Return

2017-04-21T00:14:03Z

Readers, it has been five years since I last posted.

I've been circling around the idea of starting up again, but it always felt a bit self-conscious and awkward. But then I was talking to a friend and colleague who also maintains a journal here (we were discussing the whole LJ TOS kerfuffle), and he was encouraging in a very nice way, so I logged in and poked around. And it was still about a week later that I plucked up the courage to start this. But here we are.

I've missed it. Several times I have sat for hours rereading all my LJ posts, laughing and crying and wishing I was still doing it. I think one reason I have not is that for a long time I associated blogging with a particular friend from whom I have become estranged, and that estrangement was extremely painful at the time and still hurts, though at least we have reached a bit of a reconciliation to the point where we can at least speak to one another again.

It helps, I think, to be starting again in Dreamwidth. Partly because of the kerfuffle, I am no longer cross-posting to LJ. Not because I fear the scrutiny of the KGB or whoever wants to read the extremely unexciting ramblings of a mild-mannered, geeky woman now of more than a certain age. More because it feels like a true tabula rasa, a new start in a new journal, but with access to my old life and whoever of my old flist is still around.

Many of you are my friends on FB, or in RL, so will know about my doings, but maybe in part for my own sense of bridge-building between past and present, here's a brief recap.

What is the same: I'm still pretty much the same person, though I do feel a bit more reserved and cautious even than before. My second-to-last post in LJ was, regrettably, announcing the death of my beloved bearded collie Robinson. Well, I have another one. Same breed. Name of Baggins. He will likely feature largely in these pages. I have the same two cats. I'm still working at the same community college, though I'm now no longer a union boss. I think that experience may have been another thing that put me off writing here; it was very much a mixed blessing. Good work, but difficult inter-personal relationships. I'm still living alone and unattached romantically and really don't see that ever changing.

What is different: the biggest thing is that I sold my old house, the one I lived in through all that difficult time with my mother, and have bought my own. It's in a lovely neighbourhood in one of the nicest parts of town and for Victoria it's fairly old (1912). I love it. Because of Baggins, and because it is green, with a bright red door (which makes sense in my own brain anyway), I call it "Bag End" when I think about it to myself. Let's forget any possible associations with "old bags" please.

The other biggest thing, a very big thing, is that I am working on a PhD, writing about intertextuality in the works of Diana Wynne Jones. I am very happy about this, and the work is going as well as can be expected, and I'm enjoying it. I am enrolled via distance at Cardiff University, which feels very posh. It's another new start, but also a chance to take back one of the big things I lost in the years I was looking after my mother. I doubt many realized that when I first started my LJ I was enrolled in a PhD program at UVic. I think I might like to use this now for some PhD thinking-out-loud, so let me know if you'd like to be included in a filter.

I went to Greece in 2014, which was good, but I didn't enjoy it as much as I had hoped, and it wasn't life changing.

I had another hip replacement last year, and am still not quite as mobile as I would like, but it's getting there. Baggins keeps me walking and my garden keeps me determined to stay fit. My new house has a most delightful garden, almost like a secret garden at the back and with many flowering trees and a Japanese Maple and all sorts.

I am, in most respects, very happy. So that's all right.

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Free LJ Woes

2010-10-26T17:02:27Z

Livejournals ads on free accounts just got exponentially more annoying. That's not going to affect me for my personal blog - I have a paid account - but it does affect my choices about what I ask my students to use. I would use Dreamwidth, but for the necessity to send invites; this gets problematical with classes of 28, sometimes several in a term :(

Anyone else using blogs in the classroom? Any suggestions?

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