the whole pomo thingie

Remember when we were talking about the whole postmodern thingie? Well, Brian has once again posted something that makes me feel like an idiot...so go check out his take on postmodernism and religion and start a lively discussion.

help me plan

As I'm actually finished with my grading, I'm putting together my syllabus for next semester, and I'm trying (as I always do when I do these things) to focus all the course material to put my students on the right track....that is, assuming any of them read my syllabi and related course material to begin with

To this end, I am assembling two lists:

1. topics I never want to see (such as papers on abortion, the death penalty, and so forth)
   
2. phrases I never want to read (including "due to the fact that" and "according to Webster's Dictionary,")

and I would love y'all's suggestions. I will eventually post my final lists.

C'mon, everyone, do my work for me!

brief moments of lesser pain

After two marathon sessions of grading, where I stayed on campus untill 7:30 and just slogged endlessly through papers, I finished most of my obligations for Fall semester (I did three classes yesterday. Note to Meredith: HA!). Save a few stragglers, not to mention actually entering the grades into the U's system, I am done. And, not to take anything away from the generally nice group of students I had this year, it feels good. I stayed home and slept in today. Note to any BGers reading this: I am ready to drink, so call me.

The bitter part of this is that, with the impending labor situation, I am not really sure when I will actually start back up again...so each day when I leave campus, I have been taking a load of books home with me...assembling an office in exile, so to speak.

I now have a break where I have to plan two courses, one of which I've never taught and for which I still don't have a textbook. Thanks to Jen's hard work (you go, girl), I now have to write a paper for the Cultural Studies Association in DC this year. I've been reconsidering my exit from the job marked. I have a lead on a publication I need to pursue. I have a book proposal to revise, which has been sitting around too long. And Mr. Thunder and I still have an upcoming intellectual excursion into the Toledo nightlife underworld. So I need to be sure this holiday season is not a time of screwing around.

But I can now sleep. I am free from deadlines, at least for a while. I can not wear pants for days at a time. All in all, things are okay.

vocab help

What words would one use to describe the feeling you get when you find out the cookie you just bit into, which you thought was chocolate chip, was really oatmeal raisin? Suggestions, please!

aaannnddd.....inaction!

The grading marathon commences...pray for mojo.

vinyl memories

A friend of mine burned some of my lps over to cd last week, so I've been able to listen to some great songs I haven't heard in a long, long time...tuesday, on the way to campus, I was listening to Black Sabbath's Technical Ecstacy ("Dirty Women" is one of their best songs). What I was not prepared for was how crappy records can sound. Yes, the records had a few skips in them, but the level of hiss and noise was tremendous.

I still miss lps, but it's mostly for the cover art. I have become, it seems, a total cd-head. Now, if they could only get better packaging for the suckers...

okay, there's one good thing about Wal-Mart

To be perfectly fair to Wal-Mart, I do enjoy the fact that whenever I enter that store, I'm instantly one of the most attractive people in the place...a unique feeling, for sure.

mondays aren't just the first day of the week

So I drove to campus yesterday, ready for a fun day of students going over drafts, still panicking from the approaching (and possibly catastrophic) labor strife and difficulties and wondering when someone would give me some information and maybe a textbook for the Scientific Report Writing class I'm teaching next fall. I decide to stop and get some gas at the 7-11 by campus. What could possibly go wrong?

First off, I've been listening to Two Cow Garage, so I have "Smell of Blood" stuck in my head, which is good. I'm able to fill up my tank for under $30, which is also good. Then I go to start up my car, and....nothing, save errant clicking.

I try two or three times, in the vain hope that the automotive gods (who is the patron saint of Oldsmobiles anyway?) will be kind, but no dice. Then I have to push the car away from the pumps and into a parking space...which would be easy if I drove a nice compact, but no, it's a late eighties Delta 88, and I have to push uphill...so I'm out of breath, sore, and feeling very much like a weenie loser...more so than usual.

I then powerwalk to class (only 3 minutes late) and sit through draft days and then, at my office, through a few hours of conferences. I call AAA and go back to my car, wait an hour and a half, and the guy comes to give me a jumpstart...only he can't start the car. Rather, the battery starts smoking. He tells me the battery must be dead. He was an observant guy. He can, however, sell me a new battery for $95...but that is installed. I politely decline.

