Repost: The Shortest Story Ever Told

Never worn. For sale. Baby shoes.

-Ernest Hemingway
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Don't Tweet on Auto-Pilot

courtesy of Airplane! the movie

Status frenzy pervades. Twitter boasts 6 million registered users. Myspace will surpass 50 million in May. Facebook clocks 200 million users. So think before you tweet. I'm not saying censor what you tweet. I believe in the freedom of expression. But, please, at least make your status expressive and not dull.

For Twitter, 6 million does not sound like much action compared to the legion signed into Facebook. But, before you dismiss the power of Twitter, consider the difference between the two. They are not the same beast. Twitter is a status tool. Only. Facebook is many things. Bloat. Twitter does one thing and it does it well: tells the world what you're doing. Economy.

6 million people typing out what they're doing is pretty powerful, considering most of what people write, even what celebrities write. Type a few words like, "I'm cooking lamb chops for the kids" or more profound, "I am" then click update and everyone on the planet has access to the contents of your mind at that moment. Even the Library of Congress knows the power of status. They have begun to archive every twitter status update into a database designed to perpetually capture web activity for future posterity's sake.

Does that mean Lady Gaga is making history? We really care what she's wearing? Who will we care more about in the future? Will the blazing status of today measure up to the blazing status of tomorrow? So, who cares that in a hundred years, our future citizens will be able to read what you made for dinner?

So, for those of you who tweet on auto-pilot and add nothing new or creative to the online world, listen up. We don't want your "k" and "um" anymore.

It's time to brush up on our status-making skills.

Stuff to remember if you tweet on auto-pilot:

• Make the mundane interesting. Instead of an "About to eat!" tweet, "The meatballs my mom cooks look like the face of my Biology teacher"!
• Avoid speling errors. See how BAD my sentence looks? Avoid spelling errors. There. Much better,
• Do not tweet by compulsion. In other words, only tweet when the feeling or need arises. It's a moment of, "Oh, let me tweet that!" not "Should I tweet that?"
• Remember everyone probably has tweeted the most fascinating and provocative news bits from the web. So when you retweet, add your two cents to the headline. Retweet: Read this article, it's smexy! http://tinyurl.com/2w7s4sr
•  Use tinyurl. Really. It's so much better than long-ass URLs. And you can use the less character usage to your advantage.
• Make conscientious, well-thought-out responses to other people's posts. Don't be rude. Be kind. Mean people suck.
• If you don't want what you say traced back to you, don't say it.
• Don't tweet just an emoticon. :-)
• Link your facebook to your twitter to share the love.
• Link your website or blog to your twitter using feedburner to share what you've been creating to a larger audience.

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Haiku in Honor of National Poetry Month

Trees staring upward
Like tops spinning in circles
Empties our love out

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Photograph & Rant: "Sharpen Your Mind!"

In this post, I supply a photograph I took of a battered pencil sharpener along with a short quip on a sharpener's importance in a teacher's classroom.

An orange, beat-up pencil sharpener is affixed to a wall.

Even in the age of computers, it is still nice to know pencil sharpeners have a use. Any classroom teacher will tell you that one of the more valuable objects in their possession is the pencil sharpener — many are affixed to the wall so no one will take it away.

image credit: Greig Roselli © 2010

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How to open multiple webpages in tabs on startup in Firefox (3.6.3) on a Mac

If you want more than one homepage to load when you start Firefox, say your favorite news sites, for example, then this little tip may be useful so you don't have to manually load the pages every single time.

1. Go to Preferences on Mozilla Firefox

2. Select the “General” pane in the taskbar.  In the location (s) field you probably already have your default home page.

 3.  In the homepage field type in your desired web pages separated by the | key.

4. Voila. You're done. Now when you open Firefox all your favorite web pages will open in tabs.

* Caveat: If you are not sure you want tabs to open with the same web pages EVERY time you start up Firefox, and you want more control over your morning routine, then click here to learn how to create a bookmark to open in tabs.

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How to set up a bookmark folder in Firefox (3.6.3) to open your favorite sites in tabs on a Mac

In a previous post, I demonstrated how to open multiple web pages in Firefox in tabs on startup, but if you're like me, sometimes it is just annoying to have your new sites pop up every time you open up an application, so this trick may serve people better who may only want pages to open in the morning and a certain set of pages to open in the evening. Or set up pages to open for a specific task, like research a paper, for example.

Photo: A Portrait by Casey

A family member took this photo of me when I was younger (c. the 1990s). Maybe I was ten years old? I still have the photograph. So here is a copy of it (after it went through the scanner).

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Lesson Plan: Using the Apple 1984 Superbowl Commercial in the Classroom

The commercial is a fun clip to use in the classroom.

