it's gonna be a great day

Despite beginning at 7.30am, my day started out remarkably well. The English department search committee met for the second time this week (we're hiring a new mediaevalist) to discuss the four candidates who visited over the past three weeks in order to decide who to offer the position to. It's been fascinating to be part of the whole thing, and to get to work with my professors outside of class...and to know exactly what's happening in the department when the rest of the English majors probably have no friggin clue. :) But I did realize this morning just how lovely and brilliant these people are; as the Senior Reps, my friend Amy and I are the only students on the search committee, but they give us just as much influence and respect as everyone else on the committee, and they're actually interested in what we have to say. I sure picked the right department to spend four years with... Anyway, we actually did make a decision today (I wouldn't have been surprised if we hadn't, since three of the four candidates were so incredible...I wish we could hire two), and while I'm not really allowed to say anything yet, I do hope she accepts our offer.
[above: English House. Yes, we have our own house. Admit it, you're jealous.]

As of 6.00pm on Tuesday, I've finally caught up on all the work I missed while I was in Utah at Sundance (except my thesis, but that's in a realm of its own), in spite of my total lack of focus, sleep, and general productivity over the past five or six days. It 's been hell, but worth it in exchange for being able to go to Sundance. Although sadly, the notice board in the campus center on Tuesday read, "Have a tolerable Valentine's Day," a message I feel was made woefully moot by the fact that all the sleep I got the previous night happened between 5.30 and 7.30am, I was in a search committee meeting from 8-10am, and then writing a paper for the rest of the day and heavily reprimanded for missing class to finish it. Still, it's an amusing V-Day greeting, one that belongs in the "you know you go to a women's college when..." category...

Other news:
There was a reception/information session today for the Bryn Mawr Summer Multimedia Development Institute, the internship I participated in last summer. I was talking with one of the guys from the career development office (did a video project for him during said internship) about Sundance, and it turns out that he knows the guy who shared the Jury Prize in Short Filmmaking (Adam Parrish King, for The Wraith of Cobble Hill; he won with Carter Smith's Bugcrush). Apparently they used to play baseball together. Small world.

And short films are finally being screened to the general public (although, of course, only in select cities): apparently Magnolia Pictures and Shorts International are teaming up to get this year's Oscar-nominated short films out to more people than just film junkies and insiders [it's an indieWIRE story]. It caught my eye because one of the nominees for Best Live Action Short Film is Sean Ellis and Lene Bausager's Cashback, starring Sean Biggerstaff (a.k.a. the oh-so-Scottish Oliver Wood from the Harry Potter films), Emilia Fox (Colin Firth's sister in the A&E Pride & Prejudice), and Shaun Evans (The Boys & Girl From County Clare, Being Julia). Just look at that cast -- how can you not be intrigued?

And one last thing: my brother has a gallery on deviantart, and there are photos here that I've never seen, and they're beautiful. I'd like to know why I didn't find out about it sooner. My favorites are the hand-tinted bags of lime, and the color photo of the reeds at the nature conservancy. The wallpapers are based on a story that his best friend is writing; the characters are based on their group of friends at Dickinson College. It's not bad, really, it needs some re-writes and some shortening and a thesaurus...but it turns out that there's a character based on me, and I beat the crap out of some self-important bastard with my set of brass knuckles...a characterization that I really rather like. Heh...I get brass knuckles...hot damn.