It's in!

Despite what everyone said,
I did not find this part anti-climactic.

Sorry to leave you hanging for so long, fair readers. In short, the dissertation is in!

I got the comments back from my friends, and by the end I was desensitized enough that I could just run through them and make necessary changes. I held my breath while the miraculous referencing system called Zotero created my bibliography; I fought long and hard with the college printer to get the final version onto paper the day before it was due; I took the two copies to Staples that night for binding; and I submitted them at 12:30pm on September 30. I had lunch with my friends at the pub, and then, contrary to what everyone expected of me, I got right back to work -- but on something entirely different.

You see, I somehow managed to stumble my way into a job as a technical editor for a company back home, so I just might be able to support myself again, rather than being in debt! But I'd been more or less neglecting it during the finishing-up process. So, it was time to catch up.

Not too long afterward, though, my friend Emily came to visit from home, and we took a week to travel in the northern regions of Britain: a cold, gray afternoon in York, followed by several glorious days in Edinburgh and the highlands, and a final treat in the Lake District, where we were glad to have our waterproofs along during one of our walks, because the heavens opened for the first time on the whole trip. It was the perfect vacation, really.

And now? I've been back in the library, taking pictures of how people have represented Anglo-Saxon text in printed books. This is in service of a conference I'll be attending in a few weeks. So, as usual, I'm keeping myself busy. But it's a fun kind of busy, and I'm not at all tired of telling people that I've handed in.  It is a sweet, sweet thing.