"rockstar scholar" | monday | october 10, 2005 | 10:05 pm

LL I WANT TO DO IS SLEEP. And I think I am going to do just that pretty soon. But, the hour is still relatively sane. I have actually finished up a whole bunch of work, packed up my school bag, and am just lounging till it's time to head to bed. (Hopefully, the peace and quiet of the evening continues well into the night, the week beyond.)

It's been a heck of a while since I last wrote about anything. I'm not even sure I know how to condense it all into something sensible. The bottom line is that life has been pretty darn busy. School has got me keeping pretty regular hours, teaching a new course means I have to always be extra prepared, and trying to hang out with people has me stretched pretty thin. I have always played about as hard as I work. And the harder I work, the harder I tend to play.

Classes are going all right. My theory seminar, ENGL537, on gender/race and national belonging has been challenging. I cannot imagine taking this class completely cold. I count myself lucky that at Maryland I took a class on 'queering citizenship' and my last seminar of my MA on 'the intersections of race and sexuality'. Both classes overlap a great deal with this current class. Of course, as much as I am prepared, I feel like I'm totally asea without a compass. Theory is difficult. And I keep trying to figure out why I keep hurling myself against it. Our very first class opened with Foucault and Butler. Crazy. The professor opens the discussion with a question about the 'metaphysics of substance' in both A History of Sexuality I and Gender Trouble. Discuss. I think the class must have sat there for five minutes in complete silence. I thought I knew what she was talking about, but panic set in and everything flew out of my head. A couple of weeks have gone by. The readings are a bit more concrete. And we have some primary texts mixed in. I have already written two short response papers. We'll see how I'm doing when they come back. Of course, I signed up for the very first class presentation. I present tomorrow on Benedict Anderson's Imagined Communities. I spent the whole weekend reading the excerpts, formulating some discussion questions, and writing a response paper. Hopefully, everything will go well.

My other seminar, ENGL567, on approaches to teaching composition is all right. I took a similar class at UMD. Plus, all of my years teaching English 101 help. The class is an extension of our summer training, and we're reading a little bit of composition theory, pedagogy theory, and such. It's very relaxed compared to my high theory course. I like it because I get to hang out with the other new teachers. The work is much less rigorous. Most of our class discussion becomes a sort of therapy session for the new teachers or a gripe session about how restrictive English 131 seems to be. I guess I'm past many of the anxieties people feel. And I don't mind having structure in a curriculum. I will figure out a way to loosen things up, make it my own. I'm starting to earn a reputation of being the "veteran" of the group. I have more experience certainly, but I think every new batch of kids presents new issues, problems, highlights, and experiences. I don't mind talking about my teaching philosophies and methods, though. Our first reflection paper is due tomorrow, which I also wrote over this past weekend. I have just been a very busy bee.

Teaching has been all right. I am still getting used to the way English 131 is structured. We're halfway through the first sequence of assignments. My students seem to be doing all right, though they are having some significant trouble with the reading. Most of them are not used to close reading, to rhetorical reading. The essay, Lister & Wells' "Seeing Beyond Belief: Cultural Studies as an Approach to Analysing the Visual," isn't too terribly theoretical or full of jargon. But, it does require them to really think through some of the methodologies and ideas put forth. Hopefully, they'll get it more or less. The thing about 131 is that we are trying to teach students to read for writing's sake, which means they need not fully, totally comprehend something in order to write about what supports their argument. I suppose I do that with my own work when I'm grappling with theory. My class's dynamic is still pretty low-key. They let me do a lot of the talking. I hope they warm up a bit before the quarter is over. They have been pretty positive so far. I am going to try to work in some of the stuff I've done in the past including a couple of video days and some extracurricular exercises on things like race, gender, and sexuality. I spent most of today 'commenting' on their close readings of Lister & Wells. They were not stellar -- mostly summary rather than analysis and identifying key claims -- but that is what practice is for. I'm still getting used to the whole not giving grades thing. I comment and evaluate in terms of their ideas and process but do not assign a letter (or number) grade. The rationale is that students will focus less on grades and more on development, improvement, and revision. At the end of the quarter, they will submit a portfolio of 4-6 short assignments and 1 long assignment, which they revise, to be graded. This way they are graded on final work, on revised work, and on work they've done after they've been taught what to do and practiced what to do.

