You know, Shakespeare didn’t always sound like Shakespeare. Sometimes he sounded like a pirate. And in fact, just for good measure, English didn’t always sound like English.
Anyway, here’s a couple of videos to get your brain working. Continue reading “Thinking in and about English on a Sunday Morning”
So… as you may (or may not, no judgement on my part) know, I like magic. Now, to be specific, I like magic with a “c” not magik, with a “k.” There’s nothing wrong with the latter, but the spiritual side, the part that says magik is a mystical, real thing just doesn’t interest my skeptical mind nearly as much as the art of prestidigitation.
I love this! Sure, most of us know we can use these books to teach bigger concepts. I’m sure the authors knew it, too. But having it all codified and with lesson plans makes it so much easier!
Stories that are great for learning to read can teach all kinds of things — from philosophy to financial literacy.
Source: Green Eggs, Ham And Metaphysics: Teaching Hard Ideas With Children’s Books | WBEZ
Confessions of a Scary Mommy: An Honest and Irreverent Look at Motherhood – The Good, The Bad, and the Scary by Jill Smokler
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
To start with, I’m not a mother. I’m not even a parent…yet. But my wife and I listened to this book in the hopes of gleaning some advance knowledge or get a humorous look at what’s to come. In this, we were kinda disappointed.
Continue reading “Review: Confessions of a Scary Mommy: An Honest and Irreverent Look at Motherhood – The Good, The Bad, and the Scary”
Atlanta Burns by Chuck Wendig
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I have a problem here. I have long been a fan of Terrible Minds, the website/blog of Chuck Wendig. His blogs and books about writing are usually spot on and I have long recommended him to my writing students. Then I read this book. Continue reading “Review: Atlanta Burns”
When I was a kid, and I’d see various professional athletes retire from the game and then show up in TV and films (often as wooden caricatures of themselves), I used to make a joke. At the time I was involved in theatre and would say “I’m gonna be an actor until I’m about 35 or so… Then I’m going to become a professional athlete.”
Funny, right? Continue reading “Wasted on the young…”
My niece Riley just made her first film. I think it’s awesome. There’s some wonderful raw talent here.
I am so looking forward to seeing whatever she does next!
So here’s the deal: I’m slacking on my book reviews. Not that I haven’t been reading (or listening) to lots of books – in fact, I’m one book ahead where I need to be to complete my 70 book Goodreads challenge.
But I’ve bean bad about doing weekly reviews of individual books so I’m giving myself a break and allowing for Short Book Reviews of an assembled grouping. Without further ado, then, here’s the latest batch of books. Continue reading “Review: Keller’s Fedora, Difficult Men, Invasion of the Body Snatchers and others”
So, a little over a year ago, my friend and colleague Bjorn forwarded a link to me about a publisher looking for some (semi) academic essays about everyone’s favorite BBC time traveler, Doctor Who. Lacking my own share of self-confidence, I hit up another friend and colleague, Dr. Michelle Hansen, to co-write a piece with me. Since we couldn’t decide on any one topic, we pitched two, figuring to double our odds of being accepted.
It worked! It worked so well in fact, they accepted both pitches and we found ourselves with not one, but two pieces in the book, New Worlds, Terrifying Monsters, Impossible Things: Exploring the Contents and Contexts of Doctor Who. The book is available as an ebook from Amazon as well as other sites. My hope is that you’ll check it out and leave a review (hopefully a good one). There’s some really great, insightful pieces inside and if you’re a Whovian or a pop culture fanatic or just a friend to either Michelle or me, this is a book for you.
In Lithuania, the idea of a baby shower doesn’t really exist and since we’re so far away from friends and family in the States, we just figured on not doing anything to celebrate the pre-birth of our little Monki.
But people have been asking what we need or what they can get us, so we made our Amazon registry, our Etsy list (which, yes, is filled with fun geeky things because as long as we still control what she wears, she’ll wear geek chic – if she doesn’t like it, she’ll just have to get to the point where she can tell us), and even a Pinterest board to show all the things we’re thinking of for our little girl. Continue reading “Virtual Baby Shower”
Rasa and I have a mixed household. Aside from coming from two different generations and two different cultures with two different languages, we also have mixed views on social media. For myself, I’m fairly active on Facebook and Instagram and Goodreads among others. I have no problem with letting the world know where I am or what I think of that place. Rasa, on the other hand, has no social media footprint at all. In the technological world of our AI Overlords, she doesn’t exist (outside of this blog where, for all you know, she might just be a matrix-like construction of my imagination). Continue reading “Well… we have a pronoun”
One of the great things about my job is I get to learn all sorts of new things. Had no idea that Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring” was so controversial when it was first produced.
What? You didn’t know either? Well read my latest David article to find out what all the fuss was about!
Celebrating the 103 Year Anniversary of the Stravinsky Ballet that Caused all the Fuss
Getting the Hang of Thursdays 