Better?

The new house

Today is our first post-renovation inspection of the house that we are so-grownup-ly buying. Last time we saw it, the kitchen looked like this:



They are still finishing up odds and ends, but great improvement is eagerly anticipated by us. (Sorry... Brooks has been working on active/passive handouts for his English 101 class and I couldn't resist.)

We go to closing next week. Moving during the first month of the semester is not quite as hectic as getting married during the second week of one's graduate-school career, but it runs a close second.

Still Here...

The constantly over-committed perfectionist known as Dana finally overdid it for real. After writing the last post, she decided that she REALLY HAD TO take FOUR classes, because they were so interesting and would never be offered again. Along with teaching four days a week and making the significant (and time-consuming) life decision to join the Orthodox church (see here). Her sanity survived (probably thanks to all the church-going) but her grades (sometimes even more important than her sanity, in her skewed priority structure) did not do so well. Now she says she really will follow her husband's advice in future. He's still skeptical.

Once upon a time...

there was a girl with a blog who ran out of time and ideas so abruptly that she couldn't recover the habit even when the time returned (if not the ideas).

Whenever I was too much of a perfectionist to correspond with family, my grandmother would tell me, "It doesn't have to be long; you just have to write something." I haven't really learned that lesson yet; I'm more like Elizabeth Bennet, disinclined to speak unless I can say something that will astonish the whole room. I may blather inconsequentially for a few weeks and see if I can write myself back into a more or less interesting and expressive frame of mind.

On the schedule for this semester: I am teaching Greek 102, with the same 8 students as last semester in 101. I am taking two Latin classes, one a survey of Roman literature, one on Horace. Both of them are a trifle intimidating at the moment because they are my first Latin reading courses beyond the intermediate level.

I am also taking a history of the Christian Near East, from the third century until just before the Arab conquest. Since Greek is going to be my primary research language for the PhD in Early Christian Studies, thus giving me more of an eastern focus, I need some historical context. I also need my secondary research language to be eastern, rather than Latin, so I'm hoping to get ideas about whether to learn Syriac or Coptic next year. The Latin will then probably slip down to tertiary status once I finish the MA in classics.

But yet! My goal in life is to be someone who can make interesting and non-geeky conversation at parties. I'm not sure how Syriac helps that.

Freeze Yer Buns Challenge

I'm trying to get back on the environmental wagon... and Crunchy Chicken conveniently has a new challenge right along the lines of what I was already considering (with little anticipatory shivers). The idea is not to literally freeze your posterior regions but to set your thermostat at least a degree lower than you normally would. And I'm all in favor of lowering heating bills, which are not pretty in a drafty, gas-radiator-heated apartment. Last year I was cold all the time and still had high bills, so I figure if I'm going to be cold anyway I might as well keep the thermostat at 67 during the day and 62 at night.

It's just starting to dip into the 30s at night here, so I'm starting to look for Warm Solutions. The newest idea: whenever I'm cold sitting still (which I can be, even at 67 with layers of sweaters and socks; I was the child who wore sweatshirts in the summer until my mom told me to change because she was hot just looking at me), I get up and wash dishes or mop the floor or polish the table. Brooks already says, "Everything is so clean around here!"

Lower bills (we hope) and a cleaner house! Yay for environmental consciousness!

Hard to plan

I just encountered the following quote in someone's e-signature:

"Every morning I awake torn between a desire to save the world and an
inclination to savor it. This makes it hard to plan the day." - E.B. White

Does anyone else relate? (On optimistic days, anyway...) Now that the rainy fall weather is upon us, should we add the inclination to stay in bed with hot chocolate and mystery novels?

Drive-by Blogging

In the first four weeks of the semester, I gave three ten-minute research presentations(equivalent to a 5 or 6 page paper), took two Greek exams, and wrote and administered one. It felt like finals in September.

In the next four weeks, I took three more exams and went out of town to deliver a paper at my first academic conference. Now it's the middle of the semester and time to start working on final projects.

So I fell out of the blogging habit much sooner than I anticipated. But I have learned some interesting things:

1. There was no Homer.
2. Thucydides was really writing tragedy.
3. I still love Antigone.

In other news:
1. Jena is back!!
2. We are Orthodox catechumens, to be chrismated at Easter (if we die before then, we still get an Orthodox funeral).
3. Acorn squash stuffed with quinoa, walnuts, and parmesan cheese is the hot dish of the season in our household.