In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Month: March 2005

Mid-Terms, Schools, and Illnesses

Mid-Terms
It’s time for mid-terms, which means it is also time for the obligatory scholastic disillusionment post. Tonight I practice my ASL handshape story, a five minute story told through the use of body language and next to no actual signs, and study for the Shakespeare mid-term for which I am wholly unexcited. I can’t wait to have one full guilt-free week off.

I don’t care much at all anymore, and know I’m half-heartedly jumping through the required hoops. This does not a good student make.

Illnesses
After almost one full week with a fever Ethan went to the doctor and we found that he has, of all things, scarlet fever. It sounds so Old World Victorian (“My baby has the plague!”) but turns out to be a strain of strep throat with a body rash. All week long I asked Does your throat hurt? Nope. Do your ears hurt? Nope. Okay then. The fever must be the pink eye or Fifth Disease, certainly not the Black freakin’ Plague.

Schools
In other news I have begun to get phone calls for student teaching interviews.

Going to the high school and observing the classrooms has begun to move my internal view of myself from student to teacher. Today I passed out an initital survey to the students and found that everyone is both classes has a computer, only three don’t have internet access at home, and at least six have both a website and a blog. I hope to do my semester research on the connections, if any, between technological literacy and scholastic success, primarily based on case studies, interviews, and student work. The school I observe in is unusually outfitted with the latest ed tech and the teacher I observe with uses it to its maximum degree. This is quite rare in secondary Lit classrooms, so I want to explore what kinds of effects it has on the classroom environment as well.

One of my greatest difficulties this semester has been establishing a teacherly persona. I am in the schools for two class periods. The first is overall well-behaved and engaged in the lessons at hand, while the second period is essentially run by a group of rowdy boys who insist on having the last word and making the class into a comedy venue. Truthfully they’re quite funny. This is a problem. Once I start laughing I can’t stop.

Further, they are obsessed with my presence in the classroom where the first period observed doesn’t care one way or another. Every day I get a barrage of questions ranging from What did you do this weekend? to Where do you live?, What is your first name?, What’s your screen name? Can we chat? and I’ll bet you go to frat parties, don’t you? I switch between giving smartass answers and none at all.

When I finally picked a lesson plan to teach (after abandoning the idea of Sandra Cisneros, we settled on Eliot’s Prufrock, thanks for asking), the teacher informed me that she isn’t even going to ask me to teach the second period. She said she felt like it would be throwing meat to the wolves, and frankly, I feel like fresh meat. Relief.

Perhaps the most telling experience indicating my need to better develop a teacherly persona happened last Friday. After listening to a long conversation between students on the finer points of punk rock, including the aural importance of Kurt Cobain and Nirvana, how the size of piercing gauges correspond to numbers, what constitutes a cool tattoo, and other fine examples of high school inexperience, I found myself tempted to join in on a more-punk-than-you game that I thought I had long abandoned. In the interest of prudence, I shouldn’t divulge the stories I wanted to tell, but I guarantee that anything I could put on a list like this would be scandalous enough to blacklist me from any future teaching job and require an instant revocation of my laminated feminist card.

The overwhelming urge to bring in my CD collection and school these kids in the fineries of pre-1990’s pop culture has yet to pass.

Nirvana. Jesus. When did the 90’s become old school?

[For more on my observational experiences at this school, you can see my class blog: Miss Education.]

Anniversary

At some point, I missed the two year anniversary of this blog. Unfortunately the archives don’t represent this fact, thanks to the many posts deleted during my MT days. That makes about five years of blogging.

In other news, I got the new monitor set up. Now it’s all about the CD burner.

Go wish Rox a happy anniversary as well.

Knitter’s Hands? Take Note

Since I started knitting primarily with wool, my hands have been cracking and my nails have been falling apart. My hands look like a cross between an ancient mummy’s and an alien’s. During the monthly jaunt to the health food store, I ran across Badger Body Butter. My hands actually feel human again.

And who can resist a picture of a berry-picking badger?

Blah

Not feeling like blogging this weekend.

I finally got a monitor and have procrastinated on setting it up, in part because that means moving the last gargantuan thing out of the office and my foot still hurts after the torn ligament/basement stairs incident. And in part because I’ve been busy knitting a shirt/sweater that ended up way too short despite following all the directions and matching gauge. I ripped back successfully for the first time ever and am starting over from the waist increase. Man, did that piss me off.

Ethan still isn’t better. After yet another call to the doctor we’ve decided that E either has the viral version of conjunctivitis (i.e. nasty, nasty pink eye) or Fifth Disease, which has no treatment other than suffering through a fever. He looks miserable. A cold bath and a jug of water later and he still looks miserable.

