Baby Marx

I don't really know if I can retrace my steps to explain how I stumbled up on this, but I'm slightly intrigued and slightly baffled.  It's no Strindberg and Helium, that's for sure.  But it makes for an interesting microwave experiment...maybe not better than exploding peeps during Easter, but you decide:

The puppets don't resonate with me like they do in Avenue Q, but if you like this, it's an ongoing series through the Walker Art Museum. 

MCM and The Phallus

So, in all honesty, as much as I like to think that I have always been "in the know," I had absolutely no idea at this time last year that the phallus was so important in studying literature.  There is a difference between having the phallus and being the phallus and there is even a lesbian phallus.  I'm still trying to get my mind out of the gutter and into the abstract to understand it all, but the point of this posting is that I've been thinking about the phallus more than usual...and more theoretically than usual because of preparation for comps. 

Yes, it is totally relevant to the MCM, believe it or not.  Imagine my surprise when I went to check out the Marine Corps Marathon course map today to think about my many friends who will be running this year and to ponder whether or not I will be able to make it out to the course or not in the stupor of post-comprehensive examdum...and I all I could see were several phalluses on the map indicating the route.  You can see for yourself what I'm talking about:
http://www.marinemarathon.com/MCM_Runner_Info/Course_Maps_908.htm

In some ways, I think this gives me my answer.  My head might very well explode if I go out there because of the time-space compression of theoretical knowledge, geography, the exam itself, and the fact that a number of required texts for the comps trope on the theme of maps.  (Which, by the way, includes the book entitled Maps by Nuruddin Farah, and I highly recommend it to all of you)

Got Comps?

So, I have the comprehensive exams for the my master's program this coming Saturday. It's not nearly as catchy as the "Got Milk?" campaign, probably because it feels and sounds more like an infection that I "have" or that I "got."

My study buddies and I were just laughing about how everything we are asked to do lately ends with something like "I can't, I've got comps" or "Can I have an extension? I've got comps." Or some empathetic souls in the Literature department may preemptively say something like "You've got comps, right?" or polling the class "Whose got comps?" There is no antibiotic for it, unfortunately. It just has to run its course.

Luckily, that course will be run from 9 am to 4 pm this Saturday. I'm feeling mildly prepared and mildly stressed. In general, I feel really prepared for the test in terms of content. What I'm nervous about is the fact that I am a really scatter-brained writer. I jump from one thing to the next, and I don't actually write a thesis statement until I'm nearly finished with the paper. So, this exam has two questions with three hours to respond to each one. I hope I have the stamina and energy to write a productive and cohesive answer!

If any of you have forgotten your grad school days, this might jog your memory:

We've Finally Made it to Men-Ups

I grew up with Bop magazine....

And then, there was Big Bopper.....

And now, more than 20 years later (Mark it!), we have Men Ups.  I am way way impressed:

"Unhelpful in the Extreme"

The title is in quotes because it was said by someone else. It is my title because the comment was directed at me.  Yeah.  Thank you graduate school for breaking me down and reminding me to be humble.

So, what kind of writing receives a comment that marks it as "unhelpful in the extreme?"  

Lists.  I've been working SO HARD on my statement of purpose for months now, and I finally got the courage to send it out to folks for review over the weekend.  I got written feedback from one prof who said "this is everything and the kitchens sink" (not in a good way) and commented that I'm "all over the place." No surprise there, being all over the place is kind of my modus operandi.  Although, of course, I do realize that this is not the impression that my statement should give about me.  I am actually supposed to work really hard to hide that in my statement of purpose.  (Once they know me, they will come to love that about me, but they can't know it too early)

Then, came this last blow of how the listings of my interests and research projects are "unhelpful in the extreme."  I also watched my prof laugh while reading it...ouch.  But it made the process feel more human today, and actually, getting such harsh feedback spurred me to defend myself and my lists!  The meeting turned out great because I was forced to articulate the core of my interests and put together a narrative and then, she basically helped me to write it all out.  Helpful in the extreme.

I wish I could convey what exactly it feels like to be writing a statement of purpose for a PhD program...AND having professors read it.  I mean, I know that many of you have probably done some form of this before.  But, somehow, I really do feel like doing it for Literature programs makes the stakes that much higher because we are in the business of narrative!  The statement has to be academic, eloquent, concise, focused, intelligent, interesting, and all in direct phrases and ACTIVE VOICE.  Damn that active voice. 

Essentially, when I share my statement with my profs or talk about it with them, I feel the exact same way that I feel when I wake up from a dream in which I was naked in public.  So, the question is, where in the hell can I find some clothes?! 

Immigration Day

I've been slightly bitter today because I had been planning to have today off of work not realizing that AU does not celebrate Columbus Day. Now, I have no love for Columbus. So, it actually makes me happy in that AU is not celebrating. But I was also looking forward to a day off...and quite frankly, I am more invested in being selfish about my time right now than I am about righting the wrongs of history. 

