30 October 2008
Since Zack brought it to my attention, today I decided that I was going to participate in National Novel Writing Month. Perhaps the challenge of having to type 50,000 words (which, according to my calculations, is roughly equivalent to 100 single-spaced pages) will provide me with sufficient incentive finally to write the novel I've been meaning to write for the last several years? I hope it doesn't count as cheating, but I had an image in my head and I decided to write it out, so I already have approximately 1,800 to my credit. As you already know, I have a great deal of writing to do in the next few days before I go to Ireland, but I figure that the daily effort of laboring on my novel will help to keep me in shape (after a fashion), so that writing my papers doesn't take so long. It'll certainly be more constructive than wasting hour on hour working on my imaginary country.
Besides that, things haven't changed much since my last post. Tomorrow is Emma's and Tristan's birthday, so my flatmates and I have decided to throw a small party in their honor. It should be really enjoyable--fortunately, it's supposed to be nothing like Chazapalooza (a.k.a. My 21st Birthday Party). Just a reasonably small gathering of friends to share a meal together and cake. It should be simply lovely. I can't wait. It's going to be so much fun. Afterwards, I have my papers to finish--and God willing, I should be able to complete them in timely enough a manner that I'll be able to relax a while before embarking for the Emerald Isle.
P.S. Those of you who are interested in the ongoing state of affairs in the United Kingdom of the Staro-Chadite Empire and Chadania, things are good. Even with working on my novel and my papers and everything else that's far more important, I should have plenty of disturbingly thorough material to share with everyone when I get back to Dickinson. God, I am so weird.
Friday, October 31, 2008
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
How Goes It?
28 October 2008
Since my last post described my efforts to make dinner, you might have gathered that things haven't been terribly busy in Norfolk. Honestly, I am presently between scenes, as it were; I began this month with a journey to lovely Dorset with DeArmond and I'll be starting November with a four-day trip to Dublin. Right now, all that I have to do is researching for, writing, and editing papers. Today I turned in the first of two essays I have to write for "Modern Germany, 1866-1945." As no-one in England believes that university students could possibly develop their own topic for a paper, I had to write mine in response to one out of a series of questions listed in our syllabus (which, by-the-bye, is nearly forty pages long between scheduling guidelines, suggested essay questions, seminar questions, and reading lists).
I decided on Question #5--"Was 1848 'the turning-point when German history failed to turn' (A.J.P. Taylor)?" I chose it for two reasons: (1) as I have already mentioned, I've really found my lectures of the Revolution of 1848 and the Kulturkampf to be fascinating; and (2) given the nature of the question, I got to eviscerate--er, I mean, critique--another, more prominent historian whose writing annoyed me terribly. (Is it really my fault that the man couldn't say a nice thing about the German nation? Or that he referred to such dated ideas as "national character"?) I'm not going to bore you with the details, but I do think that if this had been a boxing match with Taylor and I in opposite corners, I thrashed him. Of course, that might simply be my opinion. I might be wrong.
Next, I have to write papers for Humanities 309 (due November 7th) and for "Women & Gender in Early Modern Europe" (due November 11th). In regards to the former, I think I'm going to consider the City of London, and for the latter, I will be discussing the concepts of honor, credit, and reputation and their importance to men and women in early modern Europe. Neither should be prove as difficult or as time-consuming as the paper did for German History, mostly because I've either already researched for my chosen topic for an in-class presentation or am pursuing something that's a little less ambitious than tackling one of the more significant historians of Germany of the last fifty years. It should be fun, though.
Besides these sundry considerations, I read occasionally (though not as much as I should like) and I spend a substantial portion of my time in thought. The objects of my ruminations vary: American politics, religion, the future trajectory of Western society over the next several years, friendships (both past and present), and myself. And since I don't have anything else to do apart from my papers, obviously, I may as well share a few of my reflections with you.
American Politics
Well, we are now seven days away from Election Day--and I have to admit that I'll soon be lower the curtain on the whole spectacle (that is, until January 22nd when the media will begin to speculate about the 2010 midterm elections). Having spent most of this election cycle on a university campus, I can appreciate firsthand the excitement which this race--and Senator Obama's candidacy, in particular--has generated among the young people of America. Sadly, I don't feel as if I can share in it. That's right. The boy who feigned illness to escape the teasing of his Democratic third-grade classmates after the 1996 election has grown into a young man who's pretty well sick and tired with the entire political process.
Honestly, neither candidate, on their face, has impressed me. Senator McCain has been one of the most influential members of the upper house for almost thirty years, renowned for his willingness to cross the aisle in order to enact needed reforms--but the man chose for his running-mate Sarah Palin, a woman whose selection was intended to pander to the Religious Right and consequently has aggravated the already profound fissures in American society. Senator Obama has displayed an extraordinary gift for oratory which has helped to reach across the partisan landscape in a fashion which probably hasn't been seen since a certain Californian occupied the White House. However, if you listen to his followers for a half-hour, you'd almost believe that he was faster than a speeding bullet and more powerful than a locomotive--and all with one of a relatively thin political resume. Pardon me if my time across the pond has caused my grip on reality to fray, but in the face of the most severe economic crisis in at least forty years, an ongoing war against an elusive and insidious enemy in Iraq and Afghanistan, and increasing pressures on American power from authoritarian regimes in Tehran, Moscow, and Beijing, are these really our only choices?
If I ever get my absentee ballot, I plan on voting for Senator Obama, but that's primarily a function of three factors: (1) the leftward trend that I've been undergoing, more or less, since my senior year in high school; (2) my sense that an Obama administration has greater potential to be successful than a McCain one; and (3) the brutal fact that most of my friends will be voting Democratic this fall. I'm not going to lie. But if McCain orchestrates some sort of miracle, I won't be heartbroken, either. I am certainly not going to embrace the expatriate's life. (Now if he dies and Sarah Palin becomes President, that's another case entirely.)
Religion
I know that unlike Great Britain or Europe, religion remains a "touchy" topic of discussion in the States, so I'll keep this brief. If I had to measure my faith when I first arrived in England over two months ago, I'd say that it was wearing mighty thin. I was looking forward to a year without navigating the uniquely vicious politics which characterise faith-based organizations, without the hypocrisy that Christians seem to display more than they do the love of Christ, without church-going, prayer, scripture readings, sermons, or any of those practices. And I'll be honest: I'm nowhere near the point where I'd seriously countenance marching down to the UEA Chaplaincy or boarding the #25 bus on Sunday mornings in search of religion.
However, since we've arrived in Norwich, I can't help but remember things that I used to hear on Sundays even if I appeared to be sleeping. I continue to love the old hymns and songs of the faith. And on occasion, people still will approach me when they have a question concerning some element of the faith, questions that I still can answer and that afterwards I am glad were asked because they gave me a kernel to chew over for a while. How did the old chestnut go?
"For I stand convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:38-39).
Friendships (Past and Present)
I'm not going to trouble you with the details on this one, either. However, what I will say is that after careful reflection, I now apprehend a few realities about "the family I have chosen," as I like to call my friends to my parents. First, I am a person with many connections, several casual acquaintances, and few close friends. Second, many of the people I used to think were my friends aren't. I might still care for them or their welfare, but I don't really like them or relish their company like I do my truly close friends. Third, your friends often include people with whom you might seem to have but the slightest sliver in common. There are people on this program with whom I might have exchanged five words over the previous two years at Dickinson, people whom I'd now call "friend." And finally, since I'm tiring of playing King Solomon, let me close with the declaration that all of the preceding are perfectly all right. You really don't have to have thousands of friends, or stay close with them for decades, or have to share everything in common with your friends to be happy. As Henry Drummond tells Matthew Harrison Brady in Inherit the Wind: "It's the nature of the life-process."
Myself
If I had to compose a list of adjectives describing who I am three months ago, it'd have probably included such terms as "loyal," "self-conscious," "thick-skinned," "lazy," and "intelligent." But as I've had an opportunity to consider my reflection in the mirror, the contents of that hypothetical list have begun to change. I'm not thick-skinned. I'm actually pretty sensitive; I just seem to be able to get up a little more often that some. I'm not exactly lazy, either. I might not crucify myself in order to complete an assignment, but I get it done as best as I possibly can. And I'm not even going to touch the whole "self-consciousness" issue. But if I had to encapsulate myself in four or five words, provisionally I'd have to say that I am intelligent, loyal to friends and family, probably too generous at times, an incurable optimist, impulsive, and I can be one of the harshest people you could ever know.
In any event, this is how I've spending my time in lovely Norwich. Researching. Writing. Editing. Thinking. Hopefully, I'll have a little bit more to report next time--I should. I only have six or seven more days till I go to Dublin with Zack, Meghan, and Lauren. I can't wait! Ireland, here I come!
Since my last post described my efforts to make dinner, you might have gathered that things haven't been terribly busy in Norfolk. Honestly, I am presently between scenes, as it were; I began this month with a journey to lovely Dorset with DeArmond and I'll be starting November with a four-day trip to Dublin. Right now, all that I have to do is researching for, writing, and editing papers. Today I turned in the first of two essays I have to write for "Modern Germany, 1866-1945." As no-one in England believes that university students could possibly develop their own topic for a paper, I had to write mine in response to one out of a series of questions listed in our syllabus (which, by-the-bye, is nearly forty pages long between scheduling guidelines, suggested essay questions, seminar questions, and reading lists).
I decided on Question #5--"Was 1848 'the turning-point when German history failed to turn' (A.J.P. Taylor)?" I chose it for two reasons: (1) as I have already mentioned, I've really found my lectures of the Revolution of 1848 and the Kulturkampf to be fascinating; and (2) given the nature of the question, I got to eviscerate--er, I mean, critique--another, more prominent historian whose writing annoyed me terribly. (Is it really my fault that the man couldn't say a nice thing about the German nation? Or that he referred to such dated ideas as "national character"?) I'm not going to bore you with the details, but I do think that if this had been a boxing match with Taylor and I in opposite corners, I thrashed him. Of course, that might simply be my opinion. I might be wrong.
Next, I have to write papers for Humanities 309 (due November 7th) and for "Women & Gender in Early Modern Europe" (due November 11th). In regards to the former, I think I'm going to consider the City of London, and for the latter, I will be discussing the concepts of honor, credit, and reputation and their importance to men and women in early modern Europe. Neither should be prove as difficult or as time-consuming as the paper did for German History, mostly because I've either already researched for my chosen topic for an in-class presentation or am pursuing something that's a little less ambitious than tackling one of the more significant historians of Germany of the last fifty years. It should be fun, though.
