don't read comic books. do NOT read comic books. put batman: year one down immediately.

i am trying to write a paper and it hasn't gone this badly in a pretty long time. i still like grad school - i do - the balance is much different since i started teaching, but i do still like it. this one class i'm taking is a little f*cked, but i'm making the most of it, and i went out for beers with the two professors i'll be taking classes with next semester (i know this doesn't actually seem like a good way to tell what the class will be like unless you are maybe a college freshman, but i have found that in grad school one of the best ways to go is to register for classes with professors you know to be stellar and suddenly their interests are your interests. it's happened at least once a semester already), so it's going okay. the problem is - well, the first problem i guess is that this class is sort of f*cked - but i think the real problem is that there are people all around me who are embarking on "real lives" (howard has an incredible job - at first i was extremely jealous, partially because of the color schemes of his id and the office, and also because they gave him a little leveler keychain for his office keys, then later because his coworkers are rad, he works in one of the coolest neighborhoods in boston and he has the most awesome parking spot in the entire city - but now i've realized that it's just the right job for him and i'll find one for me. also, people are doing things together - taking fun road trips, seeing movies - and i just have all this homework all the time) and i want one too. i don't know how comic books really have anything to do with this, but every time i look at the screen and see how little i've written, i think "this is f*cked" and have this crazy urge to just read batman: year one cover to cover.

also i got a haircut and went darker for winter. my roommate tells me this is a thing. i never knew it, but i'm enjoying it anyway. you can't really tell anything about my hair though because i'm in pretty typical "write paper, look like sh*t" mode. it looks a little like this:

zombie eyes and everything.