Bad Blogger!

What a funky time. I'm getting my presentation ready for the interview day on Monday. Another marathon day, 8-5:30. It's been very hard to concentrate on work tasks. Our lives are in flux right now. And yet I'm expected to keep on as if everything is cool.

So, I find myself web surfing at times--got to keep abreast of information happenings! But it drags down my productivity and lets me spin on things. I'm finding cool stuff out there too, on Slate and NYTimes, mostly (the regular site visits). But I'm just too much of a stress puppy to blog about it..... (Whine, whine, whine.)

Everyone in my life has been so supportive of us during this stressful time. Friends, family, church, co-workers. That's been great....

Middle of the Marathon

I've never run a marathon, so I don't know what I'm talking about. One day-long interview is down, and another is on the horizon. This week may be a "here but not here" week like all the others. Must try to stay productive. I'll just be glad when it's all over.

On the Mom front, have really been amazed at the linguistic developments of my son. His mimicking ability is starting to take off. He's running through his animals, and responding when you say "what does a ___ say?" Yesterday he was saying "kak kak" all day long (he was wearing his duck sweater).

Also thinking about weaning--MAS is 14 months old. I'm off the pump at work, which is nice, but it's time to make a little more progress. I would like to not be such a critical part of the bedtime routine....

The side effect of starting this weaning is another feature of womanliness, which started yesterday. My first since getting pregnant, so it's been almost 2 years without having to think about that. (Unless you count all of that messiness the few days post partum) This, of course, has me thinking about the passage of time, and how for women that is marked by the body. I also see it as a "go-ahead" sign to have more children (nature's sign only, not my following through with that). Physiologically it's misleading, since a woman can start ovulating before having any periods. Anyway, just a very significant time.

It's not a rescue thing cuz he's already in recovery

A big ol' article on one of my mom's and my favorite people in New York Times Magazine: The Sobering Life of Robert Downey Jr.. 4 web pages of text, I'm only through one of them, must get back to work. Glad he's on the mend--he's a great talent and, yes, I'll admit it, a crush of mine.

Difficult workday since I leave tomorrow for job interview #1. A daylong talkfest. Nerves are there, antcipation is there. I hope all goes OK, especially the first air flight with Michael since he started walking.

Job update and today's link (mistakenly posted to Michael's blog)

In to work on a Friday, my usual day off with Michael. Meeting with the big boss to discuss interview questions (a coaching session), so Michael is taking a "drop-in" day at daycare today. Had a great full breakfast at Cafe Allegro, and my lunch was loving prepared by my husband. Should be a productive day. I'm feeling more on top of things. I'm trying to take the tips to heart about preparing for this like an actor would, with scripts, costume, getting into character, etc. Less than a week until showtime!

This link is for my buddy Gary, a Clare scholar: Slate article on John Clare

Not-newsy News from Slate

Just finished a lunch of student union burrito (jealous of my husband's office lunch run from a great GREAT taco truck south of town), and skimming through www.slate.com. Finding something blog-worthy: a great piece by great piece by Constance Casey, who's a gardener in NYC. One of her frequent finds as she picks up litter from public gardens: playing cards. Finding random playing cards is a theme in my bud Holly's life, so I thought it interesting that Casey mentions this in her list of finds.

Day is ambling along. Tomorrow will be another day on campus, with Michael dropped in to daycare. However, I won't be in acquisitions librarian mode, but job candidate mode.

Good Stuff for the Ears

Have I mentioned what a great music ministry All Saints Church has? The music is great! There are a lot of flavors of Christian music out there (just like non-Christian music). Sometimes I listen to streaming music at work, hoping to hear songs that we sing during service. Some of the songs are here: Phillips, Craig & Dean Home Page. These guys have a country flavor, but they cover a lot of the songs we sing. Nothing like having a spirit-filled song to make the workday go by easier!

School me, Brother!

Today I stopped in to the lunchtime Bible Study of the Christian Students Association on campus, whom I visited last week at the table they had set up for the first of week of school (all the clubs had their tables out). I didn't really know what to expect, and was a bit surprised to see their form of opening prayer (I came in a little late--bought a sandwich at the HUB to chow on while discussing scripture). There were more people than I thought, formed in kind of a snail shell formation. The prayer was not led by just one person, but it was very participative. The group leader started the prayer, and then others could join in to throw in a benediction of some sort. This initially freaked me out, sort of "Shiny, Happy Christian" groupspeak stuff. They also read aloud the 3 questions posed for the passage of the day--all together now.

