Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Rock Band
The folks I'm staying with have all the ModCons, which includes a full set of instruments for rock band. So I've been playing it with them, as it's more fun with more people. It's kind of crazy, because you're not really playing an instrument but you really feel a sense of accomplishment when it says you did well! It is a truly impressive game design, letting people with no musical skill or experience feel what it's like to make music. And I think a lot of folks decide to go from the game to learning a real instrument because it's a lot of fun. It is interesting though, how while theoretically it's a group game, in actuality you're sort of playing just for yourself. You get an individual score at the end instead of a band score, so you're competing against the computer and yourself instead of competing with your 'band-mates'. But still a lot of fun, especially since it satisfies my long buried Karaoke needs. Well, my long buried live performance needs which I have been sublimating into Karaoke!
Friday, February 15, 2008
Moving and packing
On the one hand, I'm pretty pleased with myself that I'm keeping less than 1/4 of the things I had in my storage space. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure I could probably get rid of more if I took the time and effort. But I just can't care that much! Sure, I could do it, but would the reward really be worth it? Probably not. I'm hoping to find a company that ships by volume, which would mean losing a LOT of stuff would be worthwhile but not losing a little stuff. Perhaps if I sell stuff off rapidly I'll take the time...
It's amazing to realize that if all goes well I won't be back in California for years, if ever. And more amazing to realize that I'm really pleased by that-- a few years ago all I wanted was to live here.
It's amazing to realize that if all goes well I won't be back in California for years, if ever. And more amazing to realize that I'm really pleased by that-- a few years ago all I wanted was to live here.
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
In which I am a dumbass
I have resolved to post at least once a week, and maybe will even make it to daily. We shall see! It's all about not waiting for something funny and/or major to happen. And on that note...
This morning I was a moron. I woke up and my eye felt a little funny. On examination in the mirror in the bathroom, I was getting a little bit of a zit on the lower eyelid. No one likes this, as it's both unattractive and painful, so I thought, 'oh, I know, I'll wash it right away and maybe that will help it be smaller/go away'. So I wet my face, got a little tiny dab of soap on my finger, leaned in to make sure I put the fingertip in the right place for maximum washing and... stuck my soap-covered finger directly into my eye. The pain and the burning and the 'oh, oh, oh crap, owwwww!' was made all the worse by the fact that it wasn't a normal soap-runs-into-eye-in-washing event-- I stuck a finger covered in soap into my own damn eye because I am just that dumb. I washed it out as fast as possible to mitigate the effect, but now not only do I have a little zit on the bottom of my eye, but also a big old case of red-eye ouchie. It's going to be a glorious day!
This morning I was a moron. I woke up and my eye felt a little funny. On examination in the mirror in the bathroom, I was getting a little bit of a zit on the lower eyelid. No one likes this, as it's both unattractive and painful, so I thought, 'oh, I know, I'll wash it right away and maybe that will help it be smaller/go away'. So I wet my face, got a little tiny dab of soap on my finger, leaned in to make sure I put the fingertip in the right place for maximum washing and... stuck my soap-covered finger directly into my eye. The pain and the burning and the 'oh, oh, oh crap, owwwww!' was made all the worse by the fact that it wasn't a normal soap-runs-into-eye-in-washing event-- I stuck a finger covered in soap into my own damn eye because I am just that dumb. I washed it out as fast as possible to mitigate the effect, but now not only do I have a little zit on the bottom of my eye, but also a big old case of red-eye ouchie. It's going to be a glorious day!
Sunday, February 03, 2008
life and all that stuff
It's been months since I posted. Partly out of inertia, and partly because I just didn't know what to say. I think I've been frozen since October, when I dropped out of grad school.
It wasn't a really surprising thing for me to do, since I've been joking about it for years, but it
took me by surprise nonetheless. I came back to campus after spending the summer with my Boy in England, and the sight of Stanford made me cry. The thought of having to deal with the people and see the places made me want to run away and hide. And the only good reason I could think of to do any of it was to get paid--which is laughable given how little I was getting paid! So I left the department, I left academia, and I probably left archaeology. I love the field, I love the work, but I don't love it enough to make up for all of the bad, and these days you have to take the two together. So, I decided to move on to something that was at least enough money to make doing it just to get paid worthwhile! I got fired up about what I want to do next, and started making plans. But because I was back in England, I couldn't get a job, so I just... froze. I didn't have anything to do, or anything to be, and I got a little lost. I don't like being a housewife, and I hated being financially dependent on the Boy, but I couldn't do anything about it-- and it was made worse by the fact that we didn't have the conversation about how our six month test of living together was going until three days before I left, and so I retreated into our flat and hid for a little while. But now we've decided that we DO like each other after more than two weeks in a row, and I feel like a real person again, as though I can start to make plans and do things for me.
Hopefully, more frequent blogging will be on the list of things I do-- it'll be nice to have a record of what I was thinking as we began the moving process!
It wasn't a really surprising thing for me to do, since I've been joking about it for years, but it
took me by surprise nonetheless. I came back to campus after spending the summer with my Boy in England, and the sight of Stanford made me cry. The thought of having to deal with the people and see the places made me want to run away and hide. And the only good reason I could think of to do any of it was to get paid--which is laughable given how little I was getting paid! So I left the department, I left academia, and I probably left archaeology. I love the field, I love the work, but I don't love it enough to make up for all of the bad, and these days you have to take the two together. So, I decided to move on to something that was at least enough money to make doing it just to get paid worthwhile! I got fired up about what I want to do next, and started making plans. But because I was back in England, I couldn't get a job, so I just... froze. I didn't have anything to do, or anything to be, and I got a little lost. I don't like being a housewife, and I hated being financially dependent on the Boy, but I couldn't do anything about it-- and it was made worse by the fact that we didn't have the conversation about how our six month test of living together was going until three days before I left, and so I retreated into our flat and hid for a little while. But now we've decided that we DO like each other after more than two weeks in a row, and I feel like a real person again, as though I can start to make plans and do things for me.
Hopefully, more frequent blogging will be on the list of things I do-- it'll be nice to have a record of what I was thinking as we began the moving process!
Monday, April 16, 2007
thoughts
I am more and more sure that this academia thing is not for me. I like teaching but I don't love it, I enjoy research but I'm not obsessive about it, and I feel like there are lots of things in my life that are important besides my work--I'm never tempted to work ten or twelve hours a day because 'I just have to get this done, it's so interesting'. Ever. And that seems to be the expectation, that you'll be so obsessively devoted to what you do that everything else takes a back seat. I can't think of a single thing in my life that I feel that way about, with the possible exception of The Boy, but even that's different, because it's not obsession-- he's important, but both of us have things we want to do away from the other, and don't feel guilty about it. I want to use my evenings to relax, watch TV or go to the movies or spend time with friends. I want to see breaks as time when I can relax, not time when I can get uninterrupted work done. I want to make enough money to go out to dinner without feeling guilty, and even to go to the movies more than every few months. I want some control over my life--I'm sick of someone else being able to change how often I get paid without warning, or deciding how much it ought to cost me to live and only paying me that much. I believe that I'm going to be staying in England with The Boy permanently, which means that we can't really move, so even if I get the degree, I have such a restricted search field that I have almost no possibility of getting an academic job better than adjunct. Even if I wanted academia, I don't want that, adjuncting (in England, lecturing) is a shitty job--the pay is horrific and you have no job security, as you might not be needed for any given term.
