Perspective

As I have previously mentioned, comps does many things.  Among those things, it gives you perspective.

It gives you perspective about your friends.  Who is really going to be there to cook you dinner at the end of the day when you can barely make eye contact and talking about anything that’s not theatre history is simply out of the question?  Who is going to not be offended that you haven’t called/been to a party/replied to text messages for the last few months because you’ve been swallowed into the oblivion of studying?  Who is going to understand when you just need to sit and stare at the wall/cry/talk out an idea that they have no possible way to contribute to?  Who is going to respond to the rally of “I need to not be in my house tonight, but I don’t have any energy to expend socially”?

It gives you perspective about your life.  Can you ever really say that you’re having a stressful day ever again?  Or a bad day for that matter?

It gives you perspective about what you can and cannot handle and what you can and cannot do.  I, for instance, am never going to say that I don’t have enough time to complete x assignment again without some serious thought about what I managed to do in four-days with my take-home exam.  I have a better idea of my own limits both emotionally and intellectually.

Most pertinent to my everyday life and writing, however, is this: it gives you perspective about books.  I have a brand new notion of how big a “big” book is, or how many books is “a lot” of books.  What this really means is that my perspective is skewed.  I sat down, for instance, to write about how I should be doing some research right now and sorting through the “large pile of books” that I brought home from the library today.  But looking at it?  It’s not that big.

In other news... campus was really pretty today!

In other news… campus was really pretty today!

…it’s really not my fault that, at my peak this summer, I was reading 5-7 books in a day and, thereby, a stack of 8 books no longer looks insurmountable, right?  Somehow, this newfound regard for the amount of research that I am capable of is somewhat dehumanizing.  If I can really pound through that many books in a day, then what does it say on days when I don’t?  Days when I’m working at my usual speed rather than ridiculous comps-speed?

The psychological aftershock of this process is something that I’m going to be dealing with for some time now.  Also; I’m not even really done yet.  I still have orals to get through.

No rest for the weary.

…ergo sum

I am really tired.

Everything is funny.

Everything is beautiful, and nothing hurt.

No wait, that’s not it.

I am… a seagull.

…no…

I am… an actress.

I am… over-worked and completely stressed out.

I am attempting to find comfort in frozen yogurt and hard cider.

side-note: the acorn head at Tufts has been replaced by this dapper gentleman.  Whomever worked the sparkly tophat onto this deserves a good hardy handshake.

side-note: the acorn head at Tufts has been replaced by this dapper gentleman. Whomever worked the sparkly tophat onto this deserves a good hardy handshake.

I am reading and re-reading, copying information onto index cards, thinking deep thoughts, trying to make the puzzle pieces slide into place and keep them slid once they get there, trying to control the number of books I have in my house, trying to make sure I don’t rack up overdue fees on anything.

I am prepping my syllabus for Acting I, scanning readings, setting up my online bulletin board for my students.

I am bracing for the new semester and all the meetings that come with it.

I am evaluating my fall wardrobe and what pieces I need to acquire/dispense with.

I am both praising and cursing the coming of seasonal pumpkin flavored treats.  This is not going to be good for my diet but OH MAN DO I LOVE ME SOME PUMPKIN.

I am counting the days until this is all over and the next chapter begins.

I am cursing myself for counting the days because that means I have to face the reality of this test actually happening.

I am going back to work.

Riding the Wave

Lately I’ve been doing what I not-so-fondly refer to as “riding the wave”.

It begins like this: it’s Monday.  I have all my books lined up for the week in neat bite-size piles.  I can totally do this.  I’ve learned so much already and I’m a rockstar.  No, I’m friggen invincible.  I’m bloody supergirl.  I can conquer not only this book pile, but maybe one or two from tomorrow’s book pile and OH MAN THAT EXAM BETTER LOOK OUT!

Tuesday morning dawns and I’m still riding the Monday high, rearing to go, totally ready for whatever the day brings with it.

By Wednesday I have to slow down a bit.  My zen isn’t completely blown, but I begin to experience symptoms of eye strain/brain overload/stress and I decide to take it easy for the day so I can make it through my week.

