After a pretty crappy day, I found shreds of joy in this clip of socially distanced salsa.

In my discipline, teaching small seminars typically depends on students sharing their weaknesses and vulnerabilities in pairs and small groups, gradually building trust while the teacher moves through the room, listening and joining in and backing away as appropriate. Masked students who are 6 feet away from each other will have to shout their failures…

Hollow Pursuits (#StarTrek #TNG Rewatch, Season Three, Episode 21) Misfit Crewmember Faces Holodeck Addiction

Rewatching ST:TNG after a 20-year break. Awkward, stuttering junior engineer Barclay spends too much time in an alpha male holodeck fantasy. His swordplay, barroom brawls and over-the-top moments of swagger and seduction approach Kirk-level bravado. A predictable but enjoyable riff on Thurber’s short story, “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.” LaForge and Riker have given up…

Okay yes, this affirmation does matter to me and it will go into my annual review for next year.

Marked 832 AP English essays in a week of online work. Rating is based on how accurately I marked the pre-graded training examples scattered in amongst the flood. A really good professional development tool, that helps me to align my assessment with what my peers feel is high school writing skill that deserves college credit.…

When is Donald Trump kidding? When is he being sarcastic? When is he being serious? Who gets to decide?

Earlier today a reporter, following her journalism training, asked Trump, “Were you just kidding, or do you have a plan to slow down testing?” His response: “I don’t kid, let me just tell you.” At this weekend’s Tulsa rally, the president had said, referring to the US response to the coronavirus pandemic, “I said to…

I am at that stage of life where I am excited about loading a new dishwasher for the first time. (The one that came with the house in 2003 finally died.)

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Dennis G. Jerz | Associate Professor of English -- New Media Journalism, Seton Hill University | jerz.setonhill.edu Logo

In June, 2000 I was blogging about anagrams, 1750 Paris, ambiguity, a hyperlink patent claim, and reading posture

In June, 2000, I was blogging about Poems inspired by anagrams (T.S. Eliot = Toilets; Emily Dickinson = Skinny Domicile) Where to go if you wanted to know what was happening In 1750 Paris The Lexicon of Intentionally Ambiguous Recommendations A patent lawsuit that claimed ownership of the concept of hyperlinks Reading posture (how do…

Happy Father’s Day

One of my favorite pictures of my father. This is our Chevrolet Caprice station wagon, circa 1971. I’m rocking the stripes. Similar:A new headshot for the girl.PersonalRare Philadelphia win – for a Whig! For the first time in 159 years, Phi…CultureI pulled out a shelf on my teaching station and was greeted by this lovingly arrayed…

A father gives his happy toddler a ride on his shoulders.

Only a Dad (Edgar Guest poem, read by Carolyn and Peter Jerz for WAOB Audio Theatre)

Carolyn and Peter Jerz recite “Only a Dad” (directed by Leigh A. Jerz for WAOB Audio Theatre) Similar:Updated a "Gender Neutral Language" handoutMTV recently ditched the “Best Actor/Act…AcademiaNetflix’s ‘The Piano Lesson’ adaptation breaks cycle by not filming in PittsburghVery glad to see another of August Wilso…BusinessKickball Ice Cream Maker Is Both a Stupid and Awesome…

Sharing memes about news you don’t see is lazy. Be part of the solution!

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Canadian teen’s short film captures Spring 2020

Not graphic, but emotionally powerful. Similar:The Myth of the Fake Geek Girl It’s not surprising, then, that being a…CultureThe secret history of “Y’all”: The murky origins of a legendary Southern slang wordThe Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is u…Culture"The Machine Stops" by E.M. Forster (a reading)https://youtu.be/mppsaL4MEXU https://…BooksA Video Game About Changing What Happens In Shakespeare's HamletElsinore…