I love PostSecret, and I love the fact that I have someone's secret as my desktop background.
I think that makes everything all right.
Monday, December 7, 2009
Monday, November 9, 2009
If music be the food of love...
"Play on" if you're a fan of Shakespeare; "Sing on," if you're a fan of PMEA District 9 Chorus 2003. Both have great meaning to me, so...yeah.
I'm taking a brief break from my regularly scheduled NaNoWriMo-ing to visit my blog. I had a lovely realization this evening on my ride home from choir, and I felt the need to comment on it.
I never officially participated in PAI, but I am starting to understand that "Art is a bond." Side note: Let's face it; if I had gone to PAI, the only thing that would have happened would have been that my love for a certain then long-haired choir director would have gotten a shot at an earlier start. Thus, not so sad that I never had a bajillion dollars to cough up for that program.
But I digress.
"Art is a bond." Looking back over all of my friendships, past and present, I realized that the strongest and longest lasting friendships I have had have all been forged in music or theater. "Art is a bond." I have this feeling that it's the music that's been keeping us connected for all these years.
I listened to some District Chorus pieces on the car ride home, and, as bad as I now realize they are (let's face it; I'm a grown-up choir girl now in a grown-up choir that can actually cut off together...most of the time), I can't help but smile. I still remember most of the words, and I still remember some of the notes, but it's really the people that made the music come alive. And at the same time, it was the music that made us come alive for each other. I always try to look towards the future and welcome growth and change, but if this is the stuff I'm going to get nostalgic for every now and then, I couldn't ask for anything better.
To those of you who read this and were there: you understand.
I'm taking a brief break from my regularly scheduled NaNoWriMo-ing to visit my blog. I had a lovely realization this evening on my ride home from choir, and I felt the need to comment on it.
I never officially participated in PAI, but I am starting to understand that "Art is a bond." Side note: Let's face it; if I had gone to PAI, the only thing that would have happened would have been that my love for a certain then long-haired choir director would have gotten a shot at an earlier start. Thus, not so sad that I never had a bajillion dollars to cough up for that program.
But I digress.
"Art is a bond." Looking back over all of my friendships, past and present, I realized that the strongest and longest lasting friendships I have had have all been forged in music or theater. "Art is a bond." I have this feeling that it's the music that's been keeping us connected for all these years.
I listened to some District Chorus pieces on the car ride home, and, as bad as I now realize they are (let's face it; I'm a grown-up choir girl now in a grown-up choir that can actually cut off together...most of the time), I can't help but smile. I still remember most of the words, and I still remember some of the notes, but it's really the people that made the music come alive. And at the same time, it was the music that made us come alive for each other. I always try to look towards the future and welcome growth and change, but if this is the stuff I'm going to get nostalgic for every now and then, I couldn't ask for anything better.
To those of you who read this and were there: you understand.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Things I should be doing right now:
1) Grading papers
2) grading quiz corrections
3) Writing a donation request letter to my place of employment from the non-profit choir that I sing with
4) Applying to Grad school
Things I am actually doing:
1) Writing in this blog
2) Looking at the papers I have to grade with generous amounts of loathing
3) Having no clue where those quizzes even are in my grading folder
4) Gearing up to play a few games of Bejeweled Blitz before my next class
With those things in mind, I'm actually having a pretty solid day. Sometimes I forget what good conversation can do for my general outlook on life. I had two good conversations so far today, and my afternoon class is always good for a few laughs, especially when I get stuck on ridiculous examples like "Panda bears and sunshine are the most important things in a girl's life." and use them to illustrate every concept that I am attempting to teach. For example, when talking about major versus minor details I might say "Discuss three reasons why panda bears and sunshine are the most important things in a girl's life." Or when I am explaining the concept of just stating the main idea of a paragraph instead of over-telling me, I will probably say "Don't write 'I am going to discuss three reasons why panda bears and sunshine are the most important things in a girl's life.' Write 'Panda bears and sunshine are the most important things in a girl's life because they are warm, cuddly, and bright.'"
My afternoon class enjoys these examples. My morning class does not stop speaking Hindi long enough to let me make funny examples. Ah, the trials and tribulations of a part-time adjunct professor at a local community college.
I am taking note of the fact that I am writing exactly the opposite way I am teaching my students to write. My excuse for this is that I am teaching them academic writing, and I am merely blogging at the moment. So there.
