Nikwalk

Dreams

2012-01-27T07:45:00.000-08:00

I would like to write a blog about something else than what I have to do today but since I went to sleep stressing about a student, woke up at 4:30 with a headache, re-stressed about a student and then about all the stuff I should do today, I should probably write a blog post that reminds me to work instead of watch Curious George with Max and look at Facebook as a means of avoiding the work. The work, when it is thick and wide and tall as a concrete wall, can be mistaken for a fog that settles everywhere, and therefore, nowhere.

Perhaps beginning at the beginning of the week will shed some light on why Friday is a large pile of too much.
On Monday, Max woke up with a terrible cough. I had a conference call with a potential publisher of a new book so Erik took Max to work. I went to get Max from him an hour later. We went to New Frontiers. Twice (I forgot the celery). It's supposed to be a writing day but Max isn't one of those babies who likes to sleep and watch TV when he's sick. He likes to play trains. Adamantly and often. So the writing didn't happen so much but some major emails were sent, some reports filed, some plans for dinner made. That's the night I made the chicken and dumpling soup. Thomas Keller makes you boil the celery, saute the carrots, and pouch the pate a choux dumplings separately. Also, make a roux. It takes forever. Perhaps I should not follow the Keller on a Monday.

That night, Erik was sick. Max was sick. The next morning, I had barely time to pick up ginger ale for Erik after I dropped Z off at school before making it to the advising center--5 students came in for advice plus prospective students. This was not conducive to commenting on student in class writing so that got squished between 11 and 12:45. I taught and then had a thesis meeting with a student.

Wednesday. Why Wednesday? I'm trying not to go in on Wednesdays so I can get some work done but this Wednesday? All in. Max in the morning, meeting with Associate Dean about program fees at 10, meeting with Dean of Grad College at 10:30, meeting with Assistant Dean about online application at 10:40. Lunch with Associate Chair and Chair (with request for lecture line!) Faculty meeting at 11:30. Big Grad Studies committee meeting at 12:30. At 2:00, another conference call with a different publisher which was not nearly as fun as the Monday call. At 3:00, pick up Z, pick up Max from Rick and El's (what would I have done without my in-laws this week?), homework with Z (lots of homework, drawing with Max, and the making of the tacos which are quick and very-non-Keller in their workload distribution.

Thursday I tried to read and comment on student essays with Max but that was going nowhere so I took him to El's, went to school, wrote comments on the essays, prepared for intro nonfiction, read book for grad nonfiction, met with a current and a previous grad student about their futures, taught until 5:30 and then fell into the booth at Fratelli's where the first piece of pizza was awesome but the next one had diminishing returns (as the Keller says happens after the third bite) and the third piece of pizza was just maintenance.

So today is the finishing work for what happened this week. Write to contributors. Send Tuition Waiver Language to Tuition Waiver person. Ask Doug if he wants a link to PIE. Arrange room for Creative Writing meeting on Wednesday. Begin report for grad online app. Ask Yvette to let you know how many GTA apps are ready for review on the 1st. Send micro essays. Input scratch marks indicating student participation from paper grade roster into BB Learn. Enter grad comments into BB learn since apparently the grad students wont' turn them in if I'm not grading them like undergrads. Read for Diagram. I would like to clean the house, go to the grocery store, go on a run, and finish an essay I'm working on but I don't think any of that is going to happen...

because now I must go play Lego's with Max which will be more fun than the work list but won't be as fun as it could be if I had already finished the last paragraph of my life and could move on to the blog post that I want to write.

Desert Living

2012-01-23T15:15:00.000-08:00

In the past ten days, we've had the chance to go to the desert twice. The first time, further South, where the Saguaro actually live, and yesterday, to the close desert of Sedona. Neither of them is balmy right now but compared to the snowy mountaintop, it was warm. One could sit outside for an hour or two. One could watch the clouds roll over the Central Arizona Water Project. One could refill the aquifer, if one were Zoe or her friend Louisa, by turning on the hose and making a fresh pile of mud in the sand on the driveway.
I'm sure it's my protestant, Weberian background that makes me believe one must fully experience four full seasons but one benefit of Flagstaff is that I get my Protestant Boy Scout Badge by bearing the snow while still occasionally being able to dip down to the hotter places. Not hot enough to swim but hot enough to be outside.

In the desert, you can eat, if you are Zoe and/or Louisa and/or Max, forty-eight Clementines. You can splash in the hot tub. You can wake up before everyone else and sneak down to the wash to see if last night's rain made a flood. You can take a bath and then run around naked after. You can make mud. You can change your clothes on the patio. You can eat nuts that fell into the sand, if you dust them off first. You can play hide the tangerine, practicing for Easter Egg hunts. Or, in the closer, red rock desert, you can ride your bike down a slickrock trail at 25 miles an hour, making even your dad scream, "slow down." You can cry a little afterward, all adrenaline filled. Or you could choose to ride in the carseat on the back of your mom's bike going "woah, woah, woah" over the rocks. And then you can come back home and sit by the woodstove and wait for dinner. Perhaps, the next night, you mom will make chicken and dumplings with the dumplings pate a choux style.

Sometimes, even when it's probably in my best interest to check out other places and other jobs, especially ones with water, I wonder if I should bother. It's nice to have the hot so close even while I suffer the winter of my Protestant/Weberian self. And, Erik says we live on top of the one of the world's largest aquifers so perhaps there's more water than I think.

So far in not cooking

2012-01-21T14:13:00.000-08:00

I have made granola:
Oats, wheat bran, flax seed, oil, honey, cooked for 1.5 hours at 250 degrees. Stirred every 15 minutes. Added cashews and almonds after cooking. Zoe and Max helped make it so it doesn't count as cooking.

And I made salad Lyonaise because we had: eggs, bacon, lettuce, mustard, vinegar. The eggs, bacon, and salad were on grown locally. The eggs, so fresh, made the best poached eggs ever. Zoe ate salad dressing for the first time. The bests and firsts compensates for the not.

But I'm holding out for dinner.

Another Train of Thought

2012-01-20T12:53:00.000-08:00

Why is it without Max here, I still go around saying, "choo choo"? There must be something comforting in the repetition.

On Wednesday I vowed to cook never again. I cooked for an hour and a half, making some Thomas Keller farro, squash, rice, and spicy greens salad. It took an hour. Why does cooking vegetarian take so much longer? Steak. Grill. Done. Between helping Z with her homework, letting Max "help" me cook, and sauteing, then baking, the squash, I had a semi-decent salad that Max wouldn't eat and Zoe only sort of liked. Then, while Erik bathed the children, I cleaned up. While cleaning up, I declared that that was it. From now on: noodles and hamburger. And, I haven't cooked since. Last night, I picked up pizza from Fratelli's and tonight we're going to Erik's parents for carne asada. The only problem is, I have 1/4 pound of a pig I bought from a local farmer. 2 hams, 8 pork chops, 3 lbs of sausage, a roast and a sirloin steak aren't going to cook themselves. I got a note from the farmer: "the hams are smoked but not cooked. Cook them. And they'll need salt because we didn't use nitrates to cure them." My curiosity might get the better of me.

