christmas, sad sabbatical, and th jefferson
Christmas in Ohio was not too bad (I got some sweaters, yay!) except for parts of Christmas Day itself, like when I was at the adult table and put my bread on the wrong plate and then the cranberry sauce on the wrong plate and then spilled cassarole (twice!). But mostly, not bad. Saw lots and lots of movies, at theatre and on tv. Now I am in Maine. I don't know what's going on for New Year's, as I'm supposed to drop by the library on the 1st but I don't move into Lisa's townhouse until the 2nd. Um. Hm. Edit: I'm going down the 31st and moving in then to Lisa's in Brookline, so I will be there for New Year's and all.
My advisor just let me know that he is going to be taking his sabbatical early. Next semester. He'll be in town so that's good, but normally sabbatical = not teaching Civil Liberties. Awesome. Not only is it a course that I was really looking forward to, but it's the only politics course that I was in. So I don't know. Hebrew Bible is still open, T/Th 11 am, and if I take that I could do, um, Chinese Politics, maybe, M/W 11, but it doesn't look amazing. In which case I would drop either the philosophy or the critical social thought. Le sigh.
I did finish reading American Sphinx, and I both love Jefferson and think that he was a little loony at times. I mean. I love the agrarian ideal, really, I do (I have a whole plan for my farm that I will own and lose incredible amounts of money on, even), but that if a portion of the country becomes too wrapped up in industry and cities, the other has a duty to secede in an effort to protect the agrarian way of life. *claps slowly* Nice going, slick. I mean, what did more to destroy states' rights, destroy Virginia, and end slavery in not at all the way he wanted, than the retaliation from being all "We thumb our noses at you, industrial urban society!"
Anywho. He also tried to make UVA totally democratic, which went really well until a bunch of college guys got wasted and had a violent riot and no one would fess up. Cool, though, was that he tried to model it off of a New England village (and his public elementary school system plan was from the New England model, which is also why it didn't work in Virginia). He also wanted the government class to teach pretty much exclusively works by Virginian Republicans (to which Madison called bullshit, being the fair-minded nice man he was).
So I enjoyed the book, and I'm looking forward to taking the seminar, so that's good. I just started reading some of The First Poets but I will probably take something else to Massachusetts. We'll see.
My advisor just let me know that he is going to be taking his sabbatical early. Next semester. He'll be in town so that's good, but normally sabbatical = not teaching Civil Liberties. Awesome. Not only is it a course that I was really looking forward to, but it's the only politics course that I was in. So I don't know. Hebrew Bible is still open, T/Th 11 am, and if I take that I could do, um, Chinese Politics, maybe, M/W 11, but it doesn't look amazing. In which case I would drop either the philosophy or the critical social thought. Le sigh.
I did finish reading American Sphinx, and I both love Jefferson and think that he was a little loony at times. I mean. I love the agrarian ideal, really, I do (I have a whole plan for my farm that I will own and lose incredible amounts of money on, even), but that if a portion of the country becomes too wrapped up in industry and cities, the other has a duty to secede in an effort to protect the agrarian way of life. *claps slowly* Nice going, slick. I mean, what did more to destroy states' rights, destroy Virginia, and end slavery in not at all the way he wanted, than the retaliation from being all "We thumb our noses at you, industrial urban society!"
Anywho. He also tried to make UVA totally democratic, which went really well until a bunch of college guys got wasted and had a violent riot and no one would fess up. Cool, though, was that he tried to model it off of a New England village (and his public elementary school system plan was from the New England model, which is also why it didn't work in Virginia). He also wanted the government class to teach pretty much exclusively works by Virginian Republicans (to which Madison called bullshit, being the fair-minded nice man he was).
So I enjoyed the book, and I'm looking forward to taking the seminar, so that's good. I just started reading some of The First Poets but I will probably take something else to Massachusetts. We'll see.