Besides these sundry considerations, I read occasionally (though not as much as I should like) and I spend a substantial portion of my time in thought. The objects of my ruminations vary: American politics, religion, the future trajectory of Western society over the next several years, friendships (both past and present), and myself. And since I don't have anything else to do apart from my papers, obviously, I may as well share a few of my reflections with you.
American Politics
Well, we are now seven days away from Election Day--and I have to admit that I'll soon be lower the curtain on the whole spectacle (that is, until January 22nd when the media will begin to speculate about the 2010 midterm elections). Having spent most of this election cycle on a university campus, I can appreciate firsthand the excitement which this race--and Senator Obama's candidacy, in particular--has generated among the young people of America. Sadly, I don't feel as if I can share in it. That's right. The boy who feigned illness to escape the teasing of his Democratic third-grade classmates after the 1996 election has grown into a young man who's pretty well sick and tired with the entire political process.
Honestly, neither candidate, on their face, has impressed me. Senator McCain has been one of the most influential members of the upper house for almost thirty years, renowned for his willingness to cross the aisle in order to enact needed reforms--but the man chose for his running-mate Sarah Palin, a woman whose selection was intended to pander to the Religious Right and consequently has aggravated the already profound fissures in American society. Senator Obama has displayed an extraordinary gift for oratory which has helped to reach across the partisan landscape in a fashion which probably hasn't been seen since a certain Californian occupied the White House. However, if you listen to his followers for a half-hour, you'd almost believe that he was faster than a speeding bullet and more powerful than a locomotive--and all with one of a relatively thin political resume. Pardon me if my time across the pond has caused my grip on reality to fray, but in the face of the most severe economic crisis in at least forty years, an ongoing war against an elusive and insidious enemy in Iraq and Afghanistan, and increasing pressures on American power from authoritarian regimes in Tehran, Moscow, and Beijing, are these really our only choices?
If I ever get my absentee ballot, I plan on voting for Senator Obama, but that's primarily a function of three factors: (1) the leftward trend that I've been undergoing, more or less, since my senior year in high school; (2) my sense that an Obama administration has greater potential to be successful than a McCain one; and (3) the brutal fact that most of my friends will be voting Democratic this fall. I'm not going to lie. But if McCain orchestrates some sort of miracle, I won't be heartbroken, either. I am certainly not going to embrace the expatriate's life. (Now if he dies and Sarah Palin becomes President, that's another case entirely.)
Religion
I know that unlike Great Britain or Europe, religion remains a "touchy" topic of discussion in the States, so I'll keep this brief. If I had to measure my faith when I first arrived in England over two months ago, I'd say that it was wearing mighty thin. I was looking forward to a year without navigating the uniquely vicious politics which characterise faith-based organizations, without the hypocrisy that Christians seem to display more than they do the love of Christ, without church-going, prayer, scripture readings, sermons, or any of those practices. And I'll be honest: I'm nowhere near the point where I'd seriously countenance marching down to the UEA Chaplaincy or boarding the #25 bus on Sunday mornings in search of religion.
However, since we've arrived in Norwich, I can't help but remember things that I used to hear on Sundays even if I appeared to be sleeping. I continue to love the old hymns and songs of the faith. And on occasion, people still will approach me when they have a question concerning some element of the faith, questions that I still can answer and that afterwards I am glad were asked because they gave me a kernel to chew over for a while. How did the old chestnut go?
"For I stand convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:38-39).
Friendships (Past and Present)
I'm not going to trouble you with the details on this one, either. However, what I will say is that after careful reflection, I now apprehend a few realities about "the family I have chosen," as I like to call my friends to my parents. First, I am a person with many connections, several casual acquaintances, and few close friends. Second, many of the people I used to think were my friends aren't. I might still care for them or their welfare, but I don't really like them or relish their company like I do my truly close friends. Third, your friends often include people with whom you might seem to have but the slightest sliver in common. There are people on this program with whom I might have exchanged five words over the previous two years at Dickinson, people whom I'd now call "friend." And finally, since I'm tiring of playing King Solomon, let me close with the declaration that all of the preceding are perfectly all right. You really don't have to have thousands of friends, or stay close with them for decades, or have to share everything in common with your friends to be happy. As Henry Drummond tells Matthew Harrison Brady in Inherit the Wind: "It's the nature of the life-process."
Myself
If I had to compose a list of adjectives describing who I am three months ago, it'd have probably included such terms as "loyal," "self-conscious," "thick-skinned," "lazy," and "intelligent." But as I've had an opportunity to consider my reflection in the mirror, the contents of that hypothetical list have begun to change. I'm not thick-skinned. I'm actually pretty sensitive; I just seem to be able to get up a little more often that some. I'm not exactly lazy, either. I might not crucify myself in order to complete an assignment, but I get it done as best as I possibly can. And I'm not even going to touch the whole "self-consciousness" issue. But if I had to encapsulate myself in four or five words, provisionally I'd have to say that I am intelligent, loyal to friends and family, probably too generous at times, an incurable optimist, impulsive, and I can be one of the harshest people you could ever know.
In any event, this is how I've spending my time in lovely Norwich. Researching. Writing. Editing. Thinking. Hopefully, I'll have a little bit more to report next time--I should. I only have six or seven more days till I go to Dublin with Zack, Meghan, and Lauren. I can't wait! Ireland, here I come!
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Grandma's Baked Potato Soup
24 October 2008
Till now, when it has come to preparing group meals, I haven't felt as though I've been pulling my weight around the flat. Everyone else has contributed in the form of some dish or another. Tom has made spaghetti with vodka marinara; last night, Zack prepared the most delicious chicken and pasta stir fry; and a few Sundays ago, our flat sat around the table in our kitchen and enjoyed a proper roast chicken dinner. And those are just the ones which leap most readily to mind. Everyone till now has prepared a group meal--that is, except me. So, last night while we were discussing what we were going to prepare for dinner tonight, I volunteered. I decided to cook my Grandma Frazier's Baked Potato Soup.
In principle, the recipe isn't too complex. It requires 4 baked potatoes, 2/3 cup of butter (or margarine), 2/3 cup of flour, 7 cups of milk, 4 sliced green onions, 1.25 cups of shredded cheese (I decided on mild yellow cheddar), 12 strips of cooked and crumbled bacon, 3/4 teaspoon of salt, and 1/2 teaspoon of pepper. You bake the potatoes for forty-five to sixty minutes at 400 degrees Fahrenheit, peel and cube them, and then pour them into the broth or sauce which consists of the flour, butter, and milk along with the bacon, cheese, and sliced green onions. Well, that's the Spark Notes version of the recipe anyway. It didn't turnout that way in practice.
First, there is the simple fact that the highest setting on the convection oven in our flat is 150 degrees Celsius, which is roughly three hundred two degrees Fahrenheit--one hundred degrees less than it needs to be to bake the potatoes. I tried compensating for the lower temperature by baking the potatoes for 75 minutes. In the end, only 2 of my 4 potatoes actually were cooked through when I removed them from the oven. And even when I went to peel and cube those two, I could tell as I forced the knife through the starchy innards of the potato that they weren't cooked as well as they could have been or as I should have liked.
Of course, that probably was a blessing in disguise in light of the second complication I faced; namely, my Grandma's Baked Potato Soup recipe assumes that one has a large cooking pot. We don't. I had to settle for the largest saucepan I could find, which, in the grand scheme, worked well enough--it just meant that as I was stirring everything together, I made a small mess. Nothing too serious. The exterior of the saucepan just looked really, really white when I was finished. I was just happy that I didn't have to clean the dishes tonight--oh wondrous perks of cooking!
Besides forcing me to adjust the amount of potato I actually put in the soup, the saucepan also necessitated a few additional revisions in terms of the other elements to the recipe. I put in the required amounts of flour and butter, pepper and salt, and shredded cheese, but I had to cutback on the milk and the bacon. I probably poured in 5-6 cups of milk instead of the seven required by the recipe, which just made it harder to eliminate the tiny lumps of butter and flour that formed. And of course, the constant and vigorous stirring that the presence of this offensive little tumors didn't help me in my efforts at tidyness. As for the bacon, strips or "rashers" as they are called here tend to be a little larger than strips in the States, so I wasn't worried too much about it.
(On a sidenote, I didn't have any green onions--apparently, British farmers don't grow them because they were at the Co-Op when I went there this morning. And I was most certainly not going to Morrison's since I didn't want to sit on the bus for a half-hour there and then a half-hour back. I don't even like green onions on baked potatoes anyway.)
When I called everyone into the kitchen for dinner, I was dreading their response--I thought the sauce or broth was going to be milky, floury, and lumpy; there wasn't going to be enough potatoes for everyone; some one might stumble on some stray piece of skin that I wasn't able to remove from one of the potatoes and hurl. The number of doomsday scenarios which flashed through my mind really seemed to be boundless. I don't know if it was an instance of divine intervention, random chance, or the legendary culinary indifference of the English, but my rendition of Grandma's Baked Potato Soup was well received, I'm happy to say. It was tasty with a nice bite to it (since I hadn't reduced the amount of pepper that I put into it). There weren't any real lumps of dough; the sauce had a pleasant, reasonably smooth consistency. And even if a few pieces of potato still weren't completely cooked through, what's a meal without at least one or two tiny imperfections? I was really pleased with the outcome.
My only regret has to do with the less than obscene amount of food I prepared--my grandmother's recipe is supposed to prepare enough soup for 8-10 servings, a fact which caused me great delight because it meant that perhaps for the first time since I reached England, I'd get to enjoy what I call "good old-fashioned down-home fat*** Middle Western American-sized portions." How I miss going to a restaurant in the States ordering a steak and getting half-a-cow or visiting either my mother's or my father's family and enjoying plate after heaping plate of potatoes, meat, and vegetables! (By-the-bye, I'm sorry if this makes me sound like the world's biggest glutton or the world's skinniest supermodel, but what can I say? I enjoy food. And I can eat a lot of it.) Sadly, since I had to use a smaller saucepan, the amount of soup I ended up preparing was only enough for perhaps 6-7 servings, which was far less than the amount anticipated by the original recipe. So, while I still am pleased with the outcome, I know that before the next time I make it, I'm going to get a proper pot.
