I feel like this is what I look like today. I slept well enough last night, but I can't stop yawning.

Our Memorial Day weekend was a nice combination of productivity and utter laziness. We did manage to do quite a bit of yardwork and some housework. We saw Away from Her, which was excellent and sad. Monday night we had our own little cookout with cheeseburgers (gorgonzola - yum), corn on the cob, and baked beans. We ate out on the deck as the sun set with a citronella candle flickering on the table and Otis napping at our feet. We saw the summer's first fireflies.

Neil and I are reading Bend Sinister together. He's farther along than I am. He likes it and I am glad. Chapter 7 (the Hamlet chapter) has made him laugh out loud.

I sent off some poetry this morning to a local contest. I haven't the slightest idea of the caliber of writing this contest attracts and thus how my work might compare, but at least I put it out there. I've been working a bit on some fiction lately, too. Writing fiction now is a lot harder than it used to be. It came so easily to me when I was a teenager. I was much less self-critical then. I recently bought a Count Basie album that I listened to a lot as a teenager and I'm hoping that it will help me get back in that free-flowing creative headspace.

I've been fretting again (as I do so frequently) over what I'm going to do with myself after I graduate. Part of me thinks I should do something really practical and get some sort of schooling or training that will clearly prepare me for a career; a second master's in mental health counseling, massage school, anything that will allow me to graduate and say "Okay, now I am a ______." But then the other part of me wonders how I can even possibly consider doing anything but the one thing I should have gone to school for in the first place: writing. As a grad student in Women's & Gender Studies I feel like I have made up for a lot of stuff I missed out on as an undergrad; I've lived near school, made friends, had fun, and gotten good grades. It's been the complete opposite of my undergrad experience and I am grateful for it. But the missing piece is that I've been doing this whole higher ed thing now for going on eight years and I've managed to skirt almost entirely around the thing that is closest to my heart.

So I started looking at creative writing MFA programs (again). My obvious first choice was Spalding, because it is here in town and offers a low-residency program (low- or brief-residency programs meet for 7-10 days at the beginning and end of the semester, but the rest of it you spend working independently under the direction of a faculty member). However, the program at Spalding is about $26,000. I already have more than that in student loans, so there is NO WAY I'm going to do that. I kept looking at similar programs around the country and found that tuition was similar, and of course I'd also have to factor in all the travel and lodging expenses for the residencies. I started to get discouraged until I realized that Murray State has a low-residency program and that it's CRAZY cheap. With in-state tuition it would be about half the cost most of the other programs I looked at. So I think that is my plan now.

Of course, that raises the question of what the hell I'm going to do with a MFA in creative writing. I have one current and one former co-worker with these degrees, and suffice it to say, our workplace and job duties have pretty much zilch to do with creative writing. But I feel confident that I could come up with something. I'd like to teach, and the MFA is the teriminal degree in the field, meaning that I could teach college. I'm not about to enter the college professor job-finding rat race, but I could definitely adjunct at local colleges, esp. since I will already have experience doing so in WGST. I would love it if U of L would let me come up with a class that somehow combined the two. And I could do workshops and stuff. For a class I had last fall I had to come up with a sample grant proposal for a fake non-profit, and the non-profit I made up held writing workshops and retreats for middle school girls. I think that would be so awesome! I also really like the idea of Women Writing for (a) Change, but oddly (and sadly) enough an estranged friend of mine has already opened a Louisville branch. We had a falling-out when we were much younger and I've tried to reconnect with her but she's not interested, which is a shame, because I think Women Writing for (a) Change is totally awesome and I'd love to just talk to her about it.

Anyway. That's what's been on my mind the last few days. Now lunch is on my mind. I have a Lean Cuisine I don't want and City Cafe is serving calzones today. Hmmm.

My MacBook arrived yesterday. It's pretty sweet! I'm especially enjoying iSight and Photo Booth. Here's a photo I took with it right after I got it.

I came home from work and decided that the clothes I had on - gray slacks and a sleeveless black shirt - while a perfectly nice ensemble, felt very not-me. Or at least didn't fit my current mood. So I put on some cropped sweat pants - actually, no, let's call them yoga pants - some yoga pants and a yellow t-shirt with the Nestle Quik bunny on it and put my hair in pigtails and I feel much better now.

Needless to say, many things great and small have happened since I last wrote here. I've been asked to teach an intro Women's & Gender Studies class this fall, and I'm going to be a teaching assistant for such a course in July so I can figure out what the hell I'm doing. I'm nervous but quite excited about it. This fall I am taking a course called Women's Personal Narratives and a creative writing course. In the spring I'll do my culminating project and then be done with my master's degree! Yay! Except, um, then what? I don't know yet.

Our beautiful deck is done, aside from the railings and various other cosmetic things. We're hoping to have a come-sit-on-our-new-deck! cookout soon. It was a big hit at our Derby party before it was even nailed down. :)

I've ordered a MacBook and will maybe (hopefully) have it tomorrow. My iBook suffered the logic board failure so common to G3s and G4s and, after much wringing of hands and gnashing of teeth, I bit the bullet and decided to upgrade. (Right now I'm using Neil's old eMac; not too sexy but still quite functional!) I cannot wait to get my hands on that MacBook, though. I've already named her Gertrude. Isn't there something exciting about customizing a brand new computer, adding all your stuff to it arranging things just the way you like them? It's like moving into a new home, except much less of a pain in the ass.

This morning I finished reading White Teeth by Zadie Smith. It probably sounds rather un-literary of me to say this, but I kind of hate it when a book builds and builds to this huge climax and then you get half a page of denouement and the rest is yours to wonder about. It's not that I want everything all tied up nice and neat for me with a bow... except maybe I do. I don't know. It was still a great book, despite that and the fact that nearly all the characters were unbearably annoying. Zadie Smith is amazing, especially considering that this was her first novel and it was published when she was 25. I'm in awe of her.

I've ordered a second copy of Bend Sinister by Nabokov; now that I'm done with White Teeth, Neil and I are going to read it together. I read it in 2003 but I want to read it again and I think Neil will really like it. And it will be fun to have someone to discuss it with as I read.

My wanderlust is acting up (though really, when is it ever not?) and we have a few trips planned for the summer. In July we're going up to Chicago for the Pitchfork Music Festival, primarily to see the New Pornographers. Yoko Ono is going to be there, too. I really have no opinion on Yoko, but I think it will be fascinating to see her just because she's, well, Yoko. Iron & Wine are going to be there too; I'm looking forward to seeing them. And I'm excited about checking out Chicago. I've sort of been there twice. I saw a Cubs game there and immediately came home afterward, and I went to the Bolingbrook Ikea. So, yeah, not much of a Chicago experience.

Also in July we're going to see the Cubs play the Reds in Cincinnati. Neil got us free tickets through one of his sales reps, and even though Cincinnati is not that big a deal to either of us, we thought we might take the opportunity to spend the weekend there and see what we can get into.

I'm hoping that in August we will be able to make our yearly pilgrimage to Gulf Shores, though that remains to be seen. All I can tell you is that I think about it all the time. The seafood, the beach, the laziness, the napping, the miniature golf... Total bliss.

Neil's giving someone a private camera orientation lesson thingy right now, so I'm trying to find ways to occupy myself until he gets home and it's time for dinner. I'd like to read but I don't want to start on anything with Bend Sinister on its way. Perhaps I'll find some short stories somewhere.