On Leave

Last week I received word that my request for sick leave was approved, and applied retroactively to September. The university credited me this year's tuition, and I'll go back in the fall. In the meanwhile, my library card doesn't work, and I'm not supposed to be engaging in any research/academic work. (Ha.)

It's a strange feeling, suddenly having that weight off my shoulders. It's now okay that I've been useless for the past year. I've spent the year doing was doing what I was supposed to be doing: taking care of myself and my family. I was sometimes a little hard on myself about my lack of progress, because I know people who finished their dissertations in the midst of being pregnant and having a baby. Of course, I constantly have to remind myself that it's not fair to compare myself to anyone else, because I've been a rather exceptional case. (So exceptional, in fact, that I was granted leave after the terms of my extension explicitly stated that I didn't qualify for leave!)

It's funny how my brain is more full of ideas and strategies for finishing, now that I'm not registered. I'm going to get myself an alumni library card, since I qualify for one here. I'll start practising my German while the baby's napping, and since it requires the use of a headset microphone, I've ordered a baby monitor, and will watch the little lights for signs of the kid making noise. I'll also take this opportunity to review my primary sources, since it's been a while, and the review will be good for getting my brain going. That's all I'll really do this summer (and meet with my supervisor when we go back to the Island in the summer: he'll want to see the baby, and then we'll draw up a timeline for completion).

But I'm also going to allow myself some space. I'm on leave, and I'm going to make sure that I appreciate that. This is the first time I haven't been a registered student in a decade, and I want to take some time and enjoy being home with Li'l E.

This has all coincided with the good news that E won't need surgery (there was some concern, but it has thankfully turned out to be unfounded), and so we now have fewer health professionals in our lives, which means fewer appointments. (Okay, in the next few weeks, she has a physical therapy appointment, 6-month checkups with both her family doctor and her pediatrician, and then her next round of shots. But then we get a break!) More importantly, we no longer have that anxiety hanging over us, and we can just move on with our lives, dealing only with normal baby stuff.

And so I'm grateful for this bit of respite from all the craziness of the past year. Normal is a nice change from the usual.

Introvert has a child, discovers she's now always being watched

Li'l E is asleep (although we'll see whether she sleeps for more than half an hour). I'm sitting down with a cup of tea (this week, it's David's Teas' Salted Caramel, because I'm apparently in the mood for tea that tastes like candy). I'm finally starting learn how to carve out little moments in my day.

For a while, it seemed impossible to get anything done or to take any time for myself. At first, Li'l E and I had the double whammy of my slow recovery and her constant feeding (undersized baby more than doubles her weight in the first three months: oy). I also had a serious case of the New Moms, where I didn't know how to get anything done while she was awake, since she wanted to be cuddled constantly. But now she's growing up a little (and so am I), and I've been working on getting her to be more independent. Now, I can at least get housework done while she's awake, and she's just pleased that I talk to her while I work.

The next hurdle is getting back into the dissertation process. I really don't know how to work while she's awake: she's so demanding, and wants my attention constantly. I'd be too distracted to form many coherent thoughts. (I guess I could do mindless tasks and some editing while she was awake, but writing is another story.) I need a lot of sleep right now in order to continue to function, and so working after she goes to bed is out of the question. I imagine that nap time will become my ideal writing time, once I get on a roll. Li'l E takes several small naps a day, and during her morning naps I've already formed the habit of approaching them with the attitude of "I MUST WORK AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE."

Really, the problem is that I'm so tired and distracted. Perhaps reintroducing my SAD lamp into my morning routine would alleviate some of the tiredness, but I'm also tired because I'm physically catching up with the requirements of my new life. I don't know how to deal with the distractedness part. Right now, I'm trying to deal with it by taking a little time to be quiet. A cup of tea and a little bit of silence. I grew so accustomed to having endless quiet time at home over these years, and now that I have a small and loud constant companion, I find that I need to deliberately carve out quiet time for myself. I never before realised how much my mental health depends on time spent being alone and quiet.