2) grading quiz corrections
3) Writing a donation request letter to my place of employment from the non-profit choir that I sing with
4) Applying to Grad school
Things I am actually doing:
1) Writing in this blog
2) Looking at the papers I have to grade with generous amounts of loathing
3) Having no clue where those quizzes even are in my grading folder
4) Gearing up to play a few games of Bejeweled Blitz before my next class
With those things in mind, I'm actually having a pretty solid day. Sometimes I forget what good conversation can do for my general outlook on life. I had two good conversations so far today, and my afternoon class is always good for a few laughs, especially when I get stuck on ridiculous examples like "Panda bears and sunshine are the most important things in a girl's life." and use them to illustrate every concept that I am attempting to teach. For example, when talking about major versus minor details I might say "Discuss three reasons why panda bears and sunshine are the most important things in a girl's life." Or when I am explaining the concept of just stating the main idea of a paragraph instead of over-telling me, I will probably say "Don't write 'I am going to discuss three reasons why panda bears and sunshine are the most important things in a girl's life.' Write 'Panda bears and sunshine are the most important things in a girl's life because they are warm, cuddly, and bright.'"
My afternoon class enjoys these examples. My morning class does not stop speaking Hindi long enough to let me make funny examples. Ah, the trials and tribulations of a part-time adjunct professor at a local community college.
I am taking note of the fact that I am writing exactly the opposite way I am teaching my students to write. My excuse for this is that I am teaching them academic writing, and I am merely blogging at the moment. So there.
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Ignorance is your new best friend.
I never could explain why it is that I tend to want to blog after typing a ridiculous amount of school work.
Perhaps I never will.
And now I don't feel like it anymore, haha. I think I'll just go to bed.
I think I'll bring my laptop with me to campus tomorrow. I hide out in the library a lot, and I always seem to run out of things to do on my break. Laptop time should fix that.
Perhaps I never will.
And now I don't feel like it anymore, haha. I think I'll just go to bed.
I think I'll bring my laptop with me to campus tomorrow. I hide out in the library a lot, and I always seem to run out of things to do on my break. Laptop time should fix that.
Friday, September 11, 2009
An update.
I always find the urge to blog when I am nowhere near a computer or near a computer that would be an unwise choice for the bloggings. Today is a prime example of this. I actually subbed for a computer teacher who (first time EVER) left me a log on for a computer. I started thinking about all of the wonderful things I could write, and then I realizes that School District in Which I am Subbing probably would not appreciate my bloggish musings.
I honestly do not feel like writing right now. However, I feel compelled to do so. I will explain why in a moment.
August was a bit of a whirlwind, so a general update on my whereabouts and well-being might be in order.
I moved out of 517. This was fraught with drama, and unnecessary bad feelings were foisted upon me. I moved out and moved on over to the West side, in with Boyfriend. I have been living here ever since. Very happy.
On the flip side of that very happy, School that I Wanted to Teach at Full-Time hired 4 people to teach English and none of them were me. Not cool. However, the very next day I got a call from Local Community College asking me if I would be interested in teaching a few lower level English classes. I accepted, so now I teach college on Tuesdays and Thursdays, sub on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and work at the good old Lodge on the weekends. With all of this, I believe I will have managed to cobble together the sort of acceptable income that allows me to live on my own but not save anything or have health insurance. Welcome to my mid-twenties.
The reason I felt compelled to write and will attempt to continue feeling compelled to write is my LCCC class. I gave my students an assignment that is designed to force them to write in a journal twice a week, and I feel like I would be letting them down if I were not practicing what I am preaching. So, while I teach them about nouns and verbs and stuff, I will be muddling along with them in their journal-writing struggles. And I promise I will work on concluding sentences.
I honestly do not feel like writing right now. However, I feel compelled to do so. I will explain why in a moment.
August was a bit of a whirlwind, so a general update on my whereabouts and well-being might be in order.
I moved out of 517. This was fraught with drama, and unnecessary bad feelings were foisted upon me. I moved out and moved on over to the West side, in with Boyfriend. I have been living here ever since. Very happy.
On the flip side of that very happy, School that I Wanted to Teach at Full-Time hired 4 people to teach English and none of them were me. Not cool. However, the very next day I got a call from Local Community College asking me if I would be interested in teaching a few lower level English classes. I accepted, so now I teach college on Tuesdays and Thursdays, sub on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and work at the good old Lodge on the weekends. With all of this, I believe I will have managed to cobble together the sort of acceptable income that allows me to live on my own but not save anything or have health insurance. Welcome to my mid-twenties.
