Bear Grylls's Home is Not in Alabama

I watched "Man v. Wild" last night for the first time. I'd seen a few minutes of the show here and there, but never had much interest in it. But last night's episode was set in Alabama, so I thought I'd check it out and see where he went.

He made a good choice by going to Little River Canyon. It's in the northeast part of the state, where the Appalachian mountains end. The canyon is impressive. I went there once during college on my first and only rappelling venture. As I recall, we rappelled down canyon walls that were about 140 feet or so. It was fun. Grylls used a tree to get down (impressive), but he only descended an 80 foot wall (wuss!).

When he got to the canyon floor, he rafted out of the canyon. I don't know where he ended up, but eventually he needed to cross a flooded plain (or perhaps a river). He explained to the viewer how dangerous this was due to the fact that Alabama has alligators in its fresh water bodies. I'm certain that's true, but I doubt anyone has had to worry about gators 350 miles inland. Maybe Bear rafted all the way down to Mobile county, although I have my doubts. But freaking out about alligators reminded me of the scene from Parent Trap where Haley Mills (and Haley Mills!) get Vikki to smack sticks together to frighten off the mountain lions.

Good one, Bear Grylls!

My Home's in Alabama

...in which I contemplate the grass is greener on the other side of the Mason/Dixon line.

It's been a couple weeks since we got back from our summer tour of the Deep South, but I've been too busy/lazy to post anything about it. The trip was pretty good. We hit the usual four locales in three states--Pensacola (FL), Birmingham and Huntsville (AL), and Cedar Hill (TN). We had more time on this trip, though, so it didn't seem nearly as rushed as the holiday tour. I think the grandparents liked having more time with their grandson, too.

Ben had some sleep troubles toward the latter half of the trip. In fact, we had a few of the worst nights with him since we got him to start sleeping through the night back in November. I'm not sure if it was the teething pain or the new locations, but he really had a hard time of things. He was pretty chipper during the day, though, and he was great on each of our flights.

One thing that struck me on this trip was how new everything felt. I first became aware of it when we were driving with Jackamo's troop out of their neighborhood and headed toward an on-ramp to the interstate. They're in a quickly growing area outside of Birmingham, with newly constructed shopping centers, roads that are still dark black and have brightly marked lanes, homes that were built after the Eisenhower administration. Everything seemed so clean and put together.

It's not that Maine is falling apart (although our roads are), and it's not like Watoosa and Ben and I live in a hovel. But the communities where our friends and family live seem more dynamic and thriving and...fresh, for lack of a better word. I know the suburbs often get bashed for soulless blandness--I've joined in that chorus once or twice myself. But there's something to be said for safe streets, uncracked sidewalks, and a noticeable lack of emergency vehicle sirens blasting through one's windows on a daily basis.

I was especially surprised to notice how much my attitude to my hometown, Huntsville, has changed . As a surly teen, I couldn't wait to leave. It seemed so boring. Even now, it doesn't have the hip factor of Atlanta or Nashville. And yet I realized at some point during our stay with my family: I could live here and actually be happy. It was a bit of a shock. I never would have said that fifteen years ago. Or even five years ago.

Of course, part of the reason for that is family. The longer I'm away, the harder it gets to pull myself away from my parents and sisters (and brothers-in-law and niece) at the end of a visit. I envy Kathryn so much for living in the same town as my parents. And I envy Karen for being able to fly in from Dallas as frequently as she does. I'm lucky to get three visits a year. When I go back to Huntsville or even Birmingham, I feel like I belong there, even as I feel disoriented at how much both places have changed. And the fact that Watoosa's parents are just a stone's throw away make it all the more appealing.

This doesn't mean that I don't like living in Maine--far from it. Watoosa and I have been lucky in that we've really liked all the places we've lived. And since, in our nine years of marriage, we've moved to four different states spread out all over the continent, we'd like to stay put for a while. But I was surprised by how wistful I felt on this last visit.

Looking Out My Window

My neighbors now have an Olympic-size swimming pool. Hope they like it!

Even the green area in the bottom left of the picture is covered in water. The deepest part looks to be several inches deep. It come right up to the edge of our property, which doesn't extend very far past the house. If it gets much deeper, their pool may be opening a branch office in our basement.

That part of their yard routinely fills with water whenever we get a good rainfall, but I've never seen it this deep before. Thankfully, our flood insurance policy is in effect. I'd rather not have to call in a claim, though.

And on the side...

Not one of the funniest, but this did come across my virtual desk this evening:

"So we assist those closest to us first and work [our] way out with the exclusion of special rolls such as doctor patient."

