Update (day 3)

I was so blessed to get to sneak out on my family last night and have dinner with a friend. We sat in her cozy living room and we ate Indian food, and we talked -- for about 3 hours. (Apparently I had a lot to say. And so did she.) Her cat Zimmie sat on my lap and purred loudly.

My friend said she'd visited my blog and it looked like things are really flowing for me right now. "You're getting so much done!"

No, I'm not. I'm grinding away here, gears screaming, hoping that the muse will show up at some point (because we know that just like eating encourages appetite, writing encourages inspiration, right?) and HELP ME!!!

Yesterday I had a presentation at school that -- even though I knew that it was no big deal -- was in front of the Dean's Council and (idiot for authority figures that I am) I completely overprepared for. (Not that it helped, though I think we will be approved for our learning community -- Writing Monsters -- next winter quarter.) But when I went back to my desk, I hauled out the poetry manuscript, opened the file on the computer, and started typing in changes and cutting out poems that don't fit as well as they could. It's down to 71 pages now (including the title pages). Doable. Today I'll drop by Kinko's and print it out. Maybe I'll actually put it in the mail?

Today I will work on my article for historylink.org (at least for fifteen minutes). Which reminds me, if you haven't visited Priscilla Long's blog at http://theamericanscholar.org/what-do-worms-want/, you really should.