A while ago Wednesday, Jan 23 2008

When I came in to post today, the only posts in my list say “posted a while ago” sigh. I’ve always wanted to be good at keeping a journal, but then, I just never have been.

The semester started this week, and I am teaching Microeconomic Theory, which is in my opinion a fun class to teach. I’ve realized that people sometimes get overwhelmed the first day because I do a very intense review and make everyone participate – reviewing some simple models they learned in intro, reviewing definitions and giving them some new ones that I would like to seem familiar to them when we get to it in the material. I like to start off the semester strong – we can always slow down later.

I’m also taking a class, which is being taken by way too many students I myself have had in class! I’m planning on taking Calc 3, which I never managed to take as an undergraduate student – let this be a lesson to all wanna be economists. I like the professor a lot, and I’m looking forward to seeing someone else’s teaching style first hand.

Last night, I made mead with Sarah, Chris, and Andre…it was a good deal of fun, and took HOURS – next time, I’m starting earlier. We also made an experimental beer that Andre dubbed “Slick Walk Honey Wheat” after I fell twice, on the phone with him, walking home through campus. It was a very slick walk.

The honey wheat was made with this basic recipe:

About 1.5 pounds each of honey, dried light malt extract, and a wheat malt extract
a teaspoon of yeast nutrient since honey doesn’t have any
an ounce of Hallenauter hops, boiled with the wort for 15 minutes
and 1.5 gallons of water

Well…the wort was boiled first without the hops, and then for a second 15 minutes after adding the hops, and I at first put some chunks of ginger (left over from the mead – a ginger mead recipe, obviously) but then changed my mind and took it out, and the only things that were actually measured were the can of wheat malt extract and the yeast nutrient…so this is one of those things that will live once and then will forever be remembered. In two weeks, I should know if those will be pleasant memories.

The mead smelled terrific going into the carboy…honey, ginger, gypsum, irish moss, citric acid, and yeast nutrient…I may add herbs to some of it when it’s bottled, in about a month and a half. I will be drinkable in about 3 months, but will continue to improve in flavor for about a year – I’m thinking christmas presents.

Hopefully, I will write more soon….

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Brewing Beer Monday, Jan 7 2008

I’ve always kind of wanted to make beer and/or wine…there’s something magical about creating alcohol, an intoxicant that has been around for a good long time and a part of most cultures around the world. Beer used to be one of the staples of the British peasant diet and, as long as they were eating it with whole wheat bread and not white bread, it provided a pretty good diet.

I would say that I have a healthy respect for alcohol as a drug. I am very mistrustful of it, and mistrustful of drinking it too often. I’ve seen alcoholism, both in the older-person-sending-themselves-down-the-drain way, in the younger-person-not-getting-much-done-but-drinking way, and in the person-of-any-age-needing-to-stay-a-little-high-all-the-time way. None of them are all that pleasant fo the observer, friend, lover, child, or co-worker, and I imagine they aren’t all that pleasant for the drinker either. I don’t have a problem with more-than-slight amounts of alcohol as part of celebration rituals, or with a drink with dinner, or with the occaisional alcohol-linked holiday (i.e. New Years Eve in this country), but I don’t like it as a ubiquotous social lubricant, as a form of escape, as a crutch to relax, or as a right of passage into adulthood. I also don’t like binge drinking – personally, because I don’t like the hangovers, and I view any activity that makes you want to die the morning after with a certain amount skepticism – and intellectually because it feeds into to so many problems – violence, rape, and cultures of drinking and unconsciousness. It is difficult to live fully consciously when you are drunk.

That said, I like good beer (more so than good wine). I think it tastes great…it’s food. Monks brew it (Omegang Abbey Ale is a new favorite of mine), and I bet it made the abbey glow a little brighter. I love the idea of taking quality ingredients, performing a little magic, and turning it into something people have been drinking for centuries. Since it’s made 5 gallons at a time, and doesn’t keep forever, I imagine I will be giving away a good amount of beer I brew myself, but I’m ok with that…I think I will probably also be expanding my repetoire of food recipes containing beer. I’ve always loved dishes made with alcohol.

There is currently a five gallon class jug filled with brewing beer sitting on my kitchen table…there is a thick plastic tube stuck in the mouth of said jug, siphoning off some of the foam, parts that, according to my brewing book, would make my beer taste yeasty and bitter. Given the yeasty smell of the foam coming out of this tube, I believe the book.

This batch of beer was made with a packaged malt extract kit, flavored to make Porter. My opinion is that the yeast that came with the kit was a bit old, since it didn’t make the wort (unfermented beer) start to ferment…I added a second package of fresher yeast, that came out of a refrigerator rather than off a shelf, and the magic started. It seems like there are varrying degrees of processed in terms of what you make beer from – you can purchase cans of thick, gooey malt extract that is flavored with hops and everything and just boil it in water and go, you can purchase dried malt extract that needs to have hops added (hops can be added as flowers or as processed pellets), or you can make the beer from actual malted barley and whatever other flavors you want to add, straining the pieces out before you start the fermenting process.