By Thursday, I’m completely frazzled.  I have (sometimes) multiple panic attacks, I don’t want to see or talk to anyone, I’m pounding my head into my desk singing “I suuuuck I suck I suck I suck I suuuuuccckkkk” (see: 2:48).  I often give up reading halfway through the day in lieu of watching filmed theatre or documentaries.  I have a fitful night.  Sometimes I drown my sorrows in ice cream.  Sometimes I opt for a beer.

Friday, I drag myself out of bed and a miraculous thing happens: I talk myself into doing it again.  Somehow, through sheer force of will, I sit back down at my desk, portion out some more books, and crack them and get to work.  I take it easy for the first few hours, but eventually I get going and when I really get going I’m hard pressed to stop.  I remember why I love theatre.  I remember why I’m doing this.  I remember why I picked this life style.  By the end of the day, my spirits aren’t completely revived but I am resolved to spend the weekend relaxing and recharging and getting ready to do it again next week.

The important part isn’t that we love what we’re doing all the time.  We’re not going to love what we’re doing all the time.  There’s always going to be some part of the job that we loathe, detest, or otherwise makes us utterly stressed out.  The important part is that, when this does happen, we pull it together.  We pick ourselves up and get back on the proverbial horse.  We charge back into the fray, guns blazing, ready to show that research who’s boss.

I am officially T-minus twenty days to comps liftoff.

Here I go, back into the fight.

Autumn is Coming

As August winds down and the summer comes to a close, I am nearing the completion of my study-time.  I’m also nearing the completion of my list of things to study.

Lately, when I talk to people about the study process, pretty much everyone has the same thing to say about it: “Well, it’s almost over.”  The smart people then revisit this statement, look at me with a wide-eyed sheepish gaze, and add “…which is both good and bad.”

It’s both good and bad that I’ve, at this point, combed through every chapter in Brockett except the one devoted to contemporary theatre (which I might not get to and, honestly, that’s probably okay given the amount of contemporary theatre I see and have lived through).  It’s both good and bad that I’ve been through every section of my reading list and ordered/read the books from each of them (I’ve just done the last round of book-looking for the “North America” section; I’ll be picking those up at the library tomorrow).  It’s both good and bad that I’ve even started to return some of the beginning-of-the-summer ILL acquisitions (ILL books tend to have a sooner due-date than those borrowed from my home institution, and they are unavailable for renewal so I don’t have much by way of choice here and with 135 books sitting on my floor and more to come I can probably use the cycle-out time; if I haven’t gotten to them by now chance are I won’t get to them anyway).

This is, by far, the largest book in the book fort.  It is literally bigger than I am and 300 pages long.  It nearly killed me.

This is, by far, the largest book in the book fort. It is literally bigger than I am and 300 pages long. It nearly killed me.

I’m feeling oddly serene these days (though exhausted).  Granted, it is the beginning of the week and I tend to be more at peace with the universe before Thursday morning.  However, there is a consistent feeling of calm; I’ve learned a lot this summer.  I know a lot of things.  I’ve forgotten a lot this summer, but I’ve scheduled review time into my study habits.  I continue to look at old exams and think “well, it’d be a struggle but I think could manage this”.  Perhaps it’s just that I’m getting used to the stress load (there’s only so long you can run around feeling like Atlas before your shoulders become stronger).  Whatever it is (and I don’t want to say this too loudly in case my body figures out that I’m onto it), I am grateful for the respite from the physical symptoms of stress.

I’m definitely experiencing the trifecta of exhaustion (physical, mental, and emotional).  I’m definitely still in the weeds.  But, for whatever reason, the end of summer isn’t (at least at this moment) causing blinding panic and paralyzing terror.

I’m looking forward to the start of the semester.  I’m looking forward to teaching my acting class.  I’m looking forward to taking the next step on the journey towards Doctorhood.  I’m looking forward to returning the book fort only to re-model it with shiny new books.  I’m looking forward to doing something new and different with my days.  I’m looking forward to boots, sweaters, scarves, and the return of my favorite seasonal jacket.  I’m looking forward to pumpkin flavored treats.

