The Toughest Job You'll Ever Love

So I'm on campus today, finishing up all my end of semester work and enjoying the campus quiet. It's been, to say the least, an odd semester. And it's an odd feeling, too, going into winter break, not knowing when (and if) we'll be paid or what sort of situation we'll be coming back to.

Frankly, I've been in a bit of a funk. When I woke up this morning, I lay in bed staring at the clock long after I should have been up and on my way in to school. "I'm depressed," I realized, in an oddly narrative moment of clarity. "This whole thing is really depressing."

Anyway, so I got up and came to school, and spent a rewarding morning typing up a letter of reccomendation for one of my favorite students. Then, when she stopped by to pick it up, she gave me a present:



And if I didn't know it already, it's great to be reminded: teaching is the best job, ever. Um, I mean, best job ever, teaching is.

Course Reading Wednesday

"Religion is what the individual does with his own solitariness."

A.N. Whitehead

Happy Christmas

In all the years we've lived in San Francisco, we've never had a tree. We always go home for Christmas, we've reasoned, so what's the point? But we've missed it, and home is sort of like an electron or whatever -- it's wherever it is when you notice it, but it could very well be someplace else simultaneously. Plus, this wee one's not even three feet tall, and was less than $20. How could we resist?

Happy Birthday to my Mother

When I was a kid, I used to love pulling my parents' old paperbacks, the ones they'd had since college, off the shelves. I loved the smell of them, the aura of brick halls and turtleneck sweaters, young love, and bright, adolescent intellectual endeavor. I read The Bald Soprano, the Odyssey, tried to read Freud and Kazantzakis and Ezra Pound. I wanted to be my parents' youthful promise, their love, the bright, ridiculously joyful smiles in their wedding photograph.

My mom and I both like Ezra Pound, my mom because she's smarter than I am, and gets the classical allusions and whatnots at some essential gut level, and me because I hope to be as smart as my mother someday. Because when I was eleven, his words held everything that was wonderful and hopeful about both the future and the past together in one small book.

And sometimes he's just pretty:

In a Station of the Metro
by Ezra Pound

The apparition of these faces in the crowd;
Petals on a wet, black bough.



Anyway. Happy birthday, mom!

My Day in a Nutshell II: Electric Bugamoo

I spent the morning running around like crazy, finding some lost files and not finding others, dreadging information from long-forgotten data systems and generally behaving like a headless chicken unleashed on an unforgiving, flickering florescent-lit world.

Finally, at 3:00, I took lunch. I ordered some mushroom soup from a nearby deli, ran a series of errands, and rushed back to the office to proofread transcripts in preperation for a big-deal deadline tomorrow.

As I absentmindedly slurped my soup, I noticed that it tasted kind of strange. Something strong and unfamiliar. I poked at one of the mushrooms. It didn't look like a mushroom. Was that a piece of meat? Could there be meat in the mushroom soup? But they always have a veggie option at Bi Rite, and the mushroom couldn't have had meat in it, because the only other soup today had been.... crap. Beef and freakin' Barley. Beef! And Barley!

I've been a vegetarian since I was eight. My stomach is so not happy right now. Never mind the poor cow.

Not Dead Yet!

As I assured my mother this morning, I am really not all that sick, despite my ongoing blog-winge. That's a hazard of NaBloPoMo -- previously unbloggable events (i.e., "I lay on the couch all day and did nothing") become newsworthy. Moods that would normally keep one far away from the computer for fear of alarming loved ones are chronicled in excrutiating detail. Hurrah November!

Speaking of which, I don't know why, but NaBloPoMo never really clicked for me this year (I've been experiencing that with a lot of things, actually). I don't know if it's because of how busy I've been, or our new living situation (where every night is hang-out-with-the-housemates night), or the turmoil at work, but I haven't felt so creatively engaged lately. Looking back at last November, with all my talk of poets and poetry (and all my unblogged memories of reading and such), I can't help but wonder where my mind is these days.

Anyway. I'm off to an opening at The Lab with Brian and Hope (I can't seem to link directly to the Post Postcard show we're going to see, but it's on the front page tonight). Our freinds David Faulk and Michael Johnstone are both involved in the show, and I'm hoping things'll be cheap enough for me to to some Xmas shopping!

Voiceless

I woke up this morning with only the tiniest, raspiest of voices. It was hilarious. Brian and I chased each other around the house, Punch-and-Judy style. "Goose Trousers!" I squeaked at him, "Monkeybutt!"

If it weren't for the coughing and fever, this would be the awesomest thing ever.

Course Reading Wednesday

Rule a big country
the way you cook a small fish.

If you keep control by following the Way,
troubled spirits won't act up.
They won't lose their immaterial strength,
but they wont harm people with it,
nor will wise souls come to harm.
And so, neither harming the other,
these powers will come together in unity.

Did You Know

That you can download all of Kelly Link's Stranger than Fiction under a creative commons license? 'Cause, yeah. You can.

Monster Kitty is Angry

I really haven't left the house all day, except to go to Walgreens (and then take the long way home, to avoid the agressive panhandly lady), and to go meet Brian (and then I bought sequins! Because that's what you do when you're out in the world and high on Dayquil).

Super Secret

I can't tell you what I did today, because the 3.5% of it that wasn't spent snuffling on a coffee shop sofa with my plague dog boyfriend was filled with super secret, crafty projects. Super secret crafty Christmas projects. Secret!

Ugh

Is everyone sick? I slept the better part of the afternoon, but my legs ache like I've been doing deep knee bends.

Postpriandial Cat

We Gather Together

Lately I've been coming to terms with the fact that for all my free-wheeling, easy-going,live in San Francisco and own nothing more formal than office casual (well except for my prom dress collection) lifestyle, I'm really a bit of an uptight perfectionist. This comes out especially when I'm cooking -- every dish must be opulent, delicious, and done to perfection, all with an air of off-the-cuff insouciance.

All week, I've been planning on making the same stuffed pumpkin recipe I made two years ago:



It's yummy and delicious, and looks like something a fairy godmother Martha Stewart might make. Unfortunately, it also takes the better part of a day to make.


that's one big pumpkin

So, this morning, after spending a few hours agonizing over the fresh toasted breadcrumbs I needed to be toasting and the pumpkin flesh I really needed to start seasoning, I finally screwed my courage to the sticking post and asked Brian and Hope if they'd mind stuffed pumpkin for Saturday dinner, since we were already making salad and tofurkey and mashed white stuff and pork loin and beer bread and it's just the three of us and Jason, who'll be coming from another dinner. And they were all, "Duh, can we take a walk now?" And so we did.

Aaaaaand Scene.

Brian and I are walking down the street. A man walks by in stylized safari getup, including combat boots with the pant legs tucked in, and a wide-brimmed hat.

Me: Do you think he's a Man in the Yellow Hat fetishist?

B: What?

Me: That man (points exaggeratedly with eyes). Do you think he's a Man in the Yellow Hat fetishist.

B: Because he's got a hat, he's a man in hat fetishist?

Me: Man in the Yellow Hat. Didn't you ever read Curious George?

B: I'm familiar with the concept, but not really, no.

Me: Well, the Man in the Yellow Hat is his friend. He's an explorer. He finds him in the jungle.

B: Curious George finds the man, or the man finds George?

Me: They kind of find each other. And then the man takes George home and then he drinks ether and paints a jungle scene on his bedroom wall.

(beat)

B: So you think because he's a man in a yellow hat, he's a Man in the Yellow Hat fetishist? Does it work that way?

Me: If he was wearing leather chaps, we'd say he was a leather fetishist. Ergo, man in yellow hat, Man in the Yellow Hat Fetish.

