Quickie Update

Quickie, because I haven't been able to leave Tot alone -- or be left alone -- in days. We've moved from our apartment to a house. We're partly moved, that is. No dining table, no couch, no bed. We're sleeping on an air mattress and in our new two-person sleeping bag (bought for that camping we were going to do) that's surprisingly comfortable. This place is a tri-level, though, and maybe it's in the nature of the tri-level or just the layout of this house, but it's very difficult to keep tabs on Tot in here. So I'm constantly going up one flight or two flights to find out where he is. So I've been following him room to room (no gates yet, and it would be really difficult considering the design of the stairwells to put up traditional toddler gates) with my book the last few days. Ahh, here's Tot coming down a flight of stairs.

I just sent him back up to play with his cars. Is he too young to be playing without supervision, I wonder.

He just came down the stairs again. Oy.

He's had pinkeye for the last few days, which has meant really terrible antibiotics that are wreaking havoc on his g-i tract.

But what I wanted to say to you all is that the differences between our apartment and this house really makes me reflect on my relationships to nature and people. I'm even thinking of writing an essay about it, about how much I've loved communing with the ducks and geese and swans, especially this spring when they all had babies. Oh how I marveled at the swan tending her nest, then worried when I saw the nest was abandoned until I finally saw the four signets. The Canada geese parents (both) who spend their entire lives walking their babies around, sometimes in the creek, sometimes on its banks. The duck mama and her tiny babies all running down the bank to the creek at the same time. Now our backyard, which is big, gorgeous, and unfenced, looks out into other people's backyards. When I look out the front, it's worse: just houses up and down.

Here's what I'm trying to say: We have a lot more space -- inside and out -- but I feel more closed in.

I think part of this has to do with my dislike of subdivisions and how much this feels a bit too much like the place I grew up. Some of it is, perhaps, my discomfort about being "the mom" and therefore representative of the family, my discomfort about being observed at close range, being someone who has coffee with the neighbors and seems like she has it together. But some of it is my relationship with nature. I'm thinking since there will be no waterfowl in my backyard, I think I must go and seek out spaces where I'll get to hang out with the birds. Until then, I'm going to get very into vegetative life -- me with my nineteen potted plants now sunning themselves on the deck.

Must go now. Tot's been very patient.

RBOC: Will This Quarter Ever End Edition

Hi everyone. Things have not exactly calmed down over here -- in great part because the quarter isn't over but is getting there which means mounds of grading and grumbling -- but they are different, so that's good. Today I have so many things I should do that my brain boggles just thinking about the edges of it -- and I need to figure out which things I must do today versus the things that can wait, alas, for another day. (Some things have been on the "can't do today, but must do soon" list for so long it's ridiculous.) So I'm going to blog, partly because I just haven't blogged in forever, but also to figure out what I must do today versus what can wait. In the process, I hope to update y'all. I look forward to blogging again like a real person soon.

So here goes:

• We're moving into a house by the end of the month. It's stretching us financially, because we had to cough up a huge security deposit, but we figure our quality of life will improve so much that it's worth it. I don't have to do anything on that front today; we're expecting the lease agreement but that's not urgent. We have not begun packing or anything. ETA: They sent the lease agreement. Some stupid ridiculous things that make no sense. Oy! Another thing to deal with.
• Grade 12 portfolios. Yes, I need to grade. Must do today. ETA: Graded three. Oy gevalt.
  
• I wanted to take my yoga class, but 1) I need to pay because my pass ran out and we don't have a lot of cash right now; and 2) I don't have a lot of time today, but will have time later in the week to focus on my headspace and health. It bothers me that when I'm busy the easiest thing to get rid of is the stuff that actually makes me more balanced, but today I think it just cannot be helped. No yoga today. Go later in the week, if the money's there. Otherwise, work out with Leisa Hart at home.
  
• I have a therapy appointment in the afternoon. I don't really want to go, because I'm too busy to do navel-gazing, but I've cancelled so much lately I don't want to do that. So off I go to that. Do this today. ETA: This ended up going really well.
  
