I keep waiting

I keep waiting but the days don't seem to be getting any better. I think I've turned into one of those cranky teachers, complaining about "these kids today!" I had a lot of conferences with students, and most of them went well. But then I had to chew out one student for being such a sh*t in class. I think I could have handled it better, but I always think I can handle these events better. The trick is to grow from them and not brood as I am wont to do. As I like to say, "things would be so much easier if I didn't care."

Okay, in other news, I have been salivating over this book which depicts many layout sketches from Ghibli films. Last summer there was a big exhibit in Tokyo where I could have seen them in person (I wonder how good the security was...). The images are so amazing! But 50 bucks plus another 40 for shipping! egad! I will have to stop yelling at students so santa will bring me one.

Absence makes the heart.... (subtitled the WAR ON TERROR)

I've been avoiding the internet(s) because it drags me in so. Some interesting news from one of my many mailing lists. Apparently, a game called "The War on Terror" has been pulled from shelves in England. You can read all about it here. In a nutshell, the problem was this:

"The player who is designated as a 'terrorist' state has to wear a balaclava (Brit speak for a ski mask) with the word 'Evil' embroidered on it—and it was this ski mask that caused the Kent constabulary to seize the game. The Kent police contended that 'the balaclava could be used to conceal someone’s identity, or could be used in the course of a criminal act.' It appears that when it comes to the War on Terror board game, the police, like the buyers for the tony high street chains that have refused to carry the game, sorely lack a sense of humor."

And can't people just buy a ski mask anywhere? Or have these, too, been banned in Britain?

In other, unrelated to "war on terror," news, I would like to plug two books which are written in or feature some pals. All of you probably already know about this, but it doesn't hurt to send a shout out to Mr. Gene, whose 500 Essential Graphic Novels has been published. Awesome! I can't wait to get my copy so I, too, will be in the know. Plus, my friend, A. Hunt, has a story featured in Comic Book Tattoo Tales Inspired by Tori Amos. If you are a Tori Amos fan, or like short story comics, get this book. It's a hefty tome -- nearly ten pounds -- so make sure that you get free shipping on Amazon.

Aren't I cool to have such cool friends?

I promise the Tiki review will be forthcoming, but...

The title is a teaser of my review of the fab tiki party that Sandy and Mike threw on Saturday. The Queen and I (I feel a song coming on....) will have battling blog posts (and if Cranky wants to throw in her cents, all the merrier). But what I want to talk about today is that I'm about to go hear a newly minted Pulitzer-prize winning author, Junot Diaz. He has been scheduled to speak to us for months but what a coup to have him just a few days from receiving such a coveted prize (oh yeah, Bob Dylan got one too). I read, or rather listened, to his novel, The Brief, Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao which got him this fame. What I did like about it was that the main character is a comic book, science fiction geek who grew up about the same time I did. Therefore, scarily, I got all the geeky references that he made. It was a good book, but not, what I think a great book. The Academy (not my workplace but the CAP A -- academe) is currently favoring the pop culture/high art split that we are seeing more and more in such works.

One amusing comment about the book to show its true geekdom is that rather than having a usual pompous quote from some famous personage on the front page, this guy writes: "Of what import are brief, nameless lives... to Galactus??" Diaz talks about this in an interview. I quote at length from it:

"The book makes it clear that the Galactus figure, the Darkseid figure, and the Sauron figure are interchangeably dictatorships and also even the mindset found in the United States. I think that in some ways it's asking a question of the reader more than anything, because in some ways, depending on how you answer that question, it really decides whether you're Galactus or not. In some ways I think there are plenty of people who are members of the kind of brief and nameless lives, and yet they don't give a shit about other nameless lives. Some people are incredibly powerful and still think that. And so what's interesting about this is that the person that that's being asked in the comic book is the very character whom the narrator, Yunior, takes on as his narrative alter-ego, his nom de plume. Galactus is actually asking the question in the Fantastic Four comic book to the Watcher, to the person that's telling stories. So I always think that that's a question to the reader but also a question to writers in general. This was the only way that the book could begin. I was like, 'Yeah, I like that. Okay.'"

Now, discuss. Galactus as postmodern metaphor.