I parked in the driveway tonight after class, because I think both my Critical Area Parking sticker and my registration sticker (called a "tab" here in MN for some reason) expire at midnight. I was too busy all day to stick them on, and too lazy tonight to deal with it in the dark.
I actually LIKE teaching when I get into the room, but I'm always racked with apprehension and insecurity all day beforehand. I think class was ok - although I need to do a LOT more research on the fundamentals of intellectual property law and I also need to improve the "zoning game" exercise I premiered tonight. I think next time it will be really fun.
Tomorrow is the day I've been waiting for all week: time to work on my reading lists. Then, a slightly lighter week than usual next week: no proseminar; a shorter book in history seminar; really solid materials for my own class.
Due to poor time management, I ended up finishing my Polish homework in our so-called "grad lab" yesterday. This was a huge mistake on my part. First, the room is filthy: that grey institutional dust on the floor that gets all over your coat or bookbag or anything else you set down there; the tables dusty, coffee-stained, and covered with bits of candy wrapper or whatever my colleagues were too "busy" to throw in the trash. Second, you get about 20 linear inches for your work space, including the keyboard and mouse, so your text(s) have to be managed from your lap. Third, it's full of conversations and comings-and-goings. (Fourth, I'd really not thought about whether the lab computers support Polish character sets (they don't) and so I had to add all my accent marks by hand, a total drag and an invitation to lots of errors.)
I actually watched one of my colleagues sweep a bunch of sunflower seeds from a seat onto the floor. They weren't a mess of his creation, but....Those seeds will be there for the rest of the term, in smaller and smaller bits, as they get stepped-on, crushed, and pushed around the room. I am not blaming our custodial staff - they have their established responsibilities - but the idea that floors get swept/vacuumed/damp-mopped less than once a semester is weird to me. When I worked in the public sector, the custodial staff vacuumed our offices EVERY AFTERNOON and damp-mopped the hard-surface hallways every day in the wet season, and several times a week in the summer.
I just hate that grey dust of vinyl composition flooring. Anything that touches the floor is immediately covered with it.
Today I was one floor down in my so-called grad student office, and I noted that the floors and desks were equally filthy. At the beginning of the semester, I washed down my desk, removing years of accumulated coffee rings. Otherwise, the place is a mess - and filled with do-gooders "recycling" things that can't be recycled. Why smart people can't read the list of what can and cannot be placed in the boxes is beyond me.
Anyway. I will cease ranting right now, and will be more upbeat tomorrow.
I am thinking of starting yet another blog. (The grammatically incorrect Geografica Polska is also mine.)
This would be for keeping track of my dissertation ideas. Uncertainty Distribution says it well (scroll down to the March 22 entry to read the whole thing):
1. Keep a record of all the meetings with adviser and committee members;
2. List the tasks or next step we've agreed on and record why those decisions were made;
3. Keep track of administerial timelines, like all the paperwork I need to file with the Graduate School, when each piece was filed, etc.; and
4. Record ideas and musings that may prove useful in the future.
Trouble is, I am torn between the convenience of having a UThink blog (available anytime, anywhere), and my feeling that I might want to write openly about my insecurities about research and my potential frustrations with people (committee members, advisor, interview subjects, etc.) in ways that I wouldn't want to have available on the web.
Anyway - that's a decision for another time. Right now: loads of Polish homework. Professor P. is really heaping it on lately.
The Gang of Three came over last night after coffee hour and we drank wine and then went out for Cambodian food, which turned into Vietnamese food, and then came back here and drank more wine and finally kicked them out at 1:30 or so. The kitchen clock needs a new battery; that’s part of the problem.
This afternoon I went to our departmental skating party. I brought my skates out to MN (10,000 lakes; I figured there would be skating) but haven't been at all except for once earlier this winter. I don't fall very often, but less than a minute onto the ice, I fell flat on my ass. THAT'LL be a nice bruise tomorrow.
I skated for more than an hour; at the end I was starting to get wobbly. My left foot/leg is a lot less stable than my right. That's always been the case for skating, but it was more pronounced today. If I could lose some weight and do my back exercises, I could probably strengthen my body and even this out.
I am feeling a little more upbeat today about upcoming prelims because I had a meeting yesterday with the most demanding person on my committee, and what she is asking for prep seems finite and pretty reasonable. That's a huge relief, and I am actually looking forward to getting on it. After I finish that damn reading about Deng. Yawn. And Polish - I'm slipping a bit there too. The study-one-day-a-week method isn't working anymore.
