Date: 2009-10-18 14:30 Subject: Ha! Security: Public Mood: nerdy

I've been reading the livejournal of one of the fanfic authors that I like, and just realized that she's in the same field of study as I am.

The major national conference for our academic discipline is coming up next month. I am going to be looking sideways at all the women there and wondering, is it her? Did she write that fabulous fic?

Our discipline is known for being a bit staid and backward. The fact that there is an HP fanfic author among them is amazing and wonderful.

Date: 2009-08-12 11:06 Subject: Why is it... Security: Public Mood: apathetic

Why is it that when I am home, I shirk my household chores, overeat, don't exercise, and am completely addicted to my computer, and when I am at my parents' house, my room is as neat as a pin, I eat moderately, walk their dog everyday, and rarely spend more than an hour a day online?

If I weren't married, I'd move back in with mummy and daddy and try to remember what self-discipline feels like.

My husband and I went stargazing last night, saw some of the Perseid meteors, and came home smelling like the marijuana that was being smoked by some of the other visitors to the mountaintop. Lying on the ground in a sleeping bag was actually not as uncomfortable and torturous as I remember, or maybe it's just better when I have someone to cuddle with, but it's making me think about going camping. I haven't slept in a tent since I was 15 and I hated it then. Maybe I would hate it less now. We don't have a tent or any camping equipment other than sleeping bags, though, and no money to buy such things nor any place to store it, so thinking about camping is a bit of an academic exercise.


By the way, my friend who was shot is recovering. She can walk on her own and is regaining her appetite. She is still weak, though, can't manage stairs very well, and is having a difficult time emotionally. After being cared for by friends for several weeks, she has finally been convinced that she should go home to her family for a while. When you have a good relationship with your parents, there's nothing quite like being in their care to comfort you and make you feel secure. And the police have caught the shooter, who has confessed.

Date: 2009-06-30 14:45 Subject: People Can Be Evil Security: Public Mood: anxious

This morning my husband and I awoke to the worst text message we've ever received: a friend of ours was shot in the chest last night and was still in surgery.

Thankfully we now know that she is expected to (eventually) make a full recovery. Still, it feels like a terrible nightmare to all of us who love her.

The most shocking thing is that this happened less than a mile from the apartment building she and we both live in. This is supposedly a safe neighborhood, and people walk around at night all the time. The police think the crime was gang-related: a witness said that three men demanded our friend's purse, and after she handed it over, shot her and drove away.

The second most shocking thing is that my husband and I were the last people to see her before she was shot. She was going to house-sit for another friend of ours who left for Hawaii yesterday morning, and was looking forward to escaping her annoying roommates for a while. We drove her to the other apartment and dropped her off at about 10:30 last night. She could have asked us for a ride for her other errand--it wasn't far, and we would have been happy to drive her. She didn't ask. We didn't ask if she needed anything else. The man she was supposed to house-sit for had no idea his neighborhood would be so dangerous for a woman alone. We're all pretty unhappy today.

Date: 2009-06-27 22:32 Subject: (no subject) Security: Public Mood: accomplished

The summer has been good to me so far. There have been fun hikes, a wedding and a couple of funerals (to sing at, not people I knew), and more fun stuff to look forward to next month. There probably has not been enough studying, but, well, time for that in August, right?

Today my husband and I learned to shoot a bow and arrow! There is an archery range here in Los Angeles that provides free lessons to beginners every Saturday. Totally free: free parking, free equipment, free lesson. There were five instructors and about twenty students, so we all had a bit of one-on-one time. I shot sixteen times. None of them were bullseyes, but a couple were at least in the vicinity of the bullseye, and none were off in space. I didn't hurt myself, which I was a bit afraid of.

