For those who don't know: Sisyphus is punished to carry a heavy stone up a mountain to have it fall back down the mountain. He has to repeat this indefinitely. Sounds bad, right? But we all are Sisyphus...or we all have our own metaphorical rocks.
In my own life, my rock is anorexia. I finally get up the mountain and think that I've conquered the rock, just to watch it plummet back down the mountain. And, no, I'm not just talking about the eating thing. That is mostly under control. I'm talking about everything else that goes along with it, most people focus so much on the food part, that they forget about all the other things.
I've been doing research into it, there are a lot of things about my personality that I don't like and thought it was time to figure it all out. I bought a book recently, Gaining*, and the author has me pinned. She knows my darkest secrets. How? Because anorexics all have similar tendencies. I fluctuate between wanting to throw the book across the room, and devouring it. It helps me see that each time the rock falls down the mountain, I can push it back up. It may never stay, but it's doable. My rock will not get the best of me. Because it will never fall for the same reasons again.
For now, I don't lay awake at night obsessing about the food I did (or did not) eat that day. (Well, sometimes, but never in the same way as I did during my darkest days, more in the "I can't believe I ate the whole thing" way.) Now, it's "I can't believe I didn't clean my room. There are clothes on the floor, I hate this!!" And I do not let myself get out of bed to clean. I'm not giving into this. I don't know if this is the best method, but for now it'll work.
*I don't know why this book is discounted at B&N right now, it's amazing, but I'd recommend it to anyone.
This post is part of the Blue-Beta Blog Coordination, a continuing series of content coordinated by theme or motif with posts from Confuzzled of I Keep Wondering, Gromit of The Dancing Newt, Redoubt of Redoubt Redux, Third Mango of Funkadelic Freestylings of Another Sort, and Yarjka of Sour Mayonnaise. This week's theme: 'A Heavy Box'.
23 February 2009
19 February 2009
All That For NOTHING?
Yesterday, I sat down and filled out an application that took me about 4 hours to do. I had to rewrite my resume because I couldn't find my old one to just update. I had to write a cover letter, something I hate to do. And I had to edit something. Well, I did all that. Then I get an email this morning saying that as a grad student I could just go to the orientation meeting.
Are you freakin' kidding me?!
Not that it wasn't a great learning experience or anything (yeah, right), but was it really worth all that effort?? I don't think so. Because, now, I get to sit down and go through a new application process that involves more editing. Which only has to be consistent in format. I don't have to actually know the Chicago manual of style, MLA, APA, or anything like that. WHEW. That's comforting. At least it can wait till this weekend.
IRB approval: here I come!
Oh: and my mouse battery is dying. YAY me...I forgot to charge it last night.
Are you freakin' kidding me?!
Not that it wasn't a great learning experience or anything (yeah, right), but was it really worth all that effort?? I don't think so. Because, now, I get to sit down and go through a new application process that involves more editing. Which only has to be consistent in format. I don't have to actually know the Chicago manual of style, MLA, APA, or anything like that. WHEW. That's comforting. At least it can wait till this weekend.
IRB approval: here I come!
Oh: and my mouse battery is dying. YAY me...I forgot to charge it last night.
17 February 2009
Imagine: My World
Imagine that I posted this yesterday, on time, instead of sleeping all day to try to get rid of a cold.
Got that mental picture? Good. We continue:
I had a hard time coming up with a good way of talking about imagination. The only thing that kept coming to mind was John Lennon's Imagine. I love this song, but that yielded no good topics for me either...(I mentioned I had a cold, right?)
So here it is:
Imagine a world where Tuesday is Monday.
Imagine a world where one graded 40+ syntax homework assignments late into the real Monday's night)
Imagine a world where one is having to deal with IRB approval.
Imagine a world where one had to get up early on this fake Monday to finish homework.
Imagine a world where one still HAS more grading to do.
Imagine a world where one spends 10+ hours on campus daily.
Imagine a world where one has to find time in that 10+ hours on campus to go feed and water 3 cats.
Imagine a world where one has to tutor one student for a basics class, and one has to have a review session for Syntax.
Got that picture going?
Now you are in my world.
This post is part of the Blue-Beta Blog Coordination, a continuing series of content coordinated by theme or motif with posts from Confuzzled of I Keep Wondering, Gromit of The Dancing Newt, Redoubt of Redoubt Redux, Third Mango of Funkadelic Freestylings of Another Sort, and Yarjka of Sour Mayonnaise. This week's theme: 'Imagination'.
Got that mental picture? Good. We continue:
I had a hard time coming up with a good way of talking about imagination. The only thing that kept coming to mind was John Lennon's Imagine. I love this song, but that yielded no good topics for me either...(I mentioned I had a cold, right?)
So here it is:
Imagine a world where Tuesday is Monday.
Imagine a world where one graded 40+ syntax homework assignments late into the real Monday's night)
Imagine a world where one is having to deal with IRB approval.
Imagine a world where one had to get up early on this fake Monday to finish homework.
Imagine a world where one still HAS more grading to do.
Imagine a world where one spends 10+ hours on campus daily.
Imagine a world where one has to find time in that 10+ hours on campus to go feed and water 3 cats.
Imagine a world where one has to tutor one student for a basics class, and one has to have a review session for Syntax.
Got that picture going?
Now you are in my world.
