It's been a busy week!

Last week my cousin, Janel, was visiting the area since she'll be starting an MA program at Umass in the fall for creative writing. So Tuesday we drove around Amherst in her rental car, looking at various apartment options. But I think she ended up finding something the next day, a bit north of the town, that will work out better. I had small group for SAW, so we weren't able to eat dinner together -- we met up afterwards to see Prison of Women though (a play being put on at MHC, in which Miranda had a part!) I enjoyed all the visuals, and realized that the script the students had made was better in my opinion than the original they used for a basis. Weds. Janel & I got together for dinner -- I'd suggested Fresh Side since it's one of my favorite places here. We caught up on family, work/ school, & plans for next year... Quite fun, because Janel was always my favorite cousin growing up; I felt a connection because she also liked mashed potatoes best at Christmas dinners!

Friday was a busy day, as we started Verbosity layout. We basically hung out in the Info Commons around a large monitor...all afternoon! Friday evening Sarah & I joined up with Jess, Diana, and Mel to go see the production of Arcadia at Smith. We were quite jealous of the theater building at Smith - so much nicer than ours here! We ate pizza, and headed over... Sarah & I were in the front row, center... amazing! No one in front of us... No heads obscuring parts of the stage... wow. Then Prof. Salter & her husband came in, and they had seats right next to us. Very cool. I appreciated the ambiguous ending, as I'd been depressed over T's death as I read the play that morning. Afterwards, we tried to go for ice cream, but everything was closed.

Saturday morning I had thesis work, and then I joined up for another afternoon of Verbosity layout. Managed to do something fun in the evening though, to make up for the fact that I didn't go to Boston this weekend (Andrew, Jon, & Jen were giving Andre (the Brazilian cousin) a tour of Boston). So I went with my neighbors & Kathleen to the piano concert, since both my profs. wrote song lyrics to be set to music. Kathleen & I got the giggles as we sat through a very long piano piece... I just can't stay interested in piano music for that long.

Anyway... after a long night of work, Sunday morning I went to brunch to meet Miranda's mom (who was visiting). On the way over to another Verbosity meeting, I stopped at the carnival, managing to consume a snow cone and two servings of cotton candy. We got the cover art done, & Laura & I went to the carnival for snow cones... We had to wait awhile for them to get more ice... And then this woman in front of us kept trying to get the last of the cherry syrup out of the bottle. It sprayed all over her, but instead of stopping, she kept going! And managed to get it all over my supposedly dry clean only skirt, sweater, and white tank top... She mumbled sorry and hurried off... needless to say, she didn't even offer to pay for cleaning (which I think would be a standard, courteous gesture... she wasn't a student, either, so it's not like she could play the starving student card...)

After cleaning up, Laura & I sat in the gazebo. It's really quite nice. You're outside, but not exposed to the mosquitoes. Plus it smells like sun warmed wood. That night I finally got down to finishing my introduction. This week I'm meeting with Corinne, Prof. Ahmed, Quillian, and Azeen over the thesis. Ack! I think it will end up relying more heavily upon the critical chapters. Quillian thinks otherwise it will be too long and disjointed (before special big margins, it's 68 pages of critical work, and at least 30 of stories... seems kinda unwieldy). If I were starting this project over again, I'd nix the stories & go heavier into Marxist theory, weaving it into the close reading... If I had world enough and time... right?

Anyway, that's my news! It's been gorgeous out, which has been good for my mental health... I'm so glad to be going to CA next year... I never again want to live anywhere that requires one to wear pajama bottoms under one's pants just to stay warm in the winter!