T minus 9 and counting

oh man, i was doing such a good job of posting regularly, but it's tough to keep a good thing going. particularly during march madness, i guess. i feel like the last few weeks have been basketball, basketball, basketball with a sprinkling of graduate school. i'm still preparing for my comprehensive exams and have lost a bit of hope that i'll get through my entire reading list before i have to start writing. we will see, i suppose. it might be more plausible if i wasn't going to be in denver for the majority of next week.

the point of the preceding paragraph, before it goes completely awry, is that there's a good chance i'll be completely off of the radar for the next month or so. the schedule looks something like this:

march 31: preconference meeting in denver
april 1 - april 5: SRCD research conference in denver
april 6: writing for comps begins
april 20: writing for comps ends
may 1: comps oral defense

i like none of those things at this point.

here's some happier news, though. i did get to see matt when he ventured up to state college during his spring break. again, not a lot to report unless it would be interesting for people to hear the game-by-game repaly of the march madness events. though i will say we probably found every place in state college that has satellite and would let us sit for an entire afternoon and watch basketball games. this was one of the few pictures that i could find where without one of us looking like we're saying something super serious about where we stand with our brackets in the tournament pools. doesn't sound at all like us, does it?

i also don't have pictures back from it yet, but we went roller skating last night for rachel's birthday. that's right. i said roller skating. turns out there's a rink (penn skates) right out here by toftrees. i wore the four-wheeled version and everything. i actually did pretty good until i started trying to be fancy. then i totally wiped out in a way that still hurts this afternoon. although somehow nobody saw me except for the guy who runs the place. i think rachel took a bunch of pictures, so if she posts them where i can get to them, i'll try to share a few.

okay, this is random, but how awesome would you feel if you were michigan state and magic johnson was just hanging out at your game cheering for you? that's pretty rad.

sorry. . . focus. i thought this was one of the cutest pictures i've seen in a while. makes me feel like i'm missing out on some interesting indoor fun as the kids keep themselves entertained during this second round of winter.

i did get an e-mail telling me that whatever group is sponsering the gardens over the summer did not have room for me. that's kind of a bummer, but judging by the looks of my plant lately, it may be for the best. i might have been the least "sustaining" of the community group. i would take a picture just so that you could see and laugh, but it's still a little bit embarrassing. okay, a lot embarrassing. i'm blaming it on my no-light, no-warmth basement apartment. it couldn't be me, right? :)

okay, if i'm going to feel at all entitled to complain during comps, i suppose i had better at least attempt to be prepared for it. see you in may or thereabouts.

“Change is never easy. You fight to hold on. You fight to let go.”

i was all ready to start this post with something cute when i just saw a commercial for altoona first savings bank (that's altoona, pa, not altoona, ia) where a little girl is explaining that "a lady can be a doctor and a boy can be a nurse." i couldn't believe it. really? really? i'm so shaking my head that this is even still an issue. i wish i could've found it online so that you could see it. oh, man.

somehow, this daylight savings time thing has got me feeling like i'm totally jetlagged. though not quite as bad as when i came back from japan, i've still woken up every morning thinking that i could sleep for about 5000 times longer. i was actually just commenting on how silly i thought the whole daylight savings time thing was, when i found this washington post article that made me giggle. i'm glad i'm not the only one who feels like it's all a bit archaic, although to be fair, i never had a summer job walking beans and only spent that one day detassling before i was unavoidably detained at the pool for the rest of the summer (thank God).

lacey and i have come to the slow but unavoidable realization that our spring breaks are laaaaame-o. not that i ever went on super awesome spring break trips, but i also typically didn't intentionally avoid them. and now with jess in florida and dad in north carolina, well. . . where is my warm weather? i guess we'll have to be satisfied with time at allen street grill, making silly faces and taking pictures.

actually, in just a bit i'm heading to a pot luck dinner at caroline's and adam's place. i have an espresso-mousse pie in the freezer that i'm hoping will fulfill the expectation of my bringing something for dinner. it definitely has taught me 2 things:

1) if you're supposed to buy instant pudding, make sure you buy instant pudding. apparently not all pudding is instant and the non-instant kind involves a LOT of stainding over the stove and stirring. BORrrrrring.

