Oh, lord. Where to start. I haven't updated this journal in-- almost a year? So there's a lot to explain.

Wait. There is too much. Let me sum up:

Career-wise (Since that's the last thing I posted about):* I made it through my first year of teaching without crying, shouting, or otherwise second-guessing my career path. \o ( Read more... )

I love a good road trip. I really do. We didn't fly much when I was a kid-- too expensive-- so I grew up watching mountains grow and fade outside the windows of our family car, listening to my sister count cows or my parents sing along to the Beatles. I remember road trips as books, too-- we used to check books on tape out of the library before ( Read more... )

1. Technosaurus Rex; or, What We’ve Got Here is a Failure to Communicate

The first time I saw Jurassic Park, I was ten years old. I remember sitting in the dark of the theater next to my mom, clutching the arm rest between us with white fingers as the first Red Shirt was devoured by an unseen, anachronistic monster. It was my birthday, and ( Read more... )

1. I am holding my head very, very still at the moment, and hoping that my stomach can handle the banana I attempted to ingest tonight in lieu of a proper dinner. We're on Day Two of a Really Bad Migraine here in Carol's brainbox, and oh oh oh oh ow. Day Two is usually when that feeling of Something is going to burst out my skull like that one ( Read more... )

I present to you a brief but illuminating conversation:

Why Historians Should Never Enter the Adult Entertainment Industry
(or, Shit We Think About While Grading Your Essays)

Friend A: You know, Louisiana Purchase would be a really great stripper name.
Me: Wait, what?
Friend A: Louisiana Purchase. It's perfect. Nicely mercenary, with a super- ( Read more... )

The writing continues, and I am slogging my way through the fiddly bits at the moment in order to get to the fun stuff, which means that I am not in love with what I'm writing at the moment. The honeymoon is over, and now I'm discovering that this story sometimes snores and steals the covers. But that's okay, because I love it and am willing to ( Read more... )

The year was 2002. Bush was in his first term, the War on Terror had not yet been defined as the War on Brown People with Oil, Facebook was just a twinkle in Mark Zuckerburger's eye, and I was taking a physical anthropology class on human evolution that was driving me round the bend because my professor was an absolute sadist. (Seriously. She ( Read more... )