restless

i have the worst case of cabin fever imaginable right now. i need to get out of here. i'll spare you all the details... it's just the same old stuff that gets me every break. every break. and now i can't even shower 'cause the pipes are being worked on. of course, this would happen right when i was about to get in the shower.

did i mention i'm restless?

boxing day!!

so, southie has caused me to realize that it's been quite a while since i last posted. so... let me catch you up on all that has happened.

last week i: met with sayre (which was a lot less scary than i thought it would be), bummed around campus for a few days, slept in, drove home with paul (in bessie - the van of doom), and test drove a very nice volvo v50 and a very nice mazda3 5-door.

this weekend: was christmas. traditional insane christmas eve, and then christmas dinner at paul's house. funny story about that... in addition to me drinking a bit more wine than i ought to have, the table broke immediately after dinner! we were all sitting around, and then we heard a big POP!. and then another POP! and then the table was sagging in the middle and there were a couple of screws on the ground. talk about crazy.

today i: am coming to the realization that a car for me will never happen - like all other awesome things, it's fast becoming a pipe dream. (johndepoe, looks like i might still be calling you for rides next semester.... sorry?). i also need to do some hardcore work on my writing sample. i think a couple solid hours should get it done... it's hard to work here, though. very hard. but, once i finish that, all i have to do is mail things off and pay for my apps (that'll hurt). and then the long waiting period begins. goodie.

in actuality: i am not quite as bitter as i sound. don't worry. a girl's gotta vent somewhere. and my doggy's been quite cute lately. as he get's older, i think he finds it harder to deal with my being gone. consequently, when i come home, he follows me everywhere. and gets (much too) nervous when i'm gone. this morning, he was lying outside the door of the room where i sleep. waiting. now that's cute. (i know you don't like dogs, southie, but even people that don't like dogs like this guy. he's that good.)

all right, time to work. for reals this time.

boo on you personal statement.

boo on you.

three guesses as to what i'm trying to do right now.

i tried drinking some wine to facilitate the process. now, i'm afraid i might be sobering up. but... in a last ditch effort i am going to try and write my personal statments (or, at the very least, some thoughts that can be transferred) in blogger because somehow, this is a less intimidating screen than that white, blank appleworks screen. so here goes.

question #1 - why do you have such a shoddy undergraduate gpa, dani? and what changed?

i began my undergrad as a physics major. physics appealed to me in its attempt to answer fundamental questions about the structure of the world. however, while i was intrigued by the questions being raised, the dry, mathematical answers of physics left me wanting more. i was unhappy in physics, but i was unwilling to switch to a 'fluff' major.

by my junior year of college, it was clear that i had to leave the sciences - my lack of interest in my physics classes was manifesting itself in a poor gpa and i was beginning to fear that i would become locked into an unfulfilling careerpath. during my sophomore year i had taken courses in history and philosophy that had piqued my interest, and i began to seriously consider switching majors. one night, after attending daily mass with fr. jenkins (a philosophy professor and the future president of UND), i told him of my dilemma and asked what i should major in. after thinking for a moment, fr. jenkins responded, "philosophy." i replied, "ok," and began filling out the necessary paperwork a few days later.

altough my decision to major in philosophy was made rather capriciously, i have no doubt that it was the correct one. the next three semesters (my last as an undergraduate) were by far the best of my collegiate career. i flourished in my classes and was on the dean's list for each of those last three semesters. since then, i have gone on to pursue a master's degree from wmu. my time at western has increased my knowledge (esp. in contemporary analytic philosophy) and sharpened my skills as a philosopher. i believe that my performance as a masters student at western and during the final semesters at notre dame are indicative of my ability to suceed in a philosophy phd program.

question #2 - why do you want to study philosophy/what do you want to study?

i am interested mainly in ancient greek philosophy. specifically, i want to focus my studies on plato, particularly on his later dialogues (sopist, statesman, theaetetus, etc.). the issues that interest me in these later dialogues are issues dealing with plato's metaphysics and ontology: what is the onotological status of the Forms? how exactly do they relate to (or interact with) sensible things? are there any sort of intermediary objects between Forms and sensible things? these and other questions have motivated me to pursue a phd in ancient philosophy. eventually, i hope to secure a tenure-track position at a university where i can teach and continue to study plato.

ok, i think this is it for now kids. please comment. this is by no means final... i just needed to get some thoughts down... and any feedback you can give me would help. and yeah, i realize it all prolly sounds stuffy. but really... how do you write about yourself without sounding stuffy?

believe it or not...

i'm gonna write about philo stuff for a couple of seconds!!