I have the song "You Light Up My Life" stuck in my head. If god wanted a sappy song written about him, he wouldn't let babies die, so suck it Debbie Boone. If there is a god, he would prefer Social Distortion, who is coming to town. Erik bought tickets for us. Very exciting.

And yet the song continues to play in my head. I should share, "You give me hope/to carry on/ you light up my days/ and fill my nights/ with/ song. How can it be wrong/when it feels so right/ cause you/you/ you light up/my eye eye eye/ life."

Which then turns to "If lovin' you's wrong, I don't want to be right."

I do think, overall, I was lucky to grow up in the seventies. Maybe Debbie Boone is a product of the early eighties.

Erik's pictures are up at Anderbo. http://www.anderbo.com/anderbo1/aphotoessay02/aphotoessay-02.html
That is good news.

They're surveying the street behind our house. Surveying is never a good thing. It leads to strip malls and housing developments.

I taught the first nonfiction grad workshop yesterday. I went through 6 versions of an essay I was working on to show them how much revision some essays might take. The highlight was when I turned to version 4, which was an entirely new essay, having not one word in common with the other 5 versions. I found itilluminating. I'm not sure they did. But the first day. They are always pissed if you don't just pass out the syllabus and let them go. I don't blame them.

My friends' other baby (my friend had given birth to twins) is doing better. I heard from her in a broadcast email today. She is one of the strongest, most amazing people I know. She wrote so beautifully--"I can't write words for my grief. It will be my partner the rest of my life." But she went on to say, speaking of the outpouring of love and support: "It is confusing and profound that times of such tremendous weight and hardship would paint so vivid a picture of what is good in the world." She's the true writer, artist that she is. Anyone who can be that eloquent in so much grief is probably going to be OK. They're an amazing family. I am lucky to know them.

I do believe that bald eagle lives in our neighborhood. It flew over my father-in-law's car yesterday. That is a good thing. May the surveyors stay away.

Marching on

2012-01-19T10:51:00.000-08:00

Although all I think about and dream about is my poor sweet friends and wonder how they're doing, I still have to try to keep it together. The semester has begun. Work is flowing into my inbox at a rate of one email every ten minutes. There are still requests for recommendations. The program change is underway, requiring typo fixes and Curriculum Process Associate feedback and Curriculum Committee meetings. There are Grad Studies Committee meetings to schedule and syllabi to copy. There is legalese to study and negotiations to prepare for. There is the parlay, as Erik keeps reminding me, with the chair and the dean. There are lesson plans. I'm excited though for the lesson-making.

Today, in Intro nonfiction--I'm going to teach about narrator versus author, Brenda Miller, and how to workshop generously.

In grad nonfiction, I'm going to use the blgog by my new best friend, Mr. Jackson Connor about writing about writing, the newest Writer's Chronicle, where Jackson cites an interview with Sabina Murray, and another blog, mine, that became an essay where I show them the 6 revisions the piece went under since this will be a revise-y type class. The blog piece is about Zoe's prematurity and how does one revise about the self when the bigger picture is so much bigger and more important than your own and the circularity of it all. Everything connects back up eventually.

The most exciting thing is the 15 nontropes of nonfiction. The "non" goes with the feeling of nothingness these days. There is still no bald eagle in the snag down the road.

What is not there

2012-01-17T09:59:00.000-08:00

It's not hot. There's not much snow. It's not the end of the semester. It's not summer. I saw a bald eagle sitting in a snag at the end of my road. It wasn't until it wasn't there the next day or the day after that that I realized how magnificent it had been. An eagle at the end of the street. I haven't seen it since.

My friends, ones I've known for 20 years. Longer. They lost their baby yesterday in the NICU. I keep trying to think, how can I help them? There's loss there too. I don't want to point out the holes, all the nots, the tree with no birds, but sometimes that's all there is to see.

Pants

2012-01-12T07:36:00.000-08:00

I have been buying my own pants for years now (not that many years. My sisters and mom think I'm somewhat shopping-dysfunctional and like to replace my hole-in-Levi's with no-hole-in-not-Levi's because it's not 1980 anymore supplies. Actually, my mom did buy me real Levi's but they had stretchy material in them, making them distinctly not bought from The Copper Rivet.)

But I do occasionally go to the non-thrift store to buy pants. I buy pants in some size between 8-10. No matter what size I buy, they fall down. I do think this is my fault, to some degree. I am squarely shaped. Erik recently bought me some pants that cost $70! $70 pants! In the size 8. And they fall down. Am I supposed to buy a belt. Am I supposed to spend the day hitching up my pants? I do not think a size 6 would have fit me and if it had, it would have produced some pastry-type-top that I refuse to name.

There used to be a store, possibly next to the Copper Rivet, called 5-7-9. I shopped there when I was in Junior High. I'm essentially the same height now, if not exactly the same weight. Perhaps if it still existed, the size 7 or the size 9 would be the answer to my pants-falling-down problem.

Erik thinks this falling-down business is true for man-pants as well. He says it's a product of the low-rise phenomena. He wears a belt sometimes. But for me, the belt cinches and it sticks and it doesn't seem right either.

Do you know who looks good in the pants of today? Zoe. She's 6. Even her pants are low-rise. But somehow she pulls it off, possibly because the model body shape today is an elongated kids size 6.

Compass

2012-01-11T07:48:00.000-08:00

For a moment, I am full of certainty. Where my house sits, it seems to point directly west. The sun goes down in front of it and sets behind it. I can see Mt. Elden which is due west. I can see the Skydome, to my southwest, which I thought was distinctly south. And yet, Mt. Elden also, when I'm driving around, seems to be due north from downtown. And now, I doubt which way my house sits.

I grew up in Salt Lake City on a very perfect grid system. Houses did not face 297 degrees northwest. They faced west, or north, south or east. That Mt. Elden is confusing because the town essentially wraps around it. It is north and west, depending on how windy the road goes. Downtown and the skydome are both west, but the skydome is more south and the downtown, slightly so. I think. I keep driving around town, holding my hand to over the dashboard to see if I'm picturing the orientation of my house correctly. When I pull into the driveway, I hope the hand and the house are parallel.

