hiLARious.  laughing out loud at the truths contained within.

let's hope i don't need this tomorrow, but just in case i do...

"a step-by-step cure to your new year's day hangover"

december: 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, & 38

holy end-of-december, batman!

here's what i read this month.  6 books?  um, i kind of went crazy.  don't get too excited, though - 3 are definitely young adult books...


lord of the flies, by william golding (a re-read, but the first time i read it i was, you know, in high school or something and i read it because i was required to.  super creepy to read as an adult, when i wasn't stumbling over big words or being asked to analyze themes.  i'm glad i re-read it - definitely an interesting book.)

a christmas carol, by charles dickens (the first book i read on my new kindle!  i've read this book before - i actually own it (it lives in north carolina) and i read it about every other year at christmas time.  if you haven't read the book, you should - it's even more wonderful than any movie you've seen based on the book.  and i read it for free - books that are out of copyright are free on the kindle.  victory!)

the tipping point, by malcolm gladwell (another good malcolm gladwell book!  i like books that teach me fun facts that i can then spout out and my friends can call me nerds behind my back (or to my face).  my fun facts this time will include things like that fact that telephone numbers have 7 digits because that's the maximum amount humans can easily memorize.  and that paul revere did such a good job on his midnight ride because he had so many connections in all the towns he visited that people opened their doors to him in the middle of the night.  the paul reveres of the world today don't seem as glamorous because they're using twitter and facebook and the TELEPHONE...)

if everyone hanging out without me? (and other concerns), by mindy kaling (mindy kaling plays kelly kapoor on the office, but more importantly she's also a writer on the show and wrote some of the awesome-est episodes there are.  this book is really good - a memoir of growing up and getting into writing and acting.  she is hilarious and said a lot of things that are just so TRUE.  i read it in three days because it's that kind of book.  (she actually says at one point that if you're reading this book for more than a weekend there is something wrong with you.)  i learned from this book that mindy kaling loves paul simon and joni mitchell.  we're basically best friends forever.)

the secret garden, by frances hodgson burnett (another re-read; another free kindle book.  a little slow at times, and honestly not as good as i remembered it.  and the characters are a little childish.  i mean, they ARE children, but i still can't excuse it.  oh well - you win some, you lose some.)

slaughterhouse-five, by kurt vonnegut (i had been wanting to read a vonnegut book for a long time and had never gotten around to it.  then a conversation with aaron at trivia one night was the urging i needed to download it to my kindle.  i really liked this book.  a very easy ready and i stayed awake reading longer than just a couple pages a night.  i loved the narrator's voice - vonnegut's voice, i guess.  thanks, aaron, for the recommendation!)

and with that my 2011 reading challenge comes to a close...stay tuned for a wrap up of 2011 and a preview of 2012!

last day in north carolina!

tomorrow i'm headed to connecticut with my dad to visit my grandma.  she lives in a retirement community, and was on the list to move from her apartment into the assisted living unit...and we found out on monday that she can move on thursday.  so - a pretty big project while we're up there!

hope your holidays have been as relaxing as mine have been.  i'll be back in atlanta on saturday just in time for new years...and then two glorious days of vacation before school starts back again.  2011, where did you go?

(anyone else excited that our blue devils are FINALLY playing another game on friday?  it feels like forever since they've played...)

pioneer woman's brussel sprouts with balsamic and cranberries are to. die. for.  and i didn't even think i liked brussel sprouts.  becky made these as part of christmas dinner last night and there were no leftovers.  so i forced her to make them for dinner tonight, too.

(apparently it's brussels, with an "s," sprouts, but i don't care.)

merry christmas, all!  we* woke up at 9 for presents and cinnamon rolls (a christmas breakfast tradition), then lots of lying around, reading, tv, eating, napping.  we just went on a walk with the dogs, so now i won't feel guilty about lying on the couch for the rest of the day...

hope everyone is happy and healthy and warm!


*well, everyone else was already awake when i was summoned downstairs...

what i'm listening to right now

"oh my sweet carolina," by ryan adams (with emmylou harris):



i'm off to north carolina for a week, then up to connecticut for two days to visit my grandma.  hooray for holidays!

some EXCELLENT radio - radiolab's episode entitled "patient zero."  typhoid mary, the true patient zero in the AIDS epidemic, and how high fives got started.  listen to all or part of it for freeeee.

LOVE IT.

oh, google, you entertain me.

last night i watched the first two episodes of HBO's game of thrones with andy and a bitter willis (willis did not want to watch this show and was forced to by me and andy.  willis hates fantasy.  willis needs to get over it).  yes, this show aired LAST spring, but andy just finished the book and i haven't had access to HBO until recently, when a little (awesome) birdie made it possible.

people, this show is amazing.  i may or may not have been on the edge of my seat (literally) when watching the crazy-beautiful opening credits.  also, i definitely had to clutch willis's arm with my germ-y paws* during the opening scene of scariness.  he is a good friend for letting me do this.  also, he had no choice.

the books are so addictive and now this show is even more so.  I LOVE IT.  and...since i'm watching with andy whenever we can get together, i can't just plow through the whole season in one 24 hour span, which is absolutely what i would be doing otherwise.  ugh!  it's like waiting for christmas morning.  which is very fun.


*i'm a little sick.  boo.

“Winter is the time for comfort, for good food and warmth, for the touch of a friendly hand and for a talk beside the fire: it is the time for home.”
     --Dame Edith Sitwell (1887-1964); British poet

what i'm listening to right now

"golly" is a word we don't use nearly enough these days.



i didn't get the appeal of frank sinatra until i bought the CD (well, mp3 download) of "christmas with the rat pack" from amazon.com.  my kindle has ads on it, and there was an ad to buy any one of 100 christmas albums for only $3...i picked this one.  the songs - including the cheese-fest above - are awesome.  i mean, seriously.  you can't tell me they're not.



how can you not love this?

for all of you out there who love love actually, i present you with this.  again, props to nora. :)

http://thehairpin.com/2011/12/hate-actually

now i must go home and watch this movie.  oh wait!  i can go home!  half dayyyyyyyyyy!

december 16th.

63 degrees outside when i drove to work this morning.

wtf.

what i'm listening to right now

patty griffin, "christina."  beautiful.  LOVE patty griffin.



(the song is about the life of christina onassis.  in order for me to enjoy songs, things like this are important for me to know.  anybody else the same way?)

happiness is drinking hot cocoa with marshmallows out of my new charlie brown christmas mug, courtesy of wendy!!

to quote nora, who sent me this link, "this is actually kind of adorable."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/senates-secret-santas-make-their-rounds/2011/12/13/gIQAQ0udsO_story.html

oh boy.  just read this line in an essay that one of my students wrote:

First of all, Smith lacked the needed experience in government to be a liable candidate from the gecko.


viable candidate from the get-go, liable candidate from the gecko - you know, being a teacher is all about translating.

and giggling.

um, hilarious.  gawker's gifts for people you hate.

what i'm listening to right now

is it embarrassing that i like country christmas music?  i hope not.

i've done some pretty cool things, but one of the most amazing weeks of my life was going to hawai'i for a conference that brought together japanese and american teachers to learn about and talk about the bombing of pearl harbor.  (what made it extra special?  it was almost free - my school paid for the flight and the national endowment for the humanities made the conference itself free for teachers.)  sitting in a room with japanese teachers and talking openly about sensitive topics was VERY cool.

i learned that the post-world war 2 japanese constitution forbids war.

i ate lunch with pearl harbor survivors.

i stood on the uss arizona memorial and saw the wreckage below gurgle up oil, as it has done since the ship sank in 1941.

it was an incredible week.

i'm not a proponent of war, but i do think it's incredibly important to understand why wars happen, and to honor the people who fought and died.

so, on this 70th anniversary of the attack on pearl harbor: i hope you're remembering.

