Author: Nate

Musing on English classes

A New Assignment: Pick Books You Like

JONESBORO, Ga. — For years Lorrie McNeill loved teaching “To Kill a Mockingbird,” the Harper Lee classic that many Americans regard as a literary rite of passage.

But last fall, for the first time in 15 years, Ms. McNeill, 42, did not assign “Mockingbird” — or any novel. Instead she turned over all the decisions about which books to read to the students in her seventh- and eighth-grade English classes at Jonesboro Middle School in this south Atlanta suburb.

My recollection of high school English class was long periods of slogging through (or reading the Cliff notes for) novels (and in some cases, plays) I had no interest in, with occasional moments of high interest in the a few with sufficient adventure or science fiction credibility to hold my interest. One of my favorite memories of my whole education was discovering Brave New World and plowing through it in a single evening – something I’ve never done with a whole novel assigned for class, before or since (even in the “Science and Science Fiction” multidisciplinary class I took in high college to fulfil my literature requirement.)

Huxley blew my mind; here was a far, far more evocative dystopia than 1984 – and much more frighteningly believeable as a child of the 1970s and 1980s, compared to Orwell’s vision of a “hard” police state. I had started 1984 on my own at some point in the previous year or two, but unlike Animal Farm, never finished it on my own (although it was one of the more enjoyable books we had to read for class, IIRC, a year later and a couple of years of maturity in between my first attempt and the latter one made a big difference.)

At some point I’ll need to dig into my files to refresh my memory of what I read from 8th grade on (anything from 7th will have been lost to old Commodore disks and handwriting.) Sort of scary, I suppose, that I still have a good bit from 8th grade on. Digital preservation, you’ve got to love it, and I can still read any of the files involved (although if any of them are in the old Wordstar format, that will take a little work.)

Ducks, they’re not just for Foster City

Late in getting the pictures up, but back around the end of May some ducks came to visit on my lawn, came by for a day or two, then disappeared. Ah well. One of the few things I miss about the old apartment complex is the ducks and their occasional noise.

Ducks on my lawn, trying to feed them.
Ducks on my lawn.

I’ve GOT to visit Estonia…

Kidding, although it does sound like an interesting place to visit for other reasons than the translation of “twelve months.”

In other news, I’ve been super-lax about updating this (even ignoring the 3+ weeks when there was no server running at all.) We’re finally sorta-kinda moved in. Some house-related posts coming up one of these

WTF? (“What the frak?”)

Saw the final episode. Interesting. A few really cool moments… although the big setpiece battle felt a little rushed, and a case, like Return of the King (something already mentioned on DBA) of the denoument being broken up into too many pieces. I didn’t mind for RoTK, given the source material and what they had to resolve, but for this one they spent a lot of time on things that weren’t that satisfying. The last “twist” was predictable, but the execution of it was surprisingly funny despite it.

All told? Good stuff and a relatively good ending to the series, but without the rewatchability of the first four seasons of Babylon 5.

My weird dietary habits

Things I don’t eat
1) Mushrooms or other “edible” fungi. Things that are that closely related to the gunk that grows on your feet are not food! (Yeast, used as a leavening or fermenting agent is fine. Marmite is probably out.)

2) Shellfish, worms, bugs, or other invertebrates. “Ewww, bugs!”

3) Most condiments
3a) Mayo or miracle whip is right out on anything.
3b) Non-honey mustard
3c) Most salad dressings. (Ranch or honey mustard is OK, as long as it’s not too thick and not mayo-based.)

4) Organ meats

5) Heads/claws/feet/hooves – and leaving those attached to otherwise yummy things makes them inedible until rectified.

6) Cuts where the bone-to-meat ratio is too high (ie, chicken wings, although good ribs are just low enough to qualify as food.)

7) Salmon, unless smoked.
7a) Any other fish, if prepared in a manner which leaves it “mushy.”

8 ) Sweet American cheese on a hamburger, unless it’s from a fast food place.

9) Diet sodas, except for Coke Zero.

10) Weird vegetables: artichokes, coliflower, eggplant, squash, pumpkin or anything else weird/gross looking or squash-like

11) Red onions.
11a) Other onions, if raw. (Raw non-red onions are OK on sandwiches and good on burgers, but are to be left on briefly for flavor and then removed before eating.)

12) Most non-wheat (whether whole or white) breads
12a) Regular “American” squishy loaves are really only good for toast or grilled cheese, too
12b) French-style loaves shouldn’t be squishy
12c) Whole-wheat bread shouldn’t taste sweetened.

13) Anything stir-fried

14) Coffee, or anything coffee flavored.

15) Anything except tea in hot black/green tea (although toasted rice is “tea” if it’s genmaicha)
15a) No sugar in iced tea unless there is a LOT of lemon, or it’s a sweetened milk tea
16b) No milk in tea except for the sweetened milk tea, ie from a boba place

16) Unsweatened “flavored” waters

17) Grapefruit or pomelo.

18) Un-pitted peaches, apricots or plums (although all three are yummy if pitted or if I’ve got a knife handy to do it myself.)

19) Solid tofu, or any tofu-based faux-meat. (Tofu or soy in things that are not faux-meat are fine if I can’t tell it’s there.)

(Previously posted on flyertalk OMNI, originally on Jun 18, 08; for those OMNI qualified, look for the “Your personal food rules” thread, which is particularly funny.)

An eventful weekend.

1) As of Friday, I was accepted for readmission at UC Santa Cruz, and will be going back to retake Algorithms and finish my MS this spring. W00t.

2) As of Saturday, we are officially under contract on a house. It’s here in San Mateo, really near work. Pictures are available but will not be posted here until we close, which will be on like March 2nd or something like that. Keep your fingers crossed that nothing gets screwed up on the financing.

On the down side, I was sick as a dog with a cold all weekend.

Meta-phishing.

Here’s a phishing email I received:

Important:
You’re getting this letter in connection with new directions issued by U.S. Treasury Department. The directions concern U.S. Federal Wire online payments.

On January 26, 2009 a large-scaled phishing attack started and has been still lasting. A great number of banks and credit unions is affected by this attack and quantity of illegal wire transfers has reached an extremely high level.

U.S. Treasury Department, Federal Reserve and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) in common worked out a complex of immediate actions for the highest possible reduction of fraudulent operations. We regret to inform you that definite restrictions will be applied to all Federal Wire transfers from February 6 till February 13.

Here you can get more detailed information regarding the affected banks and U.S. Treasury Department restrictions:
(URL Redacted, for obvious reasons)

Yes, it’s a phishing email pretending to be a warning about phishing. Good grief!

I gotta travel soon.

It’s been a while since the dollar has been this strong in places I’d like to visit (or visit again), which is weird given the economy, but whatever.

US$1.4 = 1 UK pound (just better, actually!)
US$1 = nearly 35 baht
US$1 = nearly 3.5 Argentine pesos

The Canadian and Australian dollars, and the Euro are fairly strong, and the Japanese yen is crazy strong – only like 89 to US$1 – so I’m glad I went there when I did. But yeah, it’s definitely time for another outside-the-US vacation/mileage run, and I hope the dollar will still be this strong in March or whenever I can actually take one.