It's really amazing making the transition from the corporate world to academia. Not only are expected turn around times much longer, meetings are much longer. And not because they're really more or less productive.. things just seem to move more slowly in academia. At least most of the time.

In other news, I'm trying to nail down numbers before I leave at 2, which requires nailing down John, which is not an easy thing to do on the fly.

To Do:
Work
* Track down John and confirm enrollment figures
* Update AFIR with actuals from 20051 and 20054
* Figure out who gets the NSF surveys
* Identify code for data for NSF surveys and move to tablet for updating this weekend

Home
* Notify office that Toki will be using our parking space this weekend
* Scoop scotch truffles (2 batches, both with Glenlivet 18, one with Ghiradelli double chocolate chips, one with Nestle's semi-sweet chocolate chips) and package for distribution
* Remember to bring Jack's leftovers
* Wait for cable guy
* Delete AOL from tablet
* Wait for Toki
* Wait for Matt and elliesam

80 minutes left at work.. 45 minutes on the bus.. 120 or so minutes at home.. And.. Go!

Current Mood: busy

I think the School of Tyranny needs some of these.. or maybe it's the Quacks Guild..?

Current Mood: mischievous

.. 3 p.m. is a bit late for lunch..

.. not being able to open the nummy carrot bits makes for a not very happy Teej..

.. Must pee, but must eat, but must finish this bit before the 3:30 staff meeting..

Current Mood: frenetic

From the Wine & Hop Shop December newsletter:

Greetings from the Wine & Hop Shop staff. We have just bottled our 2003 Port and are busy bottling other wines that you can sample when you visit us. Be sure to ask when you next stop in. We have also put a large number of our wine kits on sale, ranging from some of the Vintner’s Reserve kits, including the Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon, to all of the Alexanders juice concentrates. In addition, we have put all our stout and porter beer kits on sale. It’s the time of year for those heavier, tasty beers. You might also give a try to our new Belgian Queen Bee Honey Ale, a beer with a complex orange, fruit, and hint of honey flavor. It’s also high gravity beer. On sale till Dec 24 for $43.95. Regularly $49.95

Current Mood: devious

I figured out how to resize my photos so if you want to see them now they should load faster. Enjoy!

Went grocery shopping tonight. Got food and stuff to do scotch truffles and pumpkin bread. Figured I'd do the truffles for Saturday's post-revel bit so we could indoctrinate Cam and Dee to the evil. The pumpkin bread is more a thought about having snacky bits around that can serve double as breakfast food if needed. Looks like I'm baking and such tomorrow night.

Current Mood: full

.. that I'm an anomaly in Higher Education, pr'bly due to my background in the corporate sector.

Why?

Because I don't think waiting two days to get back to someone is "prompt", but several people have commented and thanked me for my prompt responses to them.

Scary.

Current Mood: cynical

Today, December 1st, is World AIDS Day. Personally, I think it should be World AIDS Awareness Day, but won't quibble about semantics.

It's an annual reminder for me. Too easily, too frequently in my life, I skate through days, weeks, even months without ever stopping to think about the terror that is AIDS. I could, now that I'm thinking about it, spout statistics or case studies of countries in Africa, or point everyone to Respectful of Otters - written by a psychologist in an AIDS clinic - but Rivka's been a tad preoccupied with L'il Critter lately to be posting that much.

Instead, for those of you who don't know, I'll tell my tale. It's not terribly dramatic or frightening or brave or even sad. I've been extraordinarily lucky that none of my close family or friends have contracted HIV or died of complications related to AIDS. But there was a time when I was much more active in the AIDS service community. A time when I was living in Seattle, in a monogamous heterosexual relationship. A time when I wanted to do something more to help than assist at fundraisers for the Northwest AIDS Foundation (now, the Lifelong AIDS Alliance, created when NWAF and Chicken Soup Brigade merged in 2001).

( A time when I volunteered to participate in an experimental HIV vaccine trial. )

Current Mood: contemplative

*smile*

It's ( nifty. )

I put the pictures from my digital camera on it tonight, but have spent the last couple hours installing software (Firefox, Trillian, Semagic, AOHell (just until Friday though), so I don't think I'll get to uploading them to Photobucket tonight. Pr'bly tomorrow sometime, since now that they're on here I can do it over lunch at work.