I call my wonderful wife, and she agrees to bring me my tools after she gets off work, so I can buy and replace a new battery that night. So I return to my office to warm up, drink some tea, and play some poker (I play online at UltimateBet in case anyone wants to join me). I lose tremendously...every time I get trips, someone else flops a straight. Thank the heavens I'm still in the free games.

My lovely wife arrives...I'm very glad to see her...and then she realizes that she forgot my tools. She does have some in the car, though, so we go to (shudder) Wal-Mart to get a new battery...yes, I know they're evil incarnate, but they do sell cheap car batteries, and right now, my finances outweigh my ethics.

At Wal-Mart, we encounter people walking on the wrong side of the isle, elderly in those electric carts directly in front of us who suddenly and mysteriously shift into reverse, parents who push their kids in front of our cart, idiots who don't look where they're going, and other travesties of man and corporation. Wal-Mart is very close to what I expect Hell to resemble. As you get closer to Christmas shopping season and the Wal-Mart crowd increases, you move down to a more perilous circle of hell...you see, Dante was wrong in the details. We did run into one of those plastic animatronic mounted deer heads that sang Elvis' "Suspicious Minds," and that was the highlight of our visit.

So we got my battery and got out of there. While I was putting the battery into the trunk, I checked Lori's tool box...and all the tools I'd need had mysteriously been removed. So I go back into Wal-Mart to look for one of those all in one tool thingies...the really handy guys reading this will know what I'm talking about...and they don't have any. So I pick up a plastic tube of 5 tools for the home for $5 dollars and what ends up being the worst beef jerky product I've ever tasted.

We drive back to the car, and needless to say, the cheap tools are useless. I can't get anything to budge, and I'm getting weary and frustrated, so I break down and call AAA back for a tow to a Bowling Green service station. The whole time, I have the Drive-By Truckers song "Outfit" stuck in my head, particularly the line "don't ever say your car is broke." I feel like a loser, out of touch, like less of a man. I can't even change the stupid battery in my car. I'm going to have to turn in all my macho clothing and forget the secret "real man" handshake.

Lori runs to McDonalds, and we are just finishing our value meals when the tow truck guy pulls up. He's nice, but he looks a little too much like a psychotic Amway salesman I know. He informs me that he could just tow my car to his shop, because his mechanic is still there, and they could install the new battery there. The only thing is, if AAA asks, I have to tell them that they took it to BG. I agree, but somewhere deep inside me, the "watch out for scam-o-la" light clicks on.

We get to his shop. There's a whole bunch of used cars littering the lot, and not once but several times, various people working there try to sell me a used Crown Victoria. Every single person there is smoking Marlboros, even when working on my car. One gentleman complains about the cold, and another responds: "If you think you're cold now, just wait untill I piss on your let and it freezes." While they're installing the battery, someone else tries to sell me another Oldsmobile.

They get the battery in, and...it's dead. The car won't turn over. After speculating that I might need a new starter or alternator ("which we can put in for you tomorrow"), they jump the car, and it turns out that the brand-new Wal-Mart battery was dead on the shelf. They let the car run, test the battery, test the alternator, and try four times to convince me that I need to let them perform a tune-up ("you can drop off the car on your way to work tomorrow").

I ask them how much for their trouble, and they tell me $30...only $5 less than the battery cost me. I tell them I've got $20 cash or we'll have to go to credit card. Luckily, they don't have a machine, so I'm off the hook for the cheaper price. I have a feeling that I've inspired them to upgrade their technology to better fleece stranded motorists...they realize they can get more for their services if they take plastic. They then give me two sets of directions home, one hideously complex, one very far out of the way.

Yes, I eventually get home, and the car does work now. I didn't get to hit the grocery store, put up my window insulation, get a much-needed hair cut, cook my famous jambalaya, or do anything remotely fun. Instead, I stared blankly at the television for a while, thanked my wife a few times for being so nice and not abandoning me, and then went to bed, where I dreamed I was street-racing Santa Claus, and I disconnected his sleigh from his reindeer, causing Santa to tumble from the sky...

