i forgot i had a blog.

I actually forgot.

I’ve been a little preoccupied with…

Dissertation. After this weekend, I should have a complete final draft of the dang thing. My advisor and I will give a final run through and if all is well, send it off to my committee. On July 3rd, I have my final exam so the fireworks on the 4th of July will all be for me.

Work. I have taken on a lot the last few months. Enough that people I rarely work with are coming up to me and saying, “Are you, like, the Advising manager now?” I love what I am doing and it’s a great next step to balance out the fact that my actual position (academic advisor) and education (doctorate) don’t match at all. The two new advisors I trained are about to fly solo and start advising on their own…they are very excited and want to wear caps & gowns that day to celebrate their accomplishment. They’re cute.

Wedding. Oy. It’s slowly coming together. It’s not until December, but so many people have to travel that they’re asking for info they need to make plans. Thus, the wedding website is launched. I’ll be more excited about all that after school is done.

Boss. Lordy. This dog. His co-dependency issues have NOT dialed down. I’ve started giving him “Boss time” alone in our bedroom while we are in the living room so he’ll start to appreciate his own company. It’s sad to hear the little howl from the bedroom. Must. be. firm. Funny thing about him: if one of us toots, he spins in circles about 3 times and goes back to napping.

I’ll try to remember I have a blog. Then maybe I won’t just be posting general updates when I write. But no guarantees.

Lazy blogger.

It’s been a ridiculous amount of time since I posted on the new blog I was so sure I would regularly maintain. So, being lazy, I thought I would post some recent Facebook statuses (stati?) that might shine a bit of light into my life since my last post…not one to be completely lazy, I did add some themes that should help illuminate the major things going on in my life as of late.

2/9: Girl raced past me in the Starbucks parking lot to get ahead of me in line this morning. As if that wasn’t rude enough, she then stood at the counter and stared at the menu, trying to figure out what she wanted. Seriously? (Theme: Stupid people. Annoying people. People. Starbucks.)

2/9: I have the BEST fiance! He is taking my car in tomorrow to get some work done and is doing all the research on it today. He’s more than just eye candy, ladies. (Theme: Harry. Cars. Candy.)

2/11: Returned to Portland (Oregon) and Powell’s (Books) after 6 years! (Theme: Travel. Books. Heaven.)

2/14: Love is…sharing a cough & cold on Valentine’s Day. (Theme: Health/Wellness. Holidays. Love.)

2/16: Data collection is officially DONE! (Theme: School. Sanity)

2/21: Girl Scout cookies arrived today! I may or may not have eaten an obscene number of them within an hour of taking possession.  (Theme: Diet. Or the Lack Thereof. Girl Scout cookies. Obscene.) Update 3/21…one month later: 11 boxes consumed, 3 boxes remain.

2/25: Dissertating…8 pages in about 4 hours. Not too shabby. (Theme: School. No Life on Weekends.)

2/29: Honeymoon is booked! Christmas in Cancun with my love–here we come! (Theme: Wedding. Honeymoon. Mexico. Harry.)

3/1: There may be a perception that my dog is my child out there. I got a photo book of our engagement pics and when my friend saw the outside today, she asked if it was a photo book of Boss. (Theme: Boss. Pets as children. Photos.)

3/2: Just submitted my dissertation proposal for a research award…I feel so smart! (Theme: School. Perceiving oneself as intelligent.)

3/9: Weekend off to a good start at happy hour with the new co-workers-turned-friends! (Theme: Work/Co-workers. Happy hour/drinking after work.)

3/13: What I’ve eaten today: doughnut, bacon cheeseburger, fries, cupcake. I say I just keep eating whatever I want today and start over tomorrow. On the other hand, if I eat anything else, I might just die on the spot. (Theme: Diet. Or the Lack Thereof. Death by consumption.)

3/13: Daylight savings last weekend. Snow today. Seattle sucks in the “spring.” (Theme: Seattle’s sucky weather.)

3/15: If anyone finds my voice, please send it back home. (Theme: Health/Wellness. Making people’s wishes come true by being rendered mute.)

3/17: One year ago today, Emma Byrd spent her birthday helping me pick up my new best friend! Happy birthday Emma and here’s to another year of having Boss in my life! (Theme: Boss. Emma. Holidays.)

Today: First wedding nightmare last night: day before the wedding and we never picked out a bridesmaid dress. Me: “Just tell them to wear black dresses!” Other Me: “What if they didn’t pack black dresses and now it’s JUST TOO LATE!” First Me: Cries hysterically. (Theme: Wedding. Nightmare. Bridesmaid dresses. Crying. Hysterics.)

By the numbers.

Dissertation interviews completed: 14 (of 15)

Transcribed: 11 completed (4 by me, 7 by my fantastic professional transcriptionist) and 1 in progress (by me)

Books currently checked out of the university library: 8

Said books related to my dissertation: 4

Said books unrelated to my dissertation: 4 (scary, right? I just checked them out…just because they sounded interesting. As though I’ll have time to read them before I have to return them in April.)

