The Monocle

Bear Grylls's Home is Not in Alabama

2009-08-20T04:56:00.000-07:00

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

2009-07-21T18:42:00.000-07:00

...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

2009-06-19T12:54:00.000-07:00

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...

2009-05-20T18:41:00.000-07:00

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

2009-05-07T06:41:00.000-07:00

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

2009-04-29T18:01:00.000-07:00

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!

2009-04-19T18:46:00.000-07:00

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

2009-04-18T19:04:00.000-07:00

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

2009-04-09T06:00:00.000-07:00

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!

2009-04-04T05:46:00.001-07:00

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

2009-03-14T06:29:00.000-07:00

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

2009-03-12T08:06:00.000-07:00

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

2009-03-10T14:39:00.000-07:00

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

2009-03-10T11:38:00.000-07:00

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

2009-03-02T06:51:00.000-08:00

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

2009-02-24T14:57:00.000-08:00

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...

2009-02-08T14:06:00.000-08:00

...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

2009-02-08T14:03:00.000-08:00

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!!!

2009-01-04T14:15:00.001-08:00

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.

I'm Proud to Be an American...

2008-12-17T06:15:00.000-08:00

...where at least I know I'm free. Free to eat cakes in a cake contest, that is.

According to the Irish Times, a recent European Union regulation has outlawed eating cakes and confections entered into competitions at country fairs and agricultural shows.

This rule applies even to the judges!
Says the report: "Under the rules adjudicators of bakery sections in local shows are only permitted to taste the traditional favourites such as apple tarts or cheese cakes. Once the judging is over, the produce must be immediately destroyed. As a result, only bite-sized versions of the cakes will be entered in shows."

Destroying cheesecakes? I think that's just perverse. One Irishman is quoted as saying, "it’s no wonder the people voted No to the Lisbon Treaty." No wonder, indeed.

Dodging Bullets

2008-12-13T14:20:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, thanks to the worst ice storm in ten years, half of Maine's population was without power, even as night fell. Now, Maine isn't the most populous state even in this region, but that's still a lot of people. Plus, our state's population is spread out more evenly than, say, Georgia, where pretty much everyone lives in Atlanta. With temperatures expected to dip into the teens, officials were telling everyone without a heat source that didn't rely on electricity to hightail it to a public shelter for the night.

At school, I thanked my lucky stars that our house still had power. Some of my students lived in houses with wells, which mean the outage shut down their water supply, as well. I figured since we live in downtown Westbrook, near a mill and a hospital, we'd be unlikely to lose power and quick to get it back if we did.

The electricity went out around 6 p.m. I headed out to get some food, and with the eerie, moonlit darkness I began thinking about how feasible it would be to spend the night at home without heat. Over the radio, officials from the power company said to expect to spend "at least" one night without power. Now, Watoosa and I could easily camp out in a high school gym on a cot for a night, but having a baby changes the equation completely. I honestly don't know how it would work, and with the widespread outages, I figured the hotels would be full.

Fortunately, the power came back on after an hour, and it hasn't cut out since. There are still well over 100,00 people who don't have electricity, and my heart goes out to them. But I'm thankful we didn't have to leave the house.

It's a shame that ice storms are so destructive and disruptive, because they make the trees look so beautiful, especially when the sun comes out in full force, like it did today. Everything looks like it's encased in glass. But I guess it's hard to enjoy that when you're effectively homeless or huddled under every single blanket you own.

Still Here

2008-11-27T10:03:00.000-08:00

Well, I suppose my paternity-leave-from-blogging should just about be coming to a close, given that Benjamin has now reached the 3 month-old mark. Here are a few updates:

-Last week, I went to an academic conference in Copenhagen. It was a great conference, and I got good responses to my paper, so I'm glad I went. I also got to see a good bit of the city. But it was so much harder to leave Watoosa and Benjamin than I had expected. I always miss Beth when I travel, but I was pretty much wracked with worry the whole time. So while I'm glad I went, I'm also glad to be back.

-Fatherhood has brought with it a whole range of emotional states that it's dizzying to keep up with them. Taking care of Benjamin (and Beth) in the early days was certainly one of the toughest emotional experiences of my life. Things have gotten easier now that we have him on a feed/wake/nap schedule. It's made a world of difference. But there have been times when the combination of stress and sleep deprivation showed me just how much moral formation I have yet to undergo.

-And yet... I have grown so attached to the little fella, much more than I realized until I had to say good-bye at the airport last week. I like the way he giggles and flashes his big toothless grin, and how he stretches his arms out when he wakes up, and how he makes little cooing sounds when he eats.

-I also love showing him off, seeing everyone delight in looking at him as they fight off their sense of disbelief at how he is just as unbelievably gorgeous as his father. Good stuff. When we took him into campus to let everyone meet him, we started off in the secretaries' office. As soon as she saw us, Jane, who was on the telephone, just burst out, "Baby! Must go!" and hung up on whomever she was talking with. She told us they'd understand.

-Watoosa and I were proud when we were asked if he could play baby Jesus in the Christmas pageant at church. Alas, we'll be out of town. Plus, he will probably be larger than the kids playing Mary and Joseph by then. And while that might nicely represent the relative importance of the characters to the story of salvation history, I doubt the organizers want to have a baby Jesus that has to be hoisted into the air by his parents with a series of pulleys and levers.

-Greta's status position in the household has, naturally, declined. She gets more attention from me, since that's pretty much the way things were before Benjamin arrived. Now that the cold weather has come, she likes to sit in my lap when I wear my robe, and she likes to sleep on my back at night. But unfortunately she doesn't get quite as much attention as she wants. To be more precise, she doesn't get the attention she wants when she wants it. Perhaps recognizing the new attention-hog, she completely ignores the baby. We'll see how that strategy works once he gets mobile.

-Benjamin had an early lesson in the difference between men and women when I picked him up in the middle of the night for a feeding. Since it was still during warm weather, and I had jumped out of bed, I was shirtless. He tried latching on. Let's just say neither one of us was happy with the outcome.

-Finally, I'd like to formally revise my pre-season football predictions.

I don't know if any of my former readers still check in, but take this as a sign of more regular writing, if you're interested. I have noticed that many people start their blog and then over time lose momentum. I 'm not ready for mine to go dark just yet.

All About the Benjamin

2008-08-25T07:21:00.000-07:00

Watoosa and Ben are now home from the hospital. We're all pretty exhausted, but happy to be home, and happy that Watoosa's parents are here to help. We've got relatives lined up to cover the next three weeks or so.

Ben is very healthy. He weighed in at a hefty 9lbs. 11.4 oz., and he only lost about a pound of that before he started gaining again. He's also very sweet-natured, as long as his every wish is fulfilled without delay. Unfortunately, doing so is made more difficult by the fact that Watoosa is moving a bit slower than usual. When he's being...uh, not sweet-natured, he can pack a wallop. He's already developed a William Shatner-style karate chop, with which he rained blows on my face and chest when he had to wait for Watoosa to get out of the bathroom and feed him (check out the 1:15 mark here to see what I mean). He should call it Kirk Fu.

It's still a little overwhelming to realize that I have a son, but in a good way. When we finally got discharged, we were so excited and relieved that when I went to get the car, I steered toward home out of the parking lot before I realized that I was forgetting to pick up Watoosa and the baby at the entrance. Luckily, I didn't get far.

For more on Ben, check out his blog at The Kid (soon to be renamed). We've been too tired and busy to post anything yet, but that will change soon.

This Is What Justice Looks Like

2008-08-14T07:09:00.001-07:00

Sweet, hilarious justice.

Word to the Wise

2008-08-12T16:57:00.001-07:00

The wait continues here at the home office. Watoosa is now ten days past due, which is well beyond fashionably late.

Meanwhile, in preparation for my role during the delivery and first few days of childrearin', here is a list of words, phrases, and sentences which I am pretty sure I should avoid using.

"great with child"

"fruit of my loins"

"Walk it off."

"Let me finish this nonogram first."

"What's a contraction?"

"football"

"whiner"

"women's work"

"Are you cooking tonight?"

"Dibs on the bathroom!"

"I'm pretty sure he's crying for his momma."

All Those Years of School Were Totally Worth It Because of This

2008-08-07T17:52:00.000-07:00

My doctoral regalia came in this week, so I had to try it all on.

The tam looks even better on Watoosa. I think she's starting to show, now.

Greta liked the tassel.

Surprising Experimental Finding of the Week

2008-08-01T13:03:00.000-07:00

Bicycle helmets make you less safe:

"When he wore a helmet, vehicles tended to pass closer than when he did not wear a helmet. Passing drivers may have read th helmet as a sign that there was less risk for the cyclist if they hit him. Or perhaps the helmet dehumanized the rider. Or--and more likely, according to [the researcher]--drivers rea the helmet as a symbol of a more capable and predictable cyclist, one less likely to veer into their path. In either case, the helmet changed the behavior of passing drivers."

That's from Tom Vanderbilt's Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us).

I'm tempted to try this experiment myself, given how scary it is for cars to pass too close by me on high-speed roads. But I suspect an AK-47 strapped across my back might lead them to give me even more leeway. These are the things I fantasize about as I pedal around the area.

In other news...no, labor hasn't started yet.

Regrettable Food...Soviet Style!

2008-07-29T07:02:00.000-07:00

Nothing in your life can prepare you for this:

Questions:

(1) Obviously, the most pressing question is this: "Do the makers of this commercial want us to buy this product, or are they trying to turn us off of meat forever?"

(2) Is that voice-over
(a) simply part of the soundtrack?
(b)a Manchurian Candidate style hypnotic trigger designed to send someone out to bring the system of capitalism to its knees?
(c) a voice inside the women's heads?
(d) a voice inside the women's heads projected by the chicken, announcing impending bloody vengeance on the human world for this and this(!)?

(3) The women at the restaurant seem to be exchanging knowing glances, as if to say, "Do we dare try the Kana hakkliha?" What do they know that we don't? Something tells me that deep down they suspect that KANA HAKKLIHA IS PEOPLE! IT'S PEOPLE!

Your New Timewaster

2008-07-20T18:15:00.000-07:00

If I could have prayed to the god of Cyberspace, I would have asked for the Failblog. Here are some of my favorites so far:

The Waiting is the Hardest Part

2008-07-18T07:48:00.001-07:00

We're officially at T minus 2 weeks, now, and counting. And counting and counting and counting. People have told us the days leading up to the delivery are tough emotionally, especially if the mother is overdue. We're not quite into that territory, yet, but we're pretty much ready for the little fella to arrive already. Watoosa says that for a while, she had small worries about the whole delivery process, but now she's looking forward to it, if only because it means the end of being pregnant. It was magical and wonderful for a while, and hers has been blissfully free of complications, but she'd like to be able to actually lay on her back for more than a few seconds.

Yesterday, she came down with an acute case of boredomitis. It was too hot to go outside, and she didn't want to do anything in particular, but she also didn't want to be bored, so she lay on the floor and demanded to be entertained immediately. I suggested that it might be fun for her to sit quietly and watch me finish my nonogram puzzle, but that seemed to just enrage her. I figured it would be good to practice not-disturbing-Daddy-when-he's-working, but she seemed to have different feelings on the matter. Oh well.

Everybody asks her when she's due, now. And I mean everybody, from a stranger on the other side of a busy street to the girl working the register at taco joint last night. Watoosa says that people respond differently, but fall neatly into categories. Old men sort of chuckle, knowingly. Older ladies want to know all the details, and then want to share all their stories of childbearing and childrearing. Younger men and boys seem a little freaked out, as if she might "pop" at any moment.

The nursery is ready, the car seat is installed, the doctors lined up...nothing is left to do except wrestle with the following questions:

1. Will the baby have more hair than me?

2. Will he develop a New England accent, so that he sounds like Good Will Hunting or Cliff Claven from Cheers? We sure hope not.

3. When facing the inevitable envy and resentment from his peers at his superior good looks and staggering intellect, will he be able to handle it with grace and humility, like his daddy does?

4. Will his mother succeed in her fell attempts at preventing an appropriate fervor for college football?

5. Will I be able to persuade Watoosa that my weak stomach should preclude me from diaper duties and vomit clean-up?

Keep watching this space for the answer to all these questions--and more!

Impeccable Logic

2008-07-11T06:58:00.001-07:00

From The Pirates! In an Adventure with Napoleon:

'Baby kissing is a tried and tested way of getting votes, Captain.'

