Miss Independent

Last night, I decided it was about time to get out of the house after sunset. I was starting to feel like some sort of reverse vampire, only able to leave the house during daylight hours. I can't even remember the last time I was out of the house after 8pm. One of the downsides of moving to a new country where you don't know anybody = no babysitters.

It was my first time driving in England at night, and I was a little nervous. My desire to participate in the world and not spend another night sitting on the couch watching reruns of Top Gear outweighed my nerves, though. I'm starting to feel like maybe I can actually do this driving thing.

I hopped in the Yaris and drove to downtown Maryport where I saw a performance of a musical called "Bad Girls." The show was actually great. It was by a local theater troop that, despite the fact that Maryport is a teeny-tiny town, was very talented. I really enjoyed myself. It was so nice to be out and about, even if it was all on my lonesome.

At intermisson, I met a very nice older lady named Chrissy. She runs some sort of women's club in Maryport. We got to talking, and she ended up asking me to come and speak to the club about life in Colorado and the move to England. It's a little intimidating, though. The person speaking next week is the mayor of Whitehaven. Two weeks later, it'll be me. I'm not exactly sure why the women's club would be interested in a D-lister like me, especially since it's clear that they're able to snag a much more important class of speaker. Still, it was impossible to say no to Chrissy. She's a very sweet, sunny lady. We'll see how it goes. I'm supposed to talk for 30 minutes, and then field questions for an hour afterwards. Even though I'm used to speaking in front of  people, its pretty intimidating to talk to a roomful of strangers. If the topic was, say, how to write an effective argument, no problem. But on the topic of my life? Weird and scary.

On a side note, Matt couldn't go with me, because he had to stay home and take care of Frankie. When faced with the challenge of being a solo caregiver, can you guess what happened? Frankie fell asleep at FIVE. She didn't even get a chance to eat her dinner. She just conked out thoroughly and completely before I even left the house. She fell asleep on the couch while I was making dinner, and couldn't be roused. She was so out, we had to put her to bed fully dressed in her jeans, shirt, and hoodie.

She stayed asleep all night, giving Matt an evening all to himself. Of couse after twelve hours of sleeping, she was wide awake at 5am, wondering where her dinner was. So I had to get up with her. At five.

Sigh.