Third Run

Run #3 down!

It’s only been a couple of weeks or so since the half marathon, and already my body has returned to pre-training hermit mode. Running the meager 2.5 miles I just returned from felt like a challenge and a half. The main thing missing was motivation. When you run when you want to, the motivation is there. Either because you splurged and got a pizza (and ate the whole thing…) that week or because you’re training for something. While my new project does take away excuses, it does not necessarily replace them with motivation.

The run I chose today was a bit hilly and one I hated during marathon training. On the hills I just imagine everyone I pass cheering me on and saying, you’re almost to the top, don’t stop! It’s cheesy, but helpful!

One reason for the lack of motivation today stems from the lack of sleep last night. As a birthday surprise The Professor took me away to camp for a night in a nice park an hour from the city. It’s been about a year since we camped last and were both unable to get used to the hard ground and did not sleep at all. (The Professor means well but does not always plan in detail. Among things left at home was my sleeping bag and food. This did not stop him from surprising me with breakfast in bed tent of doughnut holes and tea, boiled in bowls for lack of mugs.) Fast forward to a powernap this afternoon in my big, comfy bed and I hit the road for my third day of running!

2011 Can Bite Me

There are a lot of reasons that bloggers close their computers and disappear for a while. A move. A big life change. Apathy. All of these things happened to me. Not that I was a barrel of sunshine and happiness in the first few months of 2011, but after my holding pattern came to an end and I was preparing to move and start a new job 2011 actually got worse. A couple weeks after moving I went through a major family tragedy. My beloved grandmother died after a long struggle with heart failure. I had taken care of her for the past ten years and with her passing my life shifted in a major way. During this time my entire family leaned on me for support and I found myself withdrawing from certain things, like this project and my husband and eating well and brushing my hair and wearing pants when I didn't need to.

Baby Girl and I  (her Godmother) at her baptism

I won't dwell, although I'm sure it will come up in the future. I started hating 2011. This year brought me unemployment, death, and near death of loved ones, funerals, and financial strain. I tried to focus on the one great thing from 2011, my niece (Baby Girl,) who I started to call our angel and our blessing. She was born two weeks before the roller coaster started going up and down and holding on to her during a lot of the darker times made life seem worth it all. (Yes, this is a pretty heavy post for a welcome back!)

I would sit with my computer open searching for way to update this community or to fake happiness and blog about cooking (which I had stopped doing) or activities (which I had also stopped doing.) But I couldn't quite bring myself to do it and I explained before, once you stop something it is harder each day to pick it back up again.

Now for the light at the end of the tunnel! 2011 ended. It was a very symbolic New Years Eve for me. I jumped into the shower at 11:50pm on the last day of 2011 and stepped out into 2012, clean and ready to turn it all around. My grief had attributed to an extra 30 pounds on my short frame and I was determined to take care of that. The Professor and I signed up for a half marathon. We trained hard each week. I started cooking again, and cooking healthy. I unpacked our apartment (something I had avoided due to having to clean out my Grandmother's home and constantly finding her letters among my things.) We started actually exploring our new city. I adopted a puppy, Lil' Bit. My marriage became stronger. I was ready to hit the ground running.

Let's Talk About My Hat

Lately there has been a lot of chat concerning hats, and for good reason. There has been a royal British wedding and then came the Kentucky Derby. Hats are everywhere. I'm glad. I've been saying for a while we should bring hats back into fashion in this country. Maybe I say this because I look awesome in hats and I wish to accomplish my own selfish goals of wearing more hats? Maybe.

I inherited a large collection of vintage hats, which I grew up wearing and still wear to this day. Only when I moved to England did I start appreciating contemporary hats and all they have to offer. They are, in their own right, throw-backs with a modern twist. And naturally I bought too many.

One such lovely is depicted above, on yours truly. I stumbled across it while perusing M&S and had to have it. Unfortunately it was very close timing to our big cross-Atlantic move and I was a bit worried about how it would emigrate to America. But, like always, I ignored these worries and bought the hat, enjoying it (and a pimms!) on the one remaining day of sun in Britain that I can remember.

Far too soon my new hat was boxed up, with the best of care, and shipped to New York to live in said box for a couple months until we could be reunited. And it felt good.

