Things About Which I Am Illiterate vol. 1: iTunes

Only recently did I even venture into the realm of the iPod. I've had one for a while, but since I tend to shy away from new things until the majority of the population has successfully integrated them into their lives, I have been ignoring it. Like when I was in middle school and everyone had CD players, but I still used tapes. Don't get me wrong, I had a CD player, but it was almost like I felt sorry for the three thousand cassette singles I had purchased at Camelot Music. What would happen to them?

Since giving birth four months ago, I have slowly started to get into working out again. Before I got pregnant with Griffin, I was running and loving it, so I am working toward that goal again. The iPod tends to be a bit easier to carry than a Discman (which I have), so I've decided it was time to get to know him. The problem is, that it seems to be so easy to use that I get confused. And iTunes, well now, wait, what do I do?

Since Rhett's music collection consists of a wide variety of what I can only label as loud guitarry music, I have been searching for something to run to. Long story long, my BFF Allison made me a super-awesome mix and I am very excited to utilize it but I spent OVER AN HOUR last night trying to figure out how to get the songs (which are now on my computer) onto my iPod. And by the time Rhett got home, I had given up and forgotten about the task altogether. What is wrong with me?!?! Why can't you just set the thing on top of the CD or point it at the screen and have them magically appear? Everthing else about the darn thing might as well be magic.

Poetry Analysis, the Spring, and My Over-Crowded Desk

Welcome to Spring-time at the relaxing retreat-away-from-home affectionately known as My Desk. Spring means Literary Analysis. Which means essays. And poetry analysis. And essays analyzing poetry.

The result, as you can see, is that my desk looks like this. Some people might think, "Wow! I could never leave my desk like that on a Friday. She'll be there all night getting through that pile. I'll bet it's all she can think of..."

But you know what? Not true. The sun is shining, the birds are singing, and I am looking forward to the weekend. In fact, I've thought of about 30 other things just in the last 5 minutes. And I'm 95% sure my desk will still look like this when I leave today.

Peace Montag.

Nothing says "summer's almost here" like a celebration of book-burning. After I get over the creepy photo of Ray Bradbury on the back cover of the book, I always enjoy a good romp through Fahrenheit 451. In 1953, Bradbury wrote about a future overrun by technology, where children no longer care about the validity of information, but consume what is set before them without question, quickly moving on to destroy things at the local theme parks.

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The story goes that the fireman's duty is to destroy knowlege and promote ignorance, all in an effort to equalize this futuristic society. The setting is full of over-stimulating images of fast cars, giant and ever-blaring television screens, and 200-fo0t long billboards. Reading has given way to faster means of consuming information; important and accurate information has given way to tidbits of purposeless banter. This cryptic novel is full of thought-provoking paradoxes such as "not empty" yet "empty indeed" and "dead" yet "alive" or "there" yet "not there". These paradoxes serve to further the certainty that, without substance, life would be uncertain indeed.

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This book becomes increasingly interesting to me as we plunge deeper and deeper into the Age of Technology. My mind was especially blown yesterday when 3 of my 90 honors students had heard of Maya Angelou, yet 90% of them picked right up on a reference I made to Nazi Zombies (apparently a level in Call of Duty 5).

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Missing my Lost rundowns? Don't worry, I'm getting to the finale.

But, I can make time! (an old draft, but finally finished)

RIP Daniel Faraday. Last night marked the end to my second favorite Lost character ever (Charlie being my 1st).

Danny Boy pleads with his mom to let him continue with the piano, but she insists that he must give it up "for the Greater Good" (read: Dumbledore and Grindewald, i.e. Deathly Hallows). Dan's reward for being diligent with his studies and becoming Oxford's youngest Doctoral candidate? More criticism from his mother. If it were me, at age 11 (? I'm terrible at guessing ages), I would have gladly given up the piano lessons. However, I was not a genius (contrary to popular belief) and I had a piano teacher who would kick my shin if I was off-tempo or missed a note. And his name was Ken. Enough said?

