News Flash...

News flash everyone: Emily has officially passed her PhD candidacy exam as of yesterday. It was a weird experience but I made it through and now I am an official candidate for the PhD degree, whatever that means. I guess this means I'm officially one step closer to becoming Dr. Emily Rine-Jeter (whenever Derek sets the date;) Just thought I'd spread the news....Have a good one!

It's Still September, Right?

Hi everyone! I've finally gotten done sorting through some articles and cleaning papers off my coffee table (which is a fabulous feeling to get organized) and I thought I'd celebrate by writing to you all:) So I've been noticing lately that my thoughts, as far as numbers and dates go, have been all jumbled lately. I mean, it's not that I'm normally that bad at math. I passed the AP in high school and took multivariable calculus in college and all that. But lately, my brain does not want to process numbers correctly. For example, I thought I was putting too much pressure on my students for their first paper, so I thought I'd be nice and extend the due date for a few more days. I sent out a mass email to them last night to tell them the good news. As I walked into the classroom this afternoon, however, I was not greeted with a rousing rendition of "She's a Jolly Good Fellow!" On the contrary, my students were down-right pissed off. Apparently, instead of writing that the good news was that the first paper was going to be due on Monday, October 10th, I wrote that it was going to be due October 3rd, 2 days before the original due date. Ooops, my bad. They thought I was some sort of sadist or something. But then I got it all straightened out and everything was good again. Whew! Thought I was going to be lynched to the sound of Pink Floyd in the background or something. I swear my brain is so fried that when I went to Wegman's this evening, thank God I brought my credit card, because I couldn't count out the change I owed the cashier. Yup, it's that bad.

On a related note, while I was at Wegman's, I noticed that one of the workers there was busy putting up decorated Christmas trees at the front of the store. Christmas trees? What the f^$? It's still September, right? And I thought Halloween stuff out now was bad. But Christmas?! And they were playing Xmas muzak at the Chinese restaurant back home last weekend. What's that about? As if we're not going to be inundated with 50 versions of "Jingle Bells" in 2 months or so. Maybe the Hundley girls will get their fireside acoustic Xmas album out by then;)

Last but not least, as I was driving home I noticed the sign at the Dairy Queen announcing the return of Pumpkin Shakes! Hallelulah!!!!!! It's officially fall!! Yay Pumpkin Shakes!!!

50th Birthday Bash!

Evenin friends! I'm back in town from mom's 50th birthday and I must say it was a rousing success. The beer and wine flowed, there was general merriment about, mom made off with lots of presents and drunken debauchery was kept at a minimum. I think mom had a good time, so score 1 for Team Emily:) Since I lost another weekend to drinking and dessert;) I can't amuse you all with all the stories from the night's events. I have the cirpus waiting for me as well as several papers to grade. Therefore I'm going to just leave you with some pics from the party. Enjoy!

















The Birthday Girl:)















We are Fam-il-y: Uncle Mike, Jessica, Melissa & Brian















Sexy ladies: Aunt Penny & Em (and Barry)
















Somehow people's photo-shooting abilities started going downhill as the alcohol content went up. Coincidence?
















What the picture above should've looked like...
















Look how pretty the outside decor looks
















The family that drinks together, stays together:) Photo taken around 1:30am

Must See TV

Good evening friends. I am currently at home nursing a cold of some sort and since I don't feel well and can't concentrate on work, I thought I'd try to watch a little TV. I really should know better because I already have my VCR set to tape Gilmore Girls, The O.C., Gray's Anatomy, Reunion, and One Tree Hill. I absolutely do NOT need any more shows to become addicted to, especially since i try to catch up on my shows during the weekend and the more shows I add, the shorter my already short weekend becomes. But as most of the season premieres of shows are on starting this week, I have gotten sucked in to 2 more shows. Damn you Must-See TV. After watching the season premieres this week, I am now officially addicted to Lost and Kitchen Confidential. Plus I was already borderline hooked on Desperate Housewives. I'm seriously up to 8 shows now. Dude, I need an intervention of some kind or something because I thought I was bad at 5 shows. 3 more? Oy! If I stop surfacing on weekends, it's because I'm glued to the tube catching up pn my shows, and take that as a cry for help;) But to be fair, have you seen how pretty Matthew Fox of Lost, Patrick Dempsey of Gray's Anatomy, and Bradley Cooper of Kitchen Confidential are? Yummy!

Seriously, Could you choose between these three?




























