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October 27, 2006
Four out of Five
Awhile ago, I read the statistic that at least 80% of detected Down's Syndrome babies are aborted. The statistic has haunted me, maybe because my life has been deeply touched by people with Down's Syndrome. Wikipedia notes an even higher figure, citing an article which calls this trend "eugenics by abortion" (and suggesting positive alternatives, like adoption and developing disability sensitive environments).
In honor of my friends...
Brett--my childhood friend's little brother. You had no fear. I remember sprinting across a field trying to catch up to you as you wandered cheerfully off. I remember the story of when you nonchalantly walked out your front door, unknown to anyone else. Your parents--and eventually the police--frantically searched for you, only to find you curled up, peacefully sleeping in the local cemetery. You're all grown up now. I hear from your sister that you are happy and working a great job.
Noah--I only knew you for a week, when I was babysat for a conference as a teenager. We all fell in love with you, especially noticing how you watched out for the littler guys. We made T-shirts, with everyone's foot prints. Yours are the only ones I remember--your purple footprints were shaped differently than any other kid's. I love your footprints.
Amy--I married Tim, and got you as a cousin--what a perk! Your exuberance is contagious. I have an image in my mind of you dancing with your headphones on, singing at the top of your lungs. And I have another image of you lovingly taking care of your baby doll. You're our social butterfly, making everyone around you feel comfortable and at home. I love watching you and Tim pal around--you bring out a side of him that really touches my heart. When you walk into a room, you make us all feel like family.
Mark--you are so faithful at church. You do every task--whether its collecting offerings or handing out bulletins--with your whole heart. It's always fun hearing about the latest basketball and football games as we talk after church. My favorite thing that you do for all of us is the way you spend part of each Sunday afternoon searching through the hymnal so that you can pick a hymn in the evening that reinforces the sermon. It makes the truths of the sermons so personal to sing through them beforehand.
You all live your life with such joy and courage. Thank God you weren't the four out of five.
Posted by Tim and Jo at 12:19 AM | Comments (0)
October 26, 2006
More YouTube Fun
Heee!! People keep on finding funny things and showing me.
Weird Al meets Anakin and legos.
Posted by Tim and Jo at 10:29 PM | Comments (0)
I feel cool!
I just used video clips of performances by Jimi Hendrix to help my music appreciation kids understand the virtuosity and wild, almost supernatural persona of Paganini and Liszt. And the continuing "Romantic" elements in music today.
I think they made the connection. I love it when I can cross a boundary in teaching.
I feel really with it!
Posted by Tim and Jo at 12:54 PM | Comments (3)
October 24, 2006
LOTR humor #2
Thanks again to Karen for finding this little oddity on YouTube. Hee!
Posted by Tim and Jo at 8:52 AM | Comments (0)
October 23, 2006
Art meme
To follow up on the art meme, here are your very own personalized art works. I can't draw, so I had to resort to alternative media!
Funke, enjoy the changing seasons!
Autumn College #1
And 'Stina, the first few snowflakes outside my window inspired this, an homage to the time-honored tradition of decorating 4-C and 4-South.
Blue Snowflake
Karen, in honor of two of your grand passions!
In Search of the Perfect Man
Posted by Tim and Jo at 3:48 PM | Comments (4)
October 18, 2006
musicology humor
An answer from a midterm,
The chant "In Paradigm" was sung when people decreased.
I hope people sing about paradigms when I am decreased!
Posted by Tim and Jo at 3:47 PM | Comments (1)
October 17, 2006
bewilderment
So…here’s what I’ve been thinking about lately. The 1970s. Scandals. American identity. Confusion. Bicentennial. Public history. Social history. A new emphasis on individualism and personal history (the "me" generation). The idealization of the past. The idealization of the south and rural life. A return to tonality. And how these all come together in the form of two pieces written during the early 1970s that use shape-note hymns.
I just can’t figure out how to pull it all together into a coherent chapter.
I feel like I'm fumbling through different kinds of history and historical writing, wishing I had a better grasp on methods of historiography.
Posted by Tim and Jo at 7:15 PM | Comments (2)
October 14, 2006
Lennon, Pagliacci, and Oedipus
Here's Tim catching up on fun times of our past week!
Tuesday In honor of discovering our little friend, we hung out in Squirrel Hill tonight. We got some pizza at Napoli’s where we had our first date. Then we had some coffee at the Coffee Tree Roasters and some ice cream at Cold Stone. We headed down to the theatre on Forward Ave to see The U.S. vs. John Lennon. Before the movie we played a Lord of the Rings pinball machine and “we did good!”
It was an exciting machine to play, even though some of it was quite corny: We got to the BASH BALROG!!!! stage and the Balrog roared at us! And every time we got the ball to hit the Gimli bumper, we heard a resounding “And my Axe!” All this added to the aesthetic experience and made us feel like a part of the Fellowship on the quest for the ring. Frodo lives! [Joanna got over her painful disgust at the shameful marketing of her FAVORITE book (long before it was a fad) in order to bash enough balrogs to win two free games. Woohoo!]
