Isn't stuff like this only supposed to happen in sitcoms?

So at about six o'clock this evening, Kerry called me and asked if I wanted to go out. We had been "invited" to go out for appetizers and cocktails with the neuropsychiatry residents with whom she is currently working. I think hard when it comes to going to ritzy places, but decided I would be a supportive husband and go mingle with the doctorfolk.

We arrived, the valet parked our car for us, and we found our party sitting around a large table with barely enough room for Kerry and I to squeeze in. We ordered our martinis and food and tried to make smalltalk. It was a bit awkward, though, as half the people were residents and the other half were some other sort of support staff. Not to mention that Kerry has only been on the service since Tuesday. So in short, the table consisted of three different groups that didn't seem to know each other.

Just when we're beginning to settle into decent smalltalk, in walks what I can only assume is the attending from hell. She pranced up to the table and declared, "Who are these people and what are they doing at my table?" Four residents immediately stood up in a panic while a fifth gobbled down his meal that that had just arrived in less than a minute. We ended up shuffling around while a solution was sought. The resident who invited us insisted we sit back down (at a different side of the table), but one of the others (techs, I have been informed) leaned over to me and said it would really be preferable for us to leave.

The poor confused waitress ended up bringing our meals to the waiting rail, while the group of four to five old crones ended up annexing the table that could have easily seated twice that many.

Experiences aside, the food was delicious. I had a group of four...things...that were comprised of asparagus and cream cheese wrapped in a thin sheet of sliced sirloin and marinated in teriyaki sauce. 111 Chop House may very well end up being one of my favorite restaurants since a good number of food items and cocktails are only five dollars from four to seven every weekday. I'll enjoy making a reservation for me and the doctor that I do like sometime.

Clearing the Air.

I hate anticipation. The months since the move have passed in a blur of cooking, sporadic job-hunting, television, and video games. Without any clear objective, I find it harder to get motivated about things. Now, though, I have objectives to think about--a direction in which to look.

Simmons offers some very specialized graduate programs in library and information science (LIS). There is a special program for people aiming to be school librarians and media specialists. Public librarianship, academic librarianship, and archiving have their own special programs as well. I think it will suit me best to stay in the general program. With the lack of librarians in Arkansas, I think that a general, overarching education would make me more qualified for a variety of positions than pigeon-holing myself into one specialty.

Another thing I'm thinking about is my terminal education. Do I want to pursue my education after getting a Master's? And if I do get a doctorate before returning home, do I want it to be in LIS or in history? A Ph.D in LIS would make me qualified for executive managment positions in Arkansas, but there aren't so many faculty positions as there are no LIS programs. :/ Getting a Ph.D in history would give me a very well-rounded education with the possibility of teaching something I find interesting...and I'd still have a Master's degree that would actually open up job possibilities outside universities. That practical side of an education is something I have come to value much more since undergrad. :)

So now I have things to think about through the holidays...which are creeping up. A week from tomorrow, Kerry and I will be on our way back to Arkansas!

A Letter:

Dear Justin,

It is my pleasure to inform you that the Admission Committee for the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at Simmons College has admitted you to the master's degree program for January 2010. I hope you find your program here challenging and rewarding...

...Congratulations and welcome to Simmons GSLIS at Mount Holyoke!

\o/

Snow, Ramen and Interviews.

It snowed today! It came down lightly for a couple hours. Although it melted on contact, it was still interested to see snow in mid-October.

