Update

I just updated my professional blog, katherineinmuseums.blogspot.com. It just updates you on the projects I'm working on. The Urban Museum Collaborative got the supplemental grant they've been wanting, which is WONDERFUL! I'm still working on the portrait gallery, 7 out of 15 write ups are done but I have to edit those 7 a LOT. I turned in my exit project proposal this week, BIG weight off my shoulders there. I'm really excited about this project - I'm creating a children's book that tells the story of Campbell House, then doing a story time education program to go with it (so anyone that has kids, be ready to get an invite to the 1st one in May :-) ). Plus Dr. Lankford says he thinks he found me an illustrator for the project! YAY! I still have to talk to her, but keep your fingers crossed it works, cause I can't draw at all and while I could always just photoshop the 1885 photographs I really wanted good illustrations that truly bring the house to life. Hopefully it'll work!

Other updates - I had my last class last night! WOOHOO! I felt good when Jay was talking about stuff cuase I felt like he finally explained where he'd been trying to get us to go for the past year and a half... and like I understood it... always a good thing. Afterwards my cohort went out to Schlafly bottleworks. It was definitely a bittersweet moment. On the one hand I had SO much fun with everybody and am SO SO SO glad the semester is over, cause I can have time to think again. But on the other hand, that was my last class with Jay - we don't have him next semester. It's also my last class with eveyrone in my cohort - with the directed readings and internet course next semester, I won't see anybody in class. I can't believe it's been a year and a half since we started, it's flown by, but I also feel like I've known this group of people forever. I'm really gonna miss seeing them all the time... which means we HAVE to get together out of class!

I was thinking about it at lunch and it absolutely amazes me how much life can change in a year. Think about it. This time last year:
- I went down to Shreveport to see Emily in Rabbit Hole. 1st time we'd been down and her ex wasn't there. I went to her church and said "I want a place like that, where I go in and everyone says "Hey Katherine! I saw..."
- I had no clue about the AAM conference, had never been to Philadelphia, and hadn't even thought about doing an internship in Natchez
- No clue what I was gonna do for an exit project
- Felt close to my cohort but was still feeling really lonely

Now:
- Emily's engaged
- I've found an amazing church
- I'm looking for jobs
- I had a great experience with the national park service in Natchez
- I loved AAM and fell in love with Philly
- I've got a wonderful exit project and a 2nd project that's so great
- I have wonderful friends, I'm even clsoer with the people in my cohort, and am no logner lonely (well most of the time)

Wow. And that's just part of it. If you know me, you'll be able to see how much I"ve changed over the past 2 years, and especially the past year. Thank you to everyoen that was a part of that.

Oh and speaking of conferences, I'm not gonna go to AAM this year. It's in LA. That's super expensive, both hotel and air fare wise. No one else is going for me to share a hotel room with. I don't really care that much about the museums in LA. I don't want to be out there, and most of the people will probably be on the west coast. There's just nothign that says "Oh I HAVE to go to that", and there were SO many things about Philly that said that last year. Same with most conferences I've found - the interesting ones aren't till later, all the upcoming ones are ones that make me say "Eh". I dont' want to pay bucu bucks for "eh". But there is a historic house museum conference in Texas in November 2010, so if I don't have a job by then (which hopefully I will) I"ll probably go to that.

December-January is gonna be my big push on job searching/really start the job search. I'll try to update you on how that goes. KEEP YOUR FINGERS CROSSED!

Oh and I'm now addicted to Dr. Who. I blame the field house for this :-). They were tlaking about it at work. I got curious and watched it. LOVE it!

That's it. Bye now!

I don't get people

I don't want to say much in this post because I don't feel it's right to air the whole situation on a blog. I will say that this post is not about my family. My family has been amazing through this, absolute ANGELS.

All I'll say is I don't get why some people are so rude. Why they feel the need to be uppity. Why they feel the need to verbally attack someone without even hearing an explanation. Or why they freak out over a tiny little mistake.

People are ridiculous. That's all I can say.

At least it's almost Christmas! I hope you're all having a happy holiday season!

Oh paper trail

So tonight at Brad and Hannah's, we played a game we have named Paper Trail. It's a combo between telephone and pictionary - we actually played it a few times at Phoneathon to keep us happy on the phones. One person writes a common phrase on a piece of paper. They then hand it to the person next to them, who has to draw the phrase. The drawing is then passed along and the next person has to interpret the picture. The cycle continues like telephone till it gets back to the start.

Here are some of the funny phrases from tonight -

"Shut the front door!" became "All the lights in the house are on"

"Da roof, da roof, da roof is on fire" became "And suddenly, the house was on fire!"

"An apple a day keeps the doctor away" became "During apple season, don't eat too much or you'll end up in the hospital"

"Mama's, don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys" became "I don't know if the herd is surrounded"

"Luck of the draw" became "No couple equal to back I have a pair" (hey I wrote what I saw!)

"God rest ye merry gentlemen" became "Dreaming of fairies and horseshoes will drive you crazy" (I drew a cross with an arrow to represent God, a bed with a guy sleeping for rest, a u to represent ye, a fairy plus m for merry, and guys with hats for gentlemen. They had no idea what my cross was, thought I'd crossed out the m, and wrote "Dreaming of fairies and horseshoes makes you crazy")

"No sex in the champagne room" was drawn. I'd never heard that phrase and wrote "We popped the champagne cork on the couch and now we can't sleep" to which I was told "That sounds dirty..."

"Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness" became "A fetus and the statue of liberty make me smile", then "A fetus and the statue of liberty are ecstatic", and SOMEHOW back to "Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness"

But here's the BEST one. I was handed "Peter Piper picked a peck of pickle peppers". So I drew a guy smoking a pipe to represent Peter Piper. He had a big hand and was reaching towards what I meant to be peppers. There was also a basket of peppers next to him. Brad thought my peppers were drugs and wrote A COLUMBIAN DRUG SMUGGLER CARRIES A PURSE . The drug smuggler then became Ethiopian. Finally the cards came back as "Just say no". Yep that was definitely my fault. It was HILARIOUS.

Yep I love paper trail. It's awesome.

By the way, I"m gonna take a break from thanks for the memories. I may pick it up later. But I"m kinda done with that series for now.

PS - other people know the phrase "Dance with the one who brung you", right? Because I was handed a drawing tonight and wrote that. Granted, the phrase started as "Do a little dance, make a little love" and became "Prom king and queen", which is what was drawn, so I was wrong anyway. But I wrote that and NO ONE there had heard that phrase before! Is it just a Southern thing, or just a Heugatter thing?