Monday, March 9, 2009

Old red-eyes is back.

(Five bucks if you can name the band who recorded that song by the end of this post.)

Since long-distance relationships have been the subject of some blog-conversation, I thought I'd mention that I have to leave tomorrow night/Wednesday morning at one a.m. to go "present" at a "symposium" at Neruda's college on Wednesday afternoon. (Translation: what can we scheme up to get our institutions to cover our travel costs to see one another?)

It sucks being across the country, but I have to say that it sucks more how I have to work like mad BETWEEN our visits, to make up for all the stuff (grading, prep-reading, writing a conference paper that I have to present in 3 weeks) I don't do when we're blissfully together and devoting all our mooney eyes to one another.

Does anyone have love-time-efficiency advice? Does anyone think it's pathetic that such a question must be asked?




(The Beautiful South, from 0898 Beautiful South, 1992).

(And did you know that Fatboy Slim used to be in the Housemartins, with PD Heaton, who went on to form the Beautiful South?)

(I've just moved into the "F"s, in my endless upload-the-CDs-to-iTunes project.)

11 comments:

jw said...

Oh, c'mon. If it's going to be for five bucks, you should at least make it something challenging. I had it before I got past the headline. Then again, once we get beyond The Beautiful South I go stale pretty quickly.

Oh, wait: advice? Um. Sorry.

Renaissance Girl said...

No time for advice, JW, just time to show off how you overlap musically with me? Which is not a surprise considering that WE WERE BORN ON THE SAME DAY.

Renaissance Girl said...

Shoe update:

Having been paid half of my advance by the translation publishers, I bought these as a self-gift:

http://www.aldoshoes.com/ca-eng/women/pumps/round-toe/69412564-zelaya/28

Flavia said...

Damn. Those (and the previous pair) are some fantastic shoes.

As for advice? Not much to offer, though I will say that for someone as procrastinatory as I, a relationship--and in some ways especially a long-distance relationship--can be a really useful way of blocking my time and getting stuff DONE.

I've always brought work with me when visiting my LD beaux, and having plans to go out or even just hang around at home and watch a video in the evening can be a marvellous spur to productivity during the earlier hours of the day. This is easiest, of course, when I'm on vacation, and the beau is not--I always feel guilty if I haven't gotten something substantive done by the time he gets home--but it's actually nicer, and nicely companionable, to work silently or mostly silently together in the same room.

I'd also estimate that I wrote 70% of my dissertation between the hours of 8 p.m. and 11: my then-partner and I had a standing phone date at 11, and after frittering away most of the day I'd finally force myself to crank out a few pages so as to be able to enjoy our phone call and not be filled with self-loathing.

(Of course, you have kids, so your days are always more structured than mine. . . so maybe this isn't useful advice at all!)

Anonymous said...

No advice but good wishes for your trip. And a thank you for reminding me about the Housemartins! Blast from the past...

Blue Cheese said...

No relationship advice here. I'm working on a mean spinsterhood.

Blue Cheese said...

P.S. I got these:

http://www.aldoshoes.com/ca-eng/women/shoes/flats/71577392-fritima/68

sexy said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Renaissance Girl said...

Cheese: They're totally you. Not so much me, but TOTALLY you. Can't wait to see them on your dainty little toes.

Fie upon this quiet life! said...

Well... I don't have relationship advice for LD relationships. But I do have a bit of comfort to offer. My hubby is working on his second masters, and I am full-time mom by day and part-time teacher by night. All of my work for school/research happens at night. All of my hubby's work for his classes happens at night. We are too poor to have sitters for regular dates and live nowhere near family. So we get to go out on a date about once every three months if we're lucky. We make it work, but it's been harder than hard for the last three years.

Anyway... I actually envy the fact that you get to go somewhere and actually spend time with your significant other. Right now, I feel like we're roommates who wish they could go on a date and who occasionally have great sex. Grass is always greener...

Anonymous said...

Don't postpone fighting or normal life under the assumption that these are a waste of precious, limited time together. I think the biggest danger to an LD relationship is failure to communicate problems effectively because one assumes that there is no time for it and that the rare time together must be spent in activity that makes one happy (as opposed to in relationship work that can occasionally be painful).