repeat

I don't watch a whole lot of tv. In fact, there are a few shows of which I have only seen 2-3 episodes. So, how is it that whenever I can't sleep and turn on one of those shows with which I have passing familiarity it always, almost without exception, turns out to be one of the very few episodes that I have seen? Are there just a few episodes of all shows that get shown over and over again in syndication? Or am I just defying the odds?

Either way, the reason I couldn't sleep is because I can never sleep the night before something exciting, and this morning I am going home!

11:30

was when I woke up on my no alarm day. It was lovely.

A no-alarm kind of day.

Tomorrow will be exciting. I am about to go to bed. And I am not going to set an alarm clock. At all. On a typical day, I set three. One on the computer, one on my phone, and one actual alarm clock. On days when I don't need to be up early, I set the real alarm clock. On days I can sleep in, I usually set one alarm, and then usually end up turning it off. But tomorrow, I am not going to set an alarm at all. And see when I naturally wake up.

This is a bad call for a variety of reasons, the primary of which is that I am catching a 6am flight on Tuesday, and the logical thing to do would be to wake up early and establish a normal sleeping schedule so that on the morning that Sondra picks me up at 4 in the morning, I will have had some sleep the night before.

But all semester I've been fantasizing about the day that I can not set the alarm. Tomorrow is that day. I'll let you know when I wake up.

[instead of a real post]

Katharine Hepburn

You scored 27% grit, 38% wit, 18% flair, and 23% class!

You are the fabulously quirky and independent woman of character. You go your own way, follow your own drummer, take your own lead. You stand head and shoulders next to your partner, but you are perfectly willing and able to stand alone. Others might be more classically beautiful or conventionally woman-like, but you possess a more fundamental common sense and off-kilter charm, making interesting men fall at your feet. You can pick them up or leave them there as you see fit. You share the screen with the likes of Spencer Tracy and Cary Grant, thinking men who like strong women.

Find out what kind of classic leading man you'd make by taking the
Classic Leading Man Test.

Link: The Classic Dames Test written by gidgetgoes on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

One semester down!

I feel like I should write some big semester wrap-up, soul searching post. But I'm not going to. It's kind of like waiting for your birthday all year, getting to it, and realizing that you feel exactly the same as you did a few moments ago, you're just a year older. Well, I've still got work to do.

But you should, whether you know me for real or not, go do this Johari window; I posted it like two years ago or something. Heck, do it again if you've already done it once! If you don't want to go do that, you should play with this. You won't be able to stop.

3 more days 'till I go home. I remember when I made my little wall chart so long ago, thinking that it would never get this close.

Overheard, on the way to the student union

A female student was on the phone:

"Mom, I have not gotten one alcohol-related anything since I've been here. No trouble at all, no police reports.... I know, I'm proud, too!... Well, I just took one [presumably a final exam] and I think it went ok. I'll be finished on Friday and then we're going to go party.... I know, mom [exasperatedly, presumably the mother was telling her daughter not to get arrested]."

Now I'm off to ace a stats final! Wish me luck!

To the world generally:

(I feel appropriate in venting this frustration because I give no context whatsoever.)

If you're typing in Microsoft word, as I suspect most of you are, you are bound to notice a little green squiggly line sometimes underneath your sentences. That typically indicates a sentence fragment. Don't ignore it. The lines are your friends. All you have to do is go back and make sure that you have both a subject and a verb in the sentence. Easy as pie.

Welcome Tom

Tom Delay now has a blog. I haven't read it and don't intend to, but a cursory scroll through shows that you have the opportunity to apply to be an "elite grassroots activist." What does that even mean??

Hopefully, if you're one of the elite, you'll learn how to get sweet deals from lobbyists, knock off those who endanger those deals, misuse your own federal investigation agencies, and so much more. (yeah, just go to google news and search for tom delay. I gave up on linking to news stories, but still... they're out there.)

It's so weird to think that 1998 was, like, 9 years ago.

I'm writing a lit review and was about to label something as "recent," when it clearly isn't. That's crazy. I was in the eighth grade nine years ago.

Oh man, I forgot all about my broccoli and it went bad.

