In Which I Declare My Own Delurking Day

Posted on January 26, 2011 by Kate

I was wondering the other day if it was too late to make a New Year’s resolution. Could we call it a Late January resolution? The thing is, I have another thing I want to do this year and that is this: comment on more blogs!

Lately I have found a ton of great new blogs, and while I managed to add them all to my RSS reader and even add most of them to my links page (working on completing that list), I still haven’t commented on all of them, or, if I have commented, I don’t manage to do it regularly.

If you don’t have a blog yourself, you may not know this: receiving comments is basically the best thing ever. It is like crack to us bloggers. It makes us feel like we are no longer shouting out into the ether, like a street-corner conspiracy theorist in a sandwich board.

The problem is this: I often feel like I have to have the perfect witty comment and if I don’t, why should I bother? Sometimes I long for the easy simplicity of the Facebook “like” button, whereby I could add positive feedback without having to generate the content of said feedback. No thought required! But then again this is why blogs are better than Facebook. We have to put some thought into things.

But I plan not to be stopped by that pressure any more. I am no longer going to worry about having just the right clever witticism to post in the comments section of my favorite blogs — if the extent of my thought process is “like!,” then maybe I will simply post that. I don’t promise to post a comment on every blog post I read every day (I read dozens if not hundreds), but I’d like to be more comment-happy.

And would you join me?

Every year, there’s some (official?) day in the world of blogs declared to be “Delurking Day,” where readers who don’t usually post comments are encouraged to post a comment, outing themselves, and saying hello to the blogger for the first time. I always, always want to participate in Delurking Day and I always, always miss it! I have never done a delurking post here.

Well, this year I missed the day again, but I have decided to celebrate it anyway. I declare today to be Delurking Day II (Comment Boogaloo) here at kateo.org. Yup, today. I say we stand up to The Man and comment whenever we choose!

So, would you please say hello down in the comments section today? New readers and old readers alike!

You don’t need to leave your real name or email or anything and I promise not to stalk you, but I’d love to “meet” you. For those who have a blog or are on Twitter, would you leave me a link so I can find you? And, bonus!, I have just added threaded comments, so I can reply to you individually and you can reply to each other. Fancy.

If you can’t think of what to say, you might tell me: what is the best food item you’ve eaten recently?

And while you are busy with that, I am off to go comment on some blogs!

Monday, Monday: So Good to Me.

Posted on January 24, 2011 by Kate

Today could have gone quite poorly. Due to snow days and the MLK holiday, today was the first Monday I’ve had to teach so far this semester and therefore also the first Monday I’ve had to teach since summer. I was a Tuesday/Thursday Lady last semester and let’s just say I sure got to like it.

But you can’t win them all, so into work I had to go. I normally get up at 6:00, but today my dog decided it was time to get up at 5:00. “Take me out,” he said. “Feed me,” he said.

“Shut up,” I said.

This continued until about 5:45, at which time my cat started making that human-like garbled howling noise that announces a hairball is on its way from inside of her body to outside of it.”Oh woe oh woe oh woe,” she said.

I got up.

A Monday morning that begins with such loving* attention from two adorable* pets is a thing of beauty*, am I right?

(*Am I using these words correctly?)

Despite its inauspicious beginning, my Monday turned out to be pretty nice. Not spectacular, but nice for a working Monday, you know? Lots of little things seemed to brighten it up. Here’s a list:

1. I wore a pretty new dress for the first time.

2. I actually remembered to fix some coffee in my to-go mug and also successfully put it in the car and then I even brought it into the office, enabling me to drink it. I don’t always get all those steps right.

3. People I have met through blogging can be truly, incredibly nice.

4. Last week I strained my right calf (either Vibrams- or weight-lifting-related injury, not sure) but today it finally feels back to normal. I am planning some running and some yoga and such. Carefully.

5. I made falafel for dinner, complete with my own non-dairy tzatziki. Take that, cow-yogurt-having restaurant falafel!

6. I went to the grocery store to pick up another jar of my latest strange addiction, Bonne Maman brand cherry preserves (heavenly, I mean it), and while there I made an amazing discovery: at the grind-your-own-nut-butter station, there was a peanut grinder that had a few vegan dark chocolate chips mixed in. Not only did this allow me to grind my own chocolate-peanut butter, which is really damned delicious, I also got to think about the term “grind-your-own-nut-butter station” and quietly snicker my way through the store.

Nut butter. Grind your own. Heh.

So how has your Monday been?
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VERY IMPORTANT UPDATE! A Facebook friend’s post alerted me to the fact that today is allegedly “Blue Monday,” otherwise known as the most depressing day of the year. What a day for me to write a post here declaring that I had a great Monday in spite of its awful (cat-puke-filled) start.

Here’s what I think about this: you can have a dreary day that gets off to a bad beginning, full of inconveniences and petty frustrations and disgruntlement. And if things start out that way it’s easy to blame it on a Monday, a bad day, or a “most depressing day of the year” scenario. But then doesn’t that just shut out from your mind all of the small successes and unexpected pleasantries? The things that, added up, could swing your day from bad to good? I don’t mean to be all Pollyanna on you here, but this shit matters.

