Gillian Polack's Blog, page 49
November 12, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-11-13T12:54:00
My publisher has sent me a whole box of Langue[dot]doc 1305. This means that anyone who orders from Satalyte's website ( http://satalyte.com.au/product/langue-dot-doc-1305-gillian-polack/ ) can, for as long as these copies last, get signed copies and even personally inscribed, if you let me know directly*. You might want to order sooner rather than later though, for two have already gone (I'm posting them this afternoon).
And now I'm due a cup of coffee, for I've earwormed myself with one of the songs from the cave karaoke session in the book. It's my own fault. I've been complaining, after all and someone has to tell me to stop.
*let me know about the inscription directly - order the book first!
And now I'm due a cup of coffee, for I've earwormed myself with one of the songs from the cave karaoke session in the book. It's my own fault. I've been complaining, after all and someone has to tell me to stop.
*let me know about the inscription directly - order the book first!
gillpolack @ 2014-11-13T11:33:00
Today is a "Nothing but a pack of cards!" day. Lots of little irritants, the same as the whole of the week. One of those weeks when the big things seem to mostly behave, but for every big thing that behaves there are twenty little things that go wrong. The little things have added up to far too much, and I'm having to severely check my finances and my scheduling. They may be fine - it may just be that people bill quickly and pay slowly and that I'm simply not hearing from people because they're taking their time - but they may not be, and it's always better to check than to worry.
I still mean to do more substantive posts (you've had too much of the everyday-whinge lately) but I have to get the many small messes out of the way first. So many of them! So annoying!
Right now, though, I'm going to do an hour of real work, for that will ground me and make me feel as if my life is not merely about the small and annoying messes caused by others. After that hour of real work, I have three hours of messages, all of which are mainly of the mopping-up variety. Then I can spend the rest of the day doing real work, and I'll feel better for it. I need progress, not puddles!
I still mean to do more substantive posts (you've had too much of the everyday-whinge lately) but I have to get the many small messes out of the way first. So many of them! So annoying!
Right now, though, I'm going to do an hour of real work, for that will ground me and make me feel as if my life is not merely about the small and annoying messes caused by others. After that hour of real work, I have three hours of messages, all of which are mainly of the mopping-up variety. Then I can spend the rest of the day doing real work, and I'll feel better for it. I need progress, not puddles!
November 11, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-11-12T14:20:00
The current crop of essay-writing students did something particularly clever last night. They worked out by themselves that the skills I was teaching them could help with most writing. Not every class reaches that point, and most need encouraging towards it. I was very chuffed when they made their own links and worked out the reasons why we teach essay-writing the way we do in Australia and why essays are such an important part of evaluation. They're still yearning for simple answers, but they're beginning to see why those simple answers may not be in their own best interests. It's moments like this that make teaching so worthwhile.
November 10, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-11-11T12:17:00
Thank you, everyone for the good wishes.
It's funny that things like that (not the good wishes, the fact that if my father had been diagnosed at my age, he would have lived) create a kind of logjam. I did the big things, but got behind on the small things. I waited for other people to do things they'd promised, leaving anything that might conflict until I'd heard from them. Except they've done other things and forgotten the promises (or ignored my emails) and I was too busy worrying to realise. This last hour, I've started catching up on the small things and finding a way out of this small mess. Mostly that means littering the world with messages, because everyone was out or in between jobs.
A large chunk of my problem today is that people said "Help me with this" and have decided that favours are not returnable. Which is their choice. I just wish they'd say so straight up, because then I could sort things out my way and get things done. Being left in limbo is far worse than someone not being able to talk to someone else on one's behalf, or not getting round to write something.
And now I'm worried that I've been leaving other people in limbo. I have one more phonecall and then I shall turn to my email and see what else has fallen behind. I've got til 2 pm to sort stuff out, so I might as well sort as much as possible.
It's funny that things like that (not the good wishes, the fact that if my father had been diagnosed at my age, he would have lived) create a kind of logjam. I did the big things, but got behind on the small things. I waited for other people to do things they'd promised, leaving anything that might conflict until I'd heard from them. Except they've done other things and forgotten the promises (or ignored my emails) and I was too busy worrying to realise. This last hour, I've started catching up on the small things and finding a way out of this small mess. Mostly that means littering the world with messages, because everyone was out or in between jobs.
A large chunk of my problem today is that people said "Help me with this" and have decided that favours are not returnable. Which is their choice. I just wish they'd say so straight up, because then I could sort things out my way and get things done. Being left in limbo is far worse than someone not being able to talk to someone else on one's behalf, or not getting round to write something.
And now I'm worried that I've been leaving other people in limbo. I have one more phonecall and then I shall turn to my email and see what else has fallen behind. I've got til 2 pm to sort stuff out, so I might as well sort as much as possible.
gillpolack @ 2014-11-11T00:33:00
I'm safely through. No cancer.
This is where I admit that I've reached the dangerous age (given my family history), and that we couldn't rule out cancer for some of the things my body does until the moment when the gastro expert pronounced me perfectly fine. I'm so fine I don't need checking for fully five years, which is astonishingly good. I lost five days over it, which is a bit of a nuisance, but I lost five days in such a very good cause.
