Building Castles on the Beach

I still haven't finished Crime and Punishment . But I have until January before my students will have read any of it, so I'm free to continue not reading it for now. For now, I'll read what I want. It usually takes me weeks to read a book. That's because I read several at once until I get nearish the end. Then I cruise through the rest. This solid technique often results in finishing a couple-few books around the same time, which is what happened this week (or so). This short post is simply to direct you to my latest book reviews over to the left on the Shelfari. Just hover your mouse over the book, and my cogent review pops up for your perusal. Easy peasy Nice N Cheesy. But in case you're too lazy to do even that, here are the books, live and in technicolor, but with fewer words of wisdom from me. The Crystal Bridge by Charles M. Pulsipher I've touted this book before on this here blog, but I've finally finished reading it. Read an interview with ...

When did I become this guy? I used to consider myself a free thinker, an individualist, an anti-establishment nonconformist rebel punk. But I'm not that guy any more. Now I'm the guy who follows the rules, who enforces the rules. The company man. I am the establishment. This could go any number of directions, but today here's where it's going: At school there's a "no food in the classrooms" rule. This is such a strict rule this year that the new custodial staff sends emails warning us of roach infestations if we leave food out for the bugs, and I was recently forced to hold a "Lunch with Shakespeare" discussion in the cafeteria during lunch because I ordered pizza for the my group of students. I try to ask my students to finish their food and beverages before they come to class, and if I see them with food in the room, I kindly ask them to put it away. Of course, this past week, some student group introduced a coffee cart that offers coffe...

Last year I started a journal that I'd hoped to show the boy later as he grows. This blog has turned into that record of his growth and development (but an excerpt of that journal is included below). I posted two other portions of his birth story last spring that you should read if you haven't. My wife's ordeal that ended up in a five week hospital stay before labor is related in p art one , and labor and Alexander Brent Wescott's birth on November 15, 2010, constitutes  part two . Romantic stuff. Part three is to be read to the tune of Israel Kamakawiwo'ole's "Somewhere Over the Rainbow." When Xander was born premature at 34 weeks, within a couple of hours it was clear his lungs hadn't developed enough to handle his own breath, so he was intubated with a CPAP mask that covered most of his face. That mask only lasted a day, but the ventilator tube remained down his throat for a week. Over the next few days, he ...

One year ago today, this happened: You can find out more about what happened immediately before this by reading the first two installments of "A Star is Born": part one and part two . Part three is pending. Look for it this week. Promise. It'll tell more about his time in the hospital, as seen above. After a month, he came home. Then some more things happened. Most of them entailed becoming cuter and cuter. And a little fatter. Despite not leaving the house for the first six months, he's done quite a few amazing things in his short life. He's already had one Christmas. He loved it. He had his church blessing. He loved it. He went to Vegas. He loved it. He went swimming. He loved it. His sister loved it also. He went to Halloween. He loved it. He's been in the snow. He loved it.  He's a pretty cool guy. I'm glad to know him. I'm trying to post this to the minute. He's now exactly one year...

Dave over at Dave Wrote This has initiated a blogfest stemming from his exhaustive recounting of his faves from each year of the past decade. He has good taste, probably because he's British. And he has a lot to say about Buffy . I really can only remember the past by recalling the music I regarded at the time. So I'll list some decent albums from the last decade. It should be an interesting exercise to lead me into my own Best Music of 2011 Extravaganza every Monday in December. Despite the morass of music I listen to, the following albums stand out as...outstanding. Give a listen. Travel through my time portal to the past... 2009 Passion Pit Manners Icy synths and high falsettos. Passion Pit takes the best parts of the 80's new wave revivalist sound and perfects it. Great dance beats, sing song melodies. Ear candy in the best of terms. 2008 Ladyhawke Ladyhawke Immediately hooky, Ladyhawke is the dance music I wish would sw...

I currently own 55 albums that dropped in the year 2011. That's way too many for some people. For me, it's just the beginning. I'm sure to double that in the next year or two. My 2010 iTunes list boasts 115 albums. But wait. What would you say if I told you that number rose to 177 for albums from 2009? It's true. This is what they look like. No video. No photos. Just 30,000 songs on each of them. And I still need another one if I'm to carry all of my music around with me. Most people know I'm a connoisseur, that I own some CDs, that I listen to music much of my time. But I'm certain no one until now realized the extent of my addiction. Not my wife, not my Amazon account. Me? I've known it all along. It just got that much worse when my wife bought me my first iPod three years ago. Now I own two iPods. The classic, big kind. None of this "nano" bull pucky that holds about fifteen tracks. I could carry around a Sony Discman if that's ...

I wrote the poem further below as a model to my students for writing parody poems. The original poem comes first. My apologies to the genius that is Nikki Giovonni. Revolutionary Music by Nikki Giovonni (published in The Selected Poems of Nikki Giovanni , 1996) you’ve just got to dig sly and the family stone forget the words you gonna be dancing to the music james brown can go to viet nam or sing about whatever he has to since he already told the honkie “although you happy you better try to get along money won’t change you but time is taking you on” not to mention doing a while song they can’t even snap their fingers to “good god! ugh!” talking bout “i got the feeling baby i got the feeling” and “hey everybody let me tell you the news” martha and the vandellas dancing in the streets while shorty long is functioning at that junction yeah we hip to that   aretha said they better think but she already said “ain’t no way to love you” (and you know she wasn’t talking to us) a...