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Writing Travelogue: Process & Product, Ch3

It has been called to my attention lately by a few people that I don’t write the way they do, and that my process could, in fact, use a little “improving”. Improving? Huh. You’d think that after nearly 20 years of writing research papers, my process would have already improved.

The truth is, it has. Writing this dissertation, working on it day by day (and admittedly, some days avoiding it completely) has taught me that you can’t write some things in one night. That’s a BIG imp…

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Posted by voncookie on May 10th, 2008 at 12:05pm — No Comments (Add)
 

Ch3 = Herding LOLCats, or ¿I Can Has Chapter, Pleez?

Things are going well with Ch3. They really are. But big ideas beg for structure, and so, well, there’s been a lot of attempts to organize that have felt like herding cats. And because it’s already midnight, those cats have morphed into LOLcats, from whom I garner much inspiration, similar to Work Bird, who sits on my desktop and can always see me procrastinating. (Thanks, Acephalous!) I’m starting a collection of LOLcats related to my topic (believe it or not, they exist) and they’re up at t…

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Posted by voncookie on May 10th, 2008 at 12:06am — No Comments (Add)
 

Preparing to Kick Ch3's Ass

I haven't started writing yet, no, I will cop to that. But I am like that kid on the blacktop just winding his foot behind him, waiting to smack the kickball across the court into the crop of Kindergarteners out for juice boxes and granola in the sunshine. I am wiggling my foot. I am about to put a massive dent in Ch3. In fact, I'm about to drive a stake through Ch3's heart, watch it get all good and dusted. Yeah. I'm gonna rain smack down on Ch3.

This is all my tough talk that I do be…

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Posted by voncookie on May 9th, 2008 at 3:28pm — No Comments (Add)
 

Oral Exams: The Horror!

The problem with oral exams is not that I have to *do* them. I love having the chance to have a 1-on-1 with each student, hear how much they’ve improved since the start of the semester, find out how their final exams are going, etc etc.

But there is one distinct drawback to the oral exam thrill: having to listen to my own voice recorded—in Spanish—and played back to me so that I can hear how many grammatical errors I myself made when speaking. Plus the joy of hearing my idioti…

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Posted by voncookie on May 8th, 2008 at 8:55am — No Comments (Add)
 

Sleep of the Damned: The LitMag Strike Cold Fear in My Heart

So, the voice in my head at 1:00 a.m. decided to scream at me the following words:

"YOU'RE MISMANAGING THE LITMAG, DUMBASS!!!"

Hard to sleep with a haranguing drill sergeant in your head. Very hard. So here I am writing today's blog post, all insomniac-y and stressed out at quarter of 2 in the morning.

The LitMag has been a daily stress for some time. It *will* be over soon, I keep telling myself. And I'm really not mismanaging it. There have just been some things…

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Posted by voncookie on May 7th, 2008 at 1:47am — No Comments (Add)