À qui de droit:
I don't even know you, so please stop trying to IM me. Just because we have a mutual friend, it doesn't mean that I want to talk to you. Besides, you don't even speak English, nor do I speak your native tongue. So any communication between us would be pretty much pointless. I don't know why you even bother.
Veuillez agréer, Monsieur, l’expression de mes sentiments distingués.
Kaitlin
I know that England is not too well known for its culinary delights, but there are a few things I tried and grew to like while I was there. So lately, I've been frequenting the International sections of my local supermarkets to pick up my favorite foods that I had in England. Over Christmas, my dad and I drove up to Massachusetts to buy some Pimm's, so now I can enjoy the tasty beverage at home. I've also picked up smoked salmon (which I know isn't foreign, but I never ate it before going to Oxford), hummus (ditto), brie and cream crackers, Aero Mint bars, and rich tea biscuits. Next time, when I am not poor, I will go for the PG Tips (which are, alas, $6.99 a box). They even have Marmite, which is very British but I've never tried it because it looks disgusting.
These are all nice, but I just found out the best thing of all:
I can order Ben's Cookies from the States.
It's fairly pricey (about $14 for a small tin with 4 large cookies), but when you take the exchange rate into consideration, this is actually a slightly better price than at the Covered Market.
Being able to have that tasty cookie goodness here in the States would be pretty awesome. However, I have to consider some other factors, like nutritional value, the willpower to have 4 Ben's Cookies in my home and not eat them at once, and the sad state of my bank account.
Which is more important? Tasty cookie goodness, or the state of my bank account?
I'd like to know what you think.
Peace out,
Me
Hey folks, I'd like your advice here.
As I mentioned before, I'm leading a seminar presentation on the Virtual Classroom feature of Blackboard in about two weeks. I've presented and made handouts on this before, but I wanted to get some more perspectives from people who have used the tool.
I have no problem getting people to participate in the virtual class sessions. But I am particularly interested in strategies to get people to stay focused and on topic, and to keep people from slacking off during the class session.
If anyone has used Blackboard or WebCT to hold live online classes, I'd be interested in your feedback of what works and what doesn't. I'm also interested in suggestions for when to use the virtual classroom, other than exam review or bad weather. And finally, what do you do to deal with technical difficulties? Some people genuinely have problems that keep them from entering the virtual classroom, so I hate to penalize when it's not their fault.
Any feedback that anyone may have (from your experience as a student or faculty member) would be much appreciated. Leave a comment here, or drop me a line if you'd rather comment in private.
Many thanks! :)
As I’ve mentioned more than once on this blog, I have this weird reaction to change. I resist it as long as I can, it makes me physically ill, and then once I plunge in and do what I have to do, I can’t imagine why I ever felt hesitant to begin with.
Last night, I went to a talk by Susan Douglas at my old university. (Yes, I went to a lecture on a Friday night. I have no life.*) Her talk was on the representation of motherhood in the media. A lot of my former professors were there, as were a lot of my colleagues from my last Master's degree. It was a great talk, and it gave me a lot to think about. And just as I did in Oxford, I bought the book and I had her sign it.
But I felt really out of place.
Don't get me wrong, it was a great lecture, and it was great to see some old friends. And the style was a bit more lively than some of the Oxford lectures I've attended. But I've grown accustomed to the Oxford academic life. I missed how presenters would cite articles written by scholars who happened to be sitting in the audience. I missed going with my friends and exchanging scandalous comments throughout the lecture. I was even a bit surprised when I got there and remembered that "refreshments will be served" does not include wine at an American university lecture.
I keep feeling compelled to go back to visit my old University, but every time I go back, I just feel like a visitor. The place hasn't changed much, the faculty haven't changed much, and a few of the students I knew are still there. I guess I'm the one who has changed.
Anyway.
In related news, I found out last night that the article on Media Literacy that I co-authored with two professors and a grad student last summer has been accepted for presentation at the National Communication Association Convention in Texas in November! Yay! I know it doesn't have anything to do with my current Master's or DPhil, but it's another line for my CV. :) It's also under review for publication, so I'll let you know how that turns out as soon as I find out.
Much love,
Me
xxx
*In Oxford, if my friends and I had decided to go to a lecture on a Friday night or some other weird time, we would have complained noisily for hours about what losers we are, but we would have genuinely enjoyed the lecture and would have talked about it at the bar with our friends afterwards. Ahh, the social life of grad students...
