supercheesegirl

F and I went for a good hike on Sunday. We walked over to Wissahickon Valley Park, entered the park from Rex Ave, hiked all the way over to the Valley Green Inn, stopped for a pee break, then hiked back. We also stopped by a pretty stream and waterfall for a picnic lunch, and then again along the creek to dip our toes in. It was a wonderful afternoon. The only downside was that we only packed one bottle of water, so after it ran out, walking home again was rather unpleasant. But then we drank a quart of lemonade and watched Buffy, so all was well again. Overall it was a lovely day.

Yesterday was my last comp theory class. I handed in my paper, gave my little presentation, filled out the evaluation form, etc. It was a really good class, and now I have a ton of new things on my To Read list, and I feel like I learned a lot and that I could be a pretty good teacher. I don't know if I'll continue with the masters program at SJU--it's a fine program, but it's not the most convenient place to get to from either my current apartment or our new one over in Swarthmore, so I don't know. But I'm glad I took the class. Now just to receive my grade and then submit the paperwork to my company in the hopes that they'll pay me back for it.

And now that class is over, I can go back to my regularly scheduled reading, instead of focusing on comp all the time. I celebrated by filling up my library hold list with some travel writing, archaeology, women's history, a mystery novel, and a Guy Gavriel Kay fantasy novel. Score.

Oh yeah, I don't think I mentioned--F and I found a new apartment. It's a three bedroom, 1.5 bath place, spitting distance from the Swarthmore train station and a quick walk from F's office. His entire commute will pretty much disappear. The apartment itself is really nice. It's in a building that used to be an old fashioned hotel, and it's the suite that the really rich people rented--so the third bedroom was intended for the servant's quarters, and the half bath is actually a small toilet and a little hobbit-sized tub, no sink, attached to the little third bedroom. Because I'm guessing the servant couldn't possibly use the same bathroom as the family. So that's kind of cool and quirky. The third bedroom setup will be perfect if we decide to have a child while we're in this place, and will be perfect for a little yoga room for me until that happens. The rest of the rooms are quite large, and there are tons of large closets. There's a dishwasher too (the machine kind, not the kind that lives in the third bedroom). No laundry, unfortunately, which is the main downside, but several nearby laundromats, and walking distance to the Swarthmore co-op and some restaurants and a ten-minute drive to Media, where there are many cool and excellent things. Overall, we're really excited about the new place. Move in date is July 1, which is unfortunately a Wednesday. I still need to give notice at my current place, so I'm going to ask them if we can extend our lease just a little into July at a pro-rated rent so we can move over July 4th weekend. So we'll see about that.

I was also going to post about Heroes and a few other things, but I was just reminded that I have to be at a training at 10 am. Whee.

Oh, and I got a 52/50 on my Maya midterm. The highest score possible would have been 53/50, so I missed a point in one of the essays. I am still pleased.

In case anyone was wondering, I totally rocked my midterm the other night. I won't get the grade back for another week and a half, but I know for a fact I did awesome.

Look at me, I'm not studying for my midterm!!!

No, really. I will. In fact I am skipping yoga so I can A) finish my editing homework, and B) study for my midterm. I have studied for my midterm every day since Friday. I studied for two full hours last night. Can I just take the damn midterm and get it over with?

This does not bode well for my future research paper for this class. Argh.

so yesterday's yoga class was awesome. i feel like i'm finally making progress (at least a little bit) with my body. yesterday i was able to (almost) get my leg completely behind head. i actually hovered in the crow position for about half a second (but my feet were off the floor for that half a second!). when doing the sun salutation, i can jump my feet back to the four-legged stick and then after downward dog can jump my feet back up to my hands again (instead of walking/hopping them up and down the mat, like i was doing all semester). AND yesterday i did a headstand for the first time. i only needed minimal help from my teacher (i can't get my ass in the air!); she helped me kick up so i could lean my feet against the wall. and it was cool.