So. Where do I go from here? I finish my project of organizing the house, so that I have space to work. (We really didn't get off to a good start here, with my inability to take part in the unpacking process. We've been in survival mode until now.) I get started writing while family is around to deal with the baby, and then create tasks that can be done during naps. I continue to allow myself a little quiet time.

And now the baby's awake, and I'm typing with one hand. That second cup of tea will have to wait.

Update: I just got a message from my grad secretary, saying that she's confident that I qualify for medical leave (backdated to the beginning of this school year), even though the terms of my extension stated that I could not apply for leave. Apparently my case is exceptional!

I've been too reliant on Twitter

I was just trying to type a tweet, which was getting to be too long and I thought "Oh wait, my blog has unlimited characters!"  Right.  But, because I've spent the day sorting through articles on the history of the German advertising industry, and I'm now mostly brain dead (but also because I'm more used to tweeting than to blogging these days), here are some small bits of ephemera for you:

• I put some green apples in a shiny colander, and set them on the dining room table near our big window, because it looked pretty.  Today was an actually sunny day and I discovered that my pretty fruit arrangement was not a good idea: Ky (who worked here today) noticed that there was smoking coming from one of the apples!  When we checked, it turned out that the bright sun reflected off of the shiny, curved colander, and was starting to burn a hole in one of the apples!  Science!
• So, we keep buying cheap office supplies at the BC Government Surplus place (and then repeating to ourselves "Maybe these monitors are just cheap because they're replacing them!  Maybe this isn't the result of mass lay-offs!").  Chris recently bought himself a second monitor there, so that he can be That Guy With Two Monitors.  While he's waiting for a connector that he ordered for the monitor, I stole it and hooked it up to my laptop.  Now, with the external monitor, external keyboard, and external mouse, maybe I should admit to myself that I'd rather own a desktop computer.  
• Also: I think I'm not giving Chris back this monitor.  He can buy another one for $40 at the We'll Continue To Pretend We're Not Taking Advantage of Mass Lay-Offs store.
• In six days, my sister flies out here for a one-week visit!  And then three days after she leaves, I go to Maui for a week!  And then it's May, and I have to have so much more writing done, and also I'll only be a month away from the three-week course that I'm teaching.  Oh crap.
• The above point may clarify why I suddenly feel like I urgently need to get a lot of work done.
• But Hawaii and Sister Visits! 
• My brain is having trouble forming long, analytical thoughts.  I feel like my current chapter is only slightly better organized and coherently-thought-out than this blog post.  Do you know what would be nice?  If my dissertation could just argue "Hey, look at all this neat stuff!  Isn't it cool?" and then I just told stories and showed pictures for 250 pages.  
• But but but! I met with my supervisor on Friday, and boy does it ever feel gratifying to find that your supervisor also thinks that the Treasure Trove of Cool Primary Source Material you found is cool, and also gets distracted coming up with a million different ways to analyse it.  I feel less like I've been wasting my time.  And I have more ideas about how to bring this all together, so that this chapter is less of a Massive Hodgepodge of Stuff.  

So, that's how my brain has been working lately.  

Even though it feels cheesy

A few months ago, my counselor gave me an assignment.  I'd just told her about how I keep having to remind myself that my dissertation and my PhD are the beginning and not the end of my career: this isn't the end result of a life's work, but a first effort that just needs to be finished.  It doesn't have to be ground-breaking; it just has to be completed. 

So, after I said something along the lines of "I really should post that message on my wall above my desk, because I keep forgetting," my counselor suggested that I do just that.  She gave me an assignment: write down some affirmations and reminders and post them where I can see them when I work.

I got excited about doing that until I got home and started worrying that it seemed cheesy to do that.  My desk faces a big poster!  Where am I supposed to put a bunch of affirmations?  Won't that seem especially cheesy to any houseguests who stay in our office?

