I got a letter from the government / the other day / I opened and read it / It said

2005-09-21

I got a letter from the government / the other day / I opened and read it / It said

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Work! Glorious, glorious work! How I've missed you!

The wait to get this news was actually even more exciting than it had to be. They told me on the phone that a decision had been reached, but they couldn't tell me what it was, so I had to go down in person. Two and a half hour journey. Then I spent half an hour waiting in the wrong line before I finally got the good news.

Thanks for your support, everyone! Especially people who let me sleep on their floor while I was a bureaucratic zero. (And, uh, who will let me sleep on their floor over the next couple of weeks until I get my own place. Ahem.)

Let us all celebrate by admiring images of Koyuki turning into a cat. So this is what they mean by Otaku-ism going mainstream.

Popularity factor: 13

Ali:

Woo! Employment! Congrats. How long does this new visa (or whatever the term is) last?

justin:

Congratulations! Red tape = snip!

...and thanks for remindning me of that song.

language:

Congrats from me too!

stacy:

It said empty circle?

the other Justin dammit:

Tail or not, Koyuki still lacks hotness.

Matt:

Ali: It lasts for a year, but assuming that all goes well, when I renew it next year I can get a three year long version.

Justin: Any time! For some reason iTunes keeps putting it into my shuffle, so I've heard it over and over again recently.

LH: Thanks!

Stacy: That empty circle is like the Japanese version of a check mark for "yes". "No" is × and apparently a handwritten check mark, like we use in Australia, is interpreted as a ×. This caused some serious consternation the first time I marked schoolwork here.

Other Justin: I'm afraid that with the tail, we'll have to agree to disagree.

Anonymous:

Hey Matt, congrats! And sorry for not being able to say hi to you the other day because I was talking with my project member when I got the call from the HR manager. Anyway, see you at the office next week!

Anonymous:

Congratulations indeed!

Anonymous:

now stop your whining, bitches,

Matt:

Thanks, L and TM. As for you, Salmo, there's only one of me and where I come from we don't end sentences with commas! Were you raised in some kind of poorly punctuated barn?

IbaDaiRon:

Congrats from the jungles of Ohio as well.

(Would've said so sooner, but have been slashing and hacking away at it.)

Mark S.:

Congratulations! That's great news, Matt. But I hope this isn't going to mean fewer posts here. Maybe just a new source of material.

Matt:

Thanks, IDR! Stay away from the banks of the Ohio, that's my advice. They're bad news. Even if it's just a little walk.

And ditto Mark S.! NDAs will keep me mum about work stuff, but I'll still have a decent commute to fill up with reading so things shouldn't dry up altogether.

2005-09-21