bookish dreamer

I made it alive!!  Got into Hartford last night at 11 pm and had to drive from there to New Haven because I bolluxed up my plane ticket (i knew i'd screwed it up, and that's what rental cars are for).  Not only was it in the dead of the night, it was raining!  Perfect way to introduce myself to east coast driving, right?  And the car rental lady thought she was doing me a favor by giving me an SUV type thing too.  I'm laughing about it this morning, and even last night I think I must've had a bit of a maniac grin clutching the steering wheel hoping no more big trucks would pass me.  Hey, the slow lane and me?  Got very well acquainted.

Did you know they don't put helpful little reflectors in the road for you out here?  They don't.  It was disconcerting.

Luckily I pulled up safe and sound to my girlfriend's girlfriend's apartment, on a tree filled street, got walked in and bedded down and other than being slightly cold slept straight on through this morning.  I assume tomorrow, when I have to actually be awake for my own presentation first thing, is going to be when I'm most tired. 

It's absolutely beautiful here - crisp and cool, and I'm wearing my winter jacket (that most people here would probably consider a fall jacket since they're used to snow - thank all the gods it's not snowing).  Not that I'm wearing it right now since I'm sitting in a free-trade coffee shop drinking a mocha worthy of the name (not too sweet, actual foam) waiting for registration to open for my conference.

I'm on pins and needles about presenting tomorrow - I have the paper done, but it could use some more editing.  I have so clearly in my head what I want to say about each piece, but definitely my power point will be getting some major revisions today so that it adequately reflects that. 

I want to take pictures, too, so I'll have to do that at some point and really be touristy - perhaps Sunday when I can take a deep breath?

I felt last night, as the road stretched in front of me, covered in water, that if I'd been with Neil when this was happening he would have been concerned for me -- funny that, because it's not exactly the feeling of missing him so much as missing having someone out there who i call to check in with who tells me to be careful.  So I called my mom when I got in which I think worked out pretty well for her and me. And I smiled at myself a little, because as much as it was a strange adventure in the dark of night, it was also just driving an hour in some rain. 

I can't stop smiling this morning either, and I don't think it's just the sleep dep./jet lag/what have you.  I think part of it is just that I'm here doing this thing called life.

It's kind of awesome.  I'll probably post more if I get bored at the conference, but if not, wish me luck!

by the way, did I mention that I'd finished for the semester?  Well I have!  *does dance of manic and exhausted joy*

I think I'll save the emotional and mental recap for another moment, or a different post, and just say for now that this has been, without a doubt, another end of the semester that seemed designed to run me through the emotional and mental ringer.  Never a dull moment, I tell you. 

That being said, I'm still having trouble standing looking at the computer screen - after having done it for so long that my eyes began to have flickers in the corner (and yes, i know that's not good, but it went away), i just have needed time away.

It's also been a marathon of another sort because Tuesday, after we did class presentations, we went and had dinner with each other for my comp lit class.  Which involved salty shared plates of food and wine and shouted conversation.  And then last night, i went and had a post-class-'i'm finished-let's-watch-a-movie-and-decompress-by-talking' hang out with friends from class, and then tonight had dinner with a couple of ladies that involved much more wine than planned but was welcome nonetheless.

But, as far as my social calendar, which has mostly involved dates with my computer with minor breaks including dog walks, it's like 0 to 60 as far as social interaction goes.  I'm still waiting for a day of decompression where I don't talk, don't think, and instead make pretty graphics that don't talk back to me.

I've been sort of following the author-anti-fanfiction-blah (only because dwg and seperis are both such fantastic posters and I am like addicted to both of them for their posts and their ability to retain their senses of humor) and each post makes me more annoyed - partially because these anti-fanfic authors simply don't GET what it is that fanfic writers are doing - which is really a deep engagement of LOVE for the work that they're fanficing.  What higher compliment can you get than that?  Oh, right, money.  I am so tired of money being the baseline measurement of success (like can you publish as an original author? can you make money doing what you do?  ok, then THAT is ok.  but if you don't make money?  if that doesn't even enter into it?  if you have no ambitions about publishing something but want to enjoy yourself? Outside of the monetary economy where an author writes words and you buy them?  OH THE HORROR!!  /rant. 