And so I procrastinated from doing that.  And procrastinated from booking my next counseling appointment.  I got a lot of work done during that time, but after I finished my last of my research, I found myself stuck.  And procrastinating a lot.

And so here I am in January, trying to get myself back on track, and trying not to feel guilty about how unproductive December was.  I've done a bit of writing in this current chapter, but it's hard getting past all the negative self-talk.  I think that the fact that I was also procrastinating from a task that I knew I ought to do didn't help.  And then this morning, as I was trying to figure out how to organize my bedroom, I noticed that I have this little photo holder stand that was taking up too much room on my dresser.  The pictures in the stand were several years old, and while I was trying to figure out what to do with it, I realised that this could be a good place to put my little affirmations, instead of finding places on my wall. 

I've written up four so far.  For a while, I wasn't even sure what to write (other than the first statement I'd made to my counselor), and so I went through my blog for some inspiration.  This post from mid-2007 gave me a lot of ideas. 

So far, this is what I have:
- I love my research
- My dissertation just needs to be finished, not perfect or ground-breaking.  I am capable of doing this.
- I am going to finish.
- I can't measure my self-worth by external validation.

So.  I'm allowing myself to be a little bit cheesy, with the hope that this will help.  Because I really want to get this writing finished.

Adventures in Microfilm-Reading

I've been working my way through a newspaper whose title translates to the "Berlin Local Advertiser."  During my time period, it was run by a far-right-wing wealthy industrialist who ended up throwing his support behind Hitler, and under his direction the newspaper was a mix of mundane local news and international news, a giant classifieds section, and Crazy Right-Wing Spin (Blame Everything On Communists variety).  I've been reading it as a counterpoint to the liberal paper that I researched last year. 

Reading this paper has been fascinating (especially because of its conflicted portrayal of Berlin women), but it got mysterious as I got near the end of the microfilm.  I was looking forward to looking through the July 1932 newspapers, to compare its portrayal of the July 31st election with the Berliner Tageblatt's.  However, I discovered that the June and July 1932 papers are missing from the microfilm.  It's not that there's a roll missing: a single roll of microfilm skips straight from May 31st to August 1st.  I looked through my box of microfilm a little more and discovered that a couple more months were missing: January 1933 (the month that Hitler was appointed as chancellor) and June 1933 (the month when Hitler disavowed Hugenberg, the industrialist who ran this paper, and Hugenberg resigned from his cabinet post).  It's always full months that are missing.

This is simultaneously frustrating and fascinating.  Were these papers lost, damaged or destroyed?  Do hard copies of them exist anymore?  (I do know that most libraries in Germany have just identical sets of microfilm to this one.)  If they were destroyed, did it happen when the Nazis bought out Hugenberg's publishing empire, or after the war?  Or is it just a coincidence that the months that are missing were really historically important ones?  Is this just limited to the microfilm and are there hard copies out there in some archive?

 ****

In other related news, I may or may not have caused the breakdown of an expensive machine this week. 

So, you know how I said a couple of weeks ago that the microfilm scanner had developed a quirk?  Well, it broke down entirely on Friday, while I have only three rolls left to read.  It no longer advances at all, and the IT guy and I suspect that one of its motors burned out.  The fact that the scanner broke down after I'd been using it constantly for four hours makes me worry a little.  Also, the possibility that I might have to use the 20-cents-per-copy old-timey scanner for the last three rolls worries me a little more. 

But the library's bringing in a technician to fix the digital scanner, and I may have convinced them to temporarily replace it with the still-functioning scanner that they currently have in storage. I'll see what's happened when I go to school on Monday.

That (and the recent parade of visiting friends) has been keeping my hands full lately. 

