Constant Craving

Ok, so I owe you all an explanation. I've been blogging a lot less than I used to. And I don't post pictures of my meals with recipes anymore. And I don't do any baking to speak of. I haven't had the time or the energy. I've had bouts of really sad times balanced by good but busy and productive times. I'm working on posting more. I'm working on lots of things.

I am super proud of myself for my most recent accomplishment. My dissertation is in the hands of a good editor, and I'm turning it in in a couple of weeks for printing. But it's done. No extra work needed. That, in an of itself is a big effing deal. I get that. I do.

And I got to go home! I missed it much more than I realized. It was nice to see my family and friends, and even nicer to have something to celebrate while I was there. Seeing my friends and the old hood was pretty cool too.

While I don't want this blog to be a "pity me" blog, it bears mentioning that the day after I got back,  instead of ushering in a few weeks of rest and relaxation, my job situation really tanked.

Remember how I work at Wolfram & Hart, the evil law firm? And remember how they had me doing horrible foreclosure hotline stuff, where I'd have to talk to people who were losing their homes and tell them that they had to pay huge sums of money within a week or their house will be sold? Well that stuff sucked and was shitty. Also apparently a lot of it wasn't too legal. My firm is being sued in a class action lawsuit (along with our clients, big giant banks). This has resulted in a massive amount of layoffs.

My friends at work started to disappear. The week I got back, they started laying off people in batches of 15. Then they slowed down. Then I got transferred again. This time, to a department that handles out-of-state cases. Then they started laying off people again. Important people. People needed to get things done. People who have worked there for 15 years. People who were in the middle of celebrating their birthday. Yeah, that's right, one guy got fired ON his birthday. It hasn't been a month since I went out to LA for my defense and yet a huge amount of people at my firm are gone and each day has been incredibly stressful. Every time the phone rings, we jump because it might be HR asking for a private meeting. Even some of the demon lawyers are gone! Demon on demon crime, you guys! It's a crap shoot each day that I'll have a job. Which means an apartment and medical insurance and CABLE TV.

Anyway, I have been a stress ball each day all day! If I don't have a job, we're screwed. M. hasn't found decent employment, we've got a dwindling savings, and none of my teaching applications have yielded much in the way of even one adjunct class. I can't even get any kind of academic adjacent job.


I've tried to love Philly. I love parts of it a lot. But a year should be enough time to get a spot teaching one class as an adjunct with a PhD. And if M. can't get a decent job after applying for over 300 positions (ranging from full time benefited to hourly retail), then I think we have to reassess our long term plans. The major reason we came was to have a better financial future.

We're thinking of moving back to Long Beach. We've done some soul searching about it. M wanted to move back 6 months ago, but I thought we owed it to ourselves to give it one year. Now that the dissertation is done, I feel like I can finally think clearly about what I need and what I love to do.

Until I finished, I felt like it would take forever. I felt like I'd never be done. I was running in place for a long time. Doing whatever I could to avoid the work that needed to get done.  And now that the work is done and I'm actually proud of it, I feel like a million bucks. And Wolfram & Hart is destroying this million bucks feeling. They are tearing into tiny tiny pieces and crushing each piece.

I've got a very possible job situation happening in January 2012. A good one. One with possibilities for the future. One that would make it very easy to move back to Long Beach. I think it's happening. And I think I'm happy at the prospect. Some people would look at this Philly thing as a failed experiment. But I look at it as my last chance to do a big crazy move, to experience totally new things, to understand myself better.

I want to not be stressed out all the time. It's really messing with my mind and my body. And I want my husband to be happy. And this war of ovarian aggression will one day end. I want to be on the winning side of that one. Sigh. I've given up on the need to be a homeowner. I've looked at enough awful mortgages and ruined lives at Wolfram & Hart to never ever sign a mortgage. Not until I've got real stability and a hefty savings. And I've started to be OK with that. I can have a rental house someday. And I can take good care of it like it was my own until things get better.

So this was an apology (for being gone), an explanation (for why I've been gone), and an indication of what's coming.

Wish me some luck already, damn!

Winter in Review

 I did something I haven't done in months yesterday. I opened a window in my apartment. It's nearing 65 degree temperatures here (briefly, I'm sure) and so we're getting a little winter reprieve. There are rumors of snow next week, but I'm ignoring them. Rumors, by the way, is what I now use to refer to "weather reports," which are really just sort of "possibilities" pertaining to weather. Anyway, now that things are changing a bit, I am reflecting on what my first east coast winter was like and how I dealt with it as a native Californian.


