Caring and sharing

My faithful readers, such as they are, will have noticed that I have been silent for almost a month before the previous post. This was due to the joyful occasion of having my parents visit for three weeks here. Though we didn't go on any massive holidays, going away only at the weekend, it did somewhat cut into my 'random' time, especially because I was at work during the day, so I felt I had to spend proper time with them in the evening.

This is not the place to discuss in any detail how the three weeks went, though I will say that it wasn't as bad as I feared, and in fact a lot of fun was had at various points (yes, so there was a minor breakdown or two as well, but that was to be expected), and it even feels a little weird now that they are gone (not that I will be living on my own for very long......*grin grin grin*).

Instead of musing on the psychoticness or otherwise of my family relations, I shall dwell on more interesting (? well, more safe for public consumption at any rate!) episodes of the past three weeks. First and foremost: I drove on the motorway!!! Thrice!!! It had many lanes! And trucks that I overtook! And ramps to get onto and off of! And I was a little scared! But somehow - well, with my dad's direction in part - I did it, and nothing bad happened, and though I am not particularly interested in taking it up as a hobby, it's good to know that I can do it if necessary, and avoid wandering round minor roads all the time. Related to this is the acquisition of a GPS speaking thingy, I was torn about it since it seems a bit of a cop-out to me, but at the same time it is SO nice to drive about without having to deal with getting lost in the NJ countryside all the time, picturesque as it is - I feel I've had more than my share of that for a while....

I baked a couple of times while they were here and it was well-received, which is nice, given how competitive my dad and I are in the kitchen :-) I was even rewarded with an electric whisk to facilitate said baking, which, though not strictly necessary, is not unwelcome! (but I was in Williams and Sonoma at the weekend and could be found lovingly stroking what I really have my eye on [warning: awful flash], when the time is right...)

Also my dad decided that I really needed a pressure cooker, a thought which to be honest had never even entered my mind, but there you go. I now have one, and it is rather neat, and cooks things very fast, though it makes a very scary hissing noise while it does so, and there is a constant mild undertone of fear of explosions and scaldings to the cooking process, but never mind. I will get over it.

Still on the subject of food, I took my mom to see Julie & Julia which we rather enjoyed, especially the parts about Julia Child, and it confirmed my opinion that Meryl Streep is the bearer of much, much acting greatness.

This post seems to revolve around food a lot and those who know my family know it's the way in which we communicate best, so no surprises there :-) We also did a bit of travelling in nearby regions, but that will be the subhect of another post...

Stevie Gerrard and I have the same birthday

Though he is two years older.
And that, my friends, is the most important factoid to have emerged from my stay in Liverpool.

I jest, of course. But only just. :-)

No, really Liverpool was definitely the suprise destination of the year for me - I was going there for a conference, and it seemd like a good idea to stay an extra couple of days with Nick as a mini-break, but we weren't sure what we were going to find. Well, we found there is plenty to do, and in fact left a lot not-done, because there wasn't enough time!

Actually, the beginning of my stay there wasn't so great, because the conference accommodation (oh how I wish I didn't have to google the spelling of this word every time!) wasn't in a particularly pretty place, and the campus, while having nice Victorian buildings here and there, is also not in a particularly pretty place. But when you move more towards the centre, it all goes ex-industrial-waterfront-done-up just the way I like it, like Bristol or Southwark (though not quite as finished yet) and it's all very beautiful and a bit dramatic, especially when you look out towards the sound (assuming you are well braced against the wind!), and the old warehouses are all cleaned up, and it made me very happy.



To cut costs, and spare my stomach a bit, we had decided to rent a short stay apartment and slightly sold out and went with a big brand, the Staybridge Suites. It was another very pleasant surprise, so I want to give them a bit of a plug here. They were cheap. The room was biggish and comfortable, had a great kitchenette, free wifi, huge flatscreen tv, a view onto the water, and it came with breakfast, and wine/snacks happy hour on weekday afternoons. And it was only a few minutes' walk to where it was all happening. Including a Tesco where one could buy dinner ingredients. We felt very smug about our great plan and I would definitely pick them again, even if it would probably be more Guardian-reader-like to hunt down a private local landlord instead.

And with that out of the way...the two comments we probably uttered most often were 'Everything is so cheap in the north!' and 'Everyone is so nice in the north!' because, well, I think it is/they are! Prices seemed lower, and people friendlier, and more willing to engage in human contact even if they didn't know you - I liked that very much.

Also, there is just so much to do there, as I said! Much walking around the wharves (sp?) and gazing at the water, of course. And walking around the city centre watching Liverpudlians engage in what is clearly the municipal sport: competitive shopping, with added heels for the women (recession? what recession?)