• Tot has a water day at school tomorrow, so I have to 1) make sure his trunks still fit (why, oh why didn't I do this before I took him to school today?) and 2) I must buy him a beach towel. I don't know why I feel like I just cannot take his regular bath towel to school and forget this shopping expedition today, but I just can't. He deserves a darn beach towel from his parents who can more or less afford it and are just lazy and skeptical about many of the normal things that kids have. Check the trunks against other clothes he can wear, then go to get a beach towel and new trunks, if needed. ETA: Checked his not one, but two sets of swimming trunks (which is hilarious because we never, and I mean never, go swimming because I'm a big weenie about Tot and the swimming pool), and I'm just not sure that the larger won't be too tight. Must go and get swimming trunks on top of the beach towel. But where? The websites for what's in stock at my usual stores is pretty disheartening. Why is it that I don't think of doing this after I pick up Tot? Hmmm. Interesting possibilities there. ETA: Got trunks and beach towel at Kohl's after therapy.
  
• I've got to remember to bring a check to Tot's school for his field trip this Friday that I have to go on too, right before I jet to a dental appointment, then back to campus to pick up all the last papers from my courses. Just write the check and be done. Done.
  
• Tot has lost one of the little feet that cushions his nose on his glasses. I've got to get a replacement, which means I should call around and find out who has one. Have I mentioned I hate talking on the phone (in part because I have a "Smartphone" and it's one of the ones that has really high levels of radiation, which is bad health-wise). Yes, I bought a headset. It's okay. Call Tot's eyecare place because maybe the little foot will be free. ETA: I called, but apparently there are hundreds of nose pads and so they have to be brought in. Right now, they are on Tot's nose at daycare. The next day I can realistically bring in his glasses is Wednesday (considering that I teach all day tomorrow). Sigh.
  
• I keep buying plants at the Farmer's Market. Yesterday, they had a booth that was all organic heirloom vegetables in little pots for $1 each. Okay, it's basically like they asked what would EE most want to see at the Farmer's Market. It was amazing for all the obvious reasons, but also because while our farmer's market has some organics, it's not as if every other booth is organic, by a long stretch. (Not even every other booth is food! There are lots of crafts too.) So anyway I have all these plants on the patio now, and they really need to be replanted into larger pots. I have to buy said pots. I do have organic potting soil that I bought especially. But no pots. It's getting a little ridiculous out there. I also need a decent watering can because going in and out of the house with a 2-cup pyrex measuring cup to water about 15 plants is just silly. But when will I be able to get to even buying the pots? I do not know. Don't ask me why I couldn't manage to get this done over the weekend. I think it had everything to do with the fact that I was reading a book this weekend. (Despite what my academic calendar says, my brain saw all the sun and the plants and everything and screamed "summer" and hasn't been the same since.) Buy a bunch of pots and a decent watering can wherever I get the beach towel. ETA: This will have to wait another day.
  
• Since I finished my delicious mystery last night, I'm really dying to go and get another one today. At least, AL said I should go get it today. He must have no idea how long my list is already. I think this is going to have to wait. I could call and find out who has the next book, but I think I can't pick it up today.
  
• Because Tot is making this transition to his toddler bed, which means he gets up every few hours, I was in bed getting a few needed Zs with him instead of getting up early, taking a shower, and drinking some coffee. Shower and coffee are both still on my to-do list. I'd love to take a nap too. Coffee and shower done. How silly it is that I have to put such things on my to-do list!
  
• I have a student who wants to see me this afternoon. I think I basically need to say no because how can I get any of these things done and make it into the office this afternoon, however late. The grading, while not totally horrendous, is going to take me the bulk of the day. Everything else has to fit in at the odd angles of my day. Sadly. Send him the email that you'll see him tomorrow. Done.
  
• I need to send an email to this workshop thing I was very excited about going to, but now have decided to not go to. Why? Here's the story I'm telling myself: I've been in moderate pain since practically the beginning of this year. First it was the back pain (which hasn't gone away, but it pretty manageable now), then the terrible tooth, then just when the tooth was over, I got the worst heartburn/acid reflux of my life. I really thought I was going to die. Now, it's all abated except the referred pain from my back. But during all this time that I've been in on-again, off-again pain, I've been trying to work on Much Needed Article. I decided on a direction, then figured out exactly why that won't work, but in the process missed all my deadlines. Now, I've received word that I need to work on that article from last year because it does seem very likely that the collection is going to pick up a publisher very soon. During all this time, I've been teaching, doing service, taking care of Tot. And me, me in all this? I just want to rest. I want to rest and garden and read books. I want to do yoga and take care of myself and get healthier, because lately I've just been dragging my sorry ass from one thing to another. With Tot and his challenges (sleep and super-activity), I feel like I have very little time off from others' expectations and needs. I have almost two weeks off between the end of spring quarter and my full-time summer obligations, time when Tot will be in daycare during the day. And the workshop is scheduled during those two weeks. No. Just no. I can't. And now it turns out we're going to be moving during that exact same time. No. Sorry. I just can't do it. I.need.some.time.off. This email does not need to be sent today.

