A Texas lawyer accidentally left a kitten filter on during a video conference call with a judge and was unable to change it, eventually responding to a judge’s query about why he was being addressed by a digital feline by saying: “I’m here live. I am not a cat.” Later, the judge wrote: “These fun…
I’ve taken over teaching the English department’s relatively new career focus sequence, so I’m more than usually invested in these ideas. It’s time for faculty and administrators to be blunt: postgraduation success, more than ever, requires a demanding curriculum that includes extensive writing, facility with data and statistics, and extensive opportunities for collaboration and critical…
The media constantly takes things I say and then repeats them on their news shows and in their magazines, and they always leave something out, like the thing I haven’t even said yet that lets you know I don’t believe the thing I already said. If the media wants to be completely accurate, they should…
Enjoyed watching the restored version of the hugely influential 1927 sci-fi movie #Metropolis I hadn’t seen any of the 20m or so of restored footage. Added main title music was good, but repetitive and not always emotionally aligned with the story. The print was very clear, with crisp details. Nothing like the version I saw…
August Wilson’s Century Cycle > Spoiler-free scene breakdown Premiered: 1999; Broadway 2001 Setting: 1985; backyard of row houses; Pittsburgh Hill District Prologue (starry night) Stool Pigeon, clicking ham bones, monologues to an offstage cat (which belongs to Aunt Ester). “The story’s been written. All that’s left now is the playing out.” I.i King (30s), ex-con…
Similar:'My Fair Lady' Couldn't Actually Dance All Night, So These Songs Had To GoClever little Easter eggs in this articl…DesignPast Tense, Part 2 (#StarTrek #DS9 Rewatch, Season 3, Episode 12) Sisko must channel socia…Rewatching ST:DS9 After the recap of …CultureMy son showed me Seven Samurai. I had never seen it before. Amazing!I’m going to have…
Similar:In September, 2000, I was blogging about PICK UP AX, Bellamy's Looking Backward, WB Yeats,…In September 2000, I was blogging about …BusinessStill shot from a flyover video that's been taking about 3 minutes to render each fra…AestheticsA little board-gaming for Labor Day.PersonalPart of my daily routine is practicing German for about 15m per day. With…
One former student said I’m the only adult male in their life who ever supported their creative efforts. A second former student posted an essay on social media, describing bouncing back from alcohol and cocaine addiction, and after mentioning several life-savers, mentioned me in the final line of the essay — thanking me for teaching…
Although considerable resources have been invested in helping teachers retool, not much has been done to assist their pupils. Instead, it has been taken for granted that 21st-century youth naturally become fluent in any technology, even without explicit directions. While supposedly clueless instructors are given a plethora of tips and tricks – like the OK,…
I enjoyed reading this short John Henry Newman poem for WAOB Audio Theater. Similar:Daughter Carolyn plays Cherry in Prime Stage's production of The Outsiders (Mar 6-15)My daughter Carolyn plays Cherry in Prim…BooksImagine all the people. Just reading their damned syllabus.These are not the rhetorical choices I w…AcademiaWhy Our Brains Make Us Click on ListsThe article-as-numbered-list…
I’ve been a college English faculty member for over 20 years and I just realized I’ve been spelling and pronouncing “detritus” wrong all my life. A short while ago I realized I had typed “detrius” — and that’s how I heard the word in my head — “DEE tree us.” But the word has an…
Similar:Carolyn, Easter 2017 PersonalNow I can relax a bit. (But just a bit.)PersonalA pallet of cabinet fronts and structural elements to flesh out #neovictorian #steampunk i…PersonalAnother section of a #steampunk control panel, made in #blender3d for a personal project. …AestheticsSmall Business Social Media 101: How To Get StartedUseful skills for anyone hoping to turn …BusinessMeme alleging…
Ford built about a half dozen of these custom cars designed by Allegheny Steel. I’m not a car guy so I can’t place it beyond that. Similar:How Technology Has Changed The Way We WriteSocial media services have put writing t…CultureTolkien v. Orwell: Who understood modern surveillance best?Interesting set of observations explorin…CultureI broke the garage door…
Playwright August Wilson Takes Center Stage on U.S. Postal Service Commemorative Forever Stamp 📬📃🖊 #AugustWilsonForever #BlackHeritageStamps https://t.co/Ezj04lKcPa — U.S. Postal Service (@USPS) January 28, 2021 Similar:Oh the Overthinks You Can Overthink: Horton the Elephant, the Wickersham Brothers, and Mas…Yesterday, I performed in a school matin…AcademiaTom Jones, librettist for "The Fantasticks," dies at 95I was so…
Don’t reject a news source just because it slants against your own slant, and don’t accept a news source just because it slants the same way you do. Update: Media Bias Chart 10.0 If you find a news source where you agree with all the content all the time, that doesn’t mean the source is…
I have shared and liked this image, and incorporated it in lesson plans. The juxtaposition suggests that the little knot of photographers is hunkering down in order to make a small fire appear more threatening in front of L’ Arc de Triomphe in Paris. I have seen plenty of cases where unrelated images were juxtaposed…
After spending several days clicking buttons and ticking boxes and waiting for pages to refresh in my school’s content manager, I really, really miss the command line interface. This video shows the 1970s computer game “Colossal Cave Adventure” running on a printer terminal (that is, its only display is text that it prints out on…
Similar:My daughter was five or six when she created the character “Moonbot” for the #steampunk be…https://youtu.be/GoWiNB_tlJ8 AestheticsThe Missing Will, by Agatha Christie (WAOB Audio Theatre)I had a great time playing Hastings in t…CultureI Love Books: A Campus Library EvolvesI love books. I love smelling them, t…AcademiaThoroughly enjoying Company.PersonalMy son showed me #PacificRim.My son showed me…
August Wilson’s Century Cycle > Spoiler-free scene breakdown Premiered: 1982; Broadway 2017 Setting: 1977; Becker’s cab station, Pittsburgh Act I.i (morning?) Youngblood accuses “old man” Turbo of cheating in checkers; Turbo accuses Fielding of drinking his gas money; Youngblood turns down a grocery run, which Turbo takes; Youngblood gets defensive at Doub’s silent look; Shealy…
In January 2001, I was blogging about The Onion: Clinton Not Expecting to Collect White House Security Deposit Anachronisms in the movie Titanic A textual detective who helps the FBI solve crimes and says Clement Clark Moore did not write “A Visit from St. Nicholas” A student whose client backed out needed a project, so…