Why We Have Little to Say

Just in case anyone was wondering (we have ways of knowing), things have been excessively busy around here of late, what with about 80 midterms to grade, project proposals to comment on, lectures to prepare, and an unhappy rabbit who's supposed to have ear drops three times a day. The ears are allegedly getting worse instead of better, so now she has to accompany her human to school twice a week in order to be sure of proper dosing on school days.

Relaxed Alertness

I made an offer on the recently pictured house and accepted the counter-offer. Mortgage stuff now underway and inspections scheduled. Meanwhile:

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): I have compiled a set of four affirmations that I think will keep you on the right track in the coming weeks. Try saying them at least twice a day. 1. "I am cultivating Relaxed Alertness, because that will make me receptive to high-quality clues about how to proceed." 2. "I am expressing Casual Perfectionism, because that way I will thoroughly enjoy being excellent, and not stress about it." 3. "I am full of Diligent Indifference, working hard out of love for the work and not being attached to the outcome." 4. "I am practicing Serene Debauchery, because if I'm not manically obsessed with looking for opportunities to cut loose, those opportunities will present themselves to me with grace and frequency." (via Freewill Astrology)

While I try to live like this in general, I think a little more Serene Debauchery could be beneficial. Ms. Spots is the most skilled practitioner in the household and has Orion and me wrapped around her little toes. All she has to do is lie down and someone is likely to rush over and fulfill her wishes. Admittedly, at times she gives one or the other of us a special come-hither look. But she doesn't have to in order to get her message across. On the other hand, when it comes to Relaxed Alertness, Ms. Spots excels at Relaxed while Orion excels at Alertness. The full weight of Casual Perfectionism and Diligent Indifference is on me, since the rabbits don't work.

Rabbits Wonder About Their Human, As Usual

Ms. Spots and Orion would like to point out that their human has been pretty unreliable and sleepy of late and has made many strangely enthusiastic remarks about grading and how much better the students have done than last quarter, and especially about how stunningly they did on the design-a-cathedral-or-mosque project. Ms. Spots and Orion feel that the human's time would be much better spent paying attention to whether there are enough greens in the refrigerator, although Orion was pretty excited this evening to discover that the human was too mentally deficient to realize she had poured tasty pellets into the litterbox instead of litter.
Ms. Spots and Orion have also gathered that the human has been offered a permanent sort of job and that instead of moving to climes unknown this coming summer, the plan is to move somewhere within a mile or two that will offer space to compost all that used litter and grow lettuce and cilantro. Given the looming deadline to file for the first-time home-buyer tax credit, the human has had to take up house-hunting as well as all those other time-wasting, non-lapine-oriented activities. Fortunately there are some photos to be had from this insanity.

Bunny Nativity

It was brought to my attention awhile back that there is apparently a subcultural art genre best described as "bunny nativity scenes/figures."

Looming lop-eared nativity figures
Simplicity pattern of lop-eared group

While we're at it, see this fine essay on the Easter Bunny's Nativity.

I don't think I have the nerve to tell Ms. Spots and Orion about this.

Napping Rabbits

"So stretched out huge in length the Arch-fiend lay" (Milton, Paradise Lost)

Rabbits Like Stairs

The attempt to keep rabbits downstairs and out of the office (since its door doesn't close and it is full of tempting papers and boxes):



How Ms. Spots turns barrier into ramp for early-morning explorations of the upper realms:


Baseboards here are too thick (about an inch) for proper deployment of the barrier. It's easy for rabbits to knock over the barrier and bound up the stairs. Calypso Spots knows she's not supposed to do this, but the temptation is too great. After all, she's found packages of stale airline cookies lurking in tote bags up there. What rabbit could ask for a more exciting breakfast?

