Wit & Whim

Germany does not boast the most impressive array of renaissance artists, but "Praying Hands" by Albrecht Durer is a piece of such simple and deep pathos that it is almost certainly more likely to be recognized by the average protestant than the works of arguably--very arguably--greater Italian counter-parts like Ghiberti, Tintoretto, or Masaccio. The hands pictured by Durer have seen many years. They are not straight and smooth, but course, rough, and battered by a lifetime of hard and often fruitless work. It is the position of these hands that brought this painting to the forefront of my mind today. This afternoon my dear mother informed me of a minor war of words being waged on Facebook, which appears to have been caused by someone misunderstanding, or failing to reflect on, why some fold their hands in this position. When I was younger, I learned to fold my hands this way in imitation of the Acolytes at my church. The young learn action by imitating those they admire, and...

Have you ever had diversity training? Thank goodness I had it with someone fun, because with the materials at hand, it might well have been stultifying. Green. Yellow. Red. Green Light: If you were having a high tea with your Grandma, your Great-Grandma, a posse of nuns, the Queen, and a team of ACLU lawyers, then you will probably be making "Green" conversation. Yellow Light: Anything that might be misconstrued or make anyone uncomfortable. The vast majority of social interaction falls in this category, just so you know. (The examples for this during training had all the trainees saying that the people in the scenario were being oversensitive.) Red Light: Hurtful things and other un-nice things. Zero tolerance: One offense equals three strikes. Examples sounded like they were excerpts from conversations recorded earlier in the day on the sales floor. The yellow one was bugging the snot out of me. The literature said that, even if 99% of recipients would not be offended by t...

There I was, halfway into writing the blogpost that would be my Pulitzer, when the shewoof begins reading over my shoulder, causing me to spaz and accidentally close it. There are very few things that make me spaz so badly as having some nosy interloper gawking at my unfinished work. File that topic away for later.... The majority of all drafts that I write never make it to publication, and this is indubitably for the better. The editor can't stand pompous tripe, and suggests that I find some other rag to publish it. I am really very lucky; this attention to detail has doubtless spared me many face-palm moments (whose the palm? Methinks there would be no shortage of candidates). Blogging, especially for someone of my relative youth and inexperience, strikes one (yes, one is me) as an inherently egotistical practice. The egotism consists in my assumption that my opinions are worth positing--that all must, naturally, benefit from the wisdom of what I have to say. Simple scenes from ...

It is such an easy thing to allow a blog to fall into neglect. I have the most time to write when things are slow on the home front, but I bore myself with the banal material and chafe at my own self-satisfied pomposity. And when something worthy of chronicling does come up, well, there never seems to be much time to spare for blogging. No, that's not true. I could easily find time to blog. I find plenty of time to putz around. Since the end of this last semester I have been lucky enough to remain busy with work, be that selling suits or demolition on the new house. Penney's continues to provide for moderately enjoyable work at a decent wage. There are of course aggravations, some from customers, others from colleagues, and still more from bosses who think that the fact that I do the extra work the others won't means that they should demand even more from me. But these are all petty annoyances, and are usually easily dealt with. The Job remains pleasant, the pay decent, and...

Last night I completed a staggering feat. I started working on a research paper in the afternoon, and turned it in early the next morning. Granted, my subject knowledge was already exceedingly strong, and I already knew the sources from which I wanted to draw my support, but it was still a grim battle with fatigue to churn out such a staggering work of astute comparative analysis. One never really realizes how much church there is during holy week, until the rest of one's time has been greedily gobbled by work and homework. Only in retrospect can I see the crunch, I did not even think of it at the time, and I was so concerned with other matters, that the paper sort of snuck up on me. It does not make matters easier that Bartky does not believe in giving a month's notice, as he realizes the class will procrastinate the first to weeks anyway. So he elects to procrastinate for us, and gives us the paper without any extra procrastination time. The result is that today I am tired. F...

I joined battle with half a classroom today. I had one ally to my name, but as it was Scott, who is TA for two professors, I felt like I was in good company. The topic that we were engaging was Nuremburg, and whether or not it was a case of victor's justice, or if it was indeed a fair and just trial. Scott and I both pointed out a massive inconsistency in the trial. The Leaders of Soviet Russia were as guilty, if not more guilty, of every charge brought against the Nazi leadership by the London Charter than were the Nazis. If you look at the death tolls, the simple fact is that Stalin was more deadly, and he did not confine himself to dissidents, Jews, and "defective" people. The Soviets went after every cultural and ethnic anomaly; the cossacks--or anyone else with Tatar, Turk, or Alan blood--were also subject to genocide. Why were Russian judges sitting to convict Nazis of these atrocities? Nuremburg was victor's justice; it was selective justice. We dropped the at...

I don't believe I can possibly impress upon the reader the extent of my love for rain. It is not just the delight of having the myriad droning, bleating, sounds of the world covered over in the gentle wash and echo of the rain. Nor is it the sight of the tastelessly and scantily clad masses scurrying for cover as they shiver. Nor is it even the pungent and oddly cheering wormsmell and greenness that blot out all the unpleasant smells, which the constant passing of thirteen-thousand people and their jalopies leaves behind. One would not have the whole of it, even if one were to add to the first three pleasures, the delight which comes from the markedly pleasant sensation of rain on the face...I need hardly get started on the difference wrought by the release of days of pressure built up in the joints. I do not much care for cloudy days, but I love a rainy day; thunderstorms are even better. I never think more clearly than when I am walking, and the rain only serves to aid this effec...