25stories

12:48 pm: Things I am excited about:
-Because I have bizarre food cravings, I have been desperate to try my hand at making CLAM CHOWDER for the past few weeks. And as our new stove had its gas turned on yesterday and I discovered that you can indeed buy clams in this town, I'm having a dinner party on Sunday! I LOVE THROWING DINNER PARTIES, it's a little bit compulsive and wonderful. On the menu currently is: clam chowder, spinach salad, cornbread (my cornbread is the best in the world) and RHUBARD PIE. I am very excited, I just love the idea of bringing together a bunch of friends I don't see often enough, and gorging ourselves and chatting and lalalala.

-Gorgeous weather and picnics and cherries

-Red grapes, fuji apples, NECTARINES

-Ok basically I'm really excited about food.

08:14 pm: Thank you Mr Cohen
The morning had not come,
Nancy was alone,
looking at the Late Late show
through a semi-precious stone.
In the House of Honesty
her father was on trial,
in the House of Mystery
there was no one at all,
there was no one at all.

It seemed so long ago,
none of us were very strong.
Ah, but Nancy wore green stockings,
and she, she slept with everyone.
She never said she'd wait for us,
even though she was alone,
I think she fell in love for us
in nineteen sixty one,
in nineteen sixty one.

And morning, would not come,
Nancy was alone,
a forty five beside her head,
an open telephone.
Yes, we told her she was beautiful,
we all told her she was free,
but none of us could meet her in
the House of Mystery,
the House of Mystery.

And now why don't you look around you,
see her everywhere,
many of you use her body,
many comb her hair.
In the hollow of the night
when you are cold and numb
you hear her talking freely then,
she's happy that you've come,
she's happy that you've come.

09:34 am: Almost summer
I woke up this morning with my first mosquito bite of the season - ON MY BOOB. Thanks little dudes.

06:07 pm: Hairy
So I have been working on this paper for what feels like forever now even though I meant to have it finished ages ago. And I have realised that basically I'm living the academic version of THE PEANUT BUTTER SOLUTION - the goddamn thing will not stop growing and it's terrifying me. Every time I go in there to just like finish footnoting or whatever, another paragraph pops out. Stop the madness.

Also in 48 hours I will be on a plane to Budapest. Yikes.

01:58 pm: Oh, England
Tidbit from a friend who was over for dinner last night, who is currently finishing up her undergrad thesis on the philosophy of suicide-

Apparently during a short period in 18th century England, the penalty for the at the time criminal act of attempted suicide was hanging.

PS - I really really really want to go into London to see this movie tomorrow night.

12:21 pm: This post is mostly for Laura
This morning I started thinking about contact dance for the first time in a few years. All of a sudden I miss it so much.

Sunday mornings in a sunny Montreal dance studio rolling around on a hardwood floor with a dozen other twisting bodies lifting each other and moving each other like it is all effortless. I feel calmer just thinking about it.

I should find out if there's a studio around here.

12:31 am: Fucked priorities?
So I got an email from my supervisor this morning, who I haven't spoken to since this fall. Which is slightly problematic as I have since totally changed my thesis topic, among other things. And he wants to meet on Wednesday.

What's more fucked is that before the OH MY GOD I NEED TO HAVE SOMETHING DECENT WRITTEN FOR HIM BY TUESDAY (so that he can read it by Wednesday) panic set in, I got really excited that I will be going to see him this week because it means I GET TO PLAY WITH HIS AWESOME ORANGE TABBY. I was like "Whee! I get to see the cat!" And then, oh yeah, PhD thesis.

But dudes, he is a really great cat.

08:07 pm: Best thing I read today:
As an act of defiance, the Sarajevo String Quartet played in the ruins of the National Library in Sarajevo throughout the war, through mortar attacks and shelling.

(I then wasted much of the afternoon trying to find a photo of this to no avail.)

07:25 pm: To do list:
--Email supervisor #1 for meeting
--Email supervisory #2 with thesis outline and mock questionnaire
--Figure out how to make supervisor #2 officially a supervisor
--Figure out how to sign up for compulsory seminar next term
--Figure out just how broke you are
--RSVP for awesome book launch for book about experiences of Palestinian children
--Read all the theory that you've been avoiding like the plague
--Groceries
--Figure out how one sets up a seminar (booking rooms, funding, getting on the lecture list)
--Figure out when you have to submit paper to transfer out of probationary status
--Figure out how to sign up for language course this summer
--Figure out what the ethics board will want out of you
--Do your freaking language lessons, seriously
--Email all the scary NGOs in Bosnia and start building contacts
--Start going to sleep earlier
--Figure out how to write a letter to your dad BEGGING him to work on his memoirs again and making him understand how important they are
--Make friends that don't ask you "why do you study something so depressing?" every day
--Stop being so ridiculously neurotic