retirement

Now that they're both retired and none of us live nearby anyway, my parents are toying with the idea of moving somewhere far away.  So this afternoon I went through all the shit in my room from grammar school, high school, and college.  Hilarious/touching/still kinda embarrassing.

Greatest Hits:

From Elizabeth's and my "Historical Getaway" sophomore (?) year.  We stayed with my Uncle Bob. Honestly, of all the stuff I found today, this is my favorite.  It's as funny to me now as it was then.

Rough draft of the itinerary for our Historical Getaway.

Final draft of the Historical Getaway itinerary.

Dude's still smelly, which I did not add to the list but should have put on the list.

Favorite/only doll.  Named Ralph.

I love this grammar school stuff.  Especially Red Ribbon Week.  They brought in these two guys every year.  One had a moose puppet that would fake lick the microphone, and the other could play the drums with glow sticks super cool -- because he's drug free.

My mom sent a peanut butter sandwich on wheat bread every day for twelve years.  And I broke my wrist by pushing my brother's friend's butt.

"Ellen is cool!" "Laura is deadly!" Ellen is a dumie!" "Not"  

Just a few of the so much Virgin Mary regalia.

Mr. (Greg) Syler was the new Theology teacher and hot, so we used to use Yahoo! to search for pictures of him.

Diary entry on a trip to Ohio for a feis:

"Got up at 7:00 and drove Mom nuts.  Finally left at 10:00.  Picked up Kate.  Drove for a while.  I had to go pee.  Said it out loud.  Katie had to go pee we stopped at Hardees & went pee"

The caption kills me.

Evidence of bossiness blossoming in high school.  Items 4 and 7 are my favorite.

Wall calendar from 8th grade.  Things I love about this:

Noted WWF programs every Sunday and Monday... as if I would have forgotten.  AS IF.

Hot lunch days! 

Show Show Show Show Show (March, so we danced at lots of St. Patrick's day events.)

Noted Terra Nova testing

Confessions

I remember being so excited for this field trip because "Moliere really pumps my nads." ("I love his work.")

... Thank GOODNESS for that Gender and Women Studies class I took my first semester at Illinois.

Would you get with Tag if you had to get with fat Chandler?

Every month, without fail, when the school newspaper came out, Moe would rip this section out and make fun of me.

From the first time I ever got drunk!

We're (Moe and I) soulmates.

a playlist that should be called "sickest, saddest sap in the whole wide world wallowing in self-pity"

I recently scrounged up a new charger for my old laptop.  And it's such a happy thing because now I can access all the music that's on that one.

I laughed the other day when I found my "cheer up" playlist.  I made it four or five years ago, the first time that I had a really intense depressive episode.  It was horrible.  And I listened to "cheer up" so much.  (Sorry, Jess.)  I remember Moe coming to visit and being like, "Why the hell is this called 'cheer up'"?

Whatever, I still like it.

1.  The Mermaid Parade – Phosphorescent (When he says, "Yeah I found a new friend, too, and yeah she's pretty and small, and... goddamnit Amanda, oh godaamnit..," I just feel for him.)

2.  How to Fight Loneliness – Jeff Tweedy

3.  You Are Not Alone – Mavis Staples

4.  Slip Slidin’ Away – Paul Simon ("She said a good day ain't go no rain / she says a bad day's when I lie in bed and think of things that might have been."  Crushing.)

5.  At This Point In My Life – Tracy Chapman

6.  Cocoon – Jack Johnson (You know, what?  Just lovely.)

7.  Forgive Them Father – Lauryn Hill

8.  Skinny Love – Bon Iver

9.  Power of the Gospel – Ben Harper and the Innocent Criminals (The intro times a million.)

10.  Torn - Natalie Imbruglia (Don't even care.)

11.  Night Falls On Hoboken – Yo La Tengo (I even used this one for a mini-lesson on quoting song lyrics in an essay.)

12.  I Get Along Without You Very Well – Nina Simone

13.  I’ll Fly Away – Alison Kraus and Gillian Welch

14.  I Remember You – Steve Earle and Emmy Lou Harris

15.  Either Way – Wilco
16.  Angel From Montgomery – Susan Tedechi (So good: "How the hell can a person go to work in the morning / and come home in the evening and have nothing to say?")

another list

I'm really slogging through this day.

I have a list SO LONG of shitty things I have to take care of, and it seems like every time I do one, it sprouts more shitty things for me to sort out.

Here's a list of things that I noticed didn't suck today:

1.  I talked to Willard on the phone.  About a former student of his, he told me, "She's a Republican, but she's a good person."  And then we both laughed so hard.

2.  I brought these two mugs to the laundromat.  For Christmas, Moe got me the one with a meerkat on it that says clit. "It's a meerkat!" she said.  Tammy gave me the Moscow mule mug; she had put it in her purse for me after I had admired it while drinking out of it at the bar by my parents' house.

3.  I listened to "Try A Little Tenderness" while I ate a sandwich.

4.  Rachel and Margaret both agreed that they've had enough of teaching White boy American lit at their respective teaching posts, and that they're just gonna "go quietly rogue."  (Rachel's always turning phrases that make you wanna stand up like, "go quietly rogue.") Also, resonating with Suzanne.  And a peek at Katie's kids' badass YPAR project on sexism at their school.  I really have some serious teacher-friends.  Thank goodness.

5.  My Mom.

6.  I like this sign at the Post Office.

highlights of my week:

1. Moe visited! And the highlight of this highlight was probably our pregaming Apples to Apples. That game. So dumb and yet so fun at the same time.