But I think the absolutely first thing I have to do is make some coffee. I can't believe I've even gotten this far without a cup of coffee (though I have been wondering whether I should quit coffee -- come on, EE, not today: don't you have enough to do? Don't you want to try to get stuff done today?). Then a shower. Then. . .everything else. As much as I don't want to do anything right now (except buy that book and dive in), I better just do my best to race to the finish line so I can have the bulk of those two weeks to myself, even though we'll also be moving and I'll be preparing summer syllabi. I'll have true time off. . .in October. Sigh.

Telegram from Apartment on the Pond

We moved. Or are moving. In slow motion, really. This complex is right near a pond, so we've got geese and ducks honking outside. And the friendliest squirrels ever, who came right up to our door. It's rainy and autumnal and green. I love the fall. I love wearing more clothes. I love being cozy.

I had a good talk with my department chair, who said assured me that getting tenure and parenting are both doable, but require self-discipline, something I've never been long on. But it's clear to me that when I've got an hour to do something, I can sure get it done without all the hand-wringing that used to take hours upon hours. So I'm pretty hopeful I can manage everything. My big goal for myself and for this here blog is to start working on my scholarship in earnest and recording my progress.

Absurdist Baby is so funny. He's sleeping on his boppy on the floor and keeps rolling around and stretching, then turning over and trying to go back to sleep. Will he, so I can blog? Nope, now he is up.

That's all folks.

Random Non-Bullets of Crap in Which I Try to Talk Myself into Working

Yesterday, I was just about to write about my thoughts about being an academic and a (new) parent, but right at that moment, Absurdist Baby woke up from his nap. And now Absurdist Lover just looked in on me and now I'm staring at AB again through the gate that separates the kitchen/baby area from the computers. Clearly it's not going to happen today either.

I have grading to do. Revisions on one project and then another project. We're on the quarter system here, so I think this blah I-don't-want-to-do-work-and-can't-seem-to-fret-myself-into-a-good-panic-about-it feeling is just the usual mid-semester blues I'd be feeling if I were on the semester system. (Obviously, this means I'm totally out of sync with the rest of the academic world, most of which just started a couple weeks ago --and the honeymoon period is just ending for you and your students about now, meanwhile my students and I are staring at each other with wild eyes scrambling for the escape hatch.) I really need to do this grading today, which means asking Absurdist Lover to take care of AB. The truth is I just want to lie on the bed and stare at the ceiling -- especially because when I woke up, the baby was in bed. AL tells me that he woke up at 3am and was inconsolable (natch) and came to bed with us. Usually I don't sleep through such things. But I don't remember.

So I've got a case of the ughs. I need to work and don't want to.

I also need to call my grandmother today. She was diagnosed with breast cancer a while back and it's now in her spine. I found this out from my brother's away message on IM. Not only am I unhappy to hear that my grandmother has an inoperable (but slow-moving) cancer, but I'm not thrilled that I was only lucky to find out. Now she's in a special nursing facility where they are going to treat her ancillary problems in order to strengthen her so she can undergo more chemo. The last time I talked to her, she sounded a bit drugged up.

In happy news, we're moving to a cheaper place. We're ecstatic because this place we've got has some major problem with the water system. The water comes from a well and smells all sulfury, which I'm told is normal. But the plumbing in this place is totally substandard. There are leaks all over the place. The plumbing was better in the travel trailer. Seriously. Even I can look at the plumbing and tell you it's crap.

Maybe I should take a shower and get up and fake it. I surely shouldn't go on kvetching. Maybe I'll grade then take a shower as a bonus. AB is laughing hysterically. I want to catch some of his sweetness.

