A day in this life...

August 2nd Cat Crazy Caturday - The Kitty Stroller

2008-08-03T17:42:00.003-05:00

I've wanted this for my future kitty for over a year! I can't wait to get one. Heck with offshore drilling or health care, people seem to be quite divided as to whether cats should be taken out for walks, jogs or other events in strollers. I wonder if the presidential candidates have an opinion on the issue? Some friends I've mentioned this to think it's crazy while others think it's cute and fun for both parent and kitty. I've read advice on how to get the cat acclimated to the stroller. It's probably not a good idea to just buy one, throw them inside and go for a spin. It's best to leave it out in the open, maybe put some toys inside and let them get used to sitting inside it in the house. I also wouldn't want to use it for vet appointments to avoid any negative conditioning effects.

Hopefully I'll be out jogging with the kitties next summer! Maybe we can even do a 5k together! Show those parents running with babies in strollers how it's done!

August 1st From the Files Friday

2008-08-03T17:40:00.002-05:00

March 13th, 2006

I had just gotten back from a conference in the spring of my second year of grad school.

Just a little Miami sunshine for the day. Not much to report for the day. I went into the office for awhile, and had a short conversation with JM. Lots of reading and other things to do - as usual. I'm looking forward to seeing more people tomorrow. With the conference craziness and spring break I feel that I haven't seen a lot of people in awhile. Desperate Housewives is on in an hour - a little treat for the day!

July 31st One down, many, many more to go!

2008-08-03T17:39:00.001-05:00

I did my first job application yesterday. It's for a small liberal arts school. The deadline was now and didn't require teaching, research statements, evidence of effective teaching or letters of rec. I just had to write a cover letter, send my vita and contact info for references. Why can't they all be that easy? :-)

I've scored quite a few preliminary interviews for the conference next week. one of my letter writers said that while these interviews are good, they are just preliminary so that helps me not feel too nervous.

Research is going well. I'm starting to get more back into my paper/s and a few have just gone out the door.

I got my last bday present today! From my parents: a Harry and David baby veggie basket. The basket gives off this great fresh vegetable, garden smell.

July 30th Random

2008-08-03T17:38:00.000-05:00

I had another sleepy day yesterday. I took a three to four hour nap but then went to bed around midnight and slept five hours. I feel very energized today so that’s good.
I’m going for my second yoga class tonight. It looks like I’ll be taking the next couple weeks off and maybe purchase a full session for mid-August through September. I didn’t go jogging today because it was so incredibly muggy and 78-degrees at 6:45. It was cloudy this morning and I was hoping it would storm - to at least take the edge off the humidity maybe. It looks like it will cool down about when I head to Big Conference next week.
My advisor is putting a lot of effort into my research right now. She’s also simplified the analyses and that makes things more doable for me.

July 28th My Weekend

2008-08-03T17:37:00.000-05:00

I slept a lot - seriously - more than 12 hours yesterday. Then, last night I couldn't fall asleep until about 4am and slept until 11. I've had such a hard time sleeping regularly this summer. Maybe Purple Daisy's sleeping issues are contagious! :-)

Today was a bbq for a grad student that's leaving. I made a nacho recipe that used up my ramen noodle stash - finally, and cut up veggies with hummus. yummy.

I'm doing a power point presentation due on Friday to the discussant for my upcoming conference. I have yet to finish either of the two papers I need to read and generate commentary for my discussant sessions.

I have several interviews scheduled for the upcoming conference. I plan to submit more cover letters/vita packages tomorrow.

July 26th Cat Crazy Caturday

2008-08-03T17:28:00.001-05:00

Similar to "From the Files Fridays" I thought I would start another feature called "Cat Crazy Caturday." As many of you know I plan to be a Mommy next year of two lovely kitties that I will adopt from a shelter. Every Saturday (or what I prefer to call it, Caturday) I will post something related to my future feline children.

Today's topic: Cat Names.

I've started to give some significant thought to what I'd like to name my children. I plan on adopting from a shelter so I'm trying not to fall in love with any specific breeds. The name will likely be dependent on what type of breeds, or mix of breeds I adopt. Here's a short list of my ideas thus far. I have these saved in a word document already.

Political-Social Names.

Political and social issues are a huge interest of mine. Why not name a cat after one of my favorite political or social change figures? Here are some ideas:

James Carville - supporter of both Clinton campaigns and I could imagine the kitty saying, "When I go to the litter box, I do it Cajun Style!" (that will only make sense to people who saw the episode of 30 Rock where he was a guest star - so funny!)

Madeline Albright (first female Secretary of State, could call her Maddy for short)

Dee Dee Myers (first female Press Secretary and author of Why Women Should Rule the World)

Abigail Adams (Abby for short, and a trail-blazer as first lady. She went to congress and insisted they give money to create a home for unmarried pregnant women and new moms - many of whom were impregnated by congressmen!)

Eleanor Roosevelt (Elley)

Sandra Day O’Conner (Sandy)

Ruth Bader Ginsberg (Ruthie) I really like the idea of naming cats after the first two female Supreme Court Justices. O'Conner is a little too conservative for my tastes, so this would work if I had a little Ruthie to balance it out.

Lucy Stone - suffragette who lobbied in the mid 1800's for women not to change their last names upon marriage. Now there's a nonprofit organization, The Lucy Stone League, named after her that lobbies for that and similar issues.

Hillary - no explanation necessary on that one.

Bill Maher - Hillary made me think of Bill and although I do like Bill Clinton, I love Bill Maher's social commentary. I could then make jokes about Bill Maher and catnip, because Maher (the person) is fairly open about his recreational use of marijuana.

TV Show names

SATC characters (Charlotte, Carrie, Samantha, Miranda) - four female cats - how awesome would that be!

Sopranos characters (Tony, Carmela) - for a blondish female cat and black male cat. Get this: I could get two kitty condos and put signs on each of them one: "State of Denial" for Carmela, and "The Bada Bing" for Tony. I guess I could name a male kitty Mr. Pussy, but what if I have older, tenured professor colleagues over for dinner and have to tell them his name?

Dexter - I'm envisioning this for an orange colored tabby cat. For a cat that has a vigilante streak.

Liz Lemon - that would be neat, and then I could have a Jack Donoghy kitty too! Or I could name a cat Alec Baldwin, because I really do love me some Alec.

Maybe some names after The Office? Michael Scott, Pam Beasley....or, Angela Martin (for a well-behaved, slightly judgmental feline)!

Social Science Researcher Names

Originally I wanted to name my kitties after pioneering females in my field, or the social sciences in general. Preferably I'd like to name my kitties after those who have passed on, because I feel weird naming my cat after someone in my field, or a related field, who is still alive. Can you imagine that getting back to the person who I named the cat after? Someone sees the eminent person at a conference and says "Yeah, so did you know Dr. Meaningfulgrrrl named her cat after you?" (ooh, I really like Dr. in front of my name - even my pseudonym!)

So far all I can think of is Margaret Mead. I know a lot of psych people read this blog, so if you have any ideas let me know!

Also, if you can think of any male names of social science researchers that you think would be cute/interesting for a cat, you can post those too! I'm still undecided as to gender. Who I choose will probably depend on the dispositions of the kitties when I go to the shelter.

I'm looking at getting two cats because it's twice the fun, right? Also, I read they behave better because they have someone else to play with when I'm gone (I don't know how much time I'll spend away at work). Also, there's a social learning theory that the cats teach one another how to behave. For example, if one cat doesn't understand that clawing at the curtains is not a great way to express one's need to claw, the other cat can say, "Dude, that's not how we roll, use this cat scratcher Mom bought us, it's the bomb!"

July 25th Introducing: From the Files Friday

2008-08-03T17:25:00.002-05:00

Having seen this lovely feature on several other blogs (too many/don't feel like linking right now) I thought I'd do it too! It seems especially fitting in honor of my three year anniversary. Each post is selected randomly by the Random Post feature, so there's no rhyme or reason to each Friday's selection. This week's post was from my prelim days. Sometimes when I'm writing papers, dealing with tables and HSRB I kind of wish I could just sit, read and take notes again - well, almost wish.

Email Crazy Day

February 9th, 2007

I made specific plans for yesterday to be a reading day for prelims. However, it seems the universe conspired against me. I wasn’t in the building, only on email but things kept coming into my inbox that required my immediate attention. Here’s a short list of what happened: had to plan a client meeting, email several people articles/chapters that they requested, student emails AND confusion over what I’ll be doing/getting paid for next year. Oye.

Today has been much better. I woke up, had some yummy cinnamon toast while reading the news online and then got a couple of articles read and written up. I’m getting caught up on my notes now and have finally developed word documents that I’m happy with for notes. I’m integrating my notes with a alumnus that had the same specialty (and committee) as I have who took prelims two years ago. Initially I was taking notes in a separate document, but decided it would be best to integrate the two.

Tonight I’m having sushi - yay! I haven’t had any since the holidays and I plan to catch a little tv before going to bed.

July 25th My Three Year Blog Anniversary!

2008-08-03T17:23:00.000-05:00

Three years ago today I started blogging. It was the summer after my first year of grad school. I initially started blogging as a way to communicate with my parents because none of us our big "phone" people. Both of my parents' jobs require talking on the phone so calling more then once a week is just not something we do a whole lot.

Back on topic, although I started blogging just for the parents I quickly discovered all the academic blogs out there and they became a great resource. I think I've learned a lot about academic life from spending time in the academiblogosphere.

I recently downloaded Blurb's software to see if I decided to make my blog into a book how long/expensive it would be. I think I was just over their maximum of 440 pages! Wow. I'm so glad I decided to start blogging because I will have such a great record of my graduate school experience. Next year I'd like to actually get the book made. If I take out the really silly surveys and such I'm sure I can get it under 440 - or I could do 2 volumes!

I looked up what the gift is supposed to be for the three year anniversary. The traditional gift is leather, which as a vegetarian and someone who has always tried to avoid leather - I find slightly disturbing. "Hey honey, here's a dead animal skin to commemorate our time together!" The modern gift is crystal. I wouldn't mind the above for my three year anniversary if my future-DH (dear hubby) ever reads this.

July 20th Another Meme - Tagged by Julie

2008-08-03T17:19:00.003-05:00

A. Attached or Single? Single

B. Best Friend? several

C. Cake or Pie? ice cream cake or chocolate cake with fruit filling

D. Day of Choice? Saturday

E. Essential Item? laptop

F. Favorite Color? All the cool colors (blues, greens, purples) plus pink. I really love teal-ish, seafoam green in the summer.

G. Gummy Bears or Worms? neither - don’t like chewy candy - but would love some chocolate

H. Home town? all over the east and midwest - I moved about five times or so growing up so nothing really feels like a hometown

I. Favorite Indulgence? ice cream

J. January or July? I like them both actually. January is the start of the new semester, right after the holidays (re: goodies) and if it doesn’t snow and get icy too much the cold doesn’t bother me. July, although my birthday month, can be a little off because there is so little structure and so few people around because of the summer semester. Plus it’s the hottest month of the year.

K. Kids? Maybe adopt - not sure. I definitely want kitties!

L. Life isn’t complete without? Friends. Work I feel passionate about.

M. Marriage date? Marriage might not be for me.

N. Number of Brothers and Sisters? Only child

O. Oranges or Apples? Depends. I love fresh orange juice more than apple. It would depend on the quality of the orange and apple.

P. Phobias? Too many to count. My startling noise thing is probably the biggest one. Thinking about it now many of my former phobias are now just mild fears. My spider fear has diminished although that’s largely because of having a middle apartment that’s super well insulated and only having about 2 spiders in the past 4 years. I’m a slightly nervous flier now as opposed to “fearful” probably because I fly several times a year now for conferences and vacations.

Q. Quotes? Most anything Eleanor Roosevelt said. Or Hillary.

R. Reasons to Smile? Less than a year left of g-school, friends, nice career prospects (I hope!)

S. Season of Choice? Really anything but summer. I do really love fall because after summer I really appreciate the cooler weather. I like the flexibility of fall fashion. I can wear summer clothes and just add a cardigan or wear long sleeve tops and sweaters. I love that fall semester has so many breaks (labor day, Fall Break, T-day). I like being able to drink hot beverages more again, the food, and *maybe* going to one football or sports related event.

T. Tag 5 People - Student Operative/L, New Caprica, Life&TImes, Reassigned Time (although I don’t know if she’ll see this), Profgrrrl (although I think she’s way too busy to do this)

U. Unknown Fact About Me? I ran away from summer camp the summer before 6th grade (1993). I had a deranged “buddy” (i.e., buddy system the girls scouts used)

V. Vegetable? Love most of them

W. Worst Habit? I’ll go with Julie on this: worrying.

X. X-Ray or Ultrasound? Had both. Ultrasounds aren’t fun if you have to get a catheter

Z. Zodiac Sign? Cancer

Z. Which Zoo Animal is your Favorite? My Mom’s crazy for Polar Bears and I may have picked that one up.
I like the giraffes (did the first big paper of my life in first grade on them) too and I’ve always had a soft spot for rhinos. I did my 8th grade term paper on them and another project in elementary school.

July 16th Birthday Party

2008-08-03T17:16:00.002-05:00

Today I'm having friends over for my birthday dinner. My birthday is this week, not today, but a friend is leaving for vacation soon so it had to be today.

I'm excited to make portabella mushroom pizzas with soyrizo, pasta salad with fresh veggies and pesto, and fresh mozzarella-Italian parsley-basil bites as an appetizer!

I'm making it a bit more classy and green by using actual plates and glasses instead of plastic/paper. I have about seven people coming - yay! The guest list includes Purple Daisy, Neighbor Friends, Officemate, Student Operative (can't remember if I updated her pseudonym) and one of the only remaining members of my program cohort.

*Party-planning: calling Bert and Ernie for a brunch swaray 24 years ago. I started early.*

July 14th Dissertation Art - click to enbiggen

2008-08-03T17:14:00.004-05:00

Wordle counts the frequency of words in whatever is copied into it. I used my dissertation proposal.

July 11th They like me! They like me! They really, really like me!!

2008-08-03T17:14:00.001-05:00

I was about to head home from the office today when a little email from Academic Job Posting Site sent me an alert that a school has expressed interest in me and would like access to my contact info! I know this is just the beginning, but this is my first real job search so I anticipate getting excited over everything. :-) Woot! Hopefully this is the beginning of a fruitful job search!

July 11th Iced Coffee and Pesto Tortellini

2008-08-03T17:11:00.000-05:00

That's my lunch for today. yum. I love Amy's Kitchen frozen entrees and especially the pesto tortellini!

It's worth the five dollars. I'd spend that much if I had a salad at the Union, or some other take out option. Why not? Especially when I have so. much. work.

That's been the theme for this week. I don't think I've gotten more than seven hours of sleep a night - usually around six, but I'm so focussed on what I need to be doing I'm not that tired. The job search has officially started. I've received a *surge* of job ads this week and plan to set up arrangements with letter of recommendation writers this week.

I met with Dr. Advisor (aka Jon Stewart) we both agreed I need to get super annoying and huge paper out as soon as I can. Add to that interviews at Big Conference next month - plus three sessions. Yikes.

Many, many posts from May, June and July!

2008-07-09T18:56:00.006-05:00

I've been busy and kept putting off updating. My Mom reminded me tonight. I'll do my best to be better, but hopefully this helps to make up for things.

7.04.08 - Resourceful Veggie Loaf

A week ago while celebrating a friends birthday, for some reason, we started talking about meatloaf. My friend has never had meatloaf and that made me think that a new veggie I will never be able to have meatloaf again. It's not the meat so much that I enjoy, but the combined taste of all the other ingredients (brown sugar, bread crumbs, ketchup and we mustn't forget: swiss cheese in swiss meatloaf!).

I started looking at veggie sites online and found numerous delicious-sounding recipes for veggie meatloaf. The catch: I didn't have very much faux groundbeef on hand. I did, however, have a box of veggie burgers that had spent a bit too long in the freezer. Sometimes I'll buy veggie burgers on sale and they get lost in the freezer. They were to the point that they had some freezer burn and wouldn't of tasted very good as patties. However, if they were to be ground up and mixed with the other veggies and ingredients they might be "revived" and I wouldn't have to run to store (and spend more money). Well, I tried it and the meatloaf - or veggieloaf is quite good. Yay for resourcefulness!

Here's the link to the recipe: Mama's Mock Meatloaf

This is what it looked like after baking - the only change I made to the recipe was using orange as opposed to green peppers. That's all I had on hand and I like things a bit sweeter.

7.02.08 - Don't take my Starbucks!

I don't know if you've heard in the news today (I was watching Morning Joe this morning on MSNBC - Jack Welch was on - and I love the program), but S-bucks plans to close 8%, or about 600, of it's US stores in the next year. All of them are "under-performing" and a lot are recently built (maybe S-bucks is trying to avoid sunk-cost effects, lol). I'm afraid the GradTown S-bucks may be on the list. It seems to be thriving, but there's always Murphy's law. There are three (technically) in GradTown: one at Kroger, one at the Union and one on SecondMainStreet. I'm confident the Union won't get the axe because it's heavily trafficked and GradSchool would have to totally redo that section of the building, but I'm worried about the one on SecondMainStreet. It's only a couple years old. I don't go there that much, but it's a nice short drive from my house and sometimes when I'm reading or working on the weekends, or heading home from the gym it's nice to stop there for an iced coffee or skinny latte.

7.02.08 - My iPod Top 50

I've had my iPod Nano for about a year and a half, and my iPod just a few months. I thought it would be fun to post what my iPod says are the 50 songs I play the most!

Crazy - Gnarles Barkley

Dreaming of You - The Coral

Under Pressure - David Bowie & Queen

Smile - Lily Allen

Suddenly I See - KT Tunstall

Ain't that a kick in the head - Dean Martin

Multiply - James Lidell

Let's Get it Started - Black Eyed Peas

Pump it - Black Eyed Peas

Black Horse and the Cherry Tree - KT Tunstall

No Sleep Tonight - The Faders

Another One Bites the Dust - Queen

Don't Stop Believin' - Journey

Ruby Blue - Roisin Murphy

Happy Go Lucky Me - Paul Evans

Fidelity - Regina Spektor

Woke Up This Morning (Soprano Theme)

Got to be Real - Cheryl Lynn

Everybody Got Their Something - Nikka Costa

Stronger - Kanye West

Bang Bang to the Rock 'n' Roll - Gabin

Feelin' Good - Nina Simon

Holiday - Madonna

You're My Best Friend - Queen

Mack the Knife - Michael Buble

Hey Ya! - Outcast

Twentysomething - Jamie Cullum

Don't Cha - Pussycat Dolls

In da Club - 50 Cent

1234 - Feist

I Got You (I Feel Good) - James Brown

Cosy in the Rocket (Grey's Anatomy theme) - Psapp

A Beautiful Morning - The Rascals

Let's Stay Together - Al Green

There's a Girl - The Ditty Bops

Moondance - Michael Buble

2 Times - Ann Lee

Wait - Get Set Go

Float On - Modest Mouse

Here it goes again - Ok Go

Just a Ride - Jem

Love Song - Sara Bareilles

You know I'm no good - Amy Winehouse

Under the Boardwalk - The Drifters

The Dog Song - Nellie McKay

Maneater - Nelly Furtado

She Drives Me Crazy - Fine Young Cannibals

I've got you under my skin - Michael Buble

Promiscuous - Nelly Furtado

Bring on the day (first song in Sweet Home Alabama) - Charlotte Martin

Whew. That was a lot to type! I should clarify I use my iPod for jogging, exercising and driving. My listening habits for working, reading, cooking and entertaining are quite a bit softer. I like faster, bouncy music for the road and exercise. In case you haven't picked up on this from my blog, I'm very eclectic in my tastes, whether it be music, clothes, food or decorating.

