I’m (Almost) Back!

So, this semester blew.  My mother-in-law got stage 4 breast cancer, my husband’s grandfather was diagnosed (and then undiagnosed) with lung cancer, and my parent’s house got hit by a tornado…on Mother’s Day…while I was home for vacation. Oh, and then I had to take incompletes in all of my classes because – seriously – after all of that there was no WAY I was gonna make the deadlines.  I mean, come on!

Anyway, now lfe has calmed, I’m much happier, and I’m going to start writing again soon.  Hopefully that will make whatever readers I still have say yay!
 
Right now I’m in Europe for the summer – have been here since May 20 and come back July 25 – but when I return, changes are in store.
 
First, I move to NEW YORK CITY in August.  So excited!  Second, I’ve had time to reevaluate things in life and have decided I want more time to pursue homemaking crafty stuff. You know, like knitting. And cooking. I might possibly even (dare I say it?) – learn to sew. Third, I’ll even document it all here, because I’ve missed my blog and the personal validation it gives me (yep, I’ll admit it).

So, get ready. In July/August I’m back and writing again.  For now, I’m relaxing, enjoying Europe, and gathering myself together after the longest most stressful semester of my life. It’s good to be (almost) back!

I Have Not Written For A Very Long Time

Sorry.  Life is….unexpectedly interesting these days in both positive and negative ways.

Positive: since I was awesome at school last semester, I got a scholarship and had my seminar paper accepted to a conference.  In a week and a half I leave for a week’s vacation in Barcelona.  Grad school socializing has kicked up a notch and I have my pick from loads of things that can distract from my work.

Negative: The week’s vacation in Barcelona is to visit Alex’s grandfather, who is dying of cancer and only has a few months left to live.  Also, and this is the larger negative of the two, my mother-in-law was recently diagnosed with breast cancer.  We didn’t originally think it would be very bad – only Stage 2 which, of course, still sucks, but not in comparison with Stage 4.  Her last mammogram was in August and she was clear.  Now she has 2 tumors in her breast, a tumor in her liver, a tumor in her stomach, and some nastiness in her lymph nodes under her arm.  It’s bad, y’all.  In less than 6 months she went from cancer free to metastasized.   We’ll know more this week about treatment options and prognosis, but this thing isn’t curable, only (hopefully) manageable.  At this point it’s a matter of figuring out if we’ve got closer to 2-5 years with her or closer to 2-5 months.
  

So. That’s why I haven’t been around here much lately.  The combination of school, social life, and various family cancers is kicking my ass.  I will be back periodically, but for now I’ll probably only update every so often.  I wanted to let y’all know I haven’t forgotten that I have a blog.  Just…well, right now other things have to be more important.  

Home Again, Home Again…

I love the Fort Lauderdale airport because, dear readers, they have that thing which most eludes me when in public with my laptop: FREE WI-FI. Love it. I have my New Yorker, and my knitting, and my first assignment of the semester (due, of course, before the semester even starts, ugh), and a few good books I’ve been poking my way through over the past few weeks – but now I have y’all, too! I can blog, and I can plan my weekly menus from gawking over tasty recipes at this site and this one, and I can check my email obsessively. Oh, and I suppose I can probably read the news eventually, too.

But right now I am basking in the glory of my wi-fi. Ahhhh….

Anyway, here is one airport sock picture, of the fabled second sock. Hopefully it will hold you over until I have the chance to post more more more of all my knitting triumphs from this break!

Beach!

We didn’t stay long, but at least we went. It was a gorgeous day for the beach, not sweltering and with just the right amount of sea breeze. Water was chilly, so I only went in up to my ankles. Still nice.

I was so excited to get there, I couldn’t help taking pictures as soon as I saw water.

Thankfully it was a short trip.

The beach was a lot rockier than most of the beaches I’ve been to, but it was fantastic for shelling.

See?

I enjoy collecting them, but I never do take them with me. What would I do with them? My apartment is two already jam-packed 12×12 rooms.

I have plenty else to take with me, besides. Like memories of the time hot stuff and I spent together today.

I know, I’m a sap. I’ll only be a newlywed for so long. Anyway, we left the beach about an hour after we got there so we could enjoy getting home without dealing with rush hour traffic.

