Let it snow!

Wow, I just disappeared there, didn't I? I was sure that I'd have time to put up a quick post before we left town last Saturday, something like:
but it didn't happen. And once we were in the mountains, I really didn't feel like facing a computer. So I pretty much didn't.

We left for Mammoth last Saturday, to spend spring break skiing and hanging out in front of a fire. I, of course, had my own packing priorities (it helps that my ski gear mostly lives in one place, so there was very little searching to be done):
That bag held a whole lot of goodies.
That's two spindles, three sock projects, a hat, two neckwarmers, and a shawlet. I actually was fully prepared to bring more, but decided, wisely, to leave the rest behind. It's probably just as well that I did, as I finished far less than I brought, and I didn't even touch the spindles (I'd forgotten, as I always do, how tired my hands are after a day of skiing the steeps -- it takes some serious pole-work to make those turns).

I did, however, finish a neckwarmer and an earwarmer (not enough yarn to make two neckwarmers). The neckwarmer is currently on Older Daughter's head (she likes it better to hold her hair back and keep her ears warm), but it's a wider version of this:
Isn't it cute? That's Mary Lou's new pattern, in Mini Mochi; I tossed the skein and pattern in at the last minute, and I'm so glad that I did. The pattern is such fun, and perfect for the long color changes in a yarn like Mini Mochi. I knitted madly on the neckwarmer all the way up on Saturday, and finished it and the earwarmer (for Younger Daughter) on Tuesday, which was our rest day.

That rest day actually turned out to be perfect timing. We skiied Sunday (which was Older Daughter's twelfth birthday; how did I get to be old enough to have a twelve-year-old daughter?), and it was an absolutely perfect day. I think Older Daughter felt that it was a good way to spend her birthday.
She looks pretty happy at the end of the day, doesn't she?

The snow was gorgeous, and the mountain was nearly deserted. I don't think Rick and I waited in line once all day. We skiied the top of the mountain, which wasn't even open the last time we went up, and the girls took a lesson. It always amazes me how happy I am to be back on skis. I took a skiing hiatus for a number of years, while I was pregnant, and the girls were little, and it surprised me utterly how comfortable I was the first winter we went back. I got those skis on my feet, and it was like my body remembered everything it had to know, how it feels to walk in ski boots, the moves that make it possible to stop suddenly, turning to face the top of the slope, the joy of speed. And this week, the snow was FAST. I like going fast.

(Does anyone remember this VW commercial from a few years ago? The first time Rick saw that fast sitting in the front seat, glowing malevolently, he took one look at me and broke up laughing. He didn't stop for a while. This might make even more sense if you know that his nickname for me for years was Mariana -- as in Mario Andretti. I like to go fast. Heh.)

We'd always planned to take Tuesday off, to put a break in the middle of four days of skiing, and our timing turned out to be perfect. Because on Tuesday, a storm blew in and dropped 18 inches of perfect powder all over Mammoth. And it got cold. It was down to about 4 degrees at night, which meant that the snow stayed light and fluffy. Younger Daughter spent some of the day outside, building snowmen and playing in the powder.
I stayed inside and knitted my Turkish socks.
(You can see there how ski boots chew up my ankles.) Aren't they gorgeous? And SO fun to knit!
I've changed them a bit, and I think these will fit my feet better than the original version. I'd forgotten how much fun two-stranded colorwork really is. It feels like it goes quickly, because I'm always motivated to finish just one more motif. Rick's very impressed with them, and has asked whether I'd knit him a sweater like this. The answer is yes, but most definitely NOT at this gauge (about 7.5 sts/in).

So there it is. A perfect week of skiing, almost no lines, plenty cold. I think that one of the best bits, for me and Rick, was seeing how much the girls enjoyed themselves. There's nothing more fun than seeing them become more and more confident, not only on skis, but just in general. At the end of each day, they were leading us to the runs they'd liked the best, poring over the map of the mountain and planning how to get to where they wanted to take us, which chair lifts to get on, and which runs to take.