***Update, 2:56 p.m., 7/22/06: Sorry, for some reason I ended up posting this six times. I have no idea what the hell happened.
Dear Amazon.com,
Why, oh why, when I need two books so desperately for my DPhil proposal and order them with expedited shipping, do they arrive in my mailbox exactly one hour after I finish my proposal? Please advise.
Love and Literary Theory,
Kaitlin
OK, this is really weird, but hear me out.
I was looking at some childhood photos of a friend recently, when I realized that I am totally envious of people who have childhood photos of themselves in a different country. Yes, I know they were born and raised there, but it just seems so much more exciting to have childhood photos from Italy or India or Scotland or whatnot.
I don't know what goes through my head - not just, "Hey! That's you when you were little! Cool!" but also, "Hey! That's a backyard in France twenty years ago! Cool!" Babies and small children seem to look the same the world over, but for some reason knowing that the photo was taken in another country makes the baby much more interesting.
Maybe I've just become indifferent to my surroundings. I've had them for the past twenty-six years, so it's all the same to me. When my friends came from Spain to visit me during my freshman year at the University of Hartford, I thought it was funny to see the kinds of things that excited them. School buses. Tall buildings. Baseball. Jack-o-lanterns. People who say "Good night" when you leave a restaurant at 7 pm. Hell, my friend even got excited about apple juice. It's the same around the world - Americans who go to London snap photos of the "Mind the Gap" signs (I did it too when I was there), when it's really something just as mundane to Londoners as a "No smoking" or "Exit" sign.
So why do I get so excited about childhood photos from other countries? What makes a baptism in a church, a high chair in a kitchen, a picnic in a backyard so much better when it's in Brazil or Spain or Hong Kong? I have no idea. It's just one of those odd quirky things that I find interesting. Maybe it's just because it's something different. Although I whine about how boring things are around here, it's probably interesting or exciting to someone who has never experienced anything like it before.
Sorry for this long-winded ramble. Off to have dinner and then back in the pool. Have a good week, everyone!
Ok, it doesn't have the same ring to it as the famous weekly event over at Phantom's place (where I won for style again this week! woohoo!), but I needed to whine, so I will do it here.
Having been in England, where the food is not quite as spicy as it is over here, I worried about American food making me sick when I got home. It hasn't so far, but I've discovered another problem now that I'm home:
My alcohol tolerance has dropped significantly.
Over in Oxford I drank like a champ, at all hours of the day, with food (including sketchy kebab) or without. Most of the time I was fine, with the one exception being that really hot week in May when we had the graduate dinner on Thursday (free sherry and wine for all) and the guest dinner/Cinco de Mayo party (free drinks for committee members on duty) on Friday. I had a headache after that, but other than that I usually have no problem.
Now I can't have more than one drink without feeling terribly sick. For two nights in a row, I just had one drink, and I felt like I was gonna die. What's up with that? And it's not like I'm drinking anything bad - one night it was vodka with Fresca, the other night it was a Pimm's and lemonade.
I need to get back in shape if I want to make it through our weekly trashage events in the Fall...;)
Now that I'm off for the summer, my Flickr page won't be filling up with quite so many photos of black tie dinners and pub outings. Instead, you will find an alarming number of photos of my Adorable Younger Siblings. I swoon over them like most people swoon over their kids, so be prepared. (Remember, my youngest siblings are 13 and 14 years younger than I am, so in many ways I'm like another parent to them.)
Not much to report here. Family BBQs, dissertation proposal work, job hunting. Nothing exciting. In the meantime, why not mosey on over to my Flickr and swoon over my Adorable Younger Siblings?
Much love,
Me
PS: FORZA AZZURRI!!!!!
Well, after I received these prestigious awards, I didn't think I could possibly receive any greater honor while at Oxford. It turns out I was wrong: I just found out last night that I have been chosen as one of the 50 People LEAST Worth Knowing in Oxford. Check out my listing under number 23: "Killing Fish and Bigamy."
I am so proud to be included on a list of such great prestige.
This is a post aimed at my American following, as y'all do it differently across the pond.
If I am invited to present at a seminar/workshop (like a one time thing), where does it go on my résumé/vita? I have a section for academic and university service - would it go there? The seminar presentations I have given/am giving are about using chat rooms and instant messaging in teaching.
I'd like to know what y'all think. Much love,
Me
