I understand that I live in the hotbed of hurricanes and that having them come straight for me is not fault of mine or the people around me. Just bad luck. But honestly, we evacuated for Gustav and nothing happened (besides it taking 4 days out of our lives) and now with the Ike knocking on our backdoor, the panic starts again. All of my friends are telling me to stop being so fucking stubborn and accept the fact that an evacuation is on the way, but i JUST FUCKING CAN'T. As selfish/idiotic/obsessive as it might sound, all I care about at this point is going to school, putting out Friday's issue and living to see the weekend. That's all I want... I don't really care about my belongings or my house or my family... I'm the equivalent of an asshole dad who never comes home to his family cuz he's obsessed with my number-crunching, desk job. Except that I don't have a family and that analogy doesn't make sense at all. I love being editor of the paper. I said it, Lord: I LOVE BEING EDITOR OF THE UNIVERSITY PRESS. I love laying out page 1 and 2 every Monday and Wednesday afternoon after a busy hectic stretch of classes. I love going to interviews, tape-recorder in hand, listening to the next person and reporting what they have to say in an accurate, easy-to-read manner. I love picking out the graphic for page 1 and building the layout around it. I love making blue boxes with important information in them. I love going to the APexchange and checking out what's going on in the world, whether it be flooding in Cuba to Paramount opening a new office in China. I love waking up early on T/R and finishing the rest of the pages with my fellow editors and Andy. I even love Perkins with his shaky hands and coffee smell, speaking with the speech of a man from the 1950s even though he's only in his 60s. I love everything about the UP, all the highs, all the lows. The staff, the editors, the office, itself, the history. I've said it before and I will say it again... I am obsessed with my job. Sadly, it's all I think about. For those of you who can read my page, just pray that I can get the paper out on Friday (if not hard copies, than on the website). If not, I'm ready for a full-scale, menstruation-induced, breakdown of a century. Be ready.