And suddenly, everything I've been working for since I was about twelve years old is pointless. Why get a PhD if I'm never going to use it? What's the point? I mean, yes, I could go by Dr., yippee, but if I'm not going to be teaching and I'm not going to be publishing, is there a single thing in my life that would be better if I finish the degree?
I can't think of one.
And suddenly, everything I've been working for since I was about twelve years old is pointless. Why get a PhD if I'm never going to use it? What's the point? I mean, yes, I could go by Dr., yippee, but if I'm not going to be teaching and I'm not going to be publishing, is there a single thing in my life that would be better if I finish the degree?
I can't think of one.
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Time for a breath of air
I've officially passed both written exams, yay and yippee! Oddly, the one I was less confident in I did better on--I suppose I studied more for it because I was less confident, but it still seems odd to me. Now all I have is that pesky oral exam.
Now, I have no fear of public speaking. Or performance in general, put me up in front of a thousand people with something to do and I'm good to go. But have a panel of five people who know more than I do and let them ask me questions, and I freak out. I suppose this is just a form of test anxiety that most people don't have to deal with, but wow, it sucks. I get hot and I can't think. I'll grab onto the first author I can think of who discusses the issue, regardless of how recent or relevant they are: 'As you know, Aristotle discussed this issue, arguing that the sun rotates around the earth based on these criteria...' Urgh. I'm concentrating on pausing and taking a moment to think, because it does no one any good if I answer right away and make a babbling fool of myself.
In other news... nothing really. I can't go away for the break as I had planned because I am bad at budgets, so I will instead be sitting around with nothing to do but worry. And knit, I think I will take knitting up again. It has to be good for relaxation, it's so meditative. Oh, and I'll get to spend more time at the gym. This may not be a horrible break after all!
Now, I have no fear of public speaking. Or performance in general, put me up in front of a thousand people with something to do and I'm good to go. But have a panel of five people who know more than I do and let them ask me questions, and I freak out. I suppose this is just a form of test anxiety that most people don't have to deal with, but wow, it sucks. I get hot and I can't think. I'll grab onto the first author I can think of who discusses the issue, regardless of how recent or relevant they are: 'As you know, Aristotle discussed this issue, arguing that the sun rotates around the earth based on these criteria...' Urgh. I'm concentrating on pausing and taking a moment to think, because it does no one any good if I answer right away and make a babbling fool of myself.
In other news... nothing really. I can't go away for the break as I had planned because I am bad at budgets, so I will instead be sitting around with nothing to do but worry. And knit, I think I will take knitting up again. It has to be good for relaxation, it's so meditative. Oh, and I'll get to spend more time at the gym. This may not be a horrible break after all!
Friday, March 09, 2007
Fun-having ban of epic proportions take two!
I've been working on written exam number two for three day snow. I've got about six solid pages written, which is a decent but not spectacular start, and I'm feeling reasonably good about it. I've also found out that I passed the first written exam, which puts me on track to have my orals at the beginning of the quarter.
Which is all well and good, but I seem to care less and less. The more I think about the academic lifestyle, the less I'm sure that it's what I want to do. It was all well and good in the 1970s, when they couldn't hire tenured professors fast enough so coming from a decent program meant not only a job but the potential for a bidding war, academic publishers would publish anything that was of sufficient academic merit, and the only people who made it to college were the ones who really wanted to be there. But now that universities are downsizing, students are more and more treating college like high school where all they should have to do to pass is the absolute minimum, and academic publishers are choosing to publish based on possible profitability rather than on merit, it's not looking so pleasant.
I don't want to spend the next five years attempting to publish constantly in order to meet ever more ridiculous tenure requirements. I don't want to put having children off until I have tenure, but I don't want to have to teach two or three classes a semester and write a book and several articles while pregnant or with a new infant. I don't want to have no choice over where I live, because there are so few tenure-track academic jobs open that IF I'm offered one, I will have little choice but to take it. I don't want to spend the next five years barely scraping by as an adjunct, never having time to do my own research but not being able to get a tenure-track job without constant publications. I don't want to deal with entitled students who think that just because the made it to college (or because they're at an Ivy League), they deserve good grades with little or no work, because 'that's how it was in high school'. I don't want to never be able to afford to own a house because universities are almost always located in the most valuable real estate areas. I want health insurance that involves a doctor who doesn't assume that the only possible illnesses are pregnancy and STDs. I want dental insurance and eye care. I want an income that a person could live on somewhere other than rural Idaho (that not being, notably, where I actually live).
It truly saddens me that academia has come to this. I love my research, I love teaching, I love thinking deep thoughts and trying to puzzle out how people work and why, but the bureaucratic nonsense has made that less and less of the job.
Nontheless, I treck onward. I'm going to finish the damned degree at this point no matter what. If I chuck it all at that point, all well and good, but I'm too far in not to finish.
Which is all well and good, but I seem to care less and less. The more I think about the academic lifestyle, the less I'm sure that it's what I want to do. It was all well and good in the 1970s, when they couldn't hire tenured professors fast enough so coming from a decent program meant not only a job but the potential for a bidding war, academic publishers would publish anything that was of sufficient academic merit, and the only people who made it to college were the ones who really wanted to be there. But now that universities are downsizing, students are more and more treating college like high school where all they should have to do to pass is the absolute minimum, and academic publishers are choosing to publish based on possible profitability rather than on merit, it's not looking so pleasant.
I don't want to spend the next five years attempting to publish constantly in order to meet ever more ridiculous tenure requirements. I don't want to put having children off until I have tenure, but I don't want to have to teach two or three classes a semester and write a book and several articles while pregnant or with a new infant. I don't want to have no choice over where I live, because there are so few tenure-track academic jobs open that IF I'm offered one, I will have little choice but to take it. I don't want to spend the next five years barely scraping by as an adjunct, never having time to do my own research but not being able to get a tenure-track job without constant publications. I don't want to deal with entitled students who think that just because the made it to college (or because they're at an Ivy League), they deserve good grades with little or no work, because 'that's how it was in high school'. I don't want to never be able to afford to own a house because universities are almost always located in the most valuable real estate areas. I want health insurance that involves a doctor who doesn't assume that the only possible illnesses are pregnancy and STDs. I want dental insurance and eye care. I want an income that a person could live on somewhere other than rural Idaho (that not being, notably, where I actually live).
It truly saddens me that academia has come to this. I love my research, I love teaching, I love thinking deep thoughts and trying to puzzle out how people work and why, but the bureaucratic nonsense has made that less and less of the job.
Nontheless, I treck onward. I'm going to finish the damned degree at this point no matter what. If I chuck it all at that point, all well and good, but I'm too far in not to finish.
Sunday, March 04, 2007
the accidental date
I'm thinking this through as I write, so it may not be terribly well structured (or, to be honest, interesting). This is what you get for reading old entries, oh you (so-far imaginary, future) readers!.
This weekend I went to a comic convention in the city. This is in itself a fairly unusual thing for me to do, as I don't read comics and am not particularly interested in them as an art form, but several of my friends from out of town were going to be there, so needs must. It was fine, inasmuch as I talked to friends and when they were busy went off in a corner and read On Performance by Schechner (who I am LOVING. So very helpful in thinking of daily life as a performance, but he also says some interesting things about the nature of drama in a society that can't even be considered illiterate but must instead be a-literate.). I did pause to think that I was the girl at the comic convention who was reading an academic book instead of staring at all the people in their crazy costumes or rushing the minor celebrities, which in fact pushes me right past geeky and into full-on nerd territory--there's something lowering about the moment you realize that geeks can reasonably mock you (mental note, must resolve to embrace my inner nerd!)--but I pressed on and got a good few chapters done before the exhibition floor closed and my friends were free. A huge group had arranged to go to dinner afterward, but because of the number involved we got a late reservation, which meant that we had to entertain ourselves for a couple of hours in-between.
