adventures
16 Jul 2010

whaaaaales!

Monday, July 5, 2010

Gloucester, Massachusetts

Whale Watching Tour

You guys ever heard of Groupon?

Oh, you guys.

I Grouponed some tickets for a four-hour whale watching tour, 25 bucks a head.

We drove madly through Boston to make our appointment,

and by 1:00, we were on board,

and cans of beer were only 2.75! Who knew?

How many whales would we see?

We took bets.

Lance said 3.

Frank said 4.

I said 7.

We saw like, 20.

But first, we saw a fin.

The tour lady said it was a floating flat sunfish or something. Common to the area.

But she was wrong.

IT WAS A SHARK!

Oh. Snap.

It was so much fun.

adventures
15 Jul 2010

country superstar fireworks

Sunday, July 4, 2010

Boston, MA

The Esplanade

On Saturday, Lance and I had to leave.

I forgot to tell my Grandpa until I was going to bed the night before.

He was shocked.

I was shocked!

But we had places to go,

people to pick up from D.C,

and fireworks to watch.

And boy, did we get a choice location.

Highlights included:

  • high schoolers on hallucinogens hosting a guitar sing-along circle
  • some old-fashioned, Midwestern parenting: screaming parents, Burger King for dinner, and projectile glowsticks landing on my stomach
  • a far too epic adventure to acquire pizza
  • active members of the Toby Keith Fan Club who, as our companion Alesa put it so succinctly, were obviously caught in a Rad Bromance. And who did push-ups during the chorus.
  • A guy busted by the cops for stripping off his shirt and swimming across a pond. Sakes alive!

Oh, and the fireworks.

They were pretty.

adventures
14 Jul 2010

rebeach

Friday, July 2, 2010

Sunset Beach

The Ocean

We returned, this time with SPF 30.

Lotion, not a spray can.

The waves were awesome,

they had a Rumba at the gas station on the way in,

and we made fun of Dorothy’s cross-country tan a lot.

I promise you, the sunburn looked a lot better in person.

Although now I look like I’m a freakin’ shedding snake…

adventures
13 Jul 2010

get your ankles wet

Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Sunset Beach, North Carolina

The Ocean

On Tuesday, we went to the beach.

On Tuesday night, we all developed sunburns.

On Wednesday, we settled for a walk. A clothed walk. On an overcast day.

Lance said, “Let’s come back for a swim tonight! A night swim!”

We forgot, and went to see Toy Story 3 instead.

But it was still a nice afternoon.

adventures
10 Jul 2010

long and lonesome

Friday, June 25, 2010

Monday, June 28, 2010

Saturday, July 3, 2010

The Highway Called Life

2002 Saturn LS

Some forty hours in the car,

most of them boring.

Except when we got a flat tire under an overpass in the Bronx,

(Thanks for handling that, Lance)

And when we saw a Mormon Temple!

Take a look at that golden angel, will ya?

adventures
09 Jul 2010

freeze

Sunday, June 27th

1:30 p.m.

Washington D.C.

National Portrait Gallery

On a break from conferencing,

a visit to my favorite D.C. museum

with my family

who, the day previous, had started a very specific photographic series.

We caught on quickly.

adventures
08 Jul 2010

where have you been?

Monday, June 28

After 1:00 a.m.

Fort Totten Station, Washington D.C.

After sidecars and Connect 4 tournaments at the bar, three weary travelers get caught at a Metro Station for an hour or so,

the least grumpy of which brought a book to read.

boston
01 Jul 2010

the weather, again

This morning I walked to the train slightly ahead of two girls, my age, who ran into each other in the Starbucks.

One girl asked the other what she was up to – was she still working at the place where they met?

“No,” the other girl said. “I actually just quit.”

After a comfortable amount of small talk, the one girl asked her why she left, what she’s doing now.

“I started a blog,” the other girl said. “About four months ago. I’m really going to focus on that…”

*Insert seven thousand internal judgments here*

“… and it’s getting written up in next month’s Improper! You should look for it!”

Oh, wait, you didn’t mean “I quit my job and my life is a mess but GEE WHIZ, I have this BLOG!” you meant “I started a blog that’s getting pretty successful and I’m banking enough ad money to quit my job and work on being more awesome and popular and super cool.”

Me?

I missed one train by about 3 seconds, had my fare card denied, and got trapped on a disabled train stopped about 30 feet from the station.

I got a little lost trying to walk to school from a different stop.

And I wore my sweater inside out.

But at least the sun was out.

boston
22 May 2010

new digs

So the dramatic conclusion to my previous post will have to wait. Things have only become more complicated in my head and in my life since then, and there is this thing called a Twelve To Fifteen Page Paper on Picturebooks Due on Friday to take care of.

