Nattering

Why am I beginning to feel like my MFA program wasn't the sole cause of me constantly being behind on everything, but especially e-mail? Surely this state of affairs is temporary, right? Oh, and because I like staying overwhelmed, I'm officially taking on freelance assignments again when they come up, so if you're looking for someone to write an article or do some reviewing…

Of course, this hand-wringing over not having completely caught up on life, the universe and everything, and finished my revisions, could also be the usual case of my never quite cutting myself enough slack*, since I only got home from two weeks of insaneness in Vermont last Friday and we've had something called a catastrophic ice storm this week (we only lost power for one night**, thankfully–so far, anyway). Right now the sun is out, and the trees outside my window are shining like they're made of glass, or possibly covered in soap bubbles. But not melting. Not yet.

Also, um, we aren't going to Wiscon this year, because we're going somewhere else really cool the week after. This makes me sad, but it seems like many of the regulars are taking this year off, too, and I'm sure those of you who aren't will provide the good goss after. Promise? 'kay. This could always change were we to win el lottery. I'm keeping the reservations until the last minute, just in case.

*Slack is for slackers! Except I only believe this when it comes to the lady in the mirrortron.

**It went off during the middle of the gobsmackingly brill Let the Right One In, drat it. Will finish watching tonight.

There was this moment on the first leg of our return flight–Burlington to Newark–before we safely made the abruptly announced "precautionary landing" in Albany when I leaned up to my classmate Gene Brenek and said,"You know, if this plane crashes, it'll be great PR for the Vermont College of Fine Arts, what with two recent grads, a faculty member, and at least one other student on board." Happily, it didn't come to that. And we even made it home on our actual second flight, which had been delayed in a most fortuitous fashion.

Anyway, the graduation ceremony was lovely and fun and slightly disconcerting as all events with bagpipes must be (Martine gave such a great speech though, and Leda did such great readings for everyone, and Rita didn't decapitate us with our hoods), and I feel awfully lucky to have graduated in such fine company. Dorky berobed pictures to come. But to all the Revisionistas–Micol, and Gene, and Shawn, and Lynda, and Galen (AND dearie dear Kate, who will always be one of us one of us, no matter when she graduates)–y'all are all rock stars, and I'm so glad to know you. And that goes for all the fabulous other people I've met in my time at VCFA too, especially those of you I hardly got to jabber with this time around (Jess, Margaret, and Insert Name Here, I'm looking at you).

Dogs are crazed. Hemingway is mad. Peoples are exhausted. Laundry piles could be developing sentience. And I'm finding it much easier to develop the energy for little tweets than for posts, but I'm sure that'll pass as soon as I get a really, really good night's sleep. (Plus, with Monday being awards day, there'll be lots to post about!) I was largely kidding myself about having writing time at residency, of course, and find it's actually nice to have the revisions on the book to launch back into right away. AND I believe I've decided what I'm going to work on next, once those are done.

Never too much rest for the wicked,  as the ever-nebulous they have been known to say.

I've been in more or less a news blackout during the residency, because there's very little time for the outside world to penetrate. It's unbelievably nice to tune back in for this Inauguration. There are some days you just feel lucky to be alive in these particular times, and this is one of them. Hope is the only word, isn't it?

(Lecture down, and seemed to go well, and tonight grad reading with Micol and Lynda, which'll be fun. Tomorrow, graduation, and then life returns to normal. Dogs and revision. I can't wait, even though I'm having a blast.)

"All about us is noise"–Elizabeth Alexander was amazing.

Negative 23 degrees.

Enough already with the cold. We get it.

If you have ever owned a dog, I don't have to explain that moment of horror when you see your dog start to grind and roll on something on the ground when they're off lead. It takes you a moment to get there and pry the dog(s) in question away from the often dead and nearly always disgusting thing they've discovered, and cries of "No! Leave it!" are willfully ignored during that moment. It is during these lost seconds that they absorb more scent than seems strictly possible in such a short time.

This happened earlier this afternoon on a rich kid school playground that we let the dogs off lead to race around in sometimes, when it's not inhabited by playing rich kids. Almost as soon as he was free, Puck the dog went to town in a pile of leaves near the fence. Emma came over to investigate, but I was mostly able to keep her away. My own shoes? Not so much.

You do not want to know what it was. I'll just say that the phrase "awful offal" was bandied about on the way home. I'm not thinking too closely about it, although it's still on my shoes.

The dogs have both been bathed–against their extremely strong wills–and, paraphrasing the immortal words of Gillian Welch, have shaken like chorus girls, like holy rollers, like their souls were at stake, like hurricanes, like to make it break (actually, a vase-type thing did break).

But now they are mostly quieted, and they look funny with spiky wet hair. Their collars and a whole bunch of towels are soaking in the washer. The cat is hiding out, and everything is back to normal. 

At least until the next time this happens.

Say what you will about that Christopher Rowe, but he makes some excellent soup.

And I leave the old year with an emerging cold (zicam, zicam, zicam), and happy thoughts for 2009.

This was a good year, but it was a busy year, a weird year, as perhaps all election years must be. So much time expended thinking about polar bear hunts and writing critical stuff. But everything has come out fine, and I have the best sort of feelings about what the new year will bring. Keep your fingers crossed until midnight.

Due to inconvenient and dastardly rain that fell from the sky and promptly froze all surfaces last night, no shopping was done. So it must be done this morning instead!

I feel today will be busy. And tomorrow. But sweet potato pie from excellent neighbors for breakfast is a good omen, right?

Anyway, don't forget to mosey over to Mr. Rowe's place (Typepad, LJ, Facebook or Twitterville) and wish him a Happy Birthday tomorrow!

I had completely forgotten about the existence of Arts and Letters Daily until Christopher mentioned he'd seen an article there the other day.

A&L was my faithful first stop online for quite awhile back in the dark ages of the early 2000s, and I don't remember when or why I stopped looking. An easy guess is that it was around the time the number of blogs I followed picked up. Anyway, I thought it didn't exist anymore, or at least I never thought of it anymore and so it felt like it didn't exist.

But it does! And it looks exactly, and more than a little comfortingly, the same.

Have a good weekend everybody, in the snow, or the cold, or the sun.  I'll be revising away, and working on my last set of things that have to be completed and compiled for grad school. Veritas odit moras, as they say.

Updated: And, via the old standby, comes a link to this worthy piece about James Wood's criticism, discussing both its virtues and flaws. (I'm more convinced by the discussion of problems related to his bias against nonrealist fiction than of any innate issue with his use of angled modifiers.)

For so many things, I am. I'm a very happy girl with where life has landed me, with noremarkably few complaints.

It's hard not to love a day when you get to appreciate such luck. Have a nice holiday, everybody.

Updated: Also for "10 Things You Should Know About Twilight." C'mon, guys, let's go see this instead of Bond!