Books that did not come up in my last list.

Read the list below. Weigh in. I'd say I did better than this list. Here are books that I strictly stayed away from:
1. Harry Potter. The whole series. These characters are too family friendly.
2. Animal Farm. I'm not into bestiality.
3. Macbeth. Some characters are too fucked up to be fucked with.
4. Kite Runner. See above.
5. Any book by Toni Morrison. Yeah there is something to that she doesn't write very attractive males.
6. Memories of My Melancholy Whores. Don't really have a thing for 90 year old men.
7. Julia Alverez books. I like them for their portrayal of women. The men are there to cover what the women can't.
8. Romeo and Juliet. Some stories may be over told. (And over fantasized)
9. Twilight series. Vampires, no thanks, and wolves that can attach to 2 year old children they will eventually marry? gross.
10. Sun Also Rises. I'd say pretty self-explanatory.

To improve on my boring self

Someone has pointed out my blog posts have taken a nosedive in the interesting category. True. Well I happened to also come across some blogger's list about what literary characters they'd like to get it on with, but I disagreed with the list (Macbeth, Heathcliff and Holden Caulfield were on the list... gross). He suggested I should make my own list SO here it is (and I don't include underage characters even when they're fictional. that is gross.)
In no particular order:
1. Edgar from King Lear: He's my Shakespeare choice. good guy, takes care of dad, and comes back to beat the crap out of evil brother. Many girls may go for the bad guys but deal. (Second choice- Benedick)
2. Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice: An overlap from the original list. Colin Firth's portrayal in the BBC made me love him forever.
3. Teacake from Their Eyes Were Watching God: My favorite book and one of the greatest love stories that manages to be not sappy and annoying. I want some of that.
4. Richard Mayhew from Neverwhere: The whole story gets started because he's the only person to notice a homeless girl. Hot.
5. Dave Eggers from A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius: Ok so this is an autobiography but man if he weren't married with a kid I'd be trying to find a way to get to SanFran fast.
6. John Proctor from The Crucible: HOTTTTness. Shady since he cheated on his wife with an underage psycho girl but whatever. He saw his flaws.
7. Phillip Marlow from The Big Sleep: Not from the movie. I'm not turned on by Humphrey Bogart. But the character in the book. I could do that.
8. The Fool from King Lear in the book Fool: He's a crazy do it with anyone guy in the book but he's smart and must be pretty good with all that practice.
9. T.S. Garp from The World According to Garp: One of my other favorite books because this main character fascinates me.
10. I'm going to leave this one open and get back to you. I'm having more trouble with this than I thought I would...

Things I have to grade...

1. Reading journals for all 75 of my students.
2. Essays about the traits of a hero based on The Odyssey and O Brother Where Art Thou
3. Persuasive essays on topics from global warming to gun control to abortion to domestic violence
4. Games, survival guides, postcards, comic books, soundtracks etc. for The Odyssey
5. Stories, speeches and analytical essays about Animal Farm.
6. One day of reading circles for Kite Runner
7. One day of reading circles for Hound of Baskerville

Good thing the end of the quarter is coming up.

Halloween Approaches...

Yeah, school is keeping me very busy. It would keep me busy anyway, but doing a second first year of teaching make it definitely crazy. I've been using work on my current Halloween costume as a distraction. Here's a list of what I've been in the past:
1. Sleeping Beauty (mom made)
2. An Illini Cheerleader (store bought)
3. Evita (mom made)
4. Dorothy from Wizard of Oz (mom made very quickly)
5. Greek Goddess (when I figured out the college version of Halloween)
6. Ballerina (I needed something fast but comfy)
7. Pumpkin (Last year when I had to make a costume last minute)

I realize this is a pretty lousy list. in part because this seems to be all I remember and in part because the costume listed are pretty sad. Except Evita. (and of course the Illini Cheerleader)

My awesome 25th birthday

It was a great weekend celebrating my 25th birthday and here is a list of highlights:
1. I got some very thoughtful cards from special people even deeper than your standard happy birthday card with no personal message. :)
2. Say what you will about facebook, but it's pretty great to receive e-mails all day letting you know that people have said happy birthday.
3. I get to watch the pilot of Sports Night!!!!
4. Nothing like getting 4 new pair of shoes.
5. Brand new real CDs are so rare these days ;)
6. Figuring out where to hang beautiful artwork is a good problem to have.
7. A class of tenth graders singing at the top of their lungs have a pretty great version of Happy Birthday
8. Phone calls with special people is always appreciated.
9. Toy Story and Toy Story II at the El Cap was a good laugh.
10. If you have to go to a class, having chocolate cake there makes it infinitely better.
11. I had an amazing party with lots of wonderful friends and shared with a great person (I do love shared birthday parties) plus about 1000 pictures to remember it by (hopefully some of them are decent.)

Books I'm teaching next

1. The Odyssey
2. Fahrenheit 451
3. no idea....
Do we sense a problem?

In a dream world...

Book rooms are a tricky thing. Luckily I've gotten funding that has allowed me to purchase books for my students but it requires a certain amount of leg work (well internet work and begging work). Here is a list of types of books that if I had my way would be in the book room when I arrived at the school.
1. Books by authors who are still alive. I know it's hard to pick which books will become classics but we have certain authors who are at the top of their game right now, buy their books!
2. Books by authors who aren't white, but who are dead. Generally if the book room does have books by authors who are still alive it'll be a Sherman Alexie or a Toni Morrison as if white authors used to write all the books but recently other races have discovered writing. That's a load of bs.
3. Books that are easy to read and worth reading for 9th graders. The stuff for a good Junior/Senior English class is usually easily sitting on the shelf and Sophomores you can push through that difficult stuff in order to get them used to it, but when a Freshman class first arrives, they need something they can read without thinking reading books is impossible.
4. A play that is not Raisin in the Sun, The Crucible, Death of a Salesman, or Shakespeare. Again you'd think there were only three playwrites who exist in the world with no mention of any other options. (Maybe an Antigone or Oedipus is in there).
5. Books of a variety of genres and purposes. Book rooms are mostly fictional sometimes with a bit of nonfiction as long as it's a narrative, but rarely will you see an informational text, a graphic novel, or a collection of articles someone may have written for a newspaper/blog- yet our students are expected to be able to read all of those. (ok so they don't have to read graphic novels, but they are expected to be able to talk coherently about political cartoons which can take many of the same skills)
6. Books of high interest (maybe low in canonical value- gasp!) that aren't just about gangs/ganglife. I get that a lot of students like books like Always Running and get really into them and that's fine, but our kids face a lot of issues beyond just gangs, but it seems that gangs are the only kinds of high interest, grab your attention books in book rooms. What about a Go Ask Alice to talk about drug culture, or a Jumping the Nail to talk about domestic abuse?

Soon I'll be at the donorschoose once again trying to get yet another copy of Maus. And this set will hopefully be the last one I have to go online to ask for.