Update of sorts
No PotD today; instead you get a selective update of what's going on with me. Keeping in mind that this post is the most I've written on LJ in quite a few months, I'm going to put it under a cut to keep it from clogging up folks' flists. PotD should be back tomorrow.
Weekend:
This past weekend one of uisinger's aunts, along with a great aunt and two second cousins, threw a wedding shower for us down in Chicagoland. Aunt Jami invited my mom, who drove down from Minnesota early on Saturday. We had her leave her car in our parking spot and took the Subaru down to Chicago, a trip that seemed longer than usual for some reason. The Subaru once again proved a practical and capable mount, handling all our overnight bags, pillows, the large plastic bin full of favor boxes, hostess gifts, and assorted other flotsam while still allowing us to use the cargo cover to keep everything out of the sun. I continue to be happy with the purchase, and we haven't even used it for a full winter yet. How fortunate we are to have that car - mine would have achieved the same mileage, but requires bank-breaking premium fuel. I've probably put on less than 200 miles since winter ended on it simply because it doesn't make much sense to drive it if we can avoid it.
The shower was very enjoyable. My mom met quite a bit of my new family, including all the aunts, the two teenage girl cousins who will be in the wedding, Papou (uisinger's grandfather), and some very close members of the extended family. She also met grownie, doraphilia, and picodulce, and remarked several times about how wonderful our friends are. Of course, they are, which is why we love them so. I was so very happy they could come, as we haven't been able to visit with our Chicago friends nearly as much as we'd like this year. Unfortunately, the invitation to gws57 and evilone79 wasn't delivered by the Post Office, and although I know they were on vacation, I'm a bit upset by that.
We stayed overnight in Aurora, and drove back up on Sunday after breakfast. Sunday afternoon uisinger and I made a cold cantaloupe soup, which spent four hours in the fridge after we finished assembling it. The heat and humidity have been nigh unbearable over the last week, and this soup is just about the only kind of tonic that can provide a wedge against insanity.
School:
Last Monday I began my second round of summer classes. I generally prefer the summer schedule, which is Mon-Thurs and provides 2.5 hours for a class. It's can be rather intense, particularly when the class is reading-intensive, but I enjoy the more consistent schedule and the opportunity to concentrate on an individual area of study for three weeks. I'm taking a philosophy class this time around, one concentrating on sentential calculus. As I often do, I've hit it off with the TA, who is ex-Army Special Reconnaissance from the Desert Storm/Bosnia era. In the time I've been here in Madison, I've only made friends with three undergrads; the bulk of the friendships I have here are with doctoral students and professors. One the one hand, it's nice to have academic friends who view me as an equal, but at the same time, I'm aware that I'm not, and of how long it's going to be until I'm on equal footing with them.
Wedding:
I can't speak for anyone else, but I feel like we're getting to the stage where mountains have shrunk to molehills. This isn't to say that there aren't plenty of things to be done, but simply that the really big things are nearly all in place. I have to finish wrangling the groomsmen into getting suit fittings and make sure that everything is taken care of so Stan can be the koumbaro, but other than that, it's relatively minor stuff like putting together a map and directions from the hotels to the church for out-of-towners (which was finished tonight and now only needs to be taken to Kinkos).
One unfortunate setback which I'm steamed about is the rehearsal dinner. I spent a few days scouting potential restaurants in the area around the hotels and church, and another day driving down from Madison to visit them, and I finally found one that both sets of my parents could agree on (no easy feat, let me say). I was ready to put a deposit down on the place on Saturday, when they informed me they might be closed for construction in October. I couldn't believe it, and now I'm feeling like I'm back to square one. Hopefully, I'll get a call this week from the restaurant saying they'll be open for the date I need, but I'm not counting on it.
So, now I have to start the process over again, and while that's extremely annoying, I'm keeping perspective. I refuse to live the next two months stressing out over every detail, particularly the ones that won't matter much in the end. If the planning were to cease today, we'd have the ceremony booked, the guests provided with accommodations, a very nice meal, and music to help us celebrate. We have a photographer to take pictures to show our children and help us remember in old age. Our invitations will be in the mail next Monday. Yes, the suits and the rehearsal dinner need to be taken care of, but the important thing is getting married to someone I love, and everything else beyond that is, to an extent, extraneous.
Life in general:
I don't have much to say about this subject, mostly because I don't care to discuss it much. I'm back on blood pressure medication now, and I have a doctor who I like. It'd be nice to have health insurance to cover the cost of seeing him, though. I'm working on making changes to my way of life which should help my health, but I won't bore you with the details. I'm trying to read more analog sources and fewer digital ones, though my tower of books to read will probably never be whittled down once school starts. Somewhere in my brain I have a major paper waiting to be written down, but I've been too mentally dissipated in the particular area of concern to attack writing it. I've been listening to a great deal of good music lately, ranging from classic performers like Jimmy Smith, the Modern Jazz Quartet, Lester Young, Bill Monroe with Doc Watson, and Dexter Gordon, to more contemporary talents like John Zorn, Charles Lloyd, and Bill Frisell. I'm anxious for our move to come so we can get out of this cramped apartment and into one in a better area of town and with enough square footage to spread out and make our own spaces. I can't wait to have another book case; I have over fifty books in various piles tucked around the living room. I keep thinking five years in the future, waiting for the present to catch up.
