Point of Reference

As I sit here, reading posts from my friends in Ottawa and Toronto about how very, very hot it is, I'm really coming to appreciate the air conditioning in my apartment. It is, of course, a terrible drain on our resources and generally bad for the environment, but since I have no control over it and no way to turn it off, I'm just going to enjoy it. Until 3:00, when I have to leave for a meeting.

And hey, the kitten is finally coming out to play, though she still runs under the furniture if I move too suddenly.

Do you know what's a good time waster/procrastination technique? Cleaning out three years worth of (primarily) commercial emails from my commercial email account. Blumer remains unfinished, but I'm down to 2 pages from 5 in my hotmail account and I've discovered a bunch of new recipes from Epicurious's recipe flash that I'm now eager to try. Woohoo! Oh, and speaking of Epicurious, this roasted-corn salsa is really good. I haven't tried the steak half of the recipe. (Tonight's pesto was pretty good too, but not special enough to post the recipe.)

Hmm, maybe I should think about going to bed soon. (Sleep is another great procrastination technique.)

I have set a date for my theory comp. I will be writing in the last week of August. I have about forty books to read between then and now. Should be fun.

In other news, every time I hit any keys that are not letters, I bring up the search bar in Firefox. No idea why, but it explains the lack of contractions in this post.

It's summer in Toronto, and the film crews are out and about. Last year, it was Take the Lead, for which they transformed the building where my department is located into a New York high school, complete with New York police cars, New York cabs, New York street signs, and a partial facade. (I have no idea what, if anything, they did to the inside. I didn't go into that part of the building to check. Although I probably could have--security wasn't that tight most of the time.)

This year, they're filming at a local frat house two doors down from my apartment. The letter they sent around last week said that they're filming the next American Pie movie, specifically an after-party at a frat house that takes place following the famous Naked Mile run at the University of Michigan. Toronto: the all-purpose city. One year New York, the next Michigan. It's a more focused shoot this time, so they haven't done as many external transformations: one street sign, some different Greek letters on the house, some carefully positioned beer bottles (which didn't really require staging), and I think they took the snow tiger statue down. I believe it's entirely an outdoor shoot. Sadly for them, it just started to rain.

Oh, and they were a lot of trucks on campus today, so someone is probably filming something there too. But then, they usually are.

It's 6am, the sun is up, the birds are chirping, and it's time for me to go to bed.

Yeah, I'm on a screwed up schedule.

I just sent off what I hope will be the last set of major revisions on the journal article I've been working on. Now that it's done, I'm going to try to return to a more normal sleeping schedule. This extreme late night stuff (as opposed to my usual 2am late night schedule) tends to be driven by procrastination, and the panic that sets in when I realize that the day's over and I haven't accomplished anything, which pushes me to stay up later and later. And nothing leads me to procrastinate like paper writing. (Yes, I realize this could be a problem if I continue to follow my current career trajectory. I'm working on it.)

So one goal for the next week is to bring my bedtime back to a reasonable hour. (I have a few others as well, which I may write up later.)

Now, bed. Well, except that I've killed several large and scary creepy-crawlies in here tonight, all in the vicinity of my bed, and I'm a little freaked out about climbing in there. Oh well, I'm sure exhaustion will win out sooner or later.

***

semiotic_trader and a_just_society, I'm sorry, I was at B's on Sunday and didn't get your phone message about lunch until Monday afternoon. Are you going to be back downtown before you leave?

I'm running late on this one; should have done it this morning...

List the last five things you've done most recently. Then tag five people to do the same.

1. Brushed teeth.

2. Snacked on leftover steak, tomatoes, steamed collard greens, and blueberries.

3. Did laundry.

4. Picked up some groceries. Yes, after midnight is chore time here. Thank heavens for 24-hour grocery stores.

5. Worked on revising an article for publication.


Hmm, no specific tagging from me. If anyone on my flist is bored, consider yourself tagged.

It looks like I'll be teaching tutorials again this summer. That's fine; it pays the bills and it means my TA hours will be spread out instead of all concentrated at the end. Marking would have had the advantage of not tying me here all summer...but at this point it doesn't look like I'm going anywhere anyway. The only big trip I was considering was Italy, and B has decided not to attend that conference after all, so that's already out. I would like to drive to Ottawa with B and his family next month, but I can live with it if the timing doesn't work out. So now my only concern is not letting tutorial preparation take over my life, as it's done in the past. (In the past I've found that the students tend to show up ill-prepared and without their books, which has lead me to over-prepare so that I'm not left with nothing to say when the students can't contribute. But there's also a strong element of procrastination involved there too, and that's what I need to avoid this time.)