Hm. My left shoulder is very sore. I wonder if I twisted my arm when I fell.
Warsaw was no vacation, that's for sure. But it wasn't supposed to be. There are several areas of general interest, even though I am most likely not going to work there. (It's too big, too unique in terms of government organization, and too bleak to really enjoy. If you are going to do fieldwork for an extended period, you may as well really like the place.)
1. the ways in which the Ghetto uprising and Warsaw uprising are memorialized in museums and other monuments is very relevant to the ideas I've been thinking about for the past 5 years. Since the destruction of the city follows other, earlier, destructions, there is a lot to tie to with these ideas about memory and ruins.
2. there is a lot of green space. Didn't look like much on this trip due to the March greyness, but it would be worth looking at ideas about green space: is it primarily recreational? Ecological? Aesthetic? What kind of ideology drives its creation and preservation?
3. there are a number of somewhat contested urban renewals: a) the area around the loved/hated "present" from Stalin, the Palace of Science and Culture; b) the university redevelopment down by the river; 3) the ideas about developing more of a city center and more-walkable streets (although those may not be as contested; and 4) the competition for Copernicus Museum, also probably not as contested.
4. real estate development is HOT, although the profit margins were probably higher in earlier years, and the RE ads now are for tertiary markets in Poland, and for retail and high-end housing primarily. Some statistical work is needed to help get the picture here: who can buy all the stuff that's being sold? Who can afford these luxury apartments?
Lots to think about. It may take some time to process it all.
We are back in the City of Lakes. Our luggage is still in Chicago. It's leaving shortly, but we will be sleeping when it arrives, since it's the middle of the night "our time."
Warsaw: it rained or snowed nearly every day. The streets were sloppy with sand and mud and every bit of trash dropped since it started to snow last fall. Blocks are large, with large modernist apartment blocks plopped in the middle of them. There is a fair amount of graffiti. The proportion of historic/cultural/artistic tourism spots is quite small for a European capital. Everyone there speaks Polish, dammit.
I met or talked with a lot of good potential contacts, and learned a lot. What will come out of it remains to be seen: I didn't get the scholarship that would have enabled me to continue with Polish.
Well, I'll have to sort this out later. When I am not exhausticated. Till tomorrow...
Well, off to Warsaw this morning. I finished everything I had to do yesterday, except write up my preliminary reading list and mail it to the professor. I might be able to do that now, while I wait for B to shower and dress.
He is taking a stats exam and then we are going right to the airport.
Ultimately, I've only heard from three of the many people I contacted in Poland, but I re-emailed and left the telephone number of the hotel, so perhaps others will drift into the picture.
I'm nervous about meeting them and nervous about getting around with my limited Polish. I can frame simple statements, but if people talk to me or even write to me (as some of these guys did) I don't understand. Nic nie rozumiem! (I don't understand anything.)
It's gonna be cold in Warsaw - like here, 20s and 30s.
Full report in about a week.
research MN OSHA (see WebCT)
read and print out Arkell case (if worthwhile)
return capri pants
update HL reading list and email it
Finish PPT except for formatting and print it.
Later: email update to Piotr and Pawel
Spent all day yesterday reading, and then went to a party, and when I got home, I found a package from our friends B, N, and C. And inside - !!!! - two bags of fabulous Dunkin Donuts coffee!!!! Thank you, thank you, kind readers!
Ah, the universe is good.
This whole coffee thing - well, it's all the changes in B's life. For all the years I've known him he wasn't a coffee drinker. Yeah, there were a couple of years where he had iced coffees packed with cream and sugar, but that was brief, and stamped out first by the aversion to caffeine and then by the need to reduce sugar.
So coffee was MY thing. Every morning for the last three years I've made a pot of coffee. Four cups normally, five if I'm feeling in need of a little pick-me-up. I make it when I get up, I drink it before it's been sitting too long, and I make it with one rounded teaspoon per cup.
So, now B is part of the coffee gig. (What have you done with my husband??) HE gets up early (again, where's my husband?), makes really strong coffee, and we argue about how much coffee per cup. My whole ritual is askew.
This Dunkin Donuts gift should even things out. You can't make a bad cup!