Promises, Promises

I've been wanting all weekend to write a post weighing in on being an academic and a parent -- a subject that exploded around the academic blog community last week -- but I got caught up in a classic academic parent problem: my time is not my own on the weekends and so I never had clear-headed time to post. I'm hoping to catch up on that soon, because I co-opted Profgrrrl's comments and clearly have more to say/explore.

In other news, I'm getting together with colleagues for lunch (yay! having lunch with people like I'm a person rather than a teaching drone!) today! And AL and I are also trying to move so that we can have more money per month and so get AB into daycare.

More blogging coming soon. I hope.

Jobness!

All right, all right, so I haven't exactly been doing research this week. I did, however, finish grading that set of essays. I still have one more set, but because of the Week of Busy Weirdness, I haven't even started. Because the Week of Busy Weirdness is over, I don't even care that I haven't started these essays. I had the kind of week where we did lots of good important things, but so many of them were emotional and conflicted and hard that I definitely feel I'm going to be processing them for a while. (For example, yesterday I went to a funeral.)

One of them, probably the least conflicted of all, was that I got the contract for my job! Yes! One of those mystical animals that are rarely seen: the tenure-track position. I'm sorry I didn't tell y'all sooner, but it wasn't real to me -- which means I could've jinxed it by publicizing it -- until I got the contract. (Which is why I was blogging and then basically dropped out of sight. At first, I was freaking out everyday and had nothing new to say. Then I got the offer, but it took ages until I got the contract and so was paranoid.) I will be fully employed soon! It's a good position for me, I think, because of the mission of the department, though it's not the kind of university I saw myself at. (Of course, two schools that were totally the kind of places I thought I'd be best at contacted me after I accepted the offer. Grrr. Well, if they had gotten their butts in gear sooner. . . .) While not all of the faculty have books or anything, I do think that research is very important there, so I'll be trying to pursue a pretty aggressive research agenda -- which is crazy because I don't even have a firm idea of what to do next and how to think about my research agenda beyond turning my dissertation into articles. If anyone has a good way of thinking about building a research agenda (I mean of course I have a rough one, but I could always use the extra help), please please please let me know. Boice and others don't seem to talk about the project of building a coherent research agenda! I guess we assume that everyone wants to do their research enough that it's merely about following one's interests. For me, the problem is I"m interested in so many different things that I wonder what is smartest for me to do first and how to balance long-term and short-term projects so that I have enough scholarship for tenure. Anyway, the university is in a totally different part of the country, so we're packing ourselves up and moving the second my semester is done here, which is early June.

We're ecstatic to be leaving Urban Home City, which really feels to me a lot of the time like a dying city. Cross your fingers we'll be able to find a place that has a lot of land for my gardening obsession.

We've Moved!

No, not blogs, but living situations. Instead of teetering on an up-turned milk crate, I'm on two cushions on the hardwood floor of Absurdist Lover's and my apartment. After an uncomfortable hour-and-a half journey during which Mr. Tabby and I figured out that this was his ninth move, Mr. Tabby seems happy. Absurdist Lover got up early and met with the cable guy (amazing, since we got him to come the day after we moved in) and so now we have internet access and everything. My laptop is still fried, but if I can maneuver myself down to and up off of the floor, then I can use Absurdist Lover's computer.

So now instead of living with a lakeview, we have a full shower, cable, and walking distance-access to way too much consumerism. As we were planning and hoping and crossing our fingers for this move (because my credit sucks and I had to get my father to guarantee the thing), I had the distinct feeling that we were moving in the wrong direction. Instead of being further away from Urban Home City, we're now deep in it. As in, can't park on our street because it's too busy at 10pm on a Friday night in it. Over ten years ago, fresh out of college, I left Urban Home City with a sense of triumph. Though I lived in a gorgeous condo in a good neighborhood, at the local coffee house people still talked about working hard for another five, ten, thirty years and then getting the hell out of Urban Home City. But everyone knew that very few people ever get out. And you can't wait until there's a good time or money or ideal conditions. You have to run with your two feet under you and that's it. When my then-husband 's job was relocated to another city 360 miles away when I was twenty-three, I was ecstatic. We were actually going to leave, the same city that since my father emigrated to this country when he was three, he hasn't lived outside of a forty-mile radius, despite his coming home from business trips when I was a kid declaring that we were moving to Louisville, Kentucky or Charlotte, North Carolina. (My mother said no way, sight unseen. I haven't been to Charlotte, but I have been in Louisville and felt a sense of loss when I saw the gorgeous houses that could've been ours for a song instead of the dingy tract houses that cost a bloody fortune -- buying a house in Urban Home City is making a bargain with the devil that you'll work at high-paying jobs that you hate, watch the hours of your life tick away while you're in traffic, and get rid of any pesky remaining longings for authenticity, supporting small local businesses and farms, and a generally non-prepackaged, value-driven life.) And in the twelve years since, I haven't lived in Urban Home City, haven't even thought about moving back here, not even after the divorce. Despite the inevitable questions from family of when I'm going to move back to Urban Home City. Never, I would silently reply.

