Life in brief.

What, you may ask, has been keeping me from this ole blog? A little of this and a little of that:

- I'm currently taking 4 classes, wrapping up work from my summer reading course, and auditing 1 class that meets 5 times a week. Two of these classes are film courses (i.e., homework involves reading plus watching movies), one is a class on the Book of Job held at our local maximum-security prison (i.e., half the students are from Vanderbilt and the other half are from Riverbend), and one is a class on women, psychology, and religion (we're clipping along at about a book/week). Lots and lots of coffee-drinking in these parts.

 - When do I find time to earn my keep? Not only do I work at the library two nights each week...

I picked up a morning gig at the Robert Penn Warren Center. I will confess that I have a weakness for working in historic homes previously occupied by wealthy families, and that, combined with the Warren Center's amazing programming lineup, pretty much convinced me it would be unwise to not work there. Finger on the pulse, folks.

- I am still sans auto in Nashville, so I take my daily exercise up and down hill, with the breeze and in the sunshine. Fortunately there hasn't been an overabundance of sunshine during the last few weeks: given the hills, I prefer cool and rainy days to humidity and oppressive heat.

- PhD program application season is upon us, so when I'm not occupied with all of the above, I'm busy pulling together papers and essays and asking professors to write letters of recommendation. Basically I'm doing everything I can to make my dream life come true.


- This is not to say that it's been all work and no play. I've found time to participate in multiple potlucks, see a few non-class-related movies, and attend the National Folk Festival:

I'm trying to talk Bryan into getting matching Hawaiian 

shirts and straw hats for us. Wouldn't that be tres chic?

I also spotted my dream home:

And I scored some fresh tumeric (!) in the farmers' market. I know, I know, this is not local at all, but since I so rarely see this stuff I couldn't resist. 

 
And best of all, Bryan is coming tomorrow for a long weekend!  Hooray!