The Laursonian Institute

Somehow going to the gym today did the opposite of relaxing me… and I’ve been trying to fight off this doom feeling since I got home.  Poo.  I’m ready for bed, and feeling a smidge grumpy about it, so I’m defaulting to list format.

Good:

• Nearly finished Lewis’ PJs.  Just have to put cuffs on his pants.
• Got my work done rather early, feeling prepared for my presentation on Friday.
• Made green curry eggplant and sweet potatoes for dinner.  It turned out well, and was, for once, saucy enough.  (I admit, we doubled the sauce portions!)
• I actually did go to the gym, and did have a nice workout, even with pervasive funk.

Meh:

• Messed up a disappointing number of things on the jammie project.
• Graded papers.  I guess that’s a success, but it’s a crap way to spend an hour.
• Feeling unconvinced about section tomorrow.  Lots of stuff, some of it crap, no real grip on my theme or trajectory though I prepared everything.  Ick.

If I were a betting woman, I would put my money on that last point being the source of my grump.  Being convinced your section is crap before you start teaching is a sure way to put a defeatist gilt on the remainder of the day.

April 28th, 2009 | Tags: cooking, grading, grump, gym, sewing, taing | Category: home, school | Comments Off

Mondays are one of my favorite days, because I’ve got my 7:30 yoga class.  Yoga at the end of the day is the best!  I come home all relaxed and feeling well and ready for bed.  Today’s class had a bit of an odd twist to it, though I’m trying to not make anything of it.  While we were doing our little cool-down meditation (where you just lie on your back and breathe) the instructor came and gave me a mini-massage – feet, knees, chest and head! – and didn’t seem to do this to anyone else.  It was a little awkward!  On the other hand, it was also very relaxing and felt nice.  I’m going to assume she was just being nice and maybe I looked like I needed some extra relaxation.  Otherwise, I’m not sure what to think!

The rest of my day was also excellent, and thankfully not also awkward!  Class this morning (cogneuro) just about killed me.  A big uppy-up was guest teaching, which actually isn’t unusual, since we usually have guest lecturers present the work their labs are doing once a week.  This one was strange because this guy already gave his lecture, but presumably our teacher was just out of town or something today, so he sat in for a second day to oversee the student presentations that we do the other half of our time.  Sadly, a kid was presenting work this guy had published, so it took him a whole hour to get through his 20-minute powerpoint since the uppy-up had a bunch of stuff to add after every point.  Pooh.  We only had two presenters today, so we were going to get out an hour early – but we almost got out late instead!  Not to worry though, because our Wednesday class was cancelled.  Yay!

I got lunch with Lewis at a great cafe just a few blocks from the Center, so that was a wonderful find.  Gourmet sandwiches for 6 bucks!  I’m always on the lookout for good places that aren’t crowded, expensive, or crappy.  This place is friendly, delicious, convenient, and relatively crowd-free!  Yay!  After lunch I was supposed to hang out in the lab until it was time for our inaugural Journal Club meeting, which my advisor-to-be had asked me to run today.  Presented two articles there, both of which had fruitful discussions, and I think I did very well.  Or at least as well as one could expect to do in a we’re-all-friends no-consequences sort of meeting.  I’m happy with the result, at any rate, and off the hook for journal club for probably the rest of the quarter.  Whoo!  Also got myself signed up for some more fMRI stuff this weekend — one session worth of scanning shadow (hopefully we’ll be less rushed and I’ll get more info) and once to be scanned myself!  I’m hoping to come out of this with a nice high-res picture of my very own brain.  And hopefully I don’t panic in the magnet.

Only other triumph worth mentioning today is that I finished sewing Lewis’ PJ shirt!  It turned out pretty well, if I do say so myself, though I know I messed a number of things up.  There are just a handful of things that show (like the pocket which is kind of crooked), but I learned a hell of a lot, and there isn’t anything I think I didn’t learn from.  The next shirt will be mucho mas smoother.  I’m really excited to get moving on the pants so the whole outfit will be done, but I lost patience with it today after wrestling with the button holes for a whole hour and a half.

All things considered, it’s been a most triumphant day!

April 27th, 2009 | Tags: cogneuro, fmri, presentations, reading group, sewing, triumph, weird, yoga | Category: home, life, school | Comments Off

I had one of those days where I felt like I never really rose out of the bog and instead flailed around covered in swamp gunk all day.  Actually I take that back – this evening has been very nice.  I went to yoga (new instructor – decent!), came home, riled Lewis up for a walk to our local Sushi place, took another leisurely walk home, and then read an article I need to present to my lab’s reading group next week.  I think I’ll go to bed soon, though it’s not quite even 10 yet, because I’m feeling quite finished.

Rest of my day was decent enough, besides feeling generally incompetant.  I only have Lin 1 on Thursdays, which is both nice and somewhat aggrivating since I’ve got no other reason to be on campus, let alone awake so early.  I came home from that and got all the rest of my grading done, which I probably spent longer on than I needed to.  It’s amazing how well the kids are doing on the homeworks this week, since this is a part of the class kids usually don’t get very well.  Something must be working!