Now, there are two guys there in particular that I wanted to see--I shall call them... Lex and Niles*. They live out of state, and unlike the other folks there, I only see them once or twice a year at the most. But they were both actually working while at the convention, so I only got a few moments of hurried conversation with Niles and a snatched lunch with a group including Lex. He had a meeting as the floor was closing, so I stayed with Niles. We had all decided to go to the 'masquerade' to fill the time, but by the time we got out of the main room, the line was out the door and well down the block--we couldn't see the others, and it was chilly out for standing so we didn't just get in line ourselves. Fortunately, Niles had been talking with the man in charge about how one runs such a thing (because he is planning a major event this year), and worked some amazing mojo to get us into the room even before the press. I saved us front row center seats while he shadowed the man, and he came by several times to check on me.
[I should at this point mention two things: a) I am a flirtatious person. This is not meant to be meaningful, and if I realize that someone is taking it that way I will try to stop, but my default mode for interaction is light flirtation (apparently this is a non-gender specific thing even, and since I don't actually go both ways I think that shows the non-sexualized nature of the interaction to me); and b) Niles pointed out to me about a year ago that Lex was interested in me and had been for a while. I had a bit of a crush on him when we first met, but he didn't appear to respond, so I wrote him off, and then I met my Boy, whom I had been with for nearly a year by the time anything was said. At this point, we had a nice situation where Lex knew that I knew but didn't have to say anything, so I could carefully not flirt with him while still being friendly and he could be on the record as interested if the Boy and I break up. Unfortunately, I think this not flirting may have led to a bit of a problem. Because Niles wasn't 'not-to-be-flirted-with', so I did. And in retrospect, my flirting with him and not with Lex after he'd told me that Lex was interested could be read as a signal of interest in him. Ah, hindsight!]
So, we watched the show, and I got a text from another friend who had just arrived, asking where I was sitting. I told him in the front with no room for others and it occurred to me that this was a little odd-- if Niles could get me in (not even wearing my convention badge) he could surely have gotten one or two others, and he had several of their numbers to call them. And then I noticed his body language. And I thought about some of the conversations we'd had during the day--they were perfectly appropriate and witty remarks in context, but when he made that joke about 'liking to watch', there was that extra bit of eye contact, wasn't there? And during that other joke... and the eyebrow lift... and... there was that comment about if-when-if- *ahem* I move back from abroad, Lex maybe having a chance... and then when Nathan complimented my necklace and said that it was a clever plan by the Boy to distract people from my chest and he said... oh. So, I'm retarded. He's been flirting with me all day and I only just now realized that it was real flirting and not fun flirting. And was he ever talking about Lex at all? Or did he make a subtle transition from talking about Lex to talking about "Lex-wink-wink-nudge-nudge'? How socially inept have I been here? Anyway,
Armed with this realization, I ended up sitting somewhere else during dinner, so avoiding meal-related flirtation. But the thing is, I like him. He's a great guy: he's funny and smart and cute and the right amount of geeky for me, and he lives a fair way away, and I'm not going to see him before I move, and there is just no need to have an awkward and painful conversation about the fact that I'm happy in my current relationship and not planning on doing anything outside of it. So I didn't say anything, and when we ended up in a little subgroup afterward with Lex and Nathan and several others, I didn't stop flirting. I cut back, but we'd already established a mode of interaction for the day, and it would have been not only rude but unnecessarily mean to begin, with no explanation, to act differently. (OK, I'll be honest, and I was enjoying myself) He broke a rose off of an arrangement for me and helped me up and raced through the revolving doors with me, and was generally a lot of fun. If it had, in fact, been a date I'd planned, it would have been a damned good one--dinner and a show and a few of those manly 'see, i treat you really well, look at me' displays that I have to admit I enjoy. In thinking over the day I don't think I could have done much differently, barring an epiphany when I arrived, and I don't regret it--it's nice to flirt with an attractive man who flirts back. I didn't lead him on, since he knows about the Boy and he knows that even if I were so inclined I couldn't have done anything what with him sharing a hotel room and all. Everyone got to flirt, and no one had to have a horrible 'we have to talk' conversation that would leave the friendship damaged. This experience actually helps me understand how people who are poly do it. I love the Boy, but I like Niles too, and if no one would be hurt or bothered by it I might just see where that goes--he's not my type in a long term sense but he could be fun for a while. But on the whole, I'm planning to avoid any more accidental dates in the future, because trying to walk the line can be exhausting!
* Phew, this pseudonym thing really is difficult--finding a name that evokes the person so I can remember it while also making sure it's not identifying, even if people I know actually ever read this. Hope I'm good at it! Am now going back to make them for everyone, it's silly to use real names if I'm not giving any other details.
This weekend I went to a comic convention in the city. This is in itself a fairly unusual thing for me to do, as I don't read comics and am not particularly interested in them as an art form, but several of my friends from out of town were going to be there, so needs must. It was fine, inasmuch as I talked to friends and when they were busy went off in a corner and read On Performance by Schechner (who I am LOVING. So very helpful in thinking of daily life as a performance, but he also says some interesting things about the nature of drama in a society that can't even be considered illiterate but must instead be a-literate.). I did pause to think that I was the girl at the comic convention who was reading an academic book instead of staring at all the people in their crazy costumes or rushing the minor celebrities, which in fact pushes me right past geeky and into full-on nerd territory--there's something lowering about the moment you realize that geeks can reasonably mock you (mental note, must resolve to embrace my inner nerd!)--but I pressed on and got a good few chapters done before the exhibition floor closed and my friends were free. A huge group had arranged to go to dinner afterward, but because of the number involved we got a late reservation, which meant that we had to entertain ourselves for a couple of hours in-between.
Now, there are two guys there in particular that I wanted to see--I shall call them... Lex and Niles*. They live out of state, and unlike the other folks there, I only see them once or twice a year at the most. But they were both actually working while at the convention, so I only got a few moments of hurried conversation with Niles and a snatched lunch with a group including Lex. He had a meeting as the floor was closing, so I stayed with Niles. We had all decided to go to the 'masquerade' to fill the time, but by the time we got out of the main room, the line was out the door and well down the block--we couldn't see the others, and it was chilly out for standing so we didn't just get in line ourselves. Fortunately, Niles had been talking with the man in charge about how one runs such a thing (because he is planning a major event this year), and worked some amazing mojo to get us into the room even before the press. I saved us front row center seats while he shadowed the man, and he came by several times to check on me.
[I should at this point mention two things: a) I am a flirtatious person. This is not meant to be meaningful, and if I realize that someone is taking it that way I will try to stop, but my default mode for interaction is light flirtation (apparently this is a non-gender specific thing even, and since I don't actually go both ways I think that shows the non-sexualized nature of the interaction to me); and b) Niles pointed out to me about a year ago that Lex was interested in me and had been for a while. I had a bit of a crush on him when we first met, but he didn't appear to respond, so I wrote him off, and then I met my Boy, whom I had been with for nearly a year by the time anything was said. At this point, we had a nice situation where Lex knew that I knew but didn't have to say anything, so I could carefully not flirt with him while still being friendly and he could be on the record as interested if the Boy and I break up. Unfortunately, I think this not flirting may have led to a bit of a problem. Because Niles wasn't 'not-to-be-flirted-with', so I did. And in retrospect, my flirting with him and not with Lex after he'd told me that Lex was interested could be read as a signal of interest in him. Ah, hindsight!]
