Why I blog in English

I got a comment, a few days ago, from Kate, a blogger who, I believe, is a regular reader of Otir's blog. Kate had linked to my blog from a comment I had left on an entry posted by Otir.

Where am I going with this?

Well, Otir, a French expat who lives in the U.S.A., blogs in French and, when I comment on her blog (which is kind of rare, because her blog entries are usually quite deep and lead you to think, and they are not the type on which you can comment with some banality, or with a rather laconic "I agree with you"), I do it in French. Kate, who also blogs in French (there is no profile on her blog, but I believe that she lives in France, somewhere around Brittany), expressed, in her comment, her dismay at having discovered that my blog was in English. And this is what led me to ponder over why it is.

I have written here and there on this blog about my arduous learning and acquisition (two very distinct terms when it comes to foreign language acquisition theory) of the English language. I became enamored with English because of only one thing, basically - British and American rock music. Yearning to "get" the lyrics of songs by the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, and other great rock bands, I decided to play catch up with my English. I must say that I had been very lax on that front until about the French equivalent of the 8th grade (classe de quatrième), so I started to do things like reading Agatha Christie novels and listening to Brit "Pirate stations" on the radio, even though I did not understand a word of any of the DJs, who spoke at what seemed to be an amphetamine-induced speed.

One thing happened - and rather quickly, I must say. My written English improved immensely. I started to use a lot of idioms, because I was able to "feel" them. My knowledge of English grammar was as poor as it had ever been, but, when I wrote in English, I knew when what I was writing was correct, just because (hence, I was no longer "learning" English, I was "acquiring" it.) My aural comprehension and oral proficiency were still abysmal, though. In fact, my issues with aural comprehension lasted for a very long time, and it was only after I had lived in the U.S. for a few years that I was able to understand every single word of every conversation I had with people, or words spoken on TV.

I decided to specialize in English when I entered the classes préparatoires aux grandes écoles, and the curriculum there was certainly not conducive to fostering one's English proficiency. The pedagogy was archaic - grammar translation at its best. We spent countless hours on tedious thèmes (translations of texts from French into English) and versions (translation of texts from English into French)*, and read a few works of English and American literature that were on the program of the competitive entrance exam to the Ecole Normale Supérieure of Saint-Cloud/Fontenay-aux-Roses - whose level of language and sophistication was way beyond my grasp. How can you get the meaning of a literary text (or of any text, for that matter) when you don't understand the words?

Two very brief "immersion" trips to London did help a bit, but very very minimally. After that second disastrous year of prépa, I sort of put English on hold, although I seriously prepared for a whole year in the U.S. I have written copiously on my blog about that year in this country, back in 1974-75, during which, of course, my English proficiency improved tremendously. Yet, at the time, I still had no clue that the English language would take on such an importance in my life and, basically, overcome my psyche.

After I moved permanently to this country (in late August, 1975), I realized that there were serious gaps in my linguistic and sociocultural skills that led to a serious dissonance in my life and a certain level of conflict with those around me, especially my in-laws. In fact, now that I think of it, I am getting this backwards: First, there was a huge malaise in my life (whose symptoms were anxiety attacks - and I had no idea what they were at the time), but I had no clue where it stemmed from. It is only later on that I realized what was going on. I was struggling to adjust to a new life and environment, and those around me expected me to be done with it already. The pressure that they put on me, and that I put on myself, was too intense, and I cracked.

But, in a rather serendipitous turn of events, two things happened:
1. I decided complete a B.A. in political science at the University of Delaware (credit must be given to Rick here, who did encourage me to resume my studies.) I was, by now, a "born again" student, and did extremely well, graduating Summa Cum Laude in June, 1982 (it took me over five years to complete my degree because I went to school part-time, except for one year when I took 12 credits each semester.)
2. I befriended a wonderful woman who was then a professor of history at Delaware. This woman became my mentor, in many, many ways, and taught me most everything I know about American history and culture (she knew zip about rock music, though, but I could fill that gap on my own.)

