Lazy Sunday
Sunday morning began rather later than it normally would have for me. In one way, you could say that the reason was that I hit the snooze button eight times, after--of course--listening to the opening cadences of M.I.A. 8 times, but cutting it off before the acoustic guitar gives way to the electric. In another way, you could say that it was because I was--am?--a lazy bum, and just did not want to drag my carcass out of bed. To some extent, both of the above would be true.
The real reason, however, is that I--and several unnamed accomplices--had just finished watching the last season of breaking bad at 2:30 the night before, and one does not simply slip off into gentle sleep after that. I will not say anything about the show here, because everyone should watch it and spoilers would be a bad thing. Without spoiling anything, I can say, it was really good.
How good? I might just buy into TV as a potential art form; that kind of good.
Anyway, my Sunday started late, and I took no pains to make my morning rituals any faster. I moseyed down the street to the Gottesdienst, not thinking about how my leather soled shoes would fair on the polished ice. Concentrating my full energies on not spilling my coffee, I skittered my way down the sidewalk like a Great Dane puppy; unfortunately rather less cute and coordinated.
After a couple close calls I had made it across Rudisill. There was church, complete with Confirmation and Baptism, with an excellent little reception to follow; the morning was satisfying, life was good, and the rest of the day promised interest as well.
Now, before I continue to chronicle my boring day, and so you do not feel like I have tricked you awfully when I reach the end, I should tell you that the only reason that this day seems worth chronicling to me, is because I never get Sundays off of work. Ever. As such, while everyone else is used to Sunday being a day to chill, mine is usually pretty well occupied from 9:15 until 8:00 in the evening, which makes for a fairly long day to be out and about; nothing to complain about, but I usually never feel settled on a Sunday until I stop to unwind at night.
A free Sunday is something of a novelty for me, and having the time to assimilate it makes everything so much more pleasant and clear, both at the time, and even now as I reflect on it. Even church and seeing my church family are more pleasant when I know I do not have to rush off to work right afterward.
This could be a place where I might launch into much breast beating about my desire to have a normal, fixed, work schedule, but that is rather done to death at this point, so we press on.
After taking my sweet time at the reception, I got home and realized I needed to book if I wanted to change and get to Cinema Center on time. And I was not showing up in a suit.
Cinema Center was having an event to support the Three Rivers Language Center, and particularly their excellent--and quite fascinating--work reanimating the Myaamia language. The Myaamia are working on relearning how to speak their language, which went dormant in the Sixties; the center is helping them decode all of the linguist speak to recover the syntax and pronunciation. Interesting work. A worthy cause.
I was there because I had been bribed with extra credit. Sad, but true. In my senior year, there are now many things I won't do for extra credit or bad free pizza, but this seemed like it had the potential to be interesting. Plus, this was all being done at Cinema Center; how better to build my cover with the hipsters, the secret to whose origins I am still seeking.
I changed and got downtown much faster than I anticipated, so I decided to park by the library and walk to the theater. It was windy, and downtown Fort Wayne lends itself quite well to turning ordinary wind into bone-chilling, biting, howling winds. While I was not entirely comfortable, I was consoled by how remarkably bad-ass my coat looked in the wind (so the nice hooligans said).
I finally made it to the theater, considerably warmer for the walking. The first thing I saw when I got into the theater was Dr. Bischoff, who was pleasantly surprised that a few of his students were taking the bait. It appeared that I was the only student that had made it from my class, but there was a fairly decent group there, including people I've had classes with before.
I slipped into the auditorium, and two minutes later I was joined by someone I did not expect to see. I was sitting there, counting a larger number of people than I had expected, when Joe Strange slid into the seat next to me. I have had several classes with Joe before, in both History and German, and it was not until we started talking that I realized that I missed him. He is probably in his late thirties or early forties; he has a wife and kids, a wry sense of humor, and a je ne sais quoi that makes him really easy to be around. Oh, and his name is awesome.
He and I spent the last little bit before the show catching up, and then, just before the show began, Curt sat in the seat on my other side, and it was really good to see that Curt wasn't dead.
An announcement was made, we applauded about something, the lights went down, and our feature began. The Linguists turned out to be a documentary about the documentation of dying languages. As the film reminded the viewer--over and over--there are seven thousand languages, and languages go dormant--or lose their final speakers--at the present rate of 2 a week. The viewer is whisked along on an often amusing but thoroughly alarmist exposition of how an intrepid pair of linguists spend their professional life tracking down and recording these languages.
My final review of the movie is that it was worth my time. It belabored a few points, presented the linguists in a light that was less than flattering to them as skilled academics, and tried to make a cheap drama out of an otherwise fascinating topic. Nonetheless, the crap editing and attempts to make it sexier did not spoil the interest of the people and languages.
In the movie talk afterwards, I got to hear Myaamia spoken, which was rather cool, and I got to listen to the panel try to toe the line between supporting the cause and acknowledging the flaws of the movie, which was especially funny, since all threee panelists had worked with the linguists in the documentary.
I didn't hang around after the screening, mostly because I had consumed a fair amount of coffee before the film, a bottle of water during the film, and by the end of the somewhat protracted talk, and in the face of a long line, I decided I would be a happier man if I just hoofed it back to the library. I got there, saw some more of my classmates, stopped, chatted, then went looking for research materials before the library closed. New materials on hand, I left them in my trunk, and decided it should be a marvelous thing if I went to Starbucks. To Starbucks I went, I got a cappuccino, and it was good. Even in the snow, Downtown is a great little place to walk.