My car made it to work just fine this morning...so things are looking up, but I do realize it's still early.

kick me, I'm postmodern

The Vancouver Rape Relief and Women's Shelter has published a very wierd article which claims in part:

The "postmodern" supposition that sex is nothing more than a "constructed social identity" threatens the very concept of "woman" while leaving intact the oppression of women. Little wonder that the sophistry of "deconstruction" - primarily developed and promulgated by white men such as Michael Foucault - has found such favor in our sexist society. But whenever off our backs publishes a two-page paean to "deconstruction" which cites Colin Powell and Jerry Springer as its only "authorities" ("Identity Politics and Progress", off our backs, April 1998) it is time for a reality check in a world in which women are routinely discriminated against and murdered because they are women. "Deconstruction" may very well eliminate the perception of such injustice by mutilating the bodies beyond all recognition but the injustice itself will continue unabated.

Now, I want to come out and state, for the sake of the record, that I am not disagreeing with the ultimate goals of this organization. Hell, I've never even heard of the organization before following the link the other day. And yes, for the record, the opression of women and violence against them is horrible, icky, and nasty, so my goals are basically aligned with theirs.

Now, my point: this group's observation quoted above shows a complete lack of thought or attempts to understand postmodernism. It is unnuanced, stereotypical, and knee-jerk reactionary. In other words, they are looking for a scapegoat to distract from their own lack of intellectual engagement.

When I was in a grad theory class, the major beef that some of the students seemed to have with postmodernism (other than the fact that many of its proponents could not write anything comprehendable) was that by deconstructing the essential existence of categories, it was saying that there were no categories at all. Furthermore, by deconstructing these categories, postmodern (they argued) rendered political action impossible. The only possible recourse, then, was to ditch this way of thinking and stick with our modernist politics, thank you very much.

This reminds me of the die-hard Christians who seem to think that Atheism is nothing more than a license to act sinful...that if one doesn't believe in God, then one just does whatever they please regardless of the harm to others. This view also reminds me of those who see anarchists as a bunch of people who think we should throw away the government, rule ourselves, live for ourselves, and to hell with everyone else.

For some reason, we mock the simplistic view that one has to be evangelical Christian to have morals, and we mock the view that one has to believe fully either in our government or in chaos. These are simplistic readings which show a lack of critical engagement, we (rightfully) say.

Why, then, is it okay to kick postmodernism using the same mindset?

Now, I am not the most fervent postmodernist out there, but it does make some good points. And while I am quite capable of slinging around the theory to support my argument, this ain't that kind of blog. But we cannot simply say "postmodernism says this," because the amount of things postmodernism does say is huge...because there are multiple varieties of postmodernism (the avant-garde engagement of Jameson, the weird literary formalism of Hassan, the "everything is illusory" world of Baudrillard). But what most people mean when they use the term "postmodernism" is really just a stereotype of people playing a meaningless intellectual game. What I would like to do is suggest that we have to look at these things with an open mind towards the true complexities of intellectual existence before we dismiss them with stereotypes.

Something I go over with my freshmen is the "social construction of reality" does indeed say that the categories under which we operate are constructed socially. What it means to be "a woman" or "a black" or "a working-class" is contextual, constructed, often entirely so. However, that your identity as a Jew or Latino is socially constructed is relatively unimportant if you are being beaten up with an axe-handle as the result of that identity. The students, being relatively reasoning individuals, get this.

Just because something is socially constructed and thus not really real does not mean that construction is not very real in terms of effects. You can deny the reality of an image, still be upset by and work to overcome its consequences, and be entirely logically and morally consistent. Postmodernism is more than capable of sustaining political action because (unless you are reading something written by an idiot or are yourself unbendingly literal) it does not say that since large elements of our lives are constructed, we should treat everything like a dream.

Furthermore, if you deny postmodernism, you are also denying the denial (if you follow me) of manichean logic and "essential" truths...because these are the things against which any good postmodernist should rally...they are the "shared feature" of most varieties of postmodernism (if such a thing can be said to exist).

To my mind, the question is less "how can you be postmodernist and politically active" than it is "how can you not be a political postmodernist?"

Elsewhere, I have railed against the annoying tendency of pro-choice activists to fall into a "you are either entirely with us or you are entirely against us" intellectual binary (this was, incidentally, in response to my being told that I wasn't allowed to have an opinion on abortion unless I could gestate a fetus). This binary, I argued, plays into the "women are reproduction machines" argument which is part of the system that has been oppressing women in the first place. It, unfortunately, is a mindset similar to that of many postmodern-hating lefties out there.

