I’m writing this post from the parental manor, where the rest of the fam are watching a loud movie. Because my parents are otherwise apparently participating in some 1900 House style reality TV show, they’re still on dial-up, so blogging will be light, as well as lite, until pretty well into 2008 (which I acknowledge [...]
Archive for December, 2007
22 Dec
Das Passagen-Werk* lite
To drag myself out of my post-grading funk yesterday, I went shopping. While I went to a lot of shops and had told myself I was out to buy something, “shopping” isn’t quite the word for what I was doing. I probably flatter myself in describing it as flâning, because I have to stifle a [...]
21 Dec
Have you seen this woman?
In The Tin Drum, Günter Grass’s grotesque allegory of World War II, Lina Greff is the slovenly, neglected wife of a pederast who surrounds himself with Nazi youth. Naturally, she becomes the third lover of the novel’s hero Oskar, who has willed himself to stop growing on his third birthday, and then resumes growing on [...]
18 Dec
$19.99!
That’s how much my most recent free dinner with a job candidate will cost me. I am elated, since this is the least I will have ever spent on dinner with a candidate here. By comparison with last year—when I spent $98 on an otherwise unmemorable salad and some random excellent cheese, for example—I [...]
16 Dec
Incomplete post
Despite my heroic marathons last week and into the weekend, I’m still not done grading, and it’s not my fault. Three of my undergrads did not turn in their final projects and have not replied to my gentle queries reminding them to, like, finish the course and hoping nothing’s wrong. My mailbox was clean as [...]
15 Dec
A tear jerker
Whenever I do laundry, this threadbare sweatshirt is always in there somewhere, and it is usually the first item out. Unless I need to be presentable, I throw it on while it’s still warm from the dryer. I know I’m hardly being original in having a favorite sweatshirt. While we’re on the subject of unoriginality, [...]
13 Dec
Don’t do it, d00d!
As I was picking up the latest book from Interlibrary Loan that I will probably not have time to look at very closely before it’s due, I noticed that the young man ahead of me in line also had no books with him. Soon it’s his turn. He’s there to pay overdue fees for a [...]
12 Dec
Why I disapprove of public displays of affection
Readers of this blog may recall that I’ve been spectacularly cursed special since my arrival in Funky City. There’s the vermin-infested house of horrors that I call home, where I arrived eighteen months ago to find termites eating my books. Since then, my bathtub faucet and hot water heater have burst within days of each [...]
11 Dec
24
Welcome to Day Two of Finals Week Grading, um, Fest 2007!
On Monday (i.e., yesterday) evening, I received half my undergraduate research papers and returned them within twenty-four hours. I’ve just received the other half. Twenty down. Twenty to go. It could be better. It could be worse. My undergrad grades are due Wednesday. Tomorrow: it’s [...]
