Worst Day Ever

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh! All of the other students in my program have had their breaking points previously in the semester where they have pretty much come unglued. They have told me repeatedly that I seem to be the only one who can keep it all together . . . until last night, that is. I think I finally hit the figurative "brick wall" that everyone has been talking about. I was planning on going up to Springfield today to spend the day with Greg, and I thought that I would have time to do that, but then the reality of all I have to get done by next week hit me, and a whole bunch of other stuff got dumped on me too.

First of all, a "freezing rain alert" was issued for Springfield, and the weather report said that there would be ice accumulation on the road. I don't even like driving in rain--let alone freezing rain!! So I didn't want to drive up, and then Greg was upset that his plans for the day got ruined, and now I'm kind of freaking out at how he reacted to all of this. The bottom line is, if I had driven up there today and ended up sliding off the road into a ditch, it doesn't matter what he had planned--you can't enjoy Christmas cheer in a body cast. Anyway, there are just several things upsetting both of us, and I don't have the time or energy to deal with any of it right now, so I don't know what to do. I literally can't worry about it today though because there is so much I have to do. Right now I'm going to go write a paper about slavery and then, well, actually, I'm not even going to type the list because it will just make me feel worse. So, I'm signing off now to get to work, and to make things even worse, the freezing rain is on its way to Charleston. Today is pretty much the worst day ever, and if I survive until Christmas break, it will be a wonderful Christmas miracle! :-) My classmates (or fellow inmates) are quite concerned that Tiffany has run into her brick wall--because, they say, what does that mean for them? So, Kristen says that sugar makes everything better, and she's going to hook me up with some of that tonight. :-)

Palestine Tourists

Today I was doing some research for the corridors exhibit (trying to find quotes to go along with different topics), and I remembered this awesome quote from Eliza R. Snow when I was writing a paper at BYU. A book called Correspondence of Palestine Tourists contains the letters of Eliza R. Snow, Lorenzo Snow, George Albert Smith, and others, who began a journey to Israel in 1872. Eliza R. Snow has a perfect quote for our exhibit. In writing about traveling from Salt Lake City to Chicago by train (over pretty much the same terrain she'd traveled by foot and wagon 30 years before), she said: "In crossing the plains, I frequently drew the contrast between the present and the past, and could hardly realize the present to be a living reality. To travel with ease, devoid of fatigue, in three days, a distance which a few years ago required more than three months of weariness and privations to accomplish, is certainly a very great change."

In reading more of her letters, I found some funny quotes. Eliza R. Snow was truly a wonderful writer. After seeing Niagara Falls, which she loved, she made the remark, "I leave it, after drawing the conclusion that Mark Twain was induced to speak indifferently respecting this celebrated curiosity, lest he should be suspected of doing or thinking for once like somebody else." Ha ha. Eliza was referring to a time when Mark Twain wrote that he thought Niagara Falls was overrated. I don't know for sure, but I would imagine that Eliza R. Snow may have met Mark Twain, or at least seen him when he came to Utah in 1861. He didn't have very nice things to say about the Mormons (but he did say some funny things), so it makes sense that Eliza would be a little critical of his indifference to the falls.

Then, about crossing the ocean, she Eliza wrote, "I have experienced a slight touch of that disquieting malady called sea-sickness, just enough to make my appetite inexpensive for two or three days, and to cause a little cleansing of the stomach for my future benefit." It was fun to read those things.

This morning all of us when to breakfast at a restaurant called What's Cookin'? It's a cute little place located on the square in downtown Charleston, and they have really good food. I had blueberry pancakes with eggs and hashbrowns--it was totally awesome. Now I'm going to write research papers before going to babysit the Stowell kids tonight. I don't have a lot of energy for babysitting, but they're good kids, so I think it will be fine.

My Evil Clone

Do you love the Christmas tree decorations? I put Aly's and my favorite things on the ornaments: BYU, New York (that's where Aly is from), the St. Louis Cardinals, the Boston Red Sox (that's Aly's favorite baseball team--I don't like them), Salve Regina (Aly's alma mater), and the Utah Jazz. It's hard to see in the picture, but on the star atop the tree we have Abe Lincoln himself. It now feels kind of Christmas-y here at the apartment. I even practiced some adaptive reuse techniques, as historic preservationists call it, in putting a Christmas wreathe on our door. We had a nice fall wreathe with fall leaves on it, and it's so pretty that I thought it would be a shame to take it down, so today I wired some holly berries onto it, put a big red bow at the bottom, and voila--we now have a Christmas wreathe!

