Flying Back to Fall in the Mountains

I will be making a quick trip back home this weekend to spend time with my daughter Madaline. It should be a welcome respite from my current schedule, although I actually have to take an online Latin quiz while I'm there. It will be good to feel the crisp fall air in the mountains even though the weather in LA has been great so far. I'm enjoying all the new people I'm working with and I think this situation will work well for me if I can manage the time constraints on the linguistic side. I also have a meeting Monday to try to secure a funded place on an excavation in Italy next summer involving Roman tombs. Hopefully, I can convince the people in charge of my inherent greatness and wondrous personality! Be well!

A Better Setting for an Academic Lecture

I went to my first academic lecture in LA last night with a trip all the way down Sunset Blvd to the Getty Villa in Malibu. One of the most prominent scholars in my field (Erich Gruen - who recently retired after more than 3-4 decades at UCBerk) delivered a talk in the Getty auditorium on cultural identity theft and appropriation in the ancient world. Dr. Gruen will be serving as the Villa Professor this year at the Getty in his first year of quasi-retirement. As a consequence, he will likely be brought to speak as a guest in my courses at UCLA - an added bonus. The environment and following reception were excellent and I started to make the necessary political rounds at the reception to lay the groundwork for future connections. Hopefully, I've learned how to play the game well enough over the years - sadly, it's more important than most people in academia realize. The collection of antiquities was of highest quality. I'll need to go back when I have more time to stroll the villa and examine the artifacts in more detail. All in all, one of the better lecture events I've been to.

Adapting to the Rigors of a New Life

After my first few classes, I am still adapting to a very different academic environment within my new department. There are many positive aspects and great opportunities associated with my new situation that are somewhat overwhelming for me at this stage. I am able to enroll in highly specialized seminars on a variety of topics that are actually filled to capacity with people approaching things from very divergent perspectives. The level of academic expectation at all levels is distinctly higher than any previous environments I have been in. It is simultaneously stimulating and daunting, but I have confidence I can prevail once I become comfortable with the new environment. The scholars I will be working with are of the highest quality, and most are extremely socially gifted in terms of pragmatically dealing with Graduate Student issues. The situation will immeasurably advance the quality of my work. The only down side to this situation will be effectively balancing the more stringent academic expectations with some degree of living standard in order to retain some semblance of sanity. In past situations, I have been able to navigate these waters while still preserving the necessary degree of mental decompression. This will be very challenging for the time being. On a good note, I was able to get my DMV situation dealt with at the Santa Monica office (much nicer). I even went down the street to Beverly Hills to get a better lay of the land. I'm starting to be able to find my way around a wider area a bit better - if I actually had time or money I could even hit the trendy spots. Alas, woe unto me! On a better note, on Thursday, I'll be going down to the Getty Villa in Malibu to hear a lecture on Roman society by a most prominent scholar and view all the collection of Greek and Roman artifacts at the villa with many of the historians in my field. I'm off to bed to read for a bit - Strength and Honor!

A Wasted Day of DMV Hell

Attempting to change my driver's license yesterday was foiled by the US State Department having my passport in process with my only birth certificate. California refused to acknowledge the validity of my Oregon Driver's License, even though they have to recognize it as valid ID to drive on the roads. The bureaucratic mess leaves me unable to change my residency status for at least a few more days. I should still be able to make the year and 1 day window for next fall, but now it is getting close because I have to count the 10 days allowed to change a license in the calculations for residency. I hate bureaucracy in all it's detestable forms. I met my cohort on Monday in the History Dept, it was described as particularly small this year at 30 (last year being 49) with a total dept grad population of roughly 180 at all levels - spread over roughly 100 professors. Everyone I met seemed of high quality with a very diverse range of topics. I'm off to do more paperwork - Be well!