Bleary eyes

Hi.  I'm still around, even though I seem to disappear for long stretches of time.  I've become a microfilm-reading machine, ever since I lost two weeks' worth of productivity to The Cold That Ate Vancouver Island.  I managed to read three rolls of microfilmed newspaper today, all of which was in old-timey-font German.  Well, I read all but the last couple of days on each roll, because the microfilm scanner decided to develop a quirk today, and fast-forward whenever it gets near the end of the roll (and that can't be an intended feature, because it needs to be rewinding).  (And it's never done that before today.)  By the end, it was getting bad, and so I decided that both microfilm-reading machines (the scanner and I) needed to stop for the day. 

But, on the other hand, today I discovered that the grad restaurant on campus is now selling pulled pork tacos, which is the BEST NEWS OF MY LIFE.  So, that makes up for the semi-broken scanner. 

And now I'm going to shut off my computer and enjoy my quiet living room for a while.  (Did I mention that the microfilm scanner is behind the reference desk in the library?)

Patent Medicine

My latest chapter is based around a book that was written in the early 1930s for "Berlin women" (and those who wished to visit or move to Berlin).  This book is the one I was complaining about for a while, because most of the typeface is of the old-timey German sort.  Well, one of the most interesting parts of the book, which I ended up spending some time carefully translating,* is the hundred pages of ads in the back

These ads are hilarious, especially after having spent some time listening to Terry O'Reilly and watching Mad Men.  There is a three-page ad for gift baskets full of meat.  (The gist: now that it's the Great Depression, you can't afford servants anymore!  So buy a basket of meat instead.) But my favourites are the patent medicine ads.  And by "my favourites" I mean "the ones that terrify me the most."

Medicine ads from the early 1930s are really interesting, because they have awareness of recent scientific discoveries without the full knowledge of side effects.  For example, there's an ad offering radiation therapy at health spas (in either drink or bombardment form), as a treatment for rheumatism, sight problems and pain in your legs.

And then there's the medicine that was called "Phagocyte" (as in the white blood cell), which promised to make your blood "acid free."  Ky's response: "Great! I always wanted to scrapbook using my blood."  Chris's response: "But acid is what makes our blood able to absorb oxygen!"  My response: "I really hope that the medicine didn't really contain phagocytes.  Actually, I hope that this was a straight-up sham and people were just taking sugar pills."

Now I have to figure out whether to talk about these ads, and how to talk about them without "Maryanne's Present-ist Snarky Voice".



* Now using my new Kindle!  Uncle Al is right: I have become Techno Bill.  Even right now I'm sitting at my laptop, between my smartphone and my Kindle. 

My old arch-nemesis

So, remember how I loathe old-timey German typeface?*  I've mostly managed to avoid having to read it, because by 1929 most Berlin printers had switched to the same fonts as we use.  I was very thankful when I discovered that I only had to deal with old-timey German in the occasional Frankfurt newspaper article.  I'm cool with that.

And then last week a book arrived via Inter-Library Loans, which I'd ordered two months ago.  It's the single most important book for this current chapter, and I was excited that there was a copy available from a North American library (Harvard is the only library that has a copy I can order), because then I don't need to find it in a German archive.

I picked up the book, and it turns out that, even though it was published in Berlin in 1932, it almost exclusively uses Fraktur (aka Old-Timey German font).  I'm getting better at reading it (although I have no idea what the handwriting on the front page says), but the only thing that's keeping me from periodically throwing the book across the room is the fact that it's a rare (and antique) book.

You might find, within this post, the cause for procrastination that drove me to spend an hour making pudding on Sunday.

In conclusion: please send magnifying glasses and Advil.


* I am so precise with my terminology.