B: But we wouldn't say the man in leather chaps was a Man in the Leather Chaps fetishist.

Me: (disgruntled silence)

Me: You're an obtuse dingbat fetishist.

B: (wraps his arms around me) Which is why I like you so much.

It's on!

My cousin Molly, her boyfriend, Steve, and I have been talking about doing a pub quiz one of these days. They're away for Thanksgiving this week, but once they get back, ooh, it's *so* on!

I've been researching our pub quiz options. Because really, what else am I going to do with my time? Stuff a pumpkin?

My Day in a Nutshell

My phone gently expired at some point in the midst of Beowulf's gut blasting shenanagins the other day. I'd been getting this blue screen of death-type thing intermittently when the thing was low on batteries, but this time, it lasted a whole day, and no amount of plugging it in or turning it on and off seemed to help. So this morning, Brian and I took it down to the Radio Shack where I'd bought it to see what they could do.

We waited in line for about an hour. One guy, the Not Phone Guy, was helping other customers. The other guy, the Phone Guy, was assisting this one customer who spent an eon and a half filling out cell phone paperwork, and then decided he wanted an iPod nano (and grinned back at us, as if to say "Look at how charmingly impulsive I am! Wheee!").

Anyway. Finally, The Not Phone Guy came over to see if he could help us. I showed him my phone, and explained that I'd bought it there less than a month ago. "Oh, he said. We can't do anything with that. You need to take it to the Cingular store downtown. They can repair it there." And then we asked Phone Guy, and he turned it on and off a few times, and then took the batterey out, and then said "Yeah, we can't fix that here. You need to go downtown." And they gave me directions, and that was that.

Anyway. Then I went to work and had a crappy day.

Finally, at about 6:30, I left the office and got on BART so that I could head downtown to the Cingular store. Ten minutes later, I find the store and walk in. About two seconds later the guy told me "Yeah, I can't fix that. You'll need to return that to the store where you bought it."

And then it took me about an hour to get home. And I forgot my freakin' book at work.

Is it too early to be listening to Christmas music?

'Cause I'm ready.


When I was a kid, I had all sorts of rules about how Christmas had to be (some completely my own, some family traditions. All clung to with OCD-like intensity). The tree is decorated on or after the 4th Sunday in advent (yes, even if that's Christmas eve). Christmas morning starts before sunrise (yeah, sorry about that guys). And Christmas music (including Handel's messiah) is to be listened to in the advent-to-epiphany window alone.

What a little tyrant I was! Time to get over that, stat!

P.S. Have you heard Low's Christmas album? Frakkin awesome!

Beowulf!

Yeah, so I didn't blog before midnight. But I saw Beowulf in 3-D, so, uh... yeah.

The movie left me with mixed feelings. On the one hand, jeez that was gory -- and did we really need all the blood and spears and bile in our face (I mean that literally -- this was, after all, 3-D). And I often felt like the immersive sense that the 3-D glasses created mereley compensated for the overall flatness of the graphics. And don't get me started on the changes made in the storyline (mostly because I don't know what to do with 'em. I can see the reasoning behind the choices made overall, but... huh).

But still, Grendel? Was freaking creepy, man.

Tesla Wins!

The End of DC Current in NYC

"Despite the clear advantage of alternating current — it can be transmitted long distances far more economically than direct current — direct current has taken decades to phase out of Manhattan because the early backbone of New York’s electricity grid was built by Mr. Edison’s company, which had a running head start in the first decade before Mr. Tesla and Mr. Westinghouse demonstrated the potential of alternating current with the Niagara Falls power project. (Among the customers of Thomas Edison’s Pearl Street power plant on that first day was The New York Times, which observed that to turn on its lights in the building, “no matches were needed.”)

But direct current clearly became uneconomical, as the short distances that it could be transmitted would have required a power station every mile or less, according to Joe Cunningham, an engineering historian. Thus alternating current in New York began in the outskirts — Queens, Bronx, Upper Manhattan and the suburbs.

The direct current conversion in Lower Manhattan started in 1928, and an engineer then predicted that it would take 45 years, according to Mr. Cunningham. “An optimistic prediction since we still have it now,” he said.

The man who is cutting the link today at 10 East 40th Street is Fred Simms, a 52-year veteran of the company. Why him?

“He’s our closest link to Thomas Edison,” joked Bob McGee, a Con Ed spokesman."

via boing bong

Podaroo

Ok, now that we've gone there, what was your childhood nickname? And what is this impulse to convert perfectly respoctable names, names chosen very carefully just months before, into schnuzzawuzza puddin muffins?

How did the reading go? I honestly can't tell.

And this article from the Chronicle for Higher Education explains why not:

"It's like we have this trick scale... Here's how that scale works: Self-doubt and negative feedback weigh heavily on the mind, but praise barely registers. You attribute your failures to a stable, inner core of ineptness. Meanwhile, you discount your successes as accidental or, worse, as just so many confidence jobs. Every positive is a false positive."

And the worst part is? It's annoying. I become annoying, socially inept. I can't trust praise. I can't trust people. And so I end up this stuttering misanthrope, rushing out the backdoor after I'm done reading, afraid to confront, or even acknowledge, my audience.

Stupid cat germs.

Course Reading Wednesdays: Confucius

The Master said, "What the gentleman seeks, he seeks within himself; what the small man seeks, he seeks in others."

About that thing

So, I'm reading tonight at the Bazaar Cafe on California St. here in San Francisco, between 21st and 22nd streets. The reading starts around 7:30ish. Ish because I'm coming from work, and god knows how I'll get there on time.

No, don't stay here.

Go here. Read this. It's better.

Well, here we are.

Today's our friend Tamsen's fourty-humenahim birthday. We're throwing her a party. At two. No one, not even the birthday girl, has arrived yet.


At least the house is clean.


And there's cake.

12 Words I Particularly Like

1. Carapace
2. Postprandial
3. Nadir
4. Vitriol
5. Jocular
6. Crinoline
7. Eroded
8. Bereft
9. Harbinger
10. Bean
11. Pumpkin
12. Twelve

And then there's this thing

Lovely things in the mail.

This is such a marvelous surprise! I mean, yeah, I am aware that I signed up for Tricia's blogger swap. And (coincidentally), I even picked out a gift for my own blogger swap buddy today. But look! Presents in the mail! Can anyone ever really anticipate the amazing fun that is?

My very awesome and just-what-I-wanted gift is from Anne over at Archie's Room. Thanks Anne! I'm rather fetishistic about bookmarks, and these are just perfect. And thank you, Tricia, for setting the whole thing up.

You know what I hate?

Tom Hanks movies. Except "Joe vs. The Volcano." That's an exception, that is.

Course Reading Wednesdays

I form the light and create darkness,
I bring prosperity and create disaster;
I, the LORD, do all these things.

Ya Vote!

Voting always makes me a little giddy. Participatory democracy can be such a head rush! And it was extra fun this morning -- bonds for libraries! Pony rides! Free internets for all! Never mind the old-timey thrill of voting for a man with a handlebar mustache (and while I'm at it, hurrah fro rank choice voting! No more throwing your vote away!. I even got to write in Joanie Caucus as my second choice for DA (there was only one choice on the ballot, and I get to vote for three, so why not?).

I was still a bit lightheaded on my way to work. Which, combined with an extra long wait for a walklight, contributed to the following impulse buy:




I've been needing goloshes anyway, and these have been calling to me every time I've passed Nisa's windows for the past week or so. Galosh galosh! Bring on the puddles!

Good Intentions Like Dogs at my Heels

I walk a lot. Twenty-five minutes to work in the morning, then another twenty-five home, then hither and yon and yon again whererever I need to go (I never learned how to drive, okay?).