For the first time, I thought I’d try a kit, but next I think I’ll go for broke and use an actual recipe. I’m not a huge drinker, but I do really love a good beer, and I can imagine having a lot of fun becoming a brewmaster over the next few years (although I think I’ll have to give away a good amount of beer in the process). There seem to be so many different ingredients you can use, and there are so many different types of beer (I was spoiled in this regard by going to graduate school in an area with some good breweries)…I’m thinking I’ll try an herbed, dry honey mead next time.

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New Years Saturday, Jan 5 2008

I had a very nice New Years at the First Night Celebration in town, stopping at Circus Cafe for a while, and then hanging out at my place. My friends stayed until about 3pm the next day, so it was a nice two day adventure (I’ve always liked to have adventures on New Years). I have three resolutions this year:

1) Cook more: last semester, for some reason, I just didn’t cook. I ate a lot of Espo, a lot of uncommon bagel sandwiches (with or without soup), and a lot of Pink Store pizza. This is, of course, not my ideal diet. I moved into my apartment only just before the semester started, and so I never got into the habbit of cooking. I’ve been hanging out with my friend Marla a lot, and she is a really good cook, cooking the type of healthy food I like to eat…this is what partially inspired me to make this resolution. So far, I’ve been doing well. I’ve made a few simple dishes, a big pot of soup (some of which is now frozen), and I haven’t eaten out except for a few lunch dates.

2) Be more informed about the world around me, like I was before graduate school sucked up all my energy: When I was in college, I knew a lot about what was going on in the world. I was very informed, I read the New York Times, every time I wrote a paper, I would read a ton of news articles about Africa. I knew what was going on in the world. Once I got to graduate school, I had far too much homework to be able to read like this…my papers were about theroetical this, intellectual debate that, not about what was going on in the real world (even though this is what I really care about). I went from knowing about a lot of current events to knowing about what I was writing about specifically – the war in Sierra Leone. To fulfill my resolution, I’ve decided to start by reading the Economist and Mother Jones, two good, well written magazines. I find newspapers very frustrating with too many repetitive articles, too much fear mongering, and too much about the war…so, I’m going to skip on those for now.

I like New Years resolutions .

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No posts Friday, Dec 28 2007

Well…I haven’t posted in a while which seems to have slowed the tide of random interneters reading my blog. So, here is a numbered list update:

1) defended my prospectus successfully on Wednesday, though it was an ordeal. (YAY!!! This is the giant hoop I needed to jump through…in fact, the final hoop before the dissertation defense itself)
2) spent Thursday at my mother’s preparing to travel to western PA and finishing up Christmas preparations, etc
3) Friday in the car to PA (TOO FAR!)
4) Saturday hanging out with my mother’s fee friend in PA
5) Sunday ditto plus celebrating solstice that evening
6) Monday in the car back to NY (TOO MUCH DRIVING!)
7) Tuesday (Christmas) at my mother’s coming down with a cold…my mom’s long-time friend and two of her kids, plus one kid’s husband came over and we exchanged gifts
Wednesday, sick as a dog at my mothers
9) Thursday took Andre clothes shopping (so he could finally get some clothes that actually fit him…) and went to see Walk Hard: the Dewey Cox Story, which I did find amusing
10) Friday (Today) came home for my piano lesson, to find it had been canceled, and to my messy, messy apartment after the days of chaos with no heat…but, the apartment is warm! The rest of the day will be spent doing a little dissertation work and cleaning
11, 12, and 13) Unforunately, the next three days will be spent in grading hell
14) New Years eve will be spent at the first night celebration in town with a few friends…possibly with the plan of all dressing up together
15, 16, … ) The rest of my foreseeable life will be spent writing my dissertation…it’s time to get it done.

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Prospectus Defense Wednesday, Dec 19 2007

Today, I will defend the prospectus for my dissertation.  It’s been a long road that has brought me here, and hopefully this will just be a step along the path to the dissertation defense.

