So yes, a much-needed and long-overdue update, the theme of which will be "flux."
Why flux, you ask? Well... many things. For starters, I just got back from my krazy - and constantly in flux (eg, slept in 8 different cities during 8 nights on the road) - trip to Jordan/Palestine/Isr@el/Egypt with Lar. It was great, and you can check Facebook for pictures because it is too stressful to try and tell all the stories here. Though in many ways the trip (and the 16 total days Lar was here) were a bastion against flux, because it is really good and reassuring to have someone who knows you better than almost anyone else in the world come and insert themselves into your crazy new life for 2+ weeks. Judgment ensues.
Continuing with flux: I got my new passport this week. My old one expires in 2009, and I didn't want to get my visa for the new job only to have my passport expire 6 months later... plus, my recently acquired Isr@eli stamps make travel elsewhere in the Middle East a little dicey. (Oh, and I was never going to get let back into America with my current eclectic collection of visas... yeah.) ANYHOW, the whole process of getting a new passport was very traumatic for me, which sounds crazy, but if travel is as important to you as it is to me and you do it as much as I do, you will understand that parting with the physical evidence of the past 9 years of my life was... weird. It necessitated a lot of pontificating along the lines of "OMG, I got this passport in July 1999 when I had never even left the US, just in case I needed to cross over the Canadian border during my college orientation canoing trip to Minnesota, and who could have ever imagined 9 years ago that I'd be where I am now, and where on earth will I be 10 years from now when this passport expires, and no matter where I am won't it kind of suck regardless because I'll be 36, and and and and and..." [cue hyperventilation]. Anyhoos, to make matters worse, as I'm flipping through the old passport for like the millionth time, I suddenly find a note penciled on one of the pages that must have been written at least two years ago, but which I had never noticed until now: "I love you! JMVDV" Which is NOT the kind of note you need to find when you are already having a mini-psychic crisis about The Changing Stages of Life. Argh.
More flux: my last day at work is 13 August, and my new job starts 20 August. Furthermore, I found out this week that my first project is in... wait for it... S@udi Ar@bia! Which means I'll be living/working in the Kingdom from Sunday-Wednesday most weeks for the better part of the next three months. Which is great, and crazy, and exciting, and an incredible opportunity, but is obvi a huge change from my current lifestyle in Dubai. And... wow. I'm also totally intimidated by the level at which they expect me to work and feel that I might have concocted an enormous sham in convincing them I was qualified to be hired for the level at which they took me. So I fear that when they realize this in S@udi, I'll be on the first boat back to ex-consultant land... I don't know where that is, but I imagine it's even worse than Riy@dh.
Sooooooooooooooooooo... that's enough flux for now. To deal with all of this change (and to celebrate one of my last weekends of freedom before I sell out to the Man) I am going to Baku, Azerbaijan with Flatmates E & D for the weekend. It will be my first time on the Caspian Sea, my second former Soviet republic, and my third 48-hour weekend trip of the summer... AND we plan to watch the Olympic opening ceremonies in a dodgy communist-era bar on Friday night while drinking lots of Azeri beer. What could be better?!