The reason I felt compelled to write and will attempt to continue feeling compelled to write is my LCCC class. I gave my students an assignment that is designed to force them to write in a journal twice a week, and I feel like I would be letting them down if I were not practicing what I am preaching. So, while I teach them about nouns and verbs and stuff, I will be muddling along with them in their journal-writing struggles. And I promise I will work on concluding sentences.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Wait, what?
I have titled this post as such because I have a habit of mishearing things. I often have to ask my friends and students to repeat themselves. It's something I'm working on.
The real idea that sparked this blog entry was the fact that I often tend to mishear song lyrics. I'm sure that I am not alone in this matter, but sometimes I get rather upset when I hear the wrong thing. I'm an English teacher, and I have been taughtt to critically read. Song lyrics are just poems set to music, therefore I pay a lot of attention to the multiple layers of meanings that come with lyrics.
The problem with this critical approach to lyrics coupled with my frequency to mishear lyrics is that I tend to form opinions of songs based on the lyrics I think I hear. When I eventually get around to looking up the words on various websites and I find that they are not what I think I heard, I generally get upset. I can think of three specific times this has occurred in recent times. All three of these instances revolve around a single misheard word, but these words seriously affect the meaning of the particular lyric and/or the entire song for me.
1) Jack's Mannequin - "Miss California"
I initially heard the lyrics to the refrain as "You'll be Miss, Miss California/ You'll be kissed by only me." As I was trolling the internets, I came across the slight tidbit of information that it is actually "You'll be missed, Miss California." And this could be an incorrect or way out there interpretation, but the repetition of "miss" versus "missed" when looked at in the context of the rest of lyrics of song causes me to infer that "Miss California" is not going with our narrator willingly. And that makes me dislike the message of the song a little bit. Instead of me hearing a song about two people running away from the prying eyes of the rest of the world, I now hear a song about a dude trying to sequester his lady-friend. Not cool.
2) Raine Maida - "Yellow Brick Road"
I've only just recently begun listening to the amazingness that is Raine Maida's solo album that features all acoustic instruments, spoken word, and oodles of those deep lyrics that I love to interpret as applying to my life and my life only as if they were written just for me. Narcissist in the house. Aside from Raine quoting T.S. Eliot in this song (and not just any old T.S. lines, oh no. It had to be one of my fav lines from my fav poem, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"), I initially heard my other favorite line in the song as "We were having a near-life experience." I LOVED the idea of this line, because I've heard all about near-death experiences, but who thinks of NEAR-LIFE experiences?? Brilliant! Then I looked up the lyrics, and found that all of the lyrics sites I checked stated that the line was actually "We were having a mere life experience." How cheap! To imply that these people that are described in this fantastic song are just "merely living" lessened the impact of that line. Thankfully, I have chosen to believe that my hearing of the lyrics is the correct one as I have now listened to the song about 20 more times, and I am convinced of an 'n' sound rather than an 'm.' I have also seriously considered creating a new Myspace in order to friend Raine Maida and message him this very question, "Near or mere, pal?"
3) Our Lady Peace - "Sorry"
Go figure, another Raine Maida related incident. This one is actually a lyric that was not "misheard" by me. I heard the first lyric of this song as "Today's a reason for living." All of the lyrics sites I have checked seem to agree with me. However, Boyfriend hears "Today's THE reason for living." Even though this is not my hearing of the lyric, it still creates an entirely different interpretation of the song for me. Instead of "today" being one of many reasons to live, when we hear "today" as "the" reason for living, I feel that it excludes a lot of other things worth living for. Tomorrow is a pretty good reason for living, too. Oreos, too. Laughter. The first season of Dollhouse on DVD with a super-secret-never-before-aired-epilogue-episode. Lots of other reasons for living. Although I could see that today being THE reason for living would lend itself to those "live for the now" people, I do like my interpretation better, and, since it seems that the interweb agrees with me, I have managed to stick with my reading.
I suppose the moral of this story (blog post?) is that words matter. Actions might speak louder than words, but the difference between "a" and "the" can be broad enough to blow your mind. So, choose your words wisely! You never know what crazy English teacher might be decoding and deciphering them at this very moment.
The real idea that sparked this blog entry was the fact that I often tend to mishear song lyrics. I'm sure that I am not alone in this matter, but sometimes I get rather upset when I hear the wrong thing. I'm an English teacher, and I have been taughtt to critically read. Song lyrics are just poems set to music, therefore I pay a lot of attention to the multiple layers of meanings that come with lyrics.