So, remember how I talked about my arch nemesis Stanley Thayne yesterday? Well, my sister Lindy sent me the funniest picture she found online of Stanley. You can see him here (he's the one on the left) standing next to Dr. Alex Baugh, one of the BYU Church History professors. This photo was taken after Stanley Thayne won the Mormon History Association undergraduate student paper competition--the competition I was supposed to win with my paper about Confederate General Sterling Price and the Mormons! :-) But you see--I'm cool too--I can hang out with BYU Church History professors like Susan Easton Black, and I have cute nieces! :-) I'm just kidding about all of this, but it's kind of funny. As Lindy pointed out, in this particular picture of Stanley, he bears a strange resemblance to me. Lindy thinks that Stanley is my clone gone terribly wrong. Maybe he's my evil clone? So now he's living the life I thought I would have, and I'm living the one I'm supposed to have--it all makes sense now.

Today has been a good day so far. I had Historic Preservation this morning, which is one of my favorite classes, and we talked about preservation in the Western United States, which I especially enjoyed. After class Dan and I went over to the Tarble Arts Center (awkward few moments there) to speak with their director about the website we're going to be doing for next spring's exhibit. She is really nice, and I think the website won't be too terribly difficult, but what that we do here isn't difficult? :-) I am so excited for the exhibit opening next April because one of my all-time favorite BYU professors, Dr. Rugh, is coming out here to be our guest speaker!!! Our class was offered some grant money if we could find some visiting scholars to come speak to the public here about our exhibit topic--transportation history in the Midwest. I suggested Dr. Rugh, since she did her graduate work in Illinois, and she is the world's best travel and tourism guru/scholar. She agreed to come, and I am so excited to be able to show her around Charleston next year!

I've just been decorating for Christmas and doing homework this afternoon, and then later today I'll be going over to the Bauman's for dinner with the missionaries, then Angel and I are going to go visiting teaching. No rest for the weary!

Chicken Fried Steak

I'm a little sad because KFC in Illinois does not have chicken fried steak :-( At home in Utah, Mom and I would always get chicken fried steak at KFC, and I loved it! I bet I could get some chicken fried steak at Cracker Barrel in Mattoon sometime. I went to KFC this evening because I realized that I was falling into another vicious cycle where I did not have time to eat or sleep. I have food at my house--just no time to fix it. I got spoiled over Thanksgiving break when I had time to both eat and sleep! :-) Since they didn't have chicken fried steak at KFC, I got some chicken strips, which are pretty good. I'm at home for a minute, but then I need to go pick Dr. Hardeman up from one of the school judiciary committee hearings and go work on some house survey stuff with some of the other inmates (that's what Mrs. Miller calls us). :-) The other day we had a discussion about what an EIU Historical Administration student action figure would look like if there was such a thing. We decided that it would be really skinny (no time to eat), have white skin with black circles under its eyes, bloodshot eyes that could pop out of its head (no time to sleep), and have really grungy clothes (no time to do laundry). Ha ha. As the saying goes, "if you don't laugh, you'll cry."

I think I'll be at the library for a really long time tonight because I need to do some reading for class tomorrow, and I need to look at some items for one of my research papers. I was so excited today to see that an item I had ordered over interlibrary loan has just arrived. It's a microfilm of the Prud'homme family papers from Natchitoches, Louisiana that span from the 1700s to the late 1800s! It might night sound very exciting, but I am totally ecstatic and can't wait to go crank up the microfilm reader. That is one of my favorite strange secret hobbies: reading microfilm. Today in Dr. Reid's class we got to talk about how the South has memorialized its pre-Civil War past through the use of Confederate monuments and Southern Colonial revival-style architecture. I was in heaven! Well, I'm off to pick up Dr. H. and spend some quality time at school.