The Captain didn't look convinced. 'Thing is, number two, what's the voting age nowadays?'

'It's eighteen, sir.'

'Exactly!' The Pirate Captain waggled an informative finger. 'So there's not much point lavishing all this attention on babies when they can't even vote for me, is there? I should be concentrating on the eighteen-year olds. And you know which other bit of the electorate is often unfairly overlooked? Women. So really it makes a lot more sense for me to spend the morning kissing eighteen-year-old women.'

Fireworks

2008-07-05T06:33:00.001-07:00

Last night, Watoosa and I had dinner at the home of some new friends, and then we walked over to the Back Cove to watch Portland's fireworks display. The display was pretty good, and the bursts of light were reflected in the water. The only drawback was that our distance from the launch spot meant that the explosions weren't very loud. But since our friends had their 1-year old daughter with them, that was probably for the best.

Here are some of my most memorable fireworks experiences, in no particular order:

Independence Day 2004 (Cedar Hill, TN) My extended family traditionally gathers at my grandparents' farm for major holidays, and for the past 25 years or so, we've shot off a mess of fireworks on the 4th of July. During 2004's session, for some reason one of the "big ones" traveled only about 20 feet up in the air before exploding. I got hit with burning fragments in the middle of my chest, on my side, and on my arm. My shirt protected me from the first two, but the last one burned the skin on my arm like you wouldn't believe. I still have a scar. Good times!

Independence Day 2003 (St. Louis) Every year, St. Louis holds a big fair right downtown, and it culminates with the Independence Day fireworks shot off from the river, which means they're framed by the Gateway Arch. But since it's the middle of the summer, seeing the display usually means slogging through the stifling heat while being crushed by the masses of sweaty plebeians, many of whom are shirtless. In 2003, though, one of our friends invited us to watch them from her office, which was in the tallest building downtown. Watoosa was sick that year, so she couldn't go, but I got to watch the show while sitting in a cushy chair in blissful air-conditioned comfort. The view was fantastic, too.

Independence Day 1998 (Seattle) I was studying in Vancouver for a few weeks that summer, and went down to Seattle to visit my friends Nick and Jenn. Nick's parents were in town, and we all took an evening boat tour of Puget Sound, after which the boat dropped anchor in the harbor for the fireworks show (which were launched from a barge not too far away, as I recall). Very nice. The one drawback was that the music accompaniment included Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On." I could do without that.

New Year's Day (Night?) 2000 (New Orleans) Watoosa and I and a dozen friends or so all went down to New Orleans to ring in the New Year. I had been to New Orleans a few times, but never during Mardi Gras. New Year's, I was told, was like all the nights of Mardi Gras crammed into one. I wondered if it would be a bit much (in addition to the worries about the Y2K bug--remember that?), but we had a blast. The fireworks were OK, but this was the first New Year's that I was with a significant other, which means it was the first time I got to start the new year off with a kiss. My friend Steve, alas, was not so fortunate. I offered to plant one on him myself, but that didn't seem to console him.

Bastille Day 1999 (Paris) Watoosa and I got engaged just a few days before in the Luxembourg Gardens, and this was the last day of our trip to Europe. That morning, we saw the military parade on the Champs-Elysees. It was impressive--far more than France's military tradition itself. Since our hotel clerk told us that the fireworks display was held the night before (which made no sense to me), we figured that was the end of the festivities. But that night, we had finished eating dinner and were walking around the Esplanade des Invalides when we heard explosions in the distance. We raced over to the Parc du Champ de Mars and saw one the most spectacular fireworks shows I've ever seen, with the Eiffel Tower in the foreground. It was the perfect end to a perfect trip.

My New Route

2008-07-03T11:58:00.000-07:00

I had a great ride today out to the southern tip of Sebago Lake. I wondered if I'd be able to find some good rides once we moved out to Westbrook. From Portland, it was still pretty easy to cross over Casco Bay and ride through Cape Elizabeth to the Portland Head Light (and for a longer ride, to Prout's Neck). I could still do that ride, but it would mean adding on a few more miles of uninteresting city riding each way.

But I've been really pleased with the rides inland. The New England countryside is beautiful, and there are more hills. I miss having a lighthouse to look at, but the views of the lake are still a nice reward for pedaling.

Here's the route:

&amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/ride/united-states/me/westbrook/445895898587"&amp;gt;Lake Run 1&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;&amp;lt;br/&amp;gt;&amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/find-ride/united-states/me/westbrook"&amp;gt;Find more Bike Rides in Westbrook, Maine&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;

What's Cooler than Bein' Cool?

2008-07-02T11:12:00.000-07:00

Ice cold.

Which was the approximate temperature of the water in my shower this morning. Watoosa first noticed the lack of hot water, and it turns out our boiler is down.

I had gone for a jog and was super sweaty, so I had to have a shower. After my brain processed all the impulses of frigid agony coming from every single nerve ending in my body, I couldn't help but think of the "shrinkage" episode on Seinfeld. Those of you who have seen it will understand me when I say that I may never be able to use a stand-up urinal again.

At least it happened in July, and not January!

Question: Are You Ready for Some Football?

2008-06-30T17:44:00.000-07:00

Answer: Yes. Yes I am.

I am so ready that I even stooped to watching a little bit of Remember the Titans, just so I could get a simulation of the real thing. For those of you who haven't seen it, Remember the Titans offers up about as much cinematic excellence as Clash of the Titans*. While RTT doesn't have the laughable not-so-special effects of COTT, it does feature little Hayden Panettiere, who turns in what has to be the most grating child performance since Jonathan Ke Quan annoyed the living crap out of America with his portrayal of Short Round in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.

And yet I put up with it, just to get a glimpse of some behelmeted lugs tackling each other. I blushed when Watoosa came back in the room, and I quickly changed the channel to public television and feigned interest in a somber discussion of the Fed's decision to lowering interest rates. But that shows you how hard up I am for some gridiron action, and there are still several weeks before even fall practice begins, let alone the first kickoff. I honestly don't know if I can make it.

Anyway, here's my prediction: Auburn will play in the BCS Championship Game either this year or the next or (most likely) both. You heard it here first. There's a good chance that Ohio State will reprise its role as SEC whipping boy, too, which will give me bragging rights over certain acquaintances of mine (you know who you are). War Eagle, y'all!

*Holy shnikies, IMDB says there's a remake of this stinkbomb due out in 2010!

(Un)Wanted

2008-06-28T14:44:00.000-07:00

For years now, Watoosa has maliciously told all our friends that I "made" her go see the execrably bad Pearl Harbor. It's true that seeing that flick was my idea, and that I probably should have known better. But I would like to enter the following points in my defense:

1. 2001 was an abysmal year for summer movies, and we got hoodwinked into sitting through other stinkers that year (Jurassic Park III and Planet of the Apes, for example).

2. I was really in the mood to see a movie.

3. The idea of just being in a movie theater was irresistable, as it was scorching hot that summer and our AC wasn't working (this was in the humiditopolis of St. Louis, after all).

4. Anyone who knows us will also know that Watoosa can bend my will to hers any time she wishes. In other words, I didn't exactly have to drag her into the theater.

5. It had Kate Beckinsale in it.

We tried to lower our expectations, but we just couldn't get them low enough. Apart from regretting our having paid good money to see the film, we were disturbed by the response of the guy sitting next to us, as he seemed utterly moved by the narrative (literally to tears, as I recall). If he'd been a WWII veteran, I could probably cut him some aesthetic slack, but he was hardly older than me.

Ever since, Watoosa has yet to let me live it down. But now we're even, because she talked me into going to see Wanted yesterday. True, this summer--like 2001--has been a stinker as far as movies go (We liked Iron Man well enough, and wisely opted against Indy 4, The Happening, and Prince Caspian). But Wanted is a complete waste of time, not to mention film.

Morgan Freeman phones in his performance, which is more than the script deserves, and I can't say much for James McAvoy. Angelina Jolie does what she does best, which is scowl and look undernourished (honestly, I've never understood all the hubbub about her). And when she throws a punch with her veiny, Tinkertoy arms, it's about as believable as watching the Ewoks kicking stormtrooper butt.

I might have enjoyed the movie slightly more had I not been disturbed to see that the woman down the row from us brought her preschool-age son! What's with these people? This movie had two separate sex scenes and enough F-bombs to supply the U.S. Navy! Since the theater was dark, she probably couldn't see my raised eyebrow communicating my consternation, shocked disbelief, and disdain for her parenting skills. Years from now, when her reprobate son is prosecuted for knocking over a 7-Eleven, she'll surely look back on yesterday and wish she'd decided to see Wall-E.

Just like me.

Brutal

2008-06-20T05:49:00.000-07:00

From A. O. Scott's review of The Love Guru:

"To say that the movie is not funny is merely to affirm the obvious. The word “unfunny” surely applies to Mr. Myers’s obnoxious attempts to find mirth in physical and cultural differences but does not quite capture the strenuous unpleasantness of his performance. No, “The Love Guru” is downright antifunny, an experience that makes you wonder if you will ever laugh again."

2008-06-18T07:19:00.001-07:00

Yesterday, I finished C. S. Forester's Poo-Poo and the Dragons, a book that allowed me to annoy Watoosa by referring to it as simply "Poo-Poo Dragons." It's a children's book that's been out of print for some time, now. I located a copy through our local library system. When I looked at the Due Date slip, I noticed that it had been regularly checked out since 1969. I suppose these stamped Due Date slips will soon go the way of the Card Catalog, but I like seeing when other library patrons have checked out the books that I read.

Pre-natal Thoughts

2008-06-18T06:48:00.000-07:00

Last night, Watoosa and I had our sixth and final birthing class. I haven't really blogged about the pregnancy, so here are a few random thoughts about the class and the upcoming event.

-The class has been very low-key. From what I had seen in movies and TV, I expected graphic videos that would make me squirm, and lots of time spent on the floor, pantomiming labor. There was really none of that. Mostly, we just talked about what would happen during the various stages, and how to breathe.

-I was surprised at how old all the other couples were. I'd guess that many other women, if not a majority, are older than Watoosa. Since we're in our thirties, I expected us to be the old fogies.

-One of the women in the class is a professional model, and she still looks like one (albeit one for a pregnancy magazine). Her name is Jennifer, and she and her husband were the last to arrive on the first night. When she walked in, Watoosa told me that she could detect the self-esteem of all the other women taking a nose-dive. That may be, but Jennifer can't rock the sexy librarian look like Watoosa.

-One of the husbands in the class looks remarkably like Vladimir Putin. Keep your distance, comrade!

-We've gotten the impression that a lot of the other women have been more irritable than Watoosa, who has been pretty chipper through the whole process. We've been lucky on that score.

-We did watch one video that showed several births. At first, I could only see half the screen because someone's head was blocking my line of sight. At first I just put up with it, but then I began to worry that I was missing something important on that obscured side. What if there was a special technique that the doctor was using, or that the husband was doing? I'd never know! I guess I'll find out in August.

-When they showed the baby coming out, I was shocked to see just how pointy the head was. I had heard that vaginally born babies have coneheads, but this kid looked like TV's Bert.

-Watching that video made me so very, very glad that none of us remembers our own birth. Sheesh!

-On Sunday, we toured the birthing center where we'll go for delivery. They've got free WiFi throughout the house. Watch for my liveblogging. ("Hold that contraction, honey--I'm almost done with this post!")

-The baby kicks and pushes. A lot. It's pretty freaky to feel it, and even freakier to see it. Watoosa says it doesn't really hurt as much as feel uncomfortable and weird. But since it has interfered with her sleep, I've decided to ground the kid as soon as he comes out. Spare the rod, spoil the child.

-Last night, as she crawled into bed, Watoosa huffed, "Ugh! It's just a festival of discomfort." She makes me laugh.

-I can't shake the suspicion that I really have no idea what's about to happen to us. Maybe it's because people keep telling us that we have no idea what's about to happen to us.

Alert the Media

2008-05-29T08:52:00.000-07:00

From a student paper:

"Through this article, it has come to my attention that yes, killing and stealing no matter in what aspect, is morally unacceptable."

I hope he remembers that when he sees his grade.

I Hope This is a Typo

2008-05-23T13:49:00.000-07:00

From a student paper about terrorism:

"Only a primary target could be assed...."

