The Cynical Career Counselor Explains Your Future as a

Cryptographer

Hi there--I saw your picture in the paper for winning that math contest last week. So, you want to be an engineer? Quantum physicist? What's that? Cryptographer? Hmm. You sure you don't want to turn that brain into something more... traditional? Okay, if that's what you want.

Yeah, of course I know the difference between codes and ciphers. Ciphers are how my ex-wife used to communicate with her therapist behind my back when they went off for their 'extra sessions' so he could violate his code of ethics. Sorry, I'm not a bitter man, usually, but sometimes... Anyway, I know that codes are word replacements and such while ciphers are about replacing individual letters or something like that.

You've got the sort of mathematical intelligence that will make you the most popular partner in the college recruiting dance. Still, the people you want to talk to won't come to your typical high school career fair. I mean sure, the military will be there, but that's not who you want to talk to. Army intelligence might work, but you're better off sending your SAT scores and a little resumé info to the CIA, since if you're as good as I suspect you'll be, they're going to come looking for you.

They'll do a full check of your background, from your internet surfing history to the papers you wrote in 10th grade. You'll be deemed safe, and taken for a series of psychological and intellectual assessments that indicate you are too valuable to ignore, but not as mentally strong as the Agency would like.

You're sent to a small college which has unusually prestigious mathematics and languages faculties, which you learn is solely because they are funded by various intelligence agencies to provide discrete high-level training for their recruits.

There you prove both your math skills and your aptitude for picking up new languages quickly. After your first year you find yourself in some deliberately misnamed statistics courses which really focus on honing your ability to decipher and decode all manner of cleverly-disguised communication. You are not surprised to find you have a knack for this sort of thing, and soon you've zipped through four years of college in less than three and you're off to start your secret work protecting freedom.

You are sworn to uphold the secrecy of what you learn, and since you're more about the puzzles than the rationale, you don't care much if you're discovering Al Queda strategy or stealing technology from "allies"--you just enjoy the challenge of testing your mind.

The problem is, you become so immersed in looking for hidden meanings, you can't shut it off. You meet a girl who works in the Agency's document classification office, and the two of you fall in love and marry after a brief courtship. At first things are fine; you both have sufficient security clearance to allow you to have real conversations at the dinner table, but soon everything she says seems to convey hidden subtext as your paranoia grows.

She leaves you, and you have to give up the condo near Langley the two of you shared. You need a change so you request a transfer to New York, where you'll analyze all sorts of communications between various U.S. diplomats. You decide to take a cheap apartment in a not so great part of Brooklyn, and your daily commute exposes you to a plethora of tag graffiti that immediately appeals to your cryptographic instincts.

Soon you're noticing all sorts of subtle characteristics of the public face of gang communications. You develop the ability to quickly 'read' the tags, and you notice that one particular latino gang is boasting of some of their more dramatic crimes before they are actually committed. The agency warns you not to get involved in such local crime enforcement, but you can't help yourself. You also discover the tattoo parlor down the street, and begin hanging out at the coffee shop next door so you can spy on the various tattoos to determine who's associated with what gang, who's been in prison, and who has actually committed murder.

Eventually some local gang members figure out you've been reporting their graffiti messages--let's face it, you aren't going to be taught much spycraft as the CIA wants you for office work--and you only escape death when a patrol car pulls up as you are being beaten by six men.

You recuperate and the agency decides to send you overseas to work in the London office. They make sure you're not in a neighborhood where you'll be distracted by gang tags, but you develop a new obssession--the conspiracy theorist's eclectic appreciation of all things 'templar'. Soon you're hanging out near the old Knights Templar compound and taking weekend trips to scout out old libraries for glimpses into the secrets of everyone from the Jesuits to the "Illuminati". You don't care much for the religious aspect of the conspiracy theories, but you develop a conviction that there is some sort of secret organization manipulating world events for their shadowy purposes.