Oh, really quickly I just wanted to say a few words about my arch nemesis: Stanley Thayne. I've met Stanley Thayne before, but he probably doesn't remember me. But he is totally my arch nemesis! He is currently living the life that I thought I wanted, but things have worked out for the best for me. Stanley was an English major at BYU, but then decided he likes history, so he started entering papers in all of these LDS Church history paper competitions. He always beat me out--whether is was the Religious Education Student Symposium or the Mormon History Association, he was always the one who was one up on me. Then, I totally wanted to do the history graduate program at BYU, but didn't get in, but who did? Stanley Thayne. And he wasn't even a history major! Then, I submitted a paper to the Journal of Mormon History--the granddaddy of all Mormon scholarly publications, but it got rejected. Well, who has a 37-page article in the latest issue of the Journal of Mormon History? Stanley Thayne. Grrrrrr. Sorry I'm being mean--he just makes me so mad! :-) Although the editor of the Journal of Mormon History did contact me about submitting a paper that I presented in Salt Lake this summer, so there is still hope--I just need to find time to revise the article before submitting it. Like I said, I think things seriously have worked out for the best for me--even though I used to be really sad that I didn't get into the program at BYU. I bet that Stanley Thayne doesn't know how to draw museum exhibit floor plans, make a website, or judge the structural integrity of a historic house! :-) Just kidding--I shouldn't be mean.

Hide Tide at Gettysburg

How did I get an 8-foot Christmas tree for $3.84? By making it out of green duck tape! Ha ha--it has many benefits: it doesn't take up any space, it weighs zero pounds, it doesn't drop pine needles on the carpet, it doesn't smell and won't catch on fire, it looks cool, and it will be super easy to take down. The next step is to make the ornaments--more pictures will come.

Today was a weird and funny day. Last night Aly had said to me that it would be nice if Dr. Barnhart cancelled class today like he did the week before Thanksgiving. So when my phone rang this morning at 7:30 a.m., I thought I was dreaming that Dr. Barnhart was calling me to cancel class or at least bump class back a few hours like Mr. Riccio did yesterday. Then I realized that I wasn't having a dream, so I got out of bed and answered the phone. Sure enough--it was Dr. Barnhart. He has brochitis and said that he needed to cancel class today. I was still kind of in zombie land, so I don't remember all that he said, but he was talking to me for about five minutes explaining that he is sorry that we haven't had very many sessions of his class this semester or learned very much in his class. He said something like next week we'll just meet to turn in our research papers, and then we'll call it good for his class for the semester. I went and knocked on Aly's door again and said, "You're not going to believe this, but Dr. Barnhart just called me and cancelled class." She was very excited and rolled over to go back to sleep. I called the other kids, and they thought it was so funny. Dr. Barnhart's class is for sure the most random class any of us have ever had. Out of all 14 weeks of the semester, we've had an actual class only about 6 or 7 times. We're a little concerned because some of the readings that we were supposed to have done for that class seem like they would be pretty essential to our field of work--like "Interpreting Historical Sites," and other such articles--but oh well, we're not complaining.

So I just did work all morning until I needed to go help Dr. Hardeman do some grading this afternoon. His students' papers never cease to amaze me--they don't make any sense at all! There were a number of funny things I read today. My favorite was the 15-page paper entitled "Hide Tide at Gettysburg." Dr. Hardeman had me pick a paper I wanted to read, and I said, "How about 'Hide Tide at Gettysburg'?" He got a good laugh out of that one, since the book that the student was supposed to be basing their paper on (which they didn't) was called High Tide at Gettysburg. Then there was the student who said, "Chivalry and Lynching were two forms of public humility in the South." That sentence has issues on various levels. First of all, the student did not mean to talk about "Chivalry" (meaning gallant or heroic action); they meant to talk about "shivaree" (meaning a crazy public gathering). And, the student didn't mean to talk about shivaree and lynching as a form of public "humility," but public "humiliation." There is certainly nothing humble about a lynching! It was quite funny though, because the whole 15-page paper compared chivalry to lynching and, numerous times, referred to the humility caused by these actions. Last but not least was the student who wrote an analysis of the book Mothers of Invention. Their first two sentences read, "Mothers of Invention. Yes, this is the name of a Rock Band, and they are pretty good. But when one considers this phrase as the title of this book, it has more meaning." Oh dear.

Well, I'm off to this week's crazy meeting, which hopefully won't last for seven hours (but you never know).