The whole "exclusion of special rolls" bit just reminds me of a roughly translated Chinese restaurant menu. All entree include side item with exclusion of special roll!

They're probably made with ends meat. That's what makes them "special."

Sorta Funny

From a test answer this morning:

"...eventually anyone that is not very wealthy turns into the poor working class doing everything they can to make ends meat."

Mmmmm! Ends meat! Roasted, grilled, or fried, you can't go wrong with ends meat.

It's probably akin to Kana Hakkliha.

Make It Stop

I graded a late paper this evening. It included this mysterious claim:

"Grief motivate Batman is a different sense."

You really can't make this stuff up, people. Unless you're one of my students, in which case it comes as easy as falling off a log.

In the closing paragraph, I found this nugget:

"I believe movies really are magically."

Watoosa's reply was, "Magically delicious?"

That's why I love her.

Return of Out of the Mouths of Babes!

From tonight's batch:

"Ethics and morality should be at the top of people's lists on how they want to run their lives. Instead people are worrying more about not being robbed or raped or even murdered."

Gee, I always thought ethics and morality (my favorite redundant phrase) had a lot to do with robbery, rape, and murder. Since I hope to avoid being the victim of all three, that must make me amoral. And non-ethical!

In the very next sentence, this person wrote:

"The world we live in today would be spit on by Socrates' time."

I think if Socrates' time actually did spit on our world, our world would totally kick Socrates' time in the wiener. Take that, Socrates' time! If you want to step to us again, you'll get more of the same!

Out of the Mouths of Babes, Part Deux: Electric Boogaloo

From tonight's grading:

"Everyday we are given the choice to sit in our comfortable homes, or caves if you will. But this is not how things have to be."

Hey, I like my cave, dangit! I'm certainly paying enough for it. I'm not leaving, and you can't make me.

"In conclusion the fact that Socrates would rather die than to live without philosophy people will always either be examining themselves or others using philosophy although self examination is not the best because you can think very highly of yourself others will prove you wrong on your knowledge and the only thing you can do is try to better yourself."

After I made it try to comprehend that sentence, my brain and I are no longer on speaking terms.

Awesome Thing of the Week

This story is a bit old, but I just happened on it. Someone in Austin, Texas, hacked into some flashing road warning signs and reprogrammed the messages. The new messages include: "Caution--Zombies Ahead," and "Run for Cold Climates." As many of you know, Watoosa and I have been getting into the whole zombie genre, thanks largely to the fantastic World War Z. So I had to tip my hat to this Texas prankster. Yes, it's technically illegal, and yes, my last post came down hard on vandals. But dangit, this is hilarious.

I also liked this one:

We Wuz Robbed!

Or burgled, to be more precise. I'm told that robbery is directed toward a person, while burglary is directed toward a house. Either way, I'm steamed.

It happened last week. The guy came in during the hour that Watoosa and Ben went to the grocery store. He got our computer, our camera, and a webcam. Adding insult to injury, the camera had a memory card that I had bought two days before. A neighbor across the street apparently saw him go into a couple homes in the neighborhood but decided not to call the police. He will not be getting a Christmas card this year.

At first, our biggest concern was that we had lost all our pictures of Ben, but I think we can get most if not all of them back. Now the concern is that someone will get information useful for identity theft. But so far we haven't seen any signs of that. We also dodged a bullet with the cat, who got outside for the first time in her life. I didn't even realize she was gone, and thankfully she showed up of her own volition when the police came to the door. So things could have been a lot worse.

Mostly it just angers me that this guy can (and it looks like, will) get away with it. I've been telling people that I can almost excuse murder more easily than theft or vandalism. At least in many cases, the murderer recognizes the humanity of his victim (in a weird way) even as he abuses it. Even as he chooses to kill, he is tacitly affirming some importance of his victim as a being that has merited his attention. But the jerk who burgled us didn't give us a thought at all. He even walked past baby toys, saw a picture of our baby on the computer desktop, and grabbed our stuff anyway. And there's really not much we can do about it.

These are the things I think about. And the more I think about them, the angrier I get.

I also begin to have a new attraction to the philosophy of Thomas Hobbes, which I've been teaching this week. Hobbes argued that human beings are basically self-centered and quarrelsome, and only by being dominated by a strong central authority can they be made to live in peace. Lawbreakers have broken their word to keep the social contract, which means that we law-followers are no longer bound by justice with respect to them, and we can do anything we wish--no matter how violent, cruel, or disgusting--to protect our lives and interests. Basically, it's back to the law of the jungle: smack down your opponents by any means necessary.