there's a christmas party going on downstairs right now, and there's a few physics people down there. well anyway, me and this one guy are talking about physics and philosophy and whether or not any philosophers ever actually study physics. now, coming from a (extremely modest) physics background, i always get pretty annoyed when i see philosophers pretending to be mathematicians/physicists. although i left physics early on, i was in it long enough to know a fake when i see one. anyway, a couple of weeks ago i was hanging around the dept. and heard jonah and adam talking about philosophy of physics and how much philosophy motivates physicists. i disagreed, but they dismissed me, so i walked away from the convo. anyway, i asked one of the physicist present about this.... about how much philosophy does motivate phyiscs... and he replied "very little." as a test, we asked some of the other physics people in the room if they'd ever even heard of the bohmian interpretation of quantum mechanics. no clue. and, mind you, these are people actually working and studying in physics. no, this isn't conclusive... but, i think it does give us something to think about. as philosophers, we want what we do to matter, not just to ourselves, but to the world (even if it is just the academic world) at large.

the question here is, to what extent are we just fooling ourselves?

what do passwords have to do with eating cheese?

if you can answer that question, you will have gained insight into the subconscious mind of the paul.

i have no reason to be up right now, but i'm strangely awake. despite having spent the night in fitz and woken up at eight thirty, i find myself wakeful and energized. (lets not forget that i also helped the dude take a final and had an exhausting talk with sayre. its been an eventful day). i think the best excuse i have right now is that my hair is wet, and i don't want to go to bed with wet hair. especially not in this house (as always, it is cold in this place). i think, in this house, sleeping with wet hair would cause me to wake up either with pneumonia or an ice cube for a head. i'm not really sure which would be worse.

i wrote a CV today. its sad how little i have to put in a CV. and amazing that despite this, my CV is still three pages long. i heart formatting. i don't want to think about anything else regarding apps right now, though. at least till morning, they're not real.

tomorrow, i think i'm gonna have to do laundry (seriously) for the whole day. none of my clothes are clean, and all of them are downstairs in the laundry room. its gonna be a long day. very long. it could be worse though... i could be taking finals.

you know, i wonder if i am awake precisely because i spent the night in fitz, woke up early, and 'took' a final. after all, it is just like olden times. and in olden times, this is the sort of thing i would do... stay up till two or three in the morning, staring at my computer, for no better reason than that my hair was wet, or its was wednesday. it must be something about the notre dame air. i can never do this is k-zoo, i get too sleepy. but here, its all different.

i really do lead a split life. someday, all of my life will be in one town. i think it'll be nice. i only hope that by the time it happens, i'm not so used to living two lives that i can no longer enjoy a stationary existence.

allright, time to go. it's too cold in this place for me to sit up any longer.

just like olden times

sitting in a computer lab in fitz. prolly will be all night. paul's doing an all-nighter, so i said i'd stay up. so here i am... florescent lights, whirring computers, and all. i can only hope that hordes of angry engineer types don't come into this lab. there's no where here for me to sleep, so i'd have to stay up and listen to them. boo. my ipod is plugged into some speakers here. the whirring computer noise almost drowns it out, but its putting up a good fight.

i started doing serious work for my applications today - filling out forms for recommendations, requesting transcripts, handing out envelopes. basically, all the tedious horrible stuff. its hard to get enough motivation to work on them at all. i get this frightened feeling in my tummy every time i start doing anything with my apps. trust me, its not from a desire to stay at western. if it were just the school, i wouldn't be able to leave fast enough. some of my fear stems from the uncertainty, surely. i hate not knowing where i'm going next year. and i hate that so much of it may be decided on completely irrelevant factors, such as standardized test scores (no test score should be able to decide our lives, but somehow this one gets to), or an undergrad gpa that is largely reflective, not of my ability to do philosophy, but my unhappiness in the sciences. i realized today that the rest of that icky feeling in my tummy comes from the realization (which hits me each time) that we will all probably be scattered by this time next year. i never expected, on coming to western, that i would make any real friends. but, now that i have, i don't want to leave them. i'm just not ready for this.

it's too early to get sad. i gotta stop. back to the delightful whirring computer cluster noise... oh wait... that's not gonna help. i forgot what late nights in fitz are like. it's been so long. i would really need my knitting here with me to make this night complete. but all my knitting is either in the van or paul's place. oops.

tomorrow i help the dude with his final for sayre. i dare say sayre'll be surprised to see me. it's been a while. i need to find a printer before i see him so i can have all his forms and envelopes ready. at least this time he won't be calling joey trying to find me so he can tell me to give him envelopes. this time, i am prepared. =)

i think its time to go find a couch to crash on. you don't want to know how long this entry took me. let's just say it took a lot longer than it ought to have.