2) soy milk makes otherwise not low fat things low fat, but if you try to drink it by itself, it is disgusting!!! yuck. honestly, even when it's chocolate. don't do it. not even on a dare.

i'm also two for two on good mail days so far. unexpected books and clothes. i'm loving it! perhaps that will be the gem of my spring break.

and love you all, of course.

rjb

it's a jungle out there (in Missouri)

Appropriate or not, I have to post this e-mail that I was forwarded from Liz yesterday. I'm sorry, but if it doesn't make you laugh. . . well, that's just silly.

Hello Everyone,

Last night McAlester Hall was visited by two raccoons. They were stuck on the second floor and they were not housebroken. So please watch where you step. The raccoons have been removed from the building.

A cleaning crew will be coming this morning to clean the hallway on the second floor and someone will be by to fix the tiles of the ceiling that the raccoons fell through.

FYI

Kelly J. Davis

University of Missouri

Dept. of Psychological Sciences

"turn forth her silver lining on the night"

it seems weird to have trouble getting back into the swing of things following a weekend that ultimately resulted in a free bonus day with matt (courtesy of the winter storm in philly), but that's still kind of where i'm at. there was a very interesting series of events at the philadelphia airport on sunday that were undoubtedly the epitome of frustration for the weekend, but you have to remember that it's relative to the amount that matt and i typically get excited about things and did, eventually, result in said bonus day and matt being able to fly out of state college (rather than philly) early this morning. so, there is, in fact, a silver lining, as is typically true in stories for which i am the narrator.

all else was fantastic. it seems that we both got a respectable amount of work done before the trip got underway and there was an onslaught of activities to be involved in over the weekend. it all started at this awesome restaurant off of the PA turnpike on our way back from philly on thursday. the pictures don't really do justice to the fantastic decor or the gigantic cow outside the building that originally lured us in in the first place. thank you, pennsylvania. if you are nothing else, you are delightfully eccentric.

the rest of the weekend was really a montage of events associated with it being our developmental area recruitment weekend, "fake patrick's" day in state college (for some reason it gets celebrated twice here. . . i have no idea), and several people's birthdays. plus, people are typically pretty great about wanting to get together and do stuff when there are visitors in town. thankfully, we triple-dated with lacey (i know that three people don't technically constitute a triple date, but just go with it), so we have pictures.

even though it's kind of a strange pic, i have to post this first one, because it's the only visual we have that's related to the really cute story of ryan (far right) being one of matt's biggest fans. i actually think he might have invited matt to his birthday party before he invited me. anyway, at some point, matt walked stepped away for a minute and ryan told me that he really wish that matt lived here because he was pretty sure that the two of them would be "buds." perhaps "best buds." it was actually super cute and earned ryan a solid place as a participant in march-madness-related activities when matt returns over his spring break at the end of the month.

the psu-indiana basketball game and a visit to kristin's house went down in the afternoon (and we totally got free t-shirts, which karen, lover of all free stuff, will appreciate, i'm absolutely certain). then we found ourselves at jess's birthday gathering. given that the rush from event to event meant that we weren't able to eat at all in between a late breakfast and arriving at jess's circa 10 pm, lace, matt, and i were all pretty much starving. thus, the excitement over the menu as renacted in picture two. seriously, yum.

so now i suppose it is buckle down and work time. comps are almost officially 1 month away and i have a manuscript and poster that i'd like to finish before we leave for srcd at the end of the month. actually, the poster has to be finished given that that is what i'm presenting. the manuscript is a self-imposed deadline. spring break is next week, which actually only means that i can work uninterrupted by classes. i'm hoping to make a gigantic dent in my comps readings, on which i already feel behind. and i'm trying not to feel bitter that - were comps not an issue - i might be going to missouri. but. . . two months from now it will be all over, i'll be working on a grant that would possibly fund me for the rest of my graduate school career, and it will be almost summer time.

see? silver lining :)

i'm supposed to be reading and studying right now. . . but i'm not

i've decided that i'm going to include lots of pictures from my birthday party in this post, because it's almost all that i've done that wasn't school-related since my last blog. sad, but true. and good news, i suppose, because it probably means you can skim over most of the content without missing much :) the first one is lacey and me, then me with jeremy, one that includes caroline, lacey, me, amy, and rachel, and the always necessary "blowing out the fake candles" picture. because you can't actually put candles on pizza. my eyes are weird, but you also can't expect not to share such a picture, right?

it's been busy here trying to get things organized for comps and for the prospective student weekend that is coming up. the comps process is at least starting to demystify. the writing - as previously stated, i think - is going to take place from april 6th to april 20th. then my oral defense will be the following week on the first of may. i am hoping that defending on karen's birthday will mean lots of good luck and positive karma. let's pretend that's how the world actually works, okay? okay. now i also feel less guilty about posting this instead of studying right now like i should be.

