TGIF, people!

Lucy Has a Boyfriend

The bottom floor of our house goes a bit below ground level. I'm sure there's an architectural term for this but I have no clue what it is. "Below ground level?"

Lucy lives on the bottom floor.

A certain little furry suitor has commenced regular afternoon visits.

 We've caught him staring through the window at her. She has no idea.

It's only a matter of time until he realizes she's not playing hard to get; she's just mean and antisocial.

Then he'll go for our rabbit lawn ornament.

One Last Book Review To Tide You Over

Already the break seems so long ago. And yet...I'm enjoying the new writing consultant job, despite the insane and unbelievable amount of work it is. I've been put in charge of a couple of workshops and part of me appreciates the opportunity while another (unfortunately, more internally vocal) part of me wishes I could have five minutes to get my own life and classes in order before taking on additional work crap, but what are you gonna do? I mean, really?

How I spend every waking minute at home:

It bears mentioning that the waking minutes are so outnumbering the sleeping ones at this point. So sad.

I squeaked in one more book at the end of the break: She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb.

I read this several years ago and remember it being funny. Upon reading it again, I remember that it's also very sad and moving. How's that for descriptive? <-- go easy on me, I have no mental stamina, people.

The story is about a girl who is raised in a broken home and uses TV and food as coping mechanisms. Thus, she becomes very large, gets made fun of, and further isolates herself from people and activities that could help her. The story follows her throughout school, college, and into her mid-thirties. She undergoes a lot of changes as a result of personal development (and psychological healing), and eventually forms meaningful relationships and a healthy life for herself. There are some disturbing parts in it, but Lamb does a phenomenal job of presenting a complex and broken personality, worthy of love and redemption (<--not to say that there is redemption, but there is the potential for it). What I like best is his ability to weave the pitiful and the hilarious; it is just like real life, and I appreciate that.

It is a book I'll hold onto and read again in a few more years if I ever get myself out of 18th century England.

Speaking of, I better get back to it.

Winter Tradition: The Stock Show

Yesterday I managed to leave eighteenth century England for a few hours, G put on his chaps, and we headed to the SuperBowl of Stock Shows!

G says next year, we should treat this like a Con (<--that's nerd speak for a 'conference' or gaming convention or nerd fest where the people all dress up like hobbits and anime characters and stuff). He said he could don some skin-tight Wranglers and I could plaster rhinestones all over my purse and we would fit right in. The man has a point.

I've probably mentioned this in past posts, but they have everything you can possibly imagine at these conventions. Each year I get a couple of new tattoo covers bracelets. We pig out. We have some drinks. We people watch. We always check out the "bird people": an educational program that rescues wild birds and uses them as ambassadors for the animal kingdom, traveling to schools and shows to teach people more about native wildlife.

This year we were brilliant and reserved tickets for the rodeo in advance. It occurs to me that people may have mixed feelings about rodeos, or about these huge agricultural events in general. Don't they just use animals? Break them and breed them and then eventually eat them?

I have to say, and maybe this is a product of mostly growing up on a farm in the south, you will be hard-pressed to find a group of people that (1) understands animals, and (2) respects them more than farmers, ranchers, and cowboys. They have relationships with these animals, and you can see that. It makes me want to go out and buy 57 horses immediately. Lucy can deal.

Full disclosure: it does feel a bit weird to gush and love all over the animals, then sneak away to eat some BBQ. But, what are you gonna do? It's so good.

They had (of course) every kind of farm tool and transportation known to man. There were cooking shows and furniture expos and clothing shops and endless arrays of boots and hats. There were petting zoos and indoor pony rides and souvenir picture booths and CSU educational displays. There were birds and lambs and cows and horses and llamas and bison and herding dogs. There were cowboys and cowgirls of all ages.

We considered running home and getting Lucy so that we could trade her in for a more useful animal. But we didn't feel like making the drive.

We ended the day with the 109th annual North Western Stock Show Rodeo. Now, I'm no stranger to rodeos; I've seen my fair share of bull- and steer-riding. My papa was a horse enthusiast and I spent a lot of my youth watching him train wild horses. I've even been bucked off, which, let me tell you, was not a fun experience.

But even so.

I almost gave myself a headache, grinding my teeth and holding my breath while these cowboys got flung all over the place. I would grimace and the lady next to me (a total stranger, I might add) would grab my arm and pray in Spanish. Meanwhile, G was adjusting the camera settings, looking around, sipping his frozen lemonade. This man is heartless when it comes to the rodeo. As far as he's concerned, the cowboys are certifiably insane for getting that close to a 2,000 pound, unpredictable bull in the first place. If they get trampled? Well, they had it coming.

A couple of times, I thought I heard him rooting for the bull under his breath.

Meanwhile I was trying to flag down the Coors guy. If not for myself, than for the Señora next to me.

It was a great day. It was nice to mix in some Americana before returning back to England for the rest of the night, weekend, etc.

TGIF, people! (<--- Remember These?)

I present to you the only stick figure family sticker in the entire world that G likes:

{Oh, if only this were true for us.}

The Thing About Introverts

In my piddly little anecdotal experience, I have nailed the most common misunderstanding about introverts.

