Feb 28

Yea! For the first time this year, my strep test came back negative. But now I have a sinus infection. Great. Will this ever end? At least she did not give me a shot, lots of pills but no needles.

Next week is spring break. I have a week of study planned. It is only: an eight page mid-term, two plays, research, abstract, and an uncounted number of pages to read. I am going to have so much fun. Seriously, I just hope the books I ordered come in. The knitting book is for pleasure but the other is a primary source for a major paper I need to start pulling together.

In other exciting news, the presentation went well yesterday. Always go first when playing Russian roulette and giving presentations: they amount to the same thing. A friend of mine also discovered that Medieval Lit has desensitized us to a lot of disgusting concepts. We were talking about Saint Catherine of Siena’s accomplishments, and not the whole ‘Holy Anorexic’ thing, and our Theory professor had to leave the room. I kept eating the cookies I had in my backpack. Not to be a tease, but it is rather gross so only look her up if you aren’t planning to eat for an hour. Just trying to play nice. Another classmate sided with me on having to snack while reading her.

Feb 26

The nice lady who watches the Twins told me she would not be surprised if the doctor wanted to remove my tonsils. Eh. But at this point, I would cut the blasted things out myself. I have this hideous cough and a presentation tomorrow. Fun stuff.

But upon checking out my favorite artists’ sites, I discovered that Helmut has received recognition for having sold over 12.5 million records. And Hayley has a new album coming out the week after next; of course the one I really want is the UK/International which leaves me scavenging around looking for it.

I sent off my StepBrother’s and Sister’s birthday gifts today. It has delivery confirmation on it so I know when it gets there. With their hectic lifestyle, it could take an extra three days for a phone call saying they received it. 50 cents well spent in my book.

And for the record, if you ever get the desire (or have to read it for class) to read ‘The Life of Catherine of Siena,’ be sure to have snacks on hand. After reading fourteen pages of the text describing how she went seven years without eating and over a hundred days without sleep. The portions on which foods she gave up when are very descriptive and gave me a sharp craving for steak. I am not for restricting people’s religious calling or their beliefs, but did she really need to fast so drastically?

Feb 25

What is the best thing about having cable? MASH comes on every night at eight and eight-thirty.

In other news, the showers went over very well. My chough is worse. Mom’s little pom-pom dog wanted Puppy to bark at Cat, thus the natural order of life was endangered but Puppy is a follower, not a leader and all is well now. This morning the Elder Twin said, “I don’t like my [Sunday school] teacher, she gives me headaches.” Oh, and my tire picked up a nail. StepDad put a plug in it but I am still getting it checked out in the morning.

Feb 24

I am back home at last. House-sitting for the StepPaternal Grandmother was not what I thought it would be. It is very nice indeed to be able to sleep in my own bed. With my own Puppy, hers just were not the same as mine.

Thursday was one of those days that never seemed to end. I thought it would end around 1800 but that simply did not happen. It was close to 2200 before the day ended. And yesterday ended five hours ago.

Despite a lingering sore throat and being tired, everything is just peachy. I read The Tain in two settings. That was a wonderful read, well worth the wait. I am glad I talked myself into buying it. Now to figure out what to write my paper on.

Half the people whom I could have sworn know not which side of the planet my Dad inhabits have been keeping my phone busy this past hour, inquiring how my Paternal Grandmother made it through a rather nasty storm this afternoon. This is rather odd. The storm was not as bad here, however, we were forced indoors for a spell while it passed by. It finally cleared up enough for me to rush to a bookstore to by my StepBrother a birthday present as I was too sick to knit him up a pair of mittens.

As of this moment, I have five projects going. 3 scarves, 1 lacy shawl, and a Christmas present that never got finished. Not so horrible is it? Tuesday is going to be hard, it is a long stretch between classes and I found a quicker way to the craft store last week. Why did I pick ‘buying new yarn’ as my Lent forfeit? Oh yeah, it was easier than giving up knitting.

Feb 21

I still have strep throat. Great. No surprise, but disappointing all the same. A shot and some pills should clear it up in the next few days, or so I am desperately hoping. I am sick of this sore throat. However, I am back to knitting for hours a day; ergo, I am getting better. Four hours yesterday (three were in class and one was during a reading group) and two today.

The Tain came in yesterday and I was much too excited about it. In fact, I am speeding through some of my other readings to get to it. Just because I have a new book does not mean I can give up reading the articles, books, plays, and excerpts for my other classes. Being a grown-up is not fun.