Similarly, Absurdist Lover got fed up with Urban Home City a few years ago and felt he had to leave, moving his family way up north to a place that I've heard is basically in the middle of nowhere. And though we both talk about getting a farm in Idaho, here we are, back in the thick of Urban Home City and its seductive consumerism: you can have anything right now, if you have the greenbacks to get it.

We are here for the baby. Here is where we have the familial and financial resources to manage our lives right now. Basically, I feel like I'm back in college, getting supported by my father. I'm grateful, because I wasn't doing very well on my own resources in the camper. On the other hand (and obviously I can't say this to him), I feel like I've gone backwards in my life. I've regressed. I'm a PhD and have had a job as an assistant professor in the kind of city that makes people say wow, but now I'm just a pregnant woman trying to make ends meet being supported by her family. Again, I'm grateful. I'm very lucky. On the other hand, I really want to go back to being. . .I don't know. . .a person. A person who doesn't have to beg. A person who is respected as someone who knows what she's doing in a job that she's good at. Of course, I'd also like to be a person who knows what she's doing. Lately, my brain is so clouded that I can barely think through where to put the TV when Absurdist Lover asks. It's bad. People say that pregnant brain is very normal. Great. It doesn't help me make decisions at either of my jobs, get myself reading and writing and generally working my way back to my field, or keep me from getting overwhelmed at basically nothing. But somehow I've got to manage to keep my authentic self and my values in this consumerist bordello. Keep my eye on the ball that reads: get the hell out!

Have I mentioned lately that though Urban Home State is often looked at as a leftist bangladeshgranolahead mecca, both the birth center and the private midwife care at a local hospital have disbanded, a farm I went to didn't know whether pesticides had poisoned their produce, and basically I am having much trouble finding people at all like me around here. It's all too yuppified for words. Of course, no one from anywhere else ever believes me when I say I'm an Urban Home City native. From now on, I'm telling people I'm from the moon. Maybe I'm not really from here -- but from here in the seventies with dark bead macrame, cordoroy jeans, and everyone chanting gongyo trying to find themselves. Now people have just found their bluetooth, their Starbucks (I've been going to Peets in protest), and their inner brats screaming I want, I want, I want. I never thought I'd say this, but I want to go back to Grad City. I've lost my urbanity and want to live in the quiet boonies where I can get some direct sun on my brand new rosemary and sage plants!

All that said, it's very wonderful to be in an apartment instead of a 24-foot camper. Absurdist Lover approves of the shower, as do I. Absurdist Fetus will have a nice place to live when s/he decides to leave the relative safety of my body. (We're exhausted today from yesterday's moving adventures -- and by we, I mean Absurdist Fetus and myself, who is merely the cocoon around AF's transforming body, the fruit around AF's seed.) I'm sure I'm not making sense anymore. Hi everyone!

Happy Blogoversary!

Happy anniversary, dear blog, dear Absurdist Paradise! It was a year ago today that I first decided that I needed a place to vent about and try to make sense of the absurdity, at that time of the job search process, then dissertating, then counting down to Adventure U. Then there's basically been this Absurdist Paradise radio silence, where I haven't felt like I could risk publicizing what was going on with me.