Those two events were seminal in my "acclimation" to my new life in the U.S. and in shaping my identity as a French transplant in this country. They also contributed tons to my English language skills. Pursuing a college degree led me to read a lot and, by then, I was one of those students who completed every single reading assignment. My mentor-friend also suggested books for me to read, and we would often discuss all kinds of topics. In language acquisition, input is of the essence and, let me tell you, I got a lot of it. I also got exposed to what is referred to in socio-cultural theory as a multiplicity of "communities of discourse" and "communities of practice" - which turned me into a well-polished individual, capable of functioning extremely well at many levels in American society.

Little by little, English became my language. I wrote many college papers in English, and became a fairly decent writer in my second language. I also realized that I loved writing in English as much as I had once loved writing in French. In fact, it is partly my ability to craft witty and well-turn prose that landed me a nice promotion as creative manager (I was later on promoted to director) at the Franklin Mint. This job required writing advertising copy, and this is something that I could do, and do well.

While of all this was going on - over the course of something like at least two decades - my relationship to the French language became tenuous at best. I seldom read in French, and spoke French pretty much only for a few weeks, with my French relatives, whenever Rick and I could eke out enough money to pay for an airfare to France (I should add, though, that I first started working at the Franklin Mint as a translator and, in that capacity, made occasional telephone calls to France, and sometimes served as an interpretor for French visitors.) The straw hit the camel's back when I made that fateful trip to France with Claire in June, 1990. This may sound preposterous, but I have yet to recover emotionally from that trip, during which my parents behaved hideously toward me and, worse yet, toward my daughter, Claire, who was not quite yet four years old by then.

What is quite interesting is that, following that disastrous trip, I both embraced and rejected the French language at the very same time.
1. I embraced it, because, in late August, 1990, I started a PhD program in French literature at the University of Pittsburgh. Due to the requirements of this program, I read, over the course of the next five years or so, most works in the French literary canon. I was also immersed in an environment populated by a good number of French native speakers, and by professors who would always address me in French.

But I secluded my use of French exclusively to my life as a graduate student because

2. At the very same time, I rejected the French language as the language of my family life, as a language meant to convey feelings and emotions, as the language of my heart and soul. Having had the ambition of raising my daughter bilingual, I had pretty much spoken only French to her until our June, 1990 trip to France. By then, she could understand French quite well, but was not stellar at producing it. Her French had improved somewhat after a month in France but, as a result of my horrific experience with my parents during our stay with them, I completely stopped speaking French to her. For years (actually, until only a few weeks ago), I explained away the fact that Claire was not bilingual because she had "rejected" French when she had started attending pre-school (in late August, 1990, just as I started graduate school), but the truth to the matter is that it is not Claire who rejected French - I'm the one who did. Frankly, I don't really think that Claire ever rejected French, until she decided, after having taken three years of it in middle- and high-school that she hated her French teacher and no longer wanted to study French (and I believe that it was easy for her to make this decision, because French, to her, had never become part of her psyche, it had never become the language of her heart and soul, a language that holds a sentimental value to her - although, to an extent, it probably does.)

Don't take me wrong, I love my native language, I still speak it extremely well**, even if I occasionally pepper it with one of those nasty anglicismes or if, while engaged in a conversation with a French relative, I have to ask for a French equivalent of an English word or idiom. But I have come to realize that French is a language that is part of a very painful emotional baggage for me. And it may be the reason why I feel happier when I function in English. Again, I do not mean here that hearing French or using French makes me unhappy, far from it. I relish every single conversation that I have with those French relatives or friends who are dear to me (and yes, it's a bit more complicated when it comes to my mother...).

