Paving hassle at my building

I've been shut in at my apartment for the last few days.  There's been paving work in the parking lot, so everyone had to move their cars.  Since I was going to have to put equipment in the car today, my response to this was to move my car on Sunday, before the paving work began, and leave it in the most ideal spot I could find until today.  The alternative would have been to take my chances and risk having to carry my equipment all the way to the Canadian Tire parking lot if I moved my car meanwhile and couldn't park close again.  Ironically though, it looks like the paving work finished early, so my car is already back in its spot now. 

Research

On a note that may or may not be related to the previous re: being "shut in," I sometimes feel like the research stuff is making me crazy.  I will have one day where I have anxiety attacks, get nothing done, and then become more anxious because I got nothing done - which is obviously unhelpful - and other days where I can write 7 pages and it is not a big deal.  I think it is sometimes related to a recurrent "no matter how much I eat when I wake up, I still feel hungry/dizzy/can't concentrate" problem that I've had for most of my life, which no amount of doctor-testing has ever really dealt with, but I'm sure some of it is just a simple matter of being burnt out.

My plan had been to get the whole thesis done during the summer, but I think at the rate things are going I am more likely to be about 75-80% done the draft.  This isn't bad, I guess, but kind of a pain in that it's hard to do the from-scratch writing during term when I am teaching, whereas editing while I am teaching is somewhat easier.  (I need lots of uninterrupted time to get the actual writing done, but with editing there is already something down, so if I get busy for a few days it is easier to come back to.)

I often am in a bad mood about the whole thing because it has become increasingly evident to me that I can't write as much per day now as I did back when I did my MA.  I'm sure there are many reasons for this, some of them (e.g. personal issues since that time, PhD research is more demanding, working at the same time I write) more valid than others (e.g. better social life and better video games than in Lancaster).  Mental upheaval amongst PhD students is by no means rare, so I figure I should accept my stress, procrastination, doubts etc. as normal and not beat myself up over it if I just cannot get done what I wanted to within a particular time period.  Unfortunately though, good intentions alone on this front do not automatically trip the "I should be doing more, goddamn it" -switch to "off."

The good thing about the last few months is that I have definitely gotten enough done to feel sure that I can, if nothing else, finish within the six year limitation period.  It's annoying wasting money on tuition in the meantime, but apparently that alone isn't enough to "make" me write faster.  I've become convinced that writing speed is just not something that I have absolute control over, because it is mentally demanding and it is physically impossible for me to be totally on top of my game all the time every day. 

One other thing I have decided over doing research this summer is that once I am done, I do not want to do any research related to the topic of abortion again for at least a few years, if ever.  It's funny how reading pro-life stuff all day can make you want to kill people. 

Teaching

I found out recently that I start teaching earlier than I thought, September 10 instead of September 13.  It's not that big a deal, but it does throw me a little bit re: my sense of how much time I had left this summer. 

I've been reading a lot of novels that I may be using in one of my classes.  They have all panned out good except for one, which I have decided not to use in that class, because discussing a book with lots of pedophilia and homosexuality with a class of kids just out of high school is not my idea of a good time.  Well, that and I also think the book has too many characters, too many loose ends, tries too hard to be subtle ("What the fuck just happened there - are they having sex or not, for fucksakes?") and various other complaints.  So I'll have to go in tomorrow and talk to the bookstore about what do we do with that book now if I'm not using it for my class.

I also find it funny that a book that was probably borderline-porn back in the 1700s can be taught in a university class as "literature" over 300 years later.

Chimera and other events

In an apparent twist of irony given my past complaining about it raining when I DJ, it seems to me that today is one of the hotter days of August so far. 

I'm thus really glad that I have a guest DJ coming for Chimera, as it will be much more comfortable for me if I can go outside now and then during the evening when the weather is like this.  As has been mentioned before, it gets pretty hot inside of Soda.

I sent to see my supervisor today.  She seems pretty happy with what I've written so far. 

We revised my schedule such that I'll now be finishing the complete thesis draft by the end of the summer, editing in fall and defending in winter.  I suspect "winter" here will mean January; I'd prefer earlier so as to avoid paying winter tuition, but given that I'll be teaching in fall I doubt that trying to defend my thesis in December is a good idea. 