Extroverts simply assume that introverts are shy, or don't like people. (I'm not saying this is revolutionary, here. I'm just sayin' this has been brought to the forefront of my mind these days.)

Neither of those descriptions apply to me. I like some people and I like sometimes being around them. Like, for real. Genuinely. They usually don't scare me or intimidate me. They generally don't keep me from talking or asking questions. Lord knows I'm not shy. But I am definitely, and without question, an introvert.

Which is the hardest part about this semester. It's not the busy-ness and it's not the crazy hours. It's not driving incessantly to tutoring seshes and it's not doing hours of reading and writing.

It's interacting with others in a very draining way. Even though good teaching (as they say, in composition at least) makes the student do all the work, I, as the teacher, am The Enthusiast. I role model the good energy. I open myself up to all the questions and comments. I do my best in front of a total of 50 students, and then I have to put forth my best in two graduate seminar classes.

And then I go to 1-4 tutoring sessions.

So, at the end of that, I'm satisfied and fulfilled. And empty and tired. And 150% depleted of all energy. I go home and - quite literally - go to bed. No washing face. No brushing teeth. No checking email. (Don't worry about my personal hygiene. In general, I try to keep up with it.)

I think a train could blow through the bedroom and I wouldn't wake up. I think Lucy could tap dance on my face and I would never know it. The energy it takes to be around people, interacting with them, for hours at a time, takes everything I have. Lucky G gets the leftovers. Which is to say he gets to watch me snore.

And speaking of introverts, I thought I might show you some action shots of Loo Loo Bell. Mostly she just lays around, but if there's a cardboard box on the floor, watch out! She can't resist it.

My precioussssssssssss.

Nom nom nom nom.

Just surfin' on this plastic wrap...

...ooh! What's this? Another box?

...mmmm. Just as tasty as the other ones.

Ok, peeps. Tomorrow's another one of those days.

But! The stock show is this weekend! I can't wait! Get ready for some rootin' tootin' blog posts, lassies!

Oh. Em. Gee.

Today, I:

--got up at 5:00 (vomit) to make sure I had all my academic ducks in a row.

--drove to campus.

--tromped across campus to get some keys for a couple of new (to me) offices.

--taught a class.

--taught another class.

--took six pages of notes as a student in class.

--ran to a food truck.

--ran to the book store.

--ended up ordering a book online (thank you, Amazon) with priority shipping because I need to read it by NEXT TUESDAY .

--went to my last class of the day (as a student) where I was assigned three articles to read by, oh, day after tomorrow

--left straight from campus to tutor a brand new student for two hours

I was gone for over twelve hours.

Lucy had a party.

That is all.

Good night.

Ready or Not (+ Book)

I would say that today is my last day of freedom, but that's not true. My last day of freedom was sometime around the beginning of last week.

Also? I would say that today is my last day ever to leisurely sit and drink my morning coffee, but that's not true, either. It's my last day to do so at 8:45 a.m. Tomorrow I'll be sipping it at 5:30 a.m.

The syllabi are finished. I'll print them in a couple of hours. Lesson plans for this week are finished. Student rosters are printed. Books have been purchased. The travel coffee mug is ready to roll. Playlists are created. Student tutoring stuff for tonight is finished. I'm about to prep for the rest of the week.

Ready or not, here we come.

What? Planning my lessons under the influence? Never.

Although I'm tempted to whine and groan and stomp around the house, grumbling about the end of my freedom, the truth is, it was a long break. It was a good break. And it's time to go back to the chaos.

Plus, Lucy is counting the hours until I leave.

Time for another book review! Add this one - or any of John Green's books - to your list: Paper Towns. We were discussing something of his last semester and my students told me he's known as "The Teenage Whisperer." I have to say, although he's writing for teenagers and from a teenager's perspective (via the characters, narrator, etc.) his plot and themes are sophisticated and thought-provoking. I think I've now read all of his stuff and will definitely re-read it in the future. I'm even using a small portion of this one in class this semester to talk about perspective and voice.

This is the story of high school senior, Quentin, who is settling into bed one night when his neighbor, Margo, sneaks through his bedroom window and talks him into going on an all-night, life-changing adventure with her. The next morning, she disappears. Just two weeks before graduation, Quentin and his crazy peeps must balance finals, college prep, clingy parents, and a secret mission to unravel a mystery.

Get it. Read it.

Ok. Time to head to Kinkos for three hours. It was nice knowing you guys. Say a prayer.

My Top Chef Moment (+ B&A)

It's the small things, I tell you. If it's a small thing to troll around Home Depot for an hour, craning your neck to pick out a ceiling fan, then bribing a good friend to come over and spend two hours putting it up while you create an Italian meal completely from scratch. Then, yeah.

For your viewing pleasure, I present to you our new dining room ceiling fan!

Before

After

Things I like about it: (1) It looks less fake-woody and more modern, (2) I like the patterns of light it casts (around the room versus straight down), (3) I think the dark color blends with both the painted wall and the picture.