Which is why I find writing so hard. Not writing. Writing is easy. I love writing. I giggle and I have to stop myself in the middle of sentences to look at Facebook not because I'm stuck (well, sometimes because I'm stuck) but also because, coming from good Mormon/Max Weberian-type-protestant stock, I'm sure I'm supposed to be having this much fun doing work I jump around the room when an image from paragraph one has miraculously (by that I mean not consciously intentional). When I find out a word means both hot and prickly. When the full stops come fragments. When the connections between the 2004 tsunami and the burble of an IV don't seem arch. When the sentences run long and I can still piece my way back to the beginning and see what I was saying. When all this is happening, I am sure. I am convinced. I know which direction I'm facing and am certain it's the right one.

But then I go driving around town and doubt keeps in. Maybe tsunami and IV together are arch. Maybe there's too many images. Maybe the subconscious placing of the image in paragraph 11 isn't serendipitous. Maybe it's stupid. Maybe I cannot interpolate food and Y2K and fertility all into one essay. Sadly, when it comes to writing, I can't pull out a compass and say, oh, that's where I was pointing.

It's one reason I like to write fast. The serendipity is cleaner. The one-true notion remains pure and directional. I write and write. It's the stopping that let's the doubt creep in.

But, and this in somewhat in responses to Mary Anne's post about Rilke's Letter to a Young Poet. Where does the doubt come from? From the ability to foresee the piece being published? From what Erik may think about it? From what my friend-writers might think? Or is there some real basis for the doubt? But even if there is, does real basis matter? I was having a good time writing. Less fun doubting. So I will go work on my syllabi until I find a way to reorient my doubt or until I can see a way to straighten the thing out. But as my friend Rachel used to say, always go forward, never go straight.

A train of thought

2012-01-09T09:16:00.000-08:00

There's a much-beloved blog that I link to on the side, Julia's Hippogriffs, which is funny and awesome when she describes her kids and sometimes talks about her too-attractive husband. She's written it before, years ago, almost word-for-word, and last week she wrote
I frequently read - entirely in the comments of advice columns, I admit - about how hard it is to be married. This is not my experience at all. Being married to Steve is the easiest thing in the world and every single day I marvel at how lucky I was to meet him and how bizarre it is that none of the things that initially interested me (his green/gold/brown eyes, chiseled jaw and automobile figuring largely) have anything to do with how happy I am now. He makes me laugh.
And this brings ire to her in the comments. It also bugs me because it does seem kind of neener-neener-ish. But obviously she's glossing over. He goes to his farm for a week at a time, leaving her with all three kids. She has anxiety attacks. One of their kids is a genius of some sort but also has some permanent sinus infection. They have an organized, if traditional, division of labor. He works (from home) and she has the kids and the house and the cooking. Would the marriage be harder if he had to clean more or if she worked outside the home? The way they have made their life seems to cause them no strife but obviously, that's partly personality and partly a matter of life-choices that suited those personalities. I bristled at the "Being married to Steve is the easiest thing in the world." It IS kind of braggy but I think she's saying more than, "aren't I lucky?" I don't think she's saying that there's no strife, just that even in the strife, there's an easy knowledge that this is the person with whom the strife is supposed to take place. That the hardness isn't about marriage--that hardness is about being a human and it's nice, when it works out and you marry someone that likes you despite the fact that you are sometimes a hard person or that he is sometimes a hard person. It's easy to fight/disagree/argue when fundamentally you know that person knows you're hard and difficult and knows that he himself can be hard and difficult and manages to still find you funny and still manages to be funny. Marriage isn't hard. Life is.

And so hard is life when the children are throwing up on both a Friday night and a Saturday night. Why can't kids throw up in the day time? Is there a law against the light of day and viruses? Viruses are vampiric enough, no? Can't a kid say around noon, hey, I don't feel well, and find his or her way to the toilet? Must the moaning ensue around 11:00 p.m and last until 3 a.m.? And why, when the kids finally fall back asleep, why can't I go back to sleep?

However, when I slept fitfully between 11 and 3, I had a dream about my friend Craig, who died 3 years ago, maybe almost 4, while climbing in Japan. It was so nice to see him. He reminds me of Ralph Fiennes playing Voldemort. Not in the way Voldemort is evil but in the way Fiennes twists his hands around. Also, Voldemort is bald and so was Craig. Craig gesticulated a lot and in the dream, he twisted and turned his hands while he explained how he'd escaped his fall and had just taken awhile to get back to his girlfriend and his ex-wife, he told me as we sat at a very blue bar. It was a good dream.

The dream of mozzarella was close but not quite perfection. The meltiness of mozzarella: I think the mozz I made was better raw than cooked. On the pizza, it developed a slightly slippery texture that reminded me too much of milk. Maybe that's because now that I made it, I knew its root texture, which was slippery milk. Next time, I will make cheddar.

Max

2012-01-06T09:54:00.000-08:00

Today Max turns two. I joke that Max was born two but it's true. He's the most stubborn person in our family and that is saying a lot. He wakes up in the morning saying "choo choo" and he points at everything and says "choo choo." If no train is forthcoming in the form of Thomas on TV, Thomas on the track, Thomas on the iPhone, the "choo choo" becomes insistent as if volume could make trains appear out of nowhere. And sometimes, volume does. If the world could be turned into boxcar, he would be a happy person. But really, he is happy. This morning, when I said happy birthday, he said "happy!" and when he cleans up his Legos he says happy and when he sees a choo choo or a choo choo track, of which we have many in Flagstaff, he is happy. He's a chatty Kathy. Sometimes, it's "Elsay morta lamoo new?" Doncha know? but it's also often, bye bye Cam, bye bye baby Blake, bye bye Lily, bye bye Straw (what he calls my mom), bye bye Val, bye bye Paige. He calls his Grandma Ellie and his Grandpa Baka. "Please candy" is definitely his strongest two word sentence. When he wants more, he says moo. Which, lucky for him, rhymes with choo and often can get as loud and insistent. Moo. Right now in fact.
Ellie says that Max is a danger baby, and he is, but he's also kind of cautious. He stands up in the middle of the bed, falls down and says "Crash" and smiles widely but he's always checking to make sure he's the middle of the bed where he can't fall off. Almost always. I catch him the other times.
He is not shy. We were downtown in the square yesterday and he and Zoe were running around while Zoe tried to teach him the letters embossed into the bricks. He was just running. Mostly in the way of other people. He didn't get nervous when he ran into the legs of some stranger. He just looked up and said "hi." The guy said "hi" back. He also says "hi" to trains. And "bye bye choo choo."
Right now, he's watching Thomas on the TV while watching it on the iPhone. I'm not actually sure if he likes the Thomas as much as he likes the technology. He also likes books and points at words, instructing me to read at exactly what pace. If I go to slow, he just takes the book and reads it silently to himself.