Okay, enough man candy for one night:) I'll be in Ohio this weekend for mom's 50th birthday bash. Should be a raucous good time. Pics to follow:)

Hand me a Kleenex, I'm PMS

Good morning friends. It's a lovely morning here in S.C. and I'm enjoying my cup a joe and thought I'd give an update or two. While it's no big surprise, women can sometimes get very emotional and hormonal during certain times of the month. And basically, it you are a man, you wan to tread lightly around them during that time period. But what surprises me most about the transformation from someone sane into a maniac is how much more dramatic it becomes the older you get. When I was a teen, PMS was no big thing. A blip on the radar. As I've gotten older, I've become wayyyyy more emotional. For example, like the time I cried like there was no tomorrow watching The Princess Diaries 2. I couldn't have been more emotional if it was "The Princess Diaries in a Concentration Camp"(coming soon to a theater near you...;) And while that was kind of embarrassing, you should have seen me last night while I was watching the Emmy's while working on the corpus. It was like no one had ever won an Emmy before and they were personally thanking me for being the wind beneath their wings in every speech. When Felicity Huffman won her first Emmy for Desperate Housewives, I cried. When James Spader thanked his father from the beyond, I cried. Hell, when Donald Trump sang Green Acres with Megan Mulally, I cried (but for different reasons). You should have seen how pathetic I was sobbing over my laptop. My point is not that I'm a total loser (although this post is tipping me in that direction) but that for one week per month, I have no control over my emotions whatsoever. My mom's 50th birthday party is this weekend. God help the person next to me when she gives her toast. Wishing you all a Kleenex-free day! -E:)

Poll O' the Day

Good morning friends. I'd like to say it's a lovely Sunday morning here in S.C., but it really doesn't look so pretty out. The sun could be hiding because my B.C. Eagles lost against Florida State last night, but I'm still waiting for confirmation from Apollo on that;) As I go through my morning rituals of java, perusing my friends' blogs and reading the NY Times and ESPN.com news online, I thought I'd comment on a few things I've noticed as of late. First, if you don't tend to use my link to peruse other blog buddies of mine's sites do so today. Lisa posted an excellent entry yesterday evening that questions whether or not there really any stellar new bands out there that have "it". It's a really interesting question, because Lisa's contention is that most of the new really breakthrough stuff is coming out of Country and Bluegrass. Could be. She's absolutely right that this new band Sugarland is awesome. I saw them perform with Bon Jovi on CMT and it was kick ass! I disagree though that Rock music is without new killer artistes and so the new question of the day asks for your recommendations of what new bands/artists have made fantastic breakthroughs recently and are worth listening to and haven't been over-produced and manufactured to death. I'll start. Below are my top 5 recommendations of music to listen to NOW that I find particularly awesome and worthy (obviously very subjective) and then below that are 5 albums that are not necessarily new, but you should check out if you just want something good to listen to. So thanks Lisa for inspiring the poll o' the day.

Kick Ass bands to Check Out Now
1. Citizen Cope- The Clarence Greenwood Recordings
2. Sugarland- Twice the Speed of Life
3. Keane- Hopes and Fears
4. The Killers- Hot Fuss
5. Coldplay- X&Y


Bands & Albums Always Good for Listen
1. Black 47- Fire of Freedom
2. The Doobie Brothers- Greatest Hits
3. Dave Matthews Band- Crash
4. Barenaked Ladies- Rock Spectacle
5. U2- Live in Dublin (1993)

More cheers and jeers

This saves me from having to put coherent, whole sentences together:)

Cheers: No school on Fridays:)

Jeers: Enough work to do today to take up both Friday and Saturday:(

Cheers: Going out and getting drunk on a random Tuesday afternoon

Jeers: Dealing with the aftermath (aka missed study time and slight hangover) of said choice of imbibing on a Tuesday

Cheers: I noticed that the leaves are starting to change colors a tiny bit

Jeers: Damn Dairy Queen still hasn't come out with their pumpkin shakes!

Cheers: Bitch fests with friends who are under the same amount of stress with school

Jeers: Candidacy exams, 300+ pages of reading for this week's classes, and the fact that I'm running low on Dunkin Donuts coffee from my stash (gifts welcome)

Cheers: Pres. Bush's approval ratings going down

Jeers: It's only 2005 and not 2008

Jeers: His speech about Hurricane Katrina cut into the new Fox show "Reunion" that comes on after The O.C.

Cheers: Google's new Blog Search tool.

Jeers: Every word you utter on a blog can be tracked by Google. I had to delete an entry last week that bitched about some research I was doing because it was traceable by my advisor. oops!


Okay, that's enough purging for this morning. Hope everyone has a good Friday:) Cheers!

New Bet

Good evening friends! I finally had a minute to myself to sit and ponder for the blog so I thought I'd tell you a funny story about a new bet that going around. I take no credit for the idea, that one is Jason M. and all his weird college friends. But I was at MadMex for about 9 hours yesterday (I know, I'm so kamikaze to go drinking on a school night;) and after about 4 of them, my friend Steve, the waiter Dean (our new buddy), and myself thought it would be funny to start the bet here in S.C. It goes like this... ( from Jason's Blog):

Back in college, when I actually made out with girls, my friends and I had a competition. This competition was to make out with a girl to the weirdest song possible without her stopping or saying, "What the hell song is this?" You had to bring a girl home, put on some music, and make out with her to, say, Primus' "Winona's Big Brown Beaver" without her questioning the song. Also, it had to be a FIRST TIME make out, meaning girlfriends or occasional hook-ups didn't qualify. Immature, yes, but totally awesome? Definitely.

