Sunday Stuff

We fell back. It's weird that it's only 11am right now. It already feels like it should be much later.

I cut back to one 10 oz cup of coffee per day this past week because I found that bigger cups were exacerbating my anxiety. So far, so good. Today I decided to go big and had 20 oz while I was jabbering with my mom over breakfast, and I need someone to come peel me off the ceiling.

I have a few things to do today. I'm listening to an "angry feminist" playlist on YouTube while I clean, organize, and generally whip the house into shape. First, I did a bit of weed eating in the front yard. The flower beds needed chopping down for the fall. Of course, I weed eated (weed ate?) the toes on one foot. Ugh.

I'm reading a bit. I have Just Mercy and Missoula downloaded and I'm taking them a bit at a time. Big, heavy, absolutely-necessary-to-read-right-now topics.

My students are starting a unit on power structures and cultural norms as we round out the semester. We started last week with very little commentary/direction from me. We watched Amanda Palmer's "The Art of Asking" TED Talk to get their initial reactions (verbally and a response paper) which we'll later break down into a class discussion and some more writings on norms. This is gonna be a fun unit.

Finally, I'm having a blast with my planners. Yeah, I'm up to three. I have an Erin Condren I use for pre-planning my week...things I have to remember, bills to pay, school deadlines, grocery list, etc. I use a Happy Planner for memory keeping...essentially journaling or scrapbooking. The bottom line of that one is remembering stuff I would otherwise forget...cute stuff Greyson says and does, behavior notes that come home with him, my runs, food choices. I also have a personal planner. I actually use this one the least. I keep a few notes about my classes. They're on slightly different schedules, so I have to refresh my memory about which class stopped where and what assignments are coming in at different times. I'm finding that with the swirl of election stuff and tumultuous feelings I'm having, planning is incredibly calming and cathartic. Having an overview of everything is comforting.

The photo up top is the first half of this past week's spread.

What are you up to? 

Poking Head Out of a Hole

Hey splendiferous people! It was not my intention to take a bloggy break, but I had to act like a teacher this week. That is, our August term is getting ready to kick up at my dear sweet day job, and I'm in the tizzy planning for my Literature and Film, Science Fiction & Fantasy, and Fundamentals of Writing courses. I'll also be teaching the usual College Writing I and II online, along with Children's Literature, this Fall. How crazy am I? A whole hell of a lotta crazy!

For a good week or two I did not touch a book. Did not so much as stroke the cover of one, but that little reading burp seems to be over. A Facebook buddy and former grad school colleague of mine sent along a copy of Sarah Waters' The Little Stranger (only slightly gnawed by her cat). So far I LOVE THIS BOOK. So much more than the part of Affinity that I read.

I was one of the sixty gazillion people seeing Harry Potter 7.2 on opening weekend, and I've since decided it's a crackerjack idea to re-read the whole series from the beginning to see what I missed along the way. And can I just say, in regards to the film, NEVILLE ROCKS! There. I needed to get that out of my system.

Finally, I will be hosting the BookClubSandwich discussion of Jael McHenry's The Kitchen Daughter on Monday the 25th! If you haven't finished reading, you should. Or you should at least try and come discuss. At that juncture you will see why I am a pot calling a kettle black. Ahem!

So that's about it. Crazitude teacher planning + exhaustion + summer sluggery in the 104 degree heat + a renewed interest in reading make me a blog comer backer. See me coming back!

Poking Head Out of a Hole

Hey splendiferous people! It was not my intention to take a bloggy break, but I had to act like a teacher this week. That is, our August term is getting ready to kick up at my dear sweet day job, and I'm in the tizzy planning for my Literature and Film, Science Fiction & Fantasy, and Fundamentals of Writing courses. I'll also be teaching the usual College Writing I and II online, along with Children's Literature, this Fall. How crazy am I? A whole hell of a lotta crazy!

For a good week or two I did not touch a book. Did not so much as stroke the cover of one, but that little reading burp seems to be over. A Facebook buddy and former grad school colleague of mine sent along a copy of Sarah Waters' The Little Stranger (only slightly gnawed by her cat). So far I LOVE THIS BOOK. So much more than the part of Affinity that I read.

I was one of the sixty gazillion people seeing Harry Potter 7.2 on opening weekend, and I've since decided it's a crackerjack idea to re-read the whole series from the beginning to see what I missed along the way. And can I just say, in regards to the film, NEVILLE ROCKS! There. I needed to get that out of my system.

Finally, I will be hosting the BookClubSandwich discussion of Jael McHenry's The Kitchen Daughter on Monday the 25th! If you haven't finished reading, you should. Or you should at least try and come discuss. At that juncture you will see why I am a pot calling a kettle black. Ahem!

So that's about it. Crazitude teacher planning + exhaustion + summer sluggery in the 104 degree heat + a renewed interest in reading make me a blog comer backer. See me coming back!

Books Headed into the Weekend

I've been on fire this week! Ever since I whipped through The Passage I've been fearful of a slump. I've been trying to get my hands on a diverse sampling of books so I won't get bored. I'm pretty sure this is when I really fall into a deadly reading slump: when I'm bored by what I pick up immediately after a huge favorite.