It was a great afternoon. Maybe tomorrow I’ll show you my knitting, but for now I’m hanging with my husband, and Ironbeer, and The Flight of the Conchords. Ahhhh….

(Some of) My Xmas Holiday in Pictures

Hey y’all! I would have posted sooner, but Miami has not been as phenomenal an experience as I’d hoped. Specifically, I made the mistake of eating mussels and clams at dinner the other night. I’ll leave you to guess why I’ve been MIA for a few days. Ugggghhh. But here I am again, mussels and clams be damned, with pictures at the ready!

First: I spent lots of wonderful time with family and friends.

Mom and I did the robot to Run DMC’s Christmas in Hollis while setting up the tree. We are not, as you can perhaps tell, experts at doing the robot. Good thing we’re experts at having goofy fun.

Dad played his bagpipes for our next door neighbors’ Sunday School kids, and lectured a bit about the pipes’ origins and how they work. Pretty cool – and he’s a good bagpiper, too! He played as Alex and I were coming out of the church after our wedding.

Alex and I also got to go to Athens for a day to visit with his old adviser from his Master’s thesis and some friends of ours. It rained all day, but it didn’t matter. We ate lunch at Waffle House, went to my favorite shops downtown, knit at the best coffee shop in the area, and had a delicious sushi dinner with these crazy kids:

Kacie, the girl next to me, also has a knitting blog – and the hat she talks about on it was something she was working on while we were knitting in our coffee ship.

Moving on…to Miami! Or the flight there, to be more precise. Lots of knitting got done. See the sock? I told you I finally started on the second. My goal is to have it done by the end of break so I can start knitting a second pair. I have the perfect yarn! Pictures of it later when I feel like putting forth more energy.

Anyway, it may look like I had a decadent business class seat, but I assure you folks – despite this little slice of heaven:

Tasty snacks, lots of leg room, my own personal Zach Braff!!!! Well, I got all that in coach, suckers. Fly JetBlue. I’m now a convert.

When we arrived in Miami, I of course broke out more knitting. Beezer was initially intrigued:

But very quickly grew bored.

Heinzie was not bored.

I think we have a new favorite toy in this Miami household.

Well, that’s all I’ve got for you now. I’m going back to the couch now to relax with more ginger ale, saltines, and girly movies. Better posts later this week, with more knitting pictures and maybe possibly (hopefully!) beach pictures. Happy knitting in the meantime. I’ve gotta say, I was happy to ditch the blog for a bit but it is so nice to be back.

I’m Back!

Happy Holidays and Happy New Year!

I’ve been gone for a long time, I know, but trust me when I say that at the end of the semester I needed to preserve my sanity by retreating from the outside world. I flew home to Georgia on December 19 and spent an excellent two weeks with family and good friends. My last paper was completed Dec. 27 so, unfortunately, I spent more of break than I would’ve liked with it hanging over me and making me feel guilty in the midst of my fun. But fun was had in spite of it all! We shopped (I finally bought a good winter coat, which was half off since no one in GA needs a good winter coat), cooked, ate, watched Buffy and lots of Woody Allen, read fun books (ie, ones not for class), and worked crosswords in front of the fire while drinking booze or coffee. Oh, and did I mention that I knit? Boy, did I knit. I’m most of the way through the body of my Thermal, I started my second sock, and am almost done with an elephant toy I’m knitting a new cousin. Pictures to come later.

But wait – there’s more. Break is not over for me until Jan. 21. Alex and I flew home to Jersey for a (very cold) day on the 2nd, and flew out again on the 4th. Right now I’m in Miami for 10 days with my in-laws. It’s sunny and warm – I wore a t-shirt this morning! For the first time since September! This weekend is all about family time, but his parents go back to work on Monday and we’ll have the weekdays to go to the beach and have some alone time. Break with the families is great – I love and miss my parents and still cry when I have to leave Georgia (I know, I’m pathetic) – but I’m looking forward to spending a bit of time with just Alex.

Anyway, I feel rejuvenated and it’s great. I really needed the break. More to come later, but now I’m going to go sit by the pool and knit or read or – well, whatever I feel like. Ah, break, how I love thee, let me count the ways….

