Eying or Eyeing

1. This is the first holiday season since we moved to California that Mark and I have spent together. It's been a nice combination of laying low (cooking, movies, walks) and socializing--we spent a nice Christmas Eve with the California branch of Mark's family, and this evening we're going over to the Rothenbergs'. In a few more days, we're headed to Ensenada. I've long fantasized about blowing off the entire winter holiday season and instead getting out of the country, so this is a step in the right direction.

2. All the climate change involved in the travel from here to Florida and back again has irritated my skin. I've got a patchy red rash that almost resembles hives. It's uncomfortable, and it makes it difficult to wear makeup.

3.Back from a hoop class with Michelle. After a year of thinking that working with more than one hoop would be completely impossible, it's so much fun to be playing with two and have it start to make some kinetic sense.

4. My attempt to keep my hair short is finished. Having short hair requires getting regular hair cuts by stylists who actually know what they're doing, and stylists who know what they're doing cost money. My hair is neither super curly nor super thick, so nearly any fool can cut it when it starts to get long. Therefore, I am growing my hair out again.

5. For Christmas, Mark got me: 1) Mind of the Raven: Investigations and Adventures with Wolf-Birds, by Bernd Heinrich 2) Feelings Are Facts: A Life, by Yvonne Rainer and 3) The Silk Road Gourmet: Volume One: Western and Southern Asia, by Laura Kelle. They're all super cool books that I've been eying a long time.

Merry Christmas

Lester, with traces of the roasted red pepper soup he had for lunch still on his beak.

Still in Florida. Last we had a rainy thunderstorm of the sort that never happens in southern California. All the heat and the green here is kind of amazing. The shore birds are nearly the same, although I saw a lot of  Solitary Sandpipers, which I haven't seen around Carlsbad. They must be migrating.

Headed to Florida on Thursday morning.

1. Backbend (wheel) with feet at the wall into a backbend with feet on the wall into handstand into a walkover. It feels good to have a super challenging Sunday yoga class.

2. Still playing around with some off-body moves with two hoops. Coordination with on-body moves comes a lot easier.

3. Nearly finished with my paper on Nightwood. I didn't really have time to do anything especially ambitious. I wonder if I could do a critical independent study in the winter or spring quarter? It's interesting how an image search for "Nightwood" doesn't immediately give me any results that have anything to do with Djuna Barnes' novel.

4. In the last movement for theater class of the quarter, I sprained my toe, but I also stood on someone's shoulders and tossed a ball back and forth between my hands. It was kind of amazing when I finally relaxed and settled into the posture--my bones were perfectly lined up above the person basing me.

5. Dear professors: please tell your TAs about your plans for grading at the end of the quarter early so that they can schedule their travel plans accordingly. Dear TAs, ask the professor you are working with about this at the beginning of the quarter so that you don't accidentally make plans that mess with the professor's plans.