So, we watched the show, and I got a text from another friend who had just arrived, asking where I was sitting. I told him in the front with no room for others and it occurred to me that this was a little odd-- if Niles could get me in (not even wearing my convention badge) he could surely have gotten one or two others, and he had several of their numbers to call them. And then I noticed his body language. And I thought about some of the conversations we'd had during the day--they were perfectly appropriate and witty remarks in context, but when he made that joke about 'liking to watch', there was that extra bit of eye contact, wasn't there? And during that other joke... and the eyebrow lift... and... there was that comment about if-when-if- *ahem* I move back from abroad, Lex maybe having a chance... and then when Nathan complimented my necklace and said that it was a clever plan by the Boy to distract people from my chest and he said... oh. So, I'm retarded. He's been flirting with me all day and I only just now realized that it was real flirting and not fun flirting. And was he ever talking about Lex at all? Or did he make a subtle transition from talking about Lex to talking about "Lex-wink-wink-nudge-nudge'? How socially inept have I been here? Anyway,
Armed with this realization, I ended up sitting somewhere else during dinner, so avoiding meal-related flirtation. But the thing is, I like him. He's a great guy: he's funny and smart and cute and the right amount of geeky for me, and he lives a fair way away, and I'm not going to see him before I move, and there is just no need to have an awkward and painful conversation about the fact that I'm happy in my current relationship and not planning on doing anything outside of it. So I didn't say anything, and when we ended up in a little subgroup afterward with Lex and Nathan and several others, I didn't stop flirting. I cut back, but we'd already established a mode of interaction for the day, and it would have been not only rude but unnecessarily mean to begin, with no explanation, to act differently. (OK, I'll be honest, and I was enjoying myself) He broke a rose off of an arrangement for me and helped me up and raced through the revolving doors with me, and was generally a lot of fun. If it had, in fact, been a date I'd planned, it would have been a damned good one--dinner and a show and a few of those manly 'see, i treat you really well, look at me' displays that I have to admit I enjoy. In thinking over the day I don't think I could have done much differently, barring an epiphany when I arrived, and I don't regret it--it's nice to flirt with an attractive man who flirts back. I didn't lead him on, since he knows about the Boy and he knows that even if I were so inclined I couldn't have done anything what with him sharing a hotel room and all. Everyone got to flirt, and no one had to have a horrible 'we have to talk' conversation that would leave the friendship damaged. This experience actually helps me understand how people who are poly do it. I love the Boy, but I like Niles too, and if no one would be hurt or bothered by it I might just see where that goes--he's not my type in a long term sense but he could be fun for a while. But on the whole, I'm planning to avoid any more accidental dates in the future, because trying to walk the line can be exhausting!
* Phew, this pseudonym thing really is difficult--finding a name that evokes the person so I can remember it while also making sure it's not identifying, even if people I know actually ever read this. Hope I'm good at it! Am now going back to make them for everyone, it's silly to use real names if I'm not giving any other details.
Saturday, February 17, 2007
one down, two to go
The exam is finished. I turned it in with a little bit of time to spare, but honestly, I don't feel good about it. I just...couldn't start. I had a week to write this thing, and it took three days to really get started. Two of the questions were fine and the third was...ok. Not a triumph, but I chose it strategically--my chair wanted to know that I knew about a related area, and while I don't know it as well as the area I work in, I decided to answer the question about it instead of the questions I knew a little better.
Recently, I've spent more and more time questioning whether academia is actually somewhere I want to work. It's funny. I've wanted to be a professor since I was twelve years old, but suddenly, I'm not at all sure. If I had all the money in the world, would I still do this? Probably not. So why the hell am I doing it now? It's not like I'm going to get rich doing it, after all.
I love archaeology, I like the puzzle and the thinking and the work. But I don't love the academic process. I don't want to have to publish on someone else's schedule, I don't want to constantly beg funding bodies for money, I don't want to deal with the increasingly anti-social-science bias in the academy and the country as a whole. (I suppose the last one is less of an issue if I actually permanently leave the country, but it's still there) I actually like the teaching element, and the research, but I want to do it on my own schedule.
Recently, I've spent more and more time questioning whether academia is actually somewhere I want to work. It's funny. I've wanted to be a professor since I was twelve years old, but suddenly, I'm not at all sure. If I had all the money in the world, would I still do this? Probably not. So why the hell am I doing it now? It's not like I'm going to get rich doing it, after all.
I love archaeology, I like the puzzle and the thinking and the work. But I don't love the academic process. I don't want to have to publish on someone else's schedule, I don't want to constantly beg funding bodies for money, I don't want to deal with the increasingly anti-social-science bias in the academy and the country as a whole. (I suppose the last one is less of an issue if I actually permanently leave the country, but it's still there) I actually like the teaching element, and the research, but I want to do it on my own schedule.
Friday, February 09, 2007
We don't need to STEEEENKIN' exam!
I was supposed to begin this exam at 6pm on Wednesday. This fit nicely into my grand plan to finish by 6pm on the evil V-day, gather up some friends with no romantic plans, and drink to celebrate being one third of the way through. The questions were submitted to the department admin a week in advance, along with an email (to which she responded) specifying date and time, on which she would email the questions. As 6 approached, I huddled in front of my computer obsessively clicking 'get mail', panicking. Would my reasonable, if overly broad in scale, questions have been modified to form hideous franken-questions, requiring not 5-8 pages but a complete War-and-Peace-sized novel to answer them? Would they have been shifted slightly to emphasize the things I'm less secure in my knowledge of, like the prehistory of the Levant or herding techniques in use in the Anatolian Neolithic? Or would they appear as drafted (or even, heavens, even smaller and more rational in scale, dealing with more relevant topics), meaning that I could just sit down and write the damned things without having to dive back into frantic last minute reading?
5:59. Click.
Nothing.
6:01. Click.
Nothing.
6:05. Click.
Nothing.
At this point I begin to be concerned. Our Admin is known for her thoroughness, for her complete inability to not do the job perfectly. The woman sends work related email at 8pm on a Friday night (admittedly, it's never urgent, so why she doesn't wait until business hours on Monday I'm not sure), she would never send something this important late. Perhaps I'd better call her.
Dial, ring, voicemail. Leave a message. Perhaps she's been abducted by aliens?
6:10. Click.
Nothing.
This can't be happening. She must have sent the email, maybe it's just taking time to get through the system. Type nonsense email to self and send it off, half hoping that it won't arrive so I'll have an explanation.
6:20. Click.
1 new email! From me. Email is indeed working, apparently. Maybe it's a problem on her end?
6:30. Click.
Nothing.
Send off an email to both the admin and the exam chair mentioning the fact that I haven't received the exam, so that whenever it does turn up, I will get that extra time allowed.
7:00. Click.
Nothing. (and it was amazing how, having flooded my inbox with forwards and chatty commentary all day long, my friends chose this point to stop emailing) At this point I begin to believe that I will never get these questions, that the whole thing is a big hoax, that I have in fact already washed out of grad school and this is their way of telling me. "Oh, you thought we were going to test you for candidacy? HA!! The test was the last two and a half years, and you FAILED! No exam for you, pack up and move along, you big fat failing failure."