French is, for me, a language of deep pleasure - the great writers whom I love the most have often brought me to the verge of pure ecstasy. But it is also a language of excruciating pain - of harsh words and deep misunderstandings, of sheer control and domination by my now deceased father and by my overly demanding mother. What I don't quite get is that English did have the potential of becoming a language charged with pain as well - because it is the language in which Rick and I functioned in our dysfunctional marriage - but this never happened. In a way, the disintegration of our marriage rested on silence and things left unspoken - so, it is not spoken English words, but unspoken ones, that hurt me the most during the darkest year of my marriage. As a result, I do not associate the English language with mental anguish.

I find it much easier and natural to express all of the feelings and sentiments that are close to my heart in English, rather than in French. And that is why I blog in English. I wish that I could be like Tomate Farcie and publish my blog both in French and in English, but this would be materially impossible. There are not enough hours in a day to do this. And I also believe that words would fail me in French to convey what I would have written in English.

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* I related elsewhere on this blog that I once received the abysmal, and highly embarrassing grade of 2/20 on one of those God-forsaken thèmes. When I looked at my paper, I realized that there were only very few errors, so I confronted my English teacher, who told me that, well, the enormous mistake that I had made on a past participle had led him to give me that grade. The mistake I had made was on the past participle of the verb "to lay." I realized, later on, when I came to live in the U.S., that hardly a native speaker of English knows the difference between the past participles for "to lie" (as in "not to tell the truth" - the preterit of this verb is regular, "lied," as is its past participle, which is also "lied"), "to lie" (as in "to assume a horizontal or resting position on a supporting surface" - the preterit is "lay," and the past participle is "lain"), and "to lay" (as in "to put down" - the preterit is "laid" and the past participle is "laid" - as I always tell my students, they basically know how to use this verb in only one of its manifestations, i.e. "did you get laid last night?"). Most people also keep on giving their dog the erroneous command: "Lay down," when the proper one should be "lie down." So, go figure. Here, I got a 2/20 on an assignment for having made a mistake that most native speakers of English make routinely.

**I feel the need to say this, because I have, over the years, encountered a number of really sad cases of native speakers of French who, after having lived in the U.S. for many many years, have never quite managed to master the English language and no longer have a very decent mastery of their native language.

A couple of really good ones...

This morning, I posted this status update on Facebook:

Finals week - time of the semester when professors get e-mails from delusional students who have done C (for "Crappy") or D (for Direly Deficient) work all semester, asking them if they have a chance of getting an A in the course, or what they can do NOW to do so...

A colleague wrote this comment:

One of my students is so deficient, that with 32% going into the final (out of 400 points) she wants to know what she needs on the final to get a C. I wrote back and told her she needed a 222% on the final, and she wrote back and said "okay thanks."

I thought that it was hilarious, but, frankly, I also felt a little like crying...

Over the weekend, about which I will write in a day or two, I went to Pittsburgh and had dinner with Rick on Friday and Saturday nights. He told me of sitting down with a first year assistant professor for her first year review last year (he is a department chair), and basically telling her that she had not done nearly enough in terms of scholarship, especially since she had a reduced teaching load to be able to get a lot done on that front. The woman had the gall to respond that, well, he should realize that she had been absolutely crazed with the extensive remodeling of her kitchen during most of the academic year! I just couldn't believe it!!!!!

On being/feeling harried

I think that I need to go on a life (well, maybe just "time") management workshop. I am looking back at this academic year, and realize that I have felt harried most of the time. And I think that it has to do with the fact that I am a hopeless procrastinator and that I manage my time and priorities extremely poorly.

I often look back at how much I used to get accomplished when Claire was still in school and living with me. At the time, I would have her at school by 7:20 or so, and I would get tons done before leaving for the university. I was not exactly a model when it came to getting all of my grading done as soon as I my students would take an exam or hand me assignments, but I never fell alarmingly behind either. I have to say that, this semester, I have not hit a "crisis" state yet as far as grading is concerned, but I have come close, if only because I have to grade French pronunciation assignments that are recordings made by my students (I have 17 of them), and it takes forever to assess, and provide decent feedback on each recording.

