So, this is now my Russia blog

Maybe I should have made a new blog for this, as the intended readership will now increase from about 4 to... well, to some larger number. But I have not, because I don't feel like it. I would have had to come up with a clever Irkutsk/Siberia/Russian related title. Wait, I already have a perfect title for a year in Siberia. So that's my excuse for not creating a new blog.

My suitcase is sitting next to my bed, though I don't leave until Wednesday. It's zipped up and standing on its side, the better to constantly weigh it on the bathroom scale lying beside it. It's 38 pounds right now. That is not good. The limit is 44 pounds, carry-on included, and I have a 5 pound computer and I have not packed any socks and I need to take enough contact solution to last me 10 months. I'm already going to wear my winter coat on the plane, and I've already put all the small, heavy things I can find in the coat pockets so as not to count as luggage, and snapped my winter hat into the hood of the coat. Luckily, this weight limit applies only to the flight from Moscow to Irkutsk- maybe I can just put on 6 layers of clothing before that flight. That's not nearly as awful as wearing 6 layers of clothing and a winter coat at Dulles- we are having here what is approximately the hottest, most humid weather in the history of the world.

I think I should be reflecting, about now, on my motivations for spending this academic year in Irkutsk; I should be articulating goals for the year, or thinking about where I am in life before I begin this experience. But the piles of papers and clothes and other sundry items, some half-unpacked from Language School, some half-unpacked from the end of the school-year, some recent, some ancient in their disorder, drive all such responsible and mature thoughts from my head.