For Future Reference

To people who are way above my pay grade:

It is probably not the best idea to send out an email telling your faculty and staff to expect financial woes the hour before you host the Christmas reception. Expect a run on the bar, some angry drunks, and a negative attitude to be shared by all.

Oh, and happy f*cking holidays to you as well,
Dr. Disenchanted

Shopping Therapy

Felt Cut-Out Tote Bag
Ten Thousand Villages
To haul around my new Mini 10v.

A Tale of Two Ovens

Monday night, I came home to make dinner. On the menu? Sloppy joes, homegrown corn (from the freezer), and french fries. I pulled out my Pyrex dish, sprayed it down with Pam, and dumped the fries onto it. Went to turn on the oven. Then I heard it:

BEEP!”

The digital display lit up, but the oven didn’t turn on. I turned the oven off, then back on. Again, I heard:

BEEP!”

The display lit up, but nothing else happened. I decided to leave it alone for a while, hoping that the oven was being temperamental from all of the abuse it received over the Thanksgiving holiday. I mean, we had that thing running for hours on end, making apple pies, roasting potatoes and figs, making stuffing and beets. The Coach even ran the self-cleaning feature because the pies made a mess in the bottom of the stove.

So, I chopped the onions for the sloppy joes and started browning them. I started the corn. I crossed my fingers and called The Coach into the kitchen. After listening to him whimper about the onion smell (while I was still wiping the tears from my eyes), I asked him to turn on the oven. Again, the display light up. And again:

BEEP!”

I broke down and fried the potatoes so we could eat. Completely unhealthy, I know. While we ate, we fired up the computer and when searching for a solution. Surely, we thought, the oven can’t be dead. I mean, we had no problems with the oven up to this point aside from a woeful lack of insulation on the front door. After consulting the Maytag troubleshooting page (long live the Internet!), we decided to turn off the circuit breaker to the oven. Our hope was that the oven would reset itself. Of course, it took a while to figure out which breaker actually went to the oven.

We waited.

Eventually, The Coach decided to turn the circuit back on — after the Saints had a convincing lead over those sucky ass Patriots. We tried the oven and the same thing happened. Sigh. At this point, we were fairly convinced that the oven was broken, so we poked around on the ‘net some more, developing a few theories of what went wrong. It wasn’t until the next morning that the display actually went nuts and — out of the blue — gave us a F1 error code.

I did another round of Googling and learned that the problem would cost us at least $200 in parts. Considering the fact that the oven has to be around 15-16 years old, we decided that it wasn’t worth getting it fixed. As you know, we recently invested in a new fancy black refrigerator, and thought it might be nice to have some matching appliances.

So, now we are searching. We had thought about buying a stove with a double oven, but after seeing it in person decided that wasn’t a good idea. The bigger bottom oven opened up at floor level and I could just see the Tenure Puppy burning her paws. Instead, we are thinking about buying an entry-level convention oven. While I really, really want a gas stove, we don’t have patience to mess with finding a contractor to run a gas line to the kitchen. Plus, there’s really no point in getting a gas stove unless I can get the stove I really, really want: An antique Chambers.

Unlike the refrigerator catastrophe of this summer, we don’t have to rush into buying a new stove. The Coach is a hardy soul and can grill outside in snow up to his butt cheeks. Plus, I went out and bought a nifty toaster oven which actually made better pizza than our deceased oven ever did. Heck I even used the toaster oven tonight to make a tuna melt and an indoor version of S’mores.

For the record, I’ve already picked out my new dishwasher. I suspect that’s the next thing to go. Blah.

To The Coach: My Christmas List

Cheap Items:

• New Betta for my office. (Poor Huey P.)
• Lip balm, any variety
• Starbucks gift card (for sloggy days on campus)
• iTunes gift card (because I always need new tunes)
• A vintage fallout shelter sign (as seen on eBay)

Sorta’ Free Stuff:

• Fix my bicycle.
• Take my car for a wash/wax and clean the icky latte out of the passenger’s seat.

Cooking Gear:

• Really cool Pyrex Box Grater

Videos of All Varieties:

• Walt Disney’s Treasures: On the Front Lines
• Walt Disney’s Treasures: Tommorrow Land
• Gone with the Wind (on DVD)
• The Wizard of Oz (on DVD)

Books:

• Margaret Atwood. The Year of the Flood.
• Julie Powell. Cleaving.
• Sarah Palin. Going Rogue. (Morbid curiousity on my part)
• Alton Brown’s new book about “Good Eats”

Other stuff:

• Emily the Strange Collectable Print (Too cool!)
• Emily the Strange Red Riding Kitty

So, where is your list? I’m waiting to shop!