It turns out I like winter. I am as surprised as anyone, and maybe it's just puppy love and I'll grow to find it awful and regret the day this ever posted, but right now I love it. I enjoyed wearing various coats. I enjoyed wearing a hat and gloves. I liked choosing scarves to match my outfits. I liked wearing boots everywhere and not having to ever wear uncomfortable shoes. . I like the colors of fall and winter clothing. Nobody sees my tattoos in winter, really, so I kind of have a different winter personality as a result of the normalcy I apparently present to the world when I have my hands and arms covered. People look me in the eye and stuff. I really appreciated the beauty of snow and the soft, silent way it falls.

Every kind of storm I've prepared for has been loud and chaotic, but a snow storm is so quiet. I got to experience thundersnow, which is thunder with no accompanying sounds of rain! So eerie! I enjoyed not sweating ever, even if I had to walk the mile and a half to work because the buses shut down. These joys were only possible because I don't have to shovel a walk or drive a car. Both of these things would change my outlook considerably.


There are things I didn't like about winter. Like I said at the beginning, it's weird to never open your windows and get fresh air. My apartment has wall unit heaters. One in the bedroom that didn't work, so we had to cover it (it let in cold air), and one in the living room which has been threatening to die for months. We had our own little oil heater that we rolled around the bedroom, and had to buy another floor heater for the living room. It helped to do laundry, as the dryer seemed to warm the place up. Being cold inside your house is just sad. Luckily our little dog Radley allowed us to stay warm at night, though there were a few nights when I was so cold I was unable to sleep, even with him tucked behind my legs. I feel like this is more of an "I hate my apartment" thing than a winter thing, though.

I didn't like the melting of the snow, and the resulting grody slush puddles. Slush puddles gather right at important crosswalk locations, and unless you wear galoshes, you find yourself doing a fair bit of jumping and hoping you won't slip on an icy patch. Slippery ice is also a bummer, but (knock on wood) I haven't fallen once. There was a bunch of black ice around our building a few weeks ago too, and I learned it is extra slippery. It looks like a puddle of polyurethane, and is the slipperiest surface ever. I haven't driven once this winter, but M. has had to a few times and found it difficult to park. Since most streets in the city are plowed, there are huge banks of snow piled up in prime parking locations. In between cars are mounds of snow as well, so parallel parking is crazier than usual. Driving over snow sounds crunchy, like you did something very wrong, and your chances of sliding into bumpers is pretty high.

I found that being cold is your own fault, a result of poor planning. I walk home from work sometimes and on several occasions I have come home with frozen thighs because I didn't think to wear tights under my work pants. I have an amazing winter puffer coat that goes down to about a few inches below the waistline, so between that and where my boots meet my knees, I was freezing! I figured walking would make me warmer, and I rationalized that, ahem, ample thighs are a natural insulator, but not so. I was so cold one day that I came right home and went immediately to the bathroom. For some reason, I thought I may have peed my pants. I spent about a half-mile repeating "WTF, I peed my effing pants" in my mind. Why did I think this? Well, because my pelvic region and my thighs were so cold that they were kind of numb, and when I felt the least bit of warmth returning, I assumed it was pee. I started wearing tights and taking the bus.


Once, M and I met some friends for dinner in Fishtown and had to wait for the trolley at night on a Friday We waited about forty five minutes in 19 degree weather (no cabs came by). We were wearing cold weather stuff, but 19 degrees is no joke. You need full ski outfits and face masks if you're just going to hang out in the night air like that. We got home at around 10:30, after walking a few blocks from where the trolley let us off. By the time we got home, we had chattering teeth and immediately made hot chocolates. Friday night, 10:45pm, no work the next day, and after one hot chocolate I had to say "I think I'm ready for bed." Cold. It's a real killjoy if you don't respect it.

All in all, I'm glad to live with winters. I think it will make me appreciate the spring time all the more. I can't wait to see the flowers bloom and the trees get full. I am already hearing more birds than before.  

New Job

It has been a loooong time since I have worked in a regular office. Not a library or a university, but a corporate office. Wow. I am beat. It's Wednesday night and I'm wishing desperately for Friday, the day when you are set free. Free! Two days of glorious freedom. I long for it so. Don't get me wrong, I'm thankful for the job and the upcoming medical coverage, but I forgot how soul-sucking life in corporate America is. My office isn't more soul-sucking than any other. And it's a big enough firm that I don't feel like it resembles the show The Office in any way. Well, maybe a couple of ways. But the people are super nice. Time card technology sure has changed. I type in a code number and then a machine scans my palm to verify my identity. Like freaking futuristic spy stuff. But the job itself isn't fulfilling like my other jobs have been. Maybe when I get further into it, I'll find something to love. Mostly it consists of math and "dealing with difficult people via phone" skills. I honestly don't know how I got placed in my department, unless it's one of the universe's funny jokes. Har har universe. Right now, though, I love paychecks. I mean, I love them so much! I can't wait for my first one. I'm going to get myself a manicure and a pedicure and after I'm going to have one of the big blended mocha frappachinos while I read a new magazine. Mmm.....can't wait.

