Key West revisited

Alright, dear reader, they have been posted. Both in the Travel Photos section (accessible from the main page of this website if you know the SUPER SECRET password - explained on same page) and on the Facebook. Thrills! And now it is time for me to hit the hay, I think.

posted @ 12:20 AM - link -

File under things that are depressing
Well, and trip planning(!), which is not depressing(!)

Postcards From the Hedge: Faking a Vacation at Home <-- Yeah, I guess it's a clever idea for a business, but the fact that people are doing this (or that the economy is making them do this) is making me feel sad. The Japanese stay-vacation sounds kind of desperate and the poor woman who gets home to hear that having some dude come into the apartment to make it seem like a hotel and then is informed by her husband that this is as close to a vacation as she's going to get? Sad. I am glad I am lucky enough to be able to travel (or, at least, to not mind the debt I incur to travel, and/or to figure out ways to get grants to pay for travel!). Blah.

On this same subject, I am on the phone with United right now figuring out the last little detail of the trip to Europe in late August. Once this phone call is over (and I stop hearing this "Rhapsody in Blue" over and over again -- I like Gershwin and all, but they seem a little overly eager with the one part of this piece on repeat) my trip will be all planned out! Huzzah! And fully a month early too.

Plane tickets organized - check
Train pass purchased and received - check
Accommodation lined up/booked/organized - check
Friends notified of imminent arrival - check
UK hotel booked - check
UK rental car booked - check
wedding gift bought/dispatched - check

So am good! The only thing left is to find gifts for the two friends Jess and I are staying with at an obliging Borders before departure and I will be good to go. Rock on.

posted @ 11:50 AM - link -

Hilarity ensues

So someone from Georgia (the country, not the state) found my blog today running a rambler.ru picture search for "babaiaga". Hilariously I have the first two hits under that (of a total of 9. I can't help but think that either rambler.ru really needs to work on their image search or people from Georgia need to search better.

posted @ 9:07 AM - link -

Impressive feats

Yeah, they are lame impressive feats. But still, feats nonetheless. Today I finished my RA project!!! And cleaned out my inbox!!! The whole arduous procedure took me about 6 hours. Really need to stop getting behind on the inbox. What nonsense!

posted @ 5:53 PM - link -

Whoa

Ok, the fact that it is July 20th kind of scared me a little. Late July? Already? When did that happen? The summer really is rushing away. Ack!

posted @ 12:19 AM - link -

Oh man

So today I watched "Dr Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog". For those not in the know, this is the 3 Act musical released to the internet and, theoretically, eventually, to DVD. This week it was released on 3 different days, will stay viewable for a week, and then will disappear and you'll have to pay to see it.

For those who want to get in, here's the link:
Dr Horrible's Sing A Long Blog
I suspect it turns into a pumpkin at midnight TONIGHT (tonight being Sunday) unless it already has.

In any case, it is a short musical by Joss Whedon and others done during the writer's strike this past year. The idea was to keep it low budget and to not violate any of the ideals of the strike, I think is a good way of putting it, in creating it. And, yeah, it is low budget. It stars Neil Patrick Harris and Nathan Fillion and, let me tell you, dear reader, Nathan Fillion is looking good. And making me really wish that I had my Firefly DVDs on hand so that I could watch him for a lot longer.

Also, Joss Whedon is brilliant at musicals. I am suitably wary of his new series coming out in January as it is coming on Fox and they really don't have a good track record for not cancelling things that are good. Also, maybe it won't be good. Anyway. I am skeptical. But the musical? Brilliant. The songs are cute and lovely and then it switches back to awkward as soon as they stop singing, but I feel like that is as it ought to be. The whole thing makes me chuckle. A lot. And now I can't stop singing the songs, especially those of Act I. Tragically the musical is not being released on DVD for ages and ages. Blah.

posted @ 12:18 AM - link -

Le summer status report

As July is nearly 2/3 of the way finished and I am departing for Germany in a month (the trip to Germany capping off my summer), I thought I would write a brief update as to how my summer projects are going. So here is the news:

Things I am making good progress on/am nearly done with:
- the RA project
- the converting old family videos to DVDs project

Things I am not making as good progress as I would have hoped on:
- the translation (am on page 136, so just about 100 pages to go before August - erlack)
- the ballgown (fabric is bought, and that's about it -- really need to get sewing! I tell myself that I will commence when the RA project and DVD projects are finished)
- the paper for the December conference (it's mostly written, but it needs serious revisions and I haven't had time to think about it with the translation deadline)
- the teaching portfolio (have done some, but not nearly enough - am sooo behind!)

