The Mutt's look-alike

Thanks to Puppies and Pancakes, I found the artwork of Sharon Montrose. And among her awesome photos of fabulous animals, I found the fuzzball's long-lost cousin.

The resemblance will be far more obvious to anyone who has personally seen the head-cocked-to-the-side move Gracie does. But, see for yourself.

Exhibit A: my furball
(photo courtesy of the fabulous Kelly Prizel)

Exhibit B: Squeak
(Go on...look at the blog of well-photographed adorable animals)


And now, back to my academic pursuits...

A sticky sweet Friday treat

I love Starbucks' Gingerbread lattes.

I have great memories of the simple pleasure I received from buying one for myself in the middle of a bone-chilling Chicago winter during my first year of teaching. I was a full-time volunteer and I had very little spending money. But on a Saturday, I would occasionally take the train from our gritty west-side neighborhood to the Magnificent Mile. I would stop in to Starbucks, then window-shop all the way up to the top of Michigan Avenue. With a warm, spicy latte in hand, I could pretend that I was just like any other shopper on the street, and escape, if ever so briefly, from the stress of being a first-year inner-city Catholic school teacher living in a convent. (a long story for another time...)

I mentioned this great love to the Mr. last weekend when the urge to find the nutmeggy-latte goodness arose. I bought one, and savored the taste, but lamented the price tag for a tall. Nearly $3.50! Surely there had to be a more affordable way to get my fix?

I tried the Coffeemate gingerbread creamer - only$2.00 for the whole container with a coupon! Alas, nothing about it resembled the lovely latte.

But today, my day off to do grad school work, a box arrived from UPS. It was addressed to the Mr. It came from somewhere called "CoffeExperts" and it *sloshed* when I carried it inside. I called the Mr. at work and asked if I could open it. Inside I found a bottle of liquid happiness - gingerbread syrup!

And so, I sit here, getting ready to polish off my class paper while happily sipping my at-home gingerbread latte. Thank you, my Mr. Thank you for my Friday treat. I love you.

Ick

And now, I'm sick!

Boredom (segue to my existential crisis)

I love many aspects of my life right now: marriage to the Mr., the ever-so-slowly-coming-along renovation of our house, my great girl friends, living close to family, intellectually challenging graduate school classes...these are all great things.

But work...work is boring. It is a job that I dropped into quite by accident. It has a 30 hour work week, a flexible schedule, and tuition remission. I should be happy, right. Bored, and happy.
But, I work in a windowless basement. I answer emails. I keep track of paperwork. I manage data. This is not challenging. It is boring.

The problem stems from this - since college, I have had a job that kicked my a** nearly every day in some way, but always got me excited. For the last five years before this job I taught middle school in the inner-city (or, more precisely, two different inner-cities). I was bone tired at the end of nearly every day, but I felt like I had a role in the world. I was good at what I did and I liked it...most parts...and felt energized by it. Now, I am good at what I do, but so could most people be. I feel no "jazz" about what I do for the world on a daily basis. I am bored.

But, if I gave up being bored and went back to, say, teaching in the inner-city, could I be as intellectually involved in my course work? Would it be worth scaling back to a part time grad-school schedule? What about the toll that kind of work would take on free-time and building a marriage?

What am I doing with myself?

Monday Musings

My thoughts on totally unrelated topics:

1. Though I still really miss living in my quaint city neighborhood, throwing parties in our new house rocks. Our giant kitchen/family room combo is a big as my whole former apartment and WAY more amenable to hosting guests 'round the kitchen counter while cooking. Score 1 for the house in the suburbs. :)

2. Said house is also rockin' for hosting guests. Our first attempt at hosting houseguests = success! And the houseguests themselves are pretty rockin' - they cooked a mean veggie lasagna, brought awesome petite sirah from CA and a tasty, smoky Cab from WA, and made crepes. Yum. Score 2 for the house!

3. The commentary on WaPo articles about Michelle Rhee borders on insane. What do these people DO all day besides write comments on articles? Check out two examples here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/01/AR2009110102318.html?hpid=sec-education

And here:
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/class-struggle/2009/10/rhee_is_right--summer_learning.html

4. I feel old when I try to read long documents/articles/reports on my computer screen. Despite the environmental impact, I find printing and reading documents (and marking them up by hand) far more comfortable. That said, maybe its an eye strain issue...computer screen + fluorescent lights = bad situation for the peepers. Any suggestions on this?

*Also, a question for my two readers: Either one of you know how to shrink the URL of a link to make it less cumbersome? Advice to the internet neophyte would be much appreciated...

House Guests

We're about to host our first houseguests as a married couple. And while they are here, we're throwing our first party as a married couple. And I'm pretty darn excited.
The Mr. and I are both extroverted people, but since the house has been so unfinished and the wedding planning/grad school attending had kept us/me so busy, we haven't been our usual social selves. But now, the hardwoods are in (at least in a few rooms), we've got carpet in our bedrooms, and a fully functioning kitchen. So, with one working bathroom and two happy married folks, bring on the guests!

Animal Question

So, while on the couch last night it somehow came up in conversation that the Mr. has never considered what kind of animal he'd be if he could choose. I wish I could remember the origin of the conversation, but it eludes me.

Nonetheless, I have asked him to seriously ponder this question. He thinks I'm a bit ridiculous and thought he'd outsmart me by claiming that he's like a child in the Golden Compass series and his daemon is ever-changing form. I reminded him that even a child's daemon has a primary form. I am not to be out-smarted. So, he's still working on his answer.

I'd be an otter - a sea otter, more precisely. They're cute, fast, and clever and always seem to be having such fun. That seems like a good life to me!

And you? What animal would you be?

*Pic by Mike Baird from http://www.wildlifenorthamerica.com/Mammal/Sea-Otter/Enhydra/lutris.html