Though I might fall asleep on the couch so instead I did a little more work on Lewis’ PJs.  They’re coming together really surprisingly nicely, though every little thing is screwed up in one manner or another.  It’s all a big learning process, so I’m not too concerned with these… I haven’t thought through constructing a shirt before, and I know lots of things I’ll do differently next time.  However, I think the end result will be wearable (or at least I hope!) and if it keeps going like it has been so far, it will even be something to be proud of!  Today I sewed the front panels to the back piece, and got the whole collar made (including fancy-pants piping!).  Haven’t attached it yet, but I guess that’s off a few steps further.  I’m getting a little nervous as we get closer to the sleeve parts, but I don’t know if in reality those are going to be any worse than anything else.  But… circular!   Does seem daunting.

April 23rd, 2009 | Tags: ennui, paper, presentation, reading group, sewing, sushi, taing, yoga | Category: home, school | Comments Off

It’s been a pretty fantastic minimal-work type of day.  In short:

• went to lin 1 this morning, did very little, but had a nice chat with my co-TAs after class.
• came home, had a really good salad for lunch (blood oranges, pecans and goat cheese!)
• read outside in the hothot sun for a while
• played two games of croquette with Lewis!
• hit up yoga, felt relaxed and well stretched
• Lewis made me the tastiest dinner wrap evar
• came home and attempted to begin sewing Lewis’ PJs… marginal success, but I’m feeling stoked!

Section tomorrow AM, so I should probably take myself off to bed.  I do wish this yoga class were a little later in the day because I have plenty of time after class to get myself all worked up again.  Lame!

April 16th, 2009 | Tags: croquette, sewing, sunshine, yoga | Category: home, life | Comments Off

Spring break is over, it is.  And I’m feeling pretty good about that.  I got everything I wanted to do done, which is really rather surprising for a relaxing vacation.  Garden was planted, much weeding and work accomplished, I decided on the gym to join, saw all my Ask friends (twice!), hung out a ton with Emily, baked goods, read books, got a new bookshelf moved in and filled, finished our taxes… amazing!  I’m feeling very relaxed, my palpitations have been minor in the last few days, and I’ve almost entirely gotten rid of the elephant-on-my-chest feeling.  I’m not feeling nervous about tomorrow, but rather looking forward to this week.  It’s my easy week, with no sections to teach, and I’m hoping for a pretty smooth quarter.

I’ve had a long thing about this stress and my life, and I think I’ve made some headway.  My mantra this quarter: “everything is optional”.  As in, I take on only the stress I take.  Everything in life besides basic function – food, home, pay – are entirely optional.  School is optional, thus classes are optional.  The gym is optional, biking is optional, blogging is optional.  Reading is optional, assignments are optional, excelling is optional, research is optional.  I choose to do these things, but they do not characterize my life.  They are choices I make every day, because I like to do these things, and because I choose to spend my life this way.  And there is nothing that says I must keep doing any of these things.   I think keeping this in mind will help me keep from stressing out.  I’m a lucky girl who gets to do what she wants to do nearly every day.

March 29th, 2009 | Tags: break, mantra, school, stress, success | Category: home, life | Comments Off

I’m feeling so very delightfully relaxed.  Sorta.  I realized right after typing that out, that per usual I’m sitting here with my jaw clenched as tight as can be.  I do wish I could stop doing that.  I guess on a metalevel I’m relaxed, but on some sort of biological level I’m still all keyed up.  Anyway.

It was a good day.  Penultimate semantics class finished, though it was sort of painful.  Professor was discussing his own paper, which is really interesting, but I didn’t bring it with me (it’s 60 pages!  truthfully, I didn’t print it!) and it was more like a talk than a class.  Got some TA work done after that, and headed home.  Spent home-time pretty well, reviewing my semantics work and doing a bit of thinking about the last meeting with my professor for research I have tomorrow.  Got tired of thinking and mowed the lawn.  Made Lewis take me out to our local “Mexican” place (New Mexican I guess?) to split some nachoes, and then I was feeling all rejuvinated.  Did a bunch more research prep for tomorrow (synthesizing! my greatest talent!) while sitting by a toasty fire.  I’ve had this kitty on my lap all night, while I drink mate and eat what’s left of my chocolate chip cookies and listen to these nice Mozart clarinet and bassoon concertos… life is pretty spectacular.

