11:52 PM:

After my last entry, a couple of people have asked me whether I was, like, out of the closet, and these have been people with enough data to know better; I suspect my more casual readers aren't even bothering to ask.

So, okay, let's clarify this; no, I'm not actually gay. (Insert standard Seinfeld reference here.) I'm a 1 on the Kinsey Scale, or about 99.9% heterosexual. I've been attracted to two men that I can think of in recent years... as opposed to, like, a couple thousand women. The John Linnell thing, mild as it was, was noteworthy -- and noted -- precisely because it was playing against type; if I'd been attracted to a female singer/bandmember, it wouldn't be worth mentioning.

My gender, on the other hand, is admittedly a much messier question, one I imagine I'll continue to grapple with here in the future. I'm uncertain about just where I fall on the masculine/feminine continuum, not to mention what the exact nature of that continuum is in the first place. But gender and sexual preference are two entirely separate issues in my mind.

I'm afraid this'll come out sounding apologetic or defensive, but, anyway, that's the story. And now I really need to get some sleep (alone, alone, all, all alone...).

3:33 PM:

Okay, let's see, where were we?

The two-day fall break was mostly spent catching up on my reading, starting to clean my apartment, and waxing my legs. The last of those turned out to be incredibly time-consuming, but also turned out to have much better results than shaving. This was followed by getting right back to school, with Wednesday and Thursday being busier than usual.

Thursday night, I did some baking, bringing a couple of cakes to my Pedagogy class Friday morning. The vanilla-frosted yellow cake turned out pretty good, actually; the brownies were okay, but a bit dry. I still have leftovers of both. Note to self: next time, one cake'll suffice.

(There was a sale on cake mixes at the local supermarket, and I can't eat one all by my lonesome. Hence the class participation.)

The weekend was spent doing more reading, partly for a book review I needed to write for one of my classes. It turns out that I have some anger issues to work out about this whole getting-thrown-out-of-the-doctoral-program thing after all. This is actually a bit reassuring; so far, my reaction has pretty much been confined to feeling drained, tired, and perhaps just a bit depressed. But, see, I hated this book, and it seemed to exemplify everything I've come to dislike about academia, and I expressed my feelings about both in no uncertain terms in this paper. Perhaps more strongly than the book actually deserved, in truth; I didn't cut the author any slack, perhaps overstating my case a bit. (Not that the book didn't suck.) Still, it was therapeutic. And, fortunately, that's how the professor took it, too.

(A brief excerpt, from the nicest thing I had to say about the author: "...the book as a whole does establish that [the author] is fully engaged with -- and enmeshed in -- the web of academia, and he does display knowledge in many matters related to his field, even if he can't formulate a coherent argument using any of them. He is, in short, perfectly suited to an academic life...")

Otherwise, I'm holding lots of extra office hours right now, meeting with students about the longer papers they'll be handing in soon. And, in what may have been one of my less sane decisions, I also went to see They Might Be Giants in concert last night. I would've enjoyed it a lot more if I hadn't been tired, hungry, and stressed -- not to mention if I'd remembered to bring my glasses -- but it was still kinda fun. (And I seem to be over my crush on John Linnell, although, again, see "lack of glasses" above.)

Y'know, this entry is really gonna confuse any new readers, I figure. Which is not such a bad thing... anyway, that about brings us up to date, and I've gotta get ready for class. Type to you later!