Riddling confession finds but riddling shrift

Songs of the Hour: Trees Lounge by Hayden; Nick Drake, White Sulfur

First of all, I'm sorry I've been so incommunicado.
I've gotten a few messages/emails in the last week or two to which I haven't gotten a chance to respond, or haven't been in the right mindset to respond properly. I did find myself watching two documentaries-- Guys and Dolls, about 4 men and their relationships to their Real Dolls; and the Half-Ton Man, which is self explanatory.
I generally don't watch a lot of films during the semester, having a zillion other things to do, unless it's something I'm doing with Joss. But I stumbled on these online, and my morbid curiosity compelled me (like the power of christ, but different). Ethnographies of sorts for the most part, they emphasize certain human behaviors and psychological processes one might not ordinarily have opportunity to examine so closely... But on a human level, it's really sad. Which leaves me all ruminatory and  thoughtful and socially withdrawn until I can adapt to/internalize the perspectives and paradigms to which I've been exposed.
I think I'm over it now... but I recommend them both, and the links above go to the full film if you have the time/interest. They're about 45 minutes each.

School is steady as she goes. It's midterm time, and I completely blanked out on my Shakespeare test, but hopefully rambled enough to get a passing number of points (which of course means at least a B). Secretly, I'm loving the class. I wrote a paper on "Wombs as Tombs" imagery in Romeo and Juliet, focusing on the foreshadowing language for how they die... I really do love this Literature business.  I envy you guys with the stomach for academia, well, with the balls to teach, at least. I'd be far happier if I had your courage. I'd be content to extol on the beauty of lit to apathetic young minds for a living if I could only stand to address more than 3 people at any given time. So carry on, my loves, and let me live vicariously through you.

When Joss started back to school 2 weeks ago, I made a dry erase chart of the things he needs to do each night in an effort to help him organize his apparently overwhelming amount of tasks. His teacher and school counselor recommended it, and I thought why the hell not?  The first week, my little monkey transformed into a complete angel. He knew there was some money/boons on the line, and he made the unfortunate mistake of demonstrating what he was capable of when he set his mind to it.  He said it was really hard, but his teacher sent home a note saying he  was focusing in class, and for the first time ever, consistently finishing his classwork. This last week was a disaster. Well, he started coming around on Thursday, and did ok on Friday, but the beginning of the week was the usual not bringing home the books he needed to do his homework, and getting negative behavior reports. The "let's start over monday with a clean slate" approach usually works best for him, keeping him from getting too discouraged, so I'm hoping to get back on a productive track next week. Meanwhile, I'm playing phone tag with UNC's psych clinic trying to get his evaluation appointment set up now that I've gone through all the preliminary interviews. I think it's going to be about $750; well worth it if it helps figure out exactly what his issues are.

We saw Transformers last night. I could go on forever about its mixed criticisms and endorsements of the military-industrial complex; the 90 minute Hummer commercial; the glorification of the military, etc. etc. But it also made fun of the faceless president, and showed a few somewhat sincere consequences of violence... all around I don't know how to feel about it. It was edgy for a kid's movie, and a little flat for a grown-up movie, but Joss loved it. Afterwards he asked some really insightful questions, so at least it was thought provoking for him. I dunno how I feel yet. I'll get back to you.

Every day or two, I realize that I'm graduating in 2 months. It leaves me with the mixed feelings of relief, panic, and melancholy. I really, really need to get down to Career Services and figure out how to get the kind of research job I want... but little things, like not knowing where the building is, really slows me down. You know, stupid stuff. I'm also reevaluating the grad school program options. Which leads me to university websites, which makes me crazy. Like stark raving frustrated. But I'm not going to get started on that again because I have another midterm I need to be studying for, and script to memorize. Oh, by script I mean an experimenters script, since I'll be helping to run experiments for my research director for the next few months. Interpersonal communications have never been so exciting... I can't tell you more until the experiment is over, but I'm really enjoying the research assistant stuff. I think, theoretically, when you do the sort of stuff we're doing, us lowly RA's end up somewhere on the list of researchers when the papers get published. Which, if true, looks lovely on grad school apps. Hmm. I should look into that too.

Faulkner calls. Sorry for the most boring post ever, but at least it's something. I'm alive and somewhat kicking. Also, foaming at the mouth. No, I mean it. You know that can of stuff that you use to clean computer equipment? It's like an air power-spray? Well, it's also used for huffing, so some companies put a "Bittering Agent" in it to prevent abuse. Having cleaned my laptop with it, and having not read the label carefully, every time I touch a key it gets on my fingers, which inevitable touch my mouth and this chemical spreads into your sinuses and it DOES NOT GO AWAY and I can always taste it or smell it and no amount of keyboard wiping cleans it off. So, fyi, be warned. Read labels.

drooling bitterly,

love.

Comments

[Marco]

I want to talk to you about the real dolls documentary, fascinating stuff. It was also wonderfully shot, and I thought the filmmaker did a great job of not resorting to "look at this guy, he's boinking a $6000 doll."

Now get over to the midpoint and get your shuffle game on!