Cheerfully Withdrawn

Sad

2008-08-24T13:31:00.003-04:00

So it appears that even if I imbibe in the barest minimum of alcohol, even if I stay up long enough that I feel fine and sober before I go to bed (and even though I can hold my liquor just fine besides), I will still get hungover the day after, no matter what.

I don't understand why my body is such a delicate flower in this fashion, but I guess it's just another drop in the bucket of the whole having-the-constitution-of-an-octogenarian thing.

Anyhoo, even though I am 95% sure of the classes (YAY) I will be taking this semester, I'm going to go ogle my new course catalogue (YAY). It's so pretty! I can't wait to superfluously highlight more course descriptions.

HOW have I not watched 30 Rock until now?

2008-08-21T11:19:00.004-04:00

I'm in love with Tina Fey. And finally, there are some goddamn female names in the top creative roles--the first two (edit: er, actually, three!) executive producers are women! Joy! Not surprising for a show that actually portrays its female characters as real people rather than plot devices or decoration, but incredibly and disappointingly rare in television overall. This is seriously awesome.

I have been doing other things with my time besides watching TV, but the implementation of my own personal productivity system (I finally read Getting Things Done) is not nearly so captivating as Liz Lemon et al.

And oh, yeah: I quit my job (FREEDOOOOOOOOOOOM). I've been checked out mentally for quite awhile, though, so contra my repeated listening of Think, I didn't get that much of a visceral thrill out of finally leaving. And even with the start of graduate school circling vulturelike over my psyche, I'm just not that wound up about it yet. Could be that the anti-anxiety meds are working, who knows. I'm sure I'll have a psychological breakdown soon enough, because even though I'll largely be doing the same everyday activities that I've been doing for the past year (going to classes and workshops, reading academic papers, etc. etc.), the implications for my entire life are vastly different now. (I can feel my heart rate rising as I type that.)

Well, no need to rush along the panic attack, when it'll take care of itself in its own time. Until now I'll do what I do best, and just not think about it!

Delinquency

2008-08-10T20:57:00.003-04:00

Greetings. The past few weeks have been unusually pleasant and social for summertime (I absolutely hate summer, at least when without climate control, but at least we only have a month or so of it left), and thus my absence. I'm checking in not because I have anything special to say at the moment (I've mostly been watching a lot of Golden Girls on DVD, via Netflix), but to ensure those of you who may guess otherwise that no, I am still not dead.

Not dead, and I start grad school in less than a month! Insert perfunctory "eek" here, even though I'm not that eek-y right now--mostly tired and dusty.

Anyway, quite enough of my little ramble. Time to go watch Rose deal with her disabled sister Lily.

I don't understand

2008-07-22T08:55:00.002-04:00

how it is that over the course of my recent caffeine detox, downgrading from energy drinks to Dunkin' Donuts iced coffee produced fewer headaches than downgrading the iced coffee from a large to a medium.

Help me I am uninteresting

2008-07-21T15:01:00.000-04:00

Seriously, ridiculously boring over here. The heat does not help, as it induces further lethargy and uninterestingness.

Here are a few of the uninteresting things I have been doing lately:

Getting paid for being neurotic! Or rather, will be getting paid a cool $50.00, after I complete the second part of a psych study for the self-identified anxiety-ridden. I love living by a research university; I've accumulated at least $400 just doing medical/psych studies like this one.
Finally trying out Pandora. It's all right, any given channel gets repetitive fairly quickly, but I've found some good stuff so far, like Madeleine Peyroux and Adele. And it offers me a greater variety of Bonnie Raitt than I've found on YouTube.
Procrastinating about my RA write-ups. Adviser Guy doesn't nudge me at all, which is sorta terrible, since I'm a person who needs to be nudged. I'm doing the research, just not the formal reporting on it, as I'm a class A perfectionist and am horribly afraid of the suckfulness that will emerge as I try to write the reports.
Finally getting dinner and catching up with a friend who lives literally less than a block from me. She's been there almost a year, and I'd never seen her apartment. We commiserated about how transient our friend groups are, affectionately mocked local activist politics, and made tentative plans to get together and be friends more often.
Drinking beer at 2 in the afternoon because it is the coldest beverage in the house amidst all of this horrible, horrible heat. It does make me more sleepy, though.

...And with that I am off to watch the last few AbFab episodes on this disc before I return it to Netflix.

Clean house, maturity angst

2008-07-13T16:36:00.004-04:00

Gifted with an empty apartment this weekend, I took it upon myself to do some major clean-up.

Why? A friend and former roommate visited last Friday, as he was in town to conduct his own apartment/condo hunt. He's a wonderful guy and a great roommate; we're not living together again because the lease was up last month, and at that time he was planning to move a few states over, having been stuck in waiting list purgatory at one of BTU's professional schools. Happily, a few weeks ago he got notice that he's in off the waiting list (huzzah!). Since he's doing a joint professional degree/PhD program at BTU, he's going to be living here about as long as I am. I.e., we get to hang out for forever!

So, he was crashing at my place while he looked at a few apartments, and we got to talking about what kind of spaces we'd like to live in as we continue our studies and as our twenties gradually slip away from us. After this year he's going to give some thought to buying an apartment/condo, which took me by surprise. It seems like such a grown-up move.

This naturally induced me to become vocal about my maturity insecurity, and from there we discussed the distinct post-graduate feel of my current/his former domicile. It's sort of a mess, with a bunch of kitschy accents left over from previous tenants (like the beaded curtain in the living room) as well as our own personal touches added in a like-minded spirit of whimsy over the past year (like the holiday garland draped over the inflatable alligator head) (no, really). And it's dusty and slapdash--our auxiliary TV/internet devices sit on a dining room chair because we don't have a proper stand. And the cords and duct tape. Everywhere!

So, on Saturday, after my old roomie left, I impulsively got to work. I had two discs of 90s sitcom "Living Single" to keep me company as I got to cleaning every damn thing in the living room, in addition to doing several loads of laundry, washing dishes, and going through old clothes I've been meaning to toss out. The living room was the primary focus, though, and, if I do say so myself, the results were spectacular. The floor is so shiny, and the cords are so pretty and orderly, and the dead plants have been cleaned out and their pots cleaned up. Having a respectable-looking space makes me feel much more like a real person.

We're keeping the alligator head, though.

Indecision 2008

2008-07-10T11:03:00.004-04:00

I gchatted (is that a verb? it is now. woo branding) with one of my college friends a few days ago. He's worked a really awesome-sounding non-evil consulting gig for the past year but has been making eyes at law school for as long as I can remember. He took the LSAT last month and got an appropriately fantastic score for a guy who made it his mission to be an overachiever among overachievers in college. And I know from Type A--the two of us actually "met" online the summer before freshman year via the circle-jerk that is the Princeton Review college admissions boards. (My tool roots run deep.)

Anyway, given said fantastic score and fantastic college GPA, he has as good a shot as anyone at getting in to one or more of the top law schools. When we chatted it turns out I caught him on a day that he, glowing with the shallow yet undeniably warm and pleasant affirmation bestowed by a decent standardized test score, was slacking at work in favor of looking up the strengths and weaknesses of various law schools. I contributed what I know, since I briefly considered law school though did not end up taking the dread LSAT. Hearing him so excited and excited in particular about programs with a strong social justice/social responsibility orientation, well--it didn't make me jealous, exactly, but it did sorta make me want to run off and buy an LSAT prep book and start reading law school guides and plan to audit a law school class or two this semester. To keep my options open. Or something.

I'm having the occasional moment, particularly after conversations with friends like the aforementioned, when I think of how, with very little real-world experience, I'm embarking on a commitment of upwards of six years with few employment options aside from the professoriate waiting for me on the other side (that is, if I can get a job, knock wood)--and it makes me feel like I'm looking into the abyss. Law school seems so much more practical, and a shorter commitment with more options at the end if I turn out to really despise it. And I may not despise it! How do I know! I could just love it to pieces and I'm not giving myself the chance to find out! Fool!!

And then I think of the debt, and I'm back to thinking the doctorate isn't such a bad idea, after all.

Anyway. I doubt this feeling will ever go away completely, at least until I take and subsequently hate a law school class. And I sort of doubt I'll be doing that any time soon. I know it's my natural impulse to want to learn everything about every potential life path before I commit to anything, and of course that's impossible. But still, it seems like graduate school is a particularly harsh mistress in terms of what you give of yourself and what you potentially get back, or where you can turn if you end up not liking it or if you don't get a steady job. Maybe that's just how it looks from inside the fishbowl, or rather, when you're getting ready to dive into the fishbowl.

Given that I will be second-guessing myself no matter what I do, it seems that the best way to go from here is to just shut up the doomsaying voices for awhile and keep my eyes and ears open. I have a tendency to live anywhere but the present, and I'm not going to learn anything about myself or what I want unless I commit to experiencing the situation first. Maybe then I'll start thinking about law school again. But maybe I won't.

Can I just say

2008-07-08T14:40:00.004-04:00

that I really, really hate the "word" "proactive"? What's the matter with just plain ol' "active"?

The worst part is that this non-word is showing up frequently in good-hearted documents produced by good-hearted (well, maybe) people on improving diversity in the academy and effective ways to support junior faculty.

Back to cringing at intrusions of management jargon...

When national politics alienates...

2008-07-07T00:29:00.004-04:00

So, I think I'm done with the presidential election. I'm really, really trying to like Obama, but he continues to fuck up royally--regarding FISA, faith-based organizations, reproductive issues, etc. etc. and so forth, all in the interest of pandering to people who would never vote for him anyway. I don't live in a swing state, so for whom to vote doesn't have to be a gut-wrenching decision for me--at face value McCain sucks more on, well, EVERYTHING, and I'd never in a million years actually cast a vote for him, but Obama in this incarnation does not represent my politics, and the amount of misogyny that many of his supposedly-progressive supporters were all too happy to engage in during the primary was incredibly demoralizing. Not to mention, the policy of complete non-criticism and metaphorical wagon-circling to which some of his followers are now subscribing really scares the shit out of me. My vote's not completely committed to the Greens (I still need to vet McKinney properly) or to abstention, but Obama had some serious damage control to do to earn my vote post-primary, and he just hasn't been doing it. But like I said, I'm not in a swing state, so I can feel free to vote closer to my real political stance, which is honestly a relief.

All of this to say that, since I've not been given sufficient reason to invest myself in the national campaign, I'm looking forward to using that energy elsewhere. I used to do a lot more work for our local Planned Parenthood than I do now, and with even the Democrat candidate taking up right-wing frames and religious-y rhetoric on choice, it seems like they'll need as much volunteer power as they can get.

The other thing I'm looking forward to doing is contributing toward graduate students' efforts to unionize when I join their ranks this fall. A few months ago I had coffee and what felt like the beginnings of a very aggressive organizing relationship with one of the lead union people--you know, I understand where she's coming from and am just as pro-union as she, but I found and continue to find the hard-sell approach to these things distasteful; she was trying to get me to agree to head up organizing another department in my first freaking semester of grad school. She's attempting to seal this deal a good five months before I've even enrolled. And then she had the gall to get sort of sullen when I refused to commit to her grand plan, seeing as how I'M NOT EVEN AN OFFICIAL GRADUATE STUDENT YET AND MAY NEED SOME TIME TO ACCLIMATE WHEN I AM jesus.