While The Poison Diaries, by Maryrose Wood, was not a successful read for me, I still managed to finish it in one day. That always makes me feel accomplished and giddy, so crisis successfully averted right out of the box.

Yesterday I picked up Beatrice and Virgil, by Yann Martel. I had to proctor an exam for an absent instructor, so I had some time to read at work. While the book is a little iffy so far, the writing is enough to keep me interested. Many seem to think this book is too self-referential and stuck up, but I haven't decided just yet. I've read a lot of self-referential authors (Hello, Paul Auster!), so that part doesn't bother me in particular. However, we'll see if Martel manages to pull off this animal thing again.

I also managed to catch the reality show I've been salivating over: The Fabulous Beekman Boys on Planet Green. How I remembered to set the DVR in a sleepy haze yesterday morning I'll never know, but I was rewarded with three episodes of the show last night. Funny! Very funny. Gay men from New York City running around helping raise goats is a good time, my friends. It's not as silly as I expected it to be. There was minimal flailing. Still fun and lots of snark.

I have Josh Kilmer-Purcell's book about their move and farming experience--The Bucolic Plague--on my nightstand. I just read the introduction and part of the first chapter last night before I sacked out, but I'm really excited to finish it now. Kilmer-Purcell, a former drag queen and a marketing executive, and his partner "Dr. Brent", who was the medical consultant for the Martha Stewart Show, are wonderfully irreverent and terribly sarcastic and smart.

So what books will be accompanying you into the weekend? Let me know so I can covet your stacks.

Note: I'm also participating in my first Book Blogger Hop this weekend! Happy hopping!

Books Headed into the Weekend

I've been on fire this week! Ever since I whipped through The Passage I've been fearful of a slump. I've been trying to get my hands on a diverse sampling of books so I won't get bored. I'm pretty sure this is when I really fall into a deadly reading slump: when I'm bored by what I pick up immediately after a huge favorite.

While The Poison Diaries, by Maryrose Wood, was not a successful read for me, I still managed to finish it in one day. That always makes me feel accomplished and giddy, so crisis successfully averted right out of the box.

Yesterday I picked up Beatrice and Virgil, by Yann Martel. I had to proctor an exam for an absent instructor, so I had some time to read at work. While the book is a little iffy so far, the writing is enough to keep me interested. Many seem to think this book is too self-referential and stuck up, but I haven't decided just yet. I've read a lot of self-referential authors (Hello, Paul Auster!), so that part doesn't bother me in particular. However, we'll see if Martel manages to pull off this animal thing again.

I also managed to catch the reality show I've been salivating over: The Fabulous Beekman Boys on Planet Green. How I remembered to set the DVR in a sleepy haze yesterday morning I'll never know, but I was rewarded with three episodes of the show last night. Funny! Very funny. Gay men from New York City running around helping raise goats is a good time, my friends. It's not as silly as I expected it to be. There was minimal flailing. Still fun and lots of snark.

I have Josh Kilmer-Purcell's book about their move and farming experience--The Bucolic Plague--on my nightstand. I just read the introduction and part of the first chapter last night before I sacked out, but I'm really excited to finish it now. Kilmer-Purcell, a former drag queen and a marketing executive, and his partner "Dr. Brent", who was the medical consultant for the Martha Stewart Show, are wonderfully irreverent and terribly sarcastic and smart.

So what books will be accompanying you into the weekend? Let me know so I can covet your stacks.

Note: I'm also participating in my first Book Blogger Hop this weekend! Happy hopping!

Farewell for the weekend...

Here's my weekly "farewell while I do weekend things" post. I woke up with a gawd-awful sleep hangover this morning. I apparently slept on my head last night because my neck feels as if I've been playing Twister with it.

So, what to post, what to post....

Books!

I finished Philip Roth's The Dying Animal early in the week or late last week. Can't remember. Time flies when you're planning courses and reading erotica.

Anywho, The Dying Animal is another stunner from Roth. It's told from the perspective of David Kepesh, one of Roth's most famous and enduring characters, to an unnamed person who only speaks at the end of the novel. It's a chronicle of his relationship with a student, Consuela, with whom he becomes quite obsessed. Obsession is something foreign to Kepesh, a notorious bachelor and lover of sex. The novel is a chronicle not only of their affair, but also Kepesh's realization of his mortality. The title is a hint at the various layers of the text and is an allusion to his dying sexuality, his waning manhood, his mortality, and mortality in general, as Consuela's fate is not terribly sunny.

It's just a fantastic, multi-faceted, thoughtful text. While T. assures me that the Kepesh in The Breast and The Professor of Desire is quite a different incarnation, I'm excited to read those books just to see what Roth has up his sleeve. He's a shifty one, and I love it.

Reading now:
Unmasqued, an erotic retelling of The Phantom of the Opera, by Colette Gale.

Up next:
Eclipse, by Stephenie Meyer

And in a bit of a sad twist of fate, since I'm teaching the Monday night class from 6:00-8:30, I won't be able to attend the face-to-face book club I'd planned to join. I just hope maybe I'll have a chance in the Spring when my schedule changes.

Happy weekending, all!