A nice, lazy Memorial Day. Jason and I spent the day grocery shopping (went to the thoroughly exciting Euromarket), napping, reading, watching Delicatessan and playing with the pets. Jason even managed to work in three hours of revision. No writing for me, though. My brain still feels too scattered for that.
At the Euromarket we bought a mild Greek feta (pretty good, but not exactly what I was looking for), a bottle of green olives stuffed with cheeses (interesting, though my stomach feels queasy at the thought of all that powdered cheese product), and an interesting box of coconut-pineapple juice that we've yet to try.
Oh, and Passage is very good, goddamnit. It just has a mediocre beginning.
After finally finishing Alice Munro's selected story collection yesterday (I think I only read two pages the entire six days my family was in town), I decided to take it easy and re-read Passage by Connie Willis, one of my favorite sci-fi writers. She writes intelligent science fiction and has a great sense of pacing. Except ... I'm stumbling through the beginning of this book. The dialogue feels kind of contrived and stale, there's too much 'he said,' 'she said,' repetition, the funny bits aren't quite as funny as I once thought. Does this mean that my MFA has made me into a literary snob?
Finally phoned Marion and told her about the teaching fellows. I was dreading the call, imagining that she would be so distraught about losing both Jee and I in the period of a week and a half. But she was very gracious. Definitely stressed out about having a tiny staff, but she seemed happy for both Jason and myself.
I mentioned that I knew someone who might like a job there, and Marion said my recommendation would definitely make the person a shoo-in. So I emailed Sarah and told her about the position, and she emailed back, saying she was heading to the Registrar's office right away. Yay! I hope everything works out.
Must investigate the laundry facilities downstairs. Ever since Nina's laundry mishaps with the dryer, I've been taking loads over to the laundry emporium a block and a half away. But today I feel kind of lazy ... I promised Jason I'd unpack more boxes before meeting him at Astor Place, though ...
My brother was way impressed with New York. He's seriously thinking about moving here. He said that more girls smiled at him in the six days he visited than an entire year spent in Kentucky.
Piper has developed a phobia to the shiny hardwood floor in the apartment. She spends 99% of her time on the bed. She's reluctant to even jump down for meals. Why the sudden fear of hardwood floors? Maybe the polish makes her paws slip a little when she walks.
In other news, it is late, and I have to make yet another pilgrimage to the post office tomorrow morning. I hate post offices.
I wonder what teaching in an inner-city school will be like. Probably not at all like this:
When my family finally arrived in Lexington after at least seven ridiculous hours of delays at JFK and Cincinnati, they were promptly in a car accident involving a semi-truck running a red light. Everyone is okay, but Maria's car is smooshed and no one can get their luggage out of the trunk. My family has been in an amazing amount of car accidents. This makes three in the eleven years since moving to Kentucky.
In other news, Piper is slowly adjusting to city life. Peeing on the sidewalk, no grass, crossing busy streets. Two days ago my family and I took her to the East Village, where she walked at least twenty blocks, gawking at everything.
Now if only I can get her to stop barking every time someone walks past the apartment.
I got into the NYC Teaching Fellows!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!I graduated yesterday with my MFA in Fiction!!I'm moving in with Jason Irwin tomorrow morning!!
My family is here. We picked them up at JFK yesterday, and then promptly got lost -- we drove through many, many Brooklyn neighborhoods I'd never seen before. We were too tired to even venture to Manhattan, so we stuck around Clinton Hill, ate Middle Eastern food and chili, and went to bed obscenely early.
Now we're on our way to the Natural History Museum and Central Park.
The LAST was relatively easy. There were only a few questions about math and science, the majority was reading comprehension, critical thinking, history, the arts, and literature. There was also an argumentative essay portion, not unlike an assignment I gave to my freshman comp classes way back when.
Afterwards Jason, Dan, Jonathan and I went to the Biergarten for afternoon libations. We had two pitchers of beer, one pitcher of sprite (mostly for me), and two plates of sausages and sauerkraut. It was a great spring afternoon, and the Biergarten was full of young couples, children and musicians -- including a few accordionists. I encouraged Jason to take up the accordion, but Dan insisted that it was a disgusting instrument.
Later that night, we crashed Anna's party briefly for leftover Chinese soul food. There was an exciting Soul Caliber match going on, and all in all the party reminded me of one I might have gone to in Hawaii, but Jason was sad and uncomfortable, so we went back upstairs and went to sleep.
