Courses taught: 5

Papers graded: 870, not counting homework

Book contracts for an edited collection on Margaret Atwood given by Cambridge: 1

Car accidents: 1

Hours of physical therapy per week for over two months: 3-6

Nieces and nephews born: 2

Books read for work: about 20

Books read for pleasure: None, I think, even over break.

Upper GIs: 1

Cancers found by Upper GI: 0 (yay!)

Conference panels chaired: 2

Book chapters written and sent to editors: 2

Margaret Atwood Journal issues out: 1

Minor foot surgeries: 1 (a redo, since the Jan doc did it so badly)

Campus Book Project talks given: 1

Campus Book Project talks chaired: 3

Campus Book Project books chosen: 1

Plays attended: 3

Awesome Halloween costumes: 1

Mix CDs produced: 3

Kittens fixed: 2

Kittens taught to stay off the desk and counters: 0

New Recipes Tried: probably 15-20

New mentees for the Guardian Scholars Program: 1

Trips to take the boy’s car to the shop: 2

Letters of recommendation written: 6

Types of bitters homemade by me, Vanessa, Rae, Marina, and Melissa: 5

Trips to wine country: 2

Here’s to a better year (all the good stuff, but less of the silly medical stuff)!

I don’t love everything about Christmas. I don’t like that the season starts too early (thanks to our amazing commercialism); I don’t like realizing that while I’m in the midst of finals after what is usually my busiest quarter, I am behind on making, buying, baking, and shipping presents; I don’t like the pressure to buy things for people I don’t know well.

I don’t like how the phrase “Merry Christmas” is changing. I say both “Happy Holidays” and “Merry Christmas” interchangeably–I always have. Both are accurate for me and basically everyone I know. Almost all of us get Christmas off, so even the few people I know who don’t celebrate Christmas can still enjoy that break. Happy Holidays, despite what Fox news says, has always been fine–there are more than this month that we celebrate. I’ve never had anyone who doesn’t celebrate Christmas get upset with me for wishing them well. But now there are apparently people out there who get upset when I wish them well for more than one day in a season.

Dan Savage recently wrote about reading Sarah Palin’s book, which says you can’t wish people peace and love without wishing them “Merry Christmas” because there is no peace and love without Jesus. I guess that means a bunch of people I know, including myself, don’t really love. This war on the made-up war on Christmas is going to create the very thing it rails against, as I, like Dan Savage, now feel obligated to say “Happy Holidays,” as reaction against those who say we’re not allowed to. Years ago, those people took the American flag and made it the symbol for conservative rather than American; now they’re taking my ability to say “Merry Christmas.”

Just the other day, I said “Merry Christmas” to a local business owner on the way out the door. He commented that he “had” to say “Happy Holidays” so as not to alienate people. He had mistaken my automatic I’m-leaving-now holiday wish as a statement against political correctness. I probably gave him the impression that I’m conservative and Christian by my thoughtless use of a phrase. I just noted that I say both phrases and that I’ve never gotten in trouble for either one. He confessed that he had never been corrected by someone for using the Christmas word in his greetings, so in the spirit of Christmas getting-along, we were able to agree that since neither of us had actually experienced this particular front of the war on Christmas, it was likely just something those people on TV made up.

Why, you might ask, do I celebrate Christmas if I’m not Christian?

Well, like most Americans, I was raised Christian, so Christmas is part of my childhood, part of my life. It represents family, the gorging on gifts that comes with being a kid, and the only time when my mother and stepfather would try not to fight, when my mother’s smile would return for days on end.

When it was my turn to be a parent, I didn’t want to lose that connection to childhood or to rob my child of it. Christmas can be magic. Not celebrating the birth of Jesus (which would be in Spring anyway, Biblical scholars agree) is surprisingly easy, given how pagan the whole holiday is. We combine solstice festival traditions, medieval traditions, and the Roman sun-God Baal’s day (today) into a frenzy of presents, singing, eating, drinking, and decorating trees inside the house.

However, what I’d like to confess about Christmas is how much I love it. Despite all its problems, despite the commercialism, despite the war I’m apparently in about it, I love it.

I love finding the perfect gift for someone. I love those moments when my friends find that perfect thing for me.

I love the baking. Although I cook all through the year, I rarely give myself the time to bake. Each Christmas, there’s a little frenzy. Alexander says it’s the most stereotypical mom thing about me. Each year, I make some classics, which, because I only make them once a year, mean it’s Christmas when I bite into them (eggnog pie, cranberry apple pie, scotchies, oatmeal lace cookies, sour cream drops with burnt butter frosting, etc). And each year I try something new. This year, it was Mansikkalumi, Finnish Strawberry Snow. And then there’s the ham, which I usually only get at Thanksgiving and Christmas, and which is my very favorite meat.