 

And then, I read this article that confirmed my selfishness and how very American it is of me to be selfish. I like this idea of celebrating Immigration Day today. How very appropriate to be working myself on a day that celebrates the immigrants who come to the U.S. not only to perform jobs that no one else wants to do, which reduces the complexity of immigration to a simply monetary exchange, but also the immigrants who are here to pursue love and vocational work, like academic and scientific pursuits that they are more qualified than Americans to perform. 

Of course, immigration day celebrates my family's heritage since my great grandfather came over in 1907.

Irony

Ironically, I was just complaining last night about deer and the potential for an accident.  Well, tonight I had an actual accident with an animal.  A party animal.

The whole scene seemed like it was staged.  I was buzzed.  Before I left my friend said "be safe, you've had a few drinks."  I blew off the comment and said "don't worry, I'm riding on the sidewalk." 

Well, the sidewalk is a real obstacle course for bikers.  Pedestrians don't understand that bikers can ride on the sidewalk.  So, there is a lot of hostility built into a bike ride along the sidewalk rather than the road.  See, I had to ride on the sidewalk because I planned really poorly for the day, in general, and I didn't have my bike lights with me by the time I was heading home after 10 pm. 

So, I was doing just fine, ringing my bell incessantly and slowing down for pedestrians, trying to maneuver the crowds.  Until, drunk asshole #1 shows up right in front of Benetton on Connecticut Ave.  He was doing some kind of performance for the girls he was with, and I was ringing my bell and doing all I could to alert him to my presence.  And then, it happened.  We had a collision.  I thought the idiot would move.  But he didn't.  And I ran right into him.  My handle bars lodged right into his ribs.  I had to jump off of the bike. 

It was really the most anti-climactic moment ever.  He yelled "oh, yeah." And I yelled back, "ohhhhh, yeahhhhhh."  And then, his girlfriend huffed.  And then, I huffed.  Then, it was all over.  I got back on my bike.  And I headed home.  I really had no idea what had actually just happened, but I wasn't about to look back.

The other thing I realized in this moment was the serious level of uncoolness that I embody.  I was wearing my helmet - the helmet that I use everyday and that everyday fits my head just perfectly.  Well, tonight, it was as if all of the work on PhD applications shrank my brain and as a result, my entire head.  My helmet, which is supposed to protect me, was my biggest enemy during this duel with the drunk idiot on the sidewalk.  I was yelling at him as if I were a professional biker and he was a professional idiot.  And all the while, my helmet wasn't actually on my head, and the strap was choking me, but I was trying not to let on to those facts.The wind forced my helmet to fall behind my head, so it looked like I was wearing a helmet scarf and having some kind of sado-masochistic moment of pain with my head-protector.  It was just awful.  I felt extremely self-righteous on the sidewalk.  

And as I panted up the steep hill from Dupont Circle to Adams Morgan, I realized that although in my mind, I did everything right in that situation...perhaps to the outside eye I seemed a bit crazy.
 
Sadly true story. The End.

Oh Deer!

We have FINALLY had consecutive days without rain, which means beautiful weather for biking!  I had an unusual encounter last night and again tonight with fearless deer in the stretch of Mass Ave between AU and the Cathedral. The deer are on the sidewalk, very near the road, hanging out, and not looking out for bikers. 

There is a lot I am still trying to learn about biking...like how I just finally learned this week how to inflate my own tires!  But dealing with deer while on the bike is both awesome and terrifying.  I had no idea how to manage the fact that there was an entire family that I couldn't just swerve around...there was one on the sidewalk, one on the right side of the sidewalk and one further ahead on the left side.  My first thought was something like "deer in headlights...surprise...frozen...unpredictable."  I had no idea how to alert the deer and to prevent one of them from bolting right in front of me.  I started blinking my light and ringing my bell, and the deer didn't even look up!  I guess that's what happens when you graze every night along a busy street.  Then, the one on my left ran across the street and actually just kept running.

Now I'm feeling a bit bad about how I handled the situation.  Did I scare the little bugger away unnecessarily?  Or was I right to ring all of the alarm bells and lights? 

One of the roads I ride home on displays your speed, and I am usually going about 27 mph downhill, so my guess is that I was going about 27 near the deer and started braking hard once I noticed them.  I'm not sure what kind of damage that would do in a collision with a deer, but it seems like potential for something bad.  I turned to Google for advice, and found out that Matt Lauer dislocated his shoulder in a bicycle accident with a dog a few years ago.  So, apparently it happens....

I wasn't concerned about this -- frankly, I hadn't even considered the possibility of danger -- until a yappy little dog actually jumped up near my peddles as I was riding down Connecticut Ave and tried to latch onto my leg a few weeks ago.  FREAKY!