The BEAR on campus today...

Weirdest text from campus alert service ever: "Black bear reportedly sighted on campus near north King and High Street. Please use caution."

Follow-up message a little while later: "Bear last seen going into the wood behind the Clarion Hotel. If bears are seen avoid contact move to a safe place and report by calling 911."

Here's a picture, courtesy of Shepherd's Facebook page. Apparently someone in Admissions snapped it.

Happy birthday, Walt (a bit early)!

Walt Whitman's birthday is tomorrow. (It's also my parents' anniversary, so two events that were deeply formative for me happened on May 31.) Anyway, check out this terrific response to a truly complicated situation. I love Walt so much, but yeah, he had some pretty deplorable ideas. How do we deal with that complicated legacy? Click the link!
http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2013/05/30/quote-for-the-day-ii-69/

Picture it...

Here's a crazy image from yesterday that would be sure to entertain (or scare!) anyone driving by my house yesterday: Me, in gym shorts, a ratty t-shirt, and a sweaty baseball hat (lovely, right?), listening to my iPod, pushing a lawnmower, and singing along to "Rainbow High" from Evita. That's some juxtaposition of glamor and well, the opposite of glamor. If you don't know the song, you can give it a listen here. (The link is from the Elena Rodger version, which I saw on Broadway last summer. My preferred version, of course, and the one I was singing along to, is the Patti LuPone version, but I couldn't find a decent youtube version.)

Most of the time, I listen to podcasts when I mow the lawn, but I felt like music yesterday. This is probably not the best decision for my public image (which matters so very much to me!), though, as I find that I can't help but sing along and even kind of dance when I do so. The mower becomes a reluctant dance partner.

Again, what an image!

Krista's Baptism

Previously.tv and Rectify

After a long wait, the folks behind Extra Hot Great, one of my all-time favorite podcasts, and, (before that, one of my favorite websites) have started up their new venture: previously.tv. And it's pretty amazing--tons of great writing about television. Even though the site just launched on Monday, they've been collecting writing for some time. Explore a bit and you'll see some great pieces from earlier this year. Check out, for instance, this lovely piece about Andy on Parks and Recreation, written back in February. Or this one on Chummy from Call the Midwife. Both are parts of a "Characters We Love" series.

Which leads me to my next point: you all need to be watching Rectify. What an amazing show. So much is said through gestures, single images, the way a scene is laid out. The people behind this show get everything right. And of course, previously.tv has some smart writing on it. I just finished watching the episode that first aired a week ago and it blew me away, especially the last scene. Sarah D. Bunting says it best: "Don't let the pace fool you; Rectify is the unlaziest storytelling on TV right now."

So close...

I was less than ten minutes away from having the lawn completely mowed and the skies opened. I had to stop. Now there's this weird patch on the side lawn that will have to wait until tomorrow. It's driving me crazy (you know, "perfectionist, type-A personality" me).

Making matters worse, I pretty much waited all day until the skies looked clear and the radar on weather.com looked clear to get started. The best laid plans of mice and men...

So add one item to tomorrow's to-do list: finish that weirdly shaped patch of grass.

Done!

I finished my grading on Saturday morning, but things have been crazy busy since then. I know that doesn't seem to make any sense since one would think, "Hey, how can it be busy when the grading is done?" but trust me...things can still be busy! (Meetings, workshops, parents visiting...) So busy that I didn't even get to do my proper celebration complete with chair dancing. But better late than never. So here we go: a little Paul Simon.



Now I need to write that syllabus for Summer I...

Look who turned nine...

This little face greets me every morning as I finish drying my hair. He sits on the dresser and peeks around the frame of the bathroom door, meowing at me until I go downstairs and feed him. Actually, first he peeks around when I start to dry my hair. Then he gets scared of the hair dryer. Then he comes back when I turn it off. Then he gets scared when I spray some hairspray. Then he comes back. It's like this all morning. He follows me, meows at me incessantly, gets scared by something (the shower turning on or a splash of water from a faucet, for instance) and then comes back. If I am not too cranky with fatigue, I realize that it's actually pretty cute.

Anyway, my favorite "little gray baby" turned nine last week. He's still such a kitten to me and makes every day much sweeter.

End of the semester totals

It's that time again. So here they are, the numbers of papers and exams to be graded before final grades are due on Monday, April 29:

ENGL 215 exams: Only 10 of these to grade. They come in on Monday afternoon.

ENGL 312 essays: 34 of these total, and they are supposed to 8-10 pages each. I actually got these this past Monday and already finished them. (Yay!)

ENGL 312 exams: There will be 34 of these, too. I get half on Wednesday and the other half on Friday.

ENGL 355 essays: Nineteen of these, 10-12 pages each. I got these on Friday and have already made it through six of them. 

Not too bad. I think I can do this. 

Looks like I'll be sticking around...

About a week ago, I got a letter from the University's president, informing me that I have been awarded tenure and promoted to Associate Professor. Pretty awesome news.

My favorite Easter bunny...

(Yeah, as I mentioned in my post from earlier today, it's been a long time since I posted...)

Much more blogging to come later, but for now...

...how about some 80s ballads?

I find myself up in my office on this Saturday morning, grading papers and writing exams. For some reason, 80s love songs are appropriate background music. It is a good thing I am alone up here in the building because every once in a while, I find myself belting out lines like "I ain't missing you at all! Since you've been gone...away."



More to come later (as I take some grading breaks). So much to post about!

"Felix Crow"

I just heard this one again on the Poem of the Day podcast while out walking in my neighborhood, an activity that always involves some bird watching.

This is one clear case of needing to both hear and see a poem, though, as those terrific short lines don't come across as clearly in the audio version. It's a fun poem ("quid pro crow") with fun rhymes ("rudiments"/"students"). I also love the double "g"s in lines 14-16. And the (sort of) unexpected turn in the last lines. I've written before about (just a bit) about how Ryan can remind one of Dickinson, and I can't help but be reminded of Dickinson's bird, who is ultimately a bit less approachable.

"Felix Crow" 
Kay Ryan

Crow school

is basic and

short as a rule—

just the rudiments

of quid pro crow

for most students.

Then each lives out

his unenlightened

span, adding his

bit of blight

to the collected

history of pushing out

the sweeter species;

briefly swaggering the

swagger of his

aggravating ancestors

down my street.

And every time

I like him

when we meet.

Bing at 11

My favorite orange cat turned 11 on Sunday. That afternoon, as I read the paper, I snapped some photos with my ipod.

Just in time for ENGL 312 tomorrow...

"Is it Whitman? Who hears this voice hears a man. Out of the text, out of the abandonment of song, a living voice arises, transubstantiated. How glorious to hear him, whoever he might be. He reads the first four lines of a six-line poem called “America” (why only four? A revision of the poem? Or was that all the time the wax cylinder allotted? Does this elision itself constitute an abandonment of song?). Decease calls him forth. He reads the poem that is the namesake of the nation in which he had such mystical faith, such metaphysical hope. For the duration of the recording, the tension between orality and text is resolved. He springs from the pages into our arms."

Read the whole thing here!