Guess Whose Diploma Came in the Mail

"The Curators of the University of Missouri
To all whom it may concern
Greeting:

Be it known that the Curators, having been advised by the Faculty that Emily Jo Akins has completed the Course of Study required of candidates for the degree of Master of Arts English and is qualified to receive the same, do confer said degree with all the honors and privileges appertaining thereto. In testimony whereof the signatures of the proper officials and the seal of the University are affixed.

Done at the University of Missouri-Kansas City in the City of Kansas City, State of Missouri, this eighth day of May, in the year two thousand and nine."

Spring Mix

The Brookside Farmers Market has been open for two weeks now and I finally went today. I have a big end-of-semester paper to work on this weekend but I abandoned it for a couple of hours to get my farmers market fix. So I took the bus to the market and read the whole way (Greeting Cards: Individuality and Authenticity in Mass Culture, for my paper).

writing my last final paper

The market, indeed the neighborhood, was bustling, even though the vendors and produce were springtime sparse. I wasn't looking for much anyway - I have no time to cook anything too elaborate this week, what with my paper deadline looming large. I was just craving something - anything - green, green, green.

People who have gardens or yards or at least porches were buying plants and transplants - herbs, tomatoes, nasturtiums, et. al. So promising. But I bypassed all of those and went straight to the food at the KC Center for Urban Agriculture stand: salad greens galore, "micro mix" and scallions, kale that someone else bought, broccoli raab that I bought after Katherine (KCCUA farmer, director) urged me and instructed me on cooking methods (you braise it in olive oil and garlic, by the way, and add some asiago). A couple of bread vendors were there - Bread of Life (I bought a pizza crust) and Roaring River Bread Company (I got the last ciabatta). And I bought Green Dirt Farm cheese and "jumbo" eggs from some farmers that I've never bought from before because they sell mostly meat. I used every last dollar in my pocket and came home with many good things and lots of green. I'm so glad it's market season again.

salad spinning

I finally broke down and bought a salad spinner this year. I usually resist the notion of kitchen gadgetry, but I frequently succumb to the ones that look like they'll save time. The 'smarttouch' Zyliss Salad Spinner functions as a colander and a serving bowl as well so I justified the space it will take in my kitchen and bought the smallest one they had at Function Junction. I broke it out of the box today and took my micro mix and salad mix from the market for a spin. The truth is that if you wanted to dry your greens by wrapping them in a kitchen towel and swinging them over your head slingshot style, you could successfully achieve the same degree of water removal as you can with the salad spinner. But I can assure you that the cheaper, slingshot method will result in a water-sprayed kitchen and a surprisingly wet towel, circumstances which the salad spinner will enable you to avoid.

salad having spun

So now I have a dry kitchen and four servings of salad to last me into the week, until next Saturday's market by which time maybe I'll have more of my paper written and can spend more time at the market and can buy more food and can cook more. Although there is that final final exam to study for.

Jazz and Post-Structuralism on Fat Tuesday

I live down the street from the Phoenix Piano Bar, a legend of a place in this city. But I haven't been there in ages, not since long before we moved in down the street. Tuesdays are open mic night and a friend was on the schedule to sing and Sergio was going to listen. I wanted to go, too, but I'm behind in my reading for class and maybe I should just stay home ... unless I could read there ... with a beer. It is Mardi Gras after all. So I went, with my articles in tow. And, in the glow of a deceptive, fake candle adorned with beads, I read Jane Tompkins' "A Short Course in Post-Structuralism" to the tune of a lot of live jazz.

Tompkins: "...the notion of the arbitrariness of the sign, of the unmotivated relationship between concept and sound image..."
hi-hat: tssss-t-ts-tssss-t-ts-tssss-t-ts...

The Phoenix is a quintessential place, flawless in its informality, refreshingly straightforward. The neon sign in the window glows "Jazz" - not the brand name of a beer. The musicians are lodged like permanent fixtures into the stage up front, held in place behind a bar, as if in a cartoon with impossible proportions. Is that a drum set back there? And a baby grand behind the bar?

Remarkably, the Phoenix shut down for a while last year. I hated to see it dark when I drove past on my way home. (Even though I never went, I just liked knowing it was there.) I'm so glad it's open again. Tonight it was not dark at all. And I am going to go more often.

The musicians who are there play all the parts for the ones who aren't so the sound is totally full and if you were reading instead of watching you'd think the band was much, much bigger than it really is and you might be distracted long enough to watch a little of one of your favorite songs.

vocalist: ...There'll be no one unless that someone is you ... I intend to be independently blue...
Derrida: "In every exposition it would be exposed to disappearing as disappearance. It would risk appearing: disappearing."

In my next life, perhaps I'll come back as a philosopher. Or maybe a jazz singer. In the meantime, I'm just somebody who is glad she lives on 8th street.

Good times on Fat Tuesday.

My Saturday

And just because you are confined to your apartment all day reading genre theory, doesn't mean you can't have a nice snack.


In the foreground: bruschetta featuring local parsley and fresh (fresh!) local tomatoes (an heirloom variety of cherry tomato, grown in a greenhouse by Alice) and Woolly Rind, a local sheep's cheese from Green Dirt Farm - both purchased at Bad Seed Winter Market. Plus crackers from an undisclosed location. (Okay, they're from Whole Foods. *sigh* You can't win 'em all...)

In the background: Writing Genres by Amy Devitt.

My Friday Night

Just because you are really busy writing a paper, doesn't mean you can't have something nice for dinner. And just because it's December, doesn't mean your dinner can't be somewhat local.


In the foreground: pasta with local oven dried tomatoes, local dried oregano, local dried chili, and fresh (fresh!) local parsley from Root Deep Urban Farm and local rosemary fougasse bread by Roaring River Bread Company, both purchased at tonight's Bad Seed Winter Market. Plus a few local pickled okra - not pictured, but fun to say - which I pickled myself about four months ago.

In the background: a paper about hair in nineteenth-century sensation fiction from both sides of the Atlantic.

A Lot of Hands

Tonight was the penultimate class session for Transatlantic Sensations. We are off next week for Thanksgiving, then we meet on the 3rd to do peer reviews on our papers, then our final papers are due on the 10th and that's it - the end of this, my last literature course for my degree. Next semester I have only one rhetoric class left (and one huge thesis project) in order to finish my masters degree. So six months from now ... I'll kind of ... be done.

On the one hand, this is really exciting because it means I'll have successfully completed this major accomplishment. But on the other hand it means I won't get to go to class any more. But on the one hand it means I will have more free time to read other things. But on the other hand it means I will not get to sit around with 12 people and discuss what we've all read. On the other hand it means I won't exhaust myself staying up until 2:00 am. to finish school work. But on the other hand it means I won't be writing academically as much. But on the other hand it means I can write non-academically more. But on the other hand it means I won't be reading thematically like I am now ('transatlantic sensations'). But on the other hand it will free me up to do other things besides read, other things entirely.

But in the meantime I have a 15-page paper to write and a big thesis project to work on.