Operators are Standing By

You know something's wrong in your life when an evening of Calculus homework feels as decadent as eating cake in the bath while listening to the Box of Funk.

Actually, you know a couple of things are probably wrong.

But here we have a list of Things I Hate About Phoneathon:

1. Talking on the phone
2. Calling people during dinner
3. The sense of my own mortality brought on by the knowledge that I will receive these phonecalls every single year until my sheet goes in the DECEASED file (yes, I do have one in my cubicle, just in case)
4. The alumna yesterday who went on a five minute rant about how she's never going to give money to Smith again because of the presence of transgendered students (and you want Smith to do what exactly about this, rude intolerant lady?)
5. My grade on my calc quiz today was much lower than usual because I am behind (or was until about 15 minutes ago)
   
6. Having to ask people for one thousand eight hundred and seventy five dollars
7. ... even people who have given $10 a year every year since 1957
8. I am going to miss most of the Washburn House Halloween party, an event I look forward to all year (but which tends to disturb my sangfroid so maybe it's for the best.)

However, there is one Thing I Love about Phoneathon:

1. Tonight is my night off.
   

Dance, Kurt, Dance!

I'm really proud of myself because I just finished a rather amusing computer science programming assignment using graphics. The user chooses an avatar for herself (either an apple, an orange, or a banana) and for the computer (either Nightcrawler, Magneto, or Spiderman). Then the avatars move around, toss a ball back and forth, and "dance." It's quite fabulous. They do a twitchy little dance that's basically just moving in a small square on a counted loop, and they toss the ball, and all and all I'm very pleased with it. This is even better than when I set up my conversation program to talk like Bertie Wooster.

Oh, when shall we ever be done growing up?

Crush crush crush

It has long been my theory that it is okay to have a crush on a professor to the extent that it encourages you to excell in the class. So for instance all the girls in my high school who had crushes on Malcolm (does this set include me? At this point it's too long ago to remember exactly) would have wanted to do really well in English so they could impress him. This is sometimes consious and sometimes not. My crush on Jim, for instance, has always been purely a professor crush, since he's 40 years older than I am and could be my grandfather and is other people's grandfather. It's the sort of crush that makes me want to do well in Set Theory and go to his office and talk about infinite games and that sort of thing. It bears no resemblance to the crushes I get on my peers.

My crush on my calculus professor, on the other hand, is a much more insidious, much less benign sort of crush. It's the sort that makes me babble incoherently when I go to his office. It's the sort that makes me want to giggle a lot. I feel like I'm thirteen. I think I'm going to drop the class and become a Women's Studies major. Or Computer Science. Some department where the professors are less dreamy.

Sniffle

I could be at the Iron Horse right now, seeing Stars with Spanish for Hitchhiking as the opening act- probably an amazing show. But I'm ill and exhausted and I had three hours of Phoneathon training so instead I'm in my pyjamas, having some tea, and going to bed early.

Received a box of apples from Uncle Bruce today, which pretty much made my day. Have to send a thankyou note tomorrow. I just had one and it was the best apple I've had in eons: crisp, sweet, not waxy.

Tomorrow I have Comp Sci and testing children. Thursdays are light days for me so I can coddle this cold a little bit and hopefully it won't linger. For now, I have Calculus to catch up on.

*hearts*

Letter in the New York Times by that paragon of virtues, Jim.

My Life According to Jay

Interesting chat with Jay today. Jay has a very specific vision for my future. I am going to go to the Peace Corps (this was virtually my only contribution but he's okay with it) and then graduate school. There are 9 schools he wants me to consider:

1. NYU
2. University of Pittsburgh
3. Indiana University
4. MIT
5. Berkeley
6. Stanford
7. Melbourne
8. Australian National University
9. University of Queensland

Note how the last three are in Australia. Jay loooves Australia. These 9 are, evidently, the best 9 schools for Logic in the whole, wide world, and if I don't get into one of them Jay doesn't want me to go to graduate school AT ALL. That's right, it's these or nothing. Applying anywhere else would basically just be a waste of everyone's time. My time for applying, his time for writing me a recommendation, everybody's time. So there's that.

Somewhat more cheerfully, Jay wants me to take something completely random and fun for my fourth class next fall. This is of course in addition to my thesis, German, and Chinese linguistics, but still. I don't know what I'm going to take, but I feel rather as though I've just been given a present.