Time allowance: 45 minutes
Objectives:
Teach students how to articulate abstract ideas.
Demonstrate brainstorming techniques
Analyzing multimedia using literary terms
Incorporating quotations into student writing

Note: this is a useful lesson as an introduction or a wrap-up to classes devoted to dystopian literature, like 1984, Brave New World, or The Giver or for teaching Thoreau's Walden, or any film or text focused on the tension between individual will versus societal hegemony.

Warm-up
Start the class off with a quick free write. Have the students write about the following prompt:

What is the difference between being in a group versus being alone?

After the students have had a few minutes to write, ask the class to brainstorm what is the difference between an individual and a group. Whip around the room and share ideas on interactive whiteboard or on class chart board. You can use the example I use to start a class discussion. If I walk into a classroom with a classroom of students dressed in uniform, how do I tell each student apart? What gives us away as individuals when we are in a crowd.

Beware. The discussion will begin to take a life of its own and you as the teacher will have to allow every student to talk. Community expression and individuality is an important topic among teenagers so be ready for some interesting comments from your students.

An Astronaut Frequents an Apple Store

Activity
After you have allowed the students to express their thoughts out loud, use the board to generate a chart of the advantages and disadvantages of community living and do the same for individuality. You might want to include a definition of both terms, which you can add to the board. Or, you can have the class come up with a working definition of both concepts.

After you have compiled the list, explain to the class, that many novels and films deal with the tension between community and individual and as a class explain to them that they will begin to analyze some important scenes from literature and film.

At this point, if you want, you can have the students quickly popcorn a list of films and books that possibly illustrate the theme a tension between the two.

Ask the students if they know what apocalyptic literature is or if they know what dystopian literature is. Read a definition from a literary dictionary or other reliable source and explain to the class that there is a genre of literature that deals with the fall of society, the community, and how this affects individuals.

1984 Apple Commercial
Use 1984 as an example. If you want, you can briefly explain the plot, which can be found here. Make sure the students know it is a novel by George Orwell and it is famous for introducing the phrase, "Big Brother is watching." Ask the students if they have ever seen the television show and ask them why they think the show is called by this name.

Background
Explain the background of the 1984 commercial which can be found here. Have the students watch the clip several times, telling them to jot in their notebooks in list form everything they notice about the film: color, sound, tone, mood, dialogue, etc.

Apple Computer, INC produced an ad spot for the 1984 Superbowl to sell its new product, the Macintosh desktop computer. The computer would eventually inspire a long line of desktop computers boasting an easy-to-use GUI (graphic user interface) and the first computer to introduce friendly smiling icons and folders.

The commercial is a visual allusion to George Orwell's classic dystopic novel 1984. The short clip features a Big Brother figure imploring dull, grayed-out workers (played by skinheads) to stick to the status quo. It is hard to follow what he says, but he says something about a "garden of pure ideology" and something about being safe from the pests. It is obvious the drones are like IBM computers. The running gag line is PCs are conformists and Macs are individualists. Midway through the commercial, the Mac pest shows up, though, amidst the sound of an alarm, and a team of SWAT men chases her down really cool sci-fi corridors. She wields a hammer which she swings into the screen. The screen explodes and the commercial ends with the words: "On January 24th Apple Computer will introduce Macintosh. And you'll see why 1984 won't be like 1984."
More on Wikipedia

Writing
Pass out a handout of at least twenty quotes

You can use the following quotes if you wish, or you can research your own quotes about community.

Students in a group of three or four discuss each quote and relate its meaning to the concept of individual and community.
For each quote, students discuss, "Who wrote the quote? How does the thought express individuality or community? What quote(s) resonates with your generation?

Extension Activity: 
Have students write a creative piece on an advertisement that can be used to demonstrate the similarities and differences between abstract ideas. Or, they can write an essay on the 1984 commercial incorporating the quotations.

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Software Review: Access My Library for the iPhone

Have you ever wanted to use your iPhone to access your library's electronic resources? Well, you can with Access My Library.

I love access to my public library's online resources, like EBSCOhost and Galegroup resources.

I'm pleased to know I can access some of the resources I pay taxes for, not only on my computer but on my iPhone.

Gale Group, a leading reference resource has developed a nifty iPhone app that uses geotracking to locate the nearest public libraries in your area and allows you to access electronically through an app.

What this means is I can access Scribner's Writer's Series on my phone.

If I lived in San Francisco, then I could access the public library there as well.

Gale allows this access for free because it knows it helps libraries reach out to more of its patrons who may not have access to the stacks because of work or other commitments. This ensures libraries will continue to use Gale as an online database service.

The app enhances iPhone's ability to search out reputable resources. The worldwide web does not always contain the most desirable sources, and sometimes I need access to a subscription database to locate trustworthy information.

Now, only if the legal battle can cease, then Google can offer a similar service through its Books feature.

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On a Visit to Ozanam Inn in New Orelans — A Men's Homeless Shelter

New Orleans has an all-men homeless shelter on Camp Street. Today my cousin and I stepped inside to take a look.

