Friday's Presentation

I have to give a presentation on Friday at Virginia Commonwealth University.

In addition to the regular massive lectures I get to prepare.

Here's the title that conference attendees received:

“Art Without Audience Is Incomplete”

I have to write a 15 minute presentation on this topic by Friday. I don't know what I was smoking when I submitted my abstract. I figured I'd come up with something brilliant, but I haven't got a clue!!

Art without audience is incomplete.

Yep.

I did my Masters thesis on the necessity of audience participants in early modern drama. I thought that I could take some bits of the thesis and use it in the presentation. I went to Silver Diner tonight and read the thesis over looking for bits and pieces I could mangle in an effort to squeeze the 60 pages into a 15 minute paper.

As I reread it, I was really happy with the work I had done on it 3 years ago. I began to read it through the eyes of my advisers. I felt horrible for making them read it over 3 times. Then I thought about my future reading thesises, theses, (feces . . . :) All I got out of that trip was a yummy meal and a giant headache.

And now it is 11:27pm and I am enraptured with Will and Grace.

I will write the presentation tomorrow morning.

I promise.

List of Random Stuff

I think it's high time I made a random list of things that have been crossing my mind lately. I'm home for a 2 hour break and I'm going to spend part of it blogging.

1) I can't find any scissors in the house. I'm tired of using knives. My mother has had the same blue scissors for over 20 years. Her sewing scissors are about 100 years old. She never loses anything. Ever.

2) I've stopped wearing a coat because it is after March 21st and I believe that Spring is here whether the wind chill factor is 35 or not. I may be freezing, but I will not wear a coat today. S'there.

3) Did you know that Confucius studied to become an adviser to rulers, but because of backbiting politics among other officials, he never reached his goal--and finally accepted that through teaching his students he could have more influence over the fate of his people than he would as a mere minister to a ruler?

4) I haven't had a Rockstar or a Red Bull since before Christmas. I didn't eat anything after downing my McFlurry last night at 5pm.

5) I'm enjoying doing family history right now. I just printed off the cards to have my great-grandmother's immediate family sealed to one another. Neato Frito!!!

6) My favorite commercial is the hulu one with Eliza Dushku where they admit that they are aliens who want to turn our minds to mush through constant access to television.

Mission accomplished!

And now I need to get back to studying the ins and outs of World Culture.

Tuesdays with Evey

Yesterday I compiled a 30 page lecture. Much to the chagrin of my poor students who were hoping I would run out of things to teach after 3 hours. I was really proud of it. In talking about slavery, I read from Slave Dancer while showing the students pictures from the Middle Passage. When introducing the Declaration of Independence, I showed them a video I had taken of the tour guide at Independence Hall. And I passed around a book about Benjamin Franklin that CJ had given me. It is the coolest book ever. It has awesome copies of original documents. I am so pleased!

Today is my day off. It is gorgeous outside, and I could still go to a museum if I wanted to.

Instead I'm sitting in my pajamas doing family history.

Why? Because today I get to do whatever I want. I get to get caught up. I am going to do laundry, and I'm going to clean the house a little. I'm going to enjoy being able to spread out my tasks across the great expanse of the day. Oh the great expanse of Tuesdays!

I should make the most of this day. But if I don't--who cares!! It's my day! My beloved wonderful Tuesday.

The day off.

Cj's wedding

I just realized that I talked about the wedding, but I never posted a pic. This is my roommate CJ on her wedding day. She's kind of happy in this picture I think.

Their courtship dates were loosely, Dec 15-(first date) to March 7 (wedding date).

But they're sure happy.
Then again, if I was that gorgeous standing with another hottie patottie, I might be smiling too!

Congrats!

Duplicity

I liked it! The best scene in the whole movie is when Paul Giamatti and Tom Wilkinson get into this massive knock down drag out slow motion fight in front of their private jets. Wilkinson flips Giamatti over and then goes to pummel him, but misses and punches the ground--all in slow motion. It is HILARIOUS! Everything else is just gravy. It's worth the $8 just for those 30 seconds.

First Week of the Quarter

I know it's been forever since I posted. I have wanted to post, but then I remember that I have to prepare massive lectures. And then I get anxious and tired and decide that I would prefer to watch Buffy or Arrested Development. Then I feel guilty. Then I work on my lesson plans.

