Saving this for the next time I teach Death of a Salesman, in which Willy misunderstands what makes a person “liked.” Summary: charismatic people don’t obsess over what they can’t control. Instead, they focus on what that they can do. Similar:Why I Left Academe to Become a Science Communicator: The pursuit of academic research was…
Much of what Krystal writes about the novel also applies to drama, but the difference is that theatre presupposes a community. The writing, editing, manufacture, sale, and criticism of books is, of course, a communal endeavor, but the novel as an artifact can be experienced in isolation. Fiction, speaking very generally, is about the individual…
Similar:Spring office cleaning thoughts: 1) I used to print a lot. 2) I have enough tote bags. I used to print a lot. I have e…AcademiaThe Course of True Fun Never Did Run Smooth: A Midsummer Night's Dwarf Fortress ReflectionI am in rehearsals to play Oberon in a c…CultureThose shoggoths hacked from lungs unspeakable1) Last…
Similar:Fall colors are past their peak but it's still a beautiful late October day.PersonalI'm marking them faster than they come in, which is a good thing. I won't be doi…PersonalHappy Easter 2020 CultureTake a moment to appreciate these good COVID-19 statisticsMay 1, my state had the third-highest pe…AwesomeCan't upload photos to Facebook from my MacBookI…
Similar:Laughter and Light Abound in Prime Stage’s “Twelfth Night” Kudos to Prime Stage for a Twelf…CultureRing Theory Helps Us Bring Comfort In … and “dump” our own stuff out.I spent some time listening to someone w…CultureTwitter has blocked President Trump’s account, citing policy violations.PersonalSignage failure at Seton Hill, c. 2008.PersonalGetting in the Christmas spirit.PersonalOut for an…
I was not a fan of this show, but I am a fan of this paragraph: I was a teacher in 2004. I coached our school’s chess club. I saw how my students were picked on, bullied. I tried my best to defend them, but I couldn’t be everywhere. My students were smart, huge nerds,…
“When it comes down to it, life is really all about finding a hashtag for yourself and sending hilarious emoji on Venmo,” Packard said, and then, after a moment of reflection, added: “Lena Dunham.” […] “You’ve gotta ask yourself: Would you downvote the Yik Yak of your own life?” Delaney mused. His mood quickly soured.…
Hardcore Twitterers have the savvy and patience to continuously tune the array of accounts they follow. They even train the nuances of their visual attention to notice only what they care about when scrolling rapidly. However, new users usually get lost in the rough before they have a chance to find any diamonds. The next…
Rake-thin and bearded, Dorsey radiates a sense of composed quietude. Walking and talking around Twitter’s offices, he has the air of a docent showing off a collection of Donald Judd sculptures. He wears a white T-shirt, black jeans, and laceless, orange high-tops that look like they’ve been painted from a bucket of melted creamsicles. “What’s…
We went through a Lloyd Alexander phase at my house a few years ago; I read through the whole Prydain series and a few of his stand-alone works. I did enjoy Disney’s The Black Cauldron, which is technically impressive, and ambitious in its storytelling, but made a muddle of two of the five Prydain books.…
Elsinore is a game where you play as Ophelia from Shakespeare’s Hamlet. She’s stuck in a time loop, a la Groundhog Day or Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask. Her goal? To prevent Hamlet, a Shakespearean tragedy so tragic that it borders on ludicrous, from ending tragically…. As Ophelia, you gather information and interact with people…
The words we use and the ways we refer to people mirror — and shape — our perceptions, our attitudes, our behavior. So where to begin? The “r” word has fallen out of use and good riddance. “Handicapped,” too, for the most part. Generally we don’t refer to people as “disabled,” as in “he’s a…
Similar:I have two scenes in a horror film. My head appears in a third scene.During Fall Break, I filmed my scenes fo…AestheticsWhere There's a Whip, There's a WayThe girl was singing lyrics she learned …AmusingAmazing birthday cake, created by Jane Eyre herself, Karen Baum. (Thank you @kaboom1250!)PersonalAfter some long-delayed recabling, these are the bits I…
ME (a couple years ago): Okay, students. Get your iPads, go out there and record some interviews, edit them into a news story, and upload it to YouTube. STUDENTS: … ME: You have 50 minutes. STUDENTS: … (Time: the present.) ONE OF THOSE FORMER STUDENTS (by email): I just accepted my first full-time job with vacation…
My daughter just trounced me in a pun war. In high school, I often tried masking my social awkwardness by making puns. Not just random puns, but stupid chains of rapid-fire puns, all on the same general subject. I had these mental lists of puns related to bland subjects like photography (“Lens be serious.” “That…
Similar:Google Docs "Writing to Learn" ActivityI created a fresh Google Docs page with …AcademiaSynergistic Synthesis XVII Sub B1 Chair by Kenneth SmytheAfter my daughter’s theater workshop, I …AestheticsIs Superman the next Drudge? Clark Kent quits newspapers in latest issue Even Clark Kent can see through the wri…Current_EventsHear That? It’s Your Voice Being Taken for Profit.Why…
This is an amusing little story about how politics affects the English language. An obscure word that politicians and pundit like to use to refer to their opponents has faded in and out of use. The “wrong” move was removing the word from the dictionary recently, after which it made a comeback. (I’d still never…
I just ordered the book Lang mentions in this article. In my experience — having observed many dozens of college courses over the past two decades — most faculty members eye the final minutes of class as an opportunity to cram in eight more points before students exit, or to say three more things that just…
A photographer blogged about taking photos inspired by Wuthering Heights. Note please the dark clouds and the wall of rain looming in on us…. We were racing against the impending drenching, and chuckling at the comments from a family of climbers “oh how beautiful! I think they just got married!” We had to break the…
No actor says “My character does this and says that because he is evil.” How many voters wake up in the morning saying, “I support this candidate because I am evil, stupid, and/or racist”? Nobody votes “against women’s reproductive rights” or “against unborn babies.” Those are labels provided by the opposition, not the identity claimed…