And if walking's good for anything (besides keeping what's left of my girlish figure intact), it's ruminating on world issues and self-betterment. Tonight, walking home, I had such plans! Beer bread! Salad! Poems to write! Courses to plan! Laundry to do! Blog posts! Chores!

But, oh, home! Home is where my friends are, and wine, and snuggly dogs and rotten cats. How can I write when there's tea to be made? How can I work when there's socks and dogs and minestrone?

Art Zoo! (Gesundheit)

Hangin' out in Brian's studio this morning. Some folks are coming by to look at his art, and then we're going to the zoo. While I'm here, though, how's about some pictures from Brian's open studio?

Dreams

I didn't sleep well last night. I dreamed I was a child in a city where all the adults had died or gone away. We lived in a railroad-style apartment and had to stay away from the windows so the gangs that roamed the street would think the building was abandoned. Venetian blinds were hung from the window frames in artful dissaray.

Eventually we escaped out the back way. It led to an unpaved alleyway lined with walled gardens. We were welcomed into one of them, and offered water to drink. I put a small dog in my waterglass to make sure the water was safe to drink (the puppy was wet and licked my nose, so I woke up).

Soon after, I fell back to sleep, only to wake up with a sense of urgency. I'd been willing something to happen so hard in my dream that I'd half sat up in bed. I remembered the dream so clearly then, but now I can't remember a thing, except that I was sick, and when I coughed my skin would fade slightly, and you could see flowers wilting underneath.

It's the cow of the sea-ea-ea!

The #4796th thing I love about our neigborhood are the banners that adorn the light posts on Haight Street. Each lampost has a different one, all painted by local aritsts. What makes it so extra awesome is that our corner is the manatee corner (which, by the way, is reason number #7928 that my lovely and darling seester should come to visit).


(apologies for the low-quality image up there -- the cell phone camera's not great with the zoom).

The only downside is that everytime I walk over to Haight St, I end up with this song stuck in my head.

Flickr Friday

So here it is, November 2nd, and I'm already out o' things to blog about (I knew I shoulda gone to the Dia de los Muertos Parade). So here's something pulled randomly from my Flickr account:



Me and the Boo, circa 2004.

Rabbit, rabbit

Happy November, everyone!

So, new month, new rules. To start with, this is so last month:



Word is, we're getting paid tomorrow. And the Friday after. And so on, forever and ever, until our great-grandkids finally suck dry the teat of institutional solvency.

Okay, maybe not. But we're at least getting paid tomorrow, and should be paid only five days late for the payperiod after that.

It's been a rough couple weeks, though, I gotta say. Not so much the financial strain (though my bank account, like many of my coworkers, is currently overdrawn due to automatic payments going through post-non-payday). Rather, it's the emotional impact of not getting paid that continues to sting. I'd never realized what a capitalist I am before, but jeez. Not getting paid casts such a pall over my workday.

Anyway. Here's to new months! New beginnings! New posts! Paychecks!

Course Reading Wednesday

Cease to do evil
Learn to do good,
search for justice,
help the opressed,
be just to the orphan,
plead for the widow.

Earthquake!

This was the first I've ever felt since we moved here 4 years ago. Eeeep! (and Wheee!)

Welp

We still haven't been paid. Let me repeat that: No one at the school where I work has been paid for over a week (unless there's a secret cadre of elites I'm not aware of, rolling around in secret rooms full of money as I type). There's even some indication that there might not be a regular payroll until December 3rd (just in time for mom's birthday!).

So, my question is, how much longer to we keep on keepin' on? At what point does "I'm still here for the students" become "I'm giving the students a false sense of stability by staying"?

I feel irresponsible talking about this in so pubic a forum, but at what point does stiff-upper-lipping cease being useful and start being harmful? At what point can we just shut the doors and start mourning?

*Just to be clear: it's been a week since payday came and went. It's been more than four weeks since we were last paid.

Punkins!

We carved pumpkins today. Hurrah!

Mine's the one with the big, goofy grin. I like it. I think it looks genuinely amused, for a pumpkin.




In other news, Go Sox!

Words Fail Me

Something smells funny in here.

Well, have you run the.... sinky... thing lately?

Sinky thing?

The... the trash.... exploder.

Trash exploder?

Yeah. Rararararararar. Exploder!

What?

Rararararararar. Trash.

What??

Rarrararararararar.

Priorities

Lately I've been having trouble making it in to work on time. Even though it's just a thirty minute walk, even though I don't have to be there until ten. Lately I keep hitting the snooze button til 9:15, and then I lie in bed for another ten or fifteen minutes, stretching my fingers and toes and staring out the window, listening to the Writer's Almanac on NPR.

There are two busses I can take on these late-sleeper mornings: the J and the 22. The 22 drops me off in the heart of the Mission, 2 blocks up a busy, grouchy, pee-smelling street from where I work. Last week, I spent the entire 10-minute ride trying not to listen to the mind-numbingly vile coversation. I don't really like the 22 right now. The other bus, the J (really an above ground train) drops me three blocks away from work, four blocks if I opt for the scenic route, as I did this morning. It's worth the extra five minutes.


(photo taken on my new pink cell phone)

The train drops me in the upper corner of Dolores Park. Most mornings it and the city are encased in a mochi-skin of fog, and some days there's a great dane gallumphing around in the mist, looking for all the world like some mythic beastie.

It's been a rough month here at work. Our paychecks are a week late as of today, with no word on when we can expect them. Students are still waiting for their financial aid awards. Everyone is tense, pinched and anxious and fragile. And there's so much work to be done.

Anyway. It's my lunch break now. I'm off to sit in the park.

Reccomendations

I realize that, in spite of the whole post-every-day kick I've been on, I been kinda light, content-wise, of late. But am I about to remedy that? Nooooooooo. Instead, here's a bunch of better stuff for you to read:

The Fart Party (Cartoons!)

The Comics Curmudgeon (Blog about cartoons!)

Dykes to Watch Out For (Cartoonist's Blog!)

Clock Watching with a New Haircut

You know you have a tendancy to overthink things when...

Your fist thought, after buying a new pink cell phone to replace the old, black one is, "Am I over-conforming to gender norms?"

Shakespeare on the Bus

- Damn. Tanya. Someone should have killed her ass years ago.

- Uh-huh.

- Killed her in a trashcan.

- Killed her in an outhouse.

(general laughter)

- Shit. You married?

Missing

I'm not so thoroughly modern as to have photos uploaded already, so you'll just have to take my word for it that Brian's open studio went swimmingly. The art was lovely and the crowds gushed gushingly.

And it was great to just hang in the studio all day, chatting with friends and meeting people and just spending time with Brian's work. But today, now, sitting on the couch with books, and tea, getting ready to watch Buffy and toddle off to bed, I'm remembering how nice it is not to be busy, not to have deadlines looming, how nice it is to just be us.

Humph. Too bad I have to work tomorrow.

In other news

Happy belated coming out day, Albus Dumbledore!

Open Studio

For those of you in San Francisco:

This weekend (October 20 & 21), from 11am-6pm, Brian will
be opening up his studio as part of ArtSpan's citywide Open Studios (which you can read all about here).

For those of you not familiar with Brian's work, he sculpts these big wood panels into a sort of collage-y melange of different carving styles (I've put an image of one of 'em to the left over there). I'm really not up to describing them (and they're the sort of thing that you really should see in person), but if you want to get an idea of what I'm talking about, you can visit his website.

Anyway, his studio's at 2221 15th St. (between Noe and Castro). It's in
the basement -- the door is on the right side of the garage. There'll be
free food & drinks! Art! Artists! It'll be rad.