Autumn is coming.  You can try to run from it, or embrace it.  And I, personally, look great in fall colors.

I hope your semester-start prep is going well; keep plugging!  We’re nearly there!

Work Habits

As August stretches out before me, I begin to hone in on the methods which create the best study environment for myself.

This is, of course, assisted by the magical early arrival of autumn here in New England.  I can definitely say that my work habits are much healthier when I can comfortably sit at my desk all day as opposed to having to find alternate places to work due to the heat.  My office is wonderful and sunny with lots of windows… though these qualities also make it the hottest room in the house (lots of windows = greenhouse effect and essentially bakes me out of the entire area as soon as the temperate spikes much above 75°).

I’ve come to carefully and jealously guard my weekdays.  While technically I can work anytime anywhere, I find that I am much less inclined to work on the weekends.  I have no qualms about working late, but if there is anyone else in the apartment I become distracted; I mean, really, who wouldn’t prefer to watch episodes of Supernatural with housemates than read about Weimar Classicism?  So, despite the HUGE amounts of temptation* to go do other things during the week, I am extremely careful to keep my work hours to work hours.

I’ve found that a pile-system works well.  When I move into a new unit, I order somewhere

....just my supplies for a normal trip to campus.

….just my supplies for a normal trip to campus.

between 20 and 40 books from the library.  When I get those books home, I pile them on my desk in thematic piles.  I can generally go through between four and five volumes in a day, so I try to pile them in approximate daily-dosage.  When I go to work in the morning, I pull a pile and see, visually, how much work I have to get through in a day.  It’s a good way to track how much I have accomplished in a time period (be that time period a morning, a week, etc.) and a good way to track how much more I have left to cover before I can move on.  Since I’m a kinesthetic learner, this is HUGE in terms of facilitating my study plan.

As I (not so slowly) reach burnout point, I’ve also learned to prioritize information.  I will look at everything on my desk, but the amount of time I devote to a volume will depend on that volume’s readability, the ease with which I know I will digest the information in that volume, and my ability to connect the volume to something else I know.  Learning is facilitated by connections.  As I fill in the edges of the theatre history map, it is much easier to move outward from territory I have some passing familiarity with than to plonk myself in a strange land where I know nothing and try to figure out the local culture.  Sometimes, I will have (and have had) to start from scratch (let me tell you how much I knew about the Spanish Golden Age before I started this process… there we go, that’s about all I knew), but by and large I can relate most things to something either historical or theatrical that I already have in my arsenal.  As such, if I find something that’s difficult to digest, completely unrelated to anything I already know, and written in impenetrable academicese, I tend to set it down and move on.  The time I would devote to decoding this piece of information is valuable and could better be used finding a book which will explain it to me in a way I can readily understand.

I do find ways to give myself little rewards and motivational things for reaching the next hundred pages, the end of the next book, etc.  Often times these thing consist of “okay, we will send that e-mail AFTER we get to page 150” or “you can check in on facebook/twitter once you finish x more chapters”.  This way, I’m not distracted by the completely natural urges to participate in the rest of the world for longer than I can afford, and I’m motivated to get through my workload.

side-note: I also taught myself to embroider this summer.  This is my first piece (mostly done, I may add some highlighting to the roses).

side-note: I also taught myself to embroider this summer. This is my first piece (mostly done, I may add some highlighting to the roses).

Speaking of distractions, I know that I work better if I can silence my phone and leave it in another room.  No matter how well intentioned, mid-day texting completely breaks my concentration and instantaneously takes me out of whatever it is I’m doing.  Chatting while working seems to be a phenomenon that desk-job people can accommodate (I know when I worked a desk job, I had an IM window open all day every day).  Because of the nature of my work (deep thought, deep research, uninterrupted brainwaves yield the best results), I simply can’t do it anymore.  Even when I’m in the deepest portion of research mode, the smallest thing can jar me back to reality and, often, I find it twice as hard to recover whatever it is I was doing before someone decided to ask me some menial question or send me a selfie.  Solution: silence the cell phone and put it face down on the desk.  Unfortunately, this is a do as I say not as I do item as my self-control tends to only go so far with this rule.  But!  We are all in a process of bettering ourselves as individuals and if this is what I need to work on as a human being, I’ll add it to the list right under “being careful of caffeine overconsumption”.