Don't even think about assing a secondary target. It's just wrong, dangit! If the good Lord had wanted us to ass secondary targets, he would have made them primary targets.

Now I'm going to ass his paper. Like there's no tomorrow.

Uh-Oh

2008-05-22T05:26:00.000-07:00

Peter Travers on the new Indiana Jones flick:

"By midpoint, the movie starts to play like National Treasure meets The X-Files, with a touch of The Goonies, and I don't mean any of these comparisons as a compliment."

I'll still probably go see it, but I'm increasingly concerned about this franchise suffering from the kind of treatment George Lucas gave to the Star Wars franchise. Mitichlorians, anyone?

For Crying In-N-Out Loud*

2008-05-17T06:29:00.001-07:00

We saw Iron Man last night. I have never even thumbed through an Iron Man comic, so I have no idea how faithful the film is to its source, but it's good, fun, escapist fare. I remember hearing last year that Robert Downey, Jr. would be taking the lead role, and I couldn't believe it. I just can't get the image of him in New Wave make-up in the laughable (as opposed to actually funny) 80s teen romp, Weird Science (scroll down here for pic). But he sold me on his performance.

The low point of the film comes at the beginning of the second act. Tony Stark (the Iron Man) has just returned to the U.S. after three months' captivity in Afghanistan. He wants two things: to head over to his press conference, and to get an "American cheeseburger." In one of the lamest ever product placement shots in film, the next scene shows one of his handlers passing him a Burger King bag. Now, the scene is set in Los Angeles, which means that zillionaire Tony Stark has not only passed up a burger made by a real chef, but he's also passed up In-N-Out. And for a crummy BK greaseburger.

Granted, that's still better than McDonald's or (I shudder at the thought) Krystal/White Castle. But that scene still stretched my suspension of disbelief past the breaking point. If I had been Tony Stark, and I had been captive overseas for three months, and I wanted my first cheeseburger, and one of my flunkies gave me a Burger King product, I would have fired that employee on the spot. Then I would have bought the companies that employ his friends and family members, just so I could fire them.

*Alternate title: "I Can Has Cheeseburger?"

Striptease

2008-05-16T06:08:00.000-07:00

Ever since move-in day, I've yearned to strip off the wallpaper in the kitchen. It's not hideously ugly, but it does look (a) dated, (b) "countryish", and (c) dingy. There were several edges that had come up off the wall surface, and I knew I could just give a tug and the whole sheet would come right off. It was all I could do to keep from pulling it all down, but we had already spent enough time redoing the other downstairs rooms and the nursery upstairs.

Well, we decided we can't take it anymore, and that we'd paint the kitchen in the next week or two. So yesterday I pulled off several sheets. There will be a few spots that need some work, but most of it will come off easily. It was hard to rein myself in, but I had to prep for class.

We're going to try to paint this weekend, and then the house will finally be done. Although...the walls in BR 1 & 2 are starting to look bad in comparison. And then there's the bathroom.

Must...stop...redecorating!

Got to...avoid...becoming...HGTV cliche!

How Do I Put This on my Goodreads List?

2008-05-08T07:17:00.000-07:00

Say what you like about Wikipedia, but I often find myself sucked in by it, bouncing from one link to another as the time flies by. Yes, it's probably not a suitable reference for an academic paper, but it's still great for introducing you to new things.

Today, I saw the entry for the World's Largest Book. From the entry: "It has 730 leaves and 1460 pages; each page is three and a half feet wide, five feet tall and five inches thick." It should go without saying that I won't find it at my local library.

I have no desire to read it--Buddhism has always put me to sleep--but it looks like it's worth seeing in person. Unfortunately, travel to Myanmar isn't in the cards for me anytime soon, for a host of reasons.

Netflix without Watoosa

2008-05-04T14:47:00.000-07:00

Two days after moving in, Watoosa left for Florida to attend her sister's wedding. So until last night, I had the house to myself. It was a little odd. If I hadn't spent the previous two weeks here working I would have felt like I was house-sitting or squatting.

I used the time to watch Netflix movies that she wouldn't be interested in seeing. It was a pretty interesting mix, this time. The first was an epic samurai flick whose title sounds like a Tolkien rip-off: The Sword of Doom. The second was a famous documentary about French collaboration and resistance during World War II. The third was Metallica: Some Kind of Monster.

The Metallica movie was OK. It was interesting--almost comical--to see the uber-heavy metal group try to solve their personal issues through psychotherapeutic hokiness. Megadeth's Dave Mustaine, who was kicked out of Metallica right before they got big, makes an appearance and comes off as a total whiner. Suffice to say, these guys don't exactly come off looking hardcore. To their credit, though, they released the film, anyway.

The best part, for me, was realizing during one scene that the band has stocked their studio with the stoneware that Watoosa and I use: Denby Energy. They even have the same salt and pepper shakers. Yep, James Hetfield gripes about his feelings and how he never can trust people whilst slurping coffee out of the same cup that I use.

The similarites, I can assure you, end there.

Aaaaaaaaaaand...We're In

2008-05-04T14:36:00.000-07:00

We are now officially moved into our new house. Actually, it's been a week and a day, now, but I've been too busy to post an update.

All the work on the house was actually enjoyable, but it's great to know that it's behind us and we can focus on settling in. The carpet is now installed, and just about everything is unpacked, but we still need to hang a few things on the walls and organize the books in the cases.

This remodeling/redecorating stuff is addictive. When I sit in our living room, which has been repainted, I can see the den and dining room, and part of the kitchen. The contrast between the first two (both of which have been repainted) with the dingy, 1980s kitchen becomes unbearable. I have to exert all my willpower to keep from ripping the wallpaper off the walls. We've decided to paint them, but later this month, and we might even do the countertops. Why not?

Whoops

2008-04-23T04:43:00.000-07:00

Somehow, when I posted an update on the work at the new house, it got posted on Watoosa's blog. So here's what I wrote:

"Our House is a Sorta, Sorta, Sorta Fine House"

For now at least. We made a pretty good mess of the interior by stripping off wallpaper, scraping old paint, sanding, sanding, sweeping, and more sanding. Yes, I'm tired of sanding.

But the end is in sight--yesterday we actually began putting up primer on walls in two of the rooms. It's a relief, since we've been doing prep work since we closed. I've never seen so much dust apart from the time that our house in Santa Barbara was beset by fallout from a huge forest fire.

We also incurred our first damage to the house. While trying to drive a nail, I split a stair step. But my friend Jason managed to fix it, and now it's even stronger than all the others. He and his wife Amber helped us prep and prime this weekend (extra large size thanks to you guys for that).

Today my mother and sister arrive, God and the airlines willing. Hopefully we can get all the painting done this week. Moving day is Saturday.

Homeowners

2008-04-10T16:42:00.000-07:00

Today, Watoosa and I closed on the house. We now actually have two residences--an apartment (for the next 16 days) and a house.

We met the sellers last night when we did the final walk-through. They've lived there for 34 years--longer than Watoosa has been alive. It was easy to see how emotionally attached they were to their house. They even camped out on the floor last night to sleep in the house one more time. At one point during closing, I thought the husband was going to call the whole thing off. It lasted only a couple seconds, but those were a tense couple of seconds for us! But they told us that knowing a "nice" couple are moving in would make it easier for them to leave.

It was great seeing the house again. I was wondering if it would lose its luster since we first looked at it, but last night I was reminded all over again how much there is to like about the place. As we finished the walk-through, the carillon in the church behind the house began ringing out hymns. I take that as a good sign.

The house is in great shape, but we do need to redecorate. That will involve stripping wallpaper, painting five rooms (including a stairway), and installing carpet in one room and on the stairs. We are hoping to get it all done by move-in day (4/26). So we tackled the first chore today. I now see why people tell horror stories about removing wallpaper. In most of the rooms, we didn't need to use any chemicals--we just tugged and it popped right off. But in the room that will be the nursery, we had to scrape. And scrape. And scrape. And scrape some more. Thankfully, that part is now done. Next step: sanding the walls to get them ready for painting.

I'm actually looking forward to doing all the work. The physical labor is a nice change of pace from my egghead job, although I've never had a student that was anywhere near as recalcitrant as that wallpaper.

Self-Refutation of the Year

2008-04-05T12:41:00.000-07:00

From a student's paper: "The good thing about philosophy is that you can't be wrong."

Oh, he's so very, very wrong.

Alternative explanations:

1. He's subscribed to the Nick Naylor school of philosophy (see the 1:30 mark).

2. The term "you" refers specifically to me, in which case the statement is analytically true.

Sicko

2008-03-30T14:11:00.001-07:00

Watoosa and I are both under the weather. She caught a cold early last week and kindly decided to share it with me. I feel like someone shoved a bicycle pump up my nose and started inflating my head, Dig Dug-style.

I can't remember the last time Watoosa and I were sick at the same time, but I find that it results in a drastic decrease in both the quantity and quality of cheap sympathy and coddling to which I have become accustomed. This must not stand. Comments are open, for those of you who feel like picking up the slack.

UPDATE: Things got worse for me last night. I don't want to bore you with details, but let's just say that having Indian food for dinner last night was a big, big mistake.

It was fortunate, then, that Watoosa has been improving. When I get really sick, my judgment begins to cloud, and sometimes I just need to be told what to do--autonomy just gets in the way. Many of you have heard her tell the story of my walking around Santa Barbara in a feverish stupor, looking for a doctor's office. I wasn't quite that bad off last night, but it sure was good to have her here, and I hereby retract my gripe about the cheap sympathy and coddling.

Me Think Real Good

2008-03-27T11:16:00.000-07:00

From a student essay: "Philosophers are very intelligent individuals, more so than humans...."

Yes, students see me as a veritable deity, whose ways are high above their own. I don't know what I could have done to give them that idea.

Foolish mortals!

U2 3D

2008-03-21T06:12:00.000-07:00

Last night, Watoosa and I caught the final showing of U2 3D in the area. I had been eager to see it after reading the NY Times review, but I assumed it would be coming to Portland. Apparently I was wrong. Luckily, I happened to check listings for a theater 2o miles away.

Unfortunately, we didn't get to see it in IMAX, but it was in 3D, and it was amazing. The last time I saw something in 3D--the 2007 re-release of The Nightmare Before Christmas--the effect was pretty negligible (although Watoosa seemed more affected by it). I was hoping that this film would work better, and I was more than satisfied. Although some of the images challenged my eye focus a bit, most of the time it was like watching a performance in person.

Only it was better than that, because the multiple cameras swoop over the crowd and hover over the band, and the editors blend and manipulate images with wild abandon. I was mesmerized, and fully sucked in. Early on, during a low shot from the crowd's perspective, I got annoyed for a couple seconds at a few hands obscuring my view of the stage--I thought someone in the seat in front of me was getting too carried away. Then I realized that those hands were in the film, and I remembered that Watoosa and I were the only ones in the theater.

If it's still showing in your town, pay the higher ticket prices and see it on the biggest screen you can find. It's worth it for the first encore alone.

All Systems are Go

2008-03-20T07:04:00.001-07:00

This week we got our "Clear to Close" from the bank who will be handling our mortgage. That means we're one step closer to closing the deal on our house, and that Icktoosa headquarters will soon be relocating to Westbrook.

Next month, then, looks to be pretty crazy for me. Here's what will be going down:
-Close on the house
-Remove wallpaper in three rooms
-Paint four rooms
-Rip up some carpet, replace it on the stairs
-Move
-Grade papers in all three of my classes, plus tests in two of them
-Teach three sessions of an additional class
-Help lead a workshop on ethics and torture

My work is cut out for me, but I'm looking forward to most of it.

Protecting Our Polity with Peircing Pickle Projectiles

2008-03-18T19:00:00.000-07:00

I really don't know what to make of this, but it's certainly worth a look: a portrayal of America's military conflicts from WWII to the present that uses foods representative of the countries involved. Who thinks up this stuff?

Some of it is funny--like the arms race with the Soviets (stroganoff)--but other parts strike me as a bit too...beyond the pale. Watch for yourself.

A cheat sheet for the various entrees is here.

What Sunday Afternoons Are For

2008-03-09T12:43:00.001-07:00

2008-03-08T08:26:00.001-08:00

Here's a video of a woman doing 21 different accents. She even attempts to distinguish closely related accents, such as Czech and Russian, California and Seattle, Texas and South Carolina. The funniest is Toronto. The weakest is Texas. South Carolina doesn't sound quite right to me, either, but it's such a delight to hear it, all the same.

