Posting may be light around here for the next week or so, as I work at a university and classes are starting AND we’re opening a new building. Any time I’ve gotten overwhelmed by the stress of it all today, one thing has calmed me down. It’s this picture, via the Huffington Post, which should really be the #1 photo in a Google image search of “oh hai:” 
Feel free to bookmark this picture in case you need a quick pick me up sometime in the future. Smiley seal says hello.
favored son
I’ve thought since the first time I brought him home that my family liked my husband more than they like me. My mom is a feeder, loves to cook for people, and for the first time she had a BOY to feed and feed and feed. He’s not picky, he has a ginormous appetite, and happily goes back for seconds. And don’t even get me started on how he wowed all the women in the family by doing the dishes the first time we had him around for Thanksgiving. And my dad? Well, much as he adores his three girls, it’s been adorable to see him with a son for the first time, geeking out about doctor stuff, playing ping pong for hours, working on projects around the house. Even my littlest sister thinks he rocks, because he’ll jump on the trampoline with her. So you might see how I’d get the idea that he’s everyone’s favorite. But now I have actual proof.
For Christmas this year, my Memaw gave everyone money and mittens. My dad got $50. My mom got $50. My sister got $50. I got $50.
My husband?
He got $100.
The rest of us maintain that two $50 bills simply got stuck together, that it’s some sort of error. My husband maintains that Memaw simply likes him more than us.
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back in ten
I’ve decided my theme for the new year is Back in Ten. Back to Arkansas. Hopefully back to a more normal schedule for Jon now that residency is over. Back in our old neighborhood. Maybe even back to school for me, we’ll see. No matter what, I’m BACK in ten, baby.
And hopefully, the entire country is on its way back, too. Back from the recession. Soldiers back from war. The uninsured back on health plans. Back on track. We can do it.
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i’m not a heathen or a pagan, but i’m for the rebel Jesus
I know I’ve been mostly absent from the blog, and that’s likely to continue, as we’re splitting our Christmas time in Arkansas and Colorado, and I don’t have much internet access beyond what I can get on my BlackBerry, provided it’s working properly (maybe Santa will bring RIM some better infrastructure). Anyway, we were in a restaurant the other day and I caught the tail end of a Christmas song I’d never heard before. The only line I heard was something about “a heathen and a pagan on the side of the rebel Jesus.” So, thanks to Google, I’ve now found and fallen in love with this song by Jackson Browne. Consider it my Christmas card to you, Internets.
All the streets are filled with laughter and light
And the music of the season
And the merchants’ windows are all bright
With the faces of the children
And the families hurrying to their homes
While the sky darkens and freezes
Will be gathering around the hearths and tables
Giving thanks for God’s graces
And the birth of the rebel JesusWell they call him by ‘the Prince of Peace’
And they call him by ‘the Savior’
And they pray to him upon the seas
And in every bold endeavor
And they fill his churches with their pride and gold
As their faith in him increases
But they’ve turned the nature that I worship in
From a temple to a robber’s den
In the words of the rebel JesusWell we guard our world with locks and guns
And we guard our fine possessions
And once a year when Christmas comes
We give to our relations
And perhaps we give a little to the poor
If the generosity should seize us
But if any one of us should interfere
In the business of why there are poor
They get the same as the rebel JesusNow pardon me if I have seemed
To take the tone of judgement
For I’ve no wish to come between
This day and your enjoyment
In a life of hardship and of earthly toil
There’s a need for anything that frees us
So I bid you pleasure
And I bid you cheer
From a heathen and a pagan
On the side of the rebel Jesus
I wish you all joy and happiness, whatever you’re celebrating this time of year, from someone who is neither a heathen (well, that depends on who you ask, I guess) nor a pagan, but a fan of the rebel Jesus.
