L'adventure de Montreal

There has been an overwhelming request for details of our adventure home from Montreal, QB. 100% of our followers requested an account of the unfortunate demise of our beloved 1998 Beige Toyota Carolla and the imprisonment of our heros in the desolate village of Frickville. So here it goes:

Nate and I had brilliantly decided to combine our 2 year anniversary with an academic conference and poster presentation. Though friends and parents had warned us that mixing work and romance never worked we set off in our 1998 Carolla ( with 156,000 miles on it) for Montreal. No one was as smart, capable or as in love as us and therefore we would triumph! We also had the car checked out the week of the trip, had booked an awesome hotel for $50 on priceline to split up the drive to Canada, and made sure we were staying at one of the most romantic ( and reasonable) b&b in all of Montreal.

The day before the trip came, along with a massive winter weather advisory right up route 87 , with the eye falling right over Saratoga Springs, where we booked our nonrefundable deal only two days before. After frantic calls to parents, we set off to Canada Thursday afternoon, with our sights set on Syracuse and 81 north. We avoided the storm, but not a late night panic trying to find a reasonable hotel room at 9pm while driving up 81 ( Emily was panicing, Nate was driving) the extra bill of a last minute night at a Holiday Inn Express. The next morning we woke up proud of our excellent communication and compromise on the hotel room.

Canada's border crossing was much more thorough then we expected. Our car was searched and we were given a stern lecture by a border crossing guard in charge of our background check on the important of answering questions in relation to past involvement with the police accurately. It would have been funny if a guy hadn't just been taken away in handcuffs, and another man thoroughly dressed down for not admitting a "drunken in public" arrest from his college days.

We finally reached beautiful Montreal, just as it started spitting freezing rain. After signing in at the conference and awkwardly running into an old co-worker, from a job I daily hope to forget I experienced, we headed back to the beautiful b&b to restart the day. We had a great night with a friend from school full of wine, beer and delicious crepes. We were finally in Montreal and loving it :0) . The next morning we woke up, excited about the day of academia and romance that awaited us. We headed to the dining table to be greated by the smell of fresh brewed coffee, warm chocolate crossants, and three university professors from a nearby university one of whom was a collaborator with my research advisor. It turned out they were staying in the rooms next to us....for the next two days. So we feasted on our homemade omlettes while politely discussing final four basketball and children with parents in prison. Not quite how we had pictured spending our mornings in Montreal.

I presented my poster, had a grand total of 4 people talk to me in 1.5 horus, and then went a random selection of talks while Nate walked around Montreal searching for free internet and a quiet cafe. We met up afterwards, exaughsted and rather defeated. Though we had researched jazz clubs, we realized we just needed to eat, sleep and get the heck back home. Luckily there was an adorable french restaurant, with reasonable prices, across the street from our bed and breakfast. The meal was delicious, the conversation rejuvenating, and Nate and I once again were enjoying the advenure of Montreal . Its good we didn't know that night the adventure that awaited us only twenty four hours after that romantic and peaceful dinner ....

To Be Continued

The time has come for another blog post!

We've decided that once every 6 months is an appropriate spacing of blog posts given the pace of our lives right now. People ask us "hows grad school" and we let out a joint reply/ moan "its fiiine" or we're feeling enthusiastic "thank goodness this year is almost over!" Although we are thrilled to be continuing our studies at the same time/ place it is having an effect on how interesting our lives are. The day generally goes:

1)Roll out of bed 15 minutes after the alarm goes off.
2) Finish the reading/ paper writing we didn't complete the night before because our brains were mush.
3) Realize we forgot to start the coffee pot 15 minutes before we're supposed to run out the door.
4) Realize we still have to shower 12 minutes before we're supposed to run out the door.
5) Realize we haven't made lunch when we are supposed to be leaving and either
a) make a fast pb&j
b) grab some odd combo of snacks such as string cheese, apple and granola bar & hope
we're not hungry that day.
c) Give in and buy lunch - bagel or poptarts for Nate, egg sandwich for Emily usually
6) We head off to our respective classes, where we spend 6-9 hours listening to lectures, pretending we thoroughly read articles, have small moments of brilliance followed by hours of feeling overwhelmed, and procrastinating doing other work by checking Vulture, NYTimes.com, and other blogs ( esp. http://noofandnoel.tumblr.com/).

6) Get home between 5:30 and 8 , depending on the day, eat dinner, do more work, watch an episode of something on Roku, do more work but then not finish it because our brains feel like mush and head to bed.

This is the general pattern of daily life, with the exception of a few wonderful adventures : friends visiting, birthdays, beer brewing, cars breaking down on 81 on the way back from Montreal, sit down dinners, beautiful days that require long walks around the downtown mall. Although the moments are rare, I suppose they are worth documenting. If anything to remind us that we are more than the sum of our syllabus assignments.

PS - this posting is for you Nefret. And yes, it was done as a distraction from writing my 5 papers.

Greatest failure

Anyone who knows me well will know that I have one gigantic flaw. I never charge my cell phone. Ever.

like 70% of the time you will not be able to reach me because I don't have the phone with me or it isn't charged.

As a psych student I can't help but wonder the underlying causes for this very annoying behavior.

Frued would probably say it is an unconscious defense mechanism. My id ( aka primitive instinct) wants to flee the stressors of grad school. My superego ( aka super conscious) knows that I have to conform to society and stay always acessible by keeping a cell phone with me. Therefore resulting in my ego's compromise of keeping the cell phone but convienantly forgetting to charge it.

Or behaviorists would say I'm negatively reinforced to not have my cell phone with me. When my cell phone is on, people can contact me, reminding me of how I've been horribly out of touch with dear friends, running late, or forgetting to do or be somewhere. By removing the phone, i remove the "punishment" of feeling more stressed.

My theory is that I'm tired, forgetful, and its really really hard to get my charger plugged into my phone so i avoid it at all costs.

But this is a habit that I am determined to break. As silly as it is I realize it is terribly inconvienant for myself and others that I am rarely in possession of a fully charged phone.

Luckily, as I wean myself back onto the cell phone, google has an excellent back up plan. I'm pretty sure they designed it just for me as I have gchatted my good friend Nefret many a time to call Nate to pick me up at various locations when I realize my phone has no charge.

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/08/call-phones-from-gmail.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+blogspot/MKuf+

Living on a prayer, school loans and beans

Nate and I are married - I'm in grad school and he's in law school. When we tell people this we get one of two reactions :

1) Power couple! Wow - your kids are going to be messed up. Let me tell you about this crazy cousin of mine......

2) Wow - good luck! I knew this couple that did that and they got divorced in like 2 seconds....

Encouraging I know. Nate actually received a pamphlet on surviving law school and it included the following advice " Do not start a significant relationship. Do not get engaged. Do not get married or you will get divorced" I think since we had gotten married 4 months before the first day of class we're safe.

Luckily we have incredible family, friends and fellow students standing behind us and cheering us on. We enjoy what we're studying ( most of the time). And most importantly we really, truly love rice and beans.

Both being in school has its perks ( someone to procrastinate with, and to commiserate with when the procrastination leads to 2am cram sessions) and its difficulties ( living on a grad student stipend and school loans). If you are looking for a blog on how to get through law school without accumulating any debt and saving enough for a down payment on a house all through clipping coupons - this is not the blog for you. We do not have clever ways of turning newspapers into decorative wall hangings or empty wine bottles into lamps. Nate and I aren't the model of ingenuity and frugality - although a lot of times I feel the pressure to be both with our limited budget. We are just doing the best we can to stay sane and enjoy the adventure and we'd like for you to join us on the journey.