As I cannot face this idea any longer (plus, the mental image of my chair saying the phrase 'failing failure' in his incredibly repressed British way makes me giggle, which is becoming more and more tinged with hysteria), I decide it must be a problem with her email system, and spend the next few hours trying to figure out how to convince my email program to check extra special hard. I fail to make any difference, and finally go to bed at about 4, still trying to figure out why this email out of all my emails would be the one to go missing.
After a fun-filled and only 30% coherent conversation with the very nice UPS man, I was sitting on the couch staring vacantly at the clock saying 9:15 and desperately trying to gather up the energy to go back to bed when the phone rang. It was our admin. She forgot to email my exam, very sorry, how was today as a start date?
ARGH.
Got it at noon today, meaning it will officially end at noon on the 15, but I'm hoping to finish writing the two and a half books required by the end of the day on Wednesday so I can get my 'my boyfriend is 6,000 miles away' drink on in the company of friends.
And it is kind of nice to know that even administrative goddesses make mistakes!
5:59. Click.
Nothing.
6:01. Click.
Nothing.
6:05. Click.
Nothing.
At this point I begin to be concerned. Our Admin is known for her thoroughness, for her complete inability to not do the job perfectly. The woman sends work related email at 8pm on a Friday night (admittedly, it's never urgent, so why she doesn't wait until business hours on Monday I'm not sure), she would never send something this important late. Perhaps I'd better call her.
Dial, ring, voicemail. Leave a message. Perhaps she's been abducted by aliens?
6:10. Click.
Nothing.
This can't be happening. She must have sent the email, maybe it's just taking time to get through the system. Type nonsense email to self and send it off, half hoping that it won't arrive so I'll have an explanation.
6:20. Click.
1 new email! From me. Email is indeed working, apparently. Maybe it's a problem on her end?
6:30. Click.
Nothing.
Send off an email to both the admin and the exam chair mentioning the fact that I haven't received the exam, so that whenever it does turn up, I will get that extra time allowed.
7:00. Click.
Nothing. (and it was amazing how, having flooded my inbox with forwards and chatty commentary all day long, my friends chose this point to stop emailing) At this point I begin to believe that I will never get these questions, that the whole thing is a big hoax, that I have in fact already washed out of grad school and this is their way of telling me. "Oh, you thought we were going to test you for candidacy? HA!! The test was the last two and a half years, and you FAILED! No exam for you, pack up and move along, you big fat failing failure."
As I cannot face this idea any longer (plus, the mental image of my chair saying the phrase 'failing failure' in his incredibly repressed British way makes me giggle, which is becoming more and more tinged with hysteria), I decide it must be a problem with her email system, and spend the next few hours trying to figure out how to convince my email program to check extra special hard. I fail to make any difference, and finally go to bed at about 4, still trying to figure out why this email out of all my emails would be the one to go missing.
After a fun-filled and only 30% coherent conversation with the very nice UPS man, I was sitting on the couch staring vacantly at the clock saying 9:15 and desperately trying to gather up the energy to go back to bed when the phone rang. It was our admin. She forgot to email my exam, very sorry, how was today as a start date?
ARGH.
Got it at noon today, meaning it will officially end at noon on the 15, but I'm hoping to finish writing the two and a half books required by the end of the day on Wednesday so I can get my 'my boyfriend is 6,000 miles away' drink on in the company of friends.
And it is kind of nice to know that even administrative goddesses make mistakes!
Sunday, February 04, 2007
Performance, Practice and Phenomenon
I'm toying with using bits from performance theory, practice theory and phenomenology in my dissertation. And it's been a little more trying than I'd have liked, so I'm going to get some thoughts down here.
I like the idea of phenomenology--exploring the sensory world of past cultures. And this is a little more grounded for my project than for others, since I'm talking about things that were in physical contact with the body. But at the same time, this problematically assumes that the physical experience hasn't changed, and I'm not entirely sure how helpful it's going to be in actually talking about anything new and different. Yes, the physical experience of wearing something that limited movement can impact the possible work one does, but can I actually tell how much/ how often an item was worn? If it only restricts movement when worn and was only worn for special occasions, that's not really a significant impact, is it.
Performance theory also has its pros and cons. Judith Butler talks about how people 'perform' their gender, but she's talking about an unconscious performance. I think it's a more subtle action than that, a performance that is both conscious and unconscious. When we interact with other people, we are always performing ourselves--the face I present to my best friend is not precisely the same as the one i present to the chair of my committee, or my mother, or my boyfriend. This isn't lying or acting, and these faces aren't hugely different from each other, but there are always little status signals or emphases on this personality aspect over that one that make a difference. This is especially visible (to me, having studied linguistics) in the register shifts that lead to different word choice and pronunciation depending on who's around you. And all of this is slightly unconscious, but it's also something that you're aware of. You know that you can't hug your boss like you would your mom, and so you carry your body differently, you feel its physical relationship to their body differently, which informs your movement and your thinking and your speech. This is both conscious and unconscious, and as you can tell, I'm having a lot of trouble articulating it! Looking into actual writing on acting, perhaps they discuss this explicitly.
Practice theory is still a little confusing for me. It all comes from Bourdieu and his theory of practice, but it's gone so many places since then- basically, the way you always do something comes to shape the way you think. So the fact that you have to move around the table to get to the door influences the way you think about the door. Your practice is influencing your thought. But I feel like this works really well for spatial analyses, for architecture, and not necessarily so well for clothing. If the clothing you habitually wear is influencing your thought, isn't that more likely to be due to its physical contact than to its mental influence? Are the two separable?
I like the idea of phenomenology--exploring the sensory world of past cultures. And this is a little more grounded for my project than for others, since I'm talking about things that were in physical contact with the body. But at the same time, this problematically assumes that the physical experience hasn't changed, and I'm not entirely sure how helpful it's going to be in actually talking about anything new and different. Yes, the physical experience of wearing something that limited movement can impact the possible work one does, but can I actually tell how much/ how often an item was worn? If it only restricts movement when worn and was only worn for special occasions, that's not really a significant impact, is it.
Performance theory also has its pros and cons. Judith Butler talks about how people 'perform' their gender, but she's talking about an unconscious performance. I think it's a more subtle action than that, a performance that is both conscious and unconscious. When we interact with other people, we are always performing ourselves--the face I present to my best friend is not precisely the same as the one i present to the chair of my committee, or my mother, or my boyfriend. This isn't lying or acting, and these faces aren't hugely different from each other, but there are always little status signals or emphases on this personality aspect over that one that make a difference. This is especially visible (to me, having studied linguistics) in the register shifts that lead to different word choice and pronunciation depending on who's around you. And all of this is slightly unconscious, but it's also something that you're aware of. You know that you can't hug your boss like you would your mom, and so you carry your body differently, you feel its physical relationship to their body differently, which informs your movement and your thinking and your speech. This is both conscious and unconscious, and as you can tell, I'm having a lot of trouble articulating it! Looking into actual writing on acting, perhaps they discuss this explicitly.
