got a haircut, still don't have a real job

brace yourself for the randomest of random posts. i'm a little hopped up on coffee juice and i can't seem to stop myself from typing. i did, in fact, get a haircut and i kinda cheated on my hairdresser. but we have an "open relationship" which means she told me which of her hairdresser friends i could cheat with while she is in india. so i did. my hair is a little "cute" now (hence the pic of the cat) and i'm trying to deal. with being cute. which kinda makes me wanna barf.

also, i have been thinking a little about flexibility lately. and not the kind one dabbles with in open relationships with their hairdresser. but rather the kind that life demands. the flexibility that requires patience. and well. being flexible. i don't consider myself a person of rigidity but since discovering something called boundaries at a late stage in my life, i kinda dig them. life without them seems chaotic. but sometimes life within them feels stifling.

i still laugh at the time someone called me "easy-going." i am not easy-going. i have truly only met two people in life that i actually think are easy-going. i am fairly certain that both were the result of a near-nervous breakdown. apparently breakdowns can be freeing. i'll work on one to achieve the level of "easy-going-ness" i saw once glamourized in a jack nicholson movie. well. maybe not glamourized. but brain-damaged-ly peaceful anyhoo.

i think accepting your inflexibility is perhaps key to being flexible. pressing up against your own bounded boundaries and deciding they are too smooshy is perhaps therapeutic. not judging yourself for the limitations you place on yourself but being gently persuasive enough to realize that the walls you construct around you are mere facades. hollow of meaning. but securely holding you in place. straight-jackets of self preservation. useful. but too tight. like underwear.

cheating on my hairdresser made me realize that you can step out of your comfort zone.

but you might end up cute. which maybe isn't so bad.

on hate

i know what you are thinking. hate is such a strong word. therefore we need some clarity in this endeavour. i don't actually HATE this blog but i'll let you in on a little secret: i hated my last blog. it was painful and "professional" and horrible. i needed to get rid of it. so i dumped it for this sweet new glossy one. all pretty and easy to use. so hate is a misnomer. so there. on my last blog i felt compelled to be confessional, professional, and...well, that was just boring. but this is a whole new story. as someone who has always loved to write and who now studies new media technologies, i decided that i NEEDED a blog. what makes me so needful of a blog? i guess the advice of another recently morphed phd student come doctor who recommended a blog for procrastination purposes (find her fabulous blog here). and a conference where another phd student tracks the pedagogical importance of blogging for other phd students (find her personal blog here - it links to her phd research blog). so i'm putting a lot of eggs in this basket. i am hoping for catharsis for sure. so maybe hate isn't really a misnomer. i hate the compulsion to narcissistically write about oneself. but hate stills sounds so harsh. i also hate the compulsion i feel to outline the uses and abuses of my blogging. like an outline for an essay, i feel i need a plan. i have been watching way too much of the Showtime series Dexter and feel that this prefatory blog entry is inspired by the painful articulation of his innermost thoughts which acts as the narration of the show. maybe that is what this blog will be: a narration of my writing-up "process." a friend recently encouraged me to join his ten-year plan for the (un)completion of his phd process. wittily, he explained that people immediately stop listening as soon as you tell them that you are writing your dissertation. he has been effectively hedging people off and doing his phd swimmingly for ten years now. as envious of his procrastination as i am, i still want to be finished in a year. so while the time starts ticking, the hate stops here. until, of course, i begin to hate my dissertation which is TOTALLY gonna happen. fer sure. it's coming. wait for it...