Random bullets of it's all going to end
- First off, you guys are depressing me with all your happy chatter about the end of the semester. Don't you know that the end of your semester means the end of my leave? Have some compassion, people!
- The book revisions are going okay. But I'm at that stage where every time I wake up--to a windstorm in the middle of the night; to a cat's paw on my eyelid at 6 a.m.--it's with a new idea for whichever chapter I'm working on. Sometimes they're insane and nonsensical, but sometimes they're actually rather smart.
- All systems are go on the home-buying front. We close in early June.
- Getting married and buying a house means many delicious hours of internet shopping. Mostly I'm just scouting out our options and keeping an eye on prices (for exciting things like a washer and dryer), but I did unexpectedly purchase an entire 72-piece set of vintage china last week.
- I'll be teaching a two-week intensive Shakespeare course later this month, about whose pedagogical value I am dubious.
- Its economic value, however, is beyond doubt. Did I mention that in July we're going to Prague (and Vienna and Budapest)? We're going to Prague (and Vienna and Budapest)!
- I was completely unprepared for this news last night. I'm not sure I ever expected to hear that news.
- Is it just me, or does Nirvana's Nevermind sound dated in a way that Hole's Live Through This doesn't? I still think the latter a nearly perfect album, though it's also true that post-feminist rage never goes out of style.
- Eh, fine. Happy end-of-term, everyone!
8 comments:
I'm going to Prague too! Perhaps we'll see each other there. :-)
Cool! Are you going to take your students to see the bear-ridden seacoast of Prague, and the mysteriously pirate-infested prisons of Vienna? (And ... Budapest? Does Shakespeare even mention Hungary?)
Pantagruelle: Awesome! I'm not actually on the program--just along for the ride--but if there were to be, say, a dance party, you'd see me at it.
Fretful: I should definitely visit both the seacoast of bohemia and look out for pirates in Vienna. Photos if I see either! (And I realized afterward that my wording/sequencing was ambiguous: I'm not going with my students--teaching a summer class will, however, fund my going there for pure pleasure.)
I understand your economic incentive just fine, but I'm baffled as to why someone would want to take a two-week course on Shakespeare. It's not a bicycle-repair class. What do they think they can get out of a two-week lit course?
On another note, I adore Budapest, and I can give you some good recommendations for places to go, if you want my two cents. Drop me an email, if you like, and let me know what you're interested in:
loveanddisdain at gmail
Dr. K:
The incentive for students is easy: we require a Shakespeare class for English majors. I was pretty happy with the 5-week summer class I taught a couple of years ago (and for which I had astonishingly good students), but I don't have five weeks to spare this summer.
I'm sure the strong students will be fine: we have as many in-class hours as the five-week class, and we're reading almost as many plays. But I really worry about the weaker ones, and intend to tell the class, at the outset, that this isn't the ideal format to come to terms with something new or difficult--that it takes living with a subject, in time, and making it a part of one's daily or weekly life for learning to happen.
So, we'll see. I expect to blog about this more once I get there and see what I'm working with and how the format goes...
(And I will definitely email you closer to the date--late July--for your Budapest recs. Thanks for the offer!)
I love Hole, although I prefer Celebrity Skin to Live Through This.
I also love vintage China. I think other people have discovered the amazing bargains that can be found in vintage linens too, although there are still some amazing bargains to be had, so don't neglect these critical accessories!
I bought a Noritake set made in Occupied Japan just after WWII with some wedding money. It's so much nicer and cooler than anything new I could have purchased.
Wish I could haunt the junk shops and antique havens with you, Flavia, while we blast the Hole on the old car stereo. Good luck with the new home!
Can we talk about how amazing it is that the new house and wedding shopping are happening together? It used to be The Way Of Things, but seems so rare now, for any number of very good reasons.
But really, how cool to be furnishing a new space with new stuff!
Historiann:
Mine's Noritake, too, though a decade younger--the pattern ran from the mid 1950s to the early 1960s. I was coveting a pattern made in occupied Japan, but it was just too hard to find enough pieces at a reasonable price. (Bought on ebay, but I also live in a part of the country where antiques and old things tend to be very cheap--bonus!) Would love to go junk-shopping with you--maybe some summer our paths will cross.
Horace:
Hadn't thought about that, but it's really true--it will also be the first place we've had together, so it does feel like starting from the ground up. V. nice, and exciting.
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