I mean, obviously keeping people focused on the unionization goals is necessary if you're an organizer, but fucking hell, can you at least express some basic respect for the boundaries that might be necessary for me to draw, depending on how fast I get a handle on this whole going-to-grad-school thing? Oy.

Okay, this is turning into more of a rant than the expression of enthusiasm for the grad student unionization cause that I wanted it to be, but yeah, if you know activists, you know that some of them can be just the most amazingly annoying people, if just in their activist capacity.

Trying personalities notwithstanding, I think I'd be able to make a good, solid contribution to the work the union's presently doing. It's a cause I've been aware of for a number of years, and it would give me another reason to abstractly root for getting a Democrat into the White House (hello, NLRB) in the face of feeling ambivalent about this candidacy in particular. I've thus been trying to more formally acquaint myself with matters of academic labor lately--I'm still in the midst of Bousquet's How the University Works--and I hope that will make me a more effective advocate on the grad student level. And actually, reading a bunch of academic blogs over the past year has been a wonderful education in itself. I really am looking forward to putting that education to good use.

Good to know I'm keeping it real?

2008-07-06T21:20:00.002-04:00

Fourth of July and friends

2008-07-06T20:40:00.002-04:00

On the fourth of July I was treated to the news of both Senator Jesse Helms' long-overdue demise and Barack Obama's fucking ignorant and privileged remarks on late-term abortion. On balance, a politically ambivalent day.

Luckily, I had the opportunity to take my mind off of politics, if not the patriotic spectacle of fireworks, and trekked over to a friend's parents' apartment for an Independence Day reunion. This guy whose parents' apartment it was, well, he works far far away in an area that is not the most socially progressive--it was lovely to have him back if just for a few days, and even better that several of our college friends in the area made it there. It was a grand old time, with his mother encouraging us to imbibe in their impressive variety of liquors. And the apartment had a beautiful view--we could see three or four separate fireworks shows over the course of the evening, though the ash pretty much blocked our view after two or three minutes.

I should probably make more of an effort to see my friends, particularly the ones who only live an hour or two from where I am. But it seems that everyone's extraordinarily busy and exhausted, figuring out first jobs and figuring out themselves, and before you know it you're suddenly content seeing people once every six months when you used to see them every day. I suppose with the sense of "I can get it touch with them any time I want" imparted by Facebook and Gchat and text messaging and all the rest, it's not necessarily a dire thing. Time passes so fast that it doesn't feel dire except insofar as once in awhile you get jolted with a thought of "holy shit, it's been a year already? You're totally going to be dead before you know it."

Anyway, I'm rambling now, but summer around here's been lonely, and I have to admit that this get-together was a really nice reminder that there ARE people out there who get me and who are gotten by me, as it were. I just wish they were more accessible.

My intuition was correct.

2008-07-03T22:34:00.003-04:00

In other words, the meeting of which I've been afeared this past week turned out to be underwhelming, as far as sources of potential terror go. Pretty collegial, actually. I think I've gotten a little less on-edge around Adviser Guy--at least I feel freer to be my normal sarcastic, misanthropic self. He seems to find it amusing. Which of course makes me wonder, is this something he appreciates in everyone, or is this part of the process of Golden Child-ification where I do no wrong, or does he find me more amusing/less threatening because I'm a woman, or all of the above?

Yeah, it's sort of stupid. It's better to be liked by the ones in charge than not, so I guess I should shut up and enjoy the fact that my dark humor's appreciated, and that more generally I seem to have become one of the favorites (typing that makes me feel sort of gross, but I'm not the only one who's noticed it, unfortunately). I'm just left wondering what will happen if/when I piss him off. I have no reason to believe he easily dumps students he finds promising or that he's fickle...

On second thought, actually there's some anecdotal things. He doesn't seem to appreciate the decisions of women students (perhaps men students, too, but the anecdotes in question don't involve men) who end up choosing a more family-centered life, like taking a job at a less prestigious university to be close to loved ones or putting their own career on the backburner for a bit to accommodate a spouse's or whatever.

I don't think I'd necessarily make similar decisions (life being what it is, though, that could change). My current ambitions are pretty much in line with what I imagine his ambitions are for his students, him being a professor at a fancy-pants university--I'd like a job at a research university that has a good name for itself, sufficient resources, all that. I'm not so hot on teaching, I don't think. But then again, I've never taught, so who's to say that I won't end up liking it? Who's to say what I'll want, six years from now?

It's this uncertainty that makes me wary. I feel like I won't become a black sheep as long as my ambitions for me and his ambitions for me continue to match. And there's a good chance they'll continue to do so, all the way through the time I go on the market. But the prospect of my life goals' changing, as scary as such transformation can be on its own, has much more dire consequences if the favor of my adviser depends upon their continuing to look a very particular way.

Lazy days of summer &c.

2008-07-02T22:39:00.005-04:00

It's been particularly pleasant around my life for the past couple of days, as the office has really gone into suspended animation--I can't do anything on this big important report until we get more edits from the higher-ups, one of the new people has gone off on a planned vacation for two weeks, and the other new person is still getting her sea legs, so it's quite educational for her to be doing all of the things that I could ostensibly helping with. Besides, there's not much to be done in general, so, you know, it's good for her to get in all the acclimation that she can, with me just doing troubleshooting. Heh. Nice work if you can get it...

In any case, it's finally given me more time during the day to do this research that I'm supposed to have been doing. I've been plugging away for the past three days, especially because I've a meeting with the supervising prof tomorrow. Unfortunately it's not going as fast as I'd hope, though it has become significantly more fun for me, for whatever mysterious reason. Perhaps due to my starting to take the anti-anxiety meds again. Who knows.

Anyhoo, I'm quite pleased because it appears that my original slacking intentions for the summer are finally coming to fruition, and I'll get to use my 9-to-5 hours to do a good bit more academicky things. Although, it's going to land me with no real time off, no real summer between now and the start of grad school, if I do the RA gig all the way through. I was thinking I'd ask my adviser for a one-week vacation, officially sanctioned, starting tomorrow. I want to do some Nothing for the tiniest while, you know?

But I'm having second thoughts about that request, especially since I got a slow start on the research. I feel a responsibility to my adviser and I'm disappointed in said slow start, to be sure, but I'm also thinking that having a real initiation into a lifestyle of "get up, work for a long time on research, crap out, go home" on a regular schedule, rather than just the frantic preparation I'm used to doing immediately before deadlines, will be a necessary kick in the ass for me. Plus, I tend to get antsy when I do "nothing" for too long of a time, anyway. So I might not ask for time off until about a month of intensive researching has gone by. Maybe it'll teach me something.

Anyway. Back to summarizing articles. I'm a bit scared of this meeting tomorrow, but I'm usually scared of meetings with authority figures, which then subsequently turn out to be not as horrible as I expected, so I'm hoping things will go relatively smoothly. I know I got some 'splaining to do, but I'm ready to do it and to grovel but good. I also have some interesting new stuff, so I'm hoping that will serve as a successful offering while I bow and scrape, as a cat offers a dead bird to its caretaker.

Okay, I've had either too much or not enough caffeine, off with me now...

Eh.

2008-06-28T16:53:00.000-04:00

Things that make me sad:

having to go back to the DMV on Friday after I had already spent three and a half hours there Thursday
that my horrible boss used the slang "sweet" in an email, in a pathetically transparent attempt to ingratiate herself to one of the new, early-20s-aged staffpeople
breaking/chipping a tooth on a chicken bone and needing to go in for a mini-filling next week
summertime, both for the hot weather that makes me uncomfortable and for many of my friends' having skipped town, leaving me a hermit

Things that alleviate sadness somewhat:

that the Friday revisit to the DMV took less than an hour (shock)
planning to buy a Met ticket package with my friends for the upcoming season (yay opera! though the number of options is rather paralyzing)
that there's a university computer lab with air conditioning in which I can take refuge while I read some continental philosophy

And the hum of the various lights/air conditioning units/computer set-ups in the lab is pretty soothing, as well. Now, back to the books.

From the deep freeze

2008-06-25T16:03:00.000-04:00

About half a year ago (yikes...) I started some entries that never made it through to posting. Here's one of them that I think is sort of interesting as a snapshot of my growing-up angst:

"My mom and I don't talk about the big narrative arc of my life much. She knows I'm interested in pursuing arts, which was my rationale for staying in the same place after I graduated in the spring, but as far as the my other options went, eh. I kept them to myself. Mostly because there were so many other options, the bulk of which were indistinguishable to me in terms of the potential career satisfaction they'd offer. Cause, really, who the hell was I to know?

"Other options," obviously, have grown increasingly important in my life of late, particularly over the past summer. I've got the Ph.D. program to think about--for which I was basically guaranteed admission today, according to Advisor Guy ("not that we're corrupt or anything")--and I'm more and more enthusiastic about pursuing a career in academia. I don't know how I feel about this in the context of my musical aspirations. My job and my auditing of classes just drains me so much, which, along with a lack of practice space and a busy teacher, has really put the brakes on my big plans for how much of myself I was going to devote to music."

That's where it ended, as I am wont to leave my thoughts incomplete. (Bad habit.)

Where I was going to go with that was a phone conversation I'd had with my mom that prompted the writing of the post. In the conversation I told her that I was applying to a Ph.D. program, and for the first time I was confronted with the reality that my mom has little idea what that meant, either as a practical matter (how many years it takes, will I have enough money to live on) or what sort of career path such a course of study routes people into. It was a little weird, correcting her that it's more likely to take six to eight years rather than three or four, and needing to specify that (for all intents and purposes) I'm pretty much bound to becoming a professor afterward (taking good luck on the job market as a given, knock wood).

I think the weird/vaguely queasy vibe I got from the conversation stems from two things. One, it really drove home that my mom and I are quite distant from each other; we make pleasant, small-potatoes talk on the phone, but we're neither of us the most forthcoming people. She has little idea of the specifics of my life or opinions, and vice-versa. I don't think we've ever been entirely comfortable around one another. So, my announcing to her, from her perspective from out of nowhere, that I'm going to get a Ph.D. (when I was supposed to be pursuing this arts career), and her supportive but slightly bemused reaction, underscored that basic wall that's between us and likely always will be.

Two, building on the first thing: it seems that if I enter this profession of which my mom has pretty much no knowledge, despite her being a well-educated person herself, well, it just seems like there really will be no "going home again" (even if such a "home" of reciprocity never truly existed). I mean, perhaps this separation happened to some extent when I went off to an elite/elitist college for my undergrad degree, but it didn't seem that different on the surface--my mom went to college. She skipped two grades when she was a kid, so notwithstanding familial constraints, I'm sure she could have gotten in to as good a school as I did (paying for it would have been another matter, in the days before generous financial aid packages). Heck, she has a master's degree, so she still out-credentials me. But I can't shake the sense that this Ph.D. deal is going to make any efforts at "getting" each other quite a bit tougher from now on.

RBOC: it's still too hot for my liking despite being overcast

2008-06-24T12:14:00.006-04:00

When I first started watching Curb Your Enthusiasm a year and a half ago I wasn't too fond of it on account of the relentless pessimism and awkwardness. Now I love it and think that Larry David might be the closest personality-match I've ever had in a TV character. What does this mean?

My car is an embarrassment, like a midlife-crisising person trying to hard to retain its youth. "I can go from 0 to 30 in five seconds, baby, and I'MA LET YOU KNOW IT WITH MY MACHO ENGINE GROWL please ignore that the passenger window can't roll down and the AC works only intermittently LOOK AT MY BRIGHT BRIGHT RED PAINT AND MY TINTED WINDOWS RRRR." Sad.

