kareina

After a truly delightful time in Wisconsin visiting with family I'd not seen in many, many years (most of them not since I was 16!) and good friends from An Tir who settled there I boarded a plane for London. Once again my charmed life provides me extra luxury; I had three seats in a row to myself, which meant that I could lift up the arms and lay down across them all to get some good sleep on the flight. And mine was the last row before one of the toilets, making it very easy to make necessary trips. Landed around mid-day (a good hour or more late, so it is good I didn't plan a tight connection to get to Milan) and made my way to an affordable hotel not far from the airport. I spent the day trying to catch up with e-mail LiveJournal FaceBook etc. and did a short walk to a local store to pick up some shampoo and some fruit juice to have with my muesli in the morning. I then went to sleep early and slept till a bit after midnight, when I got up and accomplished a few useful tasks (like mending the skirt I'd ripped the other day) and more on-line tasks. I've got another couple of hours before I need to head back to the airport for my flight to Milan, so now I need to decide if I want another nap, or if I'd rather listen to some of those Italian CDs I was given (thank you blamebrampton!).

I heard from one of my fellow post-docs today--there is a bbq at his house on Friday, so I'll get to meet people and start developing a local social life straight away.

in the past day and a half I have:

* Finished chapters 1 & 4 and sent them to my advisor

* got back chapters 1, 2, & 3 with minor suggested corrections from my advisor (and have already acted upon those from 2 & 3)

* Packed up all of my things in my office and brought them home

* got all of the UTAS catalogue numbers written on the rock samples I collected and turned them in

* re-organized 150 rock thin-sections into numerical order (well they were already in order, but I had one box of "didn't wind up doing analysis on these" and one of "samples I actually used", and it was needful to consolidate them back into a single series again) and turned them in.

* four loads of laundry, including all of my bedding I want to take with me (and re-made the bed with sheets from the house, as I may not be sleeping much just now, but I want to be comfortable when I do)

* re-arranged the furniture in this room so that I can get to the shelves/cupboards in which my things I still need to pack are located.

* Made arrangements for the shipping company to pick up my things to ship to Italy on Monday

* attended my good bye dance/party and had a wonderful time seeing everyone who could make it & got in a reasonable amount of dancing (and got some wonderful gifts from friends, thank you--it is so good to be loved!)

* managed to get a total of seven hours of sleep, in short, concentrated bursts

( Still to do before flying out )

I've finally finished the edits for most of chapter two and gathered together the figures from their various sources. Just the "summary of all" paragraphs to go. But, first, it is time for a walk to stretch my legs, which are sore from sitting still for hours on end, and to see if that lovely moon which was out earlier is still out... Yes, I wanted this chapter done days ago, but I think I may just be able to manage it on the next session at the computer. Wish me luck.

In other news, we may have saved me some major time. clovis_t, who is flying to Scotland to see his family on the same day I head to the US to see mine, is starting to think in terms of relocating to the UK rather than just visiting, and is seriously thinking of leaving his stuff (that has been packed in boxes along with my stuff ever since we moved in with his parents back in late November/early December, since we were still a couple back then and anticipating moving together wherever we went next) in the boxes and he can come collect it from me in Italy after it arrives. He doesn't really have that much in there, mostly books and clothes. And while the books would be easy to find, as the inventory specifies which books are in which boxes, the clothes were used as packing material, with no notes as to what items went into which boxes. If we don't have to empty and re-pack those boxes, that will be a very good thing. And I don't think the total volume of the things which belong to him are going to make any difference in the cost of shipping whatsoever. Besides, it will be nicer to work out who gets to keep which of the books we purchased together at some time when we have leisure time, and not while stressed about getting things done before time to board the plane.

My visa has been affixed to my passport, and is en route to me.

