"Ear" Is Weird

"Ear" is a stupid word.

It's lazy! It's a lazy word. Like, think about it. It's actually just a sound that we could make accidentally. It's a sound that you could potentially hear coming from the bathroom stall next to you or something. (Sorry, too much?) Really, there are words like, "alphabet" and "onomatopoeia" that are working SO hard at being words, you know? Like, they're really just going for it! Syllables! Multiple consonants! "Ear" is NOTHING compared to those words. "Ear" is like the burnout kid smoking pot under the bleachers while "alphabet" and "onomatopoeia" are the captain of the football team and head cheerleader at the big game.

Do you know the history of the word "ear?" Probably not. DON'T GOOGLE IT! I'll tell you... Some cavemen were sitting around talking about what they were going to call stuff, when one caveman was stung by a bee right on the lobe! So he exclaims, "eeeeeeaaaaaaaaar!" and he grabbed his ear and all the other guys were like "Oog" and "Ahh" and they looked at each other and stuff (because for some reason they hadn't come up with a word for "yes" yet.) They thought he was naming the ear, and it was getting kind of late, so they just went with it. And that's where that word came from. I did a bunch of research on this, I promise. Don't worry about looking it up. 

While we're talking about body part names... What about "eye?" Are we supposed to read into the word more than we do? Are we supposed to look at the fact that they're homophones and assume that eyes are named because our true selves are found in the eyes or something lame like that? Whatever.

Anyways, this isn't a particularly important thing to write about, but it is something that I thought about pretty hard on the bus earlier today.

Professor McGonagall Watched Me Pee (More Bathroom Talk)

Here's a fun fact that you should know about me: I have a recurring dream (nightmare) about having to pee in a room with a lot of toilets but no stalls. I mean I have this dream probably once a month. And no, it never ends with me peeing my bed, because I never actually get to do any peeing because I'm too busy panicking about all the people who are about to see me void my bladder.

The dream comes in variations. It usually starts with me in a shopping mall or a grocery store or on a train with a giant pool full of inmates on it (that was a particularly strange one.) Then, I realize I have to pee and I find the bathroom, which is usually a maze (and I mean maze like that one windows screensaver that I spent many many minutes as a child just staring at and then I would accidentally bump against the mouse and have to wait five minutes before the screen saver came on again. That kind of maze.) with toilets scattered all over the place and ladies who I don't know happily peeing and chatting with their friends. Is this weird yet? 

Occasionally the dream will consist of only one person potentially seeing me urinate instead of a whole bunch of people. For instance once Professor McGonagall just stared at me while it happened, and another time (even more disturbing) my Grade 6 teacher was there. I don't know if that has something to do with teachers making me feel uncomfortable? I don't really think they do. Freud might say it means I want to sleep with all my teachers or something. But let's not look into that too much.

The conclusion I've drawn is that this dream just represents the kind of feelings I have towards personal stuff like peeing (and other bathroom duties) or maybe even the kind of private person I am all together. Above hiding physical stuff from people, I also like to keep a lot of my emotional stuff on the DL. This may shock a lot of people who have read my tweets or some of my previous blog posts. Yes, I think my dream is just about keeping private stuff private, and not about wanting to copulate with my professors. 

Anyways, I'm currently reading Let's Explore Diabetes With Owls by David Sedaris. Excellent read, I suggest you all give it a try. In one of the chapters he describes a trip to Beijing. "My trip reminded me that we are all just animals, that stuff comes out of every hole we have, no matter where we live or how much money we've got. On some level we all know this and manage, quite pleasantly, to shove it towards the back of our minds." He goes on to say that in China they put it all out in the open. Because after all, it's natural. If I had the courage to tell you all the bathroom stories that have caused me immense amounts of stress in my life, I would. But alas, I am not nearly that brave. Because our society has taught us all to pretend that pee and poop don't happen. The hot people on TV's most popular dramas never stop what they're doing because they have intestinal distress. Dexter never tells his victim that he'll BRB because he has to take care of business. They don't show the part in Indiana Jones where he has to squat in the corner of a cave and relieve himself. Even poor Pumbaa sang that whole bit about being exiled because he had frequent gas. 

Western society just doesn't have a place for bathroom business. Even bathrooms aren't safe for doing some bathroom related things. Ever sit in a stall for 20 minutes just waiting for all the other people to leave? (I'm painfully aware that some people do not have this problem.) And thus we are all doomed to walk around with cramps and bubbly pressure for our entire lives (or until we're old and can't hold it in any more.)