He's not feeling 100% today--long week back at school, a head cold, and maybe a stomach ache, so he's extra cuddly. He's the kind of baby who gives big hugs and big kisses and even sticks his hand down your shirt, when it's most inappropriate. And, now that he's two, not that much a baby which makes me squish him harder. I wanted to get him a strider bike for his birthday but they're $150 and would last merely a a season. I still might give him an IOU for this summer. I'm sure he'll exchange it for a choo choo.

Edited to add: Max likes buttons. He likes the buttons that run the iPod. He likes the iPod. Sometimes, he pushes the button that ejects the iPod. Sometimes, he removes the iPod from its player system. This time, he has taken the iPod and hidden it somewhere. Zoe drew a picture of an iPod to help him remember where he put it. When that didn't help, she put the paper iPod where the metal one used to go. It's similar but not the same.

Meta mega melt

2012-01-05T10:59:00.000-08:00

In honor of Jackson's beautiful blog Write from Scratch, I would like to take a moment to go all writing meta for a minute. I wish I could do such a thing as Jackson is doing but I think it would cause me much anxiety about the current writing project(s) and then I wouldn't be able to finish them which is what the meta is all about. If his book is half as good as his blog,
Here's my problem and I do think you all know it. I have too many book projects. When you have several book projects and none of them is done (i.e. not published, thereby not set in stone), your 3 book projects an easily become one book project. The themes swirl and eddy, the styles impinge on one another, the stories can be interchanged. This seems particularly a problem for me who is writing, of the 3 books, 2 kind of memoir things. How many memoirs does one person need to write?

When Quench finally (and I mean finally) got picked up in September, I was nothing but glee even though Salmon (Salmon) still was not making any headway and Salmon was what I had the most invested in of late. So when Quench--about water, wine, sex, birds, wolves and dams--won the contest, I rested on my laurel-like chair for about half a minute and then freaked the hell out. The first problem was, why was I revealing so much? Shut the hell up, self. The second was, um, don't I say this in Salmon? Was Salmon really just a rehashing of Quench? Was Quench just a rehearsal for Salmon?

But late one night, after a kind David Shields gave me some good advice, I realized two things. Quench is Quench and Salmon is Salmon. I went back into Quench and took out all the nervousness, the over-reaches and the I'm-so-clevers. Well, at least the ones I could see for that minute. And then I went back to Salmon and chopped off, like chopping off a toe (a much-loved but not really necessary body part), the first half of the book. The reveals in Salmon are fewer (Quench is burdened with those) but Salmon, which had suffered from tonal issues, is now a lot more fun. I hope. I need to get it into the world because one problem with meta is its all very interior and this week, which has been in some ways like a writer's retreat, is also kind of The Shining like in that maybe I think I'm making progress but only in the cold light of day (what kind of light is it? Harsh? Hard? Sometimes, I think English is not my first language--idiom-wise) will I know. And sadly, the cold light of day is not always easy to find even though it is indeed sunny out there.

Tarantulas, Big Birds and Cheese

2012-01-04T10:24:00.000-08:00

I did make the cheese. It was mostly easy with a lot of measuring of water temperature and cautionary tales about the curds looking like ricotta instead of custard (which is bad) which is what mine looked like, but then, the mozzarella stretched and became elastic and smooth and I cooled it in water and it tastes pretty good. Will it melt? I don't know. Do I want to make cheddar? Yes. Yes I do. I thought about the cost--$4.00 for a gallon of milk plus the rennet and citric acid (free for now, because the kit was a gift) versus the cost of homemade mozz from the New Jersey Pizza Co. For about the same amount of cheese, NJ Pizza charges $8.00. So, was it worth the $4.00 of time? I'm not sure. Zoe liked it but wasn't in love with it and there's no way she will eat the cheese (she only likes orange cheese. And remember the time we made homemade butter? I think she prefers things in squares. She probably will eat it on pizza. Maybe). And I presume I'll get faster but there's a lot of water heating and tossing which seems wasteful (less wasteful when the big factories make it?) and the curds cling to things but overall--yes. I will make it again if it melts on the pizza that we will make for Max's birthday on Friday!

As for the birds. When I first moved here--I was dismayed. Where were all my hawks from Utah? But since then, I've found them, plus a horde of others. I'm not so good at knowing the small birds but there is a black and white little jobber I would like to call a Junco, so I will.
The other birds include:
Red tail hawk
Harrier hawk
Some falcon I saw yesterday.
Northern Flicker.
Regular old woodpecker like in the cartoons
Bald Eagle (first spied last year)
Blue Jay
Ravens Ravens Ravens mostly ravens
Vultures (only in the summer. Interesting).
Some white-long-legged crane type thing.
Some water-loving Sea-Eagle
Gray Herons.
Pigeons.
Mourning Doves
And owls of some kind, though I'm still looking for them.

Today, in the forest while running (or rather, stepping gingerly over snowing snowbanks and icy ice patches) I saw a tarantula. A tarantula in January! Who knew. I also slipped on the ice but I always fall so it wasn't too bad except to remind me to practice my Kegels.

Anxiety

2012-01-03T07:55:00.000-08:00

Anxiety is a wasted emotion. It's like chewing on foil with teeth full of metal. You can mack on it all day but you won't get anything nutrients out of it and the shooting pains such chewing sends down your spine aren't good for your heart.
To stave off anxiety, make lists? Possibly.
1. Send Cam and Lily the clothes they left here and Lily's hat and Cam's gloves from sledding.
2. Max's birthday. Thoughts? Bike? Or is he still too little? Closet organizer? He's two. It's the last year I can get him housewares and pretend it's a thoughtful gift.
3. Send revised Quench to blurbists.
4. Read Diagram essays.
5. Read and select Chapbooks!
6. Get a new computer that types actual letters.
7. Read essay for good friend.
8. Revise.
9. Write anew all of Salmon.
10. Next micro project!
11. Grant?
12. Make cheese. Today mozzarella. Tomorrow. The world.

Also. Birds. And exercise. It was so cold in December but it is going to be 58 degrees here by Thursday. Calls for running. Even bike riding. Yay.
My dream is to use these two weeks before school starts to get into a good writing and exercising habit so when the great wall of the semester starts, I have enough momentum to crash right through it.

Ah. Metaphors.

Road Trip

2011-12-20T14:27:00.000-08:00

In an attempt to forgo Wendy's (why does anyone go on a road trip if not to eat fast-food?), I spent today for fast-food distracting snacks. I wanted to buy a whole pound of beef jerky but am trying not to eat too much CAFO meat or too much salt. So I bought proscuitto.
I am not entirely sure these are different things.