I take the bus every day. I am a bus person now. In LA, bus people are a whole different deal. I would never have taken the bus in LA. I would have made someone drive from 50 miles away to pick me up if necessary. It wouldn't even have occurred to me. And had I called someone 50 miles away, they'd be bummed on having to make the drive, but asking me to take the bus or even referring to it would not have been an option. The buses there generally were believed to have held degenerates, weirdos, and homeless folk who like talking to themselves. The only buses I ever road in California were in San Francisco (aka Sweet Lady's fantasy dreamland).

Here, though, the bus is the major mass transit. The subway is actually not as useful. I haven't been on it once. Trains do run out to the further outlying areas of the city, and up and down the two major arteries, but the bus is how you get around. People are generally nice on the bus, but once I got on as school was getting out and had to sit amongst 30 teenagers. Teenagers are frightening just in theory, so to be so close to them created a super frown, like a Charlie Brown super frown. I had to hear them talk. About movies, dating, cell phones, and football. Thank god for vodka.


Generally, I am brain dead when I get home. Yesterday, I got into bed with my laptop at 8:30 and had to put it down and go to sleep at 10.  What a baby. I gotta toughen up. At least there are perks. Yesterday we were all let go early at 3:30, which I was told was a really rare circumstance. The reason? The Phillies are in the playoffs. And when I left the office and entered the streets, it was full of people also leaving work. It looked like 6pm out there. Everyone took off to go see the game. Nutz.


Sigh, I actually have to stop tying this now because I have to go to bed soon so I don't wake up haggard. I'm trying to look professional and not too shell shocked. Nobody has seen my tattoos yet. I'm establishing "nerd identity 001" for the first few weeks.


Good luck with the rest of the week people. I'm blogging sporadically until my brain resumes normal functions.

Philly Days

Been trying to get out and explore now that it is beautiful out. Jacket weather is the best weather. You can walk around without shivering or sweating! Today M. and I decided to try some shops in the Northern Liberties area, and we found some goodies:

 

The pins and the recipe cards are by boygirlparty.com and the cupcake plate was $8. I got it all at Art Star, a shop that sells indie craft and art stuff. They have a cool website with an online shop!

We smelled something delicious when we got out of the shop so we followed our noses down the street to the Green Eggs Cafe. It seems like it's really new. They had a lot of choices for breakfast and lunch. M. had the lox and bagel, I had the crab cake sandwich:

Both were yummy.


We got home and I got busy cleaning. Tomorrow we are celebrating my mother-in-law's birthday by spending the afternoon at a pumpkin patch and then going to dinner. The pumpkin patch is the same one M's family has been going to since he was little, so I'm super excited to go! I will bring the camera, so pictures are forthcoming. After the pumpkin patch, we're coming home to relax a bit and then meeting at Distrito, one of Jose Garces' restaurants. Then, we're retreating to our place for cupcakes and watching her open presents. So that's why I spent much of today cleaning. I will be having guests! It is surprising how messy the place gets when you spend all of your time there.


The Phillies are in the playoffs, which is a big freaking deal here. Across from our building there is a small street that has blocked off the street and a neighbor has projected the game onto the wall of the Perleman Museum, so you're hearing the game no matter what. The streets were relatively empty tonight because everyone's indoors watching the game.


We, however, moseyed on down to the Eastern State Penitentiary. No, we didn't go in. They are doing their haunted house and I don't want to go in until it's back to normal. We walked down there because the Cupcake Lady was parked across the street, and I had to try one of her cupcakes.

For those that don't know, the Cupcake Lady sells cupcakes out of a truck. It's one of the few food trucks that Philly has, and she's pretty popular. A lot more popular after her truck was impounded when she parked it somewhere she wasn't supposed to (though it seems she didn't have clear instructions about where it was not OK to park). That's right, she parked her truck to sell cupcakes, and cops came and didn't just ticket her, they towed the truck. With cupcakes inside. Totally ridiculous. As a result, the incident was covered in the newspaper and I started following her on Twitter. When we heard she was in Fairmount, we went over.

We both got red velvets, and they were really, really tasty. Light and fluffy, and the cream cheese frosting was rich and sweet, a perfect complement to the cupcake. And I got to use my new cupcake stand. Pretty awesome day, don't you think?

Library Letdown

Things are looking up. For one thing, I have a job interview. Not a teaching gig, but it's a job! I'm very excited. I'll tell you all about it after the interview. I am trying not to jinx it too much. But that one phone call propelled me into motion today, making me do like 15 tasks on my to-do list. I even sorted through all of the bills and old mail.