Main travel tickets have been purchased. I fly from Sydney to San Francisco on Thursday 18 June. This means that I *must* have the thesis done before then! I will need someone willing to drive me to June Crown from the Bay area--any takers, or shall I ask on SCA-West? I might need crash space on Thursday evening--I've given my step-sister, who recently moved to SF first refusal on my company that evening, but haven't heard back yet.

I will be doing a road-trip with a friend after Crown, getting me to Seattle by 26 June, where my sisters and I will all be at the same place, at the same time for the first time since my step-dad died, over five years ago. It will be different--back then two of them were contemplating starting families, and now they each have two children...

I will be flying from Chicago to Milan leaving on 6 July, but I still need to arrange travel to Chicago. I will probably head that way early enough to visit with family in Wisconsin before I go (with a potential stop in Colorado to see friends there), but there is a slight temptation to stay on the west coast and attend An Tir-West War instead.

I arrive in Milan in the morning on 8 July. Give me a few days to get settled, but after that, friends are encouraged to come visit, I may not wind up with luxury accommodation, but I'm always happy to provide at least floor space...

But, before any of that I need to:

* finish the additions/corrections to Chapter six my advisor suggested.
* ditto for chapters 1-4
* get the figures for chapters 2-4 camera ready
* book flight from Tassie to Sydney
* print the thesis & get it bound
* unpack my boxes which have been in storage since December, get clovis_t's stuff out (he will help with that part, but I so want to be involved), and repack the boxes with a detailed inventory, including value of each item
* decide when/where all to visit & book flight to Chicago (+/- additional stops?)
* get boxes to a shipping company & on their way to Italy
* cut out sewing projects to take on the plane with me--make certain that they won't need to be touched by scissors again till I arrive.
* pack luggage
* ship by air anything that was too important in the short term to send by boat, but that I don't have room to take with me

oh, and some sleep would be nice, too. I got almost three hours last night before getting back up to return to work. Got sleepy and curled up in bed for a nap, only to have an important text message come through. After replying to it, and to the two follow-up messages I gave up and returned to work, but it may well be time to try for another nap, because my brain is going fuzzy...

Long hours of work, all night, every night. I seem to work best at night, so have gone nocturnal. Last night I finally finished up the latest revisions on chapter five, including some new information and new figures which will make writing parts of chapter six *much* easier, then did a walk, my yoga, read my 1000 words a day, and went to bed at 08:40, feeling pretty good about having accomplished all that. Slept deeply and peacefully till 14:00, when the Italian embassy called in reply to an e-mail I'd sent them. (I had forwarded them a message from the university, which said that she expects to receive my visa authorization on Thursday 28 May and will sent it via DHL to me so that I can take it and my passport to the embassy down here to get the visa itself affixed to the passport.) I had already turned in my visa application complete with passport to the local Honourary Consulate here in Hobart, who then sent them off to Melbourne. At that time I'd had a tentative booking which had me flying out of Hobart the first week of June. Which is why the embassy guy called me--there is no way I would be able to fly out that soon--I can't leave the country till he gets the visa into my passport and the passport back to me. Granted, looking at what still needs doing for thesis work, I'd already revised my goals for departure to heading out of here on time for West Kingdom A&S the weekend of 12 June, instead of the first week of June. Now, looking at the calendar, and talking with the embassy about realistic times for paperwork to be shipped over here and visas making it into the passport and passport making it back to me, I'm thinking I should revise the plans again and give Kingdom A&S a miss and try for June Crown instead.

What do people think? Would I get to see those of you in the West whom I love and miss at Crown? Is there a camp which could take me in and give me a place to sleep and other basic necessities that I wouldn't be able to bring with me on the international flight? Is there someone who could get me from the airport to the event?

How about Portland people--if I were to spend the following Monday and Tuesday +/- Wednesday evenings (22/23/24 June) there would I get to see everyone there I'd want to see?

Seattle folk: is the weekend of 26 June a good time to see people?

I'd hoped for a month in the US, and it is looking like I'll be lucky to get two weeks, but however long it is, it will be good to catch up with folk...