Feel free to email me if you have any questions or would like more
explicit directions.

Hope to see y'all there,

Nora

Poetry Thursday

from Unforseen

Evocation
by Micah Ballard

From the burial
grounds of Old Metairie
& hallways thru pyramids

with unnumbered bones
to the 3 St. Louises
& live oaks of Cypress Grove

onward we carry
whatever has traced our
way. So might the soil

turn over -- Apparitions
come forth, this path
hath only one following

one way to get away.
East of these walls
& never to be returned

let it be said
the oath has been told
sold for the taking. Not

again will these vaults
faces hide, never
to end their dens

which do not stop
but drop to that final place
where all is erased.

Course Reading Wednesdays

His trail glows clear -- like a track of fire.
Invisible and silent -- the spoor
Of the polluted man.
The smell of his mother's womb clings to his heels
And sweats from his instep.
Plain as the blood-slashed route of a wounded stag
In the noses of the hounds.

Self portraits of the artist at the end of the workday

21 Pet Peeves

Or, when every day at work is a crappy day, should crappy be considered the new 'okay'?

1. People not saying "hi" back.
2. Machines breaking for no apparent reason.
3. The phrase "please advise."
4. Lactose intolerance.
5. Intractable schedules.
6. Klingon foreheads.
7. Expired warranties.
8. Bank fees.
9. Stern answering machine greetings.
10. Free-floating anxiety
11. Ambiguous instructions.
12. Quotation marks used for emphasis (ex: please "do not" destroy the English language).
13. Global Dimming.
14. That orange juice is not available on tap in my office.
15. Hard and fast deadlines on 24 hours notice.
16. That hating Mondays was co-opted years ago by a cartoon cat.
17. Being 'not really sick'-sick.
18. Un proofread 'open letters'
19. People who say 'please' like it's an insult.
20. Stupid hair.
21. Lists in lieu of real blog entries.

Competition

The cat really wants on my lap right now. Sorry, blog-o-sphere, but you're competing with 20 pounds of pure cute. I may have to sign off rather quickly.

So, how is it Sunday night already? As a matter of fact, how is it October? 2007?? And omigosh, I'm 30? When did that happen?*

Oh, I'm feeling chronologically misplaced tonight. I'm listening to a CD that I listened to a lot when I was about, I dunno, 20? I'd just dropped out of out of college, was living at home, and kept having dreams that my teeth were falling out. I wore a lot of black and had a stuffed crow named Great Aunt Ponsomby. And I was taking classes at the Museum School. That was fun.

Wait, what? I'm 30?





* April. It happened in April. I'm a little slow.

Sa-Sa-Saturday

Oh, it feels so good to be home, unscheduled and barefoot. Went to the farmers market this morning (after a brief stop off at work), now I'm home with books and tea until it's time to shop for my friend Chris' birthday dinner tonight. I can't wait to give him his present (stylish and an in-joke -- the perfect gift!).

Oooh, I'm cold.

Brr! It's the rainy season all of a sudden!

Ugh.

What a day. I probably shouldn't go into detail for fear of being dooced, but here I am, sitting at a desk awash with papers, wondering how it got to be 7:30 and what ever happened to that lunch break I meant to take.

Course Reading Wednesday Thursday!

But your mother heard the lowing of our horned herds, and springing to her feet, gave a great cry to waken them from sleep. And they, too, rubbing the bloom of soft sleep from their eyes, rose up lightly and straight -- a lovely sight to see: all as one, the old women and the young and the unmarried girls. First they let their hair fall loose, down over their shoulders, and those whose straps had slipped fastened their skins of fawn with writhing snakes that licked thier cheeks.

Auuugh! Forgot to blog!

Itsstill11:59I'mgoodok.

Rorschach

Despite (or perhaps because of) all the various options open to us in San Francisco this weekend, Hope and I headed down to Fort Funston on Sunday for walkies on the beach with her dog.

The beach is bordered by steep cliffs, popular with hang gliders and red-tailed hawks. Sand streaches on for miles, bounded by shining sea and veiny rock, frolicky dogs and their sea-contemplative humans as far as the eye can see.

Halfway through our walk, we joined a cluster of dog walkers and baby toters who had stopped to peer at the cliff face above them. A man and his dog were clinging to a ledge more than three quarters up, the dog having apparently fallen from the path above. Now both were struggling against the sandy rock, the man pushing and the dog scrabbling, every inch of progress sending tumbles of pebble and rock down the side of the cliff.

Watching the man and his dog struggling in the hot sun, unable to do anything except watch and pray, I said to Hope, "I bet he's never felt more alone in his life."

Hope squinted up. "Or maybe he's never felt more alive."

And we watched until the man and his pushed their way to the very top and, the path beneath their feet again, bounded away.

I has tablet

Brian's encouraged me to get a drawing tablet, so that I can doodle directly on to the computer. It's taking some getting used to, but here's my first doodling attempt:

21 for 21

In honor of Tricia's Get it Down: 31 for 21, Twenty-one Things (That You Might not Already Know) About Me:

1. I'm absolutely addicted to web sites that present first hand accounts of paranormal encounters.

2. I don't believe in ghosts (but I'm scared to pieces at the prospect of seeing one).

3. When I'm having trouble falling asleep, daydreaming about the toast I'm going to have for breakfast puts me right out (anything to get closer to the toast!).

4. I never kill bugs intentionally.

5. Well, mosquitos get one warning 'shoo' before I smack 'em.

6. Luckily, there are hardly any mosquitoes in San Francisco.

7. I can't spell 'mosquitoes' for the life of me.

8. I can't spell the name 'Michael' either. The 'a' and 'e' always confuse me.

9. I had a crush on a boy named Michael Fuller in fifth grade. Said crush manifested itself in constant bickering.

10. I think he liked me, too.

11. For years, I believed that I'd reached my peak in 5th grade, and that I'd never be as confident, funny, or full of potential again.

12. It's a gloomy twelve year old that believes her best years are behind her.

13. And an even gloomier twenty-one year old.

14. 'Twelve' is one of my favorite words.

15. I have reoccurring dreams that take place in a library.

16. Or sometimes a church.

17. Or sometimes the blocks surrounding my childhood home.

18. The geography of my dream worlds is fairly consistent -- If I dream of a down stairway or a pathway this week, it'll be there next week when I need it.

19. I love dreaming. I'll sleep til noon if my dreams are good.

20. I always feel guilty when I sleep in. Said guilt manifests itself in grouchiness.

21. I drempt this morning that I was hiding out in the belfry of a gothic cathederal (sanctuary!!). I slept til 10:30.

Holding Pattern

Busy all day, with no time for the bloggin'. So, while I get my act together (something that's gonna take more than the five minutes I have before the day's over), here's this tidbit from Good Advice for Young Trendy People of All Ages, a book I picked up at Manic D Press' booth at the Castro Street Fair today:

"I am in favor of making one's life an open book. If everybody knows you are considering going out with So-and-so, they can give you the dirt. The other option is to misstep alone and suffer silently. If everybody knows you just smoked crack, they may excuse you from the consequesnces of your behaviour. We're all supposed to be understanding now, but you have to give us a chance to understand something first. So do tell.

However, when personal information becomes a weapon, as it is on the East Coast and perhaps Japan, the social construct is not correct. The best reaction is to form a noise band and just scream and scream (check out Sick of It All, Masonna, the Boredoms). I mean it, go see them.

Belinda's the Decider

It's a good tired. Last night, Hope, Jason & went to see the the Go Gos at the Independant (pics to come). Then today, Hope and I drove down to a nature reserve outside Palo Alto where we saw a Kingfisher, some hawks, egrets, and a funny little bird with a yellow spotted belly. It's Hope's birthday tonight, and we're grilling portabellos, monkfish, veggies and cheese, alongside figs on rosemary skewers. Soon we'll be sleepy and full, bundled against the October night air with red wine and grilled figs in our bellies.

