Freedom

The fact that I am finally finished with my masters hasn’t sunk in yet. I handed in the final assignment yesterday, after I had a surprise lunch with Miss A, (always a pleasure even if I did leave her drooling over cake memories). I’m not sure what I was expecting as I put the assignment in the box. It’s not like a fanfare is usually played, but it was all a bit anticlimactic. 

I came home, read two more books, and went about my business. Even after getting up this morning it still doesn’t feel like it’s over. If doesn’t even feel like I’m on holiday or something. It’s all rather strange. Perhaps after three years of studying it’s going to take a little while for my body/brain to adjust.

Miss R wants to celebrate me finishing with a lunch or dinner with everyone, since I refuse to go to graduation. I refuse to sit there for 2 or more hours bored out of my skull so they can get my name wrong and hand me my piece of paper that says I’m a Master. They can post it to me. I’d much rather eat with my friends.

Now that I am free we can start planning the zombicide event. Not exactly sure where we are going to have it or when. I am going to spend the morning unpacking the box while the washing machine serenades me. Uni may be over but chores are forever.

Halfway peoples

Ok, I’ve been slack. Not just a little slack, but on an epic scale. Since semester finished I’ve been spending more and more time away from my laptop. Time that has been channelled into far more pleasurable activities, like seeing my friends and reading. Always reading. This slackness has meant that I didn’t print my reading list for May or June, something that I have now rectified.

With the countdown to my final semester I have started getting things into order. I’m in front for my reading, which is a good thing. Today being the 1^st of July, and day 183, I am quite pleased that I am currently reading book 187. It’s all downhill from here. I realise that in lots of way this challenge has taken over this blog. The last few posts have been little but my reading lists. It would be easy to think that it has taken over the rest of my life too. But it hasn’t really. 

I don’t go out any more or less than I would if I wasn’t reading. I can honestly say that I haven’t missed out on doing anything with friends, or going places with Miss R. I don’t entertain any less, or see fewer movies (though there hasn’t exactly been a wealth of stuff worth seeing). In fact the only thing I do less of is watch tv. Which, in the grand scheme of things, I can’t take that as a bad thing.

On the baking front I finally sourced chestnut flour for my wheat/gluten free baking. It’s first outing as part of a vegan chocolate pumpkin cake was a success. I plan on consuming the last of it with a bowl of warm custard after dinner.

I’m running a second photobooks class on Tuesday morning, and have managed to pick up a few extra shifts, so the bank a/c is slowly recovering from the chunk my rego took out of it. Work also paid for my first aid course. I expect my certificate in the mail any day now. 

The quest for full time work continues. There are possibilities with the opening of the new library in September, but council is still looking over the positions. In the end what they decide will come down to money. I don’t want to leave my library, but it’s hard to live on only 17.5 hrs a week.

Maybe Miss R and I should open that dessert home delivery business …

A year to the day …

Given my busy schedule, with the baking/shopping/working, and of course Skyrim, it’s hard to believe that I actually had time to notice that a year has passed since that fateful afternoon I spent with Ms L. But I did. In truth it’s hard not remember, given that it coincided with my brother’s birthday. Well technically it was the day before. The fallout started on his birthday. 

So, a year on, where are we? Nowhere.

Whatever friendship there might have been is long since dead. Sad, but such is life. I’ll be honest, part of me is still disappointed at how things turned out. I extended the olive branch more than once, but got nothing back. Given that we are in the same profession, and in the same city, I had hoped we could at least have parted amicably. Nothing makes a conference or industry event more awkward than being introduced to someone who would quite happily scratch your eyes out (I know this from experience, but that’s a story for another time). While the situation hasn’t presented itself yet, I am aware of the possibility, and have prepared a response accordingly.

Long ago I mastered the ancient art of civility. I don’t often practice it outside of work, mostly because my friends accept me for the cranky bastard that I am, but it is a skill I possess. I harbour Ms L no ill will. So if our paths cross, I will smile and nod, engage in polite conversation (if the situation calls for it), and then be on my way.

But I won’t be offering gingerbread. That’s only for my peoples.

I’m free, I’m free

It’s official. Uni is over for the year. To celebrate I sat down and read a whole book in one day. How I have missed reading for pleasure. That is not to suggest that I haven’t enjoyed most of what I read for uni this semester, just that it is nice to read a book written for adults, not teenagers, and non-fiction.

I’m up to date with the new series of Dr Who. The new Elder Scrolls game ‘Skyrim' is released in just under 3 weeks, so I’m afraid I’ll be useless for about a week (must game). The last two books in my Robotech series finally arrived. I can now read all 21 in the order they were intended. I’m driving Ms P and friend to the airport on Thursday. Other than work, I won’t be doing anything for the rest of the week. Instead I will be using the time to prepare myself for the onslaught of November. Busy month ahead.