And the museums! A nice little Tate outpost, with changing exhibitions (we saw one on colour, very jolly); the Beatles Story of course, which we went to despite ourselves, and enjoyed it; the Walker Art Gallery, which is like the National Gallery in quality but smaller, and so less overwhelming (and had live jazz playing!) and more pleasing; and the 'World Museum', which would probably be more fun for children, as it tries to cram in loads of things about history and natural history and world cultures and Lord knows what else - though one should never turn down a good dinosaur. And we had to pass on the Maritime Museum, and the Slavery Museum, and a few more besides probably.

Not satisfied, we also had a little outing to Chester, because of the Romanness of it (I, for one, had been hearing of it for years and years and years in relation to the fact that the Romans left a legacy of place names in Britain and the standard example is Chester, from castrum, etc etc etc).



At first, said Romanness is quite underwhelming: there is a barely noticeable amphitheatre, only partially dug out, with a very sad looking guide dressed like a centurion (or was he a gladiator? can't remember) giving tours to schoolkids. But then we went to the local museum (Grosvenor Museum), which was, well, small and perfectly formed. At least as regards the Roman section, which is the only bit we saw. It had a good amount of stuff, and really good explanations, and hands-on things (I now understand how abacuses work!!), and even a thick file giving loads of further information about Roman culture and history and how to read inscriptions and even bibliography for those interested - really nice.

Apart from that, it's a cute town generally, a typical English cathedral town, with city walls that go all around and that you can walk on quite easily. Sadly I didn't run into any wags, though. All in all, I'd definitely go back to either, or both, places.

As a coda, it was interesting for to attend this conference on the Liverpool Uni campus, as it was a chance to see how the other half, or more like the other 90%, lives when they go to uni - there is an enormous Student Union building which I guess is where every other university student apart from Tabs hang out - with a bar and a cafe/social area and tvs and a little shop with useful things and some other large socialising room and useful services like ticket sales and career services and the like, all under one roof...I wonder if I would have liked it more or less. Maybe in that kind of setup it's a lot easier to meet loads of people and eventually find a bunch that you like, but maybe also easier to disappear if you want, slip through the cracks, and not be coaxed into any kind of sociability? Which isn't necessarily a good thing. I will never know if I 'did' university the 'right' way or not...

Curioser and curioser

I have seen the future...and it is scarily, scarily, middle class. Maybe even upper m.c. I have just got back, walking down my lovely street and feeling rather suburban, with bunnies in the yards, and fireflies fluttering (do they flutter? hover? anyway.) about, and all very pretty. I have spent a few hours of the late afternoon at a neighbour's house, since she had invited people on the street for a potluck dinner at her place, and since I am still trying to get to know people, I thought I'd go.

And this is where the scary UMC-ness comes in. Now, most of you know that I really like giving dinner parties, and gathering people I like around food I like (though I really ought to do it more). In fact, cooking for friends is one of the things that makes me happiest, and one of the greatest pleasures of being mistress of one's entire house/apartment. And I know that as I get older, it will be a more frequent occurrence. But this thing tonight...with people of varying ages, all older than me, all so terribly proper - the architect, the retired physicist, the psychiatrist, the woman who will do x-rays of incredibly rare 15th century Celtich harps - discussing house prices, and schools, and insurance policies, and holidays in the south of France (yes, it appears that even from here, it's the done thing for sensible middle class liberals) - it was like the Ghost of Dinner Party Future, and it was almost enough to make me not want to host another dinner party, ever.

I thought I had finally come round to the idea of being A Real Grown-up, but I guess not...


Moving swiftly on....

Among the various bits of neighbourhood gossip, and who is moving where when and having what children, I acquired the knowledge that Toni Morrison lives in the neighbourhood, which is kinda cool. I shall keep an eye out for her now.

Up next: some reflections on Liverpool.

Two weeks later...

...I'm still trying to catch my breath, but alas, I seem to be getting more and more exhausted, so much that on Sunday night I actually wimped out and went to bed at half ten! Oh, the days of all-nighters (well, the nights of all-nighters I suppose) are so, so far away...

Also I am about to set off again for Europe, so this post will be rather bitty and wimpy, just like me I guess...

Things that have been keeping me busy include blueberry picking (yum!), rather successful attempts at baking (muffins! yum yum), doing a large amount of driving to pick up V whom I saw again over Independence Day weekend - 70 miles each way! And I didn't get lost or get myself into any trouble! It was very pleasing. We also tried to go to the shore, or rather, we got there (Belmar) and, cartoon-like, as soon as we had paid for parking, it started thundering....and never stopped, so we gave up. Sniffle.

