Birthday

It's now officially my birthday, although most of my celebrating has been done already. At some point I'll do something with friends, but besides that it ought to still be during July, that's about all I know. My "major accomplishment" (heh) of this evening was writing my thank you notes to my grandmother and her boyfriend. OK, so I got their gifts Saturday night, but still, that isn't too horrid a turn around time. ANd I did write actual short letters rather than those tacky cards by the format of:
"Dear ______,
Thank you very much for the _______. It's very nice. [Insert comment, approx 3 sentences, about future use of said gift, and/or why you wanted it.]
Love,
Maya"
At least I've outgrown the long period of my childhood where such letters ended, before hte closing, with "Thanks again" for lack of other way to end.

Em went on a CD making spree today. She's labelled one of them "Monsters Under My Bed", which, considering that she has the top bunk of our bunk beds, makes me both a monster and plural, I suppose.

At work I got paid both for walking through New Haven (to go to ITS to deal with getting myself on the computer network, as it wasn't working from where I was at Slifka) and later for sitting at the main desk all afternoon reading, during which time I answered the phone twice and let people into the building on occasion. Oh yes, and signed for maintenance once. It let me get a lot of reading done on this book from my grandmother (other grandmother, the maternal one). Once again, another gift based on the fact that it has Jewish protagonists, and presumably, because I'm a JUdaic studies major, I like anything about Jews, even though this is another one about the Old World and then New York, and World War 2- decidedly not my favorite time period. But this seems to be her concept of what being Jewish is about. Honestly, I'm significantly more interested in Jewish life after that point (especially the impact of feminism, modernized ritual, response to modernity, etc) or a bit before that point. I've just gotten too much of that time period, and it's too stereotypical and too much what everyone pictures all the time for it to interest me all that much. And this book, "The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay" by Michael Chabon, has that stereotypical picture of Jewish young men, and espcially of Jewish mothers that is just overdone, inaccurate and sort of denigrating. But it was a gift, and I've started it, so I'll finish it. But it won't get pride of place on my bookshelves afterwards. She also gave me a set of tapes for starting to learn Yiddish. If I can get myself to listen to them, it might be a good thing.

Birthday

It's now officially my birthday, although most of my celebrating has been done already. At some point I'll do something with friends, but besides that it ought to still be during July, that's about all I know. My "major accomplishment" (heh) of this evening was writing my thank you notes to my grandmother and her boyfriend. OK, so I got their gifts Saturday night, but still, that isn't too horrid a turn around time. ANd I did write actual short letters rather than those tacky cards by the format of:
"Dear ______,
Thank you very much for the _______. It's very nice. [Insert comment, approx 3 sentences, about future use of said gift, and/or why you wanted it.]
Love,
Maya"
At least I've outgrown the long period of my childhood where such letters ended, before hte closing, with "Thanks again" for lack of other way to end.

Em went on a CD making spree today. She's labelled one of them "Monsters Under My Bed", which, considering that she has the top bunk of our bunk beds, makes me both a monster and plural, I suppose.

At work I got paid both for walking through New Haven (to go to ITS to deal with getting myself on the computer network, as it wasn't working from where I was at Slifka) and later for sitting at the main desk all afternoon reading, during which time I answered the phone twice and let people into the building on occasion. Oh yes, and signed for maintenance once. It let me get a lot of reading done on this book from my grandmother (other grandmother, the maternal one). Once again, another gift based on the fact that it has Jewish protagonists, and presumably, because I'm a JUdaic studies major, I like anything about Jews, even though this is another one about the Old World and then New York, and World War 2- decidedly not my favorite time period. But this seems to be her concept of what being Jewish is about. Honestly, I'm significantly more interested in Jewish life after that point (especially the impact of feminism, modernized ritual, response to modernity, etc) or a bit before that point. I've just gotten too much of that time period, and it's too stereotypical and too much what everyone pictures all the time for it to interest me all that much. And this book, "The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay" by Michael Chabon, has that stereotypical picture of Jewish young men, and espcially of Jewish mothers that is just overdone, inaccurate and sort of denigrating. But it was a gift, and I've started it, so I'll finish it. But it won't get pride of place on my bookshelves afterwards. She also gave me a set of tapes for starting to learn Yiddish. If I can get myself to listen to them, it might be a good thing.