Why did I promise my advisor I would make a webpage for the recreation(ish) dinner of a George Scharf menu we are doing? More importantly, why didn't I start freaking out about this sooner? More importantly, where have all my mad skillz gone? I used to be able to do some nice things with graphics. Now, it's just a good thing I prefer a clean, spare look, since I can't really manage much more.

On the other hand? Conceptually, site should be wicked cool when done. We're blogging the dinner, I'm getting copies of the Scharf menus themselves, our revised menu, the recipes we're using, etc.

Bleargh, comps next week, stab, die.

It's funny thinking about the habits of mind one gets, and where one acquires them. I tend to think of myself as my mother's daughter, but this is certainly not true. To illustrate: my mother does catering work occasionally. One year, this foul old woman told her the tortillas had to be flipped with her fingers and not a spatula. WTF? Now any sane person would say, "I am not putting my fingers near that griddle." My mother? Flips the damned tortillas with her fingers. And burned them, you know, pretty painfully. I was furious.

The point here is that I would not acquiesce to this bizarre tortilla-flipping demand. I am, in some ways, my father's daughter. That came to me today when I was peeling an orange. When I was a girl, my father told me he would show me the best way to peel an orange with my fingers. And it was. That is what I've taken from my father, I think. An interest in the best way to do things, and--and this is sometimes laudable when well kept in check--a desire to share it. When not kept in check, it becomes something along the lines of control issues. When well used, it becomes a very good quality that we call leadership, mentoring, etc.

What's funny is that my mother is just as efficient in her own little way, if not more so--but she doesn't have that need to share it with others. There's a diffidence with her that, while it seems like a good quality, can also be harmful, because it can make her horribly frustrated with people.

It's so hard to know when and what to share and when to shut up is, I suppose, the real point here. Either can make you maddening to yourself or others.

I woke up this morning with last night's beginnings of a sore throat (that I didn't notice because of fun times with Cassandra and Jason!) having burgeoned into a raging sore throat and cough. Yay.

But neither cough nor sore throat nor malaise nor fatigue could keep me from the polls! And seriously, I was done in like ten minutes because everyone early-voted to avoid the lines and stood in line for like forty minutes. Ha. And I went in just beaming away and came out crying because being sick makes me emotional, and I was also just really, really excited. This is the first presidential election that I've voted in where my candidate actually has a prayer. And my polling place is an African-American church, which made it feel even more historic because whatever I may feel about intersectionalities and the privileging of race over gender, I am so, so joyous to see this moment in the civil rights movement.

And now I'm going to make more tea with honey and possibly go back to bed. UGH.

After an entire week, just as I was coming home to pack some clothes so I could run away to a Holiday Inn in Austin for the weekend, guess what I found?

Yes. Power. Air-conditioning. Light. A functioning refrigerator. Hot water. All the luxuries that huge swaths of the world have never even seen but I apparently can't function without.

Brown rice is simmering on the stove, the latest episode of House will be ready to watch soon, and after a nap, I am going for a frighteningly expensive trip to the grocery store (to put in my very, very clean refrigerator).

So if anyone wants me, I'll be basking.

So I still don't have power, and by now, I've run out of fuel for cooking and am pretty well reliant upon restaurants for eating anything at any temperature other than lukewarm. This morning, Starbucks is providing me with coffee, oatmeal, and internet. I'll probably head in to school after this and then spend the rest of the day there, which is what I've been doing for the last two days.

It's so strange the things you realize during an extended power outage. How alone a dark house without internet feels, or how dazzling the "bright lights" of the city are when your home is just a swath of darkness. How much you rely on the comfort of a hot dinner or a warm drink in the morning, and how darkness makes an untidy house seem messier.

All that said, I'm plainly holding up fine. I have gas (thanks to a late-night raid on the gas station last night--I wasn't going to wait half an hour or more for gas), money for food, and school to provide me with a place to crouch and use the internet.

And with that too said, I'd really like my damned power back.