Also I had my first American 4th of July - we went to a big open area where they were doing fireworks, which weren't bad, but a bit scary in that they were waaay too close to where people were sitting, and bits of spent firework and ash kept falling on us. Hm. All in all, it was fun, and less oppressively patriotic than I feared.

Also making the most of the NJ summer (it's lovely and hot here) and the fact that everyone I know except me lives in proper houses which have bbqs and sometimes even swimming pools :-) Summer is definitely the time to be here...

Off I go to finish packing!

[actually I have been doing a lot of thinking and introspection, about this displacement thing, which I really need to get round to writing about sooner rather than later...]

And after that...

...the fun never stops!

[here is the promised diaristic post]

Seriously, I don't think I've had time to catch my breath since, oh I don't know, the end of May. Ok, I know that sometimes in the past I have been known to complain about not having anything to do and being lonely, but surely there must be a happy medium somewhere!

From Ann Arbor, I went straight to a small town in NJ where my very good friend V was staying. I hadn't seen her in six years due to various geographical mismatches, and her penchant for being in very random and dangerous corners of the world, so it was amazing to see her again, and surreal that it was in small-town suburban NJ! We had a lovely, if brief, 24 hrs there where we basically just talked the whole time, sparing just a few hours to sleep, and tried to catch up on everything from the past few years. It made me very happy. I then boarded a random coach that got me to Philly, where I crashed on a kind friend's sofa and dragged myself out of the house at the crack of dawn (well, almost) to bag a ride back here with one of the bosses at work. Needless to say, a little exhausted.

There followed a week notable mostly because of the incessant, depressing, rain/thunder/lightning weather, and my attempts to work hard, which were in the main successful. And at the end of that week, I welcomed my second proper-guest-who-is-not-Nick, a friend from undergrad whom I hadn't seen properly in ages. He was here until this gone Monday.

It was actually really really good to have him visit (and no, I'm just saying this because you're reading it! :-P ) - weird how you can not really see someone for years, and then just click back into your old comfortable ways when you meet up again. It's like something V had said the week before - sometimes it doesn't really matter if you can't keep up with the day-to-day stuff, as long as what's really important, the deep connection and affection, is still there. And indeed, we spent an awful lot of time talking away, about all things big and small, and a not insignficant amount of my questioning him about his work - partly because I think it is one of the most awesome jobs ever, and partly because I realised, much to my shame, that I don't actually know that many people who are not employed in academia in some way...

So, in between going to work most days, we managed to fit in quite a few fun things, photographic evidence of which will probably be on Flickr and/or FB soon:

- we randomly encountered a regatta at the lake near my house, which was a bit like being down by the river in Eights week, except the average age was rather older (note: there is a point in life after which it is not, repeat, not acceptable to wear lycra), and there was no Pimms

- I finally went for a walk along the canal towpath, which is indeed very beautiful, and only a few minutes outside Princeton! Among other things, we encountered some cool turtles, as you can see (photos nicked from Chris):



- we tried to rock the Princeton nightlife, but really I should've known that would only lead to bitter disappointment

- The shore! The beach! (as I said in the previous post) As well as sunbathing, we also had a fun time playing shooting videogames, though the gun thingy was awfully heavy and I'm sure it cramped my style. Our fun was a little marred by the fact that it started thundering as we were wanting to head back, and we didn't actually leave the parking lot for a good 20/30 minutes - in the end Chris realised that I would never have the courage to drive in the dark+rain+thunder and very kindly took charge of the situation. Given that suicidal fireflies also got added to the mix, it was very nice of him to do so...

- and on Saturday...a Warriors-inspired pilgrimage to Coney Island!! Well, Chris wanted to go because of The Warriors, and I am always up for boardwalk tat, so...it was incredibly good fun, first we stopped off at Brighton Beach, which I remarked felt like being in Odessa - not knowing that it is indeed often called Little Odessa, because it is home to a large Russian-and-other-ex-Soviet-countries population. It was pretty amazing - all the signage in Cyrillic, plenty of elderly ladies sitting outside on the pavement chattering away, and I swear that both there and Coney Island I barely heard a word of English spoken all day. Coney Island was just the right mix of elegiac and dilapidated and tat and brilliant - we walked up and down the boardwalk lots, played a lot more shooting videogames (House of Dead rulz), Chris went on the Wonder Wheel (I felt queasy just looking at it, I admit my wimpiness), I tried to get more tanned, and we generally just took in the atmosphere, the randomness of the people, and tried to channel the Warriors, though I think it was a little less dingy now than 30 years ago. Maybe. I can't quite do it justice - hopefully the photos will help a little.



