2011 Halloween, another awesome weekend!

Best.Holiday.Ever.

Seriously, I love Halloween so much. We need more holidays that involve dressing in costumes, masks, watching scary movies, and maximising party opportunities ... all in my favourite autumn season!

Slight rant directed towards the absurd special event that the Indianapolis Zoo hosted. ZooBoo has been excellent in the past, but this time the grand total of candy that Elle collected was 8 pieces. Yes, you read that correctly. Why bother with giving the kids the bags? What they really needed were folders, to collect all the crap paperwork they passed out. Nothing like turning on a 4 year old like coupons for kids meals at barely mid-range chain restaurants, advertisement for a private school, toy advertisements, and my personal favourite, a discount for a Sam's Club membership. It would seem that the zoo rented out tables to companies and this was what was deemed acceptable. I thought Halloween was safe from the commercialism disaster that Christmas has been transformed into, but holiday commercialism is another entire rant that I'll spare you for now :) Anyway, Princess for ZooBoo and Jessie from Toy Story on Halloween night, her awareness of the awesomeness for dress up takes another gigantic step forward!

Meanwhile, the adult Halloween marches onward! Eric had the good fortune to be sitting next to Michelle Branch on his flight back from Denver, who gave him two tickets to the first annual Gravedigger Ball that she was opening. I went as a gypsy or pirate, and Eric went as a 1930's bartender...

Michelle Branch, dressed as a safari member from an earlier era did a wonderful job with the opening and exposed me to her music for the first time. Anybody that leads the crowd in the theme song for the Flintstones for her encore and knows the tunes for multiple levels of Mario gets my praise and respect regardless of her tendency towards country music :P

The costume contest produced some seriously amazing costumes. Absolutely awesome and levels of effort that I can only barely conceive. I posted my favourite, and am very sad that I didn't get Frankenstein and his bride. They deserve honours as well.

The Mad Hatter got my vote.

The Hans Solo deal was pretty popular.

These guys were great :)

The photo does not do these guys justice...best undead I've seen!

The start, not end, of the journey!

When individuals who have earned a PhD or EdD indicate their level of education on every piece of correspondence possible and / or have to include this tiny little fact in verbal communication as well, I feel like they saying to anybody who will listen that they have achieved greatness. It's possible. However, as I come closer to the end of my own PhD, I feel deep frustration that I see so much more out there that I cannot possibly understand in my lifetime. The degree holders can only claim a very deep knowledge of a very small vertical slice within a specific discipline. For example, as I earn a PhD in Education, I can babble on forever about adult learning needs, specifically for the online platform. Can I talk to you about educational technology? Only from what I read on the aside.... Can I talk to you about K-12 needs? Only from what my peers in college specialise in K-12 talk about... Can I talk to you about institutional effectiveness and assessment? Only from what I've experienced in the workplace as it touches my own area of expertise... My point being, there is SO MUCH about education that I can't claim expertise about, but essentially will be writing a book about my area of expertise, and already have written three 120 page theses about it. This isn't even bringing in different disciplines, but merely staying with the single discipline of education (although I feel it's essential that we become more interdisciplinary in our approaches).

As I see people create email addresses such as "doctorjohndoe" or "JohnDoePHD" or drjohn", I seriously wonder about their capability of seeing the world on a bigger scale than their own self-created bubble. Other times I see facilitators tell students to "call me Dr. Joe" or whatever. My thoughts are if you really want to "connect" with your students by being a peer in leadership form (as adult faculty should be), the reference to masses of hours focusing on a super small area of expertise is not the way to do it.

Granted, getting a post-graduate degree is much more than whatever focus you chose. The rigor and structure I have learned to extrapolate data for positive application, run valid studies, and become a change agent on a systemic level is all credited to my experiences with learning post-graduate level research and the mindset instilled by my university, Walden. However, as I look at what's left...two more theses, two more short residencies, and dissertation, I feel incredibly inadequate than before I started the program three years ago. While my focus is very strong on my particular vertical slice right now, I am very excited about graduating, taking a long holiday in Africa, and then coming back to delve into other vertical slices, cross communities with interdisciplinary studies, and discovery boundary objects that I can use for multiple communities to experience the discoveries that a particular discipline has experienced.

My fellow doctoral candidates and graduates, this is not the end. Don't walk away saying "phew, life goal complete". We are merely getting the star chart for discovering galaxies. We don't need to brag, remind, or fulfill minor insecurities with our status of past accomplishment by putting PhD and EdD on everything (putting aside the fact that it's necessary for some things, such as publications and vitas).

Meanwhile, to everybody who knows me...if I pull that "look at my three letters" stunt after I graduate and the celebration party, kick me really hard.

...in neutral...

