I forgot I had this again.

I have nothing to say, really.  Am still job hunting.  Am probably moving in six months to a bigger city.  Am considering getting my teaching certificate.  Am considering having a glass of water.  Enjoyed watching The Mist.  Enjoyed Thanksgiving.

Lookit, I have a doozers icon.  Ah, nostalgia.

Heroes tonight needed more Parkman.

"Want to effectively support minority rights? Support groups that show minorities how to function as members of society, rather than trying to force society to accept whatever minorities want. We have majority rule for a reason."

Wow, I just read that from someone being serious.  I am staggered by the idiocy and ignorance.  I can't even bring myself to start to reply to that--Not that I could where it was posted, really.  It wouldn't go anywhere and somehow I would be the insane one from the treatment the reply would likely get.  I mean, shit, look at that phrasing.  "Function as members of society"?  "Force" society to accept things?  Because clearly the majority of people are well educated on the sources of their socially influenced opinions, have thought them through carefully, and are not easily swayed by scare tactics!

I'm absolutely disgusted.  I think this is one of those "if weren't for my horse" moments.

So I'm juggling an over-affectionate kitty who missed me while I was at the movies as I type this.  So any weird typos are likely from said kitty walking on my hands.  Anyway, this afternoon I saw 28 Weeks Later with the Shiny One.  It was the second time I'd gone to see the film, the other being on opening night.  Strangely, or perhaps not so strangely, I had mixed feelings about the movie.

On one hand, it's a sequel, and regardless of what we often wish about the integrity of a sequel as a film or a work of art or a whatever, a sequel always has expectations thrust upon it.  It also usually sets up and avoids having to provide some information that the first made abundantly clear.  In this case, what we needed to know about the first film was minimal: there's a virus, it's called "rage" even if that name is very rarely (if at all?  hm.  not sure about that actually) used, and that it happened in Britain.  The first flick happened to be fucking fantastic, which put expectations high for this one, even if the entire cast and just about anyone important in the production crew was different.

Let me be up front about this.  I like this movie.  However, there are parts of it that frustrate the hell out of me.  So I'm going to ruminate on both, and probably end up with a lot more yay than nay. 

Music Library-->Random--->First fifteen songs' first 2-4 lines. I did omit the really obscure shit that I really wouldn't expect anyone to know evar, as well as the repeated bands, things too obscure to be lyric-found online and that I can't quite grok on my own, and obviously instrumentals or things that have one line only.

My randomizer made sure that it took about fifty songs to get fifteen I could actually post first lines to. GO ME.

PS This is kinda weird. I don't think I'd get some of these myself. But then again there's shit in my library I don't listen to or haven't for a million years. Eh. Also: I take no responsibility for odd formatting.

1) I gave you my love
Though crystallized
I sent you a rose with nevermore
So many years

2) Have you come to wash my sins away
This, I wonder
You've turned blackest night to crystal

3) Driven with (Event width).
Two paths given.
Pure force downs.

4) The sea's evaporated
Though it comes as no surprise
These clouds we're seeing
Their explosions in the sky

5) I hear the dog is barking tonight
The first foot forward is the right
The blood in the sands and the broken crutch
The blood on my hands whose magic touch?

6) this beautiful saint is bleeding, fall poi-
son words as arrows fly, while distant
thoughts intrude like poetry, some
apprehension...and some regret.

7) A pained token disaster mental reactor put it to sleep
A second coming after fearing the laughter feeding the sheep

8) When you're taught through feelings
Destiny flying high above
all I know is that you can realize it

9) Be clear every day, every evening
It calls here aloud from above
Carefully watched for a reason
Mistaking devotion and love

10) Can't Sleep, Get No Relief,
I Really Miss All The Things That I Need.
I Feel Inside Out,
Do You Know What I Was Dreaming About?

11) Let's fake an answer for the curious
Let's fake it all for the fame
They'll think delivering was easy
Living the fairy tales and the lies, lies

12) Don't believe in everything you hear
Don't believe in everything you read
Don't believe in everything you see

13) I could have got through anytime
Cold lonely puritan
What are you fighting for

14) I ain't happy, I'm feeling glad
I got sunshine, in a bag
I'm useless,but not for long
The future is coming on

15) I travelled this world around
For an answer that refused to be found
I don't know why and I don't know how
But she's _____(song title)___

Okay go.   (And VERY bizarrely, there is no KMFDM on this list, though there is very-very-very-close to KMFDM.)

