Eight years ago, I chose to leave a career track P.R. job with a Fortune 25 corporation, in part to avoid a scheduled reassignment to Washington D.C., where I pledged I'd never move.
Eight years later, well, here I am. Life is a funny bitch sometimes.
It was with a mixture of excitement and trepidation that I took this gig, and nearly a full year later, I'm happy to report most of the excitement is still there, while most of the trepidation has faded away.
I like my job. Of course, I liked it before I moved, and in most ways, it hasn't changed all that drastically. But in the ways that it has -- greater autonomy, better pay, many more opportunities to get out of the office and "live the beat," as it were -- it is light years ahead of what I was doing before.
Cricket infestations notwithstanding, I like where I live, and will probably re-up my lease another year. The temptation to overpay for a place in D.C. proper is still there, but I'm proud to say I've overcome most of the more snobbish motivations to make that move. If living in a decent-sized space in a safe neighborhood in Alexandria (and still having enough pocket change at the end of the month to indulge my more wasteful hobbies) brands me as a suburban rube, well, I'm mostly ok with that.
Socially, Beltway life remains a mixed bag. When you're new in town, and a fairly anti-social person to boot, then both living alone and working alone can prove a difficult combination. I've tried to do my part to overcome that combination, to force myself to get out and meet new folks, but I can't say I've always tried as hard as I could. At this point, I'm happy to report that I now can call upon a decent stable of fellow misfits to hang out with, although the proportion that I'd ever hang in with remains pretty slight.
Anyway, I digress. This is supposed to be a Year in Review post (I'm always late to the party) so here goes: the top five new persons, places or things I was introduced to in the last 12 months that helped make 2005, all in all, a very good year.
5. The Navy Memorial -- It's not that I have any particular fondness for the armed forces' nautical branch, or really any of the branches, for that matter. But in the spring and summer, when the fountain is active, it's one of the more pleasant places to plop down for lunch, just to sit and check out the young punks doing their olleys, or to watch the pretty ladies walk on by.
4. Crosswalks -- I'll give the state credit in those approximately zero out of infinity situations where credit is due. Alas, this is one of them. Crosswalks that count down how much time you have until the light changes are one of those inventions that's just so goddamned obviously RIGHT that I still can't fathom why this is the only place I've ever seen them.
3. Lunching with the Marginal Revolutionaries -- Being invited to sit in with the four-headed George Mason monster of Cowen, Tabarrok, Hanson, and Caplan, recreating exactly the sort of "extraordinary group of economic detectives" that Steve Landsburg describes in The Armchair Economist, is simply more fun than geeks should be allowed to have. I wish I could do it more often.
2. Willana -- Or, if you prefer, Robkinson. Individually, they're Wilko and J-Ro. Together, they're the ultimate D.C. libertarian power couple, the Brangelina of the A.F.F. set. But as if being Triple-Bs (that's "brilliant beautiful bloggers") weren't enough, prophecy foretells they shall one day conceive the annointed one, and unto him shall the gathering of radical individualists be. And he shalt smite the state, and there shall come water out of it, that the people may drink. And he shall be really, really ridiculously good-looking.
1. Five Guys Burgers -- These things are grilled crack on a sesame seed bun. Unfortunately, my top new discovery of 2005 will have to be among the first things I give up in 2006, as your intrepid correspondent would like very much to live to see 2007.
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