Pho for Ali redux

2011-12-19T18:17:00.000-08:00

We made Pho for dinner. Even Max ate it like a mad dog. BUT in this recipe, which I haven't used for awhile because I usually make it from memory, I neglected the mung bean sprouts. I had daikon radishes from the CSA I used instead--which worked just fine--but in case you want to remember next time, here's the recipe, fixed.

For the broth:

4 oz rice noodles.
4 cups Beef Stock.
3 tbsp Nam pla (Asian fish sauce)
5 star anise
6 cloves
2 cinnamon sticks
2 rounds of ginger
1 tsp. ground pepper

To accompany:
1 pound very lean sirloin of beef.
small onion, sliced thinly
jalapeno, sliced
1 lime, quartered
Sriracha Sauce
Hoisin (optional. Makes it too sweet, I think).
Bean Sprouts.

Freeze the sirloin for a about an hour so you can slice it thinly.
Soften the noodles in a bowl with hot water.

Combine stock, water fish sauce and spices in a large pot. Simmer broth for one hour (this should reduce the stock enough that you don't need more salt but if you do, add some.)

Slice sirloin as thinly as possible and pop it in the hot broth. Garnish with limes, basil, sriracha, onion and jalapeno. And hoisin if you must.

This semseter

2011-12-17T14:46:00.000-08:00

I've posted only five or six times in the past five months. The normal reasons: too busy, nothing much too say, one nasty-ish comment that made me gun-shy, busy, Facebook. I have also been trying to write new stuff at least occasionally to send out so whatever time I do take to write, I do it in Word instead of Blogger. But now that the semester is mostly over, and the Christmas shopping is mostly done, and the 2-foot tall blue Christmas tree has been plugged in, and Max is asleep and Zoe is at her grandma's making gingerbread cookies and Erik is watching another Clint Eastwood Western, it seems like a good time for a wrap up.

This was the first year that Erik had a regular 9-5 job. He's worked a lot since we've been here, but it's been a more varied kind of work schedule. But in some ways, the consistent, and constant, work has been more relaxing. Instead of trying to get childcare here and there when both of us had to work, we've had very consistent work schedules which has made life more routine than it's been since I left Portland for grad school. I went to grad school so I didn't have to be to work by 8:30. Now, I'm at work by 8:15, most days and up by 6:40 every day.

Mondays, I was home with Max, working and playing and mostly managing to be prepared for Tuesdays marathon advising center-teaching-teaching day. Wednesday, since Max went to day care anyway, I was in by 8:15 again. Wednesdays were supposed to be my writing days but my office is next door to my students' office so when I'm in, everyone knows. These became long advising days, which was awesome in a lot of ways, but not in the I-need-to-write-something ways. Also, when you're on campus and in the hallway, everything's a mini-meeting. I administrated on Wednesdays. Thursdays were identical to Tuesdays and Fridays, which should have been writing days were really Zoe-has-short-days days and so now I have the kids at home and we might as well go bike riding.

So, I was at school more than I've ever been. I got a lot of stuff done school related. We will probably get to turn our MA into an MFA, thanks to my constant meeting and emailing. I think I organized 17 hours of meetings to make this happen. From meeting with my area, my chair, my dean, the VP at Distance Learning, the Vice-provost, the associate dean of the grad college and the dean of the grad college, I believe I've learned how to get things done at the University. Talk to everyone until there's a buzz big enough that people already believe that whatever plan you were planning is already in the works. Then spend the next 45 hours filling out paperwork (actually, I filled out the form fast the Wednesday the graduate studies committee and the faculty passed it and I found out to get this to happen by next Fall, I had to have it to the curriculum committee by Friday). I kind of like this stuff and I'm afraid for liking. Do I like administrative stuff really or do I just like it because it's immediately gratifying, compared to the long slog that is writing submission and rejection?

I worked more consistently this semester and therefore, was less stressed out. This is probably how I'm supposed to do it. But I did miss regular writing and regular exercise. The good part about my old life is that I was "running" every day. Now, I'm lucky to go on Mondays and Fridays. The good part about my new life is that Zoe learned to ride her bike without training wheels in July and by September, she was riding in the woods behind the house. The days that may once have been writing days became riding days and that was not so bad.

I did make some progress on the new book project but only because I'm writing shorter things. I was able too to trim a 40 page essay to a 22 page essay and that got accepted so not zero writing work was accomplished this semester. I wrote a few poems that I should send out but compared to the last couple of years, the writing has taken a backseat. This is sad in someways but also, not so sad. There's a lot of writing already in the world and my friends are writing awesome things and my students are writing awesome things and maybe next semester, I'll sneak into my office at school through the window so no one knows I'm there. Or get a carrel at the library. Or go back to writing at Late for the Train, which has coffee and a nice, albeit fake, woodstove.

Christmas card

2011-12-15T15:13:00.001-08:00

Stationery card

View the entire collection of cards.

Thanksgiving Weekend

2011-11-27T08:09:00.001-08:00

Thanksgiving has been awesome. Much turkey (20 lb locally grown from Valley View Farms, brined. Cooke in 3 hours. What's up turkey? Why did people used to get up at 5 a.m. to put the turkey in the oven?), much pie (not enough sugar to compensate for roasted pumpkins), much stuffing (two kinds, cornbread and green chile and regular mushroom, onion, celery--thanks Mary Anne!) and possibly the best gravy ever (Thanks Grandma and mom for teaching me how to make gravy. If there were gravy-making contests, I'd enter). Besides food, we have gone on two bike rides (and I hope for a third today), cleaned the house, shopped for a mountain bike for Zoe, bought two (two! Christmas presents, none on Black Friday), eaten ramen noodles for lunch on Thanksgiving Day and sushi for dinner on Saturday. Erik's raking pine needles and putting away the outdoor furniture. But I've spent most of the weekend revising the nonfiction manuscript. It's due to the publishers on Wednesday. I'm freaking out. (I forgot there was sex in it. Sorry mom!). I'm reading Joni Trevis's "The Wet Collection" and Maggie Nelson's "Bluets" and hoping my book is as good (it's not like those books at all). I'm happy to find some common threads besides the purposefully constructing one. Lawn mowing mostly, but a recurring motif nonetheless. It is different publishing nonfiction in book form than in lit mags. I'll tell you who doesn't read lit mags. My mom or my mother-in-law. But they read books and this one has highly inappropriate sexually material. I cut some of it out but still. It's one of the points of the books (boundaries/dams/giving way/holding back) so most of it has stayed. I've also fixed most of the ridiculous phrasing and typos and possibly made some of the tangential metaphors clearer. I look forward to editorial feedback from the press. I want this book to be as good as I can make it, even if it freaks my mom out.

33 Flavors and then some

2011-11-13T18:03:00.001-08:00

I typed this all up and then Firefox crashed. I hate my computer. But I love my sisters who made me and sent me notes leading up until my birthday so I will retype them (OK, Zoe retyped half of them) and indicate whether or not I did the job that the sisters suggested.