OK, that's a little bleak. And at the end of the day, I'm not really a Hobbesian. I suppose I should be focused more on forgiveness, especially seeing that this is happening during Lent. But that's not coming easily these days. Rather, I'm seeing the world through Walker Texas Ranger's eyes, eyes that see only two kinds of people: (a) honest, hardworking, law-abiding folk; and (b) contemptible miscreants in need of an all-out, country-style asswhoopin.

Quirkademics

Here's a list of the strangest college courses in America. I don't know how thoroughly researched or scientifically valid the list is, but it does offer some courses that veer far off the beaten path.

The biggest surprise: Underwater Basket Weaving is real! I always thought it had to be an urban legend, but it's offered at both UC-San Diego and Reed College in Oregon. As it turns out, however, the "underwater" part simply refers to submerging the reeds in water so as to make them more pliable. Still...you get as much credit for it as you would for physics, history, or calculus.

I don't know what to think of the fact that several of the courses are offered by philosophy departments. I suppose it's not too surprising, since philosophy departments are often desperate to attract students to the most arcane of academic disciplines. And there has been a rash of books released recently about philosophy and popular culture. It started (I think) with The Simpsons and Philosophy, and now there are forthcoming titles such as The Red Sox and Philosophy and Christmas and Philosophy. I wish I was joking about those last ones.

But using film or television shows can be helpful in illustrating and conceptualizing philosophical issues. One of my good friends has routinely used science fiction in his classes, and he's no slouch as a philosopher or a teacher.

The strangest course on the list is "The Art of Walking." At first, it sounds like the only thing less academically challenging would be courses like "Inhaling and Exhaling" and "Practicum: Sitting in a Classroom Three Times a Week." On closer inspection, however, it turns out the class is actually devoted to Kant's Critique of Judgment, and so it sounds like an interesting way of bringing that text (and it is a killer) to life.

The worst idea has to be "Arguing with Judge Judy: Popular 'Logic' on TV Judge Shows." The course uses such shows to illustrate logical fallacies, and such programs do offer rich source material for that topic. But still, you'd have to sit through half-hour after endless half-hour finding these fallacies. I'd rather read Kant's Critique of Judgment cover-to-cover. In German. In a dimly-lit room. While having my knuckles rapped with Kant's walking cane wielded by a stout Teutonic woman named "Helga" whenever my mind wandered.

From the Truly Bad to the Sublime

I just finished P. G. Wodehouse's Quick Service, and it is now one of my favorites. As usual, there are plenty of brilliant comparisons, like these:

"An instant before, she could have been mistaken for a rattlesnake about to strike. Her air now became that of a rattlesnake which is prepared to reserve its judgment till it has heard all the facts."

A page later, he describes the same character: "If she still bore any resemblance to a rattlesnake, it was one which has heard the voice of conscience and decided to simmer down and spend a quiet evening with the boys."

Here's one more: "'Yes, it's beautiful,' she said, panting a little, like a girl who has discovered a dismembered corpse in the attic. 'Lovely. Well, I must be shoving along. Ta for the tea.'"

Oh, to able to write like that!

If you like star-crossed young lovers, mistaken identities, petty theft, love, spite, and false moustaches, then this is the book for you.

A Lesson for the Kids Out There

If you're writing a paper, never--never ever--use the phrase "since the dawn of time" or some similar nonsense. It's the fastest way to tell your prof, "I absolutely refuse to give this assignment an ounce of original thought, and furthermore I would like to take the first sentence of this essay to insult not only your intelligence, but my own as well."

After reading this phrase for the third (!) time in a single batch of essays, I googled it and quickly stumbled upon an oasis of sarcastic greatness: Kem's Utterly Merciless Guide to Essay Writing. She tells it exactly like it is, which is to say, she says exactly what I'd love to tell students myself if I was willing to risk bad course evaluations.

For example, in reference to the phrase mentioned above, she kindly informs us: "If you start at the [expletive] dawn of time, how the hell are you going to narrow down your topic in time to write anything on it? If you were writing on the joys of peanut-butter sandwiches, would you begin with a history of food? No? Then keep your hands off the dawn of time. It is not relevant to your essay unless you are Stephen Hawking, and somehow, I don't think you are."

Balm for the soul.

Similarly, in reference to the use of commas: "Commas are not the chocolate sprinkles of written language."

Finally, she lays into one of my pet peeves: the use of "they" and "them" as singular gender-neutral pronouns. This usage leads to absurdities like "When making a decision, someone should make up their own mind." As I point out to my class, there are a few philosophers who believe that mind is singular and we all simply partake in it rather than having our own individual minds, but no student of mine even understands that claim, let alone believes it. This mistake also leads to atrocious pseudowords like "themself." Ugh.

