Seriously, though, this week can just die already.

I haven't posted much this week. It's not because it's been a particularly uneventful week, but that it's been a little too full, to be honest. For the first half, I've been recovering from the oral surgery, which means it's mostly stories about writhing in pain, or feeling really, really good about these pills I'm taking, you guys.

 And for the second half, it's been preparing for two presentations, one on the database I've been tweaking for my research assistant project, and one on videogames and paratexts that covers the material I go over in the first full chapter of my dissertation. The database one was stressful because it was a presentation, and a database isn't really the most visually appealing type of structure. The value of a database comes out when you have to apply it to something, when it turns out that bit of information that you desperately need. And it's hard to demonstrate that to a room full of people in ten minutes. I think I found something that works, though.  The paratext discussion was stressful because it's part of a lecture series which has really been the only thing that gets members of our faculty and student body out together this term, and talking about game studies to people not in game studies can be immensely difficult, especially if they don't play games at all. It'd be like trying to discuss film with someone who's never watched a movie in their life, but vaguely understands--or think they understand--what one is. Again, though, I think I pulled out a few strands that would allow all audiences to understand what's at stake.

That doesn't matter though, thanks to the third thing that was bad about this week: the weather. Starting Sunday, we've basically had continual rain all week. Problem is, it also got colder every day this week. So by Thursday, we had a full on ice rain. This was particularly problematic for me, because I had been on campus preparing for my dual presentations until 2 am; walking home in freezing rain at that time, knowing you've got to be up at 7 for your presentations is not a great feeling. Also not a great feeling is getting to campus the next day and learning that both of your presentations have been cancelled due to--wait for it--bad weather conditions. It was extremely frustrating, to say the least. I had worked very hard to bring both presentations to a level I was satisfied with presenting and to have them both stripped away by weather I had braved was a fairly un-satisfying conclusion. Both presentations will presumably happen at some point, but they've been postponed indefinitely for now.

And it's *still* raining.

Later Days.