five prospective developmental students are visiting this coming weekend from thursday night through saturday morning. it seems unfortunate that that will overlap with matt's thursday through sunday visit, but it's actually turned out to mean that we don't have to participate in all of the goings-on. see? karma's rolling already. sweet. we'll have times to do fun things like watch mediocre basketball (psu vs. indiana) and movies and enjoy one another's company :) but look at this fun recruitment-related video i found!

another pleasant surprise was having liz here over this past week. she came to talk with kristin and me about projects that we're working on together and also to some of our staff and undergrads about some coding that they're doing for her dissertation. it's been such a long time since we've been able to hang out and i forget - not how great liz is - but how she was another large contributor to making my time in missouri so wonderful. we mostly did work while she was here, but since she stayed with me got some quality time in - if i do say so myself.

although most of my excitement right now is wrapped up in matt's visit this weekend, i'd be lying if i said i wasn't also excited about the fact that spring break is only two weeks away. (excited and scared, given the amount of work that i need to get done before then). i'm hoping to have both papers that i'm working on done by then, if not sent out for review. we'll see how close that actually is to happening. no exciting plans except for continuing the race toward comps. ooooh, and i should probably put together my poster for scrd. that's also quickly approaching.

just in case being associated with wisdom and success makes me look awesome, can i briefly say how proud i am of matt and lacey? both have seen some form of recent success in the top journals of their relative fields (social psych and developmental psych). matt has an article coming out in the journal of personality and social psychology and lacey has a very promising revise and resubmit to child development. they'll both be humble about it, but it's very exciting and they both have a lot to be proud of.

okay. . . so maybe i should get back to work. i'm betting that if you're reading this, i miss you. and i further bet that i miss you a LOT.

another belated update

oh my goodness, why am i such a terrible blogger these days? having all of that time at home really threw me off somehow and i can't get back on track. the GOOD news is that there is lots of good news to report. (the only bad news remains that i live a bajillion miles away.) how about a blog list since i love making lists so much?

1. as many are aware, i got back on sunday from a trip to missouri and it was absolutely wonderful. i actually think it's worthy of a list-within-list type situation, just to hit the highlights :)
a) it was missouri's recruitment weekend and the social area (which matt is a part of) was in full effect. i got to meet a lot of the faculty members who i heard about, but never got to interact with when i was at MU. i think some of them thought i was there to interview for a spot as a student, which humored me much more than it made me uncomfortable. a lot of times they would ask me, "so who do you hope to work with?" and i would be like, "oh, i already go to graduate school - at penn state" and you could watch their faces twist all up as they wondered what the heck i was doing there, anyway.
b) matt and i remembered to take some pictures when we were at the basketball game!!! we did not remember to download them to either of our computers. (baby steps, people, baby steps.)
c) kara jo mailed us some scotcharoos since she was unable to be in attendance for this visit. it was awesome. they got there during my first full day in town, so we had sweet treats to live off of. (as if we're not sweet enough, right? ;)
d) i finally got to hear live music again. that was a much needed event.
e) since i don't technically have any of the pictures we took this weekend, i'm posting this old school one of us. i think this is one of the first trips that we all went on together to st patrick's day in kansas. that's josh on the far left, amelia behind him, me (when i still had blonde hair), matt, becca, amanda (she's not in missouri anymore), and christine. who knew all that would blossom in the years to come?

2. there is an application floating around for a community garden that students can rent out and learn how to grow food organically. it so far seems like it might be a good idea and might possibly save us some money. produce is expensive, after all. and why not grow some sweet corn if you can, right? i'm sure if that works out, there will be some interesting stories as a result.

3. neverhaveiever been so thankful to have a gift card than when i went to buy groceries this week. i was down to buying even the bare necessities (i.e., pepper and flour). thanks mom :)

4. there was some question as to if my comprehensive exams would involve me writing for a full day (i.e., 1 day for 8 hours) or for two half days (i.e., two consecutive 4-hour days). neither kristin nor i had strong preferences, so we decided to leave it up to my committee. apparently i will be writing for two weeks. i'm generally pretty good at math, but i'm not really sure how that worked out. . .

5. we are going to see madeline albright speak tomorrow night. bob knight is going to be a tough act to follow, but i think she's got a shot. should i ask her what i can do so that i don't have to pay off my student loans?