Anyway, on to Library Letdown:

I went to the Free Library of Philadelphia, center city branch, on Monday. It's a gorgeous building:

It is a grand place, built in 1927. Some pics of the interior:

I walked up the grand staircase in the lobby and was in awe:

Maybe because it was a rainy day, or maybe because it's been treated poorly due to budget cuts, but I found the whole building to be pretty depressing. Don't get me wrong, there are tons of books, and it's huge, but once you get into the separate departments, you find that though the architecture is beautiful, it isn't being used to its fullest potential.

Drab green-grey walls and metal bookcases mixed in with older wood bookcases. The saddest part was the art section, which was large but there was no actual art on the walls. In fact, there were no pieces hanging in any of the rooms I went into, even though it was clear there were at one time paintings on the wall. The hooks and nails were all still there.  I thought, Ok, it's lost some of its luster, but maybe the collection makes up for it. It's a big collection, don't get me wrong, but it's hard to find any book in the convoluted system they use.

When you get there, the terminals all direct you to the same web search you can do from home, but you quickly find that when you do a search, you aren't in the library where your book happens to be!

This is the search page for the "classic" search method, which usually yields the basic information you need:

Can you tell where you click "search"? No? Well that's because there is no search button. Once you enter a phrase to search, you click "Author, Title, Subject, etc. Those are the search buttons. 

Then when you get to the book you are searching for, it's hard to figure out where it is because the location of the item is buried under a bunch of other information:

Right there at the bottom under "Holdings' is where you look to see if it is in the branch you are standing in, and guess what? Nine times out of ten it is in another branch. Look how many branches have Dead Until Dark: 

There were two copies held by the Central Library, and neither were available. I get that, it's a popular book, but I found that it can take up to 6 weeks to get it from another library! You can just drive there and pick it up in less time. No information about interlibrary loan was available, and it was hard to find a call number that corresponded to the Library.

Even worse, I walked down to the lobby and saw no signage for a checkout desk. Usually, in any library you walk into, whether they be academic or small public libraries, the circulation desk is clearly indicated. Not so here, I had to go to the "Popular Library" section, where they keep the most popular titles, DVDs, and test reference books. It seemed like a silly, redundant section and was really small. There I found some self-checkout machines and two actual library workers, both dressed in grubby t-shirts and jeans. They looked like they were dressed for moving day and I thought maybe I was in the wrong place. Damn. I could not have gotten away with looking schlubby at the library I worked at. And who would want to!? It may be a low paying city job, but damn if you've given up on looking decent on your way out to work, you should really take inventory. The librarians in the other departments seemed more professional, but why was circulation so laid back?

Two, count 'em, two library weirdos talked to me. I'm a freak-magnet, and libraries are also freak-magnets, so I figured it was par for the course, but these two dudes were heavily strange. One walked by and whispered "looking very cute todayyyyy" so creepily that I thought he must have been singing along to a song, but no, he was looking at me.

Later another one came by as I was doing a search on a catalog computer and said, "Pretty lady, where are you going?" Both guys exhibited crazy, base-head behavior. Smelly, close talkers who I gave the death glare to immediately. The death glare involves a stern face, a raised eyebrow, and the look that I get that says "are you fucking kidding me, asshole?" I gave it a lot in my twenties apparently. It's why I never dated much! It kind of looks like this face that my cat Stevie gives:

One thing I'm learning here, it's to bring out the death glare more often. Sometimes I walk around with it on the default setting. It helps weed out the crazies on the street.

The other day, some random Indian guy came up to me as I was walking to my bus and tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Hi, how are you?" To which I said, "Good?" because who says this if they don't know you other than salespeople, right? He then asked where I was going and if I was Indian. Yes, you read that right, "Where are you going? Are you Indian?" No, sadly, I'm not from India, but the pick-up line used here was superb, no? I told him I was Cuban and he said, "Are you sure?" all quizzically like I'm lying, which if I was, wouldn't you just accept it and leave me alone? I mean, would you really be like, "You are lying, you are in fact Indian and are lying to me. I deserve your time!"WTF!?  And so I said, yes, it's true. And then he was disappointed! Dude, seriously? Not only do you have an Indian girls only plan, but you are so bad at deploying it I feel bad about myself. Am I a loser magnet too? People who know me, don't answer that.

Anyway, I checked out one Mexican cookbook and nothing else because they didn't have anything I needed. Not even reference items that were in the catalog. The librarians were all nice and knowledgeable, but seemed a bit stressed. The budget cuts once threatened to shut down all of Philadelphia's libraries, so I can imagine they don't have time or energy to gussy the place up, but it's so sad to see a lovely building not as shiny and beautiful as it could be. In the very city where the first library opened its doors to the public, no less.

