The View From Kalamazoo

I suppose I should do some catching up: Made it to the gym today. Yay me. Didn’t go Saturday, although I had rather intended to, since childcare is only til noon, and we (and by we, I mean Emma) were just not moving very quickly that morning. Ah well. So I missed last week entirely and only went once the week before – but that’s largely because of the nasty cold/sinus Monstrous Thing I was suffering under. Back to the grindstone. I upped a couple of reps today, and upped my outer thigh weight to 100lbs. from 90lbs. Otherwise same-old-same-old. I’m taking a belly dance class starting Thursday for the next 5 weeks – fun, a great ab workout, and an hour away with adults.

This weekend I spent some time to organize and catalog my scholarly books. I need to be thwacked – I have so many brand-new doubles both because I mislaid books I had just bought and then bought second copies and bought myself books and forgot to take them off my Amazon.com wish list so I got them, again, as gifts. I am such a dumbass sometimes.

Between that, and having to get started on that paper I agreed to give in June, the Latin practice is suffering. I found the Tractatus de superstitionibus long-winded, not-to-the-point, and generally annoying. [Blah blah so we were sitting his this pleasant garden after brunch blah blah crapola. Piss on that.] I guess I’ll putter through something from the Vulgate and just get back in the swing of things. I have some microfilm to work with when I get time to play with paleography, and did just manage to find my books and notes in a box in the basement so my reference materials are handy again, but time, damnit, time!

Last week I attended a local MACED meeting. The speaker was someone from our public school system, and she discussed verbal de-escalation. It was mostly targeted at adolescents and teens, but I still got some good info I can try to apply to Miz Thang and her perpetual Attitude (with a side of Temper). This month the local CHADD folks are having a one-day conference, “Living and Learning with AD/HD.” I need to come up with $50, but I think I’ll go – it looks like a useful thing. I swear, between meetings with/calls to/keeping up with her school, and all of these information gathering exercises, plus the books I need to read/buy….it’s like having an extra part-time job.

And I have received my first thin envelope: The University of Notre Dame has declined my offer to join their History Ph.D. Program. Ah well – they weren’t my first choice, anyway, and they were my “reach” school (and at the suggestion of PESz), so I’m far from crushed. One down, six to go!