On the third day, Older Daughter stayed with her lesson to ski with some new friends she'd made, and we took Younger Daughter off to ski with us. She was doing so well that I asked her if she wanted to ski down a black diamond run (an easy one, honestly), something she could brag about to her sister later. She thought about it, and said maybe not just yet, so we planned to take another way down. As we were skiing toward the lift, I heard this voice behind me saying, "Mama, I've reconsidered my decision." (Honestly, that's a quote. I about bust a gut trying not to laugh.) "I think I'd like to ski that black diamond." So we did. And she nailed it. Slow, but steady, and she was so proud of herself afterward, I thought she'd burst. I think this is what they mean when they say that sports are good for kids, especially girls, that they increase confidence and positive body-image and all of that.

Not to mention the fact that they're fun.
Top of the mountain, 11,000+ feet. (Rick and I kept having to pop our ears as we skiied up and down the 3,000 feet of vertical drop on the mountain.)
It was very cold, though. The last two days, all of the skiers on the mountain looked like bandits, with no bit of skin showing anywhere.
Our last day, the mountain was covered in absolutely stunning, completely untouched powder. And every skier wanted a piece of the untouched snow. As soon as the lifts opened to the top, it was like a land-grab, skiers making mad dashes for any untouched run they could find. Rick and I managed to bag first tracks on one of the bowls on the backside, and spent the rest of the day feeling quite smug about it. (Turns out, I'm not very mature at all about some things.) The snow was absolutely gorgeous, like skiing in clouds.

And now we're home. There's laundry to do, and a dog to walk, and a house to get ready for a new week. But it was so good to get away. I didn't fret about work, or about any of the things I've been spinning my wheels about lately. I didn't think about deadlines, or about anything more pressing than finding that new snow, making that next turn, catching that next ride up the mountain, and cheering the girls on as they skiied away down their runs.

I need to plan better

The last time I posted, I remember thinking to myself, "Dude, you should seriously save some of these project photos for the next time, when you'll have made no progress worth a darn. Then you'll have something to show off, all ready. Like a Tupperware of chili in the freezer."

Did I take my own advice? No, I did not.

I hope this makes anyone who's ever given me advice that I've ignored feel better; apparently, I do it to everyone, so you're in good company.

I have been knitting, though. Truly. I am almost done with the garter stitch section on Damson. And I am further along on the zigzag scarf (I don't like the name of that scarf in the book, so that's what I'm calling it). That has turned into excellent meeting knitting, and I took it with me up to Tehachapi for Sunday's language work, so progress is slow but steady. I have also been spinning. I am almost done with the first third of the roving I showed you last time. I decided to work on this one first:
That is Wensleydale (in the Abalone colorway). Before buying it, I thought that was a cheese, but apparently it's also a sheep. (Related? I don't know, but now I'm going to have to find out.)(This will take some real research, because when I Wiki'd it, it only referred to the region. Nary a cheese nor a sheep in sight.) Kristine, from A Verb For Keeping Warm, recommended it highly when I told her that I was looking for fiber to spin into socks. And can I just tell you how much I'm absolutely loving this fiber? It is incredibly long-stapled, I'm guessing at least three inches, with almost no crimp, and it drafts like a dream. I'm putting in plenty of twist (which I find difficult, for some reason -- my hands want to product a loosely spun two-ply, somewhere between fingering and lace weight, and I'm trying here to produce a pretty fine singles, with very tight twist, so that I can end up with a tightly twisted fingering-weight three ply; we'll see how it goes), and it's taking it like a champ. I took the two hanks of fiber and broke each of them into thirds, keeping the colors in each third similar. We'll see how the final yarn turns out, but I'm having a lot of fun, and spinning each evening a little bit. I'm wondering whether it would be excessive to take my wheel along to Mammoth next week...

