Early morning observation

It hasn't been that long since I was last up at sunrise, but I'd forgotten how fast it happens. It was pitch black outside, and then voila! twenty minutes later, gray daylight.

(No, I didn't mean to be up this early. It just happened. Yes, I am at least getting some good work out of it.)

sigh

I am so ready for this week to be over.

Sadly, it's only Sunday night.

Skunked

There's a guy a couple of tables over who clearly thinks he's quite smart. I suspect he also thinks he has a reasonable grasp on how to get along in polite society.

He is wrong.

In addition to conducting a conversation with two preschoolers in outdoor voices (as they were running circles around the middle of Panera, which admittedly is more their parents' fault), he has just made the following statement:

"You know that street where people hung out in the sixties? They're still there, and it's twenty years later!"

Excuse me, sir? The sixties were "twenty years ago" when I was in preschool. You're looking at 35-40 years ago now. I'm sorry, but your brain is skunked.

Just another headline...

Read this headline:

US singer Sheryl Crow has had cancer for breast surgery, and doctors say her prognosis is "excellent".

If you think it looks like just another headline, read it again.

The story itself is of course not at all funny, but the headline amuses me.

I knew I liked the English

Apparently, in England, a person can face charges for failing to respect others. That's awesome.

Meet Herb

For no particular reason, I'm feeling petulant about repeating the phrase "the author of Hebrews" or even "the author." I've decided to give said author a name and gender. Meet Herb.

This is what happens when my little brother and I chat aimlessly about things as diverse as musicals we did in high school, Anglican/Episcopal polity and US law, and finance tests. I think of silly things, like naming the author of Hebrews after a character my brother played in Godspell that happens to share letters with the name of the book.

Reading Week Task List

~Research Hebrews paper - in progress
~Draft Hebrews paper - in progress
~Research pacifism paper - in progress
~Draft pacifism paper - in progress
~Write sermon
~Write to Aunt Sally
~Call about bridesmaid dresses
~Call Kristian
~Work-study stuff
~Find lector for tomorrow
~Look at music for Thursday
~Look at materials for faculty conference
~Read for Greek class Monday
~Learn vocab for Greek Monday - in progress
~Translate for Greek class Monday
~Translate for Greek group Monday

Why do you torment me so, creature?

Something is chirping. Or squeaking. It's doing so at a more or less regular pace. It does not appear to be coming from the windows - in fact, it's loudest when I stand right in the middle of my living quarters, away from all doors and windows. I'd say it was a bird, except what would a bird be doing in my walls? I'd say it was a mouse, except it's awfully regular for a mouse. (Plus, I'd really like for it not to be a mouse.) Whatever it is, it's driving me batty. (ok, no pun intended there - I really hope it's not a bat.) Animals and their sounds do not belong in any part of my indoor living quarters.

mensch

How come it's only Reading Week and not spring break yet?

Weird Mail Day

Today, the following came in the mail:

~A package from Amazon, containing two books I had ordered and a sample of men's deodorant I had not. (If anyone wants it, let me know.)

~A king cake, which turned out to be from my aunt. She's never sent me a king cake before, so I certainly wasn't expecting it. She also doesn't send notes with things, though, so I don't know why she sent it, either. I guess I'll take it to class tomorrow, since there's no way I'll eat a king cake myself.

~A card from Rhonda, with an article about a random heart-stopping condition.

~A valentine from Julia. (ok, that one's not weird at all.)

Cue the music

You Are Figure Skating

Graceful and expressive - yet athletic and focused. You could bring the best of both worlds to this glamorous sport.

What Winter Sport Are You?

This is grad school, right?

I just finished my homework for a particular class. It taught me the following things:

~Sometimes verbs change forms when they change tense. For instance, they may add an "s" or an "ed": play, plays, played.

~Sentences should have a subject and a verb. Plural subjects should take plural verbs; singular subjects should take singular verbs.

~Separate sentences should have a period between them.

~It's a good idea to look for misspellings before you turn in a paper.


My transcript and tuition seem to indicate that I'm enrolled in a master's program. My homework seems to indicate otherwise. Now, I'm all for asking grad students to pay attention to the finer points of editing - the use of semicolons and commas, transitions between paragraphs, etc. In fact, I'm all for asking grad students to pay attention to basic editing skills. But are we really so far gone that you have to tell me that verbs have plural and singular forms?*

*Yeah, ok, I've read enough papers from students (none of you, of course) at reputable institutions of higher learning to know that, apparently, we do have to tell people these things. It still makes me grouchy to have to "learn" things in grad school that my daddy taught me when I was seven.

Yeah, I'm still here.

I just don't seem to have anything worth saying.

Me, a socialist?

Tripp posted this a few days ago and Frank asked about it today. I am a socialist, or, if you prefer, apparently halfway down Hillary Rodham Clinton's left torso. Gee, who'da thunk it?