I feel myself getting panicked a lot more easily than I used to when I face a number of tasks that I have to accomplish. And, often, instead of just proceeding calmly and knocking them down one by one, I get discouraged, procrastinate, do nothing, and then feel bad that, after, for example, an entire weekend, I have nothing to show for. The same applies to my very weak attempts at doing some sort of scholarly work, I just dream about it, but never do it. I already see this summer melting away before my very eyes and not having done anything by the end of August.

I think that, once the semester is over, I want to turn a new leaf and get stuff done. I have a few "resolutions" that may help me make this happen:

1. Clear the attic - get rid of all the junk in there. No longer plan on a garage sale that will just take time to prepare and yield only very little cash. Just take stuff to Goodwill. Marty told me that he would help me get started when he visits on the weekend of May 8-9.

2. Limit Facebooking to one hour a day tops. I am thinking of posting one status update in the a.m., and then one more in the late p.m. What will most likely help is that, while I am in Europe, I will probably not spend much time on Facebook, and may get weaned off it.

3. Set tasks for myself that are not overwhelming, that I can actually complete instead of finding them overly daunting, which deters me from even attempting to get them done. I will definitely write up a list. Already on it are:
- Clean up my school e-mail box (this will take at least one entire day!)
- Clean up my Yahoo account in-box.
- Finish editing one article, and submit it for publication before the end of the summer.
- Clean up the house very thoroughly (my house is clean, but has not been deep-cleaned in a few years), one room per day. I plan on doing this in August.

4. Watch more TV and movies, and spend less time on the computer in the evening. I used to really enjoy watching TV and movies, and now I let myself be dragged into the Facebook phenomenon. At the risk of repeating myself, this has to stop.

5. Reconnect with this blog, and with my blogroll, maybe one hour a day.

Oh, and, as a start, I decided NOT to attend the Union Leadership workshop. I decided that I needed some "at home" time to attend to serious household logistics.

So there you have it, I do have a plan. I am very proud that, for close to two years now, I have been able to maintain some definite discipline in the areas of sticking to my diet and exercise (although I really want to shed another 6 or 7 lbs.) If I can carve some time to walk four miles everyday, I should be able to manage my time better on other fronts.

Quick Update

It's been somewhat crazy since I returned home from the Popular Culture Conference and my Easter weekend in D.C. So much so that I realized, this past Tuesday, that I had forgotten to submit my expense report for my conference trip (and it's worth at least $800!). So, I took care of that on Wednesday. I also filed my local taxes a few days late - on Tuesday, April 20, instead of on Thursday, April 15, but the Borough Tax Office here is a little mom and pop operation, and the lady in charge was very cool about it, and let me date my returns (we have two!) April 15.

I am just trying to stay abreast of my grading and class preparation.

• I am fine with the French Phonetics and Pronunciation class, I am teaching the last couple of items on final consonants in French this next Tuesday, two students from my distant ITV site will give their final presentation and, on Thursday, the other six students at the distant site will do the same. Students from my school will be presenting on their final projects on Tuesday, May 4, at 1:00 p.m., which is the day and time of their officially scheduled final exam. To be honest, I'll be very glad when that class is over, because I feel totally unqualified to teach it, I am not a linguist, and I feel that I am about one page ahead of my students. Thank God, I have to teach it only about every three years.

• I am also in good shape with my two French II classes. Only a couple more items to teach. I need to post a review sheet for the final exam on Blackboard, and get the exam copied. The finals for those two classes are on Wednesday, May 5, from 8:00 a.m. to noon.

• I basically decided not to teach anything new to my French IV class. It is the worst French IV class I have ever had since I have been teaching (I have been at it since 1990!). I will keep them busy with various activities until the end of the semester, and will give them a very summary final exam, and will ask them to turn in an essay on that day. Their final is on Friday, May 7, at 2:00 p.m.