good night.

almost... there...

so close to finishing my grading... so, clearly procrastination is in order. i'm grading papers now, which is not nearly as bad as grading tests. (theres a car outside revving its engine like mad... i wonder if it's dead, or stuck? i'm too comfy to get up and look, so i guess we'll never know.) but, after a while it still makes my head hurt. i'm trying to not be too hard on them... i know i tend to hold people to a very high standard of writing, so i am trying to compensate for that. it makes things go slower though. i've also found myself not reading some of these papers very closely. it seems that a nice skim (with close attention to intro and conclusion) seems to do it. its a lot easier than i anticipated to see where the kids are going with their papers and skip to the end so as to avoid all the bs. i wonder if that's how my profs read my papers. scary.

i think my favorite part of being in the blog-world is getting comments posted on my blog now and again. its a nice feeling to come back to the blog and see that someone actually wanted to respond to you. its also kinda fun (but not as fun) to look at how many profile views i've gotten. i've notice a sharp increase since i posted a comment of john's blog... figures.

i can't wait till break really starts... and by that i mean when not only i have my work done, but the dude has his work done, and we're both done with our apps, and then we can rest... that will be a glorious day. i think we will sleep forever.

i took my kitty-man to dan's today, where he will be spending the christmas break. i miss him. it's weird not having him in the apt. and annoying having the only cats here be my roommates cats (i don't get along so well with chloe and murphy). so, since i miss my guy, i'm putting a pic of him up here. and no, he never actually drank any beer (its highly toxic for cats). the bottle was empty before he started playing with it. but i wish i was drinking a beer... that would make the papers go by faster...

wearin' o' the pink sunday

soooooo sleeeeepy! and i still have grading to do. but i won't do it tonight. tomorrow night will be the time for grading. it'll be fun... somehow.

so, i haven't been blogging the past couple of nights because my (mooched) internet has been down at the apt. lately. i'm in south bend now, so who knows if its fixed yet. i drove to south bend last night... yesterday afternoon was exceedingly boring, and well, it seemed like the only thing to do. i did have one really scary moment, though... it started to snow a little bit as i was driving down, but it really didn't seem like that much, so bessie and i kept chugging along. once we got to cassopolis, the roads were a bit worse, but still nothing to worry about. getting off of M60, as i was slowing down to merge onto the exit ramp, bessie decided that exit ramps were just not her style. i pushed the brake, she didn't slow down. i turned the wheel towards the ramp, she tried to spin out. i managed to get her under control before she careened into the area between highway and ramp, but it was a frightening five seconds.

i soooo need a new car. i think joey told mom about the slide. and i've been telling her about all the times i have to leave bessie somewhere/get a ride from someone. so, i think the 'bessie is (really really) not good in the snow' message is starting to sink in. and since christmas break is only days away... maybe we can start car shopping! i'll take suggestions as to what i should look at (remember that the protege5 is my ideal... i like the little wagons).

tomorrow, when i get back to k-zoo, i'm gonna take soren over to dan's, where he will stay for all of christmas break. it's gonna be weird in the apartment without him tomorrow night. i know i won't like that. but i imagine he'll have fun with dan. i hope. i'll miss my guy.

we had our big advent mass at steds tonight. it went well... we did the super-awesome-cool version of take comfort my people. it was nice. fr. tom didn't wear pink, though. he had his excuse (apparently steds doesn't have pink vestments), but it still seemed silly.

allright, time to sleep. i gots to wake up early enough that i can drive before the snow this time. bessie and i don't need anymore slides in our future.

i heart advent.

let it snow

if i had to guess right now, i'd say there was about a million inches of snow on the ground, give or take. but i'm giong to stick by this measurement and say a millioin. too bad i don't have a camera. if i did, i'd take a picture. 'cause i'm sure you are all wondering what a million inches of snow looks like. and how i can manage to see out of my apartment right now. we might just have to admit that this is one of life's great mysteries. i'm watching the news right now so i can watch the list of schools with snow days. its fun to watch, even if it has absolutely no meaning for me anymore.

as of noon-ish yesterday, i am done with school for the semester!! (i am, of course, ignoring the massive amounts of grading that i have yet to do... and the phd apps that need sooo much work.) the last (and only) final is taken, the papers are turned in. and i am finished. i already celebrated last night by doing a substantial amount of knitting. =) it was the first time in a while that i've been able to knit without feeling guilty of procrastination (grading barely makes it on the list of things to do right now). i should be asleep right now. i have no idea what i'm doing awake. allison and i stayed up till one-ish last night, and i hardly slept the night before. but here i am. the cats are having a massive battle though, so this is totally fun to watch.