Obviously everyone is different so what works for me may not work for you.  My point is that astute self-observation will lead you to the path of righteousness and productivity.  Sleep well, study hard, and get ready because autumn is coming.

*By “HUGE amounts of temptation” I’m talking huge… like the knowledge that my entire family is having a get-together in New York because my scattered-across-the-country siblings all happen to be free on one weekend and are flying home and so I should totally join them two weeks before my test.  Let me tell you how painful that was to turn down, especially when a certain family member who shall remain nameless simply won’t stop pushing the issue no matter how many times I say “no, mom, I can’t come down to New York two weeks before my exam”.

And Knowing is Half the Battle

Since I seem to be writing nothing but theatre reviews lately (…mostly because I’m seeing SO MUCH THEATRE!), I figure it may be time for a reprieve from the “mundane” (or at least routine) around here.

Here is an unexclusive, incomplete list of things that I learned this week.

Thing one: Cyrano De Bergerac is a tragedy… and actually really sad.  This would be fine except I saved it to read for when I needed a pick-me-up… suffice to say it’s been a rough week for many reasons (only one of which being the sheer amount of maudlin tragedy I’ve had to choke down this week).

Thing two: Peanut butter, when put in a saucepan, burns really quickly.  If you want to melt it to… say… pour over your ice cream, you need to do it low and slow.

Thing three: Early Russian theatre sometimes consisted of “serf theatre”.

Shot of my desk... and my book fort.  Yup.  It's a book fort.

Shot of my desk… and my book fort. Yup. It’s a book fort.

The Russian feudal system persevered long after it was abolished in other countries (my mostly uninformed hypothesis about this entails factors such as geographic distance from anywhere that may have been interested in creating a mercantile class, a sure-fire way to abolish feudalism, and the many puns one can create using the word “serf”).  Russian landowners, for lack of better things to do, sometimes trained their serfs and created theatre companies with them to perform for said landowners’ amusement.  This, for some reason, is both fascinating and wonderful to me.  Probably because I’ve never been a Russian peasant.

Thing four: When held in contrast with other nineteenth century pieces and scholarship about said nineteenth century pieces, melodrama actually makes for surprisingly engaging reading.  Go go Pixerécourt.

Thing five: I think if Victor Hugo had actually written the playscript to Les Miserables rather than just the novel that it was based on, it would have been markedly more wonderful, decidedly more Spanish, and never would have run on Broadway for a record 6,680 performances.  See for evidence: Hernani.

Thing six: If you hope hard enough, despite all natural barriers to the contrary, you can make it be autumn in New England even in July.

Thing seven: You could very feasibly murder people utilizing nineteenth century stage technologies and hide their bodies in places that would never be found, even within the theatre itself.  Unfortunately, once I had this thought, actually enacting such things was the only notion on my mind as I flipped through my well-illustrated guide to the nineteenth century French stage.  As such, I’m earmarking this idea for a potential future novel; sounds like a great historical detective case to me.

This is a REALLY cute kitten taking a nap (about palm-sized for the record).  He's not mine, but I like him better that way. I don't have to clean his poop.

This is a REALLY cute kitten taking a nap (about palm-sized for the record). He’s not mine, but I like him better that way. I don’t have to clean his poop.

Thing eight:  I wasn’t just whistling Dixie when I told people that German would be a useful language to have in my back pocket in the field of theatre history.  Just this week I’ve encountered several books and one play (the play, unfairly enough, was Russian in its original language) which entail lengthy/important passages in both French and German that the scholar/translator couldn’t be bothered to render into English.  Academic superpowers activate!