My supervisor is technically on sabbatical after fall, but since she was originally going to Thailand and strangely enough has decided not to go now (she mentioned something about a bad hip and not wanting to go to places where she might have to run away from people setting things on fire, etc.) her availability that semester is likely to be a lot higher than I'd been worried about.

I find this sort of thing is fairly common in my life.  i.e. I can get things done under pressure if I "have to," but often when I start feeling dislike for building pressure, some external circumstance will change such that I don't have to worry about it.  Extensions fall out of the sky before I have to ask for them, and so on. 

This is assuredly not something I take for granted, and it surprises me whenever it happens because it's certainly not something I feel entitled to.  In the vast majority of circumstances, I plan assuming that the opposite may happen.  I am the sort of person who, for example, would feel like I've left an essay too long if there is "only" two weeks left until the due date - in sharp contrast to most undergrads who, so I am under the impression, leave things until the night before. 

Admittedly I've procrastinated way more with the thesis than with most things, but that's been due to a combination of factors, primarily a) the sheer length making it hard to estimate how much time is really needed; b) unexpected leads coming up and needing to be followed and/or other thoughts ending up getting derailed or going nowhere; c) getting distracted by life, i.e. a past era of too much giddy happiness followed by too much suspense/drama/scheming/backstabbing/etc.

If anything I think I have a slight guilt complex about it, moving me to, say, not apply for scholarships that I'm technically eligible for, because I feel like I've dragged my ass long enough with the academic work + can support myself on my own earnings = therefore better that money go to other students who need it more. 

That sort of altruism is, in my world, actually motivated by pride rather than humility, since it entails the sentiment of "I am giving this up because I can support myself and am thus good enough to not need it." 

This pride does not, however, extend to taking credit for things I have no control over - a category which "the universe randomly giving me more time to do things in" obviously falls into.

So yeah, in short I'm glad things are working out between my supervisor's schedule and my own.

I haven't been writing in this journal recently as much as I'd like.  Often that's partly to do with having various rants half-composed, and then either doubting the internal consistency thereof or not feeling like dealing with anticipated counter-arguments.  (It's not to do with anything personal, but rather just the usual "defensive philosopher" sort of thing. )

That doesn't mean that nothing's been going on though:

I just finished marking all the finals yesterday.  Institution A says "you must have them marked within 3 days" and had the finals last week; Institution B says "we don't care, take until May if you want" and had the final this week.  This is not conducive to just sitting down and doing them all at once, since I have to do those from Institution A as they come in. 

(Incidentally I don't remember which institution was "A" and "B" last time I posted - that's fine, we'll just keep changing them up to preserve anonymity in any case.)

I don't know if I'm also just burned out, but for some reason marking the exams was a serious drag.  Interestingly, of my three classes, one had above average marks, one average, and one below average, yet I was doing exactly the same lectures, exams, etc. for all of them.  This, to me, proves the folly of marking on the bell curve in humanities: some groups of students just "get it" more than others.

The marking of exams reminds me of two gems (not necessarily from the most recent exam) that I haven't shared previously:

1. I had one question about religion's patriarchal oppression of women.  Many students brought up the point that many religions have a tradition of women being "unclean" because of their bodily functions.  Now, what I found funny here was that all the female students would talk about this by just outright saying "menstruation," whereas male students invariably had some hilarious euphemism or other.  My favourite was probably "natural monthly phenomena."
   


2. In response to a question about New Age spirituality and typical beliefs associated with it, one amusing Engrish answer I got was "all thing is one."  I'm not sure why I think this is as awesome as I do... possibly it's just that I have a weird fondness for Engrish.

In any case, I'm glad it's all basically done now.  I figure I'm going to take all of next week off before starting my research, because I don't foresee any useful writing getting done in my current state of fatigue.

In other news, I'm really not looking forward to trying to load my equipment tonight with the wind being as it is.  Hopefully, given that I have to be there regardless of rain or shine (likewise with the door people) people don't pussy out on Chimera tonight due to the weather.

So, the plan had been to go to the teahouse tonight, but that fell through since I hadn't realized that a certain dead-guy-nailed-to-a-piece-of-wood was going to have an effect on said establishment's hours today.

