There was a drunk in the men’s room stall...

and he was singing in a low voice, “Ninety-six bottles of beer on the wall…” slurring rather. Not knowing how long he’d been on his throne, I couldn’t tell if he’d just recently begun or couldn’t, in his condition, get through the nineties.
His singing disturbed my concentration and dried up my stream. There were other things on my mind that might have the same effect, to be sure. I knew with the surgery I was soon to face, I shouldn’t even be in a bar, but then, I had no one waiting at home to provide consolation, and at least here, at the Dew Drop, there were lights and music, however dim and off-key. And Happy Hour was not to be taken lightly.
When the drunk stopped counting bottles and a thud sounding like a falling body followed, I thought to check if he was still seated upright but felt I had not enough self-constructed consolation to share.

posthumous, nature, depth, and plumb

Did he really write so seriously and reach the depth of feeling for which he has been credited? Was he a poseur? Another Proust wannabe, or Fitzgerald plumbing for the reasons behind a Gatsby-like obsession; going for the posthumous ble ribbon? He was sensitive to the vicissitudes of the hard scrabble life as well as to that of privilege, but it was not in his nature to be consistent, certainly not for the length of a novel.
I believe faithful Tess had a hand in all his most acclaimed work and were it not for her contributions, we would not be sitting here talking about him. What does Carveresque mean anyway—that one has a tendency to cut away all the meat?

drinking, atheism, blue, and stony

Atheism doesn’t leave much time for drinking problems, financial worries, feeling blue when God doesn’t answer your prayers—there’s just so much not to believe in. To be sure, you will still be able to manufacture whatever stressful situations you need to get you through the stony silence of a blue sky that contains no heaven. The pointing finger that has missed you on the radar has found everyone who has the inclination to be led. Turn your head away and close your ears. Your business is your own. Time is not money if you treat it as a spendthrift.

strange, secondary, distinguished, and program

The primary stage of the program was where you were separated from your peers to be observed by experts in the field. They would note whether you excelled at simple tasks and were therefore worthy of more of their time and theorizing or were flat out incompetent and could be left among the normal group. If you did, somehow, impress beyond the ordinary and became part of their further research. The secondary phase was distinguished by severe trauma over trying to succeed at something for which most were ill-prepared, leaving you ecstatic if you achieved the set goals but feeling strange and inadequate were you to detect the merest sign of a scowl on the faces of the judges.
They never lie.
They are never complacent.

telepathy, family, balance, and calm

Jackson’s family was first in all matters. Through a sort of telepathy, each would know when one or another member was in need of help, be it financial or support of a more spiritual nature. An equanimity settled over the big house, and all could be accomplished with a calm other clans could only wish for. Mama said they were in balance due to their poise and upbringing. Papa claimed it was their birthright, as they were born with superior genes. Jackson only hoped his next girlfriend would be more understanding of his family’s quirks. He would like to marry and father children of his own one day.

HoW 04

HoW 4: Cape Charles 2013

I had bought new swim trunks to go to California the week before, and so within the same week I wore them in the Pacific and in the Atlantic. This was the HoW at which Nicole and I met face to face, and the one at which I spent the least amount of time, having to return early for a school conference.
 