Our freezer is so clean, it is surprising. One of my new roommates is quite industrious! She tells me she's a binge-cleaner, like myself, so it will probably work out as long as our binges settle into a complementary schedule.

My current credit card balance is particularly scary because I've been picking up the group bill at restaurants lately because I get reward points that way. But this does not reduce the initial scariness of seeing the credit card bill.

Despite this, I'm still going to make an online purchase in the interest of doing some street activism. Except I'm not sure if there are any really prominent stop signs around my neighborhood. Will scout this today.

Circadian math

2008-06-19T12:08:00.003-04:00

Most of my classes in the coming semester will begin at 9:30 a.m. I went to sleep at 4 this morning. This, perhaps, necessitates an adjustment plan.

Physical (vs. mental) exhaustion

2008-06-18T15:29:00.008-04:00

I've never had a very hardy constitution. Had I been born in the 19th century, I totally would have been one of those kids who died of consumption or exposure or scabies. If the temperature's over 75, I wilt, and that's when the humidity's livable. And I've always been a depressive, too, which I don't believe is unrelated to my tendency toward fatigue.

So I've grown worried lately, thinking about not so much the mental but the physical requirements of an academic job. About how I plan on dealing with the exertion (and in my case the almost certainly attendant exhaustion) that seems to be necessary for success.

At the beginning of college I discovered better living through self-medication, the medication in question being caffeine (initially in coffee form, but then on to other caffeinated beverages). I have addictive tendencies/trouble with temperance, so caffeine has on occasion evolved into more of a crutch than a help, but for all intents and purposes I now cannot imagine my life without it: it makes me feel better, at least in certain mysterious doses, the amount of which I unfortunately have trouble anticipating from day to day. When I overload on it, it makes me more tired and more likely to fall into a funk. And even after all this time I haven't figured out what works consistently, though I continue trying to make the most of the whole "your body, your science experiment" motto. I hope I'll learn something one of these days.

All of which is to say that even now, with caffeine a staple in my toolbox (metaphor mixing what?), I am frequently have no goddamn clue what I'm doing with it. And I continue to be sleepy and/or grumpy and/or anxious and depressed.

On top of this, I am not at all a productive worker. I come across, apparently, as rather intense and scary regarding work in real life, and I AM very intense about schoolwork for the most part. The problem is, I spend more time stressing over it than actually doing it. (Even now, I'm writing this blog post instead of doing my RA work.) Nonetheless, the last-minute work on which I've skated by has always held me in good stead. I'm a decent writer, so I rarely did more than one draft of any paper in undergrad--reason partially being that I edit as I go along, partially being that I'd start writing no earlier than the day before a paper was due such that there was no time for second drafts.

But even given the psychological barriers to my doing low-intensity, ongoing work (I need to read more Boice, apparently), I'm concerned about the extent to which my mood/physical comfort affects my ability to motivate myself to work, and how easily I'm discomfited. I read the academic blog posts about the fourteen-hour days, all nighters, running from class to meeting to designated research time, and I just think, even WITH caffeine, how the hell am I ever going to do this? I never was that good at all nighters in undergrad, and honest to God, I'm already feeling my "advanced" age in my early/mid-20s. I've always had the mental outlook of a 50-year-old, and now my body's settling in to match. I now value sleep! Or not so much value as actually need a lot of it to function. Unless I sleep too much, in which case I'm groggy. Meh.

I suppose I'm worrying a lot about this right now because I've been feeling particularly crappy lately--I have never dealt well with heat, and again, when I'm feeling bad physically it will affect my mood, as well. I've never been an equilibrated sort. I also have inklings that I'm falling into depression again.

In any case, I'm trying to deal with this through a few small things. I've signed up for an awesome summer yoga class, of which there are ostensibly two sections, MW and TTh, but the awesome instructor lets us come all four days a week. Class hurts, but in a good way, and I hope it'll add some structure to my day and eventually increase my energy level. I'm also planning to make an appointment with health services to see someone about anti-anxiety medication; I took them freshman-sophomore year and they helped a lot with physical symptoms of anxiety that hindered my ability to concentrate. No clue if they'd still be helpful, but since I strongly suspect that the physical exhaustion has a mental tie-in, I'm hoping I'll hit on something effective.

Even with the incremental changes, though, it's a tall order to turn my fatiguing tendencies into round-the-clock productivity required for professional success in academia. It seems to be a marathon-length run at a sprint pace, and I'm totally uneasy about my ability to handle that.

A thought from a warmed globe

2008-06-14T16:36:00.003-04:00

I don't mind being at the grad student offices doing research on a Saturday afternoon. It means that I can revel in the arctic temperatures offered up by its cooling unit, versus the seasonable warmth I experience inside my apartment. Plus it's peaceful and deserted here, with only the hum of what I imagine is aforementioned cooling system to keep me company. (And the research is fun, too!)

Hey kids.

2008-06-07T23:57:00.008-04:00

I have returned (three months can sure fly by), having contracted out my youth to a Ph.D. program at charmingly (?) elitist Better Than U. I'm planning to continue my present work through the summer for the sake of the paycheck, but I aspire to put in as minimal an amount of genuine effort as possible.

I also have some academicky stuff on my summer reading list, but right now it's all I can do to finish up these back-issues of Wired and Bitch and MakeShift for the sake of decluttering my apartment--perhaps it's a good idea to leave off the academicky stuff for a few months, anyway, so I can at least not be totally put off it when I return to reading nothing but that sort of thing when I start classes again in the fall.

It's still not entirely hit me yet, but I do feel like a parenthetical (eek) belongs in that sentence about starting classes again in three months...

In more current events, this primary season has depressed me remarkably. The best articulation for my feelings is the always on-point feminist blog Shakesville, and my link-of-the-day for the past couple of days has been this one.

That's all for now.

Alive, and wrangled

2008-03-09T20:46:00.002-04:00

Brief update: although I have not officially contracted the rest of my twenties out to my chosen graduate institution just yet, it is surely only a matter of time.

Cheers and happy daylight savings time to all.

One of my three wishes:

2008-01-13T15:10:00.001-05:00

The power, despite my peon status, to shut down logorrheic superiors so that meetings are actually completed in a speedy fashion, rather than in the niggling, time-wasting, mind-numbing way of the land. (Some disciplines have a greater disposition toward this than others, it seems. Granted, my sample size is small.)

Is there a way to finesse this such that one can make efficiency happen while not needing to be the equal or superior of everyone in the room? This sort of thing seems like it would be less of a problem in the day-to-day life of a garden variety grad student, but this period of relative calm could very likely circle back to bite one on the ass when one finally (hopefully) becomes junior faculty. I imagine it's best to acquire such skills now, rather than later.

Ecch!

Measuring class: the meme approach

2008-01-10T17:02:00.000-05:00

Via many, many academic bloggers.

"Yeses" are in bold, caveats and comments in parentheses:
Total yes: 16
Total no: 18

1. Father went to college
2. Father finished college
3. Mother went to college
4. Mother finished college
5. Have any relative who is an attorney, physician, or professor
6. Were the same or higher class than your high school teachers
7. Had more than 50 books in your childhood home (A good chunk of them were probably children's books. Mom and I both made copious use of the library.)
8. Had more than 500 books in your childhood home
9. Were read children’s books by a parent
10. Had lessons of any kind before you turned 18
11. Had more than two kinds of lessons before you turned 18 (more than two kinds, but never simultaneously)
12. The people in the media who dress and talk like me are portrayed positively. (with caveat--there's also the whole "woman" thing)
13. Had a credit card with your name on it before you turned 18.
14. Your parents (or a trust) paid for the majority of your college costs. (HA!)
15. Your parents (or a trust) paid for all of your college costs. (")
16. Went to a private high school.
17. Went to summer camp.
18. Had a private tutor before you turned 18.
19. Family vacations involved staying at hotels. (Never went on any family vacations.)
20. Your clothing was all bought new before you turned 18.
21. Your parents bought you a car that was not a hand-me-down from them.
22. There was original art in your house when you were a child.
23. You and your family lived in a single-family house.
24. Your parent(s) owned their own house or apartment before you left home. (Nor after. Still have quite a few years on the mortgage.)
25. You had your own room as a child.
26. You had a phone in your room before you turned 18.
27. Participated in a SAT/ACT prep course.
28. Had your own TV in your room in high school.
29. Owned a mutual fund or IRA in high school or college.
30. Flew anywhere on a commercial airline before you turned 16. (Flights used to visit relatives on my dad's side a few times when I was under 7 or so. Father's funeral was in his family's state, so I imagine I flew then, though I don't remember that far back.)
31. Went on a cruise with your family.
32. Went on more than one cruise with your family.
33. Your parents took you to museums and art galleries as you grew up.
34. You were unaware of how much heating bills were for your family.

(Copyright: Will Barratt, Meagan Cahill, Angie Carlen, Minnette Huck, Drew Lurker, Stacy Ploskonka , "From What Privileges Do You Have?" Illinois State University)

The survey really highlights that there is no one good way to measure class. My family's always been working class by income standards, but the levels of and commitment to education in my immediate family were pretty high, as was my household's general "cultural capital." That, no doubt, aided me in gaining admission to an elite university and being able to seamlessly integrate myself into its discourse, both academic and social. (In other words, tee hee, I can walk among "them" undetected!) In that way, I consider my relatively high score to be pretty appropriate, even though on tax forms we looked a lot "lower-statused."

That said, you can look at many of these items (and many have) and interpret them in different ways, either as being able to indicate lower/upper class simultaneously (e.g. "why would a family go on a cruise twice, when they could vacation in other, nicer places?"; not having television in keeping with an ethical line that it's bad for kids, which seems anecdotally to be a more common view in upper-class households) or as indicating aspects of one's circumstances that are not particularly class-inflected (e.g. I had my own room because I had no siblings; an upper-kid kid who doesn't need a private tutor probably won't have one).

One can also argue over the relative weighting of the items (I personally wouldn't equate having a trust paying 100% of your college costs with having a phone in your room, but that's just me), as well as some significant omissions--being raised by one parent springs immediately to mind. In any case, I'm glad the exercise was developed, and I hope it eventually gets put to good use and discussion in college classrooms.

These things have added so much Zen to my life.

2008-01-10T07:00:00.000-05:00

I'm not even kidding.

Bingbingbingbingbingbing...

Oh, Gloria

2008-01-09T07:15:00.000-05:00

I've seen a lot of people, online and off, comment and/or applaud this piece by Gloria Steinem in yesterday's New York Times. Although I was initially pleased to see a feminist voice in the mainstream media (unfortunate that it's so rare that non-"celebrity" feminists get a pulpit, but that's another story), the piece started to give me real pause starting here:

That’s why the Iowa primary was following our historical pattern of making change. Black men were given the vote a half-century before women of any race were allowed to mark a ballot, and generally have ascended to positions of power, from the military to the boardroom, before any women (with the possible exception of obedient family members in the latter).

That paragraph and the next definitely raised a "my oppression is greater than yours" red flag. I was glad to see that, at least, Steinem does explicitly deny that she's trying to engage in a pissing contest and references intersectionality, though it has a patina of lip service to it: "I’m not advocating a competition for who has it toughest. The caste systems of sex and race are interdependent and can only be uprooted together." But something still bothered me about it, and additionally, I was bothered that I liked the op-ed as much as I did.

