apathy, thy name is shannon

so we were supposed to read the part of kevin's paper that he posted on his blog and comment on it. this is what i have to say: good job so far. indeed! i especially liked the last paragraph because it seemed like you're going into the actual ways that imagination and memory lead to better learning and education. guess how much of my paper i have done? absolutely nothing. yay me! but to be fair, now that we're in the last 5 weeks of class, it seems like i have a major paper or project (or both) going on in every class i'm taking. ick. anyway, my paper is going to focus on how the fall of primary orality gave way for print culture, which allowed more ways of communication to blossom, therefore making it more possible for deaf people to interact with the world. i mean, it had to be pretty hard for a deaf person to exist in a totally oral community - unless they became a master at lip reading...but also, in the "olden days" ;), alot of deaf people were considered deaf and mute, because they lacked ways of learning to speak. but once writing came along and deaf people could (somehow) ...( - i'm seeing some research in my future) learn to read, think of the opportunities they had! and the fact that someone who can't hear can learn to speak words that they have never heard blows my mind, too - so hopefully i'll be adding some stuff on that in my paper. it just never occurred to me that oral traditions could exclude certain people - kind of like how print culture excludes people who are illiterate. sad.
i've already found some stuff in chapters 5 and 6 in ong that i can use for my paper, so hopefully i'll be able to make a good case for my paper - i'm really not good at the whole research thing. i get bored, frustrated easily, but since i'm actually interested in this subject, i think i'll be able to stick it out. however, frankly, i'm feeling uber apathetic about school right now - which is bad, based on how much stuff i have to do. whatevs. c'est la vie, oui?

theater/theatre

so i have to start memorizing lines from act 5 of richard iii for my shakespeare class, and it. is. so. hard. seriously, i can't train myself to memorize regular english, let alone "english" that was written like 400 years ago. boo. and i keep getting the urge to just say everything in a british accent, but we're performing the battle scenes as a dodgeball game, so i think that might come off as out-of-place. anywhey, the memory theatre thing is not gonna help me on this one - does anyone have an awesome way of memorizing lines?

and also, since we all have to learn epithets for the class, i think you should all go see "i love you, man" because there is some schveet nick-nameage in the movie. and its just hella funny. so if you need a break from reading ong, take yourself out on a date ;)

i pity the fool who lives in malta.

i have to say, memorizing and reciting 50 things didn't kill me inside like i thought it would. ;)
i don't know if anyone else felt like they were speaking in warp speed up there, but i definitely felt like i was up in front of the class for about 10 seconds. maybe because my list wasn't too difficult. well, it was difficult for me because i seriously lack in the skills needed for memorization. and i learned something with my list - like there's a town called scobey. and poplar.
if anyone's dieing to know how i commit ed all the towns/cities to memory, you don't have to be a carmen sandiego gumshoe to figure it out. i think alot of us went for the alphabetical method - it's just so practical.
one thing i loved *loved* about everyone's memory stuff was that we all suddenly got a case of ceiling eyes (if you don't know what i mean by that, just google pictures of audrina patridge from the hills. she is permanently looking up. it is weird.). seriously, no one looked down. it reminded me of how you can supposedly tell if someone is lying to you if they look down and to the left or something like that. i wish i could lie when things were important, but most of my lies are weak-sauce - like, "yeah, i've totally been to plentywood. love it there. awesome gas station." and most of my lies are forgettable, much like the town of plentywood. ZING! j/k
anyway, whether you looked at the ceiling or bored into the soul of people in your direct line of sight, i think everyone did a great job memorizing stuff. you go, class. you go.

p.s. hope you all have fun in class on friday - i'll be on my way to chicago in a plane that will probably smell like feet and hand sanitizer. strike that - it WILL smell like feet and hand sanitizer. happy spring break!

fretting/forgetting

so, i'm pretty sure i'm going on wednesday to present my list of 50 things because i won't be here on friday (going to chicago! woot!), and i'm using my own technique that i just invented. i don't think anyone has ever done anything like this before: alphabetization. cha ching! ;)
i attempted putting up post-it notes so i could do the loci thing, but all that did was bother me because they were in my space!
also, i don't know if anyone else is experiencing an intense spring fever, but mine is interfering with my memory. i have literally forgotten to do homework for my world lit class for like the past 5 classes. i write the assignment down, i even put little check marks next to things in my planner and keep track of things. but for some reason, my mind is blocking out world lit. i'm surprised i can remember to blog, too - because sometimes i'll wake up at like 2am and be like "eff, i forgot to do my blog!" and then i have a nightmare about my memory dissolving right infront (back) of my eyes! not really, but whatever. it seems that writing does indeed hinder the memory.

i know a man named michael finnegan...not really.

so all this talk about finnegan's wake made me want to investigate it more and see if it was worth adding to my summer reading list (along with the twilight books...i just don't have time to read fun stuff during school. and i need to join the phenomenon and learn to love those sexually charged, yet abstinent vampires...)
anyway, i wiki'd it, and whoa - i don't think i'll be pursuing this nugget of literature. check it out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnegans_wake
it's like the longest and most detailed wikipedia page i've ever seen! ...and i also found out that dropkick murphy's have a song called "finnegan's wake," and even though i don't really like them, i gave it a listen - it's weird. i'm just getting the vibe that i'm not meant to enjoy the "genius" of joyce or something. when i read ulysses, i wanted to kill myself....sorry ireland.

so i'm trying to read yates with an open mind since i'm shunning joyce (i don't think it's good karma for a lit major to totally reject an author, but i'd put yates on my list as well), becuause the first few chapters just confused me. i find it interesting that she spells cabala with a c on page 177, because i've only seen it spelled "kaballah," so i'm wondering what's going on with that one. i feel like i've read alot about kaballah this semester - partly because of a book i read in another class, and partly because of my favorite old lady - madonna. anyway, i almost bought catholicism for dummies the other day, and now i think i should get judaism for dummies, too. it's a sign from zeus ;)