This week I started a new quarter. Just to make myself feel better about things, here's the giant list of crapola I get to teach this quarter:

American Experience
Advanced Writing
College Composition
American Experience (again--thank heaven. Less planning time.)
World Cultures
and I'm still teaching Theatre Experience

and today, I am tired. I taught 8 hours of history yesterday. My brain is ready to explode. Teaching for 8 hours, (each class is a 4.5 hour class) is not a problem. I can talk and talk. And I can find youtube videos and develop activities, etc. BUT, finding all these activities and reading all the material to make sure that I've got 4 hours of material is making my head explode. In class, I love my job. Before class, I'm a nervous wreck hoping that I will be able to pull off the feat of teaching in 3 different disciplines.

I seriously love my job. I just wish I could do it full-time and only have to teach 4 classes a quarter like a normal person instead of grabbing every class possible because I'm not sure what next quarter will bring. I'm not fond of the anticipation factor.

Well, I posted! I did it! Here's a post. It's not really all that interesting, but interesting isn't what's traveling in my veins right now. Sheer exhaustion is flowing in my veins.

On the bright side, if you want to know about Sargon the Great or the Zoroastrians--I'm your girl!

Bartolome de Las Casas

I am getting ready to teach American Experience tonight.

I have decided to teach this quarter doing profiles of influential people. While researching Bartolome de Las Casas, I came across this reading that Viggo Mortensen did of some of his writing. It's incredibly powerful. He reads the words in the original Spanish until 5:08 into the video, then he translates it into English.

Enjoy!

Memoirs from the Grindstone

I am currently sitting in class waiting for my best and brightest to finish taking the test so that I can go home and watch tv.

Truly, I am a ball of ambition.

Everyone presented their research papers tonight. It was more than a little interesting to sit and listen to a paper given on abuse when all of us were accutely aware that the abused wife was sitting in the back of the class with her husband--who did not know that we all knew he beat her. (Does that make sense?) She came to class alone once and told us that he had beat her and that he left her. Well . . . they worked things out and he is back in class. And so little Lataja got up and gave a great presentation on the different types of abuse women suffer. It was perfect. I could have hugged Lataja.

Kelvin gave a paper on the consequences of war in Liberia. It was wonderful and scathing. Porcia talked about arranged marriages and a friend who had escaped marriage to a 50 year old man when she was 14.

And right now, they're just plodding away working on their tests.

I brought them Easter candy, so despite how "difficult" the test is--(I swear this is the easiest test in the world . . .) they would still love me. I need them to love me.

I even brought sugar-free candy for the diabetics. I'm that lovable.

My new supervisor told another Dean today, (and cc'd me) that he is going to cut my rate as the CPT advisor to $25/hour. I told him he could do that if he liked, but that I would no longer be working as the CPT advisor if he did. Stupid dork. If you're gonna cut my pay after I did a killer job this quarter, at least have the decency to write me a direct email about it instead of cc'ing me. Trust me--I can live without having to edit papers week in and week out.

I love my job, but today I am not luhhhving my job.

Career Fair

Tonight I presented at the church's career fair. It was incredibly intimidating. There were 12 presenters from different fields. I had no idea how many interesting careers there are among the members of the church here. One of the men presenting was in Midsummer. He presented on working in Intelligence. One woman talked about working as a producer for Wolf Blitzer. Seriously . . . yeah.

Over the past couple of weeks I've had the wonderful opportunity to really ponder my own career.

On the drive over to the church, my dad asked me what I was going to get my phd in. (sigh)

Two weeks ago, I had an interesting conversation with the former dean of my department. He told me that he was leaving the department and said that he was going to submit my name as his replacement. For the dean. the dean. dean. It was a little overwhelming. The fact is, the position is more about administration and finding a balance between the students, professors, and the powers that be (ie money). My talents lie in finding that balance and cooperation. I know I could do it, but I can't do it because I don't have my . . . . .phd.

I am working with the head of the Computer Programming masters program right now, and he strongly suggested I get my . . . .phd.

Seriously, I have no idea what to plan for anymore. I should just get the phd.

grrrrrr . . . . .

Why am I so against this? What is my problem? I guess I just can't stomach making a 5 year commitment to an area. Of study or geographically speaking.

Unless. . . . I found a cool program in England! I could commit to that!!!

I want to look into sustainable theatres. Green theatre if you will.

But that's another line of thought.

Monday and Tuesday Updates

Yesterday, I had a great time at lunch with Josh (he helped me get the teaching gig at NOVA--great guy--in my C2 Ward). He told me about a news story he heard about how women's brains shrink when they're having a baby by 6% and when the baby is 6 months old, their brains grow beyond the size they were before. It seems there is a scientific explanation for Mother's Intuition. I love it! I want to give an IQ test to a woman who has had lots of kids and see where she'll test at! And it's good to know that the parts of the brain that process pain are being slightly dulled at the onset of birth.