The problem with this critical approach to lyrics coupled with my frequency to mishear lyrics is that I tend to form opinions of songs based on the lyrics I think I hear. When I eventually get around to looking up the words on various websites and I find that they are not what I think I heard, I generally get upset. I can think of three specific times this has occurred in recent times. All three of these instances revolve around a single misheard word, but these words seriously affect the meaning of the particular lyric and/or the entire song for me.
1) Jack's Mannequin - "Miss California"
I initially heard the lyrics to the refrain as "You'll be Miss, Miss California/ You'll be kissed by only me." As I was trolling the internets, I came across the slight tidbit of information that it is actually "You'll be missed, Miss California." And this could be an incorrect or way out there interpretation, but the repetition of "miss" versus "missed" when looked at in the context of the rest of lyrics of song causes me to infer that "Miss California" is not going with our narrator willingly. And that makes me dislike the message of the song a little bit. Instead of me hearing a song about two people running away from the prying eyes of the rest of the world, I now hear a song about a dude trying to sequester his lady-friend. Not cool.
2) Raine Maida - "Yellow Brick Road"
I've only just recently begun listening to the amazingness that is Raine Maida's solo album that features all acoustic instruments, spoken word, and oodles of those deep lyrics that I love to interpret as applying to my life and my life only as if they were written just for me. Narcissist in the house. Aside from Raine quoting T.S. Eliot in this song (and not just any old T.S. lines, oh no. It had to be one of my fav lines from my fav poem, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"), I initially heard my other favorite line in the song as "We were having a near-life experience." I LOVED the idea of this line, because I've heard all about near-death experiences, but who thinks of NEAR-LIFE experiences?? Brilliant! Then I looked up the lyrics, and found that all of the lyrics sites I checked stated that the line was actually "We were having a mere life experience." How cheap! To imply that these people that are described in this fantastic song are just "merely living" lessened the impact of that line. Thankfully, I have chosen to believe that my hearing of the lyrics is the correct one as I have now listened to the song about 20 more times, and I am convinced of an 'n' sound rather than an 'm.' I have also seriously considered creating a new Myspace in order to friend Raine Maida and message him this very question, "Near or mere, pal?"
3) Our Lady Peace - "Sorry"
Go figure, another Raine Maida related incident. This one is actually a lyric that was not "misheard" by me. I heard the first lyric of this song as "Today's a reason for living." All of the lyrics sites I have checked seem to agree with me. However, Boyfriend hears "Today's THE reason for living." Even though this is not my hearing of the lyric, it still creates an entirely different interpretation of the song for me. Instead of "today" being one of many reasons to live, when we hear "today" as "the" reason for living, I feel that it excludes a lot of other things worth living for. Tomorrow is a pretty good reason for living, too. Oreos, too. Laughter. The first season of Dollhouse on DVD with a super-secret-never-before-aired-epilogue-episode. Lots of other reasons for living. Although I could see that today being THE reason for living would lend itself to those "live for the now" people, I do like my interpretation better, and, since it seems that the interweb agrees with me, I have managed to stick with my reading.
I suppose the moral of this story (blog post?) is that words matter. Actions might speak louder than words, but the difference between "a" and "the" can be broad enough to blow your mind. So, choose your words wisely! You never know what crazy English teacher might be decoding and deciphering them at this very moment.
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Things that make me mad #1
I have not felt compelled to blog for quite some time. Shame on me. Anyway.
I like that some of my blogger friends have frequent posts that follow the same theme or pattern. Thus begins "Things that make me mad."
Tuesday, I drove into Manhattan with Boyfriend to go see Our Lady Peace at Irving Plaza. (Things that make me glad #1?) The show was so amazing that I got the idea at approximately 2:35 this morning (approximately 10 minutes ago) to check LiveNation's site to see if there were any tickets left for the Philly show. Yes, OLP was that good. So good, in fact, that I would like to see them again in a little less than a month. That's just dandy, isn't it?
Well, here's the thing that makes me mad. You might think that there were no tickets available. Ah, but there were. I could not get them in the cheaper 4 pack promotion because it seems that there may be not be any of those promotional packs left. Alas. So, I checked for two adults, and I found two tickets available at the $20 price. Great, right? After Tuesday's show, $40 seems like a more than fair ticket price.
