don’t you look beautiful

maura @ 9:17 pm

The cat’s been out of the bag for nearly two weeks now and I’m not quite sure why I haven’t told you about this sooner, o internets. So I’ll tell you now. One of my Top Secret Projects has resulted in a Big Decision: tomorrow night is my first class at Pratt’s School of Library and Information Science. I’ve decided to get my MLIS so I can become an academic librarian (and finally put that PhD to good use).

I’m going to take 2 classes over the summer while still working my standard 25 hrs/wk and having Gus a few afternoons a week (and hopefully not succumbing to the ravenous dust bunnies as I clearly will not have time to clean the house at all). And then at the end of August I will stop working altogether so I can go full-time to school for the fall and spring. At that pace I’ll have the degree in hand and be on the job market this time next year.

Yes, my head is spinning too!

I’m really, really excited. I’m also a little bit nervous, as is to be expected. I did lots of research and I think I will lurve being a librarian: the ultimate nerd (is that a video game? maybe a very dull one! watch as she shelves books and teaches undergrads how to do research!). I’ve been sort of treading water at my job for a while now and it’s good to have a plan. I’ve enjoyed my time working for corporate internets, but I miss academia and am ready to go back.

I feel lighter for having these goals and for having told everyone at work about it already (har, only the OCD-ridden give 4 months notice!). But I’ll miss my coworkers terribly. I’ve never worked in a place with so many great people. I’m not one for crying at work, but I can already tell that my last day will be sniffly. Luckily one of my fall classes is at the NYPL, only a block from my job, so I can go visit often (esp. when there are cupcakes, see below).

We had a fridge full of weird leftovers last night, the result of which is that today I had a total Uncle Buck lunch (“would you like to talk about a possible lunch trade?”). I packed my standard trail mix (peanuts, pumpkin seeds, raisins and dried apricots) for mid-morning snack, but beyond that the normalcy ends. Braised purple cabbage and carrots, cut up pieces of roasted pork shoulder (the latter was left cold and mixed into the warmed cabbage), strawberries and a half a peanut butter sandwich. Luckily our (now former) intern graduated last week so there were cupcakes at the dept. meeting, since that nearly carb-free lunch left me totally starving. How so those crazy Atkins folks do it?

Ack, I have to go now, I have a ton to read and won’t have any time to do so after classes start tomorrow. Bye!

lemons on sale again

maura @ 2:49 pm

Happy Spring! It’s in full force here, as our trip to the botanic gardens this morning can attest. There are 8 zillion gorgeous different pansies and tulips, and even the lilacs are starting. The cherry blossoms are about 30% there, which means they’ve timed it perfectly for next weekend’s festival (which we will not be attending, since the entire rest of the city will be. Plus I have extra recycling to take to the food coop, stinky hippie that I am.). Unfortunately it’s set to rain tomorrow and Sunday, bah. Jonathan’s dad is visiting so that means lots of crazy ordering the grandpa about by the little mister inside rather than out. Hope the neighbors are ready.

We had a nice easter weekend visiting with my family, including my brother, sister-in-law and 10 week old niece. Gus was a gas with Baby Ellie — kissing her head (“she’s softer even than a cat!”) and cooing over her various tiny extremities (“she’s like a little doll!”). It was insanely cute.

I, on the other hand, felt a little bad to be the only family member not to arrive bearing gifts. Since when did easter morph from a candy holiday to a candy-and-presents one? As the only a former catholic in my family I must admit that I feel a bit weird about easter. I am completely fine with christmas, since there’s really been a tradition of secular christmas in America for many many years now. Plus just because I’m not christian doesn’t mean I don’t think that Jesus was a good guy whos birthday deserves celebration. But easter, weeeeellllll…hard to cut the christianity out of it. I think next year we should have Aunt Maura’s agnostic easter egg hunt. Is there candy in the eggs? Are there even eggs to hunt? Maybe, maybe not.

So I finally got off my butt to redesign this site. I’m sure you’ve all noticed that the frames are gone, hooray! It’s not quite the exact way I’d like it to be yet: I need to go clean up the excessive tables + font tags in peas & carrots, and I want to add a graphic to the nav, and I am annoyed that the green in the nav will not go all the way across the screen on the blog pages, but it’s a start. I’m not the best photoshopper in the world and the wordpress stylesheets are cornfusing, so this will all take time, time, time. Someday.

looks as though they’re here to stay

maura @ 9:42 pm

I’m sick, bah. Gus and Jonathan are sick, too, but I have it worst this time (even took a sick day today). This is a bad time to be sick: Gus’ 1.5 week spring break starts tomorrow and I am taking a bunch of days off work to run around town with him and do crazy things like go to Staten Island (the ferry is free!) and to the science museum in Queens. Also we are going to my mom’s this weekend to meet my 10 week old niece, and I don’t want to give her all of our evil germs. Bah.