School takes up a lot of my time. I like my Tuesday-Thursday schedule, but the slide from Tuesday to Thursday is really rough. I have to get all of my work done in only two days. Though, the long weekend is nice. I have tried to balance school with keeping social. I hang out with folks, mostly school people, whenever I can. I have made a few pretty good friends, so far. We mainly hangout after classes or meet up for drinks during the weekend. It's all still pretty new, but fun and comforting. Suffice it to say, the last two weekends have been very full and very exhausting. The week before last, I went out Thursday night to Neighbours, Friday night to the Rosebud for drinks with my friend Deborah and Andrew and some of the English grads, and Saturday night to my other friend Deb's house for dinner with some of the Antioch crew (which ended in drinks and karaoke at a little dive bar). This past weekend, I went out Thursday night to Neighbours, Friday afternoon to the English Grad reception, drinks with the kids in the University District afterward, even more drinks with people on Capitol Hill (counting the reception, I had drinks at 6 different locations that night), and Saturday night to a fashion show with Julia, Steven, and Deb, which also resulted in drinking free wine and beers at a little fancy bar called Satellite Lounge (moreover I tried to go home early and get to bed but alas my upstairs neighbors decided to wake me up at 2 AM singing karaoke in their living room -- what is up with that?). I need to figure out more things to do other than just going out and drinking all the time. Or not. Hopefully, this weekend will be a bit more chill.

That's it in a nutshell. Hopefully, details to follow. Or just ask me about something.

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"wish i were a rich man" | tuesday | october 18, 2005 | 10:33 pm

S YOU WELL MAY HAVE NOTICED, I haven't really posted a lot. In fact, I have only been able to manage a post about every two weeks. Sad, really. I have a lot to write about. I have a lot to keep track of. I've even doddered off of my pen-and-paper journal. But, I have been captured by all that is school and all that is not school. The last few weeks have been very involved. I am not overcommitted per se. It's just that I try to make use of almost every moment I've got. And a dichotomy has developed that I want to shake. When I'm doing school stuff, I'm doing school stuff. It takes up most of my energy and time. And when I don't have to do school stuff, I do everything possible to leave it all behind, tuck school stuff away, and play pretty hard, sleep pretty hard, veg pretty hard. That doesn't leave me much middle ground. So, first on the list: more middle ground. With that, I should get ready for sleep. Tuesdays are a bear. I'm in the twilight of consciousness (a pretty cool phrase, if you ask me). I should be using it to write a short paper. But that can be staved off till tomorrow. Good night.

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"guerillas just wanna have fun" | saturday | october 22, 2005 | 2:38 pm

AST NIGHT WAS THE FIRST GUERILLA QUEER BAR SEATTLE. A couple of weeks ago, I hadn't planned on getting started on GQBSeattle till at least November or December. With school and teaching and the apartment and everything, I figured I didn't need another project in my lap. But, being the overachiever that I am, I made the decision to just try. It was a litmus test. I have no idea if GQB can be sustained in Seattle. There have been incarnations in the past, another group called Seattle GQB in 2001 (and the order of words makes a difference) and a more recently updated Seattle GQB in 2005. But the last even was in April. Plus, if you look at their logo and their sign-up form, it seems to be predominantly a queer, male group. GQBS (the letters in our order) makes no said distinctions.

Last night's inaugural event was at Linda's Tavern (707 E. Pine @ Boylston), a sort of western-themed saloon. It was a fun night. I first met up with a couple of guys from my program, Andrew and Jay. We went downtown because I needed to buy a pink tie (because the 'theme' of the evening was to wear something pink as signal to other guerillas). I was a little nervous because I really wanted to the night to go well. I want people to have fun. I know I had fun in DC with GQB. I wanted to recreate that community in Seattle. We got to the bar a little early (after having a slice at Hot Mama's). We hung out till other guerillas started showing up. The whole pink thing worked. I ended up spotting a group of women who looked liked they were searching the crowd. I walked up, my tie a blazing, and asked them if they were looking for GQB. In total, about 24 or so people showed up. About half of the group were people I knew. The other half were total strangers who had heard about GQBS. Most of the crowd were women, interestingly enough. Hopefully, future events will attract a more balance in gender. Most of the night was spent hanging out, drinking, talking with people. I met some really nice ladies. Of course, lesbians totally love me. All of the attention I got last night was from women. It was very sweet (but I totally need some manly attention).

There was some critique about choosing Linda's as our first venue because it's in the heart of Capitol Hill and is already pretty queer-friendly. But my rationale was to pick someplace 'easy' at first. Plus, Linda's might be friendly but its clientele is primarily straight. There are still lessons to be made and learned even in 'safe' places. Case in point: there was a guy who sat down next to Andrew, Jay, and me. He was cool, Scottish, with a really deep brogue, cute, and straight. But unknowingly he turned to us and told us that he just met another guy across the bar who turned to him and asked him, "Are you a faggot?" Point blank. The Scottish guy rebuffed the other guy. The other guy commented, "Everyone around here seems to be faggots." Or something to that degree. The Scottish guy replied, "Well, I'm not, but what if I were?" The other guy clearly did not realize that he was in a bar, ostensibly straight, on Capitol Hill. But that very moment, even if it didn't happen to one of the guerillas, shows that even safe places can be potentially treacherous. It was a good night. I, again, drank probably a little too much (considering the night before was spent drinking up a storm at happy hour with grad friends and then at Neighbours). I'm glad I decided to get GQBS started so early. I hope the next one is bigger and better.

