Tense(s)

So, take this passage:

The major problem is quite simply one of grammar, and the main work to consult in this subject is Dr. Dan Streetmentioner's Time Traveler's Handbook of 1001 Tense Formations. It will tell you, for instance, how to describe something that was about to happen to you in the past before you avoided it by time-traveling forward two days in order to avoid it. The event will be described differently according to whether you are talking about it from a standpoint of your own natural time, from a time in the further future, or a time in the further past and is further complicated by the possibility of conducting conversations while you are actually traveling from one time to another with the intention of becoming your own mother or father.
Most readers get as far as the Future Semiconditionally Modified Subinverted Plagal Past Subjunctive Intentional before giving up; and in fact in later editions of this book all pages beyond this point have been left blank to save on printing costs. (1)

Got it?

Ok, now pretend it's in a foreign language, and that you have an exam over these tenses on Monday.

And that is how my Spanish class went today.



(1) From The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

PhotoPost

I must record the following exchange:

Drunken "magician": Pick a card.
Niki: *picks card*
*pause*
Niki: IT'S THE SEVEN OF DIAMONDS!!
Sarah: *chokes on noodles*
Sarah: Eating is just not safe around you.

Rundown

Whew. So, I've been to each of my classees once (and, in one case, twice) so far. Rundown time!

Accelerated First-Year Latin meets every morning at 10. And by "accelerated" they mean "intensive;" we're going to be covering something like two chapters a day in 50 minutes. The class is pretty cool, though, since the workload means that everyone in the room wants to be there. The prof. is from England, I'm pretty sure, and he seems to enjoy his subject.

Adv. Spanish Grammar and Composition is "eh" so far -- we didn't do much on the first day, but I'm sure it'll pick up soon. Our first assignment is to write a poem, which I'm not looking forward to, but the prof. is nice enough and a native speaker (I heard two of the girls in my class discussing a SPanish IV prof. who apparently has a horrible accent).

English Grammar should be ... interesting. The prof. went into great length about how the "traditional grammar" we learned in middle school is "flawed" and wrong. Fine by me; I never learned grammar the traditional way, so I have nothing to forget for this class. The prof.'s sense of humor is dry as dirt, but he seems ok.

Greek Archaeology promises to be a LOT of fun. The prof. is a field archaeologist with a great sense of humor (*coughandhe'scutecough*). Which will hopefully make up for the fact that the syllabus is teh scary. We have to keep a journal, there're lots of readings, three essays, and our first quiz is memorizing the Greek alphabet.

Physical Anthropology is self-paced, so hopefully my biggest problem will be making it to the special lab we have to take our weekly tests in.

And now I have to go to work.

Dinos!

Yeah, I made it through the first week of school (at work; college doesn't start until the 30th). AND the first Monday, since last week was a short week.

The first day back was pretty confusing, considering the complete lack of communication between the transportation system and, well, everyone else on the planet meant that half the kids didn't show or showed up late. On the other hand, I have some pretty great kids this year, and I'm looking forward to a month from now when they've settled in enough that we can do more than one thing a day.

Oh, and apparently we don't have class on Fridays anymore. I was disappointed because I had already done lesson plans for the next two weeks and thought I would have to squeeze everything into four days instead of five. BUT (!) it turns out that almost every kid in class already knows at least the basics of dinosaurs and fossils, which actually puts us a day ahead of schedule. Way cool.

Today, I was really pleased that the kids were engrossed by the online sites I wanted to show them. We actually got through all the dinosaurs on the interactive site at discovery.com, with time for discussion about which dinosaurs were bigger and smaller and faster and slower. Most importantly, I was glad that the one girl who showed up today was showing just as much interest as the boys. Also, getting done early gave me time to let them "design" their own dinosaurs.

And now, it's time to go grocery shopping.

Ann Coulter

So, in browsing the lj group ljdemocrats this afternoon, I found this article. The title pretty much sums it up; Plagiarism Expert: "If I Never Read Coulter Again, It Will Be Too Soon." Apparently, some new software found evidence that Coulter, well, steals shit. Lovely. My favorite line?

"After combing through Ann Coulter for a while, it doesn't take long before you want to call it quits. I want to prove the technology, but I don't want to make my eyes bleed."

I feel his pain. I once went line-by-line through a Coulter article pointing out inaccuracies and idiocies in order to make a point on a conservative's blog. It does, in fact, hurt.

A google news search brings up a few more fun links:
Update: Company to Probe Coulter Plagiarism Charges
Olbermann Talks to Coulter Plagiarism Spotter
UPDATE: Coulter's Syndicate Requests Report From Plagiarism Prober -- As She Hits Back at 'NY Post'
Will the media outlets who host Coulter ask about recent charges of plagiarism?

Happy 4th!

I want to submit this to blogexplosion, but I just realized I don't have enough content. So, I figured I'd spice things up a little with links to some animation! My friend Ivy did these back in high school for multimedia projects and they're a lot of fun. Plus I enjoy putting her in the spotlight. *evil grin*

Here they be:

Mothra

Ladybug

Monsters

Bunny

Final Project ... of DOOM!