So I'm in the Peets by my mom and dad's house, blogging. This is just not working. There are people all around me. There's this table of very fierce looking middle aged Asian Amercian ladies near me, and they keep stopping talking to look over at me, and then go back to talking while glancing significantly over at me. I don't know if they're speaking Cantonese or Mandarin, but I'm pretty sure I'm being discussed. It makes it very hard to post things around here --- as if this were a secret spy identity or something illegal or horrible instead of a slightly silly internet hobby.
I came here to upload some pictures for you since they are on the laptop and I can't connect the laptop to the internet at my parents' house --- they do not believe in wireless, so I have to go into my dad's bedroom, when he is not there or sleeping or wanting to futz around on the computer himself --- and when he is not interested in pestering me or teasing me or reading over my shoulder, which really intereres with blogging --- if I want to use the internet at home. But uploading pics at the Peets is just not working, either. And this place is crowded and I can't get a seat in a corner somewhere where people can't see my screen. So I will post my pictures and various updates and things in a little bit when I go back home and collect my cats.
Instead I am going to go shopping today!
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Sunday, December 20, 2009
Happy holidays!
Greetings from the parental units' house. I'm having troubles accessing the internet regularly, and I have a picture of my cats in jail but can't upload it on their computer, and all in all that means I probably won't be posting or commenting much til after the break. (note to self: you still have to do the syllabus for after the break, you idiot!) So, happy holidays and see you later! May all of your vacations be filled with Chex Mix. Toodles!
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Christmas Cats
So in the midst of one of the many "oh crap! I haven't gotten the Christmas gifts for everybody yet!" realizations I keep having and yet keep doing nothing about (more on that anon), I decided that I wanted to get gifts for the cats. Why they get priority gift-getting over my brother and other remaining family members, I don't know, but I digress.
You might remember that my cats had collars on the blog at one point, or in blogpics, and now do not. That was because Timido scratched his into a mess (he's an itchy little cat) and Loquito kept getting the metal tag and ring caught on the carpet when he rolled around and then the whole collar would pop off. So I think I want to splurge and buy them new collars.
Obviously this won't help when I drop them off at the cat kennel later this week --- they get mad at the idea of unlabeled cats and tape some masking tape around their necks with their names markered on them (which I find kinda ghetto but hey, we are poor ghetto types these days) --- but I figure they need nice little collars and labels for the next time the state catches on fire, or floods, or mudslides, or whatever comes next, and someone finds them and tries to return them to me. So. Collars it is. And maybe some new catnip mice because the collars are not actually much fun for cats.
Anyway, collars. They say ("they" being the mysterious pet ownership gurus who are masters of guilt and anxiety production) that cats need "safety" collars or "breakaway" collars, not the leather rolled collars that dogs have, cause they could get caught on something and choke to death. Those little breakaway collars with the plastic buckle, however, won't hold my cats for more than a minute; one scratch with a hind foot and it flies off. So does anyone have some leads for a 1) non-choking 2) cat-sized 3) non-escapable cat collar that either has a tag built in or can have tags hung from it?
The cats would be much obliged.
(here, have a blurry cat photo in recompense.)
You might remember that my cats had collars on the blog at one point, or in blogpics, and now do not. That was because Timido scratched his into a mess (he's an itchy little cat) and Loquito kept getting the metal tag and ring caught on the carpet when he rolled around and then the whole collar would pop off. So I think I want to splurge and buy them new collars.
Obviously this won't help when I drop them off at the cat kennel later this week --- they get mad at the idea of unlabeled cats and tape some masking tape around their necks with their names markered on them (which I find kinda ghetto but hey, we are poor ghetto types these days) --- but I figure they need nice little collars and labels for the next time the state catches on fire, or floods, or mudslides, or whatever comes next, and someone finds them and tries to return them to me. So. Collars it is. And maybe some new catnip mice because the collars are not actually much fun for cats.