One of the guys at the University of Milano has kindly sent me a letter answering my "what is it like there" questions, and he included some links. One to the map of where the uni is located, which includes a button for a "street view". I've never bothered to click on one of those before, but since this is where I'm expecting to move, I did. I am most relieved to see trees lining the street outside the uni!

minor panic starts to set in--I want my thesis submitted at the end of May, because I'd like to travel in the US in June, and I need to be in Italy to take up that job offer at the end of June (this assumes that all goes well with the visa application and paperwork etc.)

I lost some working time today heading in to town to talk to the woman at the Italian consulate. Yes, it turns out that Hobart has one. It is a one-woman office, and it isn't listed on the web page listing the Italian consulates in all of the other capitol cities in Australia, but when I couldn't get any of those phone numbers to work, I tried the phone book, where the Hobart consulate (but none of the others) is listed. When one dials that number the voice on the other end says "hello" (not "Italian consulate", nor even the name of the travel agency, which is on the door of her office). When I told her I needed to know what sort of visa to apply for, she told me I needed to bring in my application, passport, passport photos, and all supporting documents. This not being as helpful as I might have liked, I printed out the e-mail letting me know that I have been selected for the position, and went in. She read the letter slowly, moving her lips as she read the words (and so I guess that she learned English later in life), and then printed out the form for me (which is good, because I couldn't find any forms on their web page) and let me know that I'd need information on my salary and health insurance. She looked at me funny when I admitted that I didn't know what the salary was yet. (As one who has been on a student budget for most of my life, it is reasonably safe to assume that the salary will be "more than I'm used to", what more do I really need to know than that?) Armed with solid information, I then went back to uni and e-mailed my contact in Milan and let him know what details I'd need to apply for the visa. He replied with salary details (why, yes, it is more than I'm used to!) and let me know that he'd have a copy of the contract (in both languages) soon. So I can put "visa application" on the back burner till I get that, and keep focusing on thesis stuff.

Which is not as far along as I want it to be, but I am determined to succeed in the goal of done on time to travel in June. I've just completed the last calculation for chapter five, so I hope to give that one its final edit (and checking that the numbers quoted match the new, officially final version of the table of results) and get the figures together tomorrow. ok, that is a long list, it might go longer than just tomorrow, but I sure hope not much longer). Then I can fill in the last of the holes in chapter two and write chapter six (discussions and conclusions). I think I've been doing a good enough job with organizing the figures that there shouldn't be much time elapsed between finishing chapter six and having a good copy ready to bind and turn in.

Other things to do--investigate air fares and see how many places/friends I can manage to visit during early and mid June (if you want to see me on that trip, let me know. If you've got crash space, let me know that, and if there is a special event you think I'd want to attend during that month, let me know that too--I may not get to see everyone I want to see during that trip, but I can try!) Check out how long shipping takes, and figure out by when I need to ship stuff such that it gets to Italy around the same time I do. Then make time to open up the packed boxes and get clovis_t's stuff out and re-pack things before shipping. It is going to be a busy next few weeks! They say that sleep is for the weak, but, alas, if that is true, then I am week, because I am not willing to slight myself on sleep (though, I will squidge it around to odd times in the day as needed).

Spent much more time doing things to help settle into the new house than uni work today. clovis_t and I did a "tip run" (in Australia they call it a "tip" because you "tip" the "rubbish" out of your "ute", rather than the US version of "dump" where you "dump" your "trash") because his parent's house is far enough out of town that there is no "rubbish" collection service. I really needed to do this one for me--the accumulation of bottles, cans, newspapers etc. to be recycled was getting much too deep for any more to be added. It is my hope that we will do a tip run often enough that it doesn't get that bad again.