I just realized something: Penelope! Penelope is Odysseus' wife who waited 20 years for him to return home from Troy, and all the while he was drifting around at sea, encountering innumerable obstacles on a quest to return home to his wife. Sounds like...Desmond and Penelope? Why yes, it does.

Lost Without You

Since there is no Lost this week, I would like to recommend an alternate viewing option that will knock your socks off. And maybe even your pants. But not your underpants--it's not like that. Of course, you could use the time to read a book. But you probably won't, so how about this brilliant televised event of the past:

Slings and Arrows

Leave it to the Canadians to come up with something so good that goes so unnoticed. This is one of my favorite shows of all time. The show centers around Geoffrey, a once highly-acclaimed stage actor who seven years previously had a mental breakdown in the middle of a production of Hamlet, jumped into Ophelia's grave, and ran away. When the series begins, Geoffrey is directing at a hold-in-the-wall theater in Toronto and is constantly trying to avoid bill collectors, but is inspired by the art of it all. Then he gets a drunk-dial call from Oliver, his former partner at the New Burbage Festival, which is shrouded in mystery and followed by Oliver's untimely death by "Canada's Best Hams" truck. Geoffrey ends up taking over Oliver's job "temporarily" and there you have the series.

I could list ten reasons why this series is so brilliant, but I won't do that to you. I'll just say this: each of the three seasons follows the production of one of Shakespeare's major plays (Hamlet, Macbeth, King Lear), events in the show mirroring important themes and motifs from the plays. A fan of Shakespeare? You will love this. Not a fan? You will still find it hilarious.

***Side Note***I tried to show a portion of Season 2 (Macbeth) to my students last year while we read The Scottish Play and it was a disaster because I could not navigate around the flurry of f-bombs. Needless to say, we had to have a conversation about "mature television viewing."

Battle of the Books

Tuesday got the lucky priveldge of hosting the culminating event of a four-month reading fest that has taken place with our ninth grade students. All ninth-graders participated in Battle of the Books (albeit, some more enthusiastically than others) by choosing a team and reading or becoming knowledgeable about fourteen novels. The first day teams competed in classrooms to answer a variety of questions about these fourteen books. One team from each classroom (17 total) moved on to the Finals, which was nothing short of awesome. Here is a taste:

Quit looking at my answer (Pirates, arrg.)!

Stumped.

Wait for it...

Success is so sweet! And apparently bitter.

In addition to the good times had in the competition, we had a visit from Jim Lynch, the author of The Highest Tide, which was one of the students' book selections. He provided my students with the perfect combo of nerdy-cool writer guy and mysterious sea-life-lover. Plus he dropped a couple f-bombs, which didn't hurt his presentation one bit. The book is now flying off my shelf.

"That douche is my dad."

I knew it! During the first episode of the season, when we saw Pierre Chang and his little baby, I said, "Hey, I think that baby is Miles." Well, for once, my theory has panned out. In "Some Like it Hoth," we got to see the deeply conflicted child and adolescent Miles who turned out to be the deeply conflicted and moderately grumpy adult Miles. And now we get it.

Despite the seven thousand Star Wars references, this episode was totally enlightening. The premise seemed to revolve around the classic time-travel argument over whether the future can be altered by time travelers--something Hurley is convinced of as he hopes to write The Empire Strikes Back three years before its time. And we were treated to an endless stream of Hurleyisms that were laugh-out-loud funny. Like:

"How do you spell 'bounty hunter'?"

"Dude, that guy's a douche."

"Because, let's face it, Ewoks suck, dude."

"Polar bear poop, got it."

But Miles is not sure he buys into Hurley's theory. He has figured out who his daddy is, yet he is reluctant to approach him, choosing instead to "leave things alone." Oh Miles, who doesn't, on some level, want to talk to his once-thought-dead dad who apparently kicked his mom and he off the Island for a yet-unknown ( but we can assume it is that he found out about the Purge) idea? Doc Jensen seems to think that Miles will be the one to tip off his father about the coming Purge, and therefore set his own sucky life in motion. Not a bad idea, if you ask me.

My favorite part: seeing that guy chisel the fateful numbers (4 8 15 16 23 42) into the unassembled hatch. Hurley: "Dude, that's our hatch."