The movie was quite amazing. Watching John and Yoko pull off all those crazy stunts (the “bed-in”, Bag-ism, the "War Is Over" posters), and ruffling the feathers of the FBI was quite a treat. They exercised their right to free speech in about as many ways as are possible!
Thursday and Friday Joanna and I have been really artsy-fartsy in the past two nights. On Thursday night we went to see a dress rehearsal of the Pittsburgh Opera’s production of Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci at the Benedum Center. Tonight we saw Sophocles’ Oedipus the King at the O’Reilly Theatre. Both were excellent!
We liked the part when Oedipus puts on a clown suit after he married his mom. (is that right?) And then he kills Tonio on the road to Thebes and becomes king of the commedia dell’arte. (wait…that doesn’t seem quite right.)
Let’s talk about Pagliacci. Pagliacci answers the riddle of the Sphinx and then paints his face and kills his father. What drama!
Hmmmm. Maybe we shouldn’t see an opera and a play on consecutive nights!!!
Posted by Tim and Jo at 12:12 PM | Comments (1)
Caught redhanded and I'm feeling blue
Our students had their midterm on Wednesday.
As we were grading, one of the TAs had been suspicious that one of the students from one of my recitations was cheating. Her first page looked iffy, but the second page was unmistakeable.
The guy next to her was really excited about his answer, and at the end wrote (words changed for the protection of the innocent) "I'm da bomb." At the end of her very odd and incorrect essay, she wrote "I'm da bomb" as her concluding sentence.
I didn't confront her in recitation on Thursday, not knowing yet how the professor will handle it. My first reaction--other than laughing at the absurdity of it--was to get angry. In this copy-and-paste generation, some kids have little qualms about breaking the clearly stated rules of academic integrity. We could easily fail her in the whole class, leaving a mark on her academic record. I wanted to at least give her a zero in the exam.
This morning, I saw her working in the library, perhaps even full-time. And she's an international student, English is definitely not her first language, though she does speak well.
And my heartstrings are being plucked. I have a soft part for international students, their guts in working in a language and country not their own. And I also have a soft spot for kids who work their way through school, instead of having it handed to them on a silver platter.
Justice or mercy?
Sigh.
Posted by Tim and Jo at 12:00 PM | Comments (0)
October 13, 2006
Why grad school is like home-schooling
...I've done some of my best work in my PJs.
Posted by Tim and Jo at 9:35 AM | Comments (2)
October 12, 2006
Art meme
Since Jeannette made me a cool photograph, here it goes...
The first five people to respond to this post, will get some form of art, made especially for them, by me.
The only catch: If you sign up, you have to put this in your own journal as well.
And here's Jeannette's cool picture! It reminds me of Kafka as bedtime story with my old roommate Grace. Creepy Gregor!
Posted by Tim and Jo at 5:08 PM | Comments (3)
October 10, 2006
New Neighbor
Tim discovered this little guy making a nest in the ancient ivy overgrowing one of our windows. When he sleeps, you can only see his foofy tail poofing up and down as he breathes.
When you tap on the window and wake him up, he makes funny little faces at you.
I'd love to give him a little food, but I don't want to disturb his little cozy by opening the window. He's so wee and mischievous! Maybe I'll call him Squirrel Nutkin...
Posted by Tim and Jo at 1:41 PM | Comments (1)
October 6, 2006
Shepherd's Pie
Following up Jeannette's menu exchange from a few weeks back, here's a standard in our house, especially as the weather edges its way towards nippyness. It's an easy recipe to vary, so here are some variations as well. And it makes lots, great for making extras for lunches or busy days when you don't want to cook.
Shepherd's Pie (8-10 servings)
Continue reading "Shepherd's Pie"
Posted by Tim and Jo at 2:54 PM | Comments (0)
October 2, 2006
Bernstein
Oh, I've neglected this blog woefully lately! I have some fun pics of our little vacation, and the "Josquin Club" reunion I'll put up later.
Tim and I have been watching bits of Leonard Bernstein's lectures "The Unanswered Question," named after Charles Ives's work of the same title.
Incredible. He weaves together musical examples and performances with an encyclopaedic knowledge of music and literature, beautifully articulating how music illuminates the ideas of its time-period, especially the nearly-apocalyptic milieu of the twentieth-century. He makes me remember why I wanted to become a musicologist.
After his philosophical discussion of Mahler and the conducting of the finale from Mahler's Ninth, I was struck by the parallels between Mahler's music and Dostoevsky's novels. Agony, death, love, and occasional luminous outpourings, all inextricably tied together in a complex narrative, shattering and satisfying at the same time.
Posted by Tim and Jo at 6:24 PM | Comments (1)