I’ve been listening to a lot of early Bowie lately, mostly Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane but then last week we watched The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou* and I remembered that I hadn’t ripped Hunky Dory so I brought that into work this week and listened to it repeatedly, like the obsessive that I am. It’s funny, most music I love makes me reminisce hard about a specific time or place, but Bowie is different, I feel like it’s sort of always been there. Which is patently untrue: unlike Steely Dan or Fleetwood Mac or Carly Simon or Cat Stevens, my parents did not listen to Bowie. I think my first exposure was around age 9 — my best friend at the time had 2 older, jr high + high school age brothers, and we’d sneak into their rooms and take their records, one of which was ChangesOne. But other than that my most nostalgic Bowie memory is listening to (and singing along with) the factory tape of Hunky Dory in my car in high school (also Janet Jackson’s Control, so hot). It’s strange, though, the melodies feel burned into my soul in a way that’s just not like other music.

* The movie was nice: sweet, funny and swell but also kind of slow. Jonathan liked it more than I did. But we both looooooooooooooooved those crazy Portugese acoustic Bowie covers. Loved them! That CD is going right on our wishlist, to be sure.

While convalescing on the sofa today I finished Cosmopolitanism. It was so so so good, everyone should go out to their local library right now and pick it up. His writing is clear and incisive and the subject is so thought provoking. I’ve come out the other side sort of envious of philosphers, and their ability to sit around thinking and writing all day.

Another thing that’s struck me with this is how much better prepared I am to read theory of any sort these days than when I was actually reading it for school, in college and grad school. While I loved the idea of reading theory and primary sources (nerds love doing things that are nerdy), it seemed so far from everything in my life then: friends, parties, music, travel, games, etc. Now that I’m older, a parent, and more mature (in some ways, at least), all of these deep thoughts and heavy ideas seem far less foreign.

Not that I’ll be delving back into Durkheim anytime soon, but I’m quite sure I’d have an easier time with it if I did.

EDITED 8/4/06 TO ADD: Man, those blog spammers are just crazy! The title of this post *used* to be “homo sapiens have outgrown their use”, but the homo is just a blog spam magnet, so I’m changing it in hopes of putting them off the trail. Sheesh!

there’s other fish in the sea

maura @ 9:19 pm

This week I finally went back to the gym after taking a month-long hiatus for various reasons. The cardio didn’t really faze me, but I am sore from the (meager) weights that I lift. Also, it appears that they’ve changed the radio station at the gym to some sort of lite soul station. Much as I do love the smoove grooves of Sade and the greatest hits of Pebbles, they’re not really good for getting that workout blood pumping. I much prefer the brainless, 140-ish bpm dance music they played in February. Harrumph.

Most hilarious thing Gus said this week: “Mommy, are my elbows heavy?”

And speaking of fish, we had a pretty excellent (if too short) time in Florida. Gus liked SeaWorld, though he was a bit disappointed to discover that there was no place for him to swim there. But the hotel pool was really nice. It was hoooooooot at SeaWorld, though the orcas and manatees were really, really cool.

So here’s a question for you: should I shave my head? No, this is not because of Natalie Portman, though she is a cutie and I am so so so happy that the whole Star Wars fiasco hasn’t ruined her career. And actually I don’t really mean shave, I mean just buzz it really short. I’ve never had hair that short before, and it seems enviably easy to deal with. On the other hand, I’m a wimp. And while my long hair is often a pain to deal with, I think it flatters me. And it’s been this long (with a retrospectively bad though blessedly short phase when I had a sort of long bob) for the better part of 20 yrs. And I might look like the opposite of a dalmatian: it’s getting pretty grey, but it’s hard to tell where the grey is: what if it’s in spots all over my head? Also, Gus might freak out.

Thoughts?

brer rabbit, work your charms

maura @ 11:09 pm

I should be writing a real post now — it’s been so long — but I’m tired and still need to get a bit more packing in tonight. We’re off to Florida soon to see Jonathan’s family and take Gus to SeaWorld. Hopefully it will be fun + relaxing — Gus tends to ignore us when Grandma’s around so J + I are dreaming of lots of poolside cocktails.

I’ve been ruminating on a big ol’ post about consumerism and anti-consumerism, but you’ll all just have to wait a while longer for that one.