One Down, Two To Go

So, I got an A on that paper I was writing last time I updated.  Yay!  I haven’t seen the teacher’s comments, but I know that to get in A in the class we were required to get an A both for our participation and our paper. I didn’t think my paper was very good at all, but I’ll take it! An A in my first grad class! 

Today I finish my second paper, the research-based seminar paper, and then pack up to fly home.  That’s right – tomorrow I’m going back to Georgia for TWO WEEKS!!!  I’m so exciting. I’m so pathetically Southern, and I didn’t even realize until until I was relegated to Jersey for grad school. I’m going to eat me some good barbeque, fried chicken, collard greens, grits, WAFFLE HOUSE (oh god, how I miss hash browns), and sweet tea. I’m definitely visiting Athens, my college town and favorite town ever, and of course I’m pumped to see my family. 

I mean, I do have that one paper due Christmas Eve (ugh), but at least I’ll be at home with people I love. I can’t wait. I’m so excited I can’t even put it into words!   

ps – there has been knitting, but I have to finish this paper before I can show it to you. pray i finish soon!  

Today’s Bloggy Goodness

Yup, I’m supposed to be writing a paper. No, I don’t want to. So, hi!

I’ve been doing some thinking about grad school while writing this paper. What I’ve decided is that I love being a grad student – who doesn’t love a job description that says: read, think deep thoughts, write them down, repeat?

What I HATE is writing historiography. I want to do my OWN work, not analyze the shit out of others’. I want to visit archives, dig through documents, and write up what I find. For example: my seminar paper? I love it. LOVE IT. My historiography papers? Well, I’m supposed to be writing one right now. There ya go. I know, I know – historiography is important. I use it in my research-based work so other people know where what I’m writing fits in. Being able to analyse others’ work is a valuable and necessary skill. It’s just that I don’t like it. I like research, I don’t like historiography.

You better not smirk at me when I say that, either, or suggest that I chose it for myself and need to suck it up and get it done. Look at what happened to this guy when he made that mistake.

Ahhhh…

Ok, freakout over – for now, at least. I spent a good portion of the weekend – at least 12 hours – at the NYPL and found the magic documents which will make writing my seminar paper possible! I also had a presentation in class today about it that I think went well…other than the fact that I was so nervous/hyped up on coffee that I kept stumbling over my words. Whatever – I have a paper! I wrote 5 pages of the 15 already, so now it’s a matter of adding 10 more pages, slapping an intro and conclusion on, and I’m done! I can’t start finishing it until Saturday, though – my Technology, Culture, and History historiography paper is due Friday and I haven’t written a word. I’ll be working on it pretty solidly from tommorrow until it’s due. If I’m lucky, I might even have a good draft by Wednesday night!

Anyway, enough of the school talk. I know it bores y’all. Unfortunately I don’t have any knitting pictures to offer as pittance, but I can hopefully placate you with the NYC pictures I got. Looky:

The NYPL decorated their main hallway for me!

And Patience (or is it Fortitude?) is getting into the Christmas spirit, too.

Macy’s also had some pretty spectacular lights in Herald Square.

I’m afraid that our tree and our lights display pale in comparison.

Ah, well. We’re grad students. What are ya gonna do?

We like our setup ok, or at least we do until we get a decently sized apartment and can have a normal sized tree. Gotta say, though, I do enjoy making the runty tree look as ricidulous and over decorated as possible.

Anyway, that’s all I’ve got. I’m sitting here, Bailey’s-spiked egg nogg in hand, Xmas music playing (anyone here like South Park? Ever heard Merry Fucking Christmas? Just sayin’.), and thinking of school – even Christmas spirit can’t make that guilt melt away. I’m going back to work, y’all. Happy Xmas season!

Modern Rumplestiltskin

I feel like that chick in Rumplestiltskin. You know, the one who has to sit in a room with piles of hay and spin them into gold? Same thing – replace “hay” with “books” and the situations are practically identical. Ugh. I don’t know whether I’ve had too much coffee or too little, but it’s one of the two and I’m having a hard time with my spinning today.