The nice bits of my day

1. Brand new lemons --> lots of hot water with honey and lemon. 
2. I took an honest-to-goodness sick day today.   I stayed in my pyjamas until Chris came home and didn't feel guilty about it at all.  And watched a lot of the Food Network. 
3. I spent the whole day thinking "I wish someone would show up with a pulled pork sandwich. I think I'd feel stronger if I had some meat." And then Chris got home, heard that I was craving barbeque, and picked up pulled pork and brisket from a place downtown.  And that made me feel much better. 
4. I thought I was supposed to be starting preparations for the staff end-of-the-year party for Chris's work, and then he called to say that he was wrong and the party is on Monday.  Not only do I get to do nothing today, but there's no pressure to do anything tomorrow now either.  Bliss.
5. Chris is done all his prep and marking for the year. Now it's just supervising one more exam, awards day, and grad.
6. A book I ordered from England (for the dissertation) arrived in the mail, while all the delivery estimates thought that it would arrive after we left. 
7. Dissertations being available online in pdf form: I love living in the future.  No ordering, no waiting.  (Dr. Supervisor discovered that someone wrote a really relevant-to-my-research dissertation and defended it last year.)

That chapter + hair-blogging

Hey, remember That Chapter That Won't Die?  It no longer deserves its name!  Yesterday, I sent off That Chapter to Dr. Supervisor, and can finally move on with my life.  And by "move on with my life," I mean that I've already started working on another chapter, but I picked an easier chapter this time. 

And by "already started working," I mean that today I looked through a few books, took a few more out of the library, made a bit of an outline, and then spent more than an hour trying to figure out how to do my hair for Andrea's wedding on Saturday.

I think I might do something like this (which takes much more work than you'd think, considering the fact that my hair has absolutely no curl to it, and doesn't hold curl very well):

So, after sending off That Chapter, and struggling to come up with enough ideas and analysis to make this chapter Not Embarrassingly Short, this morning I woke up and had three good ideas for that chapter.  After it was already sent off.  After I finally sent it off and relaxed, then my brain started working again.  But I won't worry about that; there will be many revisions, and I can add those ideas in later.  In the meanwhile, I wrote down my ideas and moved on to writing about Berlin women. 

Further Adventures in Dissertation Land

I went back through some of the resources that Dr. Supervisor sent me, while I was trying to write a difficult part of this Chapter That Won't Die.  It turned out that one of the sites that he sent me had a link to a site I'd never encountered before, which had scanned images of all the relevant newspaper articles about different German historical figures from the 20th century.  This means: a.) it had a bunch of stuff that I already found and scanned when I was doing microfilm research, but b.) it also had a bunch of stuff from newspapers I haven't had a chance to see yet. 

And that's how I ended up spending the rest of my afternoon squinting at old German typeface (because the non-Berlin newspapers were still using this until long after 1933):

Oh boy.

Where I'm at in my dissertation right now:

Fighting off the urge to describe the phrase "moral parrot-sickness" as being "both awesome and wonderful." 

The nicest kind of afternoon

I decided that I needed to work from home today.  I'd been putting off laundry and bread-baking, both of which are tasks that I do during weekdays while I'm dissertating.  They're the two household tasks that are exclusively mine, because they can be done in little bursts of time through the day, forcing me to take breaks.  They also give me little pockets of time in which it's easy to get a lot of work done: there's nothing quite like "Let's see how much typing I can do in the next forty-five minutes while this bread rises."  And it means that I'm not sitting around checking my email during my breaks: I'm up kneading dough or hauling baskets.  

I don't have much of substance to say.  I just am feeling happy because I managed to scan through a difficult German-language book quickly, and then I got to knead some bread dough, and rewarded myself by sitting down in a sunbeam with a good cup of tea.  A sense of accomplishment, a little physical work, some sunshine and some tea.  That's all I need in a day. 

Cubicle Living

The building that houses my department is undergoing repairs for the next few months, and so we're all in exile until the Fall.  Our department office is operating out of a seminar room in a different wing of the building, while the grad offices have been relocated to what Trillwing calls a "cubicle farm."  But a really, really nice cubicle farm. 