Some things:

– Spring is nearly here, the daffodils and hyacinths have bloomed, and the crocuses in front of our building are even over. It’s time for us to get back to the botanic gardens for a visit before the cherry blossoms hit and the whole dang city invades. Looks like the strawberries and chives survived the winter in our courtyard, but the mint and lavender have not. We’ll need to get on that now if there are to be mojitos in the summer.

– An old friend made some mp3s of a mixtape made by another old friend, and I am really enjoying the indiepop wayback machine that it is. Passmore Sisters! French Impressionists! So very nice.

– Reading Anne Lamott makes me feel so much better about everything. She’s like a nice warm blanket and fresh baked cookies.

– The article by Calvin Trillin in last week’s New Yorker about his late wife Alice nearly made me cry.

– I also read this new book by Marrit Ingram last week, and it is really really good for stopping child-related pity parties of any sort. 4 yr old with an attitude? Better than a projectile-vomiting, excema-covered infant any damn day of the week!

oh, and p.s.

maura @ 10:55 pm

MAN, how good was that Battlestar Galactica season finale?!?! So amazing, everything is just so totally different now. I will be so very cranky if they really make us wait til October for new eps, as the internets have been rumoring. Esp. since Lucy Lawless has reportedly been signed for 10 eps next season. And how perfect is Lucy Lawless + Battlestar Galactica? SO DAMN PERFECT, like cookies and milk.

the sun a small star

maura @ 10:38 pm

Attention fellow residents of Prospect Heights:

Now that the weather’s warming up (not that it was ever really that cold this winter to begin with, stupid global warming) my offspring and I will be spending much more time out and about on the mostly lovely streets of our neighborhood. So it is with much neighborliness that I implore you to

CURB YOUR (damn) DOG AND SCOOP THE (damn) POOP (please!)

Let’s break it down, shall we?

CURB: This is the very edge of the sidewalk, right next to the street. It’s most courteous to have your dog do its business there, because most people don’t spend a lot of time walking on this particular bit of sidewalk. The curb is not the building side of the sidewalk — please note that when you let your dog pee on that side then there’s a little river of pee all the way down to the street. Nobody likes pee river jumping at 8am.

YOUR: Possessive pronoun which indicates that the canine(s) in question do, indeed, belong to you, presumably a responsible adult who realizes that dogs don’t use the toilet and thus need cleaning up after.

DOG: The animal in question. Four-legged and furry, often very sweet, yet must deposit waste products somewhere (as must all animals).

SCOOP: Using a plastic bag, pick up the excrement left so thoughtfully at the curb by your dog. Simple and neighborly, why not do it today?!

POOP: The waste product in question.

Seriously, it is DISGUSTING the amount of dogshit in my neighborhood these days. PEOPLE, let’s get it together!

Thank you.

In other news, there’s really no other news. I’m hard at work on not one but two top secret projects, but I can’t tell you about them yet because they are TOP! SECRET! Gus has been watching a lot of Pee Wee lately. We made chocolate cookies for a friend’s birthday last week and there were too many for the box, so now the extras are in our freezer, mocking me with their irresistible chocolatyness. We had a very fun surprise visit from a friend of ours from college over the weekend. I’m sort of caught up on email, but I haven’t talked to anyone in my family for a long time. We’re considering taking the train to visit my dad in VT — it’s an 8.75 hr train ride as opposed to a 7.5 hr car ride (driving time, not including stops) and much cheaper than flying (even on JetBlue, bah). But man, that’s a loooooong ride. Thoughts?

walked down the street looking at my feet

maura @ 6:44 pm

Here’s another time warp post: as I type this I’m at a conference for work, but by the time you read this it will be tonight after I get home. Not really a big deal, except that the conference is an internet conference and I have been completely unable to actually connect to the internets the whole time I’ve been here. First I tried to get online in one of the session rooms (*before* the session started, honest!), but no dice. Then it took me a million years to find the poorly-signed (People! Where are the directional arrows?) “wifi lounge” (<snort>). THEN I finally connected only to be redirected to some weird proxy page which came up blank. Not that I should bemoan the lack of internets here, I mean, I am listening to these sessions most of the day, it’s not like I need to be surfing. But it’s the principle of the thing: WHY AM I UNABLE TO CONNECT TO THE INTERNETS AT AN INTERNET CONFERENCE? Sheesh.**

In other news, Jonathan’s sick with a chest cold again, and Gus had pinkeye last week (missed 1 day of school) and got strep throat (with bonus scary swollen neck glands!) over the weekend (missed 2 days of school). The pediatrician said Gus needed to stay home from school a second day, and I should have sent her over to her house to run screaming up and down HER hallway because that boy was clearly better. Not that we didn’t have any fun — we went into Manhattan for an errand and had lunch at his favorite restaurant*, which is always a hoot. He orders grilled cheese and a side of carrot-ginger dressing and proceeds to dip the sandwich in the dressing before each bite, enthusiastically proclaiming his utter and undying love for the meal. It’s insanely cute.

