Rack Pull - 685

Grip and lock out work.

24 hours to live

Some group predicts the end of the world tomorrow. So, if you had 24 hours to live, just think, what would you do? Leave your answer in the comment section below.

Someday...

Someday, when I am an old man, I want to sit alone on a beach on a cold day feeling the sand and the salt in the wind that comes in from out to sea. I want to walk and carry a walking stick with me that I can use to poke at the gray, gravelly sand from time to time. I will look down at the hole a crab has made and I will wonder what it is like to have to rebuild your home after every single tide. Somewhere, far out to sea there will be a lonely white cloud rolling across the sky. Pieces of sea-weed and feathers from a seagull will draw an uneven line across the beach marking the progress of the last high tide. There will be a rock that I will find to sit on, and I will wait right there with my thoughts, my doubts, and my loneliness – but I will not cry. After several minutes, I will get up and walk back to my vehicle. I will turn it on. Before driving off, I will see some old toy that I picked up for my son still sitting on the dashboard against the windshield. Before driving off, I will taste the bitter, coppery taste that intense feelings of regret or disgust sometimes brings with it, I will taste the saltiness of my own skin and my own tears as my eyes begin to blur with sadness. My heart will pound, and I will take a few deep breaths to get control of myself once more. Then I will turn the key and pull away and the waves will continue pounding the sand and the crab will come out of her home. The tides will shift and then everything will start rebuilding.

 

Teaching Spanish

I just got a job at an all boys Catholic high school to teach Spanish. Beginning in the 2012-2013 school year, they are getting rid of all their text books and supplying the students with iPads. They want to get rid of the textbooks so that they can offset the cost of buying the iPads and the entire Spanish curriculum is going to be built around (free) online materials. What do you think of that? Give me your opinion in the comments. Also, if you know of any great websites that teach Spanish, please, feel free to mention those as well.

Thanks,

me

Spring in my backyard

J

Weekend Update

 

Lope de Vega - Arte nuevo de hacer comedias

Podemos dar las gracias a Lope de Vega por la regla de no más de dos horas en el teatro (cine ahora).

Aquí están sus reglas de cómo hacer comedias:

1.       Nunca dejar el escenario vacío

2.       Hacer “tragicomedias”

3.       Tener siempre dos planos de intriga – uno para la nobleza, otro para el pueblo

4.       Tener un desenlace feliz

5.       Actuación es más importante que caracterización

6.       No tardar más que dos horas

7.       Mucha acción – acción verbal y decoración verbal

8.       No se respeta las unidades clásicas (de lugar, tiempo, acción)

9.       Aplauso: más de un significado y nivel (acudir a la audiencia para ver cuándo y para qué aplauden)

10.   Función: divertir y educar (y servir como un medio de propaganda de la monarquía)

 

Que no pidan explicaciones – yo no sé tampoco.

725 Rack Pull

me

life without facebook

I don't know how long it has been - a week maybe? But the simple fact that I would want to write about it can indicate that it is on my mind. I don't think that I was (or am) any more addicted to Facebook than anybody else I know but not having it makes me much more aware of how much time I had been spending on it - and I haven't really found a productive replacement for that time. This week I have spent a lot more time reading news stories on Google news. I guess it is a similar distraction - just that the headlines don't update as often as status updates. Inasmuch as nobody I know is in the news the similarity to Facebook ends (which is to say, there really isn't much similarity besides the way that they are both just distractions).
All in all, I feel a little bit more alone without Facebook than I felt with Facebook. I don't have a whole lot of close friends that I stay up to date with in other ways. But Facebook isn't a sufficient replacement of more meaningful relationships for me to reopen my account right away.
me

Sights seen

I am sitting in the Salt Lake airport on my way back to Memphis. Here are a few of the photos that I took over spring break.

Snail's pace

Without a car, Gabriel and I set off for the nearest zoo on foot - about 4 miles away. So far we have gone about a half a mile and seen lots of interesting things: snails snuggling up, a homeless people tent town, lots of orange flowers, and beautiful green leaves.

grisáceo, mojado

Mojado, lluvioso, húmedo…. No creo que importa la palabra – el tiempo es lo mismo. Es la primavera; pues, no es la primavera – es el invierno, pero sólo según el calendario. Me siento cansado hoy. No quiero salir de la casa.

Cancelé mi cuenta de Facebook. Tengo varias razones por haberlo hecho.

 

En todo el día hoy el color del cielo no ha variado nada. Es un gris blancuzco o tal vez un blanco grisáceo – no sé cuál. No quiero levantarme. Anoche casi no podía dormir y miré una película en mi computadora mientras yacía dos horas en un baño de agua que cambiaba poco a poco de caliente a tibia. Me bañé pero no me lavé y ahora me huelo y no me gusta mi olor.

Hoy no tengo mucho que hacer. Necesito enviar correos electrónicos a mis clases y hacer mis maletas. No tengo internet en casa pero puedo escribir los correos ahora y enviarlos luego. Mañana tengo que ir al aeropuerto a las cuatro y media de la mañana.

Aquí, he adjuntado algunas fotos que he sacado esta semana.

 

me

New news

I bought a new camera today....
More to come later.

row, row, row your boat...

life is but a dream. <<...>>

Snow in the Mid South

Already this year semester school has been cancelled about a half dozen times (even as I write that it seems like an exaggeration to me but I think that it is accurate). School was cancelled yesterday at 12:30 pm and it is closed today. Why, you may ask. What sort of catastrophe could cause the University to miss at least one day every week so far, you might wonder. Well, it has been terrible. It has been almost unbearable. Right now the entire city of Memphis has come near complete stand-still because there is so much snow outside. I mean it, folks, right now there are almost  two whole inches of snow outside. Seriously – hide your kids, hide your wives, and hide your husbands, too – it is end-of-times bad out there. I don’t know how much more of this intermittent snowy weather I can take. If you don’t hear from me, assume the worst. I am holed up and might perish if this weather doesn’t improve.

Here are a few photos to illustrate just how terrible we have it here:

I know that some of those pictures might look beautiful, but don’t be decieved – it is really cold stuff. And those photos that look like fluffy cotton – it is SNOW. Please, pray for me – I am not made for this sort of horror.