Practice theory is still a little confusing for me. It all comes from Bourdieu and his theory of practice, but it's gone so many places since then- basically, the way you always do something comes to shape the way you think. So the fact that you have to move around the table to get to the door influences the way you think about the door. Your practice is influencing your thought. But I feel like this works really well for spatial analyses, for architecture, and not necessarily so well for clothing. If the clothing you habitually wear is influencing your thought, isn't that more likely to be due to its physical contact than to its mental influence? Are the two separable?
Saturday, February 03, 2007
On Wednesday, I begin the first of three exams to qualify me for dissertation writer status. Fingers crossed! I'm surprisingly not nervous. It's just 40 or so well cited pages in a week, i can do that with no problem (my high school self is crying to hear me say that. Ah, those innocent days when I could spend a week polishing a five page paper... I'm not entirely sure I can even write a five page paper these days, what could I possibly say with any supporting evidence in that amount of space?). This is the area exam, so I'll mostly be going over dates and artifacts and the like, with relatively little of my own thought. The topic exam, with all of the theories I'll be using and how I'm putting my own mark on them, is going to be much more difficult, but I will leave that panic for its own time. I'm still annoyed by the fact that no one seems to know how this works. My chair sent me to ask the department admin, who gave me an entirely different story than my second reader had given me. It's so easy to mess up the process. Especially given that one of my readers has had a family tragedy and is pretty much out of it for the next few months. We'll probably last minute subsitute someone else, which has its pluses and minuses. Since they won't know what I''m doing, they could not comment much, and leave it all to the others who do... or they could be horribly offended that I haven't included their favorite authors and give me grief. Here's hoping for the former!
I haven't managed to write much here recently, and this is unlikely to change with the exams and all, but I'm going to try and be a little more regular! (Not that anyone actually reads it, so no worries!)
I haven't managed to write much here recently, and this is unlikely to change with the exams and all, but I'm going to try and be a little more regular! (Not that anyone actually reads it, so no worries!)
Saturday, January 13, 2007
de-motivation
So, in just over four months, I'm moving to England. And in the next two months, I'm taking three major exams which (if I pass) will make me ABD, with only my actual dissertation to write. The problem? The problem is that I'm thinking too much. If things go well in England, I will be staying there, maybe getting married, and living in the London area. All good things, except for professionally. The odds of finding an academic job are not good in the best of circumstances. It's not like every university hires someone every year-- it depends on who's retired or moved to another institution and how the budget looks and what direction the department is trying to go. And of course it's not as though I'm guaranteed to get every job I apply for, I won't. In any given year, there might be at most fifteen positions I could apply for in the US. I might get to the second round on half of them, and beyond that on even fewer. So by making the committment to stay in London, I limit my options so severely that I don't think it's even possible that I will get a job. The odds on one of the universities in the area needing to hire someone with my exact qualifications in the year that I graduate are infinitesimal. And this, in turn is making me less motivated to care about these exams--what good is it to pass them if I'll never be able to use the damn degree? I know I need to proceed as though I'm not going to be staying in England, but that idea is so horrible to me that I can't even think as though it's going to happen.
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
happy day!
the bugs are gone, oh glorious day! it took nearly three months of sleeping on the couch and cost just over three thousand dollars, but the bugs appear to be dead. it's also taken an incredible toll on my mental health, but i think a few weeks of good sleep in a row should clear that right up. now i can begin to think again, and possibly actually post things. yippee!
Tuesday, October 03, 2006
mild paranoia
Dealing with the bedbug situation has been--trying. I've taken every single thing made of fabric other than the mattress and the couch out of the apartment and moved it to a secure quarantine location. I bought a few things and have been storing them in the regirigerator to keep them completely safe from infestation (although I've slept fo the couch for two weeks with no problem, so I think they are confined to the upstairs area). I've had two visits from the exterminator, which has required two boarding visits to the vet for the cats. I've come to accept the fact that for the next several months I will be extra sensitive to itches and half-believe that there are bugs crawling on me because there were at one point (Wikipedia describes a major side effect of bedbugs as mild paranoia, and they aren't kidding!). And I've begin the lengthy process of laundering everything I own. This just... sucks. I know I've got a lot of clothing, but I wear it slowly and thus wash it slowly. Having to do it all at once has really brought home the cost of the process--it would be hundreds of dollars on laundry alone, without even thinking of the dry cleaning. I'm hoping to negotiate a big bulk discount at the dry-cleaners, because I've got literally more than a hundred pieces that need to go, and I can't afford to pay $7 or $9 a pop. I can't even imagine how people who live in houses they've been in for years manage this, because my apartment is relatively spare in terms of stuff, and this is going to take forever and cost a fortune. It does give me an idea for a company though--I honestly can't estimate how much it would be worth for me to turn the entire process over the professionals who would remove and clean everything, spray and fumigate while I went and lived in a hotel or on someone's couch. Probably thousands.
Monday, October 02, 2006
concepts and art
I've recently found several folks who sell their art on the internet, in an interesting way- Anthony White and Sala are both doing a non-repetitive series of numbers (money and just numbers, respectively) that they sell for a price that is determined directly or indirectly by the number of the painting. Anthony White's pieces are very individual, and he seems to have increased in skill while doing them, but Sala's are deliberately identical and thus it's not possible to see skill or changes in them. I'm fascinated by the fact that there isn't necessarily talent involved in this process: they may or may not be good artists, but they are marketing geniuses, in that they are selling their art for steadily increasing amounts.
Is this what art is becoming? Or is it just a flash in the pan, from which art will return? The influence of computers and the internet is everywhere, and our art should reflect that, but not only that. Interesting.
Is this what art is becoming? Or is it just a flash in the pan, from which art will return? The influence of computers and the internet is everywhere, and our art should reflect that, but not only that. Interesting.
Thursday, September 21, 2006
good night, sleep tight, don't let the--oh, hell
I've been lax in posting since I got back (and of course, failed miserably in my attempt to post while gone!). But I feel I am slightly excused by the traumas that met me on return. It began slowly, with a defunct showerhead that took almost a week to fix, and then heated up with a very sick cat and a rush to the emergency vet, followed almos timmediately by the thrilling discovery that my apartment is infested with bedbugs. Oh, yes, bedbugs. As a child I thought these were sort of like the boogeyman, something grown-ups tried to scare you about, but nothing real. How very, sadly, wrong I was. I was bit so badly in the first day that I thought I had a rash on my arms, some freak thing, and went in to the health center. Then I saw the first bug and smushed it, leaving a bloody streak on the wall. *shudder* There are few things in life so unsettling as sitting in bed realizing that while you slept, tiny blood-sucking bugs have been crawling all over you sucking your blood. The exterminator is coming in, but before he can treat, I have to remove everything fabric from the apartment except for the furniture, wash it, and keep it out until after he's treated. Which involves the rental of a storage space in addition to assloads of washing. Not a happy girl. Can't write more, too depressed.