I also got myself a sock kit with which I am tremendously delighted. Check this out. How wonderful is that? I have a few modifications in mind, but mostly I'm going to knit them as they lie, and enjoy the completely over-the-top nature of those socks. So I need to wind that up and pack them to go on our trip.

Meanwhile, work continues. My field methods class is progressing beautifully. They were very brave, and over the last two weeks, four groups have worked together to elicit the Frog Story from our speaker. This sounds like an odd thing to do, but it's something that every linguist will recognize instantly. See, there's this book that Mercer Meyer illustrated years ago, called Frog, Where Are You. The entire book is pictures, no words, and the story is extremely active (it's about a little boy whose pet frog goes off hunting for some lovin', and the boy and his dog go out to find the frog and have many adventures before finding the frog with his lady frog and many froglets; the ending is happy, I promise). What this means from a linguist's perspective is that you can show this book to the speaker of another language, and ask them to narrate the story, in as much detail as you like, and you are guaranteed to get a story that is a) not influenced by translating from an English text, and b) has lots and lots of lovely verbs in it, because of all of the actions in the story. It's a staple of linguistic fieldwork. And that's exactly what happened here. Suddenly, all of the accusitive and genitive marking that I'd been waiting for in vain appeared out of nowhere, like mushrooms after a rain; we got verb tense marking up the wazoo, and a whole lot of other fun things, too.

It's also more fun for the students and for the speaker, I think, to be focusing on an actual narrative, rather than individual, unconnected sentences. But it is simultaneously hairier, in that you never know what's going to come at you from one sentence to the next. It's real language. We're lucky, in that we have an amazing speaker, who is both tremendously patient, and willing to work with the students as they analyze the sentences; in fact, I have to remind them not to rely on her too much, both because they need to do the work themselves, and because sometimes speakers either don't recognize some of the core phenomena of their languages (in fact, let's be honest, most speakers don't recognize most of the core phenomena of their languages), and sometimes what they've been taught about how language works is not, in fact, particularly accurate. In any case, my students all turned in their analyses of the story on Monday, and I've been having fun (honestly) reading them; with luck I'll have all of that done before we leave for spring break.

Knitting!

Actual, honest-to-goodness knitting. I haven't been whipping through any projects, but I have been working steadily, and this morning I finished a pair of socks.
I haven't taken pictures of the pair; this is from the pictures that I took last weekend, in preparation for a post on the projects I have OTN, but I promise you, there are two, and I will a) wear them out into the world very soon, and b) take pictures of both of them on my feet.
Aren't they lovely? This is the first kit from the Vintage Purls Summer of Socks club that Stella so wonderfully signed me up for. (As an aside, she has posted some really interesting discussions lately about knitting and designing; they certainly inspired me to think about my knitting in a new way.) I'm already looking forward to casting on for the next kit. You can't really see in this picture, but these socks are beaded, just up towards the top, which charms me all to pieces.

I knit these using my size one Signatures, which were perfect, as there were some k3togs and some sssks, and the pointy tips of the Signatures make light work of moves like that. They're knit toe-up, which is not my habitual style of sock knitting, but I like shaking things up a bit, and this cast-on was quite nice, and I like the round toe. The heel was particularly nifty, and of a style I'd never done before; it fits beautifully. And I really do love this yarn; I have at least one other skein of it in stash, and I'm starting to lay plans for it.

So that's mostly what I've been working on. Barring the bit where there was beading to be done (using my trusty little bitty crochet hook), these were excellent travel socks, so I've been schlepping them about with me and working on them here and there. I was vastly entertained last week when I pulled them out at a meeting. Everyone insisted on fondling the first, finished sock, looking at it and then looking at me strangely. "You're knitting a pair of socks?" one person asked. I gave my latest answer to this question (I've gotten it a lot lately: "You knit that sweater?", etc): "Someone's got to." There was a moment of silence, and then another person looked at me and said, "You can buy socks at Target, you know, for ten dollars a bag." Honestly. Someone actually said it. I thought that was one of those things that people only say to Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, but there it was. What I wouldn't have given to have had my recorder to hand. I don't think my fellow committee member understood why I found that so vastly entertaining; there is was, a trope from the modern knitting experience. But you know what? I couldn't buy these socks at Target for ten bucks a bag, baby.