FYI...

my day to write for edu180atl* was yesterday, and my 250 words are up on their site!


*a blog that takes submissions from atlantans who answer the question "what did you learn today?"

the adviser to our school newspaper asked me to write an article for the december issue from the point of view of rudolph the red-nosed reindeer.  i agreed...and this is what i came up with.  thought i'd share it with you all...


Dear Santa,

I won’t be able to come to work on Christmas Eve this year. I know that you’ve been relying on my nose to guide your sleigh for the past 72 years, but I hope the night vision goggles I’ve enclosed will be a good substitute. You’ll also find enclosed a bill for $139.98; the goggles didn’t come cheap. I’d appreciate reimbursement by the end of business on Friday.

The reason I can’t come to work on Christmas is because I’ve become involved in the #OccupyNorthPole protests, and we aren’t taking a break for Christmas. I hope you are able to make the trip to deliver toys to children even if I’m not there. It’s not the kids I’m trying to hurt. It’s you, Santa.

Let me take a moment to speak for the 99%. The 99% is made up of all of us reindeer, plus all the elves who work tirelessly to make toys for you to distribute to kids all around the world. We, the 99%, would like to inform you of the complaints that have caused us to stop working and to join the protest that Prancer started.

1. For a long time you have been violating American law by asking the reindeer to work more than 8 hours on Christmas Eve without paying us time and a half for overtime. Actually, Santa, without paying us AT ALL. Paying us in kind (through food and shelter) is not a valid form of payment under United States law. (You may recall that I was born at the North Pole but my parents were born in Alaska, thus making me a United States citizen.) Minimum wage in the United States is now $7.25/hour, and we reindeer and elves expect to receive at least as much for our invaluable work at the North Pole.

2. Santa, you have always taken the credit for the work we do on Christmas Eve. This credit is built on the backs of countless generations of reindeer and elves. We ask that you make a speech to be broadcast on television and radio of the 193 member countries of the United Nations, plus the Vatican City, Kosovo, and Taiwan which do not have member nation status. In this speech you will acknowledge that the reindeer and elves deserve the credit for the success of Christmas around the world, and that you are merely the face of the organization.

3. How long, Santa, will you continue to discriminate against people who are not Christians and thus do not celebrate Christmas? Our Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, and Hindu brethren deserve presents, too. Include them in your yearly trip around the globe or risk history remembering you as a man who discriminated against the majority of the world’s peoples.

I have my drum and my protest signs. The other reindeer and elves have joined me. There are only a few weeks until Christmas, and what will Christmas be without Rudolph?

Sincerely,
Rudolph

i'm in DC for the national social studies conference.  so far this weekend i have...

...happened upon occupy DC, where i forced jenny to walk slowly so i could gawk as much as possible.  actual, non-ironic, non-middle school "anarchy" flag!  hundreds of tents!  very few visible people, though.

...toured the supreme court building (very cool) and the library of congress (also very cool).

...this mug came into my possession (thanks, jenny!!) and we shared a history nerd moment with the library of congress bookstore worker.

...gone to some pretty interesting sessions, but managed not to wear my nametag outside of the convention center (success).

...eaten at nando's!!!  (this is a favorite restaurant of mine from oxford that has a couple locations in DC.  yesssssss.)

...seen rachel and morgan, and will see nora tonight.  i have more friends in DC than in any other city (other than atlanta).  why am i not applying to any grad schools here?  oh right...because there are none with programs that match up with what i want to study.  SIGH.

...eaten amazing food at every meal, courtesy of my per diem from school.  yesssss.

...discovered an outdoor holiday market where i'll be spending some time tomorrow before my flight leaves.

...panicked a little bit about the party i'm hosting on monday night that i haven't prepared for at all.  oops.

november: 30, 31, & 32

november!  this month i read:


the professor and the madman, by simon winchester (this is a story of the creation of the oxford english dictionary.  having spent time in oxford, this appealed to me, and it's got a great title and a great premise: one of the biggest contributors to the oxford english dictionary was locked in an insane asylum.  i like a good non-fiction book every now and then, and this book did the trick.  it's not a book you're going to be rushing home to continue reading, but i enjoyed it nonetheless.)

cutting for stone, by abraham verghese (i had this book for more than a year before i picked it up to read - the 670 page length was daunting, but this book was SO readable, with lots of twists and turns that kept me really interested.  i read the whole second half lying on the couch at home in north carolina over thanksgiving break, with the tv on or other conversations going on around me; i usually can't do this - i can't concentrate well enough.  somehow it was easy to do with this book.  this is a story of twins in ethiopia who grow up in a hospital (their parents are doctors), but (of course) it's so much more than that.  there is some medical mumbo jumbo, but not so much that i was confused.  i would definitely recommend book to others!)

the giver, by lois lowry (this is a re-read; i first read this book in 5th grade.  i remember that because a woman my mom worked with questioned if a 5th grader should be reading this book.  yo, i was an advanced reader.  back off, other person.  though i will say: i enjoyed it more now than i did as a 10 year old.  it was sadder, more poignant somehow.  i really GOT it.  though some things stuck with me from the first time i read it - i could vividly remember the final scene where jonas is sledding down the hill in the snow, for example.  if you haven't read this book you absolutely should.  someone brought this book up at my book club last month when we were talking about the hunger games, so that's the reason i re-read it now.)

love = love.

gender doesn't matter, silly.

(scroll down for the video.)

http://news.advocate.com/post/13324191023/possibly-the-most-beautiful-ad-for-marriage-equality

attention!  there has been a change to your itinerary!  if you do not find this acceptable, please contact delta.

wait...it was more intense than that.

attention!  there has been a change to your itinerary!  if you do not find this acceptable, please contact delta.


minor panic attack.  access itinerary.  the change?  i'm getting into DC tonight 15 minutes earlier than originally scheduled.

also, they have changed the plane variety (make? model?  variety.) and now i am seated in an exit row.  poor me.

simmer down, delta.  i'm okay with this change.

here is the new york times calling the tiger's wife (a book i did not LOVE) one of the 10 best books of 2011.  wow.  i did read it, though, and i did LIKE it.  so that's something.

some of my friends got together this year and bought me a kindle touch for my birthday.  !!!!

it was just released this month, so i have been waiting (somewhat) patiently for mine to arrive, and it came today.  other claire brought it to me this morning and i almost peed my pants in excitement.  kindle!!!  i can't believe how small it is - it's literally the length of my hand and just an inch wider than my hand and as thin as a pencil.  they are not kidding.

it supposedly hold up to 3,000 books.  um, absurd.  at the rate i'm going, i could read books on this thing for 100 years without deleting any.  let's hope i'm still reading books at 129 years of age...actually, let's not.  i hope to die by then.  109 is fine with me.

suffice it to say that i haven't done any work since the kindle arrived on my desk.

if you're reading everything you can about the penn state scandal (like i am), you need to listen to this week's this american life - you can download the podcast for free on itunes, or listen to it online here.  the episode is called "back to penn state" - two years ago they dedicated a whole hour-long episode to life at penn state, as it had just been named american's #1 party school (that episode is called, appropriately, "#1 party school" and is also excellent).  in this week's episode they go back to penn state for additional interviews and stories.

i love podcasts that tell real life stories - this american life, freakonomics, radiolab.  i listened to 2 episodes of this american life and one of freakonomics on my drive to north carolina yesterday.  speaking of north carolina...the high is supposed to be in the 60s all week.  glooooooorious unseasonably warm weather, i will take you.