Tomorrow should be an interesting and sorta big day!  I’ve only got Quechua to get through, but I have a million things in the afternoon to do.  First of all, and I guess most importantly, I’ve got a lunch date with a very famous visiting linguist!  Thankfully it’s not just me, there should be several of us grad students, and a professor friend of ours who invited us (and is good friends with the visiting linguist).  It’s just a little unnerving, but very exciting to feel partially responsible for entertaining someone I respect so much!  After that, I’ve got a meeting with the teacher I TA for to get the last homeworks from him, then my last research meeting with that professor.  Hopefully he’s going to tell me that I don’t need to do any more work this quarter!  And then after that… the lecture that the visiting linguist is giving.  I’ve actually seen him give this talk before when Lewis and I caught him at Cambridge, but it’s a really neat thing, so it certainly won’t be boring to catch again.  Yay, it’s Comrie Day!  (For fun, try to count the number of publications he has on his site..!)

March 10th, 2009 | Tags: comrie, lunch, quechua, relaxation, semantics, work | Category: home, school | Comments Off

I’m full of toasty chai, and very sleepy.  It’s been a long day.  A long, choreful day.

I got up early and made Lewis some apple cinnamon muffins and got rolling on the laundry.   Spent all morning alternating laundry and homework, which is a sure way to wear oneself out by lunch.  But I did manage to finish all my work today, and all the laundry, as well as cleaning both bathrooms and finishing up the dishes.  Ooh, and we took a walk and got some ice cream from the Davis Creamery!  Phew.

I guess that makes me prepared for a day of playing tomorrow – we’ve got two birthday parties to attend, one in Berkeley, and one in Davis.  Wouldn’t have said yes to both, but they’re for two of our favorite people, and I can’t imagine not going to either.   Should be rousing fun, even if it’s an early morning (after daylight savings at that!) on a day Lewis and I both have an awful lot of work to do.  Some days you just have to choose frolic and folly and know you’ll make it all up somewhere else.

March 7th, 2009 | Tags: chores, ice cream, muffins, work | Category: home | Comments Off

Well, another day, another something.

I woke up with a wonderful feeling of optimism.  My first thoughts were reassuring myself that I didn’t need to stress out about getting to campus on time (my usual thought pattern) and that I could have a nice morning and get to class no problem.  Which is exactly what I did.  It’s amazing how much of the timbre of your day is determined by the outlook you assign it.  So not only did the morning go well, but Quechua was enjoyable too.  Learned an interesting statistic – we’re the largest intro Quechua class in the world!  Or so my yachachiq says.

Only downside of the day was I also woke up with a big headache this morning, and it was pretty crappy.  Thankfully I managed to score myself a nap when I got home and it went away!  That never happens!  Spent the rest of the day relaxing and getting small work done.  And installing Mint!  Working quite nicely.   I know somewhere in my brain that I should be attacking this semantics paper from all fronts, but I just can’t seem to get past feeling like I need to calm down and take care of myself.  I suppose when I put it that way, it doesn’t sound as ridiculous as it feels sometimes.

Ooh, also Lewis and I tried to make a Dojo-style noodle curry that would be all saucy and delicious.  We’ve been failing pretty poorly with the saucy curries, though the results are always fairly tasty.  Anyway, I was feeling the inspiration tonight, but to no avail.  I found a decent recipe for a generic curry sauce, and it was tasty, but per usual not saucy enough for the masses of meat and veg we put in it.  Oh Dojo noodles, why must you be so difficult to replicate?  Or alternately, why must you be 5000 miles away?  Or even, why are there no good noodle houses in Davis?

March 4th, 2009 | Tags: curry, headache, lazy, noodles, outlook, quechua | Category: home, life | Comments Off

Ah, the most bittersweet night of the week, Sunday is.  But it’s really not so bad.  I’ve only got two weeks of school left though, so I can slog through no problem.  The worst of it is the five remaining Quechua classes, which is really making a mountain out of a molehill, since class is always enjoyable, and never particularly stressful.  I just don’t much enjoy it overall, and though I’m learning a little, it seems like a waste of time.  It’s a series of ill-explained half-successful in-class exercises, and time consuming dialog recitations.  I miss my Russian classes, with their textbooks and small class size and clear goals.  I did way overdo some Quechua homework today.  We got the remaining class materials emailed to us this weekend and I’ve gotten pretty tired of doing these orally in class so I just did them all ahead of time.  It says something about how useless our class really is when I can do the next two weeks worth of home and class work in about two hours before the material is even introduced.  I should put that in quotes:  “introduced”.

Anyway, it’s been a very nice and very relaxing weekend for it being during the quarter and all.   I’ve been doing a lot of baking, which is nice.  Made two loaves of whole wheat sandwich bread today, but I haven’t tried it out yet.  Maybe tomorrow.  I sure am looking forward to getting through all this to finals, by which I mean writing the one paper I have to write and being done with this quarter.  I don’t know how much I’m looking forward to next quarter, but the plus side is that I’ve got a whole new set of classes, one of which is with one of my favorite professors from USC.  I’m TAing, too, which always makes life sort of fly by.  I hope my sections are good!  Still not sure whether I can audit my neurobiology class, or whether I’ll just take that pass/fail, but either way, I’m looking forward to change up.

March 1st, 2009 | Tags: baking, bread, classes, complaining, quechua, spring | Category: home, school | Comments Off