Last few weeks of freedom...

..and boy, do I have a lot to do! Papers to submit (still), a class to wrap up, IRB's to complete. This summer has flown by too quickly and I've not been as diligent in my academic work as I should have been.
However, we've gotten a lot done on the house - the main bathroom is remodeled (well, except I need to cut and install new baseboards and buy a medicine cabinet), we removed the diseased shrubbery by the front door (yayy, electric chainsaw! Thanks Mom and Dad!), and the 2 huge trees in the backyard should be taken out this week. That last job will NOT be done by me, I know my limits.

I just got back from spending 10 days in FL with friends and family. It was way busy, but really fun. The first weekend, we had a huge shrimp boil at the parent's house. I didn't realize that many people would fit in that little house! There was Cajun music playing, margaritas, and key lime pie (my recipe) and coconut cake for dessert. A jumbly, odd mix of people and it worked out great! Side note - I really wish one of the gang was a picture-taker. We never seem to end up with documentation of these events.

Later in the week, Chel stayed the night night. She and I played video games at Aladdin's Castle, went to a Japanese restaurant for hibachi, then went to see the Harry Potter movie (v. good!). She handily kicked my tail on every game we played. Apparently you do lose some skills if you don't use them. Two nights later, Em and I went for pizza, to see G-force (cute), and more video arcading. That girl has a real thing for skee-ball :) She woke up the next morning and asked if I would take her to get her ears pierced! So we did. I'm an aunt, how could I say "no"?

In between 1) had lots of coffee and dinner outings with friends, 2) drank heavily at Josh and Trina's and played this game that had me laughing so hard tears were running down my face, 3) took my godson out for brunch and really got to talk with him, and 4) just reconnected.
I'm exhausted, but in a good way. Now, back to work - the countdown has commenced.

Torchwood is Dead

There is a dearth of good sci-fi shows available, and now it seems we've lost yet another one. Torchwood just finished a 5-episode miniseries that has pretty much busted a cap in its own ass. Seriously, they knocked off more than 1/2 of the cast, a resurrection would be hard to pull off.
Shit!
Its bad enough we lost Firefly after 1 freakin' season, we had to run to the BBC to get a decent replacement. (Side note to Josh: what did you expect of a sci-fi show that had a crap-ass cowboy song in its intro? That was guaranteed doom.)
There are already rumors a-buzzing on the Interwebs that Capt. Jack will be in a spin-off series. That could be something. But the writers will be hard-pressed to find the same kind of character magic that they had in Torchwood.
So, R.I.P. Torchwood.

Summer. Finally!

Yesterday was bad. Couldn't stop crying, even at Star Trek. (Good movie, but the opening scene was a little much for my fragile mental state.)
But today is better. It is the first day of summer and I have a ton to do. Luckily, most of it can be done from home, in my pj's.
Here is a partial list:
>Edit and upload my summer course for the distance students
>Write specific aims, hypotheses, and analyses for my Alzheimer's study
>Send a course description of my Food and Film class to my boss
>Make a remediation coursework packet to send to the poor kids that didn't pass their clinical rotations
>Finish my photo albums
>Wash the dogs
And various and sundry other housekeeping-type things.

I'm tired of feeling so anxious and thisclose to shattering. I think a quiet summer to reflect and regroup is exactly what the doctor ordered.

"It's that time of year, when the world falls in love..."

But every song you here seems to say "Spring!".
This was the opening morning of the Pepper Place Farmer's Market. To give you an idea of how exciting that is, C and I hauled our selves out of bed at an unheard of 7:30 a.m. to go buy local produce.
Usually we take Harry (it is a very dog-friendly scene) but he's been really sick lately, so he had to stay home. He was devastated.
We strolled around the market listening to banjos and fiddles being played, sipped our coffee, and made our purchases. Radishes, tomatoes (of course!), and white turnips. I've never had turnips, so this was a a "food adventure" purchase. They are so pretty, ~ the size of quarters, and pure white. I am going to have to do some Googling to find the best way to prepare them.
We also found our favorite jam sellers there. There is a local company called "Not Yo Mama's" that makes the BEST habanero pepper marmalade EVER! A cracker, a smear of cream cheese, and a dollop of this marmalade = heaven. Here is their website: http://www.notyomamasgourmet.com/
Don't be surprised if we hand this out as Christmas presents, its just that good.
And now I am going to work on my class. I am teaching an Interim class called "Food, Nutrition, & Film". Its fun, but a lot of prep work.
Peace.
Image from the Pepper Place website.

