Bearshorty's musings

Happy Halloween! I saw many kids out trick-or-treating today with some fun costumes – my favorite was a kid covered in all blue. We gave out a bit of candy too.

But it was a long workday for me as every Monday is. I have an access to a copy machine on Monday so I do most of copying or other grunt work on Mondays since I’m in my office from 8:30 to 12. And then I have two classes back to back from 1 to 4:10. And I did reading for those classes in the evening.

I also wrote Exam 2 for my law class (which I gave today) , graded In-Class Exercise 2 for one history classes and commented on bibliography for another, started re-reading “El Cid” for the discussion class on Wednesday and read law sources and book for Wednesday too. I did take a few breaks during the day (and I showed the movie "El Cid" for 25 minutes in one class) but it feels like I’ve been working all day. I just want to read “The Hobbit” before I go to sleep if I’m awake enough for it.

One weird thing today: so one of my Global History students asked for a paper extension for Paper 1 a month ago for just one class session, but since then he kept avoiding turning it in though lots of bullshit excuses mostly involving email not working or cooperating. Finally, finally today he brought a paper copy, like I told him too. When he showed it to me right before the lecture (in the classroom with other students gathering) he was enthusiastic and asked for a hug. Which threw me off and I didn’t exactly respond since a) I rarely hug people unless I haven’t seen them for a while and mostly really close family members/friends, except for Bear who I hug all the time, understandable and b) he is a student in college and not in kindergarden and c) I never hug students. But he came over and asked again and did hug me. Now the hug itself was not creepy – it was an appropriate length and everything; it was just something I would never do and I wish I knew how to or, had time to respond properly, to not hug. I did focus on his second paper right away and told him to make sure he had it on time and got in a serious teacher mode, which threw him off a bit. But seriously, dude, don’t hug your professors. And he would never have done that if I’ve been a guy. It doesn’t bother me on physical level, again it was not a creepy hug and I’m not really going to dwell on it after I write this but it was just not right.

( House S8E4 )

It occurred to me last night that I have a Kindle and therefore maybe I can get an English e-copy of “The Hobbit” in my library. So I reserved it and today I got an email and was able to download it for the next three weeks. Awesome. I might still continue in Russian maybe, since illustrations are kind of cool. But probably not as the original is always better and little things can’t be translated. Here is my edition’s picture of Gollum :



I finished grading the Gilgamesh paper finally, just in time to give them a new assignment on “El Cid”. I think this semester I am assigning slightly less reading.

I sent an email out saying that I put an Example “A” paper online and anew paper assignment and my bitchy student actually wrote this back to me (and I’m quoting directly): “Oh thank you. I will view the assignment on [online website]... and only the assignment.” She is referring to my previous suggestion of reading a sample paper and her earlier response that it would be useless to read the peer papers since they do less work and get higher grade. Now, I would never, ever, write to my professor in that tone. Does she not realize that pissing your professor off is not a good idea? Nor do I care if she actually takes the steps to improve instead of thinking that she was perfect and obviously why would I even comment being the teacher and all.

In my Global lecture, on Charlemagne and feudalism, I showed them the Brundage sex chart, since we had time and I figured I needed to make them laugh. This class also was most shocked by ‘not naked’ thing – they just can’t understand how that is possible!

I did get to show Inquisition clips, so yay. Next week I start medieval England which I can do in my sleep. Yay.

Galina and Olya came to stay this week too from Miami and as I was coming down to the kitchen to greet them I saw that Mama had Men’s Gymnastics World Championships on TV. I stayed down to watch for a bit. It plays to my weakness for muscled upper arms and it is pretty amazing what those boys can do. Can’t wait for Olympics next year. But seriously, those arms!

Happy Birthday Lenya and Lika!

Mark Reads is starting the “Hobbit” on Monday and I read it a very, very long time ago so I thought it would be a good time to reread it, especially since the movie is coming out next year. The thing is, I didn’t know where our English copy was. I tried looking for it in our downstairs library but couldn’t find it. My Russian childhood copy of the “Hobbit” with cool illustrations was sitting right and center, however. Since I really don’t want to spend money on a new book, I figured why not. I checked the translation online but reading some of the first chapter in English in Amazon and the Russian translation is very good. So I’m reading the “Hobbit” in Russian again. First time I tried to read it as a child I couldn’t get into it. I did read it at some point, probably as a teenager but I don’t remember too much other than trolls turning to stone and Gollum. I forgot how funny this book was or maybe I could not appreciate the humor then. Like how golf was invented. And the ridiculousness of the dwarves just coming in to your house and demanding food. Maybe it is actually better as an adult.

I did do some work too like grading the map quiz. This semester more students actually studied for it, which is good. Some still didn’t know the basics like Jerusalem.

In my writing class, I taught connection. In our Teacher’s Guide there was a very nice exercise so I thought that was useful.

In the evening, I was just set to stay home and read, but the Kid came over and wanted me to come to her house (it is two doors down from me) and play some games. So Kid, Laura and I played Jenga and dominos. It was actually nice to do something other than stare at the computer.