Yesterday’s Critical Theory reading was a walk down memory lane. I can see why I enjoyed the Romantics when I did, and why they do not hold the appeal they did. All the same, I wanted to pick up my Wordsworth and Blake (and did for a brief moment). Not that Hume was not a blast to read; but I must confess to getting lost at one point. When I found myself, I was back where I started. The readings for tomorrow’s Renaissance Drama was so enjoyable, I read the whole play. E. Carey’s The Tragedy of Miriam was not meant to be performed and I understand that. All the same, I want to see it on stage—there would be much in the way of characters rather than action and it would be fun.

I am actually observing Lent this year. No buying new yarn. I had already decided to go on a yarn diet, but this way I will not cheat. That would just be wrong. Fat Tuesday was really Fat Monday, since I bought two skeins of yarn at Michael’s that was not on sale. And it is getting harder to close the trunk without half a skein sticking out.

Feb 19

After missing two classes last week and spending very little time on the computer, I feel half-human again. This is a big change, as I have felt extremely low since Wednesday.

Needless to say, I am slightly behind in my homework. Thankfully, I am down to having only one class left; though I still feel behind. Between Tuesday and Saturday, I had perhaps knitted for only one hour. In a typical day, I knit at least that much. No wonder I feel behind in my life.

Feb 13

Good news: my Medieval Lit prof liked my paper proposal on the morphing bodies to land and vise versa. That justifies buying the book: The Tain (pronounced like ‘coin’ but with a ‘t’). It should be in by the end of the month. Part of my StepBrother’s birthday present will probably contain a sample of the text. If blood, guts, and war cannot tempt a boy to read, nothing will. The Maternal Grandmother had a birthday today and she loved her felted shoes.

Bad news: the APN called me ‘Strap Throat Mary’ as this is the second time I have come down with it this year. He had the nerve to have Mom tell me I cannot go to class on Thursday if my fever hasn’t broken. Ok, so I only have one class that is meeting on that day; but I do not like missing class, even if I had to miss my night class tonight. I just got tired of the sore joints and raw throat.

It looks like I will not be going to my yarn shop for awhile. I stepped into a craft store—just to look and walked out with a bag of clearance yarn. Needless to say, I need to thin out my stash again. The trunk that contains the stash is having difficulty closing. Scarf anyone? You can knit it yourself.

Good news: my Medieval Lit prof liked my paper proposal on the morphing bodies to land and vise versa. That justifies buying the book: The Tain (pronounced like ‘coin’ but with a ‘t’). It should be in by the end of the month. Part of my StepBrother’s birthday present will probably contain a sample of the text. If blood, guts, and war cannot tempt a boy to read, nothing will. The Maternal Grandmother had a birthday today and she loved her felted shoes.

Bad news: the APN called me ‘Strap Throat Mary’ as this is the second time I have come down with it this year. He had the nerve to have Mom tell me I cannot go to class on Thursday if my fever hasn’t broken. Ok, so I only have one class that is meeting on that day; but I do not like missing class, even if I had to miss my night class tonight. I just got tired of the sore joints and raw throat.

It looks like I will not be going to my yarn shop for awhile. I stepped into a craft store—just to look and walked out with a bag of clearance yarn. Needless to say, I need to thin out my stash again. The trunk that contains the stash is having difficulty closing. Scarf anyone? You can knit it yourself.

Feb 12

The last of my textbooks are in. One of them has colored pictures in it. I cannot remember the last time I had a book with colored pictures in it for fun or for an English class. This is absolutely wonderful. The book is:
Barber, Richard. Bestiary: Being an English Version of the Bodleian Library, Oxford, MS Bodley 784. Boydell Press. 2006.

I cannot remember the city of publication, or this would be a full citation.

Tomorrow is the last of the February birthdays, and I was actually able to work on my Blue Cobweb. Thankfully, I still remember the stitch and did not have to dig through my books to relocate it. But what to knit tomorrow? I have no mindless knitting started to work on while I am on campus; and I do hate having to pay attention to what my hands are doing when I am reading.

Sadly, I am getting sick and a full day’s work tomorrow.

Feb 11

Tuesday’s homework is done. That is correct. Tuesday’s. Have I started Thursday’s? No. But it is a light day and therefore I should be done by this time tomorrow.

Friday was iced in for the second week in a row. I did some reading for Tuesday and worked on the rest of my knitting for February’s birthdays. I have completed the knitting but not the felting of the last of them. And I have a very good head start on March.

