Back to the Grind

Stacy has left and we are back to the daily grind. In January I set what I thought were overly-ambitious goals for the semester and had promised myself that if I somehow managed to meet them, I could then focus on drooling over baby clothes and relaxing until Peanut’s arrival. And when I volunteered to present at the last workshop meeting of the semester (and therefore gave myself a deadline of last week for the final component of my goals), Stacy’s visit was supposed to be the beginning of my break. Well, the best laid plans . . . and so her visit was instead only a brief respite. It now looks like even a February defense isn’t an option (stupid Hopkins bizarre rules), and so I’ve lost another two months and will have to defend in December, which means finishing my dissertation by Thanksgiving. And so, despite the fact that I already drafted three chapters and revised an article this semester, I started drafting another chapter tonight. Gah!!!!!!! (This is where Joe would say, “Tell us how you really feel.”)

Okay, I am now officially done complaining, and will focus on happier things instead.

While Stacy was here we added a few more touches to the nursery. We put up the Noah’s Ark picture we bought at the flea market. And we hung a hammock on the wall above the dresser/changing table for all of the stuffed animals I wasn’t sure what to do with. I had contemplated putting up a shelf for them, but decided that with a hammock Peanut would have something to look at during diaper changes. I’m not sure how interesting animal butts will be, but they have to be more interesting than the underside of a shelf.

We also went out shopping for a bunch of the practical things that we should just have stocked—like diaper cream, baby Tylenol, etc.—and ran a bunch of other uber-practical errands that I had been putting off either because of work or because I just didn’t want to deal with them. And, in things completely unrelated to Peanut, we spent a lot of time talking, playing games, watching Full House, and having root beer floats. It was phenomenal!