What I’ve Been Up To [2]

A while back I did a “what I’ve been up to” post, and I really enjoyed it, so I’ve decided to make it a thing!

I got back from my little vacation in France on Saturday to amazing weather in the Netherlands. Apparently, we’ve had the nicest weather in all of Europe for the last two days, which is nuts, since that includes places like Greece and Spain. Either way, I’m loving it. Today is my mother’s birthday and we spent the entire afternoon in the garden, which hasn’t happened in years; and yesterday I spent a lot of time outside as well, eating pie and ice cream, and burnt my nose and forehead. Good times, good times!

But back to my vacation! I’d been pretty stressed in the days leading up to it because things weren’t going very well with my dissertation. I planned on doing lots of writing in Normandy while my parents were off seeing the sights and since this was the sixth time we went to this particular part of Normandy, I didn’t feel too bad about missing that. And it was so worth it! I wrote 5,000 words in 5 days, which is huge for me. I figured I’d write 2,000 words at best. I’ve still got loads of editing and rewriting to do, but most of it’s there now, and that is such a relief.

Plus, my week wasn’t all about the writing – I also did quite a bit of reading. I started Winter (by Marissa Meyer) in the car on Saturday and finished it on Tuesday. It was SO GOOD! I know some people don’t like that it’s over 800 pages long, but I didn’t mind that at all. It just meant more story! Although I did think there was probably almost enough stuff for two books there. Anyway. I’m going to talk about Winter in gushy detail in my review of it, which should be up… someday.

Another big thing that happened recently is that I moved! I didn’t feel happy in my old place for quite a while now, and then this opportunity came up and now I’ve moved into a lovely studio. I already feel really at home there, and when my internet finally starts working next week I’m guessing it’ll be even better. I can blog to my heart’s content again! This whole not having proper internet thing is also the reason why I haven’t replied to comments in ages. Sorry about that! Also, I was going to include a picture of my place here, but it looks like a bomb exploded so, yeah, maybe some other time.

With the vacation and the move behind me, I’m going to be all about my dissertation for the coming two and a half weeks. My deadline is on the 26^th of May (which is SO close already) and I’ve got loads to do until then. Secretly I’m kind of hoping the weather will become less nice soon so that I don’t have to longingly stare out the window for too much longer.

Quite a few people have actually been asking me to tell a little bit more about my dissertation, so I’ll just give you the title, which is basically a really brief summary: “Damsels in Distress No More? On the Representation of Girls in Recent Young Adult Retellings of the Cinderella Fairy Tale.” I’m looking at Ash by Malinda Lo, The Selection by Kiera Cass and Cinder by Marissa Meyer, in combination with the traditional tales by Charles Perrault and the Brothers Grimm. It’s been really interesting so far! Perhaps I’ll write a separate post about it when I’m done, or elaborate on it some more in one of these posts.

Well, that’s all from me for now. I just had a lovely dinner with my parents in the back yard, and baked the mojito muffins my mother requested for her birthday. And then tomorrow – back to the dissertation.

In the meantime, tell me what’s been going on with you! Are you enjoying the warm weather? Have you read any good books lately? What’s been on your mind?