Afterthought: I'm aware that pee and poop have become the subject of not one, not two, but three of my posts. It's easy to talk about it when no one is looking you straight in the face and you can just pretend that someone hacked your account and you didn't write a word of it.

I Heart Words (Can My Prof Tell I'm Not Paying Attention?)

So I'm in my Children's Literature class right now. Yes, right this second. (Sorry, mom.) Children's Lit, doesn't that sound fun? It would be more fun if we were reading Dr. Seuss instead of Anne of Green Gables but I guess I shouldn't complain. (I complain anyway. I hate Anne of Green Gables.)

The class in this room before us is like chemistry or calculus or something that has numbers and symbols in it and the previous prof likes to leave it all up on the board, as if to say, "Haha, you English students have no idea what this means." Which is absolutely true. But anyways, then my prof erases the garbage on the board and starts putting up notes about Cinderella (which is actually a terrifying story about chopping off your own feet to make someone love you.) which is something I find humorous for some reason.

Today we're actually talking about a lovely book called Harris and Me by Gary Paulson, which I thoroughly enjoyed despite the fact that it's for kids. I do suggest that you read it someday or get your kids to read it. (Just get your kids to read anything. It scares me when I think about the number of people I know who never read.)

I love when profs swear. Mine just said, "You'll never find that the subtext in an adventure story is 'life's a bitch and then you die.'" Then we all had a laugh.

I recently decided to take the 50 Book Pledge. I'm really behind mostly because of school, and I'm becoming convinced that I may not make it to 50, but this is fun, and I'm almost positive that they don't send anyone to pop your eyes out with a spoon if you don't complete all 50 so I think I'll stick with it.

If you've been keeping up with my previous posts, you may know that I've been going through some lack of inspiration. But as I was searching for books to add to my "to-be-read bookshelf" for the Pledge, and I read excerpts and quotes, I found exactly what I needed. I found great writing and I knew that I wanted to make great writing too. Granted, I wouldn't exactly call any of my blog posts "great" or like the next A Man Without A Country or anything. However, I also found a spark of inspiration to start writing a story that's been hanging out in the back of my brain for a while. I couldn't sleep last night because I was so excited about it! Damn sleep. I hate it sometimes. I awoke this morning and the excitement was gone. (It was replaced with anger because I think everyone in the entire building I live in decided that this morning would be a fun time to slam a lot of doors.)

Since we're talking about being annoyed, I'm also annoyed because some chick decided to take my usual seat in class and I had to sit towards the back of the room. I'm pretty sure I'm going blind so my prof is extremely blurry and for all I know is an impostor. Also, my foot is asleep.

Where am I going with all of this? This is a question that maybe I ask too often. What I'm talking about is the power of books. The power of literature. The power of words in general. I love words. One of my favourite word-users, Stephen King, once said, "Words create sentences; sentences create paragraphs; sometimes paragraphs quicken and begin to breathe." 

They're so much fun! There aren't a lot of things that I can name that are as versatile as words. Think about life without them. You would have just spent 20 minutes trying to use symbolism (symbolism other than letters/sounds organized in such a way that other people understand what you're communicating, that is) to order a sandwich. And what would our thoughts be like? They would just be pictures. That's lame. 

And what would comedy be? It would be all farcical. Or "fartsicle" which is a reference to the most recent episode of Parks and Recreation but is extremely appropriate at this moment. Comedy would be all fart jokes and slipping on banana peels. And as much as I enjoy watching the roadrunner outsmart Wile E. Coyote off of cliffs, I wouldn't want to rely on that for constant comedic entertainment.

Some of the most beautiful things in the world come from instances where the most perfect words are put together in the most perfect way.

Am I getting too sentimental about words? I don't think so. I think people overlook how strong and exciting words can be. They make you laugh, they make you cry, smile, think. With the exception of maybe the ocean or the grand canyon or a snow-capped mountain range or the opening scene of Up, I don't think there are things existing on Earth that are as powerful.

I mentioned Dr. Seuss. What a guy! Making up his own words. And why not? I make up words all the time. (You should see all the red underlines happening during most of my posts.) And Shakespeare practically invented half the words we use today. The possibilities with letters and words and sentences and paragraphs are endless! This is one of my favourite examples of playing with words:

r-p-o-p-e-s-s-a-g-r by e.e. cummings

I think that's a perfect place to stop. Because this might be the perfect poem. I don't know, though. Have a nice day.

University, Children's Cartoons, and Other Things

I have a story for you.