Myself and those who'd told me they were coming ended up going to a last-minute BBQ at a friend's place rather than sticking to the "plan B" (Boston Pizza) I mentioned in my e-mail.  So if anybody I'd invited showed up there (BP) instead, my apologies for not getting ahold of you to let you know where we went.  Give me your phone number and/or let me know if you are actually coming next time, and I'll be sure to update you in the case of such plan changes in the future.

With regard then to the rest of my birthday weekend: Z and I are going for dinner with my parents tomorrow, and probably going for a visit with nscafe afterward.  Then it's Easter Sunday dinner with the family the day after that.  So that's got the food and presents angles covered, but the partying element not so much.  Regarding the latter, I've decided to have the house-party-that-would-be-celebrating-my-birthday after the end of semester, either April 24 or May 1.  So far I'm leaning toward the latter date, but I'll decide for sure later this month.

I've vaguely been feeling like I should post something this week, but really haven't had a lot of time to be on here. 

Between research, marking and normal class prep, I increasingly feel like this semester is slowly turning into a clusterfuck.  Not that I won't get everything done ok in the end - inevitably I do - but the intermediary state(s) are currently annoying me more than usual. 

Next weekend is likely to be a shut-in-and-catch-up one, though I do still intend on going for tea on Friday.

In the meantime, my apologies to various people who are e-mailing me with social or event-related questions and not getting rapid responses, or who I said I was going to send things to and haven't yet done so, and etc.  I'll try to get to it in the near future. 

I've been struggling to find time to post this, but here's a few bits and pieces from my first week back teaching:

1. Institution A has given me two spacious classrooms with large windows and properly-working AV and computer equipment.  Institution B has given me one classroom that has too many desks in it, no windows, computer podium in the corner (which makes zero sense for trying to do powerpoint presentations) and terrible sound equality on videos.  I have the same number of students at both institutions, i.e. class size at one is half that of the other.  Institution A pays better.  Gee, I wonder where I want to work more in the future. /sarcasm
   


2. I have a special needs fellow in one class who is bright and enthusiastic, but has a bit of trouble with the whole "make comments that are relevant to what I'm talking about, not just relevant to the topic of religion in general" concept.  I was worried about handling this gracefully for about the first 20 minutes, and then it occurred to me that countless students engage in "I'm now going to beak off with my random theory about life, the universe and everything" in religious studies classes all the time anyway.  So really it's just business as usual.
   


3. On last Monday I had to teach two classes with zero sleep.  This turned out to be a silver-lining thing though, because I think it's had a beneficial effect on some lingering self-consciousness issues I have with teaching.  i.e. "I'm too tired to be self-conscious about this right now," a sentiment that helps me with slowly ridding myself of the problem entirely.
   


4. I recently gave up on a certain friend ever giving back certain comics of mine that I've asked for on multiple occasions, so I just went and bought them over again.  I spent my over-tired periods of time this week re-reading the whole series, and this being Grant Morrison's Invisibles, I have a lot of background spiritual-theorizing going on in my brain now.  I may or may not write about it once it runs its course.  I also pulled "have you heard of the Invisibles?" on some random student who was asking me a question about Zoroastrianism in P.K. Dick's work, so hopefully that goes somewhere for him.
   


5. Because of having to change my textbook this semester, and thus re-write all my lectures, quizzes and whatnot, I'm finding the workload for teaching is really heavy right at the moment.  I hope though that if I put as much time as I can into it for the immediate next while, I can get far enough ahead to be pacing the research better once again.
   


6. As far as the research goes, the end result of the Xmas break was that I got lots of reading and brainstorming done, and have a much clearer idea of my overall direction, but didn't actually finish the chapter(s) I had hoped to because of more shifts in focus, claims I thought I could make that fell through, and etc.  I get frustrated at times that, while this doesn't bother me-in-and-of-myself, because I know it's part of the process, I'm annoyed at the potential for it to seem like a lack of progress in the eyes of other parties, academic or otherwise.  Can't do much about misperceptions of that sort, so I know it's ultimately pointless to worry about, but there it is anyway.
   


