Tuesday is Rant Day.

I haven't been blogging a lot lately...though I have been lurking. Sorry. I guess this makes me a blogosphere creeper. But you know what? I'm not really feeling ashamed of that.

Part of the reason I haven't written much lately is because work has been busybusybusy. My firm is in the process of wrapping a big project up, and I'm one of the point people on it. Of course, there are tons of loose ends to tie up that I didn't even realize existed. So, by the end of the day, I haven't felt like writing any more. I'm reminded of the FRIENDS episode in which Rachel is dating a gynecologist and she wonders why he hasn't showed much of an interest in being...ummm...intimate. The following conversation occurs:


Dr. Franzblau: I try not to let my work affect my personal life, but it's hard, when you... do what I do. It's like uh...Well, for instance, what do you do?
Rachel: I'm a waitress.
Dr. Franzblau: Okay, all right, well aren't there times when you come home at the end of the day, and you're just like, "If I see one more cup of coffee..."


Heh heh heh...makes me chuckle every time. But that's how I feel about writing sometimes! I want to blog...but when it comes right down to it, I think, "It I see one more blank word processing screen..."

ALSO, I've been reluctant to blog because all of the topics I've thought of have been whiny ones. But you know...this is my blog, and I'll whine if I want to! (And hopefully, said whining isn't childish enough to drive people away.) In any case, I suspect I'm not alone.

Mostly, I've been frustrated recently by Spike's schedule, or lack thereof. Let me preface the following rant by saying that I know I'm lucky to have him here with me at all. I thank God every day that I get to have face-to-face conversations with him (even if they're not as frequent as I would like) and that his Company command ended up being for a rear detachment unit and not a deployed one.

That said--as some of you warned me it would be--this rear detachment command is already getting on my last nerve, because it's sucking up so much of his time. Spike comes home late nearly every evening, and nights and weekends aren't sacred anymore either. When we go to bed at night, I half-expect to be woken up by the buzzing of Spike's cellphone. It's a sound I am growing to loathe, because it means (at best) a series of calls to other people in the chain of command and at worst, a several-hour-long trip to the office. In the middle of the night, or during the weekend.

I guess I'm just angry because I'm not getting very much quality time to spend with my husband--time when he isn't preoccupied, stressed, tired, or getting ready to go somewhere. I miss having regular "us" time, and being able to semi-reliably plan ahead. This frustration is compounded by the fact that if Spike stays in the Army, odds are he will deploy at some point not too long after his rear-d command ends. Knowing that, is it too much to ask of the Army gods that we get to have more than 2 meaningful  hours a day together now, while Spike is actually here? (Plus, on a pettier note, if my husband is going to be working the hours of an investment banker...wouldn't it be nice if his salary matched? Now that, I KNOW, really is too much to ask-ha!)

Of course, my feelings are all exacerbated by the fact that my social circle here isn't huge, and by the fact that I haven't yet begun to look for a volunteer or part-time position that involves actual face-to-face interaction with real people, not my computer screen. However, hope is on the horizon. Once my big work project gets wrapped up, I am hoping to start my transition to part-time so that I can start to plant some roots. I know I'll feel somewhat better when I start to get out of the house more.

Okay. Rant over. And I do want to point out that I'm being very diligent about telling Spike that I'm frustrated with the Army, not with him. He's doing an outstanding job of juggling an ever-growing number of balls, and of handling some pretty messed-up situations that, shall we say, wouldn't be out of place on Springer or Maury. When I stop by the unit's office to see Spike (sometimes to drop off food so that he gets to eat!), I always leave so proud to be his wife.

Lastly, during my I-don't-feel-like-writing period, I got a blog award! I am going to post about that soon, but not today, because I don't want to taint the awesomeness with my griping.