So the other night I'm reliving my childhood by watching clips from the beloved children's film (if you can even call it a children's film because holy goodness, it's intense. Epic battle scene, much?!), The Land Before Time.

Completely-off topic-you-can-skip-over-this-if-you-want-Note: Does anyone in the world really know what the rules are with parenthesis and other punctuation? Does anyone even care? Are brackets even relevant anymore outside of BEDMAS? Just a thought. Googling it later. Anyways...

So I'm watching TLBT and loving my life when suddenly it occurs to me, "Holy fucoxanthin, these dinos are racist!" Yes, yes, it is true. Examples:

Cera: Threehorns never play with longnecks. They only talk to other threehorns and they only travel with other threehorns. 
(And at one point she calls Littlefoot's dead mom a "stupid longneck." Like, for realsies.)
Also...
Ducky: Hello. I said hello! What is your name? Maybe you cannot talk yet, huh?
Littlefoot: Don't you know anything? Longnecks don't talk to, whatever you are.

So anyways, you get the point. And by the end of the movie everyone loves each other and species doesn't matter anymore and everything is great. So I'm feeling all warm and happy and then I think, "Wow, this would be great for an essay about race relations or anti-racism!" And THEN I think, "Holy $&%@! I hate university." Because? Because it's ruining perfectly enjoyable entertainment and making me find themes and deeper meaning. I don't want to think about themes and meanings behind my favourite childhood films. I just want to laugh at the silly farcical comedy (FARCICAL?! See, it's happening again) and giggle at the more adult jokes that I didn't get when I was little. (Another side note, a bit more relevant - 13 movies later and Littlefoot and the gang still aren't grown up... Which is probably a good thing for him because what giant dinosaur wants a name like Littlefoot?)

So now I'm thinking about all my favourite childhood stories and they're all being ruined! I hate learning life lessons! And I hate thinking when I don't want to think. My brain doesn't shut up half the time. It's why I watch kids movies. They're so simple.

You know what was a good movie? The Swan Princess. And was it about accepting people even if they're different and love is blind and bestiality isn't really a big deal? NO! It was about nothing. It was just a good story. So shut up, brain.

For the record, I'm not talking about shows like Caillou and Veggie Tales that are clearly trying to teach us about sharing and not calling out the dumb kids in class for being dumb. I'm not talking about the clear societal morals that we're always trying to teach our children so they don't grow up to be major brats with babies at 16 (Wait a second, did teaching kids these lessons through television and media fail? Did they all become a little too friendly and curious because Spongebob is just a little too friendly and curious? That would be a great essay...) And for the record again, I hated both of those shows. (Caillou and the talking vegetables.) Jeepers, Caillou, listen to you parents and clean up your mess already, okay? Stop being a brat. And it was on PBS. PBS is the worst thing in the world. Except for the show Zoom. I will not argue about this any further.

I learned all my important life lessons from reading Berenstain Bears books. They were the greatest. And look, I'm basically perfect now. (*cough*)

Okay, I've gotten off topic just a bit. I hope you haven't nodded off. Let's make an awkward commute into the point that I know gets brought up by every bored English student while we're reading To Kill A Mockingbird and Huck Finn:

"What if the author just wrote that and had no intentions of providing us with commentary on racism." This statement can clearly be applied to every other book that we study and CLEARLY it does not always have to involve racism. (Whenever I'm writing things on the internet I feel as if I have to spell everything all out for everyone. I have no idea why...)

What if all of these amazing, breakthrough tales read and written about over and over again are just that? Just tales, meant to entertain. That's what storytelling is, isn't it? When my cousin used to make up stories for us when we were kids, she wasn't trying to teach us life lessons. We just thought that a bear who had gas and fell down hills a lot was hilarious. And guess what? It is. It is hilarious. And things like that will never stop being hilarious.

Unless the author comes back from the dead and says, "I'm talking about Racism, you fools!" then I don't quite buy some of the stuff people say about some literature.

So, university, STOP making me unconsciously look for themes and values in everything I watch and read. There's a time and place for deep thinking and for coming up with ideas. That time is not when I'm watching one of my favourite childhood films. UNLESS I actually need to write that essay someday, in which case, thank you for giving me such insight.

I don't think I've said a single insightful thing at all in this babbling. What does it all mean? What's the meaning of life? Who cares? We're going to die and find out eventually. Sometimes you have to take a step back from the problems and the pressures of society and just watch a freaking cartoon rabbit trick a cartoon duck into running off a cliff. And it's funny. And we laugh. And we don't know why. And we don't care why. And that's the truth.

The end.