7.01.08 - TV/dvd recommendations

I'm in my office at school and don't feel like working. I've made a decent amount of progress on a few things this morning/afternoon and was trying to think of something to blog about. I thought of the above. I really enjoy spending a few nights a week with tv-on-dvd or a good movie. I really haven't blogged specifically about what I watch so here are some things I've seen recently that I enjoyed.

Brothers & Sisters. This is on after Desperate Housewives and I'm usually busy on Sunday nights so I decided not to watch it when it started last year. I just started getting it through Netflix and am really enjoying it. The show does an excellent job at making Republicans loveable. j/k :-) Callista Flockhart plays a conservative commentator who just moved back to California around the time her father passes away. It's a little similar to Six Feet Under in that Dad dies, Dad had a successful family business that the kids take over, and by the way Dad had a few little secrets too! It also stars the amazing Australian, Rachel Griffiths, who starred in Six Feet Under. Although, I must say her character is not at all annoying in this show - whereas she drove me nutso in SFU. The show does a great job at alternating between each of the siblings and the mother of the adult siblings, Sally Field. I can't forget to mention that Sally Field is great in this role. It's an interesting bit of trivia that Tom Skerrit plays Field's late husband. What does that remind you of? Answer: Steel Magnolias, where he played her husband as well.

Shark. I'm really enjoying James Woods in his role as a successful "shark-like" defense attorney turned prosecutor. I may want to watch more of his work after this. It's similar to House, in that he supervises a group of young prosecutors, but better in some ways because the characters is not nearly as cantankerous. A lot of the crimes are really interesting, and the show does a good job of balancing personal stories with the crime of the week. Mom: I was reading about James Woods online and I read he's a Republican and supports Bush! I thought you would like to know that if you didn't already. :-)

Briefly, for movies that are currently in theaters, I saw Get Smart a week or so ago and really enjoyed it. The fun gadgets weren't as great as I remember from the show, but overall it was definitely worth seeing. In rentals, I saw Bobby, the movie about RFK recently. I didn't know that much about his career and assassination prior to he movie. I know I had a book on RFK and JFK as a child that I read, but that was a long time ago. I read a book about the life of JFK more recently. Anyways, the movie isn't so much about Robert Kennedy, but shows the lives of several people who were at the hotel that night for very different reasons. Lindsey Lohan plays a young girl marrying a high school friend so he won't be sent to Vietnam, Anthony Hopkins is a retired hotel bellman, and Sharon Stone is the hotel's hairdresser. I really got into the lives of the characters and got quite worried some of them were killed in the end, but thankfully found out in the credits that they all survived.

Ok. I may add more to this later on, but I should probably get back to work.

6.30.08 - Fun and Fabulous Weekend!

I’ve been trying to increase my research productivity as of late and my lack of energy and enthusiasm about research may be waning. After I defended my dissertation I felt so spent. I had to really hustle to propose by the end of the semester. I was expecting the meeting to go a lot worse and was thrilled when they suggested I shorten and simplify the study. So far this summer I haven’t been as productive as I’d like, but have started getting a handle on my job search and, as I posted a few weeks ago, explored alternatives if the academic job search doesn’t go so well.

This weekend I had two nonacademic events for a friend’s birthday that were super fun and made me feel like I have actually have a social life and friends. I’ve been doing a lot of things with the girls that live next door to me (on either side) for most of the past year. They’re great and I’m thankful to have them so close by, but I really enjoy my other friends and sometimes find we are more similar than neighbor friends.
Anyways, I had a really great, relaxing and fun time this weekend. If only all of summer could be like this.

6.24.08 - Update

Not much going on here. I'm in my building's computer lab now trying to do some work - hsrb application stuff.

Here's a short list of things I need to do in the next week. Maybe by blogging this I will be more productive. Blogging the to-do list has helped in the past.

1. ~~Get T-data from C-lab. Start looking at T-data to begin analysis.~~

2. Modify HSRB application for diss with Dr. Advisor's suggestions.

3. Modify survey - decide what to do about "annoying construct where I can't find a measure that applies to all of the population I'm measuring."

4. Try to do one thing for CI paper per day.

Personal things -

5. Make the freakin' scallop risotto that I bought stuff for last week. I've been lazy! It was really good!

6. Exercise everyday. I'm trying more mild workouts so I can go out 6 days a week.
took off Thursday, but really got a good workout in on Weds. - and did rebounding in the evening

7. Strength training 3xs per week

8. Make progress on needed appoints: hair, dentist, gyn

Well, that's probably enough stuff for now. Back to work!

6.21.08 - Twisted Trailer Flashback - When Harry Met Sally (1988)

I was going to post the actual trailer, but I thought this was very funny and creative.

Now I just watched another take at it and this one may be better.

Okay, here's the actual trailer. The line, "I'm going to be 40," "Yeah, in like eight years," well I actually used that a few times when I was in my early 20's around friends and family but said 30. I got some funny reactions out of it, except with my parents who may have been slightly disturbed. The fun of plagiarizing movies/tv in everyday life!

6.19.08 - A random meme. I haven't done one of these in awhile.

If I were a doll, the accessories packaged with me would be:
a laptop, a book and a dvd.

I have an irrational fear of:
startling noises, getting lost or in a car accident

What type of food do you eat at your grandparents house?
I don’t eat there anymore (read: avoid at all costs), they come to our place to eat

What did you do yesterday?
Cleaned my apartment, relaxed and had dinner with Purple Daisy

I find the thought of childbirth: makes me want to adopt children, if I decide to have any at all, which there’s a large possibility I might not

Next door to my house is:
one of my two neighbor friends

Why is your number one myspace friend your number one?
Because she’s Angela Kinsey and she rocks as Angela Martin on The Office and in real life, too.

Know how to cook?
Yes, it’s one of my fav things to do, especially when I can cook for other people.

I am annoyed with:
research. all of it.

What was the last thing to make you cry?
Friend talking about his Dad who has cancer

What are the stems on wine glasses for?
Putting those little circular marker stems on them that I have so people can know what glass is theirs.

My favorite shoes are?
Right now flip flops or ballet flats

Can you use chopsticks?
Fairly well

Do you prefer beaches or forests?
Beaches

What serial killer do you find most disturbing?
What about a serial killer is not disturbing?

Who knows a secret or two about you?
Purple Daisy

Have you ever burned yourself?
Who hasn’t?

Who is probably talking a load of crap about you right now?
Probably lots of people that don’t really know me

Who is your hero?
Angela Martin (The Office) Or, Kathy Griffin, I just got done watching the first episode of her show this season. I may post about that soon.

Where is your brother right now?
No Brother

Do you believe in things that last forever?
Yes

What are you listening to?
Outdoor noises coming in from the window

What do you smell like right now?
Citrus Basil Shower gel and Love Spell Body Splash from VS

If i look in your glovebox right now, what will i find?
Papers for the car, napkins

What jewelry are you wearing?
Nothing but a cute headband I picked up at Target when I bought the ballet flats I posted about.

What is something your friends make fun of you for:
Making slightly outlandish comments about things at certain times.

When was the last time you saw the second person on your top MySpace friends?
The last time I watched The Paper on MTV

What is in your pocket right now?
sunshine

Where was your default MySpace picture taken?
On my 26th bday last year

Who do you know that is in jail?
One of my Mom’s cousins is in prison, but I don’t think I’ve ever met him.

Something irritating about your living situation:
Hmmm, I really love my apartment. I've really enjoyed making it my own unique and personalized space the last 4 years, but I wish I had an extra bedroom for guests.

Where are you right now?
At my desk in my bedroom

What was the most interesting thing that happened today?
Watched the first episode of Kathy Griffin, My Life on the D-List

When was the last time you got blood taken and why?
Can’t remember - I donated plasma regularly my last year of college.

What were you doing at midnight last night?
Watching the Tim Russert Memorial service on MSNBC

What were you doing 3 hours ago?
Jogging

What’s for dinner tonight?
Scallop Risotto - If I can get of my a&^, find the recipe and get to the store

What was the highlight of your week?
Spending the day with a friend

Are you spoiled?
Probably

Do you fake bake?
Does this refer to tanning? No, I don’t go to tanning salons, but I do like to use the fake tanning lotions - if I can get them not to streak

What was the first thing you thought when you woke up?
I shouldn’t sleep in today

6.13.08 5 Words

Some friends of mine came up with this survey where you have to answer all the questions using only 5-word responses. I just finished cooking for my extended family for Father’s Day and need a break, so here it goes! Feel free to do it too

Answer the Following Questions Using Only 5 words!

Summer: introspective, calm, planning time, fun

My Decorating Style: classic, contemporary, eclectic, and organized

My Favorite Meal: pasta, seafood, fresh veggies and wine

My Family: love parents; not close to rest

My Man: undecided; funny, cuddly, stubborn, courteous

Something I’m Looking Forward to: getting a job; leaving school!

Place I’d Rather Be: at a cool beach resort

A Fun Fact: I have a lazy eye

My Hobby: jogging, cooking, reading, movies, “nesting”

My Job: teach students, complete meaningful research [play on words there for those who know my main research interest!]

My Guilty Pleasure: pizza and tv-on-dvd crack

My Addiction: above, blogs, magazines, perfection

My Favorite Drink: as of late iced coffee

My Perfect Day: jog, shop, time with friends

A Wish: getting a job, being happy

6.12.08 - A few of my favorite things: resorts and spas!

’m back from the resort. It was amazing - I hope to have more resort vacations in the future. I love having so much to do in one location and not having to navigate/plan so much. The weather was also perfectly comfortable which is nothing short of remarkable given the flooding that was nearby and the generally hot temperatures for that part of the state which is typically five or so degrees warmer than up here in the north.

Tuesday night we walked around the hotel which has the most amazing atrium. They recently renovated the hotel and it’s absolutely amazing. Lots of gold plating, ornate patterns, and lush furniture!

After walking around we went to the “sister” hotel via shuttle which is where we had dinner and I got to go to a casino for the first time ever! They had many fun slot machines that I enjoyed featuring dancing pandas, exploding fireworks and singing lobsters. I think I may have an idea for a study exploring age/generational differences and slot machine preferences. Neither of my parents liked the video shot machines that I played and exclusively used the boring “old school” kind with fruits and numbers.

Wednesday we enjoyed breakfast on the veranda of the hotel and then my parents went on a tour via horseback of the area. I’m afraid of falling and semi-afraid of horses. It did not appeal to me at all - so I headed to the spa and got a late morning appointment for hydrotherapy which cost about the same as it would of if I had joined them on the horse tour. It was so relaxing! I got to spend lots of time in the “tranquility” room reading high end decor-home magazines like “Town and Country” and “Architecture Digest” that I don’t get the chance to peruse that often. After the spa I swam in the pool, had lunch with my Mom while Dad explored a lake and then we got ready for a delicious dinner at the sister hotel’s main restaurant - then on to more fun with the slots! In total I won about $50 - not bad for my first time! Our room was extremely comfy and luxurious with a two-room bathroom, wall-mounted flat screen tv and dreamy bed. Ahhhh….maybe I need to plan a resort trip for after I finish my dissertation!

6.08.08 - Safely at the parents' house

I left grad school town today around 1pm (after watching most of Hillary’s campaign suspension speech) and made a quickie stop at Target. I had done some online shopping for summer dresses and really liked several ballet flats. I really do love ballet flats. They’re cute, look good on me, and are comfy/good for me with being flats as opposed to heels. Usually for the summer if I’m in heels I wear wedges which are supposed to be the least of all evils as far as heels go and I find them to be very comfy.

Anyways, I decided I needed new ballet flats because my current pair are almost 2 years old and are starting to wear and I’d hate to be without them. The price was really good at Target but I was worried about buying them without seeing them in vivo first because it’s so easy to make shoes look good in a picture, when in actuality they don’t look so hot up close. I was very pleasantly surprised! Not only are they comfy and more stylish in person, but they were on clearance for only $7.50 a pair! I got one in a faux black patent leather and one in a rosey gold color. Score!

I’m also proud of myself for waiting to go to Target until I went on my trip because it was on the way and saved me some gas money. With gas being as expensive as it is even little things add up.

6.06.08: Job Search - the journey begins

Today I more fully explored some job-related options for the next year. This has helped to alleviate some of my ambiguity-related stress. There's a service organization that will be a good back-up if academic jobs don't pan out. I just need to decide what track to apply for and I’m leaning toward the one that would give me an offer in March. That might give me the optimum leeway for academic jobs but not put me in the last track of the year.

In other news I signed up and paid my subscription fee for Academic Organization’s online job posting site. There were a ton of jobs I hadn’t seen before already posted! I posted a brief profile and hope to add my vita next week.

This weekend I’m leaving for my parents’ place for a little over a week. Tomorrow I’m driving about 3/4 of the way home, stopping by my Uncle’s for my cousin’s high school graduation party and then heading to the ‘rents tomorrow night. This coming week we’re spending a few days at a resort in the southern part of their state. It’s a renovated old resort from back in the late 1800-early 1900’s. There’s a casino, pools, outdoor activities and shopping. I really don’t care what we do it will just be nice to get out of town for awhile! Hope ya’ll have a great weekend!

6.04.08 - Patagonia

I’ve never had the opportunity to shop here, and I’m not outdoorsy so a lot of their products don’t relate to me, but I’ve shown a short profile video about this company to my class and just saw this on a blog.
Their policies at corporate are similar, and it’s good to see they carry that down to the factory workers in Mexico.

6.04.08 - Caternity/Peternity Leave?

I’ve lapsed in my postings as of late. I’ve been busy working, relaxing, watching The O.C. on dvd (I’m on Season Four now), and just doing miscellaneous tasks for school and my apartment. I’ve always felt passionately about issues affecting animals. Given my area of study, one policy I feel could make dramatic changes in the lives of many pets and owners is for organizations to offer pet health insurance as a benefit for employees. This could also help with singletons who often feel discriminated against in regards to employee benefits because married people or people with kids get more than singletons do. If the pet health insurance couldn’t be offered to all employees it might be more feasible to offer it people who aren’t having a dependent or spouse on the organizations health care plan.

Anyways, I was reading a blog about someone who had to take time off from work to take care of a sick pet and I thought of the above, or peternity leave would be the broad term for all pets. Why not give workers an allowance of a few days a year for pet emergencies or for taking some time off when acquiring a new pet?

I thought I couldn’t be the first person to think of “peternity leave” so I Googled it and a few interesting things came up. It turns out organizations in the U.K. are already initiating this policy. For some reason the U.K. seems to be a bit more on the ball regarding worker well-being issues.

Maybe when I negotiate my job next year I should request a week of caternity leave. I know academic jobs are more flexible than most making this a bit less necessary, but if people can stop the tenure clock or take a semester off for a new baby, I don’t think a week off to help my new kitties adjust is that much to ask for!

5.27.08 - Shelfari Safari

A friend told me about this site recently that’s like a Facebook for books. Everyone has a shelf and can place books they’re reading, have read or would like to read in the future. You can post reviews and give ratings and there are also groups for various interests. I joined one about Unitarian Universalism because that’s something I’ve been interested in lately. You can also friend people and I find it interesting to see what people I know are reading. If you don’t know my IRL identity, are on or plan to be on Shelfari and would like “to be my friend” just comment with your email and I’ll give you my IRL name.

I really enjoy this site and am trying to get back into reading so it’d be great to get more people on board!

5.26.08 - Trailer Flashback: Something's Gotta Give, December 2003

It’s strange to think this movie came out about four and a half years ago. I remember it came out in December and I went to see it with my parents. It was a nice break from completing grad school applications, and giving massive amounts of money to ETS and fifteen schools in the process.

I really enjoyed this movie and have since bought it on dvd as well as the soundtrack, which is one of my favorites. I’ve listened to commentary when I got the dvd and here are a few fun factoids about the film.
1.) Nancy Myers asked Diane Sawyer if it was okay to reference her in the movie as a previous conquest of Nicholson’s character, Harry.
2.) Great lengths were taken to make it clear to the audience that the daughter, Marin (played by Amanda Peet) didn’t consummate her relationship with Harry , because it would be kinda creepy to have Harry be involved sexually with the daughter and then involved with the mother, Erica (Diane Keaton).
3.) The scenes in the house were actually filmed in a Hamptons house and many people have wanted to recreate the decor for their own homes.

5.25.08 - Like Dwight

I was reading about this book applying philosophy to The Office and came up with the following through one of the reviewer comments:

Because I help professors I am an Assistant Professor instead of being an Assistant to a Professor.

5.19.08 - All set to Zoom!

I got my IZoom in the mail today. It’s one of those things that lets you go through toll booths in certain states (including my parents’ state - the reason I got it) without having to stop to pay. I had ordered it just last Wednesday because parents’ state DOUBLED it’s toll for non-IZOOM using folks - yikes. With going home six times a year or so that could result in a serious chunk of change. My trip is usually comped by the ‘rents, but still, money is money. I also heard that the lines for paying “old school” are seriously long now from people having to pay more money. Anyways, I’m excited to get to ZOOM through the toll booths now after so many years of stopping to pay. Zooming entitles me to go at at least 80mph right?

Work, work, and watching The Paper

2008-05-25T12:26:00.003-05:00

Lot's of stuff has been a-happening! At least it's the summer now - yay for nice weather!

5.19.08 Deep Thoughts on the Desperate Housewives Finale

I really enjoyed it. I love it when shows do longer finales! Gary Cole (most famous for his role as Bill Lumbergh in Office Space) was excellent as Katherine’s creepy and psycho ex-husband, Wayne Davis, but it wouldn’t it have been so neat if his dying words were, “Ahh, I’m gonna need you to go ahead and come in to work on Saturday, mmkay?” hehehe

I’m sure it’s been hard for Cole to live down his most famous role as Lumbergh (I know the correct spelling because I have read SO many papers on him in the last year by my students). FYI, for any college age readers out there, if you’re writing a paper for a class about a fictional character - take the extra 30 seconds to make sure you’re spelling his/her name correctly!

Anyways, I was reading some other people’s reactions to Cole’s guest-starring role online and someone made a good point that he has the ability to create a menacing presence, although in very different ways, on both DH and Office Space.

As a side note, I also think it would be neat for Orson, who played Trey in Sex and the City, to say “Alrighty” at some point in the series. Marc Cherry, if you’re reading this that would be such a neat shot out/omage to SATC fans who watch your show. I also find it interesting that Kyle MacLachlan portrays the husband of both Charlotte and Bree, who appear to be analogous characters in comparing those two shows. But then, Marc, you were inspired by SATC in creating DH. The central point of difference being that while on SATC the women shared everything - on DH the women have HUGE secrets they go to great lengths to hide.

5.17.08 Office Finale

In fun news I had a little get together for The Office finale. The last five seconds of it were especially exciting for me because I do love me some Dwangela. I’m happy for Paul Lieberstein as I had read in some articles that he works 16 hour days during the taping of The Office and he originally hadn’t planned on being in the show, but had a few lines in a couple episodes that went over well and so they further developed his character. I’m sure he’ll enjoy the greater “work-life balance” he has in his life. I’m especially strong fan of Paul because he was a lead writer for Clarissa Explains it All - the most awesomest show on Nickelodeon and by far my favorite from back in the early 1990’s.

In the strange category, there’s an ice cream truck that goes around my neighborhood way too much. Since the weather got remotely decent, we’re talking above 55 degrees or so, it passes at least 3 times a day. My neighborhood is mostly college students. I wonder if it makes any money? Maybe it’s just passing on it’s way to more child friendly areas on the northeast side of town. Also filed under annoying noise, someone in my complex has a car that definitely needs to be fixed! It sounds like a diesel engine or something - lots of rumbling. With the windows being open because of the nice weather I hear him/her all the time.