In the evening I took the large boxes of kitchen stuff off to storage (thanks madryn_1960 for the use of your crawl-space! This also *really* needed to happen. When we moved in the boxes of books and craft stuff got piled in a corner of the "rumpus room", much to the annoyance of clovis_t's sister (who wanted the room available for her birthday party last weekend) and dad. Since they made it clear they didn't like the stuff there, when he took the last load of our stuff over and I kept scrubbing the old house, he stacked the boxes in the middle of our room, where they towered taller than I am, and left only a very narrow path. Yesterday I cleaned our room, but the cost was putting those boxes into the hallway. This made life inconvenient for all of us, as it drastically narrowed the egress. There now being no room in our room for boxes (the new configuration has my recliner/computer station in the middle of the room), I couldn't move them back in, so out they had to go.

Between those two major distractions (and a couple of walks--one with baronsnorri, who rents the house from madryn_1960 under which I am storing my stuff) that didn't leave as much time for uni work as I would have liked, with only two full hours devoted to it--most of that this morning before 06:30, when I went back to sleep. But that work did give me an additional 214 words for my thesis, so it is better than not working. Other than a party in the evening at the home of our local Baroness, I don't have any distractions planned for tomorrow, and despite the fact that the family would like the boxes out of the rumpus room, I think I'm finally settled in enough to devote energy to work. I sure hope so!

The past few have been hectic! I last checked in with you all on Wednesday. Thursday clovis_t and I spent the morning finishing scrubbing the walls at the old house--we were nearly done when the carpet cleaner arrived, so he started on the rooms we'd finished, and we managed to complete the final room as he was ready to start it. We then started packing the kitchen stuff. I am very happy to have the nice wooden tourney boxes--they make such safe places to pack one's breakable items, safely cushioned with scrap fabric, clothing, or stuffed animals. We managed to get that *mostly* done and the load ready to be taken to the new house by around 10pm. We dropped it off, filling our bedroom with boxes, then went back up the hill, built a nest for the night out of mattress pads we don't plan on keeping, and managed to get a nap between 0:30 and 05:30. Then up and finishing packing, scrubbing the kitchen and laundry room while he took stuff we aren't keeping and couldn't give away via FreeCycle to the "Tip" (Australian word for dump) shop and another load back to the house. He got back from the errands on time to finish scrubbing whilst I got a quick shower, then into town to turn in the keys and off to my citizenship ceremony. From there a quick stop at the store to grab some food for the party and home with enough time to spare to clean up the kitchen enough to use it, bake a cake and folks started to arrive.

The party was much fun--just sitting around with a group of friends telling stories and relaxing. I didn't even sew, having managed to get enough cuts and scrapes on my hands over a week of packing to be disinclined to hold fabric, needle, and thread until they heal a bit. People wandered off fairly early (for a party), which meant that we were able to tidy up the kitchen a bit, unbury our bed of junk and create a path to the bed and do yoga, read my 1000 words of geologic literature, and still get to sleep only a bit after midnight.

Now we need to find a storage unit to keep all of our boxes. The pile takes up only a tiny corner of the huge rumpus room, but Crian's dad and sister are *very* unhappy with us for having it there at all. She wants it gone on time for her birthday party tomorrow (never mind that the family has had a pile which takes up more floor space but less vertical height in there for many, many months). Personally, I'd rather spend some time working on my thesis, which I haven't touched for over ten days as we did moving stuff! I wonder if we can find a storage unit which will pick it up, store it, and then ship it to wherever we go next? I'm battered, bruised, and tired of moving stuff.

This year my birthday is The Answer. Pitty the Earth got destroyed before we discovered the question.

Spent yesterday doing more packing and moving, and today moving and scrubbing the walls. I also received the dirt tires for my trike (yay! My new house is on a dirt road, so I needed them), so as soon as I post this I'll celebrate my birthday by pedalling down the hill to my new home, and spend the evening trying to create order in the chaos there. Tomorrow: more cleaning, and (finally) packing all of my kitchen toys. Decided that part could wait till the carpet cleaners got here tomorrow so we focused on getting the carpeted rooms ready to go.