of course, that was the last yoga class of the semester. i really want to go to triad yoga and see if i can sign up for a class there, but elan takes yoga there, and she says they're on a 12-week session plan right now, and they're in the middle of the session, and that prices have gone up. i don't really want to have to join a class mid-session, if they'd even let me do that. the cheapest course of fitness action for the summer would probably be to just join the uncg gym for the summer session at the alumni rate. i was thinking about taking some martial arts thing with carra (from self-defense), but that might be even more expensive than yoga. sigh. at least at the uncg rec center, they do have aerobics classes. i like the class thing better than i like sitting on a bike reading a magazine.

in other news. yesterday i went to the bar to meet everyone after workshop. we went to the local mexican place on tate street, which is kind of new and which i hadn't been to before. i got a strawberry margarita for only $3.75 and chicken quesadillas for $4. a pretty good price, and the quesadillas weren't bad either (although the margarita tasted too much like tequila and too little like strawberry for my taste). while we were there, melissa and adam (the mfa melissa and adam, not any of the ones you other folks know) announced their engagement. we were all congratulatory, but it was kind of weird. i like melissa, and i like adam. but some of the surprise that i felt when they first got together is persisting. i mean, i always sort of thought they just had good sex but would eventually move on. it's strange to imagine them together long term and having kids and stuff. i guess if they're happy, i'm happy too.

more and more of my friends are getting married and engaged and stuff. and every time there's a new joyous announcement, people always ask me if i'm thinking of getting married. i'm running out of cute jokes about my ringlessness. actually, i'm sick of people asking me ANYTHING about the future. when is graduation, what are you doing this summer, when are you moving to boston, do you have an apartment yet, are you looking at jobs, what kind of job do you want, what are you going to do????? shut the fuck up, all of you. i will fucking let you know when i figure my shit out, believe me. i know people are just interested and concerned and stuff, but it is seriously not helping.

the one good thing about my family/friends back home not being particularly fond of jorn is that they don't ask if we're planning to get married. they ask about all the other stuff, but not that, thankfully.

ANYWAY, this was supposed to be a happy post. and it is a happy post. because i did okay on my self-defense test--after arguing with dave on one question, i believe that now i have 10/10 on the written test (although i got 26/30 on the skillz test, which was the lowest grade in the class, even if it is a B). AND i got fred's signature on my thesis yesterday, and christy's this morning, so this afternoon after work i am going directly to the graduate school and DROPPING OFF MY THESIS. i will be so glad when it's out of my hands. i will sing The Done Song.

zelda notes: i hate those stupid fish people! stealing all my goddamned stuff. little fuckers. i want to blow up their stupid island.

tonight: watching x-men with rhett and jorn and maybe elan and some other people over at rhett's house. tomorrow: catching a matinee of x-men 2 with jorn. probably doing a bunch of other stuff too.

oh, and the self-defense girls all want to hang out sometime. we set a tentative date for may 13, a tuesday at the end of finals. not like i have finals, but they do. and we can't go to a bar, since a few of them aren't 21 yet. poor babies! but i'm really excited, i like the self-defense girls.

hey y'all. busybusy.

i attended my last two classes ever yesterday. well, last classes ever at uncg. it was really nice.

today i baked cookies, got a background check and drug screening, returned an action figure to the BiLo, shopped at walmart and ed mckay's, and wrote out almost all of my holiday cards.

here's what's going on with me later this week:

thursday/friday: temp job (receptionist), 8-5, $9/hr. (hence the aforementioned background check and drug screening--apparently the company is a bit picky about such things. whateva, i ain't been smokin' none.)
thursday/friday evenings: christmas candlelight tours at blandwood. a lovely historic 1840s home, decorations, music, and me in a hoop skirt. what else do you need, really?
friday night: party at angie & jake's.
saturday: regular weekend tours at blandwood 11-2. movie date with jorn (STAR TREK!1!!), then holiday party at jenny's.
sunday: blandwood 2-5. also, if i have time, i can help tracy move into ruth's apartment, but i'm betting they'll be done with that by the time blandwood's done with me.

