Monday is Daddy's Turn

Eleanor has been napping for over two hours. I know (and appreciate) this because, as of today, I take care of Eleanor on Mondays. Sarah took a part time job at Portrait Innovations, one of those photo places you see in shopping centers. All of the stores nationwide are closed Monday, so all calls get routed to their corporate center in Charlotte. Sarah, and a bunch of other people, spend 12 hours on Mondays answering those phone calls. They pay well and it gets Sarah out of the house one day per week so she can do something else.

This leaves me at home with Eleanor. This should be no problem for the summer, as my summer teaching is all on-line. It should work out okay for the fall as well, as I have no Monday classes. Beyond that, we will see.

I am excited (and, honestly, a little nervous) about being the house-husband one full day per week. Today I got up at my normal "go to work" time (5:50), showered, shaved, and started getting things ready in the kitchen while Sarah woke up and showered. Eleanor woke up shortly after I went into the kitchen, so I got her up, changed her, and started to get her dressed. We usually just put her in a little sleeper for the morning, then really get her dressed after her morning nap. I made Sarah a lunch and got us some breakfast ready. Sarah went off to work and Eleanor and I played around a bit until she got tired. Now, she's napping.

Eleanor has been pretty sick all weekend, with a fever -- which got pretty high at times -- a runny nose, and, last night, one vomiting episode. That (her first) scared the crap out of Sarah and I, but there has been no more vomiting even as the fever has stuck around. This morning's long nap is undoubtedly a product of Eleanor's feeling poorly and a rough night last night for everyone.

I am trying to be both be productive on my Mondays and enjoy the time with Eleanor. The trick for both, I think, will be modest expectations on the productive front. If I can get a few things completed, either while Eleanor is napping or with her "help", I will feel good about not being at work and can, thus, enjoy my time with my daughter. Today, for example, I was able to review 20 proposals for a conference. And that was in her normal nap time span. I hope to get some laundry done as well, and maybe a few other things around the house. If Eleanor is feeling up to it, we will run a few errands after lunch. If not, no worries.

Since Sarah won't get home until 9:00 or so, I'll end up feeding Eleanor all three meals (although Sarah did help with breakfast), bathing her and putting her to bed. It sounds a little daunting, but Sarah does that stuff all the time, so this gives me a sense of what her week is like.

This setup has a lot of potential to be positive for all three of us, so I hope it works out. Most of all, I hope Eleanor feels better soon.

Lost 5/15 -- There's No Place Like Home pt 1

One of the consequences of a strike-shortened season are these fast paced episodes, where lots of things happen. You don't get as much character development or even mystery deepening, but the plot advances fairly rapidly.

If you want to consider this episode the first part of the finale, then I was kinda right with my prediction that this season would end with the six getting off the island. I thought the final scene would be the Oceanic 6 coming down the ramp of the cargo plane, but that's probably not dramatic or cliffhanger-y enough to end a season on. Perhaps next week we will see the six leaving in some other way as the Island disappears.

The central issue we are now faced with is how to the 6 get together and get off the Island. Jack is with Sawyer in the jungle. Hurley is with Locke at the Orchid. Sun and Aaron are on the freighter, and Sayid and Kate are now captured by the Others. Is everyone going to end up in the same place, with some giant confrontation, where some decide to leave and others stay? That would be very similar to the beginning of this season, where Locke and Jack fight it out to hide or meet the helicopter. My gut tells me it's more accidental. Desmond and Jin would not decide to stay. Nor is it clear Ben or Locke would want Hurley (or anyone else) to leave.

One thing I am liking about the temporally displaced flashforwards, in addition to the fact that the technique itself is likely a clue to a big Island secret, is that we often see consequences before causes, actions before reasons. In the flashfoward from last night, we see the early stages of Hurley's "madness" and the first sign that the Island hasn't really let the 6 go, with the numbers in the Camaro. We see the reason Jack didn't want to see Aaron after Kate's trial -- Aaron is the visible reminder of his father's infidelity. We also see Sayid's brief reunion with Nadia and know that her death pushed him into Ben's service.

We still need to learn how, exactly, the 6 get off the Island. But other questions remain as well:

• What are the Others up to? Why were they are grubby looking? Are they hanging out at The Temple (wherever that is)?
• Who was Ben signaling with the mirror? What happened to that person? (Nice quip about the crackers, btw).
  
• What's under The Orchid? How (or does) Locke move the Island?