I attended a wedding today. One of my oldest friends (in fact, my first boyfriend ever) got married to another long time friend on very short notice. It was a sweet wedding, very simple. Inbetween laughing at the noisy crew of children and holding back the requisite wedding tears, I was struck by the culture gap between friends and family. All the family members appeared very conservative, traditional wear, etc. There was ink and hair galore in the friend crowd. A large group of friends left immediately after the afternoon service to go to a bar and get drunk even before the cake was cut. I found this rather rude. Nonetheless, I couldn’t expect much more. This town gets smaller by the day and I find myself increasingly disappointed with the vast majority of my peers. Apparently I’m getting old.

Afterward, my mother and I had a long conversation about marriage and travel and the future, in which I told her I don’t imagine myself getting married anytime soon. If ever, really. Despite my romantic inclinations, I just don’t see it happening. Even as I bumble through life, I don’t see myself bumbling through it with a life partner. I now value my independence enough that I don’t know I want to give it up.

Also, I watched “Lost In Translation” last night and don’t get why everyone is mooning over Scarlett Johansson. I think we give way too much credit to the young’uns before they have a chance to show us what they’ve really got. Bill Murray, though. He was good.

Tonight’s plans: watch movies I don’t like, reknit the damn shirt, gaze guiltily at the dishes and laundry, brush the cat, and wake up Ethan for another round of medicine. Thrills galore.

Indiana Dems “Car Bombing” Bills?

Mitch Daniels, Republican Indiana governor, got rather testy today in response to a Democrat walk-out, effectively killing 80+ bills. Some of these bills were completely bogus, but alas, others were legit.

Chuck sez:

[Daniels and state Republicans are] especially pissed because the walk-out-so-the-chamber-doesn’t-have-quorum maneuver has been employed by their own party as recently as, well, last session, when they were in the minority.

There’s nothing that gets the Republicans going more red-hot than when the system works for someone other than them. You know, like the poor, the educated, the homeless, the single mothers, the raped, the atheist, the agnostic, the thinking, and the working class. And certainly, there’s nothing they hate more than the minority having a voice or an impact. The shock and indignation rising up out of the governor’s office that the Democrats dare use what power they have to represent the people that elected them was positively appalling, leading to yet another wonderful “liberals are terrorists” metaphor:

“Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels lashed out at House Democrats on Wednesday for a boycott of business that derailed about 130 bills, saying they “car bombed” Indiana’s drive for growth and reform for purely political reasons.” (emphasis mine)

The reason rules like quorum and filibuster are available, you idiots, is precisely so, despite what anyone with a majority wants to think, majority does not rule. Majority only rules when it is A) overwhelming, typically consisting of at least a 60% majority if not more, and / or B) takes the time to work with the minority.

How quicly the time passes. Just last session, state rethugs did just the same thing. Tit for tat, a spoonful of sugar.

Scott is keeping a running tally:

Good moves:
+1 (for taxing the wealthy)
+1 (for writing his own speeches)
2 total

Bad moves:
-1 (for having only Sandy Patty and other uber-fundamentalist Christian entertainment at his inauguration party)
-1 (for refusing to address the constitutional ban on gay marriage)
-1 (for comparing Democrats to terrorists)
3 total

Score to date: -1

I add another negative for halting construction on all state schools, effectively costing the school systems and taxpayers additional funds to put all construction efforts on hold. And lest we forget, the children enrolled in said schools.

Nonetheless, this kind of language is ridiculous. Comparing one’s peers to terrorists or insurgents is unnecessary and petulant behavior from someone of his political stature. Perhaps this is the kind of language one learns when perched to the right of Dubya’s knee.

Friday Random Ten – Half-Assed Edition

Since the regular computer with all the music files is broken, I’m resorting to my wee mp3 player in which only fifteen music files are stored. This is the stuff I jog to.

1. The Kleptones – Bite
2. Bone Thugs and Notorious B.I.G. – Notorious Thugs
3. Too Short – Gettin’ It
4. Pharcyde – Other Fish In The Sea
5. Crucial Conflict – Hay
6. Pharcyde – Runnin’
7. Too Short – Short But Funky
8. Biz Markie – The Vapors
9. John Legend – I Used To Love You
10. Cee-Lo Green – The Art of Noise

I prefer the slow-ish jams when I jog. It keeps me from overestimating my speed abilities.

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Friday Catalope Blogging

Alas, no pictures as all my ftp info is on the other computer. But there is quite an interesting development in the Pablo saga.

Since Pablo got home from the vet, he’s picked up a rather annoying habit of laying on the edge of the couch, flipping his head over, and scraping his forehead against the piping. These two areas are rubbed raw and it looks as though the cat could sprout horns at any moment.