Anyway, collars. They say ("they" being the mysterious pet ownership gurus who are masters of guilt and anxiety production) that cats need "safety" collars or "breakaway" collars, not the leather rolled collars that dogs have, cause they could get caught on something and choke to death. Those little breakaway collars with the plastic buckle, however, won't hold my cats for more than a minute; one scratch with a hind foot and it flies off. So does anyone have some leads for a 1) non-choking 2) cat-sized 3) non-escapable cat collar that either has a tag built in or can have tags hung from it?
The cats would be much obliged.
(here, have a blurry cat photo in recompense.)Sunday, December 13, 2009
A Sign from the Beyond
Why, oh why, does Dissertation Buddy get the fortune cookie that reads "you will be successful in your career"? Waaah! I don't care if I have the silent support of friends and loved ones! Why can't I get the career and the academic success, oh Fortune Cookie of Doom?
Yes, I'd like a large order of meaningless superstition with a steaming side of self pity, please. Your lucky numbers are 8, 14, 6, and 67.
Yes, I'd like a large order of meaningless superstition with a steaming side of self pity, please. Your lucky numbers are 8, 14, 6, and 67.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Whoooah you're bringin me down / Pick it up, pick it up, pick it up, pick it up!
This is my new theme song. Very ass-kicking.
"Over time you can kill me, but I'll resurrect, so NANANANANA"
Not quite as awesome as the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, but she's got a nice growl on her there. (studio version here for better sound.)
What's interesting is how happy and smiling she is on the live performances on youtube, not at all performing a persona of a bad-ass or rock-n-roller or art school band or anything, just smiling and pointing at the audience and digging on their energy. She's the anti-Karen O in that respect.
Dedicated to everyone else who's suffering on the job market and has begun to think it has something to do with their work or themselves sucking. Oh no. You rock, my friends. You really do.
"Over time you can kill me, but I'll resurrect, so NANANANANA"
Not quite as awesome as the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, but she's got a nice growl on her there. (studio version here for better sound.)
What's interesting is how happy and smiling she is on the live performances on youtube, not at all performing a persona of a bad-ass or rock-n-roller or art school band or anything, just smiling and pointing at the audience and digging on their energy. She's the anti-Karen O in that respect.
Dedicated to everyone else who's suffering on the job market and has begun to think it has something to do with their work or themselves sucking. Oh no. You rock, my friends. You really do.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Academia and the Rule of Four
I've always liked 4 as a nice number to explain academia. It takes 4 years to go through undergrad (we are thinking through all this at the neat and tidy theoretical level here) and it took me 8 years to go through grad school, which made for a nice explanation that it was twice as hard as undergrad and therefore should take twice as long.
And I've also been thinking lately that 4 makes a nice limit for the academic job search. This is my fourth year on the market and I have had so little interest from search committees all those years that I might as well have not applied. Except for all that lost time, expense, and heartache, plus all the time spent in grad student/unemployed limbo while people I knew had steady jobs where they moved up their career ladder and put money away for retirement.
Besides, when you put it into the rule of 4 and realize you have been searching for a professor job as long as it takes undergrads (theoretically) to get a degree, you start to realize that's a significant chunk of time you have put your life completely on hold.
Now, I'm not totally out of the running yet --- there are a lot of places (especially the women's studies jobs; nobody knows what is going on with them on the wiki) that have not made any decisions, according to the wiki, but then again there are a lot of places that called for writing samples and I didn't get any emails from them, so I've put a little star next to them in my spreadsheet preliminary to writing them off. I have a lot of stars already. And about 5 rejections. Although I haven't been rejected from any of those postdocs yet, even though the wiki says that quite a few have sent out a first round. So I still have hope, but considering my (now sizeable) previous track record I am doubtful that anything will happen between now and christmas besides me waiting and worrying.
And it feels weird to be reading introductions and taking notes and looking at peoples' book proposals when I might be dropping the entire project very soon, but I might as well keep working on something right now. Sitting around doing absolutely nothing feels wasteful.
Unlike the rest of my family, my sister has been wonderfully supportive all summer and fall, listening to my complaints and making sure I call the fam and have some human contact semi-regularly, and when at thanksgiving I happened to say how I felt I had gotten nothing done over fall quarter she jumped in right away with "but you've been working so hard!" and then listed off a big pile of things, which not only cheered me up but I'm sure it averted another fight with my parents.