• Well, normally our exam week is from Monday through Thursday, but, this year (as happened last year), we have to make up for the Monday of the Martin Luther King's Day holiday (we have to have 70 days of instruction.) Thus, we are teaching on Monday, May 3rd, and exams go from Tuesday, May 4th, to Friday, May 7th. Some folks have exams at 6:00 p.m. on that day, and graduation is on the following day. I am not sure what happens now to the legendary "Senior Crawl" the night when graduating seniors and their friends go on the bender of their life. I believe that it used to be on the evening of the Thursday before graduation, which would give graduating students the entire Friday to get over their hangover.

I am going to spend part of the next weekend in Pittsburgh, because I want to go to the Apple store to buy my very own Mac laptop. The G4 that I am currently using belongs to my school, and I want to completely separate my personal from my professional computer use. I will probably also take the new Mac with me to Europe. I will probably hang out quite a bit with Rick (Pitt's graduation is on Saturday, May 1, so we'll get together, and will visit the Apple store only in the afternoon of that day), and he will drive me back home on Sunday afternoon.

Marty will be here on the following weekend, that of graduation at my school (May 8-9), which is the weekend before his birthday (which is on May 11.) He will get here on the evening of Friday, May 7, and will probably take off in the early afternoon of Sunday, May 9. We plan on barbecuing a lot, since he can't barbecue at his place. Hope the weather cooperates! We may have company for dinner on the evening of Saturday, May 8th.

I made a decision this past week that will probably make my life a little bit harried right after school is out: From Monday, May 17, to Wednesday, May 19, I will be attending a Leadership Workshop for members of our union who eventually want to take on a leadership role with the organization. I have never done anything with and for our union, but I am interested in getting involved, especially in these difficult economic times, when I my "low enrolled" program is being scrutinized by Harrisburg. I was talking to Marty about this yesterday, and we kind of decided that he would come and meet me in Harrisburg, where this workshop will be held, and that I would go back to Rockville with him.

This means that, instead of leaving my home on the afternoon of May 21, I'd be leaving for good on May 17 - it's fine, but it give me only one week after graduation to get everything ready. I would not be back home until July 10. I can cancel the flight that I had booked to D.C. on the morning of May 22nd. No problem there. Southwest gives you credit that you have a year to use, and I'll be using it within that time frame.

The Europe/Tunisia trip is shaping up. I am quite sure that Marty and I will discuss our itinerary through Spain (and, possibly, Portugal) while he is here on the weekend of May 8th. We have booked a tour of the Valencia Wine Country with his brother on June 6. After that, we're off on our own until June 14, when Marty flies back to the U.S. and I fly to Paris and find my way to Lille. My brother sent me my train tickers to and from Paris. I take a train back to Paris in the morning of June 23, spend one day in the city on the 24th - and get to meet my blogosphere and Facebook friend Betty Carlson that evening (we are planning on a nice dinner somewhere! - and then I am off on the 25th to Madrid and Tunis. I return to Madrid on June 28th, and spend one day there before flying back to D.C. on June 30. I finally managed to book hotels in Paris, Tunis, and Madrid, so I am all set. I hope that no volcano spews a cloud of ash over Europe during my stay there, especially when I have to fly to and out of Paris! (it seems that Madrid is safe.)

Speaking of freak items - all computers were down for a period of about 24 hours on my campus, starting this past Wednesday at noon or so. This was caused, worldwide, by an automatic McCafee upgrade that was read by Windows as a virus (Macs were, of course, not affected!), and caused computes to go into an infernal loop of shutting down and rebooting. As a result, I was unable to use my office computer on Wednesday afternoon (I work at home on Thursday mornings), but I found other work to do - I graded papers!

Well, I think that this is about it for today. Oh, one more thing that will happen is that there is a 40 year reunion being organized at the school that I attended from the time I was in cinquième until I passed my baccalauréat (with Mention "Bien" to boot!) in 1970. It was a bit complicated, because the main organizer of this event really wants me there, and the only possible date was that of our traditional cousinade, but the event will be roughly from 4:30 to 6:00 on that day, so I'll be back to Marcq-en-Baroeul and the family event in plenty of time... This promises to be quite exciting if enough people can be tracked down and make it to the celebration!

