Winter

Sucks. So much snow. So much ice. Making me not want to ride at all. That's ruining my time.

School started up again, after a holiday break where I did nothing because of the snow, and it's going to keep me busy again. Hopefully I will be able to handle all of my business and get done. Still nothing positive and concrete on the job hunting side of things.

The job market

Similar to most people looking for jobs, it's tough out there right now. The academy is no different. I've so far applied to 8 jobs, have another 8 ready to go out next week. So far I've had 2 rejections. Luckily, the first batch were more jobs I was not 100% into. For me I think the hardest thing to deal with is the location of the school. I am worried that if I don't get a job in a place I would enjoy living, I'll be miserable. Of the two rejections so far, one was in a place I would love to live, the other was in a place I would absolutely hate to live. So why bother applying?

To be honest, there just aren't many openings this year. The economic shape of the country, and most states means budget cuts, or at least the potential for budget cuts, so no one is hiring. Last year at the Annual conference in August, there were over 150 schools conducting preliminary interviews with potential applicants. This year, there were less than 30 of them. What makes it even worse is that typically jobs require certain areas of expertise. Not only that, but it's usually two of them. This means that out of the 50 or 60 possible things you could make your academic and teaching focus in sociology, you need to find a school that just happens to match on both of yours.

In order to prepare for this, I made one of my areas quantitative methods/statistics. While it's not always the funnest thing to study, it certainly has paid off big time for me in the number of jobs I've been able to apply to.

Wish me luck, it's not very fun to not have any idea of where you will be at this time next year.

Other than that, I've been enjoying trying to become more social. For some reason, the last few years turned me into a shut-in except for in a few situations. I'm combating this by trying to hang out with new people, and spending time doing things I would normally have done by myself, like bike rides. I've met some fun new people (well, some of them aren't really new, just new to the context). As of today, November 20th, 2009, I have continued to commute by bike with little exception. All year. I dress like a ninja to avoid the cold, but it's been keeping me going. I think that in 2009 I've probably not ridden to school (on days that I went to school) less than 10 times. Six of which were on days when there was snow/ice on the ground, or it was raining really hard in the morning (I don't mind riding home in the rain, but I hate being wet all day when it pours on me in the morning).

The remaining days I didn't ride were because I had to go somewhere that I couldn't ride immediately after work (last week I had to get some stuff done on my car and I went right after class in the morning). But other than that, I think I am doing pretty good so far. I'm going to try to keep it up through as much of the winter as possible. The temp isn't really what stops me, it's the risk of slipping or not wanting to get drenched.

My band is supposed to have a bass player now. He doesn't have his own equipment, so he is borrowing ours, and he hasn't learned all the songs yet. I hope we get this taken care of, so we can just play more.

Mad Dogged by the Mail Lady

Early afternoon bowling session with my friend Bo, and we get to the bowling alley to find it completely packed. Bo runs inside to see if it's actually people bowling, and I make a parking lot loop while I wait. I come to a "T" in the parking lot as a Mail lady is pulling up on the other side. She makes a left in front of me, and gives me a dirty look. This is marked as the blue circle on the map above that is at the top.

I wasn't really sure what it was about and said to myself that I just imagined it, she must've always had that scowl on her face.

I complete my loop around the lot, and pick up Bo. The place is fully packed, so we decide to try a different alley. We get to the exit (marked with the blue circle on the right), and rather than wait behind us to get out, she goes to the next parking lot, exits there and turns onto 48th headed south, so as to pass us while giving me a second dirty look.

My path in the lot is represented by the red line. Hers is represented by the green line.

There was a ton of traffic on 48th, making it hard to get out of the lot, let alone turn left (which is what we wanted to do).

Really weird.

Ok, Ok, I know, I know.

I haven't had much to say in a while, or at least the desire to write about it.

Regardless, I have a few updates I guess.

I will defend my dissertation proposal in a few weeks, and hopefully get the rest of it done by xmess.

I deleted a bunch of dumb posts from here. I'm not ashamed of the posts, or anything, but having them here just made me associate the blog with that time in my life, and it kind of made me resent the blog and I tried to avoid it.

I've been riding my bike to school pretty much every day for the last 9 months. There have been maybe 5 exceptions (rain/snow/ice or some need to drive somewhere straight from campus).

I've also been looking for jobs, and trying to piece together the next step in my life. I'm not 100% sure what will happen, but I'm almost as excited about it as I was about starting grad school.

I've got several papers underway that will hopefully lead to publication. My life has been pretty uneventful for a while, but I think I just need to focus on something else. Hopefully play some music again soon, ride more, and party more.

Amelie update: she is three and a half years old now. Super sweet. She is now staying out of her kennel (for about the last 6 months) and is good for the most part.

I've got a roommate finally.

