verging on completion

So I have fought and battled my way through this paper.... it feels like it has been a tremendous struggle, but the truth is it is happening easier than it ever has before. I am almost done, a few hours tomorrow and this paper will be history, then I can take the rest of the day off and enjoy my 39th birthday, and start my next paper, which should be even easier, on Wednesday. The next one, as well, is directly related to my PhD dissertation topic. So it should hold my interest in a way that this current paper has not been able to. It is also just a literature review of the works of a specific theorist, and the list of works is really not so large, two books, two edited compilations and a few journal articles. I have read one of the works halfway through, and I have two of the edited volumes on hand. I am awaiting the other book, which with any luck will be here any day, and I think I should be able to track down the journal articles online, so three weeks to complete for this term, in the most basic sense... what that means then, is that I am officially 1/4 of the way through my course work for this programme. this time next year I will be writing my comps... and then I will be face and eyes into my dissertation, if all goes along the time lines that currently exist.
This does not change the hope, the big hope, of getting myself a government gig. If that were to happen, I could drop back to a part time gig with school, actually earn money and contribute to the cost of my household, and still look at being finished in 3 - 4 years.
I dreamt last night, or perhaps the night before, that i was offered a gig with the computer side of the fed programme, because I had a rudimentary knowledge of Mandarin.... upon waking, it occurred to me that my rudimentary knowledge of Mandarin is not actually rudimentary anymore... it is much more basic than that... it is true what my prof told me, the characters slip out your ears as you sleep... the thoughts of trying to relearn Mandarin at this point make the dream belief seem almost inconceivable... thankfully, it was just a dream... I do hope that they call tomorrow, however, like they did in the dream, to offer me a job as my birthday present.

thinking in a ramble

There are two writers that, for whatever reason, anytime I read them, I feel the need to create, to write, to just sit at the keyboard and let my fingers tap out a story - a dream - a hope.... anything. They are Neil Gaimen and Stephen King. I am in the middle (interestingly enough I typed middlfe, which is close to mid-life, perhaps I have a crisis brewing) of Duma Key right now and I feel compelled to create... except I can't. Because it is late, and the writing I need to be doing is on my paper for school, and that type of writing does not involve the same type of creativity that is itching inside me to get out. And after I finish this first paper, I have another to crank out, and then I get to grade and grade and grade.... I am going to fit the creative part in somehow, and I have no idea how or when to make it happen... but I know that I need to... I think I need to start carrying around the little spiral notebook, and for once use it for the intentions that I had when I bought it... at least I know where I can turn to for inspiration when I need to get the juices flowing again. Now if there were only an academic author that spurred me on so....