Best thing ever? Someone* in my car really had to pee, and as I approach the next exit, I realize that it is the Starbucks exit! The elusive south Carolina Starbucks exit whose location I can never recall. Let the record show: it is exit 90 on I-85. The pee break will now coincide with a small (I refuse to say "tall") iced chai latte. Life is so good.

Second best thing ever? The iPad 2 I have borrowed from the school library that is allowing me to blog from the Starbucks parking lot using 3G. Technology is amazingggggg.

Homeward bound...


*note: i am the only passenger in my car.

GRE - check!

UPenn application - check!

(more order in my life - check!)

Columbia and Stanford - started (no exclamation point, as there is a ways to go there)

Thanksgiving break - starting in 5 hours!!!

additionally, if you have never asked 18 year olds to write letters to a presidential candidate they are considering vote for, you must do this.  you get all sorts of awesome stuff like "President Obama, you have made a lot of changes, but you could be doing more for gay Americans" and "Herman Cain, experts say your 9-9-9 economic plan will raise taxes for 84% of Americans.  How is that okay when many families are struggling financially as it is?" and "Mitt Romney, your opponents have detailed plans of how to fix the economy.  How do you expect to win without telling us what, specifically, you will do?"  their ideas are so thoughtful and honest and varied.  i'm loving it.

ohmygod.

try not to cry your way through this whole program. (i was unsuccessful.)

20/20 with gabby giffords & mark kelly

what i'm listening to right now

sugarland & matt nathanson, "run":



whoever decided to put two of my favorite singers in a duet together deserves a cookie.

what i'm DOING right now:
helping my students write letters to presidential candidates and then printing them out on school stationery and mailing them.  so fun.  four years ago when we did this about a quarter of the letters got a response...

INCREDIBLY beautiful photography!  i heart national geographic.

coach k started coaching basketball at duke before i was born.  literally.  i have been a duke fan since i was a little kid, and duke has always equaled coach k.  tonight coach k has the opportunity to win his 903rd college basketball game, the most of any coach in men's division I ever.  i can't WAIT to watch.

when coach k stops coaching, i'm not exactly sure what i'll do.  i hope we have many more years before we have to worry about that.

let's go duke!

today was a blustery day.

or, more accurately, this afternoon was a blustery afternoon.  it looked just like it does in the hundred acre wood a lot of the time.  it was really warm - mid 70s - and i went for a walk on my new favorite walking trail.  about halfway in it started to sprinkle.  and then the wind blew hundreds of red and yellow leaves off the trees (and one stick - of course i got hit by the one stick that fell), and it was beautiful.  i heart fall.

i took the GRE this morning and it went well.  hoo-ray.  they are SERIOUS over there in GRE testing world, though.  i had to be wanded with a metal detector thing every time i entered the exam room (at the beginning and then after my 10 minute break).  wanded!!!  yikes.

i have been leaving you all hanging about the reason for taking the GRE, so here's a little info: i'm applying to three different masters degree programs in educational leadership - a degree that would hopefully help me become an upper school principal or a head of school some day.  eek!  that is scary to say out loud, and i don't think i am ready for those jobs today.  but someday i hope to be.  i love working in schools, and being a dean of students has given me a taste for what the senior administrative positions entail.  so...we'll see.

all of the programs are one year long; two are full time (one in new york, one in california...and you'd better believe that location played a role in the programs i decided to apply to) and one is part time (i would stay at my current job and fly to pennsylvania one weekend a month for classes).

i'll keep you updated!  for now, though, i am taking a nap.

layover

last night i got to see becky!  she had a layover in atlanta on her way to texas for the weekend, but her first flight was delayed so she got stuck here for 7 hours.  we only got to hang out for the time it took to drive home from the airport home, sleep in separate rooms, and then to drive her to take MARTA (our "subway" system) to the airport in the morning, but it was still really nice to see her.  hooray. :)

in case you didn't know, when it is 11:45pm there are no rules when you are waiting for someone to exit the airport and get in your car.  normally there are police cars everywhere and your ability to stop and wait for someone is minimal - if they aren't coming out the door, you better move along and circle back around.  last night i sat for 10 minutes by the curb - with about 50 other cars, none of us moving - while the police just sort of watched.  10 minutes!  i turned my car off.  no one cared.  what universe are we living in?!  (i guess if you are going to bomb the terminal you don't do it in the middle of the night.  makes perfect sense.)  and then a street sweeping truck drove the wrong way past me on the one way road there by the terminal.  you know.  like they do.

just another day on the job...

this morning at 8am i was involved in a meeting in which a police officer told an 18 year old boy to "stop acting like you're batman."

this was a serious meeting...but it was everything i could do not to laugh out loud.

it's crunch time.

on saturday i am taking the GRE.

one of my grad school applications has rolling admissions, so i basically need to submit that application ASAP.  or ASAPATGRE (as soon as possible after the GRE).  i'm feeling great about how my resume looks and my references have submitted their letters of recommendation.  personal statement, it's just you and me now.

then i need to work on the personal statements for the other two programs i'm applying for; their deadlines aren't until january.

then i need to fill out the FAFSA so i can get some dollars for grad school.

it feels like a lot right now.  i forget about how stressful applying to school is; apparently i have selective memory and have chosen to forget about what it was like when i was in 12th grade and applying to college.  i realize that this is a first world problem (i have to write essays and take a test!) not a real problem (i have to feed my family or try not to die today!), but nonetheless, i'm complaining about it.  when i applied to college i had a pretty decent idea of whether i would get in to each school or not.  now?  NO CLUE.  i don't know whether i'm a great candidate or whether they're going to immediately throw my application in the trash, laughing with their admissions friends at my gall in applying at all.

i'm assuming it's not the latter, but i can't be sure.

what i'm listening to right now

IN LOVE WITH james blake's version of my girl joni's "case of you":



happy birthday, joni!  the first CD i ever owned was the collected works of simon & garfunkel.  the second was "miles of aisles" - an INCREDIBLE album.  (thanks, dad, for both of them.)

for the first time, i may know something about cars that you don't

on monday the dude in the car behind me at a traffic light motioned frantically to indicate that my left rear tire was prettttty close to flat.  yay, helpful dude!  after two days of putting a lot of air in it each day and having it leak out over the course of the day, i took it to get fixed.  dad, pretend like you didn't just read that sentence.

the guy at the garage asked me if i also needed an oil change, as my "maintenance required" light was on.  (note: this is actually an "oil change required" light.  WHY DO THEY NOT CALL IT THAT.  ugh.)  i explained that i got an oil change a week ago, but the person at that garage didn't turn the light off.  AND THEN THE GUY AT THE GARAGE SHOWED ME HOW TO TURN IT OFF MYSELF.  secret tip of the day!  in my toyota it involves only the button you push to switch from odometer to trip A and trip B.  magic!!!  i couldn't believe it.

what i'm listening to right now

"gillian," by the waifs



i. love. this. song.

the three little pigs

as you may remember from halloweens past, at my school the seniors and the pre-schoolers are allowed to dress up for halloween and they go on a parade in front of the whole school.  my work friends and i dress up and participate, too, because...really...why not?  plus, any excuse to wear a sweatsuit to work for the whole day is an excuse i'm going to use.

happy belated halloween!

october: 28 & 29

i was slowed down this month by the fact that the first book i read was 959 pages long.  sheesh.  in fact, i only read it as quickly as i did because it was a library book that couldn't be renewed because other people were on the waiting list behind me.  for each of the 21 days i had it i was doing a lot of reading.  good thing it was awesome or i wouldn't have made it.


a dance with dragons, by george r.r. martin (nerd alert.  this is the 5th book in the series; this one came out in july.  i got on the list at the library for it pretty shortly thereafter, and finally got the book in late september.  and ohmygoodness it was definitely worth waiting for.  the scandals continue.  and the teasers; one character who played a major role in book 4 showed up for literally one line in book 5.  so many characters!  not enough time!  the cliffhangers continue, as well; how am i going to wait until the next book comes out?  and this dude can take 4 or 5 years between books.  and he's getting old.  george r.r. martin: DO NOT BECOME SENILE UNTIL AFTER YOU FINISH THIS SERIES.)

the magicians, by lev grossman (i'd heard a lot of good stuff about this book, but i thought it was only okay.  it was described to me as harry potter meets the chronicles of narnia, and it, well, WAS harry potter (the first half of the book takes place in a school for magicians) meets narnia (except it's called "fillory" in this book.  but it's narnia - let's be honest).  i thought it was too much of a literal mixing of those worlds that we know from other books, and that was a bit bizarre.  definitely entertaining, but i'm not rushing out to get the sequel.)

okay, i guess there's a 29 and a half.  i listened to the audiobook of three cups of tea, by greg mortenson and david oliver relin.  does listening to an audiobook count?  i'm not exactly sure, but it was 13.5 hours long, so i will give myself some credit.  my thoughts: perhaps listening to it gave me a different perspective that reading it, but this book is CHOCK FULL of puns and cliches, to the extent that i was gagging with the cheesiness factor.  UGH.  it's not very well written.  but it was pretty interesting.  i know there is controversy surrounding mortenson and how truthful this book is...and how good his bookkeeping skills are...but i do think he's done an incredible thing for pakistan by investing money in education there.  i'm not rushing out to donate to him, but he tells a story about this part of the world that not everyone can tell.  i'll give him credit for that.  at the end of the audiobook they include an original song written about the book.  it is, factually, the worst song ever written.  mortenson's daughter sings it, and i will give her a pass because she's in elementary school, but i will not give a pass to whoever wrote the song.  decide for yourself here.  and, yeah - don't necessarily rush out to buy this book...

parking lot conversation

the scene: i have just gotten out of my car at home.  my roommate is leaving the apartment to go trick or treating with some friends who have kids.

me: um, can you believe those new speed bumps?!
roomie: no! they are going to screw up the suspension in our cars, in addition to being annoying.
me: really?  or are we exaggerating.
roomie: yes!  they are the bumpity bumpity kind!
me: true.  ugh!
roomie: the condo association needs to focus on fixing the gate instead of adding new speed bumps that aren't even necessary.
me: they are old and having nothing better to do!
roomie: no!  they have nothing better to do than meddle!
me: how far do you think it is from the gate to our apartment?  1/4 mile?  one trip around the track?  and now there are two speed bumps between here and there.
roomie: three!  three!  there's that one as you go through the gate!  and no.  it's 1/8 of a mile.
me: i'm going to say 1/6 of a mile just to not be accused of exaggerating.
roomie: fine.
me: and let's be honest, why do we need these speed bumps?  have you ever seen anyone drive too fast up that hill?
roomie: yes!  me!  i've got places to go!
me: i knew you would be indignant about this with me.

“The art of being wise is knowing what to overlook.”
--William James

it has been sads-ville in my world for the last week, which is partially the reason for the lack of posting.  a good friend's father had been fighting cancer for several years and died on saturday.  jim treated his son's friends like family, inviting us on family vacations and to their house for pumpkin carving around halloween and gingerbread house building contests around christmas.  he was warm and generous, a talented writer as he described his fight with cancer on his blog.  the world is worse off for his passing.

sometimes the world seems orderly - that hard work brings success in our endeavors, that the good people win, that every day the world becomes a better place.  other days the world seems chaotic and i search for meaning.  i've been thinking about this line recently, from "the second coming," by yeats: "turning and turning in the widening gyre / the falcon cannot hear the falconer."  i know i'm not alone in feeling like a little falcon, looking for meaning to my circles.

the not feeling alone part?  that's really important.  i've got the best friends and family ever.  how lucky i am to not feel alone in a world where a lot of people do.

ken jennings entertains me.

cookie the little penguin

this is worth watching through to the end (the last 30 seconds are the best).  reasons you should watch this video:
1. his name is cookie.
2. he is a little penguin.
NEED I SAY MORE?

um, oops.

i had my two year blog anniversary in late september and i didn't realize until after the fact.

in belated honor of the anniversary, i've changed up the format of the blog again - mostly just changed the background (love these flowers*) and added a "favicon."  if you know what a favicon is, i'm impressed, as i did not.  it is the little picture to the left of the address in your address bar at the top of the page.  assuming it's still working, that's little me!

my biggest accomplishment today was actually going to the gym even though it was cold and gray outside and i DID NOT want to.  my second biggest accomplishment was completing an 8 x 8 kenken puzzle, probably only the second or third 8 x 8 i've ever completed (i had been doing 6 x 6s until last week).  if you are not kenken-ing, you should be.


*yes, blue with flowers again.  but slightly different blue with flowers!  you shouldn't be surprised about more blue.  let me recreate an exact conversation i had on the phone with my grandma (my dad's mom) about 10 years ago:
me: dad redid the bathroom and mom painted it...
grandma: let me guess: blue.
me: how did you know?
grandma: your mother loves blue.  she always has.
(let's call this "i am my mother, example #6.")

back to the start

have you seen this commercial?  YOU MUST WATCH THIS COMMERCIAL.  it played in the movie theater on monday night when i saw ides of march and i was IN LOVE.



great music, beautiful visually, a message i love.  now, do i think chipotle uses only free range pork and beef in their burritos?  no i do not and by making this commercial they clearly want you to think that they do.  oh well.  i love the commercial anyway.

(will i be buying this song on itunes?  probably so...)

random thoughts

are tuesdays the hardest day of the week for anyone else?  i can NOT stop yawning.

yawning.  what a weird word.

my tuesday is being made even more miserable by the need to be ELOQUENT.  womp womp.  teachers are my school write comments on every student twice a year - october and march.  and here it is: october.  so now i'm trying to write coherent and helpful notes to each family about their child.  it isn't exactly fun, even if i know that is useful and necessary.  i am blogging to put off writing comments.  don't tell.

last night i made quesadillas on my panini press (did i tell you that i bought a panini press?  i did.  it is an incredible invention) and then lily and i saw the ides of march, which really was quite good.  there were exactly 3 other people in the theater.  i guess that's what you get on a monday night.

what i'm listening to right now

thanks to pandora: florence + the machine, "drumming sound"

this video is bizarro, so you should just listen while looking at something else.  i have found this to be a theme: music videos are ridiculous.

i am my mother, example #5

yesterday it was beautiful (we're having such incredible weather here - highs in the 80s, lows in the 50s, sleeping with the windows open weather.  LOVE IT) and i went for a walk at my new favorite walking location (read about it here!).  it is history + beautiful + shady + a 1 hour round trip walk.  it makes me happy.

as i'm on the home stretch and nearing the parking lot, i see a mcdonald's coffee cup on the trail.  here is a transcription of what happened in my brain: "argh!!  it is beautiful here and some lame person is littering.  i hate them.  i should throw this away.  i'm not too far from the parking lot so i won't have to carry it too far.  oh my god.  I AM MY MOTHER."

so i picked up the coffee cup, and then a twix wrapper, and then a starbucks napkin.

when i was growing up, this is what my mom would do all the time.  it's wonderful, of course - leaving the place cleaner than you found it - but somehow this really embarrassed me as a child.  like, mom, don't be weird.  no one else does this.  isn't it funny how much of our childhood we spend trying to be like everyone else?


next thing you know i'll be carrying a special bag on my walks just for other people's trash.

(i will do my best not to let that happen.)

first world problems

i am incredibly spoiled by living in atlanta - not when it comes to my commute (boo hiss), but when it comes to air travel.  because atlanta is a delta hub, i can drive 30 minutes to the airport and then fly almost anywhere on a (relatively cheap) direct flight.  no layovers for me!  direct to new york, DC, london!  (not direct to sun valley idaho, but that i can understand.)

today i had to buy a flight with a layover and it is almost killing me.  hartford, connecticut, i can get to you direct on delta, but it would cost $175 less to take a layover and fly us air.  ugh.  i guess i'll make do.

(so yes!  i'll be in connecticut visiting my grandma and aunt and uncle - and seeing becky and my dad - the last weekend in october.  hooray!)

last night i made vegetarian chili and sour cream and cheddar cheese biscuits.  it was my first lazy evening in a while - cooking and watching tv and lying around over the course of several hours with no obligations to get in the way.  it was wonderful.  the biscuits turned out SUPER sticky, such that i couldn't effectively shape them into circles, so they became more free form on the cookie sheet.  i also made them a bit smaller than the recipe suggests - so i made more like 8 or 9 biscuits instead of 6.  ohmygod they were delicious.  i may have eaten two of them just standing there in the kitchen before even ladling out the soup, grabbing a biscuit, and sitting down to dinner.

new hampshire

this weekend other claire, lilly, and i went to new hampshire to visit two coworkers who moved there this summer.  here is a visual highlight:

add to that: beautiful red and yellow leaves, a walk through the woods, great food, time to read books, a walk on the beach, shopping in portsmouth, and four nights in a house built in 1745 (!!) and you've got my weekend.

it was wonderful to spend time with friends and talk about things big and small.  the weather was incredible - highs in the 70s, lows in the 50s maybe, and sunny all weekend.  coming back to work today was a little bit of a rude awakening...

look for me here on december 5th!  very excited.  now i have to start getting nervous about what i will write...

(don't worry - i'll be sure to link to the blog once my post is up.)

what i'm listening to right now

uh, oops.  i've been really busy lately and haven't been posting as often as i want and mean to...

here's a cheating post (aka i didn't have to work very hard to put this one together):

"maybe," by ingrid michaelson.  LOVE HER.



shout out to lindsey for introducing me to this song!

this morning while driving to work i was listening to NPR, and right after an advertisement for the atlanta ballet's newest production was an advertisement for the european union.  um, whaaaaat?  (a) the european union is not a product, and (b) i thought the EU was in some financial trouble...is advertising on atlanta's NPR station really a good use of their money?

i am so confused.  and entertained.  definitely entertained.


in other news, it was 46 degrees when i drove to work this morning.  DISCUSS.

when i was in new york visiting becky i bought this hoodie (in blue) from athleta and it is totally the best thing everrrrrr.  on saturday i went for a long walk on a trail that runs off of the silver comet trail (a 5 mile drive from my house) and it was such perfect, crisp, sunny fall weather and me and this hoodie became best friends.  so then i wore the hoodie again to yoga today.  and i'm planning to wear it to the gym again tomorrow.

can i go on the record as saying that fall is absolutely the best season?

september: 25, 26, & 27

september!  this month i read...


a feast for crows, by george r.r. martin (the 4th book in the series.  each book is narrated by about 10 characters, who each get a couple of chapters throughout the book to tell the story from their perspective.  GRRM decided to make this a book entirely of new-ish narrators.  i had this conversation (monologue) with a coworker who also reads the books: me: "where is jon?  where is tyrion?  WHERE ARE ALL MY FAVORITE NARRATORS???  i hate jamie chapters.  it is all jamie all the time.  except when it's cersei!  i hate cersei chapters even more!!"  suffice it to say, i got a little feisty about all these new narrators.  i have since calmed down.)

the red tent, by anita diamant (the first book for the book club i've joined!  this is the biblical story of dinah, told from her perspective (which isn't the perspective you find in the bible).  really interesting - a look into a world of the past, and actually not very religious, which surprised me.  i don't know if i would have gotten around to reading this without the book club, but i'm really glad that i did.  and we had an AWESOME conversation about it at the book club meeting.  and kelly fed us delicious food.  victory on all counts.)

the tiger's wife, by tea obreht (i bought this book on august 4th and finished it on september 18th because...other books got in the way.  oops.  there was an urgency around books for book club and books from the library that needed to be returned by a certain date and in that climate this book kept getting put on the bottom of the stack.  it's funny - before this self-imposed book challenge it wouldn't have been unusual for me to spend a month and a half reading a book, but now i am reading 3 or 4 books in that period of time.  because i never got into a good rhythm with this book - it's not that i didn't like it (i did), it just that it never totally hooked me - i didn't love this book.  i mean: good book!  but i wasn't dying to get home to read it in the same way that i've felt with other books.  when i finished it i thought, this was probably supposed to be a profound ending, but it isn't for me.  oops again.)

things* i miss about oxford

it's official: i miss oxford.  when i got back to atlanta i was just happy to be home, enjoying the comforts of being back in the US.  but every year at about this time i start missing oxford and those experiences again; i start thinking about going back next summer.  here are a couple reasons why:

1. alpha bar.  alpha bar is this incredible food stand in the covered market with lots of fresh and healthy food; i often got a small box (4 items) for lunch.  you can mix and match from lots of salads and cheeses and proteins.  my favorite small box combination is lentil salad, hummus, carrot and cabbage slaw, and grilled halloumi cheese.  i also love the roasted veggies and feta cheese, so sometimes i sub one or the other in.  in short: if alpha bar existed in atlanta i would go DAILY.  sigh.

2. the pizza artisan van.

here i am talking about food again.  oops.  the pizza artisan van is a, well, van with a wood burning oven in it.  the van man parks on the side of the road in town and makes fresh pizzas in literally 2 minutes.  (ignore the question of how he is allowed to have a super heated fire in a van that obviously has gasoline in it.)  i became obsessed with this pizza.  in 2 minutes you can have a mushroom pizza with roasted garlic on it, topped at the last minute with spinach and rocket (aka arugula).  YUM.

3. walking places.  in atlanta i drive everywhere except (sometimes) the grocery store that's across the street from my house.  places i want to go are far apart and traffic stresses me out.  in oxford we walked everywhere, and living in a town where that is possible was wonderful.  would i want to live in a place that small year round?  probably not.  but i miss it.

4. the weather, though atlanta's late september weather is similar to oxford's hottest july day, and i'm appreciative of the fact that we're moving in the right direction.  jeans and sweaters and clear days that aren't hot - that's my favorite climate.

5. feeling like you're in college again - sort of - in that there are people around all the time and at a moment's notice you could always find someone to go grab a drink with you or play uno (don't laugh) with you.  when we weren't on duty our job was to be free in case of emergency, which also meant that people were free to hang out.  real life isn't like that - i, and all my friends, are busy and scheduled and finding time to just hang out requires forethought.  ugh.  while i understand that real life can't be like a summer job, i'm still sad about it.

