Laura, this entry is wholly and entirely (and hopelessly) devoted to you. Just so you know. That’s not me being passive aggressive or anything, just stating a fact. And any opportunity to work in an ONJ reference is not to be missed.
So, there were a lot of people here last weekend, and it was good. Very good. (Entry is dependent upon the multi-media stuff coming to my greedy little hands by hook and also crook, so MIKE, GET ON THAT… ok, that was passive-aggressive. Or maybe just aggressive. )
Work has been…. Oh god, where do I even start. So, when I was in Shermer, I got called into the VP’s office. He made arrangements for me to meet him after office hours, which was, you know, weird, and also sort of filled my head with all sorts of scenarios that are not a very good idea when you’re trying to be very professional. Also, I had had the great misfortune of wearing something a little, oh, how shall we say, BOOBIE that day. You’d think I would learn, since it was the very same kimono top that I wore a few trips ago wherein I sat down to work in the developer’s den (which is where I camp when I’m in Shermer rather than dealing with trying to find a place to hook in. I like it a lot, because it’s all a bunch of twentysomething boys and they make fart jokes and as you can imagine, I get along with them quite well) and suddenly realized that my bosoms were pretty much totally and wholeheartedly exposed. Luckily, when I’m in Shermer, I always get there on my normal schedule (around 7:30ish) and the boys weren’t in yet, since they are on the schedule of people who do not center their lives around the capacity of their milking cows’ udders. I improvised an undershirt out of a scarf, tucking it very ridiculously into my bra that day, and the next time I wore it, I remembered to bring a cami. Except right now, my weight? I have gained weight, and about 75 of the pounds are in my bosom. My tits defy camisoles. They practically defy logic. And they smell like America. Presumably.
Anyway, the afterhours meeting wasn’t about anything inappropriate but rather to be told that I am awesome and other people think I’m awesome too and also, way to go with all the awesome. And also, am I sick of my new job yet, because there’s an even more important thing over here, that… well… yeah. Huh. So that might be interesting but nothing is concrete yet. But at least everyone finally acknowledges the awesome, or at least my really effective PR campaign.
I still have not gotten to move to my new location by the window yet, which is annoying, but apparently there’s some major shifting going on and they wanted to do everything at once. AKA people are getting fired. I love corporate America.
Also, on that entry, I talk about my Murano being at 10K miles. I’m topping 20K this week. That entry is like four months ago. It is to weep.
My current class is another lit class, only this one is about women writers. I wasn’t entirely stoked about having a women writers class, but then I looked at it like this: like it or not, I am a woman writer. I’m not being bitchy or anything, but on some level, I object to the whole concept of “women’s studies” and whatnot, because damn it, it’s not like female authors are some rare and fragile subspecies of orchids that must be handled in a very careful homeostatic environment. We’re writers. With vulvas. The end. But then again, from a psychological perspective, like it or not, we’re socialized in a certain manner. Even parents who consider themselves feminists subtlety treat their girl children differently than they treat their boy children. I am, in all of my special snowflake wonder, the product of my environment, and if there are certain theories regarding the translation of those impacts onto any literature created by women, then it would behoove (god, I love that word) me to take a closer look and approach it with an open mind. Besides, can there be anything more opposite than the last lit class (I keep wanting to call it the clit class… I AM SO SORRY) which was regarding Sci Fi and filled with lots of men and some very alarming facial hair situations. And I did not do exceptionally well in that class (bitter) (still) so maybe a complete 180 with a class filled with women (oh my god, we don’t even have one token guy. Seriously, right now my ovaries hurt and I think it’s because my cycle has been reading the syllabus) would be just the thing. Right? RIGHT?! One can only hope. We had to go around the room and introduce ourselves and our plan (there are five plans in the program and whenever the creative writing people identify themselves, the rhetoric and lit people all do a little head tilt like they just watched a bear on a unicycle pull out its penis and jerk off) (wow, why am I so potty mouthed today?) and the reason I gave for taking the class was that I was preparing to defend my thesis this spring and wanted to be able to speak intelligently about similar themes in my own work. Which sounds really good, so let’s just go with that, also. That and the “not sci fi” thing. Yes! The theme is anger and so far, I’ve blown through two of the books on the syllabus and have already read the third (a million times, it’s Beloved and I had to keep from singing “PreDICTable!” when I saw it on the book list) and signed up to do one of the papers next week, so I’m hopefully going to be ahead of the game and not puking from stress around the end of April. Actually, who are we kidding? I’m totally going to be puking.
In other graduate student, I will be reading a story at a bookstore to the people who show up. It’s in Milwaukee on the day after Valentine’s, and if you’re in Milwaukee or the area, you can come and hear me read the boat story, which I don’t know if I talked about on this page or not, but yeah, there’s a boat story, inspired by Mopie’s booze cruise (although it has nothing to do with frivolity nor the King of Nothing) and I’m going to read the shit out of it. So yeah. There it is. Nothing to see until the linky squee hits.