Afterwards we took a special crazy inefficient subway route home that required riding THREE trains, which pretty much blew his mind clean away. As he grows up I will miss these days when just riding extra subways can make his day.

On the down side, it appears that Gus is really, truly giving up his nap these days.*** This is not a drill. It was a precipitous plummet from about 90% weekend**** nap success about a month ago to maybe 30% now. The kicker was the bad strep day when he constantly had a fever and didn’t sleep AT ALL. Yesterday he got really tired and fell asleep on the table while having snack around 5pm, which actually was quite hilarious, as he kept lifting his head and yelling “I’m not asleep!” every time Jonathan and I accused him of sleeping.

Anyway, I still miss the nap. Personally I have always been a fan of the siesta, and I rue its passing in my own life (at least until I get so old that it becomes unavoidable).

* And as a lunchtime treat for me, I discovered a new thing that I love there: the tofu-hijiki burger. It’s mashed up tofu with hijiki + scallions, deep-fried (uuullgghh) and served in a wheat pita with japanese bbq sauce, plus a side salad with carrot-ginger dressing, all for a measly $3.25!!! As Einar would say, so delicious!

** Also, why are they playing this awful mindless alt-rock here in the lunchroom? Why???

*** I fully realize that, as the mother of a 4.25 yr old, I have ABSOLUTELY NO RIGHT to complain about the nap-giving-up thing. I completely understand if parents of younger children who no longer nap not only stop reading right now, but indeed never read this site again. I totally deserve it, and because I am so well-rested compared to you I can completely accept it.

**** On the weekdays, it’s school’s problem, not mine.

i’ll read the map and you’ll do all the driving

maura @ 1:46 pm

The snow’s nearly all melted now as it’s been in the 40s and 50s all week, boo hoo. But we did get to go sledding after school on Tuesday with Gus’ best buddy from school, which was a blast.

And speaking of preschoolers, reading Steve’s post on nail polish for boys (and the Bitch PhD* post and Newsweek article it links to, which I am too lazy to link to here so head on over to Steve + Jessie’s if yr interested) has got me thinking. Recently I’ve been saddened to notice that the gender-neutral utopia of the preschool set looks to be coming to an end. The tomboy stuff is ever-endearing, of course (I’m still a tomboy myself): one little girl we know has the coolest shirt with tools printed all over. But I love the girly-boy stuff the best. Gus specifically requested pink and blue nail polish last year, not because he wanted to be like the girls but because his best boy buddy was wearing some. This year that buddy told a girl in their class that she couldn’t like dinosaurs, only boys could. Kind of hilarious coming from a boy in a pink and purple powerpuff girls hat.

My #1 favorite is a boy in Gus’ class who has two older sisters and often wears leopard-print leggings with his batman sneakers (and — bonus points — uses a barbie lunchbox). And last week after I very reluctantly consented to buy Gus some thomas the tank engine sneakers**, I was complaining to another parent who then told me she never takes her son shopping because he always wants dora the explorer sneakers, and they are just so very ugly.

I’m pretty much a tomboy myself***, and it makes me sad to think that next year when Gus goes to kindergarten (in a BIG school, through 5th grade!) all of this freewheeling gender bending will end. Isn’t the world more fun when everyone can wear pink nail polish?

* Man, I always forget to check Bitch PhD because she updates it nearly constantly and I can’t keep up. I’m more of the 2-4x monthly updater myself, and feel most drawn to other blogs that publish on a similarly slacker schedule. But she always has something interesting to say, and I am going to try and remember to check out her site more frequently.

** Can I tell you that they were the ONLY pair of thomas sneakers in the whole store?!?! And they just happened to be in his size. FanTAStic.

*** When I brought the nail polish home for Gus of course he immediately wanted me to paint his nails, which I did. The problem was that then he wanted me to paint MY nails, too, which I was less than pleased about. I don’t think I’ve really ever worn nail polish, not even in high school (the only time at which I wore any makeup at all, and it was minimal). I finally consented to paint my toenails and yuck, what a feeling! As a friend of mine put it: “like your nails are suffocating.” Ick.

all the flowers would have very extra special powers

maura @ 9:54 am

Happy Valentine’s Day! Take a break from all that refined sugar you’re eating and make a heart for your sweetie, courtesy of my sweetie.