Till now, when it has come to preparing group meals, I haven't felt as though I've been pulling my weight around the flat. Everyone else has contributed in the form of some dish or another. Tom has made spaghetti with vodka marinara; last night, Zack prepared the most delicious chicken and pasta stir fry; and a few Sundays ago, our flat sat around the table in our kitchen and enjoyed a proper roast chicken dinner. And those are just the ones which leap most readily to mind. Everyone till now has prepared a group meal--that is, except me. So, last night while we were discussing what we were going to prepare for dinner tonight, I volunteered. I decided to cook my Grandma Frazier's Baked Potato Soup.
In principle, the recipe isn't too complex. It requires 4 baked potatoes, 2/3 cup of butter (or margarine), 2/3 cup of flour, 7 cups of milk, 4 sliced green onions, 1.25 cups of shredded cheese (I decided on mild yellow cheddar), 12 strips of cooked and crumbled bacon, 3/4 teaspoon of salt, and 1/2 teaspoon of pepper. You bake the potatoes for forty-five to sixty minutes at 400 degrees Fahrenheit, peel and cube them, and then pour them into the broth or sauce which consists of the flour, butter, and milk along with the bacon, cheese, and sliced green onions. Well, that's the Spark Notes version of the recipe anyway. It didn't turnout that way in practice.
First, there is the simple fact that the highest setting on the convection oven in our flat is 150 degrees Celsius, which is roughly three hundred two degrees Fahrenheit--one hundred degrees less than it needs to be to bake the potatoes. I tried compensating for the lower temperature by baking the potatoes for 75 minutes. In the end, only 2 of my 4 potatoes actually were cooked through when I removed them from the oven. And even when I went to peel and cube those two, I could tell as I forced the knife through the starchy innards of the potato that they weren't cooked as well as they could have been or as I should have liked.
Of course, that probably was a blessing in disguise in light of the second complication I faced; namely, my Grandma's Baked Potato Soup recipe assumes that one has a large cooking pot. We don't. I had to settle for the largest saucepan I could find, which, in the grand scheme, worked well enough--it just meant that as I was stirring everything together, I made a small mess. Nothing too serious. The exterior of the saucepan just looked really, really white when I was finished. I was just happy that I didn't have to clean the dishes tonight--oh wondrous perks of cooking!
Besides forcing me to adjust the amount of potato I actually put in the soup, the saucepan also necessitated a few additional revisions in terms of the other elements to the recipe. I put in the required amounts of flour and butter, pepper and salt, and shredded cheese, but I had to cutback on the milk and the bacon. I probably poured in 5-6 cups of milk instead of the seven required by the recipe, which just made it harder to eliminate the tiny lumps of butter and flour that formed. And of course, the constant and vigorous stirring that the presence of this offensive little tumors didn't help me in my efforts at tidyness. As for the bacon, strips or "rashers" as they are called here tend to be a little larger than strips in the States, so I wasn't worried too much about it.
(On a sidenote, I didn't have any green onions--apparently, British farmers don't grow them because they were at the Co-Op when I went there this morning. And I was most certainly not going to Morrison's since I didn't want to sit on the bus for a half-hour there and then a half-hour back. I don't even like green onions on baked potatoes anyway.)
When I called everyone into the kitchen for dinner, I was dreading their response--I thought the sauce or broth was going to be milky, floury, and lumpy; there wasn't going to be enough potatoes for everyone; some one might stumble on some stray piece of skin that I wasn't able to remove from one of the potatoes and hurl. The number of doomsday scenarios which flashed through my mind really seemed to be boundless. I don't know if it was an instance of divine intervention, random chance, or the legendary culinary indifference of the English, but my rendition of Grandma's Baked Potato Soup was well received, I'm happy to say. It was tasty with a nice bite to it (since I hadn't reduced the amount of pepper that I put into it). There weren't any real lumps of dough; the sauce had a pleasant, reasonably smooth consistency. And even if a few pieces of potato still weren't completely cooked through, what's a meal without at least one or two tiny imperfections? I was really pleased with the outcome.
My only regret has to do with the less than obscene amount of food I prepared--my grandmother's recipe is supposed to prepare enough soup for 8-10 servings, a fact which caused me great delight because it meant that perhaps for the first time since I reached England, I'd get to enjoy what I call "good old-fashioned down-home fat*** Middle Western American-sized portions." How I miss going to a restaurant in the States ordering a steak and getting half-a-cow or visiting either my mother's or my father's family and enjoying plate after heaping plate of potatoes, meat, and vegetables! (By-the-bye, I'm sorry if this makes me sound like the world's biggest glutton or the world's skinniest supermodel, but what can I say? I enjoy food. And I can eat a lot of it.) Sadly, since I had to use a smaller saucepan, the amount of soup I ended up preparing was only enough for perhaps 6-7 servings, which was far less than the amount anticipated by the original recipe. So, while I still am pleased with the outcome, I know that before the next time I make it, I'm going to get a proper pot.
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Ring of Fire is a wicked, wicked game!
I had intended to write a full account of my activities at the latest LitSoc Pub Crawl, but unfortunately, I have a paper to write for "Modern Germany, 1866-1945" and I am far more interested really in talking about my recent culinary adventures (see post above). So, those of you interested in learning about the LitSoc Pub Crawl on Monday night, please see Shannyn's most recent post.
All I will say is that I am very grateful to have made it home alive. Unfortunately for me, I didn't appreciate how much one can consume while one is in the company of others and engaged in a feverish game of "Ring of Fire"--and I paid the penalty for it. Like so many other things during the course of this year, it was an experience, one that (God willing) I'll never repeat and from which I will come away wiser.
All I will say is that I am very grateful to have made it home alive. Unfortunately for me, I didn't appreciate how much one can consume while one is in the company of others and engaged in a feverish game of "Ring of Fire"--and I paid the penalty for it. Like so many other things during the course of this year, it was an experience, one that (God willing) I'll never repeat and from which I will come away wiser.
Monday, October 13, 2008
A Wessex Weekend
10-13 October 2008
If you'll all forgive me for not posting in a while, let me fill you in on some of my more notable activities in recent weeks. Unfortunately, this won't be too exhaustive of an account, but it'll have to suffice. So, let's begin.
Two weekends ago, I met up with Chris DeArmond in Bournemouth in Dorset. Now many of you are probably wondering: what and where is Dorset? Dorset is one of the historic shires or counties into which England has been divided for administrative purposes since the reign of King Alfred the Great during the Ninth Century. Mostly rural with a population that is among the whitest and the oldest in England, it's perhaps most famous for its beaches which have been a popular destination for the English dating to the eighteenth century and because it's the region where Thomas Hardy located the overwhelming majority of his novels and short stories; it lies squarely at the heart of his mystical country of "Wessex." Not exactly the most common destination for American students, a fact I now understand; but it was beautiful--an earthy, friendly place with rolling hills and open fields populated by sheep and lowing cattle.
I left early from Norwich on Friday the 10th, traveling by rail through London. I had to miss my seminar for "Modern Germany, 1866-1945," but I don't mind really. I read some of The Pianist (which, in a small sidenote, I found fairly compelling) and A.J.P. Taylor's The Course of German History (which I found intriguing, but infuriatingly dated and prejudiced) on the train, so it's not as terrible as it might otherwise appear. I reached Bournemouth around two o' clock in the afternoon, and I have to admit that I was a little disoriented when I discovered there was no place really handy where I could purchase a street map of Bournemouth. I wandered around for a while--DeArmond's flight from Malaga wasn't scheduled to arrive for another two hours--and I stopped for a bite to eat at the McDonald's in the Asda Supercenter across the street from the rail station and I probably paid too much for a municipal bus pass. (I know this because as I was exiting the Bournemouth Information Center, having paid 15 pounds for a 5-day pass, I heard an acquaintance of the man who just sold me my pass exclaim, "Hey! I thought you also had 3-day passes for 9 pounds?")
Eventually around quarter till four, I boarded the shuttle to the Bournemouth International Airport. John F. Kennedy International or DIA, it was not. As I wrote in my moleskine at the time (please forgive the overall self-indulgent tone):
Of course, I am certain that an element of my discomfort arises out of the fact that I am alone, seated on a planter outside the most pretentiously and most inaccurately named Bournemouth International Airport. [...] I do believe that Walker Field [the airfield in Grand Junction]--hell, the Montrose County Airport--is O'Hara International Airport next to this place. There's no sitting area in it whatsoever, only ticket counters, baggage claim, and security checkpoints.
Fortunately, the flight from Malaga arrived on time, and with it, DeArmond. It was funny seeing him for the first time since May--we didn't embrace or really show any signs of excitement. I was just seated casually flipping through Taylor's diatribe against the German nation like I might a copy of the Dickinsonian on the cushies back home, and he walked up and exclaimed, "Hey, Chad." The rest of Friday wasn't terribly busy: we ate dinner at a restaurant along the beach, and then managing to discover and check in our hostel at our scheduled time of 7.00 PM, we visited a nearby pub called "The Goat and the Tricycle" where we enjoyed a couple of pints before heading over to Subway for a quick sandwich. Chris had difficulties discovering any ATMs that would accept his debit card, so I ended up paying for everything on the first day. We went to bed relatively early, around eleven at night, because we had to rise early to catch the bus to Dorchester.
Morning arrived, and since I hadn't been able to purchase a street map at the rail station, we left the hostel around six-thirty to give us sufficient time to find our way to the rail station where we were supposed to pick up the eight-thirty bus to Dorchester. We stopped periodically at the different bus stations and looked over the maps on display there; using them, we eventually found the Bournemouth Town Square where we could pick up the eight o' clock bus to the rail station. Chris found an ATM that accepted his card, a discovery which made us both happy. I certainly heaved a sigh of relief since it meant that I wouldn't have to withdraw any more morning from my checking account (I had brought 225 pounds with me to Bournemouth, and between bus passes, dinner, beer, the hostel, and Subway, I had managed to spend roughly 150 pounds of it.)
The bus ride to Dorchester was uneventful--and realistically, the day wasn't that terribly eventful, either. From ten o' clock in the morning till six o' clock in the evening, Chris and I just wandered across Dorchester. We walked from the town center to Thomas Hardy's Max Gate on the outskirts of the town--sadly, it was closed to guests till April 2009 for renovations--and I think we traveled to three of the four corners of the town. We passed the Corn Exchange, several of the town's lovely old churches, the Dorset Military Museum, the ruins of a Roman town house, traced the old Roman town walls, visited the statue honoring Thomas Hardy, and followed the riverside path along the River Frome at least one-and-a-half to two miles north of the town's limits. In the course of things, we stopped for lunch--I had a proper English fry-up, Chris had a panini and chips--and also had a quick drink before boarding the bus for Bournemouth. For dinner, we bought a couple of pints from an off-license liquor store and a 16" pizza which we consumed happily in our room at the hostel (although we later read that we weren't technically supposed to do either of those things). We also had a couple of pints at "The Goat and Tricycle" before retiring for the day.
