IF
Nothing too new to report. We scheduled out things last night, reminding ourselves that this is all still conditional. I think my hopes are up more than Marjorie's; I need to cool it a bit in case things still don't pan out. We'll leave on September 24th, if....

Got my new Dell laptop today. Excuse me, notebook. Someone must have a trademark on the word "laptop". Anyway, new hardware hath powers to thrill the geek soul... So does things like this.

NEWS!!!
Just got this from our man in Singapore!

I'm helping with the proposal and we will submit it tomorrow. This
proposal is for the delivery of a functional specification. If awarded, we
are almost certain to win the implementation project as well.

Timelines are as follows:

Notification (for functional spec work): 23 August
Delivery of Functional Specification: 18 Sept.
Start of implementation phase: 1 October.

So if all goes well you should plan on being out here and working by 1
October. It looks like it's going well, but you can never count on
anything....

So it's not news that we're definitely going, but it is news that we aren't going at the end of this month, which is a relief. October 1st was our original target for a move date, so that's good. And I can give the boss some more reasonable notice now too. Now we need to try and figure out when we actually want to be out there...

Alas, this is my last day at work, so after today I won't have any office gossip. Also, today I'm feeling wistful and affectionate towards my office collegues because I know I won't be seeing them after today. Lucky for me, one of my least favorite co-workers isn't here, which works out especially well because she's been hounding me for the website to our yardsale and frankly, it's hard letting go of our possesions, even to people I like, and I just can't stomach this woman rummaging through our stuff.
Today is particularly hard because we still don't know if we're going anywhere. And yet I'm leaving my job. Did I mention how much I like my job? After living through two years of total job disatisfaction teaching preschool special-ed, it's very hard to walk away from a job I enjoy, and that I'm good at, especially when my collegues like me and appreciate me and I like (most of) them. Sigh.
Just in case anyone is interested in what I do/did-I'm a behavior specialist for Babies Can't Wait, the Georgia early intervention program for babies, birth to three, with developmental delays. Basically, it's a special education program for babies. My job is/was to evaluate the little ones to determine if they had delays, and if they did, were the delays significant enough to qualify for the program. It's a wonderful job. I get to help people, but don't have to work with people beyond the assessment, which in some cases is a tremendous advantage, because you don't have to deal with people's ignorance or family issues. I get to help, and also maintain detached.
Has anybody besides Mark noticed that I can't spell. Sorry. That probably won't change.

And still we wait.

What's a blog without some chatty office gossip? Let me tell you the tale of a cow orker I'd like to call Mr. Gullible. He apparently was raised in a home without sarcasm. Some recent examples:

1. I showed him this picture. His reaction: "Oh my God, they actually put that up on the highway sign?"

2. He mentioned that he lived over near a miniature golf course. I teased him, "Really? Is that why you moved there?" He took me totally seriously, and responded an emphatic "Noooooo" (much in the way Dawn Weiner responded in the cafeteria when asked if she was lesbian in Welcome To The Dollhouse. Saying "Nooooo" like this has become a catchphrase around the house).

3. Just yesterday I was asking someone else at lunch about who insures wedding rings. In the process I joked, "Of course, this means that Marjorie will find out I got her a diamonel." His response: "Oh my God, you actually got her one of those fake diamonds?"

I expect The Continuing Adventures of Mr. Gullible will become a regular feature, at least for a few more weeks....

I (marjorie) am taking a break at work (my second to last day!) to post my first blog. I struggled with what to write and then accepted the truth that a blog is a basically narcissistic endeavor and I could probably get away with writing whatever I felt like since you're basically reading my/our diary. The whole thing is rather exhibitionistic (real word?). So.......In a nod to other blogs I've enjoyed, I'll tell you some of the superficial interests of the hosts (Mark and Myself). Mark covered our wanderlust, so I'll ignore that for now.

Other things we enjoy are:

MUSIC-we're huge power pop fans. Favorites include Elvis Costello, Neil Finn, Elliott Smith, Death Cab for Cutie, The Beatles, The Kinks, JellyFish, Billy Bragg...the list could go on and on. One of our great concerns about moving to Singapore is the lack of concerts, local bands-this is one of the many attractive qualities that Melbourne has to offer though.

TRIVIA - Mark is rather brilliant and I like to pretend that I'm equally bright so we go play trivia to keep our egos in check, though sometimes we win which has quite the opposite effect.

BEER - Tiger beer is frankly another frightening aspect about moving to Singapore. It's really not very good. Truth is we've both been trying to drop a few pounds and have switched to Amstel Light for most occasions (though this is by far not either of our favorites) and I'm pretty sure it can be found in S'pore.