It's Time to Go

I've been having trouble leaving work this week. I've wrapped up the things I could conceivably get done today, and I'm ready to go, but I just can't seem to get up from my desk and GO. There's just too much unfinished business, too much that needs doing. Plus I took a very late lunch, and so I don't feel like it's the end of the day -- how can I be leaving if I just ate an hour ago?

I really wish I was leaving for a weekend in the woods (though that would interfere with my post-every-day schedule). It's just that I need space, and quiet, and maybe a little dose of sanity. Birdies chirpin' wouldn't hurt, either.

If you need a laugh

Go check out this post over on Tricia's blog. It totally turned my frown upside-down, and then proceeded to laugh me half off my chair.

Vegetal and Unfiltered

This has been one of those days where I keep having to stop and deconstruct my emotions. In a meeting, I'll find myself angry and defensive, only to find, when I try to put into words what I'm feeling, that there is no there there, that what ever I'm feeling has sprung into being independent of any external stimulus. I keep rolling my emotions around against my tongue as if I were tasting wine: an over-judgemental mouthfeel up front, with a tannic guilt-ridden open mindedness lingering on the palate.

But maybe it does spring from somewhere. There's such a tension on campus these days. In today's staff meeting a free-floating accusation that some people aren't pulling their weight hovered over the room alongside all our overstuffed workloads, pushing everyone's brows down until we all looked angry.


Plus my office smells funny.

Look! I made newness.

As you may have noticed, I updated the template a bit. It's basically one of the Blogger default templates, with a different pattern in the backgroud that I found on Squidfingers. I've never really played with Blogger templates before. It's fun!

I hope I didn't infringe anything.

Course Reading Wednesdays

Ok, if I'm going to be posting every day in October, I need some built-in multitasker slacker time. So: a new Wednesday tradition, in which I post a sample passage from the reading I've foisted on my poor students for today's class:

(From Basic Teachings of the Buddha: A New Translation and Compilation, with a Guide to Reading the Texts, by Glenn Wallis

Parayana Suta; Samyuttankiaya:

The Buddha spoke as follows:

I will teach the destination and the path leading to the destination. Listen to what I say. What is the destination? The eradication of infatuation, the eradication of hostility, and the eradication of delusion are what is called the destination. And what is the path leading to the destination? Present-moment awareness directed toward the body. This awareness is what is called the path leading to the destination.

In this way, I have taught you the destination and the path leading to the destination. That which should be done out of compassion by a caring teacher who desires the welfare of his students, I have done for you.

There are secluded places. Meditate, do not be negligent! Don't have regrets later! This is my instruction to you.

Toons for Tuesday

According to an online personality test I took some years ago, my ideal career is "cartoon artist." I don't know if that's the case (I lean more towards ballerina astronaut), but I do enjoy the doodling.

Brian's encouraging me to start posting my drawings up here. I have a few projects that I've been working on (like Ovid's Metamophoses, narrated by an octopus!), but as I haven't yet gotten around to scanning 'em, here's a little MS Paint self-portrait I did on my lunch break today.

Dreams of (Georgia Maeby) Green

My friend Tricia was the first of my college-friends-who-I'm-still-in-touch-with to have a baby (with my former pseudo arch-nemesis Cait coming in at a close second). It's not too surprising, then, that her daughter Georgia has lodged herself fairly deeply inside my subconscious.

Since Georgia was born last December, she's been the star of a series of (mostly half-remembered) dreams. They spring from all sorts of semi-concious desires, from my frustration in having not yet met li'l G (unless you count prenatal hellos directed at her mother's belly), to my own ambivilant half-formed desires for a wee one of my own.

More often than not, the dreams just consist of sitting and playing with G, or hanging out with a toddler her and Tricia in a future playground someplace. Here are the exceptions:

1. I'm working on an photo-illustrated version of 'Snow White,' with Georgia in the title role (she's a shoo-in for the part. Seriously, check out that complexion). I engage in a long internal debate over whether Prince Charming should have Down's Syndrome, like Georgia, or not. Strangely, in dream state, I don't seem to notice that G's a bit young for princes (Edit: or princesses!) of any stripe.

2. I'm catsitting for a friend when I realize all of a sudden that it's not cats I'm watching, but Georgia. Soon after, I give birth to my own baby, identical to Georgia in every way, excepting the fact that she can play the trombone.

Not Good at the Busy

Oh, I am just not good* at being busy. This semester I'm working full time in addition to teaching a class -- that's 43 hours out of the week that I have to be someplace and be working, never mind the unstructured class prep hours I need to work on top of that.

Now, technically, there are enough hours in the day to get everything done. But my brain just can't stay in work mode long enough to make it happen. I keep napping on Saturdays, or sinking into a novel for just a minute, only to look up and realize hours have passed.

This morning, walking to work, I kept looking longingly into coffee shops, at people sitting in the corner with a notebook and their coffee, at teachers reading stacks of papers and hipsters with their dork-glasses and laptops. O, for an unstructured day!



*I started this post a few minutes ago, was called away, and came back to an entry that said "Oh, I am just not god". What an awesome excuse for not getting stuff done. Thanks, id!

Getting Down With My Bad Self

In an effort to a.) write more and b.) write more here, I'm participating in Get it Down, Trixie's write-every-day challenge for October. Not only is it an excuse to write every day*, it's also a way to celebrate Down's Syndrome Awareness Month (don't tell me you already had plans). Join us!

*I had a writing teacher in college who told me that 'not only.. but also...' constructions hardly ever work. But I love them so!

Ar ar ar ar ar ar

You know you're too busy when having the flu is the best thing ever. Tuesday our new housemate (did I mention we moved?) had it, and by last night both Brian and I were laid out on the couch, too weak do do anything but sip rootbeer and watch Season 3 of Buffy (luckily, new housemate, in addition to being plague-ridden, has an excellent collection of DVDs).

So yeah. Slept from 1 til five today. Had crazy dreams, where main street Brattleboro was at the end of Haight St., and I was getting fitted for an much too small pair of shoes (were they denimn? Ew). Woke up to a cat fight, and to Hope's dog at the foot of my bed, mouth full of toys, wanting to wrassle.

Oh, my writing muscles are rusty.

It's the little things

Nothing breaks up the monotony of xeroxing like little anecdotes like this one (gleaned from a text for a Theories of Psych class):

His father was a naval officer, and Martin's favorite form of plat was floating his toy boats in the bathtub and torpedoiung them. Both parents had become frustrated with Martin because he consistently expelled his feces in his pants and not in the toilet. In desperation, they offered him twenty-five cents for every bowel movement he made in the toilet. Martin soon caluclated that it was not in his best interst to become toilet trained, because to do so would mean that he would ultimately lose money. Instead he would use the toilet for three days to earn the money. But the only way to keep the money flowing was to lose control periodically, and this he would do at home or at the homes of friends. One day, Martin's best friend'smother instisted that, at her house, he use the toilet. There she overheard him muttering to himself about Napoleon's battles. When he came out of the bathroom he informed her, "I'm Napoleon and Napoleon shits wherever he pleases!"

I am so cross-stiching "Napoleon shits wherever he pleases" on a sampler to go above the cat's litter box.

1,928 Years Ago Today

We are, of course, going for drinks at Vesuvio tonight.