Another fantastic hat

However when packing for the 7 month temporary move to rural Georgia, I did not pack the hat. We would only be there a couple months. I would find a job in no time. Then the hat would be moved to our new location. It was coming up on winter anyway. All of these reasons failed me when, in early March, it became very warm in Georgia and for this northerner, very very sunny. I missed my hat. But, I was convinced I would soon be employed.

Very similar to my lovely British hat

 I then gave in and cheated on my hat. It had been months and no job. It was sunny. I was in San Antonio, it was 95 degrees of Texas heat and I needed a hat. Luckily I was in Texas where the hat still reigns and found a fantastic sun hat (photos to come). I thought surely my job search is hopeless and I will be lucky if I ever see my British hat again. While my new hat was a comfort, it was not my long lost colorful English hat and when the opportunity came last weekend for my mother to bring me some clothing to my sister's baby shower, I jumped on the opportunity to have the hat back in my life. This of course meant my mother had to wear my floppy love on the plane. The images in my mind from this adventure were just an added bonus.

So hat and head are reunited once again, hopefully never to part.

Punting at Oxford

Punting instructions

The Professor and The Defunct Curator enjoying an afternoon of punting-watching in Oxford.

Speaking of hats... Since our trip to Oxford last summer I've been in search of a woman's Oxford punting hat. It's similar to the man's hat but with a more feminine ribbon. While watching the punters (we did not ourselves punt) I fell, once again, in love with these straw, historic hats. Are you in search of a new summer hat?

Man's punting hat

Crazy For You

After a long weekend working dawn to dust towards a deadline, The Professor has a few days off, which means I get to enjoy the 1.5 hour slog to work all by my lonesome. One silver lining of our holding pattern and our commute is that we got to spend more time together than most couples, three hours a day in the car, then all our evenings (which granted, after we got out of the car, were short) together as well. Today was weird and made me realize how lucky I am to have a partner I desperately want to spend every waking moment with.

Well, that sounded crazy. But maybe that's what I am, crazy for him. When we were first together we lived over 1,000 miles apart and were lucky to see each other once a month for a few, fleeting days. We'd fall asleep on the phone. All I wanted was to be together. Then we got our chance, moved to England and never looked back.

When we're apart, this song reminds me of The Professor. It also makes me want to be swinging on a hammock near a body of water while drinking something delicious. With The Professor of course. I also love Adele and listened to this album on my lonely way to work this morning.

I think space apart is important but I also think we've had our fair share of time apart. We respect each others' needs for personal space. We both do our own thing. But we just really like spending time together. We've both said we could be that couple that could work together and maybe one day we will. As of now we newlyweds are just enjoying being completely and utterly in love with one another.

Still Waiting

No news is good news. That common expression can’t really be applied to the job search. On one hand if you have not yet been told anything, there is still hope that the answer will be yes. On the other hand, if you have not been told anything, realistically, the job was most likely offered to someone else who is now weighing their options and deciding to take it or not. You might be able to get the offer, the sloppy seconds, if they turn it down.

So in my mind, no news is definitely bad news. And I am still waiting, no news in hand, no way of knowing to head north or south. No reason to put down roots anywhere. The waiting game has been, by far, with each new opportunity the worst aspect of this holding pattern.

Back to the quest. After my horrible interview in D.C. we enjoyed a fantastic birthday dinner, where I allowed myself to eat many calories, before jumping in the car and heading north once more to the city of brotherly love. Little Miss Dirty Martini (as named by Little Miss Can’t Be Wrong) met us outside her very college-like residence (one large room, small kitchen, futon) and I loved every square inch of it. It was real life. I miss that. I would trade this entire cottage for her slice of real life any day.

We enjoyed late-night birthday spring rolls (made by her own hands!) and had our usual conversations, and by that I mean we talked about everything and deeply. I’ve missed these talks, which face to face are so much better. I realized I miss all my friends and see how isolated I’ve been, surrounded by The Professor’s family and friends, but never my own.

In the morning we head out to Reading Terminal Market, by far one of my favorite places of all time. Then it is GPS time as we needed to head into New Jersey and find the last interview, which went really well (too bad it’s not for an open position, just for networking.)

