I have too. many. thoughts ( Read more... )

My dissertation is about, among other things, what we can get out of viewing narratives through the lens of rhetoric. This focus means that I do a lot of writing about rhetorical situations ( Read more... )

This morning I was part of a panel about writing tutors. I was realizing as I planned what to say that as of this fall I will have been tutoring/teaching in one capacity or another for ten years. It doesn't seem like it can possibly have been that long; even at this late date, I don't expect anything good in my life to last that long. And yet there ( Read more... )

It's the last week for ramps, so I got lots. Also probably the last week for morels, which I can't afford to get lots of, but I did get a few; not sure yet what I'll do with them-it seems so decadent to be getting morels just for me rather than for a dinner party. Perhaps I'll have to have truepenny and the Minister of Hardware up for dinner ( Read more... )

Last week I sent a thank-you note -- or, if you will, a geek mash note -- to the guy who wrote Narrative as Rhetoric, the book that jump-started my dissertation breakthrough a couple of weeks ago. Today I got a delightful long e-mail in return, in which he said, among other things, that my dissertation sounds fascinating. Excuse me while I ( Read more... )

This morning I had one of those moments where I got up from my desk to get another cup of tea, looked around the apartment while waiting for the water to boil, and thought, "This place is a complete mess. How long have I been living like this ( Read more... )

It's amazing how much easier it is to work on a draft once I acknowledge which pieces of it are irredeemably bad and, instead of trying to integrate them or work around them, start wielding the delete key with ruthless ferocity ( Read more... )

Against all odds, this has been a marvelous day.

( wanna hear more about it? )