I only vaguely recognised the name of the building when the department announced where we were going.  Okay, and I wasn't putting too much thought into it, because my main thought was "Ugh, giving up our office for cubicles in a space we have to share with other departments? I guess I'm really going to work from home this summer."  However, when I got talking to my friends from the department it turned out that I was just not recognising the new name for the library (now that the library has been doubled in size to include office space).  In fact, it turned out that our new space is on the same floor of the library that holds all the books I use; you go to this obscure corner of the floor, to this unmarked door that has a keypad on the handle, and behind that door is a huge, airy space that is surrounded on three sides by floor-to-ceiling windows.  I had no idea.  Actually, I was talking to one of the head librarians this afternoon, and he had no idea either. 

So, I decided to work from one of our cubicles today.  On Twitter I started to list all the pluses and minuses of working in that space: we have wonderfully bright light and full wireless signal, and all the windows were open meaning that we had a lot of fresh air.  I did a whole lot of research that I've been putting off, because it was so easy to go and grab more books.  However, it also meant that I spent far too much time gazing outside at the nice view (this is not a problem in my basement-suite home office) and it got really cold when the wind picked up.  And the construction site is right next to the building, and so I had to use my iPod to drown out the "beep beep beep" of the giant trucks.  Also, I had to have Chris come and pick me up because I ended up bringing home half the library. 

I'd say that today went well.  I got a ton of work done, and while I shouldn't work there every day, I think this will be a good summer. 

My weird writing habits

I've been stuck for the past few days.  I wrote out all the ideas I had for this chapter, in disjointed paragraphs, and found myself stuck after having written just a little over seven pages.  And then that was it.  I couldn't think of what else to do, and I was dissatisfied with the seven pages I had written, knowing that there was so much more to say on each little point I made, and yet unsure of where to even start. 

And then, for the past few days, there wasn't even the staccato, over-thought, under-developed writing.  I was just stuck.  I did some reading to try to figure out secondary materials that I could work in to what I've already written, but I couldn't get past this vague feeling of frustration about the chapter as a whole.

But today, while I was walking to the bus, I started trying to figure out how I could discuss one movie that I hadn't discussed yet.  And then I realised how it fit together with everything in the chapter.  And then I realised that this movie ties the whole chapter together, and that I should start the chapter by discussing it. 

And that's how I ended up writing a page and a half of my dissertation in my wee purse notebook.  Most of it was written on my short bus ride to the University, and then I developed the rest while I was sitting after my allergy shot.  I came home and typed it up, and then spent some time moving around the rest of the chapter so that it all worked.  I came up with some more to say, and started writing it this afternoon, but then I stopped at an obvious place where I can begin tomorrow. 

It's funny how I'm right back at the same place I was when I started this blog, and learning the same lessons all over again: sometimes I just need to break out of the routine so that I can get the creative part of my mind working.

The Verdict (aka More Meat-Blogging)

I tried the Simply Recipes method for roast beef, using the eye of round cut, and it was ridiculously good.  It was so tender and the gravy was so good that I keep going back and sneaking extra little pieces out of the fridge.  Seriously: wow wow wow. 

Also, it was really fun making little wedges of garlic and putting them in incisions all over the roast. 

In other words: Stamp of Approval!  (In other other words: Mom, try this recipe.)

****

In other news, what is it with Friday evenings and my dissertation?  For the second Friday evening in a row, I've suddenly had better writing ideas than I've had all week, sat down and made a bunch of progress.  I'm not complaining; I just wish I could get this kind of work done during the daytime. 

Struggling Through

I've spent this week getting back into a routine. My routine got thrown off for a while: Geoffy visited, and then I was really sick for more than a week, and then my parents visited. I got work done during that time (I found and translated a new-to-me German primary source, and then adapted many of my plans for my dissertation in light of what I found with this source). However, I didn't keep to a regular schedule, I didn't work at my desk, and (most importantly) I didn't add any words to my chapter. For a few weeks.

Somehow, it was intimidating to get back into chapter-writing. It was also intimidating getting back to working seriously at my desk, somehow. I kept remembering all the lost time (and forgetting the well-spent time), and then old "But this is a CHAPTER! For my DISSERTATION!" anxiety came creeping back.