NO I WILL NOT PUT MY WORKS CITED PAGE IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER LIKE I LEARNED IN CLASS AND ALSO IN THE 9TH GRADE

CREATE YOUR OWN INTRO SENTENCE:

CHOOSE OPENING:
1) In today's world
2) In this day and age
3) Times have changed
4) In these current times
5) Have you ever
6) Many

CHOOSE PHRASE (SKIP IF CHOOSING OPTION 6 ABOVE OKAY):
1) the media
2) times
3) people
4) for the better
5) for the worst
6) the world
7) America
8) young people

CHOOSE:
1) has become
2) is(are)
3) suffers(ed)
4) is burdened by
5) finds its(them)selves
6) has evolved
7) eats
8) challenges

CHOOSE OBJECT:
1) the worst
2) unfair media
3) into bees
4) the government
5) stagnant
6) anorexia
7) for a long time
8) must change
9) significantly


FEEL FREE TO MIX AND MATCH CHOICES WITH CONJUNCTIONS AND PREPOSITIONS. AND STUFF.

GO.

"In these current times the media has become stagnant and the government has evolved into bees."

AWESOME.

So I was thinking about why people are passive-aggressive, and why people tend not to speak up when they're annoyed until they're ready to shout.

I hate getting annoyed by stupid things. Especially stupid thoughtless things. But fucking hell if thoughtless things seem to be the sort of things that really deserves getting angry about. I mean, deliberate meanness? Usually a person who's attempting to hurt someone else isn't worth their own shit, so fuck 'em. But thoughtless actions come from people who don't mean harm, people who are just negligent in thought. (Or don't care, but most people don't care about others, so honestly it's not a big surprise.)

Thoughtlessness is also annoying since it usually builds, so there's no glaring example to point to as evidence for being annoyed. It's even worse when things are text-based and parties involved have traditionally poor reading comprehension that requires explanation above and beyond what responding to thoughtless behavior deserves. And since, let's face it, internet fights happen, this becomes relevant to considering the whole topic. Usually explanation is required to demonstrate thoughtless behavior's existence, setting up a premise for the writer's annoyance to be valid. So even verbally, a lot of speaking has to be done by the one being insulted. How the hell is that fair?

Why should the person being insulted explain that insult in minute, pandering detail? It's exposing a weakness: "I am insulted because you did not consider me, please use my honest expression of annoyance to ridicule or continue to ignore me." Usually the insulted person then comes across as petty or uptight, which is ridiculous. Does a person being pissed on because of someone else's misguided attempts at writing their name in the snow not deserve to say, "Hey, watch where you're pointing that thing?" I'd think they would, but usually the pisser ends up hitting the victim in the mouth. Yeah, I went there. And why does the thoughtless one do so? Because usually they feel upset and defensive, and most people lash out when they feel defensive. It's easier on them, and the cycle gets a little more vicious.

Score another point for passive-aggressiveness, bullshit that it is. Oh well, at least I've pinned this down well enough for my own benefit. I was annoyed when I started typing, now I'm just sad. Meh.

Now! to pick up the cat from the vet. She is getting a bath, because we lack means to keep a cat in a shower without encountering great peril. Fourteen bucks is not a bad trade off.

mood: a little strange

“It’s heavy, and it’s metal."

Yep.

This is our cat. Her name is Norah. For those of you not in the knowingness, my roommate and I adopted a cat around six or so weeks ago. It had been a thing we'd sort of prepared for a while to do, getting betta fish and seeing if we could take care of them first (2-3 years until old age took them, RIP little fishies). Then we slooowly started buying shit on college-student budgets, and then it was kitty time.

Anyway, I realized that I have the power to upload things to the internet. So. Pictures. LOOKIT.




It's a little difficult to actually take pictures of her, since she is pure black and our apartment is overhead-light-phobic. For serious. Also, cameras are shiny silver boxes of mystery to be investigated, so clear pictures are rare. I mean, for reals, fish were easier to catch still. Here I managed to catch her enjoying the wonders of a plastic bag and dashing to investigate a shiny thing. Despite how it looks, she has green eyes, not blue.