In that blogoversary spirit, I went back and read some of my earliest posts. It occurs to me how so much can happen in a year. I'm in a very different place (literally and figuratively) from where I was last year. If anything, I'm more, rather than less, conflicted about tenure-track academic life. I realize that this makes me a class-A ingrate, considering my incredible luck; on the other hand, I'm not sure that the luck I've had has led me to feeling useful and worthwhile in the world (which I figure is as close to happiness as I dare ask, work, or hope for). Moreover, the nature of my luck made me have to choose, as many academics do, between having a job and having a life. (I'm choosing life.) In looking back at the early posts, I see also that even back then I was intermittently thinking about some of my biggest concerns now -- no, not the job market, but who I was/am as an academic versus as a writer. I've gained a great deal in grad school, including a sense that I can write about certain topics that are important to me and that I may even have something important to say about the experiences that my education and interests have made it possible for me to have. But I'm also extremely grateful for this little academic train hiatus I've built for myself where I can choose to go forward or make a course correction. Most of all, I want to write. I've always wanted to write. And my birthday is coming up -- one of those big birthdays that seem portentous. The refrain in my head goes like this: I've known I wanted to write and wanted to be a writer for twenty-eight years now, since I found out from the bio on the back of a Judy Blume book that it was possible to be a writer and not be dead, with my manuscripts all neatly awaiting publication in my desk. I've wasted enough time. Enough already. Maspeek! Chalas!

So friends, I'm off to the do the impossible. I am yet again moving. This time, I'm moving to Urban Home City, off to a real adventure in being with the man I love, writing, and trying to figure out what to do (fit myself to the tenure track? academic administration? writing/editing? becoming a totally successful novelist/screenwriter almost overnight? being an underemployed overeducated "artiste" when I am entirely too old to do so?) that will support me in living a whole life I can blossom in and support the dreams and growth of my man. Academic or not, I'm sure the absurdity will continue.

By the way, what is up with the damn Wiki? Who would maliciously rip down a democratic and altruistic space that makes many of us feel like we have some control over our lives? Creeps. By the way, I have an interview at Dreadful Conference. My Man is coming with me. I don't know what he'll think of it all. I'm sure the madcap adventures will continue. I hope you'll come with me.

Feeling Angsty

Okay, here's the thing: I'm nervous and on edge about this move. And then there are all the other things going on (OPL). I just don't have any extra resources right now. I spend every day trying to get control of the chaos of packing and everything -- while trying not to go nuts, since my life has changed and is changing in a number of ways: my heart is big and huge and vulnerable, I've just completed a dissertation, I'm moving to my first post-graduate student job. I'm nervous and scared about everything. I don't know how much I can console other people about the scariness of the future right now. GAAHHHHHH!!!!

That said, I've spent the morning on the phone trying to arrange things. I think I've run out of people to call. Now I have to figure out what I'm going to do today since I ended up totally wasting last night with worry. I'm having a moving party on Saturday, so I know I need to clean up, since things have gotten very messy as every area is some kind of staging area for packing. I need to put out the books that I'm giving away so that people can see them -- and probably put away the things I don't want people seeing. I also need to clean up the kitchen and do some darn laundry!!! Maybe laundry will be the big task for the evening -- which means today should, I think, be devoted to clothes and the closets the world forgot. (Does everyone have to write in order to organize themselves, or is it just me?) And then I do need to do some prepping, which for now means reading and taking notes.

Tomorrow I will need to really prepare for having people in my house. Though I have lived here for five years and I love love love my apartment, I've never had a party here. And if you saw the place right now, that would make sense to you. Everything's everywhere. A total nightmare. I'm not going to be able to get it to the point that I won't be embarrassed about it, but I think I'm going to go for lack of complete humiliation. And floor space. OY! Not everyone is so forgiving as Maude Lebowski and OPL, the last two people who overnighted here. And Fabulous Friend is too sweet to ever say anything about my obvious and complete lack of organizational and cleaning abilities when she comes over. Dishes, reorganization, closets for laundry. Ooh, and I need to go to the store to get more bags.

I'm so nervous that even a Starbucks latte makes me sick. Or else I'd be over there getting one. Of course I might go anyway. OY!

***Update 1:30pm***

Hurrah! I'm going to get to share my madness with Angry Incredible Writer Friend! She's going to let me come over and do laundry, laundry, laundry, which means I have to go into the Closets that Time Forgot and get all that organized. Which means I have focus. I also did the dishes. And I really should go out and get bags and maybe even something to eat. This is totally ridiculous, my need to make public my doings. OY VEY!!!