And yes, it's not a suprise that there are varieties of feminist thought out there that buy into the construction of gender roles as essential and natural (which seems to be an undercurrent in the Center's article)...but it's still kind of stupifying that people can call themselves political activists when, rather than wanting to change the system, they really just want to bend it to their purposes. This isn't activism, it's opportunism.

Short term change is a matter of getting ahead. Long term change is a matter of fundamentally altering the system. To do the latter, you have to question the thoughts, ideas, and assumptions at the basis of that system. This is what postmodernism does, if you let it by fully exploring it and considering the consequences.

conference 06?

I just got word that I have been turned down for one of my conferences for next year. While I am bummed that I won't be going to Vancouver, my bank account is slightly less precarious as the result of this rejection. Now I just have to hope that my other conference gets accepted. Jen, who do we bribe?

The thing that's kind of weird about this one is the paper I was planning to present (not written right now, of course) has a lot of potential...which means I'm probably going to have to actually write it, which means lots of work even though I don't have a home for it yet. For someone who's having trouble scheduling all the writing tasks I already need to accomplish as it is, this is slightly annoying.

I once read a sci-fi story about a human mutant strain that, for the people born with it, eliminated the need to sleep (sound familiar to anyone? I can't remember when/where I saw this). Those born with this mutation were generally very smart, could get twice as much done as everyone else...so naturally, the rest of society hated them and ostracised them. Personally, I wish I could not have to sleep...I could actually get caught up! I could get to all that scholarship which is sitting in my brain's "to do" file...which means that when I hit the job market again, I would actually have improved my chances.

Does anyone know how I can avoid sleep and get caught up..other than coffee, which is nice, but it would send me to the restroom too often if taken in significant quantities?

cold and weary

Everyone told me years ago that when I moved up north, I'd get to experience the change of seasons. They lie in fundamental ways.

Yesterday, it suddenly got cold. There's a very evocative scene in Bone where one minute it's fall, and the next minute, a solid sheet of snow, two foot thick, falls from the sky in one giant layer...and after that event, it is definitely, unequivocally winter. That's what yesterday felt like. It went from mid 50 degree, jean jacket weather to 28 degree high, quilted jacket and scarf time.

I thought that I felt it in my bones, but upon reflection, that's just the weariness. Sixteen credit hours of composition. Two hour blocks of "Mike as Professor" performance, and two of those back to back. Marathon grading sessions, extending over to the weekends. I'm tired. I see thesis sentences gone awry in my sleep. I think in terms of five paragraph essays.

For the first time, I did one of the worst things for a teacher to do...I changed my teaching (paper grading specifically) not for the benefit of the students but for my own purposes. I'm not sure if I can keep giving it my all, do what's best for the students, and still get everything done....but I'm still trying, in spite of the impending feeling of impossibility.

Maybe I just need sleep, rest, time away. The winter fell quickly...I just hope the break comes in as equally a swift fashion.

simmeringhatred's take on Armistice day

simmeringhatred has a very sobering entry on the end of The Great War. Another example of something I need to think about a whole lot more.

mental jolts on saturdays

Warren Ellis has a brilliant character named Spider Jerusalem who mentions feeling the crackle of intelligence enhancers and caffiene in his head.

I have the latter and am wishing for the former. I am sitting in my office grading papers. I am thinking that Madagascar's fine coffee makes up for their extraordinarily gross roaches.

I am also thinking that I need to keep a ten year old friend from Scotland in my office to keep me company through such ordeals.

quantify your politics!

Where exactly does your political compass point? Go to Political Compass and then take the test...and please post your results here...I wanna know what my readership is really like.

My political compass:

Economic Left/Right: -6.88

Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -6.00

the unbearable trauma of childhood memories.

When I was last at the grocery store, I was wandering down the cereal isle and decided to buy some Weetabix. As I am the type of person I am, this has led me into an incredible period of moroseness.

For those of you who don't know, Weetabix are these wheat cake cereal things that come from England. I used to eat them as a child, when we would visit my Grandfather and Nana in Cross Keys (a little farming town outside of King's Lynn). I had good memories.

While they still taste fine, they are texturally weird. They are the biggest absorbers of milk I have ever seen--and when they get milk, they revert to a mush state, so you can't just put them in a bowl of milk like with normal cereal. No, you have to put it in the bowl, pour a carefully measured amount of milk around it, and you have to have just enough milk so that it will absorb halfway up the cereal cake, thus balancing mushiness and sawdust textures. It makes eating breakfast much more of a ritual than it should be, and is frankly a bit of a pain in the ass.