In the meantime, a quick tale about Renting Apartments in Boston.

We decided not to renew our lease for September. Surely we could find a better deal SOMEWHERE in this city, now that we aren’t green around the gills, now that we have more than 24 hours to secure shelter.

As soon as we decided not to stay, the regrets filed into my tiny, annoying, one-bedroom. Some were delusional: But I’m right by the park! How will I ever become A Runner unless I have a place to run? Some were overly sentimental: If I leave JP, I’ll never eat a sandwich at City Feed & Supply again and if that happens I will die! And JP is the best neighborhood in Boston! Ask anyone who lives here! Some were rational: We can afford our rent… I’m close enough to school to walk when the weather is nice… Free and abundant street parking… My landlady isn’t nuts… What if we’re looking for Something Better That Doesn’t Exist?

So I’m moping around, being stressed out, and constantly browsing Craigslist for one-bedrooms under 1,050 or two-beds under 1,500. The only options that meet that criteria seem to be in my friend’s building down at the end of the orange line, or are in Brighton.

Until I venture over to the “rental fee charged” section of Craigslist and find this little gem of a listing that included some irresistible real estate jargon: “dishwasher;” “laundry in building;” “off-street parking space included;” “cats are OK – purr;” “heat and hot water included;” “air conditioning.”

And it’s not only *in* Jamaica Plain, the apartment is so close it might as well BE in my apartment.

Two viewings, some advanced haggling, and a little under-the-table, dirty-dealing later…

I have a new apartment. And a dishwasher. And air conditioning in the main room. And a parking lot for Lance to change his oil in. And a square living room instead of a hallway shaped living room, so I can rearrange the furniture.

And a new roommate!

And I can still “Become a Runner” and walk to school at my leisure.

And eat sandwiches at City Feed & Supply.

And we only have to move our stuff down three flights of stairs and then up the street.

AND WOULD YOU LOOK AT ALL THOSE COUNTERS AND CABINETS!

grad school
07 May 2010

academic writing and caffeine addiction

I am about a page and a half away from the page requirement on my last final of the semester, but I think I could potentially overshoot it by a mile. Which has never happened in the history of me and writing papers, let me tell you.

But a lot has changed since I wrote my first five-paragraph-essay in the ninth grade.

At some point, Desmond Harding told me that if I turned in a five-paragraph-essay, he would shoot me in the head. Or something like that. I thought it would be easy, but I accidentally wrote one anyway. Then I revised enough that it wasn’t a five-paragraph-essay, and then revised it some more so it wouldn’t suck, but something went wrong because I got my paper back with the words “NO FIVE PARAGRAPH ESSAY” written in the margins and I counted… and there were five paragraphs, and then Desmond Harding shot me in the head. Or something like that.

Dr. Patty gave me a dense book that I liked and told me I could write about whatever interested in for 10 pages and it wouldn’t be intimidating at all because it would be fun. He was right, even though he tried to talk me into writing about nature and conservation. Or birds. Or canoeing in Wyoming. Or something like that.

Oh, Dr. Patty.

Oh, Thoreau.

William Brevda taught me that yes, you can write a 10 page paper in less than 24 hours, with a hangover, if you dedicate yourself to the task. That means shoving down calories for energy, even if stress and peppperoni threatens to send those calories right back up the spout. That means closing down the library at 2 a.m. and moving over to Kaya, but you must then take advantage of the Idiot Studier’s Special – free additional espresso shots in the midnight hours. You must also resist altercations with your previously MIA boyfriend who drove all the way from the Upper Peninsula and went directly to said coffee shop without so much as a phonecall.

William Brevda taught me that with persistence, tears, and coffee, even such a painful paper can earn an A.

Desmond Harding told me that I should stop writing a five-paragraph-essay. Okay. I figured that one out. Then Mark Freed told me I should stop writing anything that wouldn’t fit on one piece of paper. From that day forth, I abandoned conclusions and most introductions. At that point, it was a good feeling. Letting go of unnecessary baggage feeling.

Last semester, I remembered how to do all that stuff I forgot about in the two-years I spent NOT writing academic papers. My paper grades were an accurate indicator of the variable memory of humans.

And this paper…. this final paper of my first semester of graduate school? This paper has taught me the following valuable lessons:

  • Somewhere, deep down inside of me, I like to write introductions. Two page introductions, apparently.
  • Writing without at least two shots of espresso at hand is mostly impossible.
  • A paper does not always have to feel like a death march.
  • Maybe the tools of fiction revision – the constant tinkering of sentence structure to achieve maximum effect, replacement of words to clarify intent and meaning – are relevant to academic papers as well.
  • I should get back to work so I can finish all 7 thousand pages before they are due in 9 hours or so.