The 79 AD Eruption of Vesuvius
by Pliny the Younger (AD 61-113)

My dear Tacitus,

You ask me to write you something about the death of my uncle so that the account you transmit to posterity is as reliable as possible. I am grateful to you, for I see that his death will be remembered forever if you treat it. He perished in a devastation of the loveliest of lands, in a memorable disaster shared by peoples and cities, but this will be a kind of eternal life for him. Although he wrote a great number of enduring works himself, the imperishable nature of your writings will add a great deal to his survival. Happy are they, in my opinion, to whom it is given either to do something worth writing about, or to write something worth reading; most happy, of course, those who do both. With his own books and yours, my uncle will be counted among the latter. It is therefore with great pleasure that I take up, or rather take upon myself the task you have set me.

He was at Misenum in his capacity as commander of the fleet on the 24th of August, when between 2 and 3 in the afternoon my mother drew his attention to a cloud of unusual size and appearance. He had had a sunbath, then a cold bath, and was reclining after dinner with his books. He called for his shoes and climbed up to where he could get the best view of the phenomenon. The cloud was rising from a mountain-at such a distance we couldn't tell which, but afterwards learned that it was Vesuvius. I can best describe its shape by likening it to a pine tree. It rose into the sky on a very long "trunk" from which spread some "branches." I imagine it had been raised by a sudden blast, which then weakened, leaving the cloud unsupported so that its own weight caused it to spread sideways. Some of the cloud was white, in other parts there were dark patches of dirt and ash. The sight of it made the scientist in my uncle determined to see it from closer at hand.

He ordered a boat made ready. He offered me the opportunity of going along, but I preferred to study-he himself happened to have set me a writing exercise. As he was leaving the house he was brought a letter from Tascius' wife Rectina, who was terrified by the looming danger. Her villa lay at the foot of Vesuvius, and there was no way out except by boat. She begged him to get her away. He changed his plans. The expedition that started out as a quest for knowledge now called for courage. He launched the quadriremes and embarked himself, a source of aid for more people than just Rectina, for that delightful shore was a populous one. He hurried to a place from which others were fleeing, and held his course directly into danger. Was he afraid? It seems not, as he kept up a continuous observation of the various movements and shapes of that evil cloud, dictating what he saw.

Ash was falling onto the ships now, darker and denser the closer they went. Now it was bits of pumice, and rocks that were blackened and burned and shattered by the fire. Now the sea is shoal; debris from the mountain blocks the shore. He paused for a moment wondering whether to turn back as the helmsman urged him. "Fortune helps the brave," he said, "Head for Pomponianus."

At Stabiae, on the other side of the bay formed by the gradually curving shore, Pomponianus had loaded up his ships even before the danger arrived, though it was visible and indeed extremely close, once it intensified. He planned to put out as soon as the contrary wind let up. That very wind carried my uncle right in, and he embraced the frightened man and gave him comfort and courage. In order to lessen the other's fear by showing his own unconcern he asked to be taken to the baths. He bathed and dined, carefree or at least appearing so (which is equally impressive). Meanwhile, broad sheets of flame were lighting up many parts of Vesuvius; their light and brightness were the more vivid for the darkness of the night. To alleviate people's fears my uncle claimed that the flames came from the deserted homes of farmers who had left in a panic with the hearth fires still alight. Then he rested, and gave every indication of actually sleeping; people who passed by his door heard his snores, which were rather resonant since he was a heavy man. The ground outside his room rose so high with the mixture of ash and stones that if he had spent any more time there escape would have been impossible. He got up and came out, restoring himself to Pomponianus and the others who had been unable to sleep. They discussed what to do, whether to remain under cover or to try the open air. The buildings were being rocked by a series of strong tremors, and appeared to have come loose from their foundations and to be sliding this way and that. Outside, however, there was danger from the rocks that were coming down, light and fire-consumed as these bits of pumice were. Weighing the relative dangers they chose the outdoors; in my uncle's case it was a rational decision, others just chose the alternative that frightened them the least.

They tied pillows on top of their heads as protection against the shower of rock. It was daylight now elsewhere in the world, but there the darkness was darker and thicker than any night. But they had torches and other lights. They decided to go down to the shore, to see from close up if anything was possible by sea. But it remained as rough and uncooperative as before. Resting in the shade of a sail he drank once or twice from the cold water he had asked for. Then came an smell of sulfur, announcing the flames, and the flames themselves, sending others into flight but reviving him. Supported by two small slaves he stood up, and immediately collapsed. As I understand it, his breathing was obstructed by the dust-laden air, and his innards, which were never strong and often blocked or upset, simply shut down. When daylight came again 2 days after he died, his body was found untouched, unharmed, in the clothing that he had had on. He looked more asleep than dead.

Meanwhile at Misenum, my mother and I-but this has nothing to do with history, and you only asked for information about his death. I'll stop here then. But I will say one more thing, namely, that I have written out everything that I did at the time and heard while memories were still fresh. You will use the important bits, for it is one thing to write a letter, another to write history, one thing to write to a friend, another to write for the public.

Farewell.

Photobooth and I go to an all-day meeting

Dude, I need a haircut.

You'd be awake at 4 in the morning, too

If you had this song stuck in your head:

I look like a Hermione, but I identify as a Luna

The sorting hat says that I belong in Ravenclaw!

<

Said Ravenclaw, "We'll teach those whose intelligence is surest."

Ravenclaw students tend to be clever, witty, intelligent, and knowledgeable.
Notable residents include Cho Chang and Padma Patil (objects of Harry and Ron's affections), and Luna Lovegood (daughter of The Quibbler magazine's editor).

Take the most scientific Harry Potter
Quiz ever created.

Get Sorted Now!

Reviving Ophelia

Sometime around the fourth or fifth grade, my girl scout troop participated in a sleep over at the Museum of Science in Boston. It was a rowdy night, and my memories of the event are a haze of petrifide dinosaur poo, cutaway models of the reproductive system, and the view of the city skyline after dark.

One memory, however, stands out with crystal clarity: I am lying in my sleeping bag near the "Welcome to the Universe" exhibit, my feet too hot inside my pink Dr. Dentons, my perpetually clogged nostrils making intermittant whistling noises in the dark. It is after the offical lights out. I'm staring at a dimly lit model of the solar system, listening to whispers and giggles in the surrounding darkness. I can't remember what came before this moment, but I know that I have just done or said something incredibly stupid.

I make myself a promise: someday, I will be cool. I will wear a black leather jumpsuit with massive shoulderpads and I will have hair like Max Headroom. I will live in an apartment with high ceilings and concrete floors and a view of the city skyline, and I will never say anything stupid. And most importantly, I will invent a time travel machine. I will come back in time to this very moment, and I will tell myself what not to say, and what not to do, and I will never, ever, have to be embarrased by what a dork I used to be. Because I will have always been cool. This will never have happened.

The Nora of 2007, however, has much more in common with the post-nasal dripping, feety pajama wearing Nora of 1987 than she does with the plastic haired saviour of the future. So, in aid to any future time travellers (I'm not giving up on that leather jumpsuit yet!), I have compiled the following list in order to aid in distinuishing the 10-year-old and thirty-year-old me.

Then:
Mom nags me to clean my room.

Now:
Mom nags me to update my blog.


Then:
I have a disconcerting habit of humming to myself, and live at least half the time in an elaborate fantasy world.

Now:
Hm.


Then:
I am tall for my age, with unkempt hair and a goofy grin I have trouble controlling.

Now:
I'm um, taller?


Then:
My career ambitions vaccillate between artist, advocate for the disenfranchised (mostly kittens), and mad scientist inventor.

Now:
I'm pretty sure I don't have the right degree to become a mad scientist inventor. I had this really great idea the other day for fried beer on a stick, though (you could deep fry beer ice cream! Then put it on a stick! Don't steal this idea!).


