It snowed. In Eugene. Wha?

On the first day of grad school the department held an opening hurrah and, as it usually goes with awkward social gatherings, everyone bragged about how amazing their thesis was and discussed the weather. I asked about fifteen different people about the snow (it was my fallback ok? layoff) and they asked me about Zion national park. "Snow? It never snows in Eugene. It will maybe snow once, but it won't stick."

Liars! I'm looking at two inches of powder.


I hope my little plane will survive as it travels from one little snowstorm into a Utah blizzard. I'll just skip breakfast so I don't weigh the plane down. Or maybe I'll lead the passengers in Christmas carols so the holiday spirit buoys the plane, the Santa Clause style. I'm sure everyone on my 6:00 am flight will love that. At least I have a plan.


On another note, I'm going home in the morning!!

Tofurky? No thanks.

Thanksgiving is becoming my favorite holiday.

Turkey is a no go and Tofurky is just icky. But! I'm more than happy with the side dishes. My favorite food (besides chocolate) is mashed potatoes. They're delicious. Especially with garlic salt. My mom also makes cheesy onions. They're delicious. Especially with garlic salt. I also worked at Marie Calenders for a few years which left me with a special fondness for pie.

And now for some thoughts on pie:
Rhubarb tastes like medicine, but strawberry rhubarb is delicious.
French apple, a la mode? Mmmm hmmm.
Chocolate Satin is a touch over-rated, but it's much better than chocolate cream.
Finally, Custard looks like thick, yellow mayonaise and tastes like bogeys. Maybe it would be better with garlic salt...
Pumpkin pie is wonderful all year long.

**Let me just say, I'm pleased as punch that I no longer have to wake up at 4:00 am on Thanksgiving morning to sort pies and talk to crazed grandmothers who are missing their banana creams. I'm also glad that I don't have to wear that uniform anymore. Yep, yep.

Anyway, it looks like I'm going to have a really quiet Thanksgiving with my family. A lot of my extended family is coming to Salt Lake for Christmas this year, so it will probably be just my family for Thanksgiving (and various 22-year-old orphans). I also get to go to Michael's Thanksgiving. This will by third one so I'm a pro--the perpetual girlfriend. EVERYONE in Michael's family gathers at his grandparents. So I'll have a noisy one and a quiet one. Sounds wonderful right?

My other favorite thing about this November? I've been a vegetarian for 10 years. Holla! So, no turkey for me.

Drumroll please

Today I officially signed paperwork making me the GRF for one of my professors next term! I'm going to be helping her research for her book about French avant-garde artists in the early 20th century and scan files for her Spring classes. I've been holding this info back 1) because she's a tough teacher and I'm a little intimidated to work for her and 2) I'm completely honored that she picked me and didn't want to seem too pompous.

Well, I am pompous. So there!

Anyway, I get some staff perks like health insurance (I don't really need that since my parent's plan just extended to include me, thanks Mr.  President), the option to buy a cheaper parking pass (I'll hoof it though, $200 doesn't seem cheap), the ability to check books out from the library indefinitely (Why would I want to do that?) and most importantly free tuition (no snippy comment here). This means I might actually graduate from grad school without debt. Wha? That only happens to people who major in business or something more Sciencey--you know, something with job security.

Anyway, I decided to unleash my big head on my blog and give myself a pat on the back. It is my blog, after all. Please refer to the picture at the top of the page for a representation of my general mood today. I am a lucky duck.

I better go write my research paper for that class, just in case she can still change her mind.

10 days to Rusty...

 ...and everyone else I love. I think Rusty will be the happiest to see me over Thanksgiving break, since we never talk on the phone (and I take him rollerblading).

Rusty has been my happy thing since seventh grade. Seventh grade is a dark and terrible time when mean girls tell you that you're a "tag-along" or make fun of your overalls. In my defense, overalls were in. Playing the french horn and Roller Coaster Tycoon probably wasn't... 

Anyway, I convinced my parents that we needed a dog by being incredibly annoying for about a month. That's what thirteen-year-olds are best at, after all. So, we took a trip to the humane society. All the puppies and dogs were barking their little, forgotten, heads off, but Rustle just looked up at me and smiled. I said, "Hello Bubba" and we fell in love.

I changed his name from "Scraps" as quickly as possible. Scraps? That name is just tragic. 

Rusty still goes up to my room when he's afraid of thunder or fireworks. Rusty used to sleep on my feet all the time. I have to put a blanket there now, because I can't sleep without the weight. Whenever I pack up my car to move to far away places, he circles around sniffing and looking for a spot to sit. He looks up and says, "I'm coming right?" 

