Frenetisk

Wait, what, is it only Wednesday? I feel totally and utterly blown out by this week, with two more active days to go. Golly!

My primary work focus has been the proofreading of my (old) book manuscript. It's done now, after another hour this morning before classes. I ended up with a list of corrections that was five pages long! I'm not quite sure how I feel about the book after having read it closely again for the first time in a couple of years. Some parts hold up pretty well, others are a bit cringe-inducing. It will be interesting to see if it gets any sort of critical reception (it's being published by a really obscure publisher).

I've also been getting my ducks in a row for the Peer Gynt book. I had a really good talk with a colleague who said she liked the idea a lot, but pointed out that I really have to stop writing articles, as they are totally killing my book mojo. I love writing articles and hate writing books, and she's totally right. As I was talking to her on the phone I was eying my research agenda for the fall, which I had posted on my bulletin board, and it was chock full of totally fun, but totally irrelevant article ideas: Norwegian horror films, Lars von Trier and geography, etc. After she pounded into my head that I needed to only work on the book projects (Peer Gynt first, with a firm deadline of the end of December, then the cabin book after the new year starts), I crossed out that list, added a big NO at the bottom, and made a new list that has a month by month schedule for finishing the Peer Gynt book. I can tell that this is great advice based on how uncomfortable it made me feel when she said it!

I do think I'm on track now. With all the proofreading I haven't really been able to do any actual writing for the PG book, but I did call the NRK television archives today to set up appointments to view the two television dramatizations of Peer Gynt next week.  Given the wild, amorphous form of PG I find it kind of astounding that there haven't been more Norwegian attempts to film it. I'm thinking the last chapter of the book will be on these two television versions (1986 and 1993), a film I haven't yet seen called Peer Gynt i våre hjerter, and Gatas Gynt.

On the home front there are lots of Steiner school activities this week. I went to the first group parents' meeting on Monday night. It was interesting to meet some of the other parents. I felt out of place, not because I'm foreign but because I seemed to be the only really career-focused woman of the bunch. I hadn't expected that. Tonight E and I decorated a basket of vegetables to take to school tomorrow. Each family is supposed to bring vegetables so that the kids can make a soup for the fall Thanksgiving party they'll hold on Friday. I just emptied my knitting basket into an empty drawer and taped pictures that E drew to the outside of it. Thankfully we had a good supply of root vegetables in the fridge, so I didn't have to make a grocery store run...

I attended my English class today--full on lecture, and it appears that my many questions are perceived as pure distraction, rather than an integral part of the learning process. Ugh. It does inspire me to engage my own students much more in the following hour. We had our first real seminar discussion of a text today, and it went pretty well, especially considering how miserable my presentation was last week. I came home with an incredibly upset stomach and throbbing headache, though, so I'm just waiting until E falls asleep before I myself crawl into bed to try to recuperate for tomorrow.

I'll be meeting with my mentor for the first time since spring term, which should be fun and interesting. I also have to work on stuff for my former Ph.D. student, who is going on the job market again this fall, so there probably won't be time for any writing tomorrow. Friday I'll stay home to go to the Steiner school party, since KE will be in class. Then I'll collapse!

Clearly there's no pretending that I'm not smack dab in the midst of what is turning into a very hectic semester. The leaves are turning yellow and red too, and we've had frost at night, so I can no longer delude myself into thinking it's still summer.

Gjenforening

At last, after two weeks I have my laptop back! I couldn't be happier. To celebrate I uploaded some of my autumn pictures. First off is E as perpetual motion machine. Not quite sure how this picture happened, but I like it...

No children were hurt in the filming of this shot. Then there were a couple of pictures to document the house after getting it painted this summer. Here's the front:

Not long after this KE got cranked up and raked up all those leaves by hand! He left them down in the road for city pick up, but then some folks from around the corner drove up and hauled them off to use as compost. We've never been able to get the leaves to break down (they're sycamore), but apparently these people lie in wait, ready to claim our leaves as soon as we get them out into the public domain. And here's the driveway and side of the house:

The driveway doesn't actually look half bad here. In reality it's like a BMX course. No accident that the house color is practically the same as my blog background. Ah, how I love the colors of mud, clay, and brown paper bags. And finally, even my plain Jane dishcloths look cheery (relatively speaking) in the autumn leaves:


Happy November, happy computing!