You begin working overtime and take a second job at a university on weekends--saving all the money you can. Then, when you think you've got enough to survive on for a year or two, you get the Agency shrink to sign you a 'stress leave' note and you vanish.

You get some of the sketchy underworld types you've been learning about to provide you with some different i.d., and you travel as your paranoia leads you, first to Area 51, then to the Vatican, and later to Jerusalem. You visit every crop circle farm and check out ancient mountain art in Peru--the big pictures that can only be properly seen from the air. Your paranoia manufactures a new theory--it's not something from this world that you need to discover, but rather an intergalactic conspiracy whose communication you must find and decode to save the world from some unknown fate.

You read everything you can on Atlantis, then head to radiotelescope installations so you can listen to and record the crackles, pops and hisses that come from space.

You are completely frustrated--always feeling that the answer is so close, yet just beyond your reach. You check yourself into a psych ward for a rest, and when their people discover your real name and enter it in their computer files, it triggers a visit from your employers who have begun to wonder if you are too much of a liability in your mentally fragile state to allow you to keep your freedom.

They leave you there for a few more weeks, trying to figure out what to do, while making sure your 'keepers' know that you are not to be released under any circumstances. It's during that time that you finally make your great breakthrough.

The method by which the global controllers are communicating is through an incredibly subtle and sophisticated code hidden in the New York Times Sunday crossword puzzle. It's a combination of letter placement, shapes of the black squares, and words in the clues that all come together almost accidentally in your subconscious, as you complete the puzzle one Sunday, as has been your custom for years.

You realize there is a prediction of an explosion at an refinery that will suddenly drive up the price of oil. This will lead to speculation in the gold market, and the message is for all of the members of the global conspiracy to sell both their investments in oil and gold and wait for further instructions.

Sure enough, three days later the explosion transpires as predicted. You are suddenly very afraid, but decide to feign a return to 'sanity' for your employers, who cautiously take you back and send you to work in their offices in Switzerland. This is an ideal place for you to be, since as a center of world banking, Switzerland is awash in constant financial and economic news. You continue to follow the instructions encoded in the Sunday crossword, and cross-reference it with those individuals who seem to always 'luckily' sell or buy the affected commodities just in time. This gives you a list of the global conspirators, but you have no idea what to do with it.

You turn to the only person in the Agency you ever trusted--your ex-wife. By this time she has remarried, but she agrees to meet you, and you sneak away from work and fly to Philadelphia where she is running the small international consulting firm she started when she left the Agency a few years earlier.

You explain your discovery to her, trying to sound as rational as possible. You can't tell if she believes you or not, but when you try to explain the nuances of the crossword code, she excuses herself and promises to call you within the week.

You are disappointed and a little angry when she doesn't live up to her word, and you send her a scathing email. That is your fatal mistake. Her email is being closely watched. She had been discretely trying to verify your suspicions on her own, but she wasn't discrete enough, and the day before she was to contact you, she died in an accident that you recognize as typical of the Agency's tradecraft.

You 'go to ground' just before a hit team arrives--taking off in the middle of the night and heading to Italy, where you hope to throw yourself on the mercy of the Jesuits, the one group that your favorite conspiracy novelists characterize as aware of yet unsullied by the global conspiracy.

Unfortunately, your novelists were wrong. Actually, they are part of the conspiracy, and maintain the Jesuit fiction to drive desperate men like yourself into the heart of an organization which they have fully infiltrated. You will die from a tragic fall while touring an historic Byzantine bell tower.

When they bury you back in your home town, they'll hide a dirty joke in code in the epitaph they order for your gravestone. It will become a favorite screensaver for global conspirators for years to come.

correction

Just went to the movie store on goldstream and noticed the brand new starbucks has just opened--that makes 24. They're poppin' up everywhere.

real demographics

Now the new Tuscan Village starbucks is open, we were wondering how many there are in town. A quick count in the phone book reveals that the latest is #23 in town.

