Tidbits

Just random stuff:

1. State of the Union: I love listening to Obama but I still think I want to set the House and Senate on fire (I'm into burning things I don't like apparently). I found it fascinating that the Republicans are so adamant about being against Obama that they sat on their hands as he announced no new taxes, tax cuts, spending freezes, and stimulus money for small businesses. Aren't they supposed to be the small-business-don't-spend-a-dime fiscal conservatives?

2. iPad. iPon? I love gadgets and I can't get into this thing. It's basically a big ipod touch - but too heavy to cart around in your pocket/purse for tunes on the go and too small and w/o the capability to edit and type documents. Why do you need a big ipod touch?

3. Had dinner with close friends last night during which I remember him saying "you should blog about this!" But a bottle of wine later I can't for the life of me remember what "this" was. Good bye dear brain cells, I'll miss you.

4. J. D. Salinger died today. My first thought was, he was still alive? I have to admit I never liked Catcher in the Rye, I think I read it when I was too young.

5. I got to wear my green sweater today! Modeled from the office I'm using for the quarter. The button is still wonky and will be replaced, but otherwise I call it a success:

Sun!

I'm not sure if I feel better b/c the sun is up, or I started to feel better and the sun just happened to be up today. Either way, I'd be happy to have it stick around for a while. It can stay cold, I don't mind cold, or even cloudy - but a break from the rain is nice. Man, are my SoCal roots showing or what? If this blog ever becomes a primary source for someone's research they're going to think I'm completely bi-ploar with seasonal depression syndrome, or whatever its called.

The library agreed to knock $60 off my bill - yay! only $180 now! Should have just bought the books in the first place - but I'm still working on how to get the damn thing paid and my account unfrozen. For the rest of the week I'm not going to worry about it. Just going to do the TA thing, use what i have for my diss day tomorrow, and then get myself back up to Tahoe for more skiing this weekend. While there I'm finally going to try these Black Bean Brownies. Tonight some serious decompression is happening over eats and cheap wine.

Good quote from lecture today: "Henry of Navarre changed his religion about as many times as most people in those days changed their underware." (twice)

Finally, a knitting update: Mittens are going slowly but nicely, I c/o Vivian in a bright blue Cascade 220, and I"m working on a neckwarmer for L (Berroco comfort in Navy and the rest of the Misti Alpaca I used to make his scarf). I am now happily a two trick knitting pony: I can knit English and Continental. I'm slower and looser in Continental, but picking up speed. More importantly, my writs love me for the change. Pics soon, wearing Tempting today.

Under a Storm Cloud

It's still dumping here in SC but really the point is that I'm in a bad mood. It started yesterday and I just can't seem to shake it. Part of it is that I hate the rain - I hate not being able to walk around w/o getting wet and I hate not being able to go outside for sunshine, fresh air, and a long run. But it's more than that: sometimes (and seemingly more often than not) I hate being a humanities grad student at this university because of the joke of a library we're stuck with. To begin with I'm being charged $240 for books I returned but the library claims I didn't. Now, 2 of those I returned after my QE back in May of 2008, the third I brought in person to the return window and is listed as "not checked out" on the library website. But they haven't processed the return and can only remove the charges after I submit an appeals form - which I did, weeks ago. But somehow, my forms got lost. Just like my requests in email, hardcopy, and in person, for the library to search their stores to find the books I swear to fucking god they lost - got lost. And now, even though I've appealed all of them ON TIME, because the library didn't process my appeals ON TIME (if they don't get the wheels in motion on time, even though I submitted appeals back in December, somehow I'm responsible), I getting sent to collections. They've told me that when the find the book, process the appeal, and then get back to me, they should be able to reimburse me the money. Should.

Now, this wouldn't be so much of a problem if we had a decent, normally stocked library. I'd be able to go to said decent, normally stocked library and use the books there. But because Borders actually rivals our library's "collections" the majority of the books I need are either at "real" UCs like UCLA or UCB, or in our Norther CA Regional Storage Facility. Because, you know, libraries aren't storage facilities for books, so we need to have this off-site facility. And, because everything is not here, I need to request it. Which I can't do. Because my goddamn account is frozen because the library is taking their sweet ass time process my appeals. I'd really LIKE to be able to write and work on my dissertation but I feel like UCSC makes it as hard as possible to actually do so. I wish I had just bought the damn books in the first place.