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"bootacular" | monday | october 31, 2005 | 10:01 am

APPY HALLOWEEN! Hopefully, everyone has had a pretty darn good Halloween weekend. It's too bad that All Hallow's Eve is on a Monday this year. I really can't do anything too crazy today or tonight simply because I've got work to do for an early day tomorrow. Plus, the general vibe here has been pretty mellow. I almost don't want to spoil it.

The past week or so has been okay. Life's been mixed. Good for the most part. Sometimes weird. And more recently, a little sad. I feel like I'm in mourning, and I'm not sure exactly over what. I suppose my past, my last life, my last home. I don't know. My dreams have been anxious, though not necessarily fearful. I have been sleeping poorly as a result. Plus, the weather's changing pretty rapidly here. The light isn't as strong. I usually get up in half-darkness, go to school, and come home in darkness. It's also getting chillier and wetter, though I am still wearing shorts at least till November.

I have a lot on my plate. I have been doing a lot, sometimes too much. All last week was full of school. I had conferences with students on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. I teach and normally have class on Tuesday and Thursday. So, it felt like I was living at school. Teaching is going fine. I've finally learned my students names, even though the quarter is half over. They turn in their first major paper tomorrow, and we start the next assignment sequence. My own classes have been going all right. I've been doing a lot of writing of short, response-type papers. Now, I have to look ahead and get started on my seminar papers.

I've cut back a little on socializing. I pretty much only go out on Thursday night, after a full day of classes. My grad friends have taken to going to the College Inn Pub (4006 University NE), which is a little divey and smokey but fun. We play pool, drink $2.50 rails, and hang out. It is supposedly the "grad student" bar on the Ave. The graffiti in the bathroom is pretty high brow including statements about modernism and proverbs in Latin. It's a good way to blow off some stress and to get to know my classmates a bit more.

This past weekend started with happy hour at the College Inn. Then I skipped going to Neighbours, which is unheard of I know but I had to give my liver and my wallet a rest. Friday was a sort of grey foggy blur. But Friday night my grad friend Melanie picked me up, we had dinner of pho, and then we drove over to Ballard to go to a show. She's really into emo, so we have that in common, but she's got way more knowledge about the music. We went to the Paradox, which is a pretty nice and small venue. The night was pretty laid-back. It was an "all ages" show, so there wasn't the usual smoking, drinking, and shenanigans. In fact, Melanie and I felt like we were chaperoning some of the kids that were there. There were four bands on the line-up: The Fury (whose keyboardist was really cute and like 12 years-old), June (who are from Chicago, I think), Jamison Parker, and the headliners The Juliana Theory (who were good but the lead singer is way over the top). Melanie really likes TJT. I like their CD, but live shows are always strangely "different" from your CD listening experience. A girl we were walking behind summed up the experience perfectly: "I really like the music, but I can't stand watching that guy." I had a good time, even though I felt like I was going to keel over. Plus, my left shoe decided that it was tired of the world and tried to lose its sole. Saturday day was spent goofing off, reading a little, playing WoW. Then I scraped together a costume to go to my friend Deb's birthday/Halloween party in Wallingford. I decided to cobble together some of my old Archaea garb and go as Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. The party was low-key. It was nice to hang out with Deb and her friends. Some of the costumes were pretty funny. I did have this strange interaction with a very straight (self-professing straight) Russian guy, who seemed really intrigued by me and kept asking me all sorts of questions. Pictures are forthcoming.

Sunday was a lazy day. I did some more reading. I goofed off. I also sat around feeling really sorry for myself. Again, not sure why. I ended up watching The Goonies, which I love. Chunk still amazes me -- his lines are perfect -- what a precocious comedic genius. "They say 'be careful' while Data is falling." Also too funny. Then I got sucked into Heart and Souls, which always makes me cry. Cheesy, I know. But there's something about the scene where the ghosts decide to leave little Thomas that just stabs a sharp penknife into my own abandonment issues. Plus, I love Alfre Woodard in this movie. The rest of Sunday was spent working on my English 131 stuff and then going to sleep.

Today begins another week. And tomorrow begins another month. Time is chugging along. Daylight savings is back. I just hope I can keep up. More later.

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