He's home with my parents now--they're taking care of each other. Rusty is busy tracking the progress of the squirrels in the backyard and taking trips to the Uintas. 

Rusty is going to run out in the front yard, when I come home next week and say "Hello Bubba." 

Lame.

I was quite chipper on my walk home from school today since, for the first time this week, it wasn't raining. I just had to pick up a book from the library across campus. Then! karma, or irony or something struck my down. I slid down the handicap ramp on wet leaves, arms and book in the air, and now have a sprained ankle.

Hmmm, perhaps it's unethical to use a handicap ramp when you aren't handicap? Maybe the ramp has a mind of itself and becomes extra slippery when an impertinent girl with two functional ankles walks upon it.

Aw well, it's really just a good excuse to take the bus (and a few extra baths).

Portage to Portland

My Symbolism and Decadence class took a little field trip to the Portland Art Museum (no, we didn't wear matching shirts). My professor is sort of amazing--she answered all the questions that docents never can touched sculptures and got alarmingly close to canvases. We talked about frames and whether we should look at them or ignore them, she pointed out how bad some of the paintings were (that's usually a secret thought...) and spent a solid half hour discussing a painting called The Circumcision of Christ. I loved it.

The museum didn't allow cameras, but I took this picture in the sculpture garden of a piece by Deborah Butterfield. I'm a sucker for sculpture. It looks like driftwood, but it's actually painted bronze.

Our little troupe of grad students went to the Chinese Gardens next. I was so excited to see some of the things I've been studying in my Asian art class that I think I got a wee bit camera happy. Everything in Chinese garden's is framed and structured (not exactly "wild"). This garden imported limestone shaped rocks from Tai Lake in Southern China that serve as sculptures. As usual, there's text everywhere. 

Oh look, Portland.

 Framing.

 Venomous Tentacula!!!

Dreamer

There is really no reason for me to ever wake up. I always dream in color and usually float above my body. A few nights ago I had an elaborate horse racing dream where I had beat two Russian jockey bad guys (apparently I have cold war mentalities when I dream). Last night, my friend Jackson entered a face painting contest--whoever kept their face painted for the longest time won some sort of prize. What???

I also had a sleep/wake up dream about my sister reading a book called "Louis Burps" which was her favorite as a child (says a lot, I know) and "The Rainbow Fish" which is a classic. This reminded me of one of my favorite family memories that I'll share for your blog pleasure:

Laura had just started reading "chapter books" so that she could be super cool like her big sister. My parent's gave us reading time before we went to bed, or "grown up time." I still have bitter feelings towards that phrase... Anyway my sister and I spent our reading time playing that grabbing game where the person on the top bunk dangles a stuffed animal or a sock over the edge and the lower bunk person tries to pull it down. It's the bunk bed version of wack-a-mole.

Needless to say, we had not done much reading by bed time when my parents came to announce bed time. They tucked us in and went to turn off the light but my sister cried passionately, "Wait! I don't have a book mark." My mom told her that we'll just remember the page number and asked her what page she was on. She replied, "Ooh, two."

Haha. I should really just go back to bed.

Spooky Spokane.

I'm chillin in Washington this weekend. Michael and I have done some pretty scary things to celebrate Halloween. The scariest of all was the poetry reading Michael took me too, but I won't get into that. We went to an obscure Mexican restaurant--quite the gamble.

 

The risk payed off...although it was no Cancun Cafe. Michael looks so excited to be posing!!!

We also put our relationship on the line by redecorating Michael's walls. Last time we were here I ordered a bunch of prints and this time we organized them. Have you ever tried to hang pictures with someone you love? It's almost as dangerous as discussing recycling or music (Switchfoot is not cool, Michael). We made it through. I think Michael's apartment looks much better than most bachelors'.

 

The flash it terrible. Just use your imagination...

Now the real terror begings:
Michael's mom sent him a care package with a haunted gingerbread house (obviously). It took the combination of all of our physical and intellectual faculties to keep the structure up long enough to take a picture. I think humidity + gingerbread + Michael and Sarah = danger. It was fun and certainly something I've never done before. We're all warmed up for Christmas family parties now!
We took some super spooky pictures:

Trying to hold it up. 

 Tootsie Pop flying buttresses became necessary. Don't worry--I'm totally an art history major!

 Oooh, the horror.

Armando got dressed up too.