So yes, I survived Ike. We're still without power up where I am, however, which is why I'm shamelessly mooching power from Cassandra, and probably by the time I get power back, nobody will like me in the least anymore.

I have to say, I still think the whole thing is rather fun, despite the irritation of no power. I made sandbags of kitty litter and pillow cases (which were needful, as my door seal isn't all that wonderful)! I have made curry and coffee and other things that begin with C over a can of sterno. I read The Mill on the Floss while daylight lasted yesterday.

Granted, there have been less fun parts, like the misery of trying to sleep on a sultry Houston night without air-conditioning (including an attempt to sleep on the cat bed downstairs), "bathing" with a two-liter bottle of water, bailing out my car with a tin can, and not having any access to the outside world for some time (at home, cell phone texts are the only reliable way to reach me). But overall, I'm glad I've had my hurricane, and I'll be able to tell next year's first-years about Ike and The Mill on the Floss and mooching power.

I'm going to try and see if I can get some doughnuts somehow before I go home tonight. Then I'm going to make a really glorious seafood stew with all the scallops and shrimp from the freezer. At least, as best I can with a can of sterno as my cooking medium (unless I'm very lucky and there is power when I get home).

Also, I get an entire week and a half off of teaching. Which will throw off my whole syllabus, but definitely makes up for a lot.

...the water from my tap is running brown.

If I'm going to lose access to clean water before the hurricane even makes landfall, I'm not sure I see how we're going to make it through this.

(I have lots of water stored in my closet. I am just pointing out that this is not a good sign.)

I went to a quilting store today and bought fabric to make a lovely frilly apron with! Beth and I are sharing the pattern, so I need to get some of that nice tracing stuff perhaps tomorrow (along with the actual sewing machine, finally). The fabrics are to die for, green and ivory and even a tasteful multi-colored, though I feel so terrified at the idea of mixing prints, like the fashion police are going to descend upon me at any moment. But it is only an apron! A fun, playful apron. It's okay.

I also got some lovely brown houndstooth for my Victorian walking skirt for Halloween. I just fell in love with the color quite entirely. With a nice blouse and a dabble of fake blood, I should make a delightful Mina Harker.

Preliminary exams? What preliminary exams?

I just smoked my last cigarette. Ever, God and my self-control willing. I've got bags of licorice, suckers, and a big bottle of yellow grapefruit juice to get me through.

Bleh.

Ohhh--for those in the U.S., I just found a place that you can sign up to stop receiving phone books! Since the last time mine were useful was when I first moved in and needed something to smother all the weeds in my tiny garden plot, I was very excited. Of course, there's a possibility that telephone companies may ignore me and keep sending their giant, unopened doorstops that I now carry straight to the dumpster anyway, but at least I'm sending a message. Yay for messages!

Beyond that, much, much too much to do today. Plays to read, syllabi to finalize, wine and soda to buy, and Emily Post: Daughter of the Gilded Age, Mistress of American Manners to finish and review. I'm hoping the spirit will also move me to bake cranberry cornmeal cookies. On the plus side, my stress rash is beginning to disperse, so I'll be grateful for small favors.

I think I might possibly just flail out of my skin and that will put an end to the entire matter for good.

I hate how time accordions before you travel. One minute you're going, "No worries, I've still got a week," and the next minute, you're stepping on a damned plane. I swear there is nothing in between except maybe a load of laundry and a panicked trip to Arby's.

But yes. Three loads of laundry today and some epic packing and then some half-hearted cleaning and a piteous attempt to convince myself that Cassandra will still like myself after she sees how I really live.

I fricking finally have the privilege of being in debt to the federal government and shall not be turned out of my home by debt collectors at the end of the summer. Thank you, Rice.

Oh, dear, I have to go bother various departments at Rice tomorrow to make them give me money. Sometimes I hate being a graduate student. Why can't things just be done right the first time?

Had gorgeous tea today with Cassandra, who tempted me with her wicked and seductive Baba Yaga ways into trying a fruity tea.