I do have a few other things OTN, waiting for my renewed attention. I finally cast on for the Tibetan Clouds Stole using Sundara's fingering silky merino, although I haven't made much progress. It turns out that it's better for me to have only one beaded project going at once (which may mean that the stole may be derailed again soon, because wait 'til you see what's coming in the mail). But this yarn is gorgeous, and you all were right about the last set of beads I bought; they're perfect.
It's not much to look at now, I know; it'll be easier to see for a while once it's on circs. The way this stole is knit is very interesting to me; the center back is knit in the round, with increases at four points to create a square. Then I'll cast off one side of the square, put the next side on a stitch holder, cast off the third side, and begin to knit out, back and forth, on the last side. It's a fun structure, and the lace is lovely, so even if this does get put aside again, I guarantee it won't be for long.

I have two other scarves going, both of which are nice and simple for meetings or plays or movies.
This is the Wool and Camel-Down Ripple Scarf from the book Luxury Yarn One-Skein Wonders. The pattern really doesn't look like much in the book, but knitting in a colorful yarn like this, it does something lovely, I think. The yarn is Schaefer Nicole, which I quite like.

In fact, I'm liking Schaefer so much that I unintentionally stumbled at my LYS the other week, and picked up a skein of Schaefer Audrey, a gorgeous silk/merino blend (I really do like silk and merino together, can you tell?), in the happiest of springtime colorways. I needed it, don't you think?
It's all shades of pinks and greens, both vibrant and subtle, and it makes me very happy. I'm knitting it into Damson, by Ysolda Teague (Rav link), which is another little shawlet in the shape I've been loving so much lately. The skein is big enough that I might very well end up with enough to make two, which would be a nice outcome.

And that's it. That's what I've got going on right now. Nothing for a deadline, no pressure, and I'm thinking that I'd like to take advantage of that and do some spinning. I bought some absolutely gorgeous roving last summer at Sock Summit from A Verb For Keeping Warm, and it's been calling to me.

Remember these?
And these?
I think the first (a silk/merino blend, heh) needs to be spun up into a very fine two-ply to knit something lacey, and the second is begging to be a pair of socks. I'll probably start up the second soon, maybe even tomorrow.

Meanwhile, tonight we're going to see Cirque du Soleil's Kooza, the tickets for which were a birthday present from my beloved husband. I truly love Cirque du Soleil, and always find myself inspired to take better care of my body after seeing the things those performers can do with theirs. And tomorrow I think will be a catch-up day, as Rick leaves Sunday for a week in Virginia, and the girls and I will be spending Sunday up in Tehachapi (I'll be working, they'll be playing), which I think will be the perfect venue for my new socks, as it's much cooler up there than it has been lately down here.

Ceonothus and hiking: A photoessay

The ceonothus is in bloom. It's a short window each year, when the hillsides around here are covered in flowering purple bushes; some folks call it wild lilac, which it technically isn't, but it most definitely is beautiful. So on Sunday we went out on a three-hour hike and picnic to enjoy the ceonothus (and the cool weather!) while we could.
See all those lighter patches? Purple ceonothus.
They were swarming with bees; you could hear the buzzing from feet away around each bush.
Of course, this rare moment of green and bloom comes with its darker side.
Yes, that would be our friend the poison oak. It was everywhere.
My three girls.
We stopped to admire flowers along the way.
Including these wild sweet peas. And some monkeyflowers.
We finally found a perfect spot for a picnic (rock to sit on = no poison oak, and no ticks).
Tilly thought it was about time.
After a lovely lunch, we headed home. There were more flowers.
More ceonothus.
A lot more poison oak.
And, of course, my favorite: live oaks.
I think we all would gladly have kept going.
So there you go, a little green for St. Patrick's Day. And a little Irish dance to go with it.