On Sunday, we rose around nine-thirty in the morning. Chris wanted to experience the festival of meat that is a full English breakfast, so we managed to locate a Wetherspoon's pub called "The Moon in the Square" which was still serving breakfast at eleven o' clock. The food wasn't too spectacular, although Chris and I did manage to have fun mocking how everyone was drinking beer before twelve o' clock ("What a bunch of alcoholics! Oh my god!" I think he incredulously exclaimed to me at one point) and quietly thinking of mean-spirited techniques for soothing a screaming toddler at a nearby table. Those of you who know us well can rest assured that if that child's mother had heard us, she would have probably beat us to death with a stroller. We followed our breakfast with a stroll along the western beaches which were absolutely gorgeous. I am not a great fan of the ocean, but it was amazing. We returned to the hostel around three o' clock in the afternoon, rested till six-thirty, went to dinner at McDonald's, and then returned to "The Moon in the Square" for a pint.
And that's when this trip's signature moment occurred. "The Moon in the Square" was the first stop in a short pub crawl that was supposed to begin in the Bournemouth Town Square and end at "The Goat and the Tricycle" near our hostel. A fitting adieu to England, wouldn't you think? Particularly since neither Chris nor I had drank anywhere near the amount that we had originally anticipated. Well, the second stop was supposed to be "The Baker's Arms," this small pub located roughly halfway between the town center and our hostel. Chris and I had passed by it a few times since we arrived in Bournemouth, and to me, it seemed to be a pleasant place to visit, a good place possibly to mix with the locals. And even though the beer selection consisted of Kronenberg, Guinness, Wetherspoon's Old Thumper, and Strongbow and was really pathetic, it initially seemed like that assessment was accurate. When we first entered the pub, Chris and I both hesitated, but this elderly gentleman motioned to join everyone at the bar, and before we knew it, we were engaged in friendly conversation with a man whose name I think was Adrian who was a reporter and who had actually travelled in the States quite extensively.
I find that as soon as I find an Englishman or Englishwoman who knows anything of the States, I get a little giddy. Sadly, in my initial excitement at the friendly reception, I didn't notice that there were some unusual characteristics to this pub:
1. Disney's "Mary Poppins" was showing on the television, not a football match like you would see in most British pubs.
2. There were show tunes playing gently in the background.
3. There were no women in the bar whatsoever, and all the men seemed to be dressed very casually, in an almost effeminate manner in some cases.
4. There was this elderly man from Liverpool who was incredibly drunk and incredibly obnoxious who kept throwing his arm over my shoulder, complimenting me on my accent, and warning me (and Chris, too) to keep our distance from our journalist acquaintance because he wanted to shag me because I was under twenty-one.
Does anyone want to hazard a guess about what type of bar I had chosen? Well, as soon as I realized that "The Baker's Arms" was in fact a gay bar, I pounded the remainder of my beer and politely excusing myself, I followed DeArmond to the restroom, so that we could decide what we should do. Of course, I no sooner entered the restroom than Chris cried from the stall, roaring with laughter: "Chad, you idiot! You picked a gay bar. I'm going to tell everyone about this. Oh my god, Chad, they want to hook up with us! You moron!" Now my friend Chris is, in fact, gay, but even he was uncomfortable with receiving the attentions of men who were on average twenty to thirty years our seniors. So, as soon as we had the opportunity to do so, we left. Everyone was very friendly, and I must admit that as I reflect over it now, I can't say that I greatly regret the experience. I certainly didn't appreciate it when my drunken acquiantance suggested that I wore lipstick because my lips were so red after I finished my beer or when he continually invaded my personal space by throwing his arm around my shoulder. (I'm very English, in that I don't always like to be touched. Friends and family members can get away with it. Complete strangers who tells me to have "a big fat one" can't.) But it's an experience like any other. I just wished that I had apprehended the signs a little sooner than I did.
We followed our adventure at "The Baker's Arms" with stops at "The Goat and the Tricycle" and back at "The Moon in the Square." Chris joked about returning to "The Baker's Arms"--but I'm afraid that I was something of a spoilsport for the remainder of the evening. I just continued to chastise myself for having been so unobservant, and it provoked probably my worst fit of my "Black Dog" in two months. Fortunately, I managed to recover my spirits before the next morning when Chris and I rose, departed the hostel, and proceed by forced march to the rail station. There I waited till the shuttle to the airport arrived before I crossed the street and boarded the eight-ten into London. Passing through London, I was tempted to visit the South Bank, "The Bricklayers' Arms," or perhaps one of the other sites that we'd visited while we were there. Perhaps the Victoria & Albert Museum or the British Museum. However, I hadn't brought my Oyster Card with me, and I really did want to get home to Norwich. I pulled into the Norwich Rail Station around one o' clock in the afternoon, and on the #35 bus, it took me till two o' clock before I was able to slide my key into the keyhole of my flat and settle back into life at UEA.
If you'll all forgive me for not posting in a while, let me fill you in on some of my more notable activities in recent weeks. Unfortunately, this won't be too exhaustive of an account, but it'll have to suffice. So, let's begin.
Two weekends ago, I met up with Chris DeArmond in Bournemouth in Dorset. Now many of you are probably wondering: what and where is Dorset? Dorset is one of the historic shires or counties into which England has been divided for administrative purposes since the reign of King Alfred the Great during the Ninth Century. Mostly rural with a population that is among the whitest and the oldest in England, it's perhaps most famous for its beaches which have been a popular destination for the English dating to the eighteenth century and because it's the region where Thomas Hardy located the overwhelming majority of his novels and short stories; it lies squarely at the heart of his mystical country of "Wessex." Not exactly the most common destination for American students, a fact I now understand; but it was beautiful--an earthy, friendly place with rolling hills and open fields populated by sheep and lowing cattle.
I left early from Norwich on Friday the 10th, traveling by rail through London. I had to miss my seminar for "Modern Germany, 1866-1945," but I don't mind really. I read some of The Pianist (which, in a small sidenote, I found fairly compelling) and A.J.P. Taylor's The Course of German History (which I found intriguing, but infuriatingly dated and prejudiced) on the train, so it's not as terrible as it might otherwise appear. I reached Bournemouth around two o' clock in the afternoon, and I have to admit that I was a little disoriented when I discovered there was no place really handy where I could purchase a street map of Bournemouth. I wandered around for a while--DeArmond's flight from Malaga wasn't scheduled to arrive for another two hours--and I stopped for a bite to eat at the McDonald's in the Asda Supercenter across the street from the rail station and I probably paid too much for a municipal bus pass. (I know this because as I was exiting the Bournemouth Information Center, having paid 15 pounds for a 5-day pass, I heard an acquaintance of the man who just sold me my pass exclaim, "Hey! I thought you also had 3-day passes for 9 pounds?")
Eventually around quarter till four, I boarded the shuttle to the Bournemouth International Airport. John F. Kennedy International or DIA, it was not. As I wrote in my moleskine at the time (please forgive the overall self-indulgent tone):
Of course, I am certain that an element of my discomfort arises out of the fact that I am alone, seated on a planter outside the most pretentiously and most inaccurately named Bournemouth International Airport. [...] I do believe that Walker Field [the airfield in Grand Junction]--hell, the Montrose County Airport--is O'Hara International Airport next to this place. There's no sitting area in it whatsoever, only ticket counters, baggage claim, and security checkpoints.
Fortunately, the flight from Malaga arrived on time, and with it, DeArmond. It was funny seeing him for the first time since May--we didn't embrace or really show any signs of excitement. I was just seated casually flipping through Taylor's diatribe against the German nation like I might a copy of the Dickinsonian on the cushies back home, and he walked up and exclaimed, "Hey, Chad." The rest of Friday wasn't terribly busy: we ate dinner at a restaurant along the beach, and then managing to discover and check in our hostel at our scheduled time of 7.00 PM, we visited a nearby pub called "The Goat and the Tricycle" where we enjoyed a couple of pints before heading over to Subway for a quick sandwich. Chris had difficulties discovering any ATMs that would accept his debit card, so I ended up paying for everything on the first day. We went to bed relatively early, around eleven at night, because we had to rise early to catch the bus to Dorchester.
Morning arrived, and since I hadn't been able to purchase a street map at the rail station, we left the hostel around six-thirty to give us sufficient time to find our way to the rail station where we were supposed to pick up the eight-thirty bus to Dorchester. We stopped periodically at the different bus stations and looked over the maps on display there; using them, we eventually found the Bournemouth Town Square where we could pick up the eight o' clock bus to the rail station. Chris found an ATM that accepted his card, a discovery which made us both happy. I certainly heaved a sigh of relief since it meant that I wouldn't have to withdraw any more morning from my checking account (I had brought 225 pounds with me to Bournemouth, and between bus passes, dinner, beer, the hostel, and Subway, I had managed to spend roughly 150 pounds of it.)
The bus ride to Dorchester was uneventful--and realistically, the day wasn't that terribly eventful, either. From ten o' clock in the morning till six o' clock in the evening, Chris and I just wandered across Dorchester. We walked from the town center to Thomas Hardy's Max Gate on the outskirts of the town--sadly, it was closed to guests till April 2009 for renovations--and I think we traveled to three of the four corners of the town. We passed the Corn Exchange, several of the town's lovely old churches, the Dorset Military Museum, the ruins of a Roman town house, traced the old Roman town walls, visited the statue honoring Thomas Hardy, and followed the riverside path along the River Frome at least one-and-a-half to two miles north of the town's limits. In the course of things, we stopped for lunch--I had a proper English fry-up, Chris had a panini and chips--and also had a quick drink before boarding the bus for Bournemouth. For dinner, we bought a couple of pints from an off-license liquor store and a 16" pizza which we consumed happily in our room at the hostel (although we later read that we weren't technically supposed to do either of those things). We also had a couple of pints at "The Goat and Tricycle" before retiring for the day.