Dinner Guests

Had my lovely dinner guests tonight! It was nice to cook for more than two people. It was kind of a gloomy day today, though it didn't rain hardly at all. It's supposed to rain heavily tomorrow.

 

I made my version of the noche buena dinner: pork, rice and black beans, with some tostones and croquetas. It was pretty tasty.  I love when I have guests over because it means all that cleaning is for a good reason. I took some pictures of the apartment now that it is spic n span:

M. went to Whole Foods and chose two different desserts: hamentashen and mini cupcakes!

A good time was had by all. Radley especially enjoyed having a little kid around. He kissed that kid the whole time and is currently fast asleep from playing all night. And as with any good party, at least one person had to be carried out:

Goodnight, Xavier!


It's nice to have friends that live a few blocks away. Josh and Michele (Xavier's parents) were telling us about the fun that can be had on snow days in the area. Basically, when the city shuts down due to snow (which happened tons of times last year), they know which bars and restaurants open. So we can avoid becoming too stir crazy and get much needed nourishment. Cool! Is it wrong to look forward to that?

Street Food

Today it was 73 degrees. Not just at 8am either. It was comfortable, with a cool breeze, all day! I was so happy about this. I walked and didn't sweat. It threatened to rain, but it never did. To help ease the suffering of another day of bureaucracy, we decided to go to lunch and try one of the street carts the city is famous for. In LA, there are food trucks that move about and offer many different things, but here in Philly, they mostly have street carts. Some of these carts are ho-hum affairs that offer sodas, fries, hoagies and the like, but on occasion you find a gem. They tend to have their designated spots, so it makes them easy to find.

We parked on Market, in front of this sign. I don't know what the hell it's trying to tell me, but we decided to take a chance and park there. I think this sign is just a small clue as to why driving here is infuriating.

This is on a major street! Where you have 2.1 seconds to decide if a spot is worth taking!


We had heard about this cart from M's brother, who told us it was basically a felafel cart, but you don't exactly order. The guy that runs the cart just gives you food and you take it. It changes all the time. He assured us it was good, very good, but he couldn't quite explain how the process works. He's not the best storyteller. We kind of got the feeling that this guy is a kind of felafel nazi, only giving one kind of meal and not taking any kind of requests. We knew the corner where the cart stood, so we headed out.

It's just a cart on the street, very small, and a long line heading out of it. It is decorated with lots of flowers and the smell of roasty toasty food beckons you from across the street. You have to wait awhile for this food, it's not really a good option if you have a lunch hour, because once you actually get your meal, you don't have much time to eat it.

I tried to go to the front of the cart to see if there were any kind of menu or indication of what I would be purchasing. No luck. There were a couple of framed newspaper articles, but I wasn't close enough to read them, so I waited until I was closer. The articles were actually helpful. They explained that this guy (Christos) is at 20th and Market every day, and sells a limited amount each day, full of fresh ingredients. It's a one-man operation. There is a charcoal grill in the cart! He grills chicken, deep fries delicate and wonderful felafel, and creates a platter for you of arugula, grilled grapes, pasta (random), hot peppers, all drenched in some kind of magical reddish sauce, topped with a large, freshly toasted pita. He then picked through his selection of peaches to find the perfect one for each customer.

It was freaking delicious. It was also $10, which we were not expecting. Kind of a lot for a cart lunch. Don't get me wrong, it was tasty and way too much food. We totally should have shared one, but damn. That's 20 of our dollars! It was a heavenly combination htough. I quickly built a felafel chicken sandwich with my pita. The peach was a good way to end the meal, too, as my spicy food needed something cool and palate cleansing. I still have leftovers in my fridge right now, and even though I just finished dinner, it sounds appetizing. Maybe a midnight snack.

I am hoping that we find just as amazing (but cheaper) options around the city. It's tough to find out what's good. We aren't young kids anymore who end up buying all kinds of street food because we've had too much to drink and need something to sop up the liquor on our way home. I feel like those kids are on the internet, though, talking about where to find these places. I'm totally using their damn ridiculous energy and magical hangover healing powers to my advantage.

OH, and don't forget to take my poll about Halloween costumes to the right here. I need some help. Last year I knew by February what I was gonna be and this year I've got too many choices!

The Philadelphia Experiment Begins

Ok, folks. The lease has been signed, the deposit sent out. We have apartment!! It's a small apartment, but it is in a gorgeous building with an art deco lobby and a view of the city and art museum. Sigh...so nice! Seriously folks, there is a grand piano in the lobby, teak walls and marble floors. And there's a dude there to sign people in.

It has some fancies that I am very excited about.

