Wednesdays in Santa Cruz

I must admit that since we've decided on a "date of departure," I'm starting to feel a little warm and fuzzy about Santa Cruz, a town I had declared my mortal enemy a little over a year ago. It's early spring, the flowers are so pretty, we had a helluva a hot weekend, and I really can't imagine living without Shopper's Corner -- which is kinda reminiscent of Met Foods in Greenpoint, except with an awesome butcher department and not-kidding fresh produce.
So, I'm fine with Santa Cruz and my forced exile. What I cannot quite swallow, though, is the distant sound of drummers circled together under a tree celebrating the weekly Farmer's Market that takes place a block from my apt. Not that it hasn't been educational. I never really spent much time around drum circles, so I don't know a lot about them. Now I realize that the point of drum circles is not so much to make music with your buddies, having fun with the different sounds you can create with percussion instruments. It seems to be purely about zoning out (or zen-ing out?) to a beat that does not alter, at all, for four hours straight. The same, ritualistic beat, over and over.

Vraiment?!

Why is French radio playing Barbara Streisand? There better be more than one radio station over there!

Map This

In preparation for my little stay in Paris, I'm listening to French news on-line. I only understand the words I understand, which doesn't seem to help with the acquisition of new words. I'll keep at it though.

So this weekend, I went to a dissertation writing workshop. Here's what I learned:
1) Don't psychologize the writing process. I'm not not-writing (or writing slowly) cause "I suck," but because of external factors: like time-managment issues. I guess my poor time-management skills aren't supposed to reflect poorly on me personally. It's probably time's fault. He's an asshole. Don't question it.
2) Work in 45-minutes "sessions" for better productivity. I worked a total of 6 sessions today (not on writing, but on stuff like grading papers and reading for lecture), which may sound impressive until I admit it was a 4.5 hour work day. But it's mentally stressful, so suck it.
3) Try a cognitive map, which I wish were a graphic representation of my brain, but it's not.
4) Actually, the best thing she said was that when a person bitches constantly and complains about how slowly her writing is going, this most likely means she is getting really productive work done. Since I've been bitching non-stop for the past month and getting depressed about the 1-paragraph a day writing feat, that made me feel like a genius! Of course, now I'm going to moan and whine continuously, whether I'm writing or not. Better to feel like a genius than actually be one. Geniuses are boring, admit it.

What the near future looks like

Drinking champagne under a tent amid a crowd of white-haired women in pantsuits and sweater sets then stumbling over the green, through the humidity, toward more drinks -- it's a Vassar reunion.
Lecturing through a shaking voice and an upset tummy at a group of drowsy-eyed summer students -- it's Lit80.
Packing up books and dishes, trying to dump unwanted furniture on the nearest passerby -- we're out of here by Aug. 1.
Headed for Sacramento, then off to Paris.
The picture gets fuzzy after that.

Spring Break '08

From the beach to the suburbs, we did our vacation in reverse.
Our trip was spent watching the final season of "The Wire" on cable. It was a lot of work, it's not easy watching 10 episodes of an anxiety-producing show during a four-day weekend, but definitely worth it.
We also played Scrabble, washed the car, and played with the baby.

Back at home, I wake up with the mantra *please get a job soon, please get a job soon*

Update on the Frauenzimmer Dilemma

I had the smarts enough to ask my Austrian friend for help. And help he did. Here is the answer we've been waiting for:

"as for the term frauenzimmer, it's an antiquated word whose history/etymology
i'm not quite familiar with. i know it as a derogatory term for a troublesome,
troubled woman, usually lower-class, maybe of loose morals, maybe tending
toward the "hysterical," but definitely socially malicious in some way. it may
be the closest german approximation of "bitch" that i'm aware of."

There is also a German TV-movie called "Das Frauenzimmer" whose description he translated for me.:

Frauen bei der Arbeit in der Küche als Ausgangsbasis für einen Film, der nicht
in herkömmlicher Weise beschreiben will, sondern die Szenen assoziativ
montiert und Zusammenhänge sichtbar zu machen versucht, indem er die
alltäglichen Gesten, die fast schon Ritualen gleichen, so verdreht und
verrückt, daß sich die Grenze zwischen Wirklichkeit und Traum verschiebt.

[this is one long-ass stupid german sentence!!!]

[Surrealist] [F]ilm consisting of scenes of women laboring in the kitchen.
Everyday gestures that almost resemble rituals are twisted and defamiliarized
until the line between reality and dream is blurred. The film doesn't take a
conventional descriptive approach. Rather, it seeks to make visible social
contexts using an associative montage technique.


Doesn't this sound good??

Frauenzimmer. Help!

In The Interpretation of Dreams Freud says a room (zimmer) in a dream means woman (Frauenzimmer). The translator says "Frauenzimmer," literally "woman's apartment," is also a "slightly derogatory term for woman." But does it mean "slut"? The two german-speaking professors I've talked to said no. In the 18th c. it was simply a term for "jeune fille." In 19th c. Vienna it was apparently a term for the woman-servant employed in the bourgeois household. But there is a book of photos out right now called Frauenzimmer: Brothels in Germany:

What does this word mean? And where can I read more about it?