Needless to say, Sunday we were shattered (and hungover, and a little sunburnt, and possibly also food-poisoned), and then Monday the visit was over - but we definitely hit a high point with our beach goings!

Now a week of frantic work is going on, though it's one day short since we have Friday off for Independence Day - I am going to be brave and drive 70 miles and hopefully not get lost to pick V up and hang around with her at the weekend. And then another busy work week, during which I am giving a talk at work that I am freaking out about not insignificantly, and then probably a day or two in NYC, and then....England! Hurrah.

Right. That is all I think. Thanks for making it this far!

Thalassa, thalassa

And to think that the answer to my problems was there all along, just 40 miles away: on Friday after work Chris and I drove to the famed (infamous?) Jersey shore, as I had been craving beach and sea and sunbathing since, I don't know, April or something. And as I was lying there in the sun (pretty hot despite it being gone 5pm!), listening to the impressive Atlantic waves, it all just....came together. I was happy, I was caaaalm, relaxed, blissed out - all the stress of the past week, and even more of the past few months went 'puff' and disappeared somehow, or at least, it didn't matter any more. Maybe I should have thought of going there earlier in the year? It was a great feeling, and I want to try and hang on to it for as long as possible.

[A more diaristic post will follow shortly.]

Testing the waters

After Nick left, I headed over to Ann Arbor for my first conference presentation on something that isn't prepositions - a weird feeling! I was flying to Detroit (in a tiny tiny airplane - like the ones they use in remote Norway, except this is a Newark-Detroit flight, not a random rural service, wtf?!), and Detroit airport was a bit of a sad sight - it's a really cool building, architecturally (though there is a creeeepy passageway with changing lights and darkness and matching music which is just WEIRD) - but you can tell that it's aimed at a particular kind of business traveller, who may not be coming that way for much longer....a lot of the announcements are also in languages which I took to be Chinese and either Japanese or Korean; among the shops is one for golf type things; and also souvenir stores such as "The Henry Ford Shop" and "The GM Shop". It was all very poignant.

Not that Ann Arbor seems to notice any of these problems - it felt not unlike being in Princeton - small university town, somewhat low on diversity, lack of sensible stores and lots of antique and vintage shops instead (very nice ones though, I must say - and amazing second hand bookshops!). Overall, I was rather taken with both the town and the campus (which are fairly interchangeable anyway) - it felt like it had its own character, especially in the range of non-homogeneized shops, and like it would be fun to be a student there - it was a bit hard to get a good sense of what it's like in full swing as it was out of term time. The university seems to favour a building style that looks a bit like the bastard child of Keble and the Parthenon - lots of red brick and columns, as you can see.




And of course, no respectable university is complete without a quad which channels Oxbridge/the Ivy League, as in the one below, which is, perhaps unsurprisingly, the Law Quad.



I also managed to fit in a short tour of two museums there, the Natural History Museum which was full of rather endearing, retro dioramas, and the Art Museum which had, among other things, a spendlid array of furnishings and decorations made by Tiffany for a house originally in NYC - cf the photo below, apologies for the slight fuzziness. It's always nice to be surprised by wonderful objects where you're not quite expecting them!



But as I said, I was there for a conference, and the title of the post refers to the fact that I was basically dipping my toes into what is a new discipline for me - I've been interested in it for a while, but always as an external observer, never as an active participant. I'm going to be a bit vague here because it is after all a public forum, but a few random impressions of my first humanities conference follow. So many women! So few men! [insert my oft-repeated rant about the gender imbalance in my discipline - it's not like you haven't heard it before...] Scene that you would never see at an NLP conference: the keynote speaker arranging her pearls in the mirror so they wouldn't tangle with her name tag and she would look good for her talk; said keynote speaker, and others too, displaying a rather high degree of glamour, such as Prada handbags, and pashminas which matched the trim of their coats. (Not sure what it says about ME that I noticed these things....)

Also the average age was a bit higher than I expected, there were grad students there, but not as many - which perhaps didn't help with the socialising, which was a bit difficult anyway. I stood out a bit, perhaps for the wrong reasons, such as my reluctance to engage in any of the dense jargon being bandied about, and the fact that I didn't have a handout, and my slight disbelief at the content of some of the presentations (be it because of the amount of data used, or the quality of it), but hey...I guess a new field is always hard to break into especially if one just turns up uninvited and unintroduced, so I am not too upset about it. Maybe a little disillusioned, as I always thought this topic was a lot of fun, and now I'm not so sure anymore...