So interesting!!

After lunch, I came home and began working on correcting papers for CPT. I am the English Advisor to the Computer Programming masters students. This particular assignment is pure hell. I have to edit 15 page papers. I finally came up with a system yesterday and they're going well. I have one more to do today. I should just get it done, but everytime I open a new paper I find a whole new batch of issues to deal with. Computer Programmers don't write papers, they write reports. They never write complete sentences. They copy and paste from websites without giving any credit to the original authors, and they bullet point everything. It's horrible.

Luckily, I came up with a handy dandy grading sheet so I don't have to rewrite the same stuff on all the papers. It still takes awhile to grade them though.

(I know I am totally talking to the choir here.)

Tonight is final exam night. I still have to come up with a syllabus and course outline for next week's classes. Ugggggh.

Oh well, not everyday can be as fun as last weekend.

I need to get to the gym. I'm not doing too hot with the whole "not eating" thing. I need to get better at it.

Busy Weekend

It was a crazy, busy weekend. And I loved it.

Friday night I went with Lael to see the Folger's rendition of A Winter's Tale.

Before the show, Sade and Lael and I helped put up tables for CJ's reception and afterwards, Lael and I went to Silver Diner and had a great chat over ice cream sundaes and quesadillas. He is such a great guy!

Saturday morning was CJ's wedding. It was beautiful. We had a little crisis with getting extra table cloths, but it all worked out well. I spent the day running errands and making sure that everything was set. I think my favorite part of the day was playing hula hoop with Sarah Lynn in front of the church. Well--that and washing a thousand dishes with Jon! He and Eric were a great help.

Lesley's food was AMAZING. The cake was gorgeous and the different flavors of cakes tasted soooo good. The brie, the spinach artichoke dip, the fruit, the veggies, the sandwiches--all incredible.

And CJ looked like a princess. Christian looked great in his blues. It was a nice reception. Everyone had a great time.

Afterwards, we came back to the house to hang out.

Sunday, Sadey gave an amazing talk. She is such a great writer. Eric and Jon and I snuck out after Sunday School and went to tour around the city a bit since this was Eric's first touring visit.

While walking infront of the White House--we saw the motorcade! The guards were making everyone leave the area! And in the bushes, we saw secret service guys with HUGE guns hiding out. It was so stinking cool. The fountains were drained, so the monuments weren't so pretty--but dang it all--we saw a motorcade!! The suburbans back windows were open. I wondered why, then Jon explained that it's because agents are sitting in the back with giant guns. Later that night on the news, I saw Pres. Obama at the Kennedy Center. Now I know where they were going in that gigantic motorcade.

On the north lawn, they usually have protesters galore. But not anymore. Now there's just the lone guy in his tent protesting Nuclear weapons. It's so sad to see them all gone. It's not like the problems have all gone away. But somehow Pres. Obama is going to make them all disappear. I think I'd be feeling the pressure right now if I were him. I really liked the protesters. They represent free speech. It's a nice active note in the city.

We talked to a guide at the Korean War Memorial for a while about the memorials. He was great.

By the end of the tour, my feet were pretty tired. I came home and crashed on the couch.

Charlie the Unicorn

I know it's been all over for a while, but I love it. And I am posting it.

I just about die laughing every time I watch this.

The Scrap Award Post

It is called the honest scrap award and these are the rules...

A) First list 10 honest things about yourself--and make it interesting even if you have to dig deep.

B) Pass the award on to 7 bloggers that you feel embody the spirit of Honest Scrap...

Alicia passed this onto me and I don't know that I embody the spirit of Honest Scrap--but I will try to live up to this award by sharing interesting Scrap about myself. Here goes . . .

1) I am alternately a clean freak and a total slob. It depends on the day. or the time of month to be totally honest. I am completely at the mercy of my hormones. Every woman goes through a "nesting" time during the month--and I look forward to the energetic cleaning the house gets during this time. I will throw pieces of garbage everywhere and then suddenly wake up and decide that I am a very clean person and scrub everything in sight. I wish I could be a "middle of the road" cleanly person, and living with clean people has helped me to develop some good habits, but whenever I'm alone--I'm a mess. And then I become very clean.