I now know the basics of shooting a bow and three different kinds of guns (.22 caliber semi-automatic rifle, .50 caliber muzzleloading rifle, and 357 mag cowboy revolver). I've learned all this in the last three weeks. I am beginning to feel a bit like an Amazon. I definitely like the bow the best. Even the "snick" of the .22 rifle (it's not very loud) is a bit unnerving to me, although after a couple of outings with it I am becoming fond of it, and I do plan to get my own (a cowboy-style lever-action). Now I sort of want a bow as well--a nice, quiet pastime for the backyard, as opposed to the gun which requires going to a range. I'm already committed to the gun, though--it's on order--so the bow will have to wait until next spring. It's just as well. We're running out of closet space.

The bow will require more practice than the rifle. I am a better shot with the .22 rifle than my husband, and so far, he is better with the bow. We'll see if it stays that way. I'm competitive.

Date: 2009-04-04 14:24 Subject: Amazing things Security: Public Mood: accomplished

For those of you who haven't seen it (it's been around teh interwebs in the last three weeks) here are links to some very purple prose from an early-90s science fiction novel called "Silk and Steel." It's really, amazingly awful. The worst fanfic you've ever read is not worse than this.

Part I and Part II


In other news, I took my second round of comprehensive exams this week. The oral exam isn't until 24 April, so I won't know whether I'll be allowed to continue to PhD work until then. I am pretty confident, though. My essays and analysis are much better than last year. Also, the other person taking the exams this year is, well, not quite a dunderhead, but almost; there is definitely a brain in there, but the skull is so thick that the brain has trouble getting through. His presence will throw my superior skills into sharper relief.

Date: 2009-03-09 14:35 Subject: Bleh Security: Public Mood: stressed

British classmate just gave me a Marmite-flavored rice cake, and didn't tell me it was Marmite-flavored until after I'd bitten into it. Thankfully I have chocolate on hand to rid my mouth of the taste.

Date: 2009-01-16 14:52 Subject: Advice? Security: Public Mood: irritated

Do any of you wiser, more experienced ladies have advice on getting rid of a strange man who keeps trying to have a conversation with me?

There's a man who's been hanging out in the anteroom of the library where I study for a week now--I've seen him three times. The first time I didn't think it so weird that he struck up a conversation with me, because I sat down in the anteroom to eat my lunch and he was seated nearby. But the second time I was already there when he arrived, and just now I was only passing through on my way to the library. He knows my name because he saw it written on one of my belongings the second time he spoke to me. I don't know his. He's middle-aged. I don't know whether he is a student or faculty or staff member or what. He doesn't seem dangerous or interested in doing anything but talking to me, in fact he is polite and well-mannered except for the fact that he can't tell that I'm totally uninterested in talking to him, even today, when I said twice that I was going to study, and that I really needed to leave to study.

He seems a little...off, in that he changes subject matter really quickly, only stopping occasionally to ask me a question. (Sample of his conversation: "I used to scare my little sister when we were kids by raising my arms up over my head like a movie vampire. I had a friend in high school who later played a movie vampire. I was an air-force brat, my high school was more geared toward science and warfare than the segregated black high school nearby that was more interested in the arts. The only times those things have anything in common is in war movies or maybe science fiction. Someone once told me that to learn how to raise a little girl, you should make great works of art. So to help my little sister better, I copied 'The Girl with a Pearl Earring,' you know that one? But that didn't help because my sister is black and European art doesn't help. But our grandmother was half white and had almost your complexion and could pass for white, which you do in the South, if you can, but my mother had my skin tone and couldn't pass, and that used to make her mad.")

I don't know whether he's lonely and desperate for someone to talk to and fixated on me because I stopped to listen for a second, or whether he has some specific reason for being interested in me. He doesn't seem to talk to anyone else, that I've seen. Should I bite the bullet and just say, next time he tries to talk to me, that I'm not interested in speaking to him and he's interrupting my study time? Ignore him and walk away?

Sometimes I wish it were easier for me to be rude.