I wonder if Seattle has the most per capita of anywhere?

Their next nearest competitor around here, I think is Serious--there are 11 of them, though there may be new ones that didn't make the book 'cause they seem to be springing up all over. At least they're "local" in that they started on the island.

For me the difference is simple. It's not about overroasted beans, price or employee benefits;, no it's much simpler than that: free internet. Serious has it, while starbucks wants 8 or 9 bucks for an hour online.

Decided to check a few other franchises as well. Subway is even more ubiquitous than Starbucks; there are 25 of them. We have 18 Mcdonalds, 14 Tim Hortons, 8 Seven Elevens and 7 Dairy Queens. I can't be bothered to look up KFC and the rest.

Nearly all of those franchises are having trouble finding enough employees. It's not a bad time to be a high schooler looking for mindless employment; if you don't like one job, there are plenty of others to go to.

A note to those who are on my facebook--they've finally fixed the little hole in the network that let me access it at work (thanks, Alix) so if you need to get a response from me quickly, an email is probably going to be read earlier in the day.

Have a good weekend.

Poetry by Dythandra

She found me on her hallway safari
Not hard--my plumage isn't subtle
More caution than camouflage.

Hi... her voice trails off.
I see the camera round her neck
The rest not hard to guess.

I was wondering, uhm, if you've ever modeled?
I let the question hang an awkward moment.
Depends what you call modeling
Then I turn and walk away.
She doesn't follow.

I think little of it, until later
A note folded, dropped inside my locker
A web address scrawled on a scrap of paper
and underneath, "A sample of my work".

My curiosity wins out;
I visit the library computers,
But such sites are deemed beyond the pale
By our educational censorati.

Once home I see her "work"
Something called "model mayhem"
--a trifle tame for my taste,
which runs more to tattoed, pierced and pale.

Her page is like the rest,
A couple dozen pics of classmates, friends
All mimicking the poses
Taped in the lockers of adolescent boys.

She spots me in a corner two days later,
Barricaded behind my sketchbook
Where she is an unwitting model

So... did you like my pics?
I shrug and keep on drawing
I, uhm, I'd really love to shoot you
I direct a withering glance her way
The feeling is quite mutual

After a few moments I realize she hasn't left
So against my better judgement, I ask:
Why would you want me to model for you?

She looks uncomfortable--do I detect a blush?
You're kind of... exotic.
I contemplate violence for a moment,
Then slowly shake my head and mutter
I don't do freak show, thanks.

No, I mean you're, uh, interesting
And Gerry said I needed to push the envelope...

In spite of myself, I find I want to know
Who's Gerry?

Just a photographer, she explains.
A real one.

I laugh out loud. I'd seen his 'profile'
Just like the rest of them.
Creepy 28 year old guys,
Living in their mother's basements
Playing on the dreams
of misguided children.

Have you met 'Gerry'? I ask her.
She admits she hasn't--no surprise.
Seems Gerry has suggested
They might work together sometime,
When she brings him a suitable muse.

He can't troll the playgrounds for prey,
But she can bait and lure them to his den.

I suggest I'd love to play the game,
And allow one test shot--my instructions then are clear
I tell her go ahead--arrange the shoot.

As expected, Gerry's more than willing
To do the shoot--for free!
His largesse knows no bounds.

It's not surprising when he then insists
We skip a day of school to visit him
No doubt his mother works a daytime job

I'd looked at more than just her photo site--
I found her Deviantart, and read her blog
Its seems my newfound friend has daddy issues,
An angry, large controlling kind of man.

I craft the letter on a school computer,
Filled with some innuendo, then sign the name
Of the one who plans to make us prey.

I hide across the street--make sure she's gone,
Then tape the note where daddy's sure to see
When coming home from work down at the precinct.

She didn't come to school again--too bad
I had some drawings I had thought to share,
But apparently her education's relocated,
To St. Teresa's Boarding School for Girls.

