Chilly temperatures have descended over the Bay this week so I had to wrap up snuggly to venture into the city. The biggest Earth Sciences conference of the year has come once again to San Francisco so there’s lots of data to present, co-authors to meet up with, presentations to sit through and friends to catch up with (that’s the best part). Busy times ahead for the next few days…

To recap, here are some of the niggley things that have been making me glum lately:

• The whole long-distance marriage thing.
• I’m missing my friends back in California more and more every day, and missing the lifestyle too.
• The fact that I’m getting frustratingly little writing done as it’s too distracting to work from home with so many other people around, plus the fact that my non-academic IP address restricts my access to resources online.
• I can’t decide whether to knit or crochet.
• I have a horrid feeling that a jacket I’m crocheting is too small.
• My sewing machine is still broken.

However feeling down in the dumps and sorry for myself has lately got a bit too boring and has been doing nothing overall to aid these niggley stresses that are still niggling away at the back of my mind. So out of fear of falling further into a chasm of self pity, I thought I’d better be proactive and do something to haul myself back out- I’m naturally an optimistic soul and don’t really thrive in a pit of negativity. The forward movement of my immigration in the last couple of days has certainly helped, and it’s no coindence that my mood has ameliorated as that’s right up there at the top of  my little stress list right now. That all got FedEx-ed off this morning, so that’s one less thing to be moody about, hurrah.

Obviously there still remains the issue of missing my friends, but there’s not much I can do about the first right now except be patient. It’s natural to feel so near yet so far, especially that I’m just a matter of weeks away from having been home in England for an entire year now. Patience, patience, that’s what I need and in the meantime there’s always email and the phone.

Work however is something that I’ve been rapidly losing patience with lately. BUT the big thing that I’m happy about is that I’m now officially allowed access to the Bodleian Library at Oxford! This is a source of great excitement as I’ve been getting frustratingly little research/writing done at home as it’s too distracting with so many other people around, plus the fact that my non-academic IP address restricts my access to resources online. It’s a bit of a commute to get there, but I think the effort will be worthwhile. I’m hoping to be able to go once or twice a week which should allow me to get something done yet still allow me to maximise family time. EEEPS I’m excited!!

Getting access to the libary was quite an adventure in itself- I had to fill in an application form, write a short personal statement about why I needed to have access, PROVIDE REFERENCES to support my application and then sit down and have a ‘chat‘ with one of the library registrars. It was a bit like having a job interview! They’re basically screening people to make sure that they’re not tourists wanting to look around inside, and as the lady ‘interviewing’ me put it, they want to “stop people who are just after a quiet place to sit with a book or a newspaper.” Anyway, thankfully I passed their screening, and now have a six month pass. I can’t wait to spend time walking past all the tourists and through the magic doors with the big NO VISITORS signs

By the time I’d been granted access, and had located and poked around inside the Science Libary (which was disappointingly unspectacular which is why I’m going to work in the main libary next time which is the famous one) much of the day had gone and I didn’t really have time to take any photos of Oxford- just the one above, and a very quick photoshoot with the special girl who had come with me. This was Ava’s first big outing since she arrived in her super cool car.

So the work stuff, *sorted*. Now for the hobby stuff….

After humming and haahing for about two or three months, I *finally* decided tonight to frog the crocheted jacket that I had started to make earlier this year. Deep down I wasn’t happy with how the sizing was turning out and for that reason had put the project onto a hiatus. There’s nothing worse than pursuing a major crafting project when your heart’s just not in it.

So my crochet is now no more- all unraveled and now just balls of yarn. But this single action has also killed another bird as with this project now temporarily shelved, I’m free to get back on with my knitting and not have the difficult decision to make between the two yarn projects. YAY!

Now there’s just the small matter of getting my sewing machine fixed, but I can do that next week

Fingers crossed other things will continue to improve at the same rate as the past few days… here’s hoping!

I came to the conclusion today that the brain is like a muscle and it needs regular exercise in order to function well. I journeyed to this philosophy after a day of hard thinking, but the travel also involved fields of barley and and a stop in my local tearoom. And the sun finally came out too.

For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been gradually getting myself back into (semi) full-time research-paper-writing mode. I say ‘semi’ as a psychological precaution as that way I can justify taking a day off every now and again to spend time with friends and family before I emigrate and not beat myself up about it afterwards. I knew that getting back into my old work frame would not be an instant transition (lots of past information to recall for example!) but what I forgot to account for was quite how tiring it would be.

During the past nine months when I spent eight hours a day standing on my feet serving coffee to angry shoppers, I think large portions of my previously heavily-utilised memory function might have gone into hibernation. The coffee work was concentration-heavy as there was non-stop multitasking and lots of quick-fire instruction to take onboard, but it really only focused on what was happening in the next 90 seconds. As a result I’m now extremely efficient at listening and quick in conversation, not to mention far more conversationally articulate than I have felt for years, but when it comes to sitting down with a journal article, zoom-focussing in on what I’m reading and attempting to synthesise how it might relate to something else that I’ve read previously…. that’s what I’m struggling with right now. My short-term memory is needlepoint-sharp and I can recall a recent conversation practically word-for-word, but my longer-term recollection is like a blunt, rusty knife. And going through the whole process of sharpening the blade again is quite mentally exhausting.

