(no subject)
I'm still here - it's just that last weekend was insanely busy, and this week, beginning on Tuesday, has been intentionally and epically not-busy because of the Thanksgiving break. After my all-nighter a week ago Thursday night, I proceeded to spend last Saturday mostly in bed, and then spent all day Sunday and another all-nighter finishing my grading for Monday morning. But I have survived, and I've been doing a lot of catching up on sleep ever since. What's more, I only have three more lectures to write this semester, which hopefully bodes well for sleep on a regular basis from now on.
I've also been socializing! AA has been in town this week working at the library, so I had a couple of long and excellent lunches and talks with her, and former roommate and fellow history grad student JL had a dumpling party last weekend, which involved a group of us making, and then consuming, massive quantities of dumplings. It was super fun, even though it contributed to my all-nighter, and I had to leave early to go and get back to my marking.
Then, on Thursday, I had thanksgiving dinner with former longtime roommate J! She was in town visiting her significant other T, and her friend KJ and KJ's partner hosted the dinner, and they invited me. It was wonderful to see her again (and T and KJ, for that matter). I took wine and a carrot-lemongrass soup as my vegetarian contribution, and both J and KJ provided vast quantities of delicious food including three types of dessert for five people, and it was all excellent.
Yesterday, I had lunch with erstwhile advisor A, whom I hadn't seen since Haskins last year, and that was also excellent. I got to tell him about my teaching, which I've been very much wanting to do, and also about my research (and current lack of progress therein). As far as my research, he was more or less like, "well, you've hit the worst part of grad school and the dissertation process, I have no helpful advice at this stage." I have to say, it was... helpful to hear that. Apparently "no freaking clue what my dissertation is going to look like or when it's going to be done" is a normal and awful phase, which at least reassures me that I'm not the only idiot to get stuck in it. Yay, erstwhile advisor A!
After lunch we went impulse-book shopping at Raven Used Books, and impulse-bought books. I blame A for that, but now I have fluffy bedtime reading (and you know you're deep into nerdery when a dual biography of a pair of thirteenth-century abbots of Saint-Denis and Westminster abbey by William Chester Jordan is your fluffy bedtime reading). I have also, since I began writing this post, ordered more books, in preparation for my lectures on the Seven Years' War and American Revolution, and gone out to my porch to discover that one of last week's impulse book buys, Helen Solterer's Medieval Roles for Modern Times, had arrived.
I must say, on the subject of fluffy bedtime reading, that my recent achievement of purchasing an extension cord on amazon.com has immensely improved the quality of my still furniture-free life. At least now I can plug in my bedside reading light, and as a result, bedtime reading is possible. Yay!
Anyway, now I have to get myself organized and go to campus to renew my loan of the DVD of the documentary I'm showing my students on Monday, and then I'm going back over to Cambridge for supper with Z, whom I also haven't seen in ages - since before I went to France, in fact.
This entry was originally posted at http://monksandbones.dreamwidth.org/699392.html. Talk to me here or there, whichever you prefer.
I've also been socializing! AA has been in town this week working at the library, so I had a couple of long and excellent lunches and talks with her, and former roommate and fellow history grad student JL had a dumpling party last weekend, which involved a group of us making, and then consuming, massive quantities of dumplings. It was super fun, even though it contributed to my all-nighter, and I had to leave early to go and get back to my marking.
Then, on Thursday, I had thanksgiving dinner with former longtime roommate J! She was in town visiting her significant other T, and her friend KJ and KJ's partner hosted the dinner, and they invited me. It was wonderful to see her again (and T and KJ, for that matter). I took wine and a carrot-lemongrass soup as my vegetarian contribution, and both J and KJ provided vast quantities of delicious food including three types of dessert for five people, and it was all excellent.
Yesterday, I had lunch with erstwhile advisor A, whom I hadn't seen since Haskins last year, and that was also excellent. I got to tell him about my teaching, which I've been very much wanting to do, and also about my research (and current lack of progress therein). As far as my research, he was more or less like, "well, you've hit the worst part of grad school and the dissertation process, I have no helpful advice at this stage." I have to say, it was... helpful to hear that. Apparently "no freaking clue what my dissertation is going to look like or when it's going to be done" is a normal and awful phase, which at least reassures me that I'm not the only idiot to get stuck in it. Yay, erstwhile advisor A!
After lunch we went impulse-book shopping at Raven Used Books, and impulse-bought books. I blame A for that, but now I have fluffy bedtime reading (and you know you're deep into nerdery when a dual biography of a pair of thirteenth-century abbots of Saint-Denis and Westminster abbey by William Chester Jordan is your fluffy bedtime reading). I have also, since I began writing this post, ordered more books, in preparation for my lectures on the Seven Years' War and American Revolution, and gone out to my porch to discover that one of last week's impulse book buys, Helen Solterer's Medieval Roles for Modern Times, had arrived.
I must say, on the subject of fluffy bedtime reading, that my recent achievement of purchasing an extension cord on amazon.com has immensely improved the quality of my still furniture-free life. At least now I can plug in my bedside reading light, and as a result, bedtime reading is possible. Yay!
Anyway, now I have to get myself organized and go to campus to renew my loan of the DVD of the documentary I'm showing my students on Monday, and then I'm going back over to Cambridge for supper with Z, whom I also haven't seen in ages - since before I went to France, in fact.
This entry was originally posted at http://monksandbones.dreamwidth.org/699392.html. Talk to me here or there, whichever you prefer.