The Portfolio Development Process

In the second lesson of her course, Dr Barrett discusses and supplements through various resources her concept of the two faces of electronic portfolios wherein she asks is it a workspace for students to process their work throughout the semester; is it a showcase, that is, a product to be built perhaps at the end to be assessed and graded, or is it both? It is, and there are three development levels evident in its implementation. During its process stage it is a “case” for storage or a digital archive, and there is a suggestion that no work, or even the attempts made toward producing assignments should be lost. The electronic portfolio can provide the workspace where everything is saved toward the goal of achieving best examples. It is a reflective journal, which may take the form of a blog, so students look over their various attempts and remark on what they have learned at each stage of their development, and of course, it is a presentation in the traditional sense of how we perceive what a portfolio is, and this may be displayed on a structured website, being that this is the electronic age, where we have so much technology available, many young people are adept at handling same, and there is no longer any need to archive and transport stacks of paper documents as examples of their abilities and achievements. In fact, today there exists the possibility of carrying around representations of ourselves in our pockets on cell phones, small tablets, and the like.
One of the facets of teaching in the modern classroom that heretofore has seemed an insurmountable problem has been the overuse of personal gadgets, which until now have “gotten in the way” of teaching, if an instructor sees his or her job only in the traditional way of, say, spouting grammar rules and expecting students to listen attentively, learn and remember, and then be assessed in some standardized way. This just isn’t possible anymore. The technology is here to stay, and with Fulanita checking with friends about an assignment due in the next hour’s class, or the weekend’s activities, or worse, playing some hand/eye coordination game that ostensibly has nothing to do with the task of the moment, it is frustrating to the teacher who sees it as a distraction. What if, however, the lesson were conducted through the said gadget, and the student were motivated by the idea that every task being done was becoming part of her personal portfolio?
One of the ways, among many possibilities, that students can express themselves, in a mode they often feel motivated to do, is through the telling of stories. These give them the opportunity to write about personal issues, emotions, and problems they are having difficulties in resolving through non-creative channels. I have been assigning writing tasks for several years, with and without formulae and/or templates, but mostly as work to be done outside class. These have always been meant to become a part of students’ portfolios, and have been uploaded to a social networking blog. Unfortunately, without guidance, that is about where I have left them. In recent semesters, students have been instructed to produce presentation portfolios, using Powerpoint, of which, it is hoped, they maintain a copy along with what they present for a grade, but I can see now this is only the end product half of the concept, and there has been little motivation to put an enthusiastic effort into these presentations. Most do not see this as something they may have use for later in life, and thus are doing the work merely to obtain a grade. I feel the onus is on me as the instructor to motivate students to produce permanent records of their learning for purposes they may not yet see. I hope I am up to the task, and that I come out of the course equipped to be more effective at my job.

Teachers' Day

First day of Michael D. Brown's Blog, specifically for school-related stuff and language learning material.

The Meaning of 2012

The Meaning of 2012

Flashback: Soundless Wind Chime

Celebrating Dia del los Muertos

and
Álvaro’s cumpleaños

Lost at Issuu

Open publication

HoW 03-1340

god, hair, leadership, sympathy, and butter

“OMG! Your hair, what happened to it?”
He rubbed his gleaming cranium and said, “I decided to take it all off for the summer. You like?”
“No. I don’t like. You look like a buttered bean. What did you do, polish it?”
“Most women think bald-headed men are sexy and, and I thought it would go over well at work.” Now he was looking for sympathy.
Obviously he hadn’t heard the women in Human Resources referring to him as if he were a god incarnate, but if truth be told, their admiration was based on how he managed to maintain that wavy head of brown hair at sixty-four. It certainly was not based on his knobby nose, and you know what they say about noses…No, it was definitely his do, which she thought, at this moment, definitely did not.
Her first thought, he being next in line for the supervisor’s job, was how to retract the bean remark. She always spoke before thinking, but she was good at diplomacy and felt maybe now she herself had a better chance at the position.

action, husband, warn, row, and toe

He was doing it again, using his tongue for what he called his Scandinavian Move. How to warn him that were he to continue she would be turned off so much she would rather stop and turn on the TV?
Her husband, after his five-week sex therapy-cum-education course, had brought home new moves and actions guaranteed to revive their dormant sex life; as if that were all it took.
He had dutifully learned the Soft Toe Pull, the Venice Row, and this Norwegian thing with his overactive tongue. If she had wanted her nipples massaged to the point of rawness, she could get Mauro to do that, and the dog had more personality than Edgar did, anyway.
That was the one thing her husband could never learn at sex school—how to engage a partner through a winning personality.
“Are you finished yet?” she asked, and found that did the trick. He glanced up from his current activity with the crestfallen look that put the blame where it always seemed to fall these days.
She tried to remember where they had left the remote, but only took note of eager Mauro chewing on his toy.

reason, compare, nice, permanent, and companion

-- There is no reason to compare this moment with anything we’ve done before, unless like your mother, you’re so tradition bound you can’t let the good times go.
-- So you admit those were good and these are…
-- I’m not admitting anything. I’m asking you.
-- Why can’t you be nice?
-- Like…?
-- Like what?
-- Like your dad for one.
-- My dad was my mother’s companion and not like a father to me. I can’t see there’s anything I might have inherited from him which would put me in good standing, nor do I feel living in the past is, as you say…
-- There you go again. You’re on a permanent roll, aren’t you? I’m going to take a nap. I’ll see you later.