5.06.08 Dissertation Proposal - Check!!

Well, I proposed my dissertation and it went better than I had expected. It felt more like a working research group meeting than a defense. Even better than that the committee thought I had too many hypotheses and my model was larger than it needs to be for the dissertation. I cut out the dependent variables they requested I eliminate (but still include a couple in data collection for pubs/exploratory questions) and I really love that what I’m testing now is so much simpler. I went out for Italian with friends for dinner on Friday to celebrate, and also had an Irish coffee when I got home after my meeting. I pretty much took the weekend off and only finalized grades for my class. I’m meeting with Jon Stewart today to discuss research projects and the dissertation revisions.

Anyways, it was great to have the proposal go so well and I’m looking forward to a relaxing and super productive summer. I got the first job ad via email forward that applies to me (Fall 09) so that was exciting. I have the whole summer and fall to focus exclusively on research, diss. and job applications. Hopefully that will make all the other tasks much more manageable and allow me to devote as much time as I need to applications.

4.28.08 New Frames!!

These are the glasses I picked out today! I've wanted rectangular frames like these to where instead of contacts a few days a week for awhile now. I usually sleep with my contacts in and should try to get them out of my eyes for at least two nights a week according to my optometrist. This should motivate me to do that.

4.22.08

I haven’t posted in awhile, because I’ve been SO busy. I got my dissertation to committee last Friday. Now the wait begins!

My Mom came to visit last Wednesday and left Saturday. With the conference the weekend before, dissertation pressure and doing things with Mom, I was super tired this weekend. It was so nice just to chill on the couch for awhile! I watched the first disc of the first season of The OC. I’m excited that it started in 2003, because I’ll have five seasons to get caught up with.

I’m trying to be productive today. I did a bunch of non-essential tasks: made brownies for my students and did some reading. I also made a cute card for my friend who is defending her prelim tomorrow. I need to get feedback to a student asap tonight and then maybe read a paper that I’m a coauthor on with my advisor.

I’m really enjoying The Paper on MTV. I can relate to the main character (is that the right word for reality tv?). She’s not accepted by the other editors on the paper staff and is super-ambitious. I can relate to that. It’s on around The Hills (a show I can’t get into and infinitely annoys me every time I see it).

OK - off to get things done! My last class EVER as a student is tomorrow - yay!!

4.11.08 I'm going to be a discussant!!

I just went to a couple of neat conference sessions this morning and came back to my room for a break. I checked my email and had TWO messages from a conference division chair for August conference asking me to be a discussant for two paper sessions! When I volunteered to be a reviewer for said conference it asked me if I would be interested in being a discussant or chair. I thought, sure, if Conference Organization wants a GRAD STUDENT to be a discussant, why the heck not? I honestly didn’t think it would happen. I’m confident I checked my status correctly, a graduate student done with prelims but not yet proposed (although I will be proposed in just a couple weeks!).

4.11.08 In which I am SO upset to be in the Western Time Zone!

It’s 10pm eastern time and I still have 1hour and 45 minutes until I can see the new Office episode! I accidentally ran into a blog post about “The Dinner Party” episode online and wondered - how the heck has this person seen it already?!?! Then I realized I’m on the west coast for a conference and it’s past 10pm everywhere else. I also happened to be on the NBC store, looking for cheap things for my upcoming Dissertation Proposal Office-themed celebration and saw this “Serenity by Jan” stuff and couldn’t for the life of me figure out what the heck it was or referring to! From what I read from the blog entry it’s something from tonight’s episode. I tried not to be tempted and only skim what I saw of the blog so I wouldn’t ruin the surprise of tonight - but I did read that they’re continuing the tension between Jan and Michael following “The Deposition” episode.

4.3.08 - A meeting of my not so itty bitty dissertation committee - I has it!

*My attempt at LOLspeak - and om age to the itty bitty kitty committee*

I will be defending my proposal May 1st or 2nd! yay! April is going to be kuh-raz-eee! I have a conference on the other side of the country next week, my Mom is visiting the week after that, and my paper is due to committee when she visits. Dr. Advisor (Jon Stewart in the Dream Committee) says I can ask for the weekend if I would like (because the meeting would likely be on Friday) and give the draft to them on Monday, but I’m not sure if I want to do that yet.

Dissertation proposal

2008-04-07T15:42:00.002-05:00

I'm officially proposing my dissertation at the beginning of May!

3.29

I just found out that Mindy Kahling (writer and Kelly Kapoor on The Office) has a blog! Her bloggy name is Mindy Ephron - how cool is that! Nora Ephron (along with her sis Delia) are THE goddesses of romantic comedy writing (e.g., Sleepless in Seattle, You’ve Got Mail). Her blog, “Things I’ve Bought That I Love,” discusses fun clothes, beauty products and helpful tips (like how she reduced her mile time from 10 minutes, i.e., my time, to 8.5 minutes).

The other customer who took Neighbor’s coat by mistake with her keys/phone called today and she got her stuff back - yay! She surprised me when she came back with tea light candle holders in summery colors that just happen to go perfectly with my spring/summer decor. Unexpected, totally not needed - but fun surprise!

3.29

It’s about 4am now. I fell asleep soon after 11:30 only to wake up an hour or so ago feeling completely rested. It’s about 3.5 hours until I can go jogging. Maybe I should stay up? I can at least work on my references for the dissertation. I was a regular driving service yesterday - it was kinda fun. I drove Purple Daisy to take her car in on Thursday, and it was ready yesterday so I took her to pick it up and then we went out to lunch. I went home, got some work done and then my neighbor came over. She’s had a pretty stressful few weeks and went in for a little pampering at a local salon/spa. When she was done with her massage they gave her back her coat only for her to find out that it was a coat that looked remarkably similar to hers. They had given her coat away (with her cell phone and keys inside) to someone else! The staff was helpful in letting her make some calls to get our apartment complex owner to get her an extra set of keys and then an employee drove her back here. I then took her back to the salon with her spare car keys tow and I’m also her “contact person” for the salon to call when hopefully the person who has her coat realizes what happened. The salon has supposedly called everyone who was there for the two hours before this happened. Hopefully I’ll get a call tomorrow!

3.22

I so want to make kitty litter cake! The recipe sounds really fun and it’s cat related = win, win!

The link has various pictures of kitty litter cakes that will likely take you to recipes, if you’re (still) interested. It’s kind of ironic, but I think my Dad (allergic to cats) would really love this dessert. He loves yellow cake and that is what is ground up to make the “litter.” I also don’t think he’d mind the ground up vanilla sandwich cookies either. PLUS he loves Tootsie Rolls, and those are melted to make the poop! Maybe I’ll make this during the summer after I propose my dissertation.

Speaking of dissertation, it looks like I will be proposing in a little over a month, with my draft due to committee mid-April! Scary, I know.

I just discovered “In Treatment” this week on HBO - really good. It’s on every night for a half hour and chronicles a psychologist’s sessions with his patients. There’s one appointment each day and the Friday appointment is the psychologist going to his session with his wife to deal with their marital problems. The appointments (days) are tied together when patients from other days call before/after sessions, or the psychologist, Paul, interacts with his estranged wife (his office is in their home). Diane Weist and Blair Underwood star and I recognize the Paul but don’t know his name. Some of the elements in the sessions are very universal, making it almost like therapy for free!

Happenings

2008-03-20T07:12:00.001-05:00

My life lately has been comprised of work and the occasional movie and 4-days a week of DailyShow and the newly added Colbert Report. I hadn’t watched Colbert on a regular basis UNTIL about the 2nd month of the writer’s strike back in December. Since January all of my regular shows have been gone and I’ve had time to watch Colbert. I’m really looking forward to new Office, 30 Rock, Grey’s and House.

I’m running a string of good movies from Netflix and other sources. They include: Breech, Mr. Brooks, Enchanted, Dan In Real Life, and SNL The Best of Alec Baldwin (not a movie but very funny).

In addition to work and dvds I’ve enjoyed jogging outside a bit in the past couple weeks (finally) and

I have a meeting with my advisor tomorrow and I have close to a full proposal draft. The next couple days are busy with teaching today, office hours and a lab meeting; and tomorrow, wrapping up loose ends with the draft, possibly two meetings, plus the dissertation meeting. The weekend will be nice.

3.9.08
I got back Thursday from visiting my parents. While I was home I did my taxes, barely looked at the diss and graded papers I didn’t have to grade (my TA is taking prelims this month and I decided to be nice, plus a miss grading *a little*). I really don’t have time to post much right now as I’m trying to get back into work mode. More later.

Oscars, sushi and dissertation: my life the past couple weeks

2008-02-29T22:37:00.003-05:00

Life overall

Spring break is here and I’m at my parent's home to spend about 6 days with the fam. I have a pleasure reading book: Why women should rule the world to read. It’s written by the first female press secretary, Dee Dee Myers. I’m also hoping to finish the third Dexter book Dexter in the Dark, by Jeff Lindsey. I've gotten through the first few chapters of 'Women' and I'm really enjoying it. She's talked about how both she and other women in academe, business and politics are held to double standards and a lot of her personal experiences are both interesting and depressing at the same time.

I haven’t posted for awhile mostly because I’ve been working diligently on the dissertation. I hope to propose in a couple months. It's great to be at the stage where I can have concrete goals about my writing progress, but also a little demanding too. ;-)

Sushi Update

I’ve had my sushi kit for almost two months now (holiday gift) and for the past week I’ve started experimenting with riceless maki/rolls. Rice just has so many calories, such little nutritional value and is one of those things I have a hard time not overindulging with.

Not that I won’t sometimes treat myself, but I needed to find ways to make sushi rolls without the rice. I really love the basic ingredients of rolls without rice: fish (cooked, smoked or raw), avocados, maybe some may, prawn (shrimp), crab….and of course wasabi and soy sauce!!

So far I’ve managed to come up with some great combos. I really like omelet (scrambled egg) rolls. I’ve been using Egg Beaters. Kroger carries an organic, cage free form of “egg beaters” that I love.

I’ve also made Philly rolls, and various combinations using cucumber, steamed or salmon, mayo, and crab. Mayo is a great way to hold the rolls together without sticky rice.

In other sushi news, it’s fabulous that I also got a great Kitchen Aid knife set over the holidays. The serrated and slicing knifes are great for cutting the roles and slicing the ingredients. Without the right knife the ingredients of the roll are just pushed out when it is cut. I’m excited about how my sushi skills have developed over the past couple months. I know how to cut the cucumbers now to get really thin slices and just how much to lay out on the nori (seaweed) to make a good size roll. :-) Not that I’m an expert by any means, but if ya have any questions about roll making feel free to comment. I’ve also made a few combos not in roll form (sans nori) in case anyone isn’t into that.

The other night I tried cous cous instead of white rice - it was great and didn't fall apart! I took pictures and will try to remember to post them.

The Oscars

The bad: the night was a little montage crazy. Remember the montage to binoculars and periscopes? :-) I can understand that was necessary because of the writers strike lasting up until 2 weeks before the show. I enjoyed Jon Stewart's opening routine ("Does this town need a hug?....Thank god for teen pregnancy.") I saw most of the musical numbers before I got bored of the whole thing and really loved the numbers from August and Enchanted.

The good: I found three movies I think I want to see (The Enchanted, The Savages and La Vie en Rose). I recently saw Laura Linney in Breach and Mystic River (which I happened to see the day of The Oscars for the first time). I'm really starting to like her work.

Sweet Home Alabama

2008-02-10T15:45:00.000-05:00

One of my favorite movies. I just got the soundtrack today from iTunes. I don’t like all of the songs on it, but I needed a little extra inspiration for my exercise routine today. I like the song that opens up the movie, “Bring on the Day” by Charlotte Martin, and some of the other jumpier pieces throughout the film.I went jogging yesterday outside for the first time in months. Probably since around Thanksgiving time, to be exact. Or I might have been able to go a couple times at the beginning of this semester when it was warmer than average. I had a pretty good time, although I was feeling lazy yesterday morning when I got up so I had some food and chilled for awhile before going. As usual, that’s not a good idea as far as my gastrointestinal tract is concerned. I got about 3/4 of a mile away and had some yuck abdominal crams. Thankfully though, when I get cramping I can still walk comfortably back to my apartment to use the facilities - I just can’t jog.

I made German potato salad last night while watching Working Girl on WE. It’s one of those movies that I’ve seen parts of but haven’t seen start to finish. In other entertainment news I got the first disc of the last season of King of Queens this week. I lost track of that show for the last season. I had seen some of the episodes on that disc but not all of them. I think I’ll either have disc 2 (the last one) this week or “I think I love my wife” - Chris Rock’s movie. I’m on a Netflix system with the on-at-a-time program where I get one movie midweek and one for the weekend.

2.06.08 - Holiday Cards in February

A couple days ago I finished opening my holiday cards - why? Oh, because the post office lost my stopped mail for about a month. The regular mailman had the day off the day my backed mail was supposed to be delivered on January 3rd and his substitute delivered it to an apartment with the same number as mine on a nearby street. Nice. At first when I called the post office to see what the deal-e-o was a few weeks ago the person on the phone was kind of rude and not at all sympathetic to the fact that I hadn’t received my mail yet! Then, I left a VERY nice note for my mailman explaining the situation and he didn’t respond. However, when I went TO the post office the person I talked to was really nice and then later that week the mailman came to my door to deliver a package and send he had wanted to talk to me about the issue in person. So yeah, it was kind of a big mess a couple weeks ago - and then I just accepted the fact that I might not get my backed mail — or it might take a long time. So it was a really nice surprise to get it the other day! My health insurance cards were in there - which made it even better that they found it now. I thought the company hadn’t sent them out yet for my new policy and would have called about that soon.

Today I am going to focus as much as I can on the dissertation. I got up around seven, went to the gym and then decided to stop at S’bucks to try one of their new Skinny Lattes. I got the Cinnamon Dolce flavor. It’s really good and only 130 calories for a grande. That made it easy to incorporate into my 300-ish calorie budget for breakfast!

On the completed list for today - cleared up some lawsuit claims that were in my favor

2008-02-01T20:17:00.000-05:00

Yes, that’s right. I just finished filing claim forms for not one, but two lawsuits that will hopefully give me a nice chunk of change. One was for foreign travel credit card charges. I was abroad for a few months in the summer of 1999 when I was in high school and was sent a packet to fill out for my share of the settlement with the credit card companies. Yay! Because I met the criteria (abroad for more than a week) I decided NOT to do the easy $25 refund, but take a gamble and go for the estimated refund. All I had to do was indicate why I was traveling for that time period.

The second was for a settlement against Bed Bath and Beyond. I bought some sheets there in the fall to use this winter. FYI sateen sheets are really heavy - I definitely won’t use them this summer. It turns out the company misrepresented the thread counts on A LOT of its sheet sets, and as such I should receive A FULL REFUND! Woot! Coincidentally, I just noticed this week that the set is starting to show some wear, particulary on the fitted sheet where I sleep and move around at night. I wasn’t expecting this from the quality of sheets I purchased. *Shame, Bed Bath & Beyond, shame.*

Updates from the past few weeks...

2008-01-26T13:51:00.000-05:00

I've started a more private blog on a different venue. Comment if you would like me to give you the address and I'll contact you personally. :-) I'll still keep this one updated with the basic goings on.

1.26.08

I have them in my order of preference. I wonder if there are any of Angela out there? I may have to look!

Mambo Number Five

That’s What She Said

Pam

1.25.08

I’m sitting in my office at school thinking various certainly “important” scholarly thoughts when I get the idea to Google “tenured cat.” The following is what I found from Female Science Professor

1.23.08

He was found dead in his NY apartment today. He’s not one of my favorite actors, but I did enjoy his roles in Brokeback Mountain and 10 Things I Hate about You. I feel sorry for Michelle Williams (of Dawson’s Creek and Brokeback fame) and their little daughter. I know they separated in September, but that still has to be devastating.

I had to lecture about a topic in my field today for the course I’m teaching that I never had to teach before in the previous course I taught. It was a little awkward. It’s a pretty straightforward topic and I had difficulty matching my own thoughts to the slides without things getting messy.

I’m on track for my meeting with Dr. Advisor on Friday. I have all of tomorrow sans grocery shopping and exercise to work on my research (diss and other for that meeting).

1.21.08

With the dissertation things are starting to take shape. A few nights ago I spent the evening researching measures in X to try and get a feel for the area. X is something that I’ve done some research on before, but I haven’t been the principal investigator, nor was I thoroughly involved in the theory involving X. I feel that I have a pretty good understanding of how my area, meaning, will relate to X and what measures I should use.

Also, I’ve been making more progress on the article I’d like to get out this semester. I’d like to try to do more of that today or tomorrow. So, in other words, I’m making good progress for my end of this week goals.

1.14.08

I took the weekend off mostly. I was really tired from some stress associated with the first week of the semester and some of the tasks I needed to get done. Now I have a lot of reading to get done today for my class tomorrow as well as preparing to teach for the week.

I have a lot of research related tasks that are piling up that need to be addressed in the next few weeks. I should try and make lists in my planner today so I can stay on track.

I’m sad about the lack of new shows. No more new episodes of The Office, 30 Rock or Desperate Housewives until the strike ends. *Wahwah* Thank goodness The Daily Show is back on - be it in a slightly dilluted form, sans writers.

1.12.08

…but I’m trying not to eat because I’ll be leaving for dinner in less than 2 hours.

Bill Maher came back on HBO last night with new episodes. Tony Snow was on the panel. It was good, but his opening monologue was very short and there were no New Rules - sadness.

I got some reading done today for my dissertation/class - and prepped for teaching on Tuesday. My French Press cracked - I noticed that yesterday - so I ordered a new one online. I thought about getting one at S’bucks but they had one at Amazon that was stainless, supposedly has a great seal with the filter and I have free shipping there. That should be it for my purchases for awhile.

I still have some numbness in my left little and ring fingers, but I only really notice it when I type or press down with those fingers. I just put my hand on my hip and bent my hand back to see if I felt pain down my arm - nothing. That’s a good sign, but I felt the doctor indicated that I should be fine after just a few days. I still have 3 more weeks of the anti-inflammatory medication. If it’s still at all present at the end of that I’ll have to head back for another check-up. Hopefully that won’t happen - I’d probably need a x-ray and/or other more time-consuming/expensive diagnostics at that point. I’m more concerned about the “time consuming” than anything else - I’m really very lazy when it comes to personal issues. I’m all about getting the research/academic stuff done, but when it comes to the annoying domestic-personal stuff that needs to be done I have very little motivation. With medical stuff I am on very aware and on top of things - I just don’t like having to take time out for appointments.

I’m behind on my Netflix. I have a disc of Heroes and the movie, Waitress sitting here. I downgraded to the 1 at a time unlimited plan. I’m trying to focus as much as I can on research, and even with the strike there’s still plenty of new tv to keep me occupied for an hour or so a day, or while I’m making dinner, exercising, or doing other miscellaneous tasks for which I like tv-entertainment in the background.

Well, back to work before dinner - Italian food, Hillary ahead - makes me happy!

Back to reality

2008-01-09T17:23:00.001-05:00

I’m midway through the first week of the semester. Today I got caught up on quite a few errands. I went to the bank to deposit my holiday and reimbursement checks, Staples to get 2008 pages for my planner, pens and paper; and the grocery store. I had a hair appointment scheduled for Friday morning, but that got canceled because stylists’ grandfather passed away. :-( I was really looking forward to getting my hair cut this week, but I guess I’ll have to wait until next Tuesday. Oh, I also went to the recycling center to drop off my first load of recyclables! Hopefully I won’t have to go every week, but with new items from the holiday and moving things around, the trunk of my car was almost full.