And so I broke it into manageable chunks. The first day, my goal was just "I need to have written something by the end of the day." And so (after much gnashing of teeth) I re-read what I'd already written, found a place where I hadn't finished a thought, and finished off a couple of paragraphs, adding a few thoughts here and there. And I built from there. This week I've been taking the "I just need to write a little bit" approach, and I just realised that it's been working: I've doubled the size of my chapter this week by approaching it little by little. (Of course, my chapter is still in the place where it's not so difficult to double its size, but give me that victory for now, please.)

And now let's see if I can write a little more today. Maybe today I'll try to build up some more momentum.

Weimar at the high school level

My friend Derek, who is the English and Social Studies teacher at Chris's school, has asked me to do a guest lecture about Germany's Weimar Republic for his Grade 12 History class on Friday morning. Being me, I volunteered to come back on Monday morning and talk with the class about 1929-1933 (he was planning on do that on his own, but 1929-1933 is my comfort zone and I can't stop talking about it anyway).

It's an interesting challenge for me. I've done an awful lot of "Introduction to Weimar" guest lectures in 100- and 200-level survey courses, but I need to make sure I don't just treat this like it's a university course. Yes, this is roughly the same age group as I get in many 100-level courses (especially on this young campus of mine). And, since it's a non-required course and a private school, they're paying to be there just as much as my university students are. But here, I'm not resting in the knowledge that a high school teacher has at least given them a cursory introduction and they've at least seen the pictures of Germans carrying around banknotes in wheelbarrows. I'm that cursory introduction.

One of the biggest challenge is the fact that I'm dealing with provincial-government-set Prescribed Learning Outcomes, and the knowledge that these kids are going to have to write a standardized government final exam on this material. Because this is new to me, there's this part of me that's scared I'm going to miss something important because I'm focusing too much on stuff that's interesting or important to me.

Of course, that fear is irrational, because Derek has told me what I need to make sure I cover. But it's unfamiliar territory for me. However, I know that it'll be fun. I know the whole group already, and on the second day we're all going to recite together the most important words that I want them to remember: "Hitler was never democratically elected to power." I'm going to have it written up in big block letters on a PowerPoint slide (I'm using PP just for pictures and German names) and we're going to say it all together a couple of times.

We're also going to have a twenty minute question period at the end of both classes, and I'm going to encourage them to ask me everything they've wanted to know. Because if I can prevent a couple of kids from becoming future People Who Make Ignorant Claims About Hitler on the Internet, my work here is done.

As an added bonus, beyond that small block of teaching time, I'll be trapped for two solid business days in a comfortable and quiet work space, far from my phone and internet, with nothing but my dissertation for company. And there's nothing like talking about my work with a non-specialist audience for getting me thinking about my writing in new ways.

New Printer!

Yesterday, I sat down Chris and all but gave him a PowerPoint presentation on "Why We Are Buying A New Printer This Week." I showed him exactly the one we should get (and that it's on sale this week), showed him that we actually can afford to buy one right now (thanks in part to our recent frugality with food, and in part to some extra paycheques he just got), and told him that if I have to print off multiple drafts of my dissertation using his old printer (which he got for pretty nearly free six or seven years ago), I'm going to throw it through a window.

I don't know if I've stated this here before, but I hate our current printer. (Actually, I usually refer to it as "Chris's printer" when it starts acting up.) It can hold roughly 15 pages at a time, and every five pages it accidentally grabs two pages and then prints part on both of them. And goes out of alignment frequently. And its default is set to "A4" instead of "8 1/2x11", and I keep trying to change the default, and it keeps going back. And replacing both cartridges costs more than the entire printer originally did. I used this printer to print off my complete MA thesis, and it took me a full day and ruined several pages. And then my department secretary deemed the whole thing to be unusable, had it printed off professionally and made my mom (who was dealing with things on the Regina end) pay for it.