I also called this afternoon to set up cable for our new apartment, so Friday afternoon sometime I should have my cable connection from home back. Can't. Wait. Of course, I'll be gone this weekend in Madison, but I'll at least be able to uninstall AOL from my system.

Hrm.. I think it's time to go watch TV and knit for a bit.

Current Mood: geeky

I want to know how this works.. It certainly applies today!

Current Mood: cranky

*bounce**bounce*

New toy! In a box, on my floor by my desk. Just needs to go across the walk to Wing so they can set it up. Going now.. hope to have it back tonight, but doubt they'll get to it that fast.

*bounce**bounce*!!

Current Mood: geeky

Hrm. My computer did not much like the SPSS table I just asked it to build.. It's just about ground to a complete halt and has yet to pop up my table. It's been about ten minutes so far. I suspect it would have to chew on it for awhile, but didn't quite expect it to have to chew this hard.. Which means that the next table may be even more difficult as it has another layer.. Might have to tweak that.

Still no sign of my tablet. Which is a bit worrisome given that I'm supposed to have a little training session on it tomorrow. :/

Installed the software for my digital camera on the home laptop last night, but then didn't really have the energy to figure out how to save the pictures in a size suitable for web viewing. Maybe tonight. I did, however, take pictures of the various holiday gifts that are finished so once I spend some time getting them saved appropriately, any who are interested can see what I've been up to.

Hrm.. mayhap I'll go run some errands on campus and see if this table comes up by the time I get back..

Current Mood: productive

Jack met with the land lady and the new tenants moving into our Madison apartment today. By all accounts, it seems to have gone well. I'm moderately ( annoyed at one thing, though. )

Whatever. Either way, it's less than the full month's rent, so I s'pose I should take what I can get and not worry about it.

This afternoon I napped and then did dishes and repackaged restaurant leftovers into more stable containers. I recorded some for the books on tape, but should do more later tonight to finish off the fourth tape and get started on the fifth. At the moment, I'm contemplating dinner, which is made difficult by the lack of actual cooking I've had to do the last four days and a pervasive laziness that's settled in on the only day I've really had to relax this weekend. So I'm stalling by working on the strap for mom's little purse bit while watching The Godfather so I can finally connect the damned orange references..

Current Mood: lazy

I have a possessed clock. It ticks and tocks when it wants to. And stops randomly when it wants to. It's on an "on" kick at the moment for the first time since I've been in La Crosse and it's loud enough in the den to hear distinctly in the bedroom. Or maybe it's that it's so much quieter here that I hear small noises in the next room distinctly..

This weekend was decidedly un-holiday-ish for us. Thursday I puttered in the morning then spent several hours in the car with my parents, then ate elk steaks and garlic mashed potatoes and corn and packed up our barware. Friday, we ( packed. )

Also, in a random tangent, solidified plans for Cam and Dee's visit ( next weekend. )

Friday night we got mom and dad settled in their hotel room and then went to dinner at Red Lobster before heading back to the hotel to soak for a space in the hot tub.

( Today. )

At the moment, the bookshelves and other major furniture are mostly set in place. The boxes are all stacked in the living room and I'll start going through them later this week, figuring out what gets unpacked and what gets stuck in the closet in boxes until we move again.

Oh, and mom and dad brought me my ( birthday present.. )

Current Mood: tired

I'm awake. Have been since 6:30. This is really neither good nor bad, it just is. I finished the first of Jack's alpaca half-finger gloves and started the second, so those might actually be finished today by the time we get to Madison.

I'm still searching for sweater patterns for the garnet chenille. I have 12 skeins of it, but I think the skeins are each just under 90 yards, so it's only about 1000 yards. Yarn gauge is listed as about 3.5 sts/inch, though, so there should be enough for a not-too-dense sweater. Hopefully. I have a pattern from Rebecca-online.de for a Rust Jacket that uses yarn the same gauge and only calls for 850 yds; I have 200 yds more than that, so I should be okay. It's a nice little pattern done in garter stitch, so it should be pretty easy to whip up.

Yeah.. mom and dad should be here in a couple hours. I should pr'bly shower and stuff before they get here. I have to bring my laundry home because I need to do it and don't have quarters and we have a washer and dryer in our apartment in Madison. So that's two baskets to carry down, plus the kitchen tractor so we can have garlic mashed potatoes with our elk steaks tonight. But that should be it.. my toothbrush and hair brush, but those can get tucked into the baskets.