the snow has now almost completely concealed the bat-pumpkin. you almost wouldn't know there was something in that corner of the balcony. in the spring, when the snow melts, i really wouldn't be surprised if there was nothing in that corner anymore... if it all just degraded away. i wouldn't mind.

allright, i think i ought to go do something useful with my day now... like... sit. =)

anyone want to build a snow man?

procrastination

obviously, there's no better time than paper writing time to go looking for quizzes to put in the blog... right? right. =)


this first one i think is pretty good...

Your Seduction Style: The Natural

You don't really try to seduce people... it just seems to happen. Fun loving and free spirited, you bring out the inner child in people. You are spontaneous, sincere, and unpretentious - a hard combo to find! People drop their guard around you, and find themselves falling fast.

What Is Your Seduction Style?

i'm a little skeptical on quiz #2...

You Are 50% Weird

Normal enough to know that you're weird... But too damn weird to do anything about it!

How Weird Are You?

and well, for #3... well...

You are

What Rejected Crayon Are You?

argh

well, folks, we've reached that point in the semester when danielle is ready to give up hope and admit that she's a failure at life. that's right, its only 21.5 hours till the semester is done and i still have two papers to write and a final to take. that metaphysics paper that i was going to write last night? didn't happen. the article ended up being a bust. so now, not only do i have to write my other essay, but i have to scramble to find a second topic. and then there's greek to study for. too bad i haven't looked at anything greek in about a week. yeah, that'll be fun.

sigh. it looks like monday really was my day. and all the rest of this week is just going to suck. i've already cried once today. maybe twice.

i think i need a nap. i'm cranky.

this is the end

i'm watching my kids take a final now. there's still an hour fifteen to go. hopefully no one will take that long. we can hope. its snowing a lot out there, and i still have to walk across campus back to moore when this is all done. boo.

i haven't started grading the finals, but i have flipped through them, and i have one good (non-mocking) story thus far: there's one kid in my second class (which is always a fun, chatty group) that never, ever reads for class. he tells me so all the time. he's a smart kid, though... catches on quick, always has good criticisms of the arguments we discuss in class... but, since he doesn't read the material, his performance is always mediocre on tests and stuff. so anyway, like i said, my second group is real fun and chatty and i have a good rapport with almost all of them. so i always tease this guy in class about not reading, etc., and he always takes it well. last thursday, he started talking about how he wants to go to grad school. i told him that at some point he would have to start reading, cuz you can't coast through grad school. he didn't really believe me... or didn't want to believe me, and i told him that it made me sad that he never read, because he could do so good if he only went through the actual material... anyways, today they're taking the final, and after he turns his in i pick it up and flip through it. and this is what i found written on one question: since i don't know this answer, i just wanted to tell you that i'm sorry i depress you because i don't read and i don't do anything to my potential.

at first, this comment made me really sad. but now that i've been thinking about it, i think i'm not so much sad as surprised at the effect that comment must've had on him. i mean, four days later, to apologize (in an exam question) about how he's sorry to disappoint me? i can only hope that he actually takes it heart....

i'm waiting on three more kids to finish the exam. one of them is really fishing for answers. its getting to that point...

i should get back to my reading, now. i'm trying to come up with a good topic for one of my final metaphysics essays. i'm thinking about write on music as representation.... i just hope thats metaphysics-y enough. but dilworth normally isn't that picky... and he does love aesthetics... so here's hoping.

the long day closes

it's over, it's over, strongbad says it's over!

i've had more ups and downs today than i care to remember...

getting freaked out about the gre, calming down, getting freaked out, calming down, getting freaked out again... i think that went on for a good three hours. and then the gre. the verbal was hard, and i barely had time to finish the math, but i did all right in the end. i even did the experimental section, just to postpone seeing my scores. i was shaking when i finished. and it took me so long to stop being jittery. went to john's and tried to pass out for a while. that helped calm me down. and pizza. i love pizza.

such a long day. i really got nothing. and i have to write a test for my kids still. bah.

the week will end, soon.

words words words

i take the gre this morning, at 11 est. so think happy thoughts for me this late morning/early afternoon. and if your telepathy skills can extend all the way to kalamazoo, i suggest that you read a dictionary between the hours of 11 and 2/3 and beam the words straight into my head. i think that would be best.