Month hoping to graduate in: June

Month I would settle for: August

Month that is completely unacceptable: December (I will NOT be in the final dissertation writing phase and final wedding planning phase at the same time. I will NOT.)

Official employees I supervise now that I didn’t last week: 3 work study students

Dogs driving me crazy: 1

Dogs I love to pieces so it doesn’t matter: 1 (same dog, in case you needed me to spell that out)

Fiances driving me crazy: 1

Fiances I love to pieces so it doesn’t matter: 1 (again, same fiance…I dumped the other one.)

Times worked out this week: 3

Times ate ice cream this week (not counting Weight Watchers desserts): 2…I’m keeping ahead of my workouts, not too shabby.

Harry-isms.

Found his lunch bag on the bedroom floor.

Asked me the other day, “Is the Superbowl in February?” I love that he doesn’t know when it is.

Regularly locate 2-3 glasses around the apartment, and he swears he is using all of them.

Won’t get the heat fixed in his car because he doesn’t want to invest more money in his 1993 Dodge Spirit. But the clunker has broken down 3 times in the past 3 weeks and he’s “invested” to fix it each time. Harry, get a new car.

Likes loves snuggling.

Is extremely frugal yet eats out lunch everyday because he won’t make a sandwich. Is now eating homemade Sally-made sandwiches. But you know, I discovered, I love making my man’s lunch. (We’ll see how long this lasts.)

Peek at engagement pics!

Our fabulous photographer has posted on her blog of our engagements. Feel free to take a look here!

Three hour work week.

Thanks to the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday and Snowpocalypse 2012 hitting Seattle, I only worked 3 hours this week. Thankfully, I leave near three good friends, two of whom have dogs also, as well as several restaurants and a small grocery. So the Snowpocalypse cabin fever has remained at a minimum.

This was Boss’ first snow! At first, he was very confused. He looked at it, and seemed kind of mad at it. Then he realized..

THIS IS THE BEST STUFF EVER!

Boss enjoyed burrowing in the snow!

Boss enjoyed running with this friends at the nearby park!

Former Roommate & Boyfriend joined us at the park for a doggy romp!

Not taking a dump. Just running.

Last night.

Everything was going so well. I had remembered to thaw out the chicken, so Harry & I had grilled chicken with steamed broccoli for dinner. It was tasty. I gave Boss a bite with a little ketchup on it.

We watched a couple of episodes of Soap on Netflix.

Then we got on the phone with Geico to merge our car insurances (Whoa).

While I was on the phone, Harry motioned to me that Boss had a (big, huge, steaming) poo accident.

He got on the phone with Geico Guy (nice timing, Harry) and I was left with the steaming poo pile. I noticed it looked like someone had stepped in part of it. Nope, not on my shoes. Nope, not on Harry’s shoes.

I was back on the phone with Geico Guy when Harry held his foot up to my face, where the poo was clearly on the bottom of his SOCK (his sock! ewwww). He said he had walked all over the apartment before noticing. Great.

THEN. Boss heaved. And heaved. And heaved. And out came another big, huge, steaming pile…this time of vomit, but it looked pretty much like he had taken his poo, eaten it, and was now giving it to us for a second time.

I nearly threw up cleaning it.

That was about 8:00 pm.

Then, Harry complained of a headache. It became increasingly worse.

Boss threw up every 45 minutes to hour until, at 2:40 am, I decided to take him to the ER vet. I went alone, as Harry was moaning about his headache.

I arrived at the ER vet at 2:55 am and they whisked Boss away to a room where I could hear him howling.

Finally, the vet came out and told me he was nauseated (you think?) and his belly was tender. She asked me a lot of questions:

Had Boss had anything unusual to eat? No, other than I gave him a bite of chicken at dinner.

Were there any spices on it? Ketchup. Oh, and a cajun seasoning (sounds yummy, right? Maybe if we weren’t discussing it in the context of my dog’s constant puking.).

Did you know onion and garlic is toxic to dogs? No, ma’am, I didn’t.

Did he have access to anything possibly harmful, like cleaning supplies? Well, I did clean today. But when the Clorox juice spilled out the bottom of the wipes container, I cleaned it up so Boss wouldn’t lick it.

She recommended giardia/worm testing, x-rays to check for foreign objects, and then blood work. All together, it would be $800.

WHAT.

Let’s start with the giardia/worm testing and go from there.

20-30 minutes later…Boss tested VERY positive for both. Excellent. 3 meds, some fluids and $400 later, we left at 4:00 am.

I came home to Harry throwing up in the bathroom.

Are you freaking kidding me.

If I stayed on one topic, you would get bored.

Our engagement pictures are ready! We looked through them last night, and there are definitely some great ones and some “one of us is making a weird face” or “your head looks huge” ones. I can’t wait to share some of them, and will as soon as I know it’s okay (copyright-wise).