It takes a village...

Prior to entering the teaching side of academia, I spent a looooong time as a student. We (students) would have deep, "enlightened" conversations about how the professors were getting stale and inflexible compared to "a few years ago". (Yes, it's a lot of quotes already, but I haven't mastered the art of conveying sarcasm via blog without using quotes.) Now, on the other side, I see that my old student-self was partially right. Professors do change over time. But we do it in response to the increased immaturity of a few chosen students. These bad apples, if you will, force us to make syllabi 7 pages long just to cover every possible academic contingency. Truly, I just added a full page of consequences for various academic dishonesty/fraud possibilities in response to the shenanigans I've witnessed this past semester.
I refuse to become bitter, I love teaching just as much as ever. But I am rapidly losing my former naivete. In response to my former student-self, I say I am not getting "inflexible". I am getting wiser.
Yep, forget that whole "It takes a village to raise a child" crap. Hillary was misquoted! It actually "takes a cudgel"!

Nuke the village

The funniest thing I've read recently was from bitchypoo.com She blogs about her husband who complained about the almond flavoring in the cupcakes she'd just backed:
"So he had a small temper tantrum, and as my belief is that you should respond to an uprising by nuking the village, I had a SUPER temper tantrum and told him I was never baking anything for him again EVER DO YOU HEAR ME YOU GODDAMN M0THERFUCKER?! (I’m not sure that two days before your wife’s period is due is really the time to get pissy with her.)"
It's not really PC, but that may be my new (unposted) teaching philosophy:
Nuke the village to quash the uprising!
I like it!

Tiny money hurdle squashed

I just sent the final payment to my only Perkins loan. WooHooo! Let's have a moment of satisfaction before reality re-enters the room.
In the big scheme of things,that debt was infinitesimal. Miniscule even. My other remaining student loans are monsters by comparison. I will be paying on them for the next 25 years. But, for now, it feels good to knock one down.
After flunking out of my undergrad, I swore I would never waste my parents' money again. So I took out student loans to go back to school. My intentions were good, and I am proud of where I am at now. That experience helped make me the person I am today. But the burden of having so much debt is huge. It affects every daily decision Christopher and I make. We would have been able to move to Tuscaloosa 2 years ago, if it weren't for my student loans.
If we have kids, I will do everything I can to keep them from making the same mistakes I did. We will help them out with college (notice - I don't mean give them a free ride. I think working for it is important in the growing-up process), but we will also make sure they are financially savvy and are saving to help themselves.
Lesson learned on this end.

The waitng is the hardest part...

If only I could insert little "song notes" to indicate that the title of this post was from a lyric. That song by Tom Petty has been running through my head today. The thing about trying to conceive is that is runs in 2 week patterns. The first 2 weeks of my month, I am free. To drink alcohol, to renovate the House (i.e. be exposed to paint fumes, etc), and to use facial products containing benzoyl peroxide/salycylic acid/retinol. However, the second 2 weeks are sacrosanct. It's the behave "as if" you were pregnant time of each month. Goddess forbis that I unwittingly expose a potential, fragile blastocyst to environmental toxins.
Weird. After miscarriage number 2, I am more in tune with my cycle and the passing months than I EVER wanted to be.
In other, more pleasant, news: I received my first grant. It is small in dollars, but large in potential. My reproductive life is challenged, but my work life is golden.
I guess you can't have it perfect.
Peace.