I’m looking forward to the gatherings, but there will be heaps to do. I’ve been asked to make my killer coconut ice for the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party, in rainbow colours no less. I’m thinking of being ridiculously creative, but won’t mention it to anyone on the off chance I get too busy and don’t get time to follow through.

Miss R is making her eggplant dish for the BBQ, but I haven’t decided what I’m going to make yet. I have to work that morning, so I’m limited to making something that will be fine to eat the day after making. I’ll have to spend some time with my cookbooks. And of course there’s the Turducken.

I should make it very clear that I am baking because I want to, not because I have to. The Italian in me is all about expressing love through food. Miss R is the same, even if most of what I make is sugar related. 

We all know I’m not sweet enough on my own.

Uni break

I have done very little this past week. Other than work I’ve left the house to go out to dinner a few times (once with the in-laws, and the other to a friend’s place), to the blood bank (got my special 100 donations pin last time), and to the book sale at the showgrounds. 

Not terribly riveting stuff, but that’s the speed I’m happy with for the moment. There have been the extra shifts at work, which are always nice. There have been more resignations at work too, so I imagine that will also mean more work. Ms M got the uni job we both interviewed for. I haven’t seen her, or had a chance to congratulate her yet. I’m glad she got it, even though it means I have to keep job hunting.

Now that I no longer have assignments I’ve been spending less time on my laptop. The few times I do get on I play Oblivion for a few hours and then turn it off. As much as I love my laptop I’m enjoying not being tethered to it.

While I hate the idea of any bookstore closing (even as much as I have good reason to hate A&R), I will admit that I profited from their death throes sale. Twenty books later and I’ve got plenty to read. When you include in the last lot of items I liberated from the withdrawn bin I’ve got a lot of cataloguing to do.

Most importantly I have time for baking again. I’m thinking about a chocolate brownie cheesecake on Monday. Will have to see how I feel after we’ve hit the art galleries. Heide have an exhibition of Albert Tucker’s Images of Modern Evil series, and Miss R has been bugging me about their Colour Bazaar since February. Fingers crossed it won’t rain on us while we are outside. I can live with the cold, but cold and wet is rarely fun :)

coma slice

My biggest complaint with study is the homework. I love the learning, but the homework sucks. When I think that I've got another 12 months before I finish my Masters ... well, I try not to think about it. While everyone (mostly) was enjoying their break I was fighting with my archiving assignment. Going back to work on Wednesday it soon became apparent that I was the only one who hadn't spent the break in a sugar induced coma.

So to address this I decided to spend my Sunday correcting this. Thus the coma slice was born. I've put all the photos on flickr, so if you really want to know what went into it you can go there. I will put one pic up here. There are more on Facebook.

 

Don't ask me how much I've eaten. Most of it is gone now. I'm taking the last of it to work and the bloodbank. If you see your local librarian zooming around the library they may be running on coma slice. Just don't make any sudden moves. :)

indoor picnic

I love my friends. No really, I have awesome friends. I could try and list all the ways that they are awesome, but that would just make everyone else sick with jealousy or depressed that my friends aren’t their friends. It’s all true.

This afternoon’s picnic is an example of what happens when you put us all together:

• Miss A’s lentil and chickpea surprise (one of the few things I could eat, stupid body),
• Mr T (no, not that mister T) dates, cheeses, olives, crackers, tasty looking cob loaf (stuffed with lots of things I could eat, and one that I couldn’t),
• Miss J’s chicken pasta bake,
• Miss K’s zucchini slice (definitely something I can’t eat),
• Ms H’s fresh and hot non-denominational buns (with serious amounts of butter).
• Mr N provided the chocolate and walnut cookies, and I made my spicy Cajun capsicum, cheese, and corn loaf.

Lots and lots of food. Of course it’s not the food that makes my friends awesome. It’s more the loyalty, understanding, and the fact that no level of geekiness is too great (though four of us singing the “popcorn song” and could name the two games it was the theme music for was a very geeky moment). It's nice knowing that your friends will back you. They don't need you to explain. They are just there, no matter what.

It is shame that we don’t manage to spend more time together, but we have a few things to look forward to:

• Thor,
• Captain America,
• The Zoo (our gang of roving librarians [and a few non-librarians, we don't discriminate] will be enjoying ourselves, but are still prepared to leap in to action, correcting parents that are filling their children’s brains with rot),
• And a final Harry Potter marathon before Deathly Hallows pt2 is released. (I particularly like the idea of hiring the whole cinema for a bunch of us, but don’t know that we’ll actually go that far).

But first we have to survive work/uni, which means more assignments/hours/PhD proposal. Wonder if I can get zombies into my disaster management plan ...