Also, I discovered Bering's Hardware, which is everything a hardware store ought to be, right down to the gourmet chocolate counter. How have I been going to Home Depot for so long? Bering's is a hardware paradise!

Christ, I am going to California in approximately three days, and I have made no preparations apart from an elaborate packing list. *whimpers*

I was just thinking, for absolutely no good reason other than a stray mention in a book review, about elementary school science fairs. And I've never, ever been able to work out what the purpose of those fairs was. I know that, ostensibly, we were supposed to be little scientists and set up experiments, complete with a question, research, and experiment. But the thing was, the projects that won always incorporated way more advanced science than a kid could actually understand. They were building robots and shit. Are you telling me they had mastered robotics at the age of twelve (humiliatingly, at the time, I was sure they had)?

My parents never helped me with that stuff. They weren't that kind of parents and weren't, for that matter, scientifically minded themselves. So I did one science project on the power of suggestion, making some kids drink water and asking them whether it tasted like peppermint (sometimes it had peppermint in it, sometimes it didn't). Or the next year, I tried to master the question of salt and preserving meat. I left one piece of meat to rot, packed one piece with salt, and one piece with alum. And, frankly, that was still a bit more advanced than my scientific knowledge because no one sat down with me and helped me figure out why the salt helped preserve the meat (to my eternal shame, I still don't know, unless it's that it dehydrates it, which makes it a less fertile breeding ground for organisms).

If I were ever judging one of those things (which I never will be), I'd find a kid who spent a few hours looking at something and tried to figure out what it did--that's all, nothing fancy. Just the level of science that a kid could reasonably obtain mastery of, and I would give that kid the prize. And then I would smirk cruelly at all the wailing parents carrying home the robots.

Why do films like The Cider House Rules have to strictly sideline female development in order to have a story? Why aren't there films like this with female protagonists? Why do the little boy orphans get David Copperfield while the little girl orphans get prayer? Erykah Badu's character is the only really interesting female role in the piece, and she gets scarcely any screen time. *growls*

Also, I went shopping today, to the clearance center to try and find a sweater. Shouldn't have been too hard a task, but let me tell you, I spent an hour and a half in the women's section without finding anything even half-way to what I was looking for. But then, after a brain-wave, I looked in the men's section. I found a pure cotton cardigan, nicely cut and plainly colored for twelve dollars. I found pure cashmere sweaters for twenty-five dollars, wool for sixteen. And none of them afflicted with the beads, hideous coloring, and synthetics that infested all the women's tops. Look out, gentlemen! I'm not only coming for your jobs and your movies, I'm coming for your sweaters, too!

Lawrence preached the Sun as a procreative deity; urged women that happiness for them lay only in yielding submissively to the dark sexual urge of strong-loined men; and mixed up for himself a confused private religion of the theosophical incoherences of Madame Blavatsky, the Yoga writings of an obscure prophet names Pryse, the philosophical view of Heraclitus, Bacon and Bergson that all is flux, Jean's interpretation of Einstein, the anthropology of Sir James Fraser (whose Golden Bough was a key book of the period) and others, Mexican legend, and the whole literature of Freudian, Jungian and Adlerian psychology. Lawrence was without either Huxley's wit, or Joyce's playboy humour: he lived an anguished, bathetic life, and had a huge, anguished, bathetic following. His nearest approach to happiness was when in his last days at Taos, New Mexico, he bought a cow called Susan and used to milk her with mystic devotion. 'The queer cowy mystery of her is her changeless cowy desirableness.' He died in 1930, and a lesser Lawrence legend started when several of his friends write biographies of him, each contradicting the other.
--From The Long Week-End: A Social History of Great Britain 1918-1939 by Robert Graves and Alan Hodge

Have you ever noticed how very occasionally, books seem to come to you by kismet? I recently was looking through the "What Are You Reading Now?" forum on LibraryThing, and saw that someone was reading a book called The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. It was too good a title not to look into, so I looked it up, read the blurb, and decided I wanted to read it. It went on my Amazon wishlist, where it might have lingered until I forgot why I wanted to read it, but as I was looking through the LibraryThing books on offer for early reviewers (a way to get ARC's to review) last month, I saw that this book had been added at the last minute. I requested it, naturally, but I knew my chances were very small—chances of getting any book there are quite small, even though I've had a bit of a lucky streak lately.