Right now she sits in my window, chirping at the world. She does that.

Student paper. Rogerian style argument. It's essentially the "Let's just be friends" thing to her ex-boyfriend. A bit lollish, but alarming in that she seems it's okay that he considers her a possession. That is: "I know you still consider me a possession, and I understand that."

I am a little D: because she refutes all this other stuff, but not being treated like a possession.

ggg not-thesis paper sorta done oh god head explodey have to give this out and defend it but it's not a thesis no really it's not! despite having to have a committee and defend it for an hour in front of Very Smart People who oh god no wonder I've had insomnia for a month and the crazy bizarre virus from hell before that and and and dear god textual criticism makes me shake.

It is 23 pages long, my insomnia. 

My brain is leaking out of my skull.

In a month I'll have a master's degree.

Hi!

"Persuading someone to believe what you say or convince them that your idea is right, is a very tuff task."

. . .

D:

"The article also has many examples of the pathos fallacy."

what the christ

Burning Crusade today! My copy is theoretically arriving in the mail. Yay! I hope they don't do that "lulz we return tomorrow" thing if I'm not home when it arrives. We have an apartment office for a reason, but sometimes that happens.

Right now I'm having my 9 am class write a short essay on how they personally write papers. This is amusing. There is much typing. It was funny, though, when I arrived half the class waited outside instead of GASP coming into the empty-except-for-me computer lab. I think someone must have been too afraid to come in, and thus it became a lemming wait. You know, the kind where everyone stands outside an unlocked door because the first person who tried it couldn't turn the knob right, and most people arriving later just assume the door isn't open? Yeah. I was even ten minutes early, too. Ah well.

I am hungry.

Tonight there is something on tv I want to watch, I think. This is odd. I can't remember what it is. I should look up when Heroes starts new again. I could do that now.

The only bad thing about having class in the computer lab and requiring an in-class essay is that I have time to sit here and think and be bored.

Okay, so Bitchy McWhiner kid succeeded in his grade appeal. GOOD FOR YOU, YOU BARELY CAN GET INTO 102 NOW. Ass. Now I have to travel all over the fucking campus going over change of grade forms, all because the little douche couldn't have bothered to come to class a couple more times.

I was going to be asleep an hour and half ago, but I decided to find a reading or two to fill out my syllabus. Turns out I finished filling everything out. This is cool, since that means I can print/copy the rest of it (I was just finishing up the calendar, course policies were done a month or so ago) and give it to the new little bastards tomorrow morning.

I'm teaching less sessions that last longer to make up for not meeting as much. Just when I thought I was used to a 50 minute class period! BAM here is an hour and 15 minutes have fun. Ah well. I'm still having a movie week. I think I'm going to show a movie that is bad or good at arguing. I think I might use a Michael Moore movie to show how to argue on pure manipulation of audience emotion and lots of lying. I shouldn't teach them how to lie. Just how to stretch the truth for a purpose. I r gud teacher. I wonder if I could get a copy of Roger and Me for the bunny murder scene.

Yeah okay, so that last locked entry was a rant. I know, I know. It was more of a response to something that happened earlier that got cycled into my head and wouldn't leave unless I vented it out, and I do that best by carefully writing it out and editing and all that. Guess what this entry is!

Anyway, apparently my parents' neighbors' kid (a high schooler) gave my mom shit on New Year's Eve. Now, my parents live in a pretty damn quiet neighborhood. My dad is chronically ill, there are teeny babies and people who fucking work. Small town, culdesac, that type of area. Technically it's a subdivision, but no one really goes all subdivision snobby about things. Apparently this little bitch of a kid had over ten other little bitches and (illegally) lit fireworks from nine till past midnight. D: On a street with lots of normal people and no other teenagers. When we live ten minutes away from FIELDS and parks and WIDE OPEN SPACES appropriate for kite flying, fireworks, and KKK rallies (not kidding).

So, because they are our right-the-fuck-there neighbors and dad is ill, mom heads over and asks that they stop around 11. They stop for ten minutes after mom goes in, and then start yelling and shit along with even more fireworks. There was firework fog. They kept it up for another hour, and past midnight. Not quite little mountains of random fire, but things that were landing on roofs and hitting chimneys. What the christ. I lit fireworks in high school too, and had a bunch of people over, but we stopped at 11 because most of us had curfews and we weren't fucktards. The fireworks weren't too much of a problem as much as it was the shitty shits being shitty with them. (go go vocabulary) So Mom gets out of bed and goes and asks again.