Just Chillin and Shit

I have finally figured out my dissertation topic. I still need to write the damn thing, as well as the proposal which then must be approved, but I think I may have a solid idea that will yield interesting and relatively significant results. Life has been really busy, but good so far this semester. I've been able to stick with my workout routine, I've been getting a bit of work done on the dissertation (not as much as I'd like, but I can feel the momentum building behind me and making it easier to keep moving forward on it), and even though I've been bummed about the weather keeping me off of the bike as much as possible, I've managed to make a few upgrades to my bikes so that when the weather allows I'll be much more comfortable.

On my Trek hybrid, I replaced the grip shifters with thumb shifters, and replaced the stock rubber grips with some Ergon CP-1's. Today was the first time I had a chance to ride it around with the new grips and shifters, and I was stoked. The bike is already reasonable comfortable, but this addition, plus the Brooks b17 saddle I added a few weeks back has this bike on it's way to becoming the most comfortable bike period. But more than anything, I can't wait to get on the Surly again when the snow quits ruining the trails for me. The singlespeed will be cool to ride to and from school, and the mountain bike will be fun to go ride on some trails with. I am super excited to be back out riding around again whenever I feel like it.

I got a new computer, which is good because I was unable to play high definition videos on my old one. I recently picked up a cheap HD digital camcorder and a Zoom H2 handheld audio recorder. I am hoping to video and audio record some live shows and then add the good audio to the video and share it online. I'll definitely link anything I get on here.

My neighbors have been super helpful and will watch my dog on Wednesday nights when I have classes all day, so that she isn't stuck in the house ALL day. They've also taken her over there and just let her hang out while I am gone if they are home, because they say that they kind of miss having a dog, and they say she is really well behaved.

Her birthday is coming up on the 28th, and I can't believe she is going to be 3 years old already. I remember when we first got her and now she is a full grown dog. She can still steal all the space on the bed though. So I guess some things never change.

I also started to dabble in electronic music. I guess because of the difficulties I've been having with finding others to play music with, this lets me do everything myself. It's not super great or anything, but it's definitely fun, and I'm picking it up quick.

The current state of the economy has got me a little worried about finding a job, and this certainly is something I can relate to. I have actually been thinking that if I can't find a job right off the bat, I may just move to Barcelona and try to get a job driving a bus there. I've always said that half-jokingly, but if I can't get a job there is really nothing stopping me from doing it.

2009

Well, I haven't had much to say since Thanksgiving, apparently. Since then, I finished a semester, made a trip back to California, came back to Lincoln, partied a bit as a part of the end of the year festivities, and leapt into a new year. I guess the long and short of it is basically that 2008 was a fucking bitch of a year. Will 2009 be any better? Perhaps, but perhaps not. I am too afraid of having another fucked up year that I want to try to avoid any possibility for disappointment, which has made me very cautious as the year starts.

What do I hope will happen this year? More than anything, I want to get my career back on course. To do that I need to get my dissertation proposal passed by summer, and my dissertation well underway by the end of next fall semester.

Secondly, I want to get myself back into shape. I made lots of progress last summer and fall, but I'm sure I've destroyed any progress over break. Either way, it is a good stress reliever, and also usually makes me feel good after a good workout.

My third thing will not happen for sure now, but I had wanted to ride the RAGBRAI this summer, but I've ended up being offered a summer teaching course during the part of summer when RAGBRAI is. This is a real bummer, but my finances seriously could not handle taking the time off, especially because that means NO teaching (no INCOME) over the summer.

I'm not 100% sure what is happening on the roommate search front. I've got a potential roommate lined up, but I will not actually believe it until I have a rent check in my hand. Hopefully I get one by the end of the month lined up, because if not I will be probably looking for a new place come March. This is unfortunate, as I really like this place, I think my neighbors are awesome, and Amelie is at home here.

Luckily I have Amelie to keep me sane. She has helped me out so much by being very well behaved and keeping me company when I come home each day.

It's already time to start another semester next monday (technically, it starts tomorrow, for me at least, so I will have go in and get things together and hopefully moving along to get me off to a rolling start this semester). The break always goes by too fast. Anyways, I am looking forward to having a location to ride my bike to tomorrow, and yes, even with the bitter cold, I still love that early AM bike ride to school.

Oh well, I guess I should go to bed.

Good luck to you in 2009.

Friends

I don't have very many friends, but the few I have are rad. I made my world famous vegan lasagna, and am taking it and leftover potato leek soup over to Tamra's house to have dinner with her and Lance. Most of my other friends are visiting family, I assume. Regardless, it is really nice to enjoy a good, homecooked meal with good friends every once in a while. Unfortunately, because of the size of the lasagna pan, I won't be riding my bike over to her place. Luckily for Amelie, that means she gets to come also. Dog Party, and friends. I'm stoked.