What I suspect is that the reason I was so very obliterated these last few days wasn't just the interesting effects of the various beverages and tablets I had to take. What I suspect is that I reached my physical limit a couple of weeks back and have been running on adrenaline.
The life-revolving-around-the-bathroom gave me the enforced break I needed. I realised this last night, in fact, when it dawned on me that the last time I felt like this was that impossible night in York.
This means that I need to be kind for myself for a few weeks. No-one should be so very tired that bad period pain and the incapacity to take codeine for it (for it was forbidden under the per-colonoscopy regime) is merely a minor annoyance to be waved away. It appears that I possess a very strong will and can do some extraordinary things by pulling it into play. I really need to learn when I'm using that strong will and when my body's being capable all on its own.
The trouble is that I really love work. I love writing and editing and thinking and research and all kinds of teaching. I don't like it when an unreliable body interferes with work. Or with friendships. Which it does.
At any rate, I have one source of worry the less. I slept half this morning and spent the afternoon sedated. Life's looking pretty good. Mind you, I'm still tired. Bedtime!
This is where I admit that I've reached the dangerous age (given my family history), and that we couldn't rule out cancer for some of the things my body does until the moment when the gastro expert pronounced me perfectly fine. I'm so fine I don't need checking for fully five years, which is astonishingly good. I lost five days over it, which is a bit of a nuisance, but I lost five days in such a very good cause.
What I suspect is that the reason I was so very obliterated these last few days wasn't just the interesting effects of the various beverages and tablets I had to take. What I suspect is that I reached my physical limit a couple of weeks back and have been running on adrenaline.
The life-revolving-around-the-bathroom gave me the enforced break I needed. I realised this last night, in fact, when it dawned on me that the last time I felt like this was that impossible night in York.
This means that I need to be kind for myself for a few weeks. No-one should be so very tired that bad period pain and the incapacity to take codeine for it (for it was forbidden under the per-colonoscopy regime) is merely a minor annoyance to be waved away. It appears that I possess a very strong will and can do some extraordinary things by pulling it into play. I really need to learn when I'm using that strong will and when my body's being capable all on its own.
The trouble is that I really love work. I love writing and editing and thinking and research and all kinds of teaching. I don't like it when an unreliable body interferes with work. Or with friendships. Which it does.
At any rate, I have one source of worry the less. I slept half this morning and spent the afternoon sedated. Life's looking pretty good. Mind you, I'm still tired. Bedtime!
November 8, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-11-08T23:16:00
I'm a bit quiet because Monday is colonoscopy day and this time round the prep is wiping me out. I started Thursday. I'll have a great deal to catch up on next week. I'm around on FB and Twitter a lot, but not being terribly intelligent. And I've caught up on stray TV and DVDs and read more for the Aurealis.
It's taken me ten minutes to compose this email. My umpteenth colonoscopy and I've never been as wiped as this before. Possibly it's my body treating it as a detox, or maybe it's just because I was so tired beforehand. Anyhow, I've done very little and taken a very long time to do it since Wednesday. I was ahead enough on most things so that I'm not behind yet, but I may be, if this continues. Ah well, I obviously need the rest. (not the sleep - I've not had much sleep with this prep. Just much rest.)
It's taken me ten minutes to compose this email. My umpteenth colonoscopy and I've never been as wiped as this before. Possibly it's my body treating it as a detox, or maybe it's just because I was so tired beforehand. Anyhow, I've done very little and taken a very long time to do it since Wednesday. I was ahead enough on most things so that I'm not behind yet, but I may be, if this continues. Ah well, I obviously need the rest. (not the sleep - I've not had much sleep with this prep. Just much rest.)
November 5, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-11-06T15:11:00
Unless publishers send more books, I'm almost through the Aurealis reading. This is rather early and we're down on numbers, so I'm expecting more books.
They've been a bit of a godsend this week, actually (why I've made much progress in them) because it's a tough week for a number of reasons which you would be happier if I didn't enumerate. Yesterday was so bad that I could only walk 150 metres before my knee refused to co-operate. This worried me, but today I was put in a position where I had to walk just over 2 kilometres and I managed it. So I'm not as worried by the other inventions life has undertaken than I maybe could have been*, for my capacity to walk is slowly increasing and, despite live intervening and despite bad days, I'm still deadline central. If I can finish my chapter rewrite and finish editing one article, and diminish 5,000 bad words to 2,000 amazing words, then it will have been a good week, workwise, because of that lack of losing time. I have until Saturday night to achieve all this Maybe until Sunday lunchtime.
One day I'll do you an interesting post. That's more likely now I'm running out of Aurealis reading, to be honest, for I'll be able to talk about my reading more from here on in. Also my writing. Also... maybe my life will become more interesting? I live in hope. If my knee is less interesting then the change has to go somewhere, and my life is where I think it should be!
*Some are the usual slew of medical stuff. Some are people assuming I don't know my own subject specialisation and pushing me towards jobs in nineteenth century American history. Some are... now we're getting towards the too much detail.