Thing nine: For this reason, I will really be screwed when I enter into the land of Japanese theatre.

Thing ten:  I’m really grateful to have friends who will push me to tell them about what I read on any given day.  Also friends who will go with me to the theatre.  Also friends who will pester me via text message until I leave my cave and socialize in the real world.  Also friends who will let me call and cry/whine/complain about neoclassicism and why it’s an abomination against art… even if they don’t really understand what neoclassicism is.  Also friends who speak Shakespeare to me as a means of comfort.  Thank you, friends!

Thing eleven:  Restoration comedies are WAY funnier performed than on the page.

Thing twelve: I should probably consider taking a break sometime soon lest I devolve into some sort of Gollum creature mindlessly repeating pertinent names, dates, and phrases that would only make sense in the context of theatre history.

A Request

Over the course of the last several years, I’ve noticed an epidemic.

Perhaps it’s because I’m a professional researcher (amongst other things), or perhaps it’s because I’m naturally less inclined than others of my acquaintance to ask for help, or perhaps it’s because self-sufficiency is a valuable character trait to me.  Whatever it is, this epidemic is prominent enough to bear mentioning.

People would rather ask than find out.

It starts off simply enough; rather than dig through an instruction manual, you ask a friend how to accomplish task X utilizing tool Y.  Since tool Y is something you are less familiar with than said fried (who perhaps uses tool Y in his work), this just makes sense.  The friend tells you the straightforward answer to your straightforward question and you go on your merry way.

This quickly escalates into phone calls at 2AM from technically unsound persons asking you to effectively tech support their vaguely described problem over the phone for an hour when you should be sleeping.

In my case, I get asked questions about theatre.  A lot.  Generally I don’t mind these questions because it shows that my friends A) respect my field of expertise, B) like me enough to listen to me talk for a while, and C) are genuinely interested in something I’m passionate about.  “Which play should I take my out-of-town friends to see right now?”, for instance, is a great question that I’d love to spend time answering during even my most busy days.

The only time asking questions is really an issue is when I have absolutely no time, every second I spend answering texts is a second I’m not spending reading about Weimar Classicism, and the question I am asked is one which I’ve already answered in a blog post.  Recently.

Look, I would love to chat with you about theatre and, chances are, if you have

yet another comps studying still life

yet another comps studying still life

my phone number you’re someone I like enough to talk to.  But right now, I really can’t spare the moment it will take to give you a well thought-out answer to most things.  Especially if you can’t be bothered to do the preliminary research yourself to find out that the question you just asked me is something I’ve already taken time out of my day to write a nice, long, thoughtful post about.

So before you text to ask “what do you think of [x Shakespeare movie] or [y local theatre production]?”, take a moment to do your research.

This question, unfortunately, is just a symptom.  It’s a symptom of the same disease that causes my students to ask “what does [x word] mean?” instead of looking it up in the dictionary.  As a society, we’ve become complacent.  I would like to say that this complacency is the death of intelligence, but that sounds far too chicken little for my tastes.

Here’s a care and feeding tip for all of you with over-wrought PhD students in your life: before you ask anything of them, keep in mind that they are working.  Hard.  All the time.  Every little question/text is a moment out of their day.  If you would like them to give you information, do them the courtesy of at least performing preliminary google searches for the information which you require before interrupting them with a question that could easily be answered via the internet.  These questions entail you asking for a moment of your PhD student’s time; this is a professional commodity.  Just like a shopkeeper sells wares, an academic makes her bread off of research skills, knowledge, and the time in which to accomplish these.   Chances are, your PhD student is are happy to lend said professional commodity to you because she likes you.  But if you’re basically asking for free labor, at least meet her halfway and show that you are respectful enough of her time and energy to utilize this time and energy for something worthwhile.

And now back to your regularly scheduled comps studying.

DISCLAIMER: It should be noted that this particular issue is one which I’ve noticed over time and a broad cross-section of people.  In other words: this post isn’t a passive-aggressive attempt to respond to any one text or e-mail I’ve received over the past few weeks, but rather a generalization about the root of this problem.

