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March 29, 2007
spring morning sampler
Yoga last night was *lovely*. It may be because I missed last week's class, or because I spent yesterday from 930 to 530 talking through research papers with students and my body thought it would have to remain in that hunched over position forever. But I felt amazing when class was over, and I still feel this wonderful looseness and lightness even now. I'm looking forward to my first Bikram class this weekend, which I'm taking at H's dance studio.
Lance's post on being a generous audience. Indeed, there has been a flurry (or fury?) of posts about the best way to present during a conference, and Lance's post struck me as grounding: this may not be a debate we can ever come to a consensus on, and it seems like as presenters we can do what we think will work best. But it also seems that as audiences we can try our best as well. It reminds me of Anne's theory of generous audience (for which I have no citation right now, but I remember her talking about it during a talk she did here last year).
The sun is shining, and my curtains are open.
The Departed came from Netflix yesterday. We splurged and watched it on a weeknight, and we weren't disappointed. I'd heard mixed reviews of this film, and I knew that it was going to be gory. I expected the dropped accents, too, especially by Nicholson (who, I'll say, really has only one character left in him any more: old, lascivious, and under-the-influence-with-a-mean-streak scary dude). But I did not expect to fall in love with Leonardo DiCaprio('s character) the way I did. I might actually have to watch it once more before we send it back, just to make sure I didn't miss any of the twists.
We (D and I) are registered for the Buffalo Marathon. We have a hotel reservation. I will miss my runningburro, though, as she has opted out of Buffalo this year since it was pretty cruel to her last year. (I'd argue it was cruel-er to me.)
I'm working up the gumption to clean the house, which is so taken over by goldfish crumbs, balls of cat fur, laundry and duplos that I don't even know where to begin. It's so bad that I can't
*It helps to have different colors.
Posted by mryonker at 08:02 AM | Comments (1)
March 27, 2007
for abby: find a boss
Before I left for Cs, I got a rather frantic email from Abby, a PhD student who is stagnated in her program, unable to take the first bite out of that elephant:
I am so afraid or unwilling to get started and I don't totally understand why. I try to break it into do-able pieces. Like I tell myself, today I am going to do an outline for the intro section. or today I am going to list the articles I know I have for my lit review... How did you get over the getting started hump? Do you have any advice?
The problem is here is that it's clear Abby already knows the answer to her own question. That is, the advice I have, the advice that was given to me, is to make big nouns and tasks into small verbs: make an outline, make a list.
Although as I go back through her email, I think what she needs to do is to start WRITING. That is, if the outlining and listing is not making forward motion, than she simply needs to force the motion by making herself sit down a write a paragraph. Just one paragraph.
Something that I did not learn (about myself, or about writing) until *very* recently is that it is enormously difficult to do something if there is no "presence" to be responsible to concerning that writing task. When I was preparing for my exams, I had a moment where my chair essentially sat me down in his office and didn't let me leave until I'd revised it. Actually, he was much kinder than that, giving me time and space to work that freed me from negotiating countless distractions. However, there was one distraction: him sitting in the office with me, being a presence that I was accountable to.
Abby, I would try to construct some kind of accountability structure. What we sometimes need is someone standing over us, waiting for the thing we're doing to be done.
Some of us don't need much external structure and discipline--and those of us who are like that can thrive once finished with coursework in the world of exam-taking and diss-writing. Those same people among us will get up every day and run without the pressing responsibility of having someone WAITING for us at the end of our driveways, too.
This person is not me. I do have self-discipline, but it comes in fits and starts, and sometimes the multiple (and important) draws on my time and attention make it easy for me to procrastinate. I have a whole menu of choices when it comes to excuses for not getting stuff done.
This may or may not be Abby's case, but in my case, the fix for getting started was to be frank with my advisors about how I worked best with external pressure. That is, my advisors know I need deadlines, and meetings, and goals. They set them for me. And while I knew at the back of my mind that the deadlines and goals were imaginary, to an extent (because often I did have to push them back or change them), they were also real enough that I could write them on the calendar in the kitchen and the other people in my house could see them.
I talk in the past tense here about my exam process (which I believe Abby is still working through), but it translates into pretty much any project. I'm using this strategy right now for my dissertation. Find someone who will boss you around some--make your advisors schedule you some deadlines. This seems simple but for me it really was the answer. And in setting deadlines with your advisor, you'll necessarily break your large noun (dissertation) into small verbs (write one page [paragraph, sentence] of the lit review).
Posted by mryonker at 03:14 PM | Comments (3)
March 25, 2007
jiggety jig
I have returned from NYC in fine, if overstuffed, shape.
I "ate my face off," as the beloved running partner would say, the highlight being an amazing dinner marathon at McCormick and Schmick's, where I was pretty much sure I'd died and gone to seafood heaven.