Chick Does 21 Different Accents - Watch more free videos

It's Genderrific!

2008-03-08T07:27:00.001-08:00

Uncertain about your real gender? Of course you are. Now there's hope! Just enter some text into the box at this website, and it'll tell you whether (and even to what extent) you're male or female.

I just tried it. After entering some text from a recent post, the result was "Weak male." That's obviously incorrect, so I figured another test was in order. The second result was "110% red-blooded American male." A third yielded "So freakin' male, you make John Wayne look like a sissy." After the fourth try, it told me "Stop it already--we can't handle your awesome maleness and it's causing our supercomputers to blow up." That's more like it.

Watoosa's writing, on the other hand, yielded "Weak male," so it looks like we have some...."issues" to work through, although the site warns that this result could simply mean that she's European.

They Wish They Were the World

2008-03-07T07:35:00.000-08:00

The most nauseatingly self-congratulatory song of the past few decades, recreated for a Japanese television show. Josh, can you give us some background on this curiosity?

Observations:

1. The Cyndi Lauper woman absolutely nails it.
2. I swear, the Stevie Wonder is played by Horatio Sanz.
3. The Michael Jackson amazingly looks more like a human being than Michael Jackson himself.
4. I must--repeat, MUST--have the red and white suit visible at 3:10. Easter is just around the corner.

Stickin' it to the Man

2008-03-07T06:46:00.000-08:00

I've always found it annoying at places like Home Depot when, on exiting the store, they insist on looking at your receipt and nosing through your purchases. It's invasive and a waste of time. So, having read this article a while back, I decided to try refusing this "request" yesterday.

I was at Best Buy, where I purchased a set of speakers. There were more employees than customers in the store, and I was the only customer anywhere near the checkout area. The exit was maybe ten yards away from the register I used, in full view of the employee doing the receipt checks. So there's no way she could have missed me checking out. As I walked toward the exit carrying a moderately heavy and cumbersome box, she still asked to see my receipt.

I started to walk past her.

"Wait, sir! I need to see your receipt!"

"Um, no, I'd rather not," I said.

"No, I have to look at it," she said. She tried to take it out of my hand, but I moved away so she couldn't get it.

"Really? What happens if I don't let you?"

"Well, I'd have to report it."

"That's fine with me. Go ahead," I said, turning to leave.

"But I also need to make sure that you got what you paid for!" (As the article I linked to above points out, this isn't really possible, since the boxes don't have prices on them. There's no way she can compare my receipt to the intended price for the speakers, unless she happens to have memorized the price of every single item in the store's inventory, which is doubtful.)

"Thanks, but I'm sure I did," I said, and I started walking away from her. At this point, she just gave up, huffing out a petulant "Fine!"

I doubt I'll make this a standard policy, but it was fun to mix it up a little.

I Have a Cunning Plan

2008-03-05T06:12:00.000-08:00

Although I can't exactly say why, I have a weakness for a couple film genres. One is the submarine picture. Any movie that takes place in a sub will draw me in, even if I know it's not a terribly good film, and even though they are all pretty much the same film (firing torpedoes, evading depth charges, taking on water, a tough skipper, a green XO who the skipper suspects isn't ready for command, taking the ship deeper than she's rated to dive, debates about orders and military procedure, the psychological ordeal of being cooped up in a tin can underneath millions of gallons of water...you know the drill).

The other genre that I can't resist is the heist picture. The NY Times has a great article here that partly explains what makes these movies so much fun: part of the allure is watching the characters develop and execute elaborate and daring plans, and the other part is watching them deal with the inevitable snags to said plans. What the NYT didn't point out, though, is that yet another part of the appeal of these movies is that they typically include some kind of swindle. Sometimes, like in Ocean's 11, the thieves swindle the mark. But it's even more fun when there's a swindle going on within the team.

I've added some titles to my Netflix queue based on this article, including a number of foreign films, so do check it out of you're a fan of the genre. In the meantime, here are a few mini-reviews...

I already mentioned Ocean's 11, and I think it was underrated when it was first released. Soderbergh and Co. know how preposterous it is, and that's part of the fun. The sequels got progressively more preposterous and less fun (although subbing Catherine Zeta-Jones for a pasty and shrewish Julia Roberts was a big step up), but they're good for wasting a couple hours.

Speaking of Zetamax, as I've heard her called, a remarkably mediocre example of the genre is Entrapment, in which she co-stars with Sean Connery. This was the film that made me realize how much of a cliche this line is: "You're gettin' too old for this stuff [obviously, the last word can be substituted with a stronger term]." Now I'll be the first to admit that Connery has aged well, but the romance that develops between him and CZJ is just creepy, not to mention feebly developed. The ending scene in the train station is laughably lame. However, there is a memorable scene in which CZJ is "training" for the heist by slithering over, under, and around a mock-up laserbeam detection system. I remember the theater getting very quiet during that scene.

If you want to be completely terrified of the man who once played Gandhi, check out Sexy Beast. The heist is less central to the film than the efforts of the main character to resist Ben Kingsley's attempts to recruit him, and Kingsley is absolutely frightening.

I refused to see the remake of The Pink Panther for multiple reasons, but one reason was because much of the appeal of the original is the way it embodies the grooviness of the early 60s. As a kid, I laughed at Clouseau's bumbling, and I recognize Peter Seller's talent, but that part hasn't held up as much for me. Watching David Niven exude smoothness has.

Although I can't recall a single detail, and although it's far from Woody Allen's finest work, I remember enjoying Small Time Crooks. Same deal with Bandits.

There's nothing too remarkable about Frank Oz's The Score; it hews pretty close to the standard heist film. But it's well-executed, and Robert De Niro and Ed Norton give good performances. There are lovely scenes of Montreal, too. I preferred this film over its competitor that year: Heist, starring Gene Hackman. The latter was penned and directed by David Mamet, but it left me cold.

As always, I'm open to additions to this list.

UPDATE: Forgot to mention Heat and The Usual Suspects.

My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys

2008-02-28T18:32:00.001-08:00

And they still are, it seems.

Watoosa and I watched 3:10 to Yuma this week, and it reconfirmed my high opinion of it. Watoosa proclaimed it her favorite western. I wouldn't put it above Unforgiven, which is in my favorite films in any genre. But 3:10 to Yuma is certainly one of the best of its kind, and seeing it in the theater last summer was one of the most enjoyable movie-going experiences I've had in quite a while.

There's nothing fancy about this film--it's just a straightforward story about a man (Christian Bale) determined to get an outlaw (Russell Crowe) to a train that will take him to his trial and, presumably, to justice. There's enough character development that you enjoy watching these people interact and make the choices that move the plot along, and you care about what happens to them. But this is no hoity-toity character film posing as a Western. The action sequences are gripping, and there's plenty of them.

Crowe plays his character with plenty of charm, but also with enough cold-blooded ruthlessness that you never quite forget he's a villain. Bale gives his usual full-tilt performance. But Ben Foster steals the show as Crowe's right hand man. He has such an intensity that far outstrips his rather small frame. There are scenes of him waiting on horseback, positioned far off in the distance, watching and waiting for a chance to strike out at the men who have captured his boss. It's chilling.

In the bonus features, the filmmaker portrays Westerns as the American counterpart to the Greek and Roman myths. I think there's something to that, but the fact that so few Westerns make it to production these days (compared to the early and middle part of the last century) suggests that the importance of the Western to the American identity is waning. It looks to me like it will be supplanted in this century by the super-hero film.

But 3:10 to Yuma was such a treat, I hope it will remind Hollywood that there are still stories worth telling that involve horses and six-shooters and a decided lack of spandex.

I'm Not Nearly as Special as I'd Like to Think I Am

2008-02-28T18:17:00.000-08:00

One highlight (out of many) from the trip to California: I met someone who seems to have largely followed my life trajectory. During the conference, he introduced himself to the group as someone who does work in political philosophy and ethics, with a particular interest in issues concerning citizenship. That's pretty much how I describe myself, too, so I decided to introduce myself. In the course of our conversation, I discovered we had the following things in common:

1. We both grew up in north Alabama.
2. We both grew up Southern Baptist.
3. He went to Samford for one year, and ended up earning a degree from UAH. I went to UAH for one year, and I ended up earning a degree from Samford.
4. He married a Samford alum, and so did I.
5. He got his Ph. D. from Vanderbilt. As a kid, I always intended to go to Vandy.
6. We both started off with an interest in American pragmatism, and then eventually shifted to analytic philosophy.
7. Our dissertations addressed similar topics, and we seem to have argued for similar positions.
8. Our dissertation advisors run in the same circles.
9. This year, he began his career at a Protestant college in Southern California. I just left a teaching position at a Protestant college in Southern California.

How many other people are out there that have lived pretty much the same life as you?

UPDATE: I forgot to add "10. We both have the same intials--C.C."

Goin' Back to Cali

2008-02-14T05:38:00.000-08:00

Stylin' and Profilin'.

I leave in a couple hours for Southern California, where I'll spend a little time in the L.A. area and attend a conference in beautiful Santa Barbara. This conference is held each February partly in order to catch the best weather of the year. While I have loved the Maine winter, yesterday was such a mess that I started thinking that the lyrics of "California Dreamin'" were gospel truth: "All the leaves are brown, and the sky is gray....I'd be safe and warm, if I was in L.A."

On Tuesday night/Wednesday morning, we got seven inches of snow. During the day on Wednesday, snow gave way to lots of rain, which in turn changed the fallen snow to seven inches of slush, and formed giant pools of standing water that couldn't find its way to street drains. I got completely soaked through while trying to liberate our cars, as passing traffic splashed gallons of road water and sludge on me. Then I turned my attention to our walk, where I was literally shoveling liquid water.

So I should get a break from all that the next few days. Alas, Watoosa must stay behind.

But as for the rest of my readers...so long, suckers!

UPDATE: Title explanation, for those who have insufficient appreciation of 80s rap, here.

UPDATE 2: Yes, I will be both stylin' and profilin'.

Things I Wish I'd Never Seen

2008-02-12T13:16:00.000-08:00

A 1.5 cm* nose goblin dangling from one of my student's nostrils, its slimy exterior reflecting the afternoon sunlight coming in through the window.

Fortunately for him, it was in the middle of class. Unfortunately for him, the class consists of six people, so he was especially conspicuous. I was horrified, and yet I could not look away. Not even when, finding himself without a tissue, he used his freakin' sleeve.

Needless to say, I'll be handling this kid's tests and papers with safety tongs and a hazmat suit.

*Approximate measurement, but no exaggeration.

The Best Sentence I've Read This Morning

2008-02-08T05:16:00.000-08:00

From the NY Times review of Fool's Gold:

"Mr. McConaughey and Ms. Hudson, who were less than electrifying in "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days," appear to be suffering through a course in remedial chemistry, which they barely pass."

Be Afraid. Be Very, Very, Very, Very Afraid

2008-02-02T07:44:00.000-08:00

What in the name of all that is holy and decent in this world would impel someone to greenlight this idea: a cheeseburger in a can? You read that right. Click on the link, and despair.

And yet, amidst all my revulsion and suspicion, I find myself strangely curious....

Fun with Logic

2008-02-02T07:34:00.000-08:00

Just found this site, which features amusing Venn diagrams (although some of the entries are line graphs). If you haven't done Venn diagrams before, you'll still get the jokes, I think. The author is putting out a book collection soon.

Here are a couple of my favorites so far:

There Will Be Blood

2008-01-27T14:02:00.000-08:00

Yesterday afternoon, Watoosa and I went to see There Will Be Blood. I quite liked it, and I think it's worthy of a Best Picture nomination, although I would prefer No Country for Old Men. Watoosa would choose Juno, I think (I did enjoy that one, but I'd still give the big one to the Coens).

There Will Be Blood features a spectacular performance by Daniel Day-Lewis as the protagonist, Daniel Plainview. Day-Lewis uses an American accent reminiscent of John Huston or Jack Palance. It doesn't sound like the accent of a rough-and-tumble prospector turned oil man, but I think that adds to the character's mystique. I spent the entire film trying to figure him out. Is he a villain? Is he simply a hard-working businessman? Is he succumbing to his obsession? Just what is he up to? Only at the end does an answer begin to emerge, although I'm still trying to make sense of the character even now.