I reorganized my bedroom/office when I got home. I put a table I was only slightly using in my office, and moved the printer that was on that table to the corner desk unit. I have a lot more negative space now. I also put out one of the end tables that came with the apartment, that I had been storing in my living room closet out by one of the chairs. That also looks nice.

My first class went really well yesterday. We watched part of the very first episode of The Office, and another video that described the employment practices and culture of Wild Oats (a healthy/natural food focused grocery store). After seeing both I got the students to discuss the effective and ineffective elements present at Dunder-Mifflin and Wild Oats (i.e., lack of training at Dunder-Mifflin, mandatory 30 day course for new employees at Wild Oats). Two of the students in the class are considering a career in my field! Tomorrow is the first day of lecture, and will be my first time filling a 75 as opposed to 50 minute class.

I’m also excited about the class I’m taking this semester. The projects for the class are interesting as there is no writing/papers/exams - just various presentations and participation. I have a meeting with Dr. Advisor on Friday in the morning to discuss the paper we’re working on, my dissertation and probably my yearly update/”performance review.”

I have no plans for the weekend and really don’t “get anything” out of MLK day this year as I have no classes that day. Hopefully I’ll be able to get more into the swing of the semester. And - because I’m kinda on a roll with the appointment/personal-errand thing - set up an eye exam to get new contacts and glasses! I’ve wanted new glasses for awhile (my current ones are from early undergrad and when I have to wear them I usually run into things for awhile!). I want rectangular, plastic frames in blue. If I have glasses I like to wear I might wear my contacts less, saving money over time. ;-) Maybe blogging about this here will get me to finally set up an appointment I’ve been putting off for about a year.

Ok, I need to go - I’m having dinner with friends in about a half an hour - Mexican - yay!

Shoes

2008-01-02T10:15:00.000-05:00

You Are Big Black Boots!

You can be best described as: attitude
You've got lots of it - and you love to give it
A guy has to be pretty gusty to hit on you
But if he's your type, you'll warm up... a little

What Kind Of Women's Shoe Are You?

New Year

2007-12-30T11:54:00.000-05:00

2007 is almost over - I know every year seems to go faster than it should but this one especially so. It seems like just a month ago I came home from the office and watched the Shawskank Redempition fiasco (i.e., Paris Hilton) on television and that was six months ago! In a few days I'll be heading back to Grad School town and in a little over a week I'll be teaching. I'm doing the bingo card icebreaker on the first day. I managed to come up with a 5x4 grid yesterday with each square representing something that might apply to one or more students in the class (e.g., been to 2 or more foreign countries, went to school team's hockey game, eats spinach at least once a week...considering a career in Course Subject). A lot of the squares like Course Subject will give me an idea of the characteristics of the students in the class. I also have another activity for the first day where small groups discuss their best and wost experiences with the course topic and how if they were consultants they would have advised said organizations/individuals to avoid such problems.

I've been thinking about the dissertation - no writing yet - but I think I've decided which of the two venues I want to pursue for my research. Only 17 months until I hope to leave Grad School Town for Hopefully Assistant Professor Town (wherever that ends up being).

I've reached the point of my visit where I'm starting to miss certain aspects of home. It'll be good to get back but this has been a great break. I really enjoyed cooking, baking, wrapping presents, spending time with the grandparents (even though they're a little bit insensitive sometimes). It's really nice to have "projects" that aren't academic-school related.

I'm very much looking forward to the new year. I love my schedule for the spring semester. I teach a "power hour" 75 minute class (that's what they called those in Undergrad) on Tuesday and Thursdays. I have one of my last required course on Tuesday FIFTEEN minutes after I teach. All of this happens in the late morning and early afternoon. This is really a perfect schedule for me because I feel with 3 classes a week there's always that "wasted" time with setting up the powerpoint and getting things ready each time. Plus I like to have my classes and such as compact as possible to free up the rest of the week for whatever I want to accomplish.

In "fun" news, I've been watching the deleted scenes from all the seasons of The Office with my Mom. I told her how funny they are even though they didn't end up in the original episodes. I hadn't seen the first season's since last March when I first started watching the show so those were especially fun. Now that I'm somewhat of a fanatic about the show I pick up on more reasons as to why the scenes were cut. Mainly, a lot of the deleted scenes in season one made Michael look mean - as opposed to his ignorantly-insensitive, but mostly well-intentioned nature that is portrayed on the show.

My parents and I played hearts last night. It wasn't as bad as I thought. We're playing Clue tonight and maybe something else and tomorrow we'll be doing more games, but maybe we should rent a video too - three nights is a lot of games for three people. I'll be making lasagne on Tuesday for New Years - a holiday tradition and we have Shrimp around 11 o'clock on New Years Eve - also tradition. Does anyone else have any food related New Years traditions? I think I remember being back in elementary-middle school when they tried to get us to write about our holiday traditions and being the only one who had NYE food related rituals.

Another nice thing about being away from home for awhile is that I think of neat ways I can rearrange my apartment. I really think that I can clear out the area underneath my sink for a recycling area. Yes, I haven't been recycling for the past two years or so. They don't do pickups at our apartments and we have to take the stuff to the recycling center within a mile of my office at school. In my small kitchen it's hard to find a good place for recycling. I did it for my first year in grad school and then just got sooooo tired of the mess. I think it's time for me to try again. I have the reusable shopping bags, walk to school mostly, and try to use eco-friendly cleaning products - so this is the next thing for my green-conscious lifestyle.

Gotta go eat brunch with the 'rents! Happy New Year!

A little lolsecret for Christmas Eve

2007-12-24T17:30:00.001-05:00

2007 Survey

2007-12-23T13:01:00.000-05:00

Where did you begin 2007?
At the 'rents house - just finished watching a Star Wars or Harry Potter movie, I think.

What was your status by Valentine's Day?
Reading for prelims

Were you in school (anytime this year)?
I'm a graduate student, so yes.

Did you have to go to the hospital?
Just the health center and a couple doctors, thankfully.

Did you have any encounters with the police?
No, still the good girl. I almost called the po-po on my downstairs neighbor though, but the anonymous note seemed to get my point across.

Where did you go on vacation?
Not really. I went to a couple fun places for conferences and spent a few weeks at the 'rents - it's nice to get away from Grad Town for any reason or locale.

What did you purchase that was over $500?
Car and medical insurance

Did you know anybody who got married?
Two, at least. I was invited to my first "friend" wedding this year. All the other weddings I've been to have been for family.

Did you know anybody who passed away?
No one close to me

Did you move anywhere?
No, thankfully. I love staying in the same place for several years. I moved every year for undergrad.

What sporting events did you attend?
One college football game and one minor league baseball game.

What concerts/shows did you go to?
Wicked in July for my birthday

Where do you live now?
Grad School Town in the Midwest

Describe your birthday.
Chilled, did some work, watched some Soprano episodes - I was just finishing Season 1 I think. Went to dinner at a great fondue place and had cake!

What's the one thing you thought you would never do but did in 2007?
I think I made substantial progress in research that is necessary to go on the job market - not something I thought I would "never" do, but I can't think of a good answer.

What has been your favorite moment(s)?
Nothing specific, really.

What's something you learned about yourself?
Probably - I would hope so.

Any new additions to your family?
No

What was your best month?
The Fall Semester months

What music will you remember 2007 by?
The Office and 30 Rock themes :-)

Who has been your best drinking buddy?
Purple Daisy

Made new friends?
Neighbor girls

Best new friend?
Nope, I have a few good peeps

Favorite Night out?
After prelims - but I don't go out much

Any regrets?
No

What do you want to change in 2008?
Nothing really, just progress in my personal and professional life

Overall, how would you rate this year?
Average

What would you change about 2007?
Nothing I'd like to discuss here, but a couple things.

What did you like most about 2007?
everything

Other than home, where did you spend most of your time?
My office

Have any life changes in 2007?
Preparing for a major life change - getting first job after grad school

Change your hairstyle?
Yes, started growing it out in May

New BF/GF?
No

Get a new job?
Sort of, teaching different things - plus new research tasks with prelims and working on the dissertation, finishing up papers.

How old did you turn this year?
26

Do you have a New Year's resolution?
Focus on what's important

Do anything embarrassing?
I'm sure I did

Buy anything new from eBay?
No

What was your favorite purchase?
Cute summer clothes - My Issac Mizrahi brownish red pumps

Get married or divorced?
No

Get arrestted?
No

Did you get sick this year?
Yes

Start a new hobby?
Jogging more, took more photos, healthy cooking, baking, home decor - same hobbies but different spin

Been snowboarding?
No

Are you happy to see 2007 go?
Change is good - 17 months until I leave grad town! Not that I'm unhappy, or wishing time away.

Drank Starbucks in 2007?
Not too much for the first 10 months, but I do love their holiday beverages!

Been naughty or nice?
little of both

What are you wishing for in 2008?
eudamonic well-being :-)

A Very Meowy Christmas - by the Jingle Cats

2007-12-21T21:18:00.000-05:00

A 'lil Kitty Kristmas Cheer!

Cookie-bake-o-rama

2007-12-19T16:47:00.000-05:00

I'm with the 'rents for the holidays and just finished making three different types of cookies: chocolate chip, oatmeal rasin and mocha. I plan to make butterscotch fudge, peanut butter balls and walnut/fruit filled crescent cookies before Christmas. My Dad's birthday is tomorrow and my 90+ year old Grandmother is coming over early to show him how to make nut roll, a family recipe, so I will probably help with that too. I'll also help my Dad make strudel as our supply from two years ago has been consumed. :-) My Dad is very serious about his strudel. I told my Mom today that the state of their stock market investments seems to carry the same weight as strudel-making.

I just got home yesterday. The end of the semester wrapped up well. I'll probably stay here with my parents until a couple days after the new year. In addition to baking and probably some cooking I need to prepare my syllabus and materials for next semester, enter and analyze some data and write a conference abstract for a symposium submission. Not too much work. Plus, of course, the dissertation needs some attention. :-)

Happy Holidays!

Sex and the City - The Movie! First Trailer

2007-12-08T16:25:00.000-05:00

I tried to post the SATC trailer clip in vivo, but it doesn't want to comply - here's the link to the story and clip in People.

I've been busy working on my dissertation idea for the last few days and a few nights ago spent the entire evening cleaning and throwing out items from my closet. Mostly a lot of paper and some really old clothes and other items. It's all sitting in a huge pile in the living room because the parking lot has been so icy. I'll probably take it out tomorrow.

I got some feedback on my idea from both my advisor and another person on my committee and am trying to rework things a bit in regards to what I'm testing. I'd like to read another article that's related to what I'm doing tonight.

I started Heroes this week and finished the first two discs. It's so different than what I usually watch, comedies and relationship-oriented shows, but the stories of a few of the characters (the single mom and the cheerleader, mainly) have me intrigued to continue on with the season.

I haven't cooked anything to exciting this week. Probably because I've been so focussed on the dissertation, cleaning and other items in the evenings.

Crazy, hazy, not really lazy days of the end of the semester

2007-12-03T20:56:00.000-05:00

Okay enough with the cat postings, I know. I've been really busy since I got back from Thanksgiving. I guess that will happen when one has three assignments due in the course one is teaching for the semester, plus other research related deadlines and dissertation developments.

Less than two weeks left in the semester! My students started giving their group presentations today and they were quite good. I'm really impressed with how much better/smoothly things are going this year. I have another meeting, it's been two weeks, to discuss my dissertation and other research with my advisor tomorrow. I've done a brief concept paper of what I hope to cover with my dissertation plus I determined how X and Y were determined from an article that will likely be a key component to my dissertation.

An article I am a co-author on got a revise and resubmit, so I've been busy with that too. I'll be excited to see what happens to my first author manuscript/thesis come the beginning of the semester. Hopefully good things!

On a completely different note, I wore these really cute Isaac Mizrahi Target shoes today, with a dark rose/merlot color sweater. I felt especially classy today. I wore it with slightly green-toned cords/khakis which complemented the rose color and shoes.

I took pictures of my Christmas tree and some of my other decorations. I'll try to post those when I'm not so tired. I took a long afternoon nap yesterday, from about 5-10pm! Then I was up until about 3am and slept until just before 8am. So, it's 9pm right now and I'm beginning to feel the lack of sleep. :-)

If you liked the Mean Kitty video I posted the other day there are many more Sparta videos posted by that user, just click on other videos for that user. He's very funny - as is the cat - and cute too!

I sent out my Holiday cards last Monday to family and did most of the personal ones today. For friends/faculty each got a small bit of candy wrapped in green saran wrap with red ribbon tied around it. I'm a few cards short which I should print out tonight.

Okay - I really should get going! I'll make an effort to post more soon.

The Mean Kitty Song - really neat!

2007-11-30T19:41:00.000-05:00

LOLcat montage

2007-11-28T14:01:00.000-05:00

Thanksgiving break - yay!

2007-11-21T08:32:00.000-05:00

I'm at my parents house now for Thanksgiving. I'm glad I made the trip yesterday because if you've noticed the news at all recently, the weather in the Midwest right now is not good.

I managed to get up at 6am this morning and I'm already a third through a dissertation-related article. My advisor and I have had several brainstorming sessions about my topic and I have a framework for a possible dissertation that is just innovative and interesting enough for me without being too innovative. With my research area it's easy to link the concepts I'm interested in studying to other less than concrete areas - and with this dissertation idea I'm working on now it relates my concept to other well established areas. Plus, it incorporates not one but two other topics I've researched before and find exciting. That has the benefit of tying everything together (or almost everything) in my research background which should look good for the job search.

My parents and I are going to my Uncle's place about an hour from here tomorrow with the grand parental units. I'm also working on my Holiday cards. I addressed the envelopes and affixed the stamps last night. I'll be writing the letter to go inside the card today and working on some graphics for the front and the inside for a border around the letter. Did I mention I'm making my cards from scratch?

FYI I'm still working on Ugly Betty and so loving it! I haven't added last month's show, 30 Rock to my regular line-up, but I'll have seasons to look forward to watching next year on dvd.

I only have one more week of lecture for the semester. I want to make it a Blockbuster week. The last week of classes will be the group presentations and a review session (and student evals!) for the final. Time has flown since the midterm. I made my students coffee cake sour cream muffins for Monday's class just as a nice treat. One student asked what the bribe was for.

I also showed this funny YouTube video about Santa. We were discussing communication and I thought this slightly tied into that topic. I also showed scenes from the Women's Appreciation Office episode.

Developments

2007-11-11T21:29:00.000-05:00

Things that didn't make me happy this week: The WGA strike, no Daily Show, no Bill Maher AND the second to the last Office.

Things that made me happy: Ugly Betty dvds from Netflix (Heroes is next on my queue, Mom and Dad, fyi), my pumpkin spice wax potpourri tarts and finally getting to put some time in on my dissertation.

My school gets off for Veterans Day (my high school and college didn't) so although this is my 4th year of getting this day off I'm still not used to it. This year it feels especially weird because it's on a Monday, not a Friday. I didn't notice that when I wrote the syllabus for my course and put down that my students had the Friday of last week off! Someone caught my mistake last week by asking if I was giving them 2 days off for Veterans day - no such luck, honey.

I'm also developing my Office obsession and bought The Office pc game. It was $20 from mumbojumbo.com. I really like it and I don't think it hinder my own "work" productivity. The game consists of a series of challenges that make up five different rounds each with a different adversary (Dwight, Ryan, Andy, Angela and them Michael). Each round consists of 8 challenges that make up an 8 hour work day each. A work day is probably about 10 minutes. Anyways, the challenges are SO intense they take up all of my attention (good stress relief) and I only want to do 1 or 2 a day. Another thing I like about the game is that you can't really lose. If you don't beat the adversary for that particular day you don't get credit for that challenge and just have to try again, in an attempt to win 8 challenges against that adversary to advance to the next. A fun aspect about the game are the pranks/distractions. By accumulating points your "Prank meter" increases and when it's full your character (Jim) can go to Pam and start a prank or distraction against the adversary. These include actual audio dialog from the episodes (e.g., Dwights desk stuff ends up in the vending machine, Kelly comes and bothers Ryan about her closet, or Andy's cell phone is in the ceiling). When the adversary is distracted that gives you the opportunity to score more points. BTW, the whole point of the game is to help the other "friendly" characters that are at the desks complete orders by getting them files, stuff from the printer/filing cabinet, or taking completed orders to the box to go to the warehouse.

Ok, I know that was a long description, but a lot of my friends are addicted to World of Warcraft and I'm constantly hearing about stuff relating to that and I'm happy to have a small little computer game to play and enjoy!

Random bullets of I haven't posted in a week

2007-11-03T12:45:00.000-05:00

The Halloween Party was fun. I wasn't the only one with an Office themed costume. There was a Pam, Dwight, Kevin and Angela's dead cat, Sprinkles.
I hosted the weekly Grey's watching "party" for the grad students that live at my complex and those that come over to watch the show. I made a gingered pumpkin pie, recipe from Cooking Light.
I'm almost done with grading craziness. My class had an exam three weeks ago and their first papers were due two weeks ago. The exams are back and I'm finishing up the papers this weekend. I have 40-ish students and I'm trying to give them useful developmental feedback on their writing/ideas. I'm typing up my comments instead of handwriting them on their papers which saves some time.
I'm really enjoying jogging in the fall weather. I downloaded some Michael Jackson and Journey songs as well as a few others from the 80's early 90's last night for my jog this morning.
As for research, everything seems to be going well. I'm gradually progressing on the paper I'd like to have under review this semester/early next semester. I have weekly meetings with my advisor/coauthor and that's helping. I realized this week, however, that I've kinda forgot about my dissertation. I'm doing a qualitative pilot right now with my students, so that's partly why I haven't been spending much time on it, but I still feel I should be reading and thinking about it more. Overall, I'm happy with how this semester has gone - it's crazy that Thanksgiving break is in just over 2 weeks. Only 3 more semesters to go!

Angela Martin

2007-10-25T23:31:00.000-05:00

I've decided I'm being Angela Martin from The Office for the Halloween Party this Saturday. I'm quite happy with my decision - despite having the Grey's Anatomy outfit from my August party. I got quite the dowdy, conservative outfit at Walmart today for quite the economical price. Yes, I feel bad shopping at Wally World, but I'm a grad student and it's less than a mile away. Plus, the two elements of the outfit, while super-Angela-esque when put together are very wearable when in isolation. Thus, I can wear them in my non-Angela, post-party existence. A friend of mine is going as Kevin - specifically in the Halloween costume he wore in Season 2.

"This looks like sewage, but it should taste really great!"

2007-10-24T15:12:00.000-05:00

What a Starbuck's barista told me earlier today about my Green Tea Latte. After I ordered I was informed that they were out of the sugar free melon syrup they use for the lattes, but they'd be happy to use another syrup like raspberry. That sounded nice so I said go for it. When the girl handed it to me she said the above. Probably (hopefully?) the only time I'll hear that from food service personnel in my lifetime. FYI, the reason it may have a blackish color is that 'bucks' green teas are "super" green raspberry syrup is of course a pinkish-red color. The latte was super by the way - as was my teaching this morning, if I do say so myself.

After class I was super productive, writing a memo for a research group project. I need to do some analyses today and I should be going for a long jog soon. It seems fall has finally arrived here and it's the first time I can have the windows closed at home with no air conditioning - and no heat. I love that kind of weather.

My dissertation is kind of at a stand still right now as I wait for my students to complete their extra credit assignment which is a small pilot/exploratory exercise for my dissertation. I'm trying to work on a major validation paper and the weekly meetings with Dr. Advisor have been going well.

