The View From Kalamazoo

IXth Century Monastery Remains Unearthed in Bulgaria

Found at Mirabilis.ca: Archaeologists hail mosaic find in Sinai

Grave reveals medieval Caesareans

(posted w/o variables, as they are stoopid)

There is a pretty distinct lack of interesting in my world, but I’m pleased that:

The blogging medievalist roundtable is really coming together well. I still haven’t produced the abstract for a paper I promised to SocMag, however – bad me. I really need to get on that..

Colin is regularly peeing in the potty. Yes, here’s the obligatory Mom post…he’s been going just about every morning for over 2 weeks, now, and has even woken up with a dry pull-up twice. No solid matter, yet, but we haven’t been pushing it – school starts next week, most of the other kids the sitter has had will be gone during the day, and we’re getting the cotton training-undies out and ‘trying’ once the distractions (read: Emma) are out of the way. Yay! He turns 3 in a month, so this is a Good Thing – the move really didn’t help him out any in this regard, as things were SO crazy we weren’t at all pushing. He’s a smart boy, and is inordinately pleased with himself every time he goes. 🙂 I can’t wait til I get to buy those nifty toilet targets!

My hostas are blooming. They look like this, and smell heavenly. Later in the fall I’ll transplant them to the raised bed around the lightning-blasted tree in the front yard. (note to self: must get a tree trimmer to come make an estimate on getting that large, dead branch menacing the car out of the way before winter storms) I’ve been meaning to wander the local nurseries looking for deals (for there are deals to be had, but the selection is, of course, spare and haphazard) but my time has been darn precious. I think I may suck it up and just order from Spring Hill – they have a $25 off a $50 order thing on for another few days, and their 1-cent sales are pretty sweet. I think I’m going for some shade-lovers for that raised bed, and I’ll have to deal with my under-the-pines-in-the-back-yard hygrangea needs another time, as I’m po’. (I wonder if vinca will manage in that acidy soil – or creeping myrtle..that spreads like mad (there’s a barrier already in place between the yard and tree-area, so it can only take over so far) and it’ll really help that bare look it all has now. Hmmm…) I’m terribly attracted to hardy hibiscus and oriental poppies, but must remain focused – shade garden first. Bleeding heart will work in the shade, and I’m leaning toward a snowdrift aster for the edge of the rock-wall (either around the raised bed itself, or along the front of the yard where there’s a short stacked-slate(ish) wall across, next to the sidewalk. I also have a trellis that needs…something – I may just have to get a clematis. Decisions, decisions, decisions.. A lot of things need fall planting, so I do, actually, have to deal with this.

School starts Monday. Let’s hear it for saving on child-care costs! Yay! (and I’ve no more shopping, just some closet-organizing now that I’ve painted the kids’ closet door and put the handle back on. happy!)

Grandma is having surgery Monday. I need negativity break. I suppose that sounds rotten – but I’d like a little vacation from the Reality Distortion Field, ok?

I went to the gym. Granted it was 3 times in 3 weeks, but it’s more than I’ve managed for months. Yes, I should spend more time on myself. *clicks heels* there’s no place like the gym, there’s no place like the gym…

YAY!! I adored Jim Henson.( And Fozzy and Sam and Dr. Honeydew.) What a loss. But – what great stamps!!

found at Mirabilis.ca:

Ancient Bead May Be Clue to King of Orkney

‘Henry VIII hunting whistle’ unearthed

I have to share, it’s my morning amusement:

Castrating tongs stolen from London Dungeon

Here are questions asked me by Another Damned Medievalist, and my answers. If you want to ask me questions, post ’em here or email me…and if you want me to ask you questions, do the same.