7. Turn-out at tea on Friday was awesome, and I hope that's a trend that continues to strengthen.  But since Zyclobonzaron comes in on Fridays these days and we aren't much for clubbing when we're together, this hasn't been conducive to going to Datalink.  There's also the fact that I've disappeared from Datalink for periods of time due to academic priorities in the past, and of course I am even busier right now.  Just wanted to mention that because I don't wish to give the impression that I'm "against" supporting it; I don't hate it, it's just not a priority for me right now.

Better hurry up and do this before I forget:

This year I...
January: ... started teaching the apocalypticism course at a sub-par venue... and ended a friendship (in the same entry!) *
February: ... was inspired to write one of my better Valentine's Day posts.
March: ... banned everybody's favorite dumbshit from showing up at Chimera anymore.
April: ... wrote an unbelievably long summary of all the relationship bullshit I went through in the previous couple years.
May: ... bought a Nintendo DS with my Shoppers Optimum points.
June: ... marked the King of Pop's death by throwing a big old brick of shut-the-fuck-up at someone who tried to berate me for the absence of Michael Jackson tunes at Chimera.
July: ... argued rather stridently that "prodigal son"-types are bringing down the human race.
August: ... gave two gullible idiots the "duh, I told you so" treatment when my ex stabbed them in the back.
September: ... had a fun visit with the Serious Elf, and got a villain handshake from the ex, and saw Marilyn Manson in Calgary finally, and threw yet another douchebag out of the Soda - all in the same month!  OMG, best month ever!!! (link goes to September archive page)
October: ... Ranted. About Sinfest. Repeatedly. **
November: ... hung out with Old Man Fish! and Doctor Awesome! and Pagan theologians! and Unicorn Monsters! and Reverend Joker!
December: ... was a mean one, Mr Grinch! 

* = Wow, I totally forgot how incredibly retarded some of the comments on that entry were.  "I'm a dumb doormat!  A dom who sticks his cock in my fat ass can never, ever be wrong about anything, therefore your entry is defamation! I'm going to complain about you defaming someone when I'm the one who openly mentions their name in the entry! I'm a stupid cow, moo moo!"

** = From a life-update perspective, more significant this month was a visit from optimus_stoo, but apparently I was preoccupied with it enough at the time to not have blogged about it.

It was pretty hard to pick a single journal entry for some months this year, so I just linked to multiple ones.  This demonstrates what a good year it's been though.  One might think that spending so much energy in rant mode would be indicative of a not-so-great year, but to the contrary, I'd rate this year as the best one of my entire life so far.  (One of my friends once said that I'm a "happy hater," and it appears that was definitely the case this last year. )

The primary factor that made this year super-awesome is, of course, Zyclobonzaron.  But lots of other things have also been going great this year.  I feel like I've finally gotten back in gear with my thesis, teaching continues to go well, Chimera is more successful than ever, I'm surrounded by great friends, and I've eliminated everyone who most profoundly pisses me off from my life.  In short, more than adequate compensation for how much last year was total bullshit.

Here's the DJing playlists.  For the sake of interest, * = months in which there was a guest DJ.

January 29 
February 26
March 26 *
April 30
May 9 ("Public Enemy #666")
May 28
June 25 *
July 30 *
August 27 *
September 29
October 28 *
November 26
December 31

Here's hoping for an equally interesting 2010!

Note: comments off AGAIN due to Spambot asshattery.

I've been feeling lately like I'm disproportionately tired relative to how much work has (not) been getting done.  The last day and a half or so I'm pretty sure is partly due to vaccination side effects, and I'm sure some of it is the usual end-of-term winding down.  Still though, kind of annoying.

In other news:

• I'll be picking up Chimera posters for the New Year's event tomorrow.  As some of you may already know from Facebook, I decided in the end to make it a theme after all, namely dark formal wear.  The sponsorship response has been a bit on the disappointing side so far, but we'll see how things look on that front later in the month.


• I ended up having to switch textbooks for the course I'm teaching next semester, due to the current one being out of stock.  This is very inconvenient as it basically means I have to rewrite a fair number of the lectures.  I will at least be able to use the same textbook for all sections of the course now though - previously I thought I was going to have to switch for one, but not be able to switch for the others.


• I have a workplace Xmas party to go to tomorrow, so I won't be at tea.

So, here's the last day of my Montreal adventure:

* * *