1.      Cry for no reason and let them eat cake! (Yes. I’m pretty sure I did this.)

2.      Remember your terrible twos. Do something bad today. (Probably.)

3.      Take today to recognize the exploration of a three year old. What’s that? Why? (Always!)

4.      Try to drink a forty. Just try. (Nope.)

5.      Happy 5^th! Kindergarten, riding bikes, and knowing your numbers and letters. Best celebrated with a long walk, a game with the kids and at least an hour reading your favorite book. (I tried to do most of this. I’ll finish the other 45 minutes of reading this week).

6.      On the sixth day, perhaps it would be best to drink a 6-pack. Since I know this is not your cup of tea, spend 6 minutes doing absolutely nothing. (I’m working on it.)

7.      Seven DEADLY sins. Seven wonders of the world. You choose! But do one of them. (I live close to one of the seven wonders, does that count?)

8.      Eight lords of leaping! Take a leap…and do something you have always wanted to do. (I went on a mountain bike ride in the forest behind the house with El and Rick and Zoe with Max in the baby seat for 5 beautiful miles.)

9.      Listen to the Beatles White Album. (This is when the trouble began. I only own the White Album in album form. Our iTunes is somehow locked up on a non-working computer. Erik’s working on it).

10. Listen to Led Zeppelin’s Ten Years Gone today. (Listened just now!)

11. Eleven! Eleven! Today you need to make a wish. (Made a wish. Also. On Veteran’s Day, 11/11/11 I looked at my clock and missed 11:11 a.m. by 1 minute. Wished anyway.)

12. Celebrate your womanhood today and do your toes, get your hair done, make it a great day! (Not so much. But I will make a hair appointment this month!)

13. Triskaidekaphobia celebrate your bat mitzvah. (When I think of Bat Mitzvah, I think of Magda’s and her mom, Jackie Osherow’s stir-fried green beans with lemon and almonds. So I celebrated by eating green beans.)

14. It is important to listen to Metallica today, don’t ask…(I did it. I still didn’t get it. But I did it.)

15. Quincerara Day. Buy a new dress and make it a night to remember. (Val brought me a new dress when she came to visit. Does that count?)

16. Watch 16 Candles. (It was on HBO!)

17. Senior Prom! Relive it. (I didn’t go to senior prom but they have adult prom in Flagstaff in June at the Orpheum. Perhaps I’ll try to go.)

18. Graduation Day. Use this day to celebrate everything you have accomplished since graduation. Make a list! (I’m no good at lists but Zoe is typing this list for me since I got so mad the computer crashed. I think that counts.)

19. Nineteen is the end of an era. Watch gone with the wind. (I still have never seen it.)

20. This is half time. Celebrate the :20 (I think this is a pot reference but I could be wrong.)

21. Drink, drink a lot and don’t care about tomorrow. (I got this on a weekday.)

22. Make twice the wish you made for 11. (I did. Twice.)

23. This is a lucky day! Focus on the great things that will happen today. (I did this too.)

24. Take 24 hours off. Call in sick, make an excuse and do whatever you want. (Oh P. You’ll see soon. Moms don’t get days off.)

25. Quarter life crisis. Write a letter to yourself at 25. (Dear Nik, I can’t believe you left Portland for grad school. It was a good move but the word Portland still makes my mouth water.)

26. It’s two weeks to the big day, presents should start. (They did. Val sent me another present. Didn’t I get a dress from you? Opening it tomorrow!)

27. Watch 27 Dresses today. (Put it on Netflix.)

28. Watch 28 Days Later or watch 28 Days. (I gave up zombie movies and rehab movies at my last birthday.)

29. In honor of the 29^th day of February, take today as an extra day. Act as if you have an entire day to do whatever you wish. (See #24).

30. Look for all the photos from your 30^th birthday. Smile at all the ones which you look exactly the same. (This is an awesome charge. Now I need photos from the Dirty 30 party. Miss Paegle? Mr. Burger?

31. 31 Flavors. Eat some ice cream! (Does butter count?)

32. 32 Flavors and then some! Eat more ice cream. (More butter. Plus, awesome Ani reference.)

33. One week until birthday. This should be a great day. Go to dinner with friends. (Stop counting damnit.)

34. Redecorate! Find something you can change in your house for under $3.40-$34.00 and do it. (Copper from thriftstore polished and reorganized into decorative alcove!)

35. Get yourself some new shoes. (I did this one! Thanks to mom’s gift. They are awesome.)

36. Drink 4 glasses of wine and call me in the morning. (See #s 29 and 24)

37. You deserve it! Drink 3 glasses of wine. (That I can manage.)

38. (Stop counting)

39. (I said, that will do.)

The last bite

2011-11-03T12:24:00.000-07:00

I just ate the last bite of the veggie lasagna I made last week. It was possibly better than the lasagna bolognese I also made. Before I forget what I put in it, here's the recipe.
1 lb. mozz.
no boil noodles
squash of some sort
parsnips
arugula
basil
onion
tomatoes (semi-ripe)
For bechamel:
milk
flour
butter

This entire recipe, save the lasagna noodles, milk, butter and flour was made from items garned from the Flagstaff CSA.

I received a ginormous squash at the CSA. I put it out with the Halloween pumpkins and thought I would leave it on the porch steps for a month or two until its collapsed form no longer could fake decoration-status. But why not use it? Lo though I hate peeling sqaush, this one was so big, it was actually kind of easy. I used about half of it and contributed the rest to the squash heap of history. I sliced it into thin half-rounds and boiled it in salted (and a big sugared) water until it was al dente. Then, I sliced parsnips and cooked them in butter because there wasn't enough butter in the bechamel which I was making on the side and not the fancy, clove-stuck onion and bay leaf way, but the butter, flour = roux, whisk in some milk way.
Then I layered.
First bechamel. Then, noodles, then squash, parsnips, sliced tomatoes, torn arugula, mozz, then bechamel, noodles, squash, parsnips, sliced onions, sliced tomatoes, torn basil mozz, then bechamel, noodles, squash, parsnips, arugula, mozz, then noodles, then bechamel, then topped with mozz (and maybe some parm).
Cook for 1 hour while at a neighbors' party.
Possibly better than the bolognese (with CSA pork and ground beef) version I also took over to a different party that evening. Possibly.

