Enough Whining about My Life...

...and I don't feel like whining about the government. Wait. What does that leave to talk about?

I know: crazy bus people. While I was waiting for the bus this morning in the bitter spring cold, there were two people waiting with me, one young black girl and one elderly white woman. The elderly white woman sat quietly on the bench, until one point when she doubled over with crazy-woman cackling. This surprised me, but I'm a jaded city boy, so I didn't even blink. But the young girl was a little shocked by it: she stared. Big mistake. The crazy lady started talking to her, alternating between low rumbling and high-pitched birdlike chirping. The young girl ran away. I laughed, but not so much that the crazy lady would notice. I didn't want her to turn on me.

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Ever get to thinking about weird anniversaries? It was ten years ago tomorrow that I skipped my "graduation" from West Shore Community College. I was one class short of my associate's degree; I had dropped out of my statistics course earlier that semester. That semester, I was working full-time on the night crew at a local grocery store, as well as working part-time during the day at Radio Shack and going to school full-time. I used to sleep in my car in the parking lot, and there were some nice motherly types from some of my classes who would wake me up when I slept through my alarm. Ah, the good old days of sleep deprivation, overwork, and exhaustion.

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My mom got downsized, sort of. She works for a government-funded agency that regulates day care centers. She's been there for 15 years, driving her series of little red cars across northern Michigan. She learned that at the end of May they're cutting all of the full-time field agents (of which she is one) down to part time, getting rid of their benefits, and scuttling any saved vacation time they may have had. This will mean major changes, I think: maybe they won't be able to spend all summer at their campground, and both she and my stepdad will have to get part-time jobs to supplant her reduced income. I'm really sad for her, but she says she still loves the job enough to stick with it. And she's good at that—sticking with things. Hell, she still talks to me.

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And in the "news of the obvious" section, we have a study that links soft drink consumption to childhood obesity.