Deep Thoughts: The ABD Edition

I am now officially ABD, which basically means I get to do the hard part of this whole Ph.D. thing and write a thesis—because everything up until now was a piece of cake. Also, I get to call my self a doctoral candidate instead of a doctoral student. (This might actually occasion new business cards.) These past few weeks, though, have entailed insane amounts of reading (I think my record was somewhere around 600 pages in a day) and then crazy amounts of writing and then a short trip to L.A. to defend. Some of my adventures:

• Three days in L.A. = five trips to Coffee Bean. I almost went for a sixth but went out for real food instead.

• I don't care if it is raining and 60 degrees in L.A. I came from Madison, Wisconsin, and I will wear flip-flops, dammit. 

• Love is wanting to leave L.A., land of flip-flops and Coffee Bean, to go back to Madison, land of cold weather and college students, because that is where your husband is. 

• Beef bacon apparently makes wonderful gifts. This is definitely something only a man could teach me.    

• The two frum married ladies wearing berets who were behind me going through security both got  their heads patted down. I was wearing a bandana and did not get my head patted down. I am not sure why, but I think this means I should always wear bandanas on flights. Though, last time I flew, I got a full-body pat-down and even after opening my shaitel box to find, well, a shaitel, the TSA people did not discover that I was wearing a wig. Makes me feel all warm and fuzzy about airline security.

• Why does Target have a Neiman Marcus section? (Z asks if Neiman Marcus has a Target section.) I'm sorry, a children's dress at Target should never cost $100.