The film naturally invites comparisons to Citizen Kane. Both films chronicle the life of men who rise to prominence and wealth and ultimately suffer from it. Watching their protagonists develop, even to the point of tragedy, is what makes them compelling. But There Will Be Blood also features a foil to the Plainview character: a local faith healer named Eli Sunday, who eventually becomes a famous radio preacher in Los Angeles. These two characters could easily be seen as embodiments of the American century: a business tycoon and a celebrity revivalist preacher. But if they were nothing more than types, this movie would have been a lot less interesting.

The film also uses music to remarkable effect--some have likened it to Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. And there are lots of shots that are beautifully composed; we especially loved the scenes of the Central California countryside.

I think it gets a bit out of hand toward the last 20 minutes or so (although it allows Day-Lewis to go completely nuts), but it's definitely worth seeing.

Maine Barbecue (No, That's Not a Typo)

2008-01-27T13:24:00.000-08:00

After succumbing to a raging, pregnancy-fueled craving for barbecue on Friday, Watoosa did some research and found a local place that was supposed to be pretty good: Beale Street Barbecue. We tried it out yesterday, and we were quite impressed.

Their basic sauce is tomato-based, so it resembles the kind you'd get in the mid-South. It has a delicious, vegetablish savoriness, and just enough heat to make it interesting without producing rivers of sweat from my scalp (not that it takes much to do that). They also have a habanero-fueled sauce, if you want some agonizing pain with your meal.

That basic sauce gets served with many kinds of meat: pulled pork, chicken, pulled brisket, and sausages. I got some pork and brisket, and while the former was quite good, the latter was fantastic. It comes served on a hunk of tasty jalipeno cornbread.

They also serve pork ribs. Friends and neighbors, I'm here to tell you...those ribs are amazing. They are smoked and seasoned with a dry rub, and the meat is so tender that a light breeze would pull it right off the bone. I put a little sauce on a few ribs, but Watoosa and I both decided they were even better with just the rub.

I wouldn't say it's the best barbecue ever, but we wouldn't be embarassed to take our Southern friends there. If there hadn't been several inches of snow on the ground with temps in the 20s, and if our waitress hadn't sounded like an extra from Good Will Hunting, I could almost have fooled myself into thinking I was in Memphis.

I say "almost," because the menu features lots of non-BBQ items, like crab cakes, burritos, pasta and salad. And people ordered them! At the table next to ours, as I was devouring those magnificent ribs, I noticed that none of the three diners ordered barbecue. And one of them--a petulant whelp of a teenager, I'm sure--ate only a salad with some chicken tossed on top. I didn't know whether to condemn them or grieve for them. Alas, they forfeited culinary riches for a bowl of pottage (or a salad and a couple burgers, to be more exact).

Chillin' Like a Villain

2008-01-21T12:09:00.000-08:00

See that big goose egg in the bottom left of the image? That was last night's low. Or is it tonight's? No matter. It's been cold here the past couple days. Farther inland they've been having a windchill advisory, but it seems to have missed us.

After we moved out here, we'd tell people how excited we were to be living in Maine. Since they knew we'd moved here from California and that we grew up in the South, they warned us, "You'll be changing your tune once winter comes and you're digging your car out of the snow."

My insistence that we actually love cold weather was usually met with skepticism. And when I'd respond by pointing out that Southerners are naturally tough and that's why it was a scientific fact that Johnny Reb could whoop ten Billy Yanks in the War between the States and don't you even try to deny it or we'll rise up again and give you Federalists another shellackin'...well, that's usually been met with stares of puzzlement and disbelief.

But I'm happy to report that we're now about halfway through the winter, and Watoosa and I both love it. We've had an unusually large amount of snow this season (several feet, in fact) and lots of days below freezing. The snow does tend to make things a bit messy, but I still get a charge out of watching it fall and cover everything. The drive to campus (and the view of Sebago Lake and the White Mountains) is especially beautiful after a good snowstorm. Digging the cars out hasn't been a problem except for one night, and even then I was able to use a neighbor's snowblower, which was actually fun (I'm going to have to get one when we get a driveway). And I take an almost perverse pleasure in seeing how low the temps can get; I'm hoping for a day when the highs stay in the single digits, just to say I saw it.

So all the doubters can rest assured. Old Man Winter can keep on trying to freeze us out, but we're not going anywhere. Mother Nature can do her very worst, and we'll take it with a smile.

Unless we lose power. Then we're screwed.

Forever in Peace May They Wave

2008-01-14T06:39:00.000-08:00

I've always had a thing for flags. As I child, I would sometimes pull out the "F" volume of our encyclopedia set (The New Book of Knowledge, which was for some reason stored in my room) and look at a color spread of all the world's flags. I got extra excited when a school assignment required us to construct flags. Yes, I was a total geek.

So I was especially jazzed about finding this site today: a ranking of all the world's flags in terms of aesthetic value. Some of the comments are pretty funny, such as Libya's choice of a plain green rectangle ("Did you even try?"), Mauritius four-bar monstrosity ("'Hey, lots of countries have a tricolour, why don't we have a quadcolour?' Big mistake."), and Zimbabwe ("Features a hawk sitting on a toilet.").

The grading methodology is here. There are bonus points for simplicity and good colors, and flags lose points for bad colors, the use of maps, and resemblance to corporate logos. Especially damning is the penalty for "Makes me nauseous."

The United States gets a C+, which is about what I'd give it. I've never really taken to it, in part because of the proportion of the size and shape of the blue field to the whole rectangle, and because of all those stars.

The United Kingdom is one of my favorite flags, but it gets only a B on this list, having points docked for being "too busy." I don't think it's too busy at all. I like especially that it incorporates the flags of England, Scotland, and Ireland (it's the cross of St. George, imposed on the cross of St. Patrick, all imposed on the cross of St. Andrew). Of course, that means that Wales gets left out--tough luck to the Welsh for living in a principality rather than a kingdom.

Another one of my favorite flags was the Confederate battle flag, aka the Stars and Bars. Unfortunately, it's now forever tainted with racism and redneckery, but it's a fine looking flag.

Just Think of the Occupational Hazards

2008-01-12T07:14:00.000-08:00

Here's a job I'd never want to have, regardless of the salary: public restroom reviewer. The NY Times apparently has one, who's posted a review here of an automated toilet in Madison Square Park.

I've heard about these automated toilets before, and it sounded like a pretty great deal; since they are self-flushing and self-cleaning, they avoid the absolute worst thing about public restrooms, at least those devoted to males: for some reason, men seem to abandon all influences of civilization and decency once they enter, and prefer to leave their offerings right there in the bowl for the next guy to witness. I've long been baffled by this, since it's clearly a negative-sum game--we all suffer when even a few of us refuse to flush, and yet it's so easy to avoid that outcome. I can't believe that all these men don't flush their toilets at home, so why not just take the 0.5 seconds and hit that lever? If you're grossed out by touching it, use your foot (like I do).

Luckily, I've been blessed with a bladder of steel, so I can quite comfortably delay taking care of business until I can do so with a home court advantage, so to speak. But I have longed for a technological fix to this particular shortcoming of human nature.

It looks like I'll have to wait a little longer, though, because it looks like these automated units have two shortcomings that I don't see myself getting past. First, you're given only three 16-inch strips of toilet paper. Granted, that's typically enough to get the job done, but what do you do in those extreme cases? You can't just wait for the thing to reset, because the entire room gets cleaned after every use. Are you supposed to zip up, exit, and tell whomever's waiting outside that you that you want another ride?

Second, there is dampness everywhere. And I do mean everywhere. Part of the point of having a guaranteed bathroom is that you don't get your trousers infected by fluid on the floor. And there's nothing worse than the sensation of sitting down on the toilet seat and feeling moisture. You pray to the gods above that it's just clean toilet water that splashed up there after the last flush.

These units cost $100,000, so they may be slow to catch on. But hopefully they'll get a couple design improvements before they do. In the meantime, I'm forced to put up with the great unwashed.

OD on Austen

2008-01-06T18:25:00.000-08:00

Some of you may be interested in this little nugget: PBS's Masterpiece Theater, plans to air adaptations of all of the works of Jane Austen. Plus, they're including a dramatic portrayal of her life, and no, it's not the one with Anne Hathaway. Rather it's titled Miss Austen Regrets, and it stars Olivia Williams (she was Miss Cross in Rushmore), who should be a bit more believable than Hathaway. I think some of the adaptations are new, but there is at least one classic: the BBC's production of Pride & Prejudice, which stars Jennifer Ehle and Colin "You might as well call me Darcy" Firth.

I've thankfully overcome my blithe dismissal of Austen's books, and so I no longer turn my nose up at dramatized versions of them, although the BBC P&P is still the best (thank the lords of Kobol that PBS didn't use the Keira Knightley version, or Watoosa would have gone into a fit of rage). We'll see how the new ones turn out.

There is a webpage for the series here. Since it's PBS, the website doesn't really tell you that much. I hope Masterpiece Theater still uses that same theme music from when I was a kid. I knew when those trumpets started playing that it was time for my parents to watch grown-up TV and for me to go to bed.

Bonus funny story: a few years ago, I gave Watoosa a DVD copy of P&P. She was elated, and she insisted we watch it immediately. It's pretty long, so we split it up over two evenings. During the night after we finished it, I awoke to hear her talking in her sleep. With as much vitriol as I've ever heard come from her lips, she said, "Oh that Mr. Collins...I HATE HIM SO MUCH!"

UPDATE: Imagine my embarassment on realizing I used the coarse, lowbrow Americanized spelling "theater" instead of "theatre." A thousand pardons.

UPDATE 2: Masterpiece Theatre intro theme is here, although it's warbly and quiet and doesn't kick in until the 1:10 mark. On the plus side, it also features that weird Moogish WGBH Boston promo that used to be all over PBS in the 1980s.

UPDATE 3: Mousterpiece Theater intro is here.

UPDATE 4: Monsterpiece Theatre episode is here. Is it me, or does Cookie Monster say "Good Sex Joke" at 00:19?

No Movie for Loud Men

2008-01-06T17:37:00.000-08:00

The latest Coen brothers' feature, No Country for Old Men, is getting a lot of awards buzz, and I think it's well deserved. I really liked it in the theater, and the more I thought about it afterwards, the more I retroactively enjoyed it. Today, I read this article that explains part of why the film is so effective: it's the way the Coens use sound, or rather, silence.

Here's its description of the most memorable scene:

"There is at least one sequence in “No Country for Old Men” that could be termed Hitchcockian in its virtuosic deployment of sound. Holed up in a hotel room, Mr. Brolin’s character awaits the arrival of his pursuer, Chigurh. He hears a distant noise (meant to be the scrape of a chair, Mr. Berkey said). He calls the lobby. The rings are audible through the handset and, faintly, from downstairs. No one answers. Footsteps pad down the hall. The beeps of Chigurh’s tracking device increase in frequency. Then there is a series of soft squeaks — only when the sliver of light under the door vanishes is it clear that a light bulb has been carefully unscrewed."

The reference to Hitchcock is apt. I knew exactly what was going to happen in this scene, and yet I was still completely on the edge of my seat. Another good comparison is 2001: A Space Odyssey. Stanley Kubrick builds the tension to an amazing degree scenes in which the astronauts are maneuvering outside their ship, by using utter silence or limiting the sound to the astronauts' breathing and a slight hissing of the air system. It seems to last forever, and it underscores the coldness and emptiness of space, which reminds the viewer (although subtly) of the danger they're witnessing. Similarly, he focuses for an uncomfortably long amount of time on the readout monitors on the hibernation pods, when HAL is slowly killing the astronauts inside, and all you hear is a persistent, manic beeping. It's one of the creepiest things I've ever seen in a movie. You can get a feel for it here, but it loses something on the small screen.

Hitchcock's Strong Suit

2008-01-01T12:17:00.000-08:00

I'm not sure exactly how serious to take it, but I enjoyed reading this essay about my favorite Alfred Hitchcock film, North by Northwest.

The author's thesis is given in the first sentence: "North by Northwest isn't a film about what happens to Cary Grant, it's about what happens to his suit."

