Wisdom in the bottle
Topic: Whatever
The hot water bottle, that is. It says, 'Forget the soccer. Just put on your fuzzy socks and pajamas and curl up in bed. Isn't having a nice hot water bottle at your feet better than having them stepped on by drunken soccer fans?' What do you say to an argument of such persuasive power?

Dilemma
Topic: Whatever
I am, for the first time, and who knows, possibly the only time, in my life in a country that has a team in the World Cup. I'm not a soccer fan, really, but I do enjoy the World Cup. And I do enjoy me some hoopla and crowd scenes. And there should be plenty of both tonight on Lygon Street for Australia's match against Italy. Big screen TVs set up outdoors, massive crowds, lots of noise and excitement.

Why am I not rushing out the door to partake in the madness? Kickoff is at 1:00 a.m. It's the middle of winter. I'm not sure the public transportation powers that be have really done the best possible planning for an event of this nature -- ergo, I'm not entirely confident in my ability to get home afterwards. As exciting as I know it would be, I find that I'm really not all that enticed by the prospect of shivering in a crowd for several hours, losing sleep, and then maybe having to walk home. Practicality is such a killjoy.

A year and a day
Topic: Navel gazing
I meant to post yesterday, to take advantage of the symmetry of anniversary dates - I started this blog on 19 June last year, and liked the idea of posting exactly a year later, seeing what's happened, taking stock, and so forth. However, yesterday was cleaning day, and that was a project and a half. I was blowing dust off of stuff that I realize I'd last looked at back in February and wondering what exactly had left each particular resistant-to-removal-even-with-lots-of-scrubbing spot in the kitchen. So yesterday was a long series of 'not proud' moments for me, and the anniversary post slipped my mind. This time last year, I was in many ways at the same point I'm at now - semester done, brain flattened, just relieved to have it over with. This semester, though, I have the added accomplishment of having finished tutoring, and, I think, done a fairly good job of it. And the added chore of trying to figure out where my thesis is and what needs to be done with it. I haven't started that, yet. I'm not quite ready to face it. It's been an interesting year. I've been adopted by The Good Doctors' family, begun to feel at home in Melbourne, stopped hearing most Australian accents as accents at all, and been reminded many times how fortunate I am to have the friends that I do. I've missed a lot of things back home, good and bad, and I've felt my absence much more strongly than I did in Macedonia. I don't know whether that's because I'm older now, or because this is the longest I've gone without visiting home. I'm glad to be here, but somehow I'm still not entirely convinced postgrad was the best way to go. Clearly the passing of a year has not made me any less inclined to second-guess myself. I don't have any better an idea what I'm going to do after this is over, either. Still making this all up on the fly and hoping things will work out for the best. Why fuss with an approach that's worked so far? I've enjoyed having this blog, in no small part because it started me reading other people's blogs, and that has been good for much entertainment and procrastination. I hope I've provided some of the same to you. On to a new year . . .

Connections
Topic: Reading
It's interesting, the number of strands of things I'm interested in that Connie Willis has drawn together in Doomsday Book in an intriguing mesh of science fiction and historical fiction. The novel opens in the near future, where time travel is used by historians to engage in field work in their period of interest, blurring the boundaries between history and anthropology. Kivrin, a young historian at Oxford University, is about to be sent back to the early years of the fourteenth century, a period previously deemed too dangerous for direct study by anyone, let alone a female undergraduate student. The machinations of university politics have created an opportunity for her, however, one that she is determined to seize. Despite all her careful preparations, crisis after crisis erupts in both the past and the future, challenging Kivrin, those in the future who are concerned about her, and those in the past she comes to care about.

I think what I responded to most strongly in the novel is the way in which all the years of planning and study that went into Kivrin's project have, at best, mixed results. Little in the past is what she expected, proving the limitations of study done at a distance, rather than through experience. Kivrin's resourcefulness and the relationships she forms are every bit as important to her survival as all of her preparations. The past is another world, and an unfamiliar and bewildering one. All the study in the world couldn't have prepared her for everything she encounters in the past.

The picture of the past that Willis paints is detailed and evocative, in both its hardship and its beauty. Willis' speculation about the people of a rural English manor in the fourteenth century and the way they live is unromantic and realistic. The world of the near-future is a familiar one - not at all a high-tech paradise. The little details of university politics, bureaucracy and infighting are all too true to life. Most importantly, the contrast between the past and the future lies more in wealth and technology than in any change in human nature. Willis explores the richness and messiness of relationships, and reflects on altruism, selfishness and suffering, and in particular, what people owe to each other by virtue of their shared humanity. The nature of the things that have true value in life, she suggests, has not changed in seven centuries.

In record time
Topic: Uni
Marking was a breeze this time. I don't like writing reflective essays and I'm guessing most of my students didn't either - writing an essay that presents both a clear and concise argument and an overview of a subject is really challenging - but they're so much easier to read and mark than research essays. So I'm done, officially. Everything that I absolutely had to do this semester is done. I'm going to enjoy this feeling of relief for at least the rest of the afternoon. I'll worry about the state of my flat and the state of my thesis tomorrow.

Speed reading
Topic: Reading
I read fast. Usually, I consider this a good thing, since the faster I finish a book, the faster I can go on to the next one. Sometimes, however, it leads me to believe that I can do things like academic research in a completely unrealistic timeframe because hey, I can read fast, it'll be fine. Which it would be, maybe, if more academic authors wrote to be readable. It amazes me how many people who are required to produce regular publications as part of their job description seem to have absolutely no interest in writing for clarity and comprehension. And it makes me fear becoming absorbed into the featureless masses. Not that I really expect to be doing publishable work any time soon, but I wonder what sort of insidious influence the surfeit of polysyllabic words and convoluted sentences in the work I've been reading might be having.