Recognize

2011-10-30T08:45:00.000-07:00

Except for Darth, I've never actually seen anyone die. My dad and grandma, I just heard about over the phone. There was still the collapse and the wailing but from the minute the person died, I started to get better. When I was waiting for Box to die, I dug in. I told my friend, I feel like I've always been sad and will always be sad. I'm wondering what kind of coper I am. I vacillate between callous apathy: "Box is dying" to histrionic "I do not know how I will go on."
Box was the best cat in the whole world. I am biased but when I got him at the Humane Society, there was a list of Humane Society workers who wanted to adopt him. They, though, had already adopted so many animals that they were at the policy limit. Box would have been my first adoptee since I started working there so I got dibs. I don't know how exactly everyone knew he was the best cat--on the breed they typed him "orange tabby" and "exotic" so maybe it was his strange, swirly markings that drew everyone but I actually think it was the way he meowed.
He was a loud cat. Every morning he woke us up saying Ma-ma Mow and then shrieking like an unoiled door hinge.
He ma-ma mow-ed up the stairs following me to get dressed and ma-ma mowed while I took a shower. If I took a bath, he'd poke his head up over the side and ma-ma mowed at me there. And then pretended he wanted to get in the tub but obviously didn't. I guess all cats do that--just like all cats take up the whole bed when you sleep, love to sleep on cardboard.
Box was dangerous. He'd bite your toes if they were out of the covers and your hands if they were outside of your sleeves. He would knead your leg like a loaf of bread if you sat still too long. Zoe would play games with Box, dragging the string all over the house. He would follow her anywhere.
He had a lot of friends in the world. I can hear Lynn's voice saying "Box" all gravely and commanding. Ander and Megan were the only house-guests who would pet him while he ate. My mom let him stay with her over Christmas break and summer break and scratched him on his forehead. My nephew Cam, whenever Box had an owie from tangling with the neighbor cats (or possibly raccoons), would ask, "What happen Box."
I don't know. How can I convey how good he was? I'm already running the montage in my head. He loved to be outside. He was so orange against green grass. He stalked everything but ravens who stalked him. He liked to sleep in the sun on the deck and run across the 1/4 acre of grass on the house on green street. I spent half my life looking for him when he wouldn't come in. He was allowed to go outside but not to stay out all night. I was up until 2 a.m. once looking for him on 9th Avenue, opening can after can of Fancy Feast so hear the can open, he would smell it and come running.
Erik and I had to trap the mice he would bring inside from the field next door. He was a fighter but not a killer and we swept traumatized mice into empty Kleenex boxes to return to the field next door.
He slept with me every night, no matter where I slept. He was almost the kind of cat you could trust to take camping--he would go but always come back.
Last night, I thought he'd died and I held him on my lap. Then I realized he hadn't so I took him into bed. We shared my pillow and he stayed warm, I hope. I kept waking up to check if he was breathing. I thanked him over and over for staying in the bed. I didn't want him to die cold and alone.
When the sun came up, his chest started to convulse. Then, he finally stopped breathing.
I don't know how to say how Box-y he was. There are a hundred pictures of him in my head and images of him pulling up on his paws to look in windows or on chairs or over the bathtub but I think what really made him Box was how very loud he was. His purr sounded like a Mack truck. The house, even with Zoe singing ABC's and tickling Max, is quiet today.
I don't know how to say it well. I love that cat.

Darth

2011-10-26T09:33:00.000-07:00

It was spring, 1998--the spring before I left Portland for Salt Lake and graduate school. I don't know why he crawled up the front steps of our blue house. We already had four cats living with us--Rhett's cat, Smile, and my three cats, Jelly, Phaedra and Box. Maybe he could smell that we were a cat-loving people. He was skin and bones. His eyes were pools of blackness. His breathing was thick. We pulled him in the house and fed him bowl after bowl of cat food. We thought he was just hungry. That He was just the world's thinnest, stray gray tabby. We fed him some more. We named him Darth, after his heavy breathing.

Rhett's friend Noelle took him to the vet. He supplied her with fluids we could give him intraveneously. He also gave us a diagnosis. Cancer.

When Noelle got home, he seemed sicker. Diagnoses always seem to do that. We installed him on the futon in the front room. We put water and food in front of him so he didn't have to move. We learned how to insert the needle under his skin and thought, we could be nurses if we wanted.

A couple weeks later, I hosted my friend Rebecca's wedding shower at the house. I made Jello, as a you-live-in-Utah-now-and-I-will-be-there-again-soon joke, while Darth wheezed. We had other Utah food too--possibly pigs in a blanket. As we ate, our friend Julie's daughter, Calista, wondered what that noise was. She went over to Darth. He breathed at her. And then he didn't. I don't think this was the best shower I've ever thrown. It might have been the only shower I've ever thrown.

We buried Darth in the backyard, under the cherry tree that listed neighbor-ward. It happened so fast. A few days. Only two bags of fluid.

15 years later: When my sister left from her visit Monday morning, I looked at Box's eyes. He had Darth-eyes. He was thin as a stray. I fed him can after can of Fancy Feast but he wouldn't eat. I called the vet. He came immediately. His kidneys are failing, he said. I gave him fluids, electrolytes.

I said, can I give him fluids? I had a cat named Darth once. I think I remember how to do it.

He said, let's give it a couple of days.

I am slow. I thought, "let's give him a couple of days" meant "let's see if he gets better on his own." What he meant was, "This probably isn't going to work. Let's not put carts before horses or fluids into seeping cats."

Box ate a little bit of cat food this morning. He jumped up on the bed last night. Maybe he'll rally. Kidney-failure isn't cancer but they don't do kidney transplants for cats, even if that cat has ocelot-like markings winding through his orange fur, kneads your leg whereever you sit, purrs like a train, plays tiger in the grass with wayward leaves, or sleeps every night at the back of your knees.

October

2011-10-09T13:56:00.000-07:00

Today was the last day of the Flagstaff Farmer's Market. Even though I will be able over the winter to procure most things through my CSA and their market, I still stockpiled like the rapture people had called and said, no, this time, it's really it. I only had $20 cash but I also brought a brand-new checkbook. From Whipstone farms I bought the usual turnips and carrots, since Zoe eats sliced turnips and carrots in her lunch. I also bought from them kale because I'm not sure when greens season begins at the CSA. Once it does, it's nonstop greens--tatsoi, bok choy, beet greens, kale (this is the first part of a rap song that I wrote for the CSA. "Onions, turnips, rutabegas, dill" is the next line. One day, I'll finish it and force the volunteers who work at the CSA store to sing along with me. Because they don't do enough) and a head of red leaf lettuce the size of my head. $10.
I spent $54 dollars at the pork place because my 1/4 share of pork won't be ready until November ($110). I bought 4 pork chops, 1 pound of ground pork and a pork shoulder. And eggs. Green, olive, beige and blue-colored eggs. From Moonrise I bought $6.85 worth of tomatoes (brandywine, roma and a box of cherry) plus the pork share, to be delivered, soonish.
I spent $13 on coffee from Manuel Santana and 1.85 on a pomegranate and an onion. $28 dollars at Flying M for massaged* meat--flank steak, ground beef, short ribs and $15 at the chicken place for a chicken and 4 chicken thighs. The cost is a lot more. $10/lb for the pork. About the same for the beef. $4/lb for the chicken. But Erik and I are going to experiment and go out zero times in the next two weeks (well, start back last Monday when we went to Karma sushi and spent $73). So zero times in three weeks. And you'll see that the expensive meat is still less than one night of sashimi. Zoe and I made a menu for two weeks (which we forgot to put fish on! Include halibut or salmon in here somewhere! Why doesn't anyone sell rainbow trout at the farmer's market?)

