The good news is that the strands of rain streaming from the sky outside the Student Lounge window mean that the oppressive sleepiness spreading from my sinus cavities has passed. Mostly. I wish I knew why pending rainstorms give me a knee-buckling case of the sleepies, because I don’t think this makes any sense. How on earth can someone be allergic to barometric pressure?? Nevertheless, I’ve recorded it often enough for long enough that the trend stands. Allergic to “before the rain,” better once it starts falling.

The bad news is that now my trouser-legs are soggy. Why, you ask, did you venture out into the wet when we know you brought everything you’d need with you in that dorky hand-cart? (Including your lunch AND dinner?)

Because I needed to move my sluggish blood. As if the sleepiness I brought with me to campus wasn’t enough, today is the day I pinned myself down to catch up on my reading, uninterrupted by my theology class. (Our prof is keynoting at a conference. Way to suffer for Jesus! as I used to tease one of my bosses.) So I’m almost halfway through Genesis and have read two-and-a-half of five articles required for tonight’s Old Testament class. When ethnographic assessments of circumcision started to blur, I gave myself permission to take a walk.

But you could have run stairs, you wisely point out. That would’ve gotten the heart going!

True, and it would’ve been far more virtuous than what I did—walk out to the building next door, that’s essentially our Student Union building, and head down the stairs to the kitchenette in the Student Affairs & Vocation office. The place that has fudgesicles in its freezer, chewy granola bars in a basket, and chocolates in a glass jar. Because all I could think about for page-spreads 4-9 (of 19! she wailed) of circumcision ethnography was… I. Want. Sugar. And I know where to get it.

 

The encouraging thing is:
It’s a full year now since the close of The Half-Plate Project. And while my appetite rumbled on, unsquashed, during the Project and for some months beyond, somewhere in May or June I realized I really wasn’t hungry for a whole-big-plate any more. A full medium plate was perfect. And I didn’t especially care about, or for, sweet treats beyond a mouthful.

So I’ve been quietly mindful since then. And the undergraduate myth holds true for me too, now: when I read to study for multiple hours, I get carb-hungry.

Time to toss some graze-snacks in the box!