This is the next part.

The end of my time in Philadelphia is advancing very quickly and there are a million implications jumbled up in all of that. I'm a bundle of emotions that conflict and stop and start, but for the most part life is still very exciting and I've been happy the entire time I've been here. Things are way serious with The Relationship and I feel pretty confident about it continuing through the next move and into the next (still fairly ubiquitous) stage of my life.

I've had some job offers. While the likelihood that I'll move to Chicago is by far the highest, there are a few things I'll be checking out first. I'll be flying into North Carolina to work for a company that wants me for the opening staff of their newest venture in the beginning of December, and between that, my departure from Philadelphia, the (brief) return to Ohio and my trip to Nicaragua things are getting very hectic. It's nice to have so many job offers cropping up at once, especially after my long spell of unemployment in Portland.

Still, with what will probably be a two month absence from the U.S. looming ahead I've been trying to spend as much time with the girlfriend as possible. I love what I'm doing and I'm happy with her but I look forward to the long span of downtime.

Obviously I haven't been blogging much lately and I'd like to say that I'm going to return to it but it just isn't that likely. My life is taking off from here. I've been doing things I never would have been able to before, and even as responsibilities mount I feel more confident and in control of what I'm doing. It's time for me to find a way to mix the previous transience of my lifestyle with the responsibilities and ongoing relationships that I've missed having all this time. I feel like I'm accomplishing a lot and there isn't a reason why I can't manage a 'normal' life alongside my desires to travel and learn new things.

So here is the part where I try to balance an insane number of things in my life. This is called learning by doing. Please feel free to withhold your criticisms until after I fuck it up.

A brief retrospective.

Four months in Philadelphia, and I have a comfortable bed, a good job, an awesome girlfriend, cool roommates and a nice house, a one way ticket to Costa Rica and $1000 in the bank. I even bought car insurance.

Life is fantastic and I feel I'm getting pretty good at all this.

Here is the news.

Okay okay. So I really love Philadelphia.

I suppose I'll tell you what's actually going on. I've been pretty quiet about that. I was trying not to be a dick? To certain people. I guess it doesn't matter because they're still pissed at me. And maybe you'd like to know.

First of all, I'm going to Nicaragua. I'm probably going to leave Philly on New Year's Day and driving to Ohio to spend a few days with friends and family before I fly into Costa Rica on January 6th. I bought a one way ticket and I have no idea how long I'll stay in Central America or where I'll end up going. I'm bringing a backpack and some malaria pills and we'll just see where it goes from there. I'll come back when I either run out of money or get bored. Or when my tan is so vibrant that it will blind the people awaiting my return in the midwest.

I have sort of half-thought ideas of taking a job somewhere in Nicaragua once I split with my traveling partner and working wherever I can until the language immersion makes my Spanish passable. Or maybe I'll just sit on tropical beaches, eat fruit and scuba dive. Many things are up in the air right now. These are very stressful decisions to make.

After Nicaragua, it's likely that I'll move to Chicago. There are lots of job opportunities there which sound promising but it's hard to say right now. March would probably be the best time to start looking for work there so the timing may be a little off if I spend a month or less in Central America. If that happens, who knows? Maybe I'll get a job in a smalltown diner and make burgers for drunk college douchebags for a few weeks.

There's been girl drama too. There is always girl drama. There is really no way I can explain it without being an asshole blogging about relationship issues in a one-sided way. So I won't. But I miss most of the people I've ever dated and I value their friendships.

I'm seeing someone new. Maybe it's serious. I think it's pretty serious. It raises lots of awkward questions about what happens when I go to Central America and if she's coming to Chicago. It's too early to really talk about that stuff, but we're thinking it. She wants me to come back to Philadelphia but won't ask for it. And she has a two year old daughter. So shit is complicated.

But I'm doing it anyway and I'm pretty crazy about her. So we'll see how it goes.

Bread is my life!

In a classic move I became drunk and distracted by a girl and forgot all about the bread I had scaled. That is until I woke up abruptly at five AM.

Now I'm sitting here watching my bread and occasionally filling the oven with steam while she sleeps. This has happened at least five times in the past.

Ridiculous.

Murmurs.

Work is totally destroying me right now. It's been a wash of twelve and fourteen hour days and my body just doesn't react to it as well as it used to. I'm sure it will get worse as time goes on, but it hurts plenty right now.

In spite of that I'm really happy. I've made lots of friends here and Philadelphia itself is a strangely fun place to live. And there is some romance, even though it comes with way too many questions and expectations. But I suppose there's no helping that.

I'm almost ready to stay in one place. Almost. No really.

Just not here.

Sorry I've been so quiet. My life has been engulfed and in the offtime I just have nothing to say.

Moving.

Move in day is tomorrow. I'm very excited.

The unforeseen move is definitely a setback to my moving plans. I'm going to have to either be more thrifty or extend my stay in Philadelphia by a few months. If I do decide to go to Chicago it certainly won't be the end of the world to move in spring rather than winter, especially since January and February are notoriously difficult times to get a job in the restaurant industry. And I loathe Chicago winters.

Summer in Philadelphia is winding down and I think my transition into the new house will compliment it nicely. I haven't been wildly irresponsible, but my dread of returning to the filthy apartment definitely inspired more than a few nights out that would have been better spent at home. My unwillingness to bring girls home has also orchestrated some bizarre and hilarious situations. Maybe I'll tell you about it some day.

The ladies in my life are all playing games again and my interest is waning. It's very easy to jump into bed with someone, but when the coyness and gossip mount to the point of tedium it's hard not to think of things in a very temporary light. I know people have their elaborate courting rituals, but I'm just not going to be here for that much longer, and even if I was I don't see myself staying in a longterm relationship with any of these people. It's a boy thing. Girls, you do shit that is just a dumb so let me have my foibles.

Myanmar.

I really don't care about politics. I swear. I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to argue. I don't care about world peace.

For some reason Myanmar upsets me. I've never been there, quite probably never will. But man, every time a new article goes up on BBC or Al Jazeera I'm unsurprised but sad about the whole thing.

Before you start up on your 'only the junta calls it Myanmar' tirade, the junta won and they've been running the country for over a decade. Calling it Burma is like refusing to acknowledge the new authorities in Indo China. It's over. They're not letting the power go and no one is going to do anything about it.

Anyway, that country sure is fucked up.