This post is part of the Blue-Beta Blog Coordination, a continuing series of content coordinated by theme or motif with posts from Confuzzled of I Keep Wondering, Gromit of The Dancing Newt, Redoubt of Redoubt Redux, Third Mango of Funkadelic Freestylings of Another Sort, and Yarjka of Sour Mayonnaise. This week's theme: 'Imagination'.
09 February 2009
Updated: Dating Kryptonite
Update: So after my Judaism class today, this kid says to me: "Nalton?" I turn and this kid looks familiar to me. I'm racking my brain trying to place him in one of my classes that I've TAed, but I can't come up with anything. Then it hits me: Undergrad1. He's in my Judaism class. And! Undergrad2 is also in the class, just in a different section. I never thought I would see these two boys again, and there one of them was, in my Judaism class...
Dating Kryptonite: Found
My friend, LiberalFish, was invited to go to a rollerskating party last Tuesday. She invited me to come along as her guest. So we went. We strapped on skates, and we "skated." Well, I skated, LiberalFish has never skated before, but she made a valiant effort and she did quite well for the first time.
We met NewFriend while we were there, I doubt we'll ever actually see her again, but she was nice enough. She and I were sitting there chatting when the DJ announced that the next song would be used for a game. NewFriend and I were not going to participate as NewFriend was not a great skater. She, too, was skating for one of her first times. However, two boys (Undergrad1 and Undergrad2) came up and implored us to join them in the game as you needed at least 3 people to participate. NewFriend and I tried to back out, but were unable to do so. LiberalFish was on another bench when the boys came up to us; NewFriend and I told them we had another friend and that she would be joining us. The boys were okay with this. However, LiberalFish did not join.
We went out and we participitated in the game, which entailed holding hands and skating in one direction. That seemed simple enough until the siren sounded and we had to turn to go the opposite way. If any of us had fallen, our team would be out. We had a near fall, but we all stayed standing the whole time. In the end, we won. Our prize? Blinking necklace things. Woohoo.
After the game was over we all skated off and I joined LiberalFish again. She encouraged me to skate off on my own, as I "enjoyed" skating. So I did. I was skating when Undergrad2 started skating near me. He decided to strike up a conversation with me and asked if I'd ever skated at this particular rink before. I responded that I had...as an undergrad. (It just came out before I could stop it, which is not a bad thing. I'm not ashamed of graduate school...and as you'll see it's a good litmus test.) There were one or two beats before Undergrad2 asked "you're a graduate student? In what?" I told him that I was studying Linguistics. He asked if I was at BYU and I told him I was. He then skated off. Undergrad1 conversed with me a bit after that, but Undergrad2 never talked to me again.
Victory.
This post is part of the Blue-Beta Blog Coordination, a continuing series of content coordinated by theme or motif with posts from Confuzzled of I Keep Wondering, Gromit of The Dancing Newt, Redoubt of Redoubt Redux, Third Mango of Funkadelic Freestylings of Another Sort, Xanthippe of Let’s Save Our Hallmark Moment, and Yarjka of Sour Mayonnaise. This week's theme: 'Victory'.
We met NewFriend while we were there, I doubt we'll ever actually see her again, but she was nice enough. She and I were sitting there chatting when the DJ announced that the next song would be used for a game. NewFriend and I were not going to participate as NewFriend was not a great skater. She, too, was skating for one of her first times. However, two boys (Undergrad1 and Undergrad2) came up and implored us to join them in the game as you needed at least 3 people to participate. NewFriend and I tried to back out, but were unable to do so. LiberalFish was on another bench when the boys came up to us; NewFriend and I told them we had another friend and that she would be joining us. The boys were okay with this. However, LiberalFish did not join.
We went out and we participitated in the game, which entailed holding hands and skating in one direction. That seemed simple enough until the siren sounded and we had to turn to go the opposite way. If any of us had fallen, our team would be out. We had a near fall, but we all stayed standing the whole time. In the end, we won. Our prize? Blinking necklace things. Woohoo.
After the game was over we all skated off and I joined LiberalFish again. She encouraged me to skate off on my own, as I "enjoyed" skating. So I did. I was skating when Undergrad2 started skating near me. He decided to strike up a conversation with me and asked if I'd ever skated at this particular rink before. I responded that I had...as an undergrad. (It just came out before I could stop it, which is not a bad thing. I'm not ashamed of graduate school...and as you'll see it's a good litmus test.) There were one or two beats before Undergrad2 asked "you're a graduate student? In what?" I told him that I was studying Linguistics. He asked if I was at BYU and I told him I was. He then skated off. Undergrad1 conversed with me a bit after that, but Undergrad2 never talked to me again.
Victory.
This post is part of the Blue-Beta Blog Coordination, a continuing series of content coordinated by theme or motif with posts from Confuzzled of I Keep Wondering, Gromit of The Dancing Newt, Redoubt of Redoubt Redux, Third Mango of Funkadelic Freestylings of Another Sort, Xanthippe of Let’s Save Our Hallmark Moment, and Yarjka of Sour Mayonnaise. This week's theme: 'Victory'.
05 February 2009
Upcoming Events
Just to keep you posted in what's going to becoming in my life:
- New posting technique: Every Monday I will have a themed post, there will be links to take you to the others participating in this experiment.
- Mardi Gras: I have a mask and I have beads. Need I say more?
- Lent: It follows Mardi Gras, duh. I'm giving up the Pork Quesadillas and swearing. I'm ambitious.
- 3 day weekend! From German this weekend...and from everything soon. I think I want to see the Grand Canyon.
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