Last spring I told her my multi-step plan, which involved revising and publishing and doing things and then doing one last year on the market, and she thought that was a great idea. And when I've been calling and talking to her lately, she has been pushing that reminder on me very hard, cutting off my slightest musings that I could do x or y to try another year's run at the market with the statement that I just need to cut the ties and get out.
Sigh. She's probably right. And I'm going to need all her willpower to bolster mine in order to do this.
So I've been poking about a bit looking at jobs --- she suggested something called a "corporate trainer," since I have teaching experience and that might be the easiest way to transition into the business world (to make my cv recognizable to them, I mean) --- and trying to figure out who and where is hiring near my family, since if I'm going to take some crappy hr or business job doing stuff I don't like and just focusing on supporting myself, I'm not moving to fucking podunkville middle America. No big full-bore push as yet, and I haven't made up my mind about another community college job run first (if there are any job openings in the CA ccs this year, which is doubtful), but I'm starting the process. I'm in this weird place where I have a million different forking paths and each one has a heavy to-do list on it, but I don't know which tasks I'm going to have to start working on because I don't know which of the paths will be mine.
So if you're on a search committee and want to give a cog a job, give me a call already! My heart does not thrill to the thought of checking product specifications for comma splices for the rest of my life.
And I've also been thinking lately that 4 makes a nice limit for the academic job search. This is my fourth year on the market and I have had so little interest from search committees all those years that I might as well have not applied. Except for all that lost time, expense, and heartache, plus all the time spent in grad student/unemployed limbo while people I knew had steady jobs where they moved up their career ladder and put money away for retirement.
Besides, when you put it into the rule of 4 and realize you have been searching for a professor job as long as it takes undergrads (theoretically) to get a degree, you start to realize that's a significant chunk of time you have put your life completely on hold.
Now, I'm not totally out of the running yet --- there are a lot of places (especially the women's studies jobs; nobody knows what is going on with them on the wiki) that have not made any decisions, according to the wiki, but then again there are a lot of places that called for writing samples and I didn't get any emails from them, so I've put a little star next to them in my spreadsheet preliminary to writing them off. I have a lot of stars already. And about 5 rejections. Although I haven't been rejected from any of those postdocs yet, even though the wiki says that quite a few have sent out a first round. So I still have hope, but considering my (now sizeable) previous track record I am doubtful that anything will happen between now and christmas besides me waiting and worrying.
And it feels weird to be reading introductions and taking notes and looking at peoples' book proposals when I might be dropping the entire project very soon, but I might as well keep working on something right now. Sitting around doing absolutely nothing feels wasteful.
Unlike the rest of my family, my sister has been wonderfully supportive all summer and fall, listening to my complaints and making sure I call the fam and have some human contact semi-regularly, and when at thanksgiving I happened to say how I felt I had gotten nothing done over fall quarter she jumped in right away with "but you've been working so hard!" and then listed off a big pile of things, which not only cheered me up but I'm sure it averted another fight with my parents.
Last spring I told her my multi-step plan, which involved revising and publishing and doing things and then doing one last year on the market, and she thought that was a great idea. And when I've been calling and talking to her lately, she has been pushing that reminder on me very hard, cutting off my slightest musings that I could do x or y to try another year's run at the market with the statement that I just need to cut the ties and get out.
Sigh. She's probably right. And I'm going to need all her willpower to bolster mine in order to do this.
So I've been poking about a bit looking at jobs --- she suggested something called a "corporate trainer," since I have teaching experience and that might be the easiest way to transition into the business world (to make my cv recognizable to them, I mean) --- and trying to figure out who and where is hiring near my family, since if I'm going to take some crappy hr or business job doing stuff I don't like and just focusing on supporting myself, I'm not moving to fucking podunkville middle America. No big full-bore push as yet, and I haven't made up my mind about another community college job run first (if there are any job openings in the CA ccs this year, which is doubtful), but I'm starting the process. I'm in this weird place where I have a million different forking paths and each one has a heavy to-do list on it, but I don't know which tasks I'm going to have to start working on because I don't know which of the paths will be mine.