Then, I read a post at Angry Black Bitch that expressed very well what the underlying problem is, and that's how Steinem's op-ed basically disappears women of color. The whole post is great, but this excerpt really encapsulated it for me:

What worries me is that this is kind of article that makes some black women wary of feminism…wary of the sisterhood…because eventually, just give it time, it will all come down to black and white or women and men with black women vanished from the equation.

Even if I think that Steinem has an impressive handle on and an accessible way of communicating the gender barriers that are still so deeply ingrained in our society, this kind of erasure of women of color remains pervasive in feminist discourse. I can't deny that the piece was initially very appealing to me (and I do love Steinem's writing style), but I also can't say that that's not at least partially because it pandered to white women's privilege. And that's not acceptable.

Does it make me a big dork...

2008-01-06T20:48:00.000-05:00

...that I'm reading advice books targeted at faculty members even before I've officially been accepted into a Ph.D. program?

...that I would/will totally buy and wear this, without necessarily being 100% ironic in doing so?:

...that today I was struck by an itch for a Nalgene that is, in some fashion, theorist-themed? No, seriously, I swear I saw a fellow undergrad carrying one a few years back whose graduations were marked with major philosophers and some glib remark or another to go with each. (Google totally failed to help me out in my search, incidentally.)

I already know the answers to these questions...

It feels like the inside of my head is trying to escape by pushing through the back of my eyes.

2008-01-04T18:20:00.000-05:00

I guess this is to be expected, since it's been awhile since I've had one of my recurring throat/nose-sinus-y affairs. Although I would have thought that recent frigid temperatures would have, I don't know, frozen the germs, or at least made them sluggish, whatever. This is why I'm not a scientist.

Related question: should one be taken ill, but one's body normally functions only with regular infusions of caffeine, does one continue or modify usual caffeine consumption?

Iowa: eh. My preference for awhile now has gone Edwards, Clinton, Obama. I used to like Obama more, but for some reason he's starting to rub me the wrong way. Maybe if I read one of his books it'd make me feel better about his substance. Or I'll ask my policy-wonk friends to convince me. In any case, I am, of course, happy to have him a million times over any Republican. Duh. Speaking of, I don't know whether to be happy or horrified about the Huckabee thing. I had thought that if he by some anti-miracle gained the nomination, he would wither and die in the general election. Cause seriously--have we learned nothing from the past eight years? But it just makes me sick to my stomach to imagine another religious right victory. Honestly, I would have to renounce citizenship, flee to Canada, or something more drastic. I'm actually getting sad thinking about it, so I'll shut up now and distract myself with some DVDs and pills.

Done.

2008-01-03T04:37:00.000-05:00

Application sent, fee waiver obtained (How the hell do you justify charging $80 to apply for admission to a training program for academics? Doctors, lawyers, sure, fine, I can see that, but academics?), personal statement beaten into submission by compulsive editing, yep, looks like I covered everything. And now my sleep schedule's so turned around that it's 4:45 in the morning, and I'm really not tired at all. Time to play around on eBay.

Snowed in

2007-12-14T16:25:00.000-05:00

Locked in my apartment all day, working from home; it's just as well that I didn't even attempt to get to the office first thing, as when I attempted to go somewhere later in the afternoon, my car got stuck in the snowdrifts three-quarters of the way out the driveway. That was some fun times, friends. Thank god for friendly people on the street who know the right combination of pushing and rocking and shifting and shoveling to extract a low-quality mobile tin can from winter's detritus. I then parked my car as deep in the driveway it would go and settled back into my home workspace.

So. GREs are done, recommendations are done, transcripts are done, now I only have the some statements of purpose to struggle fruitlessly over for a few weeks. I was never a big fan of this genre of writing, due to my own problems articulating a clearly-defined set of research interests and projects. My questions all get so large that they lose coherency. Which is kind of a problem when you're looking to publish bite-sized chunks of inquiry and develop coherent projects and the like. You know, the whole being-an-academic part of being an academic. Hm.

I do desperately hope that I'll somehow acquire this ability somewhat naturally (osmosis-like...) when I'm a full-time student again. I don't recognize "the publishable topic/paper/etc." when I see it, yet. I have a paper that I'm in the process of substantially cutting and revising for submission to a journal, on the recommendation of Adviser Guy. I wouldn't have thought of it as something publishable until somebody told me so. Re-play of a conversation from a few weeks ago:

Me: I don't know how to write something that's publishable!
AG: Well, this [the paper] is publishable.
Me: But I don't know how I did that!

So I guess until I figure out a process, "spirit possession" will be my process-by-default. I'm sure that's sustainable.

That's all for now. Many thank-yous to Sisyphus, whose lovely shiny blogger gift came in the mail on Wednesday.

Limbo + presents

2007-10-25T21:58:00.000-04:00

I don't know what I'm doing with my life. Specifically with grad school, but the grad school I select (or the set of departments I choose to apply to, and when) has implications for other potential career paths that are important to me, not to mention for my current position.

My solution? Take a mental health day, and catch up on sleep for most of it. Yes, I am an avoider. However, I think it did provide some perspective. But I still have a lot of reading and thinking to do. And potentially scrambling to meet other departments' deadlines. Or potentially withdrawing my one application. Life is full of endless possibility, ain't it? Goddamn.

In other news, in light of Sisyphus's generosity, I have an offer to make to all two of you who read this:

By the end of the calendar year, I will send a tangible, physical gift to each of the first five people to comment here. The catch? Each person must make the same offer on her/his blog.

(And no, if fewer than five people comment, you can't come back for seconds.)

No, really, I am here.

2007-10-02T22:14:00.000-04:00

I just have been too exhausted and busy most of the time to be interesting. (And that is the only reason for my ever not being interesting cough)

Hey, so it's October, isn't it? I should get on with taking that ol' GRE exam, shouldn't I now? Which means I should start knowing what words like "sedulous" mean. And how to, um, do geometry.

I'm now having second thoughts about applying only to one grad program. I think I'm getting sick of this university, even though I'm not even an undergraduate here anymore. I hope these feelings pass, a process which I plan to aid by ignoring said feelings completely. La la la, can't hear you, doubt!

Oh, and also, I'm getting my wisdom teeth out next week. I'm ambivalent, as even though I know sweet sweet drugs wait for me on the other side, I'm probably not going to be so good for personal-statement-writing for awhile if I'm in a Vicodin haze. Though I'm willing to be convinced otherwise.

Are the Chronicle blog titles always this tongue-in-cheek/ironic?

2007-09-18T17:35:00.000-04:00

Or is it just a bad day?

Princeton Gives Top Marks to Its 3-Year-Old Policy to Control Grade Inflation

Thanks to Colleges, Students Just as Ignorant as They Were Last Year, Report Says

In related news, I'm so glad that, due to my circumstances, I have a free online subscription to the Chronicle. I'm getting to cultivating my academe nerdiness/navel-gazing to an extent not previously thought possible. Look, I even used the term "academe."

In unrelated news, I'm sick. Ugh.

Pseudo-productive things I did today

2007-09-15T01:19:00.000-04:00

(That "s" in the title is misleading...)

During a lull in work this afternoon (not so much a "lull" as an "oh my God I CANNOT read/answer any more e-mails or I'll end up forking myself in the eye") I paid a courtesy call to Better Than U Grad School's online application. I took the opportunity to enter the contact information for my second recommender, Advisor Guy, whose assistant had just let me know that he'd be fine with using the website to submit his letter. I already had the go-ahead from Mentor Woman to enter her in last week, so aside from the (rather significant, natch) next step of getting said recommendations actually submitted, I've two down, one to go.

And that's where we have a problem.

My would-be third recommender, outside my discipline but quite relevant for my academic interests--and, most importantly, knows and likes my work--has gone on "deep leave." Meaning that she's not writing any recommendations unless prearranged. And I did not know this until I sent her an e-mail in mid-August and got an auto-reply saying as much.

FUCK.

I'm aware of how necessary it is for faculty to protect their research time, especially when presented with the opportunity to take a sabbatical--I don't want it to seem as if I'm not sympathetic to that. But, dude! AUGUST, and already no deal if not prearranged? Can't I get a grace period? A grandfather clause? I didn't even know for certain that I would be applying in this admissions cycle until a week before I e-mailed! (And I thought I was being good by asking four months in advance...)

All is not lost. She did write me a recommendation for something a few semesters ago, and I wrote a cordial and tiptoe-y e-mail asking if she might be able to find time to pull that out of the deep freeze and send it along, just change the dates or whatever. And, most charitably on her part, she did respond, though unfortunately to say that she hasn't been able to find it in her files. aaaaaaaaaaaaagh. So now what I do is pray that she stumbles across it before earlyish November, probably the latest I should be asking people for recs. (Unless any readers think otherwise...?)

This wouldn't be so bad but for the fact that she's basically the only person who knows me as an academic being from whom I haven't already requested a recommendation. I know other professors, in a few cases fairly well, but they have little experience with my work that was a) not mediated by TA grading, and/or b) the best stuff I'm capable of.

Presuming my would-be third doesn't find that old letter, I think what I'll do is schedule an appointment with Professor I've Assisted, From Whom I Took Two Classes, And Who Likes Me to talk more about my academic interests and plans for graduate work, and then hope that's enough for her to go on to write a compelling letter on my behalf. Although I accidentally saw a letter she wrote for me for another thing awhile back, and it was pretty "eh."

Of course, all of this probably doesn't matter, given that those first two letter writers are tenured members of the department to which I'm applying for admission--one of them actually being the guy I want to work with and have advise my dissertation.

Any advice, ether?

Peace! And quiet! ...!!!

2007-09-15T00:51:00.000-04:00

I had a feeling my burst of sociability last week would burn off quickly. It's probably due to more factors than my introverted side's strangled cries for mercy, namely, that I've been so ridiculously busy with work (and now, school--hooray for auditing a most wonderful class with Advisor Guy) that I have not furnished my body with enough rest to actually enjoy consciousness--much less consciousness in the company of others when I feel like I have a bunch of shit to do that's not been done. Along those lines, my room's really messy and there are a bunch of dirty dishes in the sink since it was my week to clean the kitchen and I most certainly have not and though my roommates are lovely and understanding and care more about my physical and mental health than about the stagnant water collecting in our dirty half-rinsed wine glasses--this bothers me.

But!

(There is cause for exclamation points!)

Not ONLY was I able to sleep an extraordinarily helpful twelve hours last night, but...! My lovely and understanding roommates?

GONE!

For the whole weekend!

All three of 'em!!!

...

Sorry, I'm a little giddy. I had known that two roommates would be away, but it was only about twenty minutes ago and after an evening of puzzling (albeit very serene puzzling in an atmosphere of quiet relaxation) that I remembered the third had also been planning to go out of town this weekend. And this makes me way, way too happy.

But not as happy as I'll be once I have those damn dishes done.

Random bullets of wisdom teeth. And angst.

2007-09-11T00:50:00.000-04:00

Okay, the title of this post is kind of a lie, but I don't care. First, non-bulleted wisdom teeth update (fascinating):

Last Wednesday I went to the dentist (yay having dental insurance!) to get some x-rays. I was originally supposed to have had that appointment tomorrow morning, but they were able to squeeze me in last week because I called whining about my sudden inability to swallow without swells of jaw pain. Verdict? I'm teething! Or on the top of one side of my mouth, I am. Apparently one of the little suckers was able to fight its way through without getting too impacted, and that mysterious okay-something's-pinching-something-but-there's-nothing-in-that-area-of-my-mouth-to-pinch pain that was waking me up at night? Tooth, ripping flesh. And now it's extraordinarily weird to grope around the back of my mouth and feel, hey, more chewing capability back there!