Oh, and another important piece of news is that Claire got a teaching gig for one course that she designed for the New School (the New School is a renown art school in New York City) - the theme of this class is "The Documentary Self" and it "will explore multidisciplinary forms of documentary art in an attempt to answer the following question: can documentary art be a vehicle for social change?" Claire's proposed course and syllabus blew away the person in charge of hiring faculty at the New School, and Claire was offered the gig within a couple of days. This is a foot through the door. Maybe more will follow. By the way, her boyfriend Jeff, who is doing an MFA in Poetry at the New School, got a Teaching Assistantship for next year, and can keep his graduate assistantship through the summer, so at least there will be a bit of income coming in during the summer...

I know that I have not written here as much as I used to, but I will rethink the entire purpose of this blog over the summer, and try to manage it better from then on.

Flat Liners and Other Odd Balls...

I decided to give the moniker of "flat liner" to all of those folks who never display any kind of emotion and never seem to react to anything. Believe you me, I teach a good number of students who qualify for this moniker and I am absolutely dumbfounded by them. I decided to write about those folks today, because I had a few encounters with such people this week, plus with some kind of odd ball today.

On Tuesdays, I teach a class from 2:00 to 3:15 p.m., and then, I have an office hour from 3:30 to 4:30. My office hours are written on the syllabus that I hand out to my students at the beginning of each semester. This past Tuesday, this student who is in my French II class, showed up at my office door at exactly 1:50. I knew exactly why he was there. It's registration time, he is one of my advisees, and he had come for his pre-registration advising session. Of course, he had not bothered finding out when my office hours were. I immediately told him that I knew that he was coming for his advising session, and that I didn't mean to be rude, but that I had to be in class in less than ten minutes.

The conversation continued as follows:
Me - Do you know when you're supposed to register?
Student - No.
Me - Do you know how to find out when you're supposed to register?
Note: Students can go to their individual "Web for Students" and find that information fairly easily. This kid is a second semester freshman, this is something that he should have known how to do.
Me - Well, come back at 3:15, when I am done teaching, and we'll go over your degree audit and figure out what you can take next semester but, in the meantime, try to find out when you're supposed to register.

Right before I left to teach my class, I remembered that I was supposed to attend a meeting at 3:30, for which I had to leave right after class, so I left a note of apology on my door, telling the kid that we could meet at 2:00 on Wednesday, if he had no class then, but that we could discuss a meeting time after class on Wednesday. However, when I returned from my meeting at 4:30, he was at my door. I thought about sending him away (I had another meeting at 7:00 p.m., and had hoped to sneak in my daily walk and dinner before that meeting), but then thought, well, what the hell, I should get this out of the way.

Now, this is a kid who needs to be spoonfed. Before he comes to a meeting on registration advisement, he has not even taken a peek at his degree audit and has no clue what he's going to be taking next semester. So, here I went, and first proceeded to download and print his degree audit, which I taught him how to decipher (it's not a very user-friendly document.) So, then, I continue, starting to look for classes that he needs and that are still open (not many classes still have seats by the time freshmen register...). And I go through several possibilities with him, but each time I mention anything, he looks at me with a blank stare and does not respond. At one point, I ask him: "Do you like English?" - Big silence. So I ask: "Do you like to read?" - I get a grunt, and he says that he doesn't like to write. And so on, and so forth. There was absolutely NOTHING that could bring this kid to some sort of semi-excitement. Here and there, in front of my eyes, he was flat-lining, and my office is not equipped with a mental defibrillator!

Regardless, I (I cannot say "we" here, unless I use that subject pronoun as a Papal "we") wrote up a list of about seven possible classes that he could take. Since he is not registering until Monday, many of the classes that were still open on Tuesday may be closed by then. Wish me luck because, if such is the case, he will be back in my office for another one of those epic sessions. That first session, by the way, had lasted until past 6:00 p.m.!