Playing catch-up

Where does the time go? I thought after last Thursday was over that I'd be able to finally start getting back into a regular routine. Up to and including a regular schedule of posting to the blog (not to mention reading everyone else's blogs; I think I'm doing a bit better with that than with posting to my own). It didn't seem to work out that way. We went away last weekend to Los Angeles to celebrate my mom's birthday with my folks, and I spent some time trying to catch up on some things at work, and I kept composing blog posts in my head about all of the other things that are going on in my life: this rally and how hopeful it made me, the hate speech incident that happened on campus and how unhopeful that made me, the horrific news about Chelsea King and all of the thoughts I've been having about the culture of fear and raising daughters and and and...

And I finally decided that if I wait to post until I have all of those thoughts in order, I'll never get there. I will post about some of those things, as they've been the impetus for a lot of rearranging of the mental furniture, but I want to get that house a bit more in order before the tour. So, instead, a few pictures from L.A. (from my phone, alas, I forgot the camera). And next time, a review of all of the knitting projects that I've started since completing my Olympic debut.

Oh, and I should also report that the teach-in and rally were, by the standards of our small campus, extremely successful. We had 500 people at the rally, all of them riled up in exactly the right kinds of ways. I really wish that radio stations like KPBS and newspaper outlets would realize that there's another CSU here in San Diego county, and that we're doing some interesting stuff, too, but that's one of those rants that can wait for another day. Meanwhile, a few pictures:
And one of my favorite signs:
Students and faculty from our art department made black paper shadows to represent the 437 students who were qualified to come to our university last fall, but who couldn't be admitted due to lack of funding. It was a pretty visceral reminder of what we're losing when we don't have room for our young people in our institutions of learning.

Our weekend in Los Angeles came as a truly wonderful escape from the chaos of the last month. We headed up on Friday (both girls had half-days, and I had a -- deliberately scheduled on this day -- furlough), and met up with my folks downtown before walking to an absolutely fabulous restaurant for mom's big birthday dinner. Dad had done his research and done it well, and the food was spectacularly good. Rick and dad indulged in raw oysters, and Older Daughter even bravely tried one herself. I don't think she'll do that again for a while (heh), but it's always good to be adventurous, right?

On Saturday, we headed to Pasadena, where we took the girls on a brief driving tour (in the pouring rain) of Occidental, where Rick and I both went to college (in fact, where we met), lo these many years ago. (In fact, we both came to the realization that we started dating there 21 years ago next month. Who knew?) Then we went to the Gamble House for a wonderful tour; both of the girls were very impressed, and Younger Daughter has spent a not-inconsiderable amount of time since talking about the design features of the house, and about how much she likes the aesthetic of showing the way that things are put together. Rick and I, both being huge fans of the Arts and Crafts movement, can't help but agree with her. After that, we headed to the Norton Simon Museum, where I spent many happy (and cheap) hours as a college student.

Then it was back to the hotel for a quick refresher before heading out to another absolutely fabulous meal at a Japanese place (can you say crab? mmm...), and then to a concert at Disney Hall. I don't think I can possibly convey adequately how utterly in awe I was of the acoustics in that hall. I have never heard anything so absolutely clear and precise and warm. The orchestra was, of course, excellent, and the hall took the music to another level entirely. It is also just lovely, full of warm woods and colors, and it was a pleasure to spend two hours sitting and listening to Prokofiev in those surroundings. But it was the music that made the experience so perfect; I'm already wondering how to get myself back up there to hear something else in that hall. Magnificent. Truly magnificent.

And then on Sunday, we went to the Griffith Observatory, to which I've never (if you can believe) been before, and went to my first planetarium show. I loved it. And not only is the observatory wonderful from a planetary physics perspective, the architecture is beautifully Art Deco.
Such nice details.
(Ignore the thumb, please, silly camera phone.)