And because I was too busy eating the whole time, I managed to break my running streak in heinous fashion, skipping all three days I was away.
The trip was totally worth it.
Posted by mryonker at 09:11 AM | Comments (1)
March 21, 2007
mama's takin' us to the zoo
Well, in this case, "mama" is my good friend C, and the "zoo" is NYC for 4Cs, the hugest composition conference evar.
It's been a while since I've been to the big city. Nearly 10 years. Let's hope it is kind to us. I plan to eat a lot of good food.
Catch y'all on the flip.
Posted by mryonker at 06:06 AM | Comments (3)
March 17, 2007
this made my day (worse and better)
Today was the last day of the show. :( But I still laughed out loud when he threw up scrabble tiles onto the board, because this is EXACTLY how I play.
Little J and I will miss you, Ze.
Posted by mryonker at 07:40 PM | Comments (1)
shitty shamrock
Is my foul mood coming across properly in that title? Good.
On a quick break from writing, I'm trying to assuage my weather-related depression (blizzard--yuk) with a some creative iTunes playlisting.
Mexico (James Taylor)
Carolina In My Mind (JT)
California (Joni Mitchell)
Get out the Map (Indigo Girls)
Southland in the Springtime (IG)
Oceano (Josh Groban)
We Will Be Burning (Sean Paul)
Happiness (The Weepies)
Long Way (Antje Duvekot)
Paradise Cafe (Arc Angels)
Sail Away (David Gray)
Lubbock or Leave It (Dixie Chicks)
And then I give up, and start finding those that *really* reflect my crankiness.
Sullen Girl (Fiona Apple)
Creeping Death (Metallica)
Bad Mood (The Murmurs)
And then I realize I'm stalling. And that what I really need is a bag of Doritos. Because they're orange like the sun.
Posted by mryonker at 12:24 PM | Comments (4)
March 13, 2007
the luck. it runneth out.
aerobil posts today about what she's finished since the break began.
What exactly have I done? Stayed home yesterday with a "sick" child (H complained of a stomach and head aches all day). Today, I drove little J to preschool and then proceded to be stranded because the truck would not start. Again.
I walked home. Called B and explained the non-starting status and behavior. He gave me some suggestions to try to get it going and so I walked back to the preschool to try again. And *sigh* no dice. So I walked home again, plopped myself in front of the TV and watched The View and ate liverwurst and crackers for a half hour. Walked back to get little J. Rolled the truck out of the parking lot so the teacher I'd parked in would be able to get out. Tried not to care about the other parents watching me leave the truck and walk down the street.
And I'm home again. Jiggity-effin'-jig.
But hey. The weather's nice. I guess.
Posted by mryonker at 12:07 PM | Comments (3)
March 12, 2007
mismatch
Last Saturday was the 2nd annual Tipperary Hill 4 miler. I didn't run it because Saturday was also Big J's last hockey game of the season.
Here is a pic of my Deb, crossing the finish line in a green feather boa.
Here are her results:
314 (overall place)
33:49 (net time)
8:28 (avg per mile)
She is my hero. I don't think I could run an 8:30 mile ONCE, let alone four times over.
This brings me to another salient point: D and I are completely wrong as training partners. Not only does she have specific goals about finishing races (ie, now she wants to beat Kristen Armstrong in our next marathon), but she can ACHIEVE them. Me, my goals are 1) keeping healthy and 2) not collapsing at any finish lines. And so I get very nervous when she talks about training and etc because soon she will be so far beyond my own abilities that it will be silly for us to run together, except so that I can chase her and that she can go for an easy run once in a while.
Runners out there: any advice about mismatched running partners? How bad is it that she continues to run my 11:00-minute miles week in and week out?
Posted by mryonker at 03:25 PM | Comments (1)
March 11, 2007
great green
So, my push for a vegetarian week was easily thwarted last night. B and I every-so-unoften bribe the neighbor girl with cash to watch the monster children in my house so we can sneak off and eat a non-kid meal.
Last night we treated ourselves to a local eatery that we have not yet tried in our 5 years living in the north country, and after our meal we wanted to kick ourselves for not having stopped in sooner.
Not only did B order a prime rib, which I *had* to sample, I decided that my usual Italian favorite, eggplant parmesan, was not a special enough dish for our date night, so I ordered seafood pasta with garlic and olive oil.
O. my. god. So. good.
At any rate, this morning I realized I heinously compromised my vegetarianism, so I decided to throw together a split pea. I don't normally call it soup because, as with the dal, I really prefer it thicker than any soup or stew normally is. Split pea the way I know it is flavored with ham, hence the total break in my attempted abstention from flesh.