Sorry, get a couple of glasses in me and I am more than annoyed.  I almost want to find a list of all the authors who won't allow fanfic and start writing fanfic in their verses just to spite them all, but I am neither enough of a writer to do that or perverse enough to kick my own ass that bad.  But the temptation is there people, it is there.  Instead I'm going to try to catch up on all the events of your lives AND all the fic I missed while I was writing, play at summer_of_giles  (there's still time!!  and we're going to extend the deadline anyway, so SIGN UP IF YOU LOVE YOUR GILES!), and try to restrain myself from ranting at odd moments. Keep your fingers crossed.

Anyone know anywhere I can get a primer on academic words? I don't know if it was simply that I've spent the last couple of nights up till 2 reading for my classes or what, but this afternoon it seemed like every word out of my professors mouth was a set of vocabulary that I still don't understand.  And my most horrifying secret:  even after using the following word in my own work (or variations of), i am still not precisely clear on what it means.

ontology.  ontological.  defined as:
The science or study of being; that department of metaphysics which relates to the being or essence of things, or to being in the abstract.
The branch of metaphysics concerned with the nature and relations of being.

So what does it mean to talk about an author who is trying to be ontological?  Or proposing a new ontology?  (ok, the second one I can do, but the first one?)

and since I'm looking up words, neologism:
a newly invented word or phrase / newly discovered term or meaning

We were talking about Philip Dick's The Man In The High Castle and William Gibson's Neuromancer, and while I'm certainly willing to get on the high horse right along with everyone who suggests we can't dismiss either one of these words as simply pulp novels not worth the paper they're printed on, the ability to deploy this kind of vocabulary?  I've lost it.  Sometimes I'm fairly certain that I'd never had it. 

Now, don't get me wrong.  I think one of the most fascinating things about cyberpunk is that it does cram a whole lot of new meanings into half recognizable words.  And frankly, now that I've looked up what neologism means, I'm willing to say they're creating them all the time.  But its as if I missed a class somewhere, where they handed out the sheet that contained all of this terminology. I can talk sign / signifier / referent, I can talk proletariat / bourgeois (at least to a certain degree), I can talk subject / Other..... why, then, do I feel like a babe in the woods everytime someone opens their mouths in this class?

Oh well, no time for worrying.  I have a Japanese test tomorrow instead.

This morning I met with the professor in communications that is teaching the class on fandom I'm auditing and he thinks that the paper I wrote for him last semester is pretty much READY FOR FUCKING SUBMISSION to media journals right now. 

And since he's on the board of all three of the journals he suggested I should publish in, he should know.

AND he almost thinks I have enough material (in terms of what I wasn't able to cover in the article, but still want to talk about) to make this thing into a book project.  AND even if I don't do it via my dissertation work, he's willing to advise me just through office hours and crap to work on it an other projects I want to do JUST BECAUSE. 

AND he's going to write me recommendations for summer school (since i'm applying so fucking late they're due by friday) and he said "i can certainly praise you with glowing words" as if it would be EASY.

those on the academic filter will know who i'm speaking of, because, you know, I tend to overuse caps when I talk about my work that I turn into this guy, but my joy is too much to be contained under lock.

maybe I really am cut out for this stuff.  Now all I need to do is get the time to get ahead in my reading so I can re-edit this paper that I wrote last semester so I can send it to him so he can tell me if I should reedit more, and *then* make time to work on the paper about Torchwood that I really really really have wanted to write since I heard about ask_captianjack

( the schoolish update )

which reminds me - I've made some new friends in the last couple of weeks - if you guys want to be on my academic filter, which is basically me wittering, plus article summaries/notes, and the occasional rough draft of a paper, here's a poll for you! Or, if you're currently on it and would like to be removed ... let me know! If you don't answer don't worry, I won't drop people off unless they explicitly ask.

[Poll #1512157]

( a word on Japanese action movies - Shinobi: Heart Under Blade )

( a couple of thoughts on Haiti news coverage )

and finally, a quick reminder / pimp (click the banner for my thread):

I'm offering stuff to the 5 highest bidders, and only have 3 bids (from awesome people) right now, so if you've got a spare $5 you too can have the graphic you desire

OK PEOPLE I AM FINALLY, FINALLY, FINALLY DONE.

