we consider ourselves bicoastal, if you consider the mississippi river one of the coasts.

what a weekend. oh wait, weekend? it's thursday. yet it's my first day at work since last friday and will be my last until monday. sound confusing? yeah, it is. i'm confused.

the trip to oklahoma was, i suppose, successful. last night when i got home, jordan sent me an IM that said, "how was the trip? super fun!?" i said, bewildered, "um, as super-fun as a funeral can be, i guess." i didn't fight with my mother a single time, which is really an achievement since it seems to be my job to fight with my mother. i didn't go ballistic on the airplane even though i wasn't able to drug myself into oblivion beforehand. i barely even flinched when my grandfather (not the jewish one) referred to philadelphia as a "nigger town." yes, i was on good behavior.

the funeral was, as i told phong afterward, what i think my family needed. i hope that at my funeral no one sings "how great thou art." i hope that there's no old man preacher (the same man, in fact, that baptized me. when we greeted each other, he said, "i actually baptized you, young man!" to which i responded, "well i'm not sure how it stuck.") talking about how we'll all be reunited in heaven. but, as cynical, as agnostic as i am, i know that it's what my family, my mother especially, needed to hear. she's grounded in christianity; i might be the black sheep, i might be the heathen, but her relationship with christ is her rock. she needed to hear that she'll be reunited with nana in heaven, needed to hear it from her preacher from 25 years ago, when she was just married, just starting a family.

so i'm back at work. for a day. because tomorrow robin comes to visit temple in philly. i have one day to catch up on the six thousand and one emails i've gotten from the boss-people. the new girl, the one who sits behind me, told us at her interview that she does roller-derby and lives in charles village. this morning we talked about how good the bloc party album is and discussed good places to go to rock shows. she is, indeed, my replacement.