Now the bottom tooth on that same side is starting in, but it's semi-impacted and thus going to be much more annoying to wrench out. And speaking of annoying, the wisdom tooth on the bottom on the OTHER side is, like, completely horizontally impacted. So, it's off to the oral surgeon for me, and with all due speed. By which I mean September 27th. For the consultation. Yeah. Thanks, guys. I'm hoping none of my shifting teeth begin to inconveniently press on any nerves before then. I'm actually still up now because I'm having this inexplicable headache/sinus pain, and I know nothing about whether that could be connected to my teeth, but dammit, until I know better I'm gonna blame it on them.

The angst, believe it or not, is actually completely un-teeth-related. It was prompted by (another) conversation with (another) grad student. Basically the example this guy sets has got me all in a tizzy about my own motivations and ability to trust/believe in myself. More on that soon.

Another good reason to be angsty? I had to get my MacBook's power adapter replaced because, um, the wires were starting to burn through their protective covering (thanks, Apple!). I sent my craptastic fire/death hazard of an adapter back in the little box the AppleCare people sent me, but the bastards apparently did not receive it, because they just charged $76 to my credit card. *(@$&*(&%$^*(#*@&$#). Although I guess I should be glad that now my computer poses a slightly (?) lowered risk of immolating me while I sleep. Cheers!

You know it's fall

2007-09-06T15:46:00.001-04:00

when they bring back the pumpkin spice lattes at Starbucks.

Okay, back to work...

It's fun to be social!

2007-09-04T23:30:00.000-04:00

I knew I'd have to work harder at having a social life/being a non-loser when I left college. It's only natural, no longer having forty of your closest friends living ten to sixty seconds away. But I didn't anticipate how accomplished I'd feel simply by virtue of having a successful dinner with my housemates and a new person I met at my HR orientation. The food thrown together was kind of crap (we're none of us cooks around here), but the company was lovely--New Person, a fellow recent grad who just moved to the area, really clicked with our merry band, and we're all hanging out again next week. Yay for non-loser-dom!

I've been feeling particularly warm and fuzzy about social things lately--two of my undergrad friends who now live far and farther away came to visit yesterday, I'm getting to know and quite like my coworker who also just graduated from BTU, and all my non-grad friends have been coming back for the start of the new semester, so there's been an unusual influx of people to catch up with. Plus the pestering-grad-students stratagem has been a good way to get acquainted with more folk; I like having a reason to talk to new people. That's the rub--I love knowing people, but I hate having to find and meet them. The grad student thing, and the HR/recent-grad thing, and the coworker thing, we come equipped with stuff to talk about! Instant acquaintanceship.

Wow. I'm afraid if this continues I might lose my misanthropic credibility. But right now I'll just enjoy it. I mean, it's hard not to have fun when one is like so totally popular! *gigl*

Maybe herein lies some explanation for the neuroses articulated by the previous post

2007-09-02T01:16:00.000-04:00

'Cause I just can't resist, more personality test results. This time, personal DNA:

Considerate Visionary

(I also like that I'm both low masculinity and low femininity. Does that mean I'm androgynous, or just bland?)

Talk to me.

2007-09-02T00:54:00.000-04:00

My default course of action, no matter the situation, is to gather information. Knowing more about something can never hurt, right? If I have perfect information, I can anticipate all consequences and be confident in the perfection of my own response.

As the amount of times I used a variant of the word "perfect" in the preceding sentence might indicate, this so-called course of "action" amounts to procrastination, the M.O. of those afflicted by crippling perfectionism (hi!).

This is enough of a pathology on its own. My problem is, given a critical mass of evidence, I tend to resolve myself to whatever course of action "feels right," which is often congruent with assuming whatever I really really want to happen will happen. And, stupidly, for several significant life decisions this has worked out okay. I applied early to Better Than U for undergrad, had a good feeling about my chances even though it's a complete crap shoot for ALL students, and after I got my acceptance notice in mid-December it thankfully no longer mattered that I had not started a single application to other schools. This summer I stumbled upon a job opening that I had reason to believe I was an excellent candidate for, and despite the disturbingly excessive length of the search and hire process, I thought to myself, "what's the point of writing all those cover letters and redoing your résumé to send to a bunch of positions you're nowhere near as enthusiastic about? It makes so much sense for them to give you this job. They will!" And they... did.

I know, poor baby. But bear with me for a moment while I work through my issues.

I can maintain my perfectionist street cred because my refusal to do any real work in pursuit of Plans B once I've put all my eggs in one big-life-decision basket does not in any way keep me from worrying about my lack of work done on behalf of alternatives. I spent endless time from junior year of high school on, obsessing about which schools to apply to, reading the Fiske guide, honing my list of colleges according to constantly-evolving Perfection Criteria. Then Better Than U emerged as a first choice, and my gut told me this was it. Which did nothing to stop me from worrying about the essays I did not want to write (and didn't) and audition tapes I did not want to record (and didn't) for other schools while I awaited BTU's decision. And as the hiring cycle for This Job dragged on and on, I would check BTU's HR website, constantly finding other suitable openings for which I reeeeally did not want to submit applications. Once I have my ideal situation in mind, I make bad faith overtures toward preparing for the worst-case scenario without actually applying myself, unless you count the stress and obsessing.

This, as you may already have been thinking, is stupid. Really stupid. The wisest thing would probably be to prepare my back-ups more concretely. And if I'm not going to do any triage work, I should get the fuck over myself and at least be a little carefree about it.

I know this, intellectually.

But. Here in front of me, we have graduate school. Hi, graduate school! You look fulfilling and benign here from my not-in-graduate-school vantage point. Anyway, again it seems like I've stumbled into a pretty sweet situation, through no effort of my own. First of all, BTU's department in my discipline is excellent for my interests. I did not realize this until, by sheer dumb luck, I came upon Big-Deal-particularly-in-Subfield-of-Interest Advisor Guy my senior year. I wrote my senior thesis with him, he liked it, and he seems to have my back in all things admissions. Also by sheer dumb luck, three years ago I also happened upon Also-a-Big-Deal-in-the-Discipline Awesome Mentor Woman, long before I knew the first thing about what I might want out of advanced academic study (if I wanted advanced academic study), much less what discipline in which to pursue my all-over-the-place interests. She let me into one of her graduate seminars as a lowly sophomore, which I appreciate even though I felt like I didn't really belong there and was intimidated as all hell by the grad students, and she has been a wonderful intellectual and personal support the entire time I've known her. She's also, naturally, in my corner for admissions; that's just the kind of person she is.

Leaving the it's-likely-I'll-get-in thing aside, there are other compelling reasons for me to stay here. I like BTU City; if I enroll next fall I know I'll still have social support around, since one of my roommates is staying at least another year, too; my one-of-a-kind music teacher is here, and I do not want to give up the seriousness with which I study singing just yet. And, like I said, BTU's department looks unique in terms of what it can offer me as a student in Subfield. I already know I have productive working relationships with Advisor Guy and Awesome Mentor Woman. It can't really be this fucking easy for me again, can it?

Of course it can't. I wouldn't let it, natch.

In practical terms this means I end up talking to a lot of grad students. I could, you know, study for the GRE or start writing my personal statement or even attempt to contact some professors in my field at the other departments I was looking at earlier in the summer, before I concluded that BTU is where it's at. But, nah! I talk to BTU's graduate students. I talk to them and ask them questions about applying to grad school, this department, its culture, blah blah blah. All of that conversation is useful, and pretty pleasant, too. But what I'm really looking for is for people to tell me that given my situation, no, it's not the most ill-advised thing in the world to apply to only one department, (presumably) get in, and go on my merry way.

And you know? That's pretty much what I've gotten. It is going to be that easy for me, apparently(?). Maybe. Again. Eek/yay!

And if it isn't, I can only hope all this information I'm gathering will cushion the fall for which I'm so richly due.

Ow!

2007-09-01T22:58:00.000-04:00

Shit. I think my wisdom teeth are coming in. Wisdom tooth, at least. I grope around the back of my mouth and I can feel a horrible evil little tooth point lurking below the surface on the one side, and that area's been all tender the past few days.

Shiiiiiiit. But at least I might get some Vicodin out of all this.

Random bullets of my life is really not that interesting

2007-08-29T23:48:00.000-04:00

Went to my first HR orientation this week (aww!). Still need to turn in payroll forms and get a damn parking permit and fax in the you-don't-have-to-contribute-so-hey-why-not life insurance policy. My friend who's still in college says that thinking about retirement accounts makes him uncomfortably aware of his mortality; I'd like to see how he'd deal with an official pay-out being attached to his demise. Also I hope that if I don't get the direct deposit form in on time for Friday's payday that nobody steals my check from the mailbox in our desolate office building.

Trial periods are valuable things. Babysat a cat for a week and a half, a really sweet cat, too, but dealing with fur and smells and litter that makes my feet itch being strewn all over a corner of my room including an edge of my rug has made me realize that now is not the best time for me to have a pet. Her "real parents" picked her up tonight--I need to remember to make her deadbeat dad pay me for the Meow Mix.

Office life is kinda fun when you finally have someone else working alongside you in your creepy isolated fluorescently lit hallway.

Based on a conversation I had with a very helpful grad student today, I'm reconsidering the wisdom of only applying to a single Ph.D. program in my discipline of choice. I'm meeting with another grad student in said program tomorrow, and likely another one next week. I selfishly hope that I will be able to rationalize what they say as justifying the appropriateness of my initial impulses.

I switched to Gmail today from my university's webmail. I still prefer the webmail look and all my precious precious but teeth-grindingly slow-loading nested folders, but I really hope I'll acclimate, since I know intellectually that Gmail and its labeling capabilities just make so much more sense.

Those should probably be shorter to qualify as "real" bullets (the Platonic ideal of Bullet), but whatever. Time to obsess over e-mails that need to be sent tomorrow, while I drift off to sleep...

Maybe I should read the book now.

2007-08-25T16:09:00.000-04:00

You're Ulysses!

by James Joyce

Most people are convinced that you don't make any sense, but compared to what else you could say, what you're saying now makes tons of sense. What people do understand about you is your vulgarity, which has convinced people that you are at once brilliant and repugnant. Meanwhile you are content to wander around aimlessly, taking in the sights and sounds of the city. What you see is vast, almost limitless, and brings you additional fame. When no one is looking, you dream of being a Greek folk hero.

Take the Book Quiz at the Blue Pyramid.

via Anastasia

There but for the grace of bloggers

2007-08-25T13:56:00.000-04:00

Last week I went to meet with an administrator in the graduate school here at (forgive my lame attempt at assigning pseudonyms) Better Than U, to talk about a fellowship I was thinking of applying for. He couldn't help me much with that part of the conversation, but we got to talking about graduate school as a whole, my current plans of working for a year or two with an organization at BTU (heh) and then, luck willing, my beginning life as a grad student here in one of the departments he happens to oversee. We talked about the nature of the department and its requirements, the transformation it's undergone in recent years, the extent to which a graduate school curriculum can do its job of preparing students to be professional academics and the necessity of avoiding getting bogged down in the grad school morass for years on end.

I made some comment about how fundamentally different the experience of TAing (leading a discussion once or twice a week, perhaps giving one lecture in a semester-long class) must be from the load one takes on as a first-year junior professor (a 4/4 schedule, research and service expectations, etc. etc.), and the guy looks at me and says, "Oh, you need to come here--you're so reasonable!"

