to counteract my general pessimism

ugh

the day started off alright, then i opened up my browser to feministing.com and read this monstrosity.

i agree with la blonde's post from the other day.

i am sure this is a phase

i've come to the conclusion that for the most part, i kind of like teaching. i am not terribly good at it, but some of my students appear to have learned things and occasionally seem to enjoy my class. with this small amount of positive feedback i feel that teaching is therefore the most satisfying part of my graduate school experience. my classes are generally useless, and even if they were of some value it wouldn't matter because all i have time to do is cram, regurgitate onto a test/paper, erase, repeat. oh joy.

the other reason why i have become almost happy with teaching is the absolute focus it give me. when i'm lecturing i can't think about anything else except how not to screw up the next few words out of my mouth. it's almost therapuetic. this semester has brought a whole slew of negativity into my life which has left my brain to mire in the icky thoughts as oppsed to rejoicing in the better parts of my life. i can't keep my mind from wandering to unhappy/angry thoughts while i'm in class, at the gym, watching movies, or sipping back the bourbon. but while yammering on about fossils or sexual selection theory i can find some peace.

then again i have students who think opposums are a derived trait in primates. and i feel a little like kicking puppies. and still i firmly stand by my statement that teaching is more satisfying than the rest of graduate school.

give us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses...

exploit them, punish them, and force them out of the country with flaming pitchforks.

i grew up on the border of texas and mexico and have been privy to the illegal immigration issue for as long as i have been cognizant of what my parents spoke of at the dinner table. that the issue has become more national and that white people's reactions are getting so much scarier shouldn't surprise me. but it does.

apparently the texass state government put in several scary bills as an attempt to so kindly cock their gun barrels and ask illegal immigrants to "git off their prop'rtee".

what's REALLY scary is that farmers branch, tx, which is a dallas suburb (78% identified white, 37% identified hispanic) has declared english the town's official language and is making it difficult for illegal immigrants to live in apartments. now as i mentioned, is this shocking? shouldn't be given the increasing hostility of middle class white people towards hispanics (maybe it's in stasis, my mom just bitches about it more and more these days). the housing ordinance is particularly cruel in that landlords are supposed to crack down on illegal immigrants renting apartments and fine those they find out are not card carrying members of the u-s-ofa by fining them $500 a day for each tennent. right. i could barely afford 500% a month when i was renting an apartment in texas and i come from middle class white mommy and daddy money whenever i need it. don't just kick the people who do your shit jobs for you out...but kick 'em while they're down too. what totally cheeses me off though is that the people of good ol' farmers branch are claiming that this is a measure they are taking as defense against terrorism. huh? you mean you are afraid someone is going to mow your lawn for dirt cheap prices? i hardly think that the terr'ists they are claiming to worry about would ever even think about setting foot into bumfuck, tx. sorry kids. that's a part of the world that doesn't need screwing up. ya'll are doin it yerselves.

also in the news, there is a movement to change gene names because people take themselves too seriously. or maybe i am just insensitive? i think i would be comforted if i had some genetic disorder tied to a gene that has the name of a video game character.

sometimes gross things happen to me

mr. ss was complaining of bug bites the other day which put us into a little bit of a frenzy over the threat of bedbugs. we searched and poked at our mattresses and found nothing. nada. the flies laughed at us and went back to their business. ss suggested we might have rougue mosquitos. i studied and went to bed.

but ss gets the prize! DING DING she was right.

i woke up yesterday morning to a small blotchy thing on my pillow with some confusion. and there is no confusion like just woke up after a day of studying confusion. why is there a big mark on my pillow? is it writhing? is that...blood? apparently in the night our mosquito buzzed into my room and licked his chops at the thought of dipping into my sweet sweet hemoglobins. alas. i was wearing full length pj pants and a long sleeved shirt. hmmm what about that delectible head blood? well the mosquito must have gone for my head or face and met the slow, crushing blow of my head as it settled back on the pillow. and what's more is that i'm not all that itchy.

it still grosses me out that i slept for a while in a small pool of blood that must have been a mix of the ill-fated mosquitos, my roommates, my cat, and who knows what else. i tried to think of ways i could test my pillow...but my memory of genetics last semester is blurry at best. all i can remember is t.d. telling stories about shooting woodpeckers. i learn a lot of useful information.

today in mental anguish

i think i have a disease that prevents me from studying. it's making me experiencing some serious blog reading side effects.

i've been holding back a little vomit in my throat ever since i found out what a purity ball looks like. if you haven't seen/heard of this yet and don't mind having the urge to bash your head against a wall, i'd check it out. bolt girl wrote a really nice blog on these events and the whacked out "values" they attempt to impose on young girls. the best i can do is rant about how this kind of stuff pisses me off and gives me the hibbity jibbities.

it's astonishing that fathers are making their daughters pledge to remain abstinent before they tie the knot so that their virginity might be a wedding present for their future husbands. had i known that my sexuality was merely the property of some hypothetical future mr. wild-eyed rose i would have wrapped my hymen up in some fancy paper instead of letting some jackass paw his way into my panties when i got to college. i guess my father failed me there. all he did was take me to non-creepy daddy-daughter events and tell me to be responsible. no incestuous balls, no magic sex-crazed boy repelling vows, no chastity belts. nada. really my childhood was terrible.

well, i guess i am tarnished in the eyes of all good men everywhere. because i can't offer myself up on a little virgin platter no man will ever want to marry me. because really, don't all men want to be responsible for "taking" a woman's virginity. that first time sure is spectacularly uncomfortable! nah. i think i'll just take these used goods elsewhere and find some bad liberal guy who won't objectify me to ravage as an act of defiance.

that's it. i'm making a list.

i think i will start making a list of states that i will never ever live in. today we add maryland. because rape is ok there.

via publius.

google image search "anterior"

the third picture you get is wang. i guess it's anatomically tasteful? i just wasn't expecting all out full frontal male nudity.

this is what amuses me when i spend most of my day at new york city open enrollment college.

party like a rockstar halloween weekend

this weekend was a bit intense..... but for the most part quite fun.

silk stockings and i hosted a halloween party on saturday which was attended primarily by lupec ladies and their respective mr. lupecs plus a few new friends. there was beerin the bathtub, there were scandalous costumes, there were good times.

due to the fact that neither ss nor i had to really teach on tuesday, monday ended up being rock and roll karaoke night. i finally sang "i touch myself" with a live band (something i was twice promised but will never get to do in that context) and gave such a lewd performance that it got an enthusiastic holy fucking shit. hooray!

the ladies will appreciate this. i had my students meet me at the zoo yesterday for our lab, and since it was halloween i told them that if they dressed as non-human primates i would give them extra credit. one student did indeed follow up on this and came as a male vervet. blue balls and everything. it made my heart a little happier.