So here's our tentative plan for the next 2 weeks.
Sunday: Roast chicken, mashed potatoes, turnip greens.
Monday: Roasted veg: Sweet potatoes, potatoes, celery root, and butternut squash soup.
Tuesday: Hamburgers by Erik
Wednesday: Pork chops, kale.
Thursday: (Oh, we should have fish here since the menu says, ground pork--that's too much pork in a row, free range and massaged or not.).
Friday: Spanikopita, tzikia, hummus (hopefully, Beya et. al can come).
Saturday: Beef ribs and brocolli
Sunday: Pozole (hopefully, friends can come. Or switch with Saturday).
Monday: Pizza on the grill
Tuesday: turkey tacos
Wednesday: Flank steak
Thursday: Cauliflower pasta? (Maybe. Val arrives. Menu will change with her preferences!)
Friday: Souffle and fish
Saturday: I want to have pre-Thanksgiving. Erik has misgivings (ha!) about it. He wants his tongue to be surprised by Thanksgiving but I think you can't have too many Thanksgivings.

And, that is all. We'll still have Short ribs, ground pork and chicken thighs in the fridge. Can we make it one more week? Would we want to? If I don't spend any more money on going out in October though, my birthday month might be full of delicious escapes.

Also. I'm making granola right now with flax, wheat germ, wheat bran, oats and almonds so I can save money on cereal. But last time I was at Safeway (see September post), all Quaker products were on sale: Cinnamon Life (Zoe's fave), Oatmeal Squares (what Max and I like) and regular oats. Why can't Quaker products always be two-for-one ish? If they won't put them on sale, Quaker man will have forced me to bake my own granola, which is messy and a little burny-smelling.

*Massaged is the word we used to use with Zoe when we were talking about grass-fed, non-CAFO cows when she was 3. It's still easier although the beef is not Wagyu. That's for my next adventure: All food from D'Artagnan!

September

2011-09-17T14:05:00.000-07:00

Lo though I have pink doughnut frosting all over my favorite shirt thanks to "I am Max and I have to get out of the shopping cart now" man (who followed the "I am Max and I need to have a doughnut to be bribed to stay in the cart" man), and lo though I only have 1 more hour of this free time, and lo though Erik is at work, I am feeling that today, anything is possible. Part of this has to do with good news but part of it just has to do with a sunny September day. It feels Oktoberfesty. It feels like you can sit in direct sunlight and not broil. It feels like. Max is asleep right now. This is huge because we just made Max give up the bottle. I don't know why we did this. To challenge his already-fragile sleeping patterns? No. Because his doctor said it would get harder the longer we waited. And it's already hard. The first night, no sleep between 12 and 3 (his regular waking up times for a bottle). Last night, a little better, but I fear only because he slept so little the night before and took no nap. But he's actually been quite pleasant about the whole tortuous event. He's a pretty classy baby who can sign for milk but can say the word cookie.

Zoe and I went on our longest backwoods bike ride yet. There are so many trails behind our house but I forget that mountain biking is pretty hard. You have to look ahead, look down, and try never to left-hand brake. That's a lot for a little kid who just learned how to ride a bike. Now she's at a playdate with our awesome, carefree neighbors who don't feel it takes 3-4 weeks to set up a playdate.

Erik is almost done painting. Almost. 4 more weeks. I'm not sure people understand the method behind Erik's painting process. I'm not sure I do. It involves a lot of caulk, a lot of sanding, mudding and cutting in. It takes forever. But it looks awesome when it's done. He's also putting down new base molding. Pine. Polyeurethaned at my request. I really can't give him a hard time about the construction zone in the dining room.

My house is kind of clean. The laundry's kind of done. I could grade but I think I'll go write a response poem and then maybe work on an essay that some magazine might take some day. Or maybe I'll write that review. Or maybe I'll write a blog post that reads like a list but is meant to have the point that today is he kind of day that everything is right--the sun, the vultures, the dog sleeping on the porch, the glass of ice water with lemon, the quiet mountain town (that is not quiet all summer long), the big mountain in front of me that maybe we'll hike up tomorrow, and the mountain behind that that might have a couple of boletes hiding in its crevices, the caw of the raven, the promise of Chinese chicken noodle soup for dinner, because it's September and even though I can sit in the sun right now, tonight it will be cold enough for soup.

Back to work

2011-08-23T15:40:00.001-07:00

That is better. I'm tired. Exhausted. Etc. I'm home with the chitlins, thinking of emptying the dishwasher, but overall feel more balanced. Morning rush, maddening computer issues, program ad issues with Writers Chronicle, advising issues, talk in the hallway, showing off the new bathroom, more computer issues, office complaints, rushed lunch with Erik, meeting with smart grad student, email email email (now that computer issues are resolved), read Julie's fabulous poem, log microorganism footage, try to assemble a reasonable time-code list for Erik to make trailer, call Max's day care, find out Max is still asleep, rush to get Zoe, think about Julie's poem, run through the rain to pick Zoe up, drive slowly to get Max, wash out spilled coffee in car and come back here to contemplate emptying the dishwasher.

More exhausted than I've been all summer. Also. Less apoplectic. Strange.

Our offices just reopened after their remodel. I saw mine for the first time and almost cried. I had thought I was getting this cool new office--large, open, and close to the exits--but in the remodel, they bricked in one of the windows to make an up-to-fire-code fire-escape. Lame! Give my windows! The people can use the regular stairs if the building's on fire!!! Or, rather, put in the fire-escape but make it like one of those cool New Yorkie kind that clangs up and down, and, if you're a really great and fast and tall criminal, you can jump and escape upward by pulling down on the iron ladder. I wouldn't mind watching that out my window.
So now I have only one window. But one is better than none, my smart grad student who has no windows in his office told me.

So I will learn to live with it, put gigantic pictures of Max and Zoe on the wall so I can start to crave the return to summer, full-time domestication and all.

(The "C" on my keyboard is kind of wonky. If there are missing "c's" where there should be "c's" forgive me because while I do feel "back," or, rather, "bak," I don't feel very proofready.)