On Sunday, we rose around nine-thirty in the morning. Chris wanted to experience the festival of meat that is a full English breakfast, so we managed to locate a Wetherspoon's pub called "The Moon in the Square" which was still serving breakfast at eleven o' clock. The food wasn't too spectacular, although Chris and I did manage to have fun mocking how everyone was drinking beer before twelve o' clock ("What a bunch of alcoholics! Oh my god!" I think he incredulously exclaimed to me at one point) and quietly thinking of mean-spirited techniques for soothing a screaming toddler at a nearby table. Those of you who know us well can rest assured that if that child's mother had heard us, she would have probably beat us to death with a stroller. We followed our breakfast with a stroll along the western beaches which were absolutely gorgeous. I am not a great fan of the ocean, but it was amazing. We returned to the hostel around three o' clock in the afternoon, rested till six-thirty, went to dinner at McDonald's, and then returned to "The Moon in the Square" for a pint.
And that's when this trip's signature moment occurred. "The Moon in the Square" was the first stop in a short pub crawl that was supposed to begin in the Bournemouth Town Square and end at "The Goat and the Tricycle" near our hostel. A fitting adieu to England, wouldn't you think? Particularly since neither Chris nor I had drank anywhere near the amount that we had originally anticipated. Well, the second stop was supposed to be "The Baker's Arms," this small pub located roughly halfway between the town center and our hostel. Chris and I had passed by it a few times since we arrived in Bournemouth, and to me, it seemed to be a pleasant place to visit, a good place possibly to mix with the locals. And even though the beer selection consisted of Kronenberg, Guinness, Wetherspoon's Old Thumper, and Strongbow and was really pathetic, it initially seemed like that assessment was accurate. When we first entered the pub, Chris and I both hesitated, but this elderly gentleman motioned to join everyone at the bar, and before we knew it, we were engaged in friendly conversation with a man whose name I think was Adrian who was a reporter and who had actually travelled in the States quite extensively.
I find that as soon as I find an Englishman or Englishwoman who knows anything of the States, I get a little giddy. Sadly, in my initial excitement at the friendly reception, I didn't notice that there were some unusual characteristics to this pub:
1. Disney's "Mary Poppins" was showing on the television, not a football match like you would see in most British pubs.
2. There were show tunes playing gently in the background.
3. There were no women in the bar whatsoever, and all the men seemed to be dressed very casually, in an almost effeminate manner in some cases.
4. There was this elderly man from Liverpool who was incredibly drunk and incredibly obnoxious who kept throwing his arm over my shoulder, complimenting me on my accent, and warning me (and Chris, too) to keep our distance from our journalist acquaintance because he wanted to shag me because I was under twenty-one.
Does anyone want to hazard a guess about what type of bar I had chosen? Well, as soon as I realized that "The Baker's Arms" was in fact a gay bar, I pounded the remainder of my beer and politely excusing myself, I followed DeArmond to the restroom, so that we could decide what we should do. Of course, I no sooner entered the restroom than Chris cried from the stall, roaring with laughter: "Chad, you idiot! You picked a gay bar. I'm going to tell everyone about this. Oh my god, Chad, they want to hook up with us! You moron!" Now my friend Chris is, in fact, gay, but even he was uncomfortable with receiving the attentions of men who were on average twenty to thirty years our seniors. So, as soon as we had the opportunity to do so, we left. Everyone was very friendly, and I must admit that as I reflect over it now, I can't say that I greatly regret the experience. I certainly didn't appreciate it when my drunken acquiantance suggested that I wore lipstick because my lips were so red after I finished my beer or when he continually invaded my personal space by throwing his arm around my shoulder. (I'm very English, in that I don't always like to be touched. Friends and family members can get away with it. Complete strangers who tells me to have "a big fat one" can't.) But it's an experience like any other. I just wished that I had apprehended the signs a little sooner than I did.
We followed our adventure at "The Baker's Arms" with stops at "The Goat and the Tricycle" and back at "The Moon in the Square." Chris joked about returning to "The Baker's Arms"--but I'm afraid that I was something of a spoilsport for the remainder of the evening. I just continued to chastise myself for having been so unobservant, and it provoked probably my worst fit of my "Black Dog" in two months. Fortunately, I managed to recover my spirits before the next morning when Chris and I rose, departed the hostel, and proceed by forced march to the rail station. There I waited till the shuttle to the airport arrived before I crossed the street and boarded the eight-ten into London. Passing through London, I was tempted to visit the South Bank, "The Bricklayers' Arms," or perhaps one of the other sites that we'd visited while we were there. Perhaps the Victoria & Albert Museum or the British Museum. However, I hadn't brought my Oyster Card with me, and I really did want to get home to Norwich. I pulled into the Norwich Rail Station around one o' clock in the afternoon, and on the #35 bus, it took me till two o' clock before I was able to slide my key into the keyhole of my flat and settle back into life at UEA.
Thursday, October 9, 2008
An Argument for the Existence of Elites
8 October 2008
As much as it cuts against the grain of the so-called American creed of liberty and equality, I have to report now I stand even more convinced in my belief in elites, not simply in their necessity for society, but in their desirability.
All should be certainly equal before the eyes of the law and should be entitled to pursue what brings them satisfaction in this world. That doesn't mean, however, that we should afford everyone's opinions or interests an equal measure of consideration. There needs to be an order of well informed and educated, empathetic men and women of character who provide a steady hand on the tiller of culture, society, and the state. You might be wondering in response, "For what purpose? Why do we need such a steady hand?" The answer to such questions is simple: People is dumb.
In support of my contention, permit me to enter into evidence the following account of my activites last night. I think that it might cast light on the circumstances behind my repudiation of the more egalitarian impulses of my American upbringing. That, or it will convince you of the veracity of all manners of stories, jokes, and rumors concerning Norfolk inbreeding.
***
Last night, the Literary Society at UEA (more conveniently called "LitSoc") hosted an event where anyone who was interested met at the Odeon Theatre near Riverside in Norwich to see the recent film adaption of Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisted. Shannyn, Abby Reed, and I had all decided that we wanted to attend, so around seven-fifty, we left from Professor Rudalevige's house and boarded the bus from Unthank Road to Riverside. Arriving there, we met up with some of the people from LitSoc that I might have already mentioned-- the president and Chris Eiswerth doppleganger Max Gordon and the treasurer Hannah Willis--in addition to some new folks, such as a first-year Literature student named James who, apparently, misplaced one of his gloves some time ago and so now goes about in the cold with one hand uncovered. Though I had never read the book before and so I couldn't evaluate the film in terms of its faithfulness to Waugh's original, I enjoyed it very much. It dragged a little toward the end, I think; but in terms of the cinematography, language, and performances, it was a delight. I definitely want to read the book as soon as I can find the time in my bustling schedule here at UEA. (Ha!)
After the film ended, we then walked across the lane to "The Queen of the Iceni" where we enjoyed a couple of drinks--I had a pint of Kronenberg while Shannyn limited herself to a half-pint of Strongbow. (Abby had decided to go home after the film.) The range of the conversation was pretty broad, including a little discussion about the film, the relative virtues of the different versions of Final Fantasy, skiing, the social agenda for LitSoc in the next few weeks, and vampire films. It was pleasant manner in which to pass an evening. Pint in hand, engaged in good conversation.
We vacated the bar between twelve o' clock and twelve-fifteen, I suppose, because as one of the barkeepers unceremoniously informed, the bar was closing for the night. We were assembling outside, chatting for a while before trudging to the bus stop when this large local woman who was dressed like a girl half her years, accompanied by her husband who was dressed to impress with two earrings in each ear, a blazer, t-shirt, and cowboy hat, abruptly stood besides Shannyn, James, and me and began to listen into our conversation. This is where things started to get interesting.
"Um, excuse me," exclaimed one of the people in our cluster who was standing just across from me (sadly, I forget his name). "Yes," I chimed in. "Can we help you with something? What do you want?"
The woman said something in response, but since it generally takes me about a minute or two to adjust to a person's accent before I can begin to guess even what they're trying to say, I have not the slightest notion what it was. In any event, this woman then brandished a 5-pence coin from her purse, licked it, and then proceeded to try to stick it to my forehead. It held there for perhaps a half-minute before it fell to the ground. I picked it up, and because it wasn't mine, I handed it back to the woman.
"Excuse me, ma'am," I said in my best, most polite voice. "But do you want this back?"
The woman took the coin from my hands, and at first, I think what I said didn't initially register with her. "Yes, yes, it would--" She replied, "Wait! Ma'am? Ma'am? Are you an American?"
"Yes, I am."
Tilting her head a little back, she continued, "Oh really? That's interesting. So, what do you think about everything that's going on there?" I'll admit that I was a little horrified by the question, not because I have any particular dread of a good conversation about politics or the current race in the States, but last night was nowhere near the ideal circumstances for such a dialogue. "Things have certainly been interesting," I spluttered lamely, a little embarrassed and frankly afraid of offending her or her husband.
Fortunately, Shannyn stepped in and saved my rear end. "Yes, we're all hoping that things will change very soon."
"Good. You know my daughter's been in the British Army for six years now..."
What followed was an interesting conversation concerning the difficulties of a soldier's life--my cousin served two years in Iraq with the U.S. Army National Guard, so I'm not entirely unaware of what it entails--and the conflict between wanting to go home and wanting to remain with one's comrades. The lady's husband, apparently, was also a veteran, having served with the British army for twenty years before calling it quits. He lifted his cowboy hat to show a series of old suture marks just above his forehead where he'd once been struck with shrapnel. The most awkward part of the whole affair was when my new female acquaintance threw her arm around my shoulder, planted a kiss on my cheek, and then used me like a brace for her drunken bombosity for five minutes or so. I wanted to scream.
Finally, we had to bid them adieu and proceeded toward the bus stop, which was located in the shadow of the rail station. There we encountered another party of locals, five in number, all male, large, drunk, and clothed ominous in threatening shades of navy blue, black, and dark brown. Again, we were simply talking about our recent encounter outside "The Queen of the Iceni" when the de facto leader of the group, a tall black man who, when later asked what his name was, said it was "My Name," approached us. "Are you all Americans?" He said, gesturing toward us with the can of Strongbow in his hand.
"No, no, I'm from London." Max replied politely. Shannyn and I remained silent, while everybody else nodded or explained that they were from England.
"You're from London?" Our newest friend continued, "So, you're not from America. What the f*** are doing here in Norwich then?"
"I'm a student at the University. We all are."