That night Little Miss Can’t Be Wrong burst through the door and we were all reunited again. These past few years I’ve felt like the silent idiot girl in all their adventures. I’ve always been out of the picture. School, fellowships, and The Professor have guided where I end up, how much free time I have, and what I do. Now, finally, when it is up to me to decide, and I want nothing more than to live close to what I call “my people” I can’t. What’s holding me back now is the job market and the utter desolation to my prospects.

Staying positive and chipper, we all go out to the best restaurant I’ve been to in ages. That’s the thing about living in the middle of nowhere and having little to no money, a huge lack of good food. Being a foodie I’ve missed that life so much. We went to Amada, Jose Garcia’s tapas place, and I fell in love. It became a mini-birthday gathering and I tried to soak up as much of the moment as possible. I was in Philadelphia. I was with my friends. I had The Professor by the side. All was well.

"what to do when you hate your husband pony tail"

Blogger is a curious little friend. It records blog stats. It tells you what search terms brought visitors to your blog. Above is one such search term which led one lucky reader here, where they were no doubt enlightened by the very mundane musings of my rural existance.

It made me smile to read this search term. Then it made me think.

What do you do when you hate something about your husband. OK, that's harsh. Maybe not hate but maybe despise-so-hard-and-it-gets-under-your-skin-and-makes-you-scrunch-up-your-face-dislike? This reader was so desperate she turned to Google to find a ponytail solution. We all have annoying little traits. I crack my knuckles. I know. It's disgusting. Even I think it's disgusting. The Professor doesn't seem to notice. I also sing along to every song on the radio that I might know some semblance of. That could also be annoying. The Professor says he finds it endearing. I leave half full (or half empty I suppose) water glasses all over the house. The Professor silently collects them and never scolds me for it.

Why then do I want to scratch out my own eyeballs at two of The Professor's irritating quarks? So minuscule in importance are these habits that most good people would never notice. First, he has become the Bing commercial. Queries of all shapes and sizes result in the whipping out of his droid to not only answer your rumination, but to tell you a million other semi-related facts that you never, ever wanted to know. Like how many Six Flag theme parks there are in the country. Or what states they are all in. When all you did was wonder out loud was if Sea World was in Florida.

While the Bing-like death grip The Professor has on his phone is annoying, it's not as worrisome as the second habit that I hope to, somehow, stop. The Professor is very intelligent. He is well educated and knowledgeable about a wide-range of subjects and can hold his own in any discourse. However, he says "like" far, far too much. It was brought to my attention only recently by my sister who noticed it spreading to my vernacular. I have since squashed my use of the useless filler word, but have sense overwhelmingly noticed it with The Professor. So what is there to do when you hate your husband's pony tail, or in my case need to address a speech issue which will shape how others see him in his profession?

Sidebar; When The Professor commits every so often to growing out his beautiful curls long enough to put his hair back, I don't find it the least bit annoying but actually quite sexy. His Scotishness comes out and it is quite delightful. Unfortunately the longer hair the higher the maintenance, and my low-maintenance Professor can only handle this look for about a week before he shaves it all off again. Sigh.

You Cut My Dog, I Cut You!

OK, that’s extreme. But we had a pretty extreme evening here at the cottage. Our pup was once again attacked by the roving neighbor dogs, which now number three (there is a new one) and still no owners in sight.

She held her own, and we’re pretty sure (or The Professor is, who ran into the whole mess) that she won. But she’s nursing some pretty deep cuts and I’m in complete mommy nurse mode.

Also I’m in angry-mommy-I’m-going-to-take-you-down mode as well. This is about the fourth time this has happened, but the worst case so far. The Evil Dogs, as I call them, used to stay in their own yard, even though I’ve rarely seen them attended. Recently they come into our land and harass our sweet pup.

The Professor, who has been a dog owner his whole life, while pup is my first and only canine, assures me that pup is OK. He says she can nurse herself better than we could (which didn’t stop me from cleaning her up,) and if the wounds still look bad in a couple days we’ll take her to the vet.

What could ever harm such a pup!

I’ll just brag about her a little more.

Pup loves mud. And digging holes. And getting muddy.

Pup hates her dog house and never used it.

She contemplates and thinks deep. About things like how to play with ducks. And why the ducks don’t want to play with her.

Pup likes to go hiking.

Pup really likes to go hiking. It makes her smile.

Pup likes to swim too. She even has fun doing it when I make her wear her adorable life jacket. Even though she doesn’t need to wear it anymore.

