Howdy from LA!

Jessica and I are in Long Beach and everything's awesome. Don't worry, our new city is not on fire. In fact, when I mentioned that fear to everyone in the first class I taught yesterday, everyone laughed, so I guess it's no biggie. The weather has been pretty hot, but we've set up a pretty effective series of fans in the apartment that work fairly well. Speaking of the apartment, it's perfect for us, and we keep accumulating furniture from various people (including our neighbors, who, when moving in a new couch, literally knocked on our door and gave us their old one).

School's been good, if challenging. Since I'm new to the discipline, they'll be some growing pains, but I'm confident that I can handle it with the help of my supportive friends/fellow grad students, and the professors who are all incredibly smart experts in their field. It's a lot like Peace Corps Training in that there's so much work all the time that you never really finish, you just stop reading at some point. The teaching is going well, too--teaching college seems to fit. I make them laugh a lot, and they come to class and do their work. Everyone wins.

As for the speech and debate team, I've already been blown away by home talented and dedicated everyone is. There are about 15 coaches. 15! The most I ever had before this was 2! And most of them have done really well at nationals!!!! Like, won national titles and been in multiple final rounds!!!!!!!!!1111oneoneone Basically I'm surrounded by the freaking Navy SEALS of forensics, and I'm just trying not to be Private Pile. The kids are amazing, too, and I fully expect a fantastic year.

Jessica's working now, too, which is great, so everything's going well. We already have a few "wow, we're really living in LA, this is awesome!" stories, and our friends Tim and Megan, who've been absolute lifesavers (in both the candy and ocean senses) are really adventurous so we'll probably have a few more this year!

Anyway, I love and miss you all.