All right - it looks like a lot of folks will be there, which is great. We're going to do 8AM on Friday before Heu Mihi and Dame Eleanor and I have to toddle off to give our papers. There seems to be some question about Mug Shots being open that early, etc. - how about the Gatehouse Cafe in Valley III? They open at 8am and if we get there when they open we could get a table easily.
Please let me know your thoughts on this - I'm glad the time proved pretty easy to agree on!
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
I have a new gray hair...
Three of them, actually. They live right next to each other at my left temple. Together, they comprise a gray "streak," I've decided (which sounds sorta cool).
Because these newcomers are many, are a collective, are legion, I've decided to name them...oh, say...Chaucer.
One is named "Graduate Chaucer," one is named "Undergraduate Chaucer," and one is named "the Grading of Chaucer." Paper Bear, Mama Bear, Baby Bear. These hairs are a perfect microcosmic representation of my life this semester. Highly intense! I'm loving my classes so much, but they are all-consuming; they give so much but they take even more. It sounds like I'm on the Therapy Channel...
I teach my grad course on Wednesday nights and when I get home I'm too wired and "on" to crawl into bed and fall into the coma I deserve and yet I'm too exhausted to do any real work. This is why I'm blogging my gray hairs. And trying not to notice the look of disgust on my Blog Dashboard's face...
The only thing left to do with this evening (other than close this rambling blogpost) is to retire to the couch with a Bud Lite and watch Kung-Fu Panda.
Because these newcomers are many, are a collective, are legion, I've decided to name them...oh, say...Chaucer.
One is named "Graduate Chaucer," one is named "Undergraduate Chaucer," and one is named "the Grading of Chaucer." Paper Bear, Mama Bear, Baby Bear. These hairs are a perfect microcosmic representation of my life this semester. Highly intense! I'm loving my classes so much, but they are all-consuming; they give so much but they take even more. It sounds like I'm on the Therapy Channel...
I teach my grad course on Wednesday nights and when I get home I'm too wired and "on" to crawl into bed and fall into the coma I deserve and yet I'm too exhausted to do any real work. This is why I'm blogging my gray hairs. And trying not to notice the look of disgust on my Blog Dashboard's face...
"You don't blog for 11 days and you're blogging...this? Wtf??!! I feel so cheap..."When I returned tonight and dragged my ass in out of the rain, I found new gifties from the cats (nice weather = shedding = increased furball-age) and began cussing a blue streak while still standing in the front doorway (which garnered a scornful accusing glare from Furball #2 - "ungrateful bitch! It was a gift!!"). And then noticed that my highly religious conservative neighbors were having a late dinner party next door with the window open. Sweet. Bible-thumping eyes bugged out. Bible-thumping noses pressed up against the window screen in disgust.
The only thing left to do with this evening (other than close this rambling blogpost) is to retire to the couch with a Bud Lite and watch Kung-Fu Panda.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Kalamazoo Blogger Meet-up
Is it too early??
It's never too early - if we don't plan it now, all our schedules will get filled up! S'okay - I will take point on this (unless someone else has/wants to) so Dr. Virago won't have to do it for the 5th year in a row! ;)
This is just the feeler post:
Who will be there?
Who wants to meet up?
When and where? Suggestions?
Bring it on!
Updated to add:
It's looking like Friday morning, early breakfast/coffee is best - I present at 10am, so maybe 8am? Is this too early/late? People can come and go at will...what is that coffee shop on campus?
It's never too early - if we don't plan it now, all our schedules will get filled up! S'okay - I will take point on this (unless someone else has/wants to) so Dr. Virago won't have to do it for the 5th year in a row! ;)
This is just the feeler post:
Who will be there?
Who wants to meet up?
When and where? Suggestions?
Bring it on!
Updated to add:
It's looking like Friday morning, early breakfast/coffee is best - I present at 10am, so maybe 8am? Is this too early/late? People can come and go at will...what is that coffee shop on campus?
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Notes from Captivity: Day 5
I feel like an indoor cat.
Yesterday I left the house for the first time in 2 days. I made TD take me out to dinner and to Home Depot.