Walk in closet. I have never had a walk in closet. I don't think there are many storage options in this place, but I love the idea of walking into a closet.

A soaking tub. Now remember, M went out to Philly to look at these places and make the selection, so I don't know what this place looks like other than the internet photos from the listing. I don't know what they mean by "soaking tub" but I have my hopes up ridiculously high. I heart baths and my current tub is just awful.

Washer and dryer. In the unit. A dream of mine for some time. Quarters you no longer have the same hold over me. I don't care about you! My clothes might actually last longer now that I don't have to wash them all together. Imagine it, a wash just for whites. Or for cottons.

Air conditioning. Yes, a completely controlled temperature in my environment. Will I be able to dry my hair in the summer? I think so! Perhaps my makeup won't melt until after I leave the apartment. Dreams people, I have dreams. There's also heat, which is important in a place that has snow, but right now I'm so jazzed on AC I can't wait.

24 hour concierge service. I don't know what this means. I just know that if it's four in the morning, I can call my concierge. I think it's just a security guy falling asleep at the desk in the lobby, but that's still way classier than what I've got going on now.

Fitness center. You heard me, a room with exercise equipment. Good ones, with flat screen tvs in front of them. In a decent sized room. Can you picture this? I not only don't have to leave my building to go to the gym, there is a chance I will be air conditioned for the entire experience from getting out the door to going back to my place to shower.  No grubby trek through the neighborhood with sweat-face and sweat stains in other, less adorable places.

Conference room. I don't really need to confer ever, but it's supposed to be a big room with a kitchenette and fridge that you can reserve for parties. I can't imagine having that many people to invite to anything, but hey, who knows?

Business center. A place to fax and make copies with a computer or two. This is like a hotel, I swear. Faxing technology is so ridiculous and yet I've found that there are several kinds of industries (loans, my graduate school) that only accept faxes. Even though emailing a scan is just as good if not a better image of the signature. Try explaining this to a bureaucrat, it's fun. I may use this business center.

Cafe in the lobby. Not sure about the quality of the cafe, but it's nice to know that I don't have to go far for coffee and a croissant.

A friggin' shuttle bus to center city. This made me think the building was way too good for me. They have a little shuttle that goes to center city regularly so you don't have to make the rather long walk. In the snow, this will be awesome.

I've got a few weeks until we move in, but in the meantime, I'm imagining furniture placement and color schemes. Wonderful!

Other bonuses, it's blocks, four blocks, away from the Eastern State Penitentiary, one of the places I was very interested in visiting.

Eastern State Penitentiary  is a fascinating building. It has a spoke design.

The left top corner is where I will live, and the spoke wheel building on the right is where the Penitentiary is (the big building on the bottom left is the Philadelphia Art Museum).

The Penitentiary opened in the 1820s with the goal of revolutionizing incarceration. It's system was copied by hundreds of prisons worldwide and was eventually called the Pennsylvania system. It's goal was punishment and rehabilitation through solitary penance. Rather than having prisoners work together, this prison severely isolated each prisoner. Other than the warden and the corrections officers, prisoners saw virtually no one. Their cells were made with skylights in them shaped like an eye which was supposed to represent the "eye of God." What was supposed to be a way to get prisoners to reform themselves spiritually (having to be alone under God's watchful eye to think about what they'd done) actually had a devastating effect. It made them go crazy. Mental illness was induced by this process, which alone would be devastating, but it was also accompanied (not surprisingly) by ritualistic torture by the guards. I mean, who are they going to tell, right? It wasn't closed until 1971, but since then, it's been allowed to go to ruin.

It's a creepy site, on account of all that happened there, but it is also fascinating to watch a building be reclaimed by nature. Some of this is happening on Alcatraz, which I visited recently (sounds like I have a prison fix, but I swear that's the only one I've ever been to!).

Al Capone's cell

It's my favorite kind of history, the kind that forces us to come to terms with the not-so-glorious past. This was supposed to be a way to fix the problem of crime, and the people who conceived it and brought it to life had high hopes. This city is full of fascinating places centuries old that I can't wait to explore!

Other places on the agenda:

Bram Stoker's Dracula papers at the Rosenbach Museum
Another trip to the Mutter Museum
My new neighbor, the Philadelphia Museum of Art
Gettysburg
Amish country
This Jersey Shore I keep hearing so much about.

Garage Sales are the Devil

Among the many things that are totally horrific about moving is the garage sale. Garage sales are great ways to get rid of things you have decided are useless and actually charge for them. Plus one point for garage sales. But they also introduce you to the weirdest people in your neighborhood, minus 10 points. It also requires you to get up at the crack of dawn on a Saturday. I should not see 6 am on a Saturday unless there is a road trip planned. Even then, we don't talk to each other, M. and I just go to the gas station, get orange juice, coffee, and snacks and wait until we're functional to speak. Minus another 5 points.