Things I haven't worked on, really, but feel guilty about:
- the dissertation? yeah. that's the big one

The summer hurtles along and I wish I could focus a bit better. Well, that is ok. Sometimes one just needs to not focus, I guess. It would be helpful if one could switch focus on or off like a light. Yes. Ok. I am babbling. Time for bed. Clearly.

posted @ 11:44 PM - link -

Be it ever so humble

Yes, I have returned after my brief trip. My sunburn has already faded to a (very) light tan and I have thrown my Margaritaville t-shirt as well as the rest of my suitcase contents into the washer. Tomorrow: proper productivity. We'll see about that.

posted @ 10:52 PM - link -

A rainy day in West Palm Beach

Well, yesterday my sister and I walked around Key West one last time, then piled in the car and drove back. First to Key Largo to drop her off at her internship. Then I drove myself and the car back to West Palm Beach, getting back around 5.30 pm. Went to dinner with Robbie, then sat around talking with him until late. All in all, it was a pretty quiet day, but with a lot of driving -- that rte 1 highway that goes all through the Keys is super frustrating to drive on because there is only one lane per side and because the traffic moves SO slowly. The speed limit is 45, but I doubt most of the people were moving that fast. Ugh. The drive took FOREVER.

But today there was little driving and mostly a lot of relaxation. I am camping out at Robbie's while he's at work. It's rainy today, which is actually kind of nice as it means that I don't have to feel guilty about not going to the beach or the pool ;-) Robbie and I went to breakfast this morning, but the rest of the day has been spent on my own: listening to the rain, organizing my suitcase for tomorrow, eating leftover pizza, reading, catching up on internet things, and getting some busy work done. Also watching "The Golden Girls", which Robbie owns all 7 seasons of. Watching "The Golden Girls" in southern Florida is very thematic. The only thing that bugs me (and that has never occurred to me until now) is how they are able to wear such heavy clothing and layers while living in southern Florida? Surely their A/C is not turned up that high!

Anyway, tomorrow flying back so have got my plane books ready, my directions back to the Fort Lauderdale airport ready to go, and everything pretty much organized. This was a really pleasant trip, a small relaxing mini-break. Southern Florida in mid-July, though, is rather warm, I must say. It'll be nice to get back to (somewhat) more moderate climes.

posted @ 2:21 PM - link -

Salsa!

Still here in Key West. Today was my sister's birthday so we made a point of eating dessert after every meal -- key lime cupcakes after breakfast, cookies after lunch, and key lime pie after dinner! We had an excellent day today. We started out early on and went parasailing. We were flying along a few hundred feet in the air, I think, harnessed into a parachute being towed by a speed boat. It occurred to us that this was kind of a bit out of character for us as we were jerked off the back of the boat, but when we were sailing along through the air, it was actually very soothing and lovely. Of course, since my sister is so much shorter than me, when they dunked us "to the knees", I got dunked to the waist. And when we came down on the boat, they got her to land standing up, which meant I got to do a kind of awesome frog crouch move. But, all in all, really awesome!



Us, airborne!

After the parasailing adventure we did a bit of souvenir shopping, wandered back to the B&B, and took advantage of the private pool, having a lengthy dip before lunch. Then had a sandwich and walked to the Hemingway house, which was really cool. The house itself was lovely, the tour was a bit cheesy, but full of interesting details, and the grounds were a really fantastic oasis in steamy Key West! There were many six-toed cats wandering around the grounds; apparently they were descendants of Hemingway's original six-toed cats, which he kept around for good luck. According to our guide, the six-toed cats can actually use the 6th toe as an opposable thumb, sort of, to pick up food and put it in their mouths. We walked around town a bit after Hemingway's house, stopped at a place on Duval St for conch fritters (awesome) and margaritas (kind of bad in a watered down sort of way, but it was buy 1 get 1 free so can't really complain?), went to an overrated pirate museum that had an 18 and over pirate gift shop at the end (you can imagine what was in there -- among other things Ren Faire-esque chain mail undergarments), hung out watching the sunset in Mallory Square, and then topped it off with some excellent Cuban food and mojitos accompanied by live salsa music in the evening. It was all in all an excellent day and a great way to celebrate my sister's 25th birthday!

So now am sun burned, enjoying the 19th century charm of my B&B room (well, 19th century with modern bathrooms, AC, and cable TV - huzzah!). Tomorrow Lisa goes back to Key Largo and I carry on back to Robbie's in West Palm Beach. Sad that our Key West trip is mostly done. It's a pleasant pace of life down here, I have to say. Tomorrow we just have to see the southernmost point in the US (well, except for places in Hawaii, I think) and we'll be pretty content with the amount of touristy things done in Key West. And, yes, for those who are curious. I do own a Margaritaville t-shirt now.

Addendum: Things eaten today made out of key limes:
- key lime salsa
- key lime curry sauce
- key lime shortbread
- key lime margaritas
- key lime cupcakes
- and, of course, key lime pie

And we also had some conch fritters, bringing the amount of conch eaten to two dishes: conch fritters and conch chowder. Both really tasty. Too bad it's hard to find conch not in the Keys!

posted @ 10:20 PM - link -