Packing Is Like Dissertating Is Like _________?

As I was looking at my poor front room last night, I came to a major realization: packing is like dissertating. You work hard every day hoping that you're going to be able to feel the progress, that watching the pages accumulate will make you feel like you've done something. But actually for the first two-thirds of the project, you feel like you've got so far to go that if you focus on how close you are to the end, you'll go comatose on your bed staring at the ceiling and trying to figure out how long you can lie perfectly still just as you did when you were a child. So you figure out that you need to not look at the big picture, but recount and exult in the little bits that you did each day. And you find yourself blogging your page count and how you feel like shit because you wrote only three pages, instead of the impossible six you were planning. (And even six feels like it will be forever until you're done, so you feel like super-crap and find it hard to forgive yourself that you had to watch that movie marathon, had to spend two hours on the phone, had to browse the internet or whatever.)

In all fairness, it was Witty Sardonic Friend, who I totally miss, who told me it would be this way. He said: work every day and it will feel like you're doing nothing and then all of the sudden you'll be almost done. The thing that is so annoying and wonderful about WSF is that he is often right. With my diss, I did suddenly feel like I was almost done. Though I had been slogging through for months, it felt like a surprise. Oh, that's what all this work was for. I get it now. So as I was looking around at the simply impossible amount of stuff I have everywhere, I figured out that I've just got to work at it every day and then suddenly in like a week and a half, it'll be almost done. What's more, the movers will come and hurriedly pack whatever I've left.

I wonder what else is like dissertating and packing. Maybe all big projects are like this? You work and work and work and are sure you're going to die before the project is over or at least it's going to kill you and then suddenly it's almost done. (I will say that often that last third feels like pulling teeth compared to the nice clip you realize only in retrospect that you've been going at for months. Case in point: Works Cited -- gahhhh!) Maybe all those books that people like Dr. Crazy and Maggie May have been writing? Perhaps remodeling a house, like Dr. Four Eyes?

So in the spirit of blogging wee progress, I thought I'd fill in the rest of what I did last night: I went through all the desk drawers and organized them (though I didn't bother packing the stuff away because I can just slip the drawers back into the desk after it's moved), another big "everything" kind of drawer, boxed a set of my notebooks (I have notebooks and journals and writings going back to when I was a girl -- I always imagine that I'll go through them and come to terms with Little Earnest when I am pregnant -- until then, I'm carting them around from place to place), and reorganized some stuff I'm taking with me to Adventure City.

Slow, But Certain, Progress

So today I managed to get the storage unit and move about twelve boxes into it. It's not much, considering how many books I have, but it' s a start. I also finally returned about twenty books to various people around campus -- and I got some things lined up for an updated dossier.

You know it's bad when you can sum it up in a few short sentences. But things are progressing in that slow terrible way. My back is killing me -- and my legs don't want to work because I did this insane workout on Sunday and I'm still not recovered. So I'm going to sit around, burn CDs, and read this one book from my advisor that I think will help me prep. Oooh, and most likely catch up some more on my blogreading. I'm comin' over. Watch out!

Blogging Progress???

More like blogging the fact that I'm a total lazy slob. Today I woke up really groggy and sore. And immediately I had moving and storage people talking to me, which half jump-started me onto the idea that I really better figure out that stuff. So I did that. And I've done some other stuff -- burned CDs (number forthcoming), copied the stuff out of the three books from the library, went through an extraordinary amount of paper -- but all this pales in the presence of the solemn vow I have sworn to not get caught in the magazine cycle again. Let me explain: I know some people read magazines on a regular basis. They leave out Newsweek and The New Yorker and visitors actually read them as they, for example, go read their bedtime stories to their four year-olds. But these visitors are occasionally on crack in thinking that just because they soak up this fascinating The Economist article and find the articles in this week's The New Yorker very engrossing that they should subscribe. And this, folks, is my doom. I love magazines. I hate them. Weeklies come way too often. Utne Reader (at least old Utne -- I haven't read it since it changed hands) was perhaps the only one I could really devour. Even if I didn't read the articles, I was interested in knowing what they were. With Newsweek and Time's dismal headlines starting at me, forget it. If anyone wants a fairly complete collection of near-pristine (mostly) news weeklies, let me know. It's ridiculous in here. I'm not getting caught in this guilt-inducing magazine consumerism again. I'm going to buy magazines where they should be bought -- at the co-op and the airport!

