Waiting

Yoko is coming to pick me up in about a half hour and we will all go to my second supervisor's house for dinner. I have transcribed two videos today, which isn't a lot, but I feel like I had a damn productive week. I did the following:

• Finished French homework.
• Submitted article to Discourse and Society.
• Finished a bulk of my French final. Only studying for the speaking test remains.
• Received epic email from applied linguistic god, Tuen van Dijk praising my work and saying the article was sent to Discourse and Communication instead, as it concerned CMC. Based on his email (I don't want to be too optimistic), it sounds like I may have a chance of getting it in. Discourse and Society is a Sage publication, an ISI journal. Ruth Wodak has been in it. Adam Jaworski. Theo van Leeuwen. These names mean nothing to you, I'm sure. Let's just say, very, very respectable scholars in the field.
• Got my Birmingham essays and marked all of them in 48 hours.
• Transcribed about 5 videos and organised my dataset otherwise (getting videos and comments in a form that I can add the transcript and put it into Atlas.TI quickly).
• Finished 68.9% of BAAL presentation.
• Ordered something for my sister, something I have been meaning to get for her since I did the shitty gift card thing again this year. I hate giving gift cards, I love getting them. I wish I could not have a deadline of someone's birthday to get them a present. I just want to get them what I think they might like whenever I think of it, regardless of what time of the year it is.
• Ate little and exercised a lot.

What follows will probably be about being healthy and dieting, so eff off if this doesn't interest you: I am trying hard to get into the range of where I want to stay before I go to Scotland. This should happen and I am really planning heavily for surviving this conference without gaining weight. Already planning runs. Already thinking about the tea and coffee times and how I will avoid making a mess of myself. Silly? Yes, it is, but if I don't do this, I am going to gain back a ton of weight in just a couple of days because I will lose control at the drop of a hat now. I need, need, need to maintain this: it's the thing I have never been able to do my whole freaking life. Goal one of finishing a diet for the first time is well within reach. I can't throw it all away.

I hate explaining this to people in real life because the first thing everyone says is, 'You're not overweight.' Well, I am not now, no, but I was in- 'No, you weren't overweight, you were fine.' Well, it depends on how you judge that. I think BMI is a good measure and my BMI was 26 and- 'Oh, I don't trust those numbers.'

How do we decide what overweight is if we can't use simple scales and measures? Look, I don't have a bad body image. I think I look fine. I don't have a low self-esteem. All I want is to be well within a healthy weight. Like a BMI of 23, body fat percentage of 16-17%. I don't want to be close to being underweight. I want to be healthy, not based on someone's opinion of what healthy is, but based on an objective measure. Is that okay with everyone?

I'm getting worked up. I'll be done in two weeks and not have to deal with this anymore.

Otherwise things are okay. I am eager to go to Aberdeen. I am even more eager to get through October and the beginning of November, all the bills to be paid and trouble with passports and visas and traveling to Spain and starting the new school year. Once that's done, I can settle in: train rides to London on crisp Friday mornings. The walk through the woods to Middlesex. The pleasure of finishing a day of teaching and getting on the underground. The British Library. Oh, I am ready: take me now!

Okay, I killed 22 minutes.