Which, well, cool. But it also made me realize how important so many of the personal-professional blogs that I've taken to reading have been for informing my expectations about graduate school and the professoriate. I'm immensely glad that these resources have been at my disposal, especially given that, judging from this dean's reaction (which, granted, has its own biases), many grad students apparently don't come in with their eyes open to these issues--even at hoity-toity BTU, which I imagine attracts its share of obsessive/Type A/think-ahead-and-plan-for-everything types.

Anyway, this is all a roundabout way of saying thank you to those who devote the time to sharing their everyday experiences in academe. You're helping the neophytes more than you know.

I've gotta stop

2007-08-24T09:48:00.000-04:00

staying up way too late, causing extreme lethargy at work the next day. And then posting about it on my blog. At least no one's here to see this. And if they were, they wouldn't care. Oof.

I have HR orientation next week, I'll be better then, I swear. And maybe I'll eventually learn how to go to bed early. For now: (more) coffee.

Also, on my office PC I notice that my Cheshire Cat picture looks kinda fucked up. Sorry, PC users. Another reason to give it up already and get a Mac. You're going to be assimilated eventually, y'know.

Hey, a post with content!

2007-08-23T18:02:00.000-04:00

Granted, it's still a meme. I'm building momentum. (Found over at Adjunct Whore's.)

1. What Do You Say Most When You’re Trying Not To Swear?

N/A

2. Do You Own An iPod?

Yep. White 30GB video iPod. It was a rage purchase during finals of junior year spring. I got a little discount through my university, and a free inscription of my choosing: "In memoriam: resistance to consumer whoredom."

3. Which Person(s) In Your Top Friends Do You Talk To The Most?

Only the non-élite use MySpace. And I haven't downloaded the equivalent Facebook application.

4. What Time Is Your Alarm Clock Set To?

It's my cell phone, and every day a different time. Lately, early enough so that I can get to work at a reasonable-ish approximation of 9am. I have a feeling I'm really going to like it when I go back to school--and I've only been out of school for 3 months.

5. Do You Want To Fall In Love?

Sure. Doesn't everybody?

6. Do You Wear Flip-Flops When It’s Cold?

Yep. Flip-Flops all the time, for everyone. Although somewhat less so now that I don't need designated shower shoes for daily use anymore.

7. Would You Rather Take The Picture Or Be In The Picture?

I'm horribly unphotogenic, but I like being in pictures when I deem myself tolerable-looking. Given this, then whatever evokes the better memory, as I'm a sickeningly sentimental person--my screen saver is currently set as a slideshow of precious moments from my college years.

8. What Was The Last Movie You Watched?

Shit, this is actually kind of difficult. Oh, no, wait--Thelma and Louise, the special edition DVD, from a free Netflix trial earlier in the summer. Not bad! And I may see Young Frankenstein at our local way-expensive theatre this weekend.

9. Do Any Of Your Friends Have Children?

Dude, hells no. Well, friends in my cohort, at least.

10. Has Anyone Ever Called You Lazy?

Probably. I wasn't too good at getting the chores done when I was a kid.

11. Do You Ever Take Medication To Help You Fall Asleep?

Eh, "medication" in the sense of wine plus an Effexor that was not mine, once, when I was really upset. And also some entirely ineffectual sleeping pills (plus wine) to attempt to keep myself from freaking out on planes. Usually doesn't work.

12. What CD Is Currently In Your CD Player?

What CD player? ...Okay, no, I used to use mine sometimes last year, when iPod/computer speakers were not readily available. Probably Rufus Wainwright (eponymous, Poses, or Want One).

13. Do You Prefer Regular Or Chocolate Milk?

Don't drink milk anymore, but back when I did, I lived off of regular milk.

14. Has Anyone Told You A Secret This Week?

Yes. A really good one! In several senses. :)

15. When Was The Last Time You Had Starbucks?

Earlier this week sometime. Large iced coffee with sugar-free vanilla, some half-and-half, and cinnamon.

16. Can You Whistle?

Nope. I suck. I'd really like to be able to do the badass two-finger whistle.

17. Do You Have A Trampoline In Your Back Yard?

I don't have a back yard. I DID just watch that episode of The Simpsons from the fifth season with the evil trampoline in it, though.

18. Do You Think People Talk About You Behind Your Back?

Sure, I'm totally paranoid. Plus my group of friends are all gossip whores.

19. Did You Watch Cartoons As A Child?

Certainly! Garfield and Friends and Animaniacs are looked back upon with the most affection, but also Woody Woodpecker, Tiny Toons, Alvin and the Chipmunks, Rescue Rangers, DuckTales. Oh, and of course, The Simpsons (allowed after I was about 7 or so).

20. What Movie Do You Know Every Line To?

Um, The Lion King has been burned into my brain ever since as a fourth-grader I resolved to watch it EVERY DAY OF MY LIFE when it came out on video. I lasted a little over a month.

I can probably recite many TV episodes verbatim, though, particularly the good years of The Simpsons.

21. What Is The Last Thing You Purchased?

So boring and uncharacteristically girly: make-up sponge wedges, nail polish remover, discounted plum nail polish, and a vanilla Coke Zero, at Walgreen's today. I'm taking a trip to Trader Joe's soon, though, whose spoils will include cheese curds, wasabi almonds, Greek yogurt and microwave-ready Indian food.

22. Is There Anything Wrong With Girls Kissing Girls?

Of course not. Death to heteronormativity.

23. Do You Own Any Band T-Shirts?

Yep. "Love Guster, don't eat them" and a Barenaked Ladies shirt from their Maroon tour. Oh, and I think I have Ben Folds Five somewhere. I've, like, never worn any of them, though.

24. What Is Your Favorite Salad Dressing?

Blue cheese, no contest.

25. Is anyone in love with you?

Well, it's ME, I can only assume...

26. Do You Do Your Own Dishes?

As opposed to using a dishwasher? Yes.

27. Ever Cry In Public?

Yeah. Stupid stuff, usually. What can I say, I'm very flappable.

28. Do You Like Anyone?

Bwah. Cute. <3 <3

29. Are You Currently Wanting Any Piercings Or Tattoo?

I have none of either, though recently I felt a sudden urge to get my ears pierced. I like the idea of tattoos in theory, but wouldn't know what to get. My roommate, unprompted, said that a Cheshire Cat would fit me. Hence the blog icon.

30. Who Was The Last Person To Make You Mad?

Idiot at the U-Haul place. And one of my supervisors. Oh, JUST now, as I was writing this, my upstairs neighbor.

31. Would You Ever Date Anyone Covered In Tattoos?

I'd probably be a little weirded out initially, but why not?

32. What Did You Do Before This?

Um, drank some refrigerated coffee, said goodbye to a visiting friend who's going to Boston.

33. When Was The Last Time You Slept On The Floor?

When I first moved into my apartment at the beginning of June and hadn't gotten my futon yet. I did have a huge pile of clothes and pillows, though, so it wasn't bad.

34. How Many Hours Of Sleep Do You Need To Function?

Hard to tell, since I so often split them up. 7 minimum, 8 maximum before I wake up with a sleep-hangover, I think.

35. Do You Eat Breakfast Daily?

Eh, kinda. I always have coffee/caffeine, and usually graze a bit in the morning before I leave for work. I suck at preparing "meals."

36. Are Your Days Full And Fast Paced?

Yeah, but with generous helpings of screwing around and wasting time mixed in.

37. What are you doing right now?

Er, writing this?

38. Do you use sarcasm?

Only when I talk. [eta: And write.]

39. Have You Ever Been In A Fight?

Emotional fights, yes. Physical fights, no.

40. Are You Picky About Spelling And Grammar?

"Picky" is an understatement.

41. Have You Ever Been To Six Flags?

Other amusement parks, but never a Six Flags.

42. Have You Ever Gotten Beat up?

No.

43. Do You Get Along Better With The Same Sex Or The Opposite?

Eh, about the same, I think. My close friends are a mix. And none of them really cleave to gender stereotypes.

44. Do you like mustard?

Of course!

45. Do You Sleep On Your Side, Stomach, Or Back?

Usually back.

46. Do You Watch The News?

GOD no. Well, national news wouldn't be excruciating, but local news is the tool of Satan himself. ugh. just ugh.

47. How did you ge--Actually, no, that's not enough. Here's the entry for "local news" that I copied out of the Television Without Pity book at a Barnes & Noble last winter, because I felt so passionate about its truth:

"News, Crappy Local --

No matter where on the North American landmass you live, or where else on said landmass you travel, you can rely on one constant: The local news is bad.

The average 11:00 broadcast leads with footage of police-car lights flashing while an inoffensive-looking anchor-clone with a bulletproof blow-dry reads sonorously about a shooting, a robbery, or a raccoon knocking over the trash at Wendy's. After the top stories (in order: a tragedy, local or national; something involving local unions, about which nobody cares; footage of the president walking around somewhere; and a nice juicy car wreck or building collapse), the broadcast segues into everyone's favorite local-news staple, the "Something Perfectly Innocent COULD KILL YOU"-slash-"Good God, WON'T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN" feature. First comes the assy graphic of, like, a bowl of oatmeal with fangs, subtitled something along the lines of "Quaker? MORE LIKE 'DAMNED LIAR,'" and the revelation that oat bran is not all that good for you if you eat nothing but oatmeal, in which case you will get scurvy, which: doy. Or the graphic is a crooked, eeeeevil close-up of a trampoline, which some Darwin-Award-winning parent allowed her child to play on unattended, and the kid bounced head-on into a tree and broke his neck, which was obviously the trampoline's fault. This is inevitably followed by a clumsy "but kids love basketball, don't they, Bob" transition into the sports segment, and then the weather report (always overhyped, always inaccurate), and then some footage of a pie-eating contest or fun run which nobody in their right mind would have attended. The anchors chuckle and shuffle their papers, and then mercifully it's over."

The end. Hope you enjoyed. Totally worth the copyright infringement.

47. How Did You Get Three Of Your Scars?

a. Three slight pock marks forming a triangle on my forehead, between my eyebrows, from chicken pox in fourth grade. Actually, they're not really there any more, but it used to be my go-to when asked about scars.

And I only have one more, but I like it so much, it's worth two:

b.&c. Quarter-sized scar on my left knee from a bad scrape, acquired this spring in a fall. I was rushing to meet my trusty theatre-going buddy at a student performance of The Seagull, and I tripped and ripped a hole in my favorite pair of jeans and got a fairly nasty bleeder. But I'm quite fond of it, because it reminds me of four years of college theatre spectatorship in the company of a good friend.

And that's a nice, characteristically sappy way to end this meme.

Hey, that was kinda fun! Why don't you try it, Swiss Beats? Warren?

I win!

2007-08-22T01:38:00.000-04:00

I always knew there was a reason I overused these...

...

Your Score: ellipsis

You scored 46% Sociability and 76% Sophistication!

Your life can be difficult because of your insecurities, but you should know that it isn't your fault. YOU didn't ask to be thrown in around thirty times per page in every bodice-ripper on the shelf! Those who overuse you can kiss your . . . you know. You need to learn to hold your head high and glory in your solitude. You really do have excellent, scholarly tastes. You must never forget that your friend, the period, will be there to support you at the end of every sentence where you truly belong, and, if what is left out is as important as what is said, why, then you are as vital as the alphabet!

