Boy or Cat?

Lucas has once again fallen asleep in his playgym. Periodically he wakes up, bats silently at one of the dangling pieces, and then promptly falls back to sleep.

I've been using much the same method to write my dissertation.

Motor skills ahoy

Suddenly we don't have a newborn anymore. This week Lucas learned to hold his head up, grab onto objects with greater accuracy and shove them into his mouth, roll over from his back to his front, and enunciate different monosyllables. He's also crying in pain periodically, we think because he's going to start teething, as one of his favorite things to do these days is gnaw on whatever is at hand (including our hands and his). Wheeeeee!

He also took part in opening some of his own presents. I wrapped our gifts to him in tissue paper so he could participate. (He doesn't like the sound of stiff paper crinkling.)



More to come. Right now I have to entertain the little guy, who's up late because he slept most of the 400-mile drive today.

Blessed be

Too much time between postings. . . Sorry about that.

I've been visiting my parents with my new little family in tow. Pete is recovering from a mini-meltdown earlier in the week—he hadn't had enough alone time—but he's mostly recovered now. Lucas has formed a mutual admiration society with my parents and sister, and he's getting used to all the sounds of the old house in which I grew up. It's a bit strange to breastfeed my son in the home office that was my childhood bedroom, but I'm coming to terms with these life changes.

We've been staying in a motel for several days so that Pete could have some privacy and time to himself. It's been OK, one of those discount executive suite/extended stay places with limited services. (Grad student budget, grad student accommodations. . .) But the place has a definite stench to it, stale cigarettes (even though we requested a non-smoking room) masked by a perfumed sponge shoved into the room's fan. I don't know which is worse, the stale smell or the perfume, but now all my clothes smell like both. Yay. Tonight we return to sleeping at my parents' house, which will be nice because we'll wake up on Christmas morning to the traditional family bustle in this house before we walk down the block to my grandmother's place, to be joined by a couple pairs of aunts and uncles and a cousin.

I'm so fortunate to have such a terrific and generous family. I hope wherever I land next year, I'm within considerably closer driving distance of them. Four hundred-plus miles is too far to travel to see them.

I'll resume my regular blogging schedule after Christmas.

Until then, Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, and Blessed Solstice.

Latest addiction

Besides reading academic blogs: Google's Book Search.

Controversy aside, it's a terrific tool for conducting research in books, and one that even my students probably won't shy away from once I introduce them to it. I especially like that they don't need to go through an authentication process to access it, as they do to use the university's library databases—a process that, I think, confuses a lot of students and keeps the lazier ones from using the library website, even though they can access it from home.

I've been using Google Book Search as a citation database. Type in your favorite author or cultural critic, and you can see who cites them and in what context. Of course, this means that the amount of money I spend buying books online is about to skyrocket, as I keep discovering great new books outside my usual disciplines. . .

Teaching Carnival IV

New Kid has posted the latest Teaching Carnival, and as always, it's wonderful. Be sure to check out the appendix.

My recent silence

My lack of posts this week can be blamed on one thing: GradeFest 2005. I have 600 individual papers or assignments (including 100 8-10 pagers) sitting in my home office at the moment. 450 of these have been graded in the last 10 days; 150 of them will be graded within the next 12 hours.

Eeeeeeeeek!

I am sooo thankful that my days as a TA are coming to an end. Next quarter will be my last TAship, and it's for a class I've TA'ed for twice and taught once, so it should be a relative walk in the park.

Strange obsession

I've become obsessed with my Amazon.com recommendations list even though I rarely buy books from it. For reasons I don't fully comprehend, I get peevish when books in which I have no interest show up in the top 45.

Usually my list comprises erudite tomes on material culture, American studies, and history, and I like to keep it that way by carefully checking the "not interested" boxes by all unworthy candidates on The List.

Why can't Amazon understand, then, that just because I buy one children's book, it doesn't mean I want my list suddenly packed with such titles as Where is Baby's Belly Button? And that when I say I own That's Not My Puppy and That's Not My Dinosaur but indicate that I'm not interested in That's Not My Tractor, That's Not My Kitty, and That's Not My Monster, it probably means I also have very little interest in That's Not My Car and That's Not My Dolly?

Jeez. I know having a child changes everything, but must it mess with The List, too?

Surprise, surprise

As seen at Professor Bastard's:

Androgynous You scored 60 masculinity and 56 femininity!

You scored high on both masculinity and femininity. You have a strong personality exhibiting characteristics of both traditional sex roles.

My test tracked 2 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender: You scored higher than 45% on masculinity You scored higher than 39% on femininity

Link: The Bem Sex Role Inventory Test written by weirdscience on Ok Cupid, home of the 32-Type Dating Test

Of course, I felt righteous indignation at the implied gendering of some of the questions and responses. But hey, if it takes me away from grading for a little while, I'll take just about any quiz. . .

War on Christmas?

Really, guys, come on.

I am soooo sick of hearing fundamentalist Christians and their media supporters claim they're being persecuted and victimized. And of course, since JC's birthday is rolling around once again, the lamentations have hit fever pitch.

Among the most egregious ululators is Fox's Bill O'Reilly. (My husband watches his show out of pure amusement, and I catch myself eavesdropping.) O'Reilly has complained about the limited observance of Christian holidays in public schools and other institutions run by the government. I disagree with him that Christmas should be celebrated unquestioningly in the public sphere, however I do think some schools and other institutions have gone too far in quashing Christmas solely to keep from offending non-Christians.

That said, O'Reilly's biggest complaining this year has been reserved for retailers. He claims many of them are perpetuating the "war on Christmas" by not mentioning the holiday by name in their advertisements and stores. I don't have any problem with retailers mentioning Christmas in their promotional materials; I mean, it's actually to their advantage to promote Christmas sales, right?

But O'Reilly is missing the boat when he focuses on retailers' failure to mention the big holiday by name as the greatest transgression. In my view, the retailers' (and O'Reilly's) spectacular promotion of consumerism at the holiday season is what really detracts from "the true meaning" of Christmas. For O'Reilly to fret over the name of the holiday is irresponsible when (a) the most meaningful aspects of Christmas are being trampled by an orgy of consumption and (b) this consumption is certainly driving many of his viewers into considerable debt (which supposedly is against Republicans' traditionally conservative financial platform).

What would Jesus do? Certainly not watch O'Reilly or shop at Wal-Mart.

On meanings of Christmas, I like the sentiments expressed here.

Neverending

Every time, I think the papers will grade themselves.

They never do.