Things I've done since getting home (less than 72 hours ago)

-Hiked Stewart Falls, which I'm sort of inordinately proud of; my body is not particularly up for it.  It took a good four hours, which included many long breaks--one laying down in the trail--but was absolutely glorious.  I've rarely been on a more gorgeous hike; Provo canyon in the spring is where it's at.  Excellent company and food also helped.

-Checked out an overflowing basket of library books, finished reading two and started two others

-Listened to Bach's Magnificat, watched the musical episode of Buffy with a friend, and played chess over skype with another friend

-Purchased thrifty, mostly healthy groceries from locally owned stores

-Unpacked and cleaned, made budgets and to-do lists, tracked all of my spending, and got up to date with all necessary banking, sorted through accumulated mail, and reconciled with my house manager and labor-bartering housemate

-Checked Barnes&Nobles for a book I may buy but wanted to have a look at first

-Briefly visited my wonderful Provo-living sister and nieflings, arranged to go out for gelato with them tomorrow

-Took Baby Girl (the beloved '92 metro who served me well since I was 19) to a mechanic, decided it's time for her to go

-Got in touch with the roofing contractor (AGAIN), arranged a date and time to go over the contract, arranged a date for work to start: rain gutters, rain barrels, an attic fan, and flashing and leak repairs are now on their way.  :)

-Decided what to get my friend Dan for a wedding present

-Purchased a high quality secondhand bike for 250$ less than I had budgeted, after having it customized: road bike frame, cruiser set up, one speed.  If there's a bike that will get me around the flat parts of town and be easy for me to fix and maintain for myself, this is definitely it.  Also found a volunteer bike mechanic whose interested in helping out the Provo Bicycle Committee.

-WD-40ed a rusted masterlock back into functionality so I can use it as a bike lock

-Went for a long walk at sunset

-Researched paint disposal/recycling, what to do about the damaged lead paint in my stairwell, and purchased paint.

-Purchased a couple of tools {this is what happens when you always loan out your painting stuff. :( } and set a minion to work giving my basement a fresh coat--finally sealing in the lead paint!

-Discovered another possible foundation repair needed  :(

-Wrote the first two pages of the first draft of the book


-Started my garden for this year.  I bought (solely based on what looked good and was cheap at my local nursery) and carried home on foot:

one sweet pepper
one hot pepper
one Juliet tomato
six striped german tomatoes
six I don't remember which variety tomatoes--maybe brandywine?
one eggplant
one butternut squash
one yellow summer squash
one zuchini
two parsley plants
one thyme plant
one large canister of organic fertilizer

I also planted all the squashes, peppers, and herbs (leaving only the nightshades, for which I may need to build a new planter), weeded sections of the garden, picked up the trash that accumulates from people walking by from the strip mall, got a minion to mow the lawn, and pruned the plum tree I planted last year.  The branches for three of its five varieties seem to be thriving. :)  Also, Rupert--the rhubarb my sister got me as a housewarming present, which I thought dead--appears to be just barely hanging on, so I weeded, watered, fertilized, cleared away dead tissue, and am hoping for the best.


I feel productive. :)

Hunger Games

I've posted {the closest thing to a review of Hunger Games that I'm likely to write} as a comment on this pretty interesting Hunger Games review:

http://znovels.blogspot.com/2012/05/hunger-games-trilogy.html

Plans for summer: some combination of the following

1.  Work on house.

2.  Read and re-read some program whatnot, especially the Bible, Aristotle's Physics, and various histories. . . possibly also some Plato and Euripides, and maybe the Anead.  We'll see.

3.  Get a bike and see what my first taste of living car-free off campus is like.

4.  Start writing a book about policy and practice in handling sexual and domestic violence within the Mormon church.  This is something I've been researching for a long time; I'm hoping to get 75 or 100 pages of rough draft out.

5.  Study Greek like a Mofo. . . a mofo who plans to support his or her family as a classicist, that is.

6.  Draw.  Also learn some calligraphy and start playing with homegrown comics.

7.  Fake RILA: doing the RILA readings, but also Rome-oriented food, movies, travel books, blogs, etc.

8.  Spend time with Heidegger, and my other Utah peoples.

9.  Love making food in my kitchen.

10.  Keep getting my five fruit & veg and exercising every day.

11.  Spend some serious time hiking, making music, and meditating in the wild.

12.  Do some prep work for next year's social justice corps.

13.  Go on a trip--maybe Seattle, Santa Fe, or the Grand Canyon.  Or maybe some combination of the above.

14.  Stay in touch with johnnies, play my piano, start practicing for the GRE, think about future summers, listen to the sophomore music compilation on repeat, read mass market urban fantasy novels about highly armed females, etc.

15.  Keep chewing on these questions:
-What ethical obligations does one have to follow rules an unjust system which one can not opt out of?
-What is the relationship between fantasy, representation, and reality?
-What is the best way to deal with possessions?
-What are the best ways to deal with groups, appearances, and relationships?
-What exactly are we doing at St. John's, and how can I make the most of it?

new april things

I continue to be amazed by my friends.  Here are some:  

G is quiet, brilliant, young, and playful, with many of the mannerisms of a kitten; he wears bright colors well, makes faces, cuts my hair, points out the thing in the reading you should have noticed hours ago, and cultivates a sardonic streak.  He says he can't dance, but everywhere he does.  Except at dances, I guess.

J is like a cross between a 40s film star and a punk rock antihero, possibly the coolest and certainly the most literary person I know.  She is strong and funny and perfect, mistress of the gourmet picnic and the bon mot.  We have sisterhood in our over-aged escape from minimum wage life.

Y takes contagious delight in the intellectual world and irresistible joy from argumentative play, with a particularly agile and demanding brain.  He's unfailingly kind to humans at hand but equally ruthless to theoretical ones, a sympathetic but unruffled shoulder to cry on, and the best lab partner I've ever had.  

They are all gentle, considerate, generous, independent, and reliable.  I love them fiercely, and try hard not to breathe or wake up.

After working hard and re-starting five times, I turned in a rough draft for my freshman essay; it was OK, quite good for a first draft, and for a completed essay, OK.  I haven't yet given an oral defense, which will probably happen next week.

My lab tutor, H, is also amazing.  She's supportive of whatever weird experiments Y and I can design, gave me brilliant advice regarding my freshman paper, and has magical Aristotle superpowers.  She tells me not to consider any grad school that would care if I've published as an undergrad, but also to go ahead and start practicing for the GRE.  She tells me that she often sees people who work outside of classics as intellectually lonely--you work in philosophy and you're specialized, the person across the hall hasn't even read the same foundational works. 

SJC Social Justice Corps is up and running, though I don't expect any large actions till next year.  Transportation to DC would be really nice.

I'm getting a more cohesive philosophy for dealing with physical objects; this may be another blog post soon, I've written some about it.  My room is gorgeous (without having bought anything new for it) and my filing is done.

My three favorite misogynists, presently, are Simone de Beauvoir, Euripides, and Aristotle.  

I have learned, when I hurt, to wait it out.  Taking care of yourself is a hard but useful thing to learn.