They've been a bit of a godsend this week, actually (why I've made much progress in them) because it's a tough week for a number of reasons which you would be happier if I didn't enumerate. Yesterday was so bad that I could only walk 150 metres before my knee refused to co-operate. This worried me, but today I was put in a position where I had to walk just over 2 kilometres and I managed it. So I'm not as worried by the other inventions life has undertaken than I maybe could have been*, for my capacity to walk is slowly increasing and, despite live intervening and despite bad days, I'm still deadline central. If I can finish my chapter rewrite and finish editing one article, and diminish 5,000 bad words to 2,000 amazing words, then it will have been a good week, workwise, because of that lack of losing time. I have until Saturday night to achieve all this Maybe until Sunday lunchtime.
One day I'll do you an interesting post. That's more likely now I'm running out of Aurealis reading, to be honest, for I'll be able to talk about my reading more from here on in. Also my writing. Also... maybe my life will become more interesting? I live in hope. If my knee is less interesting then the change has to go somewhere, and my life is where I think it should be!
*Some are the usual slew of medical stuff. Some are people assuming I don't know my own subject specialisation and pushing me towards jobs in nineteenth century American history. Some are... now we're getting towards the too much detail.
November 4, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-11-05T08:51:00
I'm in the middle of one of those weeks where everything seems a bit rushed. A new course (a very short one, already a third done) and my regular teaching are back-to-back so I come home after 9 pm on Tuesday and leave 12 hours later. Yesterday I took the afternoon off (it was Melbourne Cup Day, so I visited friends, had afternoon tea, saw the race, got immensely miserable about the horse that died) which meant that 9 pm wasn't even nearly the end of my day. I started at 9 am and finished about 1 am. Today's the same, but without the lengthy afternoon break.
It's happened like this for years, that other work doesn't step aside for teaching, so I don't know why this week it caught me by surprise. But it did and one of my papers is going to be a few days late. I've drafted it, but I need to check in with the editor and I need to do some significant redrafting. That's today.
On the Aurealis front, I'm running out of books to read again (down to three! need more nominations, instantly) but I'm way behind on filling in the spreadsheet. Our chair is going to get such a shock when I suddenly add so much to my columns. This means that there is no Aurealis in my day. Instead, I shall focus on two essays and possibly a chapter from the Beast. Now, however, I'm off to teach, for it's reaching 9 am apace!
It's happened like this for years, that other work doesn't step aside for teaching, so I don't know why this week it caught me by surprise. But it did and one of my papers is going to be a few days late. I've drafted it, but I need to check in with the editor and I need to do some significant redrafting. That's today.
On the Aurealis front, I'm running out of books to read again (down to three! need more nominations, instantly) but I'm way behind on filling in the spreadsheet. Our chair is going to get such a shock when I suddenly add so much to my columns. This means that there is no Aurealis in my day. Instead, I shall focus on two essays and possibly a chapter from the Beast. Now, however, I'm off to teach, for it's reaching 9 am apace!
November 2, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-11-03T10:27:00
My blog post on what I taught last week is coming. Right now, Christmas is coming faster, however. I blame life for gross intervention.
I've not wasted my last few days - I just haven't done much writing. I've got a first draft of an article I promised, and some serious thoughts on the missing 3,000 words in another. Mostly, however, I've read Aurealis books. Five so far this month. And I went marketing (loquats!). And I saw friends (and friends saw me). I'm a lot more cheerful than i was this time last week, as a result. Even if the Aurealis books come flooding in during the last four weeks (which it looks as if they won't - the final number might be a mere 50-something this year) I will be able to cope. And I've rested. I needed the rest. The virus that was occupying my body doesn't like it when I rest, and shifts itself to go occupy somewhere else. This is why my aim for today includes two more novels - only one of them is for the Aurealis awards, however. The other is because it contains my answer to those missing 3,000 words.
Also, I shall start work on a bibliographical essay, just because I can.
I've not wasted my last few days - I just haven't done much writing. I've got a first draft of an article I promised, and some serious thoughts on the missing 3,000 words in another. Mostly, however, I've read Aurealis books. Five so far this month. And I went marketing (loquats!). And I saw friends (and friends saw me). I'm a lot more cheerful than i was this time last week, as a result. Even if the Aurealis books come flooding in during the last four weeks (which it looks as if they won't - the final number might be a mere 50-something this year) I will be able to cope. And I've rested. I needed the rest. The virus that was occupying my body doesn't like it when I rest, and shifts itself to go occupy somewhere else. This is why my aim for today includes two more novels - only one of them is for the Aurealis awards, however. The other is because it contains my answer to those missing 3,000 words.
Also, I shall start work on a bibliographical essay, just because I can.
November 1, 2014
gillpolack @ 2014-11-02T11:05:00
The History Girls have kindly invited me into their midst (as some of you know) and allocated me the 2nd of every month. My first post is up: http://the-history-girls.blogspot.com.au/2014/11/dialogue-in-novels-medieval-experiment.html and is all about playing with dialogue. It's illustrated!