She is pretty much perfect.

For Love of the Weekend: Total Win; Total Fail.

This weekend was a curious little creature. It was long, as The Professor and I both took off on Friday. It was sunny and warm, with temperatures reaching 78 sizzling degrees (for us Northern girls, them's beach temperatures.) There was also a mix of ups and downs, making this past weekend a true example of convergence.

First, my job search claimed another fatality (besides that of my soul.) My baby toe was crushed in a door as I ran to answer my interviewer's phone call, which was twenty minutes early, thus my failure at being prepared (total fail). Although I screamed obscenities and writhed in severe pain, I rallied to answer the phone with a cheerful "Good morning!" After my hour spent in preparation, my nervous twitching, and my balmy palms, the call actually informed me that due to extreme business, my interview would have to be pushed back six hours (fail.)*

Rearranging my day, I did my weekly weigh-in and discovered I had lost 5% of my body weight, an initial goal (total win!) Which was followed by me leaving the house commenting, "I'm sure I can get around the grocery store, how bad can this pinky toe thing be anyway. It's just a pinky toe!" Total fail. My sad, pathetic self wallowed around in the local grocery, limping here, throwing my body there. Apparently the pinky toe is quite important in functioning, and balancing, and, you know, standing upright. People looked worried for me, like I had escaped some sort of caretaker.

Saturday I have deemed hide-away-day due to The Professor and I lying to anyone who asked and saying we had busy, busy and important plans for Saturday and could not attend any number of social engagements. This is because we are tired. We've been gone almost every weekend. And we drive three hours on the week days. Every day. So we spent a lazy day around the house (total win!) Well, I mostly limped around and ever so slowly cleaned (total fail) while I made sad, puppy faces, whining too much which resulted in The Professor enjoying taking care of me a bit (total win!)

When one lives in the middle of nowhere, one prepares for a day of errands like a soldier might prepare for battle. You need to rev yourself up. Play loud music. Pretend the car ride is actually fun. The hour long car ride. The hour it takes to get from your personless plot of land to the oh-so-over-populated 10 mile long stretch of horrifying plazas. After church and lunch we had only two tasks at hand. Get The Professor's car washed as we had a free coupon and go to Pet Smart. But first we had to get gas. Being adorably anal, The Professor demanded I hand over any trash from under my seat of the car (where's a girl supposed to shove her granola bar wrappers?) and he threw them away.

After what seemed like an entire lifetime we made all the necessary u-turns and plaza short cuts to come to the car wash but, EPIC FAIL NUMBER 1: The Professor accidentally threw away the coupon with my garbage. The decision: to trash dive or to not trash dive? I am not proud of us for this. But this was an exterior AND interior car wash, with buff and shine! Who can pass up a free buff and shine just because in the twenty minutes it took you to cross the highway someone could have thrown God-knows-what on top of your beloved coupon? We spent another twenty minutes returning. The Professor braved the public rubbish bin and produced the slightly dampened coupon (which I refused to touch.)

After the car wash (total win!) we completed our PetSmart run, with me pushing a shopping cart just to keep up appearances and not unseemly limp around, thus scaring all the small children. The task at hand: pick out a new collar for our beloved dog. EPIC FAIL NUMBER 2: After returning home (another entire hour in the car, during which we had to stop and get iced tea because that's how long the drive was) and painstakingly removing all pup's tags and putting them on the new collar, we discover the collar is much too large for our petite pup. Oh the horror. The Professor's face goes into melt-down mode. We must return next weekend and repeat the entire experience (except, I hope, for the bin diving.) During a slight (sort of massive) hissy-fit, The Professor rolled his ankle and is at this point also limping like a pathetic broken toy.

How could I possibly rescue such a failure of a weekend? The answer: BRINNER! Apparently not wanting anything our kitchen had to offer, I produced (using all of The Professor's gram's cottage pantry) pancakes, scrambled eggs, and fortune cookies. Our spirits brightening, we limp-danced around the kitchen to some favorite music, remembering how blessed we are and how beautiful the love of the weekend can be.

*I know jinxes are not real, but I'd rather not test it out. Thus I probably won't discuss my job interview until I hear something. Better safe than unemployed.