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poor pitiful me
I have a cold, lovingly brought home to me by my pediatrician husband who spends his days with germy children and thought I needed a dose of their cooties, and I’m feeling pretty awful. I only have to make it through one more day of work, though, so I’m hoping to stick it out. I’ve saved up 8 vacation days to tack on to the beginning of my already long (yay for being underpaid and working in academia!) Christmas break, and we’re headed out of town tomorrow evening. All of this together means: posting will be extremely spotty until January or so. I hope you all stay healthy and happy and have a lovely holiday.
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homeward bound
Jon just logged into the big computer system that decided our fate (aka matched him with a fellowship program in Pediatric Emergency Medicine) and found out we’re moving to my home, Little Rock, Arkansas in about six months! I’m relieved to finally know, giddy to be going back closer to friends and family, and full of possibilities for the next six months. Now to soak up all the things I have been meaning to do in Charleston before our time here is up!
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CSA Charleston: Post Programming Note
The weekly CSA post, the last one of the season, will be a few days later than usual. I realized I could take my time using up the veggies, as there was no new box coming to give me a deadline. Also, my freezer really can’t hold much more food. So, we’re trying to eat most of the veggies, and I’ll have a post about the last box and about the CSA experience as a whole when we finish. I guess this gives me some time to really “digest” the whole experience before sharing my final thoughts of the season.
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THESE are spirit fingers
Here’s some Friday fun for everyone. I found this hilarious video via my friend, Political Party Girl:
The instructor has clearly been borrowing Jessie Spano’s uppers.
True story, though, y’all. In college, where I was required to take one P.E. class per year, I took “Aerobic Dance,” because I heard it was hilarious. And oh my sweet spandex, it was. We didn’t really have an instructor so much as a lady who worked a VCR, and we’d basically sweat it to the oldies on the stage of the auditorium while she sat in the audience and watched us. Most of the videos we did were from the same era as this video. My favorite featured an instructor who seemed like one of Jem’s lost Holograms, and wore ridiculous thong leotards covered in stars over neon tights. If I had college to do over again, I’d make my friends buy crazy spandex outfits with me to wear to Aerobic Dance class. I’m sure American Apparel woulda done us up right.
Some day you should ask me to see some of the moves I learned. My friends in the class and I used bust out some of the moves at parties after a few drinks.
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stranger than fiction
My medical-resident husband is always saying that “Scrubs” is the most accurate medical show. Sometimes reality seems determined to prove his point.
He’s working in an intensive care unit this rotation, and was on call Friday night. There was one patient whom everyone was sure wasn’t going to make it much longer. On Saturday moring, as my sleep-deprived hubby made rounds, he came out of one patient’s room to see a dark hooded, robed figure standing outside the room of that unlikely-to-make-it patient. Thinking for a brief moment that he saw Death Himself, my husband thought, “He’s come!”
But it turns out it was just a pharmacist, dressed like a vampire for Halloween.
Costume choice for intensive care unit: FAIL.
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my apologies
I’ve been slacking on the blog the past couple of days, and I apologize. Had to turn in a paper on Wednesday, and then proceeded to have one of the worst Thursdays I’ve ever had at work (though I guess I should be thankful that I rarely have bad days, and that my boss was awesome throughout). I’ll try to be a better blogger next week.
In the meantime, I thought I’d share a passage from Aphra Behn’s Oroonoko, which I read for class on Wednesday. I’m writing my final paper about one of her plays, The Rover. Oronooko isn’t a very happy tale, since it’s basically about an African prince who falls in love with a beautiful girl, but loses the girl when his grandfather the king decides to make her his sex slave. He tries to save the beautiful girl, but this only angers the grandfather, who sells her into slavery. Later the prince is tricked into slavery, where he is reunited with his love, but their story ends violently and tragically. Still, this passage from the beginning of Oroonoko and Imoinda’s courtship would make a great wedding vow (minus the whole possession part):
He made her vows she should be the only woman he would possess while he lived; that no age or wrinkles should incline him to change, for her soul would always be fine, and always young; and he should have an eternal idea in his mind of the charms she now bore, and should look into his heart for that idea, when he could find it no longer in her face.
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