Maybe the existance of such a product reveals some deep, cultural insight about the British character; maybe Eoin can lend some insight. Frankly, however, it just sort of bums me out.

employment update

Yesterday, I came to the decision (after discussion with the spousal unit) that I was not going to do the job market thing this year. Earlier, I deleted a bunch of job announcement e-mails. I have to say, it feels good knowing that, for the first time since 2003, I will not be under tight, irrational scrutiny...except for that from my wife...or my students...or my boss...or my parents...or my friends...or the people who hate me for some reason unknown to me.

I still hold great hopes to get a tenure-track position in academia, and I feel it is even a realistic possibility. I am not giving up on my career. Things will still go forward...just not this year.

There are a lot of reasons for this decision. I am in a job that's going fairly well, but it is not a place I intend to stay forever...and they know this. I like my classes, I like my co-workers, I like my boss. However, I am teaching Composition, which is not my ideal topic...I'm a Culture Studies guy after all. I'm doing a 4/4, but the fall semester is 16 long credit hours...that's a lot of time to perform in front of a class. And whenever I have an assignment due, I get 80 student papers to grade. I'll probably be here untill 8 tonight in a marathon effort to get caught up.

So, if it is so much work and not in my field, why am I abandoning the search for a good job?

I am, frankly, tired. Before becoming an instructor, I adjuncted for two years. Last fall, I taught 18 credit hours at three colleges in four disciplines...one of which I'd only had one class in, another one that I'd never taken a class. I taught three different courses over Spring in addition to a part time job. This is all paying dues, yes, but paying dues frankly sucks...and it takes a lot out of you.

I haven't had time to be an active academic writer since I finished my Ph.D. I have a whole new theoretical direction I want to pursue. I have a book revision plan which, did it not reside in my computer, would have gathered a significant amount of dust. I have articles I want to write. And if I was to get back on the job market, I know all these things would never come back into my rotation.

So I'm taking a year off. UT is a nice place to be, for a while, and I'd like to just be a working adult for a little while, without the ego-crushing pressure of the job market.

I will be back. I will be ready. I'll have scholarship and hopefully a book contract with me when I do return, and I'm really hoping I can land a job that I want to work at for the rest of my life.

Long-term stability would be great...just let me experience a tiny period of respite before the hunt for it continues.

that skynyrd comp I was talking about

title: Radio Free Skynyrd

Workin' for MCA
The Ballad of Curtis Loew
Things Goin' On
Four Walls of Raiford
Poison Whiskey
Tuesday's Gone
Cry for the Bad Man
I Know A Little
You Got That Right
Am I Losin'
Made in the Shade
One More Time
Every Mother's Son
Don't Ask Me No Questions
I Never Dreamed
Roll Gypsy Roll
Call Me the Breeze

more thoughts on Earl

My good friend Jen brought up, in her comments on my recent entry entertainment thoughts, the question "don't you find the Earl show to be classist? I haven't figured this out yet - but the representation of poor white Americans is somewhat disturbing..."

I have to say, this gives me pause...but I haven't found anything in the show so far that either strays out of my personal experience or shoves a view that is outside of possible expectation. The main thing of which I'm reminded is the reaction from my Northern friends (who, aside from having pretty ugly versions of barbecue, are generally okay) to Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? They kept asking me if, as a southerner, I took offense to the southern stereotypes. I remain puzzled by that one, and, after further review, I have to admit to a certain amount of puzzlement over the Earl show comment...and, of course, this brings me to a whole deeper issue, that of context.

My father grew up in what could most likely generously be called working class situations. Although I have no real details, I always got the impression that his mother's first marriage (to his father) was not particularly happy. I know for a fact that it was not particularly long, and at a time when marriages generally didn't break up and single motherhood was not really easy, she divorced him, so that says something. Her second marriage was happy but short, as the man had health problems. Somewhere in the non-married times, my grandmother sent my father to live with one of my great aunts and uncles. When he did live with Grandmother, I know she had to work several jobs.

(I suppose for fairness, I should include something about my Mom's upbringing...after all, she was the daughter of a small town British farmer. However, my mother, most likely as the result of her schooling, seemed to acquire a certain desire for that sophistication and civilized life that is uniquely British...and also a covert elevation of upperclass values as to that which all should aspire. So this is obviously important, but I just can't figure out how to articulate it just yet...)

