My article on gaming and dating is in here!
PS. It’s Bleach, not Bleck.
Summer Issue of Bleech Magazine
Beating The System
Apparently, if you are an English teacher, people will come to your school and give you free books. (these people are called “representatives from various publishing companies” and not “people who really like Meg”) They also bring in cookies and fruit and coffee, in case I need to be bribed to come look at books. It’s meant to encourage bigger book orders for next semester, but I beat the system! I don’t have a job next semester!
We’re On First Names With The Insurance Company
This morning, Stick and I woke up to the sound of someone banging on our across-the-hall neighbors’ door. At least, we assumed it was their door, since we don’t have too many friends who make unannounced Sunday-morning visits.
It was actually the police. Late last night, someone hit our parked car (which is kind of unfair because it’s so new that the title only arrived yesterday). The drivers’ side door is a little concave, and when our car got hit, it hit the car parked next to it. Oh, and our neighbor’s car has a Meg’s-bumper-sized dent.
The officer was really nice to me, which I totally wasn’t expecting. They think the driver who hit the car was drunk, which explains the late-night crash and why they wouldn’t report it. I’m kind of hoping the person who hit the car will come and admit it when they’re sober (and only have the insurance hassle, not the drunk-driving charge), but Stick says that’s not likely.
But that’s ok. If I had friends who decided to come visit that early in the morning, then I’d really have a problem.
Variable Authors
I picked up Variable Star by Robert A Heinlein and Spider Robinson at the Jones Library yesterday. I usually hate collaborative novels, and collaborative sci-fi is usually the worst of the worst. Someone has a good idea, and someone else ghostwrites, sorry, co-writes, books four through twelve. I was even less likely to pick it up when I realized that Heinlein had died with the story unfinished, and Robinson had finished it… a collaborative novel that one of the authors might not even like?
I was dead wrong. Variable Star is typical Heinlein because it’s in a creative and clever ficton, with a developed main character surrounded by two-dimensional walk-ons. Robinson turns those secondary characters into an ensemble cast. Robinson needs Heinlein’s world-building; Robinson writes snappy dialogue between believable people, but ultimately his best books are about sitting in a bar. He also tones down the overt sexism that keeps me from being a real Heinlein afficionado.
Actually, I should say that this story is by Heinlein, Robinson and a ghost. Someone who had the book out before me was kind enough to correct H/R’s grammar mistakes.
I wonder if it’s ok to write in library books if it’s a public service to the next reader.
Posted in Books, Western Mass
Tagged Books, Robert A Heinlein, sci-fi, sci-fi Variable Star, Spider Robinson
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Semester Review
Much better class today. I told my students not to bother taking out their books, which put everyone in a good mood. I’d copied some worksheets from other books, so we could review the semester without boring everyone.
It was such a confidence booster! I wish I’d done other review days, it was so good to remind my students how much they’ve learned. I wish I’d kept their first papers to hand back now… they would be amazed at themselves.
We have a state exam in a few weeks, but since I won’t be here next semester, I won’t be rewarded or penalized based on their scores. I want my class to pass because it will bring them confidence in their English. But they tell me they successfully returned a defective item, talked to the superintendent, applied for a better job, got a better job, etc., and that’s much more valuable than a test.
Expendability
Sometimes my ESL lessons don’t go every well, and when that happens, they fail spectacularly. My freewrite today was a journal entry about one day in childhood, which I thought would lead neatly into a review of irregular past tense (my students get -ed verbs, but have trouble with was, had, ate, slept, got, etc.) Instead, it lead to really horrific stories about starvation, abandonment and refugee camps.
After class, my department head told me that there’s definitely no work for me this fall. I saw the writing on the wall a while back; my contract is only for a semester, and the department is losing some funding next semester. Stick and I are most likely moving this August, anyway. But it still sucked to have my expendability pointed out.
Spellcheck says “expendability” isn’t a word, but I’m an English teacher, and I say it is.
English-Language China Bloggers
Humanaught posted the other day on the lack of ladies on English-language China blogs. I think it has something to do with the lack of female expats in China.
I read the adventures of Anna Zhan in Taiwan. (I would say that’s my favorite blog on mt girls-in-China list but it’s a list of one) China Dirt is also female-written, but it’s more of a general rant about ex-pat men and pushy dates.
Even with the ones Humanaught recommends, it’s not quite enough to make a Gorgeous Ladies Of The China Blogosphere calendar.
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged bloggers, China, China blog, China Blogs, expats, General, Humanaught, other blogs
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Portuguese Igloos
I gave my students a writing warm-up exercise today. A lot of my students come straight from work, or from picking up their kids, etc. and I thought it would make a good transition into English class. And it rewards those who showed up on time by giving them extra time to complete the assignment without being unduly harsh on those rushing in a few minutes late. And it’s theoretically a silent activity, which means students don’t feel comfortable greeting their friends, which in turn means I don’t have to give the Glare of Doom. It was a brilliant plan in every way.
The assignment was this:
Imagine you are sent to live in an igloo for the rest of your life. What five things would you bring with you? Assume that you have enough food, water and warm clothing.
Apparently my ESL students didn’t grow up with “I is for Igloo” in their alphabet books. They all asked me what that means, and after I described an ice house, pointed to the Arctic Circle on the world map, and drew a weird little igloo on the board, they finally understood.
“It’s the same in Portuguese,” one of my students told me, “But we didn’t think you wanted us to live in the snow.”
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5b D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
From boingboing:
Last night, Digg.com underwent a user rebellion. Digg removed many posts — and terminated the accounts of some of its users — for posting a 16-digit hexadecimal number that is used to lock up HD-DVD movies. The number — a “processing key” — was discovered (Seriously, how does one stumble on to something like that? Was he just punching random numbers in?) by Doom9 message-board poster muslix64, who was frustrated by his inability to play his lawfully purchased HD-DVD movies because of failure in the anti-copying system.
The AACS Licensing Authority, which controls the anti-copying technology underlying HD-DVD, sent out hundreds of legal threats to sites that had posted the key, including Digg. It appears that Digg took a pro-active stance and began to seek out new examples of the key and delete them immediately, instead of waiting for notice from the AACS-LA. It’s likely that their lawyers advised them to take this course of action, since the penalties for posting “circumvention devices” can be stiff.
Does this mean the end of Digg? The beginning of cheap Chinese-style DVDs in paper covers? Or simply a new ironic t-shirt to replace Aqua Teen Hunger Force Is The Bomb?
Posted in New York City
Tagged chinese, Chinese life, Digg, e3, movies, New York City, random, tech
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Yeah, But Did They Call Him a N00b?
Mexico City, Mexico, World of Warcraft player Bronco Carson reported to local police on Saturday that 3 men broke into his home and beat his arms with clubs and smashed his computer. It was supposedly in retaliation for Carson stalking and repeatedly killing one of the attackers wife’s character during computer video game play.
Carson admitted to police that he had been “making it hard for her to get far in the game.” He said that after repeated online threats from the woman, she sent her husband and friends over to his house to “take care of him.” from Destructoid.com
No word on whether the victim or the attackers were Barrens chatters.