6. i often tell people that we study the develoment of emotions, but particularly (for me) fear and anxiety in kids. i thought this was a cute video that i should use in a talk sometime. poor thing.

7. happy belated birthday to lacey!! apparently part of the festivities were to take her texas friends sledding while they were here over the weekend. how much do i wish i would've seen that? :) oooh, and one of her birthday gifts was these cool shoes that i love not only because they're adorable, but because for every pair you buy, a pair gets donated to charity (which kind of makes them normal-priced).

okay, i think that's it for me for now. seven's a lucky number anyway, right?
one more old school picture - just for good measure. though i never did figure out why i don't appear to have a neck in it.

love to all. and to all a good night.

any time is a good time to start

wow, has it really been a full month since i have had time to devote to a blog-styled update? it's a wonder to me, still, how you can wait through days and weeks that inch along until you can finally go home, be with people you love, celebrate, etc. and when you look back you wonder where all the time escaped to. in fact, you can barely remember being so caught up in the wait for it to begin with.
thus, despite the extraordinary effort associated with its approach, the Christmas holiday now appears as a total blur in my memory. a smiling blur, to be certain, but a whirlwind of a memory nonetheless. to add insult to injury, lacey went to her own family's holiday celebration and thus i have no photographic evidence for any of what i am about to present. i'll do the best i can with what i've got from thanksgiving and google images.

december 22-23 was a visit to kansas city, where i was briefly reunited with my good friend heather and was finally able to meet her fiance, kevin. (that's them on the left in the middle of a self photo session :) i worked with heather at the pool in altoona before starting at drake and while we get together as often as possible, our paths do not cross frequently. so, it was wonderful to get to see her and kevin and to be the first houseguest in their new home in lenexa, just outside of kansas city. to make things more interesting and exciting, a pipe burst in their basement just before my arrival and so my evening there was spent playing wii, drinking a glass of wine (more for those who had to endure the stress of searching for a well-hidden water shut-off valve), and trying not to engage in any activities that necessitated the use of water. all was well upon the arrival of the plumber in the morning, though, and we met my mom and dad in des moines the next afternoon.

december 24-30 was time at home. wonderful, lazy, Christmas, birthday, high school pseudo reunion, lunch with kris & kids in the playland, first-visit-to-the-chiropractor time at home with what seemed like a revolving door of grandchildren in and out. it was great to have them all around, though. Christmas is always a bit more fun with kids, isn't it? amy just sent me these pics of emily with the outfit that she bought for christie, her build-a-bear, with the BAB gift certificate that i gave her for Christmas. i'm pretty sure there are pics that prove that both kassi and gabe are now taller than me, but i don't currently have access to them. and probably won't until that fact no longer scares the bajeebers out of me.

december 31-january 2 was spent in des moines with one of matt's high school friends, dj, and his fiance, laura. aside from being incredibly sweet, loving, wonderful people, dj and laura offered a ginormous television for football watching and some of the tastiest cuisine that i've had outside of the walls of my mother's own kitchen. this moves them up on the rankings of places that we will visit again, to be sure, and parially compensated for penn state's sad showing at the rose bowl. plus it is always really sweet to watch matt's and dj's interactions. there's a lot of love there.

january 2-4 was an opportunity for me to see a lot of lovely people that i haven't seen in ages! matt and i met up with almost the entire sinclair clan at court avenue brewery for a fast happy hour. what started as tentative plans for us with josh and josie ended up being us having a round of beer with josh, josie, terri, chris, nick, jerri, erik, and scott. we actually sat at that table at the end of the bar - in the very back of the photo on the left. it was a fast-paced exchange of greetings, hugs, and hopes to see one another again very soon before we headed to pella to meet up with some of my college friends, nick, jill, abby, bob, wade, and jodi. we went to the bowling alley and then to a local bar in pella where matt and i dominated at pool and jill dominated at getting high fives from complete strangers. it was both a sight and an experience. the next evening, matt, jill, and i did dinner at george's (yum!!!) before we went to nick's for cards and a few rounds of rock band. very, very fun.

january 5-7 i was back at home, wriapping up loose ends, heading out to dinner with grandma (at teluwut - also yum!), and trying to get in some final days of relaxation before getting back on the plane to state college. i've gotten in a little bit of work since getting back, but am sure that things will fly at me in full force when classes start back up tomorrow.

so there went 2008 and 2009 appears to be underway. all smiles so far. and here we go. . .