Dysfunctionality

It has been my experience that one periodically goes through times when apparently it is decreed (by some minor and annoying god, no doubt) that an unusual number of things should fail to work, or be recalcitrant, or otherwise drive one somewhat mad.
I have alluded to how the drains on tub, sink, and dishwasher all had to be fixed shortly after I moved in. To update these specific items, the tub proves not to like hair-washing, and its drain clogs after two or three washings; the sink now doesn't really hold water long enough to soak laundry; and the dishwasher (a fancy-looking new Siemens) has to be run every couple of days now because it is apparently a weapon of biological warfare and promptly grows mold on anything placed in it, mold which is only mostly removed during the wash cycle. My previous dishwasher could accumulate dishes for a couple of weeks without mold growth, and removed pretty much everything except dairy-related encrustations. (I could also fit a lot more dishes in that one without wondering whether they would dance around and break one another.)
Speaking of things that go bad, they are doing so at a record pace in the refrigerator. I didn't think refrigerated fruit usually had to be eaten within a day or two. Let's keep in mind, too, that the house is air-conditioned, so we're not dealing with a sweltering kitchen.
Then there was the adventure of the blender. I hadn't had a blender in quite some time, but thought that if I got one, I could make fruit smoothies and rapidly boost the amount of fruit in my diet, as I imagined that would be simpler than making fruit salad. I bought the blender and put it together according to the instructions, or so it seemed, but it dismantled itself and dribbled a lot of liquefied fruit everywhere. For that matter, the stuff I was able to salvage didn't taste nearly as good as a fruit salad would have. I have been hesitant about trying the blender again, since I'm sure the motor got inundated with fruit and water, and I'm not sure that I've put the apparatus together any better than before.
I am not sure that the vacuum cleaner is picking up much, although I replaced its bag just before moving here.
On the automotive front, about a month ago I had my windshield replaced due to the remarkable size and quantity of debris thrown at it by various trucks. I was very pleased with the replacement for at least a week or two... specifically when I moved... and the rubber molding around it came loose. The job being under lifetime warranty, a technician came out to fix it once I finally had a chance to schedule an appointment. It has now come loose again.
While the windshield problem was initially alarming (at first I thought the windshield might fly off as I drove down Highway 70), it has not been as troublesome as the car airconditioning, which I had fixed in two separate ways during the summer to the tune of well over $1000. The airconditioning gave out again as I left Chicago and I have really not had time to schedule an appointment with the shop that did the original work.
I may not have mentioned previously that the electricity in the garage gave out just after I moved in (fortunately with the garage door open rather than closed, or I would have been stuck at home for awhile), but my landlord and his able assistant were able to rewire the building in less than a day, so perhaps that doesn't count as remarkably troublesome.
In the realm of the internet, as I have noted earlier, the signal came into the building well before I was able to make use of it. This was because the DSL modem I had gotten from Verizon stubbornly subverted everything from AT&T. I still don't understand how this can be, but that was what the AT&T technical staff, who tried quite a few tests, concluded. People often complain about technical support, but I felt the people I dealt with were pretty clever and well trained, and they were nonetheless stymied. On the plus side here, however, the new modem is also a router, so I have wifi all over the house. This is an excellent thing since the lapine contingent wants me in sight.
Speaking of the lapines, I knew I would have to keep them out of the office (cords and boxes) and possibly the bedroom. As it turned out, the office door doesn't close--it gets to about two inches of closed and then quits. So I bought a handsome pet gate, one with wire since Ms. Spots has been known to destroy plastic gates. Well, it is designed to be pulled as wide as the doorway or other passageway and to stay in place with the aid of rubber bumpers. Whether this actually normally works, I cannot say, but the height and thickness of the baseboards here make it impossible to keep in position as designed. I thus stuck the thing at the foot of the stairs, sort of leaning against the stairs a bit. Mostly this works, but Ms. Spots rapidly figured out that if it's tilted enough, she can climb on it and go up the stairs anyway. She's always rather surprised when she succeeds, and since what she always seems to want is breakfast, this hasn't caused a real problem yet... but it could.
That's more than enough ranting for now.

The Veranda, Again

I was awakened this morning by the sound of Orion making his way upstairs. Rather than wreaking havoc, he consented to lie down in the bedroom and be petted. His real mission, however, was to get me downstairs to provide breakfast and morning petting for the Princess of Pittsburgh, who came up herself when I didn't stay downstairs long enough to suit her. She was a bit miffed that I hadn't kept her company during breakfast.
In the meantime, there are non-rabbit photos:

Looking up at the veranda from the sidewalk. And a view from the veranda, looking across the street:


The tenant in the front half of the duplex does the gardening and the hanging plants. I have added a batch of plants around my front door, however. In addition to flowers, I got some rainbow chard and parsley, but these aren't really growing enthusiastically enough to feed Ms. Spots and Orion. Only enough to take off a few leaves every few days.

Seen on Facebook...

"Nothing improves one's perpective faster than being suddenly incapable of reproduction. Made me feel better."
(Re a comment on the need to spay a rabbit)

The Land of Boxes and Stray Books

Remember how harmonious the last kitchen photo seemed? Well, of course, it was taken prior to the delivery of most of my belongings, so it was a bit unnatural. The kitchen quickly began to look like the following photo, and rapidly transmogrified into a complete disaster area, since although there are many cupboards, it's hard to know where anything ought to go. I mean, most of the storage is out of my reach or too narrow or shallow to accommodate what I might want to put inside. On the plus side, I discovered that there is a lazy susan. Major bonus points there! (Although I wish it could have been a full round one rather than 3/4.)



The dining room is in recovery from being The Land of Full Boxes, but I am not sure that being The Land of Empty Boxes is much better. Yes, there is a so-called "mudroom" and it is also full of boxes. (Is "mudroom" a recently invented term or has it been around for more than ten years? It's used copiously in every home design magazine I've read in recent years and I am wondering whether Martha Stewart invented it. She did not, I am sure, invent the concept.) The mudroom/laundry room has to reserve space for bike and rabbit area.