He addresses something that has always bothered me about that film--Cary Grant goes so long without showering, and yet Eva Marie Saint doesn't seemed put off at all until they're in her hotel room in Chicago (and even then she's just putting up a front to protect him). Granted, it is Cary Grant. But after all that running around, fleeing malevolent aircraft, getting nearly roasted by an exploding fuel truck, etc., when he does get a chance to bathe, he passes up the opportunity. Surely, he had to be reeking to high heaven.

But the article also points out something I hadn't thought of before: just how magnificent the suit looks, despite all the abuse it takes. Clearly, there's some Hollywood magic involved, here.

One other thing that has always bothered me about this film is its title--what does it have to do with the story? The characters move almost exactly due west, not north by northwest. Someone once suggested to me that it refers to the direction that the villains plan to go as they make their exit from the United States. But since they're leaving from Rapid City, South Dakota, that would mean they were heading to...where, exactly? I have a hard time believing that superspy James Mason would be heading to Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

I Got Deja Vu for Christmas

2007-12-29T12:15:00.000-08:00

Watoosa and I are now back home in Portland, after our Christmas travels. Compared to last year, it was a remarkably stress-free and uneventful experience, even though we still managed to cover three states and four cities.

It struck me this year how much every Christmas is pretty much a carbon-copy of all the others I've spent. Here's what happens every year:

-My mom always drops a joke about us not getting presents this year, or only getting one present this year, or some variation on that theme. This is despite a mountain of presents conspicuously placed under the tree.

-There are always ample disclaimers along the lines of, "Now, if you don't like it, you can take it back."

-Among the gifts I receive, the "Toy to Clothing" ratio inexorably continues its downward trend.

-My dad always finds crazy things for stocking stuffers. This keeps the local Big Lots in business for another month.

-When it comes time to unwrap presents, my mom insists on stuffing the torn paper into a garbage bag as each gift is opened, lest the floor become "cluttered." I've noticed this tendency in my mother-in-law, too; maybe it's hardwired into the maternal psyche.

-My grandparents are impossible to shop for, and when we give them something, they say, "Y'all shouldn't have spent so much money on us," or "Y'all didn't need to get us anything."

-The main meal at my grandparents' place is always and without exception a turkey (and sometimes ham), green beans that have stewed for hours in bacon fat, a gaggle of casseroles, Sister Shubert's rolls, mac & cheese (for the kids), and some kind of cranberry substance. For dessert, there are always two or three options, but there's at least chocolate-based cake or pie made because it's what I like. It's one of the perks I get for being the oldest grandchild. Deal with it, siblings and cousins!

-My grandfather expects that meal to be ready promptly at noon, and that expectation is always disappointed.

-There is a blessing before the meal. However, it's always a surprise who is going to do it. Sometimes my grandfather handles that duty himself, and sometimes he calls on someone else, thus putting them on the spot. The first year he did that to me, he caught me totally off guard. I think my blessing that year consisted of an e.e.cummings-esque melange of short, incoherent sentence fragments, punctuated with lots of "umms" and "errrrs." I learned my lesson, though. Now I have prepared material I can draw on.

-My grandmother is physically incapable of sitting down to eat while there is anyone else left who :
(a) is getting food;
(b) needs seconds;
(c) might possibly need something in the way of condiments, salt, etc. for the food they
already have;
(d) might possibly be dissatisfied with the chosen menu, and therefore needs her to fix them something else;
(e) might in the foreseeable and/or distant future need anything at all, be it food-related or not food-related;
(f) needs dessert; or
(g) needs more dessert.
Of course, since we have so many people eating, by the time the first people to get their food are finished, there are plates to be cleaned and put away in the dishwasher, and she's sure not going to let anyone else do that! This year, she maintained this regimen, even though she was--I kid you not--visibly wincing from the pain caused by the bone spurs in her feet. That caused her to sit down a bit earlier than usual, but she wasn't down long.

-There is always some kind of game in the evening. For the past decade or so, it's been either dominos, or Power Uno. The latter amounts to regular Uno with a couple enhancements that make it approximately fifty billion times more fun. After a couple rounds of Power Uno, we move on to Silent Power Uno, which is even better, because the need to settle disputes must also be done silently, which means that everyone is left only with fingersnaps and histrionic facial gestures. When Granny plays, it results in utter chaos, because not only does she (seemingly) not understand half the rules, she also cheats like there's no tomorrow. This sends my uncle into a fit of rage.

Way Down South

2007-12-22T07:58:00.000-08:00

Watoosa and I are in Pensacola, Florida, the first of four cities in three states that we'll be visiting during our Christmas travels. It feels very different from Portland, especially because of the accents (Southern) and the weather (balmy). The trip out here was uneventful enough, which is good. The worst part about it was the fact that I had probably the worst cup of coffee in my life at the Coffee Beanery, a franchise with a name so stupid it should be shut down for that reason alone.

The only other source of stress was on the flight from Atlanta. Toward the end of the boarding phase, an enormous man collapsed into the seat directly in front of me. With my long legs, I already feel a bit cramped in economy class. This man's weight pushed the back of his seat into full "recline" mode, even without pressing the button. Then, during take-off, the G forces pushed the seat back more and more into my lap. It was like a pair of giant jaws were closing around my legs. I began wondering how much weight those seats are rated to support, and whether they took G forces into account in their calculations. Fortunately, the seat held up through the flight, and I avoided an almost certain crippling.

Tomorrow, we head up to Birmingham to visit Jackamo and her brood, and then we'll meet up with my family for a couple nights in Huntsville. On Christmas Day, we'll drive up to my grandparents' farm in Tennessee.

We feel very fortunate that we both get along so well with our in-laws, and yes, I would still say as much even if Watoosa's parents weren't frequent readers of this blog. One highlight of our visit thus far was learning a bit more about Watoosa's ancestors. As it turns out, several on her mother's side met a rather violent end! When we asked what happened, she (Watoosa's mom) just said, "Well...he, er...he just wasn't a very nice person." If that's the kind of thing that gets you shot, then I'm in big trouble.

It's been nice this year not having to worry about the impending ordeal of the APA. To those of you who are not so lucky, my prayers are with you.

Oh, the Humanity

2007-12-17T07:55:00.000-08:00

I've now submitted my grades for the semester. My Modern Philosophy class did well enough, especially since that course covers challenging material, and it was the first philosophy class for some of those students.

As for my two sections of Intro...well, that's a different story. They bombed--bombed--the final exam. There was one 90, one 81, and everything else was pretty far below those scores. What really hurt them was the first section. Worth 40 points, it consisted of 22 questions that could be answered in a few words or a sentence or two, and which covered material that was central to the course. Most students didn't even clear the 20 point threshold, even with the two extra credit questions. Several got single-digit scores.

It's as if my students hired random people off the street to take the exam for them, and underpaid them. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of people who correctly answered the question, "What is epistemology?" even though I not only clearly defined the term, but used it throughout the semester in such a way that makes it pretty obvious what it means (theory of knowledge, for those of you who don't already know).

Grades for the course were somewhat better. I ended up scaling the final, and generously rounded a few times, but there were still far more C and D grades than everything else combined.

I had begun to suspect early on that my students here were generally weaker than those I had in years past. That suspicion just got confirmed big time. Sheesh. Maybe next semester's batch will be better.

Another Perspective on Philosophy

2007-12-15T06:27:00.000-08:00

Not quite as hilarious as the letter I reproduced earlier, but still amusing:

"Philosophy is said to console a man under disappointment, although Shakespeare asserts that it is no remedy for toothache; so Mr Easy turned philosopher, the very best profession a man can take up, when he is fit for nothing else; he must be a very incapable person indeed who cannot talk nonsense."

That's from the first paragraph of Frederick Marryat's Mr. Midshipman Easy, which was included in 101 Crackerjack Sea Books. Watoosa has given it to me for Christmas (yes, we've now exchanged gifts).

The paragraph continues:

"For some time, Mr Easy could not decide upon what description his nonsense should consist of; at last he fixed upon the rights of man, equality, and all that; how every person was born to inherit his share of the earth, a right at present only admitted to a certain length; that is, about six feet, for we all inherit our graves and are allowed to take possession without dispute. But no one would listen to Mr Easy's philosophy. The women would not acknowledge the rights of men, whom they declared always to be in the wrong; and, as the gentlemen who visited Mr Easy were all men of property, they could not perceive the advantages of sharing with those who had none. However, they allowed him to discuss the question, while they discussed his port wine. The wine was good, if the arguments were not, and we must take things as we find them in this world."

I love it! I'm struck by how Wodehousian it feels, which is an accomplishment in itself, especially since the book was published in 1836. And doesn't he also come off as ahead-of-his-time in his toying with the ambiguity of the word "man?"

I've only read the first page, but I suspect this will be a fantastic read.

What It's Like at the APA

2007-12-09T17:14:00.001-08:00

This week, the latest issue of Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical Association arrived in my office mailbox. The current issue includes a reprint of a 9-year old boy's report about attending the annual Eastern APA meeting. Here's what he wrote:

"2 days after Christmas I went to a philosophy confrence [sic]. It was horrible. There were 200 philosophers. They all did weird things. They couldn't make jokes, many had beards.

In the elevator it was worse. Once a philosopher got off on the wrong floor, so said, "wait for me." "We'll take you to the 27th," said another. Nobody laughed. "Get it there are only 10 floors," said some random old guy in a country accent. You get the point it was creepy.

A few days later there was a fire. Only one person was hurt, but everyone did weird things. Like people were standing in the roads, so nonphilosophers had to lead them out. Some people went back into the hotel. Firefighters had to lead them away. Still one guy stayed and had his bags blocking the door. Firefighters told him to move his bags, so he did, but when they left he put them back. I'll never go to a philosophy confrence [sic] again."

I got a good laugh out this, until I realized that a 9-year old has more publications in the Proceedings than I do.

Your Itenerary is Now Set

2007-12-09T05:22:00.001-08:00

The New York Times offers a list of 53 Places to Go in 2008 (free reg). I've been to five of them, if you count driving through Las Vegas. I have no idea why they would include Detroit on that list--yes, Detroit! Other than that, these all look appealing to me. Each entry has a picture; it's worth a look.

One critical oversight: Portland, Maine.

Pithiest Movie Review Ever

2007-12-08T07:32:00.000-08:00

It's for The Golden Compass.

Find it here.

Weekend at Ickie's

2007-12-02T04:41:00.000-08:00

It's been a nice, relaxing weekend here for Watoosa and me. On Friday night, we were in the mood for a movie. We thought about going to see No Country for Old Men, which is supposed to be excellent. Although I will definitely see it in the theater at some point, neither of us were in the mood for an unflinching look at human depravity. So we opted for the other end of the spectrum and saw Enchanted. It was surprisingly good. Amy Adams gives one of the most enjoyable performances I can remember; as she sends up the "Disney Princess" character, she perfectly embodies all that is pure and wholesome and innocent in the world. We loved her performance in Junebug, and while this isn't as serious a role, obviously, it was such a pleasure to watch her thoroughly inhabit her character. It was also a treat to be in the theater with so many children who completely ate this film up. There was one little girl in front of us for whom the whole Disney romantic mythos was still fresh; at one point, I heard her worriedly exclaim, "But, she's not supposed to be with him!" It reminded me of just how absorbing and exciting it was to go to the movies was when I was a kid.

Last night, we attended the Portland Choral Art Society's annual Christmas concert, at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, which was wonderful. I've written before about how much I love Christmas music, and this was the perfect way to kick off the holiday season. Apart from some usual Christmas fare (selections from Messiah, "In dulci jubilo," "God Rest You Merry Gentlemen," and the like), there were some non-standard selections as well. Two were from Rachmaninov's sublime All Night Vigil, which the Society will be performing in its entirety later in the season. This was a treat because acoustically the basses were especially prominent, and the low-register parts are so important to Russian choral music, and that piece in particular.

There was also a contemporary piece by a local composer. It's a setting of a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Portland's most famous literary figure. I was wary of it when I saw it on the program, but Watoosa and I ended up loving it. In honor of the coming winter storm (which starts tonight), here is the text.

"Snow-Flakes," by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Out of the bosom of the Air,
Out of the cloud-folds of her garments shaken,
Over the woodlands brown and bare,
Over the harvest-fields forsaken,
Silent, and soft, and slow
Descends the snow.
Even as the cloudy fancies take
Suddenly shape in some divine expression,
Even as the troubled heart doth make
In the white countenance confession,
The troubled sky reveals
The grief it feels.
This is the poem of the air,
Slowly in silent syllables recorded;
This is the secret of despair,
Long in its cloudy bosom hoarded,
Now whispered and revealed
To wood and field.

