I just woke up from a terrible dream where I was trying to play Scrabble but I couldn't. I kept forgetting how to spell words, and taking too many tiles, and soon there were six J's in play, and I had 45 letters piled up on my tray (all of which were metallic and black, so apparently my subconscious is harboring some kind of anxiety toward industrialism?). I think my dream (I just deleted 'nightmare' because I didn't want to sound so dramatic) was born out of the empanadas, sangria, and chocolate truffle cake we had a San Chez last night, so maybe it was worth it. Also, I'll bet this is my brain telling me it's been too long since I've played Scarbble, and now it's reverting to the only me-time it has to revisit fond memories. Because other than when I'm sleeping, my brain has pretty much been occupied with school and grad class - but mostly school - for the past two months.

Except, of course, for Chicago last weekend which had many highlights, one of which involves my nose ring falling out without my noticing, forcing me to scour (metaphorically) the floor of our hotel bathroom at five in the morning, retrieve it, and jam it back into my face. I've never taken it out before, so, had I been less sleepy (and maybe a little less inebriated), it probably would have been a bigger, scarier deal than it was. Besides for things like that though, Grand Rapids is pretty quiet until one of your comes to visit.

I do have one important and good piece of news: you can stop signing in before coming to see me. I think I'm safe again.

This week in class the kids podcast and really liked it. I almost had a heart attack dealing with all of the technical troubleshooting that I'm pretty ill-equipped to cope with, but next time I'll be much more on top of things. I finally met success on my quest to find bronze (colored, not made of) shoes for Emily's wedding, and my grad class is reading Last of the Mohicans which I'm preparing to force myself to finish this afternoon (as the real function of the blog as a procrastinatory tool finally emerges). This is why I don't update as much, I suppose; everything feels mundane yet urgent and hectic, which are perfect conditions to convince a blogger that she has nothing to write about. Anyway, if my nose ring falls out again, I'll be sure to check in with an update.

Lastly, is anyone else counting down to the end of Daylight Savings Time? I'm totally jonesing for a fall-back. In fact, I might just add two hours back in to my life instead of one. For some reason, this fall I'm feeling particularly entitled to gratis free time.