I love the movies and TV shows. Not all of them, of course. Today, Alexander and I are watching Doctor Who Christmas specials and Simpsons and Futurama Christmas episodes. I haven’t had the chance to watch the movies this year–Christmas is often like that–once I’m ready for it to be Christmas, there isn’t time to see everything I love, from strange Finnish horror films about Santa (Rare Exports) to Bridget Jones’ Diary to Scrooged to About A Boy to the original Miracle on 34th Street, the ultimate Christmas movie. (Back when I wrote a movie column, I wrote about the best Christmas films: http://www.matchflick.com/column/2510; http://www.matchflick.com/column/1829; http://www.matchflick.com/column/1820.)

As the creator of 9 volumes of Christmas mix cds, I must admit that there are several songs I apparently love as well, some traditional, some new. “The Carpenters Christmas Portrait” is my favorite cd of the old hits. I had the records as a child. I also have a house mix of totally secular awesome Christmas songs by Weird Al, Jonathan Coulton, etc.

I love the tree almost most of all. My stepfather’s house had a large, open foyer. He would put a big tree on a very big table in front of the sweeping staircase. I would spend hours playing in the tree. The more anthropomorphic ornaments became my dolls for a short season. My smallest toys would find their own places in the branches. My tree is always the first signal that it’s really Christmas and is usually with us for way longer than it should be. This year, I refrained from putting breakable ornaments on it, due to the mischievous presence of two little kittens, but it’s still here, staying moist from all the water bottle punishment sprays it takes with Jareth and Anubis.

Finally, I love Christmas because it’s the time of the year when I get out my address book and send a little something to those I love. I try to call people I haven’t talked to lately, but whom I miss.

(And did I mention the eggnog?)

Happy Holidays!

It’s the season that critics are posting their Best Of lists for the year. (What always strikes me as a bit odd is that year is not technically over when the critics do this.)

As I don’t want to be like everyone else, I’m going to use the rest of the month to post about non-traditional “Best Of”s.

The best ABBA song?

“Waterloo.”

Why?

Not because it won the Eurovision competition in 1974, but because it begins:

“My, my, at Waterloo Napoleon did surrender
Oh yeah, and I have met my destiny in quite a similar way”

I just can’t imagine any pop song today beginning with a historical reference. This song not only does that, but continues all the way through, comparing this woman’s finally giving into love to Napoleon’s defeat. The military analogy somehow blends perfectly with the upbeat, danceable tempo.

“So how could I ever refuse” to love this song?

It’s easy to get discouraged these days.

I’ve had a bad headache for almost two months now.* It’s exhausting. Eula Biss, in her essay, “The Pain Scale,” argues that one of the worst limitations of how we measure pain is that we don’t have a metric for how long it lasts. I’ve gone through the summer without a break, and I’ve been sort of beating myself up because I don’t have any more money than I started with and a lot of “to do” list things didn’t get done. And my oven broke about an hour ago. Flames shot out of it.

Thus, I have had to give myself little lectures on what got done this summer. They help.

WHAT GOT DONE THIS SUMMER:

I taught four classes (successfully).

We judged the Prized Writing submissions, then I edited the publication, and now it’s out.

I prepped my five Fall classes.

I served on two Campus Book Project committees.

I paid the “pay off the credit card in three years instead of a billion” amount.

I was given a new crock pot, and I tried out a bunch of new recipes.

I got two new kitties.

I fixed one expensive thing on my car and two on the boy’s.

I went to London to be in the wedding of two people I love dearly.

I spent quality time with my son, my friends, my man.

I’ve done a lot to try to make this headache go away–switching drugs (including going off the one that caused hallucinations), massage, chiropractic, physical therapy, lots of doctors’ appointments.

I went to Ashland with Vanessa and Kevin, where we had good food, good drinks, and saw five amazing plays in three days (The Heart of Robin Hood, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Cymbeline, The Tenth Muse, and King Lear).

My fractured tailbone healed.

I kept the house reasonably clean.

In addition to the plays I’ve already written about in past blogs, I saw Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen and Billy Crudup in No Man’s Land (not my favorite play, but it didn’t matter!).

I chose essays for an edited book proposal I’m about to send off.

There, now I feel better. Time for more painkillers.