BOOK STORES - we seem to spend a lot of time in bookstores, and honestly in the weeks before our move, while we are trying to eliminate, rather than accumulate possessions, I have a difficult time not buying more books (even though I have at least five that I haven't read yet. Mark is almost as bad as I am with regards to purchasing books, but is no where near the magazine whore that I am-some of my favorite mags are "JANE"-guilty pleasure, like watching Friends. "BUST"- like Ms. Magazine but with fashion spreads. "WallPaper"-very stylized, also very expensive, I only let my self buy it before a very long flight. "National Geographic"-needs no explanation. "Martha Stewart:Living"-even though I could never be like Martha, I like pretending some day I could be that organized.

HOME MOVIES- It's a cartoon of the "Adult Swim" programs on Cartoon Network. It's truly hilarious and worth checking out.

SNORKELING - Love it! Although, since we live in Atlanta, we don't get to do it often. Mark has semi-regular, very sad dreams about getting ready to go and then having multiple obstacles impede him before getting in the water. Snorkeling is definitely something we plan on doing more frequently if/when we move to S'pore, though not in/around S'pore since the water looks pretty murky there. We went to Tioman Island last year and the snorkeling was amazing, we can't wait to get back.

WATCHING TRAVEL SHOWS AND MAP QUIZ(S) - This stems from our love of travel mated with our love of trivia. Basically map quiz consists of listing every country/region/capital/etc. that you know from a particular region. Travel shows about areas you've recently read about are particularly fun, then you can predict the next area they are going to discuss and impress your partner.

BIRD WATCHING - We aren't fanatical about it, but we definitely enjoy it. We are both getting better at identifying regional birds. S'pore has Jurong Bird Park, which we enjoyed last year, it helped us appreciate the red-headed woodpeckers we see all the time in Atlanta because there's nothing like them in Southeast Asia.

That's just a brief overview of some of our likes-here are some of our dislikes:

"ORDINARY F**ING PEOPLE - I hate 'em" and don't we all.

TALKING ON THE PHONE - generally, I like talking to my friends, especially people who live in other cities that I don't see everyday. However, generally, I really don't enjoy it, and neither does Mark. We have notoriously bad phone conversations with each other, with long lonely silences, because we're not phone talkers. Really long phone messages are a pet peeve too.

SLOW DOWNLOADS - Everyone hates this. It's probably like saying you hate traffic.

I can't seem to come up with anymore dislikes that we share, other than extremely obvious things. I suppose I don't keep a running list of the things I/we don't like because I don't like them.


One last like/dislike to end this rant:

Like-checking things off our to-do list

Don't Like-looking at the to-do and acknowledging all the things that haven't been done and not knowing when/if they have to be completed by.

The waiting is the hardest part

This week is all about breathlessly checking email first thing in the morning for word from Singapore. Still nothing.

Last night I was plagued by dreams of having too much to do and not enough time to do it. Here's a partial list of things that still need to be done:

Yard sale

Take final trips for this part of the world (Mexico? NYC?)

Going away party

Set up bank accounts to e-pay US debts

Get rid of credit cards

Burn CDs to computer

Get physical

Get teeth cleaned

Get shots

Get health insurance there

Terminate accounts at video rental places

Look into taxes for expats

Cancel magazine subscriptions

Insure wedding rings

Look into absentee ballots

Get rid of cell phones

Cancel utilities

Figure out how to deposit final paycheck

Sell cars

Cancel car insurance

Cancel homeowners insurance

Get eye exam, new contacts

Get copies of dental x-rays and medical records

Make copies of passports, drivers licence, marriage license

Get copies of birth certificates, social security cards

See parents, new niece, new nephew

Close out paypal acct

Buy shoes

Renew drivers licenses

Get reference letters

Get transcripts

Get copy of teaching certification and ceu's

Get ring resized

Fill prescriptions

An Outrage Of Modesty

What a strange trip it's going to be. "An Outrage of Modesty" is not the name of a Shakespeare play, but rather Singapore's euphemism for sexual assault. Just goes to show, even in the most orderly of societies, creeps exist.

Meet your protagonists

We, your hosts, Mark and Marjorie, were married on May 25th, 2002, after four years of courtship.

We live in Atlanta, but have decided to try to live overseas. While we were dating, we traveled somewhere on the average of every other month or so -- you can find a list of everywhere we've been (plus a picture of us) here. Someday we will upload our travel photos there. We love travel so much that we've decided to live on vacation.

I (Mark) am a computer programmer, and have a friend in Singapore who is looking to find me a contract. This may be happening sooner than we are really ready for -- possibly as soon as the end of this month. And so we are squeezing onto the bandwagon and creating a blog to monitor our progress.

This week we should find out whether this job comes through or not. And with possibly only two weeks to work with after finding out, we have had to operate on the assumption that it is going to happen. And so we have spent the last few weeks turning our apartment (and lives) upside down. Need some stuff? Marjorie has put in notice at her work already -- a job she very much likes -- and is finishing up there at the end of this week.

If this contract falls through, there's the possibility of others in either Hong Kong or Melbourne, Australia. The idea of Hong Kong kinda scares us but we're going for it if it comes up. Melbourne would be nice too.

So much to do, so much to do...