Why have I not left the house? Because here in Dutchmanlandia it is crazy-cold, nasty, precipitating in bad ways, and I am without a car when TD goes up to campus (he is not on Spring Break). Also, there's nothing to do here; nowhere to go; no one to see but TD (do I sound like a whiny 8 year old yet?).
I have always had a vexed relationship with Dutchmanlandia and, more specifically, the city in which he resides and the university where he teaches. There's never really been a place for me here except in this apartment. So, coming here for a week is great because I get to see TD, but there's not much more going on and that's a little...stultifying. It's not like when we're at Medieval Woman HQ we're clubbing into the wee hours of the morning or anything (except the Job Market Gnomes have now hung a disco ball in the kitchen and, when I left, they were beginning construction on their tiki-bar). But there always seems to be stuff to do, people to see, friends to hang out with. And TD will be able to get his own campus office when he comes for extended stays. It's home, and here is a weigh station. So, I read and took notes on 5 articles yesterday and made some serious headway. The day before I caught up on my HGTV (deelightful).
When TD came home last night, I had my face pressed against the window, eyes bulging, manic look on my face. He said, "you look like Furball #1 when he wants the window open." Yes! I want to gulp in the free air! You can take me to McDonald's! Wendy's! I don't care! We need to get something at Home Depot?? No sweat! I'm you're gal!!!! And as we walked up and down those vast aisles, I beamed at everyone who walked by, chatted up the key-making dude, etc. It was a proper outing.
We have also been to see the much awaited movie, Watchmen. And I thought it sucked canal water. Leave aside the fact that it was sexist, unnecessarily gratuitously violent (this coming from someone whose favorite movie is Predator), the costumes were lame, it was chronologically confusing, not very action-y, and it was an hour too long. The worst part?
Blue schlong.
Not to put too fine a point on it. Dr. Manhattan's blue schlong was all over this movie and it was like it had a frickin' tractor beam! I couldn't look away and not in a good way. Why do we need to see that? And I understand that it's a big thing that they're finally showing male genitalia in movies when they've been showing nude women forever, and this one is pretty main stream, so it's a statement and whatever. But it was big. And blue. Oh, and he had butt implants. Big blue butt implants. Ghastly.
I'm sure that there's just something I'm not getting about how good the movie is - it's been getting great reviews and for those fankids in the know it's supposedly a good representation of the comic, etc. But TD and I looked at each other and went, "Huh?" at the end of the movie. But there were sour gummy peaches and Coke Zero on tap at this theatre, so the night was, overall, a success.
Yesterday I left the house for the first time in 2 days. I made TD take me out to dinner and to Home Depot.
Why have I not left the house? Because here in Dutchmanlandia it is crazy-cold, nasty, precipitating in bad ways, and I am without a car when TD goes up to campus (he is not on Spring Break). Also, there's nothing to do here; nowhere to go; no one to see but TD (do I sound like a whiny 8 year old yet?).
I have always had a vexed relationship with Dutchmanlandia and, more specifically, the city in which he resides and the university where he teaches. There's never really been a place for me here except in this apartment. So, coming here for a week is great because I get to see TD, but there's not much more going on and that's a little...stultifying. It's not like when we're at Medieval Woman HQ we're clubbing into the wee hours of the morning or anything (except the Job Market Gnomes have now hung a disco ball in the kitchen and, when I left, they were beginning construction on their tiki-bar). But there always seems to be stuff to do, people to see, friends to hang out with. And TD will be able to get his own campus office when he comes for extended stays. It's home, and here is a weigh station. So, I read and took notes on 5 articles yesterday and made some serious headway. The day before I caught up on my HGTV (deelightful).
When TD came home last night, I had my face pressed against the window, eyes bulging, manic look on my face. He said, "you look like Furball #1 when he wants the window open." Yes! I want to gulp in the free air! You can take me to McDonald's! Wendy's! I don't care! We need to get something at Home Depot?? No sweat! I'm you're gal!!!! And as we walked up and down those vast aisles, I beamed at everyone who walked by, chatted up the key-making dude, etc. It was a proper outing.
We have also been to see the much awaited movie, Watchmen. And I thought it sucked canal water. Leave aside the fact that it was sexist, unnecessarily gratuitously violent (this coming from someone whose favorite movie is Predator), the costumes were lame, it was chronologically confusing, not very action-y, and it was an hour too long. The worst part?