And I was really craving some broccoli.

But, don't think I'm being too healthy. I was going to eat it with ranch dressing. So, instead of broccoli, I settled for some celery... with peanut butter.

It finally happened.

As it has been threatening to do all semester, my hair dryer has died. Should I buy a new one, or just deal with it? I have long-ish hair, if that factors into the decision...

social psych done!

Now to write a lit review.

If you're on the lookout for some procrastination

Here you can find the video of the debate last night between Justice Breyer and Justice Scalia, sponsored by the American Constitutional Society and the Federalist Society, or, as my favorite Supreme Court reporter Dahlia Lithwick calls them in her discussion of the debate, "the Birkenstocks and bow ties of the legal universe."

Man oh man, my favorite two justices! I haven't actually watched this yet because I actually haven't been procrastinating all day, but I figured that some of you might be in need of something to do instead of work. I will probably watch it after I finish revising my social psych paper. Which, incidentally, will be far less fun to finish, because I cheated and already crossed it off my to-do list.

Time to get to work!

Yes, Republican House, there is new management, and you're going to have to start showing up to work again.

Apparently Rep. Jack Kingston from Georgia is used to working only a few days a week. He thinks that Representative is the sort of sweet job you get where you don't actually have to do anything but cash your check. Too bad the rubber-stamp congress is (hopefully) coming to an end. The new House Majority leader, Steny Hoyer, is going to force some work ethic on these guys:

"I have bad news for you," Hoyer told reporters. "Those trips you had planned in January, forget 'em. We will be working almost every day in January, starting with the 4th."

"Keeping us up here eats away at families," said Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.), who typically flies home on Thursdays and returns to Washington on Tuesdays. "Marriages suffer. The Democrats could care less about families — that's what this says."

You know, it's really sad when it's a headline that "house to work 5 days a week." Man, not that I like Democrats, but this was a needed change. Yeah, the House this year? Couldn't even pass the basic thing that it does: spending bills to pay for... you know... government. They spent less time at work than 1948's "Do Nothing Congress."

Another thing crossed off the list!

Only a few more to go.

Granted, it's not entirely finished. It still needs a title, a conclusion, and probably some revision. It's not great, but I'm okay with that. On my to-do list, I had written "finish theory paper," but, because I couldn't honestly say I'd finished it, and I really wanted to cross it off, I changed the language to "write theory paper," and then put a big mark through it. Might sound like cheating to you, but to me, it's the sweet sound of accomplishment.

It's so bad it's...

well... it's really bad...



The Supreme Court--Stayin' Alive

It's that time...

I've finally made it to the point in the semester at which I can list on one small whiteboard my to-do list for the rest of the semester. It's quite a lot of stuff, but it can all be contained on one list. And one of those things got crossed out a few minutes ago. It's quite exciting. Another I could knock out with 5 minutes more of work. And another I could get done in about 2 hours.

the most important thing I've learned in grad school...

Up to this point, I've learned a lot of things. But one of the most significant things is that I'm not stupid. For instance, back in the day, whenever I would read an article that made no sense to me, or someone would say something that went completely over my head, I would just accept that I just couldn't understand it--it was beyond my cognitive capacities. And, sometimes it was/is. But I've now realized that sometimes, the article/speaker is just confused or doesn't actually make any sense. It's not me, it's them.

Part of it is that I no longer completely skip the stats/methods sections of articles, cutting straight to the discussion. I usually actually get what's going on now, and can pick up on problems.

Non sequitur: I was reading this article for social psych, and I kept thinking that I had read it before. Then it hit me and the memory was extraordinarily clear. It was one of the coolest classes in undergrad (by which I mean the actual class period, not the class itself, which was rather repetitive of other courses I'd had). It was in the spring of my junior year, and it was beautiful outside. So, we decided to have class outside, sitting under a tree. You know, the classic college stereotype. Anyway, that class was typically very quiet and conversations consisted of the professor trying to get one word answers out of us. But something about the reading and the environment led to a really awesome discussion. That was a fun memory. Now back to reading.

See, and this is why I don't read fiction...

I just now finished The Cider House Rules, am in no state to sleep, and have to get up early in the morning.