So if you're on a search committee and want to give a cog a job, give me a call already! My heart does not thrill to the thought of checking product specifications for comma splices for the rest of my life.
Monday, December 7, 2009
Still sitting around waiting
Why do my ankles/shins hurt? Is it the stress of too much sitting, like I am that out of shape? Is it the abrupt change in weather? I do not know. But they hurt and are annoying. And I'm cold.
I am in the middle of an unproductive slump, but I went back and looked at my posts and diary stuff from the last few years and noticed that I have a slump, with ups and downs, every December. This year is just a little bit earlier, and I think that's because I am less busy by virtue of being unemployed. I have academic stuff to do, but most of it doesn't have to get done by any particular date (except those damn recalled library books rrrr!), so it is extra extra hard to make myself do it.
My cat insisted on sleeping on me all afternoon. It was very cute. It was way less cute when they both played soccer on my head all night; I certainly didn't get much sleep that's for sure. I could blame my lack of work or even reading productivity on that, except I slept extra long the night before and didn't really do much yesterday either. Sigh.
Really, I stick around here every year so that I'll have an extra week or so to "really get my work done" before visiting family, and then don't do any, and basically spend every December sitting around being depressed waiting for it to be over so that I can know one way or another about my job search, just sitting waiting for the time to pass while I get another year older and closer to death and my eventual reliance on the productive citizenry of society to support my aging carcass. Gah!
I would toss the to-do list to the winds and just do something pleasurable to pass the time, really make it a break, except that a) there's nothing around here I really want to do and b) no money to spend. I feel like going into genuine hibernation, bear-style, but that seems kindof a waste as well. I dunno. I'll find some way to pass the time or climb out of this funk. Sigh.
And you people are not helping either, with your dearth of posts and funny stories on your blogs! Why do you not entertain me and find me funny games to play on the internet! Or bring me snacks (I've had more than enough hot chocolate today, for warmth, to undo all my progress losing weight the past month.)
And worst of all, I reread stuff like this and think, ohno, am I turning into the Vortex of Negativity I wrote about earlier? Will I need to start censoring this from the blog too? Sigh. My life is so dull as it is that if this doesn't function as my id and space for ranting I won't have anything to post on it at all.
Distract me, people! Take me out of my head. It's not a very nice place to be right now.
I am in the middle of an unproductive slump, but I went back and looked at my posts and diary stuff from the last few years and noticed that I have a slump, with ups and downs, every December. This year is just a little bit earlier, and I think that's because I am less busy by virtue of being unemployed. I have academic stuff to do, but most of it doesn't have to get done by any particular date (except those damn recalled library books rrrr!), so it is extra extra hard to make myself do it.
My cat insisted on sleeping on me all afternoon. It was very cute. It was way less cute when they both played soccer on my head all night; I certainly didn't get much sleep that's for sure. I could blame my lack of work or even reading productivity on that, except I slept extra long the night before and didn't really do much yesterday either. Sigh.
Really, I stick around here every year so that I'll have an extra week or so to "really get my work done" before visiting family, and then don't do any, and basically spend every December sitting around being depressed waiting for it to be over so that I can know one way or another about my job search, just sitting waiting for the time to pass while I get another year older and closer to death and my eventual reliance on the productive citizenry of society to support my aging carcass. Gah!
I would toss the to-do list to the winds and just do something pleasurable to pass the time, really make it a break, except that a) there's nothing around here I really want to do and b) no money to spend. I feel like going into genuine hibernation, bear-style, but that seems kindof a waste as well. I dunno. I'll find some way to pass the time or climb out of this funk. Sigh.
And you people are not helping either, with your dearth of posts and funny stories on your blogs! Why do you not entertain me and find me funny games to play on the internet! Or bring me snacks (I've had more than enough hot chocolate today, for warmth, to undo all my progress losing weight the past month.)
And worst of all, I reread stuff like this and think, ohno, am I turning into the Vortex of Negativity I wrote about earlier? Will I need to start censoring this from the blog too? Sigh. My life is so dull as it is that if this doesn't function as my id and space for ranting I won't have anything to post on it at all.
Distract me, people! Take me out of my head. It's not a very nice place to be right now.
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