Pigeonholed, Part Two

2007-12-01T05:37:00.000-08:00

In a class discussion of John Stuart Mill's Utilitarianism...

Me: So Mill identifies pleasure with the good, but do you think there are any pleasures that are just intrinsically bad?

Student: Well, what about, like...dogfighting, y'know? That's. like, real popular down South, isn't it?

Me: (silent disbelief)

Me: Uh...no, not really.

What's with these Yankees?

Out of the Mouths of Babes

2007-11-20T08:08:00.000-08:00

From the student paper I just read:

"For centuries, philosophers have been perceived as arrogant men that question everything. And in fact they are."

It's funny 'cuz it's true! I guess I shouldn't laugh too much, though:

"There are many things in science that do not have any explanation or answer. A philosopher would always be thinking about these things and could very well end up senile at a younger age."

We've been warned, Kevin and Tim.

C'mon Get Happy

2007-11-19T17:29:00.000-08:00

Recently, a friend who was in serious need of cheering up sent out a request for happy thoughts. The best I could muster apparently garnered a mere smile--alas!. But I started thinking about the way I try to manipulate my own mood when the need arises.

Of course, there's always food--I'm a sweets man, myself. But I also turn to music. There are just some songs that reliably bring out a grin or a chuckle. So here's a virtual mix tape for those of you who need to kick the blues.

1. "Indiana," by Joe Venuti and Zoot Sims. I love the opening riff on this track so much that sometimes I'll restart it several times after just a few seconds when I need a pick-me-up. The song is so lighthearted and joyful that it even makes up for the boring wasteland that is its namesake (sorry, Tim, but you know it's true). There are other good versions out there, but "Four-string" Joe's is my absolute favorite, and one of my all-time favorite songs by any artist in any genre.

2. "Symphony No. 3 in C (first movement)," by Luigi Boccherini. It starts out light and dainty, but after a few seconds Boccherini sneaks up on you with a theme that is so unrestrainedly exuberant that you start to worry that you won't be able to stand it. Then he brings it back down, toying around with a minor key, but he keeps coming back to that wonderful theme.

3. "Summertime," by the Sundays. Yeah, it's girl-rock. But I defy any man to withstand the charms of Hariett Wheeler's pixie-like voice. Can't be done, so don't even try. The first time I heard this one on the radio, I thought it was decent, until the final chorus. That was when the chintzy synth-horns kicked in, and I was hooked.

4. "Shulie A Bop," by Sarah Vaughan. My favorite female vocalist, and this track shows that she could scat with the best of them. She throws in a line from "I Ain't Mad at You, Pretty Baby" for good measure.

5. "I Wanted to Tell You," by Matthew Sweet. I don't know what happened to this guy, but in the 90s he sure could write a hooky rock song. While "Girlfriend" is more recognizable (and a fantastic tune, to be sure), I might like "I Wanted to Tell You" even more. The great thing about Sweet's work on this album (and especially this track) is the bright, cheery backing vocals that contrast the stripped-down "garage" sound of the instruments. I'm pretty sure the BGVs are just Sweet's own voice overdubbed a few times. It works.

6. "That's Right (You're Not from Texas)," by Lyle Lovett. This song actually makes me wish I was. And that's saying a lot.

7. "Baraat," by Mychael Danna. This song that plays during the opening credits in the film, Monsoon Wedding (it's a pretty good title sequence, by the way). The song is performed by an Indian marching band, so it sounds a little like halftime entertainment in Mumbai.

8. "3:00 A. M. Blues," by Dick Hyman Group featuring Howard Alden. Another soundtrack number, this time from the Woody Allen movie, Sweet and Lowdown. As soon as I finished watching this movie, I told Watoosa I wanted the soundtrack for Christmas. It's got lots of good stuff on it, but this New Orleans-style jazz number is the tops. Toward the end, when the trumpet comes back in, I come undone.

Finally...

9. Pretty much anything by AC/DC. It's just so bombastic, I can't help but laugh. Which isn't to say I don't enjoy it. One night while riding in the car with a friend, one of their songs came on the radio, and we both just started snickering. I described their music as "big, dumb, and stupid," and I'm convinced that the redundancy is justified. Exhibit A: "For Those About to Rock," complete with actual cannon fire. It goes to eleven, if you know what I mean.

One other reason their music makes me laugh is that it reminds me of a funny story. The whole extended family had gathered at my grandparents' house for Christmas. As we were opening presents, my grandfather turned on the radio, thinking we'd all enjoy some Christmas music. But he didn't pay too close attention to what was actually being broadcast. It took us all a few minutes to realize it was "You Shook Me All Night Long." Watoosa was the first to realize the error, thanks to the line "... knockin' me out with those American thighs." Merry Christmas, indeed.

Pigeonholed

2007-11-18T07:06:00.000-08:00

This past week I saw one of my students in the caf. Here's a transcription of our brief conversation:

She: Hey, Dr. Ickenham!* Are you here for the ______ meeting?

Me: What's that?

She: He's the Democratic candidate for _______.

Me: Oh yeah, I heard he was coming to campus. Actually, I'm just here for a department meeting. Besides, I'm not a Democrat.

She: Really? That surprises me.

Me: It does? Why?

She: Oh wait--that's right. You're from the South.

*Redacted

Happy Birthday to the Monocle

2007-11-18T07:04:00.000-08:00

I hadn't realized that my last post was on the first anniversary of the founding of this blog. To those of you who regularly read it, thanks for checking in. Extra-special thanks to commenters.

Avast, Ye Dogs!

2007-11-11T12:17:00.000-08:00

Watoosa and I have both recently developed a taste for stories set in the Age of Fighting Sail. Our appetite was whetted by the film adaptation of the novels of Patrick O'Brian, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, and the excellent A&E adaptations of C. S. Forester's Horatio Hornblower series. Watoosa read the first Hornblower novel, Beat to Quarters, insisted that I read it immediately, and then we were hooked.

I began listening to audiobook versions of the O'Brian novels this summer on my commute to school. I had read the second one, Post Captain, several years ago, but I have decided that it's not good to start with it. I was surprised that so much of the story took place on land as the characters developed romantic attachments. It felt like a Jane Austen novel, which (according my then-benighted view of that author and genre) was a strike against it. I later discovered that such was O'Brian's explicit intent, as he wanted to pay homage to Austen.

It's made a big difference to start with the first novel, Master and Commander (the film is actually a composite of several of the novels). It starts out a bit slow, and I think it's harder to appreciate O'Brian's writing in audio form, but I was soon engrossed by it. I liked Post Captain much better this time, too. Last week, I finished the third book, H. M. S. Surprise, and it's my favorite so far.

The fans of these books argue over which series is greater, but I like them both, although for different reasons. Forester's books are more streamlined and focused on the action (although not at the expense of character development). As a result, they're a bit more exciting and harder to pull yourself away from. O'Brian also knows a thing or two about describing vividly the terror and exhilaration of battle. But he's more inclined to take his time getting the narrative under way, more interested in exploring the world of his characters.

Both use liberal amounts of seafaring jargon. It can seem daunting to some readers, but even if you simply read past the lingo, you can follow what's important about any given scene (the effect is similar to the techno-babble in Star Trek). However, one nice thing about O'Brian's books is that the character Stephen Maturin is a complete landlubber; the Navy and its language and traditions are completely foreign to him. That gives O'Brian a chance to explain the details of life in the Royal Navy via the words of his characters, as they point things out to Stephen. It also lets him inject comical moments into the narrative as Maturin commits faux-pas and makes wry observations on the absurdities of the world he's entered.

I can't recommend these books enough. Get them, read them, love them. And if they (ahem) float your boat, you'll want to check out this list I recently found: 101 Crackerjack Sea Books.
They treat series of books as a single entry, so the Aubrey/Maturin series is #4, and Hornblower is #9. I've read a handful of others on the list, and pretty much enjoyed them all (although I had to give up on Robinson Crusoe).

One of most enjoyable reads I've had in years is #77: George MacDonald Fraser's The Pyrates. It's full of swordplay, daring escapes, and battle, but it's also hilarious. Watoosa and I both snickered and guffawed while reading it. If you like pirates, British humor, historical fiction, or just a good ripping yarn, you won't be disappointed.

And ye may lay to that.

Film Fright

2007-10-29T18:26:00.000-07:00

Watoosa has just posted a write-up about scary scenes from books, and she has twisted my arm to do the same for films. I'm pretty malleable, so here goes.

In its early scenes, F. W. Murnau's silent film, Nosferatu, suffers from having been made in the days of slow film speed. The movements of the characters and vehicles look very choppy and (as a result) comical. The effect enhances comedies, and when I first watched this film I began to think that it would undercut the horror. But when Max Schreck makes his appearance as Count Orlok the vampire, the laughter stops. He's truly disturbing. From that point on, the technological limitations of cinema actually make Nosferatu even more unnatural and frightening.

The rumor/urban legend about Nosferatu is that Schreck really was a vampire. This legend is sent up by Shadow of the Vampire, which I think is one of the great combinations of horror and comedy. John Malkovich plays Murnau as an artist obsessed with his craft who passes off the obviously vampiric Schreck as simply a "character actor." Willem Defoe is wonderfully over-the-top as Schreck.

Another great horror/comedy combo is Simon Pegg's Shaun of the Dead. It's a brilliant and hilarious send-up of the zombie genre, but it's as much a celebration of those films as a spoof (the same is true of Pegg's even more hilarious Hot Fuzz). The scene in which Pegg and his best mate are throwing vinyl records at a zombie and then begin arguing over which ones are worth throwing and which worth keeping is a scream.

I know M. Night Shyamalan has turned out to be little more than a two-bit hack, but darned if I didn't have a fantastic time watching Signs. I had enjoyed The Sixth Sense well enough on video, and Unbreakable was interesting, if a bit slow, but I was a bit apprehensive about Signs because I didn't think M. Night would be able to show the aliens without being campy. Still, the previews lured us in, and it was one of the best "rollercoaster" experiences I've ever had in a movie theater. Everyone was shrieking and laughing and jumping out of their seats. The scene where Gibson is debating with himself about whether or not to look in the pantry where an alien has been trapped is masterfully done. The ending is hokey, but the ride is such a thrill that I don't care.

One of the best movies I've seen in the past year--period--is Pan's Labirynth. It's an odd mix of a gritty look at the brutality of life in Spain under Franco combined with an Alice-in-Wonderland fantasy (where said wonderland is a bizarre and sometimes terrifying nightmare world). After several months, I'm still trying to make sense of it, but the imagery is amazing. And if you can watch the scene that features this thing without soiling yourself in terror, you should count yourself lucky.

Finally, I think perhaps the scariest movie I've ever seen is the original Night of the Living Dead. This film isn't exactly "scary" as much as it is extremely creepy, so much so that I woke up in the middle of the night after having just seen it and experienced a residual sense of dread (and I never have nightmares from movies). There's just something disturbing about zombies--almost human, but not quite, and chilling in their utter relentlessness. This movie's low budget somehow gives the whole thing a greater sense of realism. It's easier to forget you're watching a movie. None of the actors are recognizable, and the music is just plain eerie (lots of bizarre pedal tones on an organ, as I recall). One great thing about it is that one of the protagonists is actually smart. He assumes leadership, keeps his cool, and makes wise decisions while everyone else goes straight into "disaster-flick irrationality mode."

Worlds Collide

2007-10-28T15:15:00.000-07:00

This week I traveled to Waco, Texas to attend a conference at Baylor. I hadn't seen the campus since 2002, and approximately 50% of it has completely changed. It was almost eerie.

The conference was devoted to friendship, which was appropriate since much of my motivation for going was to visit some good friends that I hadn't seen in quite a while. Down in Waco, I stayed with Jones, who was my roommate for both years I was in school down there, and had dinner with Schobert, who was one of the friends I made from the seminary there. The conference attendees included lots of Baylor people, naturally, but also a lot of people from SLU.