Who knows how many of these will get answered in two weeks? Just enough, I suppose.

Who is a "qualified" social foundations teacher?

One of my (seemingly infinite) recent research interests is social foundations as a discipline -- what is it and what does it do? One of the points frequently made is that there are non-foundations faculty teaching foundations courses. That's generally thought of as bad. No one wants non-chemistry faculty teaching chemistry courses. One of the issues here, though, is the field has trouble defining itself, so it's difficult to determine who counts as a "qualified" social foundations faculty member and what counts as a social foundations class. If you have a Ph.D. in social foundations (that's what it says on my degree, anyway) and teach a course called "Social Foundations of Education" then that would count. But what about someone who has a degree in Reading with a research focus on reading and critical pedagogy and does other work on race/class/gender? If they teach a SoFo course, does that count? What if that same professor does not teach a social foundations course (perhaps one is not offered at her institution), yet teaches a reading course with a SoFo/critical pedagogy focus?

It could be that if we define SoFo broadly, then we are not doing as bad as we think we are. It also could be that if we define it that broadly, then it ceases to have meaning as a category.

Sniffly Monday

My allergies have been KILLING me lately. All the medicine I take only helps a little. It seems I have tried everything over the counter. I may have to go back to the doctor for some help.

Despite the allergies, we had a great weekend. Friday I drove down to Columbia for John's graduation from law school. Due to a threat of rain, they held it in the Koger Center instead of on The Horseshoe, but it was still nice. I then drove back to Rock Hill, ate lunch, picked up Sarah, then we drove back to Columbia for the party. We dropped E off at a friends who has two young children for her first slumber party. She did well by all accounts, which let Sarah and I stay at the party until pretty late. We drove back to Rock Hill, arriving home at 1:15 AM! Just like the old days!

Saturday morning we collected Eleanor and said farewell to Cupps. The one bright hang out spot in Rock Hill closed, which disappoints us to no end. We then went for an Eleanor photo shoot at Glencarin Gardens, then to the Winthrop Softball game -- they ended up winning their conference tournament.

Sunday was church and a day of taking care of Sarah. I cooked some steaks, using a peppercorn sauce recipe I found on the Accidental Hedonist. It turned out fairly well, given that BiLo was out off almost every ingredient when I dropped by there to pick up some groceries. That's what I get for needing exotic spices like garlic.

We also watched two movies over the weekend. American Gangster and No County for Old Men. Both were good, the later was excellent -- it deserved every award it received. I will do my best to write up an entry about the film later.

Lost 5/8 -- Cabin Fever

First, we get a Ben episode. Then, a Jack episode. Now, a Locke episode. This gives us the Island's Big Three and illustrates a passing of the torch. As Ben escalates his war with Whidmore, Locke becomes the Islands caretaker.

Honestly, I thought this episode was a little flat. Perhaps it was because John's reemergence as the Island's man of faith was accomplished by simply demonstrating that he was the chosen one all along, not through any significant action on his or the Island's part. There were also parts of the episode that confused me, and not in a "holy crap!" way. More like in a "I thought we had settled this" kind of way.

That confusion was actually caused by Abbadon's appearance to Locke in the hospital. Prior to this, his appearances had been harbingers of sorts. He shows up to question Hurley in the hospital, asking if "they are still alive". So maybe he works for Whidmore. This view is given further support when we learn he recruits Naomi and the others for the freighter. But now we see him "recruiting" Locke, telling him to head to Australia for a walkabout. This is after Richard has shown up to Locke at two different points in his life (looking the same in the 1950's as in the present), trying to recruit him, presumably for the Island.

Of course, there is no guarantee that Abbadon and Richard are both on the same side. Richard could be trying to recruit Locke for the Island, while Abbadon works for Whidmore. Both know Locke is special and are trying to get him to join their side. So maybe I just no-prized that little puzzle. Locke's status is certainly unclear, as shown by Richard's reaction when 10-year-old Locke picks the knife. (Nice bit in the principal's office too, with the "You Can't Tell Me What I Can't Do!" line again). Although, come to think of it, that's not a very fatalist sort of attitude. Sounds more like a Jack line.

