tapas

I was lucky enough to put a library hold on Neil Gaiman's new Fortunately the Milk in the brief window after it had entered the library system but before it was available for check out. So I got one of the first copies. C came in as I was starting to read it, so I began reading aloud to her. And she listened. She listened through all 128 pages of it. In one sitting. I guess we can start chapter books now. Maybe Alice in Wonderland next?

Anyway, after a couple more reads over the course of the fortnight (good thing I enjoy that book), I was telling her that it had to go back to the library and we couldn't renew it because someone else had a hold on it. "You know," I said. "The one with the milk. And the dinosaur. In the balloon."

"Floaty-ball-person-carrier," she corrected me.

:) Win. I guess she was listening. Half a day after that conversation she told me she was sad that we had to give the milk book back to the library and couldn't renew it. I have offered to procure a copy just for us.

(Suggestions for other whimsical books of about that length welcome, please. But note that C does not like books with too much narrative tension. Bad Guys who are actually threatening are not fun for her. Bad Guys who are silly are ok.)

The library had the cookbook I was interested in, so I am now 12th in line on the waiting list for it. Useful to preview cookbooks before buying and make sure they aren't full of eggy cheesy recipes.

In contrast to yesterday's race to check things off the to-do list, today I will focus on larger projects that I don't actually expect to complete. I have one paper to write and one to read and edit. I will alternate between them. I might get the editing done today, but it's ok if I don't.

Just saw Julie & Julia. It's hard for me to tell what would be a spoiler here. Since this is non-fiction (with a little embellishing) and since Julia is so iconic, I tend to assume the basic outline of facts is pretty well known. I'll say that I enjoyed the movie to the point of laughing out loud at various points. But I'll put details ( back here )

Last night I finished Jeffrey Eugenides' book Middlesex. I enjoyed it very much; it was funny and intelligent. But I have one complaint.

( Spoilers behind here! )

Today on the plane, I read The Final Solution by Michael Chabon. You know - the one with the parrot.

( Major spoilers herein )

Hello? Anybody out there?

It's kind of lonely over here today.

Anyone read any good books lately? Seen any good movies?

Two weeks ago I spent two nights in Bethesda for NIH grant reviews. It was a good trip. I had several friends on the review committee and had a good time chatting with people during the brief breaks they gave us for lunches and dinners. Had some minor drama on the return trip when it turned out I was at the wrong airport because they'd booked me an itinerary that had me arriving at National and departing from Dulles, but it all turned out fine in the end. (That afternoon featured tapas saying 'Dulles!?! What do you mean that flight is at Dulles!?!' and, an 80 mph, $70 cab ride later, 'No, I do not have a paper ticket. I never had a paper ticket.')

Last week I finished an NIH grant application of my own. Won't know until July how it will fare. It's a resubmission of a revised application and I think we addressed the reviewers' main concerns, but I'm trying not to get my hopes up because with the recent tightening of the NIH budget only 12% of applications to that particular NIH sub-institute are getting funded. That means that really good applications with nothing really wrong with them aren't getting funded because there just isn't enough money to go around. But there's no point in worrying about that now. All we can do is work and wait and try to make some progress so we can send in an update before the review with new results that convince the reviewers how productive and worthy we are.

Interspersed between those, creed_of_hubris and I looked at more houses. We saw some nice ones, but nothing quite right yet. The houses with our favorite layouts weren't in the right neighborhood or had what looked like foundation problems. The houses in the right neighborhood that were in good repair seemed small or poorly laid out or just didn't appeal to us for no reason we could articulate. We've expanded the areas of town that we're considering to see if we can find a newer house with the desired layout in a neighborhood that is still somewhat walkable if not as walkable as our original target neighborhood. But our realtor is still keeping an eye on the original target neighborhood in case anything new comes on the market there. She has a pretty good idea of our tastes now. Though she learned last weekend that we would rather not be in a gated neighborhood, which there are a lot of around here.

Earlier this week I had a quickie overnight trip to Philadelphia for a project meeting for another grant, for which we'll be submitting an application in July. Sorry I didn't try to get in touch with anyone while I was there. I was there for only 26 hours and was on duty pretty much the whole time. I stayed with my collaborators and talked science with them around their kitchen table over dinner. I finally read The DaVinci Code in the airplane on the way home. There were some things I liked about the characters and the plot, but there were also things I disliked about the writing style and the ending. Can't decide whether I want to read Dan Brown's other books. I gather that they feature the same main character.

Late next week - conference in Acapulco! My job is frequently stressful, but the travel perks are great!