On Friday, I drove up to Dallas to see my sister, Karen, and my brother-in-law, Sean. Sean went with me to dinner that night with a handful of my friends who live in the DFW area. There were six of them (not including yours truly), representing four different social circles (and one spouse whom I was meeting for the first time). Normally, I find myself a bit ill-at-ease when my worlds collide like that, and this was the biggest world collision I'd experienced since my wedding. But we all had a great time.

The whole experience wiped me out--I was ready to drop by the time I got back to Portland last night--but it reminded me how blessed I am to count these people (and others) among my friends. I certainly don't deserve them, and I've failed my friends more than I like to admit, but I do treasure each one. On this topic, Aristotle was absolutely right: friendship is an essential part of a choiceworthy, flourishing life.

Only in Japan

2007-10-20T06:49:00.000-07:00

While living in California, it struck me how different regions produce their own particular kind of quirkiness and outright craziness. There's just something different about the crazy you find in California compared to what you get, say, down South. The former has a hippie quality that distinguishes it from the Southern Gothic kind you get in the Bible Belt.

Of course, things get even weirder once you go overseas. When in Indonesia, I witnessed the most bizarre parade in a Jakarta theme park. At one point, there were trumpet playing monkey/human hybrids sporting clown wigs and Elizabethan-era puffy trousers. It was like Mardi Gras on Planet of the Apes.

Then there's Japan. The Land of the Rising Sun has its special kind of weirdness, and the Japanese love to express it via technology and design. Hence, this slide show from today's New York Times. Alarmed by a rising crime rate (that is still enviably low by many standards), one clothing designer has created outfits that can be converted into "urban camouflage."

Got the feeling you're being trailed by some miscreant who is eying your handbag or wallet? Quick! Round a corner, jump into your vending machine disguise, and pray to Jebus that he doesn't feel like buying himself a cold beverage!

Before you rush out to buy your own, however, note the quotation on slide 6: "Ms. Tsukioka said her disguises were experimental and could even be a bit impractical at times, 'especially when your hands are shaking.'"

Watoosa pointed out that these disguises could just as easily be used by the criminal element itself. Naturally, someone will be tempted to get them outlawed for that very reason, but he should remember that when crazy urban camouflage outfits are outlawed, only outlaws will have crazy urban camouflage outfits!

The Best Thing I've Read Today

2007-10-15T11:52:00.000-07:00

How you--yes, you!--can win a Nobel Peace Prize. "The important thing to remember is that peace doesn't have much to do with it."

It's funny, because it's true.

Click here.

Faux Europe

2007-10-10T18:24:00.000-07:00

As Watoosa has reported, we spent last weekend in Quebec City. It was a fantastic trip. I'd been to Canada before, and loved it, but Quebec is something altogether different. It really feels like you've driven to Europe. The Old City has narrow streets that twist around and split off in every direction, it is still surrounded by an imposing wall, everything is in French (and French alone, unlike the rest of Canada), and there was even the occasional example of Quebec separatist graffiti. It was so easy to forget that we were just a couple hours' drive from the U. S. A.

The city itself is beautiful. It overlooks the St. Lawrence river from its position atop a large cliff. In the distance we could see rolling hills covered with colored autumn leaves. Many of the buildings are quite old, and their architecture embodies the influence of French culture.

We peeked into beautiful churches, toured the imposing Citadel and the magnificent Chateau Frontenac, walked along the old fortifications, and generally just wandered around soaking the whole place in. It was great. If you're looking for an imitation-brand version of France, without the hassle of intercontinental travel, Quebec should be at the top of your list.

In-class Embarassment, part II

2007-10-01T17:24:00.000-07:00

Last April I wrote about my worst nightmare coming true. I'm happy to report that I have doubled my vigilance on that front, and there have been no more incidents of that kind.

So the good news is that my worst nightmare has yet to come true again, but the bad news is that something even worse than that occurred today. In my Modern Philosophy class, we were discussing sense perception. I had decided to use the whiteboard to illustrate what's going on when we have a visual perception of an object.

Now, my drawing skills are what prompted the coining of the term "ham-fisted." It's not unusual to hear snickering from my students as they watch me scribbling stick figure persons in front of them, and today was no exception. Then, one of my students mentioned that there are scientific devices that allow us to monitor brain activity associated with perception. So I decided to draw such a device pointed at the stick person.

No sooner had I finished this masterpiece than I realized the device looked remarkably like a giant man's naughty part. The snickering was replaced by what I took to be shocked silence and looks of disbelief.

"Uh..." I said.

"This looks a little...offensive. Let's erase it and just imagine a scientific device that can monitor brain activity, shall we?"

There were no objections.

America...FRACK YEAH!

2007-09-24T18:06:00.001-07:00

Watoosa and I got a double-barreled blast of America yesterday, as we ventured to the storied Cumberland County Fair. It's a real "County Fair" type county fair, which means its heavy on the 4-H displays, cooking and baking contests, and lots and lots of animals. We saw cows, pigs, chickens (several kinds of fowl, actually), oxen, sheep, goats, bunnies, and giant draft horses. There was also no shortage of deep fried cuisine, which we passed up, but we did get to try some authentic maple syrup that was so good I had to fight the urge to pour myself a glass and drink it down like lemonade.

One of the marquee events of the day was bull riding, which I'd never witnessed before. It took the America to a whole nuther level. For one thing, there were 16 cowboys, or so, and it don't get more America than cowboys. Of course, half of them were Mexican, but whatever. Then, a color guard of National Guardsmen brought in the Stars and Stripes, along with the rodeo flag and the flag for the State of Maine. At that point, the announcer exhorted us to "make some love to Old Glory." I would have thought that would actually be disrespectful, but what do I know?

There was also an opening prayer, which I suspect was pre-composed by the touring company's announcer (although I hope to Zod that the "make love to Old Glory" line was just his extemporaneous riffing on a theme). It was appropriately non-sectarian and not too theologically determinate, but the warm-up music pumped through the PA system had just finished up with a song that rivaled AC/DC in lyrical debauchery. The chorus was something like "where the girls are easy and the drugs are cheap." The perfect call to worship.

Here are a few pics:

For the Book Lover in You

2007-09-08T14:33:00.000-07:00

I just came across a site that has posted photographs of the most beautiful libraries in the world. Most are in Europe, but there are a few in the Americas, including an impressive one in Puebla, Mexico, and a gorgeous one in Brazil (the authors tout it as the most beautiful of them all, and I'm not going to disagree). Click, and marvel.

I want to visit each one. And right now. I've managed to hit a couple, such as the Copley library in Boston, but that's not nearly enough.

Many of them are a bit too ornate for me to get serious reading done. Still, I can only applaud the aesthetic celebration of books. At the same time, it makes me a little dissatisfied with the gray fortress that is the Portland Public Library's downtown branch, a building so bland and forgettable that Google refuses to honor my request for images of it.

My Take on St. Louis

2007-09-06T15:05:00.000-07:00

It was great being back in St. Louis last week, although I didn't have time to see nearly as much as I wanted. Here's what I remember most about the River City.

Favorite Park: There are many to choose from. Forest Park, which was the site of the 1904 World's Fair, is great, but my favorite is still Tower Grov e. Its most unique feature is a series of ornate pavilions, but it also features lawn tennis courts, a ruin fountain, a wading pool for children, and a Victorian greenhouse devoted to palm trees. It's beautiful and romantic, and it was just a few blocks away from our apartment. During the first winter after we got married, we spent a great afternoon walking through it after ten inches of snow had fallen.

Favorite Neighborhood: The Loop is the funkiest area, but I prefer the sophistication of the Central West End. It has lots of great places to eat, beautiful Victorian houses, and also my...

Favorite Bookstore: Left Bank Books. I still have a couple bookmarks from this store. It's not huge, but they have both new and used books, and their used fiction collection was quite good. Philosophy wasn't so great, but I can count on two fingers all the bookstores in the world that get that section right.

Favorite Season: Spring. It starts with daffodils and forsythia, continues with tulips, tulip trees, and Bradford pears, and culminates with crabapple and cherry tree blossoms. After the dismal month of February, it's especially glorious. Every spring we would wait for the peak of the color and stroll through the Missouri Botanical Garden. Runner up: Fall.

Least Favorite Season: Summer. It's super-hot, and super-humid. Oh, and one year our air-conditioning wasn't working.

Favorite Pizza: You wouldn't guess from looking at it, but the inconspicuous corner bar called the Blackthorne Pub makes some incredible pizza. The thick crust version weighs half a ton, and the sauce is spicy. Runner up: Fortel's.

Favorite Frozen Dessert: It's Serendipity, as I mentioned in my last post. But you've got to at least try the legendary Ted Drewes' Frozen Custard.

Favorite Ethnic Food: Pho Grand. It was my first foray into Vietnamese food, and it's still my favorite. Maybe it's the slight French influence. They moved into a swankier spot on South Grand and still kept their prices dirt cheap. I loved them for that. There were four or five other Vietnamese places on that stretch of Grand, but Pho is my phavorite.

Favorite Place that is No More: The Chocolate Bar. Alas. They served the best hot chocolate ever.

Favorite Place that I Would Never Step Into for all the Money in the World and Absolute Power over Space and Time Combined: Some place on South Grand called "The Buttery Restaurant." It looks like they took a Waffle House back in the seventies, soaked it in grease, and set it out in the sun to rot.

Least Favorite St. Louis-style food: I griped earlier about St. Louis style barbecue, and I stand by that gripe. But by far, the hands-down worst St. Louis food is what goes by the name "St. Louis-style pizza." Imagine a cracker lightly coated with ketchup and then covered in molten vinyl, and you'd be pretty close. People who grew up in St. Louis love it. The rest of us cower in fear.

Favorite Awesome Place that is Full of Astounding Awesomeness: The City Museum. They bought an old factory, and then turned a bunch of artists loose in it and let them go wild. Click here to see pictures of just part of the fun that is to be had, and know that they don't even begin to capture how cool it is. That airplane is about four stories off the ground, by the way. If I were ten years old, they'd have to drag me away from the place, and I'd be kicking and screaming.

Favorite Theater Troupe: Magic Smoking Monkey Theatre. They do stage productions of bad movies (and sometimes good ones) and TV shows, and they feature the cheapest production values possible. When Watoosa and I saw their 1-hour Star Wars trilogy, I ached from laughing so hard. Without a doubt, it remains the funniest thing I've ever seen, and I pity everyone who missed it. Here is a list of their past productions.

Favorite Free Entertainment: It's a toss-up between the Zoo and the Art Museum (both in Forest Park). I'll pick the Art Museum since it's air-conditioned.

Favorite Famous Person from St. Louis: There's a surprising number. T. S. Eliot, Redd Foxx, Ike and Tina Turner, and Chuck Berry, just for starters. But I'm going with Miles Davis.

The city is not without its problems, and no one's going to mistake it for New York or Seattle or San Francisco. But I still think it's a pretty great place to live.

Me Defend Dissertation Real Good

2007-08-31T05:21:00.000-07:00

Well, it's now official. I defended the dissertation on Tuesday back in St. Louis, so now I don't have to correct my students when they call me "Doctor." It feels good to be done, especially since I know that a certain elderly family member will finally stop hounding me about it! The defense went well, and I got good feedback from my committee members.

I ended up dedicating it to Watoosa, which is the least I could do, since she's been so patient and supportive. Honestly, I don't know how I would have made it without her.

It was great being back in St. Louis. Most of my friends have moved on, but I did get to have a celebratory dinner with some who are still there. Two of them were the first friends I made after starting grad school, so it was a fitting way to finish things off.

On the previous evening (the day I arrived in town), I treated myself to a quick meal at our favorite TexMex place, Nachomama. Then I headed over to Serendipity. We discovered this place shortly before we moved away, and I was kicking myself for not trying it sooner, because their ice cream is just amazing. In fact, after this trip, I think I have to say that it's the best ice cream I've ever had. On this visit, I had two flavors. One was gooey butter cake. GBC is a dessert the locals make, and it's delish--sort of like pound cake, except gooier and butterier. I'd never had it in ice cream, but it was great. The second scoop was chocolate peanut butter, which is definitely the best example of that flavor I've ever had the pleasure of tasting. The chocolate was wonderfully rich, and as you bite into it you are thrilled to discover generously-sized dollops of peanut butter, and the peanut butter is still creamy (I don't know how they manage that). It was divine. I seriously thought about going back the next day, but I just couldn't swing it. But anyone reading this who lives in or near St. Louis should make sure to try it.