huzzah for once-per-month updates

heavy sigh.

well, but what a month it's been. shazbot. unfortunately, most of it was somewhat less than exciting (rather frustrating, actually), seeing as it was nearly usurped in its entirety by these goddam papers and their infernal perpetually-self-extending deadlines... but as of saturday night, the second one finally got submitted, and i've had a little bit of a breather for the first time in a very long while. this was also accomodated somewhat by the fact that yesterday was yet *another* catholic holiday in this unbelievably irrational country [rolls eyes].

so, yeah, there was plenty of work, interspersed occasionally with twin-peaks-wednesdays, and even a short low-impact hike on ascension thursday. the weather has been even more moody than usual of late; it's basically every other day now. one day of gorgeous sun, one day of muddy rain... at least they seem to share equally, i suppose...

i'm starting to get really excited about my upcoming trip to california. it's been almost two years since i've seen all my so-cal friends, and i miss them terribly. of course, all blessings have to be mixed (stupid stupid cosmic laws of the evil universe), and so with this elation also comes apprehension about my presentation for the conference, since it will be my first.

dena and conlin had a bunch of people over for a tasty fondue on saturday, which was awesome. it was also fun to be named the "guest of honor," because she said the reason she decided to do it was because i've been having everybody over every wednesday.

speaking of wednesday, i had to cancel this week's installment, as several of the usual crowd staged a mutiny in favor of going to the starwars movie instead. apparently, by some accidental mis-alignment of the stars, it's actually opening here a day earlier than in the states, as opposed to the usual three months later. strange. oh, and have i mentioned that the swiss people artificially insert fucking "intermissions" (read "cigarette breaks") into every movie that they show? it's really damn annoying, and detracts heavily from the theatre experience. but i've never been a huge movie afficianado, so it probably doesn't matter much in the long run.

i've started listening to the pimsleur recordings for german, and am at lesson 11 of 90, i think. remember the joke about highschool spanish, where the only thing you end up learning is "give me the fish of your brother raoul," or something equally useless? well, i know it will get better (at least it did with the french recordings) and i know we have to start somewhere, but i just kinda feel dumb repeating phrases like "where is the goethe street?" and "the opera square is here" and "no, no, not here, over there," etc, etc... it'll come eventually.

okay, with those godforsaken papers finally out the door, hopefully i will be more diligent about journaling. unlikely, i know, but if i keep telling myself that, maybe at some point i'll start believing it.