Wow.

It had been almost a month when I wrote all them questions! Anyway, here is where we are...

We should be closing on our house any day now. I have to start teaching again, so I would like to get settled, but I am sure we won't be moving until after labor day. The mortgage guy is talking with the bank today, and the seller is getting an affidavit from one of the neighbors acknowledging that their fence is on our property. What a way to make friends with the new neighbors. Doesn't matter, tho. We aren't going to make them take it down.

I am starting to dread teaching. I wasn't, but I am. Before I started this grad school thing I had been teaching (mostly) freshmen for several years, and I was ready to run far far away in order to make a change. Now I only have to teach a couple of classes a year, instead of 10-15, and that is pretty nice. But I still kind of hate it sometimes, and particularly now that it involves leaving my baby at home.

You might ask, why go to PhD school if you hate teaching, and that is a fair question--for an idiot. Ahem, kidding. First of all, the love of teaching is probably the worst reason to go to graduate school. (Go be a middle school teacher if you 'love teaching' because college kids will make you hate it right quick). You go to be a scholar--for a living, unlike armchair scholarship, it doesn't involve much TV or internet research--and because you are good at teaching, maybe, which I am. Also, the intro-level classes that they make you teach as an adjunct and during grad school are not in your favorite aspect of the field, they are not in your student's subject area, and they are no fun for anybody unless you try really, really hard to make them fun, and even then you probably won't succeed. I will blog in more detail about how this works when the studenten make their appearance in about two weeks. IN the mean time, check out the blog Rateyourstudents if you want to see what undergraduate teaching is really all about.

So, I have to teach. Blahh. Okay. I will do it, and I will do it well. I hope. As far as everything else, my advisor is annoying the crap out of me and wants to talk to me about everything except my work. I have a paper that is three days late and three quarters written, and major issues surrounding in-laws. (They don't have issues with me but I am involved and trying to support). Also, in case you have not heard WE NEED TO MOVE. NOW, before we are taken over by our stuff.

Oh no, the giant baby (21 pounds!) is awake.

When am I going to stop nursing my baby?

When am I going to "let" him sleep in his crib? When am I going to finish this paper? When am I going to move? When am I going to have sex with my husband? When is he going to want it when I am not in the middle of doing some fucking miserable chore or another?

Does being a doctoral student mean repeatedly handing in work without getting any feedback, or any response at all? Do anyone's babies entertain themselves for any length of time during the day? Does tummy time suck that bad? Why? Do I look like I need another person in my face?

Why do people think I have time to chat on the phone? Why do people think that I ever wanted to? Why would I rather answer a hundred text messages than return one phone call?  Why am I typing up all of these questions instead of taking a shower? 

What is that noise? What is that smell? What do I need from the grocery story? What is that thing called? What's her name? What's my name? What's it all mean? 

Who is this tired person in the mirror? Who is this sarcastic bitch? Who stole my sports car and replaced it with a sedan? Who can carry one of those baby carriers around without mortgaging her second child to a chiropractor?
  

Should I just quit? Shouldn't this be impossible? Should I have said that? Should I have eaten that? Shouldn't someone rub my shoulders?

How am I going to finish all of this shit I have to get done? How am I going to paint a nursery if Baby Apollo doesn't want to be put down? How is my husband going to build a bathroom and a laundry closet if he works all day long? How DO you entertain a five month old? How can I get more sleep, look better naked, simplify my life, take a vacation? How am I ever going to feel like myself again?

And how, how the fuck will not nursing my baby anymore make it easier to answer any of these questions?

Sleep deprivation + tired brain= nothing but questions...