Something like normal?

So. Graduate School.

This marks the end of the first sort-of-officially-normal-week of graduate school. It's actually the third week that I've had classes, but because of labor day, and moving, and registration and all sorts of odd reasons, this is the first week that actually resembles what the next two years might feel like.

To begin with, Tim started his job on Monday, so the tables have finally turned. I'm the one who stays in bed while he gets up and goes to the office, and then I do whatever Grad Students do all day.

You would think, since I only have two classes, that means that I do a lot of Beatles Rock Band and trying to convince myself to workout, but not really. My two courses this semester are The Poetics of Diaspora (on Mondays) and The History of the Book (on Thursdays) which leaves a nice little 2-3 day wedge of time in between each class to freak out about how I'm going to read two books of poetry and four articles and create a presentation--for each class. Really though, it's exactly what I was hoping for in every way except that it takes me over an hour to commute to campus on the other side of DC.

To make things really fun, my professors this semester are named Mark McMorris and Michael Macovski, which is a continual source of confusion on my part.

So far I like them both, but History of the Book is my favorite. It's one of those classes where everything makes perfect sense and a) talks about things you think about every day and b) answers questions you've had all your life. The only problem is that it's one of those classes that's on the cusp between English and Communications, which, as usual, is where I find my interests so I keep thinking "Ohhhhh crap... maybe I should have been in the Communications department."

I have too much interest in art and technology to be happy with mere English. Gah. Traitor. The Comm people would never let me read enough novels.

Anyway, the apartment still isn't entirely unpacked. We haven't put a single piece of artwork on the walls, if you can believe it (unless you count the take-out menu holder that Karma Rinpoche gave me in TsoPema). My office is really the only thing that looks like anything, probably because that's where I hang out all day (and it's the room with the most sunlight).

The apartment is pretty incredible though. And more incredible is the park across the street that is, at all times, filled with happy, running, playing dogs. THEY ARE WONDERFUL. I can't go study in the park because all I do is watch the dogs going, "hey guys, hey guys, hey guys, BALL!!!"

I swear we'll be done unpacking soon. And when we are, we'll post pictures. And you can come and stay.