2. I went to see the school play and chatted during the intermission with an older man behind me who has as his goal to attend five plays a week. Holy shnikees, right? He strongly suggested that I see a play, the title of which escapes me, in which a man dies and then comes back to tell his wife how much he loves her. He also suggested that I think seriously about the impending danger of "that satellite" colliding with "something up there," thereby knocking out every computer in the country including cars. It would set our society back eighty years he guessed. According to his estimation, the cause of this doom is the terrible direction our country is taking what with the removal of religion from so many things.

3. So many of my students are now using textual proof to support their theses and are using correct MLA style when they do it. And they're doing it quite well.

4. Jess made red pesto ravioli for dinner last night.

Freud would have loved this

In typical Moe fashion, Moe introduced me to this little piece of reality the other day: there is currently a movie about the premise of which is a toothed vagina. I mean, I don't know the story, but what else could be important to know about such a movie.

Seriously?

I've been wanting to blog about these since before blogs.

Are these or are these not the names of an elderly couple sitting on rocking chairs on the front porch?

I stopped and took Buckley's photo Saturday afternoon on my way up to Chicago, but I had to ask Katie and Moe to stop so that I could snap Onarga today on our way back to C-U.

They weren't happy; they don't think this is as funny as I do.

see what I mean:
[ellen (7:23:36 PM): i'm about to blog about your shit
moe (7:23:49 PM): what about?
moe (7:23:54 PM): my awesomeness?
moe (7:23:57 PM): or sexiness?
ellen (7:24:26 PM): no, your lack of a sense of humor
moe (7:25:00 PM): are you FREAKIN kidding me?
moe (7:25:11 PM): I am fucking hilarious
moe (7:25:15 PM): that IS my bag
ellen (7:25:31 PM): haha
moe (7:25:32 PM): so you can shove your blog up your ass
moe (7:26:33 PM): you really don't think I'm funny?
ellen (7:27:10 PM): moe, im blogging about how you dont think my photos are funny
moe (7:27:23 PM): the couple bullshit
moe (7:28:09 PM): blog about how our shower will not turn off
moe (7:28:33 PM): its freakin hilarious]

I promise to return to regular programming soon.

"Together we can build a world that's just and inclusive for all."





With the tizzy that I've been in over Super Tuesday, I almost forgot about this misguided buffoon.


Moving on, or back I should say, look at us two *young* *under 30* voters communicating instantly via the Internets:

me (9:37:04 PM): haha mitt romney's fans are holding up "change" signs
me (9:37:08 PM): change how?
Moe (9:37:17 PM): haha
Moe (9:37:24 PM): his son is named tagg
me (9:37:52 PM): he said that its important to him to preserve the kind of nation that we've had because we all want our children to grow up with the kind of prosperity that we've had
me (9:37:58 PM): um who's "we" motherfucker
me (9:38:13 PM): tagg and mitt. boyhood games
Moe (9:40:47 PM): dog names
me (9:41:10 PM): ha
Moe (9:41:20 PM): yes, I want my children to grow up with racism, homophobia, no separation of church and state, and with a war going on
Moe (9:41:29 PM): what a motherfucker
me (9:41:38 PM): mmm yes and lots of poverty, too
me (9:41:43 PM): and failing schools
Moe (9:41:56 PM): yes, poverty and a giant fence around our country
me (9:42:00 PM): NOW that's the america i'd like to see my non-existent children grow up in
Moe (9:42:04 PM): and no health care!
me (9:42:05 PM): oh yes!
Moe (9:42:33 PM): how can people even buy that shit?
me (9:42:33 PM): and while we're at it
Moe (9:42:42 PM): yes?
me (9:42:43 PM): let's chain chastity belts onto our daughters
Moe (9:43:00 PM): and strip away roe v. wade
me (9:43:10 PM): and stop teaching evolution
me (9:43:21 PM): i'm not related to a monkey!
Moe (9:43:35 PM): haha
Moe (9:43:57 PM): god breathed life into adam and then made eve for child bearing purposes
me (9:44:14 PM): and laundry-doing purposes
Moe (9:44:35 PM): [Moe's ex-boyfriend] (9:44:54 PM): u see my guy huckabee mopping up
Moe (9:44:40 PM): AAHHHHHHHHHHH
me (9:44:48 PM): NO WAY
Moe (9:44:57 PM): huckabee is below the mason-dixon line conserv
me (9:46:33 PM): he fried squirrels with a popcorn maker in his dorm in college


One more thing. I've just watched McCain's speech, and then Obama's, and something has sort of come to me. Their rhetoric is so vastly different, and it's not just a Republican/Democrat, progressive/conservative thing. McCain spoke about the campaign, and about his opponents, and about being the Republican front-runner; his speech was focused. And his audience was supportive but subdued. Obama doesn't have the focus. He talks about the abolitionists and the suffragettes and the freedom-riders and the woman in New Orleans who was told her city won't be rebuilt; and his audience speaks back to him as he speaks to them. It's dynamic. Reminds me of the call-and-response phenomenon in African American English that I looked at in a few of my classes last semester. I wonder what implications the success of Obama's campaign, which must be very much related to his inspiring speeches, might be for the status of African American English in relation to "Standard" English. Although really, he doesn't follow that many of the linguistic rules of African American English (habitual be, absent copula, etc.).



If it's not blaringly obvious to you, my dear reader/s, I've updated this post at various points during my viewing of the primary coverage. Hence the hodge-podge-ness.