A Colonial Christmas?

 As you know, the Disenchanted Family loves to travel during the holiday season. Unfortunately, this year has presented something of a challenge – our break is short, I have a conference paper to write, and apparently The Coach’s mother was unhappy that we did not go to her house last year (even though, I must add, we were told that we were not invited to Christmas last year). After much thought, we’ve decided on a short trip to Virginia. We can get to Colonial Williamsburg in less than 12 hours and — surprise, surprise — the parks that we found in the area are pet friendly! We’re going to spend one morning at Jamestowne and the other at Yorktown, then wander around Colonial Williamsburg in the afternoons and evenings. Then, we’ll be off to Ohio, making a quick stop at Monticello. Everybody wins: I’ll get my trip, The Coach gets to see his family, and the little dogs can come along for the ride. Woot!

Leftovers Be Damned …

 The Bird, Pre-roast
with dry rub, olive oil, and stuffing

Ah, Thanksgiving, with your tasty treats, how I miss you already as I sit in my office at work, eating a burger from a local fast food joint. What, you might ask, what about the leftovers? Well, a good chunk of leftovers went home with my brother-in-law (I’m officially convinced that his wife cannot cook). The rest of the leftovers are sequestered in the ‘fridge — only I didn’t dare open the door because our power went out this morning.

That’s right. Not a cloud in the sky. No wind. No ice. Nothing. But the power’s out in an eight block radius around the house and who knows when the electric company will get it turned back on.  That makes it difficult to do anything at home — I mean, the power went out mid-wash with the laundry and I am having a bad hair day because I couldn’t use my blowdryer.

I swear, the power goes out here more than it ever did when we lived in Louisiana.

So, anyways, here I am, in my office, spending the last hours of my five-day weekend at work. Notice I said “at work,” not “doing work.” So far, all I have accomplished is writing this insipid blog entry, then I plan on  doing some online Christmas shopping and finishing up our Christmas trip itinerary. Somewhere in there, I will do the Fall 2010 schedule for our department, photocopy the rest of my articles for spring eReserves, and write up a teaching observation.

Meanwhile, the burger’s getting cold …

Last Shades of Fall

@ The Hermitage
November 2009

How I Spent My Turkey Day Break: New Chair’s Edition

Ah, the quiet confines of my office. No students. No colleagues. No family. Only a big black dog to keep me company. This lovely Thanksgiving break has given me the time to work on a number of things that have been sitting in my t0-do file. So far (i.e., on Wednesday and Friday), I have:

• Put attendance grades in my undergrad gradebook;
• Graded a bonus assignment;
• Turned in my Honors’ Day award winners;
• Started to plan my Christmas trip;
• Returned to blogging (poor ol’ neglected blog!);
• Redid the schedule for the last two weeks of the undergrad class;
• Prepped the last two weeks of class for my undergrads;
• Finished my grad syllabus for the Spring semester;
• Finished my undergrad syllabus for the Spring semester;
• Sorted articles to post on BB for spring undergrad seminar;
• Photocopied articles for Spring grad class e-reserves;
• Photocopied two book chapters for spring undergrad e-reserves; and
• Gathered the rest of the material to copy for spring undergrad reserves.

The only reason I am going home is that the dog is starting to get antsy. I suspect 6 hours in an office is enough for a holiday Friday, eh?

Road Trippin’ to Nashville

Fencepost @ The Hermitage
November 2009

A few weekends ago, when The Coach’s football season came to a crashing halt thanks to a nine-point loss in the first round of the state playoffs, we knew it was time to get the heck out of Sorta’ Cosmopolitan. With the exception of my up and back trip to a state conference, it had been months since we had managed to get out of town. In fact, the last time we were away from home was back in July when we embarked on our “Great American Road Trip” through Nebraska, Wyoming, South Dakota, and the southeastern corner of Montana.

It was definitely time to get away.

Of course, somewhere along the line, we had managed to acquire the Tenure Puppy. Since she was too little to board, we knew that an overnighter was out of the question. Instead, we popped the puppy in the bathroom with her puppy pad, water, and lots of toys, loaded up the Mustang and drove south to the sunnier Southern city of Nashville. Our mission? To visit The Hermitage and do a little Christmas shopping at Opry Mills.