Date: 2008-11-04 21:48 Subject: First Reactions Security: Public Mood: cranky

1. Yeesh. I didn't fancy McCain, but there are things about Obama that scare me. The fact that he's charming doesn't make me feel better.

2. McCain's farewell speech was elegant. He isn't flashy like Obama, and I disagree with some of his political stances, but he did come across as being a gentleman.

3. Good grief. Did Ralph Nader really just say that? Really?

Date: 2008-10-02 18:28 Subject: People who can't be bothered to learn to spell Security: Public Mood: but also amused

...or write neatly, or not so minutely as to be nearly illegible.

Yes, I was marking exam essays today. The professor I'm working for this semester gives three exams in a semester rather than the usual two, which makes it somewhat easier for the students since they only have to remember things for six weeks rather than nine, but is more work for me.

The exam covered roughly 1870-1910. One of the essays asked students to write about Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker and Stravinsky's Petrushka. There were an enormous number of spelling errors, some of which were rather amusing. The Nutcracker premiered in the Maryinsky theater in St. Petersburg, the name of which was rendered by several students as "Mejiinsky" (apparently conflated with Nijinsky, who danced in Petrushka). One student wrote that Tchaikovsky and Stravinsky were "several stepps removed" from each other, which is amusing if inaccurate. Another student thought that Nijinsky's first name was Pietro (it was Vaslav).

My favorite was "Martius Pepita" or "Peteba" instead of Marius Petipa, the choreographer of Nutcracker. One of the students who wrote "Pepita" remembered that the last name was actually a nickname meaning "little step" (a Russianization of "Petit-pas") which makes the rendering as "Pepita" even funnier (doesn't anyone take French at school anymore?). Probably the best, though, was the identification of a picture that appeared on the exam as being an image of Petipa. I'm sure Petipa would have been much insulted, as the image was actually of Mussorgsky literally days before he died of alcoholism.

For comparison purposes, here is the elderly Petipa and here is about-to-die Mussorgsky

Date: 2008-08-15 13:30 Subject: Keeping it together Security: Public Mood: grumpy

A long post about recent family mental health issues( follows this cut. )

Date: 2008-04-08 23:26 Subject: (no subject) Security: Public Mood: annoyed

I know this isn't exactly a newsflash, but sometimes university professors just don't have a clue about how to behave like normal human beings.

I'm not sure what it says about me that this almost-universal aspect of university professorship really bothers me, but I still really want to be one of them, and it mostly bothers me because at the moment it is hindering me on my path to becoming one of them.

Date: 2008-04-04 17:39 Subject: (no subject) Security: Public Mood: weird

I bought new bookshelves less than a year ago. Several of the books I have purchased in the last year have subsequently been turned over to my husband's care and do not live in my apartment.

How is it, then, that I have more than a dozen books sitting on the floor that don't fit on the shelves?

Maybe it's time to return some of the library books I've been hoarding. It's a bad, bad thing that graduate students are allowed to check out books for a whole semester and renew them up to 10 times; theoretically I could keep library books for more than two years. I have about 25 library books at the moment, but could check out as many as 200 if I wanted to. A scary but also delightful thought.


P.S. I was examined by five professors this morning, who asked me lots of questions about music history that I couldn't answer. I came away feeling ashamed and embarrassed, wondering how I could have frittered away all my free time in the last two years watching YouTube videos and reading fanfic instead of reading useful books and journal articles about humanism and 17th century music, or systems of patronage in the Renaissance, or sexuality in 19th century lieder. Truly ashamed of myself. I have been a lazy clod. Unfortunately, like Mr. Bennett, I have no doubt I will get over it, probably sooner than I should.

