Mad props to the U. Libraries Blog Squad.

Part of the reason is that I liked the idea of having absolute dominion over the site. Not that the U Libraries people have imposed any censorship, but the search function from my site can cover the blog as well. A related reason for moving the blog has to do with the fact that now that I have my own domain, I look forward to pushing the limits of the site. This means installing the latest greatest version of MT (3.15) while learning the ropes of installation and some UNIX geekery.

However, the main reason for moving the blog is that I know that however long I am a member of the university community, that time is finite. Sooner or later, I would have to do the big migration. It might as well be now, when I am under no deadline to have everything moved over. Readers of this blog are probably aware already that I am struggling with the decision to stay in my program, and thus will not be too surprised that I am making alternate plans for my blogspace.

I appreciate the effort that Shane and the other folks have put into the U's blog server project, and I applaud their foresightedness and pluck in doing the installation. Full props and thanks to the library staff for installation, implementation, and ongoing support. But it is time to move on.

Now that I have ultimate control over the files that I upload and can find paths to them, I am tempted to integrate the blog into the rest of the webspace. There are good reasons to, and good reasons not to, I suppose. I recognize that blogs are public reading, and that that is their raison d'être. Therefore, the more traffic the blog sends the way of the site the better. But I think I might be serving more than one public. Putting the site under one roof is a great start to figuring out what I am really about. At least digitally.

I am not sure what the significance is of the fact that the people that know me as a person rather than as their great hope for the future are most supportive of my next Lunatic Business Venture. I am sick to death of being a lousy grad student, and equally sick of providing no reason why I might be considered otherwise.

I am mindful of the story of a neighbor's nephew, a freshman at the U. He was snowboarding in Colorado recently, and had a terrible fall, breaking three vertebrae. Everyone is hopeful that he will walk again, and the preliminary signs are better than they were a week ago. That being said, within days of being told that he would miss his classes due to being traction and on a respirator etc, the U. called his mom and told her to pack up his stuff subito. The U. might have had some good reasons for doing so, like they were worried about its potential liability for the theft of his possessions or that they really needed the space. I would have hoped that they would have respected the busy schedule of a mother whose son (a customer of the U.) is on life support. In contrast, the ski resort where he fell sent a representative out to personally deliver his snowboard and personal effects that had been found on and near him. They told the mother that they knew he had not hit a tree after all, because they did not find any bark on him. The things one learns from the Ski Patrol.

The point of all this is that I should not expect the U. to allow me to exit gracefully. I think my departure will be more of the sort "Give us the keys and the laptop NOW. You will be escorted out of the building." And this is why I keep attending classes and registering for non-existent classes (thank God for pre-thesis credits!).

Shermanilla has been writing about the various places she would consider living, should the opportunity ever arise to get the heck out, at least for a while. Recently, we have been looking at Merced, California, of all places. Merced is a Central Valley town ala Fresno or Modesto that lies at the approach to Yosemite. It is also where a brand spanking new UC is going to open. Perhaps she and I are both something of real estate speculators. Every family has at least one, I suppose, and hers more than their share.

One of the nice things about a personal webspace, untethered to the U., is that the people who may want to follow up on me will be able to do so. One preserved friendship will be worth the expense and the effort.

It is a great day to be a child: a Saturday free of care and plenty of snow to play in. I am tempted to take the toboggan we have packed around and stored for a dozen years out on its maiden voyage.

I had Spring and Summer 2002 off, but I sold a house, bought another one, and moved. Hardly relaxing. I took a week off last summer, after finishing up a summer class in German. Then came my boss' departure, the new boss' arrival, and less time than I had expected to prepare for my prelim. Then Mookie died. It was a pretty horrific semester, all told.

I have taken three courses each semester since I began grad school. I was told that this was a normal load, but I am beginning to realize that most grad students do not take this many courses each semester. Of course, it is hard to finish all the requirements in time to finish both prelims inside three years, as is required in order to guarantee funding. So far, I have not heard of anyone being denied funding as a result of failure to complete exams in a timely manner.

The big question remains: Is it fair to me expect that the nature of the stress or the amount of it will differ in any significant degree as a junior faculty member? Granted, not all colleges are not Research-1 universities, and the need to publish is not so great. But still, I will be expected to publish occasionally at least and to teach. And the stress of another large uncompleted project will inevitably loom ahead. Will I be happier then? THAT is the question.