I checked out Gerry's web site the next week,
It now points to his latest Craiglist ad,
I see he wants to buy a blender cheap,
Seems he won't need solid food for quite some time.

A Call for Submissions

Yeah, that title's going to get a bunch of academic types wandering by.

I need help, folks, and here's your chance to impact young lives for years to come. At my school, like so many others, we use computer coded report card comments. You assign each student a letter grade, an effort mark, and then have the option of giving one or two coded comments. Examples of short comments include:
"NO SKETCHBOOK" (Did I mention they're all in capital letters? We like to yell our thoughts.)
"INCOMPLETE JOURNAL"
and, my personal favorite:
"TOP NOTCH MANAGER"

Examples of long ones include:
"SATISF. WORK-MUST CONTINUE TO WORK HARD" (yes, the abbreviation is on the report card)
"NEEDS TO DEVELOP A MORE SERIOUS ATTITUDE"
and
"PLAYS WITH INTENSITY AND EXPRESSION"

We're having a department meeting on Thursday, and each department has been asked to review their area's particular comments. For me, that means I need to look at the lame drama ones I inherited that were created probably 20 years ago and that I rarely use. Some examples of these are:
"IMPROVEMENT NOTED"
"DIFFICULTY WORKING IN GROUPS"
and
"CONTRIBUTES WELL TO GROUP IMPROVISATION"

What I need from you are suggestions--they can be drama-specific, or more general and applicable to a wide range of subjects. I welcome both serious suggestions and those which are a little more tongue in cheek. (and if the words "tongue" and "cheek" appear in your comment you get bonus points)

Fire away.

From peso to par

When I was a kid, the Canadian dollar was worth 1.03 U.S. We knew that because I grew up a few hundred yards from a marina where rich Americans often moored their yachts in the summer, and the stores nearby always posted the rate.

By the time I finished high school, ours dollar was worth less than the American one, and it got worse by the late 1990s. In 2002, our dollar hit an alltime low of around 62 cents. Fox media types snickered at the "Canadian peso" suggesting that our social programs and medicare system were bankrupting the country.

There were more factors involved. For a while it seemed like every time a politician in Quebec sneezed, the dollar dropped.

Not everyone was unhappy. The town where I grew up has come to rely on a lower Canadian dollar to help make its exported paper products more attractive to foreign buyers. Tourism, which is huge in this province, also benefits from an exchange rate that helps attract foreign visitors.

Still, it wasn't fun when you had to go out of the country, and it was easy to grow tired of buying things like paperback books with price labels that would say 7.95 U.S., 11.95 in Canada.

When we went to Disneyland in the summer of 2004, our dollar was worth about 75 cents U.S., when I took kids to New York in December of 2005, it was up to around 86 cents.

Today I called Houston to book tickets for a touring production of Spamalot in Seattle in a few weeks. It was a good day to be buying something from south of the border; our dollar closed the day at par with the U.S. buck--well, within one tenth of a cent, anyway.

Had a good chat with the guy booking the tickets--we took 32 seats--after he asked me why the change in rates. I figure it's a combination of the mortgage default crisis in the U.S., the cost of the war in Iraq, the price of oil and other resource commodities, which we have a lot of, and the recent federal byelections in Quebec showing folks there aren't all that keen on leaving the country anytime soon.

Or maybe it's just all the cash from those same sex couples coming here to get married...

And file under annoying... my battery was toast when I tried to start my car to go home today. Fortunately after a jump start I was off to my brother in laws shop and one of his mechanics stuck around after quitting time to help me out.

Oops

Try the link to the Cynical Career Counselor now and then try loading the actual entries--the index should work. I had made a mistake in the coding of the menu.

Thanks Rach for pointing it out.

All 86 of them are there now

I've put all 86 of the Cynical Career Counselor posts on that site--four pages. Go here to see it.

It still needs a bit of tweaking--I want to probably get away from the 'centred' headers in the index, for instance--but I can do that over the next little while.