*again, obviously not people, as i miss my oxford friends a lot...

i'm taking the GRE in november (more on that later) and i'm studying some vocabulary in an attempt to get as good a score as possible.  the vocabulary is ridiculous, though - i consider myself to have a pretty large vocabulary and i've never even heard of some of these words.  ugh.  but i'll play the game - i'll learn some words - if it helps me get a higher score.

as i learn definitions i take the index cards out of my stack, but these four words have been in my pile for a couple weeks and i can't seem to get them.  can anyone think of some tips and tricks to help me remember them?

irascible: easily made angry

assiduous: showing great care and perseverance

sycophantic: attempting to win favor from influential people by flattery

pertinacious: holding firm to an opinion

thankyouverymuch.

st. louis needs to fall apart right now.  WHY ARE THEY NOT COOPERATING.

a new york moment

while visiting becky in new york this weekend - which, by the way, was awesome - the following situation occurred and i pretty much could not believe it was happening.

the characters: 
me
becky (my sister, who has lived in new york city for five years)
talia (one of my friends from working in oxford this summer who also lives in new york)
the cab driver
random dude who is a jerk

the scene: 
it is saturday night.  becky and i have had dinner with some friends of mine from the summer program i work for, and then we've had a couple drinks at a bar down the street from the restaurant.  it's close to midnight and we're ready to leave.  talia lives just a couple blocks from becky, so we share a cab.

the events:
we find a cab, climb in, and drive several blocks.  there's a lot of traffic, so we're moving slowly in the far right lane.  the man who will soon be known as "random dude who is a jerk" is standing on the side of the road with two female friends and as we creep slowly by he hits the top of the cab two or three times.  my first thought is that the cab driver hadn't turn on his sign that says he's got a passenger (or however they alert people of this - this has always been a mystery to me), and random dude is trying to get the cabbie's attention so that he and his friends can get in.
cab driver freaks out.  he stops the car, unbuckles his seat belt, gets out, and says a lot of cuss words while asking random dude why he ran into his cab.  random dude yells back while the three of us in the backseat are like "ummmm..." and then cab driver gets back in the car while random dude is still yelling at him.  as we are about to pull away, random dude says "your mother attacked the world trade center!" and (middle eastern looking) cab driver yells back "your mother!  your mother!" in the only real life yo mama joke i have ever experienced.  except at the time it is just absurd, not funny.  i say "ignore him! whatever!  let's go!"  cab driver does not ignore him, but reverses the cab really fast and drives backward to the random dude, who is walking away.  becky says, "no!  drive the cab!  drive the cab!  no!  we are getting out and not paying!"  but cab driver man does not care and continues backing, then gets out to yell at the random dude even more.  the three of us in the backseat scurry out and run away and get in another cab.

o.m.g.  discuss.

(note: at no point was this scary...just extremely confrontational, which i hate, and so bizarre - i couldn't believe it was happening.  in no way should random dude have said what he said, but the cab driver also had an extremely short fuse.  but who knows?  maybe he deals with random jerks all the time and has had enough.)

i'm going to new york this weekend!!!

hooray for spending the weekend with becky - our plan this evening is for her to have indian food takeout waiting for me when i arrive at her apartment.  life is so good.

heh.

how has it taken me so long to tell you this story?

over labor day weekend i went to the lake with some friends, one of whom is a 5th grade teacher.  the teacher showed me some little projects she was grading where the kids had to illustrate some of the amendments to the constitution.  i was flipping through them, and found that one of the students had written our president's name this way: brocko bama

brocko!

it's even funnier when said out loud.

in fact, i can't stop giggling about it.

my mama came to visit this weekend!  hooray!  excellent times were had - lots of good food was eaten (including some perfect peaches that she brought from north carolina), we went to the martin luther king memorial downtown (which i had - embarrassingly - never been to), we played trivia on saturday night (just the two of us - and did pretty well!), and had yummy brunch with some of my friends on sunday morning before she left.

can we talk about the weather this weekend?  perfection.  after mom left on sunday i took my book out to this little grassy area at the back of our condo complex that borders the train tracks (it feels like you're in the middle of nowhere, which i love) and read my book / napped and it just felt GOOD.  lilly and i went to see brandi carlile and ray lamontagne on sunday evening and the weather continued to be perfect.

great weekend.

book club + jam tart

tuesday was the first meeting of the new book club that i am in!  yay book club!  i was in a book club a couple years ago, but it became clear that reading the book wasn't important - gossiping and drinking wine was.  this frustrated me.  when i joined this club i wanted to make sure that we were really going to discuss the book and - success! - we did (AND we drank wine and chatted) - and great conversations ensued.  (the book was the red tent if anyone is interested.)  i'm already looking forward to our next meeting.

i brought dessert - easy jam tart from smitten kitchen.  it was my first time making this tart (actually: my first time making any tart.  but really, a tart is pretty close to a pie and i've made several of those before).  i was very nervous about how it would taste - it looked beautiful, but you can't exactly sample a tart before taking it to a party without it being very obvious that you've sampled it.  but omg people: it was delicioussssss.  and really easy.  and it made me feel like an awesome chef (obviously the #1 reason to make this).

let it be known throughout the land that i will definitely be making this recipe again.

on sunday i'm seeing ray lamontagne:



and brandi carlile:



with lilly.

!!!!!

things liz lemon has said that apply to my life, part 2*

jenna: "liz, that guy wanted to buy you a drink!"
liz lemon: "really?  but i already have a drink.  do you think he'd buy me mozzarella sticks?"

i may or may not be giggling uncontrollably.


*yes, part 1 was in february.  deal with it.  this is a very occasional series on this here blog.

what i'm listening to right now:

thanks to my belfast friends nick and jen, i have discovered lissie.  (nick is the kind of person who knows all of these bands that i've never heard of.  he is a good friend to have.)  this is my favorite song of lissie's:



(sorry about the ad.)

i have lived in the south for so long (my life minus ten months) that today i did the unthinkable.  i was walking towards the gym and a guy was walking towards the gym from the other direction and we were going to awkwardly arrive at the door at the same time, creating the problem of who opens the door.  so i slowed my pace and arrived a second after him.  (you know you do this, too.)  he was pulling open the door and then paused for a millisecond, which i took to mean "after you!", which is often what that means here in the lovely south.  so i moved to walk through the door only to realize he was NOT holding the door for me and in fact was just going through it himself, and i looked like a jerk face who tried to pass him and speed my way into the gym first.  argh.  and he had to pause and say "go ahead" but i knew he didn't really mean for me to go ahead.

door holding.  i love it.  it happens all the time - men and women.  this the south.  we are equal opportunity polite.  but simmer down, miss claire.  don't assume everyone wants to hold the door for you.

when i lived in new hampshire i was shocked - SHOCKED - that people didn't hold the door, or at least hold the door open behind them so it didn't slam in the face of the person behind them.  common courtesy, people.  common courtesy.

for your friday afternoon:

this is really cool...and i don't think that's just the history teacher in me talking.

weirdest post ever.

here is what i have decided the netflix call center is like:

they are in california.  everyone is really hip and interesting.  they wear jeans to work and have fun toys on their desks.

i have decided this because they are so CASUAL when they answer the phone.  and seem genuinely happy to be at work.  i called in june with a question related to going on vacation for 7 weeks and they solved my problem by creating a new user within my account called Vacation IsAwesome.  as in, that is the name of the new user.  i mean, they are happy to be alive if they are coming up with fun stuff like that.  (there was a very convoluted reason why they had to do this, but it made perfect sense for my situation.  i will not bore you with the whole story.)

i called again today with an issue and they were so nice and reasonable again.  i do not think they have a script to read and they are actually allowed to use their brains.  this makes me happy.

the end.

update (after actually doing some research): it's oregon!  i should have guessed...  this article is a couple years old, but i find it spot on.  as in, "[netflix] picked the location because [they] found oregonians to be polite."  this is a little more updated and also entertains me.

today...

