Teachers' Pet?

So. Yesterday, I listed, pruned, crafted and drafted way into the night. Tappity-tapped my way to a comprehensive list of to-dos, did-dos, should-dos and can't-dos for The Shark (whose tan is faded, upon closer inspection. Poor dear. He was the object of my insanely poisonous envy until this morning.) The Shark raised an eyebrow one sentence in and pointed out that:
a.) He was pioneering the use of a new statistical technique and I would be his - gulp - co-pioneer.
b.) A paper is to be produced by this time next year (gulp) using this new technique.
c.) Of course I would be applying for a post-doc, on the strength of this (highly potential) publication.

This entire plan rests on an intricate web of potentialities flimsier than a lace doily.
I am scared of the words mean, median and mode.
What the fuck good is it to tell me of an advanced statistical technique that originated in computer science and with the good will in the world, I firmly believe should have stayed there.

On the one hand, I am most amazed he thinks I can grasp the stuff. On the other, am most annoyed that I should be steamrolled into this. The approach is interesting, and the thinking behind it does excite me, but I resent it being plopped into my lap and I resent being the pawn in the great war on Methods: all three supervisors have strong (divergent) opinions, and in every meeting, I am convinced by one of them that this is the best way to go!
Thanks man, but I'd like to decide it from now on.
Still, flattered you asked.

A chin-up list

• It's fall. Leaf-peeping season, wellie season, new coat season, take the bus season. Stay at home with M. and kiss near the radiator season.
• Meeting with Scuba Shark tomorrow. For those who do not already know, Scuba Shark is my clever-as-pins co-supervisor who has the nasty habit of turning my most poetic, intricate thoughts into an uncertain jelly simply by asking: 'Uh huh, are you sure?'
• In order to not sound like a complete fool, will have to be up all night preparing. How do you prepare for a meeting that you scheduled because his door was open and he caught you openly envying his newly acquired tan (ah summer! the departing summer!) and you thought you should say something intelligent and professional so you strode in and requested a meeting?
• A house-guest at the end of this week! We will, we will: Go to the Jazz club up the street, I will, I will, take him to the park, I will I will show off my new hausfrau expertise! My first guest in the new house. Which, thanks for asking, is just purr.fect. But more on that later.

*rolls up sleeves and prepares sharp crisp meeting notes with one hand, does the laundry with the other, and wills the dinner to make itself by just imagining the kitchen. Bring it on!

Apparently, I am...

"... the Liberal Feminist. This means that you tend to think the women's movement would best succeed through legislative changes to the system as opposed to radically restructuring our governments or ideas on gender. You tend to be mainly concerned with sexual liberation, and think that much of the oppression of women is leveled against them as a result of oppressive sexual morality. Men who sleep around are pimps and women are whores. You would claim that the negativity associated with a female's sexual freedom is only a blatant attempt to repress femininity into a submissive role. Also, you probably believe women should have access to reproductive controls such as abortion and contraception. You most likely embody the ideals of the typical American Democrat: you are pro-choice, sexually liberated, and politically active (though your political views aren't very extreme)."

Uh oh kay then, if you say so.

Blogger does not censor, does it?

I want, I want:
To be able to hit send. But no matter, we will type anyway.
I want, I want (second time lucky?) to tell you what I want:
I want our tongues touching, our lips melting. Coming into each other. Hard, hard, fast. Falling fast has a primal fascination, don't you think? Fast, fast, through a starlit sky, burning, burning, gone. I want the opposite of what I want: for this fluttering, beating, breathing heart inside my chest to not calm the fuck down. Why should I want that? Why? I don't want. I reject calm. I want it to beat itself up, left right and centre. I want yours to wake up and join it. They talk across the gap between my breasts and across the space between us. No? Can't they? They can merge. I want, I want. Your arms around me, hard, tight, so tight, and your mouth on my neck, my collar bone, no.. your mouth on my mouth, our faces joined, my hands at the back of your neck, my fingertips in your hair, your hand ripping away anything that comes between us. I want, I want, for us to become one hot breathing panting sweating primal wild animal, uncaged, free, tied together, flying, falling, fast, fast, through a starlit sky, burning, burning, burning, gone.

Humph

Not that anyone knows what I mean, or cares, but:
Fresher's fair on my campus. Big noisy rainbow coloured explosion of newness and noise and potential best friends. Potential clubs to join. Potential writing. Potential phd. Potential perfect skin. Potential perfect tone. Potential sex.
Potential perfect.
Something I thought all my ultra-practical, very grownup, mature and rational friends, relations and lovers might have known by now -
Potential Perfect = Nothing is perfect right now.

Paws off London

I don't know London well, but if I did, I have a feeling I'd love her. The city is like one of those people at the end of the line in a cafe - the one who looks stunning, looks at you from the corner of their eye, smiles, you smile, and then that's it... until the next morning, when it happens again.. and again, ad infinitum. Until one of you is run over by a truck, or reality intervenes and you ask him to join you, he opens his mouth and you discover he is... well... not someone who will co-inhabit your future (no no this has never happened to me before).
But to return to the point: I would have a crush on London if I could ask her to join me.
So.
It this statement by the American Ambassador to Great Britain is particularly revolting:
"This has been a long and careful process," Ambassador Robert Tuttle said in a statement Thursday. "We looked at all our options, including renovation of our current building on Grosvenor Square. In the end, we realized that the goal of a modern, secure and environmentally sustainable embassy could best be met by constructing a new facility. I'm excited about America playing a role in the regeneration of the South Bank of London."
(Quoted here, emphasis mine)

Far as I'm aware, the South Bank could do without a big shiny building that screams about the Land of the Free, yeeeeehaw!! (Apologies to the zero yeehaw-ers who read my blog, no disrespect intended, you obviously have excellent taste.)

Anarkali

Image here.

If Rumi could bleed flowers, he'd bleed these.

Happy discovering, go fly.
Try it with your lover in the same room.
Try it alone.
Don't try it if you are apt to feel intensely moved by anything and have something important to attend soon after. You won't make it there.