I am feeling so good this early evening because I only have to write 5-7 pages for my Seminar proposal. At a meeting with my professor I had asked him for length guidelines and he had told me 7,000-10,000 words. That’s roughly 23 pages. Accordingly, I was flipping the fuck out over it. Our proposals are due April 24th, and with the due date looming large over my head, I was seriously considering going crazy and checking myself in to a local center. That was just too much writing for a mere proposal.

I’ve been keeping tabs on some of my classmates, asking them each time I saw them in class or around campus, how far they are with their proposals. No one had started it yet. We took time in class today to go over our preliminary thoughts about our topics/research and all but three of us (including me) had decided to change their entire topic. We asked about the due date and the oral presentation we need to give and about the length requirement. The professor corrected himself, saying he expects 5-7 pages, according to our individual research topics, of course. The final thesis should be roughly 7-10,000 words.

Now? Now I’m resting easy and an immense weight has been lifted.

I can totally do 5-7 pages.

This Sunday I will be changing my clocks ahead one hour in observance of Daylight Savings Time. The last time I had to change my clocks was over 16 years ago, when my family and I still lived in northern Indiana.

It has been really nice these past 16 years, living in the same time zone year-round. The fact that I didn’t have to change times was one of the few saving graces of this area. I hate you, Indiana legislature. You suck. But it’s Friday and absolutely beautiful outside, so I’m going to go get intoxicated with my friends and forget all about the time change, you bastards.

1. The Lovekevins - Stop Being Perfect
2. The Rolling Stones - Miss You
3. Donna Regina - How Beautiful
4. Mount Sims - How We Do
5. Erykah Badu - Next Lifetime
6. Delaney - A Quoi Bon
7. The Deadly Snakes - Gore Veil
8. Celia Cruz - Quimbara
9. The Clientele - E.M.P.T.Y.
10. José González - Stay In The Shade

My Seminar course is utlizing WebCT Vista this semester, which, as their website boasts,

… provides a state-of-the-art teaching and learning environment that streamlines course management for faculty, offers capabilities to help improve student outcomes, and creates powerful efficiencies institution-wide.

Now, I don’t know much about the statistics of “improved student outcomes” or exactly how “powerful efficiencies” are “created institution-wide”, but the majority of my professors have used WebCT to post our grades and maybe, maybe to post class notices or PowerPoints (like my Marriage instructor does). WebCT also includes a message board-type feature, complete with post threading. This, I find, is the most useful feature, although the post editing interface (hell, the entire WebCT user interface) could stand to be improved upon (but I’m just anal about interfaces).

We’re using the message board feature this week for our Seminar class discussions, meaning my fellow classmates will be posting their thoughts for me to tear apart read and comment upon. Right below the text box is the option to “Use HTML” and me being me, I can’t get enough HTML into my posts. It just looks neat, you know?

So I added a post entitled, “Using HTML”, giving my classmates (who often struggle with putting paragraph breaks in their posts - it’s just an extra push of the Enter button, y’all!) a crash-course in HTML. Nothing fancy, just how to use italics, bold, blockquote, and add hyperlinks.

I realize how geeky (or perhaps nerdy) this will make me seem, but I’m getting a bit tired of jumbled text, unformatted text, and run-on paragraphs.

I code, therefore I am.

It’s FRIDAY!

You know what else?

I’m not doing any homework tonight because tonight is going to be full of great food and disgustingly intoxicated friends.

I haven’t made a peep in two weeks. Should I offer up explanations or just get on with it already?

I’m still recovering from Monday afternoon and Tuesday evening, from two class discussions that were my responsibility to lead. Monday was Seminar, which meant I had to use academic speak and delve into sociological, psychological, and philosophical concepts and issues such as THE SELF, IDENTITY, SELF-CONCEPT, and SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM. I spent most of my spring break trying to wrap my mind around these things so that I could speak at length on these and many other concepts, ask in-depth questions, and answer any random questions from my classmates. I’m just glad I didn’t pick the week we’re covering (http://ccdf.ca/coach/english/ccoachb/issue_b1b_mattering.htm) MATTERING.

Tuesday was Marriage, which included discussion of such topics as parenting and parenthood, children, and “nontraditional” families. Easy, but not with my classmates, who want to have, like, a gazillion babies with their breadwinner husbands because babies are soooo cute and special and isn’t it “neat” when they’re “valid” babies, so they share your physical traits and you can say, “Oh, she has my perky nose and your chin!”? Yes, because the only “valid” child is one that comes from your own eggs and sperm.

It was a real riot trying to get a good discussion regarding adoption, abortion, and gay and lesbian parents, let me tell you.

The instructor for the class has thus far graded me low on class participation. Rightly so, as I hardly ever contribute. I just find it difficult to add constructive comments when inside I’m screaming, “WTF?!” or “It’s only your religious beliefs telling you homosexuality is a sin!” I can’t really counter “I want to have 5 babies” with “How about you take real-life problems into consideration before you breed and futher tax our limited, nonrenewable resources?” Because they’d be like, “What’s peak oil?” or “President Bush has a plan for that.” or “I just want children and it’s my right.”

All’s fair, I suppose: they scrunch up their noses thinking about butt sex and I scrunch mine when thinking about the irresponsible breeding habits of humans.

EDITED 07-24-08: Link to MATTERING expired.