After all the academic writing I've been subjecting myself to recently, reading Remake, by Connie Willis, which is what I devoted Tuesday evening to after handing in the most-wretched-of-all-the-wretched-essays-I've-ever-written, was like a bath for my brain. Although, less like a standard hot-water-and-bubbles sort of bath and more like a bath with one of these, which fizz madly and turn the water vivid colors and explode with yummy smells (and which, if its not already obvious, are highly recommended by me). Willis envisions Hollywood in a high-tech future where live actors are obsolete, iconic movie stars' likeness are copyrighted, and digital technology can erase everything from unhappy endings to cigarettes and alcohol. Willis creates a sense of a world of alienating sensory overload, in part by innundating the reader with unfamiliar slang without explanation in the early pages of the book. The language is familiar enough that the story isn't obscured, but foreign enough that you feel a little bit lost. The terms that need explaining get clarified before confusion bogs down the story, but the initial sense of displacement never entirely goes away. When it's done well, I really enjoy it when authors use shock immersion into the world of the novel and allow understanding to evolve through context.

Like most good noir, the science fiction element of the story is a MacGuffin. The strength of the book lies in atmosphere and characterization. Classic film references fly thick and fast - the novel was clearly the result of an immersion in popular cinema. The story draws on the classic tropes of the emotionally distant, cynical sell-out with a chemical dependency and the starry-eyed dreamer who cracks his shell, but there are subtle variations on the dynamic that keep the relationship from cliché. Remake is, at its heart, a story about passion, and how it can be redemptive and destructive and most of all, incomprehensible. It's a short, compelling read - fast-paced, witty, and slyly critical of American media and celebrity culture. If you're only going to read one Connie Willis novel, I think I'd recommend Bellwether, rather than Remake, but Remake is well worth reading.

Recommended reading
Topic: Reading
Still stuck into essays: got the first handed in on time, but going a bit more slowly with the second than I'd like. Possibly because I can't stay away from other people's blogs. EL at My Amusement Park was on a roll yesterday, with two extensive, excellent posts: 'You Know It's Bad When...' which addresses the effects of war on individual soldiers and the impact of the dominant Hollywood portrayal of soldiering as a 'frat-house' experience on how soldiers and war are perceived. 'How To Write About Film' talks about the sense of melancholy that comes with separating oneself from an experience of art, the vulnerability of the critic, and what theory can contribute to criticism. And even if those aren't entirely to your taste, go have a look around anyway, EL's approach is pretty eclectic: everything from current events to cute animal quizzes! Update: See also 'Define "Protect"' on TINO, where Linda addresses an issue I feel strongly about:

It's just mean. It's so small, looking at other happy people and thinking about how offended you are by their happiness. By their families gathering to celebrate how happy they are. It offends me, but it also saddens me enormously that anyone could look at the country where I live and think that this is what we need to be spending our time on.

Winding up and winding down
Topic: Uni
Classes ended for the semester last week. In my last tutes, I plied my students with large bowls of Tim Tams, talked about American junk food, told them not to get too stressed about their final essays, and thanked them for being so easy to teach.

Wish I could take my own advice regarding essays - I slogged away all weekend to get a draft of my reading course essay done, which my supervisor just reviewed and approved. At about 2:30 this morning it all stopped making sense to me, but apparently I was able to keep the argument going in spite of my own befuddlement. So I get to take tonight off, start back in on that essay tomorrow morning and get it done for Friday. Then it's straight on to the social theory essay, which I fully expect will be a horror show. I don't think I've ever gone in to an essay before with so little idea of what I'm doing. But it'll get done, because it has to.

Then I mark my students' final essays.

Then I take some time to finally clean my flat, which is on the verge of becoming a toxic wasteland, and try to figure out where on earth I am with respect to my thesis.

So if I'm not around for awhile, that's why. Wish me luck!

Waiting for my brain to wake up
Topic: Whatever
9:23 a.m., sun streaming directly into my face through the slowly-growing green-and-amber tinted gap in the canopy of the tree outside, mug of dark, sweet tea sending up soft, steamy wisps into the sunlight. Quiet, except for the occasional key taps from me and the person sitting across the room.

Short essay due today in the social theory class - it's not done, I think it's probably total crap, but I've got until 4:00 to attempt to sort something out of it. I was trying to do it last night, but my brain just refused. It was having none of anything academic. Poor brain. I've clearly been asking too much of it lately.

Somebody recently found their way here by googling 'i think i'm going to fail uni'. I don't think I've previously written that precise phrase here, but I am most definitely sympathetic to the sentiment. That can't have been a good night - I'm picturing some distressed first-year student surrounded by indecipherable lecture notes, essays due, no inspiration, freaking out, and suddenly it seems like Google is the only thing to talk to, because Google doesn't judge, it just looks for answers. Yeah, that's a bad night. Hopefully, it's just a bad night, and things look better in the morning -- even if it's just that you realize that failing uni would not actually be the end of everything important in life. It can be entirely too easy to lose sight of that when you're in the thick of study.

9:50 a.m., clouds drifting over the sun, and a current of sound has begun to flow through the hallway outside as staff trickle in. Brain still reluctant to tackle social theory. Time to administer another cup of tea, and perhaps promise it chocolate when the essay is done.

Cage Match!
Topic: Odds and ends
This vs this: which is more ridiculous? One's a massive Wikipedia entry, the other has card-shark dogs. I am SO OVER The Da Vinci Code, and I am not alone. Take that, pop culture juggernaut!