Accidently Rolling at a Movie Premiere

In a uniquely LA moment, I was eating dinner at a Mexican place about 2 blocks from my new pad when crowds, limos, and an army of paparazzi showed up at the National Theatre across the street. I was cynically amused by the crowd reactions, choreographed photo shoots on the carpet, and the whole lifestyle of the famous. One of the limos even drove into a barricade which scratched down the whole side of the car. It is a very weird environment to observe. Eventually, Jessica Alba and Dane Cook emerged from one of the vehicles to promote their movie. She did a good job approaching the huddled masses across the street to sign autographs, she seemed at ease - he seemed a bit rigid. By random occurrence due to my dinner, I was about 25-35 ft behind and to the left of the included image when it was snapped by the enormous wall of photogs. What is scary is how tiny the actors are, even the men - the camera must really add 20-30 pounds (they look like mini-people up close) It was made all the more glaring when former Boston Celtics center Bill Russell walked by me and was contrasted towering over all the actors and actresses. He looked twice their size as a 60-70 year old 7ft giant. Eddie Murphy and 80's pop singer Debbie Gibson were the only other people I recognized. It made for an amusing dinner, but the police presence, ostentatious displays of wealth, endless lines of limos with anonymous studio figures was somewhat disgusting. Everyone in fantasyland does truly appear to be detached from the real world. One good thing about the numerous theaters where I live is that they are all monolithic with old Hollywood decor and can seat enormous audiences in the traditional opera house style. Although, there is a raised dais segregated section for fat cats and celebs to separate themselves from the peons during the shows. In any case these movie houses have much more ambiance than the mall style cineplexes that dominate the rest of the country. I wonder how long it will take for me to be corrupted by LA's emotional vacuousness? I'm too mentally tired now to prevent it. Finis.

Descent Complete: Time to Attempt an Ascension from the Clutches of a Tortuous Abyss

Disclaimer: This blog post is of a personal nature, but I felt it necessary to explain to any interested parties what has gone on since my last blog. This will be the last blog of this type.

I continue to adjust to life in LA having battled my way through the myriad planes of hell this summer, I emerge spiritually purged by another test rife with life's incessant miseries. Hopefully, enduring perpetual hammering while transfixed on the anvil of life's journey has further tempered the steel in my soul so that I do not break. One way or another, I return to the blogosphere after a significant hiatus brought about by circumstances beyond my control. My daughter's well-being was severely assailed by the continued deterioration of her environment. All of my energies this past summer have been centered around providing my daughter an avenue of escape from a circumstance that was imploding around her. The situation has been dire and threatens to limit my ability to continue on in LA, but I am still working on measures to protect my daughter's future prosperity. I should be able to attain legal custody within the next 10 days, but obstacles may still emerge. My entire situation is still being evaluated, but all my decisions will be predicated upon what will give my daughter the best chance to have the highest quality of life. Her long-term prosperity may still be a function of the successful of my PhD program, but I will continue to weigh her present development against my absence in LA. After considerable deliberation with my family, she will reside with my family in her familiar environment of the sheltered valley farm where I grew up. I am unwilling to further disturb her life with a move to the chaos of LA in a time of such turmoil. In addition, it seems dubious that I could provide the best environment as a single parent in LA due to the requirements, constraints, and realities of my particular PhD program. For now, I will proceed with my program and see how things develop. At this point, that is all that can be done - but the future of this entire endeavor hangs on a precipice. Such is life, but I will just try to keep moving forward and make the best decisions I can. In any case, my future blogs will go back to their old style as best I can - I hope everyone is doing well.

Apologies for my Lack of Blogging

I apologize for my recent inability to post anything, but my present circumstances have inhibited my opportunities. My recent move, while allowing me great amounts of time with my daughter before UCLA, has been complicated by an extreme upheaval in her environment that I have been trying to rectify. I do not know the outcome yet, but I think things have been moved in the right direction. I am hoping the situation stabilizes, but it is to early to determine at this time. It has served as a reminder, however, that the stresses of the academic world are not as significant as many people think that they are. I will be thrilled to get back to worrying about things of an academic nature as a pleasant break from what life can actually throw at you from the bowels of hell! "Tell your heathen gods to ready for blood!" - Deadwood.