Weekend:
This past weekend one of uisinger's aunts, along with a great aunt and two second cousins, threw a wedding shower for us down in Chicagoland. Aunt Jami invited my mom, who drove down from Minnesota early on Saturday. We had her leave her car in our parking spot and took the Subaru down to Chicago, a trip that seemed longer than usual for some reason. The Subaru once again proved a practical and capable mount, handling all our overnight bags, pillows, the large plastic bin full of favor boxes, hostess gifts, and assorted other flotsam while still allowing us to use the cargo cover to keep everything out of the sun. I continue to be happy with the purchase, and we haven't even used it for a full winter yet. How fortunate we are to have that car - mine would have achieved the same mileage, but requires bank-breaking premium fuel. I've probably put on less than 200 miles since winter ended on it simply because it doesn't make much sense to drive it if we can avoid it.
The shower was very enjoyable. My mom met quite a bit of my new family, including all the aunts, the two teenage girl cousins who will be in the wedding, Papou (uisinger's grandfather), and some very close members of the extended family. She also met grownie, doraphilia, and picodulce, and remarked several times about how wonderful our friends are. Of course, they are, which is why we love them so. I was so very happy they could come, as we haven't been able to visit with our Chicago friends nearly as much as we'd like this year. Unfortunately, the invitation to gws57 and evilone79 wasn't delivered by the Post Office, and although I know they were on vacation, I'm a bit upset by that.
We stayed overnight in Aurora, and drove back up on Sunday after breakfast. Sunday afternoon uisinger and I made a cold cantaloupe soup, which spent four hours in the fridge after we finished assembling it. The heat and humidity have been nigh unbearable over the last week, and this soup is just about the only kind of tonic that can provide a wedge against insanity.
School:
Last Monday I began my second round of summer classes. I generally prefer the summer schedule, which is Mon-Thurs and provides 2.5 hours for a class. It's can be rather intense, particularly when the class is reading-intensive, but I enjoy the more consistent schedule and the opportunity to concentrate on an individual area of study for three weeks. I'm taking a philosophy class this time around, one concentrating on sentential calculus. As I often do, I've hit it off with the TA, who is ex-Army Special Reconnaissance from the Desert Storm/Bosnia era. In the time I've been here in Madison, I've only made friends with three undergrads; the bulk of the friendships I have here are with doctoral students and professors. One the one hand, it's nice to have academic friends who view me as an equal, but at the same time, I'm aware that I'm not, and of how long it's going to be until I'm on equal footing with them.
Wedding:
I can't speak for anyone else, but I feel like we're getting to the stage where mountains have shrunk to molehills. This isn't to say that there aren't plenty of things to be done, but simply that the really big things are nearly all in place. I have to finish wrangling the groomsmen into getting suit fittings and make sure that everything is taken care of so Stan can be the koumbaro, but other than that, it's relatively minor stuff like putting together a map and directions from the hotels to the church for out-of-towners (which was finished tonight and now only needs to be taken to Kinkos).
One unfortunate setback which I'm steamed about is the rehearsal dinner. I spent a few days scouting potential restaurants in the area around the hotels and church, and another day driving down from Madison to visit them, and I finally found one that both sets of my parents could agree on (no easy feat, let me say). I was ready to put a deposit down on the place on Saturday, when they informed me they might be closed for construction in October. I couldn't believe it, and now I'm feeling like I'm back to square one. Hopefully, I'll get a call this week from the restaurant saying they'll be open for the date I need, but I'm not counting on it.
So, now I have to start the process over again, and while that's extremely annoying, I'm keeping perspective. I refuse to live the next two months stressing out over every detail, particularly the ones that won't matter much in the end. If the planning were to cease today, we'd have the ceremony booked, the guests provided with accommodations, a very nice meal, and music to help us celebrate. We have a photographer to take pictures to show our children and help us remember in old age. Our invitations will be in the mail next Monday. Yes, the suits and the rehearsal dinner need to be taken care of, but the important thing is getting married to someone I love, and everything else beyond that is, to an extent, extraneous.
Life in general:
I don't have much to say about this subject, mostly because I don't care to discuss it much. I'm back on blood pressure medication now, and I have a doctor who I like. It'd be nice to have health insurance to cover the cost of seeing him, though. I'm working on making changes to my way of life which should help my health, but I won't bore you with the details. I'm trying to read more analog sources and fewer digital ones, though my tower of books to read will probably never be whittled down once school starts. Somewhere in my brain I have a major paper waiting to be written down, but I've been too mentally dissipated in the particular area of concern to attack writing it. I've been listening to a great deal of good music lately, ranging from classic performers like Jimmy Smith, the Modern Jazz Quartet, Lester Young, Bill Monroe with Doc Watson, and Dexter Gordon, to more contemporary talents like John Zorn, Charles Lloyd, and Bill Frisell. I'm anxious for our move to come so we can get out of this cramped apartment and into one in a better area of town and with enough square footage to spread out and make our own spaces. I can't wait to have another book case; I have over fifty books in various piles tucked around the living room. I keep thinking five years in the future, waiting for the present to catch up.