We were trying to take a normal, happy picture but the west wall gave out forcing immediate action on Michael's part.

I'm not really looking forward to the return journey, but I do have Harry Potter on tape to keep me company. Apparently, I've been doing too much talking about Harry Potter though, because the predictive text feature on my phone anticipates "HP" before "is." That's probably a bad sign...

School is cool.

This quarter (quarter instead of semester...crazy) I'm taking a theory seminar, a class on Symbolism in the 19th century and, something much further from my comfort zone, Landscape and Garden in Traditional China. Because most of my knowledge of Chinese culture comes from Disney's Mulan, I was a little intimidated about this class. Luckily, my professor wears loafers. Loafers are a good sign in a professor when you have no idea what you're doing--loafers are willing to accept that you have no idea what you're doing and work with you.

Anyway, Prof. Loaf has presented a great overview to landscape and Chinese art in general. As a western art historian, I usually try to fit eastern philosophy and artistic tradition in a western model...and it doesn't work. My favorite example of this is inscription.

Most Chinese ancient art is on either a hand scroll (sometimes 400 ft long), a decorative fan, or a hanging scroll and almost all of the works we've studied have imperial seals (stamps) and "inscriptions" or captions. When the owner of a hand scroll, for example, thought that the painting was well done, he/she would write "wow, really good work" on the silk! Some of the translations of these inscriptions include "I like Li Cheng's use of mist, but I really prefer southern painters." In the western tradition this would be equivalent to walking up to an oil painting in the Louvre and writing on the canvas (gah!) and would even be considered an honor if you were a little famous. Sometimes the fact that an emperor wrote on a scroll is more important than the image (even if it happened 100 years after it was painted), and sometimes the words are larger than the images like this piece attributed to Ma Lin.

No wonder eastern traditions don't fit into western models very well. I'm sure I'd get arrested if I walked up to a Da Vinci and wrote "Great work, mate. I really like the clouds!" Maybe Chinese characters are just prettier than English printing...or maybe I just need to get a little more famous before I autograph artists' works.

School man, you gotta love it.

A day in the life...

I took a camera to school with me for your blogging pleasure. Don't worry I didn't take pictures of people while I was on the bus or turn the camera around for one of those "this is me...I am here" pictures. In fact, this is a pretty lousy "day in the life," I just took pictures of everything that made me happy on my walk to and from school--I am becoming quite the walker 1.5 miles there and back again.

 

It's usually foggy in the morning. I love it and so does my hair.

 

Sometimes,  it's really fun to be in an art building.

 

Paper bag mushrooms in the courtyard. 

 

The leaves! by the public library.

 

This is a tree right next to my apartment. Yes ma'am.

Everything is so pretty here right now. I love when trees still have some green left. I am a little nostalgic because I really do feel like I should be taking "family pictures" with my friends back in Logan, but it is pretty exciting to be here too. After all, it's raining on my skylight. What I need is a really fast plane...or the ability to apperate.

My parents came to see me!

My Dad picked me up from school on Thursday--that hasn't happened since elementary school! Such happiness. With all the Settling and Scrabbling I don't know where we fit in adventures around Eugene, but we had a good time. I got to introduce my parents to the train...and they bought me school spirit paraphernalia--I may become a Ducks fan, but I'll never cheer for the Trailblazers (except for Wesley Matthews).

Climbing was my priority. A few days after I moved to Eugene I took a walk around my neighborhood and discovered a climbing wall. Wha? I moved from a mountainous valley full of climbing glory, but I never lived within walking distance of a rock wall! So, Day 1 had a lot of basalt cracks. My dad didn't get the climbing memo, so he's wearing jeans--how embarrassing.

 I also took them down by the Willamette river (I have no idea how to pronounce this word and keep embarrassing myself in front of the locals). I'm really excited to go down here in a few weeks when green turns to fall colors. Moss and ivy growing on trees? Beautiful.

We went to the Saturday market. Every week, rain or shine, Eugene has three blocks of pottery and other art booths, food and veggies, people who play the mandalin and a lot of dancing hobos (in a good way). I love it. It's like the Salt Lake Art Festival every week, with free admission.

 

On Sunday we went to the coast. It was like a vacation within a vacation. Tide pools and sandy beaches? Yes please. Too bad the water is freezing.

 

Overall, it was really great to see my family (minus Laura and Rusty). Plus, I got a picture of an over-the-hill mermaid and of my dad, looking like John Wayne. I have to say my apartment feels rather large now with an empty futon.