Indeed, it is that point in the semester where it's all I can do to prevent myself from constantly obsessing about the impending winter recess. The days are getting shorter, the air is ass-cold, the workload gets heavier by the hour. Yeah. I'm staying in Western MA for winter break, and I'm not predicting that this stretch of time will be, in and of itself, awesome. What will be awesome is the cessation of most formal duties. Amen! Already, I'm planning little projects for myself: some knitting, some crafting of Xmas tree ornaments (from felt). Some other stuff? I recently found a recipe for phyllo dough Apple turnovers that I'd really like to try, and come to think of it, I'll probably do that this weekend, not this December.

This upcoming recess is my potentially last winter break ever. I say potentially because, from time to time, I toy with the idea of applying to various other advanced degree programs, once I get the heck out of here. In the event that I enroll in another program, the cycle of academic holidays will reinstate itself. But for now, work in the real world looms on the horizon: a real world without winter break.

Right now I'm reading Oliver Sacks' "An Anthropologist on Mars." I'm a big fan of Sacks not only because of my fondness for "pop" psychology (& related areas), but because of his approach to writing about neurological disorders: rather than focusing on the negative aspects of the disorders he studies - which would be easy to do, given the symptoms of some of them - he writes about what new abilities (creative, perceptual) these neurological changes engender in his patients. Of course, Sacks doesn't deny the real pain these diseases cause his patients, and fairly portrays the hardships his patients must endure en route to recovery; but that he can find positives at all in brain trauma is admirable.

Beyond tonight, weekend plans are nebulous. I'm stuck on this turnover idea, though: so maybe the pastries will materialize.