My department has a Halloween party this weekend which I'm not super excited about. I've never really enjoyed myself at those, but I feel partially invested in going as I purchased a "Seattle Grace Hospital" lab coat and "Grey's Anatomy" scrubs for my party in August. I rationalized the purchase by thinking it would be for the August Grey's party, the Halloween party, a possible finale of Scrubs party this coming Spring and the scrubs are comfy to wear around the apartment in the evenings/weekend. I had a nice out for not going last year because my parent's/godparents were visiting. At least it starts early so I can be home early if I want. One of my friends mentioned maybe leaving early and doing something else fun later in the evening.

Okay, I need to read some articles, go for a jog and then maybe make a Rachel Ray cobb salad.

Week's news

2007-10-21T12:31:00.000-05:00

The midterm for my class went well. I'm almost done grading the exams and so far the grades have been good. It also didn't take as much time as I thought once I got started.
I've been going out for sushi a lot lately with a friend. Yummy. It's been a long time since I've had sushi so having it for a couple lunches this week was fantastic.
I resubmitted my thesis to another journal for publication. I'm happy to have that done. Hopefully this will go better than the first journal. I should hear back by the beginning of next semester (90 days).
I also made turkey fajitas burgers for dinner with a friend this week. We had them on tortillas with homemade guacamole.
I'm working on the outline for my second publication related to my area of research. It's coming along.
I started a pilot study this week for my dissertation. Yay.
I actually had fun at a bar on Friday - wow.

That's all. I must say my life is pretty tame.

The James Bond Lifestyle Seminar for Academics©

2007-10-15T14:16:00.000-05:00

I found this while skimming The Chronicle's website this week. Very funny! Here's the link to the original post.

As everyone knows, James Bond is cool; most professors are not. They are the opposite of cool. That’s why no one listens to them.

Most professors don’t know how to dress themselves. They are rarely seen with beautiful people. They usually drive ugly cars. And most of them don’t even know how to tip properly. Let’s face it, pal. If you’re an academic, you are probably a nerd, a geek, a loser, or, as Sinatra—the arbiter of all things cool—used to call such people, a “Clyde.”

But that’s probably why you became a professor in the first place, instead of, say, a military test pilot, an A-list actor, or president of the United States. You stayed in school, and you never learned the rules of cool. That’s why you don’t have a license to kill.

And that’s why you need the James Bond Lifestyle Seminar for Professors©. You need to be a “Dr. Yes” instead of a “Dr. No.”

Normally, this exclusive seminar is not offered to specific professions, but academics are a special, challenging case. If the average academic—50ish, overweight, and boring—can be given some charisma and class, then it shows anyone be helped by the James Bond Lifestyle Seminar©.

So, professors, let’s cover the basics:

Your work. Enough with the scholarly books already. I mean footnotes … give me a break! If you have to write books for some reason, look for projects that will give you the best combination of status and money for the least time and effort.

Forget revising your dissertation. Consider writing Hollywood screenplays. If you score just one sale, you probably can spend the rest of your life researching Piers Plowman or whatever. But you won’t want to. You’ll be writing your next treatment from the deck of your Hallberg-Rassy in the marina at Corfu.

But let’s forget about writing for now. The most important thing you need to do—starting today—is improve your image.

Image upgrades. Do you buy everything on sale from second-rate department stores? Just as you did when your mom took you shopping for back-to-school clothes?

Look, pal, you are not a child. And you are not a revolutionary. If you are tenured, then you should look like a respectable, serious professional—at all times. A professor should dress up, even when he is running to the grocery store for a bottle of Lillet Blanc. In fact, you should even dress up when you are alone—especially when you are alone because, and listen carefully here—you are not dressing up for other people but for yourself.

You are too important to wear sweatpants—ever.

Everyone knows that students give attractive professors higher ratings for a good reason: Attractive professors are cool, and what cool people know is worth knowing. Remember, every time you walk into a classroom, you are the star of your own movie. Do you really want to be Sherman Klump?

Money matters. Professors are not monks; they do not take vows of poverty. Whether you admit it or not, money is the most important symbol of your intellectual energy. The great Stanley Fish once said that if you want to know your importance as a professor, take a look at your paycheck. Your students respect money (and so, in secret, do your colleagues), so let them know that you are making piles and piles of it.

The easiest first step is to buy a money clip. Put some crisp new $100 bills on the outside, and use one of them to pay for your coffee every day. Don’t be afraid to invest in a decent watch, preferably a Rolex or a high-end Omega. Lose that 10-year-old Volvo, and get yourself the kind of car that Bond would drive. It doesn’t have to be a new Aston Martin, but you can at least consider leasing an entry-level BMW or Mercedes. Make sure you park your new car somewhere that everyone will see it; go to work early if you have to.

I know what you’re thinking: “But I make only $46,000 a year?!” Well, with all those new lifestyle upgrades, you will soon be motivated enough to increase your financial energy, and—as every cool person knows–money attracts money because money generates positive attention.

But remember that someone who looks prosperous has an obligation to be generous. Tip freely. Keep your wealth in circulation. Take your assistants to lunch and order the best food and wine on the menu for them. And don’t stiff the secretaries and cleaning staff during the holidays.

Remember that everything you give comes back to you tenfold, particularly when it comes to the people who take care of you behind the scenes. Bond always took care of Moneypenny, and she always repaid that loyalty.

Professional relationships. A cool person like Bond does not seem to be using people, even when that is exactly what he is doing. Remember that every social interaction is an opportunity for you to showcase your charm and good manners. When someone comes to your campus to give a presentation, don’t forget to call him or her the next day to reinforce your compliments, especially if you think his talk was dull and dreadful. Every social interaction should seem like a win-win situation, even though you are always going to win in the end. That’s why cool people laugh all the time, even when it seems to make no sense.

Of course, being like Bond means you also have to know how to be ruthless: Real men (and, nowadays, real women) are admired because, under the right circumstances, they know how to kill things artfully. In academe, such performances are rarely more dramatic than a negative tenure review or a cutting remark in a conference presentation. Unfortunately most academics can only wield symbolic violence, which is one reason they can never really be like Bond. But more on that later.

Your base of operations. Bond is always ready for his next mission; he never has to search for his keys. You should think of your office as your base of operations. It needs to be ready at all times for an unexpected crisis. So keep your office clean and ready for work.

Everything important—such as the incriminating photos of your department head—is kept locked in your filing cabinets. And never eat in your office. That’s what three-star restaurants are for. Nothing is more embarrassing than to have someone important arrive while your mouth is stuffed with a pressed-turkey and mayonnaise sandwich. Be sure to keep your high-tech listening devices and weapons safely stored in your Louis Vuitton briefcase.

The ultimate secret of academics©. Academic positions are scarce these days, but you can have your pick of the best jobs if you know a few secrets. Most professors are shy, sad people with low vibrational energy. They just want someone with high vibrational energy to admire them, even though most of them go seeking admiration in the wrong way.

Professors rarely get much respect from students, unless those students are planning to become professors themselves, which usually creates an escalating cycle of uncoolness. But nothing will flatter—and fluster—a professor more than seeming to be admired by a cool person, just as you are soon going to be.

If you are interviewing for an academic position, don’t tell them about your work. Redirect their questions to get them to tell you about their work. Look at them with wide, admiring eyes, as if you never heard anything so brilliant and you feel lucky to be in the presence of someone so important. They’ll love you.

Sometimes flirtatious admiration can go wrong. If it does, be sure to call any unenthusiastic members of the search committee the next day to say, “I am so glad to have had the chance to speak with you. If I get to come to your campus, I will thank you exactly 100 times.” You can discreetly pass them the envelope at some point during the campus visit. Because, you know, most professors need the money.

Positive mental energy©. Read carefully. This is the most important part of the James Bond Lifestyle Seminar©. In order to be like Bond, you have to realize that you are a being of pure energy, and you have to decide whether to use that energy to enhance your power or to enhance the power of others. The first step is to program your unconscious mind for success. Repeat to yourself, “I am too cool to be a professor, I am too cool to be a professor.”

It helps to have a personal theme song. You can’t go wrong with any of the Bond themes, such as “Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang,” but everyone is different. Many professors are so negative; everything is about oppression and inequality and other things that can only lower your vibrational energy. If you can develop enough PME©, then you will wonder how you ended up being a professor in the first place.

If you start living the Bond lifestyle for real, before long you’ll have your eye on the plushest corner office in the administration building. Everyone knows that administrators are the coolest people on any campus. That’s why they’re administrators. But the coolest of them are usually on their way to someplace else where they can be even cooler, where they can live the Bond lifestyle on an ever larger scale.

But now it’s time for you to achieve your goals. Armed with your new money clip, this year’s Aston Martin, and the Positive Mental Energy© you learned in the James Bond Lifestyle Seminar for Professors©, you will soon find yourself fleeing academe the same way Bond fled the secret volcano base of Blofeld in You Only Live Twice, seconds before it self-destructed.

It’s time to begin your second life as James Bond, Ph.D. I’ll be waiting for you at MI6.

Benton, Thomas H. Benton, is the pen name of William Pannapacker, an associate professor of English at Hope College in Holland, Mich. He writes about academic culture and welcomes reader mail directed to his attention at careers@chronicle.com.

Quick before The Office post - in ten minutes or less!

2007-10-11T19:52:00.001-05:00

I'm writing this from a nondescript hotel room in an undisclosed location where I traveled today to present my grant project. My presentation went fabulously! I'm really excited about the results we're getting. I was only able to present preliminary correlations and descriptive stats as our data set is abysmally small right now (less than 50).

In other good news my students really seem to have enjoyed my review session on Weds. We went through an essay question, with me prompting them for possible answers and trying to show how much detail they should give. Then, I divided them into teams and we played a game for the rest of the hour. Students who asked questions or gave answers at any time were given chocolate candy. Hopefully they remember that during evals in December.

I have a bunch of research goals for the weekend. Mostly they involve my main research stream: dissertation and two other papers going out for review soon.

I went to a town 2 hours away last weekend. The hometown of my neighbor. The charity brunch was fabulous and it's so pretty over there. I forget sometimes the unaesthetic nature of Grad School Town in comparison to other areas.

Gotta go - time to watch The Office - yay!!

New committee members

2007-10-05T14:16:00.000-05:00

I was thinking it would be neat to add Chris Matthews and Bill Maher to my dissertation committee. Then my meetings could start with, "Let's play hardball," and end with "New Rules."

Calming Car; Nissan Pivo 2

2007-10-05T14:06:00.000-05:00

I had CNN on this morning while I was getting ready, and they were talking about a fabulous new concept car that should come on the market in a few years: The Nissan Pivo 2.

Not only does it look unique, but it can parallel park itself, the cab rotates 360-degrees (hopefully people face the direction they're driving), AND is able to read your emotions through video cameras and other built-in physiological technologies (e.g., breathing rate, loudness of voice).

When the car determines that you're stressed it tells you, "everything will be okay," or to "calm down."

Mid-semester madness

2007-10-03T10:43:00.000-05:00

Fall Break starts tomorrow. It's nice that I won't have to teach on Friday (and I was nice and canceled class for Monday).

I'm presenting my research 3-ish hours away for Granting Agency next week. I'm excited about the topic and it should be nice to get away. The study is finished yet, but for this multi-disciplinary audience that shouldn't be an issue.

I'm taking a mini day trip on Sunday for a charity brunch. It's sponsored by a women's organization my neighbor-friend's mother belongs to. Hopefully it will be worth the trip. There will be a speaker who is an image consultant - a personal image consultant. I didn't know image consultants existed beyond PR for celebs, and other high profile people until recently, so this should be interesting. She'll be speaking about office attire.

I saw I'm Reed Fish today. It was average. I should mention I watched it mostly because of Alexis Bledel. With Gilmore Girls ending I hope she has a good movie (i.e., romantic comedy, drama) coming out soon!

Angela Kinsey will be featured on that Take Home Handyman show on TLC this Saturday at 7pm (eastern). I watched some of the preview scenes online today. Looks like it will be fantastic. A lot of her castmates, including Paul (who plays Toby and is her brother-in-law) will be at her house to help with the renovations.

In other decor news, my neighbor (the one with the brunch) has redone her bedroom with a primarily black and white theme. Her coverlet is white with an intricate black pattern, there's a black dresser, small table and nightstand, as well as a white area rug. Her accents are silver and red/pink. In fact, I think there's a red/pink border on the bedding set. Anyways, it seems this is a really hot decor theme right now. Just search for "black white decor" on Google and you'll see what I mean. Back in the day, when I was putting stuff together for my apartment in 2003-2005, the sage and eggplant-violet combo was popular. I don't see that much of it anymore, although I love my selection of those color so I'm not complaining.

I got a book, sent gratis per publisher, in the mail for the course I'm teaching in the spring. With the department I'm teaching in now the book is already selected, so the whole book selection process is new to me. I'm not too thrilled with the book I received, but with the subject area I'm teaching now I feel the books might have a lot more applied examples (which I love!), so I may need to adjust my expectations.

Tomorrow I need to work on my dissertation - specifically the initial rough description of the idea, as well as outline a new format for one of the papers I'll have under review soon.

Thoughts on Vera Bradley

2007-09-28T18:17:00.001-05:00

While teaching and walking through campus I can't help but notice the huge amount of college age women toting Vera Bradley bags. Is this phenomenon common at other universities? I don't quite understand the appeal of most of her designs. They remind me of something I'd expect a 70-plus year old woman to be carrying - not to insult that age group. I'm also not a huge paisley fan - and the quilted stitching is less than desirable in some cases. I've noticed their popularity over the past few years and they seem to be moving away from the paisley more older looking styles. This is the best example I could find of a bag that is of that older-looking paisley variety that I don't like - but I know I've seen worse around campus.

Just for fun, I was tired of reading and working on an article, I checked out the site. I really love their new Mod Pink floral design. I've been using large totes to go to school with and that's been working so far this year, but I'd like to have a new backpack. The last time I got one was last century (1999 before my summer abroad) and the old Jansport is showing it's age. Also, I've been trying to find a "professional," pretty and/or "sophisticated" looking backpack - but something that goes beyond just leather. With my environmental/borderline-vegetarian attitudes I try to avoid leather if at all possible and I like things that are more individualistic than just plain leather. I'm really loving this Vera bag in the Mod Pink Floral design.

It's girly without being over the top, and isn't the mass-advertised student Jansport-esque bag.

I hope never to have a boyfriend that would euthanize my cat without my consent

2007-09-28T09:48:00.001-05:00

Yes, I haven't posted anything substantive in about a week. Hopefully this will make up for it. The 'rents visited last weekend. It was quite fun and exciting. I'm not in the mood to upload pictures of the dinner I made, but my salad looked pretty gourmet. I had an edible orchid and tomato-basil feta.

Since my parents left on Sunday I've been pretty busy. I met with Dr. Advisor yesterday to discuss my dissertation topic, and that went well so I've met my goal (almost, need to do a one page write up to officially meet my goal) of having a topic by Fall Break (next weekend).

Although I've made progress in that area, I haven't made enough progress in the publication arena this week. I updated the "works under review/in progress" section of my vita for my website yesterday in an attempt to inspire myself to get more work done. I do have a lot of stuff that I'm a co-author on, and two with me as first author that will be going out within the next month (or are out already). My first step is to finish revisions on my thesis paper that got bounced from Freakishly Selective Journal. Myself and my coauthor were slightly disappointed with the feedback we received with the rejection. We were hoping that if it was rejection, which we knew was highly probable, that we would receive really sound and helpful feedback. This was not the case. I don't want to go into details, but the feedback doesn't give me a lot of pointers for revising. The next target journal is the journal where the base of this research was published.

Teaching went really well today. It's been a good week for class, as we're going over performance management/feedback/reinforcement, but today was especially exciting. I got copies of a case study from the back of the chapter. It dealt with sales commissions and changing to a team incentive system. A lot of the students plan to go into sales and have experience in jobs/internships that involve sales and they had a lot to say about how and why they felt a team-based incentive system wouldn't work.

I'm having a classic movie night tomorrow and invited about ten or so people. I have a couple of Hitchcock films: Shadow of a Doubt on dvr, and Strangers on a Train from Netflix. We'll pick one, or watch both.

I SO loved The Office last night. All the storylines were great. I was especially happy to see Angela get a major storyline that didn't have to do with the Holiday Party. For those who didn't see it, the title of this post is in reference to the Dwangela storyline. She was so exceptional!! The fake-out with the JAM romance for the first half hour was fun too! The HR Blog, "That's What She Said," is already updated with last night's episode. It's funny even if you didn't see the episode.

One Semester of Spanish Love Song

2007-09-23T12:51:00.000-05:00

As someone who took eight years of Spanish I find this pretty funny. The song is almost a replica of the conversation questions I had to memorize for high school.

Hello Kitty (isn't happy)

2007-09-21T05:43:00.001-05:00

The effects of PD on baker well-being: an exploratory study

2007-09-20T19:51:00.000-05:00

I made Pear Cranberry Strudel today for my parent's visit tomorrow and for my neighbors too. I cored and peeled 9 Bosc pears to make the filling for three times the recipe.

Both my neighbors had the strudel tonight and loved it. Hopefully I'll have similar results tomorrow.

Anyways, I've used phyllo dough a lot before, and having research on the brain led me to think of a new and critically important construct: Dough Deviance

DD occurs when dough does not perform according to one's expectations. One form of DD is Phyllo Dough Deviance (PD). Given its fragile, thin nature of breaks and tears are commonplace forcing the baker to trouble-shoot and possibly recreate the dessert. This insidious stressor undoubtedly leads to psychological and physical strain via the release of catecholamines that have harmful long-term health effects. Thus, a program of research is needed to study DD and specific forms of deviance like PD, determine its root causes, and importantly discover what coping mechanisms bakers use to deal with this deviant behavior.

I wonder if I can get an occupational health grant for this? :-)

Actually, the strudel making went quite well. I like working with the smaller size Phyllo, that's about the size of computer paper, rather than the larger kind. That's one of my coping mechanisms.

I have a super busy morning tomorrow with teaching and 2 meetings! Then I get to come home and make spaghetti and meatballs before my parents come over around 3 or so. We're going to the football game Saturday. I still need to prepare for my meetings and class tomorrow. Happy weekend!

Random Bullets of Tuesday

2007-09-18T20:00:00.000-05:00

I had too much fun organizing qualitative data for a table and themes today. Another paper that should be going out for review soon. :-)
I attended the first dissertation/thesis writer's support group meeting. It's following a 12-step method. Today we completed the first step: admitting we have a problem. :-)
I had a scary encounter with a squirrel while reading outside my apartment this evening. I'm on the second floor, and I heard some rustling. Thinking it's maybe my neighbor I look up to see a squirrel with a HUGE nut about a foot away from me. I shriek, he/she drops his/her nut and runs about ten feet away. We both stare at each other. I decide I don't feel like getting up and chasing the squirrel off the balcony, even though they have dug up my plants in the past. I'm sitting still watching it and it very slowly inches forward, retrieves its nut and scampers back down the stairs. I told him/her that just because I'm not moving doesn't mean I can't see him/her.
I made sweet potatoes tonight with vanilla, soymilk and brown sugar for the sauce. I forgot how long they take to make. Boiling, peeling, making the sauce. Oye.
Tomorrow I teach, need to finish revisions on another paper that is hopefully going out soon, go grocery shopping for Friday's dinner and dessert with the 'rents and complete some miscellaneous other tasks.
I'm showing a couple clips of In Good Company tomorrow, when Dennis Quaid's character learns of the merger and is demoted, to discuss fairness/equity and justice perceptions. It's only a few minutes but should lighten up the class.

