So last night we went to a famous local restaurant that I shall not name, in order to try Scandinavian specialties of various sorts, including lutefisk.
For my non-MN readers, lutefisk is cod (or white fish generally) that is preserved by soaking it in lye. Yeah, you read that right, LYE. Then the lye is soaked out and it's served hot with some sauces, like creamy diill, white sauce, or melted butter (all three if you are me).
It's said to be like fish jello and to be quite ammonia-smelling/tasting. But it wasn't bad - the jiggly consistency is a little unnerving and it smells fishy, but tastes just like fish.
(Oddly, the downstairs cat looked at the leftovers and walked away. He must not be Norwegian.)
The rest of the food was mediocre at best: stone cold flatbreads, giant bland meatballs in gloppy brown gravy, fake mashed potatoes.
So we've had that experience of MN. It's minus 5 right now so I guess we'll move on to experiencing bitter cold.
At 5:50 this afternoon, I passed my oral preliminary doctoral examination. That makes me ABD, All But Dissertation.
I was expecting a bigger rush, but I came home, had supper, did some grading. I'm really tired, though, and probably will be for several days. I have been working at an emotional fever pitch for weeks and boy will it feel GREAT not to have to think about anything to do with the political economy of cities for at least 3 weeks!
I turned in my "pass" form for the written prelims to the Grad Sch today and for good measure filled out another form telling them when and where my oral prelim would be.
Okay, I lied: I have no IDEA where my oral will be. But what do they know?
Also: bought a book called "301 Polish Verbs." Joy and rapture! They don't stick in my head very well; perhaps this will help.
Well, the giving of thanks should never end. But Thanksgiving 2005, in this household, is officially over. The last of the leftovers was transmogrified into a turkey pot pie this evening and avidly consumed by those present. Thanks, B, you are awesome!
In other news, it's full speed ahead for the doctoral oral prelim next week. There are "issues," though: lots of prep time required this weekend. Just when I thought it was impossible to be more frazzled, next week could be the most hectic of the semester.
Giving thanks though: I am alive, and I am healthy, and I still am sleeping at least 8 hours every night - and in a warm bed. Not everyone is so lucky.
Countdown: 2 classes to TA; 1 class to teach; 2 classes to attend; one oral prelim; one final exam; massive amounts of grading. A partridge in a pear tree. Yeah.
So I'm just sitting here, thinking, "oh, what shall I do with my day?" when I realize that I have to go see my advisor in about 40 minutes. AND I would love to hear one of my colleagues practice her job talk, but B also wants the car when I get back, so maybe not. Maybe tomorrow? I could work on Polish afterwards, or read books/articles.
I did some flash cards yesterday but that was about it for Polish. I have to figure out a plan for studying for the final, so that I don't do what I did last spring: cram hard at the end until all the concepts get cuisinarted into one giant mass of undifferentiated letters, and I can't remember the most basic, obvious things. It was a nightmare.