For Love of the Weekend: Cottage Shelter

I love animals. I have three of my very own (well, I share them with The Professor.) Today has been a surreal experience with a stray dog and a possibly dying baby squirrel (let the choirs of awwwwwww’s began.)

Early this morning my dog went absolutely crazy for seemingly no reason. As I’ve said before, this has been going on at all hours of the day and night, specifically the night, and we’re determined that a homeless dog nests itself outside our bedroom window and whines. We’ve even found the nest of leaves. But we’ve never captured the dog. Our plan was always to find it, take its tag, and report its unfavorable activities to its owner. Of course, we never thought its owner would be an awesome example of a human being, since they didn’t let their dog indoors on the coldest winter night in Georgia (read: 22 degrees Fahrenheit.)

This morning, as The Professor enjoyed a lay in, I spotted the white dog from our porch window as our dog once again went completely ape shit. I ran outside, sans shoes, and discerned that the pooch was quite amenable to being friendly. While my dog hopped around excitedly, I ran back and forth between the house and the yard getting things like a collar (as, it turned out, the dog had none,) some shoes, and dog treats to trick it into trusting me. Eventually, with the help of a sleepy Professor, we collared and leashed the dog, and led it into the very large dog pen that is conveniently located on our grounds (for the sake of the 5 dogs owned by The Professor’s parents.)

This dog is ad-ooooooooooor-able. It is also very, very, very dirty. I can not even tell you how many times I’ve washed my hands due to the many, many ticks I’ve pulled from its fur. It has apparently fallen in love with me, and demands constant attention and is very snuggly. With The Professor it cowers and always acts afraid. We have thus determined that it has been abused by a man. It also limps slightly, has not been neutered, and there are no signs that it has ever been brought to a vet or properly cared for.

After printing up flyers and canvassing the lake, which was sort of a fun way to see our neighbors’ little cottages, we met a man who informed us that the county road close to our cottage is a common dumping ground for unwanted pets. He said not to get our hopes up that we will find an owner.

Thus we put the word out that unless someone contacts us from the flyers in the next few days, we have a dog up for adoption. I hate the idea of dropping him off at a shelter (although we’ll research and make sure it’s not one that puts animals down.) We’re just hoping that through our network of family and friends, someone will want to bring him into their home.

As I played fetch with him (who we call, new puppy,) I heard a horrible squealing noise and witnessed our adventure cat leaping from a tree top with something in its mouth. Low and behold, he had stolen a baby squirrel from its mother and nest. Freaking-A. Getting him to drop it was oh so fun, as was keeping all the animals away as I ran inside once again, this time to google what the hell to do with a baby squirrel. Apparently you are never to touch them as they have parasites and other nasty things. So we followed the instructions of the internet (thank you, oh internet,) and put it inside a box, under a tree in hopes the mother will come in the next 1-5 hours to reclaim it. Whoa is me, and our furry household, it’s been quite a day.

*This is not our photo of a baby squirrel. We would never touch a baby squirrel because we believe in the power of google.

Welcome Back

That song has been stuck in my head for the past couple days, "Welcome back, welcome back, welcome back." And it's true, I'm back. Not so much as defunct as before, depending at how you look at it. I've returned to my previous employer in university city, back to museum work, stretching my brain and attempting to remember how to function in the working world.

I do miss going to TJ Maxx whenever I want. But the benefits far outweigh the downsides. Benefits: I get to work, function in the world, collaborate with people, contribute to an exhibition in a curitorial role of sorts once more. Downsides: I have to drive in with The Professor about 1.5 hours each day each way (not that being with The Professor is a downside, far from it, but the drive does suck hard,) the job is not exactly what I wanted (more research assistant than bad ass curator,) I work mainly in a room alone for most the day, I have far less (read: no) free time anymore due to the lengthy drive in and out, it's only temporary thus we can't stop our holding pattern and move on to the next phase of our lives. So still holding, but the landing gear may be coming out just a bit.

And I'm still a bit defunct. Yesterday I could not remember simple words and had problems drafting simple, short object labels, a task I used to be able to complete in my sleep. Apparently my brain has been buried deep beneath watching too many reruns of Grey's Anatomy and reading cookbooks all in between napping and taking random photos of my cats. I really needed to get back to work.

Another plus is I'm able to commit to this project just one month at a time, which means the search for real, fulfilling employment is still on. After about 58 cover letters and rejections I still hold out hope that not all is lost. I could even be coming to a city near you!