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No Heat Wednesday, Dec 19 2007

So, the heat is broken in my apartment…the landlord and I are hoping it’s the thermostat and not the furnace itself, because it would suck if she needs to replace the whole furnace.  I realized the heat was broken when I woke up to 48 degrees in the apartment, and since then it has gotten steadily colder – right now, it’s 42 degrees in most of the house, colder in the bathroom, and warmer in the music room where I have set up a borrowed heater (hopefully my instruments, and the rest of the apartment, will not catch on fire). The first night after I realized the heat was broken, I stayed at a friend’s house at which there was an impromtu slumber party, which was actually a lot of fun though unexpected (at least by me).  When I realized it was only getting into the 40’s in the apartment, I decided to go home the second night.  My landlord loaned me an electric heater, and I barricaded myself and my little girl in the music room, with my extra futon set up as a bed…Andre joined me for moral support.  We set up every candle I could find around the room, and it actually got rather toasty in there…I mean, I’ve slept in a tent in the freezing cold with only a sleeping bag and body heat to keep me warm, so as long as I wasn’t in danger of hypothermia, I wasn’t too worried about how cold it was.  Chuie (dog) doesn’t seem too thrilled with what’s going on, what with first being subjected to a roomful of 20-somethings in a strange house and then being locked in the music room, although, as always, she found the ‘key’ and was able to move back and forth between unheated apartment and semi-heated music room.I played my new low D tin whistle by candlelight, and it’s starting to sound like an instrument…it’s significantly harder to play than the normal, high D whistle.  The wholes are bigger and farther apart, and the airstream is touchier…I’m starting to learn how to breathe while playing it, which will help with phrasing, etc.  The first day I got it I played and played until my hands hurt…I think another few days like that and I’ll have the knack of it .

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Teaching and My Students Monday, Dec 10 2007

I love teaching. I love working with students with an aptitude for economics and watching them soak up what I have to teach and take it in new directions, making connections in their minds visible in their faces and their pens scribbling in their notes. I love working with students who struggle with economics, generally because of a lack of previous exposure to mathematics, and watching them work through the struggle, learning the material and also learning how to learn material that is difficult for them. I feel so privileged when students take risks with me, making mistakes and learning from them in my presence, allowing me to see them learn.

My mother came to one of my classes today, seeing me teach for the first time.  My students made me look so good.  I did not stand in front of the room speaking at them for an hour and a half.  Instead, they confidently and articulately synthesized ideas we have been discussing all semester, connecting books we have read to the material we’re studying right now, and engaging in conversation both with me and with each other.  And, they were comfortable speaking – this is a comment my mother made to me.  No one prefaced their remarks in such a way that it seemed they were uncomfortable or worried about being attacked, etc. 

I am still new to teaching - I think, with teaching, five years of experience makes you still new to teaching – and I know that I make mistakes and don’t have everything perfect, and sometimes I have bad days where it just doesn’t seem to work too well.  But, I also think my teaching has improved each semester, mostly because I’ve been able to get valuable feedback from students – I wouldn’t know what I was doing wrong otherwise.  I feel really blessed that I am privileged to teach intelligent, hard-working, critical students in a small-group environment.  Liberal arts colleges are one of the best products of American society, I think – not to say that there are no problems, especially the high price tag and non-merit factors that determine who gets the privilege of attending such a school and who does not.  Of all the privileges that should be extended to everyone, small colleges are one of the most important, I think.

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grading hell Saturday, Dec 8 2007

I tend to grade by descending into what I affectionately call “grading hell” – where I do nothing but grade and sleep for however long it takes to make it through all the levels of hell and back out the other side.  I tend to not stop to eat – hence many of my papers containing coffee and food stains. I enjoy reading student work, but I don’t particularly enjoy assigning grades. Grading is one of those things where I just have to give it all of my attention, and not focus on anything else until it is done. Unfortunately, this typically happens right around New Years, as grades are due on January 2nd.

This year, I tried to space my end of semester grading a bit more, so I am in the midst of grading a bunch of papers from my microeconomics class now, to be given back before the end of classes next week. I find it very frustrating to grade papers, make comments in the margins, etc, and then have no one pick it up the following semester, and this way they will all get the papers back to look at before they leave.

Oh, grading hell…this will be the eleventh time I have entered your depths, only my red pen to guide me, provisions of coffee and chocolate to keep me going. Will I emerge, once again, triumphant? By triumphant, what I mean is – will I be finished by New Years Eve? Or will there be the always unpleasant question of – do I grade New Years Eve, or plan to do it New Years day, with no possibility of a good answer. Sigh.

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This Week Wednesday, Dec 5 2007

I taught on Monday, and then yesterday did the best I could to re-read a book I assigned in class – In Pursuit of Equity: Women, Men, and the Quest for Economic Citizenship in 20th Century America.  I think Alice Kessler-Harris’s analysis is brilliant, and she does an excellent job of explaining the role gender played in the development of economic policy in this country, but I have to admit that the legislative history is hard for me to get through – tracing the debates in this committee and that, the cast of characters, etc.  As an economist, I wish Kessler-Harris would publish a paper where she outlines her theories about the policies without all the historical detail – maybe she has, and I just don’t know about it.  So, while attempting to do this I hung out at the coffee shop with Lettie who was attempting to write a paper and then we both attempted to do some christmas shopping.  Then the women’s studies program had it’s fall semester meeting, which I attended, returning once more to the coffee shop to not-read with a colleague and friend, Marla – I really enjoy our conversations, and it is startling to me how alike she and I are in some ways.