Saturday, I went shopping with the StepPaternal Grandmother. Surprisingly, it was fun. Then I was talked into spending the evening at Chucky E. Cheese’s. How gullible am I for that? It was not as fun as shopping. I woke up this morning with a sore back. But is it from all the skeeball or the rollercoaster stimulator the Twins bullied me into? Yes, a semi-grown up was bullied into ridding one of those things by a pair of preschoolers. All it took was big eyes and a ‘please.’

Today, I finished a scarf and homework for Tuesday. Why am I so happy about this? Because it composed of: *60 pages of Irish saga from the book The Tain. (That book has been added to my wish list.) A page worth of question/response accompanied it. *40 pages of critical theory and a two page short paper with citations that took an additional page. *Act V of Marlow’s Edward II and 45 pages of secondary reading. (Ok, so the secondary reading was required for another class last week. It still counts as a part of this week’s reading.)

Is this a reason to be happy or what?

Feb 6

Guess who was the dummy that did not get the memo saying the Medieval Reading Group’s meeting time was changed? Me, the idiot who walked in 40 minutes late. It happens, or so I have been told. This will not occur again.

The presentation I was supposed to give was postponed due to illness of the professor. People who saw her yesterday were not surprised. This leaves me very prepared for it on Thursday…at least in theory.

My carpool buddy and I got off campus for a spell today; I had errands and she was going stir crazy. Been there but did not like the shirts they had for sale. Maybe next time.

Feb 5

Hallelujah! The gifts have been sent. It looks like only Dad’s will be late, if only by one day. Yea.

Homework is nearly done as well. I just have to print off some papers and a journal entry. I will read the last Act of Marlow’s Edward II tomorrow and the Companion article tonight.

Knit wise—I still have a baton bag, a friend’s birthday scarf, the Maternal Grandmother’s birthday, and oh yeah, my blue cobweb shawl. I have only been working on it since before Christmas.

Feb 3

Snow and ice cancelled just about everything yesterday. By noon everything was running again. While we did make snowmen, they were a brownish-orange from the pine needles, leaves, and dirt. The dogs enjoyed running around in the snow and eating it. It was too cold for me.

After lunch today, the family minus StepDad went to the zoo. Normally, we only see two or three animal exhibits but today we saw close to six plus two gift shops.

I finally finished birthday presents for Dad and StepMom. They will arrive late but not as late as I thought they would be. The Twins, with prompting from Mom, have talked me into knitting bags for their batons. The larger bag took me close to 4 hours in the past two days. But the good news is that some stash yarn has finally left my trunk. I swear, yarn goes into the trunk and refuses to move out.

I am going to work on my German, since tomorrow afternoon I will be up to my neck in studying. Sadly, the work I did last week to get ahead seems to have made no difference at all. There is less to read tomorrow, but since a presentation was moved up; all else has gone awry.

Feb 1

Yea! I can see. Even before my first class, a screw broke on my glasses. Thankfully, it is not my day to drive the carpool and I do not need glasses to read. People across from me in the circle of desks were a bit fuzzy, but words on the page were as clear as ever. And my friends got a laugh over my monocle.

Today was just one of those days where I feel like I am in the right field. Ok, my glasses broke and my presentation was moved up to Tuesday. Even with that, I came home tickled. I made a good point in Renaissance Drama about the injustice that takes place in Thomas Kyd’s The Spanish Tragedy. I had lunch with two friends (one of whom is presenting with me on Tuesday) and we had a lovely conversation. The carpool driver wanted to go to Petco on the way home and I remembered to get Puppy a new collar.

And my birthday friend liked the scarf I made her.

It is snowing/sleeting but nothing sticks to the road.

Yea! I can see. Even before my first class, a screw broke on my glasses. Thankfully, it is not my day to drive the carpool and I do not need glasses to read. People across from me in the circle of desks were a bit fuzzy, but words on the page were as clear as ever. And my friends got a laugh over my monocle.

Today was just one of those days where I feel like I am in the right field. Ok, my glasses broke and my presentation was moved up to Tuesday. Even with that, I came home tickled. I made a good point in Renaissance Drama about the injustice that takes place in Thomas Kyd’s The Spanish Tragedy. I had lunch with two friends (one of whom is presenting with me on Tuesday) and we had a lovely conversation. The carpool driver wanted to go to Petco on the way home and I remembered to get Puppy a new collar.

And my birthday friend liked the scarf I made her.

It is snowing/sleeting but nothing sticks to the road.