Anyway, I'm feeling quite chipper this morning and so I thought I should post so that you all would see how I'm actually feeling most of the time, as opposed to seeing me rant and rave and brood as I feel like I've been doing a lot on the blog of late. I think the broodiness is really just part of my process as a researcher/writer, and it's not really how I am 90% of the time, but the blog becomes the place where I put a lot of that, and so I think it seems like I'm this miserable wretch of a girl, which really isn't true for the most part.
But so anyway. I was looking at what I'd accomplished over the summer (because part of my problem is that summer is coming to a close and I feel a bit at loose ends without having the start of the semester to motivate me), and you know, I've done quite a lot, really. No. I haven't done everything I'd dreamed I'd do, but looking at my binder of book-writing goodness, it becomes clear that I've gone through something like 60 scholarly books (some with more attention and some with less, but still) and I have reams of notes - some of which are in paragraph form and can be transported directly into a draft - and I've got a clear outline and argument for the book. So no, I don't have tons of words written in a coherent way, but I'm on my way, regardless.
I would like it though if I didn't have to read Habermas, still. Or reread. But whatever. It hurts my feelings that Habermas cannot be avoided, but I know that Habermas cannot be avoided, and that is unfortunate.
In other news, this week I received my $8K from Uncle Sam for buying my awesome house. On the one hand, the money is burning a hole in my pocket. On the other, I do not want to just piss the money away. Anyway. So the first thing I'm going to do with that money is to pay off the credit card on which I have been putting purchases for the new house (everything from moving expenses to a new vacuum cleaner to paint to curtains to my new door, and, as of this morning, furniture for my porch). Now, doing that was a good thing because I had 0% interest on those purchases until Oct. 1, so I'll pay that off and will not have paid any interest on any of my moving things. But then I'll still be left with a good chunk of change. Now. I know that what I should do is to get estimates for getting the outside of my house stained first, and also to get somebody to put a cover over my chimney so wild animals don't decide to live and die in there. But then I'll still have a tiny bit of money left after that. I am thinking very seriously about buying a Kindle.... I mean, I deserve a present, right? My birthday is coming up..... Who has a Kindle? Thoughts?
The big thing is that I don't want to just piss this 8K away. I want to be very clear about where that money goes or has gone. I want to know how I spent it. Ah well. There's no reason why I need to spend it all immediately, so I will bide my time and wait until I really know what I want to buy with what remains.
Hmm. What else? Well, in like a week and a half FL* is coming for a few days for a visit, so that will be fun, and then my parents are going to come for a visit over Labor Day. I want to have another dinner party soon, but I've also been thinking about having a bigger housewarming party, though I'm not sure whether it makes sense to do that while on sabbatical. Maybe I should do that only after I'm back from sabbatical.
At any rate, on today's agenda is to do some stuff around the house, and then I shall do some more theory-reading. The brief respite that we'd had from the heat is now over, and that sucks because I really enjoyed having all of my windows open yesterday. But with heat indexes for today and the rest of the week topping 100, I embrace my air conditioning.
Wow, I really don't feel like accomplishing things. Perhaps I'll call some people up on the phone before I buckle down and try to get things done.
*For those of you who don't recall, FL is my first love, and we have now known one another for 20 years, which, as I said to him on the phone last night, my 15-year-old self NEVER would have thought that at 35 I'd be talking to that fool on the phone still. We've actually been talking a lot lately. Dunno what to think about that, but I suppose there's nothing to think about, really. We go through phases, and apparently we're going through one now.
12 years ago
10 comments:
Your positivity makes me feel quite negative today, but I'm fighting it.
Just curious:
1. If you do get around to reading Habermas, where will you start?
2. I'd love a Kindle and an Ipod Touch, but can't decide which I'd actually use more: do you think you'd use the Kindle regularly or when travelling or both?
Re: Habermas, I need to look at _The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere_. Again, it's rereading so it's not as awful as it could be, but it still is pretty sucky, as such things go.
Re: the Kindle, I do think it's a good purchase for travel, but the other thing that I think I'll use it for a lot is for PDFs of journal articles (as opposed to printing them out, as I've done historically). I don't like looking at PDFs on the computer screen because I don't like having to flip back and forth between the document I'm working in and the article - I like to have the article viewable while I'm in the document in which I'm composing.
I got a Kindle last year and I was very wary - I read a lot and was really concerned it wouldn't "seem" like a book. But I was so pleasantly surprised that I swear Amazon owes me some cash for all the unofficial plugging I've been doing. Love it. Get totally absorbed in it like a book. I can read multiple books at once without an unsafe stack on my bedside table. Awesome for traveling. My biggest plug as a grad student (soon to be prof!) is that I can actually afford to read again, thanks to the discounted prices.
From what I understand, Kindle is the e-reader most similar to books since it is not back lit.
Re. Kindle/Nook/Ipad -- try them out and see how it feels. I don't think you can annotate any of them, which is a pain!
Habermas is boring, so I'm sorry you have to re-read.
Wv=domend
With the latest kindle you CAN annotate. This is the reason why I feel like it's worth it to get one. (My sense is that it's clunkier to do so than with pen in an actual book, so I wouldn't abandon books altogether - as if! - it would more be a tool for those things that I don't need heavily to annotate.)
"but the other thing that I think I'll use it for a lot is for PDFs of journal articles (as opposed to printing them out, as I've done historically). I don't like looking at PDFs on the computer screen because I don't like having to flip back and forth between the document I'm working in and the article"
what about buying a second display and connecting it to your laptop?...it works wonders for reading pdfs and writing at the same time
This is excellent news re: finances. Isn't your theme this year about finances? It's only halfway through the year and you've accomplished so much in that regard!
Yay for paying off house expenses without any interest!
Bullock just ordered the new Kindle. I intend play with it, too, and see if I like it. We'll have to share our experiences if you get one.
Re: the kindle - most other readers are not backlit. My husband and I both have Sony e-readers, and I love mine. I can put any kind of pdf or almost any format of e-book on it. You want to check that you can do that with the new kindle. My sister has an older one and I can read formats she can't. Also, despite Amazon's marketing, you can get ebooks cheaper from various other sites. And the new Sony reader that has wifi also lets you annotate, and is about $50 less than a kindle. You should look into the various options available before you decide.
I can't believe nobody has commented on the patio furniture. I love it.
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