Work Issues Aside

Well not quite aside, of the twenty plus resumes we've received today, only 3 have been via fax and of those only 2 submitted hand written cover letters.  So I guess I dodged a bullet, I don't have to weed the pile down to a half dozen to interview because so far I only have two candidates.

But it's not about the work, this is about that dastardly book called Wuthering Heights I've been having an epic struggle with.  The struggle has ceased thanks to iTunes which offers a FREE (though I would have paid) audio book service for classics.  It is a partnership with universities which offers a chapter by chapter reading of classic texts. Okay so I didn't technically "read" the last 6 chapters of the book, however I did listen to them while doing my GRE math preparation.  I am actually considering using the service for other classics that I cannot find the patience or desire to get into like Middlemarch or EM Forester's works like A Passage to India, which are on my "to read" pile.

I'm A Lit Geek

I get it.  I think most people who spend an extended conversation with me get it, really quickly, for some.  I have opinions - some of which hurt the hearts of the ones I love - poor X (I didn't like the book he bought for me as a gift and yes I could have lied but BSing my boyfriend to the extent I would have needed to is even more cold and damaging to me)... onwards.  At dinner last night Ms J's man asked what I am going to graduate school for beyond seminary... and then the thesis comes out along with discussions on everything else literature related.

In all this graduate school talk there is always the question, so what are you going to do with THAT.  Yes a MA is still a THAT degree.  Well dears, I do not hope to teach high school students. I would like to teach college students who understand the glorious importance of Beowulf and well the whole canon and how it shaped all the layers of development and experimentation.  But here is the issue I am realizing, those students don't exist.  They used to, but they don't now.  The education system is more or less abysmal, so high school teaching here I might be coming in an attempt to give our university professors something to work with.
Here is the reason for this change of mind:

http://shitmystudentswrite.tumblr.com/

http://croserun.tumblr.com/post/4417060448/okay-i-see-this-impression-from-my-students (felt I needed to add this too)

I will say do not drink coffee and read this, please for the sake of your gorgeous laptop.

Slightly Overwhelmed...

Life seems to be picking up the pace these days and I'm not sure I like that idea.  I actually really don't like it.  I feel like I'm failing everyone including myself, especially myself at my inability to balance and do everything that needs to be done.... *gah*

But oddly I still feel the need to pass on something - 10 Most Frequently Challenged Books from last year.  Now you might not be aware but every public and school library has books that can be challenged and removed from circulation.  Book banning makes me mad.  I will say that it makes me mad on the level it makes PETA mad every time a chicken becomes a KFC meal (and for the record that doesn't make me happy).  It actually makes me mad on the level that whatever PTA I'm apart of will likely egg my house out of frustration with my insistence that no book should be banned.  I know there are going to be people who say that they are not appropriate for children.  Read the book then yourself and have your child/teenager read it and then discuss it.  Ideas are not lethal if they are discussed and challenged.  They are only destructive if we do not equip ourselves and those we are responsible for with ways of negotiating, challenging and respecting or accepting them. 

As an aside number 10 on the list is Twilight.  I will admit I have read the series. There is nothing remotely offensive in the series - there is implied sex AFTER marriage, and there is violence which is described but not by any means graphic.  So what in there has the after 12 year old not be exposed to in the advertising media?  Books like Twilight as much as I loathe them, they are easily consumable, like Harry Potter, and open children/young adults up to the wonders of reading if they haven't found it already.  So bugger off crazy parents.  That or pick up a classic - Beowulf, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Vanity Fair and the list goes on because everyone one of those entrenched classics has at least one of the following: racism, rape, violence (bloody at that), sexism, cannibalism, elitism, homosexuality, transgender issues/themes, adultery and the ism's go on.

Okay my rant is done, carry on now - hopefully to your local library.

NSFW - I guess someone shares my love of R.Bradbury

First this is NSFW, but then really is this blog for the most part, shouldn't you be working at work, unlike me... anyways I love Ray Bradbury. But not quite like this, however I should note I'm reading the Illustrated Man and I believe that Fahrenheit 451 is possibly one of the best books written in its continuing relevance and reverence of print culture. While we are on the topic of NSFW apparently some of my favorite books are on the banned book list in the US (I heart Google), to which I say one WTF, why are we banning books? And since when did Wide Sargasso Sea and Love in the Time of Cholera rank worse for ethical content, than the works of Chaucer and Shakespeare - who I will note are not banned. Let's see rape, dead children, war, divorce, remarriage and cannibalism all come to mind at the moment, never mind cross-dressing and homo-social relationships. No those are all okay, because what child can read and understand these works or they are "classics”? Vanity Fair is a classic and Becky is a spoil, demon of an adulterous woman but hell whatever. Goodness if anyone thinks a 12 year old is going to pick up Rhys or Marquez and understand it well they should be rewarded, hell give them Lady Chatterley's Lover while they are at it because it was so damn boring and the sex scenes so ludicrous that I wanted to poke my eyes out, so if they finish it I promise they'll never want to read again. Anyways to more humorous content.

Paper Time!

Before I start on my proposal/paper I feel like I have an obligation to show you:

Bookshelf P_rn

I think you can all figure out the missing vowel in the above word I omitted lest anyone get offended.  It has nothing to do with people, just an amazing plethora of pictures that for some of us might insight feeling of bliss, joy or a certain O word. 