That wasn't painful until the very end, when I did the final read-through and felt like every sentence had turned to shit.  Since I had D. read through it and she assures me it's not shit, so ... I emailed it.  Bombs away.

now I'm all hyped up on coffee with noplace to go

Kaja Silverman was giving a talk introducing her new book yesterday and she reminded me of some of the essentials of scholarship (even though I'm not sure if she intended to):

• love the texts you're working on
• if you do what you do will have meaning
• don't forget the theory; and Freud may have gotten everything wrong but he's useful
  

I first read her Subject of Semiotics in Earl Jackson's Theory 101 class at Santa Cruz.  I'd failed the Theory 101 class I'd taken the quarter before and I thought I hated theory.  Then we read this book, along with Earl's warning that we weren't going to understand anything we read until at least a week after we read it -- but that we needed to do the reading anyway.  That, and the talking we did in the class that I often felt was over my head but ... just over it, so I could kind of reach that level sometimes, made me realize that I kind of love theory.  I love the idea that someone out there wants to talk about meaning, and that there are different ways to figure it out, different guides, different scaffolds.  And we're all operating under those scaffolds anyway, so we may as well know about 'em.

(ok, that's probably the subject of a much longer post, because it's a gut feeling and something I have a little trouble articulating, but the basic premise is that honestly? we all employ theory all the time to make most of our judgements, we just pretend we don't).

And today I am beginning to freak out for intellectual reasons.  The new school is a great environment, and I'm getting to work with someone whose work totally excites me, but on the other hand I'm feeling a little lost at this moment in time.  I have two 20-page papers due in a couple of weeks and I have absolutely NO idea what it is I want to write for either of them.  Some vague notion of new media in Japan, and some vague idea about post-war Japanese film and that's all I've got. 

On the way home I realized that part of my trouble is that I'm not speaking intellectually to anyone in my field right now.  Oh, the girls in my cohort are nice, but they're all in slightly different areas (hello classical Chinese linguistics, do you care about my stuff? do i care about yours? not for paper writing/discussion).  I've got to try tomorrow to meet with my advisor and figure out what direction I'm taking this semester.  It's overdue, and I think I let the fact that she and I are not getting along like houses on fire sort of distract me.  Just because we don't get each other doesn't mean I shouldn't talk with her about these things.

I know.  *hangs head* figuring out this whole business seems like it's long overdue.  I can't believe the semester is done in like two weeks.

From Corey Doctrow's Little Brother

More journalists asked questions. Some were sympathetic, some were hostile. When I got tired, I handed my keyboard to Ange and let her be M1k3y for a while. It didn't really feel like M1k3y and me were the same person anymore anyway. M1k3y was the kind of kid who talked to international journalists and inspired a movement. Marcus got suspended from school and fought with his dad and wondered if he was good enough for his kick-ass girlfriend.

Angry Teacher video (caught on a cell phone)

A vid made by one of the women in our class (from high school) drug free america

from Cory Doctorow's book, w1n5t0n's Instructables

ALA.org's list of 2009 Best Children's books (including Little Brother)

Did you know you can measure hope?  there are like a million ways to measure hope that have been academically agreed upon.  You can even google scholar them.

I think I'm going to be attempting to write up my thoughts on articles for my classes on my LJ.  I'm thinking I may filter it just so that not everyone gets blasted with my occasional opinions and borderline incoherency.  Right now I'm going to keep this on LJ although I have been considering starting an academic blog for a long time to keep things separate.

ANYWAY, all this was a long thing to say - Anybody want to be on an academic filter?  Opt in here!

[Poll #1452113]

Japanese is great, don't get me wrong, but I love love love love being a frigging graduate student.  Learning grammar and kanji is a means to an end.

This afternoon was not that.  It was a class I'm hoping to get into, taught by the guy who does most of the fan-culture stuff in the US. And although the class is actually on new media in the classroom (which is a little off topic for the things I'd really like to talk bout, which is more new textual production, the spread of texts across platform, and fandom), we did actually get into really interesting stuff (of course none of it is stuff I can remember exactly at the moment - I really have to get better about that).

Basically he started us off with some vids produced by students, educators and places like PBS talking about new media (ie: technology from blogs to facebook to video cameras to legos) and asked us to respond/discuss what seemed to shape the discourse of each piece.

GAH SO MUCH FUN.  Give me a text and a conversation to analyze it in!

Bonus was that I sat next to a 3rd year phd psych student who was absolutely hilarously awesome (and who had taken the prof's classes before, so knew the drill and the discourse) and who befriended me as we stepped out of class.

Here's hoping tomorrow can measure up.  OH, and that I can actually get into that class - apparently my school limits the number of grad students per class to less than 18 (which I suppose makes sense, but ... i want to be there damnit!)

now however, i'm a little bit head clogged, so hopefully i'm not getting sick with something. gah.  i don't like this feeling ookie a couple of days every couple of days.  smog, is that you trying to tell me something?