On top of that, Recreation/OPERS have charged me for an extra dance class and I'm having to appeal with them too.

There isn't one particular thing that has me pissed off, the whole situation has me pissed off, but what really gets my goat is that I came back here from London feeling very positive and upbeat and I feel like I'm getting seriously bogged down. It's all bad news from the department, from billing, from the library, all the time. I'm tired of it, really, really tired of it. And it's hard to keep yourself going when I feel like I'm dealing with all this bullshit for job training in a profession I likely won't even be able to work in b/c there are no jobs. It's weeks like these (and yeah, it is only 9:52 on Tuesday) that make me wish I had applied for the admin position in my dept that just opened. I'd have a pay check, set achievable goals, and maybe even some spare time to dick off on the interwebs.

So if you see me and I'm grumpy, I apologize in advance. Here's hoping that at least the rain will move on soon and improve that part of my mood.

Section

You know that feeling when you rock section? When you're really prepared, and the students are really engaged, and they've all (some) read, and you're totally on top of it? And you feel great?

You also know those days when you think you're prepared and you have all your notes but you get into class and they may have been written in Swahili for as far as it matters b/c they make no sense, you've lost you internal logic, but you're still talking about something that doesn't even make sense as you hear yourself say it but you still - can't - stop- talking? So you talk faster and faster and the next thing you know you're talking about Calvinists and giving the middle finger to the Catholic Church and you're only 20 minutes in and oh god, why are they all looking at me and why can't I shut up?

...it all worked so well in my head... it all worked so well on Wednesday...

Two of my biggest frustrations are trying to figure out how to teach what is so ingrained in me that I do it instinctively: reading primary source and reading secondary sources. I think this is all the more difficult with the reading-dump that students get assigned here, and in part more difficult b/c I'm looking at this stuff for the first time - but for some reason I can't seem to go through with a class of 25 what I am able to do on my own, or teach someone to do one on one. I have a hard time remembering a time when I didn't know how to read, when I didn't know how to ask questions, hell, when I didn't even know which questions to ask. One on one, np - the dialogue is what works. one on 25 (sounds dirty, no?), a mess. a horrible mess.

At some point I need to really put together a "How to read a primary source" and "how to read a secondary source" and just focus on doing one, and then focus on doing the other. What I'm doing now is trying to discuss major issues raised in the readings (which in these classes are the who/what/when/where/why/huh? stuff) and through that bring in how to do the history stuff. I'm basically combining discussing the content with the basics of how to the reading/writing/analyzing stuff - and it's not working. I guess this is the same struggle my dept faces: do we teach students the methodology or assume they know the methodology and focus on the content? When I focus on the content (which is also what the prof does), I find that the methodology is sorely lacking. When I try to focus on the methodology, I find the context is so lacking that the methodology doesn't make much sense.

Ok, enough, I'm boring myself with this post and giving you a sad glimpse into what my section-addled brain was like.

Victory - and nothing had to be set on fire!

I finished my green alpaca cursed-yarn sweater! And no I don't have pics, but I will. After some fancy needle work when I attached a button band, I was able to salvage the damn thing. And it fits! Yay me! And special thanks to Beetlegirl who has had to watch me knit, undo, knit, undo, init, curse, stomp on, yell at, among other things with this yarn over the last 3 years. Without her support it would have been at goodwill by now.

This past weekend L and I turned our storm-fueled frowns upside down when we realized that never-ending-rain in SC means, freakin' amazing snow in Tahoe. We had a place to crash, found $50 lift tickets and skied all day on Sunday. I'm still getting my snow legs back, but it was good to be out of SC and into nature for a while.