*For those who don’t know, I have a low grade headache every day. This has been the case since I was 12. It’s always there. All of my treatments over the years are to minimize the days it’s bad–the days it’s debilitating–the days I identify which muscle groups I would like to inject with some miracle that would make them release–the days I fantasize about guillotines. It’s been almost two months now of those days.

Summer classes are crazy. My students sign up, thinking that the classes they’ve feared the most will somehow be easier in a shorter amount of time. And then I explain that we have to do the same amount of work in six weeks. And then we struggle together. And then a few complain that we’ve done so much work. Sigh.

Last summer session, which ended a week ago, I had three classes running. At the same time, I was coming off Spring, off the London wedding, had that fractured tailbone, and was working to get the Prized Writing edition off to the printer.

I’ve survived. I told myself that if I did, I would reward myself in some significant ways. I would go to Ashland with V. I would have an amazing birthday weekend. I would do a little less work in summer session 2–reading more for pleasure, trying new recipes, getting some of the sillier stuff off the to-do list (eye doctor, finally printing out pictures, etc).

So now I have a trip to Ashland scheduled. This week, I’ve made four new recipes already. I’ve dusted most of the house for the first time since my Spring surgery. Went for a short walk and read a short section of a book this morning.

And my birthday was awesome. The winery I belong to, Kenwood, threw a paella party on my special day. The paella was amazing, the pours were generous, and the band serenaded me. And then I got to see friends who live near there.

Alex and I have been surviving together now for 20 years. And sometimes there are problems, but they’re fixable (except the ones that aren’t). And sometimes there’s wine and paella and music and friends.

No–no real spoilers here. I’m not going to talk about which of your favorite (or not favorite) characters are going to die on the hit HBO show.
I’m gonna talk about orgasms.
Ever since GOT premiered, the internet has been debated the sexual politics of the show, with some people thinking it’s sexist and others finding some of the strongest women on tv there. Saturday Night Live even did a fantastic sketch about why the show features so much nudity (http://www.brobible.com/entertainment/article/snl-game-of-thrones).
And there is a lot. Exposition tends to happen in whorehouses, as women of the night work on their technique. What’s interesting about most of those scenes, though, is the attention to artifice. These scenes do not feature women with their clients. Instead, the women train each other to fake pleasure, turning on and off the moaning at will.
However, what pleases me more and more about the show is the focus on actual female pleasure.
One of the most frustrating things about our pornographic society is the focus on moaning and other signs of pleasure, but the lack of female orgasms in our sex scenes. The women moan enough to let you know you’re doing a good job, but not enough to signal that they’re actually getting off.
Thus, not only is Game of Thrones breaking ground with its strong female characters, it’s actively discussing female pleasure. We don’t see the orgasms, but an amazing amount of time is given to discussing them, especially considering how many plotlines have to be crammed into each episode.
The Queen of Dragons has a happy marriage once she learns to have good sex with her husband. Margaery tries to tell Sansa that her fiance may be able to satisfy her sexually, even though he isn’t what she wants in a husband in other ways. When young Podrick spends some time in the whorehouse (his first time knowing women), he isn’t charged because the women enjoy it. Every man in King’s Landing speculates about what he’s done to make women happy–not with jealousy–but with a desire to copy his actions. Jon Snow is protected by his wildling lover because of whatever it is he can do with tongue, proving that he doesn’t need the advice a wildling general tries to give him about how to please a woman.
Game of Thrones is a guilty pleasure, but at least it’s training its viewers about what pleasure should be.

