"All dressed up with nowhere to go"

Somehow, someone had a bit too much time on their hands after grading and class prep early this morning.

I chuckled as I wrote the title, because when we "translate" puppy talk, we call their harness a "dress."

But now I've reminded myself of how Koko used to call her collar a "necklace" and am sad...

And clearly the puppies don't like this game either.



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It's cruel

When your child can drag so many of your cultural heroes at the same time and loves it so much that they send you this pic on Twitter and family chat...

#JustinInBlackFace #OldSchoolKanye










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A New Way

I usually snake through buildings and alleyways in the general direction of Grand River Road to get to class, and today I came upon this loveliness when I turned some random corner from Farm Lane.

Maps (and recipes) are more notional than instructive for me, so I just hope I can find this park again when I head back in that general direction.




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I can't live with or without you...

"cuddling"

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All because of a gown

I was thoroughly charmed to receive an email from our young alumni awardee, an Oxbridge D.Phil who currently works in Oxford, saying they'd seen my D.Phil robes at convocation and asking if we could meet for a chat to talk about our Oxford connections. They showed up at my office with a packet of McVitie's HobNobs and we had the nicest, longest conversation I've had with stranger ever.

Current state:



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Tea for Toes

I was supposed to go to a community reading of Sachiko and a yoga hike with LB and CF yesterday, but I'd messed up and yesterday was also the day Big A had noted on the family calendar that he planned to take his grant grantors to dinner. (I'll admit to completely taking for granted that Big A won't go out in the evening unless I make him...)

Nu and I were playing cards when CF popped by to give us a hug before she headed home. And then we were all sitting cozy, cuddled up with puppies, a teapot of peppermint tea, extra cupcakes from a birthday celebration at work, and the first episode of Derry Girls cued up, because we wanted CF to see it.

When I thought no one was watching me, I applied my hot tumbler of tea to my sore toe and when I looked up, Nu and CF were doing the same to their feet. I'm chuckling now remembering them both murmur "mmm that feels nice..." My intergenerational posse!

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A Place Called Home

What you can do when your classroom is in the building right next to the art museum... 

Katrín Sigurðardóttir's "Unbuilt Residences" fit perfectly with the Robert Young passage that begins "You find yourself a refugee..." and so we did a little tour in the last twenty minutes of class yesterday.

#MSUBroad
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A Moment

I don't know how, and at the end of today it seems incredible, but this was part of my morning.

Afterwards was on two different campuses, teaching, attending meetings, getting stuff for care packages. And after that was blessedly bliss--eating Subway in the rumpus room, chortling along with the last ep. of Derry Girls, and getting my poor foot (Meijer-grocery-cart-drive-by victim) rubbed down with lavender oil by Big A.



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Sometimes...

 
...the universe throws a message at you and just have to go with it:
















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Yes

Noobs and I finally made it to the bookstore after panning to for literal days, and I'm beyond excited to start this book.

And also, how awesome is that bookmark (and the kind bookstore person who just gave it to me)?!

Weekend Sibling Summary (Hello and Goodbye)

Weekend:

First this:

Then this:

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