We found an apartment we like! It's a large studio in a very nice apartment building (I was impressed by the marble hallways), with a beautiful little kitchen and bathroom. They allow both dogs and cats (!), and there are laundry facilities on the ground floor. It's also about a block away from the N and W train, and very close to grocery stores, restaurants, lots of neat things. Jason put a deposit down with the realtor, and we have an interview with the landlord Monday morning. Hope we get it!
Am feeling pretty accomplished today. I applied to five jobs through Idealist.com, and am now preparing for the LAST test I have to take bright and early tomorrow morning.
Campy Buffy picture.
Arghh! The realtor last night took us to the same crappy, roach-infested apartment we saw last week. Why? Is there only one 1- bedroom pet friendly apartment available in all of Astoria?
I wonder if we will ever find a place.
I read well during the thesis reading. It helped that the stagelight was so bright, I couldn't see anyone in the audience except Pat Dunn, who was not waving the orange flag to tell me my time was up.
The after-thesis reception was fun, with everyone from the registrar's office crowded around a couple of tables. The after after-thesis reception jaunt to the Wheel was less fun. That bar has lost all its luster to me. I prefer O'Hanlons in Queens, or even Phil McHugh's. It was crowded and weird, and Nina was a little bit drunk, and Jason spit his beer out onto her nice black shoes.
And then the trek back to Brooklyn took FOREVER. I think we finally got back at one in the morning, having hailed a gypsy cab from the Atlantic/Pacific subway stop. We decided that we were all starving and made an impromptu early-morning breakfast of biscuits and scrambled eggs. Then to bed -- where Rue persistently knocked Jason's things off the dresser.
I'm a little concerned about Rue, actually. She's been puking an enormous amount recently -- I even found a dried spot of puke on her tail. But I'm be home tomorrow, and more able to monitor her.
Nope, no apartments last night after all. The realtor called Jason at the last minute, telling him that the owner of the building went away at the last minute and he couldn't get in without them. This is the second time the realtor set up a time for us to see apartments and then didn't follow through. The one time that he did show us a place, he was more than half an hour late to the appointment. Jason and I have only been patient with him this long because he was the guy who showed Jason his current apartment.
Tonight is my thesis reading. I go through fits of nervousness, so right now I'm not. It's only five minutes, and even if I fumble through the whole thing it'll only be five minutes of excruciating embarrassment (wow! that's it!). And I'm looking forward to the reception afterwards. I hope there are cookie bars ... I need a sugar fix in the worst way. Also, supportive people will be there. Nina, Marion, Maria, possibly Dan. Oh, and Jason of course.
Today was a pleasant work day. Two hours were spent at Bates Dining Hall, counting ballots for faculty committee positions. Between counting we foraged free servings of chocolate pudding with homemade whipped cream, fresh fruit, and cookies and cream cappucinos. Lindsay has also never read in front of a huge group of people, so that makes me feel a little better.
Oh, and last night Aardvark walked through the kitchen while Jason and I were fixing pasta. I was wrestling with a tough piece of squash and said, in a very loud voice: "I guess the ROOT OF ALL EVIL doesn't know how to cook squash!" Jason thought it was great.
I picked up Rue right after she drank some water, and she puked the water up all over the floor. It was very bizarre. She seems fine now, though -- sleeping on her leopard couch with her chin on the arm rest.
Not much more to report, really.
Jason and I are seeing two more apartments tonight.
Am in Saratoga. It's beautiful here, with lots of pretty Victorian houses everywhere. And lawns! NYC makes you forget about things like lawns. Also two-car households.
J and I think we should move here one day. If we ever get a car, and rent is cheap enough.
Today was the first morning of our apartment search. We took the subway to a realtor right off the 30th Avenue stop. He was a stereotypical realtor-sort of guy, middle-agish and pushy, with a little white dog enthusiastically wearing a bandana around its neck.
"Sorry the dog's so dirty," he said. "I took him on the boat the other day."
What were we supposed to say? "Oh yeah, that' s okay. We take Rue on our boat all the time." It's strange when people mention things like their boats or summer cottages. I have never gotten used to that. Were we supposed to have more confidence in his ability as a realtor because he can afford to have a boat?
He drove us to the apartment, antsy, honking at slow cars, wondering if "all the stoplights were broken" because they weren't turning fast enough for him. Neither Jason or I do very well around strangers, and at this point we were both as quiet as a pair of mice.