 

photo credit: Ozanam Inn

Spontaneously, while walking on Camp street heading for the D-day museum, We crept behind a gate. Ozanam Inn sprung into view as if metastasized right there on Camp street, replete with a line of men, waiting in line for a room to sleep. But he didn't know what was behind the gate. I didn't tell him; he was horrified, ripped from a pleasant view into a darker corner, social inequality thrust upon a privileged. It was rudeness on my part; I had said, "Come here. I want to show you something," as if I knew what a good lesson was. To me, they were readers, workers, sinners, saints -- reading a newspaper, one, another a novel, and another dragging on a cigarette. Another protecting his bicycle leaning against the dump. For him, just a boy at my side, they were strangers, monsters in his sleep, the stay-away-from-them folks momma told you about, not the needy in want of bread, shelter -- not the Samaritan on the block. It was my fault; I deserved his "Don't ever do that to me again without telling me first" accusation. In my rush to enlighten, I revealed reality too quickly, shed the gauze from his eyes too swiftly as if I went to amputate his legs without warning. We walked to the museum and I could tell I had frightened him. He was skittish and uncomfortable, gazing into the plexiglass displays of bombers and beach ballasts, authentic uniforms; and my words, a mismatch of history and mentorship. An old veteran's wife approached us while I was trying to explain axis and allies; "Listen to him boy; you can't get a better lesson than this". You indeed can't get a better lesson that.

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Poem: “Chinese Buffet”

photo credit: wikimedia

at the chinese buffet, during lunch hour
there's a table of brash intimacy
and lunch hour camaraderie -
the sleight parent wearing a holiday
green sweater, christmas lights strung
across her child-nursing breasts;
she gestures, eggrolls pushed to
the side, the travails of I-don't-know-what-
because I am too far away to eavesdrop,
but what I did notice I've turned into miserable verse,
I must admit,
of my own voyeurism
getting the best of me,
this haphazard bunch,
articulating with words and flesh
what I can only stab at
with my fork,
ashamed at my own frog-like
existence,
crouching in the chinese buffet,
while my mongolian stew
gristles in the background.

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Notes on "On Some Motifs in Baudelaire"

Explore Benjamin's take on Proust's madeleine, Lacan's objet petit a, and how poets unlock involuntary memories, shocks, desire, and hidden chance.

Walter Benjamin on Marcel Proust on the Madeleine
I remember Walter Benjamin's writings on Marcel Proust's madeleine, the moment, in Proust's novel In Search of Lost Time, when an avatar of Proust bites into the pastry, memories of his childhood flood into his brain, what Proust calls a memoire involuntaire; but, I never noticed before this statement Benjamin (writing about Proust) makes about the search for an object related to a lost memory:

"As for that object, it depends entirely on chance whether we come upon it before we die or whether we never encounter it" (Benjamin Illuminations 158).

Lacan's Objet Petit A
This comment reminds me of Lacan's objet petit a.

It's Lacan's psychological concept for the lost object. The object of desire responsible for obsession and deranged fantasy. It is that object of desire that drives the desirer mad in search of it.

The object of desire, in the symbol of the madeleine, is a marker for that object that we may chance upon, involuntarily, or may never have at all. I think about myself, here, and my desires. If there is a "madeleine" for me, I may taste it, or I may not; the memoire involuntaire is totally necessitated by chance; I happen upon the object, the memory comes flooding in like an impressionistic painting. But, I may never come upon this memory, locked forever in some lost object of desire.

Is the Job of the Poet to Hearken Back to Lost Memories?
If it is the poet's job to unlock these memories, then I applaud the poet. If it is a poet who can open up a madeleine of lost memories, let's laud him with a crown of laurel.

I am sure there is a poem hidden in a taste yet to be eaten.

Am I hedonistic to wish for such a bite?

Proust entrances his reader with the opportunity to invoke memories through the senses. It is the poet who puts these sense impressions into language. Cognitive science confirms Proust's intimation that the senses (e.g., smell and taste) trigger a memory. Proust is right.

Proust Via Benjamin Via Lacan Are Onto Something
The memory Proust, and I think Benjamin is onto something, is alluding to is not a factual memory stuck at a particular moment in time. The memory is much broader than a recollection. Baudelaire (via Benjamin) uses the term shock - an expression meant to suggest a memory linked to trauma. The shock is a sense impression outside of some romantic notion of memory, and instead of a memory of the crowd.

I put away silly notions of private memory. The artist does not pull from something deep inside of him to produce art. It is not a private string of emotions the artist must articulate so others can understand. The memory the artist exposes is already there, involuntary.

Works Cited: 

Benjamin, Walter. Eiland, Howard, et al. Gesammelte Schriften. United Kingdom, Belknap Press, 1996.

Benjamin, Walter. Illuminations: Essays and Reflections. United States, Mariner Books, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2019.

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