Then I saw the actual purchase page. On top of each $20 ticket price was a convenience charge of $10 and a venue fee of $2. Seriously? That made each ticket cost $32 apiece, and seriously made me rethink purchasing these tickets. I understand that the economy is shitty and we all have to make money some way or another, but is it really necessary for a THIRD of the ticket price to be random fees? Why not just say that the price of a ticket is $32 and leave it at that? It looks way better than saying the ticket is $20 and then spanking the ass of the unassuming consumer with a ridiculous amount of convenience charges. I love you, Raine Maida...but fuck that.
I've been doing a lot of reading about the whole proposed LiveNation/Ticketmaster merger/monopoly/cluster-fuck, and I really can't decide if the whole concert industry is going to get better or worse because of it. They say that by merging or buying each other out or monopolozing the concert industry or what-fucking-ever they're going to reinvent the concert-going experience and ultimately make live music by national and international touring acts (like badass Canadian rockers such as OLP) more affordable and accessible to the masses. LiveMaster or TicketNation will then save the world with the power of rock and the concert-goer will be happy and the venue will be happy and the artist will be happy and we'll all get naked together and have one giant lovefest-orgy of happiness. Maybe I'm just skeptical of corporate America, but I really don't see that happening.
I really loved the OLP concert because it was in a venue like The Fillmore at Irving Plaza. It felt like a club show because it was a small venue and we were packed in like sardines and Raine Maida is fucking crazy and climbs balconies. I don't think that I should have to pay $40+ for a club show because of ridiculous fees. I end my rant having no idea what I would like to see happen. I think that $32 is still way too high a ticket price for a show at a relatively small venue, so maybe more people would still balk at sky-high prices if the fees were just included in the face value of the ticket. I have no real answers; I just wanted to bitch for a little. Thanks.
I like that some of my blogger friends have frequent posts that follow the same theme or pattern. Thus begins "Things that make me mad."
Tuesday, I drove into Manhattan with Boyfriend to go see Our Lady Peace at Irving Plaza. (Things that make me glad #1?) The show was so amazing that I got the idea at approximately 2:35 this morning (approximately 10 minutes ago) to check LiveNation's site to see if there were any tickets left for the Philly show. Yes, OLP was that good. So good, in fact, that I would like to see them again in a little less than a month. That's just dandy, isn't it?
Well, here's the thing that makes me mad. You might think that there were no tickets available. Ah, but there were. I could not get them in the cheaper 4 pack promotion because it seems that there may be not be any of those promotional packs left. Alas. So, I checked for two adults, and I found two tickets available at the $20 price. Great, right? After Tuesday's show, $40 seems like a more than fair ticket price.
Then I saw the actual purchase page. On top of each $20 ticket price was a convenience charge of $10 and a venue fee of $2. Seriously? That made each ticket cost $32 apiece, and seriously made me rethink purchasing these tickets. I understand that the economy is shitty and we all have to make money some way or another, but is it really necessary for a THIRD of the ticket price to be random fees? Why not just say that the price of a ticket is $32 and leave it at that? It looks way better than saying the ticket is $20 and then spanking the ass of the unassuming consumer with a ridiculous amount of convenience charges. I love you, Raine Maida...but fuck that.
I've been doing a lot of reading about the whole proposed LiveNation/Ticketmaster merger/monopoly/cluster-fuck, and I really can't decide if the whole concert industry is going to get better or worse because of it. They say that by merging or buying each other out or monopolozing the concert industry or what-fucking-ever they're going to reinvent the concert-going experience and ultimately make live music by national and international touring acts (like badass Canadian rockers such as OLP) more affordable and accessible to the masses. LiveMaster or TicketNation will then save the world with the power of rock and the concert-goer will be happy and the venue will be happy and the artist will be happy and we'll all get naked together and have one giant lovefest-orgy of happiness. Maybe I'm just skeptical of corporate America, but I really don't see that happening.
I really loved the OLP concert because it was in a venue like The Fillmore at Irving Plaza. It felt like a club show because it was a small venue and we were packed in like sardines and Raine Maida is fucking crazy and climbs balconies. I don't think that I should have to pay $40+ for a club show because of ridiculous fees. I end my rant having no idea what I would like to see happen. I think that $32 is still way too high a ticket price for a show at a relatively small venue, so maybe more people would still balk at sky-high prices if the fees were just included in the face value of the ticket. I have no real answers; I just wanted to bitch for a little. Thanks.
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