When I was growing up, my dad was in the Air Force for most of the time (through 7th grade), so the perks of military life (living in exotic lands, on-base housing) kind of ameliorated any real level of class consiousness awareness (racial as well, but that's a different post). When he retired and we moved to Florida, he ran into ageism and couldn't get the kind of job for which he was clearly qualified. So, for a while, he worked at first as a security guard and then at a propane delivery company before eventually getting his Post Office job. But his retirement pay, and the career military mindset, kept us, for the most part, shielded from the spectre of working class culture.

School, however, could not. Friends could not. The working class neighborhoods where some friends lived, where fellow musicians lived, let us know that we were in a vastly different place than an Air Force base. When I started working at Little Caesar's Pizza (see the pizza of my dreams), that also exposed me to a whole new realm, class-wise, of society of which I had not seen.

In many ways, the Air Force base lifestyle was better. Identity seemed to be not as much of a factor as outside our enclave. We were all military, even if black, from a rich background, from another country. There were jerks, yes, but they were mostly just jerks because of their personality. Maybe I was just too young and naive to see it, but it seemed a zone where the only thing by which people would judge you was your rank, and you could always change that. But was this realistic? Reproduceable?

Civilian life was different. Upon entering high school, I found the whole status-as-related-to-what-kind-of-car-you-drive thing hilarious (of course, I drove beaters, but still...). Upon working in different neighborhoods and seeing how class could largely determine how much of a jerk you were, I started to formulate ideas. Upon gaining friends from a wide range of classes (some had doctors parents, some had pawn shop owner parents, some had grunt work parents), I started to question how each person's sense of and definition of reality was determined by this social class.

Somehow, I tended to gravitate towards the working class people. One friend told me and my brother, upon getting his own trailer, that his fondest desire was to live somewhere where he could open his door, go out to the woods, and burn something. I had some female friends in high school who assumed they would be working full time right out of high school, not due to any "women's lib" notion but to the reality that they would never be able to have a family without two incomes. I worked with people just turning 16 who knew they would have to punch a timeclock until they turned 65 at least. I can picture these people playing beer can tag or stealing roadside barriers for the recycling money.

Conclusions? The working class had better music; where would you rather go, Skynyrd or Yanni? They had better food, as a rule, with barbecue being example one...Tony Bourdain says that the best cuisines, including what is now thought of as Classical French, came about due to the necessity to use the nasty bits of animals left over from the rich.

They also had a distinctly different outlook on life. I don't really think they believed that they could drastically improve their situation. They didn't have the time or opportunities for the sustained education which might lift them...could you really gamble away four years of earning potential, especially if you were chancing large debt and still having the uncertainty of a better career? In many respects, they saw the power structure for what it was (crooked, biased, self-serving), but they didn't have the luxury of even considering reform.

Their main goal was surviving, and maybe getting an extra pocket of luxury by any means. They had long abandoned the illusion of some idyllic fifties utopia. Their quest for survival lead to different pleasures, different aspirations. I've kind of suspected that it was a post-apocalyptic life for most, and that sort of situation breeds that different outlook which must appear foriegn to those who have never experienced it.

So, that's how I see My Name is Earl. Moreover (and definitely more importantly), I think I'm willing to see that whenever identity is the subject. When one views society from a middle or upper class perspective, it gets easy to forget the true impact that life can have on someone. If you are in a post-apocalyptic world, your logic is formed by your basic realities, not the basic realities of outside observers, no matter how open-minded they are. And yes, you may act weird, even after having the eureka moment of enlightenment, be it a windfall, karma, or anything else...but it's only weird from a perspective informed by a different rule of logic.

Although my parents did their best to shield me from that poor/working class life (are they really that different?), I got enough exposure to understand and adopt the thought process. Maybe it's the thing that makes me stand out in department meetings or in seminars (I learned long ago that it never really was the hair or the fashion choices that made me different). It's what accounts for my unconventional approach to handling students, my unconventional approach to my scholarship, and my unconventional approach to my musings (which surely you've noticed by now...).

Sometimes, that weirdness is a better approach to life. Or maybe there are more factors I haven't considered: how, for instance, is all of the above informed by the fact that we were White? Southern? Living in the eighties and beyond?