Another advisee came to me, this time on Thursday. This one is a bit more alert, although she's also the kind of kid who needs some spoonfeeding and shows displays of emotion only once in a great while. I have to say, though, that she wants to study both in French Canada and France, which is pretty brave. She was a bit more prepared for the pre-registration session than flat-liner boy was, but it was also kind of tough to get reactions from her about possible classes. Also, her interpersonal dynamics are kind of odd. For example, I noticed a number of times while I was talking directly to her (not while looking for stuff on the course schedule on my computer) that her eyes were turned definitely AWAY from me - looking to the left or to the right, or down on the floor. And I have no clue what that means, but I found that pretty unsettling.

She too, left with a list of possible courses, she is also registering on Monday, and we'll see what happens then...

So, yes, I tend to prefer kids who are alive, vibrant, excited about life and have a lot of personality, which those two do not have. I have wondered on this blog before what kind of quality of life people like that have, but they are probably absolutely happy the way they are. They are just very different from me. I am not exactly extroverted, but I come across as lively, warm, and funny.

Today was the induction ceremony for the most prestigious Honor Society on our campus, and I was present, as one of the Chapter's officers (I was Chapter President a few years ago.) Two of my students were among the inductees, and I got to meet their parents - well, one was with her mom and grandmother, and the other was with his mom and dad. Of course, I introduced myself to both sets of relatives (in two completely separate conversations.) The mom and grandma were warm and fuzzy and absolutely lovely, and our brief conversation, during which I highly praised their daughter and grandaughter, was extremely nice. However, the dynamics of my conversation with the other student's mom and dad were beyond odd. In fact, I should say that my conversation was solely with the mother, the father never said a word. Of course, I had introduced myself, and proceeded to praise this kid to his mother, and her responses were very strange, and she appeared extremely uncomfortable, although I was doing my very best to put her at ease (the son is a total extrovert who is vey bright and funny.) within about three minutes, I was feeling very uncomfortable as well, and found a cheap excuse to cut our conversation short after about five minutes. I thought to myself that, man, this woman was one of the oddest birds I had encountered in a long time. She exuded some sort of very strange unfriendliness.

Some people are tough to read. That kind of people I usually label as "opaque," and I must say that I do not like "opaque" people. I love people who are clear, bright, transparent, luminous. And I tend to try to surround myself with people who have those qualities. Opaque people and flat-liners throw me off kilter. Of course, I realize that it takes a little bit of everything to make a well-balanced world...

Tina Fey back as Sarah Palin

The Sarah Palin Network. What a concept! For those of my faithful readers who are not on Facebook, where I posted this.

Note that the feed on the commercial before the clip is really choppy, but the clip itself is good quality.

Another update - and some thoughts

Well, time to write a bit about my past weekend in Rockville and D.C. I flew out of St. Louis at 10:50 on Good Friday, and arrived at the Baltimore Washington airport at 1:40 or so (remember that St. Louis is in the central zone, so that city is one hour behind D.C.). Marty was already there, and we drove back to his place, after having gone to the store to buy some of the stuff we needed for our dinner. We also went to Cosco, where I bought Marty his housewarming and birthday gift (his birthday is not until May 11): A 32" HD TV. We returned to his place, and he installed the new TV set, which fit like a glove in his entertainment center. Marty has decided not to get any cable connection for a while, but will be using this TV to watch DVDs. It looks great, I have to say.

We chilled for the rest of the afternoon, and made a great saffron shrimp and bow-tie pasta dinner. We had champagne before dinner and some great white wine with it. We then watched an old Errol Flynn movie, Captain Blood - which is actually the film that launched his career. So, yeah, he's my new crush now, but a dead one, of course, and never mind that, according to what I just read about him on Wikipedia, he had some definite pedophiliac tendencies - he really liked very young girls, he was definitely a womanizer, and also an alcoholic (Johnny Depp still remains my #1 crush.)