The diss is coming along, I'm learning that I really enjoy the history of the Dutch Republic for my TA assignment, and that the CA budget crisis wants me want to gauge my eyeballs out with spoons. Maybe it makes me want to gauge the UC Admin/State government's eyeballs out with spoons... and after watching the recent Supreme Court decision re corporate campaign contributions, the loss of the senate seat in MA, and the heath care debacle... maybe I want to gauge everyone's eyeballs out with spoons. But the TA situation, the Diss, and the sweater all went well this week so I'll stay away from the spoons and get back to work.

I. Hate. [Nor Cal] Rain

It's storming again - which means we've lost power at home twice and the Humanities half of campus lost all power and cell service around 4 yesterday afternoon. You see, when it rains here it doesn't just rain. It dumps. Like monsoon season with slightly less powerful winds. I don't mind rain when it doesn't get too much in the way of your daily life, but once it starts raining here you can pretty much accept to be soggy and miserable even if you just step outside to get the mail. My pants are always wet, I'm always cold and my hair looks like hell. Straight, straight hair with bangs is no good in the rain.

I'm trying to plug away at diss writing but it's slow - I always interrupt myself or let others interrupt me. In non=diss news the green yarn that was the sweater from hell almost killed me (again!) yesterday. It's being knit into a cardigan that grew to oddly shaped proportions while blocking, sending me into a OMG I'M GOING TO SET YOU ON FIRE frenzy. Fortunately I put away the matches and Luke took away the gasoline and I carried on with the button band/collar shaping. I think, thanks to what I hope are inventive and not hideous decreases I made in starting the button band I've managed to fix the problem and the thing is wearable. If not and if you come by and smell burning alpaca or wool in the air - you know what it is.

Other random knitting stuff: I love the feel of ultra alpaca but hate the drape. I need springy yarns to fit me and this is not working. Also I think I'm over top down raglans: the shoulders/armpits/boobs never fit right. So far my best fit is my bottom-up raglan. Something in the sweater changes in a top-down after I've added the lower half of the garment. Even if the top ifts like it should in the knitting process, the added weight at the bottom changes the shape at the top. It's very, very annoying. I'm also trying to salvage Wendy Bernard's Favorite Cardigan. I loved the picture but off the shoulders don't work for me, nor do crew necks for that matter. For those familiar with the pattern, I have to reknit the sleeves, rip the button band, extend the length about 3", and re-do the collar. I'm going to try a short row collar to give it an illusion of a v-neck, b/c the boat neck, high neck, buttoned shape are all bad for me.

One of these days I'll be able to c/o all my nice holiday gifts.... (actually I think this will start on my trip to Tahoe in a few weeks).

Back in the Bunker

The prof whose office I am using for the quarter had the audacity to come back into town for the day, leaving me exiled to the Bunker.* But, in my tradition from last year, Bunker means Bunker knitting photos! I know, I know, you're so excited you can barely contain yourselves. I present the start of Cabled Flip top Mittens:

I got a super cheap pair of flip tops from Sainsbury's in London (£2.50 cheap) and I loved them to death (lasted about as long as you'd expect £2.50 mittens to last. I've also been wearing my fetchings a lot this winter and they're looking a little worse for the wear - not the yarns fault, just a lot of love).After messing about on ravelry for a bit, and being unable to find the right yarn to make Ailbe from the new Knitty Winter 2009, I decided that I liked this pattern and could use a stash yarn for the inner liner. I'm working on the mitten shell and so far so good. The yarn is Plymouth Happy Feet in colorway "12" (creative name, no?).

In other news I'm about 5.5 single spaced into some really bad diss writing. Yay me! I'm not to the hard stuff yet, just establishing my background stuff, but writing has never been so easy. Usually writing is like pulling teeth for me (apologies to those who helped me through my MA, and if you really want to know what it was like check the entries from Winter 2007), but this is coming along pretty smoothly. I'm not sure if it's because I know the material, I care about the material, or I don't give a shit about the quality at this time, but its working and for now that's all I care about. I'm trying to write 4-6 single spaced pages a week, that means I have 2 to go before the end of tomorrow. I think I can do it.

*this is the only day he's here this quarter and he's only going to be around 1-2 days a week next quarter, which means I'll be able to keep using the space - honestly, using his office is like waking up every morning and finding out that Santa left a heap of presents for you.

