Good news! I bought a piano! I went out to Rotterdam the day after I wrote the last post and, full of piss and vinegar (together at last!), I walked right up the guy behind the counter and said, “I want your Korg 350 BK, goddamnit. And I want it now. I don’t want you to be nice, I don’t want a deal. I just want the effing piano, so GIMMIE!” Or something to that effect. His serene reply?, “Sorry, we don’t keep pianos in stock. We only have display models. You’ll have to order it now and wait two to three weeks for the delivery.” To which I bared my teeth and snarled. He smiled. I grunted and squinted. He raised his eyebrows. I frowned and pursed my lips. He blinked. I blinked. He smiled again. I sighed and handed over my bank card. It should be here within the next two weeks. I am VERY EXCITED.
However, the real story for today is that I’ve finished that-which-shall-not-be-named (again) and sent it with all of the corrections (again) to get bound and resubmitted (again). Yes, I meant to say REsubmitted AGAIN. My journey to complete the nameless has been fraught with obstacles, hemorrhoids, and quandaries, but now the light at the end of the tunnel is blinding. And this time it’s the sun, not an oncoming train. *she hopes*
Yes, pending the final review by the examiners, I’ll be finished. Finally. People kept asking me: How’s the old nameless going? or, When will you be finished? or worse, Are you done yet? Folks, I know you care, and that’s great, but these are the worst possible questions you can ask a postgrad student. Really. Because while people wait expectantly for a confident, “Well, it’s due on October 29 so I’ll be finished on October 28″, the real answer is that IT TAKES AS LONG AS IT EFFING TAKES SO I’LL BE DONE WHEN I’M EFFING DONE… no offense. My advice to caring friends and family is to just let the postgrad student in your life get on with it and don’t talk about the nameless unless they bring it up. This goes especially to my mother who, even though I told her a MILLION TIMES not to ask me about the nameless and that “having-to-talk-about-it-only-stresses-me-out-and-I-promise-I-will-tell-you-when-it’s-done”, would still ask me about it almost EVERY SINGLE TIME we spoke. So, not only would I have to talk about it (which, as you might have discerned, I really didn’t want to do), but I would then also have to remind her that I. Didn’t. Want. To. Talk. About. It. Then I would gingerly hang up the phone or say a quick “Bye! <3″ on MSN and go spit out my freshly ground teeth. Please. Mom, when you say, “I’m not going to ask, BUT…” THAT’S ASKING. Good thing I love you so much or you would SO have a pencil in the eye.
Anyway, people have also asked if I feel happy or relieved that the nameless is finished. Which is very difficult to answer. Hmm… how do I feel? Feel… feeeeeeeel… I guess I feel like my once brimming well of joy and passion for academia has now been sucked absolutely dry by the mutant soul-destroying sponge that is the nameless, leaving my verdant hopes and dreams to lie like a mummified carcass, beaten by the Saharan sun and blown by the winds of the Atacama. That is to say, I have no feelings left about the nameless whatsoever. Not a scrap. Not a smile, not a tear, not even a half-hearted rant. In fact, due to all of unbelievable the crap I’ve gone through, my new supervisor asked me if one of the requirements of being taken on as a postgrad was to agree to participate in a four-year study on learned helplessness. It’s possible. Maybe it was in the fine print in the university handbook. I’d check, but I seem to have lost the desire to read anything that doesn’t start with “Once upon a time…”. Apparently this is another common post-nameless side-effect: Non-fiction Intolerance. It’s like lactose intolerance but with more farting and fewer words (did that even make sense?). The last piece of non-fiction I read cover to cover was a supermarket flyer. AND. IT. WAS. BRILLIANT. So colourful…
Here is a photo montage of the delivery. It looks much the same as last year’s nameless delivery photos, except there is no smiling me at the end.
My nameless on the floor:
Getting organised:
Saran wrap for protection from STDs and damp:
Packed to go in my yummy mummy bag (Hobbit foot not included in package):
At the post office getting arranged:
Packed and ready to go:
Addressed, postage paid, and sent:
Back home after stopping for soy milk and deodorant. Because life goes on:
