Contrary to popular belief, Madison can still be a blast when you're in full control of yourself. Lyssa and I went down yesterday to visit her sister, Christine, and we had a great time.

After seeing Christine's old room at the Chemistry frat, (they exist, it's odd) I don't think I could complain about the smallness of my future apartment's living room ever again. I am getting a hell of a good deal on a great place. Most student living spaces in Madison leave a lot to be desired, and cost almost twice as much as my rent will.

Anyway, on to the fun stuff. We met up with Christine's man-toy, Christopher, and headed to State Street. I hadn't been there since high school, and we checked out a bunch of the shops. Ladies and gentlemen,

I space this out for emphasis...

There. Is. A....

TIKI STORE!

Holy retro heaven, Batman! I was like a 14 year old girl meeting Britney. I had to cover my mouth to keep from squealing with delight. The store is Pop Deluxe (the website is very new, sorry), and they sell everything I've ever wanted short of love and attention. They were also playing one of my Ultra Lounge CDs when I walked in, proving beyond any reasonable doubt that they built the store for me and me alone.

Lyssa bought me an awesome 50's Pop throw pillow as a sort of early Valentine, that will be very much at home at Puckaway, and I got myself a mondo translucent deck of cards. I'm definitely going back with money; there's a kick-ass tumbler and coaster set I was drooling over, but it'll set me back something fierce. And their collection of actual tiki accessories is so huge, I was intimidated and didn't know where to start.

I've always frowned on expensive watches, but that's because Fossil and its horde of imitators never really seemed my style. I think my mind may have been changed by a very cool $150 timepiece I was eying this morning when we went back. I love this store!!!

Ok, so we did stuff besides go to the store I'll probably eventually loot. The four of us had some great Mexican food at Frida's which, considerately, decided not to haunt me until tonight. Afterwords, we took my first trip to Cold Stone Creamery, which is something everyone should experience at least once. The ice cream is fantastic and made right in front of you by employees that must have had to pass a Perky exam to get their jobs. It's not really that expensive, either. The only bad thing was trying to eat our ice cream while walking back to Christine's. My fingers got colder than my food. But it was so damn delicious, I just didn't care.

After stuffing ourselves, we wandered over to the union to see Jim Gaffigan do some stand-up. His special on Comedy Central was decent, but live he was absolutely hilarious. I'm sure that's true of a lot of comics, and seeing more stand-up is now higher on my to-do list than going to more concerts by far.

We actually were planning to go out somewhere and imbibe a bit of fire water, but we kind of all decided that general drinking was too expensive, and just watched Adult Swim at Christine's apartment until we got tired.

After sleeping on the most common and most uncomfortable piece of college furniture of all time, a futon, Lyssa and I went for breakfast at Einstein Bros., visited her friend Leslie, checked out the tiki store again, took Christine to East Towne to get some foot warmers (and wouldn't you know it, Lyssa found me a wooden tiki air fresheners at Target!), and left Mad town, poorer, but happier.

Also cool, we visited my brother Glenn at his new place, which I hadn't yet seen. Lyssa saw the eerie similarities between two people sharing one man's genes and being raised 10 years and many miles apart. I'd love to spend more time with my brother, and hopefully this summer I will. He's gotten pretty handy, by the way. He's finishing his basement, and it looks very professional.

So that was my quasi-weekend in the capitol. Alcohol free, but still fun as hell.

I feel like a little kid.

The excitement and quasi-independence that comes pre-packaged with the dorm living experience has all but faded away. I feel like I'm on some extended summer camp program or something. I live in a 10' x 16' box with someone else, I have to be quiet at "lights out" or I'll be disciplined, and I have to share a bathroom (and a shower room) with 50 other men. Oh yeah, and every other weekend, I go home to my parents. This is not independent living.

Ok, so the dorms aren't that bad. But the walls seem closer together every time I go back to Oshkosh. I'm starting to have fantasies about the apartment. I want to be able to live somewhere. I want an official address, one that I can get real, regular mail at. Somewhere that doesn't close down and lock me out on holidays. Somewhere that I can do what I want, when I want, within the confines of community courtesy and common sense. I want to be able to take a shit or a shower without other people in the room! September 1st, I anxiously await your arrival.

I want to be able to go home to visit my parents, not go home to go home. I want my bedroom turned into storage, or an office, or a meth lab, and I want to be able to sleep on the couch or in the guest bedroom when I come home.

It's not all about the housing either. I am not a contributing member of society. I am unemployed, and I can feel it all over me like an itchy rash.

One could argue that I'm in "job training" right now. Well, "one", you can shove it. School doesn't feel like a full-time job, even when I'm really applying myself. I need work to keep me sane. I know for a fact that it would fix my sleep schedule. And that's not even my main argument for it. My tuition costs roughly $4,000/semester, and, while I'm lucky enough to have savings in place to pay for it, it's a terrible feeling to just sit there and realize I'm costing myself a lot of money just by existing. I think that if I had a job, even a part-time, minimum wage dullfest, I'd feel a lot better about that.

Also, tuition and all that high-level spending aside, I have next to nothing for spending money. My parents are really encouraging me to focus on school, and they've graciously offered to pay my cell phone bill every month, but I feel like a tool for letting them. I'd love a guilt-free, earned source of income that would allow me to take care of that myself, while still leaving me enough to buy a new toy once in a while.

The thing is, there's nothing I can do about any of this until next year. Student jobs on campus are designed to work with financial aid, and even if they weren't, I'd feel guilty taking a job just to ease my stupid conscience about having to pay a cell phone bill when there are people out there who need the income a lot more than I do. My only answer lies in off-campus, part-time employment, and I'm not likely to find anything like that which wouldn't require me to have some form of speedy transit. And, oh yeah, I won't be able to keep my car in Oshkosh until next year. And, oh yeah, I can barely afford my car insurance, and my full-time summer job doesn't net me any leftover money, since all of it goes to insurance and gas. And, oh yeah, it's not even my car! I'm earning it off of my parents little by little, and I still have to pay about $400 to get the front quarter-panel fixed. So all of my little dreams of becoming self-sufficient can just keep getting squashed by reality.

Damn. I need a change. Or I just need to grow up.