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.