tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-67445572024-03-05T11:15:29.815-06:00in favor of thinkingacademic / lifeMelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.comBlogger735125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-50645413847514264732009-01-11T13:40:00.002-06:002009-01-11T14:06:41.394-06:00anti-nostalgic antediluvianOver the years, I've talked a lot about clearing out my files and boxes and closets. I've made many valiant efforts and been partially successful. But I still hung on to an awful lot of paper. Some of that was simply due to weariness -- never having the stamina to keep on clearing it all away. Some of it was due to haste -- each time I moved, I would think I would have the time to sort and Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-50105151747257376912008-12-26T13:52:00.002-06:002008-12-26T14:00:33.468-06:00doing her part for the planetOver the past couple years, several companies have switched to biodegradable packing peanuts made from cornstarch derivatives. I don't know what else must be in them, but we found Old Girl happily snacking away on a few yesterday. Cornstarch itself doesn't seem like something that would be particularly scented or tasty, but dogs sure seem to like the peanuts. Perhaps that's a secret tactic forMelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-33205474477930639852008-12-23T15:27:00.002-06:002008-12-23T15:41:18.333-06:00library happinessI just came home from a trip to our neighborhood branch of the city public library -- I had a book on hold to pick up, and I took some time and browsed around and walked out with an armful of fiction and light nonfiction.I love, love, love that feeling of walking out from the library with anticipation for what's in those books. Even though I probably won't love or even finish all of them -- thatMelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-90421645569259424582008-12-21T20:36:00.004-06:002008-12-21T21:10:29.291-06:00thoughts on timeThe thing I've wrestled with the most this semester is, not surprisingly, time. I feel like I've been struggling with time in various ways for years -- not my whole life, exactly, although a few key scenes from the past do stand out. Certainly by my mid20s I was frequently finding myself morassed in indecision when I had too much flexibility in my schedule, and feeling oppressed when I had too Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-18400371981499164742008-12-12T21:12:00.004-06:002008-12-12T22:21:30.019-06:00the nothing responseAfter yoga class this evening, I was getting dressed after taking a shower, and the changing room had pretty much emptied out. I was putting on my boots, and a young woman (20ish) said "Actually, ma'am" -- I glanced at her -- "Ma'am, there's a place to put your shoes out in the lobby, people don't wear them in here." Now, in our studio, the rule is no shoes in the yoga room itself, but you are Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-47656014476529749912008-12-11T23:18:00.002-06:002008-12-11T23:38:25.373-06:00why I like my magazines on treesEven though I'm all for digital access to texts of all sorts, I'm realizing that I'm rather old-skool about magazines. I love reading magazines -- we subscribe to a couple weeklies (news/entertainment) and a couple monthlies (health/lifestyle). (All of which get recycled, and also distributed at the gym etc for re-reading.) And whenever I'm on a plane, I feel allowed to indulge in a handful Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-91094677020874181652008-12-10T21:56:00.004-06:002008-12-10T22:12:09.563-06:00holidaysAnother Not Surprising Update from Research Leave: The holiday spirit is much more accessible when you're on leave, rather than immersed in grading. I spent the afternoon actually baking today, which then gives me simple holiday gifts for the few outer-circle people I usually give presents to. Recognizing and renouncing my perfectionism, which has prevented me from sending out the cute Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-70512799161769882152008-12-05T15:46:00.003-06:002008-12-05T15:58:13.377-06:00hibernationIt's cold today. Really cold. And because of some peculiarities with our old house, it's cold inside, too. In the winter, we close off the outer rooms of the house, only making brief foraging trips into them for particular items. We live in the kitchen, the living room, and the bedroom, camping out with our laptops and building little work stations wherever it feels warmest. (In warmer Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-432794519790196082008-12-03T23:46:00.002-06:002008-12-04T00:12:18.190-06:00a booster rocket dayMichael Neill has a wonderful discussion somewhere in one of his books (and I've heard him talk about it on his radio show) about inertia. You know, an object in motion tends to stay in motion; and one that is at rest tends to stay at rest. (And I'm sure if there were a physicist in the audience, she'd have some much more complicated revision of that "law" we got told in school, but I'm going Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-5332249807055053032008-12-02T17:38:00.003-06:002008-12-02T17:56:22.827-06:00leave: like a shower for the psycheLast spring, when I was anticipating going on leave for Fall 08, I think I told several people that I'd be sure to be meeting them for lunches and coffees, since I'd probably be feeling kind of squirrelly just working on my project, not having regular social interactions. Somewhat surprisingly, that really hasn't been the case. I think I was feeling so overextended that I needed these 7 months Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-81864703626050633292008-11-16T06:40:00.003-06:002008-11-16T06:50:58.690-06:00hotel lifeSo I'm staying in a quite nice hotel for a few days for this conference. There are a lot of things about how hotels are run that are of course excessive (new towels every day) but seem only like an exaggeration of my regular life -- I change the towels in our house every few days, so fresh ones every day is just stepping up the speed or scale of domestic practice. (And unfortunately this isMelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-63060682293279360242008-11-13T20:57:00.002-06:002008-11-13T21:07:51.558-06:00fantasy academic campI read a personal essay recently in some magazine or other -- probably one of those Newsweek "My Turn" columns, or something similar -- in which the writer talked about his experience attending baseball camp for adults. I don't remember the exact name of the camp, and I don't follow baseball -- but what I gathered from it was that a bunch of middle-aged men go to camp to be coached by retired Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-2271392269653989692008-11-05T10:55:00.004-06:002008-11-05T11:01:53.344-06:00TodayToday, I am willing to give up my cynicism about politics. Today, I am willing to give up my defeatism learned from years of living in states that don't match my values. Today, I am willing to believe in possibility. Today, I am feeling hopeful about this nation in a way I have never felt before.Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-23648736144657882462008-11-04T15:42:00.002-06:002008-11-04T15:45:35.568-06:00my voting storyVoting today was both exciting (since this election is potentially such a history-maker) and strangely anti-climactic: so many people had early voted (I know people who waited for over 2 hours last week to vote early) that there were no lines at all. Granted, GF and I did walk over to our polling place at about 2 in the afternoon; it looked bustling enough at 8:15 this morning when I walked the Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-659414908163025952008-11-01T18:52:00.002-05:002008-11-01T19:19:34.808-05:00happy novemberWhat's it like to be on a semester of research leave?it's awesome. I kind of feel bad saying that when everyone else is in the throes of mid-term grading, when people I know are in crappy jobs, and when there are much more serious problems in the world than the textual and historical questions I've been spending my time on. But it is true. And no one ever explained this to me before. I have two Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-73911521472771991322008-09-30T15:44:00.002-05:002008-09-30T15:47:26.696-05:0073 minutesThere are 73 more minutes left to the time band in which I was told to expect the washing machine repairperson to arrive.. . .sigh. This is what my afternoon has been like so far: sit down to work. Our younger dog barks furiously, I go to the front of the house to see if it's the repair person. No, it's the spaniel across the street who's causing our dog to bark. I return to my chair. Work Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-36181935486002371162008-09-22T15:50:00.002-05:002008-09-22T16:01:11.624-05:00follow upWell, after writing a carefully casual email, we have a plan to meet the afore-mentioned couple at a neighborhood coffeehouse/bar type place later this week. We'll see how it goes. And I didn't mean to start a with kids/without kids debate in the comments -- I can't possibly know what someone else's experience is like. From this side of things, I can say that it's often hard to become friends Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-18753764262208671562008-09-19T19:27:00.004-05:002008-09-19T19:41:16.811-05:00the couple friend gameI have probably said this before, but I'm not so good at making friends. The ones I have, I hang onto, and treasure dearly. But the small talk, getting-to-know-you part is hard. Even harder, though, is finding suitable subjects for such a small talk experiment. Even more challenging has been the project of finding some couples for GF and I to be couple-friends with. Usually, one of us knows Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-75886686739791471902008-09-11T21:19:00.002-05:002008-09-11T21:32:13.168-05:00not really quite so excitingI recently read Rachel Pastan's novel Lady of the Snakes, which was enjoyable enough for a Possession wanna-be. I did think Pastan's awareness of the complicated lives of young academic women was noteworthy (although some of the breeding details I thought were heavy handed -- really, does "linea negra" have to show up not just once but twice in the book as the main signifier of pregnancy? that Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-25841645324260330472008-09-04T18:31:00.002-05:002008-09-04T18:37:11.831-05:00if I were Miss MannersIf I were an etiquette authority, these are the two sentences I would proclaim banned from polite conversation:(1) "You look tired." Because really, if you don't feel tired, you don't want to hear this. And if you do feel tired, you don't need the reminder. Or the news that you are broadcasting your inner climate to the world.(2) "You look like your mother/father." Because there's at least a 50Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-60904496490213109342008-09-02T23:46:00.002-05:002008-09-02T23:55:42.514-05:00damn, September.How did it get to be September already?I know, this is hardly an original complaint, or a concern unique to little old me. And in fact at the beginning of summer I even predicted that I would feel some anxiety at the end of it. And look, I do.I don't know any academic who doesn't close out the summer with at least some tinge of regret for pages unwritten or books unread. For me, since summer Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-43428926028668954942008-08-25T11:16:00.005-05:002008-08-25T13:22:47.525-05:00from poetry to poop in 150 wordsEvolutionary biologists explain that the large frontal cortex in humans, which gives us an exceptional capacity for pattern matching, was originally a survival mechanism. If we're not stronger or faster than our predators, then we need to be able to interpret their signals and make smart choices. Our brains are designed to read meaning into our environment -- whether we're reading gestures, wordsMelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-24247450270351922112008-08-22T12:19:00.003-05:002008-08-22T12:30:54.562-05:00laugh when you canThe past couple of weeks with Elderly Parent have been kind of difficult. I finally got her to understand that I wanted her to see a neurologist -- and why (for an Alzheimer's/dementia evaluation). Since then, she's been understandably agitated, angry, sad, and afraid. But given EP's upbringing and personality, her response has been to cut herself off from her friends and to demonize me. SheMelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-39825911783415523312008-08-16T09:11:00.002-05:002008-08-16T09:33:30.156-05:00faculty leavesThis story in yesterday's Chronicle, about how the University of Georgia has suddenly canceled some faculty research leaves for this Fall semester, has really been on my mind. First, of course, is my sense of sympathetic outrage on the behalf of those faculty who thought they were on leave this semester and now suddenly have been told that they will be teaching next week. And on behalf of the Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6744557.post-37806929248603969622008-08-14T19:38:00.004-05:002008-08-14T20:42:56.879-05:00relative femininityDr Crazy's been writing some thoughtful posts recently about (among other things) the genre of personal academic blogging and gender normativity. The concept of the "personal" is inevitably coded differently for men and women -- and often assumed to have a connection to the domestic and/or feminine. I'd think it's quite safe to say that Dr C experiences her gender identity (whether on her blog Melhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18101745666402341618noreply@blogger.com0