"Oh, really, you're all students..." For the next ten to twelve minutes, while we waited for the #25 bus, "My Name" proceeded to unfold the true nature of the world to us, explaining that to the government, we were nothing but numbers--"codes" was his word of choice--who were there to pay taxes and support them and that as students at the University, we were nothing but sheep whom the government was preparing for the sheering. "You all are standing round me in a semi-circle. What's up with that?" He ased at one point, "You know what I think it is; I think you're used to sitting there and listening to your professors while they pour all sorts of f***ing worthless b****** into your heads. That's what I think it is."
"Actually, we sit in a circle," Max responded. "That way, everyone has a chance to have a say."
Our friend ignored that statement and continued with his homilly. In addition to some of the themes I have already mentioned, he criticized our choices in major--"what are you going to do studying English? You already speak it."--and asked us after whom we modeled our individual styles of dress. Max said "Steve McQueen," Hannah said that her style was her own, I didn't say anything because I don't think he'd know who George Strait was if I handed him a picture and a free CD, and Shannyn later told me that she wanted to say "Boris Johnson." The man didn't respond well to Hannah's response, saying that she had to model it after someone else because as University students, we are incapable of free thought. Unlike him and his mates of course.
For most of the conversation, I have to admit that I was terrified, dreading that one of us might say something that'd offend him or his friends in which case I would be placed in, shall we say, a most unhappy position (fortunately, the worst thing that happened was that "My Name" flipped us off as we boarded the bus because we interrupted his diatribe against such airlines as British Airways, Virgin Atlantic, and Ryanair). However, there was one moment that brough me a measure of joy: I didn't speak really for much of the time, but at one point, I expressed my "agreement" with a discernible "that's true." Damn American accent gave me away. "So, some of you are from America!" "My Name" crowed exultantly. What could we do? Shannyn and I broke our silence and confessed. "So, what do you follow more? What sport do you like? American football? Baseball? NBA basketball?"
"I actually follow all of those sports, more or less," I responded.
"Oh, really. What teams do you like? Who do you support, man?"
"Well, for baseball, I'm a Chicago Cubs fan, and in American football, I'm a fan of the Green Bay Packers." I didn't bother to say that I don't particularly care for any team in the NBA, since they don't really play fundamentally sound basketball. "What about you?" The man never answered my question. Later on, I heard he and his friends trying to figure what Chicago was.
Eventually, providentially, finally, the bus arrived and we boarded it, leaving our friends to drink, rant about our obvious stupidity, and disentangle that profoundest of mysteries, "What is Chicago?"
As much as it cuts against the grain of the so-called American creed of liberty and equality, I have to report now I stand even more convinced in my belief in elites, not simply in their necessity for society, but in their desirability.
All should be certainly equal before the eyes of the law and should be entitled to pursue what brings them satisfaction in this world. That doesn't mean, however, that we should afford everyone's opinions or interests an equal measure of consideration. There needs to be an order of well informed and educated, empathetic men and women of character who provide a steady hand on the tiller of culture, society, and the state. You might be wondering in response, "For what purpose? Why do we need such a steady hand?" The answer to such questions is simple: People is dumb.
In support of my contention, permit me to enter into evidence the following account of my activites last night. I think that it might cast light on the circumstances behind my repudiation of the more egalitarian impulses of my American upbringing. That, or it will convince you of the veracity of all manners of stories, jokes, and rumors concerning Norfolk inbreeding.
***
Last night, the Literary Society at UEA (more conveniently called "LitSoc") hosted an event where anyone who was interested met at the Odeon Theatre near Riverside in Norwich to see the recent film adaption of Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisted. Shannyn, Abby Reed, and I had all decided that we wanted to attend, so around seven-fifty, we left from Professor Rudalevige's house and boarded the bus from Unthank Road to Riverside. Arriving there, we met up with some of the people from LitSoc that I might have already mentioned-- the president and Chris Eiswerth doppleganger Max Gordon and the treasurer Hannah Willis--in addition to some new folks, such as a first-year Literature student named James who, apparently, misplaced one of his gloves some time ago and so now goes about in the cold with one hand uncovered. Though I had never read the book before and so I couldn't evaluate the film in terms of its faithfulness to Waugh's original, I enjoyed it very much. It dragged a little toward the end, I think; but in terms of the cinematography, language, and performances, it was a delight. I definitely want to read the book as soon as I can find the time in my bustling schedule here at UEA. (Ha!)
After the film ended, we then walked across the lane to "The Queen of the Iceni" where we enjoyed a couple of drinks--I had a pint of Kronenberg while Shannyn limited herself to a half-pint of Strongbow. (Abby had decided to go home after the film.) The range of the conversation was pretty broad, including a little discussion about the film, the relative virtues of the different versions of Final Fantasy, skiing, the social agenda for LitSoc in the next few weeks, and vampire films. It was pleasant manner in which to pass an evening. Pint in hand, engaged in good conversation.
We vacated the bar between twelve o' clock and twelve-fifteen, I suppose, because as one of the barkeepers unceremoniously informed, the bar was closing for the night. We were assembling outside, chatting for a while before trudging to the bus stop when this large local woman who was dressed like a girl half her years, accompanied by her husband who was dressed to impress with two earrings in each ear, a blazer, t-shirt, and cowboy hat, abruptly stood besides Shannyn, James, and me and began to listen into our conversation. This is where things started to get interesting.
"Um, excuse me," exclaimed one of the people in our cluster who was standing just across from me (sadly, I forget his name). "Yes," I chimed in. "Can we help you with something? What do you want?"
The woman said something in response, but since it generally takes me about a minute or two to adjust to a person's accent before I can begin to guess even what they're trying to say, I have not the slightest notion what it was. In any event, this woman then brandished a 5-pence coin from her purse, licked it, and then proceeded to try to stick it to my forehead. It held there for perhaps a half-minute before it fell to the ground. I picked it up, and because it wasn't mine, I handed it back to the woman.
"Excuse me, ma'am," I said in my best, most polite voice. "But do you want this back?"
The woman took the coin from my hands, and at first, I think what I said didn't initially register with her. "Yes, yes, it would--" She replied, "Wait! Ma'am? Ma'am? Are you an American?"
"Yes, I am."
Tilting her head a little back, she continued, "Oh really? That's interesting. So, what do you think about everything that's going on there?" I'll admit that I was a little horrified by the question, not because I have any particular dread of a good conversation about politics or the current race in the States, but last night was nowhere near the ideal circumstances for such a dialogue. "Things have certainly been interesting," I spluttered lamely, a little embarrassed and frankly afraid of offending her or her husband.
Fortunately, Shannyn stepped in and saved my rear end. "Yes, we're all hoping that things will change very soon."
"Good. You know my daughter's been in the British Army for six years now..."
What followed was an interesting conversation concerning the difficulties of a soldier's life--my cousin served two years in Iraq with the U.S. Army National Guard, so I'm not entirely unaware of what it entails--and the conflict between wanting to go home and wanting to remain with one's comrades. The lady's husband, apparently, was also a veteran, having served with the British army for twenty years before calling it quits. He lifted his cowboy hat to show a series of old suture marks just above his forehead where he'd once been struck with shrapnel. The most awkward part of the whole affair was when my new female acquaintance threw her arm around my shoulder, planted a kiss on my cheek, and then used me like a brace for her drunken bombosity for five minutes or so. I wanted to scream.
Finally, we had to bid them adieu and proceeded toward the bus stop, which was located in the shadow of the rail station. There we encountered another party of locals, five in number, all male, large, drunk, and clothed ominous in threatening shades of navy blue, black, and dark brown. Again, we were simply talking about our recent encounter outside "The Queen of the Iceni" when the de facto leader of the group, a tall black man who, when later asked what his name was, said it was "My Name," approached us. "Are you all Americans?" He said, gesturing toward us with the can of Strongbow in his hand.
"No, no, I'm from London." Max replied politely. Shannyn and I remained silent, while everybody else nodded or explained that they were from England.
"You're from London?" Our newest friend continued, "So, you're not from America. What the f*** are doing here in Norwich then?"
"I'm a student at the University. We all are."
"Oh, really, you're all students..." For the next ten to twelve minutes, while we waited for the #25 bus, "My Name" proceeded to unfold the true nature of the world to us, explaining that to the government, we were nothing but numbers--"codes" was his word of choice--who were there to pay taxes and support them and that as students at the University, we were nothing but sheep whom the government was preparing for the sheering. "You all are standing round me in a semi-circle. What's up with that?" He ased at one point, "You know what I think it is; I think you're used to sitting there and listening to your professors while they pour all sorts of f***ing worthless b****** into your heads. That's what I think it is."
"Actually, we sit in a circle," Max responded. "That way, everyone has a chance to have a say."
Our friend ignored that statement and continued with his homilly. In addition to some of the themes I have already mentioned, he criticized our choices in major--"what are you going to do studying English? You already speak it."--and asked us after whom we modeled our individual styles of dress. Max said "Steve McQueen," Hannah said that her style was her own, I didn't say anything because I don't think he'd know who George Strait was if I handed him a picture and a free CD, and Shannyn later told me that she wanted to say "Boris Johnson." The man didn't respond well to Hannah's response, saying that she had to model it after someone else because as University students, we are incapable of free thought. Unlike him and his mates of course.
For most of the conversation, I have to admit that I was terrified, dreading that one of us might say something that'd offend him or his friends in which case I would be placed in, shall we say, a most unhappy position (fortunately, the worst thing that happened was that "My Name" flipped us off as we boarded the bus because we interrupted his diatribe against such airlines as British Airways, Virgin Atlantic, and Ryanair). However, there was one moment that brough me a measure of joy: I didn't speak really for much of the time, but at one point, I expressed my "agreement" with a discernible "that's true." Damn American accent gave me away. "So, some of you are from America!" "My Name" crowed exultantly. What could we do? Shannyn and I broke our silence and confessed. "So, what do you follow more? What sport do you like? American football? Baseball? NBA basketball?"
"I actually follow all of those sports, more or less," I responded.
"Oh, really. What teams do you like? Who do you support, man?"
"Well, for baseball, I'm a Chicago Cubs fan, and in American football, I'm a fan of the Green Bay Packers." I didn't bother to say that I don't particularly care for any team in the NBA, since they don't really play fundamentally sound basketball. "What about you?" The man never answered my question. Later on, I heard he and his friends trying to figure what Chicago was.
Eventually, providentially, finally, the bus arrived and we boarded it, leaving our friends to drink, rant about our obvious stupidity, and disentangle that profoundest of mysteries, "What is Chicago?"