Date: 2008-03-31 23:30 Subject: Your Name Meme Security: Public Mood: blah

Snagged from SouthernWitch69

1. Your rock star name (first pet, current car):

Cuddles Forester

2. Your gangsta name (fave ice cream flavour, favourite type of shoe):

Cherry Espadrille [this and the one above both sound like stripper names]

3. Your Native American name (favourite colour, favourite animal):

Red Cat

4. Your soap opera name (middle name, city where you were born):

Katherine Vallejo [in soap opera world, I'm Latina, yet still blonde and blue-eyed]

5. Your Star Wars name (the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 of your first name):

Car-Co [Sounds more like an oil-change station than a Star Wars character]

6. Superhero name (2nd favourite colour, favourite drink):

Green Tea [Superpowers: delicious and high in antioxidants!]

7. NASCAR name (the first names of your grandfathers):

Kenneth Harold [This actually sounds like a normal name]

8. Stripper name (the name of your favourite perfume/cologne/scent, favorite candy):

White Linen Scharffenberger [Practically the only one that doesn't sound like a stripper]

9. TV weather anchor name (your 5th grade teacher’s last name, a major city that starts with the same letter):

Turpin Toledo [I had a heck of a time remembering his name]

10. Spy name (your favorite season/holiday, flower):

Autumn Cyclamen [Not bad, actually]

11. Cartoon name (favorite fruit, article of clothing you’re wearing right now):

Banana Hoodie [Uh...]

12. Hippie name (What you ate for breakfast, your favorite tree): Cheerios Redwood [lol]

Date: 2008-03-27 21:05 Subject: (no subject) Security: Public Mood: pessimistic

I am very embarrassed. I spent five hours locked in someone else's office today with a musical score I'd never seen before, writing page after page describing it and singing all the choir parts softly to myself. The composer's name had been removed and part of my task was to identify the composer. I identified it as being by a composer that I wrote my undergraduate thesis on--someone I theoretically know quite a lot about.

I was wrong. It was by a composer who was born seventy years earlier, in a different country.

It's not the most horrible mistake I could have made. I didn't identify a jazz piece as being by Beethoven or anything. But this is supposed to be the period of music that I'm an expert in. Obviously I still have a long way to go.

And I still have to stand up and face a panel of my professors next Friday and explain myself. If I didn't do as well as I initially thought I had on this part, how bad is what I wrote over the last two days?

I'm fighting the temptation to think I'm stupid. I'm not stupid. I've made it this far, and dammit I'm going to finish my PhD, even if I'm the only person in living memory who ends up having to re-take the Master's exams.

Date: 2008-03-25 21:09 Subject: (no subject) Security: Public Mood: stressed

Master's exams this week. Today, tomorrow, Thursday. Wrote five essays in five hours today, with an hour break for lunch. Score identification tomorrow and score analysis on Thursday.

Head hurts.

Hand really hurts.

Need chocolate.

And maybe beer.

On second thought, not beer. Have to wait until Friday night for beer, when I have no more school (I have to go to lecture on Friday) and Mom is no longer here. Mom does not object to beer, but I want to drink more beer than Mom would approve of. Thank God for Mom, because if she were not here I probably would not have had anything to eat.

Ow. Hand hurts too much to type anymore. Must nurse delicate paw a la Shiv.

Date: 2008-02-28 15:24 Subject: From the kitchen to the bath Security: Public Mood: relaxed

I tried a vinegar rinse (apple cider vinegar mixed with water) on my hair. It's supposed to de-tangle and make your hair shiny. I think there were slightly fewer tangles, but other than that I noticed no difference.

Last night after my Irish dance class my muscles were a little sore, and a hot bath sounded just the thing. Looking for something to make it a little bit nicer than usual, I thought I would try a milk bath. I'd come across a recipe that suggested a cup of hot herbal tea and two cups of milk poured into a warm bath would smell nice and make one's skin soft. They were exactly right. I didn't wash my hair as I wasn't sure how my hair would be in milky water, but my skin felt very soft and smooth and the scent was lovely. Be careful what kind of herbal tea you use, though--some of the fruity ones will curdle milk and create a very unappealing mess. I totally recommend the milk bath--it was good enough for Cleopatra, and it's good enough for you.