Rick and the kids chose planetary orbits for themselves.
And the views of the snow-capped mountains were quite lovely.
The girls were also charmed to pieces to actually see the Hollywood sign for the first time in their lives, and even more charmed when the movie we watched last night turned out to have a scene filmed on the very road that we drove up to Griffith. Their first experience of real-world/movie intersection.

And that's it for my travels. Next time, the four knitting projects upon which I am currently embarked. Meanwhile, we're off to a piano recital!

The other thing I've been trying to get done

Is happening today. I don't know if any of you have been tracking the series of events happening at college campuses across the nation today to remind people of the importance of publicly-funded higher education, but we're having a teach-in and rally here on my campus, and I've been part of the (very small but tremendously efficient) organizing committee. We talked about it and figured that we're teachers, and what we do best isn't carrying placards (although that has its place) or shouting slogans (although that, too, has its place) but rather teaching, so we have four faculty members on a panel talking about the California Master Plan, the politics of funding higher education, and the directions that our new models are taking us (a hint: they're not good). Then we'll be taking lots of questions.

The really cool (and terrifying) bit is that we're streaming this puppy live. Today, from 10:30-11:45. And we'll archive it, too. We're also going to be reading email questions to the panelists during the question and answer period. So, should you happen to see this, and should you happen to be interested, here's the url with the link to the teach-in (I checked, and my co-organizers said I could share):

http://www2.csusm.edu/cfa/

I don't usually advertise things like this, but this issue of publicly-funded higher education is an important one (I admit, I'm biased), and I think it's all too often swept under the rug or misunderstood. I hope with all of my heart that today's events -- not just here, but everywhere -- will change that just a little bit.

I'm wearing my new sweater for luck, and I'll be reading out those email questions, so let's hope I don't say something silly or misread something crucial. And once this is done, I'll be past my last big hurdle for a while.

Sticking the landing

Olympic Gold.

I did it. I finished this baby last night, in time to wear to Younger Daughter's school open house.
I think that one is closest of all to the color of this gorgeous yarn.

Project details: This is Anne's henley; the pattern isn't released yet, but I'll be sure to let you know when it is. It's knitted out of the absolutely gorgeous Grandma's Blessing that Chris sent to me; I love this color more every time I look at it. It's exactly the complex set of shades in the bark of a live oak tree. It's knitted on size four lace Addis, except the edging, which was knitted on size two Addis.

And here's the kicker. I cast on during the opening ceremonies of the Olympics, February 12, and sewed on the last button yesterday afternoon at 4:30, February 26. By my count, that's fourteen days. To knit an entire sweater. With lace. And cables. Craziness.
I think I really nailed the fit on this one. See that shoulder seam? It's sitting exactly where it ought to. (And as an aside, I think my seaming skills are getting better; not perfect, but definitely better enough that I'm willing to post a picture which focuses on a seam.)
Yup, just right. And it's tremendously comfortable. I'm wearing it over a t-shirt in these pictures, and have been all day; the yarn is soft enough that it's not been a problem at all. And the lace/cable combination is forgiving enough to have a lot of room for movement, so it's not at all tight, even though it's very fitted. I haven't blocked it yet (let's be honest, I haven't really taken it off except to sleep), but I think that I'd like to, as it'd help the button band to lie more nicely.

Things I've learned from taking on this crazy Olympic knitting insanity in the middle of a month full of deadlines at work:

1. It's a really really good thing that I can knit 2x2 cables without a cable needle, because this sweater has 2x2 cables every eight rows, and I never would have been able to finish this in time if I'd been mucking about with a cable needle.

2. When living cheek by jowl with a single knitting project every spare minute of every crammed-full day for two weeks, it really helps to absolutely madly adore the yarn and the pattern. I did, and so I still do. (Note: I have not declared that I can't bear to look at this thing again now that it's finished. I'm wearing it now, and have already begun to devise a way to wear it every day this week without looking like someone who's finally gone around the bend.)