Link: The Which Punctuation Mark Are You Test written by Gazda on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

I keep taking these instead of vacuuming.

2007-08-19T17:50:00.000-04:00

Your Score: Ceiling Cat

44% Affectionate, 36% Excitable, 48% Hungry

You are a master of stealth. They never see you coming. But you always see them coming. HEY-O!

To see all possible results, checka dis.

Link: The Which Lolcat Are You? Test written by GumOtaku on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

Okay really gotta go clean and shop for groceries now. Starting this evening I get to babysit my very own lolcat for three weeks!

Wtf

2007-08-19T16:37:00.000-04:00

Mid-50s in August? Seriously?

Also, I slept til 3:30 today. shite...

Reflections upon the occasion of my being a special snowflake

2007-08-19T05:44:00.000-04:00

I've come full circle. I got the INFJ (well, don't that sound vaguely medical) back when I first started playing around with Myers-Briggs stuff, probably around freshman year of high school. Over the eight (eight? omfg) years since then, my personality has proven fickle, cycling from INFJ to INFP to INTP to INTJ to INTP to my present INFJ state (though I tested as INTP, the "Loser"--perceptive!--as recently as a week ago). In the interest of navel gazery, I'm breaking this shit down:

I - well, duh. I hadn't imagined that I'd be up in the 80% range of introversion, but eh, not even too surprised by that. I do like people, but I am and always will be an introvert.

N - I guess I'm a dyed-in-the-wool intuiter, too, but lord knows I've never really understood what that meant. I'll smile, nod and go with it, 'cause it doesn't seem like it's gonna change any time soon.

Now, the tricky parts. Notwithstanding the idiosyncratic 68% Judging result in my personality badge on the blog sidebar, I'm hardly ever over 55% on any one of Thinking, Feeling, Judging OR Perceiving. This is where the desire to answer "but it depends!" to so many of these personality test questions probably does the most to impede said tests from assigning me, once and for all, forever and ever amen, a personality:

T/F - looking at my history I apparently went through a significant T-leaning phase. Unsurprising, given that a lot of my identity had grown to revolve around a respect for critical thinking, general smarty-pantsitude, intellectual snobbery and deification of logic etc. (Thankfully, I have evolved somewhat.) I think the F is correct here, though--whenever I make a big decision, I tend to go with what feels right. Don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of facts and reason and all that jazz, and I spend forever thinking and finding a way to logically justify what I believe is compelling... er, wait, wouldn't that just make me a hopelessly subjective rationalizer? (Well, we're all hopelessly subjective rationalizers...) Or wait (again), maybe the "feeling" I describe is really "intuition." Yeah. I think it is. So why the hell am I an F? Just because I can be emotional? Cause I picked mercy over justice (mercy CAN be just, fuckers..)? Or what? ...okay I don't want to talk about this anymore or I may have to go lie down for awhile.

J/P - now, this one's interesting to me as a general category. My understanding of the difference is that J-leaners like to check things off lists, have decisions made and out of the way, get tasks done and so forth. P-leaners are go with the flow, open to change, flexible, and have a vaguely earth-mothery all-is-connected-and-is-endlessly-evolving sort of view of the world. Now, I love making lists and ESPECIALLY crossing things off lists. Ooh, how I love crossing things off lists. It's like huffing ether or something. Er, anyway... so in that manner I can definitely see how I'd come up "J." Thing is, I view this as a character flaw. Not the narcotic thrill I get from striking through various tasks with my lovely extra-fine-tipped roller ball pen (although I guess that's a little weird), but to have such a closed-down view of the world. It's the control-freak mindset, and more than that, it's a basically faulty outlook. We're never really "done" with anything. Always more information to be taken into account, revisions to be made, infinite rivers to step in and all that. The P's have it. Or they have the right approach to successfully deal with it. I dunno, anyone want to put a different spin on this or redeem the J side of things for me?

Wow--that there was a lot of blather about myself. Granted, I DO score fairly high on intrapersonal intelligence over on aforementioned personality badge. Gotta keep my skillz sharp somehow.

I'm a special snowflake.

2007-08-17T17:48:00.000-04:00

Your Score: Freak- INFJ

13% Extraversion, 66% Intuition, 46% Thinking, 53%
Judging

Well, well, well. How did someone like you end up with the least
common personality type of them all? In a group of 100 Americans, only
0.5 others would be just like you. You really are one of a kind... In
fact, I do believe that that's one of the definitions for the word
"FREAK."

Freak's not such a bad word to describe you actually.

You are deep, complex, secretive and extremely difficult to understand.
If that doesn't scream "Freak!" I don't know what does. No-one actually
knows the REAL you, do they?

You probably have deep interests in creative expression as well as
issues of spirituality and human development.

You've probably even been called a "psychic" before, because of your
uncanny knack to understand and "read" people without quite knowing how
you do it. Don't fret. You're not actually psychic. That would make you
special and you'll never accomplish that.

You're also quite possible the most emotional of them all, so don't take
this all too hard. Nevertheless you most definitely have the strangest
personality type and that's not necessarily a good thing.

*****************

If you want to learn more about your personality type in a slightly less
negative way, check
out this.

*****************

The other personality types are as follows...

Loner
- Introverted Sensing Feeling Perceiving

Pushover
- Introverted Sensing Feeling Judging

Criminal
- Introverted Sensing Thinking Perceiving

Borefest
- Introverted Sensing Thinking Judging

Almost
Perfect - Introverted iNtuitive Feeling Perceiving

Loser
- Introverted iNtuitive Thinking Perceiving

Crackpot
- Introverted iNtuitive Thinking Judging

Clown
- Extraverted Sensing Feeling Perceiving

Sap
- Extraverted Sensing Feeling Judging

Commander
- Extraverted Sensing Thinking Perceiving

Do
Gooder - Extraverted Sensing Thinking Judging

Scumbag
- Extraverted iNtuitive Feeling Perceiving

Busybody
- Extraverted iNtuitive Feeling Judging

Prick
- Extraverted iNtuitive Thinking Perceiving

Dictator
- Extraverted iNtuitive Thinking Judging

Link: The
Brutally Honest Personality Test written by UltimateMaster
on OkCupid Free Online Dating,
home of the The Dating
Persona Test

Diminishing marginal returns: the substance abuse edition

2007-08-17T14:45:00.000-04:00

I gave up coffee cold turkey over last year's winter break, since I was drinking WAY too much, but I've recently returned to it--it's just so much more efficient than diet soda. Also, I was drinking way too much damn diet soda.

As one might surmise, I have an addictive personality; if I cut myself off from one thing, I'll swing too far in the other direction on the substitutes. So I end up in situations where I'm drinking four liters of cherry vanilla diet Pepsi Jazz in a single day. Not good. So for now, it will be a lovely free-floating non-obsessive mix of coffee and diet soda, and hopefully I'll gravitate naturally toward the caffeine level at which my body feels best. Heh. Or at least to an appropriate level of addiction such that I drink enough caffeine to give me a nice little productivity-boosting happy-making buzz, but not needing so much that I overwhelm my system and end up with stressed-out innards that make me paradoxically sleepy.

Speaking of, I kind of want a nap. And that's on account of not enough caffeine rather than too much. Coffee time...

Thoughts?

2007-08-17T00:06:00.000-04:00

Do we like the new color scheme? Not as harsh on the eyes, but it makes me a bit sleepy. Suggestions from those with visual acumen are welcome.

Also, I'm rather sad that I've lost the previous inane comments from various fr(i)en(d)z. Repopulate, people!

Working 9 to 5

2007-08-16T10:45:00.000-04:00

My first day in the office as a full-time worker bee. I made an effort to look halfway professional this morning, with the business dress and the heels and whatnot. I saw myself in the mirror, and I realized that I look like a grown-up. I'm not sure how okay I am with this.

Also, I met with my senior thesis adviser yesterday to discuss grad school. There is good news. I'll blog about it after I finish obsessively updating my planner and fumble around the office server some more...

Pseudonymalicious

2007-08-14T20:06:00.000-04:00

And my blog re-emerges, newly aliased. No special significance to the name, except I used to sing one of her arias quite frequently for voice things. Also, it's a half-assed attempt at irony, since I'm pretty much not like the character at all. I'm less Google-able this way, I'd like to believe. And it's more interesting than my real name. Well, more interesting than my real first name, at least.

Anyway, I'm mostly doing this blogging thing in order to get into the habit of writing on a regular basis. I figure if I ever do take the plunge and become a "real" graduate student, rather than a conference-attending, real-grad-student-pestering interloper-cum-parasite, it'll be good to have had the practice. So, into the abyss my words go.

That's not to say I'm going to have a scholarly bent here, particularly initially. I'm not a graduate student now, though I'm planning on doing some auditing and journal reading in my spare time. I don't have any memories of a time in which I WASN'T obsessive about school, so this will be a lesson in moderation for me. We'll see how that turns out.

I hate GRE prep.

2007-07-29T03:26:00.000-04:00

Weren't SATs and SAT IIs and APs enough for you, ETS? I've paid my dues. I'm spending way too much time being made to feel like a moron for not knowing how to untangle your accursed word-based math puzzlers and geometrical riddles. I have done nothing to deserve this.

Well. Actually. I suppose an interest in grad school is enough to warrant its own knock on the head--but I'd rather it be done by those who don't profit from my misery, or at least are nice enough to keep their profit hidden.

In other news, I may have a reason to switch my voter registration back to North Carolina. Heart you, state legislature.

Have you ever looked really closely at your shower curtain?

2007-07-04T18:33:00.000-04:00

I have (mine, not yours). Half of our shower curtain is covered by novel cartoon frogs wearing various fanciful articles of clothing, hats, expressions etc. And as I was showering earlier today, I took a moment to examine what I guess was intended to be a hippie frog, or a 60s-to-70s transition frog, wearing a gold medallion bearing a peace sign. Thing was, when you looked closely at the peace sign, you notice that instead of completing the line that goes all the way down the center, like so:
...the design omitted it, resulting in this:

In other words, the frog on my shower curtain is wearing the Mercedes Benz sign.

I (still) hate having a weak constitution.

2007-06-30T00:25:00.000-04:00

So I went back to work today. "Back" in the sense of cramming in three hours of productivity before an early lunch, after which I went to meet with a professor for whom I'm doing entirely different work, and then... um... went home, because it was Friday and I wanted a nap. Go team.

My Thursday absence was more legitimate, as I woke up very early feeling like I wanted to vomit and also lobster-hued. The lobster-huedness I had already noticed Wednesday night, after having spent four straight hours outside in 95-to-100-degree heat in service of the same job I blew off today. But as far as the nausea went, apparently my symptoms of heat exhaustion were on time delay. Everything's a-okay now, aside from what I imagine to be a marginally increased likelihood of getting skin cancer.

Also in the realm of things I hate: supervisors/coworkers who believe you are stupid. Especially when said supervisors/coworkers are themselves stupid. Three days ago this woman actually felt the need to explain to me the difference between "pins" and "pens." AND THE TWO WORDS WERE WRITTEN ON THE INVENTORY LIST SHE HAD JUST GIVEN ME. gah. This is the same person who, when instructing me on which information sheets to print out for some press packets, told me, "Get the FAQs--that's 'Frequently Asked Questions'..." Mother of God woman shut up before I hit you with my project folder.

That's enough happiness for one day. Off to ready myself to spend two and a half hours inside a large magnetic tube tomorrow. (I love participating in paid experiments.)