What a lot of my time I've spent writing all those. Now I realize why the masters took so long...

As always, if you want to request another career, let me know and I may give it a shot.

quick update

Life is "normal" busy now.

Went to the kids' "meet the teacher" thing last night--had to wait for my son's music lesson to end first. I listened to the son's grade 9 teachers while my wife checked out grade 7 daughter's classes. I'm impressed with what I saw, which is nice.

The lack of posting here is because I'm working tirelessly on the CCC page--but I have to put in each paragraph break, etc. when I paste them into the html documents since the formatting doesn't copy. I hope to have it up with all the entries by the end of the week.

Feel like I've kind of lost touch with a few of you, so if you feel so inclined drop me an email or a comment to let me know how you are doing.

Questions nobody asked

Why do we have one week of spring break while the two neighboring districts have two?

It's all about substitute teachers. They run the union, sometimes, when the rest of us are too busy to go to after school meetings across town 'cause we're directing shows or coaching teams or dealing with report card deadlines. They have always had a disproportional political clout in our district, and have managed to use it to make sure they get the best shake for themselves, sometimes at the expense of others. Thus, adding three days off after the easter weekend to give us a two-week break is seen as costing subs three potential days work, so the students and other staff all have to go in while neighboring districts don't.

Why the calamine lotion this week?

Three days of hives. Don't know what I reacted to, but we think we've narrowed it down to some no-name cranberry juice. Not fun.

What's keeping you from blogging?

I know I promised more once the degree was finished, but a staff meeting 'til six on Tuesday, running my folks back and forth from doctor's appointments, and a "meet the teacher" evening on Thursday have made a liar out of me.

What/who is on your mind?

A friend I had a short visit with yesterday who is dealing with something difficult and I wish I could just wave a magic wand and help it not to hurt so much.

What is disturbing you right now?

I've been looking forward to hockey season in a couple weeks--I can actually watch some games on t.v. this year--but after seeing Bay's facebook, I think she may have soiled my team...

Anything good happening?

Lots. Last night a nice dinner out with my wife--we're in a rut, maybe, going to the same few restaurants, but why change when you always have a great time somewhere?

What else are you doing?

Besides catching up on yard work, etc--I guess I'm working a lot on fixing up the Cynical Career Counselor page. I'm going to put every single entry back on that site.

Back to work...

grr

Another day supposed to go up to around 26 or 27--about 80--and I'm lucky enough to be finished teaching bit before 2:00...

But wait. Staff Meeting @ 3:30.

Anyone want to call my cell with an "emergency"?

I hate staff meetings. Truly.

phase next

I guess the novelty of being finished will wear off soon, but it's just nice to be able to focus on some of the things I've been neglecting. I'm already working on the video of our last musical, I've been fixing up the neglected school web page, and I've just had more time for family stuff.

Of course the musical stuff this week, along with the New York trip issues, and of course 'meet the creature' on thursday night will all keep me busy.

Still, I'm looking forward to more times out with family and friends, more being able to watch mind-numbing t.v. at the end of a busy day, and of course, hockey season. (watching, not playing).

More writing: Dythandra, CCC, and Nanowrimo.

The weather this weekend has been perfect. Still, I drained the pool since while it's been getting warm enough during the day (it hit 26/79 today), the evenings are cool and the pool doesn't warm up quite enough.

We did enjoy our Sunday afternoon in the park and then out for ice cream. Here are a few pics:








There was a concert in the park...mostly fiddles.





A sundial is kind of cool--and it was exactly right, as long as you corrected for daylight savings.











Almost more like spring than about 10 days from fall.








Yes, those are palm trees.

Fin

I am no longer a university student. Handed in the Masters project and it's done.

The Cynical Career Counselor Explains Your Future as a

Nun

Hi there--Marie, right? It's okay, you can come in here if you want some career help. What you'd like to... What's that? Sorry, just speak up a bit if you can. Oh sure, there's no need to close the door. Probably after those cabbage rolls I just grabbed at the deli it's for the best.