to do: pick up film, get stamps, send cards.

my mom teaches in an urban middle school located in a rather poor area, so most of her students are black. one of my mom's students is named Jtron. she refers to him and his friends as "Jtron and the other transformers." i just thought some of y'all would get a kick out of that.

weekend = good. and busy. spent a LOT of time at blandwood yesterday and today. yesterday in addition to my normal touring hours, i also attended a workshop to learn how to use PastPerfect, a museum inventory database program. the blandwood folks are working on getting a full inventory of everything in the house (a very good thing to have), and i'll get to help out by entering some of it into the system. easy computer stuff, no problem. i toured this afternoon too, or i would have if anyone had shown up and wanted a tour. i fell asleep, actually, and then closed up the house fifteen minutes early. i signed up for christmastime hours though--i'm working the weekend after next, and also for two of three christmas candlelight tour nights, and for the weekend of dec. 14. and apparently, this year on sundays, hostesses will be in costume and there will be music. woo.

i'm reading Gender Trouble by Judith Butler for my feminist theory class, and so far (ie, the preface) it's reminding me of my days in Constructions of Sexuality with Dr. Manning. he was great. i can't think of peewee herman without remembering him. but the point was, i'm also now remembering the things we talked about in that class, which is a good thing. and apparently i sold all those books, which was dumb. oh well.

tonight i hustled out the door to go to the SAI mtg, which, i discovered when i got here, is apparently canceled b/c all the SAI girls are at the NCMEA conference? this is my suspicion. the vast majority of the sisters here are music ed majors, i think (the ME in NCMEA), so it would make sense to cancel the sunday night chapter mtg. it's just annoying that there wasn't an email about it, or about where to find the mtg if in fact it's actually taking place. hrm.

my parents got to go to a preview showing of the new HP movie this morning--for free, no less. my mom says it was great and was even better than the first one. i'll be finding out on friday, and so will a bunch of you. got to get tickets sometime this week--jdogg, wanna go shopping tuesday night? we can get the new LotR dvd and our HP tickets too. AND my mom says that some copies of the new LotR dvd include a free ticket for the new movie! that would be sweeeeeet. :) she also said that LotR and Star Trek: Nemesis aren't opening on the same night (Dec. 18) like i had heard they were; she heard that one of them is opening on Dec. 13 instead. since i'm sure that's not LotR (the website is pretty definitive), then it must be that Star Trek moved their premiere (or i got it wrong to begin with, which is also possible). whatever, now i don't have to go to two movie premieres on the same day.

so class on wednesday was really good, in spite of the confusing and extremely difficult-to-sort-through article we read. (we read three other articles that were very interesting and clear, so i guess it's to be expected that one be challenging). and after hearing my prof talk about the article in question for a while, i am feeling much more amicable towards Wai-Chee Dimock. she did talk about some things that were very interesting once you figured out what they were, her analysis of Charlotte Perkins Gilman's "The Yellow Wall-Paper" was very cool, and once my prof explained what the hell was going on on page 642 (the place where my entire class got lost), i was really interested by what Dimock said there. or supposedly said. i still think she could benefit from a writing workshop. but i'm much more inclined to not hate her now.

and yo, my structure of verse professor liked my sylvia plath paper so much, he made me read it aloud to the class. he photocopied the poems i discussed and everything. i really don't know why he wanted to do this except that it killed 20 minutes of class time.

i was afraid that the other poets (it's just the seven of us) in the class were going to be bored listening to me read the whole damn thing, but they were like, yo, anything is less boring than listening to him lecture. of course, no one wants to say that though, because my professor is such an incredibly nice man. and he really gets excited about poetry. and thus my paper, i guess. whateva.