Nevertheless I’m enjoying it. The end of day feeling of a tired, throbbing head from thinking too hard is far more satisfying than a feeling of tired throbbing feet from having been standing on them all day. And I’m sure with a little bit more practice I’ll get back up to speed.

PS Scarlett got to wear her new dungarees today

Every once in a while I get a bit of a blog crush where I enjoy reading it so much that I end up binging out on the archives, happily following along from post to post like a little lovesick puppy wanting more, more, more and I won’t stop until I’ve read the entire thing from cover to cover (proverbially speaking). If you’ve ever checked your blog stats and seen a HUGE spike in page views over a couple of days, sorry, but that’s probably been me

My latest blog crush has been on Tracy Cupcakes x of Cupcakes At Home x. As the snow came down on Sunday and I found myself with an empty morning owing to a cancelled walk, I settled on the couch with a cup of tea in my hand and my computer on my lap and became completely lost in her bloggy life. Not only does she have a LOVELY family of animals that expands at about the same rate as my growing plastic brood, but she’s a pretty magnificent crafter to boot. It was probably for this that I came over all creative myself on that cold Sunday afternoon.

Eagle-eyed (and crafty) visitors to PH may have noticed something exciting in one of the photos I posted a couple of weeks ago…. See in this photo? There’s a piece of luggage with bright red writing on it…

That word says *PFAFF*. Yes, dearest husband of mine flew all the way from California with my beautiful shiny sewing machine in tow Here she is…

Hello Darling!

So with freshly inspired creative blood flowing through my blogged out veins and time on my hands, it was the perfect opportunity to break her out of her luggage straps and put her to use. Remember the patchwork charm quilt that I mentioned a while ago and never mentioned again? That was my project (I’ve actually banned myself from starting new projects before others are finished as it makes me feel like I have completion issues which makes me feel guilty and then the guilt stops me feeling crafty, so nothing ever gets finished which takes me back to square one).

But anyway that quilt was progressing, but it was rather laborious and sluggish as I was working on my grandmother’s old antique hand crank. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a beautiful old machine, but it’s just rather slow and you’ve only got one hand to feed the fabric and so lining up seams and corner was about ten times more work. With my lovely Pfaff however, I made excellent progress. This is how it stood at the end of the afternoon (hard to imagine, but there was 4″ of snow just a couple of hours previously). This morning it had just been scrappy looking pieced strips.

And then in the evening, I worked on adding a border. I had excellent help of course. I wouldn’t have been able to have done this without such excellent advice and tuition. Clearly I was putting the tape measure in the wrong place each time, but he soon sorted that out for me, never seeming to mind at all. Thankyou Barn!

By the end of the night I’d put the border on too. I tried to get a picture of it this afternoon but it was so windy that it took about half an hour! Anyway, this is how it all looks now, all ready for backing and binding.

The border seemed to take almost as long as assembling all the strips. I tried to be a bit creative with the corners, partly because I wanted to make them a feature, and partly because I didn’t have the patience to sit down and mitre them properly which would have been a nightmare given the pattern of the fabric.

Proper methodological patchworkers who are old and dead would probably have completely turned in their graves at my technique as I practically bent every single rule when it came to the border- I didn’t measure, neither did I cut along a flat edge, I just looked, lined up then cut and sewed freehand, but it seems to have turned out ok. I’m pretty pleased with how the points in the corners all matched up (i.e. the points of the diagonal square are still points where they meet the seams), so I must have done something right. I’m sure they just ad-libbed and improvised in the old days.

So there it is. My almost finished patchwork. Now all I have to do is decide how I’m going to quilt it. I’m looking forward to doing that

Thankyou Tracy for inspiring me to get this finished x

But aside from an afternoon of homely domesticity there was something else that I got from reading Tracy’s blog too. Within the past year she and her boyfriend have moved their life from the near coastal parts of southeastern England to the rural wilds of northeast Scotland…..effectively an emigration, like me. Following the details of packing up their life in Kent, saying goodbye to everything in life they’d known and leaving all their friends and family, it suddenly hit me that I would be doing this myself in a few short months from now. And it’s a pretty big thing. When I’m in California, I won’t just be able to jump in a car and drive down the road to see my family, I’ll have to take time off work and fly there. This is the last time in my life that I am going to be living under the same roof as my family and I should be making the absolute most of it and spending every single second of my waking hours with them if I can help it. With this realisation, my tiring, badly-paid, unsociable-houred part time job suddenly became very unimportant to me, so before I went to bed last night I typed out my resignation letter, and this morning I gave it in. I will be leaving there on 1st May. To spend precious time with my Mummy, my Daddy, my sisters and my cat. I feel happy xxx

