron, a good suitcase, some money, some donations to a worthy cause, and lots of fantastic and creative gifts from friends, including a homemade cookie jar, several beautiful quilts & blankets, and a set of matching aprons done with Very Hungry Caterpillar fabric.

The gifts issue was probably the single biggest source of tension (principally between my parents and me) during the planning of the wedding, but in the end I felt like we pulled it off, nobody got pissed off, and we got just what we wanted.

"I had a string of committed relationships for 15 solid years, and I flew around the world to research this article, and can I just stress how successful, wealthy, and attractive my friends are? Here's an article about how I heroically made peace with the only part of my life that isn't completely fucking amazing."

I get that. I bristled, too. And then I felt sort of bad because when i talk about being single, I feel like I need to head off any sort of criticism that I'm a loser by bragging about my awesome friends who do awesome things and my awesome apartment in an awesome neighborhood of my awesome major metropolitan city and don't you know that I write books and hang with famous scientists?

I saw it as a way to say, "I'm not a loser, my life is pretty awesome and men find me attractive so don't try and put me down."

I do it too, and I know it's tiresome. An editor should have reeled that in.

I can't imagine Matt Taibbi listing his accomplishments to prove that he's had an awesome life. I think it's assumed that he's a dude who's been on Bill Maher and is a staff writer at Rolling Stone so he must be cool/desirable. She's got a cover story at The Atlantic, I assume she has a cool/desirable life. She doesn't need to do the thing.

And the comments section is full of nice guys warning women that their looks will fade and then they will be lonely old hags neener neener.

Just, you know, FYI.

Allyson, some of it pinged me the same way.

I can't imagine Matt Taibbi listing his accomplishments to prove that he's had an awesome life. I think it's assumed that he's a dude who's been on Bill Maher and is a staff writer at Rolling Stone so he must be cool/desirable.

A side note, but Matt Taibbi is also a member of a select group (we know them as men) that gets to have cover stories in the Atlantic that don't directly intersect with their personal life. So it's not gonna come up quite as much.

I think I should sit and wait. The head of the library - the boss of the deceased - and I talked on the phone last week for most of an hour, and she knows my background and that I am looking for a job. I have a networking meeting with her scheduled in a couple of weeks. I think right now she's probably shocked and upset on a personal level and a bit worried about getting the immediate work done on a professional level (he was the circulation manager), but once she has time to settle down she'll think of me right away. I hope.

Matt Taibbi is also a member of a select group (we know them as men) that gets to have cover stories in the Atlantic that don't directly intersect with their personal life.

I heart brenda m.

she knows my background and that I am looking for a job. I have a networking meeting with her scheduled in a couple of weeks.

Sounds like a solid plan. If you want, in a week or so you can email/call her and express your sympathies and reiterate your networking meeting plans.

it it because I'm older?

I am laughing hysterically here. Yes, it's one of the many gifts of getting older. I've driven to the 250 miles to Nashville four or five times a year for 30 years. I've gone from feeling fine the morning after I got home to taking three days to recover.

There are a few candlesticks and a nice carving set around here somewhere from wedding presents, and the KitchenAid from my in-laws is still going strong. What I needed more was a divorce shower, since the ex got the television, the computer, the stereo and more than his share of the bookcases.

That's both convenient and awkward, flea. You hardly want to stand at the door tomorrow with his obit in your hand, but at the same time....