...is the very lovely becky's birthday - and the very dashing joey's birthday!  to my sister and my roommate: happy happy birthday!!  i love you both!

i am...

...going to the lake for the weekend!  and i'm turning off my computer and leaving it at home.  craziness, i know.

see you on monday - happy labor day weekend!!

what i'm listening to right now

discovered via NPR's "tiny desk concerts" podcast:



clearly i bought the whole CD on itunes shortly after hearing this.

this photography is GORGEOUS.  and so reminiscent - obviously - of the lewis hine photos of the building of the empire state building.  looking at these two sets of photos - separated by 80 years - i am struck by how people are PEOPLE, regardless of whether they're living in 1931 or 2011.  what makes us human doesn't change.

(as you probably know, photography is my favorite art form.  duh.)

august: 23 & 24

here we are at the end of august and i have no idea where this month went.  crikey.  the first of these books i read in oxford, the second back here in atlanta.  i tie books very much into the location where i read them, and thinking about the hand that first held mine takes me right back to the office in oriel college and to christ church meadow, the two places where i read most of this book.  bossypants takes me to...my bed.  less exciting.

here is august:


the hand that first held mine, by maggie o'farrell (another book borrowed from a friend in oxford.  halfway through this book i was like, "seriously?!  i knew from the very beginning that this was going to be the 'twist.'  sheesh, book.  you are stereotypical."  15 pages later i was like, "ohmygod i did not see THAT coming!"  turns out the "twist" wasn't the twist at all.  it got out-twisted.  so then i liked the book again.  a good, light-ish read!)

bossypants, by tina fey (LOVED this book - tina fey's autobiography.  equal parts hilarious and inspirational, and i didn't see the inspiration coming when i picked the book up.  i waited through a reserve list at my library with 132 - literally - people on it before me in order to read this book (for free).  totally worth it.  reading this book makes me like tina fey even more.)

today i'm at the gym - you know, the GYM, where that one woman is always there riding the stationery bike and sweating through her entire outfit.  gross.  THAT gym.  so i'm at the gym.  and my gym sometimes has people at a table near the front giving away free stuff so you will hopefully buy it later...like protein bodybuilder juice.  that is the typical product being "sold" at the table.

today they were giving away PEPPERONI PIZZA and CHICKEN PASTA IN A CREAMY SAUCE.  at my gym.  excuse me??  and this was not diet food.  this was like, "you just worked out for an hour and burned like 300 calories?  come over here and gain it all back in 10 seconds!!!"

i pretended i couldn't smell it while i was on the treadmill.  and then i ran away.  be proud.

happy happy birthday, mama!  i love you!

i went to limerick junction this weekend with some of my favorite people.

(other favorite people not shown but definitely present.)

pretty close to the best night ever.  elevated to "close to the best night ever" status by the fact that willis got on stage and sang with the guy who plays live music there every other weekend.  it was incredible.

what i'm listening to right now

i. love. sugarland.



(eww - sorry about the ad that starts off this video...)

this music is a great way to start a slow monday...

from mcgrady

when i was home in north carolina in june i helped my mom plant three rows of corn in the garden.  little dried corn seedlings, dyed red so you don't lose them in the dirt.  abby the dog "helped" us.  i mourned the fact that i'm never at home in august when the corn is ready to eat, and fresh corn on the cob is a religious experience.  i made my parents promise to mail me some corn in august.

today i received that corn in the mail.

!!!!!!

my parents are awesome.

8 ears of corn still in their husks, in ziploc bags and protected by some shredded paper.  yessssssssss.

and a bonus!  one (dead) green bug in an ear of corn.  i didn't get a photo of that.

i made enchiladas verdes (with black beans, not chicken) and they were DELISH.  the corn was sweet and crisp and i was (am) happy.  the rest of the corn is off the cob and in the freezer for another day.

life is good.

nightmares

i have discovered that sometimes my unconscious needs to work through stuff and doesn't tell me during waking hours.  it tells me in the middle of the night via scary nightmares that paralyze me with fear when i wake up from them...as in, i have to talk myself down before i can get up to pee.  when the uncertainty in my life has worked itself out, the dreams stop.  BIZARRE.

apparently the start of school is causing anxiety and it is manifesting itself in my dreams.  over the past week i have had a scary dream almost every night.  here are the ones i remember:
1. i am in a hotel and a bad guy is standing in the doorway to my room and he is going to kill me.
2. i am back in oxford and our program office is in a tree house and i have to keep climbing up and down the tree and it is annoying.  i have no memory of the scary portion of this dream, but there was one at the time.
3. i am at a trivia night hosted by a coworker (he is having one in october - so far, this dream is plausible), and somehow we need to break into this secret room to get these old books.  we get into the room by detonating a mini bomb.  when we reach in to get the book, bats and rats and things attack us.  OKAY, I KNOW THIS DOESN'T SOUND SCARY, BUT IT WAS.  i woke up scratching furiously at my neck to get them off.
4. i am trying to get into jerusalem (unclear why), but as i am not a jew i can't go through the front gate and must go through this maze in a house with the other members of my traveling group who are not jewish.  there is a tiger there and it bites me on the finger and i am worried i have rabies.  i never get to jerusalem.

scary dreams, i need you to stop.
love,
claire

new addiction: mad men, available to watch instantly on netflix.  i, um, watched a lot of episodes this weekend.  not as many as my sister watched one day of summer vacation when she was making her way through the west wing...  what's your record, becks?  19 episodes in one day?  please confirm.  love, claire.

in 2003 or so, as part of a college history class, i watched the documentary paradise lost and became really interested in the case.  and really angry about the court decision, but of course that's what the documentary filmmakers intended for my reaction to be.  i've followed the appeals off and on since then and have continued to feel a bit queasy about the whole situation.  today the west memphis 3 were released from prison and i spent a good hour of my time watching everything CNN.com could throw at me.  incredible.  i also learned a little bit about the supreme court case of north carolina v. alford (1970), which, you know, i didn't expect when i woke up this morning.

if you have no idea what i'm talking about, put paradise lost in your netflix queue.  and while you're at it, brother's keeper, by the same filmmakers.  both very well done and i think both will affect you greatly.

as 12th grade dean at my school, part of my job is organizing the chaos of senior parking.  who gets which spot, how to make it fair, getting all the cars "registered" with the school, dealing with the almost daily "someone parked in my spot."  it is NOT the best part of my job.

my job was not made any easier by the company that repaved and relined the senior parking lot the friday before school started on monday.

book challenge update

tina fey's book bossypants is AWESOME and anyone remotely interested should read it.  it is part hilarious and part inspirational (i was not expecting that part) and i have had to put the book down because i was laughing too hard to continue to hold it.  get thee to your local library.

all this, you know, READING, is because i made a little goal for myself to read 25 books this year.  last year i read 15, which was a number surpassed in the beginning of june this year.  reading is so fun!  i'd forgotten.  yay for my personal reading challenge.

this is the crazy blogger whom i occasionally read and who inspired me to try to read 25 books this year.  since i started this, i've discovered world lit up (thanks to willis for telling me about it!) and reading 100 all time novels (not sure how i discovered this one) and they are both fabulous reading-y blogs.  my book list is growing, not getting shorter, though.  not quite sure how that's happening.

i went to yoga this morning and sweated an incredible amount.  it felt SO good to be back, but my flexibility has definitely suffered without weekly yoga classes.