Okay.. off to shower. Or maybe take a bath. *shrug*

Current Mood: awake

Am I the only one who thinks it's just a touch.. *wrong* that you can buy a defibrillator at Amazon.com?

Current Mood: scared

I'll learn to wear layers to work. It's damned cold in my office and there are no markings on what look like thermostats to indicate that they'd have any effect on the temperature. I'm told I can have a little space heater bit, but with so much clutter and paper around, that's pr'bly not terribly safe right now.

And I'm still trying to figure out if I should be dressing more business formal than business casual. I'm surrounded by Deans and higher administrators, who all wear more formal things - like the men usually wear ties, even if they're not wearing a jacket and the women are usually in skirt or pants suits or at least wearing a jacket or nice sweater. Which is okay, I have clothing that fits that style closely enough to not worry about it, but not enough for a full two weeks.

So.. ( .. thoughts on making some layering garments.. )

Hrm.. off to the post office and the student center to see if they finally managed to get me into the ID system..

Current Mood: cold

The "stop" button on my Firefox skin is a little yellow box with a red plunger that is only colorized when a page is loading. Many have been the times when I've caught it out of the corner of my eye and thought it was a little rubber duck.

I've decided I really really really want a Green Mountain type cardigan sweater. I'll have to buy the yarn piecemeal, though, because it's damned bloody expensive. Here's hoping I get some gift cards for yarn stores for the holidays. Although, the Shetland Spindrift might be a suitable substitute.. have to look into that.. KnitPicks doesn't have enough colors at the moment.

Cascade 220 Superwash wool is on sale for $7.50 a skein at KnitPicks.. that's tempting, but not tempting enough as I'd need to drop $75 to get enough to make a sweater for Jack.. Still too much. :/

Her dread_ex is now on LiveJournal. Everybody say "Hi!" and don't say you weren't warned. *grin*

Today's likely to be quiet, so here's hoping I can dig into some of the data programs and figure out what's in them..

Current Mood: okay

( Snot.. uh, Snob bit.. )

Hrm.. dinner has been achieved. Pilates has not, yet. However, I'm about 10 rows from finishing the poncho I was supposed to make for the damned class at Michael's at the end of October. rufinia dear.. you did *not* want a hood, yes? This means I'll need to know how to get it to you soon, too.. ping me at verymelm@livejournal.com with contact info and such.

Which reminds me, I bit the bullet and decided I use LJ enough that I really ought to be a paying member so I get new toys to play with now.

Current Mood: bored

'Sbeen a good weekend. Social and productive. I found my local yarn shop and got some really yummy alpaca to make Jack some half finger gloves with.

Racked off the strawberry wine into the second carboy. It was, quite frankly, a pain in the butt. The siphon stopped several times for some reason I can't identify - possibly blockage from the silt, but that wasn't it all the time. But it's racked and there's far less sediment in the bottom of this carboy and hopefully in a couple months when I rack it again before bottling there'll be even less. It's somewhat less than 3 gallons at present.

Had dinner with Jack's family last night. It was very laid back and nice to be there for something that wasn't a big deal. Jack's dad went hunting in Wyoming a few weeks ago and got an elk, so we had elk for dinner and then he sent us home with a bunch. It's really very tasty. He included a small roast, which I'm contemplating making jerky with just to try it out. He's also deer hunting this year, as is Adam, and both have offered us venison should they get extra. Mmm... I do rather like wild game.

I also have some yarn that Jack's mom's been stashing away for years that she gave me - it's all acrylic, but some nice colors and enough of them to do something reasonable with. I'm contemplating making her a sweater out of some of it for Christmas, but I don't know that she'd wear it.. she wears more sweatshirts and t-shirts these days. Anyway.

Am trying to decide whether I want to go to the Rokeclif shirt meeting thing today. I'm not sure I'm quite ready to meet the whole shire, but they do seem terribly friendly and it's a pot luck thing and there sounds like there will be lots of very tasty food. Will have to see how I feel after brunch with Dave and Bobbie...

I believe it was rufinia who recently mentioned pomegranate cordial, but am not sure.. could whoever it was ping me off line with the recipe..? 'Twould be most appreciated.

Current Mood: relaxed

A-yup.

(Thanks to bsingle!)

Current Mood: geeky