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
In which I discover the sleeping habits of Turkish hunters
Well, I have landed in Turkey! I made it to the site all right, with a nine hour layover in Charlotte, NC (never, ever have a nine hour layover in Charlotte, NC, it was horrible. Their auto-flush toilets were broken, so you had to get there right after they had cleaned the bathroom or there were no toilets available. Argh!), another eight hours in London, where I changed from Gatwick to Heathrow and got to see the Boy for a couple of hours, three more hours in Amsterdam, and the final five hours in Istanbul. So tired! But I did manage to stay up, and slept pretty damn well that night. So it wasn’t until the next night that I realized that my lovely lightweight camping mattress was in fact so lightweight as to be nonexistent, and thus completely useless. I immediately asked the site manager to get me another on his next shopping trip, but after three days he admitted he hadn’t been able to find any. I suspect he didn’t look very hard, but that is what you get when you ask someone else to do your shopping—it’s never as important to them as it is to you! He did say there is a camping store near the Mevlana, and offered to draw me a map, because it’s apparently hard to find, but didn’t do it in time for Friday, our day off. So I wandered around for a bit, and finally managed to ask the folks at our friendly local carpet shop, Caravan, where it was. They had no idea, but did send me to a hunting store. It was…fabulous! This tiny little closet of a store, not more than 25 square feet, completely filled to the brim with guns. Big ones, little ones, rifles, handguns, probably hundreds of kinds. The place was literally 95% filled with guns! Turkish hunters don’t mess around with decoys or blinds or camo or any of that nonsense (although I suppose they get all the camo they need from their army stint), they just shoot the hell out of their targets. So, I timidly entered the store and fumblingly asked, in my extremely limited pigeon Turkish, ‘I want a mattress- ’ and then made the universal motion for inflating a beach ball. The little old man laughed at me and then sent his assistant (a tiny shop like that has an assistant! How much must they make?) up a ladder to this nook over the door. At first I was pretty hopefully, because all those gun-toting hunters must need to sleep somewhere, right? And it does make sense to sell it at a hunting supply store, right? So as I watched hopefully, the assistant pulled of a small stack of…inflatable pool mattresses. Little plastic packages with a woman in a bikini, in a variety of brightly flowered or rainbow striped patterns. Marvelous. Obviously, there was some call for these, as he had several and he knew exactly what I meant, but… I got one, and thus far it has been more comfortable than the camping one (although only barely, those things are not made to be wide enough for anyone to actually sleep on). But my favorite part is the mental image of all those manly, camo-clad, army trained Turkish hunters, weighed down with a wide variety of guns and knives, sleeping on little rainbow striped pool mattresses!
As usual came down with the plague that’s going around. Three days running for the toilet, but I’ve gone most of the day without, so yay! This afternoon I was so hungry (the worst part of it was, I was still hungry, the food just didn’t agree with me, so the scent of food didn’t make me sick and not want to eat) that I ate a Cliff bar and it tasted incredible. Like manna from heaven! And I know the damn things generally taste like dust, so it’s just the contrast with three days of bread that did it. No unfortunate repercussions thus far, so I may be truly on the mend. I quite like Turkey, and I know that most of the country is not an archaeological site and thus has slightly better sanitation, but I have come to associate it with immediately getting sick!
We’ve added some new characters to the site this year (and by that I mean that they are characters, not that I think of them as fictional people!). I’m working on finding fake names for everyone, on the off chance that anyone ends up reading this who knows them (unlikely, I know, but six degrees and all that!), but I’ll write up a cast of characters at some point, along with back gossip. Having to tailor my blogging for a museum site aimed at middle schoolers has somewhat limited my ability to actually talk about what goes on. I’ve been dying here! Sex, lies and all sorts of other carry on.
This year it has been cool in the evenings and hot but not appalling during the day, and I’m hoping this trend will continue. I’m in a tent this year, and learning that even in the shade, it gets too hot in there to go for a kip during afternoon tea, which was a bitch when sick, but whatever, I suppose I’ll learn to manage. This 7am to 7pm schedule takes it out of you, and I’ve been missing my afternoon nap! I foresee early bedtimes ahead. Kind of a bummer, as I love sitting around chatting with people in the evenings, but on the other hand, it means less exposure to the evil mosquitoes of death! I brought 98% DEET with me this year in anticipation, but so far have not had to use it.
As usual came down with the plague that’s going around. Three days running for the toilet, but I’ve gone most of the day without, so yay! This afternoon I was so hungry (the worst part of it was, I was still hungry, the food just didn’t agree with me, so the scent of food didn’t make me sick and not want to eat) that I ate a Cliff bar and it tasted incredible. Like manna from heaven! And I know the damn things generally taste like dust, so it’s just the contrast with three days of bread that did it. No unfortunate repercussions thus far, so I may be truly on the mend. I quite like Turkey, and I know that most of the country is not an archaeological site and thus has slightly better sanitation, but I have come to associate it with immediately getting sick!
We’ve added some new characters to the site this year (and by that I mean that they are characters, not that I think of them as fictional people!). I’m working on finding fake names for everyone, on the off chance that anyone ends up reading this who knows them (unlikely, I know, but six degrees and all that!), but I’ll write up a cast of characters at some point, along with back gossip. Having to tailor my blogging for a museum site aimed at middle schoolers has somewhat limited my ability to actually talk about what goes on. I’ve been dying here! Sex, lies and all sorts of other carry on.
This year it has been cool in the evenings and hot but not appalling during the day, and I’m hoping this trend will continue. I’m in a tent this year, and learning that even in the shade, it gets too hot in there to go for a kip during afternoon tea, which was a bitch when sick, but whatever, I suppose I’ll learn to manage. This 7am to 7pm schedule takes it out of you, and I’ve been missing my afternoon nap! I foresee early bedtimes ahead. Kind of a bummer, as I love sitting around chatting with people in the evenings, but on the other hand, it means less exposure to the evil mosquitoes of death! I brought 98% DEET with me this year in anticipation, but so far have not had to use it.
Sunday, June 25, 2006
packing!
I'm leaving town in two days, leaving the country in a week. And what have I done about this? Nothing! Why bother to pack in advance when I can stay up all night before leaving frantically throwing things into a bag, only to realize when I arrive that I have brought no underwear, and all of my shirts are long sleeved sweaters. As this is my normal procedure, I was planning to avoid it by packing earlier. But this evening I realized that almost everything I plan on wearing on-site is dirty, and therefore must be washed-but the laundry room is closed tonight, and I have appointments all day tomorrow. So, fine, no chance to have clean clothes, I'll just get up at 7 Tuesday and wash them all then.
Then, epiphany--I can take all of the clothes I plan to bring to my parents house and wash them while I'm waiting to go to a wedding! Finally, after four years of college that was too far away to bring home dirty laundry, I get to do the vacation laundry dump! Now all I need to do is decide what I need to bring instead of making sure it is fit to be brought. I am brilliant!
Crap. Now I need to actually decide what I need to bring. I hate this part of traveling the most--how I wish for the ability to magically summon my possessions anywhere I need them, instead of humping the around Asia and Europe and realizing when I get back that I've only used half of them. Last summer, I brought practically a whole first aid kit- who ever really needs a whole box of band-aids, or pepto-bismol (is there anyone else who spent years thinking it was Pepto-Bismo?), or even a full-sized bottle of Advil? There is no need to carry these things, but I am convinced that I will have some sort of emergency and they will be the difference between life and death. Damn my mother and her over-packing genes! But I will perservere, and this year, this year my luggage will not appear to contain the kitchen sink in addition to my clothes and camping equipment.
I did put the tent up in my living room to air it out and make sure it is functional. I don't recall what I was doing when I put it away the last time--I know I aired it after I lent it to Liz, but I appear to have had a stroke putting it away, as it was more Balled-up than folded neatly. It's so odd, this is completely not me, I like things to be put away in order so they don't get destroyed while they're there, but here is the evidence, I crapped out. And with no memory at all. Beginning to wonder if I might have really, really earlyonset Alzheimers... ANYway, I bought the thing two years ago but haven't actually used it myself, as I managed to finagle my way into a bed indoors each year. This year I've come to the conclusion that, while having an actual bed is all well and good, sleeping inside in the 110 degree weather is so very, very sucky that it makes the bed moot.