—What's up? School troubles?

—That too. But I just learned that a friend of mine committed suicide. We weren't close or anything, but the town we lived in has so few people that are willing to do anything to serve the community.

The exchange got me thinking about the role of honesty. Is it possible to be too honest? I don't think the professor was looking to start the seminar off on a depressed note, and really, neither was I. But he asked, and I was too tired of lying, telling people that everything was OK when it felt that the world was collapsing on top of me, to tell him that everything was fine. My need to be honest at that moment was greater than my concern that the class get off to its normally innocuous start. So I told the truth, and made everyone else feel awkward.

Sometimes life places us in the uncomfortable position of trying to strike a balance between telling people things they are comfortable hearing on side and saying things that square more completely with our own sense of reality on the other. I am not sure that any "rule" can be made that will cover when, how much, or to whom honest answers can be conveyed, but at this point if you ask, expect an answer.

I remember seeing fortune cookies made through the window of a fortune cookie factory on a rare family trip to San Francisco when I was a child. A women wearing a hat peeled of round disks off a turret and expertly folded the cookies as they came around. She tossed them in a bucket, presumably to be wrapped.

Recently, I opened a fortune cookie containing the aphorism "Example is better than precept." This seems to capture one of the problems I appear to be having with graduate school. Theoretical work is all about precept, to the extent that some political theorists (like Habermas) avoid examples altogether in their published work (even though they may and often do advocate in the outside world) and empiricists are criticized for using case studies (wherein entire situations can be understood in terms of the interrelated workings of their components) by "quants" who contend that for a theory to be valid it must be falsifiable. To sum up my longstanding of this latter stance I answer that human behavior does not follow exogenous "rules" as does celestial or atomic behavior. To be human is to understand, and to be incapable of understanding everything. And that includes understanding the forces that lead us to act and think the way we do.

On the obverse of the aphorism was a "Learn Chinese" phrase "Mayor &mdash Shi-zhang." Roomie took this to mean that I was destined to become active once more in the political capacity in which I once served. I prefer to think of the omen as a mere confirmation that the aphorism was meant for me and no one else. Who the heck needs to say "Mayor" in Chinese?

I have a favorite receptionist at the Clinic. She seldom smiles, is matter of fact and dresses plainly. I think the way she has her hair cut is the only thing that really intrigues me. When I was there, she answered a phone call from someone scheduling an appointment. What I could hear of the end of the conversation went something like this:

—How are things going? [Pauses, stares expressionless, straight ahead.]

From this I took it that the person scheduling the appointment was talking about something other than his or her mental health.

—How are things going with the meds?

The receptionist's eyebrows raised, as if she were hearing a description of halluncinations. Then her lips tightened and its corners moved to the side of her face as her eyes opened wide, as if she were hearing most unpleasant descriptions of possible symptoms. At that moment, the problems which have been consuming every iota of my free time (and a good portion of my blogspace) seemed quite minor. By the time the psychiatrist came out to retrieve me for my appointment, I was more certain than ever that I was not going to walk out with a prescription for SSRI's.

I envy my cohorts' interest and talent. And as much as I like the idea of a Ph.D., I am not so sure I like the reality of academic life. Giving up on one's dream is not an easy decision to make.

It is hard to say "I am not a quitter" when one is quitting.

Photoblogs are popular, both at the U. and in general. And for genuine polymaths, blogs provide a means of bridging public and private lives. Most blogs have pretty short life spans; people get bored because they have no readers (ie the public function is not served) or they get in trouble because of them (privacy is violated). Thus, the "freedom of speech" which sounds so appealing is actually self-limited in the interest of protecting our private selves. Blogs are memoirs of the immediate past or the present even. They allow us to peek into someone's psyche not as they recall it years later with the benefit of hindsight but in real time.

Let us know your thoughts, but keep in mind that your mom (and mine) might be reading.

The good folks at the Pioneer Press had published an Outdoor Holiday Buying Guide, wherein various outdoorsy folks typed up the gifts they would like to give and receive. This was included in one of the free newspapers we get every so often in a losing attempt to win back our business. One of the people in the guide mentioned the Gore-Tex from Cabela's, at a price that was less than half what REI or LLBean has it for. After debating the pros and cons of driving 60 miles to Owatonna versus ordering through the internet, we took off for Cabela's fairly early, if not too bright.

