D'oh!

It seems that I have to take a short hiatus from all my fun stuff, I just have too much on my plate right now with school and work. I'm not too worried about my papers as I'm making good progress on them, at least in ways of research. My last paper for the semester is due on May 7th, and after that I'm going to play until I drop!

I'm quite excited about one of my papers, actually. The paper I will be writing for the Women in Traditional China is coming along quite smoothly, and if everything goes well, I might expand it to my Master Thesis. The era I'm going to be examining is a little before my field of interest, but I believe that with ample research and a level head, I can expand the topic to modern day past 1949. I guess this kind of fits in my craft blog! I'm certainly putting in a lot of time and love into it.

Here's my thesis, the era I will write about is from Pre-Han period to the Tang dynasty:

"In this paper I intend to examine the depiction of jealous behavior in women in biographies from ancient and medieval China. The narratives selected are not retold simply for entertainment; instead, they serve as cautionary tales for the consequences of jealousy within the harem. The depiction of these 'petty' and 'vicious' women portrayed the dynamics of the inner court negatively, but the modern reader should keep in mind that many of these stories were written by men with agendas. Much like etiquette books such as the Book of Filial Piety for Women and the Leinu Zhuan, these stories serve as prescriptions rather than descriptions."

The main gist for the paper is to to examine the representation of jealousy in medieval Chinese literature. Those stories certainly make for raunchy tales, but taken in larger social context, they are much more significant than simply the realm of entertainment.

Because I only have about a month to two for this paper, I can only do so much in ways of research. Hopefully though, like I said, I would have to the chance to expand it later in my life. When I first thought of the idea, I was conflicted because the topic seemed irrelevant, trivial, and even a bit frivolous. As the question constantly proposed by a history professor last year... "So? Why does this matter? Who cares?" These questions are difficult to answer as I still have not seen a consistent answer to "Why study history?" These questions become more difficult to answer especially when I'm faced with a family of engineers and businessmen who live in the now. Though truth be told, if I were living in worse conditions, I certainly wouldn't have chosen the BA path. But since I'm spoiled, I can!

On a lighter note, Joey and I have quite a bit planned for the summer! We're going to the Scaraborough Faire and then Mudbug Madness in Louisiana in May. Which brings me to my next project:

To eat my weight worth of craw fish!!! NOM NOM NOM!

We're also planning for the annual anime convention, but as of now that's still not set in stone. Every year I declare that I'll go, but every year we flake out. Not this one though!! Not this one!

I also have quite a few projects I need to finish; crochet, knitting, and some cross stitch. The Ravelry scarf exchange is going to start soon, so after my papers, I'll definitely have to start that! On top of that, I have some video games I want to finish! I started a XBox 360 game; Kingdom Under Fire: Circle of Doom. It's a really pretty game and a lot of fun! However, the graphics are a bit frightening, so Joey has to supervise the sessions so I can actually progress in the game. It's the first time I had to turn off the "blood" setting because it was just so unsettling. That said, I still want to give Ninja Gaiden II a whirl when I get the chance.

So for now I bid Adieu! to my crafty life! I shall see you again after May 7th when we'll indulge in passionate... passion!