end of term

10:00 First course complete!

Update: Good news! Don Domanski, one of the best poets anywhere won the Governor General's Award for poetry! You can read the story here

Additional good news: I finished one essay last night! I have a final poetry workshop tonight, and then I can focus on the one big paper that remains. The semester winds down.



No photos this week.I have been busy the last few days, though I did take the time to watch The Big Lebowski last night. I should have returned to my office after supper, but did not. It was not laziness so much as a temporary burnout. I have seven in class days and this semester will be over, and the final projects are coming due, and I feel a bit overwhelmed by it all. This is the part of school that I dislike intensely. I should be reading Keats tonight, but I don't know if I will have the time. I have one twenty page paper to write by next Friday, an eight page research proposal for next Thursday, and a portfolio of my edited poems due THIS Monday. On the upside, if all goes well, I should be finished everything, including exams, by the tenth. Then I can spend the next month reading things I want to read, like the latest Don Domanski collection. From what I have read so far, he has created an extraordinary book of poetry. I would encourage everyone to go out and order it from Amazon or their local bookstore.

The weather is taking a turn for the worse. It freezes most nights, and the day time highs barely break the sixty degree mark. The long term forecast does not offer any real hope, as highs fall into the forties. What is the point of living in the south if it gets cold?

On the upside, there are still trees covered in brilliant red leaves, and some bushes of some kind still blooming. For those of you reading this stuck in the frigid and miserable north--the lawn maintenance guys came by yesterday and mowed our lawn. I am glad the property management office takes care of that stuff. It was a rather weird experience to see them mowing the lawn and it is nearly December...time passes quickly when one is busy...I have used up my quota of ellipses for the year in this one post, I had saved them since January, and felt this was a good time to use them up.

I am off to work on a long poem I am trying to edit.

Oh, it is also garbage day!!

It is the simple things that make life worth living.

the day after

My rotundity has increased over the last few days. Perhaps it is a good thing Thanksgiving only occurs once every year. Supper was very good, though the photo does not do the food justice, it does show what was devoured shortly after.

List of things I have to be thankful for:
1. Friends and family. Without their support and enthusiasm I would not be here.
2. Raleigh. Strange thing to be thankful for I suppose, but I am enjoying the area.
3. Professional support. I am in an MFA program, in part, due to the help of professors who wrote letters of support.
4. My health, the weather, and enough money to eat well, stay cool, and the energy to walk.
5. Other things as well, I am sure, but my mind is all fuzzy from eating a cinabon Yum.

We walked to the library to return an overdue book this morning, and took the long way home. My legs are a bit achy now, it is likely a four mile or so walk. I have added a link in the extra photo sections down below that contains images from yesterday and today.

Two weeks remain in this term. I need to work a bit this weekend I suppose.

Pre-Thanksgiving

I am off for the next four days. Yesterday we went to Whole Foods and spent more money than we should have (normal occurrence when buying food there). Walking past the dairy section I saw a tub of Toffuti's better than real cream cheese looking forlorn and needy, so I rescued it and brought it home. To make it feel at home I mixed up a batch of cinnamon buns and used the cream cheese as an icing. Yum.

Today I made a peach,strawberry, raspberry (no rhubarb in town) pie and some rosemary fococcia bread. The bread is great, the pie looks funny but I hope it will taste great when I eat it tomorrow after the big Thanksgiving meal. Preparations have begun, and it should be a tasty vegan celebrator meal.

It was warm enough today that I was able to sit out on my back deck and read this afternoon, with no shoes on, my sleeves rolled up, and feel warm. The high today was 77, not good for our drought, but good for an old Canadian who has grown to dislike the very idea of winter.

I may post again tomorrow after I devour all the unhealthy vegan foods, assuming I can manage to waddle anywhere. I should, I suppose, fulfill my earlier promise and mention what I am thankful for, but that will happen tomorrow.

November 17

View Album

Get your own

View Album

Get your own

This has been a busy week. In addition to all the usual readings and writings I had to prepare to lead a class discussion and hand in some notes on my long paper. I have felt scattered, reading and researching on Manfred and working on my long paper. My level of panic increases as well, there are 20 days and classes are finished. Another four days after that I will have finished my exams and final projects. I am beginning to look forward to my winter break, which is nearly a month long. My presentation/discussion went fine yesterday, and I managed to hand in some notes, though they are a bit scattered at the moment.

Earlier this week I walked to school. Two blocks into my walk I had to stop and remove my sweater as it was already to hot. We had a little rain Thursday, and it has cooled down now, but the weather is ok. In the last two weeks the trees have turned from green to multiple shades of red, yellow, and orange. Green still plays around the edges of the rich color. That color helps ease the pain of the sad approach of winter's gray. The variety of plant life that helped provide such a lush green during summer is now helping to enrich the colors of fall. Ah, if it only were warmer.

Thanksgiving is next week. I am looking forward to the holiday, mostly because I get five days away from school to work on my work. So little time and so much to do. So far we have planned on some sesame green beans, roasted squash, a soup (like the one I made for Barb a couple years ago), and some kind of yummy desert. Most recipes can be found at this site. The barbecue tempeh with bell peppers is very good by the way. Maybe I will post some photos of the meal after Thursday.

Fall

Garbage Day!

It froze the night before last, and last night. There is something seriously wrong with frost so early in the fall. I think I shall begin thinking of moving to a warmer climate, I noticed a place in Arizona that had a high of 92 yesterday. I must admit, however, that the trees are becoming quite gorgeous as they dress up in their pre-Christmas finery. The photo above was taken a few days ago, and since then even more red and orange and yellow has appeared, and what was there has become more vibrant. But such visual beauty is hard to accept when it I am wearing all my winter clothes and can barely stand the cold.

School is keeping me busy right now, all the major projects are demanding more and more attention, and I am less and less willing to apply myself. Thank God for deadlines and extrinsic motivation or I would cease and desist. Thanksgiving is only two weeks away, and already I can see that I will be working through the entire break to try and complete the projects due shortly afterwards. In fact, one major assignment is due right after the holiday. Maybe I should just panic now and get to work?

I watched Sicko last night. Not a bad film, though Moore can be quite melodramatic, he does raise some interesting problems with the American health system. Changes will not occur soon, if ever, due to the large amounts of money present in the system. As Roger Waters said, "It all makes perfect sense expressed in dollars and cents, pound shillings and pence." One comment Moore made I found interesting, he said Americans are afraid of their government. If that is true, how can we have a democracy?

Happy All Saints Day!

Yesterday was my six month anniversary. I have been in North Carolina for six months. Wow how time flies when you are busy. A retrospective is likely in order, but I am not doing one right now. Though I will say I have been mostly pleased with the area. It has become cold and icky lately, but the summer was great.I am not looking forward to winter, though I saw a major sign of its impending approach yesterday. The groundskeepers at NCSU were running around yesterday planting Pansies.

I am feeling pleased with myself this morning. I wrote for nearly two hours last night, a pleasure I have been struggling to achieve for some time. The long poem is a challenging form, and one I have not yet mastered. It is also intimidating, though I rely on bpNichol's advice that eventually you have to put the pencil to the white page and just write. There are five workshops left in this term, and five weeks, though one of those weeks is a wee tiny week consisting of only three days. What I have to do in those few weeks is terrifying. I was going to add a but, but could not think of a but that eased the fear.

I have been thinking it is Christmas card sending time. I will need to dig out my addresses again. I wonder where I put them...

It is six-thirty am and I am sitting outside sipping on a coffee. How cool is that for November 1