The first apartment was a one bedroom for $1100. It was a tiny, slightly dirty place. The bedroom didn't look like it was big enough to fit my futon, much less our chest of drawers and bookshelves. There was only one tiny closet in the entire apartment.
The second apartment was a two bedroom for $1400. It was very nice, with lots of room and two closets. But we had already mentioned to the realtor that we weren't going higher than $1200. Anyway, the walk back to the subway was a long and winding one.
Tonight we're scheduled to see two more with the realtor who showed Jason his current apartment.
In the meantime, I'm in Brooklyn, tired and a little strung out. There's never enough time to do everything. I have to prepare for another day at school, send off invitations to my graduation, apply for jobs. Meanwhile Rue is hiding in strange places like the bathtub and under a pile of cordoroy pillows, and Carl is snapping at Mr. Magoo.
Well, I am relatively caught up today. I picked up my graduation tickets and critiqued Sarah's story. Now I have an hour to do nothing before workshop. Well, not nothing. I have three places I need to call about possible apartments, and I want to start work on the YA novel I began before coming to Sarah Lawrence. I had written about 90 pages, decided that because the story was coming so easily to me it must be crap (extreme faulty logic at work), and kind of forgot about the entire thing. But it's not crap. It's not the most brilliant thing ever written, but as far as YA novels go, it's pretty damn good.
The girl who will take my room in Brooklyn is interested in moving in the middle of May. That would be great for me too -- except of course Jason and I would have to find a place by then. Our apartment search starts in earnest tonight, with two apartment viewings in two days. Hopefully we'll have a bit of good luck, find a place within the next couple of weeks, and then have the luxury to plan and pack and not act like we're chickens without our heads.
I'm writing this at the computer lab, and think that Aardvark is sitting at the help desk, handing out the writing card.
Let me explain. This year SLC began charging students 5 cents a page to print out work. The students enrolled in creative writing classes, however, get to print to free, provided they go to the help desk and present their student ID in exchange for the special writing card. They can then take the card to the printer and swipe hundreds of thousands of pages of work for free.
This process works extremely well in principle. But when the keeper of the writing card is a malevolent, stodgy man who has been telling everyone that I am "the root of all evil," it makes the process a little more difficult.
Do I wait until Aardvark goes to lunch, and the pleasant gay man (as opposed to the unpleasant gay man! Ha, I made an Aardvark joke) takes over help desk duties? Do I find someone else to ask for the writing card for me?
Good thing I'm graduating in a few weeks. All these Aardvark-related aggravations are probably giving me an ulcer.
On a lighter note, I still think a "root of all evil" comic would be really cute. Me and my evil sidekick Rue, plotting to take over the world ala Pinky and the Brain (only slightly more intellectual). I imagine that Rue would wear a little cape in the comic. Not red, of course. That's too Superman. Perhaps a nice light green to set off her eyes. I would of course insist that the cartoonist properly render the cute tufts of fur on Rue's paws.
It will be so nice when we never have to see Aardvark again.
I'm slowly catching up with the shitload of stuff I have to do. In a few minutes I'll walk two acid-free copies (the running joke is that SLC wants acid-free paper so the professors won't get high while reading theses, and pass everyone arbitrarily) over to Graduate Studies. Then to MacCracken for my four free tickets to graduation.
I know. This post is so boring.
Today I bought a sheaf of acid-free paper at Office Max. It felt kind of like a monumental event. Tomorrow I'll go to the computer lab, print out two acid-free copies of my thesis, and hand them into Graduate Studies.
At Office Max, I got a little out of hand. In addition to the paper, I bought:
1 cheap black binder
1 box of ball-point pens
4 extra-fine Z4 pens
a kit to make my own very cute graduation announcements
All in all, I guess it was a productive day. I also put together a writing sample packet for my appointment with an agent on Friday, wrote an exercise for Myra's class, and did some last-minute emailing. I also signed up to take the LAST next week Saturday, at 7:45 AM (eww) for a whopping $158. Oh, and Jason and I called a few places for Astoria apartments. I really should have written another couple of cover letters and sent out a few more resumes, but at this point I feel lazy and tired. So it's the second season of Curb Your Enthusiasm and salmon for dinner.
Oh -- and apparently Aardvark has been telling people that I'm "the root of all evil." The thought makes me laugh a little. I told Jason that if I were the root of all evil, then Rue must be the root of all evil's feline sidekick. I can see a cute little cartoon or comic revolving around our mischievous plans to take over the world.
You see how ridiculous the Aardvark situation has become.