I struggled to get over it, to value my fellow Christ-follower no matter what the flavor, in order to open up to the small group discussion, which was of 2 Corinthians 1:1-14. Our small group had a great discussion of comfort and suffering, Paul's history, the context of the passage, personal experiences, etc. I went in one direction interpreting verses 8-9, and another fellow in the group suggested a different interpretation. Since these folks are students and younger chronologically, I find that I have to work at assuming an attitude of the student myself. These are people with more Bible-reading experience than I have. I find myself out of my comfort zone as compared to the All Saints vibe, and wonder what to do with that. I still think there's a place for remaining on my guard regarding certain groups with "Christian" attached to their name. But, no one offered me red Kool-Aid....

Dean Watch

The most recent NYTimes article here: You Go, Dean! Babies of Boomers Find a Candidate. I'm glad the youngsters are doing it. I'm at the meetups in spirit.... We'll see what happens.

George Carlin's Site

George Carlin: the day is going to be good. Don't know why I haven't visited this site earlier. Got a message from mother-in-law that was a "round-the-horn" message from Carlin: the finer points of life in aphorisms then the 8 things to remember to stay young. He is one of my favorite people on earth, and I hope he's doing okay.

CA "Goober"natorial

OK, so it was so big I didn't want to print it. Here's the CA Sample Ballot for what promises to be an interesting day tomorrow.

No catchy title

There are more acronyms explained in the Dublin Core alphabet soup below, hopefully to be finished this week.

Our usual errand/recharge weekend, peppered with great food and thought. Friday the family went to Tacos el Asadero, a taco stand/converted bus. We split a chicken burrito and carnitas quesadilla (the quesa was for MAS). It would have been too much food if we got tacos too. Next time. It was very, very good.

Sunday night we met Manomi for pizza and conversation at Piecora's. Great food, squirmy child. Restaurant outings are just getting more difficult. Must find new strategies for attempted containment.

In between: church, with another session of the Fresh Start class. We are still on Session One in our booklet, which really made me anxious, in all of my "this is class we have a limited amount of time and we've got stuff to cover" way of being. I tried to bring it back on track, and then worked harder to just let it go. Sometimes the digressions are understandable to me--the tangent addresses important concerns, an immediate need, etc. Yesterday I had a harder time rooting out the thrust of the tangent. I do need to let go though. There's no test at the end of this thing....

Also talked a little with Jim and Sally who return from Thailand and an Assemblies of God missionary conference. I mentioned that I'm still reconciling the whole worth of doing missionary work like that. They understood. Unfortunately the conversation was started right before service, so we didn't have a chance to get into too much depth.

Faith-wise, I feel like I'm learning how to better apply this stuff to daily life: contentment at work, communicating with David (and right-attitude at home--overcoming the fatigue factor), money, etc. Also the big decision still before us regarding the work situation. That is the red pill or the blue pill definitely.... I should have some news this week.

More Blog-worthiness, draft--to include Dublin Core report eventually

Another email nugget, not save-worthy, but definitely blog-worthy: Scholarly Electronic Publishing Weblog

Alphabet soup from Dublin Core: There were lots of acronyms flying around, some of which I knew, many of which I didn't. Below is an incomprehensive (or incomprehensible) list of letters, with definitions as I get the time to flesh them out.

• AIP: American Institute of Physics (I remember it in a different context though)--YEP, it's APPLICATION INTERFACE PROFILE, how related to API???


• API: application programming interface


• CEN: Comite Europeen de Normalisation or European Committee for Standardization


• DOI: Digital Object Identifier


• FGDC: Federal Geographic Data Committee


• GPL: probably the General Public License, link found here at the Open Source Initiative site


• IETF: the Internet Engineering Task Force

RFC
SICI
URI
URN
VSD

Deathray gets blogged--probably not for the 1st time

OK, so I just have to remember not to post this "BlogThis!" link to Michael's site. Here's an intro page to one evil-looking kitty, otherwise known as the home site of Deathray, our friend Dana's band and whatnot.

I left the Dublin Core conference early, not for want of mental stimulation, nor for lack of good food, but for the visions I was having of both paper and email inboxes piling up, and no real "Friday" to catch up on everything, as my 5-day/week-working colleagues have. I will fill you in on some of the alphabet soup in a new post, but first let me say that I am back at the machine and sorting through email, stumbling on the Deathray, and so back to the top of the post (above). Cha!