On a completely unrelated note, my ceiling seems to be leaking again. I've called the landlords; I'll see what they do.

I've been rather negligent about updating my journal for...well, the past few months, at least. Rather than try to actually write up a proper, essay-style post, I'm going to post a list of facts instead. I may even try to relate them.

1. I've decided to try to finish my theory comp before B's family comes to visit in June. It's not looking terribly good right now, but I'm trying to remain optimistic. (Not looking terribly good = haven't read one word in three days.)

2. Even if I get my comp done, I'm not sure I'll be able to go to Ottawa with them (if that's where they end up going) because I have agreed to TA for 101 yet again this summer. I'll probably end up in a tutorial position, which is fine--better than marking in many ways--but it ties me to the city for 3+ months since I'll have to be here every Monday and Wednesday evening.

3. That's all assuming the funding for the position comes through.

4. It probably will, because the Undergrad Chair had a great deal of trouble finding someone to teach 101 this summer, and one of the incentives she ended up offering was extra TA support.

5. On the plus side, a return to Wednesday night tutorials could also mean a return of Quesadilla Night.

6. I need a TA position, because it looks like my RA job is pretty much over, apart from the possibility of being called in for occasional work. Our last meeting was interesting--it was supposed to be a wrap-up meeting as most of the team is no longer being paid (they were on salary for the term), and yet somehow it ended with all of us being assigned more work: collect more email addresses, write a cover letter, follow up with more analysis...

7. I've recently started watching "House." The plot structure is terribly predictable, but the characters are entertaining, and I think I may try to catch up on it this summer. As long as it's not airing on Monday or Wednesday nights.

8. Something else I'd like to do this summer is starting reading recent issues of the top journals, to get a sense of what's being done in the field, and to seek inspiration for a dissertation topic, because it's getting kind of ridiculous that I don't have one. (I did, but then the person I came here to work with said he didn't have time to be my primary advisor, and the person he sent me to instead said it wasn't a topic he felt he could properly supervisor. I could find a new advisor, but I really like the person I was sent to and think he'd make a good advisor, so I've decided to find a new topic instead.)

9. My lack of dissertation topic is one of my main reasons for not wanting to attend the department potluck tomorrow: I don't want to explain to the faculty who are there why I don't know what I'm doing. Roommate is organizing it, so she's really pushing me to go, but I may refuse anyway. I haven't committed to bringing anything, and we're holding a houseparty here for the graduate students after the potluck, so I won't be completely left out.

10. I'm getting small red dots all over my screen. They show up in multiple programs, on white backgrounds, but they aren't always there. I'm not sure what's causing them, but they have me somewhat concerned.

11. I wonder when they're going to turn on the a/c in my building.

For the past four or five days, I've woken up tired. It didn't seem to matter how much sleep I got, or what I ate, or whether I worked out--I was tired. (And no, I don't drink coffee or any other caffeinated beverage on a regular basis, so it's not that.) Today, with no discernible change in my schedule, I woke up feeling refreshed.

It's amazing how much more productive I am when I'm not tired. Three hours of RA work done, a paper partially edited, and I'm not out of steam yet!

27 essays down, 40 to go. Well, in theory, if you look at the class list. If I count the ones I actually have in my possesion, there are only 29 left. These essays were due six days ago, with a penalty of 10% per day (excluding weekends). Admittedly, there were a couple of extensions granted for illness, and I haven't checked the assignment box since late Thursday, but...there are either a lot of people who dropped the course recently, or a lot of people who are going to do very badly on this paper.

Oh--last night's chicken turned out wonderfully. I used the brown at high temperature, then cook at moderate temperature method and stuffed the cavity full of lemon and onions and garlic and fresh rosemary. And put butter seasoned with garlic and rosemary and sage under the skin, and a bit of olive oil on the skin to help with the browning. Not healthy, but very tasty. The gravy, sadly, did not turn out so well, so my goal for next time will be to work on that. And test the slow roast method. In the meantime, B's fridge is full of rich gold chicken stock, and I'll be heading back there later this week for some homemade chicken noodle soup.