Today, teaching again…I just don’t have any energy.  Judging by how hard *I* find it to get through the Kessler-Harris book, I don’t think my students have actually read it so I attempted to create an exercise rather than try to lead a discussion on a book none of them have read…a student is doing an independent study on Latin America, colonialism, and economic development with me, and I finished reading the rough draft of his paper – really good work, especially considering that it is a rough draft.  Then…two classes of microeconomics, my last choir practice before the concert on Sunday, and I’m off to the bi-weekly Celtic Session at the local Irish pub.

I have a bunch of things I need to finish up, all as soon as possible

- the written version of my discussant remarks from the UN

- a few final touches for my dissertation prospectus

- a final report of research I’ve been doing with a program in the Bronx

- a whole bunch of emails

- grading

 - and (my personal least favorite) quantitative data analysis (gah). 

 And this Friday is meeting day – department meeting, which is productive and only lasts an hour, and then the full faculty meeting, which may or may not be productive but is sure to last more than an hour (probably more than two)…at least I know there will good food after they release us from the meeting…

Looking at my calendar, I’m quickly realizing that the race I started to run before Thanksgiving doesn’t actually end until Christmas (assuming I’m done with my grading by Christmas, which hasn’t ever actually happened in the past, but dammit, I will do so this time). 

 I’m having a hard time recouperating from last week…the combination of lot’s of non-teaching work, feeling guilty about canceling my classes, a distinct lack of alone time, no music-playing time, getting my car towed in NYC, sleeping in less-than-ideal conditions, and driving more than twelve hours over the course of the week has taken its toll.

 It seems strange to me that all my students, friends, and colleagues seem to feel about the same as I do – that this time of year in academia kicks us all on our asses and we have to run to keep up.  Work comes in waves in academia, on the semester rhythm – and when it crests, it crests.

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Things I have Learned to See Monday, Dec 3 2007

I see a society characterized by inequality of wealth, power, privilege, opportunity, and respect.

I see a society where we do not routinely have the ability to consent to things that effect us, where decisions are made for us and through non-participatory chanels.  Instead of being left alone to do whatever we want, as long as we’re not hurting anyone, formal and informal rules we did not choose ourselves continuously constrain our behavior.

I see a society where we end up with coordination failure after coordination failure - where we make choices that are best for us in the moment, but these choices aggregate to effects none of us would have chosen, like environmental degredation.

I see a society where, due to inequality of power, some of us are insulated from the costs of our actions, making it impossible for us to make fully informed decisions.  On a micro level, affluent people do not feel the majority of environmental costs of their actions and pollute more than they would most likely choose to do if they had to feel those costs.  On a macro level, the American people have not yet felt the costs of the war in Iraq, and this keeps many people in this country from feeling a push to oppose the war.

By the same logic, this is a world where some people are able to appropriate the benefits produced through the actions of others – where poor farmers in Bangladesh are not rewarded for preserving bio-diversity, where poor people working in factories create many times the value of their wages in goods that they can not afford.

I was taught, and teach others in turn, that these two things make for a lack of justice – justice is when we experience the benefits and costs of our own actions.

I see a world where caring labor is taken for granted and undermined by our economic system, even though we all need to be cared for, to different degrees at different points in our lives.

I see a world where people are continuously making choices, and updating their preferences and understanding of the world based on the results of those choices, in a complex institutional environment that we did not ourselves create – and I see a co-evolutionary process where the institutions influence individuals, and individuals influence the institutions, over and over again.

I see these things because my eyes were opened by brilliant professors, especially by Jim Boyce (inequality), Sam Bowles (coevolutionary processes and coordination failures), and Nancy Folbre (the importance of caring labor).  My eyes were also opened by Kent Klitgaard and Tukumbi Lumumba-Kasongo, professors who, most importantly in my life, know how to and have devoted their lives to teaching young students to critically examine the world around them and to question everything.  My mother has also opened my eyes, raising me as a Quaker, nurturing my urge for rebellion, and teaching me about consent.

The question remains: what should we do about this?  I have an innate aversion to revolutionary dogma that seeks to create a new world in some set vision, as if some revolutionary can clearly see everything and construct a perfect system, and we should fit ourselves into that vision.  Sam Bowles’ ideas about coevolution hold the key, I believe: people change, and institutions change, and people change again (etc, etc).  Change at the micro and macro level are both important.  In my life, this has translated into a focus on youth as a locus of change, and as the embodiment of energy and potential – something I also learned from my mother.

 more on this to come…

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