treasure the rest of your days here

It's funny that I'm thinking about treasuring the rest of my days here, considering that it's eleven p.m. and I just wrapped up some stuff that I was trying to finish before going home for the evening. It's really my fault that I spend so much time at the office; part of it is that I'm just extremely unproductive in the morning, and then the nighttime (my time!) is when I really am able to crank through all the work that I should have done earlier. That's not to say that I don't work in the mornings; normally I have meetings in the mornings, so I can't be productive anyway, but when I do have a rare free morning (like today), I can't accomplish as much as I would if it were the hours of 9-11pm rather than 9-11am. Anyway, I accomplished a lot this evening, so at least I wasn't wasting my time. And now I'm blogging, which should satisfy you regardless of whether or not you care that I should be in bed instead.

The security guys must think I'm insane; I sit near the kitchenette on the first floor (which, in true European fashion, is really the second floor...silly Europeans), so they often come by my desk while they're going to make tea. Since I'm typically one of the only people here by the time the security guards start frequenting the area, and my eyes are probably bloodshot from too much contact-lens-wearin', they probably think that I'm a friendless loner. Or, that I'm staying late to watch porn. Neither is true, and both are somehow more glamorous (or at least more interesting) than the facts. Fact 1: I'm shy, but I'm not a friendless loner, and staying late means that I can talk to my friends on occasion, since the later I stay, the longer our workdays overlap. Fact 2: I'm diligent about my work and have yet to come to terms with the European standard of clearing out as soon as the workday is over. Fact 3: there is only one internet connection in my apartment and no wireless, so I can't work in bed, which means I might as well work at my desk instead. Fact 4: I stopped watching porn at work a long time ago, and I have no desire to start watching it again. Fact 5: Actually, there aren't any more facts pertinent to this train of thought. So, let's move on, shall we?

I wore a cute yellow skirt to work today; I had purchased it at J.Crew before I left California, but this was the first time it saw the light of day. Granted, the 'light of day' was the 45 seconds it takes me to walk from my apartment to the door of my office building, but that's still more light than traditionally appears in my closet. I think I've come to terms with the fact that it's going to be freezing even when the sun is shining, and I really wanted to wear this skirt, so I wore it with my open-toed gold sandals even though my feet will be freezing for the 45 seconds that it will take me to get home. I'm so brave and stylish.

This weekend, I'm not going anywhere, and that makes me exceedingly happy. I think that I'll indulge my desire to go shopping; I really haven't bought much of anything since I got here, other than two fountain pens (did I mention I bought a fountain pen in Edinburgh? I don't think I did. It's awesome, and I got two different bottles of ink to go with it--how hot is that? I'm such a dork) and an absurdly expensive pair of sunglasses (duty free!), so it's time to go out and contribute to the growth of the Celtic Tiger economy. Not that I should shop, since I already have baggage woes--I need to call immigration and see if they'll let me back in when I get out of South Africa, because if I can't come back in to pick up my suitcases, I only have three options: 1) Ship all my stuff home, at standard extortionate shipping rates, 2) Leave everything here in the mad hope that I'll be able to come back and retrieve it, or that someone will be nice enough to bring it to me, or 3) Take all my baggage with me to South Africa. #3 was originally my favorite option, until I found out that British Airways only allows one checked bag to Africa, and charges ~$12 per *kilo* on excess baggage. To get all of my excess baggage to Africa and back would cost more than the GDP of most of the countries I would be flying over; I may like to pretend that I'm a colonialist, but that goes against even my absurdist tendencies.

This is a problem for another day (most likely tomorrow, since it needs to be resolved v. quickly); now it's time for me to go to bed!