There’s a reason I didn’t come over here to complain about how much money I spent on groceries, or the fact that I have to go to the dentist tomorrow, or the new zit I found, or the rest of that litany of complaints I could have (quite justifiably) also authored today. I’m not sure what that reason is or what shifted my perspective today or what has been shifting it generally. I like it, though. All for it.

Riddle Me This

Posted on January 19, 2011 by Kate

Let me tell you about this dream I had during my nap this afternoon. Wait, wait! Don’t go away! It’ll be short and sweet, I swear:

In the dream, I was carefully hammering a nail into my own gums for the purpose of hanging a painting there.

What the what?!

According to everyone’s favorite cocaine-addled crackpot theorist, one Dr. Sigmund Freud, the mouth is, in dreams, an ersatz sexual organ. Dream about your mouth and your unconscious is trying to tell you something about your hmm-hmm-you-know. With that in mind, hammering a nail couldn’t be more obvious.

But hanging a painting? On my gums?

The painting was small — a 12×12 square canvas. Painterly and impressionistic, with a thick application of colors: dark teal, gold, burnt orange. It was a portrait. But of whom? I can’t make the face come clear in my mind.

Dr. Freud would say that the details we forget from our dreams are the most important. If we forget them, it’s because our conscious minds aren’t ready to know them. The act of forgetting preserves the ego.

So whose face was on that canvas? I am absolutely dying to know.

Quotation of the Day: Only Love Edition

Posted on January 17, 2011 by Kate

It’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Day here in the U.S., and most of us have the day off. Rather than treat it as a do-nothing day, however, I plan to do some reading and research and work on the mind a little. I think Dr. King would approve. He’s always an incredibly inspiring person to me, not only because of his fight for justice, but also because of his dedication to non-violence, which is an important guiding principle in my own life. Today, of course, I have even more opportunity to be inspired — so many friends are sharing their favorite quotations and moments from his great speeches on Facebook and around the internet. Here’s the one I shared last year, and one for this year:

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes. … Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that. — Where Do We Go from Here? (1967)

Back to Business

Posted on January 15, 2011 by Kate

What a strange week that was! Between the (disappointing) National Championship game and the two snow days, I only had a three-day week on campus, but I swear to dog it felt like ten days. I’ve got a million bits and pieces today, so here we go in list form:

School: Teaching is going to be busy and different this semester, with four honors classes. I think I like my young whippersnappers so far. The Big New Thing, though, is that I am working with two groups of grad students who are in the midst of writing their dissertations, helping them form productive writing groups and mentoring them. (Not to be confused with advising them academically, as an academic adviser would, which is a whole different can of worms, and not part of my job.) Anyway, this is a very exciting thing for me to do — let’s hope it goes well and I can really help them with their writing projects!

Music: Are you psyched about The Decemberists’ new album? You had better believe that I am. The Decemberists track I included on the Winter 2010 mix, “Down by the Water,” is from the new album, which (I happen to know already) rocks. Lots of harmonica and steel guitar and whatnot. You can stream the entire thing here. At the moment, however, I happen to be listening to the new(ish) Kanye album. Say what you will about the man and his behaviors and attitude, but try to deny how great this album is and you will fail.

Football: So, as it turned out, watching the Oregon-Auburn game was significantly less fun than I predicted. At least I was well dressed! Heh. I thought I would be delightfully bemused the entire time, happy with whatever the outcome was (while quietly rooting for the Ducks). As it happened, I was stressed beyond belief, and totally sad about the outcome. Only on an intellectual level am I able to muster any happiness for Auburn’s win. Sorry, Auburn people. I tried.

Food: This coming week is the last week of the current CSA season, which is also a sad thing. It’ll be back to grocery-store produce for me after that. I’m also kind of wondering if I’ll be able to join up again for spring, since I am trying very hard to save all my pennies for moving into a new apartment in the summer. I will have to look at my food budget and see if it’ll be feasible. In better food news, I am currently caramelizing onions on the stove top while roasting garlic underneath. If I could bottle the way my kitchen smells right now, I would.

Sports: I’ve been attending a lot of yoga lately, which has been wonderful. I’ve also been fitting in some body pump (weight lifting) and RPM (spinning) classes, which are also challenging and great. But my running just has not been happening as much. At first, after the marathon, I had to rest until my knee felt better. Then, I was hitting the treadmill for very short (2-3) mile runs, which occasionally brought back the knee tightness, so I eased off. THEN I got sick and couldn’t do anything at all. Not running is not fun.

Today, though, today! I was on my way around town, getting groceries and running a couple of other errands, and it was the most gorgeous day we’ve had in forever. I do not exaggerate. It was about 50 degrees, sunny, and beautiful. So many folks were out hitting the roads — I saw runners everywhere! “MEEE TOOOOO,” screamed my brain. I had to get out there. I wasn’t sure if it was wise, with the lingering knee tightness and the fact that I’d only been on the treadmill lately (for more stablity and less impact following my injury). But I was sick of holding back.

I strapped on my Vibrams and hit the road for one easy mile, just to test them out. It was surprisingly easy and almost effortless to run in them for the first time. I felt great. But I didn’t want to overdo it in the new, weird shoes, so I stopped back at home and switched into some “real” shoes and went back out for another 2.5 miles. Amazing. Glorious, perfect, perfect run.

Seems like a good note to end on. How about you guys: what’s the haps in your week?