Blue schlong.
Not to put too fine a point on it. Dr. Manhattan's blue schlong was all over this movie and it was like it had a frickin' tractor beam! I couldn't look away and not in a good way. Why do we need to see that? And I understand that it's a big thing that they're finally showing male genitalia in movies when they've been showing nude women forever, and this one is pretty main stream, so it's a statement and whatever. But it was big. And blue. Oh, and he had butt implants. Big blue butt implants. Ghastly.
I'm sure that there's just something I'm not getting about how good the movie is - it's been getting great reviews and for those fankids in the know it's supposedly a good representation of the comic, etc. But TD and I looked at each other and went, "Huh?" at the end of the movie. But there were sour gummy peaches and Coke Zero on tap at this theatre, so the night was, overall, a success.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Dirty Looks, Snow Days, and Other Bits of Fluff
Oh my god, I've never gotten such dirty looks from my students after an exam! Several of them were seen to either glare at me and roll their eyes or even mumble in response to my "have a good weekend!", "Um, I'll...try..."
But this is what I've come to expect from the new breed of students who blame their professors for the fact that they haven't done the reading or taken notes during the lectures. Quick hint, little dudes: when I talk about the genre of a certain CT and write "romance" on the board and then define it? That's not just to work out my left hand. It's not just so I can feel the intense tactile pleasure of chalk on skin. I'm not Prof. Dickens - I do not get paid by the numbers of words I write!
I have a new word for these students: baby-slackers. They slack, but they're infantile about it. If you're gonna slack, then do it. Own it. Accept that it was your decision to slack and not something forced on you by...me, for instance. Of course, there's the usual cadre of students who ace the exam because they studied and they rock and they're smart (or at least thorough) and they're the reason I still love to teach.
In other news, we had a snow day yesterday (as did so much of the Eastern seaboard - I could be anywhere! Mwahahahahaha!) - but, even better than the fact that I now only have to teach once this week before jetting off to sunny, tropical Dutchmanlandia for Spring Break on Friday: TD was trapped here for an extra day this weekend! So, yesterday we went to the diner for breakfast, went to some friends' house to hang for a little while, graded, ate leftover meatloaf and mashed potatoes, and went to see a movie. Joy.
I've accepted the fact that my life is largely boring at the moment and highly unblogable. "Pulling at the plow" is not a fun topic for a blogpost, but that's what I'm doing. Oh, I had an article rejected, but in a very nice way, so I'm sending it out again with no muss, no fuss. I'm convinced that this was because the day before I had not recommended another article for publication for another journal - bad karma! Oh well, that's wackademia...
But this is what I've come to expect from the new breed of students who blame their professors for the fact that they haven't done the reading or taken notes during the lectures. Quick hint, little dudes: when I talk about the genre of a certain CT and write "romance" on the board and then define it? That's not just to work out my left hand. It's not just so I can feel the intense tactile pleasure of chalk on skin. I'm not Prof. Dickens - I do not get paid by the numbers of words I write!
I have a new word for these students: baby-slackers. They slack, but they're infantile about it. If you're gonna slack, then do it. Own it. Accept that it was your decision to slack and not something forced on you by...me, for instance. Of course, there's the usual cadre of students who ace the exam because they studied and they rock and they're smart (or at least thorough) and they're the reason I still love to teach.
In other news, we had a snow day yesterday (as did so much of the Eastern seaboard - I could be anywhere! Mwahahahahaha!) - but, even better than the fact that I now only have to teach once this week before jetting off to sunny, tropical Dutchmanlandia for Spring Break on Friday: TD was trapped here for an extra day this weekend! So, yesterday we went to the diner for breakfast, went to some friends' house to hang for a little while, graded, ate leftover meatloaf and mashed potatoes, and went to see a movie. Joy.
I've accepted the fact that my life is largely boring at the moment and highly unblogable. "Pulling at the plow" is not a fun topic for a blogpost, but that's what I'm doing. Oh, I had an article rejected, but in a very nice way, so I'm sending it out again with no muss, no fuss. I'm convinced that this was because the day before I had not recommended another article for publication for another journal - bad karma! Oh well, that's wackademia...
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