So, is this all a classist outlook? My gut's telling me no, but it is definitely an issue for further pondering. And maybe, it's not the depiction of poor white culture in the show that is the problem, but the accuracy of that depiction is what should give us pause.

more links

Apparently, I'm now a part of the bloggosphere. We have more links to the right. Frightening. I'm happy to have everyone, glad people seem to like reading this, but I am a little puzzled. I didn't think there were that many people who both knew me and liked me....who would've figured? Be on the watch for the occasional pressure-filled freakout, now that there's an audience.

So, welcome simmeringhatred, Mrs. Davis, and Cassandra. Glad you're here. Be nice to me...

entertainment thoughts--television

(continuing my series, which last looked at current music in the Mike rotation...)

Over the summer, I decided to celebrate landing a full time job by treating myself and my lovely wife to TiVo. I have absolutely no regrets. TiVo is simply the greatest invention in the history of entertainment. Television now works for me. It will record shows automatically. I never have to delay my extraordinarily busy social calendar because the one decent show is on. My fans and admirers can have access to me at any time, and I can still be entertained...which is how it should be, isn't it?

(Okay, the only regret is that I really need DirecTV to go with it, then you might as well get HBO so you can record films, then why not get a DVD recorder, so you can archive your more important shows? Then you need to buy blanks, then you need to schedule time to burn those DVDs...you get the idea)

There's still not a whole lot on television, but now we can get everything there is that is worthwhile. I've become a regular consumer of shows other than sports or brainless entertainment (ie, cooking shows). So, my insights:

CSI:
The original only. I've written about this show before , but I've gained a new appreciation. All the characters on the show are wierdos or freaks, which is nice to see. It took me a while to get into the whole art/avante garde look of heavy blood and grossness presented as a part of normal life. And while the story lines are 90% cheddar still, they do pull out the occasional doozy...the murder in the S/M parlor episode or the delusional/insane former model turned homeless episodes were astounding, as were the segments which dealt with Grissom's hearing loss. I've become pretty fascinated with the Grissom character, and it gets good whenever they either acknowledge or play with his quirks. Plus last season's Tarantino-directed finale was probably CSI's and maybe even Tarantino's best work.

House
Also written very briefly about this one. I had fears that they would take a pretty decent first season (with occasional brilliant episodes, such as the Emmy-winning "Three Stories") and turn the whole thing into a soap opera. The episodes of season two which have aired to this point have been nothing short of astonishing. Their race episode was one of the more astute takes on ethnicity from a major network. The episode about the girl with cancer is playing a huge role in a proposed paper entitled "My Brain is My Superpower"...more details about that one if it gets accepted.

My Name is Earl
The only new show I can get behind 100%. For those of you unfamiliar, the concept is that Earl (Jason Lee) is a small-time crook who, after winning the lottery and immediately getting hit by a car, decides that his life sucks. He sees Carson Daly on tv in the hospital talking about karma and decides to give it a try: he is going to make up for everything bad he's ever done in his life.

The show is witty and crisp, especially in terms of dialog. Jason Lee is amazing, and the writers never talk down either to the characters or to the audience. Everybody has multiple dimensions, which is a rarity in modern entertainment. Yes, Earl is not the brightest guy, but he is wildly sympathetic...as is everyone else in the program. Stereotypes so far have been exploded as absurdist constructions. Plus, the show has had killer soundtracks...its use of Skynyrd caused me to go to iTunes and make my own compilation, and they actually played Montrose's "Rock Candy," one of the most underrated 70 rock songs.

American Chopper
Male bonding as aggression. Yelling as a sign of love. Complex family dynamics. Senseless destruction. Newly made celebrities who still appear to be true to their roots, class-wise and locale-wise.

Good Eats

Food meets science. Engaging the theory of cooking, rather than recipes or catch-phrase spouting, is what sets this show apart from other more boring cooking shows. Instead of learning about a dish, you learn about how the world of the kitchen operates. It's more an operational manual of cooking theory than anything else. Plus, the recurring characters (W, the incarcerated Cocoa Carl, Paul) and electric popular culture spoofs make this a fun show even if you care not a bit for cooking.

No Reservations
Tony Bourdain is a great personality...he's loud, abrasive, crude...yet surprisingly touching and sentimental. Unlike A Cook's Tour, this show gives him the time to stretch out that he has in his books. My only regret is that there are not enough new episodes.