I feel like I'm coming unglued, but it's okay, really. Things will be okay.

I'm a Human Head

I'm filling out an application for a U.S. Study Abroad insurance policy and one of the things they want to know is "Benificiary (Accidental Death and Dismemberment)."

Dismemberment. Eugh.

Any takers?

Children Suck at This: A Study On Language Acquisition

I'm getting some rather weird results from my Quantifier study. Results that are leading me to suspect that children simply have no idea what "Every" means. This could be really bad. It could also be really useful, but being who I am I'm inclined to believe it will be really bad. Today at lunch I suggested a title for my paper: Children Suck at This. It could be the first of a whole series of papers and lectures on Why Children Are Stupid. "My experiment also showed that the majority of children were completely unable to make me an omelette."

Seriously, the studies I've read on children and quantifiers do not even begin to explain the data I'm getting. Cappy says this might mean I could get published; I'm more inclined to believe it means I'm doing something terribly wrong.

The Man in the Ceiling

When I was in maybe fourth grade I read a book called The Man in the Ceiling, by Jules Feiffer. I only read it the one time and I've never seen another copy but I can honestly say it's one of the five books that changed my life the most. It reminds me a lot of some of Daniel Pinkwater's young adult novels, but it deals with things like artistic freedom and failure in ways you don't ever see in children's literature.

The other day I got a hankering to reread it so I ordered it online and it is every bit as good as I remembered. Feiffer's illustrations are marvelous, as you would expect if you've read The Phantom Tollbooth, and the ending is still so extraordinarily right. Read this book. Tell fourth-graders of your acquaintance to read this book. It's fantastic.

I'm going to China

Oh my God.

Smile, Dammit.

I'll be incommunicado for the next couple of days, in Holyoke building houses for the poor in case you're interested, and when I get back I don't want there to be any talk of the stupid thing I did yesterday and the irritating ramifications. I'm just going to grit my teeth and do my work and hum Holly Cole maniacally to myself as I walk down the street.



Smile, though your heart is breaking
Smile, even though it's aching
When there are clouds in the sky you'll get by
If you smile through your pain and sorrow
Smile, and maybe tomorrow
You'll find the sun come shining through for you

Light up your face with gladness
HIde every trace of sadness
Although a tear maybe ever so near
That's the time you must keep on trying
Smile, what's the use in crying
You'll find that life is still worthwhile
If you'll just smile

That's the time you must keep on trying
Smile, what's the use in crying
You'll find that life is still worthwhile
If you'll just smile

I've sold my soul to Phoneathon

I got a terrifying email today.
It contains the "tentative schedule" for Phoneathon, which is a part-time job calling alumni and asking for money. I signed up, on a lark, because I am Silas Marner. Now I'm kind of horrified.
I'm scheduled to work for 50 hours in three weeks. That's 16.666666666 hours a week. That's more than twice the hours of my actual job (7 hours a week).
Of course, I'd be a lot more appalled if that didn't come out to be $356.50, which will certainly be nice to have, but still.

I'll have to think of something really extravagent to buy with a portion of the money. Like, I don't know, 50 HOURS OF MY LIFE BACK.

In other news, I taught my first class today: a section of Logic 100 with about twenty students. We went over local & global properties of wffs, buffalo buffalo buffalo, shortcut, and rebuttals. I think it went okay although I was trembling like a leaf the whole time and Jay sat in the front row giving me looks. The looks said: "Don't explain it that way." "What are you talking about?" "Ask if they're clear." Afterwards, he told me (using words now): "You did a good job. You're going to make a good logic teacher some day. Actually, you're a really good logic teacher now. But you'll be even better someday."
Which is the nicest complement I've had all day.

An infinite stack of books!

Today I went to Jay's office to pick up some books he wants me to read in preparation for my thesis.

It's a lot of books. It's probably more than the assigned reading for all my other classes put together. I'm nervous about this.

But, on the bright side, I recently received my Class B Logician's License:




Yesterday a whole group of Washburnites tagged along with me to Quaker Meeting, which was pleasant, and afterwards there were pancakes for the 18-35 crowd. Then, that afternoon, I went to the Blessing of the Animals for St Francis' feast day. It was lovely. There were lots of dogs, a rat, some teeny tiny Siamese kittens, two ponies and a goat! I really wish my sisters could have been there because they would have enjoyed it. It was a lot of religion for one day but it was well worth it.