Kerry and I watched Ramen Girl a few nights ago, and I got the craving for some good noodles. We used to have the most delicious bowls of noodles at Mt. Fuji in Little Rock, and haven't found any good places for them yet up here in Massachusetts. So I decided to make my own. The noodles that come in instant packages of Maruchan Ramen aren't that bad (the horribleness comes from the spice packet). And since making fresh noodles would require making the pasta, frying it, and then drying it out, that probably wouldn't be much healthier. So I merely made my own broth as follows:

1. I soaked a box full of Shitake mushrooms in about seven cups water for thirty minutes.
2. I turned the stover burner on medium and added some salt.
3. I chopped some chicken up into little bits and started frying them in a skillet with sesame oil. I also hard boiled two eggs and chopped up five green onions.
4. Once the mushrooms and water started simmering, I dumped in the chicken and the green onions. I let it all simmer together for about ten minutes.
5. In the meantime, I peeled the eggs and chopped them in half lengthwise.
6. I tasted it and found it lacking for my current mood. It tasted like the udon noodle broth at Pei-Wei in Little Rock, which is good--I just wanted more flavor. So I added a little chicken bouillon.
7. Finally, I brought the broth to a good boil. I threw in four packs of instant noodles, discarding the spice satchets that came with them. I boiled it for three minutes, throwing in the eggs for the last ten seconds, and immediately took it off the heat.
8. Kerry and I ate big, giant bowls of it. It was delicious.

After supper, I checked my email to discover that I've been invited for an interview at Simmons GSLIS West. Tomorrow I need to call the Associate Dean to set it up. I might be a graduate student in January! Whoohoo!

College, the Boiler, Potluck, Takeout, Vehicles, and the Mall.

Last Thursday, I drove to Boston in the morning to sit in on a class at the Graduate School of Library and Information Science (GSLIS) at Simmons. It was interesting--I learned that I'm going to have to shift into the positives research methods of the social sciences and forget the relativist research methods I used in the liberal arts. I also got a crash course in the academic journal publishing "industry." After class, I at a student center burger, met with admissions, asked my last questions, and put in my appilcation. If my recommendation letters make it in time, I'll possibly be eligible for spring admission!

After driving back home, which literally took half as long as driving to Boston in rush hour, we found out what was wrong with our heating system. When the owner told us to turn the knob on the boiler fifteen seconds every week, she apparently meant just to barely twist it until you could hear water hissing through...not turn it all the way. So I had flooded the system. It was an easy enough fix, and now we have heat!

On Friday, I made some Cuban black bean soup. I used orange bell peppers and added some grated carrots so that it would be a black-and-orange Halloweeny soup. Kerry's coworkers came over, bringing ginger chicken kabobs, chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal raisin cookies, beer, and wine. We ate, drank, and made merry.

On Saturday evening, I was really looking forward to eating more soup for supper, but Kerry had eaten it for lunch while I ate ginger chicken. She couldn't exactly eat the ginger chicken for supper, so we oredered Chinese take-out (a big step for us). I had a whole quart of fried rice! A fourth of a gallon! For five bucks! It was awesome.

If I get admitted to college in the spring, I'm going to start commuting in January. I'm going to get as many classes as I can scheduled in South Hadly at GSLIS West. I can get there in half the time it takes to get to Boston even though it is twice as far away, and the drive is beautiful. Whether I'm going to be commuting the sixty miles to South Hadly over nice roads in the snow or the thirty miles to Boston over the worst roads ever in the snow, I don't fell comfortable doing it in my light-as-a-feather, rear wheel drive Sonoma. It is asking to die. So I'll be taking the Taurus.

That would leave Kerry with the truck to commute to wherever she's going. UMASS is only right down the street, but sometimes she works other places as well. Whereas over the past years I have developed an intuitive understanding of how to use an old pickup truck's brakes on wet, hilly roads, she hasn't had the virtue of such a terrifying education. It'd be better if she didn't, so I'll be driving the Saturn back to Massachusetts after our Thanksgiving holiday in Arkansas. I'll test the endurance of the theoretically broken but possibly OK transmission, and then Kerry will have a good vehicle for driving on snow in the wintertime as well.

Out weekend ended yesterday when we picked up Meagan in Boston and went to the Natick Mall. We ate burgers, then looked at clothes, a tea store, a lego store, a board game store, and then found out rather abruptly that the mall closes at six on Sundays. So we went to Target and then back to Meagan's. We discovered that Meagan has...a...kotatsu! We sat around the kotatsu chatting and all was good.

Kerry is actually off today we well, so I guess the weekend isn't over. \o/