I was expecting that my next blog would cover some of the cultural events I’ve experienced lately–the amazing sold out show at Mondavi of the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain, Common House’s amazing production of The Foreigner, my recent trip to Wine Country, in which I got to see a little grey whale swimming along the coast, etc.
But the news of the week is my loss of a gallbladder.
Saturday, I woke up early and got a lot of work done. Shortly after I had lunch, I started feeling really ill–nausea and vomiting had me thinking it was food poisoning. Hours later, still vomiting and  shaking, I headed to the ER. Tenderness in my upper right abdomen made the doctors think it might be my gallbladder. An ultrasound confirmed that the organ was “packed” with stones.
When gallbladder stones block the duct, the useful stuff the gallbladder makes can’t get out to help digest food, causing the symptoms I was experiencing. Once the doctors were finally able to get me to stop throwing up, I was allowed to go home, with instructions to the see the doctor to talk about scheduling a surgery.
Except the next day all the symptoms came back, so it was back to the ER for me, where it was decided that I would be transferred to Sacramento for Emergency Surgery. It was an exhausting night. No sleep. Many rooms. One hallway. Not enough pain medication.
At 6 a.m., the nurse finally turned out the light and told me to get an hour of sleep before my surgery, but that was when the elderly Chinese woman in the bed next to mine woke up and started yelling at all her relatives on the phone.
I gave the nurse Vanessa’s number and was herded down for them to get me ready. There was a moment when they realized that I still had my underwear on, and they seemed surprised. They needed the underwear off, apparently, so they could catheter me after putting me to sleep. Since I hadn’t know that, I thought they should have expected I would leave my panties on–who puts on a backless gown AND thinks it would be a great idea to go commando?
My panties are now in a little “bioharzard” bag. Eventually, I will stop seeing this bag as a funny souvenir.
The surgery was quick, but the nausea and pain were hard to control, so I was in recovery for about four hours, where my nurse was really great, before I was released back to my room. Vanessa was there almost instantly, and we sat for hours, her grading, me trying to block out the Chinese-restaurant ambient music coming from behind the curtain to my right.
As soon as I got the nausea under control, I announced my decision to go home. Melissa and Vanessa were able to keep me company for the several hours it took to make that happen. We left during a freak downpour. I slept for 12 hours.
It’s day two of my recovery. It basically hurts to move. To stretch to bend down, to sit up, to stand up. My arms are sore from the incredible bruising all the needles caused. My four incision sites burn.
I’ve been grinding my teeth like crazy at night, apparently–I have the headache that comes from doing that.
But I’m going to be okay.
And I’m very thankful.
Thankful for all my co-workers who have covered classes for me.
Thankful for my son, who, the second I first started vomiting, got me a throw up bowl and gingerale and offered me a cool washcloth for my head. Who, although he’s sort of shy of strangers, kept marching out to the doctors’ desk at the ER to ask about the timeline for transport, etc.
Thankful for my Ian, who relieved the boy that first night, rubbed my back, and watched Dexter with me last night so I could focus on fictional blood and wounds.
Thankful for my Vanessa, who took me to the ER with the boy the second night, rescued me from the hospital, and is doing a Target run for me today.
Thankful for Melissa, Ken, April, Marina, Mandy Dawn, Tiffany, Tessa, Poonam, and everyone else who’s called, emailed, texted, offered and/or has given support and best wishes.
I don’t know exactly when I’ll be completely myself again, but I know it’ll be faster because of all of you.

As WonderCon 2013 is the only big Con I’m likely to attend this year, this is likely the only Con blog you’re all going to get for a while–enjoy!
For the first time in 13 years, the boy and I had the same Spring Break, which happened to fall during WonderCon, so the boy accompanied me down to Anaheim.

I have to say, after a couple of years of doing these things, the most exciting reason to go is to see my friends and super-geek acquaintances.

Thus, shorty after we arrived, we went to see Barry, one of my favorite bartenders in all the world. After a ridiculously expensive dinner (just assume that every meal I mention is ridiculously expensive–bottles of water at the Convention Center are $3), we headed to bed so we could get a good night’s sleep. I think we slept for 11 hours–we both needed it.

And then it’s mostly a blur.

One day I was Zuul, the next I was Gaiman’s Death, and I ended up in my TARDIS dress for the last little morning. We saw some amazing costumes–including one little girl dressed as Death (her very lanky father was Dream), lots of Doctors, tons of Star Wars characters, a great spider, etc. etc. etc.

And I’m going to apologize now for not having many pictures. Neither the boy nor I are particularly bright about having the camera out and ready to go. (Selfishly, I would have wanted more pics of my costume, but getting the boy to take a picture of me is difficult for some reason.) However, the other reason for few pictures is how annoyed I get by the way traffic stops about every 10 seconds on the floor because of people taking pictures. No exaggeration. People ask someone in costume for a pic (a pic with the woman if the costume leaves little to the imagination–just a pic if it’s not a particularly revealing costume), the person always agrees, and then there’s the camera fiddling, the backing up to take up the entire aisle so you can get every inch of the person in the pic, etc.

Casual gathering of Star Wars costumes

I got to see my old friends–cartoonist/writer Lonnie Millsap, cartoonist/writer/co-founder of ComicCon Scott Shaw, Anthony Del Col, one of the authors of Kill Shakespeare, all the guys who work at Bongo Comics, etc.

And I got to sit in on some amazing panels, including both of Scott’s (one is his “Oddball Comics” routine; the other is the improv cartooning panel). There was also a writing panel with Jane Espenson (writer of Buffy etc), Amber Benson (Tara on Buffy), Patrick Rothfuss, Frank Feddor, and Ashley Edward Miller. Best piece of advice for writing science-fiction or fantasy? Set up your whole world–know it at an atlas/encyclopedia level–but show the audience about 10% of that. They don’t want to read an atlas or an encyclopedia.