1lb split peas
1lb ham steak cubed (or more if you want more meat)
1lb carrots chopped (I really like the sweetness carrots lend, so I use a lot)
1 onion diced
celery salt
pepper
1 Tbsp Bragg's
[clean and sort the peas if you want--sometimes I'm too impatient]
Boil the peas in 2 quarts of water for 15 minutes, and then take them from the heat and let them sit, covered, while you prep the vegetables and meat. Crank the heat back up to medium and throw all the other stuff in and cook it down until the peas are mush and the ham is fall-y apart-y. If you want your carrots intact when all is said and done, wait to put them in until the peas are cooked, and then simmer it for another half hour or so.
Pretty easy. I end up cooking mine for about an hour and a half or so, and I do have to baby sit it a little bit to make sure the pea mush doesn't settle into a thick sticky swamp on the bottom of the pan.
Posted by mryonker at 05:17 PM | Comments (1)
March 10, 2007
masoor dal
I'm kicking off a vegetarian eating week. Yesterday I made a pot of masoor dal. As per my usual habit, I spent a good bit of time on the internets looking at possible recipes, trying to find one that included ingredients that I had on hand. Then, with an *idea* in my head of what the dish needed and how it might be cooked, I ambled into my kitchen and started throwing ingredients at my stovetop.
It turned out pretty good.
2 C masoor (red) lentils
2 small onions diced
1 head (6-7 cloves) of garlic pressed
Tb olive oil
heaping tsp garam masala
heaping tsp tumeric
heaping tsp ground ginger
shake of red pepper flakes
can of diced tomato
Rinse the lentils and then boil in 1 quart of water for 15 minutes. Add garam masala, tumeric, and ginger and continue simmering on medium-low. Saute the onions and garlic in the oil until soft, and then add the pepper flakes and the (drained) tomato and cook for a few minutes. Then dump the onion-tomato mix into the lentil mush and continue to cook down, until it gets as thick as you want it. I prefer it thick, so I cooked it down for another 1/2 hour or so.
Especially good with a dollop of plain yogurt. I was sad, though, that the dal did not stay the pretty pink-orange color of the red lentils.
Posted by mryonker at 07:48 AM | Comments (2)
March 09, 2007
some up catch
Wow, I guess it's been a good while since I've posted here. The shit (and not-shit) that has gone down since I've updated last:
1. The break down of two of our cars on the SAME DAY. Last Tuesday, we lost the transmission in the Camry and then subsequently had some important heater hose burst in the Montero (said hose compromise is apparently symptomatic of something else that needs fixing). That leaves us with the Civic, pushing 200K miles and in desperate need of a muffler (and a tranny itself soon). In any other universe, I'd be appalled that we have two drivers in the house and own 4 cars (the 4th is T100 awaiting a transplant engine, ie B's resident "project"...um, note the irony of us having a "project" vehicle), but right now I'm understanding B's "extra car theory." That is, we're too poor to own sufficiently reliable cars; therefore, we own a couple "extras." At any rate, being down to one car has put a cramp in our schedules--a cramp that will be temporarily relieved since this week I essentially don't need one. And a big shout-out to D for lending me her trusty Tracker on Wednesday! Howdy good neighbor!
2. The running streak is still going. I've lost count which day we're on, but we've managed to run in the most disgusting weather. Mostly disgusting because our snot freezes in our nostrils and when I get back my thighs look first like two slabs of raw roast beef--and as they thaw these ghastly purple splotches emerge. The first time it happened I though I was disfigured for good, but it went away, and it went away this morning (when we ran it was -6 air temp). We're in week 6 of the Buffalo schedule, and have already knocked out a 15 miler (last week). I'm feeling especially strong, and I think it's mostly because I'm also being dilligent about a regular yoga practice. It would be nice if I could try to do something with my diet, though. I thought briefly about attempting a modified South Beach thing, just to try to cut out some sugar and flour, and then I promptly ate a huge bowl of granola and had a BAGEL ON THE SIDE. And then a Kit Kat (which little J calls "Kitty Kats," which I find adorable).
3. I received a tentative "go-ahead" on the prospectus. This means I have to start actually working on the research--which I have been doing for a while, but only in half-hearted fits and starts. I need to get set up with some kind of proper organizing system--and I hate to say it but I may actually end up doing a lot of printing to read and code. I'm going to renew my commitment to zerodraft, probably by posting later today about Web 3.0.
4. And for the enjoyment of those of you who actually made it to the end of this long, boring post, a quick dialogue from my office yesterday:
Big J: Moooo-om! H deleted all my email!
H: No, I only did what you told me to do! I clicked on the ar-chive link! [pronounced: AR + the herb] Moooo-om! What does ar-chive mean??
Me: ...
Big J [exasperated]: Ar-chive means DELETE in SPANISH!!
Posted by mryonker at 04:36 PM | Comments (1)