Oh Deer

On the way home from an evening at a community theater with friends, I hit a deer. My car is undamaged and the deer ran off into the woods, so I don't know how it is.

My husband is constantly warning me to look out for deer on the very road we were on when this happens. I normally take it at 45-50 miles per hour. This particular night, I was battling a headache and only driving 35.

The deer was small, barely taller than my bumper, so I think it was quite young. It darted out across the road and I had no time to react. I slammed on my brakes and, for some reason that I still can't explain, leaned on the horn (I apologize to the neighborhood for that).

The animal fell for a moment and then took off running. I stayed in my car shaking from the mere thought. While my husband was going on about how he told me to be more careful and he had once totaled a car that way, I was concerned for the well being of the now gone animal.

Several years ago, towards the end of my graduate school, i was forced to do some animal work. I had to learn to harvest the lungs of mice and rats. Eventually, I had to do this two about 10 rats. I hated every second of it. I gave up meat for over a year as a sort of karmic penance for the work I was required to do.

I hated having to kill those animals, even in the name of understanding a terrible infectious disease. The thought that I might have harmed a young deer has me a bit freaked out.

Is it possible to be too informed?

I will be the first to admit that I'm a bit of a news junkie. I think it's an off shoot of constantly reading. The easiest source of continuous reading material is the news. There's always something, well...new.

I'm discovering a downside.

I know too much.

I don't care who claims to be the father of Anna Nicole Smith's baby.

I don't want to know who Lindsey Lohan is dating.

It bothers me that I knew as soon as the reports were out that Britney Spears had graduated from rehab.

I couldn't care less about who won the YouTube awards.

And yet, these are all things I know. All this because eventually I've read all of the important news of the world that I can find and I still hunger for more news. It's like I've eaten all of the fruits and vegetables in my refrigerator and all that's left is half of a two day old burrito from Taco Bell but I'm still starving, so I'll have to just eat it and pray I don't get salmonella from it.

Only this is a brain salmonella.

And I don't have to actively eat the burrito to get it. This is all information you can glean from just the headlines and I seem to absorb a lot of headlines while searching for the latest important news.

I think I feel the food poisoning kicking in...

A Battle Too Great for Even the Force

This has been a year of massive change for my husband and I. For one thing, there's the fact that he is now my husband, not my boyfriend. Then, I went and got a real live grown up job. Then, because of the job, we moved 750 miles from Kentucky back to New Jersey. Then, because of the move, he got a new job, too. His first time not working in the family business. Then, because of the new jobs and new locations, we bought a new house. With the new house has come some new furniture.

As a direct result of all of this change, we find ourselves, two perpetual children, on the brink of scary things that could lead to mini-vans and retirement planning and all sorts of other concepts we like to avoid.

So far, it's coming out in our little daily battles.

Getting rid of the student-life standard-issue secondhand furniture has been a big one. Most of my student furniture got thrown away in the move to Kentucky, so most of ours is actually his. He's reluctant to part with the beat up wooden desk and the slightly battered, supportless loveseat. When I can get him to part, he insists he'd rather sell them and "make a few dollars." I keep trying to explain how no one ever really makes money on a yard sale and besides, we live in a townhouse and are lacking the necessary element of a yard in which to sale. He doesn't get it.

I want to buy nice adult furniture. He says why pay for things that don't do anything, like a coffee table.

Neither of us really wants to part with the far too many computers taking up space.

Most importantly, neither of us wants to admit that at 28 and 37 , with three cars, two mortgages and two nagging sets of future-grandparents adulthood has come at us full force.

The Frightening Activities of My Fellow Motorists

I am perfectly willing to admit to occasionally exceeding the speed limit, changing lanes recklessly and going through a light when it was...ehem...orange. But, lately, I've seen some appalling behaviors on our fine motorways.

* Applying makeup
* Shaving
* Reading a magazine
* Studying notecards for an exam (and this was not a young student, but a middle-aged woman)
* Changing clothes


I'm sure there are others, but these are the ones that have stuck. I know we all live in our cars, but, people, let's be reasonable. If you are looking at the flash card, you are not looking at my car trying to change lanes.