Kem's take on this irritant: "'They is not a gender-neutral third-person singular pronoun.' If I could make this sentence flash on and off in different colours, then leap from the screen and inscribe itself upon your eyeballs in letters of fiery death, I would be hunting up the necessary code right now."

I couldn't have put it better myself.

Forget U2

Just heard a track ("Stand Up Comedy") from the new U2 album, No Line on the Horizon. It's probably the worst thing I've heard from them since...well, ever. As a thirty-something white guy, I'm probably still obligated to at least give grudging respect to U2 (how is that not featured on Stuff White People Like?!), but I just can't do it. This stuff sounds like the lame, mid-tempo, monotonous guitar riffs I used to come up with in my sleep.

In other words, it sounds like the stuff that bored me so much when I played it myself that it pretty much led me to give up the guitar altogether. Now the Edge will make cash by the truckload for this swill.

"Get on your Boots" is hardly better.

You can hear the whole album here, if you can stand it.

Weather Report

It's snowing. Hard. And sideways.

The weatherman says it could turn out to be the biggest snow storm of the season.

Classes were canceled today, which means thus far this semester there has been maybe one or two weeks at most in which we had class every day. I wonder if my students will even remember me after next week, which is "Spring" Break.

An Ice Dam's Chance in Hell

Although we lived in Michigan for one year, the winters here have taken some getting used to. I love the snow, since it still has some novelty to it, and it's really not too hard to clear the driveway and get to school. And the cold temperatures don't really bother me at all.

But I've come to loathe ice. And in particular, I've come to loathe ice dams. The icicles hanging off of roofs certainly look beautiful, especially as they catch the sunlight. But what I've learned is that they're a giant warning sign that Mother Nature is doing a number on my roof. Basically, the edge of the roof eave develops a wall of ice that dams water runoff from melting snow. That water has to go somewhere, and it tends to go under the shingles and sometimes through the ceiling.

The first problem we had was last month, when, at about 4:30 a.m. I was awakened to a dripping sound near my head. A quick investigation showed a steady flow of water drops falling inside the frames of both windows in the master BR, and it looked even worse in our second BR. Not a fun way to wake up.

We got someone to come out and clear off the edges of the top front and the back roof eaves. I also went out and purchased a roof rake. The water came back through the ceilings again a week later, so we had some different guys come out and clear the whole roof of ice and snow. I figured if I cleared the eaves right after the snow falls, the ice dams wouldn't form, or at least they wouldn't get too bad. I was wrong.

Today, right before I left for school, I saw more dripping through the window frame and stain on the ceiling. I got completely fed up. I mustered my courage and went up on the roof myself and cleared the whole front part of snow. It was a little scary getting up there, since it's on the 2nd story and it's covered in slick snow, but I got used to it. And I'm happy to report I didn't fall.

The dams had formed, but this time they were farther up the slope of the roof, where the rake can't reach. Dam(n)! So that means that from now on, I'm going to have to go through this rigmarole every time it snows until we get our roof re-shingled (which, thanks to the ice dams, will be sooner rather than later. Much, much sooner). But I'm pleased to know that it's a job I can pull off myself, since we plunked down a few hundred dollars for the pros to do it.

Still, spring cannot come too soon.

Jane Austen Will Roll Over in Her Grave...

...and then rise from it and walk the earth in search of human brains when she hears about the release of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies! The product description alone is probably enough reason to buy the book: "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies features the original text of Jane Austen's beloved novel with all-new scenes of bone crunching zombie action."

As perfect a work as P&P is, I always felt that it lacked a certain something. Now I know that "something" is really scenes of undead hordes feasting on the flesh of the godforsaken living.

Can't wait 'til May 13!

Words of Wisdom

From a student paper about moral goodness:

He has his faults like some people, and what I think is right is different sometimes than his opinion, but he is a lot older and is from Mississippi.

Who knew that residents of the Magnolia state get a handicap when it comes to being morally good? I knew there was a reason we in Alabama looked down upon our neighbors to the west.

MUST...READ...IMMEDIATELY!!!

This has to be the best book review opening line of all time:

"If there's anything better than a ninja fighting zombies, it's a ninja with alien-tech-enhanced powers nuking space zombies infected by a plague of collective murderous consciousness."

I didn't even finish reading the review before I put it on my goodreads list.

Ninjas...zombies...what more could you ask for? Maybe pirates. Maybe.