We had been meaning to visit The Hermitage for a while now, but other locations in Nashville had distracted us on previous visits: the Country Music Hall of Fame, a concert at the Ryman, a football bowl game, a boat ride on the General Jackson Showboat. Heck, we even took a trip out to the Stones River National Battlefield. This time, however, we made a pact: We’d start out at The Hermitage and work our way back to our shopping and dinner locations. That way, we’d be sure to a decent amount of time at the historic site, seeing how it was going to cost us $15 each (AAA discount) to get into the mansion.

Talk about Timing
Renovations underway at The Hermitage

Like all Disenchanted family trips, we had a bit of a surprise when we got to Nashville. It wasn’t as bad as having our car die in Bonnaroo traffic (which happened on our way back from Florida) or getting rerouted around a nasty car wreck near Mammoth Cave (which happened during one of the hottest days of the summer when I had two cats and a dog in the car with me and the car conditioning pooped out on me). It wasn’t even as bad as the summer my folks tried to take us to the Statue of Liberty, only to find out that it was closed for renovations. No, this was relatively minor by comparison. You see, we managed to arrive at The Hermitage when it was under renovation! Of course, the people running the site put a positive spin on it, posting the following sign:

During the fall and winter you’ll have the unique opportunity to see restoration work underway at the Hermitage mansion and at three historic log buildings. Our historical interpreters will tell you all about the work and the history of these buildings. At times, access to areas around these buildings will be limited for your safety. We appreciate your understanding as we strive to better preserve the home of President Andrew Jackson.”

Aside from making it impossible to get a scaffolding-free picture of the front of the mansion, we didn’t have too many problems. Plus, as you can tell from the picture to the left, the site could use a little TLC. That the problem with wood in the humid south — it tends to rot and it’s a pain in the behind to keep paint on it.

We arrived at the mansion and ended up getting a great deal of personal attention because there were only two other people on the tour. The house is amazing inside: the wallpaper – a massive mural that depicted themes from Greek mythology – made it worth the trip. I’ve never seen anything quite like it. Plus, unlike many other sites, pretty much everything in the mansion had actually belonged to Andrew Jackson. The only downside was that you couldn’t take pictures inside the building and you could only look through Plexiglas into the climate-controlled rooms.

The View from the Back Porch
You can tell the fall leaves were past their peak.

Sadly, no one on the tour – except The Coach – understood my Big Block of Cheese Day references. Maybe they didn’t watch West Wing when it was on the air? Maybe the cheese reference would have worked better in the actual White House? Maybe I am just too smart for my own good? Who knows?

After walking through the mansion, we popped out the back door and headed out to the work yard to see the smokehouse, the kitchen, and the storeroom. We even got to see the poo-poo scraper sitting by the back steps. You know, I could have used one of those, but it looked too heavy to stuff in my purse. (LOL) Eventually, we walked out the gate by the bell, passed the “Lady’s Necessity,” and through the formal English garden to the Tomb of Andrew and Rachel. [I have a picture of this on Flickr, but can’t post it here because The Coach was in the photo. Ah, anonymity!] Geez, I feel like I have spent a great deal of time viewing the graves of dead presidents — Kennedy, FDR, Truman, Eisenhower and now Jackson. Does that make me creepy?

One last note: Can we really say that Andrew Jackson was a great man? Granted, he did a lot for the “common man” (read: white man), but he was still a slave owner in the South. Granted, he was the hero of the Battle of New Orleans (Does the War of 1812 ring any bells?), but he was also the same man who supported the forceable removal of the Native Americans.

Maybe he was a great man, but a good man? Probably not.

Of course, the last thing we saw at The Hermitage was the sign designating it a “certified historic site” on the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail.  Ah, Sarah Vowell, we could have used your commentary while standing there, mouths open, laughing at the irony of it all.

So far, so good…

No time for blogging today, thanks to my evil brother-in-law’s desire for a real Thanksgiving day meal. So far, I have made cornbread. I have my apples peeled and sliced (all 21 of them, from three different varieties). The pie dough needs another 20 minutes in the fridge before I can roll it out and get the pies in the oven. Then I’ll be boiling eggs, making that marvelous red bean hummus, and chopping onions and celery for my cornbread dressing. Dinner has to be on the table by 5 p.m. … but the dining room table is still loaded down with our junk mail. Sigh.

It would have been easier to throw steaks on the grill …

Really, I just came upstairs to figure out how long it will take me to cook an 11 pound turkey. Butterball tells me that the bird needs to be in the pan two hours from now in order to make my deadline. I guess I should get cracking, eh?