Mitrailleuse #451

As usual, in no particular order...

• I'm freezing.
• I'm at the univ. library; decided to sequester myself all morning to --finally-- get some computer/internet/letter stuff done.
• Plus I looked up some books... 'cause that's a good thing to do when one is at the library. Work books, to boot! (for. lang. teaching stuff - aren't you impressed!? or perhaps you're thinking: "Isn't she supposed to know all about that already?!" If it's the latter then just put it in the "Professional Development" category and then detour back to being impressed, already.)
• I hope everyone had a good 4th. Andy came for the weekend. (I might have visuals for you later. I forgot to download the pix from his camera before he left but he will probably not mind sending them to me, in between watching stages of the Tour, that is.) Highpoints: Asheville NC, hand-me-down A/V toys, and Wall•E.
• Wacky. A university payroll system with the technology to spread 9-mo. employee salaries over 12 mos.!! Who knew?!?! (Obviously NOT Aub*rn!) So OK, my checks will be smaller but gone are the days of putting aside for summer and/or arriving at summer with nothing aside and so scrambling for extra work. I will still welcome extra summer work (and am still promised a class or two each summer, which will help enormously) but it's good that there will be actual breathing room if absolutely necessary.
• Something else fun: guess what new student summer orientation is called here? "Orientation." tee hee. (For you non-Aub*rners, on the Plains this was "Camp War E*gle." I just think it's fun for some reason that I'm back where potatoes are potatoes.)
• REALLY freezing.
• Preponderance of fairly wacky oldies played in several places I frequent, like BI-LO and the library coffee shop. Today it's 1983 Phil Collins. The last two days at the grocery I happened to get there right when their premade oldies mix got to Boston. Holy cow we just segued from Phil Collins to Joe Jackson. I'm reliving my last three years at BG just now.
• Recycling this bit from my msg to Jessica a few minutes ago: The library is great - it's right next to my building, there's a great coffee shop and humongous amounts of computers everywhere, even in the coffee shop. Plus you can carry your coffee or other drinks all around the library. At first this idea seemed pretty radical to my nearly-religious views of the respect due libraries and their materials but I have to admit it's pretty great. And I guess they just figure they can trust college-age people to mostly know better than to be reckless with their beverages.There is a really good collection of dvds, too, esp. foreign. The catch is you can only keep them 2 days and you have to come in in person if you want to renew them but oh well, still: free dvd access is pretty cool when one is budgeting.
• Still on libraries but not recycled: The county library is pretty great, too - right next to my house almost - really really great selection of British mystery series, esp. (somewhat unfortunately) Midsomer Murders, which I have tried to watch on and off for years to mixed success. Sometimes I like them but often I find them too contrived and almost always I find them too populated with characters. Still, free entertainment is hard to beat and at the very least they're fun to see various fave Brit actors doing different stuff plus since they aren't super hard to follow I think I can probably knit to them easier than to stuff which requires more close visual attention... Have yet to test the theory tho.
• Peter Gabriel and now Tears for Fears.
• No but really my fingernails are blue. I might have to switch to outside for a while. I was hoping to attack a bunch of y'all's overdue email responses (from me to you that is) before leaving the computer but that might have to be for my next session. I did, at least, clean out my inbox earlier so all the actual emails from friends/family (as opposed to reminder emails from myself or gcal) are the only things left in my inbox - all ready to dig in!!
• More soon, either here or via email - promis! I'm going to try to put my funk away and just get lost in activity the next few days so while I can't promise any news exactly hopefully it will afford you contact at least so you know I haven't dropped off the face of the earth :)
• Madonna, Cherish. On that note...
• Bai.