Finally on vacation

Finally took a week off.  Now what?  I have lectures to prepare, a grant propsal draft to work on, a closet that desperately needs cleaning out, a mountain of laundry that calls out to me (something about clean socks?) and a million other small things I need to get done in the next six days.  Am I going to do any of those things today?  Perhaps.  Later.  This morning I am going to see The Avengers!  I will see anything Joss Whedon does and I usually love it.  What's funny is that I realized that this will be my first time in a movie theater in about 6 years.  You didn't misread that.  6 years.  I hate the texting, talking, nextel-ing, tweeting, and the parents who bring children to inappropriate films and then fail to take the terrified/bored/cranky children outside for fear of missing a minute of movie.  So at 10am on a Tuesday, I am heading to the movies.  Wish me luck.

I'm not dead yet, in fact, I'm feeling much better

Hello, my name is Emily, and I am a bad blogger. It has been more than 3 years since I posted here. I am embarassed to admit that I needed a password reset because I couldn't even remember my login or password for this blog. In my defense, it has been an adventurous few years. I got a masters degree (MPH), got a professional job (no more jeans at work, I'm still sad about that) and was accepted into (and joined) the doctoral program (PhD) at Columbia University. I just completed my first year. So I guess I'll have to change the title of the blog, as I am no longer a would-be graduate student!

RIP John Updike

A few hours ago, I read about the passing of the author John Updike. If you haven't read him, you should. I recommend:

The Witches of Eastwick
The Widows of Eastwick (a 20 year later follow-up to The Witches of Eastwick)
The Rabbit novels

RIP

Free at last, free at last

Ok, so I am stealing a great Civil Rights phrase and using it for something silly: a [Finally] finished object:

The Crazy-making blanket (once known as the Learn To Knit Afghan) is complete. I even wove in the ends.





I think the blanket-making bug is out of my system. Unfortunately I am halfway through another blanket. (Good thing it is a cold winter!) I am halfway through with a blanket that is a combination of the Knitters squares from The Great American Afghan, The Great American Aran Afghan, The Great North American Afghan, and Vogue Stitchionary: Cables. I'm too far along to rip it out, but I don't really want to finish it either. Way to start a new year.

Happy New Year!

2008 had some high points and some (really) low points, but I'm conflicted about kicking it to the curb. I realize that I don't have any choice - 2009 didn't ask my opinion about arriving and arrived it has.

We are still early enough in the year to hope that the lowest points 2009 brings us will be on par or better than the highest points of last year. May 2009 and bring us all health and happiness.

Happy Birthday to Me!

Happy birthday to me!
Happy birthday to me!
Happy birthday to me!
Happy birthday to me!

Rejoice! Not only because it is my birthday (although that should be reason enough) but because a Cardiff based psychologist as declared that June 20th is the happiest day of the year. (No, really - he has an equation and everything. It is very scientific.)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/2158104/Today-is-the-happiest-day-of-the-year-according-to-Cliff-Arnall's-maths-formula.html

still here

and still in a life funk. But, at least it has been sunny, mostly. This morning on NPR they did a story on Buffy the Vampire Slayer and I was so tickled by the idea of these two entities: NPR and BTVS overlapping I just wanted to post the story link. It actually was pretty interesting.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=90584068