Well, I am at the library right now, and I just wrote a page and a half on Robert Louis Stevenson, meaning I have officially begun my third chapter! As with all of my chapters, I'm aiming at around forty pages, so it might be few weeks before I am done, but once I start a chapter and have a feel for the structure, things seem to progress without ( Read more... )

Saturday night, I trekked into Houston to see the highly recommended horror film The Host. I mean, we're talking 92% positive reviews on Rotten Tomatoes!

Sadly, the film wasn't quite that good. I liked it, even though I had a hard time coming to grips with the absurd mixing of horror, drama, and comedy. The Kafka-esque subplot about the government ( Read more... )

Amazing. I believe I'll be getting back $200 from the IRS. This will be the first time in several years I will actually get a refund ( Read more... )

Ah, subbing tomorrow. I still need to shave, but I've already packed my lunch, so I'm ready. Plus, it is a bilingual class, which have consistently been my favorite classes by far. The students are sweet across-the-board, and they always like me as well. Unlike today, when a second-grader (I repeat, SECOND-GRADER) had to be hauled out of class ( Read more... )

My friend John, who teaches at a religious college in Georgia, recently told me that one of his students was describing some sort of "blasphemy contest" on youtube, and we both wondered what the student was talking about. We assumed it was something tongue-in-cheek, and, not being easily offended, I decided to check it all out ( Read more... )

I've been feeling better the last few days, and a lot of that has to do with the fact I've been reading diligently through the Stevenson works on my list (well, that and the fact my lj friends are muy supportive;). I mentioned a couple of posts back that I was disappointed by Stevenson so far, but I just finished a book that has altered my opinion ( Read more... )

Friday I ended up subbing for a fifth-grade class at the elementary school, and I quickly noticed a Hispanic boy wearing a shirt emblazoned with pro-Mexican/anti-white slogans. I copied down what was written on the back of the shirt and realized it read like a particularly strident prose poem--one Zach from the fondly remembered Rage Against the ( Read more... )

I'm at the library right now, and hopefully I will plow my way through Robert Louis Stevenson's In the South Seas. It has a lot of good stuff in it that I can use for my third chapter, but it isn't the most engrossing work either. Strangely, I think Stevenson is the kindest and wittiest of the three authors I've read for my dissertation so far ( ( Read more... )

I think I've recovered from the last couple of weeks. On top of having the flu, and then having it transform into a nasty bout of allergies, I drove nine hours from Tulsa to Houston on Monday, and then got calls to sub every other day of the week. Friday, I ended up going to bed by 7:00 and sleeping straight through to Saturday morning. Of course, ( Read more... )

I went to San Antonio this last weekend to visit my old college friend Mike and to play roadie for his band on Friday night. He's filling in on bass for his friend's band, and they were asked to play a forty-five minute set at a dive called Jack's. I helped load up the ancient Suburban with the amps, drums, etc, and then helped get the stuff on ( Read more... )