Spring Schedule

2007-09-17T10:38:00.000-05:00

I just got to schedule the class I'm teaching next semester. This is a first for me, as with Huge Undergrad University and of course Grad School, I had no choice over when I had class. I also didn't have much of a choice over when I teach now. I'm teaching Tuesday/Thursday which I'm psyched about because it will save me the time of having a third day. Sweet. I'm thinking of a clever post for later about the Emmy Awards. :-) As an Office fan, needless to say I was disappointed with the Emmy's last night, although 2 wins isn't bad. I know the show is filming now; hopefully the cast and crew had a chance to party last night. Afterall, ain't no party like a Scranton party, 'cause a Scranton party don't stop. :-)

Dissertation, The Office and the Emmys, plus Saturday happenings

2007-09-15T12:26:00.000-05:00

I slept in 2 hours past my alarm and got up at 9:30 this morning. I straightened the kitchen while watching Bill Maher, made more edamame hummus because the edamame was getting a little ripe and watched a decorating show on TLC. I saw the end of Trading Spaces which I haven't watched in about 2 years as there's a lot of shows on HGTV that I prefer. Plus, because my place is pretty maxed out with decorating and alterations, the shows are less appealing to me.

For teaching this weekend I need to prepare for class for the coming week. This is a bit tricky this week because Dr. Advisor is observing my class on Friday and I want to make sure I have lots of exciting things to talk about and fun things to do while she's there. We're covering motivation this week, so I don't think that will be too difficult. My students have their midterm in less than a month and they are very apprehensive about the amount of material we're covering. I should probably try to make a study guide for the first few chapters covering the material that will be on the multiple choice questions. I'm giving them the essay questions ahead of time, and will choose a few at random before the exam, so they can totally prepare for those. I think I might be behind in the essay questions so I should get on that.

I'm behind in the dissertation reading I want to get done too. I'm meeting with Dr. Advisor the week after this to discuss ideas and go over the manuscript I just got to her. Lately I'm thinking about combining the meaning related stuff that I'm interested in with resiliency and seeing how meaning plays a role in the resiliency process.

The Emmy's are tomorrow and Angela Kinsey just posted a fun blog on MySpace about her preparations. Here's a neat video with her preparing for last year's awards: Angela prepares for the Emmys.

I love her character, partly because I can relate to the whole "That's inappropriate," aspect. I perceive some of the actions of a lot of the people in my grad program the same way she does (even though I'm not nearly as restrained and conservative as her - and I don't tell people that I feel their actions are perceived by me as inappropriate).

I'm very proud of myself that I haven't watched all The Office episodes on Season 3 yet. I've had the set for almost 3 weeks and I only started the fourth disc yesterday and haven't done most of the deleted scenes yet. For anyone considering getting The Office on dvd, it's especially worth it because they have amazing special features. There are several deleted scenes for almost every episode - and they're just as good as the ones that made it in the original. I also rationalized getting the set because I can use clips for teaching as my field relates to the workplace. This leads me to some good news: I'll be teaching "introduction to my field" next semester. Yay! I really enjoy teaching and am especially excited to be teaching this particular course as it's different yet similar to the one I'm teaching now. It should look great on my vita and be super fun too.

I think I'm making spaghetti squash with pesto tonight. Hopefully I can be super productive until then. The 'rents are visiting next weekend and it looks like I'll be making homemade spaghetti and meatballs.

P.S. For girls only: I just heard about The Diva Cup from Snickollet's blog. I'm thinking about getting one. I won't go into specifics here, but it looks like a great environmentally friendly, economical, more convenient and pleasant option for that time of the month.

Miss South Carolina Kitty - so funny!

2007-09-15T09:27:00.001-05:00

Thursday Kitten Cuteness

2007-09-13T18:09:00.001-05:00

Kroger news and weekend plans

2007-09-13T18:01:00.000-05:00

I got the first draft of my next first author publication off to Dr. Advisor for her review. There's definitely a lot of points that need fixing and clarification, but I'm happy with how it has come together in the past week. I need to make a table for another project with Dr. Advisor, and read more for my dissertation this weekend. Of course I need to prep for next week's classes too, and Dr. Advisor will be observing me next Friday so I need to find some creative participative elements that don't involve breaking them into groups.

I went to Kroger for the first time today in over a year. Purple Daisy hadn't been grocery shopping since I helped her move into my complex a month ago! Crazy girl. We both went this afternoon. I don't like Kroger because it's located in a more congested part of town. Of course this is incredibly relative as I live in a fairly small town. Kroger's in a plaza so the parking lot is kinda crowded too, almost all the time so that's another deterrent. They have a huge health food area and sushi, so those are definite pluses.

Tomorrow is yet another barbeque/cookout and it sounds like I'll be getting ice cream with the neighbors this weekend too. Hopefully I can get frozen yogurt.

Okay, I need to go prepare for my lecture tomorrow before I get too tired. It doesn't have to be too long because they are going to work in their groups for about half the class.

Flashback: TV branding

2007-09-12T17:27:00.001-05:00

This reminded me a lot of my childhood and the films we used to watch at school. It's a bit long but still fun.

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

2007-09-12T09:45:00.001-05:00

The Good: Jon Stewart will be invited to host this year's Academy Awards. Yay! In related comedic news, I showed a clip of The Office today in my OB class. Specifically, Diversity Day from Season One, Michael's special take on diversity training. I used it as an example of what not to do when trying to combat schemata, stereotypes and prejudice.

The Bad: Christians and Yoga - what the heck? I turned on CNN yesterday to hear that some Christian leaders are discouraging people from doing yoga because the exercise has its origin in he Hindu religion (e.g., Buddhism, the Sikh and Jain religions). What's next, no Chinese food or fortune cookies? I've only taken a couple of Yoga classes, and with my lack of balance/coordination plus varying degree of overweight-ness it's kinda challenging for me to do correctly. That doesn't stop me from thinking this is ridiculous! CNN had some crazy Christian dude and a yoga exercise expert on for discussion and the yogi mentioned that a lot of people use yoga as a means of stress relief to increase their well-being. Crazy Christian dude proceeded to say that Christians should use prayer for stress reduction, not exercise. Yes, that will really help the health crisis in this country. In fact , that's what we've been doing wrong - exercising too much and not praying! Ridiculous.

The Ugly: I spent most of yesterday working on my second manuscript that I'll be submitting for publication in my major area of interest. I need to send it to Dr. Advisor tomorrow. It consists of research I've been doing for the past couple years, but it's difficult sometimes to get motivated to organize and write up. There's eight hypotheses in the paper, and I have support for all of them. It's just a matter of coordinating the results with the hypos and tables. I'm looking forward to working on the dissertation after this. In fact, with this off my plate this weekend I can devote a lot of time to that.

Domestic News: Recipes and Redecorating

2007-09-09T08:51:00.000-05:00

The squirrels are digging in my hosta planters again outside my apartment. :-(
As a counter-insurgency measure I rearranged the stones I have covering the mulch/topsoil.

I saw Vacancy last night, starring Luke Wilson. I wouldn't recommend it.

I've been having a very productive Sunday. I got up at seven and with the high humidity and rain decided not to jog today. I should be able to go Monday through Thursday. Instead I quickly took a shower, hard boiled and peeled a dozen eggs for the week, read through a paper from two years ago I'm now working on for publication and started reading a chapter relating to my dissertation idea(s). Sweet. My "break" for the day will be doing survey packets for the teacher study with Purple Daisy this afternoon. I wanted to go on a walk to the arts festival with Nixon around noon, but I don't know if that will happen with this weather. I haven't started on the slides I'll be using for lecture this week, but I should have time to pull those together this weekend. I'll probably keep the one's I used last year, just add some more interactive elements.

Over the past several weeks and months, I've been reworking elements of my kitchen, especially the area above my cabinets. Here are a couple of photos.

I used to affectionately refer to the top of my cabinets as Tchotchyville, because it housed a lot of miscellaneous items that I didn't have room for on other shelves. I decided, however, that because the bookcase in my room was all books, it might look better to put some books above the cabinets and move some picture frames/tchotchkies to the bedroom. I'm really happy with how it turned out.

In other domestic news, I made Edamame Hummus last weekend and absolutely love it. It's great on celery sticks, or as this shows, mushrooms. I love that I'm getting all the lovely health benefits of soy/edamame in something so simple and delicious. I also made this recipe for creamed spinach this week, but used fat free half and half instead of heavy cream. I really liked the nutmeg flavor with the spinach.

Well, that's enough domestic dish for now. I need to get back to work. :-)

Teaching and misc.

2007-09-07T11:49:00.000-05:00

My third week of teaching went pretty well. I had to cover intelligence/testing on Wednesday which was hard to make interesting. I had my students give me feedback again today when I did the second attendance check. A LOT of the students had no concerns - yay! They were very very grateful that I'm letting work in their groups in class instead of having to negotiate everyone's schedules to find meeting times (as my students had to do last semester!).

Data collection for my study of secondary teachers is going well. Maybe I can submit a symposium to August conference this year. I'd really like to be on the program because I'll be interviewing and it'd be nice to have a research presentation to talk about or direct people to attend if they're interested in my research.

My involvement in a research study that started my first year here when I was a research assistant is almost off to publication. I'm glad to have that off my list. It's a project that's in line with what my interests were when I first came here, and what I did for my undergrad thesis. My interests have changed tremendously since then, so it's nice to have virtually everything done for that.

I got some work done on the dissertation this week. I read articles, wrote out some ideas and read a series of essays from Gig to see if I could gain any insight into what areas interest me.

The publication prep has come along greatly this week too. I'm on track for my self-set deadline for next week. Yay. I'm motivated by the fact that this needs to go out soon for me to hopefully have it published/under revisions by the time I start my applications. 11 months-ish until then!

2007-09-06T17:19:00.001-05:00

Caturday Humor

2007-09-01T15:25:00.000-05:00

What's your walk score?

2007-09-01T14:59:00.001-05:00

I just read on Ianqui's blog about Walk Score. You type in a residential address and it let's you know how feasible a walk-oriented lifestyle is for that location. Here are my digits.

Some places I've lived (out of 100):

My current grad school apartment: 65
* I think it should be lower. It's counting the Dairy Mart up the street as a grocery store

College Apartment: 68

My parent's place where I lived for high school: 6

Elementary/Middle School House: 11

Overall town/city ratings:

New York City: 100

Town where parents live: 46

Grad School Town: 71

This could be a useful tool for me when I move and am considering where to live.

I've been meaning to write this for a couple days...

2007-08-30T20:35:00.000-05:00

but things have been so busy. Teaching has been going well. I showed a clip of "The Client" episode of "The Office" yesterday in class to discuss emotional intelligence. Specifically I showed the scenes of Michael and Jan at Chili's with the county-person. One could argue that Michael wasn't emotionally intelligent and just happened to get lucky that his sense of humor won the client over, but on the commentary the director/creators said one purpose of the episode was to show the audience that Michael is/was a good salesman and that's how he got promoted to regional manager. I was really happy with how the scenes showed the self and social competencies that make up EI. I also had the students do a personality SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis of their personality for the context of being self-employed/an entrepreneur as that was one of the themes of the chapter - also a hit!! So I was quite pleased with myself around 10:30 yesterday morning.

I've made some progress this week on the article I'm writing up for publication that furthers my main area of research. Now that it's September the dissertation thinking is starting to kick in. I set the goal of having an idea and a short write-up (1 page) of said idea by October Break. Also, related to my major research area, I began data collection this week on a project to study meaning and other fun stuff in teachers. Good times.

There's a bbq tomorrow at my complex for the psych grad students and I may watch a movie with the neighbors after that. It will be super nice to have an extra day this weekend to work on things and relax.

ETA: I actually wrote this on Saturday (today). But, I opened up the browser to start the post on Thursday, then got distracted by the multitude of things I had to do, and didn't write it until today. I didn't know it stamps the post by the day/time you start.

Happy Caturday!

2007-08-25T21:17:00.000-05:00

I just got back an hour or so ago from dinner at a really nice, yet affordable, Italian restaurant in Toledo. I went with my neighbors and a few girls from the clinical program.

I read a chapter today on effective teaching, in The Compleat Academic. Neighbor2 and I also shared some stories over dinner about teaching that were interesting and helpful.

During the day I took care of some necessary correspondence, slept late and did some weekly cleaning.

Tomorrow I need to get to work on quite a few tasks and review the Individual Differences chapter for teaching on Monday. I think I might finish this week's Time before bed.

I like going to www.macrocats.com and http://icanhascheezburger.com. These are blogs that post cute cat pictures daily with funny captions. I love that they use phonetic spelling and grammar that a cat might use if s/he was trying to master English. The caption for one of the pictures today was, "OMG it's Caturday."
That's so cute! Because Saturday is the day people can spend with their pets it's Caturday. :-) In a couple years I'll be able to have Caturdays.

Friday Report

2007-08-24T22:19:00.000-05:00

Thanks for the compliments on my party! It's been a fun summer hobby for the past two years planning the Sex and the City and this year the Grey's Anatomy, Around the World fiestas.

I taught my third class today and then straightened up my office a bit so I can use it as a work space again. During the summer I didn't really feel like working there, but now that more people are around and I have an officemate for the first time that is spending time in the office, it seems more appealing.

The computer labs were finally upgraded this summer (flat screens and new desktops) and I thought I would now enjoy working there because they aren't insanely slow anymore. From my research and coursework I know that frustrating situations (e.g. SPSS taking forever to run) lead to the release of catecholemines, which that are directly related to heart disease and other negative health outcomes. How could I knowingly put myself at such a health risk? Anyways, that was fun for a few days but I ended up missing my office. I like hearing the chatter of people in the hallways and occasionally joining in on a fun conversation across the hall. Maybe now that my officemate is around I can start doing lunch again with people. I enjoyed that my second year, although I should try and bring lunch from home and take it to the union because although I enjoyed the lunches that year, I really noticed how much money I spent on said lunches last year when the lunch dates ended.

Back to teaching, it was a somewhat easy day as we watched a ten minute video and discussed research. Research methods are basically the same for OB as they are for Intro Psych so this was the 5th time I've taught the finer points of case studies, surveys, lab and field research. I was, again, really impressed with my class when I had them generate research topics and then come up with how they could study said topics with different research methodologies. I always feel knowledgeable when I do that activity because it seems I always know of some research that has been done that is somewhat related to the topics they mention and then I can give a brief description of what I know about that area.

I have several work related goals this weekend as well as two discs of Sopranos Season 6, Part 1 to work through. A certain character was killed off in the last disc of Season 5 that has made me somewhat upset with the lead characters. I knew it was coming based on what s/he was doing, but for some reason when it happened I was still "upset" with Tony, Chris and Silvio. :-)

Grey's Anatomy Party Photos

2007-08-23T15:46:00.001-05:00

Click on any photo for a larger view.

I covered my cabinets with white paper, and used blue labels to make it look like a medical supply area.

I covered my furniture in blue drapes.

Shot of the "Medical Storage" area
One of my drinks was called the "Hello Kitty Band-Aid" and as this explains, it's not just because I like Hello Kitty. :-)

I had a raffle for a Grey's Anatomy thermos. My neighbor won!
One of the Sharps containers I ordered and GrAy's Anatomy

I put descriptions on all the drinks. I think this was the wittiest one.

Rx Scrips on the drink pitchers

Creme Brulee Transfusions

Jello Shot Injections: Lime and Watermelon. The extant scholarly literature on coconut rum says those flavors work best. I would have to concur with this research.

First week!

2007-08-23T14:36:00.000-05:00

It doesn't seem like it has been a week since my last post. I've been super busy with my party, getting ready for teaching and working on my usual projects.

My first couple classes have gone extremely well. It's so much smoother the second time around (at least so far!), which had been my experience as a TA, and I'm glad that things are going so much better for me this year. Last year's class was great - and I'm very happy with how things went for me as a first time instructor. However, with just the first two classes it seems that the atmosphere of this year's course is different.

Here's a funny/interesting thought I had about teaching this class recently. Two times on airplanes, at least once with a relative and maybe in a couple of other contexts, when it has come up in conversation that I'm teaching organizational behavior, mentioned persons have said, "that was my favorite class in undergrad." This makes me think, when my students are 40-somethings and the subject of OB comes up, what will they say? Will it be one of there favorite classes, memorable, or simply a hassle that they had to put up with one semester?
On a more selfish level, I'm hoping to have better teaching evals this semester for my job applications next year.

My Blackboard wasn't uploaded until early this week and I had quite a bit of fun setting it up. I have a picture of Michael Scott from The Office on the main page (complete with his "World's Best Boss" mug) and on the "Instructor info" page I uploaded a headshot of Angela Martin. :-)

In research, I'm still playing with ideas for my dissertation. I'm leaning towards doing more item/scale clean up to continue what I've been doing for the past few years. But to do the "clean-up" that I want to do I'll need/want to get some qualitative data and qualitative studies have been intriguing me for some time. It's possible for me to incorporate an interesting research question on the topic. Several up and coming topics are in my head, as well as samples I'm interested in, so I'm in the process of sorting all that out. I've set October/Fall Break as my deadline for having a short description of what I want to do - so stay tuned!

My Grey's Anatomy Party was fantastic. It was so much fun! I achieved just the right amount of tipsy-ness and am happy that I will no longer sound like a drug dealer when calling medical supply companies about when my syringes are going to arrive. I ordered them over a week ahead of time at one place and told them that they were for a "graduation" party (easier to explain) and that I needed them in 10 days. Well, they were back ordered, and I didn't find this out until Monday the week of my party. I was not too happy. So I then went to another medical supply company and ended up on the phone with someone politely explaining that I must have my 50 irrigation syringes by the end of the week.

My Mom's bday is next week and I ordered her a gift I'm really excited about. I need to send out the card (which I've been storing since June because I had a coupon I had to use!) and her usual Netflix subscription.

My friend Purple Daisy, who I helped move a couple weeks ago after the conference, is coming over tonight to watch more Sopranos. I'm on the last disc of Season 5 already and I'm not happy that Season 6 Part 2 won't be out until October. Bill Maher premieres tomorrow and I'd like to have some people over to use up the rest of my party drinks, but I don't know if that will happen.

Bingo, party and more

2007-08-15T20:02:00.001-05:00

I was catching up on my blog reading and I found this. It's so funny! I think I saw almost one of each of these at the conference.

I've safely arrived back in Grad School town from my conference.

The flight back was beyond annoying. There were storms popping up and our flight plan was grounded just before take-off. The pilot got rerouted, but that process took over an hour. Then, when we got to Nearby Big City Airport, we were either rerouted because of storms, or forced to circle because of a crowded airport. I don't know because the pilot didn't tell us anything for the extra hour we spent in the air, but it felt like we were circling and the engine kept going on and off.

I helped Purple Daisy move this weekend and she stayed with me for a couple days after I got home while she was between apartments. The weather was kind of muggy while we moved her boxes and furniture from the storage space to the truck, but at least there were a couple guys to help us move the stuff from the truck to her new apartment. She's living at my complex now! The building across the way. That will be fun.

My party is this Saturday. I'm having a pre-party and the first hour of the Around the World Line-up.

Here's my Grey's Anatomy menu.

McDreamy Mudslides

Hello Kitty Band-Aids: Strawberries and Cream, Rum and Praline.

Seattle Cosmopolitans

Dizzy Izzies: Creamy Pina-Coladas

Miranda Bailey Cappuccinos: Iced Cappuccinos with Mint Chocolate Bailey’s

Crème Brulee Transfusions

and Jello Shot Injections

For the pre-party I'm having Strawberry Margaritas. My selections lean towards the creamy side, but I don't care. I have a lot of the Cosmo stuff, plus there's the margaritas. There's another party the same hour as mine and four others - so people have variety.