We started setting up at 6:30, and a nosy neighbor informed us as we were setting up that the city doesn't allow us to actually sell anything until 7am. She then proceeded to ask questions about stuff that she had no intention of buying. Thanks Mrs. Kravitz, geez. One woman tried on a coat of mine and asked if it had become too small for me, which was rude, but I guess she wanted to know why I was selling it. Still. A $5 coat that was never worn does not require a conversation. Buy it or don't lady! M's shoes were a big hit, though everyone was surprised that they were only one size. We had a desk out there and someone asked if we had a chair to go with it. Like, hello, this isn't a store, it's a garage sale. Also, I don't have several sizes of feet, so I pretty much am only gonna offer the one size.

Some people were nice, though, one lady practically sold our stuff to another person she described it so nicely! M. got rid of a lot of skate shoes, and a big heavy dictionary left for greener pastures. What actually ended up selling today was the odds and ends, clothes, and kitchen storage. My bookcases are currently back in the garage, along with a stupid huge desk and a TV storage thingy from back when people (us) had big tube televisions. Ugh. I think we're going to have to post craigslist ads for them.

Anybody need a big desk? Billy bookcases? Tv storage? Close-out prices!

As a special bonus, one of the big items for sale got knocked over by a random gust of wind, hitting my neighbor's car and denting the passenger door. So even though we made a couple hundred bucks, I'm sure that will go toward some kind of deductible for our insurance so that she can get it fixed. Sigh.

Worse tragedies have afflicted people, it's true, but I really hope we don't have to do this again.

We had a lot of Ikea furniture that we just didn't feel was worth it to move across the country. I don't know what it is about this move, but I'm much more willing to give up stuff and slim down our belongings. I guess because it's no longer a matter of filling up my car a bunch of times going between the old and new apartment. All of it has to go at once. Do 10 copies of that article I use for teaching really need to make their way across the Rockies? Is that set of ramekins as necessary as the other set of ramekins I have? I mean, how many people are gonna need ramekins at any dinner party I throw in the future? Why do I have three different kinds of padlocks? I apparently will never need to buy paper clips as long as I live. I have thousands!

It's starting to get real though, this big move. We have already contacted a realtor in Philadelphia to help us find apartments. She gets paid by the various landlords, so all we have to pay is a $50 credit-check fee and she'll organize a weekend of searching in early May. Pretty sweet! We have narrowed down our search to the Queen Village/Bella Vista/Hawthorne areas of downtown Philadelphia. I am doing a lot of work and writing, so I haven't done my usual round of intense research of the area, but I can't wait to find out about our possible future neighborhood! All I know so far is it's the area where Pat's and Geno's cheesesteak restaurants are and that the world's largest pinata is housed nearby.

How do people get through a long distance move? I'm expecting a breakdown sometime in May, around when the dissertation needs to be done and my students are begging me for higher grades.

Moving Day: 1 of 159

If you've ever lent me anything and you'd like to see it back, you should probably ask for it now. I've started packing for our big move in June. I know, who packs this far in advance, right? Well, given the convergence of events happening between February and June, I decided slow and steady was the best approach. I'll be doing a lot of writing, becoming the feral creature I knew I always would. I've got a semester to prepare for, though I am hoping to do minimal preparation given that it's my last semester and I'm teaching the Pop Culture class, which won't change from last semeter. I am also putting together applications for teaching gigs, which is a lot of work for probably very little reward, but at least I'll be getting my name out there.

The next couple of weeks of vacation will be dissertation heavy, but I will be packing a little bit each day. Mostly books. I started packing up kitchen things that I can live without, and today was about deciding which books will make the cut. I have reduced my necessary-have-to-have-around books to one Billy bookshelf. One shelf! Our goal during this vacation time was to do all the culling. We've gone through closets and separated out the things we want to sell or donate. That way, when crunch time happens, we can shove things in boxes without wondering whether or not they are important. At some point during moving, you just start randomly throwing things in boxes and tossing out stuff just because it doesn't fit.

I hate packing. I hate moving! The last time we did this was a July 4th weekend four years ago. The first weekend where temperatures got to 100 degrees and neither apartment had air conditioning. Nobody was available to help us move, so we basically had to do it ourselves. We had no money, but we rented a small U-Haul truck and filled it three times. Our landlord couldn't get the previous tenant out as quickly as he wanted, so the carpet was still wet from the cleaning service, and the caulking in the tub was not yet dry. But we were in. We used a bucket filled with ice and water to soak our feet and keep cool, and my dear future husband went out and got us Taco Bell tacos. We vowed then and there that we would never move without movers again. We, it had been decided, were "too old for this shit."