For writers and the readers of the writing of others

My friend D introduced me to this blog: http://writebadlywell.blogspot.com/

Take a look and see which one you are.

Sincerely,

Qualify Every Description and Let the Passive Tense Be Used

Funding and libraries

I hate our library. I love the librarians, but I hate the library. The bastards are charging me $160 for two books I returned by they can't find. I returned them after my QE, I have searched every workspace I have inhabited since I started here and every box in my house. I gave them back and they now want to charge me $80 for a book I can get for $30 through the publisher and for $15 new on amazon.

When can we all just go digital? Although I much prefer to read print, the pain in the ass of having to lug around and keep track of books is really grating on my nerves. I don't have enough space to keep everything I need in one place at one time (yes, library carrels would be a perfect solution, but as a colleague has demonstrated, our library isn't designed for people who need books, use books, or intend to do actual work), and the cost/fees are driving me through the roof.

Which leads to a question to which I hope to get some answers: has anyone used Questia and is it worth is? precursory search shows that it has some material, but not as much as melvyl (which I can't currently use b/c my freakin' account is frozen b/c of the $160 in fees... bitter, bitter girl). There's a lot of older stuff on there, but most of that I can find in google books. If you have experience/an opinion I'd love to hear it in the comments.

Finally, another gripe about being at a small "research" university: funding. Specifically, I'm sick and tired of seeing fellowships that are Mellon-funded, sponsored by the research libraries and archives I really need to get to, but only available to specific university students. In this case: USC, UCLA, UCB. Everyone says it's easier to get the big grants once you can snag at least one. Well a number of the big name grants for grads in my field are tied between one research institution (Huntington, Clark, IHR London) and one academic institution (USC, UCLA, UCB). They have grants for people like me - year long writing and research grants with prestigious names, all restricted to their own university students working in the same pigeon-holed field I'm in. How many early modern historians of English print culture can there really be at USC? Maybe, maybe 15? How many of those are ABD and looking for research/writing money? I bet it's fewer than the 300+ who apply for the nationally open grants and fellowships (with suckers like me). So they get to face very small local competition for big desirable grants - and once they get one are more likely to win the big money on the national level b/c their academic product has been proven to be worth investing in. The disparity between opportunities afforded to those at schools with connections and those like me is becoming more and more apparent the longer I'm in my program. It makes a difference when you're trying to finish and have to constantly TA, and when you're on the job market.

Happy New Year

It's a new year, new decade, and I'm already 11 days late on a post. Good to know some things never change. L and I had a great time visiting in-laws in NJ. I scored 2 things to help with my diss writing: a new wireless apple keyboard that I love, and a fantastic electric kettle, and several to further distract me: all the scrumptious yarn on my list. As a quick knitting aside: this year I completed 2 scarves, one pair of gloves, 2 tank tops, and 3.75 sweaters (I actually finished 4 but have to re-do the sleeves of one of them, hence the .75 status). I have the first of a pair of mittens on my needles, one set of sleeves to re-do, and a cardigan I should be able to finish by the end of January. I'm also learning to knit continental, which feels a little like trying to drive a car with your feet, but I'm getting better and it should help save my wrists - which between the knitting and typing are getting quite a work out.

I learned a few things in the last year:

-Regardless of what we think it should be, grad school is a privilege, not a right, and I feel pretty privileged to be able to do something i love all day long and get paid for it. Not paid much, not what I wish I were getting paid, but I am getting paid and I do have health care. All things considered, things could be worse and I consider myself lucky to have funding and be in the position I'm in. (I realize this complacency/stockholm syndrome is the first step to letting the man/UC win, but at this point I'm happy to get paid to do the work I do and to keep working on my diss.)

-London rocks, living alone is really cool, but no comparison to sharing my life with L.

-I hate knitting sleeves - damn things go on forever. Too bad tank tops made of wool are pretty much useless for warm and cold weather.

-I'm actually going to be able to write a dissertation/my project is viable.

So I'm back in SC, writing, TAing, dancing (still sore from last week), and generally trying to keep on plugging ahead.