Zubeneschamali

I've been on vacation in the Pacific Northwest/Vancouver (JUST missing the filming of both SPN and XF, which makes me bitterly unhappy), and in my travels to various quilt shops in the region, which is an important part of any vacation, I discovered this thing called the Row by Row Experience. There are over a thousand quilt shops across the country who are participating, each designing a free pattern for a row of a quilt around the theme of water. These are some of the designs:

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The kicker is, you can only get the pattern from the physical shop, not online. And there are some really cool patterns from all over the country, and given my love of geography and of quilting, this seems like a natural challenge for me to take up. So if you live in the US or Canada, would you be able to help?

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I find it really hard to believe that we've been here for a month already. Feels like we just got here! On the other hand, New Zealand seems forever ago, and Melbourne is starting to feel familiar. There's only seven weeks to go, one of which will be in Sydney, so it also feels like it's all going to be slipping away soon. :( I don't know if I can handle going back to a place without five cafes on every block, and worse yet, a place where they don't have flat whites. There's no brewed coffee here, just espresso (short black), espresso with water (long black), lattes, or something like a cappuccino but with micro-foamed milk (flat white). So coffee is always freshly made and always really flavorful. And it's everywhere. Sushi bars, Thai restaurants, fried chicken shops, pizza parlors, ice cream shops, etc. I decided early on to set myself the challenge of having coffee from a different place every day, and so far I haven't had to deviate more than a block off my usual walk to campus. :D

So I'm loving the coffee, and I'm loving living on the 16th floor overlooking the city and one of the many parks/gardens that fill the city (and are great for running in; thanks to pedestrian overpasses and riverside paths, the distance you can cover without having to cross more than one or two streets is incredible), and I'm loving that I'm missing one of the coldest and snowiest winters the Midwest has ever had (sorry not sorry). Here's the view from our bedroom, followed by two shots from the balcony:

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The new year is 5 days old and I've already had one fangirl meetup: beadslut for a lovely brunch in St. Paul. The company as well as the biscuits and gravy were awesome; the subzero temps were not so awesome. Can't wait till tomorrow, when it's forecast to be colder here than it is on Mars. (No, I'm not kidding.)

For the first week of my post-every-week-all-year meme (which still needs a lot more blanks filled in--lurkers are particularly welcome!), wendy asked to see those pics of Scotland I teased about but never showed you. Not wanting to be accused of being a tease who doesn't put out deliver as promised, here they are!

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Graduation was Saturday, and it was wonderful. It's definitely one of my favorite days of the year because everyone's happy, and I get to meet students' parents (which often cracks me up with how much they resemble each other), and it's a nice, small ceremony for only 3-4 departments, so everyone gets to walk across the stage and shake the Dean's hand. Astonishingly, I didn't cry, though I did come close.

Also! Congrats to everyone on my f'list who graduated this year; I know there's quite a few of you. I'm going to miss the college updates, but I'm also proud of you. :)

It's weird to think that I've been here long enough now that these undergrads came in as freshmen when I was already here. It's like I've always been here, as far as they know. Even some of our Ph.D students have now come and gone since I've been here. Five years this fall, and yet it feels like I just arrived.

Which means it's time to take off to foreign lands! Mr. Z is currently at a conference in Marseille, and since I've never been to France, I'm flying out to meet him. Then on Saturday we'll transfer to Barcelona, where I have been before, and where I'm going to be doing some of the groundwork for a study abroad course next summer. (For which purpose I will be taking Spanish this fall, turning back into a student for a few hours a week. Eep.) After a week there, we have a couple of days in Madrid before flying back on the 30th.

In other words, I'll be around even less than I have been, but with good reason. :) PM or e-mail me if you want a postcard, and I'll be happy to oblige!

When we last left our intrepid traveler, she was flying to meet up with her husband in Brisbane in a passionate airport embrace. No, actually, she was going to the hotel on Monday night and when he arrived on Tuesday at 6 A.M., he was getting to the hotel by himself, because she was tired.

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The first Major League baseball game I can remember going to, I was nine years old. We went to a White Sox game every year--my school district had a deal where straight A's got you discount tickets, and even though my dad's allegiance to the Cubs was stronger than my Mom's allegiance to the White Sox, their mutual desire to avoid driving through city traffic all the way to the North Side was greater. That year, my favorite aunt came down from Michigan when the Detroit Tigers were in town, and I was so excited to go to a game at Comiskey with her.

Turns out, it was the day Jack Morris pitched a no-hitter for the Tigers. At the time, I couldn't appreciate the historic importance of seeing a game like that one; I was just mad that my team was on the losing side, and spectacularly so.

Well, this weekend I got the opportunity to see if it stung less as a grown-up.

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So way back in March, I went to Vancouver and spent a day being driven around by the lovely alaidh , who not only has a great memory and a great eye for locations that have been in SPN episodes, but a great deal of patience for me, who was all, "I don't know what I want to see...just show me something!"  Because I know some of you are going to Vancouver next week, for which I am insanely jealous, here's some shots of the places we saw (one point per place you recognize before reading the caption):

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This post is first of all to celebrate my first-ever root canal finally being done.  After three tries spanning six months.  It wasn't painful, just uncomfortable to have my mouth propped open that long.  But yay, it's done and now I can veg the rest of the night.

I also wanted to post pics of my weekend, which included one of the coolest ballpark trips ever.  See, my dad and I started this thing a few years ago where we go to a different baseball stadium every summer.  We've been to Wrigley on the North Side and both old and new Comiskey/whatever-the-hell-it's-called-this-week on the South Side; RFK Stadium and the new Nationals Stadium in DC; old Milwaukee, Cincinnati, and Philly; new Detroit; Boston, Toronto, Minnesota, Denver, both L.A.s, and San Diego.  This year, it was Cleveland's turn.  (I guess it had to happen some time.  (No offense to anyone from Cleveland.))

The cool thing was that Cleveland was doing a 1920s Throwback Night, which meant the uniforms, the music, the graphics, were all 1920s.  (Or slightly later, as my dad kept pointing out with the music.)   I've never seen "Huzzah!" on a ballpark scoreboard before.

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