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Tochter aus Elysium!
I am happy to report that the past few days have been most enjoyable--not necessarily productive in the sense of pages written or reading completed (although I'm close to the end of The Metaphysical Club), but enjoyable. Here's what has transpired.
3 October 2008
On Friday, I rose reasonably early and went to the seminar for "Modern Germany, 1866-1945." Of my two classes at UEA, "Modern Germany" has so far been the most exciting because through the lectures, I have gained a new perspective on such episodes in German history as the Kulturkampf in the 1870s where Bismarck tried to break the political power of the Roman Catholic Church in Germany. In the past, I had tended to think of the Kulturkampf as nothing more than a bump in the road to bloodier, more stereotypically masculine things (e.g., Germany's involvement in the Boxer Rebellion or the First World War). But in many regards, the struggle between Bismarck and Roman Catholicism was, to paraphrase one commentator, the defining birth trauma of Imperial Germany whose repercussions can be detected even in the modern Federal Republic of Germany. Think that's a bit extreme? Well, if you think that I'm going overboard with this, please consider this: one of the consequences of the Kulturkampf was the emergence of a political movement intended to defend Catholic interests across the whole of Germany. That movement continues today in the form of the Christian Democratic Union (or the Christian Social Union, if you happen to be from Bavaria), which remains one of the two leading political parties in Germany.
Besides casting certain moments in German history in a different light, "Modern Germany" has also prompted me to consider certain questions about the fundamental nature of modern Germany. For instance, most European History textbooks depict the story of German unification as a great struggle by militaristic and authoritarian Prussia against Austrian backwardness and German particularism, a saga whose trajectory can be traced back to the reign of Friederich Wilhelm the so-called "Great Elector" of the late seventeenth century. It runs like a sort of train composed of crucial personalities and moments: the Great Elector leads to the Soldier-King who leads to Friederich der Grosse who leads to Bismarck. However, one of the questions that my class has planted in my mind has been whether it had to be that way. Was Prussia truly "fated" to unify the German states? What other possibilities for a unified Germany existed besides the Bismarckian solution with which we are all familiar? I think my answer to the first question, at least, can be inferred based one of the instructions that I received from Professor Pinsker last semester: "I better not see the words 'inevitable' or 'unavoidable' in any of your papers. Nothing in history is 'inevitable' or 'unavoidable.' Everything's contingent. As historians, you're trying to sort out what kinds of contingencies led to, or shaped, the people and events you're discussing."
Sadly, I have to report that my seminar was nowhere near as rewarding; none of them have been, in the cases of both "Modern Germany" and "Women & Gender in Early Modern Europe." In the seminar for the former class, no-one really speaks or offers anything that might be able to motivate discussion; on Friday, we were discussing "nationalism" and such pertinent questions as "What is the nation?" and "What is the state?" and the only contributions that anyone could make to the "conversation" (mind, I use that term very loosely here) was to say that the concepts of a "nation," a "state," and a "nation-state" were all things that had been forced on to the people by some unidentified, inscrutable force. (To which, I could only respond: "Who's telling? Who's forcing? Who's compelling the people?") No-one, except for the seminar leader Professor Cole and I, could mention some of the characteristics that social scientists have associated with the "state" dating back to Max Weber, such as the presence of a central government or bureaucracy that has a monopoly of the use of violence within a clearly delineated, generally recognized area of territory.
I suppose while I'm ranting about my seminar for "Modern Germany," I may as well share my thoughts of my seminar for "Women & Gender in Early Modern Europe." Let's begin with the fact that I'm the only person in it whose private parts appear on the outside of their bodies. Yeah. That's right. I'm the only guy--a fact that I don't particularly relish and which, in fact, prompted one of my classmates, a rather fat, ugly, middle-aged woman who's taking classes at UEA on a part-time basis to tell me on the first day: "Don't worry. We will defer to your masculine superiority." To which, I responded with a nervous laugh and the following statement: "Well, thank you. I didn't know that I was superior to anyone. Thank you for letting me know that." Owned. But besides yours truly, everyone who speaks in this seminar is a dyed-in-the-wool, male-hating feminist, and at least once in every seminar discussion, someone has to engage in some philippic decrying the sundry outrages of a male-dominated world; for instance, in our last meeting, the fat, ugly, middle-aged woman expended around five minutes castigating male obstetricians "who are always hankering to use their metal tools, and forceps, and surgeries" instead of using the more natural techniques known to the female midwives of the early modern period who had gained an almost mystical understanding of the birthing process through years and years of careful practice. Mind, she didn't give a shred of evidence to support such a sweeping contention. It was her opinion. Unapologetic. Unreasonable. Unsupported. And perhaps most horrifically of all, unchallenged by our instructor who is, in fact, leading the seminar.
Let's close this part of our narrative with something I've said six or seven times already this week: based on what passes for acceptable at their universities, I'm beginning to understand how the British lost the Empire.
After I finished with my seminar, I went over to Shannyn's flat where she and I had some of the worst grilled cheese sandwiches perhaps ever made in the history of such sandwiches, paired with some watery, yet tasty, instant tomato soup. We talked for a while with her flatmate Matt who was very quiet and, as Shannyn tells it, shocked by some of my fantasies about what I'd like to do to some of the people in my seminar. We did dishes, and then trudging through the rain and the cold to the University Medical Centre, we jumped through all the hoops necessary for one to register with the National Health Service (NHS). It wasn't anything too traumatic or demanding. We simply had to wait in a queue for thirty or forty minutes, submit a trio of forms sharing some basic medical information, and schedule an appointment with one of the nurse-practitioners.
We ran into Leah in the queue, and I almost scared her to death when she noticed I had my passport. "Chad, what are you doing with your passport?" She asked, eyeing it curiously.
"They said that we had to bring it," I replied. "They need to see our visa, to see that we're students and that we're here for the year."
Leah had been waiting in the queue for thirty-five minutes by the point that we had the preceding exchange. So, for the next two or three minutes realistically until she was ushered into the office, I had visions of John Cassevetes's head at the climax of "The Fury" (1978) because as Leah later put it, all the fury of hell was flowing out of her eyes and it was directed toward my head. (Most happily for my head, Leah isn't telekinetic; and even if she was, they didn't ask her for her passport.)
When all of us had had our fill of the ecstasy that is socialized medicine, Leah, Shannyn, and I trudged over to the heart of campus; Shannyn stopped by the University Post Room where there was a parcel waiting for her before we three headed across the path to the Blend, a eatery that the Union of UEA Students operates and where you can purchase a small cup of tea, a factory-packaged muffin, or a club sandwich. Lauren Deitz joined us, and the four of us had a pleasant afternoon discussing the literary merits of The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein, the approaching presidential election back in the States, wombats, and possible destinations, such as Prague, Krakow, and the icy climes of Scandinavia, during Easter Holiday. Shannyn had to print up the request form for her absentee ballot, so she had to visit the Library. I decided to walk back to the Village with Leah and Lauren, chilled in Lauren's flat for a while, and then I returned to my room where I read a little for classes and diddled away my time on the computer.
Later that night, Beth, Tom, Cat, and I went to a comedy show featuring the British comedian Mark Watson which the Union of UEA Students was holding in one of the Lecture Theatres. Though I didn't laugh out loud that often through the course of the performance, it was very amusing. If I had to encapsulate Mark Watson's comedic style in a word or a phrase, I'd have to say "stream-of-consciousness"; he flowed from one topic to the next without bothering about a clear or logical transition. One minute he was describing how he went to and fro through a railway carriage trying to lay his hands on a lime that had escaped from his canvas grocery bag. The next, he's telling us how his wife is terrified of movable wax figures, a phobia which has resulted in her lifetime proscription from the Oliver Cromwell Museum. As we walked back toward the Village, Tom mentioned that Jimmy Carr would be appearing at the Norwich Theatre Royal in February and inquired whether any of us would be interested in going to which I gave my vote of support. I finished the night diddling on the computer, reading from The Metaphysical Club, and arranging matters for my planned trip with Chris DeArmond to Dorset next weekend.
4 October 2008
My alarm sounded off around nine o' clock, but I didn't rise then instead electing to roll over and sleep till noon. Checking my e-mail, Facebook, and ESPN, I became a little depressed as I looked over their page for the MLB because I realized that the Cubs were on the verge of elimination. (And at the time of this writing, they have, in fact, been eliminated from the playoffs for the second consecutive year. Swept. Again. Dang you, Steve Bartman!) I then showered and I was in the process of throwing on a clean pair of trousers and a navy polo shirt when I heard a rapping on my door. Opening it, I saw that it was Zack, dressed in sweats and cleats, a look of ambivalence on his face. "Are you coming to baseball?" He asked.
"We have it today?"
He nodded.
Crap. "I'll be ready in a moment," I returned, and hurriedly shutting my door, I tossed on my ball cap, black sneakers, white t-shirt, gray hooded sweatshirt, and basketball shorts. Practice was held at Colney Lane, which is a large open space to the south and west of campus just beyond the Broad and is a good step from the Village, so we didn't really begin till one-thirty, I estimate. Having never played baseball on any kind of formal basis before, I have to admit that I was somewhat bewildered by many of the drills, particularly those intended to develop your fielding abilities. Unless you've played before, it simply isn't self-evident watching from the stands or your sofa that in order to turn a double play when the ball is first fielded by the first baseman, the second baseman must immediately hurry to cover first base, so that the shortstop can toss him the ball and complete the play. Or maybe it is. Perhaps I am just giving everyone an idea of the depth of my ignorance about the intricacies of baseball.
In either case, I learned a great deal about the sport and I have an idea as to where I will end up playing: second base. I don't have the arm strength to play shortstop, first or third base, centerfield, or right field; and I don't have the range to play any of the outfield positions. Second base, in light of those realities, appears to be the closest to a perfect fit. I do not say that it's the perfect fit for two reasons: (1) I am still trying to get a feel for catching the ball with the pocket of my glove instead of the palm; and more fundamentally, (2) I am simply not athletic. I have the quickness of a sloth, the speed of a three-legged cheetah, the power of a Yugo passenger car from the 1970s, the coordination of a gawky thirteen-year-old, the bad knees and back of a middle-aged office professional.
