Home of the Snarkmaiden

One of our junior-most faculty came into the office this morning to tell me that she had been laughing out loud on the bus to work while reading my minutes of the previous month's faculty meeting. It's always gratifying when someone notices. Most especially when it's my very favoritest of they junior faculty, which is a very hard won laurel, given what a charming, amiable, pleasant, and interesting bunch we currently have among the juniors. It gives a person hope for the future, it does. And today I made someone laugh out loud. That is a thing.

Also today, I noticed a thing about my native language for the first time. So, is it weird, or just culturally revealing, that Swedish has two completely different words that translate into English as "worse"? Yeah, I know värre and sämre are used in somewhat different contexts, but really, how many ways do you really need to be able to say that things are worse, especially when you only have one way to say they're "better"? Upbeat folks, my people.

And speaking of upbeat, today I also gave my first oral presentation of the quarter in my Mandarin class. It was on educational inequality and child poverty among ethnic minorities in Hong Kong. Yeah, it's possible I got a little too ambitious in my choice of topic. But I can tell you what the child poverty rate for Filipino immigrants in Hong Kong is. In Mandarin. And With PowerPoint, because we were strongly encouraged to use slides. I don't do PowerPoint. *ptui* *hairball*. And because for me there is no such thing as the final draft of anything, just the most recent before the deadline, naturally I went off script winging it at a couple of points. That did not go entirely well. But it is over. And hey, given the near fluent, been-to-China young things in my class, I may well be Cao 老师's worst Third Year Mandarin student, but I still am a Third Year Mandarin student, so that's still something.

And I trotted down to the student union to get in on the last day of on-campus flu vaccinations for the season so I don't have to remember to go in to the doctor or queue up at the pharmacy or whatever. Must see if there's a way to self-report flu shots to my medical group's web page, though, so the flu shot reminder goes away. On the plus side, the line for getting a shot was short and quick. On the minus(?) side, the vaccination clinic had been popular enough that they had run out of Starbucks cards. I signed up on the list for them to e-mail me one. Not sure how that will work. And of course I hadn't been thinking about immunizations when I got dressed this morning, and had thoughtlessly put on a long-sleeved merino mock turtle. Suboptimal for accessing a shoulder for the jab, at least in a public ballroom with various folks of all genders and sexes wandering about. The nurse advised me to pull aside the collar as the better choice.

"But don't do it until I'm ready," she said. "We don't like to have people strangling themselves."

"Yeah, I said, "That would kind of defeat the purpose. Dead people don't catch flu."

"We should make that our new slogan."

But no new pictures taken today -- it was gray and sullen all day, and the weekend windstorm blew off many of the pretty leaves. Also, Chinese ate my brain. Luckily I took a metric buttload of pictures last week when there was sun. I'm still in pursuit of a really good photo of how wonderful the view from my office windows is in October, and have failed for another year, but here's a placeholder until I get it right.

I really have no explanation for this:

Summer in our house is a bit of a trial -- once things get warm, we tend to leave the windows open a lot. We have awning-style windows all over the house -- hinged at the top, and closing with a latch against the frame at the bottom. Perhaps there were screens for this type of window made when the windows were new, 60-odd years ago -- maybe there still are -- but if any came with our house originally, they were long gone by the time we bought it. So, there are annoyances. Flies and mosquitoes do vex us. But perhaps worst pest is the cat. With the windows open the house becomes fully permeable to cats; they move in and out at will. And one in particular is a darkling beast, red in tooth and claw. Which I don't mind in principle -- controlling the rodent population is a good thing -- but I am a bit more squeamish about getting a personal introduction to the quarry. Particularly when it is either a) several weeks dead or b) on my window sill, still alive.

Just this evening there was a rustling under the blinds next to my computer. Hal took a peek and suggested it might be time to close the window. I'm not sure what good he thought that would do, since when I looked it was clear that our own personal doom beast, Tinka, and her 'kill' du jour -- a live mole -- were already inside on the window sill. Tinka just sat quietly, waiting for us to admire her skill and beneficence. The mole waved one of it's digger-clawed forepaws vaguely. At first it wasn't clear to me if the poor creature was near death or just stunned, but it seemed increasingly to be reviving. Sfter some initial disorganized flapping and milling about I put on my gardening gloves and took the squirmy thing back outside, and set it down. In my vegetable bed by the front steps. The bed is admittedly mostly fallow just now. But any woman who puts a live mole in her own vegetable garden and watches it dig itself in has got to be in the running for World's Worst Gardener.

On the other hand, it looks like the mole may live. And I'm here to tell you they're surprisingly powerful little guys. I could really feel some serious muscle torque behind the squirming in my hand as I carried it out. I guess it's not that surprising once I consider it though -- takes a lot to move earth out of the way that fast, even if it was mostly mulch.

Earlier today I spotted this post over on James Nicoll's LJ. All unknowing whose birthday (or more correctly, baptismal date) it was, I answered that if I could resurrect any author at the height of their powers knowing they would be brains-craving zombies, I would choose William Shakespeare. Well, then Abi over at Making Light started a sonnet thread in honor of Shakespeare's birthday, and silliness came bubbling forth. Ergo, in honor of National Poetry Month and my favorite English playwright, I give you:

Sonnet for Zombie Bill, on the Anniversary of His Baptism

Behold, what soul would I a zombie make
What long-dead penman to this life renew?
For whose gilt words would brains forsake…
…well, not my own, if giving yours would do…

The puzzle posed, its answer must contain:
No English language poet can compare
If giving up one’s living mind’s in train,
No lesser author’s work is worth the dare.

So Bill-the-Bard we bow our heads to thee,
And hope to live to see your next Act III.

So, no shit, there we were, picking up a few staples at the Safeway while waiting for Trader Joe's to open. We were a bit bleary, because Hal had just got off a night shift, while I had been regaled with the sounds of fireworks and drunken hilarity issuing from next door until 4:30 in the morning. We were shambling through the fruits and vegetables when my gaze lit on an endcap display of baked goods, and I burst out laughing. The baked goods were Madeleines -- chocolate dipped and plain -- Donsuemor Madeleines, and the blurb on each package read, "The one you remember."

Proust jokes at the grocery store at 8:30 in the bleary Saturday morning. I was utterly unprepared. If I had been Teresa, I would have fallen over.

Seen any funny packaging, lately?

Aw. A Get Fuzzy strip just for me:

Vad fan, jävlar!

( And now, I shall dissect a frog. )