I completed the sixth interview (out of 14) for my dissertation yesterday, and left feeling really energized. Like, oh…this might actually, really happen. (“This” being “graduation”.) I also left thinking, “I could be BFF4E with that girl I just interviewed.”

I’ve done something I have heard is impossible when writing a dissertation: reading for pleasure. I have consistently had one, if not two, books that I’m reading just because. Clearly, I am a nerd to the core. My current book is Enrique’s Journey by Sonia Nazio. Every quarter, the Diversity Advisory Committee at the college chooses a book to read together and discuss throughout the quarter. This one sounded particularly intriguing so I jumped on the bandwagon. And it is intriguing. And also heartbreaking (consider yourself warned, if you plan to add it to your list).

I have met with my personal trainer at the gym since early November. He took my measurements the first session and then took them again last week. I gained 2 pounds of muscle and lost no fat. So I weigh two more pounds, but he swears this is a good thing. (He did say we will focus more on my diet to try to lose a little fat.) Here’s the kicker: Guess where I gained a full inch (by far more than any other single measurement)? Booty, booty, booty everywhere.

Harry brought home a little treat last night. He heated up my Lean Cuisine frozen pizza (those things are sooooo good) for me so I wouldn’t look in the freezer. Because he had brought home my favorite ice cream (salted caramel wins)! I have the best fiance.

Ramblings.

1. Heard this phrase today and liked it: “Don’t look back. You’re not going that way.”

2. Just finished reading “The Happiness Project” by Gretchen Rubin. I highly recommend it. I considered formulating my own year-long happiness project, but then decided if I can finish my dissertation and get married successfully this year, I will be happy. Done. If you want to add another blog to your reading list, check out http://www.happiness-project.com/

3. Just a little funny for your day…

During the wedding ceremony, we are going to have a Unity Sand ceremony (rather than a unity candle ceremony, mainly because candles aren’t allowed at the venue). So I ordered the Unity Sand set from Daisy Days and had it shipped to my auntie’s house. (Poor Auntie is taking on a lot of stuff and has a closet dedicated to my wedding garb until the Big Day–thank you, Auntie!) Auntie emailed me to let me know the set arrived, but the brown sand was EVERYWHERE! So I contacted Daisy Days to send more brown sand, please. They did and it arrived…when Auntie let me know, I said, “I’m glad the sand arrived all in one piece… so to speak.”

(Get it? Because sand is, by definition, in lots of pieces. Hardy har har.)

 

Two students, known as Night and Day.

Scene: My office, in Advising at a local community college. 4th day of the new quarter (today).

NIGHT

Night comes into my office. I’ve seen her a few days earlier, on the first day of the quarter. On the first day, she came in to pick out a couple of classes in order to raise her GPA so she could return to the university where she was kicked out due to poor grades. When I looked her up, I discovered she left our college on probation. How she was admitted to the (fairly competitive) university, I have no idea. She stated the reason she had struggled with her grades so far was because she didn’t really care about school (no doubt Mom & Dad are paying for it, so why care?) Anyway, I helped her pick out a couple of classes and sent her on her way.

She showed up again today, and told me that she had gone to the classes we had picked out but they were “much too easy” for her. Um, you’re here to raise your GPA, are you not? So 1) what position are you in to say a class is too easy when you haven’t done well before and B) get a clue…wouldn’t classes that are easy for you a good way to raise your GPA? I told her if she wanted to pick new classes, she could do that by finding the open classes online in the schedule, attending the class, and asking for the instructor’s permission.

She insisted that she needed to take classes related to her desired major, communication. Um, it’s the FOURTH DAY OF THE QUARTER. You take what you can get. You entitled little brat. Okay, I didn’t say it that way exactly. But there does come a point when even the most patient advisor has to tell a student who has procrastinated their way through life to get it together. That point came today. And don’t even get me started on the irony of her wanting to major in communication…yes, dear, you NEED some communication classes.

DAY

An hour or so after Night left my office, Day walked in. Day has a 3.68 overall GPA and is a student leader on campus. Day also puts herself through school as an older student and single mom. She also has a disability that she overcomes each day that she succeeds in school. Day has unfortunately found herself in a tough spot where money is unbelievably tight (she actually earns her income through the student leadership position on campus) and owes a debt to the college, so she is not allowed to register. Another staff person and I worked with her for about an hour today, trying to find a way for her to register in even one class so she could keep her student leadership job and continue in school because she fears that if she loses her job, she won’t be able to pay her debt or return to school. My heart broke for her, but she would have to find a way to pay at least part of her debt in order to come to school.

It saddens me to think that there are such entitled students out there who tell us to our faces that they don’t care about school and think the world should be handed to them on a silver platter (on the 4th day of the quarter, no less) while others who truly care about getting an education struggle just to make it all work.

This is my life at work. An emotional knapsack.