3. My family is tremendously patient with my weird knitting obsession, and is willing to pick up a lot of extra slack around the house so I can knit madly whilst muttering to myself in a corner, so long as they know it's only for two weeks. (Note the second: We are all supportive of one another's obsessions; today we went to the beach with Rick so we could watch the tsunami come in. It was not particularly observable, involving less than a foot of amplitude difference, but the rain and wind certainly were observable. And wet. Nevertheless, it was exactly the kind of thing that charms the heck out of a hydrologist.)

Aside from those smaller things, though, I also really learned a lot about my own process when I have a lot to get done. These kinds of realizations, it seems to me, are some of the best things about getting older. I've read in many places that it takes at least ten years to truly master something, to really understand it, and to begin to make significant contributions to whatever field of knowledge it is that you've mastered. And given that none of us comes with an instruction book, or a preexisting academic literature, or a master from whom to learn, it seems to me that it's reasonable to expect that it'll take a bit longer than ten years for me to really start to be a mistress of the knowledge of myself. Maybe this is why women often say that they finally feel like they start to come into their own when they turn 40. Maybe it takes a good 15-20 years of adulthood to learn oneself. Or at least to start to know where the dark corners are, and to develop the clarity of sight that allows one to penetrate the gloom. Maybe it's just me.

Either way, my experiences of this past month reinforced something that I've long suspected about myself. I really can't be incredibly self-disciplined in more than two areas of my life at a time. And I appear to have a four-week limit on serious self-discipline if it's happening in two areas at once. By self-discipline, I don't mean getting to the usual day-to-day stuff, or even a big project or two; I mean the kind of thing where I have to do lots and lots of things that are hard for me, that I have to work to make myself do, that require effort for me to plan for and execute. But in this past month, I've had to prep two classes, help develop the fall schedule for linguistics, write an 8,000-word chapter, prepare and give a presentation, write a performance review letter, write three or four letters of recommendation for students, write a grant application, write a peer-review for a journal paper, help write and present a huge committee report, prepare a proposal for a special edition of a journal that I'm co-editing, and help plan for a huge teach-in and rally that we're hosting on campus next week. Not to mention the usual rote stuff: teaching and grading and dealing with student and colleague emails, and taking notes at meetings and preparing minutes, etc etc. Getting all of that done has meant that when I sit down at my desk in the morning, there has quite literally not been time to indulge in a little blog reading, or a little Dilbert laughter, or a little checking with the International Herald Tribune to see what's going on in the world. This whole month I've known that if I didn't get through the day's tasks before it was time to do the next day's tasks, the entire house of cards was going to come crashing down around my ears.

And on top of that, I knitted a sweater.

First of all, I realize that I said yes to all of these things myself. (Although I would note that it's not my fault that every single academic anybody seems to think that February is a great month for things to be due in -- everything from letters of recommendation to review committees to the fall schedule to book chapters all seem to come due in February; I'm not the only one who's noticed this, either, it's been a major topic of conversation in my hallway lately.) But the point I'm trying to make isn't that I need pity or anything, just that I can do all of that in a month. I totally can. I know, because I did.

But what I can't do, is do all of that and, for example, stick to, oh say, a diet (to pick something at random). I can eat well, but I can't lose weight during a time like that. Nope. Nor, apparently, can I lift weights. Because those things, for me, take effort to make myself do. And what I'm realizing is that I only have so much effort of that kind available to me. And now I'm kind of done for a while. I guess what I'm saying is that I need balance, and I am finding out how long I can be out of balance in one direction before I need to swing back, and how long that swing needs to be before the pendulum comes back to rest in the center.

Tonight, I'm going to celebrate the fact that I'm almost through with all of these deadlines, the fact that I have finally learned to schedule a break for myself after four weeks of being on top of everything, and the fact that I have a fabulous sweater to wear next week. I'm a little surprised I manged it, but very happy.
Now, where's my gold medal?