They told her to "get a hotel on New Year's" because they were having fun. "Only the cops will stop us, we won't stop otherwise." They said Mom was being unChristian (??? fireworks = jesus ???) and made fun of her accent. My mother is fucking Scottish. What the christ. It's a good thing I wasn't at my parents' on New Year's, or there'd have been homicide. Neighbor-bitch-boy said his parents were in the house in bed when Mom asked where his parents were. OKAY YEAH I BET. This is the kind of shit people call the cops over, since fireworks are illegal in city limits. Apparently other neighbors called Mom the next day and told her they actually called the cops (since they were afraid to go over themselves), but that no one was on duty to actually respond to the call. How comforting. Of course, that's not a big surprise since our neighborhood had a car thief steal about 15 trucks from the area a few years ago. The police wouldn't patrol at night or respond to calls when people saw things because they weren't on duty then, so this isn't really shocking that they'd not be around on New Year's. But still. What the fuck.

So anyway, I just helped Mom edit a letter she's giving to the neighbors, politely explaining the chain of events. She'd go over and speak to them but these are people who travel and have weird work hours. So we'll see how things go. I hope little fuck-face gets grounded (or castrated). These are the type of people who home school to keep the riff-raff away from their precious Christian angel-babies, so who the hell knows. Seriously though, if I ever see this kid, I'm going to have to try and not stab him in the brain through his eyes with my fingers.

Night Watch is a fucking good book. I didn't realize how good until I got to the end. Very pleased. Movie is like a sheet compared to a quilt. Can't wait until the other books are translated. Happy me.

Merry Christmas, happy holidays of your choice, and good Mondays.

Hooray.


(ps: one should not invite another person to call them, sign off aim before waiting for a response, and have given the wrong number to call. it is mean! I am deprived of kittens because of this.)

Meh. I finally have time to do shit (last paper in today at noon), and I get a cold. The only thing I can do at home with other people is warcraft, and that's pvp-oh-you-tabbed-out-for-two-seconds-too-bad or nothing today. Or watch tv. Boring. Or read. Headache. Sad faces.

I miss writing. I wish I could think straight to do it, but by the time I'll have that presence of mind, I'll have to start filling in the last parts of my syllabus for Spring and have to go to other places or or or blar. At least I don't have to do anything for a day or two right now. That is . . . huge.

So, after not watching any anime since FMA went to shit around the mid-thirties, I've started watching Death Note. Course, I'd been reading the manga since somewhere in the first thirty chapters or so of that when it was still being scantalated or whatever the fuck the word is. So I don't feel quite so weird about watching anime again, even if it's one show. Anyway.

( spoilery thoughts )

Zomg. Posting from my office in the university. My office I share with 20 people. I am alone!

See.

Right now?

Students are filling out their instructor evaluation sheets. On me. I had to do the whole "I won't read these until after the semester and can't be here while you fill them out please fill them out oh god okay bye" thing.

I also lectured today on semicolons.

Exciting.

Hello.

So, I've been busy. Teaching is really like a full time job. I suspect it will get easier when I'm not teaching my first classes ever, but right now I'm tired and suffering from that "almost a few weeks before the haul to final papers" mental slump. I've registered for my last classes as a master's student. A study on Melville and a critical writing course, here I come! Turns out I'm teaching Tuesdays/Thursdays next semester as well. Since this is not M/W/F at 8 in the fucking morning, I am thrilled by this. It means I don't have to be up and fighting rush hour in the morning, and that I won't have to go to campus at all on Fridays.

I am trying to decide in the next few weeks whether or not I'm really-seriously-zomg going for my PhD. This is very scary. I have to apply places soonish. THIS IS VERY SCARY. I want to do this so fucking badly, but I'm afraid that it won't be what I think it is, even though I know what it is and am immersed in it right now and and and and. What the hell else would I do, anyway? eh.

I miss having time to write. I miss being an undergrad who thought I was busy. Oh well fuck that I'm going to have a master's soon. I miss being able to keep up with people, or hang out, or do something spontaneous though. Blar.

Here's hoping the router will let me post this.