Well, small chances aside, I got a notification that the book, the book I wanted most, was on its way. And it duly arrived very quickly. So yesterday, wanting to be a Good Reviewer (and increase my chance for a book from the next batch!), I began reading.

It's a wonderfully magical and satisfying book, which is something I can say about so few books written these days. It's all about books, irregular families and communities, eccentricity and individuality. So perhaps it's no surprise that I loved it, as I love all those things. But what surprised me was just how much I loved it. It's been a while since I've sat up for ages to finish reading a book before bed, but I did for this book, and then I lay awake in bed for another hour, remembering wonderful scenes in it and hugging them to myself.

So many novels these days are touted as being for lovers of literature—like the rather tiresome How Elizabeth Barrett Browning Saved My Life, which I read recently and found the worst kind of shallow and self-congratulatory. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, however, has a wonderfully unabashed erudition that made me want to reread Lamb's letters, Catullus's poems, and Wilde's fairy tales.

The plot of the novel centers on a London journalist just after World War II who, whilst hunting around for a topic for her next book, begins by chance a correspondence with a literary group in the Channel Islands, which were occupied by Germans during the war. Soon she's going up to Guernsey herself and becoming part of the community that has so enchanted her as she finds a center for her book and, of course, her own life.

All that I've said so far doesn't do the book justice. It is filled with entrancements: life-long friendships, comedy violence (my favorite!), a very real and vivid evaluation of the effects of WWII on Britain and Guernsey, wonderful pastoral description, and a velvet ferret.

What makes the book so very special, I believe, is the way that all the different voices (for it is epistolary in form) sparkle with unique energy and vigor. No voice gets lost in the shuffle, and the book finds its core very easily and sustains interest in the different narrative threads with perfect aplomb.

Oh, I want to read it again right now.

This is a very long post that I really ought to cut, but I want so much to make all of you go read it as well that I can't bring myself to diminish even slightly the chance that you will.

I am so, so over my students at this point. It's hard enough teaching for three hours three times a week, but teaching it with a bad mix of students who don't talk and/or don't do the reading is just a nightmare. My class last semester was, by and large, so smart and with it that these students look like something from the bottom of a well by contrast.

I'm hoping to teach Intro to Lit in the fall, since I haven't taught that since last fall and maybe the change will inspire me to suck less as a teacher. Because I will freely admit (to you lot at least) that I've been sucking lately. No creativity, consistency, or anything.

At least I had gorgeous lunch/tea with Cassandra today to cheer me up. I made omelette and popovers and things, and she ate them all. I like guests who eat well. It's a fine art.

And I will get back my car tomorrow, and then I can start figuring out how to pay off the humongous credit card bill that will result (compressors=not cheap).

It seems just about the right time to put up a link to the best version out there of Summertime Blues. Better than the original, better even than The Who (though you cannot--cannot beat John Entwistle's vocals in their version). Blue Cheer are the essence of sheer, glorious, late-sixties noise. This version is my summertime blues. Enjoy!

So starting tomorrow, right after I finish this last paper, I'm going to start a week's reading deprivation. This will mean I will not be reading lj for a week, so please don't say anything too brilliant and unmissable!

It also means that I may go insane. The point of this is to help sort of jump-start my brain and make me more creative, but that doesn't help if you're insane. So if any of you have lovely suggestions about what I should do that doesn't involve reading (or watching television, which I'm limiting to a short period each day so that I don't sedate my brain rather than jump-starting it), please, please let me know. I'm already planning to knit and bake and make curtains and paint and rearrange my bookshelf and clean and listen to music and exercise a lot and write (I am allowed to write) and such things, but I'm certainly going to need all the suggestions I can get. Any clever ideas?