I will no doubt miss the little bit of income that I have been bringing in each week, but time with my loved ones is worth more than all the money I have ever earned in that job put together. And besides, the tax man should be giving me a nice little refund that I can sustain myself from for the next few months

So thankyou again Tracy Cupcakes, this weekend you gave me a nice new quilt, and some nice new priorities xxx

PS Mr Afterburn’s site is also a recent blog indulgence, and is the most touching, heartbreaking and heartwarming writing that I have ever read. But take a hanky if you go there. He also happens to be a good friend of Tracy Cupcakes.

Thank you SO much for all your kind comments after yesterday’s post. You’re all such lovely, lovely people, I’m really touched that you took the time to make your comments.

I actually feel a lot happier today. I called SirMrNin last night and he took a rather pragmatic approach to the whole situation. He encouraged me to think twice about quitting, reminding me that it provides a good change of scene and gives me a time-filler and a valuable sense of purpose and fulfillment which is good for my psyche whilst I’m waiting things out over here. He also pointed out that where he is more than willing and able to support me financially through this stage, the little bit of money that I earn allows me to do some guilt-free spending, and very importantly gives me a small sense of independence in an otherwise totally dependent situation that I find myself in during immigration limbo. Again, very good for my psyche. And very good for my craft projects too- these things require a fairly steady source of funding In these respects I can only agree with him– the opposite extreme to what I’m doing right now can be equally stressful, just in a different way. It’s kind of scary to think that someone else can know me so well, but it’s kind of comforting at the same time. I guess this is what having a special someone is all about. We also decided that four months is TOO LONG to spend apart, so we’re going to rectify that next time. I think that’s what a lot of my unhappiness was about too. It’s all the time apart, and the not knowing when we can get on with business as usual again. But I can’t do much about that unfortunately.

I think I was also panicking as I didn’t yet know my schedule for the week that he was coming over, and was worried that we wouldn’t have any time together after he’d flown all this way. I already feel awful that I won’t be able to meet him at the airport, and I was getting very anxious indeed that I wouldn’t be able to see him off either, but my questions were answered today and I now know my schedule up until the New Year. Much to my joy I have five whole days off in a row over Christmas and I also get New Year’s EVE off as well as New Year’s Day, so yes, I will be able to take him to the airport and wave him off, HURRAH! Actually I’m not looking forward to that day at all, but the fact that I can actually be there means a lot.

ALSO, as from NEXT WEEK I will be going down to a four-day week consisting of 20-23 hours with only an occasional 5.30am start. I’m so thrilled about this, and I feel back to my normal happy self again as a result! It’s amazing how just one little thing like this could have tipped me off kilter, and one little change could have got me right back on track. Like I said, for me it’s all about getting the right balance. Hopefully I have that now. My first extra day off is next Wednesday and I’ve already decided that I might go up to London to celebrate, YAY!

The other good thing about today was that it gave me the chance to write in my beautiful new Moleskine 2008 diary that I’ve been dribbling over and looking forward to using since I bought it AUGUST (I was worried they might sell out )

So today turned out to be rather nice in the end. Much, much better than yesterday when I think I hit rock bottom. The only way is up now. Thankyou again for all your lovely support, I’m really very touched by all your kindness. You’re all very special *HUGS*

…because it’s hidden behind a small unassuming grove of trees at the back of a big field.

We walked there this afternoon after lunch which took place after I’d slept in until half past midday. And then when we got back from the walk, I plonked myself down on the couch and within 20 minutes I was asleep again. Next thing I knew, it was approaching 8pm (too late to start playing with all the photos I took) and my only one day off in two weeks had slipped past my consciousness, and the beginning of the next week was approaching the horizon.

I sit here writing this still feeling utterly exhausted, living the consequences of having worked a week with each day starting with a 5.30am alarm call, and then walking through the front door again at the end of the day at 7pm. I’m tired, I’m not eating properly, I feel icky, and I’ve been a complete whingebag for the last seven days. This isn’t the person I want to be and it makes me sad that I am.

Tonight I read an email from schoolfriends about a Christmas get-together on the 27th. These days we only manage to get together a couple of times a year at the most (usually at weddings and hoidays), and it’s something I look forward to each time. Originally this was planned for the evening, but now it has been shifted to the afternoon, so I’m probably not going to be able to make it after all. I’m also beginning to get very concerned that my ‘part-time‘-job-that-I-don’t-need-the-money-from is going to steal me away from the ten days that I get to spend with DrMrNin when he is over for Christmas. I tried asking for time off last month to spend with him, but was told that this would not be possible.

Even my family have noticed how miserable I am right now and are putting pressure on me to hand in my two-week notice. I’m beginning to wonder if they’re right.