rusty

one more of those things. probably sb really likes this cat, regardless of its temper, behaviour, size and other features.

power games

this makes me angry. people who are unable to solve their own power games, manipulations and stupidity. i am not interested in who puts what flowers on my mother’s grave. or who removes the wilted flowers therefrom. i am not interested in family feuds. and, blast it, i am not interested in family manipulations. and…

academic nightmares

thus there is this dream: there are course descriptions like little boats floating in the air. and then there comes a leaviathan, a white whale (like moby dick in the film), and jumps, and eats them. and i wake up in horror. ——————— parallel to the course description revision, i read. currently – rereading the…

of time machine and unrelated matters

things one might want but never has ontological metaphor for a pet cyberspace rocket anthropological ruler spirit guide for parties discriminator between justice and mercy a snark (but not a boojum) deconfuser for everyday situations

one of those things, apparently

so, i have finished grading the exam in, what a student accidentally called in a private email to me, hystery of english. it is rather a hilarious subject, as everyone might guess, full of surprises for sure. today i was looking through the result analysis, and stumbled upon the simple question “who compiled the Oxford…

useless things

computer cat clamp for crocodiles sunbleach cream cottage cheese knife banquet for moths crew skeleton surprise funeral

graveyards

i like graveyards. i really do. i like the concept of the dead being dead in a solidarity that surpasses any union the living can ever muster. graveyards are the only place in this country that grow. where people return from wherever they have been, to die, to be buried in. i can say i…

quote of the day

i have almost finished grading the history of english homework (173 students, 6 pages each)…the gulls (see previous post) do not talk to me any more. they are perplexedly silent, even at night. i have no wings, and, probably, no brain left to imagine any. hence the quote of the day – from one of…

summer

summer in this country consists of those few days of hellish rainless heat when the rain of spring is just over, but the rain of autumn has not started yet. when you do not freeze or soak, you melt. which is like soaking, only in reverse.

skypedown

when a body is voiceless, and will remain so for the rest of this week (aargh, and what shall i do at work, pray?), a skypedown is something of a tragedy. of course i can use my notepad for communication in an eye-to-eye situation, or do some mime, but my handwriting is … mmm.. well,…

on judgement day, gods and the april fools come late

and so, my students said, saturday will be the judgement day. and then i asked – do you have the grammar exam so early? no, they said, it’s more like the end of the world come this saturday. so i went to the google, and dug round a bit. it turned out to be much…

zeitgeist, in a peculiar fashion

when you apologise to sign-posts for bumping into them while walking and reading a book on your mobile device; when you try to unlock your office with your flat keys; when instead of ‘yes’, you say ‘acceptable’; when you set deadline instead of alarm on your clock; when essays are measured in kilograms, not in…

the day they do not celebrate here

i think one day i will write something terribly logical and bitterly ironic about this day they ignore, because the one side thinks they lost the war, and the other side refuses to admit they are not in moscow. i mean, the 8th of may. i mean, the day when the western world lost half…

inappropriately online

yesterday i read … how many? … too many papers. the month of may has begun, and the crop of raw papers is coming home to be winnowed and whetted into some shape. so i fell asleep on my keyboard in the middle of a paper. i woke up four-o-clock-ish. on the keyboard, or almost.…

quote of the day

there is a reason why the ancient bards died out. it was the training, according to one of my students. Bardic training formed the core of druidic teaching. The future bards had to learn raw poems, at least three hundred and fifty stories and study poetic form and grammar. (from an unpublished, and unpublishable BA paper…

keds

today i thought this: had god  any feet, he’d probably wear keds. just because keds means non-conformity, freedom and some independence. and in keds one can walk quietly, and feel the path, and be protected. ironically, the only god i have ever known, is invisible and i cannot check what he wears.

april begins

thus: the [insert country name here] scientists have carried out extensive research to determine where to find the greatest concentrations of vitamins. they have an answer! it is the local chemist’s. smile. the fools’ day is once a year, and we must be with the fools. because the fools are with us the remaining 364 days…

in the spirit of wearing the green

i wanted to write something serious and depressive. and then i remembered. today is st. Patrick’s day. he is my favourite patron saint, the one i feel most affinity for. i could possibly write sth serious about that, too, but i won’t. there are too many serious things in my life at the moment: so…

tanks

it was a word-game, initially. then i considered it, and it was true to some extent. people do move through the world like they were tanks: heavily armoured on the outside, vulnerable on the inside. i often do, and i have met others of the armoured division, too. then i had nothing particular to do…

interpreter’s nightmares

last night i had this dream. one of my interpreter colleagues asks me to pair him at a conference at the uni for simultaneous interpretation. unfortunately, i also have to present a paper there, a complication, no more. so, i turn up, with full text of my paper in both languages, all set for interpreting.…

pockets that mean much

going on with lists. i accidentally tried to estimate the weight of my jeans. it was over 3 kiloes. then i took out the things from the pockets. there were 8 pockets, and the belt-knife. thus: lower right-hand-side inner pocket a whiteboard marker wallet lower right-hand-side outer pocket a spyglass (for birds and ppt presentations)…