non-linear regression

Perhaps in diving my life, keeping this blog purely for the day to day and the other, *pats livejournal* for the bizarre fannish glee that is most of my life, I'll have some kind of balance.

It's a hope.

Meet with supervisor, Dr. Bike, yesterday. I must work to define my research question down from "I want to talk to Chinese elites about climate change!" to something more like "international norms of climate change, a case study of Chinese elites." I've been sent to the library until Thanksgiving to sort my thoughts.

Didn't make it to the library today though, today was about regression analysis, which I find oddly comforting. There's math in it, logic and equations. I love equations because once you get them, you're good, you're ready to go. Not much of that in politics.

I've been listening to streaming NPR and indulging my loneliness. I'm far past homesickness, but I'm far enough away to have a certain culture longing for what I find familiar. I miss that quietly polite Minnesota-niceness. There's a version of it here, but I think I'm missing more than just accents that sound familiar.

My own is morphing and 'tomato', 'mocha', 'pasta' and 'basil' are no longer recognisably American. 'Sorry' and 'about' have definitely gone Canadian, must be the commonwealth creeping in. It's interesting. I've become only vaguely recognisable as American to other Americans who are newer to the city.

Library, cat food for the dear little black one, and some proofreading tomorrow.