Yeah well, times change. Bank accounts dwindle. Basically, we're planning this move on a shoe string budget. We plan on selling a lot of stuff, mostly furniture. Any money we make from those little craigslist sales will go toward our cross-country trip. A trip of Motel 6s across this great land, because they take pets and we'll have both an angry kitty and a happy, but stir-crazy dog. We hope to rent a couple of those pods that you pack yourself and then they get picked up and shipped to your destination. Hopefully, we'll have friends and family in Philly who can help us unload!

Any tips for long distance moves would be nice. How did you go about getting jobs? What kind of moving service did you use? How many miles were you able to drive each day? Comment here, or email me!

Winter Reconnaisance Mission

Philadelphia in the winter.

As I enjoy my so-Cal winter (it is a chilly 65 degrees as I type this), I am feeling kind of nervous about my ability to endure in Philadelphia next year. I am utterly unprepared for real winter. I have cute coats and jackets, and lovely leather and suede boots. These, I am told, I can wear during fall. Winter, well, they don't even sell real winter things here, unless you go to a ski shop. I haven't been to Big Bear in many years, but that was probably the last time I had to worry about footwear that is water proof or the painful kind of cold that happens to your ears when you walk around in the snowy cold.

So I need help from all of you that are in cold places. Mainly, my goal is not just to know what I definitely need to survive, but also to survive in the cutest way possible. I fear becoming Philly's new stay-puft marshmallow girl in ugly boots. Is it possible? Can you be cute and survive an East Coast Winter? I know other people will be wearing hideous things in the effort to keep warm, but I'd like to know if you have any secrets, trust any designers or stores to provide you with the least ugly things during this time.

Tell me people. Give me your advice. Visually embrace these fears:

The puffy coat.


The sensible all-weather shoe

I refuse to be turned into a Hobbit by these boots!
Teach me how to layer. Do people still wear long johns? Do they make jeans lined in them? Are galoshes something I should be looking into? How many layers are we talking??

New Chapter

Those of you who are my Facebook friends got the news yesterday, but I thought I'd tell the rest of you today. M and I have decided to move to Philadelphia when he's done with his art degree in June!

What prompted this move? Well, a lot of things.

Before what people are calling the "economic crisis" (but really should be called the Second Great Depression), we were pretty set on living in Long Beach forever. Then we watched housing prices go up and up until a two bedroom bungalow in our neighborhood (with no backyard to speak of) was almost $900k. M got laid off, I got a 10% pay cut. It started to look gloomy here in southern California.

I know that in my field, budget cuts here will have repercussions lasting well into the next decade. Academic departments whose budgets got slashed will be cautious about adding new positions. And those that are already in tenure-track positions nearing retirement will be less likely to do so because their pensions were affected by the crisis as well. It's a nation-wide problem, of course, but many people know that California was hit very hard. So we started thinking.

I have considerable student loan debt. We want to have a family one day. We'd prefer to have a house or condo that we can call our own in the next 5 years. That's going to be very tough here. We needed some place where there is a big concentration of universities and colleges, a decent publishing industry (M plans on putting his graphic design degree to use in publishing layout and design), and the real possibility of home ownership. Also, we wanted to have a decent support system. I think we could go it alone if we really wanted to, but both of us would be much happier if we moved somewhere we already had some friends. So Philadelphia seemed to me to be the logical choice. I brought it up to M and he'd already been thinking about it.

We'd have the big city we've always wanted to settle down in, the support structure of friends and family, and probably the biggest concentration of universities and colleges in a big city in the country. I'm not saying I'll get a tenure-track position there, but I'll at least be able to adjunct or work in other capacities on a campus.

We've been researching the situation in Philly for a few weeks. How much it costs to live there, what home ownership is like, how much it would cost to relocate. When we realized that we were totally in love with the idea, we decided to tell the parents. My mom first, since we're leaving here. She completely understood why we needed to move and what prompted it. She said she is sad that we're leaving, but knowing we'll be around M's family makes it something she can completely get behind. I think her exact words were, "because I don't trust any strangers to watch your babies. If it isn't going to be me, the only other people I'd trust would be R and J (Ms parents)." We called them last night, at the end of their Rosh Hashana dinner, so that the whole family could hear the news at once. Of course everyone's delighted.

So we're totally doing it! I'm gonna miss you California. And these next 8 months are going to be filled with visiting places I thought I couldn't live without, and places I should have seen (Griffith Observatory, I'm looking at you), people I'm going to miss. But I'm actually looking forward to wearing scarves and coats (I have cute ones I never wear). Having seasons. Living in the oldest big city in the country. Walking instead of driving. Being close to some friends I don't see too often. White Chrismukkahs. Fireflies.

I can't wait.