Then there was the mayhem on the freighter, which gives us lots of questions:

• What's that thing strapped to Keamy's arm? It can't be good, whatever it is.
• What's the secondary protocol? I didn't notice it at first, but that symbol on the protocol was the same symbol Ben had on his jacket when he showed up in the desert. Presumably, it's some place on the Island we haven't seen yet.
• What happens to Desmond? He isn't one of the Six, yet he swears never to go back to the Island.
• Nice how Keamy's gun misfired when he tried to kill Michael. The Island won't let it happen.
• What's up with Claire? Just chillin' in the cabin, leaving her baby in the woods.

• I am interested in Jack's father's connection to the Island. It would be fun to go back and look at Jack's earlier flashbacks to see if we could pick up more info.

That's all I got for now. Like I said, a good episode, but not one of my favorites.

Of co

Geek Blasphemy: On Lovecraft

Three weeks ago, at my Wednesday night D&D game at Above Board Games, I saw a new book in their RPG section. It looked neat, so I flipped through it while I waited for our game to begin. It was a new RPG based on the Gumshoe system called Trail of Cthulhu. I wanted some new gaming material and, suitable inspired as always by NC Game Day, I picked it up last week.

In the interim, I plucked a compilation of Lovecraft stories off the shelf and started reading them again, beginning at the back with "The Shadow Out of Time."

Here's the blasphemy: I don't think Lovecraft writes that well.

Yes, I said it, and I know that probably looses me all sorts of geek points. I know Cthulhu's Librarian is getting in his car right now to drive down here and kick my ass. Or, perhaps more appropriately, drive me to the brink of madness by exposing me to cyclopean tenebrous horrors which Man Was Not Meant to Know.

Those cyclopean and tenebrous horrors are the problem. To be specific, the problem is the fact that the horrors are cyclopean and tenebrous. Expressions are curious. Exchanges are loathsome. Adjectives and adverbs are everywhere. That's the horror. Let's look at a passage at random from "The Shadow Out of Time:"

"The far horizon was always steamy and indistinct, but I could see the great jungles of unknown tree ferns, Calamites, Lepidodendro, and Sigillaria lay outside the city, their fantastic frondage waving mockingly in the shifting vapors." (362)

First of all, Lovecraft tells us those ferns are "unknown" but then tells us what they are. Then there are all those adjectives. The horizon is "far," "steamy," and "indistinct." The jungles are "great." The frondage is "fantastic."(Also note that my online spellcheck does not think "frondage" is a word). It waves "mockingly" (yes, I know that's an adverb). The vapors are "shifting," less we forget that the horizon is steamy and indistinct. That's seven adjectives and one adverb in one sentence. Are all of those things necessary?

My sense is people like that sort of language in Lovecraft. It's somewhat archaic. It may compliment his themes. Fundamentally, I think Lovecraft is critiquing the modernist project. Science and progress mean nothing in a world where humans are a mote of dust in a hostile universe. He wants to both show the hostility of that universe and remind us of some pre-modernist sensibilities. His language is supposed to be a vehicle for that, I guess. I think his language, however, gets in the way of the narrative more than occasionally. Instead of wondering what is going on with the narrator and his madness, we are distracted by all this damn verbage.

The way to avoid this criticism would be to claim that Lovecraft's stories are not really about narrative. That is, they are not plot driven and, instead, about atmosphere. That's why he needs all those adjectives, because he's painting us a (iridescent, abyssal) picture. But the stories are clearly plot driven. We have a big "reveal" at the end of "The Shadow Out of Time," when the protagonist (here's the spoiler) finds a book he has written in an archaeological site that is thousands of years old! That's a *gasp* moment, even as the reader knows it's going to happen. Lovecraft's story structure is wonderful, giving us flashbacks and flashforwards, playing with our sense of time, telegraphing the state of the protagonist to the reader which allows us to know where the story is headed even as the protagonist denies it to himself. Thus, our sympathy for the poor bastard when he makes his realization. Clearly, the narrative is important. But all those descriptors get in the way.

Lest you think I am a Lovecraft hater, I'll share a great sentence, coming at the end of the story. The reader knows what's coming. The narrator knows the reader knows what's coming (again, a nice bit of structure), so he wants to give the reader the insight he's gained through his literal and figurative descent into darkness:

"If that abyss and what it held were real, then there is no hope. Then, all too truly, there lies upon this world of man a mocking and incredible shadow out of time."

That's good stuff. It's too bad we have to wade through monstrous towers of unknown and shadowy frondage that wave above the distant misty vague horizon to get there.

Nazi's Invade!! From the Moon!!

This looks pretty cool. Hope it turns out well on what looks to be a small budget.

Webiste: Iron Sky