The Jackals have returned to the computer lab. They have been following my scent for two days now. I have tried to confuse them by switching shampoos but to no avail. They make an awful racket, yipping, howling and growling. The racket makes it impossible for one to think straight and engage in the profound literary analysis that one is usually ( Read more... )

I apologize if, due to my LJ greenness, I am about to excitedly inform you of something you are already well aware of. I have just edited my user info and decided to use the LJ school find function to list the schools that I have attended from elementary school to the present. This links you to other users that have attended the same schools. That ( Read more... )

So I have finally for real started kickboxing. I took my first class today, and have begun the path of realizing a lifelong dream. Sounds melodramatic, but it's true. My instructor said I was really good for the first time, and that my kicks were as powerful as some of the peeps that have been doing it for awhile. That being said, my boxing is ( Read more... )

Essay season is nigh. I've been struggling through Baudrillard's "Symbolic Exchange and Death." Do you feel discouraged by the prospect of being alienated from your own death? I do. Thank gad for the pop song. Why is the newest Harry Potter not out on paperback yet? I refuse to taint my HP paperback collection with a hardcover. Ooh it's snowing. ( Read more... )

An applicant for professorship is coming to Queen's on Friday to meet the department and survey the facilities. Apparently I volunteered to give her a tour of the library. Our Graduate Chair pointed her finger at me threateningly, and said "BE CHARMING!" Shall I pull the hunched over hand-wringer, or the hungover gutter-dweller? We shall leave ( Read more... )

Does it ever stop raining ( Read more... )

I've been marking undergrad papers for the last 24 hours. Here's a quote from one of them that you might care to ponder: "In my mind, evil has an interconnection with the innate quality of irrepresible rage."

I'm really starting to love these guys.

Hail Thanatos. Was it ever depressing walking past hordes of smiling trick or treaters on my way back to school to write an article review and mark papers. Especially when I know many of my peers are becostumed and making merry only a five minute walk down union street. I am making good on my promise to the Flying Buttress to think morbid thoughts ( Read more... )

The night preceding my Convocation, an old friend and I met in a bar for a few beers. We bumped into Professor X, who appears to be a regular and who has earned a rather unflattering reputation for his professional conduct regarding the female. After Prof X's usual appraisal of the 'female situation' in the bar, a friend of his, whom I have met ( Read more... )

So here's what's new. My new found academic almost confidence has crumbled. I have to give a seminar on Ezra Pound's later cantos on Monday. If you've had a gander at these you will understand my despair. I wonder how Tom Cruise might approach them ( Read more... )