I finalized my syllabus for the course I'm teaching and gave it to the office to be printed today. I don't have access to Blackboard yet, because the course is under another instructor's name. Hopefully that will be taken care of by early next week. I've decided to have 2 exams, 2 papers and a group project. That's a lot different than the 3 exam and group project grading rubric of last year. It will be more grading, but I like that I'm incorporating more activities for them to do. I'm also going to give them more time to work on their group project in class. That should help alleviate the lack of communication and coordination that happened last year.

I have some research goals for the next few days and I need to start on decorations and make a iPod playlist for my party. Those two endeavors should keep me busy through the weekend.

Summer conference in the city

2007-08-07T12:32:00.000-05:00

I'm writing this from my lovely conference hotel room in Philly. My presentation went well yesterday. It didn't achieve such critical acclaim as my last presentation on the same meaning-related topic. It was more technical than my last one and the other presenters were more conceptual. There was another presentation in the session that talked about a major motivational topic in my field (pay for performance v. other non-pay motivators) and a huge discussion developed about that issue.

I really enjoyed talking with operations management researchers this morning and learning about other meaning-related research. Meaning really wasn't represented at all in my April conference, but here there's a small stream of sessions relating to the area.

It's intensely hot here. Just going across the street to the convention center is an effort. At least there's a Dunkin Donuts so I've had two of their lovely iced coffees so far. Also the convention center has a gift shop called: unConventional Gifts. I thought that was super creative.

I went to a couple of symposia this morning as well as a poster session. This afternoon the sessions I've selected are more discussion-format. One is a "caucus."

I might try to work on some research tasks when I get back, or maybe record some of my ideas for my dissertation that I've clarified in the past few days from the sessions here.

This morning I received final confirmation about the course I'm teaching this fall. It turns out it will not be a once a week night class like I thought, but a normal 3-day a week format.
Although I'll have to trudge out to the building three days a week, I won't have to reformat my slides from last year, or figure out how to restructure the class for a 3 hour format. Having reflected on my experiences last fall for the past eight months, I'm feeling my pretty confident in my ability to do a fantabulous job this semester.

I'm still really into The Sopranos, and I'm almost done with the third season. I'd highly recommend it - even to people who don't like mob/violent shows. The violence is pretty isolated and I use mute/closed captioning for those scenes. The family dialog and conflict is great.

In literary pursuits, I downloaded Jennifer Weiner's The Man Not Taken from iTunes for my trip. I wasn't able to listen to more than an hour of it because the turbulence on my flight (Midwestern storms on Monday) left me feeling a bit under the weather and I couldn't focus. The book is a collection of "short" (but still relatively lengthy) stories. Very. Good. I'm enjoying using podcasts and audiobooks for airport travel because it's easy to listen to while waiting in line to check-in and go through security. I did this for the April confernce too. The airport's security was fairly backed up when I left. Hopefully Philly will be better when I head back early Thursday morning.

I should get ready to head off to my sessions in about 20 minutes!

Submitted!

2007-07-27T22:44:00.001-05:00

I'm back at Grad School Town and just submitted the manuscript that I've been working on ALL summer. My advisor and I decided to send it to one of the top journals in the field - with about a 90% rejection rate. It's a research note - as opposed to a full article - and it's on a topic growing in popularity (meaning of work).

I enjoyed the baseball game last Friday. The weather was gorgeous. I got to spend a lot of time with my parents last weekend before I left on Monday. Wow - it's Friday night already! I leave for a conference a week from Sunday. The next submission on my queue is what I'll be presenting at the conference, so that should help me transition.

I'm hosting an Around the World party the Saturday before school starts. This means I'm starting to stockpile the liquor. :-) I'm going more for premade mixed drinks this year. Last year was crazy with making 6 drinks from scratch. I didn't get to socialize much with people during the party (remember the theme was NYC/Sex and the City), because I kept having to make more drinks.

This year I'm doing Grey's Anatomy/Seattle. I love Seattle and I have some medical vendors bookmarked to get some simple/inexpensive items from for decorating. Specifically, I'm getting blue medical drapes (those things that cover people during surgery, or trays) and syringes!

Yes syringes. It's quite fun to tell people I'm getting syringes for my party. Actually, I'm just getting "irrigation syringes" as they are often called - no needles. I'll have about 50 shots in a shot.

I got a couple TGI Friday's mixed drinks this week and a Mudslide mix. I may add some International Delight/Coffeemate to the TGI drinks to make them a touch different.

Anyways, enough about the booze. Let's move on to racketeering (i.e. The Sopranos). I'm almost done with the second season. One more disc to go. Still loving it! I really like the stuff with the family, and there's so much conflict going on.

I just finished unpacking the last of my stuff tonight from my 2 week visit home. Pathetic, I know. My mind was really focused on getting my paper out the door. I got a hot tea maker with some of my birthday proceeds. I've made a lot of white tea this week! I'd been eyeing it for a couple years and I thought it could get me to have more green/white/herbal tea as opposed to coffee.

I met with my advisor today primarily to talk about getting the paper out, but we developed a tentative timeline for my dissertation. My goal is to propose in March, 2008. But the subgoals for that are as follows:

Beginning of October: have a specific idea, method, brief one-two page write-up
Rest of 2007: write proposal
January and February: revise

So, I need to have a focused idea and method in 2 months. I know I want to further develop the measure related to meaning that I've used for my research thus far. I'd also like to do some qualitative work and there are a few topics that really interest me that I'd like to explore.

That's about it for this week. I'd like to post my tea maker and hope to start writing more regularly again. It's difficult for me to blog a lot in the summer - as the record shows with the past two summers.

Speaking of which - my blog birthday should have passed by now. 2 years! I started this blog summer of my first year of grad school.

Hope everyone has a great weekend!! And....

For Office fans - Angela Kinsey guest starred on Monk tonight! I'm "friends" with her and Jenna Fischer (Pam) on MySpace. :-)

Update

2007-07-20T13:05:00.000-05:00

I'm heading home on Monday. Tonight I'm going to a minor league baseball game with my parents.

I got to see my grandparents as well as my Uncle this week. I had lunch over there and spent most of the day. They are in their early 90's and my Grandmother seemed to be in a pretty good mood considering her current health. I'll probably go to see them again this weekend before I head back. My parents are coming to visit me at the end of September for a football game.

My birthday was this Tuesday -26. By this time next year I'll be in the process of applying for jobs. I keep checking The Chronicle's listings every week or so this summer. I want to get a feel for the flow of jobs. For example, in early mid June there weren't many postings, but that doubled by the end of the month. Around the 4th of July there were a lot more, and now that number is probably doubled. So now I know that things will really start to move around the beginning of July. Then, I can request to have informal interviews with schools at the 2008 AOM conference in Anaheim.

My thesis submission is about ready to head out. Thankfully my advisor has been super helpful with preparing it because it's been really difficult for me to get motivated to work on it for long periods of time. I thought after taking a few months away from it I would be more energized to prepare it for publication, but a lot of the paper deals with response format research and I just don't roll like that. :-)

I finished Season One of The Sopranos and the first disc of Season Two this week! Loving it. I was pretty pleased with the Emmy nominations. The Office and Sopranos were extremely well represented. I was happy Jenna Fischer got nominated, as well as Rainn Wilson and the creepy detective that guest starred on House and then Disturbia. The theme and original song for the theme of Dexter got nominated too!

I'm watching a commentary from Entourage on right now. The creator was saying he was upset that his previous commentaries got bad grades from Entertainment Weekly. That furthers my desire to develop training for directors/actors/producers to create good commentaries. It's amazing how poor some of them are - with minutes of silence between comments. Yes, I could do commentary training and focus groups/surveys for tv shows and movies. Then I could have an Entourage!!

Wicked and more

2007-07-11T15:27:00.000-05:00

I saw Wicked this weekend with my parents. I'm staying with them for a couple weeks. Last week was kind of a blur with a few meetings, having a first year student stay over and just general happenings before I left.

The musical was average. It wasn't nearly as spectacular as some people had indicated. I most enjoyed the alternate approach to the story. I got to play with three kittens for about 20 minutes yesterday at a pet store. My Mom had me go to the bank with her to have my name put on their Safety Deposit Box and we stopped there for fish stuff too. They were too adorable - all were 7 weeks old, two black ones and one that was a black/white mix.

In other news, I decided to get The Sopranos on Netflix and I've really enjoyed the first two discs of season one. I don't like anything startling or violent, so I use closed captioning and mute for scenes that I know will have violent/startling parts. This way I just look at the bottom of the screen and I don't miss any critical dialog! There haven't been more than one or two violent scenes per episode so far.

My main work related task right now has been getting my thesis ready for publication. I'm in the final stages - just checking references and formating. I need to write the submission letter as well.

I still have a week and a half at home. My 26th Birthday is next Tuesday, the 17th. We're going to a fondue restaurant that people I have as friends on MySpace who I knew from high school who still live in this area (yes I know that's confusing) say is their fav restaurant.

Kitty Registry

2007-07-01T17:40:00.000-05:00

As I may have mentioned, I am VERY much looking forward to getting a kitty in a couple years when I'm done with grad school. I was doing some kitty-research online and a Humane Society had set up a Baby Registry on Target for a Kitten Shower they were having as a fund-raiser.
Well, I just couldn't help myself and set up a registry of things I'd love to get for my future kitties. I checked all the popular pet stores, but they don't seem to have a registry/wishlist feature. It would probably a lucrative move for those companies to set up something like that as Kitten/Puppy parties and showers are growing more popular - and as people invest increasingly more money in pampering their pets they are more likely to want pet-related gifts for holidays and birthdays.

Isn't the above tote just adorable? Another cute item is this Pet Bassinet, also available in blue.

Again, just for fun, as this whole registry thing is just for my own enjoyment, I added a $2,400 flat screen HDTV to my registry for my future kittens to watch their just-for-kitty dvds (e.g. Kitty Goes Hunting and Kitty Goes Fishing) in pristine high definition. Yes, my cats will be pampered.

And because I don't want couch potato kitties, I can take them for walks and jogs in this fabulous stroller. I researched actually having the kitties jog with me and it's strongly discouraged to have kitties jog/run because they aren't designed for prolonged aerobic activity, unlike dogs. I'm sure I'll enjoy pushing them around!

Sopranos-esque Hillary video

2007-06-30T11:30:00.000-05:00

The winning song was You and I by Celine Dion.

Mousey baskets and more

2007-06-26T19:15:00.000-05:00

When I did my grocery shopping yesterday at Midwest superstore I had to return a set of baskets I had bought the previous week because, when I opened them, there was mouse excrement, the lining was torn, a hole was in one of them and there were other gross looking stains. Nice.

I got mangoes this week along with a honeydew melon. I'm trying all the melons this summer to see which I like best and what they go well with. So far I've tried the Casaba and Santa Claus.
Neighbor brought over some seedless watermelon today. I just finished mine from last week. We started talking about how stressful fruits and veggies can be, because we're always trying not to waste anything.

I had a very brief meeting today about the grant project I'm working on. We need to spend the funds this week. It shouldn't be a problem. I just need to have receipts dated before June 30.
I've also been reading more about methods and items related to what I might do for my dissertation. I'll be doing more publication prep in the next few weeks too. I'll be visiting for 2 weeks in less than 2 weeks. I'll be there for my 26th birthday. I've already started a list of things I need to bring. I have a SteamVac and I'm going to clean some of my parent's carpeting. I LOVE using it. I get so excited about how much dirt it gets out of the carpeting!!

I also hope to make another Costco trip. There's supposed to be another Costco built in Nearby Small City, but I don't think that's happening very quickly. Going a few times a year is plenty for me anyways. I've been eating a lot of salmon and tuna - and they sell a large package of those little dishwasher packets (the ones that are a mix of powder and gel encased in a thin plastic). Love those.

The weather here has been very hot and muggy for the past couple days. I was out jogging by 7:30 and when I came back it was already in the low 80's. It looks like after tomorrow we should have really nice summer weather for about a week. yay!

Hostas and more

2007-06-24T16:13:00.000-05:00

The first hosta picture above is the one from last year, that I've been posting updates of for the past month. The second is of one of my new hostas that has gorgeous flowers on it now!

I've done a few fun things this week. I went out one night with some of the grad students that live in my building for a glass of wine and then a cookie from a new place downtown called "The Cookie Jar" that sells exclusively cookies.

I saw Evan Almighty yesterday. It wasn't the greatest comedy in the world, but it was enjoyable. I love Steve Carell - and Ed Helms from the Daily Show had a significant small role as a news caster. Steve was on the The Daily Show on Monday and they didn't mention that Jon Stewart was in the movie too - in a very brief scene.

I may see Nancy Drew this week. The jogging is still going great. It's been helping me keep a regular sleep-wake schedule this summer because I like to go out in the morning before it's 80 out. Really I prefer the low 70s or below for jogging.

As for cooking, the only original thing I made this week were Tofu Teriyaki Bites. I brought them over to my neighbor's place when we watched The Guardian - which was great by the way. I liked the teriyaki sauce that went with the recipe. I might use that from now on instead of buying premade teriyaki sauce.

As for work, I've been reading more stuff from other literatures that relate to my dissertation topic, as well as completing various tasks for various projects.

2007-06-17T15:37:00.000-05:00

This week I've spent most of my time working on a publication that includes my thesis research and have also been working on a white paper for client. In my "spare" time, there's been some work on a grant where I need to spend the funds in the next couple weeks.

I've taken a couple pictures of the nice entrees I've made for myself this week.

This is the cold cucumber soup I made last night, with cherry tomato garnish. I made gazpacho a couple times in previous summers. Both are excellent, but they take a decent amount of prep time with having to peel, seed and puree all cucumbers, in this case, and cucumbers and tomatoes for gazpacho. What I love most about this recipe is that it has some lowfat buttermilk in it (note the creamy color) AND cilantro (I adore cilantro!).

Earlier this week I made lemon rosemary halibut. This was really good for lunches and dinners this week. I added extra "Montreal Steak Seasoning" because it really kicked it up a notch, so to speak.

Speaking of rosemary and buttermilk - I was thinking last night - what to do with all this buttermilk?

After consulting The Joy of Cooking, I got the answer:
Buttermilk and Rosemary biscuits!! Very yummy and I only used a bit of oil and no butter or margarine.

I got a new Cooking Light cookbook this week which inspired the soup - and the black bean Mexican entree I'm making tonight. The fish recipe I got from cleaning out health magazines I had around and pulling out recipes that looked interesting. if you'd like the recipes I can post them, just comment.

I'm still doing well with the jogging in the mornings, although for the past couple days I've had a hard time getting up in time before the heat sets in so I've used my step and mini-tramp. I watched the first disc of Entourage, Season 1, yesterday while stepping/jogging. I think it's the male Sex and the City.

"Online dating is great! You can get all of the small talk done with so when you meet you get right to the good stuff. (paraphrased)" - one of the characters. It took me a while to get them straight. I don't think by "good stuff" he meant meaningful conversation.

I may go see Nancy Drew this week with my neighbor, and as I mentioned I'll need to go into the building several times this week likely to clear up grant related issues. Fun. I'll be happy once we start collecting the data as it relates to my main area of research. Speaking of which, I had a brief conversation with Dr. Advisor about my dissertation. I'm not working on it this summer, beyond just "thinking." It's more important for me to work on publications and then attack it in the Fall, hopefully to propose around March. I really like the more qualitative, as opposed to quantitative research endeavors that are present in the stream of research I'm in. For my dissertation I may do something with a rigorous qualitative component. I'm interested in the role of relationships in the meaning of work. Right now, the current paradigm in using for work meaning does not address the role of relationships (with coworkers, clients, family, supervisors...). Relationships could make a "meaningful" contribution to meaning. :-) I've read and heard about research investigating relational distance at work (i.e. geographical, interpersonal, hierarchical) and I think this is intriguing and could be worked into my dissertation in some way, maybe. I'm also reading some things from the sociology literature on the meaning of work and I'm finding them very insightful.

Now, to change the subject, my hosta from last year is still doing very well. I'm sure you're dying to know. Here's a picture:

There's a new outgrowth near the watering can that you can't see in this picture.
I really enjoy reading outside with all my lovely plants - and Fifi! Less than 2 years until I'll have a real kitty to call my own!

Funny Sopranos ending

2007-06-12T10:08:00.000-05:00

I often catch the beginning of the Colbert Report, or at least see the banter between him and Jon Stewart at the end of The Daily Show.

Anyways, as you might know, the ending of The Sopranos dominated the news yesterday, getting nearly as much coverage as the Shawskank Redemption. I should mention I've never seen The Sopranos, although I might try it on Netflix and just fast forward through any scenes that might be violent.

Stephen Colbert said he thought a good way to end the show would be for Tony, the lead, to be killed, but then have him wake up in bed, with the *entire* series, about him being a mobster, having been a dream. The kicker: the camera pans over to the other side of the bed and to Sarah Jessica Parker/Carrie Bradshaw, and the whole show was a dream sequence of Carrie's boyfriend/husband.

Salaries

2007-06-10T16:04:00.000-05:00

I thought this was interesting.

Real World Salaries of Fictional Characters

Saturday afternoon ramblings.

2007-06-09T11:53:00.000-05:00

I guess I'm content with my "My Space" ratings so far. I have a 'fair' for each room. Considering all spaces are rated the same (i.e. I'm in the same category as homes with $10,000-plus budgets) a fair rating is good.

What's interesting, especially from a psychological perspective, having received reviews for academic venues, is that I've had to mark several reviews as inappropriate to be removed. Although they weren't obscene, it seems that when people are able to review something anonymously, in either academics or home decorating people can be impolite. One person basically said I need to get my life together, and another called all of my stuff junk and was pretty offensive. It's intriguing to me that anonymity can make people that are probably mostly polite in other contexts phrase their opinions in such nonconstructive ways.

I need to get a lot more work done on the manuscript I'm preparing for publication. On the up side, I've been doing really well at jogging outside in the mornings. I even went out yesterday morning when it was REALLY steamy and humid. At 7:30 it was already in the 80's! For my area, even at this time of year, that's hot. It was more the humidity that made it yucky, but even with the humidity I enjoyed myself.

I got up late today. For some reason I don't listen to my alarm on Saturdays - and then I get off my sleeping schedule. I should go out later today; maybe to the trail.

I was sucked into the Shawskank Redemption, as Jon Stewart put it, yesterday. I don't mean to call Paris Hilton a skank, I just thought that play on words was funny. I don't think it's right that she has such a harsher sentence than everyone else with the same offense, and the situation highlights a lot that is wrong with the justice system. Also, yesterday afternoon, I was happy to hear that Mary Winkler will be free after spending 2 months in a mental facility. I was happy that she received voluntary manslaughter instead of first-degree murder, and given that she was victimized by her abusive husband, it's great that she won't have to spend any more time in prison, because of the time she served already waiting for her trial. It sets a nice precedent too, as the trial was in Tennessee, and Southern more conservative states tend to be less receptive to battered wife syndrome. * here ends my commentary on popular news*

Rate my space!

2007-06-06T19:51:00.000-05:00

I saw this on HGTV a month or so ago and was tempted to set up an account, but was too busy.

Rate my space!

You have to register with HGTV to be able to rate and comment, but I'd been wanting to post photos of my apartment for awhile. You can always post your comments here.