Amber Benson also confided that she was so glad she’d gotten into writing/producing, so she didn’t have to spend her days down on the exhibit floor signing autographs.

I got to meet Jane Espenson on the last day, which was amazing. I basically fawned all over her. There was a little less fawning, but no less excitement when I got to meet Terry Moore and a very nice Canadian who’s going to be making an educational video-game to go with Kill Shakespeare. He’s moving to America (SoCal) soon, so he may come up when I teach Kill Shakespeare in my graphic novel class.

The coolest I played it was when I found myself sitting at the same communal table at the bar on the last night with several people from Dark Horse Comics. One of the guys had just hosted the Buffy comics panel. When it was finally revealed through conversation that I was a fan and had been to the panel, I had to admit that the only reason I hadn’t squealed already was that I was trying not to be a big ole fangirl.

My own panel went well. When “regular” geeks (as opposed to academic geeks/professional geeks) wander into the academic panels, they have a tendency to wander out again. However, none of the 40 or so people in the room while I was talking left, which means a lot there. (People will even leave a room when Joss Whedon is in it, which I can never quite understand–maybe they’re so excited that they’re shitting themselves?)

Speaking of Joss Whedon, I got to be in the giant arena room when they had the panel with Joss and several of the actors, and the cinematographer for Much Ado About Nothing. The movie looks fantastic–the props are modern (there are cell phones), but the dress/style of the piece is an old-fashioned screwball comedy, including the film being in black and white. Can’t wait.

I got a shout out from the Bongo Comics panel–during the Q&A, they introduced me to the rest of the audience and mentioned my book. And that was awesome!

But one of our very favorite things was a quiet dinner with Lonnie and Scott. Scott is a survivor of a different time, when there weren’t really girl geeks, when ComicCon was in a basement and mothers escorted their sons there to make sure they weren’t getting diddled by the counter-culture artists. And he’s one of the sweetest, funniest, most remarkable men I know. He spends an awful lot of time at conventions looking at the work of child cartoonists–he remembers them from year to year and encourages them to keep drawing, before drawing them something original to take home. Lonnie is a friend I know through Denise. (She can totally pick ’em!) Watching him get better and more famous every year is a great honor.

I left a little early so I could prep for my brand new Spring quarter–only to get home to a dark house. The power was out; my prepping plans were thwarted, but there was wine and Vanessa and Kevin and candles, and so we made it through.

Well, it’s Spring Break–so I’ve just finished grading my five classes, prepping for the four that start next Monday, and I’m in the middle of my annual IB grading.
But the boy and I are also heading down to WonderCon today (the only Con we’ll hit this year)–so we’ll get out of town, see some friends, and be somewhere I don’t have to feel guilty for not cleaning.
The quarter has been good, though. It was sad to say goodbye to my first ever graduate class (this was my second quarter with them) & my other classes were generally engaged.
Chris Higgins, author/college roommate, came down from Portland to give a talk as part of our Speaker’s Series, & I got some awesome people from the Berkeley lab to do the same.
Been hanging out a lot at Blackbird in Sacramento–so yummy, people!
Went to wine country twice–once to pick up some shipments with V & K (while there, we hit Turnbull, where I used to work and drank a lot. For free.)–and once with V & K & E & I to hit Turnbull’s blanc release party, complete with oysters and pulled pork sandwiches.
I threw an Oscar party, though not actually on Oscar night. You see, usually I have to run home to host the Oscar party after going to the Souper Bowl, but this year, I’d scored some concert tickets that night–so I ran to Napa after the Bowl. What concert was it? ALAN PARSONS PROJECT! As people who love me know, I love The Alan Parsons Project, and so it was a great pleasure to see them on the last night of the American tour with Ian (who graciously put up with me/it)–from the 4th row!
Melissa and Vanessa and I hit SF last month to see a world-premiere play, Dead Metaphor. The first act was really funny, but the second act wasn’t paced as well–still, it was fine. Unlike a certain student play I saw this term (cough.)
Haven’t been to the movie theatre much, but did see Zero Dark Thirty and Warm Bodies, which, in the words of Bridget Jones, is a searing vision of the wounds our century has inflicted on traditional masculinity. (Seriously, it is–it’s also got a little Romeo and Juliet thing going on.)
But really, the greatest thing about this quarter was that I was almost constantly with wonderful people, I got my work done, and I didn’t get bitten on the face by a spider (thought I did get knocked down a bit by the start of allergy season).

Next blog: WonderCon!