Being in neutral in very difficult for highly goal oriented individuals. Eric and I are experiencing wonderful progress with our long term goals and sitting in neutral for our short term goals. What's next? We know of two very clear options in front of us, and one option is not moving in any direction for us to know if we are going with the second option. Given that both futures involve logistical effort, we are trying to ignore the future and enjoy the present. Indianapolis is not exactly a favourite location, but it is a convenient lily pad until future notice. Meanwhile, attention to the small things has been a requirement to not go mad with desire to know what, or I should say, where is in front of us!

Frankly, my very wise friend said that I should take this 'down time' as an opportunity to focus on my PhD and Elle, which is absolutely correct. Elle's growth has been astounding, both physically and mentally as she is now reading and writing, and although I am very glad she has moved on from her one-eyed comic head drawing series to two-eyed comic head series to snails to the current passion of kites. I have no pictures taken of this particular fad yet, but I find the kites far less unsettling than gigantic eyes staring at me.

So what am I doing these days? Writing. Drinking excellent wine. Writing. Trying to learn meditation (another post entirely). Writing. Teaching Elle. Writing. Wishing I knew what the next port of call was. Writing. Taking quick trips out of state to pretty places. Writing. Trying new gins. Writing. Investigating new excellent cuisine in Indianapolis. Writing.

Less writing: T-1 year. Fine. Maybe 18 months, but I'm really hoping not.

Growing Up? Maybe....

When you are doing something that you know is completely awesome and cool, there are two emotional reactions. The first is a somewhat natural tendency to think "I bet they wish to be in my shoes!" This occurs especially in goal-oriented people that are constantly striving to improve a situation or circumstance. The second is the happy contented sense of thinking how wonderful life is. I believe the transition between these emotions is the cusp of true self-security and maturity, and a transition that I am finally experiencing. Shutting down my Facebook account was the first signal to me that I was still experiencing the first emotion as it was all too easy in my excitement to post obnoxious snippets that essentially said "I am here, where are you?!" Something that I do not want to necessarily do is to disappear into a hole, but blasting my news and life into people's faces constantly seems equally unfriendly. I definitely recognise the value of virtual social sharing, but I also recognize that it is not the best platform for my personal growth. I do love to share my experiences and will be adding links to my Picasa albums in my blog, as well as creating real stories rather than the short hand method of communication blasts. If people wish to share in my life, and I hope you do, please pop by my blog and check out my fun crazy life. Otherwise, just give a ring. Or stop by. Or email :) However, the shotgun approach of my perceptions of a fantastic life is over...

The Last Stand (book review)

The Last Stand: Custer, Sitting Bull, and the Battle of the Little Bighorn by Nathaniel Philbrick

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

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Baking Tips

After reading this post, it may surprise you that I can plan, organize, and cook multiple course meals for many people. I can put on some pretty good parties, be a decent bartender, and have great appetisers. However, what I most certainly lack is the necessary skills for baking. There's zero art to it except in the confines of science. This is where things start going terribly wrong. Sadly, I have not even seriously cooked in a long time because travel life while studying and working is not particularly conducive to many happy hours in the kitchen surrounded by copper, spices, and wine. Thus, my first time back in the kitchen in many moons provides some important reflective insights that I thought I would share with you.

1. When putting the mixer things in the mixer, do not test if they are really in there to stay while holding on to them. They still fall out and numbness follows for a very long time.
2. When using molasses, it is strongly recommended to either a) put the cap back on immediately or b) not put it on the edge of the work area you're focused. Very bad things happen, especially if clumsiness has any potential factor.
3. Do not assume that if you can get the measuring item into the jar of whatever you're getting, ie, sugar, that means you can also manipulate the substance into your measuring device and retract it. In fact, if there is any similarity in size, you are looking at approximately 10 minutes of anger and suddenly having empathy with the sheep that gets their heads stuck in fences.
4. Baking measure a lot of stuff. I mean, a LOT of stuff. Have lots of measuring devices available so you don't have to keep washing them absurdly thoroughly and trick your man into the washing. Another option is to plan out your dry measuring before the wet measuring, but option A is much easier.
5. Do not, I repeat, DO NOT use the baking soda let in your refrigerator for two years. It turns odd colours. In fact, you may consider pitching it altogether.
6. Wearing dark clothes in any activity that involves flour is stupid.
7. When it says butter should be room temperature, it really means it. Otherwise it has a habit of slipping around, and possibly popping out and sticking to the oven range hood.
8. Do not expect a manicure to survive any type of baking effort.
9. It turns out that if you haven't used appliances in a long time, cobwebs develop. Check for these before you use them. If you don't, you then have to wrestle with the idea of just not telling the individual for whom you're baking or redoing the sifting. I'll leave it up to you on which option I selected.

Just for you to have a visual of what happens when you do not maintain the baking habit plus suck at it in the first place, please observe and vicariously learn through me :)

Iceland (book review)

Ice Land by Betsy Tobin

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

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