Along the way, we passed a mega strip mall which hosted a Gander Mountain. Gander Mountain is another hunting and fishing catalog like Cabela's, but without the caché. Once we exited I-35 and took a look inside Gander Mountain, it was easy to see that they lacked caché. They had a lot of camo furniture on display, and the prices were not that great. Not a stitch of out of season stuff was stocked. Much of the floorspace was occupied with what can be best described as "dreck": clocks and ceramic figures of labs and golden retrievers, acrylic throws, and ice-fishing setups displayed in plastic boats. There were people there, for sure, but it was not bustling inside.

Cabela's on the other hand, was something of a madhouse: in the parking lot, SUV's and pickup trucks competed to take up more space. A "Viet Nam Veterans Against Kerry" bumper sticker was displayed on the truck we parked next to. People funneled toward the entrance, which was marked by an enormous canopy. Assembled tree-stands stood out in the snow alongside mock trees, though each carried a sign telling would-be shoppers not to climb on them.

Inside the store, which was mobbed with people, a ring of deer trophies perhaps 30 feet across greeted us. Elk trophies were mounted on the wall above, drawing our eyes back to the 30 foot high mountain diorama at the back of the store. I could hardly keep up with Roomie once she was drawn into the mountain's orbit. There were stuffed bears (brown, black, grizzly and polar), lynx, bobcats, javelinas, red fox, grey fox, arctic fox, bull-moose battling, wolves gnashing at buffalo and chasing deer off a cliff, and the most elusive prey of all—grey squirrels. As we circled the mountain, I was both horrfied by the waste of life and the thought of the needless suffering of these poor creatures while at the same time appreciative that this was the closest I would ever come to seeing any of these animals alive. Except for the squirrel.

I was intrigued by the display of camo baby clothes across the aisle from the mountain. An entire line of them were embroidered with "Daddy's Little Deer" across the bib. A generous interpretation is that camo is appropriate for both boys and girls, but the double-gendered phrase is possibly confusing. Daddy is out shooting deer, isn't he? "Look at Daddy's other deer, bleeding all over the back of the pickup, tongue hanging out, eye gazing at the sun."

Lest you think that a trip to Cabela's converted me to militant veganism, I should note that I left the store with not only an armful of Gore-Tex (two suits costing me less than one complete set from the competition), but a rabbit fur lined hat. I wore it, tags and all, right out of the store.

It was really fun talking about Italy. Your reason for holding off on Italy for a longer separate trip makes a lot of sense. But Italy cannot be rightly snubbed for any length of time. Plus, Austria is already in some sense his, whereas in Italy you can share the language barrier. And he will like Brixen (Bressanone) and Bolzen (Bolzano) since his Austrian-inflected German will serve there quite adequately. Check out where Stilfserjoch (Passostelvio) is on a map. Then yodel.

Burning Man vs. Coachella is another dichotomy upon which I pontificated. The two events share dust, discomfort, lots of people, and entertainment galore. Coalita appeared at both Burning Man and Coachella, but she was born at the former. BM requires a commitment to actually participate in some small way. This replaces the passive "entertain me" component with an active "here I am and this is what I am doing" role. However, by no means do you need to come up with something on your own. There are probably hundreds of people going to the Burn from the Cities, and many are likely toting person-powered craft. A quick search of the listings can put you on to a smorgasbord of groups doing all kinds of wicked crazy theme camps. A friend of mine in San Francisco sets up a croquet lawn, complete with wickets and mallets, and kicks your butt. And then there is always Pedal Camp. Burning Man is a transcendental experience: The hardships are universal, there are no garbage cans (you pack it out), and Black Rock City is a giant collective. If you go to Burning Man, it will be a project. But it is one that I think you will really really enjoy. But what the heck do I know?

Previously in this blog I have already blathered about the relative merits of scooters and motorcycles. You may also want to check out the Susan Synarski Interview, where I ask her all about her experience as a new rider and purchaser of a Vespa LT150. I think Susan may have mentioned it, but I will reiterate: Women who ride motorcycles are HOTT.

At 9:35 this morning, I walked in the 2 degree weather across the river to the Physics Building, where I chaperoned advanced placement high school students working on public policy. Better they not know that political science has nothing to do with policy. Or very little. My cohort was lucky enough to be excused. I sat in a hallway for 45 minutes. It was kind of fun.