Then:
I have trouble finishing things, to the constant frustration of my parents, my teachers, and myself.

Now:

You Are The Fool

You are a fascinating person who is way beyond the concerns of this world. Young at heart, you are blissfully unaware of any dangers ahead. You are a true wanderer - it has be difficult finding your place in this world. Full of confidence, you are likely to take a leap of faith. Your fortune: You are about to embark on a new phase in your life. This may mean changing locations, jobs, friends, or love status. You are open about what the future will bring, and free of worry. You have made your peace with fate, and you're ready to start down your new path.

What Tarot Card Are You?

Another poem

The White Fires of Venus
by Denis Johnson

We mourn this senseless planet of regret,
droughts, rust, rain, cadavers
that can't tell us, but I promise
you one day the white fires
of Venus shall rage: the dead,
feeling that power, shall be lifted, and each
of us will have his resurrected one to tell him,
"Greetings. You will recover
or die. The simple cure
for everything is to destroy
all the stethosscopes that will transmit
silence occasionally. The remedy for loneliness
is in learning to admit
solitude as one admits
the bayonet: gracefully,
now that already
it pierces the heart.
Living one: you move among many
dancers and don't know which
you are the shadow of;
you want to kiss your own face in the mirror
but do not approach,
knowing you must not touch one
like that. Living
one, while Venus flares
O set the cereal afire,
O the refrigerator harboring things
that live on into death unchanged."

They know all about us on Andromeda,
they peek at us, they see us
in this world illumined and pasteled
phonily like a bus station,
they are with us when the streets fall down fraught
with laundromats and each of us
closes himself in his small
San Francisco without recourse.
They see you with your face of fingerprints
carrying your instructions in gloved hands
trying to touch things, and know you
for one despairing, trying to touch the curtains,
trying to get your reflection mired in alarm tape
past the window of this then that dark
closed business establishment.
The Andromedans hear your voice like distant amusement park music
converged on by ambulance sirens
and they understand everything.
They're on your side. They forgive you.

I want to turn for a moment to those my heart loves,
who are as diamonds to the Andromedans,
who shimmer for them, lovely and useless, like diamonds:
namely, those who take their meals at soda fountains,
their expressions lodged among the drugs
and sunglasses, each gazing down too long
into the coffee as though from a ruined balcony.
O Andromedans they don't know what to do
with themselves and so they sit there
until they go home where they lie down
until they get up, and you beyond the light years know
that if sleeping is dying, then waking
is birth, and a life
is many lives. I love them because they know how
to manipulate change
in the pockets musically, these whose faces the seasons
never give a kiss, these
who are always courteous to the faces
of presumptions, the presuming streets,
the hotels, the presumption of rain in the streets.
I'm telling you it's cold inside the body that is not the body,
lonesome behind the face
that is certainly not the face
of the person one meant to become.

Quiet

I'm having trouble sitting still. There are -- let me count them -- seven windows open in my browser right now, one unfinished email waiting (five if you count the ones I'm intending to write, but havent started), and (if we might go outside my computer screen for a moment) two open books and a magazine perched on the armrest next to me. I can't concentrate on any of them, but I can't put any of them away, either. I'm just too restless, too unsettled, and I can't let them go.

So, here's a poem to quiet me down:



In the Garden, by Anne Pierson Wiese


On the edge of the pond a great white
egret catches catches five-inch fish, it's trick neck
now a bone-china handle just thick
enough to curve without cracking -- sleight

of spine and cup -- now a javelin in flight
traveling with frugal grace: quickness
made slow by the instinct that missing
what's aimed for's what comes of haste, or eyes

too big for your stomach. Among the weeds' dead
shoots giant carp feed--a tea party of stiff-
tongued brutes sipping algaed shadows, exempt
by size from a predator whose slight kisses
yield up what's small enough to swallow instead
of choking alone on a single wish.

It's too darn hot

Summer days, in their full bloom of sticky hotness, are rarely seen in San Francisco. This week, however, we've had an embarrasment of riches -- a string of miserable, moist, still-hot-in-the shade days. Of course, according to my google weather bar, it's only 77 degrees, with 35% humidity. But we're San Franciscans! Don't you understand we're not made for this sort of punishment!?

My office has no windows, and only one door. The uninsulated ceiling is only inches from the hot tar roof above. I've ben here two hours, and I may have already bonded with my office chair at a molecular level. Send lemonade, Stat!

Mind the Spherical Voltage Oblongata

More About the Cat's Habits

The cat has a new game he likes to play: One of us (usually me) tries to go to bed. The other then sneaks outside through the cat door and lets loose with a shocking and bewildering array of nocturnal noises, concluding a few plantive mews at the bedroom window. The one in bed then cries out "be quiet kitten, that won't work this time."

"That's right," says her boyfriend. "You'd better not let him make a habit of this."

The one outside then proceeds to make a few more intermittent mews, mews with just enough time elapsed between them to allow one to (theoretically) begin to drift off. The one in bed's boyfriend may have gone to sleep by this point, or may be off getting a glass of water, or maybe it's one o'clock in the afternoon, and only those who have trouble sleeping nights are abed. Anyway the mewing continues. And the one in bed's willpower crumbles, and the window is opened, and purr purr purr purr purr, the cat was never cuter.

And then the window is closed, the cat runs outside, and the game begins anew. Finis. (Except not really).

Statistics

Hours of sleep I got last night: 3
Hours before I have to teach: 4
Ratio of clean clothes to dirty in my bedroom right now: roughly 1:five billion
Days since I last showered: two? three? ten? I'm not sure.

At least the cat's happy

I just woke up from my second nap today. The cat is a major fan of my new sleep schedule. The rest of the day, he prances and demands and hisses, but once I'm recumbant on the couch we become the best of friends. For the last two hours, he slept on the open face of Aristotle's Metaphysics, while I dreamed that I found a baby that no one else could see. Once I realized this, I started wearing said baby on my head. You know, because I could.

But now I've got to get back to all the other things I was supposed to do today. Like laundry, and lecture notes, and other things beginning with 'l' (lesbianism! lying! learning Latvian!).

Hypnogogia

Oh, I can't sleep. Or at least I can't sleep during normal sleeping hours. Just strange, sleepy person times. Last night I tossed and turned until the wee hours, only to sleep the (sunny and springlike) day away. And now I'm up again, restless, reading and listening to all the funny night sounds (some rowdy street noise, but mostly just the rustling of the cat as he searches for new nooks to nap in, and the stompy stompy stompy of the upstairs neighbor as he trundles out of bed to run some nocturnal errand).

Actually, for all my offness, I think I'm actually sleeping more than usual. I'll probably go to bed pretty soon, this in spite of the fact that i was hardly awake at all today (I crawled to bed at eight this morning and slept 'til eleven, then went back to bed and slept from two til sixish. And this was after a tossy-and-turny but nonetheless moderately sleep-filled night). Mending bones, I'm learning, is exhausting work. And I'm so out of it, even when I am awake. But between the meds and the mending, it's no wonder my brain's hardly stirring. You don't want to know how long this has taken me to write (and how many times I accidently typed 'sleep' in lieu of some other word).

Oh, I was going to write more, but my brain's shutting down now. Off to bed.

Whoa. It's Wednesday? Whoa.

The weird thing about having my mother here is that, like, 90% of this blog's readers are spending all day, every day with me (how large are mom and Brian that they make up 90%? How small must my other reader(s) be to make up 10%? Oh, this is impossible, and strangely discomfiting).