Tent pros:
Then, epiphany--I can take all of the clothes I plan to bring to my parents house and wash them while I'm waiting to go to a wedding! Finally, after four years of college that was too far away to bring home dirty laundry, I get to do the vacation laundry dump! Now all I need to do is decide what I need to bring instead of making sure it is fit to be brought. I am brilliant!
Crap. Now I need to actually decide what I need to bring. I hate this part of traveling the most--how I wish for the ability to magically summon my possessions anywhere I need them, instead of humping the around Asia and Europe and realizing when I get back that I've only used half of them. Last summer, I brought practically a whole first aid kit- who ever really needs a whole box of band-aids, or pepto-bismol (is there anyone else who spent years thinking it was Pepto-Bismo?), or even a full-sized bottle of Advil? There is no need to carry these things, but I am convinced that I will have some sort of emergency and they will be the difference between life and death. Damn my mother and her over-packing genes! But I will perservere, and this year, this year my luggage will not appear to contain the kitchen sink in addition to my clothes and camping equipment.
I did put the tent up in my living room to air it out and make sure it is functional. I don't recall what I was doing when I put it away the last time--I know I aired it after I lent it to Liz, but I appear to have had a stroke putting it away, as it was more Balled-up than folded neatly. It's so odd, this is completely not me, I like things to be put away in order so they don't get destroyed while they're there, but here is the evidence, I crapped out. And with no memory at all. Beginning to wonder if I might have really, really earlyonset Alzheimers... ANYway, I bought the thing two years ago but haven't actually used it myself, as I managed to finagle my way into a bed indoors each year. This year I've come to the conclusion that, while having an actual bed is all well and good, sleeping inside in the 110 degree weather is so very, very sucky that it makes the bed moot.
Tent pros:
- It cools off in the evening, to a positively balmy 90 or so degrees (or even 80 if I'm very, very lucky!)
- I have complete and utter control over the mosquito environment--no one else letting the damn things in while I'm asleep! Also, I can carefully avoid letting scorpions or snakes inside.
- I can probably get a 'mattress' for the tent in addition to my camping one (although why the Turks choose to refer to large cheap foam pads as mattresses I'm still not entirely clear)
- I don't have to share it with seven other people.
- Can be awakened by the early morning bird-song and the distant (and slightly romantic) call of the muezzin (sadly now taped not live)
- Since I'm unlikely to get a shady spot arriving so late in the season, it's going to be 115 inside during the day, so no happy shady napping during tea break.
- Walking to the tent in the dark, snakes and scorpions abound. *shudder*
- My mattress is a little thin and thus not comfy--the foam 'mattress' is thick and bad for the back, plus being filled with nasty dust mites.
- Can be awakened by the early morning bird-song and the distant (and slightly romantic) call of the muezzin (sadly now taped not live). That shit is EARLY!!
- Being outside puts me closer to the mysterious moaners. We could hear them from inside the building last year, and well, they were loud. Very loud. Very often. And she, for one, was incredibly enthusiastic. We finally concluded that she had to be faking it, because there is just no way anyone could legitimately be quite that enthusiastic for quite that long. If he were actually that good, he would be making a living doing porn without wasting his time in the dirty and poorly paid field of archaeology!
Thursday, June 22, 2006
ex dullness
I had dinner with an ex and his girlfriend tonight. This isn't the drama that people seem to expect--we broke up because he was moving to Costa Rica for eighteen months to work in a place that had no phone or internet access, so there was no anger or fighting or whatever. We just...ended. And when I moved out here, naturally I got in touch with him and said hey, and we've been meeting for dinner every three or four months for two years now. I don't have any unresolved feelings even--he was just who I needed to be with at the time, but I wouldn't want to date him now. Which is kind of the issue that tonight brought up. I know we've both changed in the four or so years since we broke up. I don't think I've changed too much, and he doesn't seem to have changed that much either.
But he's just...dull. Boring. He's a sweet guy, and his girlfriend is lovely, but they're just so...I don't even know what. We can't even seem to have a conversation (and yes, conversation is partly my responsibility too, I get that, but I can only do so much, people!), and yet I remember that we had tons of stuff to talk about.
Was I boring back then? HaveI only recently become the (terrifically!) interesting person I believe myself to be now? (and I actually called a friend when I left, to make sure I wasn't being overly generous in my attribution of non-dullness. You know what they say about people who 'assume'!) Or has he just lost all of his quirkiness? It's just so sad! I feel badly when I can look at him, at his life, and think that I would never want to live that way--it seems like a judgement of him somehow. It's not wrong to be dull, it's just... yes.
Perhaps this is just an issue of mine--my best friend from high school is getting married next week, and I sort of feel similarly about her. She is wonderful, lots of fun, crazy in a good way. But her fiancee is- I don't know, he's sweet, he loves her, whatever. He's just not interesting. And this is a man who was born without ankles (I know, right?!), so you'd think there would be a lot of interest there, things to overcome and whatnot. A good funny story or two, him being a genius skiier because he's used to not bending at the ankle, him managing to achieve his goal of competitive figure skating against all odds, I don't know, anything. But there's nothing. They're going directly into the white picket fence dream life that would make me want to rip my face off, singing together in the church choir, sitting on their back porch every summer night drinking lemonade and talking about the neighbors. And I can't even manage to have a conversation with the man, because the only thing we have in common is her, he thinks I'm odd and possibly crazy (I feel like the druggie sister or something) and I think that he's boring and she could do better (like Bill Pullman in Sleepless in Seattle). I feel badly about this, like my not wanting to live her life means I'm devaluing her choosing it.
But he's just...dull. Boring. He's a sweet guy, and his girlfriend is lovely, but they're just so...I don't even know what. We can't even seem to have a conversation (and yes, conversation is partly my responsibility too, I get that, but I can only do so much, people!), and yet I remember that we had tons of stuff to talk about.
Was I boring back then? HaveI only recently become the (terrifically!) interesting person I believe myself to be now? (and I actually called a friend when I left, to make sure I wasn't being overly generous in my attribution of non-dullness. You know what they say about people who 'assume'!) Or has he just lost all of his quirkiness? It's just so sad! I feel badly when I can look at him, at his life, and think that I would never want to live that way--it seems like a judgement of him somehow. It's not wrong to be dull, it's just... yes.
Perhaps this is just an issue of mine--my best friend from high school is getting married next week, and I sort of feel similarly about her. She is wonderful, lots of fun, crazy in a good way. But her fiancee is- I don't know, he's sweet, he loves her, whatever. He's just not interesting. And this is a man who was born without ankles (I know, right?!), so you'd think there would be a lot of interest there, things to overcome and whatnot. A good funny story or two, him being a genius skiier because he's used to not bending at the ankle, him managing to achieve his goal of competitive figure skating against all odds, I don't know, anything. But there's nothing. They're going directly into the white picket fence dream life that would make me want to rip my face off, singing together in the church choir, sitting on their back porch every summer night drinking lemonade and talking about the neighbors. And I can't even manage to have a conversation with the man, because the only thing we have in common is her, he thinks I'm odd and possibly crazy (I feel like the druggie sister or something) and I think that he's boring and she could do better (like Bill Pullman in Sleepless in Seattle). I feel badly about this, like my not wanting to live her life means I'm devaluing her choosing it.
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