Tea for Two

Happy Valentine’s Day, late night edition (if, like me, your late nights start at 8:00pm.) This last weekend was a whirlwind. We only recently got back to our little cottage and I’m only now catching up with you all.

And, it’s Valentine’s Day. As I said before, we’re not big Valentines people, but I do love chocolate and an excuse to have surprises. The Professor left me an adorable handmade card-like-thing on my pillow when we arrived home. I gave him his telegram, which he loved, as well as some Earl Grey and some almond syrup. Why? Because almond earl grey is our new favorite guilty pleasure without the guilt. I discovered it at a small coffee shop one trip into university city and have been sold on them ever since. I introduced The Professor to it just last week and he, also, fell in love. So now we can make them at home, there has already been a mention of almond tea becoming our “house drink” of choice.

Another V-Day surprise? The in-laws came by the cottage while we were away, always a bit terrifying for me as they technically own this place. They dropped off some wine, wine glasses, and chocolates in a pretty display, as well as a pork and apple pie in the fridge (from a recipe I gave, which I’ll surely post eventually.)

How cute. Also, a bit creepy? Just me who thinks so? (However, also strangely reminiscent of the honeymoon basket they gave us, read: lotion, bath oils, candles, wine, subtext: have.sex.with.our.son.)

Well, instead of the wine we opted for two cups of the almond tea tonight, mainly because I’m still nursing a wicked cold that, shocker, a 10 hour car trip twice in four days did not cure.

The chocolates were the Dove hearts, which I love because not only were they dark (the only way to enjoy coco) but also when you open them there are little expressions inside, and with them, my sage wisdom for you. So far we’ve opened:

“Trust with your heart, not your head.”

This is very wise, oh Dove chocolates. Dive in every once in a while. You have a gut instinct, trust it. This goes both ways, meaning kiss that cute guy you just met even though social graces may be shocked, but don’t climb into cars with strange boys.

“Linger over chocolate longer.”

I could not have said it better myself, tiny delicious chocolate I shall now eat. Enjoy things more. And, enjoy things slower. Too often we want a quick fix, something for right now, that we forget that snack we just popped in our greedy, little mouth was actually delicious.

“Be a little mysterious.”

Don’t give it all away. I love being a bit mysterious, with something unknown just under the surface. It’s difficult to turn this tid-bit into advice, because it already states it perfectly, be a little mysterious.

“Exercise your heart today.”

Love hard. Love today. There is someone in your life you can turn to right now and say, I love you, do it. It’ll make you feel good.

Mr. Postman

The Professor and I are hitting the road tomorrow in a strange, obligatory, and yet somehow fun weekend involving him having “man time” with my brother-in-law while my sister and I continue north to DC for some lady time.
Due to this last minute holiday, we’ll be riding back to Georgia on Monday, St. Valentine’s Day. The Professor and I generally do not make a fuss on this very strange day. Not a lot is known about this feast day’s saint but Chaucer did basically invent the secular holiday. And I just can’t deny a good Chaucer invention stemming from courtly love. So we usually do little things, generally baked goods, like cannolis (which are, surprisingly, extremely difficult to find fresh in Georgia.)
In keeping in our Valentine’s tradition of do less, say more (and since it needs to be done before this little trip,) I’ve just finished my V-Day project for The Professor.
I love Western Union telegrams. Working in the archives, seeing how they were used to tell good news, bad news, important news, I just fell in love. I was going to use a service like this one to send one to The Professor. But then I remembered two things. First, we share an address with his parents due to our unique living arrangement here at the cottage (read: no address) and I was not sure if such a shop would keep the messages private or send as a postcard. Second, I am trained as a freaking graphic designer. This would be the easiest project ever. And it was.
I downloaded this blank telegram. Opened it in photoshop and wrote a message using one of my favorite fonts, 1942 report.
I then slightly tilted the text box to give that “just stamped” look. I followed these instructions to size, print, and fold my telegram. I thought of tea-dying it for aging, but I only had twenty minutes, so I just printed on slightly yellowed paper and went about my business.

I finished the whole thing by melting some wax and stamping it shut, and completed the back with a lovebirds stamp I used throughout our wedding planning. Adorable alternative-card finished!