Lateral Thinking

My friends, I have discovered the secret to comps study longevity.

Lateral Thinking.

“Lateral Thinking” is a concept introduced to me by the great John Basil when I was studying with him at the American Globe Theatre.  John contended that it was the key to comedy.  He had a hard time defining it, but gave us the following example to help understand it:

He once saw a televised game show akin to family feud in which contestants had to reply to a prompt with something which they think might be a popular answer.  So for instance, if the category was “things you would take on an airplane”, the contestant could say “suitcase”, “neck pillow”, etc.  There was a time component to this particular round so the contestant had to be the first to press his buzzer and answer.

The category was “things you sit on.”  One contestant, feverish in his

Working the other day while hiding out from the heat.

Working the other day while hiding out from the heat.

pursuit of fame, fortune, and a cruise, instantaneously pressed his buzzer and shouted the first thing which came to his mind: “BROCCOLI!”

“Lateral Thinking” it turns out is a fairly recent development in logic.  A phrase coined by Maltese physician Edward De Bono, it refers to the method of solving problems by way of creativity.  Rather than a “vertical” approach (solving a problem step by step, with each step logically leading to the next) or a “horizontal” approach (throwing out idea upon idea without concern for implementation, a process often linked with imagination over logic), lateral thinking encourages ingenuity and attacking a problem via completely indirect means.

In terms of comedy, we can see how this appeals.  Comedy, the axiom goes, comes from recognition and surprise.  We laugh at something because we either recognize the situation which is being presented to us, or we are utterly surprised by the seemingly illogical response of the individuals/things within the situation (think of every Charlie Chaplin sketch ever).

In terms of comps, Lateral Thinking is key.  I can spend several hours a day with my books, but when I recognize that I’ve hit brain-melt o’clock, it is time to implement something drastically different.  Often, I can work for six to seven hours at a clip before I just can’t work anymore.  At this point, I need to walk away from my computer and engage in a physical activity of some kind.

Because of this, my running schedule has been wonderfully regular, and I’m picking up some extra party tricks to add to my “fun, cool-looking, dangerous things that Danielle does because she was allegedly raised by circus gypsies”*.  I’m learning to spin poi (…mostly so that I can light them on fire and add this to my list of fire tricks; I already breathe and eat fire so really, what else is there to do but weave the stuff around my body in complicated and death-defying ways?), and my sister and soon-to-be brother-in-law have finally convinced me of the merits of the bull whip as a viable form of physical relaxation (Okay, I know what you’re thinking, and it probably has something to do with corsets and

my haul from Tisch complete with HELLOPHANT!

my haul from Tisch complete with HELLOPHANT!

dungeons, but please believe me when I tell you that bull whip is actually more of a martial art than a… ahem… personal art form).  If you consider the fact that I have to bike about a half mile to get to anywhere where I can legally play with the whip (and where it’s safe to do so), that’s a fair amount of physical activity I can sneak into my day.

I’ve found that this serves as a combination stress-reliever, mood enhancer, and diet-booster.  I’ve also found that if I take a break like this for about an hour, I can come back and sneak in another few hours of work.

So there you have it: physical activity saves brains, and always eat your vegetables.

Lateral thinking: not just for problem-solving logicians anymore.

*only partially true; we’re more like the Partridge Family meets a Renaissance Faire

Working Back to Running

Operation: relax was a great success.  Spending a week away from my books has made all the difference in the world and I’m feeling much more capable of tackling the things that I left behind in Boston.

Unfortunately, getting back into my studying groove is proving more difficult than I had anticipated.  While I know that I couldn’t have maintained the pace I had achieved when I left, coaxing myself back up to running speed is not easy.

I also have found that taking a week away has done scary things to my sense of information retention.  I’m reasonably sure the information is still in there, just occluded in a way it hadn’t been when I left the Northeast.  I have to reach around the pleasant cloud of vacation to turn up the things that I need on any given occasion and that, my friends, is rather startling given the amount of effort I put into putting those select facts into my brain.

