Famished!

Billie--our tiny, smart, and feisty tuxedo cat--had to be rushed to the vet this week. Over the past few months, we noticed a change in her behavior. Her once precious trait of mewing at us when she had something to say had since escalated into a shrill and constant yowl that we just couldn't bear any longer. So slowly that we almost hadn't noticed, she had morphed into some little Hitler or diminutive Darth Vader, parading and barking orders around our nice, quiet home.

To make matters worse, she had become totally fixated on food to the point that much of my life at home (where, by the way, most of my life takes place) had become an ongoing battle against food scraps. If I failed to remove a single crumb, Billie would discover what was in her mind a feast and redouble her efforts at prowling through the kitchen. We even once caught her licking the droplets of oil off the dials on the stove.

So we finally wised up and carried her off to the vet, where we discovered that Billie had dropped three pounds. She went from being a tiny eight pound cat to an even tinier five pound one. We had no idea. After a day's worth of tests looking for things like a tapeworm and hyperthyroid disorder, we learned the true cause of the problem. Jen and I were basically terrible owners who were slowly starving our cat. Okay, so we're not that despicable, but it turns out that, a few years back, when the vet switched Billie to a hypo-allergenic brand of kibble, she forgot to tell us that it contained fewer calories.

This whole time, I had been attempting to deter her by shaking cans of pennies, cleaning non-stop, and carefully sealing anything with a smell. I even almost succumbed to purchasing a motion-sensor spray-can online, and I won't deny that I took a cruel pleasure at the thought of Billie flipping out when this thing activated without a soul around. When instead, what I should have done was just opened the fridge and said 'here you want some ham, how about a turkey.'

Anyway, she's better now. We're feeding her a half can of the heaviest, fattiest, stinkiest cat food I've ever had to dish out. It didn't take but a day for her behavior to revert back to normal. She's like, "aah, that's better, now I can go back to my life of sleeping and opening all the closet doors." The answer was that simple: she's hungry, feed her. Sometimes, I wish Billie could speak, I think I could learn a lot from her.

Before
















After

The reality of the job market: you find yourself drawn to the simple, happy things. Seriously, the other day I was watching Glee and my eyes nearly welled up with tears of joy. There's also the fact that I can't stop singing neighties* music in the car and the shower. Also, blankets. Because being swaddled helps too.

*A neologism I coined to express my nostalgia for music from the eighties and nineties.

Now I See What Mid-Western Cabin Culture Is All About

When I ask my class composed mostly of students from Wisconsin where they’re going on vacation over break, one response comes up more frequently than any other: “a friend/relative of mine has a cabin in the woods.” At this I always wonder why one would want to take a vacation somewhere less comfortable than where one currently is. Instead of sitting in the bug-free, perfectly temperate climate of my apartment, I’m supposed to choose of my own free will to be too hot, too cold, covered in bugs and/or rodents of various sizes in a cabin with very little in the way of insulation between myself and a semi-wilderness? I also wonder what there could possibly be to do out in the middle of nowhere. When I ask, my students usually tell me that they drink, a lot. So the answer, basically, is nothing.

About a week ago, some friends of mine managed to lure me out to one of these middle-of-nowhere retreats. The lure came in the form of hours of board games to which I have recently become addicted. I figured suffering through the cabin-part wouldn’t be too bad if it meant playing games like Dominion and Agricola to my heart’s content.

While there, something remarkable happened. Like some sort of revelation in the tradition of Ebenezer Scrooge I was overcome with the spirit of the cabin vacation. When I could have been playing board games, I was out foraging for kindling with which to build the evening fire or just enjoying a beer on the porch. What I discovered is that there is nothing quite so awesome as doing absolutely nothing. The full effect of it didn’t hit me until I returned home to realize that I hadn’t checked my email in three days!

You might say that I had a fever and the only cure was MORE CABIN. Of course, thinking of Christopher Walken anywhere near that cabin gives me the willies.*

*If you don’t get this reference, go watch the SNL “more cowbell” skit. It is an essential part of any cultural education.

The other day I picked up some "Habanero Horseradish Mustard" put out by the Mt. Horeb Mustard museum. I think I've fallen in love.

Three independently kick ass ingredients brought together at last. Plus, the label reads:

"Your chances of finding a better mustard are Slimm and Nunne."

Oh yeah! Yet another brilliant invention from the think-tank of Poupon U.

clothes reading

This is another post in the spirit of conveying something about grad student life to those of you who are for the most part unacquainted with our kind.

Saturday night, I decided to invite a few friends over to play Mario Kart, two of whom brought their 6 month old along (baby James, as I like to call him). Since my guests arrived all at once, we of course started things off by cooing, smiling, and generally giving all our attention to the amazing baby James.

Okay, so far so good, right? Nothing out of the ordinary here.

But then, someone points out that baby James is wearing a rainbow striped onesy with a picture of a giraffe driving, of all things, a backhoe. After quickly noting its odd cuteness, we slid naturally into a discussion of what crossed the designer's mind when he or she chose to combine these two specific objects.

Here's a quick selection of answers:

"maybe since the animal is exotic, they thought the vehicle ought to be as well"

"I'd like to attribute the backhoe to a desire to toughen up the child, but the rainbow background rules out that possibility"

"hmmm... a giraffe and a backhoe... an animal and a vehicle... are they making a point about nature and technology?"

In literary studies, this is what we like to call "close reading." Things don't, as the great Young MC once said, just make us go hmmmmm. Instead, they make us totally geek out. All the while baby James mainly thinks that we're mesmerized by his cute little baby belly.

So there you have it, a pretty typical example of what us grad students (as well as their spouses and partners - unless they're faking) consider to be a good time. For another example, I invite you to go back to the title to be either amused or slowly tortured by my attempt at a pun.

market blues

Anybody remotely connected to an English graduate program knows how horribly shitty the job market was last year. Today, there was a headline in the New York Times that went "recession anxiety seeps into everyday lives," accompanied by the picture above.



You might not think it, but the hiding under the covers is pretty accurate, though we have yet to stoop to cowering together in groups. Then again, what goes on in those shared graduate residences is beyond my knowledge. You also have to love how this picture illustrates economic woes with a picture of people attending a what is probably a pretty pricey relaxation seminar.

Seriously though, I have noticed that a general malaise has fallen over our department. Conversations periodically turn towards the subject of the market, since it's what we're all thinking about anyway. Knowing that two of, say, ten students who applied for jobs last year actually received them makes things look pretty dour. When the subject arises, there are varied levels of dispirited talk with fun facts like "1/3 of the jobs I applied for were cancelled mid-search." These discussions are often followed by a chorus of sighs or a prolonged moment of silence. Luckily, since we're for the most part used to being penniless, we mostly just resign ourselves to waiting things out till the situation improves.

If you have yet to read Dashiell Hammett's Maltese Falcon, then what are you waiting for.






For those of you who have:

Do you think that Brigid deserves what she gets?

And, what's the point of the Flitcraft story, really?