i'll write more after i've recovered. for now, i think we would do well to remember that i am a superhero, and that superhero's can easily overcome all of life's obstacles. right?

sunrise, sunrise

awake early again. for the past few days i've been consistently waking up around eight am. for those of you who really are early-types, this probably sounds late. for me, its insane. it wasn't that long ago that i used to routinely stay up until eight am, not wake up (how do you think delaney ever got the silly impression that i'm a morning person?). there were people that never saw me in the daytime. ever.

i mourn this loss of my nocturnal nature. amelia once tried to convince me that it was good, that once i get a job i'll have to do this. but i'm in philosophy. philosophy is (really) good for two thing: the denial of the 'real world' and 'morning.' and i've had a few professors that really lived up to this, that i used to routinely see rolling onto campus around noon, half asleep and completely disoriented. of course, the main impetus behind me staying up so late has always been my fear that i would 'miss something.' if i go to bed after all my friends, nothing awesomely cool will pass me by, right? right. now that all my friends go to bed so early, i guess i don't need to do that anymore... but the thought is still there: what if everyone woke up at three am and decided to go sledding? and i was asleep. i would be sad forever.

there's a good four inches of snow outside. it looks pretty now, before the plows come through and ruin it all. out on the balcony there are three little mounds in the snow. one is from the bowl my basil plant used to be in, one is the dessicated remains of my basil, and the other is the shriveled up lump of the bat-pumpkin. ostensibly, i've been waiting for a good hard frost to freeze it up so touching it won't be completely nauseating. realistically, i am probably too lazy to ever remove the bat-pumpkin. and as long as there's snow....

today, i have to get to rw for office hours. we'll see how many of the kids show up. last time it was two. this time, my bets are on four. after all, the final is on tuesday. this is the one time of the year when they might actually care. i won't be driving bessie though. bessie is at school, and has been since thursday morning. so i guess john is driving me, again, today. i am such a mooch. stupid snow.

i have now wasted time this morning by: writing post about nothing on blog, staring out window, watching cats, and eating when i wasn't hungry. seems like a productive half hour. however, i used at least two gre words in this post (can you spot them?) so mabye i can chalk this up as gre verbal study time....

in the beginning....

i never thought it would come to this... but i'm starting a blog. well, a new blog. i think i grew past diaryland ages ago, and it's been time to move on. so, here we are.

let's just see where this ends up, shall we?

as of right now, i am: sitting on the futon, watching the snow fall (and the cat's sleep) and procrastinating my studying for my GRE on monday. the snow is my favorite kind, real fine and sparkly, so it glitters every time the light catches. there's a good bit on my balcony... enough that i think in a day or so i will be able to go out and build a snowdog/cat. if it works out, i'll take pictures.

ok, now, just so this post isn't completely short and lame, ima do a survey that i got from my friend johnny-dee.

1. Seven things to do before I die
2. Seven things I cannot do
3. Seven things that attract me to my spouse/best friend
4. Seven things I say most often
5. Seven books (or series) I love
6. Seven movies I watch over and over again (or would watch over and over if I had the time)
7. Seven people I want to join in, too


Seven things to do before I die:

1. knit all the things i say i can
2. have a horse of my own that i can ride bareback
3. start a pride&prejudice colony
4. learn to play the mandolin/guitar
5. do something meaningful in my field
6. become a yoga master
7. visit the greek isles and steal something from plato's time

Seven things I cannot do:

1. enjoy analytic philosphy
2. work ahead of time
3. say no
4. ski
5. be angry at my friends
6. fix a barbed wire fence
7. love the cold

Seven things that attract me to my best friend:

1. patience (with me & my insanity)
2. loyalty
3. ability to amuse me
4. strength (of character)
5. love (esp. of puppies)
6. ability to sit quietly
7. wisdom

Seven things I say most often:

1. "wha-da?"
2. "slurpee?"
3. "sounds cool."
4. "for serious?"
5. "duuuude"
6. "tous bous"
7. "dag yo"

Seven books (or series) I love:

1. pride&prejudice
2. the plague
3. call of the wild
4. the chronicles (of narnia)
5. plato: collected dialogues
6. waiting for godot
7. one fish, two fish

Seven movies I watch over and over again:

1. p&p (the a&e version)
2. zoolander
3. spaceballs
4. the black stallion
5. aladdin
6. breakfast at tiffany's
7. notting hill

Seven people I want to join in, too:

1. i, also, will not pass this on.
2. but feel free to do it if you like.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.

mans. that took a lot longer than i thought it would. but now, the first post is done. woot.