So--what's that? Nun? Really? Hmm. I don't usually have much trouble figuring somethin' but... I guess I can give it a shot.

First of all, you'll need to finish high school. See if they can get you Latin by correspondence. Oh, plus take that civilization course where you learn the difference between Dorian and Ionic columns and stuff. In case you ever get to go see the pope, you might want to be able to make small talk.

You'll finish high school, and you'll eventually break the news to your parents. They won't take the hopes of grandchildren--wait, do you have any siblings? What? Thaaat Brandi? Oh, well I'm sure there will be a bunch of grandchildren then, though they may not all have the same... oh, sorry. That's your sister I'm talking about, I guess? What's that? I suppose she may go to hell, I don't think I'm the one to make that call. You seem kinda okay with it though.

You'll go to a convent and do whatever it takes to become an acolyte or something. I think maybe they take all your hormones out and put them in a jar or somewhere they won't bother you. Then they'll teach you nun stuff, I spose. Like the stations of the cross, and latin stuff, and the names of the saints. And maybe you'll be in one of those orders that don't talk, so you'll have to use sign language for "we're out of toilet paper" and stuff.

Eventually you'll be ready to take your vow or orders or whatever, but you'll make one last trip home first. While your grandmother--that's the old lady I in black I see you with downtown all the time, right? Oh, she's in mourning? When did he die? 1987? Ahh well, maybe she just liked the simplicity of the wardrobe. Anyway, while your grandmother might be happy, your parents won't be thrilled, and they'll have concocted a plot to change your mind.

You'll all go out to dinner, and your dad will slip a little something into your drink--nothing to make you pass out, just to help you loosen up a bit. Then skanky Brandi, er, your sister, will show up with an extra boy for you, and insist the two of you go dancing. You won't remember too much after that until you wake the next day and find a copy of a signed release for "Girls Gone Wild" stuffed in your back pocket.

You'll grab all the remaining possessions in your bedroom, throw them in garbage bags and drag them down to the local chapter of St. Vincent de Paul. Then you'll "forgive" your family by explaining that while you don't hate them, you'll probably never come home again.

Then, amid much weeping, you'll catch a ride back to the convent. You'll explain your tragic home visit to the Mother Superior, who will send you off to confession. You'll think the priest let you off easy saying a bunch of novenas, or whatever those are called, and so you'll secretly flog yourself with a skipping rope you grabbed from the nursery next to the convent.

A week later you get your first real nun outfit and they send you off to go work with the poor in Haiti. You succumb to seven different tropical diseases during the first six months of your stay, and finally once you're feeling better you're kidnapped by a band of anti-government guerillas who hold you and two other nuns captive.

The time with the kidnappers would be worse if they weren't catholics underneath all their revolutionary rhetoric. Or maybe it's just that I don't want to scare you away from the job, since I kind of think that might earn me some bad juju with the big guy upstairs.

Anyway, eventually the Vatican will part with some money quietly and get you and the other nuns back. You'll be shipped back to the states where you'll be assigned to a parish to work at a convent school. You'll enjoy teaching and helping out at the church, gardening and such.

Eventually, though, you'll develop some worrisome fears about one priest and the young boys who keep coming around for extra altar boy practice. You go to the mother superior of your convent, Sister Alberto (why do the important ones always have guy names?) and she'll scold you for having an evil and suspicious mind.

The next week you're shipped off to Italy where you get a desirable position as a Vatican tour guide. Seems that priest was connected and this is your quiet relocation in hopes that you'll keep your mouth shut. You like the new job, the prestige and the proximity to his Holiness.

Still, your conscience bothers you, and all the skipping ropes in the Vatican preschool won't fix that. You write a letter to the bishop who oversees your former parish, but he sends back a curt rejection of your allegations. Finally you send an anonymous letter to the newspaper back home.