the instructor today, as we were getting ready to start the class, told us to think about our last week...and then to let it go and focus on this moment.  (this is a common yoga-y thing to do - don't worry about what you did this week or what you have to do when you leave class: focus on just being where you are right now.  it's a great lesson for life, i think - i'm often planning the next event instead of focusing on enjoying what i'm doing right now.)  but today her comment made me think even more:
one week ago i was in oxford, preparing for the van to come to pick up all our office stuff that needed to go into storage.
six days ago i was saying goodbye to all my summer friends.
five days ago i was flying back to the us.
four days ago i was starting work.
three days ago i was getting used to my routine and trying to stay awake to a normal bedtime hour (if 8:45 is a normal bedtime hour, i succeeded).
two days ago i was saying goodbye to my friend erin who is moving to new hampshire.
yesterday i was drinking beer and sweating profusely with my friends at a beer festival.
today i'm taking stock of it all - sitting in a yoga class.
tomorrow the rush will continue, with the first day of school for students.
but today i could reflect on all the changes in my life.  and it was a really nice moment.

last days in oxford

i have some photos from our last days in oxford that i didn't get around to posting before i left...

on the last night of the program we have a big party for the kids...and a mini party for the adults!  woo hoo!  our director's 6 year old daughter is particularly excited.

these are the girls from my office this summer - love them:

and the three pembroke deans from last year...i, of course, moved over to oriel this year but that did not prevent us from having a lot of fun again this summer:

remember how we "went ape"?  this is our little "go ape" family portrait, which made us laugh a LOT as we took this picture.

after the kids left (without a hitch - yay!) we attempted another 15 person pyramid - which we never completed last summer.  this is as close as we got this summer...no success again this year, but we got so close!  that's my 12 year old "son" climbing to the top of the pyramid to complete it...shortly after this photo was taken he fell off.  oops.  pyramids are dangerous.

coming back to my "real" life has been great - so good to see my friend and get ready for the new school year - but i miss oxford, too.  it's an amazing summer job and i've been lucky to work with great people all three summers that i've been there.  and spending 5 weeks of the summer in england?  an incredible - and really fun - opportunity...  i know i'm a lucky girl.

incredibly powerful: "where children sleep"

i'm home!  hooray!

i went to work today!  hooray-ish!

in other news, the following occurred in the middle of a phone conversation with my mom - after she told me about the garden, teacher workdays, and having my sister home to visit (AKA this was not her top priority during our phone call):

mom: "oh!  did i tell you i was in the hospital for three days?"

o.m.g.

a week or two ago (they don't remember) my mom was in the hospital for three days AND NO ONE CALLED ME OR MY SISTER.  three days!  three!  days!  to quote my dad, "to be honest, it never occurred to me to call you."

wtf, parents.  wtf.

mom is fine now and went back to school this week for teacher workdays and all is well and i'm not to worry.  my sister and i have both informed our parents that in the future THEY HAVE TO TELL US THESE THINGS and they have agreed to do so.  sheesh.  shouldn't it be the other way around?!

omg this pleases me.

(also, i think willis should marry this man.  if he doesn't, i will.)

departures day...

...has actually been shockingly easy and organized - probably because (a) my office rocks, and (b) i slept from 1:30am-8am, missing most of the departures (because the two guys in the office WANTED to stay up all night).  woo hoo!

we're checking the last 30 or so kids out over the next several hours, making a trip to oxfam to donate all the random things the kids couldn't fit in their suitcases (i got two great poetry anthologies! [only i would be excited about this]), and then having dinner with the staff.  hooray!

stonehenge

on my day off last week i did pretty much nothing.  oops.  but sometimes you need a day like that, right?

on my day off THIS week - my final day off of the program - i did A LOT.  part 2 of the day you already know about - "go ape."  part 1 was stonehenge!  it's about an hour's drive from oxford, but not easily accessible by public transportation.  luckily, mike had his car.

stonehenge is one of those places you can't believe you're seeing in real life.  (other such places: times square, big ben, the san francisco bay bridge, pearl harbor, the grand canyon, the rosetta stone in the british museum - i've been lucky to go to some really cool places so far in my life.  all of these places are so LEGENDARY that when you see them in real life it doesn't seem possible - like they only exist on tv or in movies.  but there you are.  seeing it.  weird.)

here's our little crew again, less sweaty than in the "go ape" videos from later in the day - jakob, mike, me, and rosie.  it was early - probably 10am.  we actually beat the crowds - the place was twice as crowded when we left as when we arrived.  go us.

it was a beautiful day - 28 degrees celsius was the high (82 degrees fahrenheit) - and that was part of what made it so incredible.

how is this still standing 4,000 years after it was built?  i learned why!  1/3 of the stones are underground AND the stones lying across the top have a little carved out area in them that fits over a bump carved into the top of the standing up stones - tongue and groove style.  smart!  the biggest stones weigh as much as 7 adult elephants.  historians believe that the stones were probably brought from a quarry in wales 240 miles away.  THAT IS A LONG WAY AWAY.  (as you may have noticed, the audioguide gave me a lot of useful information.)

it was also incredible to see how precise they were - an archway marks where the sun would rise if you were standing in the exact center of the circle on the summer solstice and another marks where it would rise on the winter solstice - seven archways away.  in june the sun would rise through one archway, in july the next one over, august the next, all the way to december, when the sunrise would start its way back towards june.  (am i explaining this well?)  the people who built stonehenge were smart(er than me).

stonehenge + go ape = the best day in a long time.

go ape

this week for my day off i went to "go ape" with two of my coworkers (mike and rosie) and the son of another coworker (jakob).  "go ape" is a high ropes course thing with different tasks to complete HIGH UP IN THE AIR and then a zipline that takes you down from UP HIGH.  there are 5 stations, and once you're trained you just go off with your friends (and no guide) and go through them.  (if you click the link above you can get a better idea of the complete "go ape" experience.)  we "went ape" for about 2 hours, and it was so. much. fun.  i am not necessarily in my comfort zone while up high and doing scary things, but i was very brave and did all the elements.  you all would have been proud of me.

we took 13 videos.  they are hilarious.  i had to make a youtube channel to show you guys all of them / give you about 30 minutes of good procrastination while at work.  let me draw your particular attention to videos # 10, 12, & 13.

note #1: the cinematography isn't the best.  we were high up in the air or on the ground and shaky from being high up in the air.  don't judge.

note #2: my nickname "logdog" has evolved this summer into "logpoodle."  unclear why.  but a funny name nonetheless.

really thought-provoking article from the new york times, for those who are interested!

why executions should be televised

old + new

garden party

other claire came to visit on sunday and we went to the annual oxford garden party that is hosted by the founder of the summer program where we work.  think: hats encouraged for ladies, little tea sandwiches, lots of wine.  in addition, we had gorgeous weather - 75-ish degrees, sunny.  perfection!

i had all these plans to show other claire around oxford - st. mary's church, the sheldonian, the ratcliffe camera, the covered market - and in fact we only had time to (a) eat, (b) drink, (c) garden party, and (d) sleep.  oops.  it was so fun to show her the college, though, and to introduce her to my friends here.  they loved her (of course).

at the garden party we took a picture of my whole office!  these are the people i work with on a daily basis - and socialize with on a daily basis.  love them!  as i've said before, we have a great office this year.

i'll continue to say how shocking it is that the program ends on saturday and i'll be sleeping in my bed in atlanta next tuesday night.  wow.  i will absolutely miss this place and these people...but i'm also ready to get home and back to my 11-months-a-year life.

the high tomorrow is supposed to be 28 degrees celsius (82 degrees fahrenheit).  um, this will be warmest temperature i've experienced since june 21st, when i left atlanta.  hooray for this warm weather...but i'm NOT looking forward to atlanta's heat when i return...