I was having a Top Chef moment while the guys were installing it. We made homemade spaghetti noodles, home made meatballs, and sauce from scratch. The sauce had been simmering for hours and was ready to go, but I had to try to time the pasta and meatballs around their progress with the ceiling fan, and our stomachs finally decided that they needed to pause mid-way through. I was flitting around the kitchen, barking orders to G, and really empathizing with the contestants on Top Chef who have to do this every single challenge. I would have a nervous breakdown.

But all's well that ends well! I don't have a single picture of the pasta, which was amazing, so let's take a look at the construction process.

We ate by mood lighting.

Chef Campo is the real deal. He rolled in with this Home Depot bucket, complete with a TOOL APRON on it. Who has that? Like, no one!

Let's do this.

Pass us more beer, pronto.

That's when things got a little cray cray.

Ta da!

Look at that light pattern! It's like eating in a refined disco joint.

And that's it, peeps. I have more tutoring than usual today, and must hit the road in just a few minutes. This is wrong on every level I can think of, but if we want to continue with the house projects, we're gonna need, like, money, so...

Exhausted Before It Even Begins

So I've spent the last two days in training for my writing consultant job. I was picturing myself sipping coffee, meeting my new coworkers, commiserating about the start of a new semester, and filling out a few forms.

That is not what happened.

That is so not what happened.

My life until May.

Turns out this is a job job. Not only will I consult with students, but I've been assigned a special project over the course of the semester that involves helping Masters and Doctoral students with their theses (sounds like feces for a reason). As if I know anything about Doctoral theses. In medicine. Or science. Or creative writing. Or, let's be honest, in anything.

Not only that - they want me to do a book review related to this project and they have already scheduled me to present a variety of workshops for faculty in their classes. These are not the whole let-me-tell-you-a-bit-about-writing spiels. These are detailed, major-specific, discipline-specific lecture workshops.

The introvert in me has shriveled up and died in advance. It refuses to be a part of this.

Also, have I mentioned that all of this is in addition to freakin teaching two classes of my own?

And taking two reading-heavy classes?

Who thought this was a good idea?

What I want to do until May.

Also what I want to do until May.

Last night I settled down (in bed) to read around 8:30. I don't remember anything else until I woke up at NINE THIRTY this morning. NINE THIRTY! I never sleep in past, say, 7:00 or so. This is insane. I'm not going to survive the next few months. I'm telling you.

Thank GOD Monday is a holiday and all hell won't break loose until Tuesday. I'm using the weekend to finalize and print off my syllabi, purchase the rest of the books I need for the lit classes, pull a Tasmanian Devil and organize the crap out of the house and my car, tutor a few students, prep for a week of tutoring (including a new student), and pray pray pray for my own sanity.

We are also having peeps over for dinner!!! I begged Chef Campo to help us change our 1970's ceiling fan in the dining room and in exchange, we would ply him with endless wine and homemade pasta.  (Meanwhile, Nat King Cole, my niece, Lucy, and I will be off in another room doing girly things and staying away from all the testosterone and tools in the kitchen.)

I was tempted to buy this puppy but G talked me out of it.

I mean, who wouldn't want to enjoy a home cooked meal under a bunch of swaying antlers?  My Papa would be so proud.

Before and After pics coming soon, along with the final book reviews for a long, long time.

Enjoy the weekend, peeps!

Reading About Prison During My Free Time (PUNNY!)

Get it? My FREE time?

Look, I have to start up all kinds of work tomorrow and have to put on real clothes and like, act professional, so throw me a bone here, people.

Bye, bye, reading books for fun! Bye, bye, reading books that I don't have to then write papers about! See you in, oh, June.

But! This is a good one and you must read it.

Orange is the New Black: My Year in a Women's Prison by Piper Kerman

As you know, this is an enormously popular show produced by Netflix, but did you know it's actually a memoir? I haven't seen the show, but I've heard mixed reviews, that it's fantastic and super duper vulgar.

But the book is pretty darn good (and is not vulgar). Piper Kerman, a professional woman in her mid-thirties, was convicted and sent to prison for 15 months as punishment for transporting drug money a handful of times a decade earlier. The beginning of the book, when she writes about her crimes, is stilted and staccato, but just get through it. The majority of the story is about her experience as a white, middle-class, educated woman held in a minimum security prison (with stints in a maximum security prison and also traveling via Con Air). The way she tells it, prison is wayyyyy more boring and less violent than I had imagined. Of course, she wasn't locked up with the crazies and murderers or anything. She tells about the strip searches and bad food and unwritten rules of communication and enduring the bureaucracy and learning new social norms and navigating basically a brand new society. Kerman does a good job portraying an experience that is like culture shock times a thousand. With a lot riding on a quick and successful immersion.

Memoirs are weird. The authors never come across well, like people I would actually want to talk to, or get to know.  That sounds bad. I have to say that Kerman doesn't come across as likeable (to me) although she's not unlikeable either. Reading about prison, though, is fascinating when you don't have any friends or family or other connections to one. It seems so remote, and it is. We spend all of our time trying to stay out of prison, and this book takes us inside.

Enjoy!