You are a Social Liberal (80% permissive) and an... Economic Liberal (16% permissive) You are best described as a: Socialist Link: The Politics Test on Ok Cupid Also: The OkCupid Dating Persona Test

Good to know

In high school, I had mad skills at getting up and out the door quickly. I wasn't sure I still possessed such skills, but this morning, I learned that I do. I woke up to five bells ringing, leaped out of bed and got dressed, and walked into chapel as the cantors were singing the first antiphon of the Venite. (For those who aren't from Seabury, that's about six minutes.) As far as I know, my general appearance did not betray me. I'm kind of impressed with myself. Still, I think tomorrow I'll set the alarm.

Here's the thing

What have I read?
These are the 25 most popular classic books at What Should I Read Next?

I liked it!

I didn't like it!

I want to read it!

Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen

Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte

Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte

Great Expectations - Charles Dickens

Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Little Women - Louisa May Alcott

Emma - Jane Austen

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain

A Tale of Two Cities - Charles Dickens

Persuasion - Jane Austen

Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen

Dracula - Bram Stoker

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer - Mark Twain

Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy

Frankenstein - Mary Shelley

Romeo and Juliet - William Shakespeare

Hamlet - William Shakespeare

The Canterbury Tales - Geoffrey Chaucer

Northanger Abbey - Jane Austen

The Scarlet Letter - Nathaniel Hawthorne

The Jungle - Upton Sinclair

Candide - Voltaire, Norman Cameron

Complete Tales and Poems - Edgar Allan Poe

King Lear - William Shakespeare

Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson

Take the 'What have I read?' test now!
Eight different categories to try!


Here's the thing: what makes them think that these are the only three options? In fact, I have no desire ever to read either Tess of the D'Urbervilles or Dracula - yet, since I've never read them, there was no honest option for me to choose. Hrmph.

Just wondering

Does this seem like a reasonable thing to meat-eaters? Because it sounds absolutely disgusting to me.

Eighth sign of the apocalypse

My CPE final evaluation came in the mail today, signed and everything.

Still Elvish.

To me, one sign of a good quiz is that I get the same results a few months apart, after time to forget the quiz. Mark's Middle Earth quiz fits that - I'm just as Elvish now as I was in November.

Logical progression

I want to win my next disputatio.*

In order to win my next disputatio, I must convince the judges that Christians are not morally obligated to pay or advocate for a just wage.

In order to argue that the just wage is unnecessary, I must learn to think like someone who believes the just wage is unnecessary.

Someone who believes the just wage is unnecessary is likely to be a political conservative.

The best way for me to learn to think like a political conservative is to watch smart political debate.

The best way for me to watch smart political debate is to watch West Wing.


So, I'm working on my disputatio.


*Ok, the competitive part of me wants to win the disputatio. The rest of me actually kind of wants to lose the disputatio, because I really pretty strongly disagree with my assigned position. I do, however, care about looking good in class and thinking soundly, so for now, it's time to think like a conservative libertarian.

Game over.

Pittsburgh won. I am a good Clevelander, and so this makes me sad. (My little brother, on the other hand, is a traitor. A lovable traitor, but a traitor all the same.)

Also, there will be no more football until fall. This also makes me sad. (Yeah, I know there's a ProBowl. I don't think that counts.)

On the bright side, though, pitchers and catchers report in 10 days. Hurray for baseball season!

I give up.

The bookstore at McCormick doesn't have it yet. The bookstore here doesn't carry it. Amazon takes 2-4 weeks just to ship it. United Library says it was returned Thursday, but it's not at either Garrett or Seabury, in any of the several reshelving locations. I stop short of trundling from NU library to NU library tracking it down.

I think this qualifies as a good faith effort. I will complete the other two assigned readings and do my translation, and I will go to class Monday early enough to buy it from the bookstore then (assuming it's in by then) and skim the reading before class starts. That's just going to have to be enough.

(Unless, of course, one of you happens by sheerest chance to own a copy of the Abingdon commentary on Galatians by Sam K. Williams, and wants to make it appear in front of me before Monday.)

I'm so cool.

It's noon on a Saturday, and I've already accomplished the following:

~Getting up
~Eating
~Getting my hair cut
~Half my big ol' pile of laundry
~Changing the sheets
~Registering for a training
~Calling my LMT for an appointment in March

And now, I can add blogging to the list. Give me a couple of hours, and I'll have finished my laundry and been to the library, and be hard at work on something probably related to the New Testament.

Oh, yeah...

Amelie is my hero.

I'd forgotten how much I love that movie. I'm sort of amazed I don't own it. I saw it five or six times in German theaters in both Hamburg and Berlin - several of us were nearly obsessed with it when it came out - but I hadn't seen it on DVD until tonight. After a day of frustration and disappointment, a day when I thought only the end of the day could pull me out of my funk, Amelie has done it again. She just makes me feel good about life.

Link

For those classmates whose curiosity was piqued by the discussion of the Flying Spaghetti Monster in New Testament today.

(For those other readers who are alarmed by the presence of the Flying Spaghetti Monster in a New Testament class, don't worry, it was all very chaste and orthodox.)