Staring down the barrel of a red pen

It’s at times like these – when I am faced with three separate stacks of essays that seem to grow every time I leave the room to refresh my tea – that I wonder if I should teach pottery instead.
Cup leaks. You fail.
Sigh.

Girls with glasses

For a while now, Dr. T and I have been into wine (which apparently makes us all hip and trendy). We’ve got a pretty well-stocked wine cellar, a few books, and at least three decanters.
Scena water glassesWe’ve also invested in good glasses. Initially, we bought a dozen water glasses, which were the right size and shape for most of the wines we enjoy.
We really liked these glasses – but of the original dozen, we have about five left.
So we did some more research – there are some pretty pricy glasses out there, let me tell you. Bormioli Rocco premium chardonnay We found a nice compromise with these Italian chardonnay glasses.
They’re a little bigger than the water glasses, and a little heavier, but they are lovely, and, we thought, sturdy.
Ha. Turns out that if exposed to a room full of drunken English teachers who happen to be flinging digital cameras around, these babies will crack like an egg.
Despite the loss, a good fantastic time was had by all. Thanks, ladies – you can come break more stuff anytime.

Coincidence?

Yesterday on the way to work I saw someone reading Life, the Universe and Everything by Douglas Adams, RIP.
On the way home last night, I saw a completely different someone reading The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul, also by Douglas Adams.
Now, consider this: I live in a city where the English-speaking population is small enough that it only takes us three steps to get to Kevin Bacon, if you know what I mean. Furthermore, the members of that population who indulge in Adams are, I thought, all people I already know, several of them intimately (though not Biblically). Finally, both books in question are from the 1980s, so it’s not like they’re hot new releases.
Someone is trying to tell me something.
In the words of Marvin, “just because you’re paranoid, it doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you.”

Messing with near perfection

Since the captcha didn’t seem to function properly, I am taking the drastic step of recreating my blog altogether. If all goes well, things will be pretty much back to normal in a matter of minutes (or possible hours).
If all does not go well, obviously there will be some sacrificial offerings and voodoo rituals.
I will make this work, dammit. Yes, I will.
In the meantime, if you’re so inclined, please feel free to post a comment so we can test the new site and the captcha plugin.

Philosophical musings, if you will

Philosophy of Education, Journal Entry #1
In the last few weeks, we’ve been talking a lot John Dewey, and more generally, about what we understand education to be, namely, a transmission of something from one person or group to another. We haven’t yet really tackled the question of what the something is – we’ve speculated that it may be moral or social values, which certainly seems to be the crux of Dewey’s argument, or that it may be intellectual habits of mind, which we might argue is the position of the Quebec government, as manifested in its competency-based program approach to education. Finally, that something might simply be knowledge itself.

Continue reading “Philosophical musings, if you will”

Smart funnies

What kind of brain comes up with this?
I’ve been enjoying Rhymes with Orange for a few months now, and this morning’s strip made me laugh out loud.
It also reminded me that I really have to get started on my first journal entry for the Philosophy of Education course I’m taking this term. And so the laughter stops.