In addition, it seems I’ve brought the Florida weather back with me.  While it was still pleasantly autumn upon my departure, it now seems to be full-blown summer.  This makes my life slightly more difficult as while my apartment is many wonderful things, air-conditioned is not one of them.

In summary, while I know I needed the break and I am absolutely assured that it did wonderful things to my mental (and physical!) well being, it’s definitely wrecked some havoc on my studying habits.

Let’s go back to the marathon training metaphor I used earlier this summer.  Taking a

artistic rendering of my workspace at the local cafe yesterday.

artistic rendering of my workspace at the local cafe yesterday.

week off from any intensive training will give you time to relax and recuperate, but there is some inevitable back-slide upon your return.  I’m just feeling all kinds of sore from my workouts since my mind, over the course of the past week, hasn’t been as rigorously worked.

It is sometimes important to recognize that we are not machines.  Though the comps-study process is a great deal about becoming a sort of professional juggernaut, at some point we need to recognize and yield to our humanity.  Slowly working back up to break-neck speed after some time off is one of those things.  Actually taking time off is another.

I had promised myself that I would be as gentle as possible with my study habits while simultaneously pushing myself to do as much as I had to/could.  These goals, while they seem antithetical, are actually really important to maintaining both sanity and work/life balance.  In order to prevent myself from being anxious about all the things I’m not learning, I need to push hard.  In order to maintain my mental well-being and not turn into some kind of Gollum creature clutching books to my chest and muttering about French Neoclassicism, I need to preserve some semblance of equilibrium.  So without moving into the land of unrealistic expectations, this antithesis is just something I have to balance.

And on that note, I’m going to stop procrastinating and get to reviewing Medieval Europe.  If I do well today, which I should, tomorrow opens up early Modern to study and, since that means some quality time with my man Will, if I can’t get excited about that I should probably just quite now.

It was a Dark and Stormy Morning…

Scene: a rainy Friday morning in Massachusetts.

A residential neighborhood at around 9AM.

We see the front of a house.  A stoop, actually.  The house is large with a set of stairs leading up to its front door and two mailboxes.

DANIELLE a bleary-eyed PhD student zombie-walks to the front door, opens it, and takes a long unblinking look outside.  She stands and stares at the rain for a moment before we hear a voice.

HOUSEMATE: Oh, good morning!

DANIELLE: it takes a moment to register Hi.  It’s raining.

HOUSEMATE: Yes, it is.  Umbrella?  HOUSEMATE offers DANIELLE his umbrella. 

DANIELLE: barely coherent I realized I needed milk before I could have coffee, but then I was wondering how hard it was raining, because if it’s raining too hard I have to go to the garage to get my umbrella from the car to take a walk around the corner to get milk… Maybe I’ll just do the walk without an umbrella.

HOUSEMATE: Take my umbrella, go get some caffeine in you.  Almost forcibly hands her the umbrella.

DANIELLE: more than a little bewildered thank you!

….I was so out of it this morning that, not only did this happen, but I also committed a cardinal sin against fashion: I left my house in Tufts sweat pants, a Tufts sweat shirt, and imitation Ugg boots.  I’m just glad I didn’t actually run into anyone between my house and the store because good god nobody should ever have to look at that.

Still in Medieval Europe, but leaving soon.  Had to put down the books today when I realized that if I tried to push through the last 125 pages I was going to give myself another Friday stress migraine which might or might not last the entire weekend.

For no particular reason, here's a picture I took of the octopus at the National Aquarium while on break from CDC 2013

For no particular reason, here’s a picture I took of the octopus at the National Aquarium while on break from CDC 2013

On Sunday, I’m leaving town for a week to go visit family in Florida.  I probably won’t be checking in because, well, if I’m going to take a vacation, I’m taking a bloody vacation.

Have a good week; may you never run out of milk before you’ve had coffee, but if you do may you have someone in your life who cares enough to loan you his umbrella so that you may acquire more before you inadvertently do harm to yourself attempting to make caffeine happen before your brain is fully uploaded.