And yet! And yet not a day goes by that someone, some 45th percentile doesn't say, "hey, why haven't you updated your blog?" And I'll say, "I'm right here! Ask me how my day was! Tell me about your socks and I'll blog about it!" But do they comply? No. They go right back to being un-anecdotal, threading beads or knitting or whatever it is you do when you're keeping the newly surgiated company.

Brian just doddered in and asked if I was ready for bed. "Go away," says I. "I'm blogging!"

"About time," says he, taking of my shoes (I'm pretty good with most dexterous things, post surgery, but my shoes are very far away). "Come to bed soon, though. I'm turning off the lights and you might hurt yourself." I scoff. Our bedroom, dear 10th percentile, is very straightforward. No moats or casements or aligators or catamounts. I will not hurt myself. My collarbone has been resectioned, not my in-the-dark-navigation bits.

So anyway, that's that. Lump gone. Clavicle resectioned (is that even the right word? Sounds off). Blogger sleepy. Readers restless.

Busy busy busy

Brian's been nagging me to post more ("'Pondering!?'", he says. "You're still pondering your silly Quaker tree?"), and even though I have no new argyle stories to tell, I'm caving.

So. How you been? I am busy. So busy, in fact, that I have become paralyzed by the sense of my own business, unable to finish any task, be it laundry or course proposals, because don't you know I'm busy!? I must lie here and eat goldfish crackers, so busy I am.

Course proposals for next semester are due on Monday. On Friday, I go in for a second round of surgery (remember that schwannoma way back when? Yeah, that). Thursday, my mom arrives from out of town (hi mom!). I'm hoping the house will be at least moderately clean by then (she's not a judgemental woman, my mother, but I don't want her to feel like she's raised some sort of squalid so-and-so). And Aristotle! I've got to read me some Aristotle before Friday, and get some percocet-proof lecture notes together for my first post-surgery class next week. But have I done any of this? Of course not, I'm far too busy. Oh, and plus? The prospect of surgery has me a bit scared. Not that there's any risk or scariness this time 'round. But my lizard brain doesn't know that. My lizard brain says needles are bad. And knives. And those drugs that steal your consciousness away. Oh, ack. I'll stop now.

Pondering

Its been raining like crazy lately, huge storms replete with thunder and lightning and hailstones like gum balls. On the way to the grocery store tonight, I noticed that a huge branch (half a tree, really) had fallen just outside the neighborhood friend's school, blocking the sidewalk in front completely. Which makes me wonder: if a tree falls outside a Quaker school, does it make a sound?

(Insert Wookie Sound Here)

Star Wars Horoscope for Taurus

You are a dependable creature, but you do tend to be stubborn. You like material possessions and love to win at games. You hate being bossed around or losing. You may succumb to your physical strength when upset. Star wars character you are most like: Chewbacca

What Is Your Star Wars Horoscope?

Seriously, though, how would you spell the wookie roar? Mweaaaaaah? Rwea-a-a-a? Mehraaah?

P.S. More information about wookie roars can be found on the internet

[EDITED TO ADD: G-g-g-g-geeaaah?]

How I spent my Wednesday morning

10 Zen Monkeys has posted an article entitled 5 Freaky Muppet Videos complete with YouTube links and videos. If you're anything like me, this'll send you trolling through YouTube for hours, until you finally dissolve into a puddle of tears watching Deborah Harry sing "The Rainbow Connection" with Kermit the Frog.

Words fail him

From Salon.com's War Room:

What Americans really think of Bush

Twice a year, pollsters for the Pew Research Center ask Americans to say the "one word that best describes" their "impression of George W. Bush." As late as February 2005, the top two volunteered responses were "honest" and "good." The new top two: "incompetent" and "arrogant."

"Honest" has fallen to No. 3. Rounding out the top 10: "good," "idiot," "integrity," "leader," "strong," "stupid" and "ignorant." "Ass" checks in at No. 13, "president" sits at No. 18, and "unconfident" brings up the rear at No. 32.

-- Tim Grieve

What's funny to me is that the pollsters don't prompt at all -- they just ask for one word (and accept two, but don't prompt for the second). And since the last election, the list of words that jump out of people's mouths at the sound of his name has just been getting longer and longer, with nineteen words between "honest" and "selfish" in February 2004 and thirty one between "incompetent" and "tough" in March 2006. The longer the man's in office the harder it gets to sum up just what the American people think of him.

Socks and Monsters

For a few months now, Brian has been contemplating the aquisition of some argyle socks. As with all major life changes, this sartorial switcheroo has been carefully pondered, researched, discussed with friends and significant others. "I've been thinking about getting some argyle socks," he said to me one day. "I think they'd go nicely with all the corduroy I've been wearing."

Of course, not everyone was supportive. Our friend Jason called them old man socks. I just teased and brought it up (repeatedly) over dinner with friends.

So the weeks went by, and like many people finding themselves at life's crossroads, Brian stalled out for a while. H&M's socks had skulls on them. The socks at the fancy shoe store near our house were twenty bucks a pop. Then he needed a new hard drive, and then a new planer. And the Search for Sock fell by the wayside, for the most part. So far, he only has one pair (selected for him, as a gesture of support, by the aforementioned Jason). But argyle remains a funny little obsession with him, and it's become one of our little rituals: window shopping wherever we go, looking for argyle socks, and then judging said socks on various criteria to determine whether or not they are in fact the argyle that he is looking for (pink and brown argyle will not do. Neither will argyle impersonaters that lazily substitute mere diamond shapes for the more complex traditional pattern. I'm looking at you, Donna Karan).

Anyway. That's that.

Today Brian and I went to the grocery store twice -- once for dinner things and once for juice. On the way back with our dinner things (pasta sauce has been on sale lately, it's all we eat. Well, we put it on pasta), Brian and I started talking about cats, and how he'd read this article about this parasite common in domesticated cat poo that causes "mass personality changes" in affected populations, the most consistent being "guilt proneness (a form of neuroticism)." Apparently when this same parasite makes its way into rats, it causes the rats to become "active, less cautious and more likely to be eaten by a cat, where the parasite completes its life cycle." And Brian was telling me that this isn't the only parasite like this! There's another one that affects ants, and needs to complete its life cycle inside a sheep. So it actually causes ants to climb up stalks of grass so that they'll be chomped up! Just like that!

So, yeah. Apparently Brian's infected with some sort of argyle parasite. It's just not ready to complete the cycle yet. And pink and brown just won't do.

Poor Brian. This is what he gets for bugging me to update my blog more.

In other news

It's time to give the cat his monthly flea treatment.



The first time we tried to do it (a mere dab of Frontline between the shoulder blades), he howled so loud and long that I worried our upstairs neighor would think we were strangling the little guy. And for months after, just the merest waft of fleagle treatment was enough to send the clawed beastie scurrying for the cat door. But these last few months, we've had it down to a science: one of us distracts the Monster with pets and treats while the other -- in the next room -- cracks open the dread treatment. Then while the boheamoth's attention is elsewhere, squirt! Another thriving flea metropolis is no more.

Hello, you.

Oh, it's been too long. After last November's post-every day challenge, I swore I'd never neglect this blog again. So easy, this posting every day! So rewarding! So connected to the outside world I was! But then November was over. And with nothing to say and no reason to say nothing anyway, posting fell by the wayside.

So, what have I been up to? Hard to say. Teaching, but I don't want to discuss that too much on these here internets (my students are all web-literate, as are my bosses). Writing, but nothing too noteworthy (click here for some oldish news). Organizing my vaguely ordered stacks of paper into actual labeled and color-coded files. Updating my CV and dreaming of full-time work. The mundane day to day of growing up, in other words.

Figures

So I just went on the library's website to see if they have the book on procrastination that I was looking at in the bookstore today. Turns out, they have five copies. And every single one is overdue.