So far, I've been emailing my work to my supervisor, but then he prints it off and makes comments by hand, and then I feel guilty about wasting his ink and paper. I'd rather submit hard copies to him, if he's going to be commenting by hand. I know it's using a lot of paper, but I sometimes also like to edit using a hard copy; I catch more mistakes when I'm not staring at a computer screen.

When I went looking at printers, I discovered that most companies have been phasing out their single-purpose inkjet printers, and replacing them with multi-function units. I used to have a multi-function Canon; when the printer broke, the scanner became all buggy because the whole unit was freaked out about the printer. I already have a new scanner that I like, and I'd rather have my components separate. (It drives me crazy that everything's moving towards multifunction units. If I want to spend a hundred dollars, I'd rather have one good printer than a sub-par printer, scanner and fax machine.) (Sorry about that rant.)

And so I did some phoning around today, and now have a Canon Pixma iP4700 set aside for me. It's funny to me that I ended up picking out a photo printer, but it's competent with document printing and has a duplexer, and so I'm going to be able to do double-sided printing for my drafts. And it holds significantly more than 15 pages at a time! Huzzah! (As a bonus, I'll be able to hook my camera up to the printer and print directly from the camera, if I was so inclined.)

As another bonus, Chris completely agreed with me that it's time to replace the printer. I didn't even have to bust out the PowerPoint slides.

Five small reflections on my week

These could have five small blog posts, but I kept procrastinating. And so you get them all at once.

One

We took the KitchenAid mixer to the repair guy today. We pulled up to a 1950s-or-earlier house, and went up to the little door under the carport. And I mean "little": it was probably only about five feet tall and we had to crouch to get into the shop; the door had a laminated sign, stuck on with thumbtacks. We were greeted by a grey-haired man and ushered into a low-ceilinged shop full of tools and little boxes with hand-written labels that said things like "ball bearings". The repair man (who calls himself "Tom," but is called "Tommy" by everyone I've met) was straightforward and helpful, and said that he'd phone first if it turned out to be an expensive part that needed replacing.

As we walked to the car, Chris said, "He was the friendliest of the hobbits." And then said that he would love to have a shop like that (albeit with higher ceilings).

Two

I went to a Christian-graduate-student small group this week, and there I met a fellow PhD student from my department, whom I'd never met before. And he's in his second year. Everyone was all, "Oh well of course you both probably know each other, considering the fact that you share an office..." I've heard his name before, and he knows a few of my friends, but I've somehow gone for a year and a half without meeting one of our PhDs. I should probably show up on campus a little more often.

(It was really funny, because we were all talking about how easy it is to become completely isolated on campus, and how most of us have only met people in our own department since we've moved here. But apparently I haven't even met everyone who shares my office!)

Three

I find myself fascinated by the Microsoft OneNote website, and all the information about the newest version of Office being released this year. I seriously love that program; I spend more time using it than I do Word, because it works as if I had a stack of notebooks for my research and my comps reading notes, but also all my recipes and notes-to-self, but searchable and not a complete mess (as my life was when I was relying on physical notebooks).

I find it strange that I am rhapsodizing about a Microsoft product, while all my friends and family seem to be going full-out Apple. (I was amused when I found a Lifehacker review saying the same thing, but in more detail.)

Four

I went a little overboard on the "but if we buy four it's cheaper!" school of grocery shopping today. Does anyone have a good recipe that calls for chickpeas? (Other than hummus? I already have a good one of those.) I find myself with five cans of chickpeas. And so very many cans of whole tomatoes.

Five

I went to a talk given by a huge name in my field (seriously: he changed everything). It's nice to find out that someone who is your hero is also a nice person. (I also found out from a friend that another Big Name has a "prickly" personality, and this I find funny.)

It was also good to take off the "Writing My Dissertation" cardigan and put on my "Going to a Conference" blazer, and think of myself as a little bit ambitious for a while. (And stop mentally putting the word "just" in front of my description of my research.)