I thought this was a freaking hilarious idea( as long as I wasn't the girl) and so for several hours last night Steve, Dean and I planned what would be the freakiest songs to use and then Dean and his buddies will attempt to try it this out this year on unsuspecting undergrads. Several suggestions included "The Muppet Show" theme song, the theme from "The A-Team"(excellent call Steve) and my fave "Do Me" by BelBivDevoe. So here's the next poll up for grabs. Whip out your freakiest ideas and post them to comments:) Later gators!

The Health Hazards of Academia

Good evening friends! I hope everyone's had a productive and (if you're not a grad student) relaxing weekend. You know, I've never really considered myself to be a huge wuss. Granted I don't like snakes or spiders, but I know how to use a hammer and nails and don't mind getting dirty most of the time. But somehow I've always been a little accident prone. I had this friend in high school who could wear an all-white sweatsuit in the woods and go all day without getting a spot of dirt on her. I, on the other hand, have permanent ketchup stains on almost every item of clothing I own (save anything cashmere because I'm extra anal around cashmere;) Now, I spend my life split pretty much between studying, sleeping, and Must-See TV so there's not a whole lot of danger involved...usually. But within the last week or so, I've had 2 (count them 2) study-related injuries. Every nerd has their favorite school tools/accessories. Mine are the 3-inch binder and pink & yellow highlighters. Both the binder and the yellow highlighter betrayed me this week. First, I was sitting in class on Wednesday and I went to take out some paper from the binder and when I closed the binder rings, the skin of my ring finger got caught in the rings. It sucked so bad because it was like being caught in the jaws of death, just enough to bruise the skin but not break it. The second "incident," if you will, happened just last night. I tend to read articles for school in bed before I go to sleep. I always have my pink and yellow highlighters by my side, but apparently I was so dazed after the Ohio State/Texas debacle that I forgot to put the yellow highlighter cap on and away. When I woke up this morning it was a bright yellow massacre!!! The entire highlighter had been emptied all over the place because I tend to toss and turn. The highlighter went through my grandmother's quilt, my duvet, down comforter and sheets, all the way to the mattress. My stomach was even highlighted this morning when I got up. It was ugly! The thing is, how do you plan for such scholastic mishaps? At what point did reading in bed become more of a hazard than smoking in bed? Apparently academia is more dangerous than I previously thought....

Labor Day Party People

Hey friends! Sorry it's been a few days since I've posted. Back-to-school is more stressful than I remember and I had my first day of teaching today. I'm teaching an ESL writing course for undergrads and it's so cute to see all the freshman talking about how they're pre-med and loving dorm life. Ah, the naivete of youth:) But for once the reason I didn't post also had to do with the fact that I had a life this past weekend. On Sunday I hosted a Labor Day fiesta at my casa and we had the most perfect weather for it. Everyone brought a yummy dish and we grilled out and drank beers for a few hours. After a few beers, even the academics were trying their hand at horseshoes and touch football (Isn't that right Lisa?;) and I whipped out the 80's tunes. Nothing says "I'm the coolest" to my neighbors by blasting "Ice, Ice Baby" in the backyard:) It was a raucous good time, with even a rainbow appearing in the sky to let us know that my BBQs rock (jk). I thought I'd share some pics from the day, just because I can...










Lisa, you know if that whole PhD thing doesn't work out, you always have a place in the NFL:)














Even the kids know how to rock;)




Pretty people...Alina & Kierstin























How cute is this kid?

Material Girl

Good morning friends. First off, I have to say that I am a completely shallow person this morning! I got up and was all excited to blog about the fact that I finally caved and bought a new iPod Mini yesterday so that I can solidify my spot in the cool-kid-I-can't-hear-you-because-I'm-listening-to-my-trendy-and-oh-so-expensive-iPod-right-now club. Of course, before I start to blog, I like to make my way to the other blogs I read every day (i.e. Lisa, Gina, Jason, and Erik) to see what our little blogging community is up to. And do you know what I noticed this morning? That none of my fellow bloggers were talking about something stupid like their new iPods (well, Gina did take her dog to the movies;). They all were talking about Hurricane Katrina or the War in Iraq and it's aftermath. And it really is devastating! I primarily get my news from the NYTimes and I can almost not stomach reading about the destruction down South. The one good thing that I did do was give money to the Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund. It was only $5, but I really believe that every little bit helps. If you get the chance, please donate to the Red Cross online or some other very worthy organization (if only to make yourself feel less like a completely worthless individual who did not lose all of their earthly possessions!)

Okay, well there's my mini liberal crusader rant for the day. I think I'm going to do some work and listen to my iPod now;) Later!