Anything can happen in the next ten days...
Ten days! I can count on my fingers, and I'm feeling sort of calm. I know I can pack quickly, I've got a list of all the bits and bobs I will need to take as well as the necessary clothes, and it's just nice to know it's all falling into place. Natwest have approved my credit card application, and that should be here within the week. Which make financialism a bit less stressful.
It's actually sort of less than ten days, since I'll be leaving at stupid o'clock in the morning to get to the airport and check in, so it's nine days and a bit.
Things to think about:
- I'm gonna be in America for the 5th anniversary of 9/11. I have no known links to anyone who died on the day, but it'll be a weird experience on the 11th all the same
- San Francisco is overdue for another big earthquake. And it's a city with a sense of the epic or at least theatrical about it, so I wouldn't put it past ol' San Andreas to shake it up 100 years after the last major one
- Christmas. Not sure I can afford to come home, I have an aunt who may or may not be moving to Boston and be visit-worthy, but it's all up in the air. Sort of want to spend a Christmas alone, just for the experience. I'll watch It's A Wonderful Life and eat microwaved turkey.
- May well need to get a job. I suspect this will be the most expensive year of my life, at least thus far. Rent is already more than twice what I was paying in Norwich.
- I won't be alone, with both Sam and Charlie around, but I may well get lonely.
- I'm gonna turn 21 in America! Not often you get the chance to start drinking legally twice (technically this is my first legal drinking birthday, as I was in Amsterdam when I turned 18. Not sure what the law is there, but they're pretty laid back about most things). So October 3rd, I'm gonna party like it's 1776 all over again. Also on my British driving licence my date of birth appears as 3/10/85, which in the American system suggests March 10. Not sure if I can get away with it, but it's worth a try
- San Francisco is bigger than anywhere I've lived before (that would be Loughborough and Norwich). I'm prepared to feel intimidated and overwhelmed, and I'm sort of looking forward to it.