Erratic

2007-06-25T16:34:00.000-04:00

Not that my posting on here was ever anything but erratic, but, having been inspired by David, I am putting up a token hello. Given that now I've graduated and have officially lost all of my friends to the ether, maybe that'll inspire me to post here more often for the purposes of keeping up with people and such. But let's not kid ourselves--I have the attention span of a caffeinated flea.

In other news, I can't believe I didn't know about this until a few days ago.

I just discovered RSS feeds

2007-03-25T16:27:00.000-04:00

...so clearly, no work on my senior essay is getting done. I have, however, managed to drink over a liter of diet Coke and chew through two packs of Orbit, and it's not even 2:00 yet.

Ooh, gotta go, two new posts on Lifehacker...

Oh, my head.

2007-03-14T02:46:00.000-04:00

In the pursuit of knowledge and graduation, I just spent a good hour of my life subjecting myself to articles from the dread bile that is the National Review. For my senior essay I'm writing about Nancy Pelosi's accession to the speakership and women as civilly legitimate actors, and oh, the sheer gendered venom is astounding. (Really, how much bearing does one's jewelry or clothes or hairstyle have on your ability to lead?) And for good measure they usually throw in some non sequitur comment about how feminists are trying to push women away from their natural roles as feminine pretty things blah blah blah. Lexis-Nexis, thou hast forsaken me.

In order to cheer (?) myself up, I went and reread Katha Pollitt's great blog post on International Women's Day here. Not cheer, exactly, as more than anything it articulates just how much women's issues around the world demand more than one day a year of deliberate attention, but at least it's well written, in contrast with the other stuff I've spent time on today.

And here's a non sequitur of my own: how much do I love that there's a board game that's actually called "Fact or Crap"? They could have just called it "True or False," but lord knows the entertainment value would have been diminished to almost nothing.

Suburban consumerism, ahoy.

2007-03-12T03:13:00.000-04:00

I went to a mall today for the first time since maybe last May; in terms of mockery potential, it was all I dreamed it could be, but I suppose that was facilitated by the company I was with as much as by any innate ridiculousness of things seen.

The clear zenith of the experience was in front of a Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory franchise (has anyone ever heard of these before? I sure hadn't), where shoppers were confronted with a massive, despondent-looking stuffed bear slumped over on its side such that it nearly blocked the store entrance. Yes, I did take a picture with it. Yes, in it we both look like we're sleeping off a bender.

Boy, if that don't put you in the mood for some milk chocolate pecan Bears (™, apparently), I don't know what will...

Spring Break (?)

2007-03-10T00:34:00.000-05:00

Two sweet weeks of senior-essay-writing, although the "writing" part remains an abstraction at this point. I have, however, made extensive use of Preview's oval annotation tool on the three essays on the politics of recognition that I've managed to read so far. I finished the second and third ones today, and gave myself a not-entirely-intentional two and a half hour nap as a reward. I guess the semester has worn me out more than I'd imagined.

I've been more productive on non-academic fronts, if "productive" is understood to mean doing something, ANYTHING, that does not consist of my constantly refreshing my e-mail and then not responding to things I really should respond to. Example: I spent much of yesterday downloading a bunch of Mac software recommended by this guy. No particular reason, save that I am extremely suggestible. Oh, and I finally made use of the Adobe Photoshop and InDesign that a friend burned for me awhile ago. Photoshop scared me away pretty quick, but in InDesign I made text type out onto a curvy line! It was exhilarating.

I hate having a weak constitution.

2006-06-24T19:00:00.000-04:00

On the plus side, I don't have pneumonia, and the fact that the doctor from SOS Médecins wrote "bronchitis" (or rather, "bronchite") on my housecall receipt should with any luck secure a 66-euro reimbursement from my university's health services. On the minus side, from my room's open window I can hear the cheering and thumping bass and intermittent airhorn blast waft in from Parisian gay pride while I'm stuck here with my fatigue and wheezing and trash bag full of used tea sachets and phlegm (tasty!). Also on the minus side: the housekeeper that my renters employ seems today to be taking great pleasure in rattling around and being as thorough as fucking possible in his weekly visit, thereby disallowing me the opportunity to slink unnoticed into the kitchen to microwave myself some more water. Scrub the goddamn bathroom tile a little more meticulously, why don't you buddy? I have to pee, and I wants my hot water.

As far as the tea goes, at least having to decide between vanilla, caramel and peach-blackcurrant makes my life a little more interesting. Until I can get back in there I suppose I'll have another dose of Advil. Mmm, coating.

...Ooo, they're playing a dance remix of What a Feeling! Irene Cara always cheers me up...

The "Recover Username" feature is a beautiful thing.

2006-06-17T23:23:00.000-04:00

First comment: my new year's resolution was a spectacular failure, but given that I'd forgotten about it probably somewhere around mid-January and haven't thought about it for more than 2 minutes cumulative since then, there hasn't been much emotional fallout.

Greetings from Paris, which I haven't taken much advantage of since I got here on May 28th. I think it's because I spent 5 weeks here last summer and the ennui has set in. That, and I lost my monthlong metro card on a trip to Amsterdam/Brussels a few weeks ago, but since I live in the 6th arrondissement and it's easy to walk to the pretty, stereotypically "Paris" things, it's mostly the ennui. Also, the fact that I'm doing actual work for my fellowship! 8 senators and 3 National Assembly deputies have agreed to speak with me about their experience of gender in campaigning and in the French government. Those poor, poor fools. I've been trying to get my French up to snuff by taking the following measures:

- setting the default language to French on my webmail, Mozilla, and Windows (as much as it allows me without buying new language packs, at any rate)
- changing my home page from nytimes.com to lemonde.fr
- listening to Radio France, when I remember to
- when I'm walking around town, making a concerted effort to listen to the French mélodies and Jacques Brel songs on my iPod, rather than the American Idol mp3s that I spent an entire day downloading
- considering a subscription to Glowria, the French equivalent of Netflix (the first month only costs 1 euro!)

Additional suggestions are welcome. Back to reading some Kundera in the original...

PS, if any of you (the legions that read this) want postcards from sundry European places, drop me a line with a summer address.

A Modest Resolution.

2006-01-03T04:25:00.000-05:00

In 2006, I will actually read my page-a-day desktop calendar, every day.

Last year both origami and Edward Gorey failed to hold my attention, the Gorey moreso because the pages of the various books were all out of order, but this year I hope that Forgotten English will be enough to do the trick.

By the way, words for the first three days of the New Year:

January 1st:
scurryfunge - A hasty tidying of the house between the time you see a neighbor and the time she knocks on the door.

January 2nd:
pulpatoon - A dish made of rabbits, fowl, etc., in a crust of forced [stuffed] meat.
From Latin pulpamentum, tidbits.
To make a pulpatoon of pigeons . . . half roast six or eight pigeons, and lay them in a crust of forc'd-meat. . . . Scrape a pound of veal, and two pounds of marrow, and beat it together in a stone mortar.

January 3rd:
in Queen Street - "The joskin lives in Queen Street," the fool is governed by his wife.

And no, I didn't read those all at once just now. We're off to a good start.

But I'm probably still setting myself up for failure, seeing as how I never use my desk...

They won't let me sleep.

2005-12-30T12:09:00.000-05:00

I don't know who they is, but it's 9:10 am and I can usually be counted on to have fallen asleep by 7 or so these days. Isn't there a critical mass of daylight hours during which one should be unconscious if one is to be properly considered nocturnal? Or maybe I'll just be stuck awake until my whole circadian rhythm cycles around and I'm diurnal again. But man I bet I'm in for some suckful, even-more-unproductive-than-usual daylight hours if that's to be the case.

Maybe it's the eight cups of coffee I've drunk since around 8pm last night.

Nah.

I think I'll pass the time with online shopping. I don't know how in the hell (so to speak) I got "low" on the prodigal/avaricious scale on that Inferno test--not only do I have an instinct to penny pinch (despite how things usually play out...), but I had an emphatic "yes" in answer to the question about enjoying shopping even if I don't need anything. That's the only time I do enjoy shopping. Free time and the holiday season do an especially effective job of bringing out my insidious, hypocritical materialistic side. (Incidentally, I can't wait to get back to school so that I can take unflattering photos of everyone for the "photo caller ID" feature on my new phone. My pretty, pretty new phone. But the phone doesn't count, since it only cost $3.50 with the credit and rebate.)

Yesterday I bought the Season 1 and 2 DVDs of NewsRadio on eBay for cheap. Most. underrated. television. show. ever.

Well, I could've told you that.

2005-12-29T06:15:00.000-05:00

The wretched King Minos has decided your fate. His tale [sic] wraps around his body 5 times.

The sweet light no longer strikes against your eyes. Your shade has been banished to... the Fifth Level of Hell!

Fifth Level of Hell

The river Styx runs through this level of Hell, and in it are punished the wrathful and the gloomy. The former are forever lashing out at each other in anger, furious and naked, tearing each other piecemeal with their teeth. The latter are gurgling in the black mud, slothful and sullen, withdrawn from the world. Their lamentations bubble to the surface as they try to repeat a doleful hymn, though with unbroken words they cannot say it. Because you lived a cruel, vindictive and hateful life, you meet your fate in the Styx.

Here is how you matched up against all the levels:

Level	Score
Purgatory (Repenting Believers)	Very Low
Level 1 - Limbo (Virtuous Non-Believers)	Moderate
Level 2 (Lustful)	High
Level 3 (Gluttonous)	Moderate
Level 4 (Prodigal and Avaricious)	Low
Level 5 (Wrathful and Gloomy)	Very High
Level 6 - The City of Dis (Heretics)	Low
Level 7 (Violent)	High
Level 8- the Malebolge (Fraudulent, Malicious, Panderers)	High
Level 9 - Cocytus (Treacherous)	Low

Take the Dante's Inferno Hell Test

All in all, I think I end up doing pretty well for myself. I'm in a river (and not even a river of fire, at that), and I get to tear people with my teeth. What's not to like? Granted, this is assuming I'm more wrathful than gloomy, which is debatable, but hey, I'll risk it.

But what up with gender being a test question?

Today I discovered that you can make a decent hors d'oeuvres out of Alouette spreadable cheese and Hormel pepperoni. I favor either the Spinach and Artichoke or Sundried Tomato and Basil varieties of the Alouette.

Is anyone else put off by the fact that we'll be through with half the decade in a matter of days?

Having thus created the blog, I have to obsessively adjust the fonts.

2005-12-28T07:07:00.000-05:00

And thus began a beautiful relationship between Verdana and me.

So, a quick explanation of the title. One might read it as:
1) "withdrawn" meaning introverted; emotionally unresponsive and detached. But in a good humored way.
2) "withdrawn" being the past participle of "to withdraw," in the sense of recalling or retracting. In a good humored way.
3) an obscure Simpsons reference.

These, among other interpretations. Season Five was the best season.

I was just thinking, how appropriate it is that the French "une blogue," which is useful for facetiously referring to one's blog among one's pseudo-francophone friends, actually means "joke."

Then I remembered that it's "une blague," not "une blogue." Oh well.

I'm getting ornery; I think that means I need to go home, and by home I mean back to college. It was freaking 58 degrees today--what kind of winter weather is that?

This is what you do

2005-12-27T17:03:00.000-05:00

...when you have thirteen days and three papers to write.

You start a blog.

And the peasants rejoice. I blame Rachel for this.

That's all for now, because I need a nap.