Two in one day: The 4 Meme

2007-06-04T13:18:00.001-05:00

4 jobs I have held:
1. Instructor
2. Tutor for high school student
3. Camp counselor (arts 'n crafts and bunk counselor for 8 year olds)
4. Research assistant

4 movies I can watch over and over: (this is just a sample)
1. Just Like Heaven
2. 13 Going on 30
3. Somethings Gotta Give
4. Sweet Home Alabama

4 places I have lived:
1. Grand Island, NY
2. Stow, OH
3. Rochester Hills, MI (Madonna's hometown!)
4. Sterling, VA

4 categories of TV programming I enjoy:
1. Home related (house flipping, home makeover kinds of shows)
2. Sitcoms
3. Cable News
4. Witty comedy (Daily Show, Kevin James, Bill Maher, Jack Black - both performances and movies/shows)

4 places I have been on holiday:
1. The Carribean
2. Spain
3. Chi-town
4. Southern California

4 websites I visit daily:
1. Facebook
2. Google Reader - for blogs
3. Email account for my assistantship
4. Weather.com

4 of my favorite dishes:
1. Lasagne
2. Pizza
3. Seafood - including sushi!
4. Mexican - with lots of cilantro

4 places I'd rather be right now:
1. In Bed
2. Shopping with someone else's money
3. Southern California
4. At Parent's House.

Quote Meme

2007-06-04T12:56:00.000-05:00

So I'm not one for "memes," but I do LOVE quotes and with the summer I've had a difficult time finding interesting things to post about. I found this from a friend on MySpace.

Go here. Read through the quotes and pick five that best reflect who you are. Note that at the bottom of the screen you can get new quotes from a variety of collections.

Here are mine!

Believe in yourself! Have faith in your abilities! Without a humble but reasonable confidence in your own powers you cannot be successful or happy: Norman Vincent Peale (1898 - 1993)

Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple.
Dr. Suess

The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.: Samuel Johnson (1709 - 1784), (attributed; also attributed to Ann Landers)

Always be nice to your children because they are the ones who will choose your rest home.
Phyllis Diller


Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can't lose.: Bill Gates (1955 - )

Yes, there is more to my life than the garden

2007-06-02T18:59:00.000-05:00

Like writing for starters.

There was a social thing for my program last night that was fun. There's very few social things for my program in the summer so this was nice for a change.

My routine for the past week has been pretty monotonous - hence the lack of blogging. I get up in the morning around 7, jog for an hour, get ready and maybe catch the Daily Show on dvr from the night before. Then, I either stay home, work on various projects and read; or, head into the office maybe for a quick meeting or to check to see if there are any faxes to process (part of my summer assistantship).

That's about all, folks.

I've been enjoying my regular jogging routine. I've noticed that it's taking me less time to run the same course that used to take me an hour. And the iPod Nano is definitely starting to earn it's keep. I'm so glad I upgraded from my cheap SanDisk!

Today I cleaned my carpets with my SteamVac. My place smells so fresh! I always wish I had a laundry room with a sink where I could dump the dirty water when I'm done. I have to dump it in my kitchen sink and then must sanitize the whole area. The whole tank is filled with almost black water when I'm done - yes, I'm sure you appreciate the visual. I defrosted some soup that I froze a couple months ago for dinner. It was really good! I got a slow cooker for Christmas and always make the mistake of filling the whole thing with some type of soup or casserole. Then I get sick of it about halfway through and have to freeze the rest.

I might get some more reading done tonight. I've also had the urge to watch Sweet Home Alabama lately. There's also this week's Time magazine to read, too. And, I got Domino yesterday in the mail as well.

Hosta development

2007-05-31T15:49:00.000-05:00

After seeing my garden pictures from a week ago my Mom (who I affectionately refer to as the Dr. Kevorkian of the plant world) suggested that I toss the Hosta from last year. I, however, had noticed that it was starting to grow since I put it outside.

Here's an updated photo:

This is what it looked like last week:

Caught in the act

2007-05-27T19:12:00.001-05:00

I caught a squirrel in my patio garden paradise the other day. There was a significant hole in between my two inpatients! He/she really scared me, hiding in between the banisters! I had the same problem last year with "something" digging a hole in my inpatients planter

My Dad hunts squirrels at my parents house because the population is out of control there and they damage plants. Maybe I can get him to come here and stand outside my apartment one night with his pellet gun! That would be funny!

I'm a nice neighbor. I just moved my car so some grad students in my complex could play whiffle ball. What is whiffle ball? It sounds familiar... They've drawn a huge thing outside on the blacktop in chalk. When I worked in a toy department summer before college I got a lot of questions from the sporting goods department, such as "where are the raquetballs/whiffleballs [insert sport thing I don't know here]?" I'd respond by saying that I didn't know what that was and could they give me a description. I'd usually get a frustrated look and the person would walk away.

I've been jogging in the mornings a lot lately and have a meeting for two projects this Wednesday. I'm half watching Real Deal episodes on TLC this afternoon. I don't know why I love that show. "Flipping" houses and real estate has always interested me and the show is basically about the workings of a small real estate company. I'd probably be better off consulting in stead of doing real estate ventures when I "grow up." As Richard, the owner of the company, said on the show, it's all about making the right investments and he has a whole team of people to help him do that.

When I got back from my parents I got caught up on all the series finales I missed while I was at home. My parents don't have dvr or Tivo and it's difficult for me to actually remember to watch a program at a specific time now and sit though commercials. Anyways, I'm happy with how The Office, Grey's and Scrubs ended, and I'm curious to see how things continue in the Fall. Bill Maher also had his last new "Real Time" and is on summer hiatus until the first week of school (August 24).

My Patio Garden

2007-05-25T10:23:00.001-05:00

Pretty inpatients.

The hosta from last year and my new kitty, Fifi.

My new hostas and planter

Thanks to Mom and Dad for the new hosta, planter and inpatients

At the 'rents

2007-05-19T10:28:00.001-05:00

I'm at my parents house for the week. I got here on Weds. and will be leaving this Weds. Not much has been happening here, just enjoying spending time with my parents and cooking "for free."

I'll be doing some gardening today. Academic happenings are going okay. I've been reading some things for a paper I'm writing and trying to think about structuring the introduction.

On a different note here's a quiz.

Your Personality is Very Rare (INTJ)

Your personality type is logical, uncompromising, independent, and nonconformist.
Only about 3% of all people have your personality, including 2% of all women and 4% of all men.You are Introverted, Intuitive, Thinking, and Judging.

http://www.blogthings.com/howrareisyourpersonalityquiz/">How Rare Is Your Personality?

Commemorating Seven Wonderful Years: My Gilmore Girls Cake

2007-05-15T20:47:00.000-05:00

Not too bad. I used almost two tubs of icing because I needed to perform reconstructive surgery on some parts. But Lorelai's character really liked icing and that came up in at least one episode - so it's an om age.

The finale was sweet - and sad. I was hoping for more, but I don't know what would have satisfied me. It was neat how they wrapped up the characters. I especially liked what they did with the Grandparents and the town finally telling it to Taylor was neat.

I had both my neighbors over and we had cake and watched it together. I threw an Everybody Loves Raymond finale party two years ago. I love throwing season finale get-togethers!

I'm hosting a Grey's Anatomy, Around the World party in August. ;-)

Gilmore Girls

2007-05-15T12:17:00.000-05:00

It doesn't feel like tonight is the last Tuesday I will EVER watch a new episode of Gilmore Girls.
It's hard to say why I like the show so much. Yes, it's intelligent in regards to the many references to popular culture and historical events/people. I also liked that both the characters were intelligent and ambitious. It wasn't too boy crazy (e.g. not like the Felicity-Ben-Noel love triangle). And the supporting cast is amazing.

Gilmoregirls.org was going to send 1000 yellow daisies (total, I think - not 1000 for each person) to the cast and crew both to say thanks for the past seven years and to try and get another season. The 1000 daisies is a reference to the last episode of season one, where Max who wanted Lorelai to marry him sent her 1000 yellow daisies.

I like the show so much I've decided to make a cake to commemorate the occasion. NeighborGirl, who replaced NeighborBoy last summer, is coming over to watch it with me.

Anyways, I have a lemon box cake mix, which I'll make with Diet Cherry 7up. I found out a few years ago you can substitute all a cake's ingredients for 12 oz. of soda. The cake still has a lot of calories, with the mix and icing, but it still cuts down on the calories a lot.

I'm leaving town tomorrow for about a week in the 'ville with the 'rents. I'm excited that the weather will be so nice. There's a paved trail near my parents house that I like to jog on.
I just checked the weather and I guess it's 88 outside! It didn't feel that hot when I was out there a while ago.

I'm starting to get into the groove of working on manuscript issues. I'm reading something I presented a year and some months ago at a conference that I can hopefully assist to the publication stage. I also have a meeting in a little over an hour with Dr. Advisor about my Meaning Research.

Mission Organization

2007-05-11T21:44:00.000-05:00

I've done a lot of cleaning and organizing this week. I've read a few things on blogs lately that this week is often used for cleaning and domestic projects by grad students and academics. I got to hanging shoe organizers, pitched several bags of stuff from my pantry/storage closet and organized things in my kitchen.

I also spent some time making nice healthy meals for myself, nicer than usual. I love cilantro, and came across a recipe for Lime Cilantro Pesto. I followed the recipe roughly - it's just a mix of cilantro with soy sauce, lime juice and a splash of sugar (or substitute). I had that on tofu. Then, I made Tandoori Tofu tonight. I got a bottle of curry powder today and made two batches of the Tandoori Marinade that's in Joy of Cooking. I only added 1/4 teaspoon of curry to each batch - but that was more than enough. I let it steep with the tofu and veggies for two hours and that really magnified the traditional flavor.

I took pictures of both the Cilantro Pesto and Tandoori dishes which I will post soon.

I plan on doing clothes tomorrow and maybe getting a bit more into reading and work. I'm amazed at how much room I have in my closets now. I would have so much more if I decide to toss old articles that I have cataloged from my undergrad and first year or so of grad school. I have two file drawers of articles that I hardly reference now, as most things I use are in additional filing boxes, stored under my table/desk.

Closet, research, iPod

2007-05-08T19:13:00.000-05:00

Not much has been happening. I've just been enjoying the first few days of summer. I dug out some conference paper reviews that I received a few months ago, and have begun to try and organize and prioritize the comments. I can't really start to integrate them until I know how many/what the topics are of the papers I'll be writing up this summer. There are also several other projects I'm trying to get back into after my time off for prelims.

I made some progress on cleaning up my closet as well. I got one of those sweater compartment things that hang from the pole in the closet. I also organized my cubicles a bit. I have a lot of tshirts that I only wear for exercise. Maybe I should try to trim those down. I also have a lot of old pillows that I could toss. I've been hanging on to them for guests, but I can always use the nice extra pillows I made that are on my bed for that.

Gilmore Girls looks really exciting tonight. It's DVRing right now. I'm waiting a half hour or so before I start watching it because Veronica Mars is on after. I'll save House M.D. for tomorrow.

I'm finally getting to jog outside with my iPod nano. Yes, I got it in February, but the weather was ugly for so long and prelims got me busy.

Well, time for a little tv and then some reading before bed.

Random questions

2007-05-05T21:34:00.000-05:00

I finished grading today and watched some Gilmore Girls Season One in the process. I also finished the paper that I needed to get done yesterday. So, my spring semester has officially ended. Because I can't think of anything else to discuss, here's a survey.

1. When was the last time you stood somebody up? (not by accident....no easy answers... your fault)

I don't think I ever have. I don't have many demands on my time, socially speaking. I'm too happy to have someone who wants to spend time with me to stand them up.

2. Sunday Morning Church or Saturday morning cartoons?

Saturday morning cartoons.

3. When was the last time you were accidentally naked? (partial or full)

No wardrobe malfunctions in my past

4. What's in your junk drawer?

Things I thought were important to save, then later I wonder, what was I thinking?

5. What topic of conversation makes you feel the most intelligent?

Conversations about my area of study, especially if I'm talking with "lay" people. :-)

6. What is the oldest receipt in your possession?

Probably some appliances/things I bought when I moved here.

7. $20 BAR tab: How much do you tip?

I usually tip a a couple dollars for each drink (if alcohol) as I order, so nothing at the end. If I'm just ordering soda, I tip for the first soda and then none after, unless I'm there for a really long time.

8. If you got $1 million to invest in something......what would you invest it in (no saving...just investing).

Mutual fund - I don't have time to determine what stocks would be best right now.

9. Who was the first celebrity you were infatuated with? (why?)

I don't get "infatuated" with celebrities. I know I liked Chris O'Donnel in middle school ('94-'96) and that guy who recently committed suicide that was on Seaquest. (ETA: Jonathan Brandis).

10. Why did you last change your screen name?

I didn't want to have to explain the significance of the old one all the time. It was my high school Spanish name which was "retired" after I graduated - 'cause I was such a sweet girl. :-)

11. Made up word: Glaxhowzer. Give me a definition.

Umm, no.

12. What was the best school project you ever did?

I always rocked at school projects and enjoyed them so much more than tests/worksheets/other assignments. I liked having something big with less little deadlines and specifications. It's hard to chose just one. I did a bunch of neat skits and presentations, and a report on Tess of the D'ubervilles that was 20 or so pages. Also, I was always the girl who the teacher would group with the students who were/almost failing. Thanks for that folks.

13. Name something you spend irresponsibly on?

Healthy food - vegetarian chickenstrips and other stuff from Morningstar and Boca

14. Complete this sentence: The absolute best thing about the town I live in is.... (one thing....and not friends or family....something about your town)

...being within walking distance of downtown and school.

15. If you could be any character from a movie who would it be?

I like the characters Reese Witherspoon plays in her romantic comedies. Sweet Home Alabama, Elle Woods from Legally Blonde, Just Like Heaven. Also, Kathleen Kelly from You've Got Mail.

16. Open road. Speed limit 65. What lane and how fast?

right lane, 70mph - using the left lane as necessary to pass

17. Will you still have myspace/facebook/xanga/AIM when you're married?

Yes. How else would I waste my time, and know what people who I barely talked to in hs/college and don't talk to now are doing (with myspace and facebook).

18. What do you do to go to sleep when you can't?

Television, chamomile or Sleepytime tea with valerian.

Random bullets in the final ten minutes

2007-05-03T22:49:00.000-05:00

I've made substantial progress on the second paper that I needed to finish this week. I think it should be ready to send out tomorrow as I had planned.
Grey's was great. It reminded me of when I watched the first couple seasons on dvd this Fall before I started watching the show on tv. I love it when I can watch more than one episode at once. I jogged on my mini-trampoline for the whole 1.5+ hours while watching it on DVR. Scrubs and The Office were also longer this week. Competition? May Sweeps I guess.
Spoiler alert: I had a hunch from the outset that they were going to kill off Meredith's stepmom.
I hope Christina and Burke get married this season - and they don't make that some kind of crazy cliffhanger!
I added some blue cheese to my pasta and tomato basil sauce and tasted really good.
I'm looking forward to summer officially starting, no more teaching for awhile, but I need to set up a plan for what I want to accomplish with writing.
Second final for the class I TA for tomorrow at 8:30. At least only about 50 students will be there. The rest opted to take it last week. I'm done with grading study guides and created a formula in Excel that will sum the students' three highest paper grades, so I don't need to do that by hand for 200+ people.
I got my parents a chrome-plated carafe for their coffee in their kitchen. My Mom says the coffee is the most important thing IN the kitchen so I thought it deserved a more prestigious domicile. They really liked it. I had to search around for a carafe that wasn't $200.

Wild Wings

2007-05-02T15:01:00.000-05:00

I just heard Buffalo Wild Wings stock went up today after they posted their earnings report. I wonder if that has anything to do with my prelim celebrations. :-) I've really enjoyed that place much more since the smoking ban went into effect.

I'm officially done with one of the four ongoing applied projects that I had this semester. Three more to go, and two are in the final stages.

I still need to unpack all of my clothes from Big Conference and do some general cleaning.

I got another compliment on my flat-ironed hair today!

A few domestic tips

2007-05-01T12:43:00.000-05:00

I know I haven't posted much in the past few weeks. Hopefully I'll be able to get back in the habit this week as things are calming down.

I haven't posted some domestic creative ideas lately. However, I just found a neat sandwich recipe from the latest issue of Domino.

All you need is a spreadable/soft blue cheese and fig or plum jam. The recipe says fig, but I couldn't find any at Midwest Superstore, so I decided to go for Plum, because I think they're similar and in the same family. Combine equal amounts cheese and jam, add more of either to taste. Toast bread and enjoy! The calories are at a pretty healthy level for lunch.

Also, from my reading of scholarly publications such as InStyle, I'd been hearing that flat irons are great for getting a straight sleek look. This wasn't something I'd considered for my own hair before because it dries flat on its own, and curls under nicely. Anyways, the flat iron idea peaked my interest and this weekend, while staying with JB for Big Conference, she was using one and she let me try it. I love the look! So, I got a flat iron today. It's a neat model that can be used on wet or damp hair, with different settings for each. I'll have to pass this on to JB, who I think irons her hair this way every day.

Now that I've passed on these domestic tips I should get back to work.

Big Conference Recap

2007-04-30T14:50:00.000-05:00

I got back yesterday from Big Conference in Big City. The symposium I chaired on my main area of interest, meaning, went exceptionally well. The room was full and people were standing in the hall. It was kind of a small room, unfortunately, but still the turnout was great for a symposium. In addition to the large audience, it was great to meet the people that are doing research similar to my own on meaning.

I got to go to a few nice restaurants in Big City, but didn't get to see much else. I went to about three sessions each day, that overall were really great. I'm really interested in the relationship distance work that I heard about.

I got to stay with JB, an alumnus of my program, and spend a lot of time with her as well as some other alumni that were around during my first year of school here.

This week should be calmer than those of past weeks. I'm practically done with two of my applied projects, almost done with another, and the third that's been going on for a year is moving smoothly.

I heard a funny comment from Bill Maher yesterday. He and his panel were talking about the Alec Baldwin incident and then got on the topic of kids in today's society. Maher said, "you'll wish Baldwin was on the plane the next time you fly." That was especially funny because I flew yesterday.

I still haven't unpacked from yesterday, besides my night clothes, toiletries and computer. I have, however, sent out the slides for my session to interested audience members and sent out Mother's Day cards. Go me! I have a few more tasks I want to accomplish today, but overall I'm taking it easy.

Do you "get" me?

2007-04-23T15:23:00.001-05:00

Random points from the week

2007-04-22T07:23:00.000-05:00

My Mom visited this weekend. We went to the local zoo, saw "Are we done yet?" and went out for dinner both nights. The movie was a great, silly comedy and John C. McGinley (Dr. Cox on Scrubs) is awesome in it. Incidentally, he just got married last week according to People Magazine. I also introduced my Mom to "The Office" and we watched a couple episodes on Friday. My parents picked me up some really nice goodies from their recent trip to North Carolina which was a nice surprise, and Mom got me really cute pink house slipper socks too!

I have my practice talk tomorrow for Big Conference and I leave on Thursday morning.
The next few days will be crazy busy! Things *should* calm down when I get back. In thinking about next week, I don't think it's too busy when I get back, and the conference will be a nice respite from my daily routine. On the upside, I think I'm almost done with two of my applied projects. One should be going off this week and the other is hopefully in the final or near final round of revisions.

On an unrelated note, HGTV has a new "Rate My Place" website. I'd really like to take some pics of my apartment and put them up there, but I don't want to make my interior decorating interests "achievement goal oriented." There's different categories for different types of homes, and I must say I think mine could take most of the apartments. Something fun to do once the semester is over, maybe. I'm also looking forward to gardening, updating the collages in my living room (haven't been in two years!) and cleaning my closet. I also need to get new contacts/maybe glasses.

New Gilmore Girls Tuesday!

2007-04-17T06:49:00.000-05:00

Gilmore Girls is new tonight - yay! It looks like Luke and Lorelai are going to make progress in getting back together. :-)

In other news, I have my second to last motivation seminar today and am guest lecturing tomorrow for the class I TA for. I'm meeting with Dr. Advisor in a couple hours to go over the symposium slides for next week's big conference. Things are busy.

My ballet flats that match my suit

2007-04-15T13:08:00.000-05:00

The Suit