Making Books Useful

So if you're like me and my family, you probably have shelves full of these really irritating dust collectors called "books." Like seriously, just Wiki the plot summary and get those damn things out of there. Your lungs will thank you.
The internet has summarized and scrutinized all the information that books can offer, so why bother risking a paper cut, right?
And besides, there are so many other things that books can do. (More useful things, at that.) Think about it:

"It's cold out, Mama. We have no wood." "Well, paper burns real nice. Here, Kathy Reichs has written enough fire fuel to last us all night."

"One table leg is shorter than the others!" "How much shorter?" "It's a difference of about one Great Gatsby, I'd say." "Well stick it under there, then!"

"It's Christmas eve, the presents aren't wrapped and the wrapping paper closet is filled with nothing but bare cardboard tubes. But Michael Martchenko did a hell of a job illustrating those silly Munsch books. Use those pages as wrapping!"

"The kid can't reach the sink to wash his hands." "Pile up those hardcover King books. Desperation weighs about as much as the kid does anyway."

"I always keep a hardcover copy of Jane Eyre in my purse." "Oh, well that's not exactly light reading." "No, and it's not exactly a light tap on the head when a fella gets a little too friendly either."

See? And this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to making books a little more useful around the house. Now I don't mean to get ahead of myself, but you're welcome. Sitting indoors with a book is no place for a child in this society. They're all overweight and pasty and 3400 pages of Harry Potter nonsense isn't going to fix that. So prop up your tables and warm your feet. And make a little more space on the mantle for family photos and the coyote your kid shot in the backyard.

The Bible? There's a cute website that acts out the holy book with little lego guys.

There's no place for books anymore. They're too slow. They're too bulky. And you can't keep up with the Kardashians AND read their biographies too.

The Dreaded Essay - A Student's Rant

Okay, today I got my first paper of the year back. I'm not going to say it was bad, because it wasn't, but the mark was quite a bit lower than my usual. So of course, I got super offended and decided to write a blog post about how terrible my professor is. Just kidding. That's not what this is about. This is just a few of the frustrating things about essays. I'm not badmouthing any profs or teachers I've had at all (especially if one of you happen to read this.) I'm just badmouthing whatever idiot invented the stupid essay.

So, first off, why do they have to be so long? What's the point in a 10 page essay? Didn't Einstein say that any fool can make something long and complex, only a genius can condense it and dumb it down? I may have just made that up. If I did, feel free to quote me on it (WITH a citation, please. You better not take credit for my work.) In other words, I feel like it's more difficult to condense the information and make a really good summary than it is to go on and on and on about the same thing. I don't know about everyone else, but when I'm writing an essay I feel like it's 20% good information, 50% me using a thesaurus to say the same thing in a bunch of different ways, and 20% complete BS (I'm not a math major. I don't know what the other 10% is. Me napping and choosing snacks, probably.)


Okay, and bibliographies! Ahh! I think I get more frustrated with citing my work than I do actually writing it. I'm all for people getting credit for their work, and plagiarism is bad and stuff. But there are so many rules! And every class is different. I've taken psych courses, English courses and history courses and each one calls for a different format. And we all come to university to find out that MLA, APA, Chicago, etc. formats aren't just for the bibliography. No, they're for the whole paper. Spacing, font, headers, footers, type of citation, title page or no title page. (Thanks for informing me of that nice little surprise, high school.) WHY DOES IT MATTER!? Really? I change the font and it makes it like one centimetre longer. Oh boy. Why can't we all just agree on one? I had a TA once who said it's because different disciplines are looking for different things and want to be able to find stuff faster. What do I have to say to that? I do not care, disciplines. I DO NOT care.

Okie dokie, so you hand it in and then you get it back. And (hopefully) you got a pretty decent mark. Why is it that even though you got an 80, which is pretty decent if you ask me, the comments your prof puts always make it sound kind of like you wrote the worst thing ever? (Or maybe that's just me because I am the absolute worst at taking criticism. If I ever tell you, "I want your true opinion, even if it's bad," I'm lying and I will probably hate you a bit if you tell me I need to fix something.)

When it comes down to it, the most frustrating thing about essays is that every prof is different. They all expect different things and give different types of criticism. You figure out how to please one and then your course is over and you're on to the next one, who hates everything that your other prof taught you. There's no winning. So, just power through and do your best. And that's the most inspirational thing I have to say today.

If you're a fellow student, good luck with midterms and assignments. If you're out of school, I can confidently say that all students (myself included) strongly dislike you, in like, the best way possible, at least until summertime.