Photo: http://bookshelfporn.com/post/68112678

I Spell Addiction

B-O-O-K-S or P-O-W-E-L-L'-S

I had a friend ask me about my 16 books from Powell's if I NEEDED them... I need them like Lindsay Lohan needs an enabler, no, but it's going to happen without much resistance

So let's review so I can justify the purchases - actually the ridiculously cheap aspect is what I will use to justify the purchase - 16 books for $120 approx

 L-R

The Color Purple - Alice Walker

Non-Violence The History of a Dangerous Idea - Mark Kurlansky

Break Blow Burn - Camile Paglia (Poetry Anthology/Resource/Essay guide)

Howard's End - EM Forster

Intruder in the Dust - Faulkner

Gluten Free Girl - of http://www.glutenfreegirl.blogspot.com/

Diary of a Bad Year - J M Coetzee

Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger - I will note oddly enough that this book is one written in the 70's and two was recommend in a magazine Ms. J was buying - I found the recommendation - bought the book...

An Illustrated Man - Ray Bradbury - this was purchased despite my hatred for the cover art because I one heart RB and I had to read it after Criminal Minds devoted a show to it

Power Politics - Arundhati Roy is my kick me in the ass writer - she constantly reminds me I have a story - and I have a life I need to do something with - like kick other's in their brain's ass and get them going... I know that sounds weird, even weirder I will say fiction is not her strongest point, even she will admit that her fiction writing comes from a place of force and construction and her non-fiction comes from a place of need - of bursting forth in necessity.

The Translator - Leila Aboulela - I have a huge hole in my literary heart of fiction written from the perspective of an immigrant in Britain - oddly in this list I would call this the "fun" read

The Metamorphosis ... - Kafka  - Why? Because I'm tired of being in class and having someone say they love Kafka and I know nothing of it

Zora Neale Hurston - Dust Tracks on a Road - she is so much more complex and fabulous than Oprah made her book  Their Eyes Were Watching God to be

Les Miserables - V. Hugo

Mice and Men - Steinback

The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath

I Think I Just

well you don't really want to know what happened when I saw the picture below of an acquaintance's blog *goosebumps, shivers and etc*

Of course they didn't source it, so I'm going to have to search for how it was done because it appears that the spines remained unaltered - how my dear would you do that then, search for coloured spines of your favorite books... they don't really make those, when they do they are normally hard covered books...

PS the whole set up actually makes me extraordinarily happy, white is luxury and the color is well, I'm speechless at the beauty and the BOOKS, oh the books.

PPS - FOUND IT

PPPS - I found this lovely man's music - oh loveliness.

I Believe the Hair Colour Has Officially Entered My Brain...

I had the weirdest collection of dreams last night involving AB, a sex text, a large peanut butter cup, travelling, Texas, GRE, literary references, my Blackberry and an assorted cast of characters. Now the peanut butter cup - I know where I got that - Not So Humble Pie's blog , as to the other components - well a huge percentage is intense mulling about of future life options, and as to AB, once the great minds of the world create a liver friendly brain cleaner I will be first in line.

Actually I know why he's there on second though and that is another blog in and of itself - a question HSBFF posed to me. I digress.

I am trying to semi plan with headlong closed minded but not to closed minded perspective, all the while knowing that I will have to move from my home town and country. The PhD/Masters programs are all in another country... one being far south in Costa Rica, or in Europe. So I being that I can say I'm under the influence of peroxide and or ammonia - here are my options

1. English MA/MFA/PhD program - the rough list includes: Oregon, California and New York right now - it will be expanding - I intend on apply to 10 schools

2. 1-2 MBA/Non-profit administration courses most are on the East Coast

3. UN Peace - Costa Rica

4. Drum roll... CC would be so happy if this one happen... Culinary School.

In the end I have a year until I have to make decisions about 2-4... right now it's all about the books - Wuthering Heights has replaced Passage to India because I just couldn't stomach it.

I know the song doesn't really related but in tiny response to the vitriol being pumped out against the Olympics Games in Vancouver, I say that I am proud of it, all of it, including KD's performance (this is from a previous event)

Research

So while I've had technically second dates with everyone on the S&P roll, minus NN because that wasn't a date* and OM because that was purely a babymomma interview... I've somehow managed to endear myself despite supposedly breaking just about every freaking rule/advice recommend, however I have to say that it made sense... sure it was common sense in many ways, but it also highlighted things I would never have considered like the following - now whether I am going to change is another issue, the book recommends:

1. No thank-you texts/email, ie. I had a great time tonight... apparently that is overkill, either you voice that when the date is over, or no, no fishing for another contact, the implication being every email or text in polite society should be returned/acknowledged, and if he doesn't want to, you are trapping him in the whole being rude/shitty person bubble if he doesn't want to talk to you again... something like that

2. Keep ALL issues to yourself - from I don't drink dairy because I'm lactose intolerant, to whether you are a vegetarian/vegan (I guess you covertly order...?) to chronic illness, despite being healthy, like Crohn's, Diabetes etc, or even relational issues, like my mom had cancer to the bigger ones like I have kids, I'm divorced, I had a CEF etc... sure some of those are really good things to leave off the table and others... well...

3. Understand that you (women) first date for personality (sure looks are in there a little) and second for looks and all that - once it's accessed that they are normal, and men do the opposite, first date for looks and then second date for personality/spark/chemistry sake

Of course the entire book isn't just about us, it's about them too - one of the biggest ones, is making a comment on a woman's looks, I have to say, that while granted I am definitely hyper-sensitive about this, the minute I hear someone say you're hot (it's happened twice surprisingly) it makes my skin crawl, it reminds me that I am being assessed on how I look, sure I know it's happening I guess I just don't need to be reminded that you are glaring at my chest, or scanning my ass when I walk... Comment on a specific thing - I like your: earrings, the dress, shoes (!), your fragrance it/they are ______. Simple for example: I like your dress, the color is unique. Yes okay that's a shitty sentence, but hell, it isn't a killer, if she loves the dress she'll tell you she got it at some quirky shop etc...