1. Are you more drawn to your academic medieval interests or your less academic ones? Why?
That’s a funny question to answer, especially in the light of the assumption of departments (hiring or admissions committees) that applicants have no outside interests or draws on their time – even though the ridiculous Tribble piece was the recent spotlight, it’s not the first time someone has suggested it. Honestly, it depends on the day/hour/minute. Throwing a pot and squinting at a microfilm reader really draw on different parts of me, and despite the years I had tried to ignore that part that had been drawn to majoring in art over 15 years ago it was still there. Lesson learned: working with my hands does feed me in a way that researching does not, and vice versa. I was somewhat of a mess (somewhat?) after my application process trainwreck and looking back I think working with clay gave me the mental space to get a grip. I suppose that really puts the nail in my coffin, but there it is. And I’ve had people making tile orders – artwork helping to pay off my academic student loans? HA! That’s funny…

2. You are a professional cat-herder for a major medieval conference … what is the most amazing/appalling/funny story you can tell us about it?
The most appalling story may be plied from me (after alcohol) next May – it’s not quite…fit for public consumption. Hee. One I can share (that doesn’t involve a long lead-in) illustrates the phenomenon that I am God: I control the weather, the state of the public restrooms along the interstate…and time zones.

So an international guest is arguing with the folks selling meal tickets because he had wandered in for dinner 15 minutes after the cafeteria closed. I am always immediately grabbed in the case of difficult questions (or difficult people) and so he began ranting and raving at me about how ridiculous it all was, how uncivilized that we were expecting people to eat at such an appalling hour, etc., etc., with volume inching up. After he paused long enough to breathe that I could attempt a word in edgewise (and he didn’t interrupt with another volley) I asked that he clarify something that I wasn’t sure I caught correctly in the middle of his rant. And then I explained that Michigan is on eastern, not central, time. He did erupt with another volley, of course – I couldn’t be serious, this was (again), ridiculous, etc., etc.

Time zones? My fault. Oh yes.

3. Favorite sf/fantasy book and why?
I read Tolkein’s ring series when I was 14, and go back to it again and again (does this mean I should have been an Anglo-Saxonist?) I used to read a lot of Orson Scott Card, when I actually allowed myself the luxury.

4. Which other bloggers (medieval esp, also lj) have you met? Which ones do you want to meet?
I had someone come up and introduce himself to me this past Congress who writes for HNN, but I can’t recall the name – not only am I bad at names, I particularly bad at names in the middle of Congress when my brain is on over-load. Doh. Michael Drout came up and chit-chatted at the dance this past May. As for lj, a lot of the Toronto-grad blogging crew has been introduced to me, and a handful of other lj-ing grad students. I’d been conversing for some time with lj users Owlfish and Double0hilly before they said hello to me at the reg. desk a couple of years ago. Actually, I look forward to meeting a lot of folks, if they come in 2006, both those who have already agreed to take part in the blogging medievalist round table as well as those anonymous folks who cannot participate in the same way but who I may be able to talk into dishing over a beer. 😉

I’m friendly. Harried on-site, but friendly.

5. How do you manage to do it all? Mom? Wife? Academic? Kazoo herder?
Chronic multi-tasker, I guess. I’m never been one to make it easy on myself and just do one thing at a time well, oh no, I have to keep many balls in the air and complicate things. 😉 I suppose that means I don’t do one thing very well, but many things as well as I can. This position, more than the staff position I worked through most of my MA, sucks it out of me, however. It’s much, much harder to be productive now…but I’m trying to limp along, nonetheless. (Having a special needs kid is also not optimal for peak academic production, but watchagonnado?)

Growth in Spain Threatens a Jewel of Medieval Islam

Read Renaissance and Early Modern festival books on your desktop now: View 253 digitised Renaissance festival books (selected from over 2,000 in the British Library’s collection) that describe the magnificent festivals and ceremonies that took place in Europe between 1475 and 1700 – marriages and funerals of royalty and nobility, coronations, stately entries into cities and other grand events.

Team discovers medieval settlement

Archaelogists on trail of ancient warships

Wine cellars dating from late Middle Ages discovered in Georgia

Fancy Roman Dining Hall Found (found at mirabilis.ca, along with the next few links)

Archaeologists uncover Roman graveyard in Austria

Search for an Armenian BrothersÂ’ Monastery shown on the Katalan map of the world made in the 14th century

Rome’s Greatest Brickmakers Identified (found at cronaca.com)