Mostly I feel as if I've sat around mooning. OPL said he wouldn't call for a few days -- it's a lot of work having all those mental conversations with someone you can't call. I did manage to rebox some things that needed to be reboxed. But here was the moving coolness for the day, which happened early and was probably the reason I mooned about so much later in the day: when you put stuff in storage, it doesn't have to be packed up tight as when you're actually moving your things. (Yes, I'm putting most of my stuff into storage because it's really the most convenient thing to do in this situation. Sorry I can't be more explicit.) So I've been looking at the way I live my life -- and actually I have a lot of stuff in boxes -- not terribly secure we're-moving-halfway-across-the-country sturdy boxes -- but more precarious really-ought-to-be-reboxed-and-organized boxes. Which means that if push comes to shove, I just won't rebox them. And as I look around at my house, I wonder how much really needs to be put into boxes or reorganized. So much could go as is. I have this weird sense that if I needed to do the whole thing in three days, I totally could. On the other hand, I am going through a lot of stuff, because I have so much crap after five years of graduate-studenting, but part of me just needs to SEE more progress. I have boxes and stacks and stuff, but it doesn't look like a hole in the place yet. Tomorrow I will pack up the car with the few boxes that will fit, go over to the storage place and deal with paperwork, and move my first boxes into my new storage unit.

So in order to not go to bed completely depressed (what's surprising is that I'll get to bed before 4am), here's what I have accomplished:

1. Scheduled movers at a reasonable price.
2. Found a storage unit.
3. Resorted and reboxed some book boxes.
4. Discovered that deep in the closet that the world forgot there are still many boxes from when I moved in.
   
5. Went through and burned the bulk of 27 CDs.
   
6. Looked through countless piles of paper for an old receipt that I need for reimbursement. (Why, oh why oh why???)
7. Began the process of requesting an official copy of said receipt.
8. Sent emails to all my recommenders asking them to update my dossier. (You never know.)
9. Made copies of all library materials for prepping.
   

Here's what I haven't done. I haven't made a big enough dent in this whole thing. I haven't done any intellectual work nor any actual mental prepping. I haven't left the house except to go to the car. And I haven't worked out at all because I am still so sore that moving around hurts. My goal is that by Friday, I'm going to have made a significant dent in this whole thing. I especially want to go through my clothes very soon. And I really need to deal with my office, which is overgrown with books and papers. Luckily I won't have to bother with taking that stuff home. I'll just take it directly to the storage unit, do not pass go, do not collect $200.

Mr. Tabby now needs his medicine and I'm contemplating an early night. Mr. Tabby was pronounced reasonably okay (we needed to increase the dose of one of his medications), but he's lost weight and he doesn't do anything. He spends way too much time in dark areas. I don't like this.

Blogging the Moving Progress

I know, I know these kinds of posts are the most boring in the world. Look at me try to stay accountable by blogging the progress. I'm sorry if you totally hate this, but I got totally addicted to blogging the progress with the dissertation, so now I'm hooked. Blogging progress is my need! So here goes. Here's what I managed to do today so far:

1. Copied or decided against copying 44 CDs, at least half of which I did copy.
   
2. Did 15 minutes of yoga without the tape, which is also good because for unbloggable reasons, I need to scale down my stuff and can't afford to buy the DVD to replace the tape.
3. Emailed movers and storage for quotes.
4. Wrote in journal about teaching, making me feel all confident and excited about teaching at my new gig.
5. Picked up three books on teaching from the library that I intend to copy (on my no-charge at-home copier -- ha!) fruitful productive teaching things out of, which actually makes me feel much much better -- and is in line with that prepping I said I would do, except that I told myself I wouldn't do it on the weekends.
   
6. Worked out for an hour. (Yes, I realize this means that I've worked out twice today. I did the same thing yesterday. I'm going on the mantra that an hour of exercise equals 50 mg of Zoloft. Though today was a much better happier day.)

Now, I'm going to watch French Kiss (yes, the irony, I can't stand it -- let's not talk about it) and try to pack up some clothes or go through papers (much easier to do in the living room).