Date: 2008-02-22 23:11 Subject: Natural beauty Security: Public Mood: creative

I've decided to try out some homemade skin and hair cleansers and moisturizers based on recipes I find online, both because I am curious and because my current beauty routine has become rather expensive. Also, I have sensitive skin and a lot of the scents and colors that go into manufactured beauty products irritate my skin. If you have any favorites you think I should try, let me know.

Today's thing: oatmeal-yogurt facial cleanser.
Verdict: feels very weird, smells like breakfast, and left my face feeling a bit sticky when I first washed it off. I persisted in rinsing a little while longer, though, and after I dried my face I noticed that it felt very smooth and nice. I think I'll keep looking though--it's a bit weird, and I prefer oatmeal and yogurt in my breakfast bowl rather than my shower.

Date: 2008-02-02 16:37 Subject: Simple equation Security: Public

Good Tea + Warm Muffins + P.G. Wodehouse = happy

Date: 2008-01-31 09:58 Subject: Blah Security: Public

It's already the end of the third week of school, and unbelievably, Lent begins in the middle of next week! The scary thing about the beginning of Lent is that it means I only have seven weeks until my comprehensive exams, which will be the week after Easter. Comp exams are scary. I have been biting my fingernails a lot. I think I'll be prepared, though--as long as I don't procrastinate (ha!). Probably I'll scrape by, hanging by what's left of my fingernails, like I always do.

My classes this semester are good. I'm taking a seminar on opera seria (18th Century Italian dramatic opera), which is kind of cool because a lot of the operas use mythological or semi-historical subjects. Orpheus, Dido & Aeneas, and Alexander in India are popular subjects. So is the epic poetry of Torquato Tasso, such as Gerusalemme Liberata and Aminta. Thankfully, the professor is inclined to focus on the libretti as much as on the musical settings, with digressions into social context, so it's part literature class and history class as well as being about music.
The second class is on Renaissance music. I have never heard anyone give as good and concise an explanation of the structure and importance of the Mass and the Divine Office in 15th-Century Europe as the professor for this class did. I wanted to hug her, but I restrained myself. Renaissance sacred music is definitely my thing, and it looks like there will be plenty of it this semester.

I find that being away from my husband is not quite as bad as I thought it would be. I dislike having him so far away and I miss him a lot, but I am very used to living by myself. It's wonderful when he's around, but I find that I don't mind having the apartment to myself, and I am not particularly lonely. I do miss the physical contact--hugs, kisses, foot rubs...especially the foot rubs.

My apartment is an absolute mess. It's funny that when my husband is here I keep things pretty tidy and nag him about helping me clean up, but the minute I don't have anyone else to clean up after I let things go to hell. I suppose I should at least do laundry and get rid of the packing boxes that the Christmas presents and late wedding presents came in.

Date: 2007-12-10 20:29 Subject: (no subject) Security: Public Mood: annoyed

Other T.A. has confirmed that he sent an email to the department head about our professor, and forwarded the email he sent to me. So that's likely what the dept. head wants to see me about. *sigh of relief*

But things are never peaceful for long around here. I made my dinner--fried potato-veggie pancakes--and made twice as much as I planned to eat, so I'd have something for lunch tomorrow. They were very tasty. I turned off the stove just before I went to the dining table to eat, so that the extra pancakes would finish cooking with the heat left in the pan.

After dinner I went back to the kitchen and prodded one pancake with the spatula to see if it was done...and a cockroach crawled out from underneath. I whacked him with the spatula and he flipped over, ending up absolutely coated in olive oil. Since the nasty buggers breathe through their skin, that was the end of him.

Hopefully it's the same one that my mother saw a week ago, and now that he's dead there won't be any more. I will keep the kitchen scrupulously clean just in case. I was really sad to lose my leftovers, though. The potato-veggie pancakes were really, really good, and now I have no more potatoes.