Moving right along to the living room, although most people will probably see it first, books are gradually finding their way onto shelves, although not in a very coherent order. The main thing has been to get them in some approximation of the right place, not to get them exactly right on the first try. Besides, there's not a real exactly right about book placement. Shelving by topic wars with shelving by approximate size. Besides, even shelving by topic is tricky. Do we want Alberti shelved with Italian Renaissance or with architecture? Do we want Paula Modersohn-Becker's diary shelved with German art, biography, or women artists? This problem worsens with the history books, although they are fewer in number. Should all history simply go upstairs in my office, or can some of it stay in the dining room? Can we just have Central and Eastern European history upstairs, or just women's/gender/sex history? Why am I separating histories of European paganism from the fairytale books? I am so glad not to be a librarian. No classification system will ever fully satisfy me. And, considering that most of my theater and film books are boxed up in California, how did I end up with so many such books here, which clearly need to go together? (Or should those on the avant-garde, or on Czech film and theater, go somewhere else?!)




My office, rapidly becoming a repository of boxes of miscellaneous papers (not shown!), is coming along well enough in other respects. The tall bookcase is pretty much entirely filled with Czech art books, although there is some overflow (five of said books are much too big to fit on its shelves and sit on the desk). The desk is home to lots of dictionaries and related books, in the optimistic belief that I will actually use them rather than merely regard them as a kind of security feature.



And it all continues. After all, that mudroom has to be prepared to hold a new two-story bunny condo (bought on the theory that the rabbits might enjoy it as a special place to hang out), and the downstairs in general has to be prepared for their arrival on the seventeenth. Meanwhile, of course, there's no shortage of academic sort of work to do, unfortunately. I certainly hope I don't have to move again next summer.

The View from Here

Apart from the fact that Ms. Spots and Orion are presently visiting my parents, this is what the living room looks like just now (albeit the piles of boxes are much taller).
I'm not sure how Orion failed to get into more of these pictures. He was very much interested in studying the ways of removing tape from boxes, and will come in very handy when it comes time to unpack.

Susie Bright, Dadaist

I daresay most people read Susie Bright's blog for the news on things sex- and gender-related, but that's not all you can find there!
See, for example, Susie's dream about having the Obamas over to dinner! Surrealists the world over are probably in a state of envy at this dream.
And the dadaist post on 1000 bunnies listening to Obama (be sure to click on her link to the full bunny collection!) I want Susie's bunny notepad. (Although the original artist stuck the bunny's scut in the middle of its back rather than where it belongs, so Orion and Calypso Spots would be perturbed about that.)

Get Your Red-Hot Fejetony Here! (Being a Bit More Explanatory)

This blog being a new volume, so to speak, after the previous, both my old readers and any new ones will wonder what it is about. Well, not having an overridingly obvious topic such as dissertation research in Prague, I really put off doing anything with this. After all, a blog should have some overarching topic.
But as it has seemed that the things I've wanted to blog about of late are fairly random (not that different from before, but without the big theme), I believe this will have to settle for being the sort of blog that takes its inspiration from the quirky columns that used to be a staple in newspapers, and be about whatever I feel like blogging about. A collection of feuilletons (Czech: fejetony), although the word feuilleton has never been much used in English as far as I can tell.
The form of the feuilleton will, I think, let me get away with pretty much any topic that strikes my fancy, whether it be the antics of the Spotted Pair (Calypso Spots and Orion), peculiar scholarly discoveries, or complaints about modern (perhaps that should be postmodern or contemporary?) life.
To get my faithful readers up to speed, my life did not actually end with receipt of PhD regalia, nor did I abandon blogging in favor of that controversial service, Facebook. Nay, I was hired to teach in a not so distant (but not so close) city and have been spending the summer putting together courses, writing and rewriting journal articles, and preparing to move.
The Spotted Pair and I have also driven across country to visit family and friends, and in our travels have seen several friends from my Prague life, such as Jesse, Hubert (and his companion the novelist Sue), and Megan. Megan tells me that Alex will shortly be visiting, so we think it behooves us to start thinking about a full-scale reunion, which we think would be very pleasing to have in a Tahoe cabin in December.
I am looking forward to seeing other friends as well, such as my old friend Scott, whom I haven't seen in many years but who is currently finishing up an intriguing novel.
As it happens, I headed west at the precise time I did in order to be on hand for my father having his second hip replaced (fortunately he is not a quadruped), but unfortunately the operation had to postponed (utterly at the last moment) until September. We are not pleased.
In other news, Archelaus Cards has been attracting retailers internationally and continues to present a strong presence at DC's Eastern Market, as an enthusiastic customer notes.
Orion and Ms. Spots are presently napping under a desk and do not wish to be disturbed.

Rabbits Preparing for Travel

I said I might start a new blog, post-PhD, and here it is. Its topic? That remains to be seen. I imagine it will be more sporadic than the last one.

I told the rabbits we were going to go on a trip, but they didn't really listen to that.