An investigative reporter digs around a bit, and eventually reveals the truth. Before the police can arrive, the priest commits suicide. Because of a variety of past coverups, a shrewd lawyer for the family of one boy gets a subpoena for all the parish records, and finds evidence that you made some "wild accusations" before you were sent to the Vatican.

Within six months a lurid court case is under way and although the Vatican's legal team tells you you don't have to go, you choose to return to the States and testify at the civil trial--six families are suing the church for a combined total of ninety million dollars.

The day before you are supposed to testify, you receive an anonymous phone call. A mysterious voice explains that while they wish you no harm, if you choose to go ahead, your credibility must be destroyed.

You testify, quietly, tears rolling down your cheeks. That night, a mysterious videotape is delivered to a variety of news agencies showing your "Girls Gone Wild" shenanigans from almost a decade before. Not only do you disgrace yourself in the traditional exhibitionist style of the program, but this is the unedited clip which includes you singing a song that could only be described as blasphemous and ends with performing a lewd dance routine with a statue of the blessed virgin that your sister had brought along in her purse for the occasion.

Suddenly the tide turns against you--"Crusading Nun, or Sacreligious Harlot?" proclaims the Knights of Columbus News Review. While it is a small paper that is little more than a mouthpiece of the church, its story is picked up by a bunch of lazy internet news servers and soon you're the topic of several late night television monologues.

A church spokesman later explains that your carnal behavior is the real reason you were sent to Europe. It is a blow to the case of the litigants, and they end up settling for a fraction of their original asking price--seems the public somehow has lumped the skanky nun and the shyster lawyers together as part of some shady plan to profit from tragedy.

Eventually you beg to join the mission in Calcutta started by the late Mother Teresa, but they reject you and you settle for a job as housekeeper for a small convent in the mountains of Switzerland. When you fall from a cliff while out walking one day, no one is really sure if your death is an accident or suicide.

Oh, yeah--peace be with you too, kid.

Replace "blogly goodness" below with "weeping and gnashing of teeth"

ARggh!

No, not pirate noises. More my brain exploding. Seems one member of the committee for my masters has a much different standard of what needs citing than another. I can understand both perspectives and I'm not arguing as much as frustrated that the first one said I should just send it all to him for editing and not let her see it until he had given me edits and then send it to her before the defence.

Now she's all "here's my 100s of things to change/fix/cite/substantiate/define" and I'm all "er, I have to have this all submitted by Friday and I start teaching this week, and I'm all thinking "I could've sent this to her a month ago but I was told not to and my other prof was on holiday for the first half of that month so she could've given me edits/feedback and I could've had this all done while I had time.

Oh, and the panel defence I pictured as I describe my study and then deal with questions is apparently needing more of a formal "presentation" at first, I discover. Powerpoint, anyone?

It's my own fault, I suppose, for letting life interfere with pure academia. Fortunately I always tend to scramble on assignments so this deadline while giving borderline anxiety attacks and stress is less likely to make my head explode than some.

I'm likely going to hold off on that "increased blog posting" for a little while longer.

Time for much blogly goodness

Yes--life will be busy with school and such. But Masters stuff is nearing completion.

Thus--back to the obssessive procrastination through blogging. Small trivial entries. Rants. CCC, Dythandra and maybe others visiting. Pictures. Video.

I have neglected my poor blog and self-indulgence will reign once more.

Visit. Comment. Insult me. It's all good.

I went to this site after finding an old recommendation from a friend. If you've seen it before, you know perhaps why I have been kind of obssessively reading it from the first one since late last night.

If you haven't read it, perhaps check it out. Either you'll think "meh" or you'll be like me and find that hours have passed and you haven't really left the computer. Don't judge it from the first one--try maybe a dozen to get a feel for it. (plus every so often he has guest artists write when he takes a week off, and there's one by the white ninja creator)

Not many hours until the grind of work, and my defence as well.