Hi y’all! Hope everyone is doing well and that the quarter is starting off swimmingly…just wanted to give you a little update before my first day of work tomorrow. And by the way, I am still gaping at the thought that someone wants to pay me money to do package design. I made it to Brooklyn on New Year’s Eve with the U-haul, dog, boyfriend, and upper-respiratory flu and spent the next three days on the phone with my mom and Jennifer Peake alternately telling me that they couldn’t understand my pleas for them to help me figure out how to break my lease and get the hell out of here because I was crying too hard.

Suffice it to say, I have been homesick as *&%$!, but on the up side, I found $3 on the sidewalk and had the best bagel of my life this morning. Everyone that I’ve met here has actually been very kind and helpful, and a lot of things that could have gone wrong didn’t. My vision of living in a pretty brownstone on a tree-lined street vanished when I realized I could live above a barber shop called (that’s right) Hair Players 2000—new digs are also conveniently located on the same block as a cute yoga studio, a check-cashing place, and a methadone clinic; talk about one-stop shopping.

Almost all sass aside, I think I’m going to like it here. When I first came to Portfolio Center, all I wanted upon leaving was a job (any job). I never imagined that I would cultivate a sick, drooly love for packaging, or that an amazing packaging firm would see that in my book and offer me a job for it. I know that it’s not always so easy as being recruited out from the portfolio review and feel very lucky that I didn’t have to job-hunt, but as you said, Hank, ‘just do the work and leave the rest to me.’

The people at Raison Pure were all smart, kind, and seemed truly dedicated to doing great work. I think it’s going to be a fabulous experience but I’ll let you know if they don’t give me enough food, water, attention, walks. SO, hurray, another PC success story! I really didn’t think I was going to be one, and yet here I am, writing to say that I am gainfully employed, alive, and well.

Thanks for everything. I will keep in touch, I miss everyone, and as the mascot of the best Austin head shop, Oat Willie, says, “onward, through the fog!” Now I have to go meet Audrey as she booked a flight to come stay with me as soon as she heard about the $25 weave available downstairs.