Conference shit:

1) On my drive out to my conference this fall, I suddenly really need to go to the bathroom, so I park on the main street off of a courthouse square and duck in the first coffee shop that I see, only to find out that it’s a comic book shop and that the coffee shop sign outside was from the last tenant who is no longer there.

But, the woman at the counter lets me use the bathroom, and so I go duck in it and I take this just massive shit.

“Thank you so much for that,” I’m like, afterwards. “I’m starting out on a big trip, and I’m realizing now that it was a bad idea to make myself eat the last of my barley soup before I left, and then like drink strong coffee all morning long.”

2) At the conference itself, I acutely feel that I have no more fresh professional clothes, no matter how hard I tried to assemble something out of sweaters and long-sleeve shirts that I had tucked away in boxes. 

I just don’t fit in, even beyond the social hour talk of departmental politics and hiring and people's international vacations.