After that, I really had to get back and do homework, but the afternoon of unexpected freedom was nice. And yes, it might seem like a somewhat boring afternoon, but I genuinely enjoyed it.
And that was my lazy Sunday afternoon.
The real reason, however, is that I--and several unnamed accomplices--had just finished watching the last season of breaking bad at 2:30 the night before, and one does not simply slip off into gentle sleep after that. I will not say anything about the show here, because everyone should watch it and spoilers would be a bad thing. Without spoiling anything, I can say, it was really good.
How good? I might just buy into TV as a potential art form; that kind of good.
Anyway, my Sunday started late, and I took no pains to make my morning rituals any faster. I moseyed down the street to the Gottesdienst, not thinking about how my leather soled shoes would fair on the polished ice. Concentrating my full energies on not spilling my coffee, I skittered my way down the sidewalk like a Great Dane puppy; unfortunately rather less cute and coordinated.
After a couple close calls I had made it across Rudisill. There was church, complete with Confirmation and Baptism, with an excellent little reception to follow; the morning was satisfying, life was good, and the rest of the day promised interest as well.
Now, before I continue to chronicle my boring day, and so you do not feel like I have tricked you awfully when I reach the end, I should tell you that the only reason that this day seems worth chronicling to me, is because I never get Sundays off of work. Ever. As such, while everyone else is used to Sunday being a day to chill, mine is usually pretty well occupied from 9:15 until 8:00 in the evening, which makes for a fairly long day to be out and about; nothing to complain about, but I usually never feel settled on a Sunday until I stop to unwind at night.
A free Sunday is something of a novelty for me, and having the time to assimilate it makes everything so much more pleasant and clear, both at the time, and even now as I reflect on it. Even church and seeing my church family are more pleasant when I know I do not have to rush off to work right afterward.
This could be a place where I might launch into much breast beating about my desire to have a normal, fixed, work schedule, but that is rather done to death at this point, so we press on.
After taking my sweet time at the reception, I got home and realized I needed to book if I wanted to change and get to Cinema Center on time. And I was not showing up in a suit.
Cinema Center was having an event to support the Three Rivers Language Center, and particularly their excellent--and quite fascinating--work reanimating the Myaamia language. The Myaamia are working on relearning how to speak their language, which went dormant in the Sixties; the center is helping them decode all of the linguist speak to recover the syntax and pronunciation. Interesting work. A worthy cause.
I was there because I had been bribed with extra credit. Sad, but true. In my senior year, there are now many things I won't do for extra credit or bad free pizza, but this seemed like it had the potential to be interesting. Plus, this was all being done at Cinema Center; how better to build my cover with the hipsters, the secret to whose origins I am still seeking.
I changed and got downtown much faster than I anticipated, so I decided to park by the library and walk to the theater. It was windy, and downtown Fort Wayne lends itself quite well to turning ordinary wind into bone-chilling, biting, howling winds. While I was not entirely comfortable, I was consoled by how remarkably bad-ass my coat looked in the wind (so the nice hooligans said).
I finally made it to the theater, considerably warmer for the walking. The first thing I saw when I got into the theater was Dr. Bischoff, who was pleasantly surprised that a few of his students were taking the bait. It appeared that I was the only student that had made it from my class, but there was a fairly decent group there, including people I've had classes with before.
I slipped into the auditorium, and two minutes later I was joined by someone I did not expect to see. I was sitting there, counting a larger number of people than I had expected, when Joe Strange slid into the seat next to me. I have had several classes with Joe before, in both History and German, and it was not until we started talking that I realized that I missed him. He is probably in his late thirties or early forties; he has a wife and kids, a wry sense of humor, and a je ne sais quoi that makes him really easy to be around. Oh, and his name is awesome.
He and I spent the last little bit before the show catching up, and then, just before the show began, Curt sat in the seat on my other side, and it was really good to see that Curt wasn't dead.
An announcement was made, we applauded about something, the lights went down, and our feature began. The Linguists turned out to be a documentary about the documentation of dying languages. As the film reminded the viewer--over and over--there are seven thousand languages, and languages go dormant--or lose their final speakers--at the present rate of 2 a week. The viewer is whisked along on an often amusing but thoroughly alarmist exposition of how an intrepid pair of linguists spend their professional life tracking down and recording these languages.
My final review of the movie is that it was worth my time. It belabored a few points, presented the linguists in a light that was less than flattering to them as skilled academics, and tried to make a cheap drama out of an otherwise fascinating topic. Nonetheless, the crap editing and attempts to make it sexier did not spoil the interest of the people and languages.
In the movie talk afterwards, I got to hear Myaamia spoken, which was rather cool, and I got to listen to the panel try to toe the line between supporting the cause and acknowledging the flaws of the movie, which was especially funny, since all threee panelists had worked with the linguists in the documentary.
I didn't hang around after the screening, mostly because I had consumed a fair amount of coffee before the film, a bottle of water during the film, and by the end of the somewhat protracted talk, and in the face of a long line, I decided I would be a happier man if I just hoofed it back to the library. I got there, saw some more of my classmates, stopped, chatted, then went looking for research materials before the library closed. New materials on hand, I left them in my trunk, and decided it should be a marvelous thing if I went to Starbucks. To Starbucks I went, I got a cappuccino, and it was good. Even in the snow, Downtown is a great little place to walk.
After that, I really had to get back and do homework, but the afternoon of unexpected freedom was nice. And yes, it might seem like a somewhat boring afternoon, but I genuinely enjoyed it.
And that was my lazy Sunday afternoon.
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