2) My musical tastes are kinda crazy. I get a wicked satisfaction in listening to wicked screaming metal music. It's not that bad, but it sucks because some of this music is really good but I can't share it with others because it swears. So it is my secret joy. I happily listened to NIN in the car yesterday and belted out the ranting chorus. On the treadmill today I pushed my heartrate to 180 as I chugged along to My Chemical Romance. I think it's my way of rebelling against other's shallow perceptions of who I am and what I'm supposed to be. Granted, I'd feel pretty stupid at one of these concerts.

3) I never make my bed. Except when I wash my sheets. And then it stays unmade for another week, or longer. I have heard all the reasoning why I should make my bed. I even bought a pretty bed spread, but to no avail. Luckily I was smart enough to buy some nice brick red sheets, so it still looks pretty cool unmade.

4) I am still pretty shy, despite my need to overcome this. I find if I'm in a scripted situation, I do just fine. For example, at church: "How are you? It's so good to see you. I loved your comment in Sunday School." This is an easy script. In the classroom, "Hello! Did everyone have a good week? Where's your assignments?" At a party, "Hi! Good to see you! yeah, sooooo ummmm, I've run out of stuff to say and you're not really saying anything either, and I want to leave now."

5) I am always cold in the wintertime and always hot in the summertime. Seriously, can there be no middle ground? You would think that because I need it so warm in the winter time that summer would be wonderful! Well, just as my body gets used to 60 degrees, it warms up and I start sweating like crazy! I don't think my body will ever get over not being in Utah's lovely dryness.

6) Sometimes I feel like a total fake as a professor. I keep waiting for people to figure out that I don't know what the hell I'm talking about. It works because I'm introducing the students to these subjects, and I really just need to teach them how to read analytically and come up with intelligent and thoughtful conclusions of their own--but still--it sometimes scares me to death. Granted, it's a total dream job. I get to teach people how to think!

7) I have two opposing self images. The 1st is this voice in my head that says that unless I lose a lot of weight, no man will ever marry me. The 2nd is this voice that says, "Well dang Eve--you look hot in that outfit!" I think I'm pretty, but I because of the first voice, I have a hard time believing that men find me attractive. I feel confidence in myself, but I have little confidence in men.

8) Whenever men do find me attractive or make a move, #4 comes into play and I find myself running away. I get so nervous. If a guy looks at me like he's interested, I will blush 5 shades of red and start stammering until I can get my legs, which have since turned to jelly, to move across the floor and out the door. I don't know what is my problem. Seriously. I am such a weirdo. And then I run home and look in the mirror and go, "Well of course he thought I was cute, I look great!" And then I wonder why he doesn't call me. It will take a miracle.

9) I love vacuuming. I think it's so nice and relaxing and the house looks wonderful after it is done. This isn't very scrappy, so I'll tag this one onto it-- I will procrastinate forever. I have to make sure that I give myself enough time to "put things off" without actually putting it off forever. I have to give myself pep talks in the morning, "You will not turn the computer on, you will put your clothes on and go directly to the gym. You will not do the dishes, or take the trash out--you will go to the gym. Period. Are you ready? Okay, 1 , 2, and we're up! Go go go!!" I have to keep myself going without giving my stupid brain time to talk myself out of doing these things. My brain can be so stinking persuasive!!

10) I am the same person inside that I have always been. I would like to change, but at the end of the day I will always be too naive, too trusting. I will always spend too much money. I will always prefer to stay up late. I will always prefer chocolate over brocolli. I will always prefer to hang out with a friend as opposed to going to a big party. I will always be a little bit quiet, but then I'll pull out a little unexpected joke. I'm a feeler. I feel things deeply, and I am incapable of hiding my feelings. But my feelings change with the weather, so there's that. I love deeply, and I laugh a lot, and I have to process things. I trust implicitly, until I don't.

So, that's some Scrap about me.

I would love to bestow the Scrap award on:

Smashie

Sunshine

Christina

Melanie

CJ

Lauren

Eddie Izzard and the Laundry

More French (pardon my French--it's Eddie Izzard, so be warned.)

This reminds me of my high school French classes

Pictures from Philly!

This is the street beyond the LOVE statue in Philadelphia.

Here's a little wedding party we ran into.

Skaters. I took lots of pics of random people.

Me, Sarah, and Jon at the Liberty Bell.

A building near Jon's Dental School. I just about died laughing when I saw the grafitti. Can you imagine how big those letters are? And the same thing is written on the other side!

The famous LOVE statue. I think there's one in NYC too. It looked pretty.
And I like love.

Random band we watched Saturday night. Ahhhhh music.

Good times.