5 posts from June 2007

What is the most interesting class you have ever taken? 
Submitted by Melissa. 

I used to have a lot of complaints about my undergraduate education.  Namely, that pursuing an English degree didn't really prepare me for the working world, as much as I tried to make it happen.  I didn't feel like the department there was very supportive of my endeavors.  (I once attended a graduate school information session, and all they talked about were M.A. programs... when I was thinking more along the lines of something, erm, professional.  No offense.)

But liberal arts education does help to teach you how to think, and how to write down those thoughts once you've thought them out a little more.  I once took an entire class on Friedrich Nietzsche.  It was a small class and there was a lot of discussion.  I frequently felt like I was in over my head, but in a good way.  We read House of Games and The Man In High Castle, in addition to the philosopher's collected works.  My two main papers were on the Nietzsche's treatment of the feminine, and his theory of the eternal return.  I got really high marks on the papers, but more than that, I feel like I learned how to come up with an original idea and turn it into something beautiful on paper.  When I go back and read them I still feel that.  I still feel like in a small way the readings and discussions we did then had an overall effect on my philosophy of life; yeah God is dead and all that.  But also that life is art.  To be is to do.  To do is to be.  Do be do be do.

One of my favorite memories of college actually, is going over to the professor's house to watch the Mamet movie with my classmates.  It was strangely intimate to be in his home, having off-campus conversation with him and his wife, who was also a prof (English too, feminism and the Bible stuff).  We drank wine and ate strawberry rhubarb pie.  It was late spring, and I was six credits away from graduation.  I know I didn't think so at the time, but living the life of the mind was pretty good.

Did I mention I went to Book Expo America?  I did!  It was a little intense.  I'm kicking myself a little for missing the Unshelved guys on Saturday.  But I did get some nice advance readers and a little swag.

I'm particularly proud of myself for not caving in on my no-new-totebags policy.  I mean I had to take at least one but I ended up leaving it in the office today.  Maybe a group of archaeologists will find it one day and then try to figure out what we used to carry around in these colorful but primitive canvas sacks.

I hit the postcard mother lode at the fotofolio booth.

This one is going to mom and dad with the ransom-like message: "get a dog."

This one is going to a friend in Ohio.  Remember when these billboards were popping up all over the midwest?

What was the most embarrassing hobby you've ever had? 
Submitted by Billie Fable.

I got all the requisite nerd-hobbies out of the way at a pretty young age.  There was the butterfly collection, the stamp collection (my grandma worked for the post office at the time so that was cool.)  The rock collection.  And the coin and paper money collection: my prize items included European currency from World War II era (my other grandma had some interesting soldier penpals) and a steel penny from 1943 that I found in a jar that my second grade teacher gave me to look through.

No more embarrassing hobbies for me.  Unless you count bus riding, which I am rather unabashedly fond of.

Knitting does not embarrass me.

What's your favorite flavor of ice cream?

B&J oatmeal chocolate chunk.  I love oatmeal cookies, and love the fact that in this incarnation thereof the traditional raisins are replaced with CHOCOLATE CHUNKS.  Hell yeah.  Makes me want to pay a visit to the bodega guys.