On Saturday, we left by 9:00 a.m. for the Delaware shore, and hit the Rehoboth/Dewey Beach area by 12:30. Although it was a very sunny, warm day, it was very windy in Rehoboth, which made it feel a bit cold. We basically had only time to have a very nice seafood lunch and a little stroll in town, and then had to return to Rockville, because we were having company for dinner. We got back home by 3:30, but Marty had forgotten to take our leg of lamb out of the freezer, so we had to buy another lamb roast! Well, all turned out very well, though, we had a delicious meal and a great time with our friends R. and P.

On sunday morning we had a nice breakfast, I packed all my stuff, we loaded it in Marty's car, and headed for downtown to go and take a peek at the cherry blossoms. It was very crowded, and finding a parking spot was a real challenge, but we did find one - the last one left! - in the parking lot of the Phillips restaurant by the west end fish market. We walked to the tidal basin, which was also very mobbed. The trees, I think, were a bit past their peak - I think that they had reached it maybe three days earlier, but they were still very nice. We decided to skip having lunch downtown, and drove to the Baltimore Washington airport instead. We got there by about 3:30. I really didn't have to be at the airport until 4:30, so we had lunch at a Chili's, and then Marty dropped me off at the airport. It was time to return to Pittsburgh. The flight was uneventful, I arrived at 6:40, and my ride got there by 7:15, which allowed me to be back home by 9:15.

Now, it's the home stretch as far as the semester is concerned. After this week is over, there will be only three more weeks of classes and an exam week. So, yes, folks, it will be all over by Friday, May 7 (although the grading of final exams may go on a bit beyond that date. Grades are due on May 13.)

Here is my schedule after the semester is over:
- I'll be home until May 22. #1 goal then: Cleaning up my attic.
- Flying to D.C. on May 22. Will be there on the 23rd and 24th. Basically dropping off the luggage that I'll be taking to Europe.
- Taking a train to New York City on May 25th. In Brooklyn with Claire and Jeff until May 29.
- On May 29, we'll be driving to Providence, staying in an eastern suburb of Providence (Seekonk) that night, attending Claire's graduation from Brown University on May 30. We'll spend the night in Providence, and I will be flying to D.C. on May 31 (Memorial Day.)
- In D.C. until June 4th. Leaving for Madrid with Marty on that evening.
- In Spain (definitely Valencia to visit his brother, Russ, and family - and then driving around Spain and perhaps hitting Portugal as well) until June 14.
- Marty will be returning to the U.S. on June 14, I'll be flying to Paris and taking a train to Lille on that Day.
- In Lille until June 23rd. In Paris June 24th, and off to Madrid and Tunis on June 25th.
- Return from Tunis to Madrid on June 28th. June 29th in Madrid. Flying back to Washington, D.C. on June 30.
- I will stay in Rockville, with Marty, until July 10th. We may travel to South Carolina, to visit his cousin and his wife, during the July 4th weekend. I will return home on July 10.

I am not exactly sure of what's happening after that, but I will stay home for maybe two weeks, and then may stay at Rick's in Pittsburgh. I may also go and visit my friends Carol and Barbara in Wilmington, Delaware, and Rick's sister (and her family) in Middletown, Delaware, and stay at the beach for part of a week. We'll see. But, if I do that, I need to book a hotel room very soon. Marty and I may go to Seattle sometime in early August. I should be home for good by August 15.

In the meantime, I have to survive the end of what has proved to be a grueling semester.

Now, some thoughts about the blog - I have felt really bad about not keeping this blog as I should, I also pretty much never take a glance at my blogroll anymore. Maybe I have moved beyond blogging. I still like doing it for the sake of preserving memories, and I know that at least my brother still reads it. I am not closing it yet, but I will rethink its role through the summer months, when I have more time to attend to it.