Besides practicing fielding, we also worked at hitting, which, considering the overall crappiness of the weather yesterday, was a positively brilliant idea. Zack and Duncan both have pretty good arms, matched with a reasonable amount of control, and so they ended up taking turns at pitcher. When it was my turn to hit, I managed to make contact between the ball and my bat in the case of both pitchers, but since the latter tended to throw with a little more velocity, it hurt much more when I made contact with balls he'd thrown. Afterwards, it really felt as if my fingers were on fire--I'm almost certain that it would have been kinder to the old digits to douse them in battery acid. But I have to report that I am pleased with my batting stance--it's becoming more and more comfortable for me--and I think I have a fairly good idea of what I can hit and what I can't hit, so I should manage to draw a fair number of balls over the course of the season (punctuated by the occasional base hit, if I'm fortunate); my on-base percentage (OBP) is going to my best statistic. That's not to say that it's going to be what people generally think of as "good"--it's not going to exceed .400 or .500--but it's certainly going to be better than my batting average (BA) or slugging percent (SLG). Who knows? If it needs elevating at some point during the season, I may have to step in front of a few pitches.
Baseball practice lasted till four o' clock. I then headed back to my flat where I changed into my navy polo shirt and dress slacks. I originally intended to drop by a party they were having in Flat #8, but around that time, my flatmates decided that they were going to order Chinese takeaway which happened to sound pretty good at the time, and so I elected to stay upstairs. Rob and Dwight stopped by for a while, not too long after we had finished with dinner. They were curious why I hadn't stopped by the party, but more generally, they had stopped by simply to say, "Hello." Lauren and Meghan also arrived around that time, and together, we all watched Stanley Kubrick's "A Clockwork Orange," which is an excellent (albeit very violent and incredibly disturbing) film. Arguably, it was the best of his films that I've seen, though I have to admit that I remain partial to "Dr. Strangelove" and "The Paths of Glory." I certainly savored its use of music--and of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and its famous Fourth Movement, in particular--I really thought that it helped to shape the film and to advance the action of the film very nicely. I'll also admit to reading it like a historian might, noting (among other things) the fact that the protagonist, Alex DeLarge, lives in a poorly maintained government-owned housing complex as a possible rebuke of such housing projects which were appearing to spin out-of-control in countries all across the Western world during the late 1960s and early 70s. I appreciate that everyone isn't a particular fan of it--or can even apprehend its worthwhile qualities or the questions it poses about the nature of punishment and moral responsibility--but I think I'm going to make it a point to read the original book before this year concludes.
Once the film concluded, the evening soon followed. I returned to my room, read still more from The Metaphysical Club (which I am enjoying immensely), wrote a few sentences that I may one day develop into an essay on the whole idea of "progress," and then I went to bed around one-forty in the morning.
3 October 2008
On Friday, I rose reasonably early and went to the seminar for "Modern Germany, 1866-1945." Of my two classes at UEA, "Modern Germany" has so far been the most exciting because through the lectures, I have gained a new perspective on such episodes in German history as the Kulturkampf in the 1870s where Bismarck tried to break the political power of the Roman Catholic Church in Germany. In the past, I had tended to think of the Kulturkampf as nothing more than a bump in the road to bloodier, more stereotypically masculine things (e.g., Germany's involvement in the Boxer Rebellion or the First World War). But in many regards, the struggle between Bismarck and Roman Catholicism was, to paraphrase one commentator, the defining birth trauma of Imperial Germany whose repercussions can be detected even in the modern Federal Republic of Germany. Think that's a bit extreme? Well, if you think that I'm going overboard with this, please consider this: one of the consequences of the Kulturkampf was the emergence of a political movement intended to defend Catholic interests across the whole of Germany. That movement continues today in the form of the Christian Democratic Union (or the Christian Social Union, if you happen to be from Bavaria), which remains one of the two leading political parties in Germany.
Besides casting certain moments in German history in a different light, "Modern Germany" has also prompted me to consider certain questions about the fundamental nature of modern Germany. For instance, most European History textbooks depict the story of German unification as a great struggle by militaristic and authoritarian Prussia against Austrian backwardness and German particularism, a saga whose trajectory can be traced back to the reign of Friederich Wilhelm the so-called "Great Elector" of the late seventeenth century. It runs like a sort of train composed of crucial personalities and moments: the Great Elector leads to the Soldier-King who leads to Friederich der Grosse who leads to Bismarck. However, one of the questions that my class has planted in my mind has been whether it had to be that way. Was Prussia truly "fated" to unify the German states? What other possibilities for a unified Germany existed besides the Bismarckian solution with which we are all familiar? I think my answer to the first question, at least, can be inferred based one of the instructions that I received from Professor Pinsker last semester: "I better not see the words 'inevitable' or 'unavoidable' in any of your papers. Nothing in history is 'inevitable' or 'unavoidable.' Everything's contingent. As historians, you're trying to sort out what kinds of contingencies led to, or shaped, the people and events you're discussing."
Sadly, I have to report that my seminar was nowhere near as rewarding; none of them have been, in the cases of both "Modern Germany" and "Women & Gender in Early Modern Europe." In the seminar for the former class, no-one really speaks or offers anything that might be able to motivate discussion; on Friday, we were discussing "nationalism" and such pertinent questions as "What is the nation?" and "What is the state?" and the only contributions that anyone could make to the "conversation" (mind, I use that term very loosely here) was to say that the concepts of a "nation," a "state," and a "nation-state" were all things that had been forced on to the people by some unidentified, inscrutable force. (To which, I could only respond: "Who's telling? Who's forcing? Who's compelling the people?") No-one, except for the seminar leader Professor Cole and I, could mention some of the characteristics that social scientists have associated with the "state" dating back to Max Weber, such as the presence of a central government or bureaucracy that has a monopoly of the use of violence within a clearly delineated, generally recognized area of territory.
I suppose while I'm ranting about my seminar for "Modern Germany," I may as well share my thoughts of my seminar for "Women & Gender in Early Modern Europe." Let's begin with the fact that I'm the only person in it whose private parts appear on the outside of their bodies. Yeah. That's right. I'm the only guy--a fact that I don't particularly relish and which, in fact, prompted one of my classmates, a rather fat, ugly, middle-aged woman who's taking classes at UEA on a part-time basis to tell me on the first day: "Don't worry. We will defer to your masculine superiority." To which, I responded with a nervous laugh and the following statement: "Well, thank you. I didn't know that I was superior to anyone. Thank you for letting me know that." Owned. But besides yours truly, everyone who speaks in this seminar is a dyed-in-the-wool, male-hating feminist, and at least once in every seminar discussion, someone has to engage in some philippic decrying the sundry outrages of a male-dominated world; for instance, in our last meeting, the fat, ugly, middle-aged woman expended around five minutes castigating male obstetricians "who are always hankering to use their metal tools, and forceps, and surgeries" instead of using the more natural techniques known to the female midwives of the early modern period who had gained an almost mystical understanding of the birthing process through years and years of careful practice. Mind, she didn't give a shred of evidence to support such a sweeping contention. It was her opinion. Unapologetic. Unreasonable. Unsupported. And perhaps most horrifically of all, unchallenged by our instructor who is, in fact, leading the seminar.
Let's close this part of our narrative with something I've said six or seven times already this week: based on what passes for acceptable at their universities, I'm beginning to understand how the British lost the Empire.
After I finished with my seminar, I went over to Shannyn's flat where she and I had some of the worst grilled cheese sandwiches perhaps ever made in the history of such sandwiches, paired with some watery, yet tasty, instant tomato soup. We talked for a while with her flatmate Matt who was very quiet and, as Shannyn tells it, shocked by some of my fantasies about what I'd like to do to some of the people in my seminar. We did dishes, and then trudging through the rain and the cold to the University Medical Centre, we jumped through all the hoops necessary for one to register with the National Health Service (NHS). It wasn't anything too traumatic or demanding. We simply had to wait in a queue for thirty or forty minutes, submit a trio of forms sharing some basic medical information, and schedule an appointment with one of the nurse-practitioners.
We ran into Leah in the queue, and I almost scared her to death when she noticed I had my passport. "Chad, what are you doing with your passport?" She asked, eyeing it curiously.
"They said that we had to bring it," I replied. "They need to see our visa, to see that we're students and that we're here for the year."
Leah had been waiting in the queue for thirty-five minutes by the point that we had the preceding exchange. So, for the next two or three minutes realistically until she was ushered into the office, I had visions of John Cassevetes's head at the climax of "The Fury" (1978) because as Leah later put it, all the fury of hell was flowing out of her eyes and it was directed toward my head. (Most happily for my head, Leah isn't telekinetic; and even if she was, they didn't ask her for her passport.)
When all of us had had our fill of the ecstasy that is socialized medicine, Leah, Shannyn, and I trudged over to the heart of campus; Shannyn stopped by the University Post Room where there was a parcel waiting for her before we three headed across the path to the Blend, a eatery that the Union of UEA Students operates and where you can purchase a small cup of tea, a factory-packaged muffin, or a club sandwich. Lauren Deitz joined us, and the four of us had a pleasant afternoon discussing the literary merits of The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein, the approaching presidential election back in the States, wombats, and possible destinations, such as Prague, Krakow, and the icy climes of Scandinavia, during Easter Holiday. Shannyn had to print up the request form for her absentee ballot, so she had to visit the Library. I decided to walk back to the Village with Leah and Lauren, chilled in Lauren's flat for a while, and then I returned to my room where I read a little for classes and diddled away my time on the computer.
Later that night, Beth, Tom, Cat, and I went to a comedy show featuring the British comedian Mark Watson which the Union of UEA Students was holding in one of the Lecture Theatres. Though I didn't laugh out loud that often through the course of the performance, it was very amusing. If I had to encapsulate Mark Watson's comedic style in a word or a phrase, I'd have to say "stream-of-consciousness"; he flowed from one topic to the next without bothering about a clear or logical transition. One minute he was describing how he went to and fro through a railway carriage trying to lay his hands on a lime that had escaped from his canvas grocery bag. The next, he's telling us how his wife is terrified of movable wax figures, a phobia which has resulted in her lifetime proscription from the Oliver Cromwell Museum. As we walked back toward the Village, Tom mentioned that Jimmy Carr would be appearing at the Norwich Theatre Royal in February and inquired whether any of us would be interested in going to which I gave my vote of support. I finished the night diddling on the computer, reading from The Metaphysical Club, and arranging matters for my planned trip with Chris DeArmond to Dorset next weekend.
4 October 2008
My alarm sounded off around nine o' clock, but I didn't rise then instead electing to roll over and sleep till noon. Checking my e-mail, Facebook, and ESPN, I became a little depressed as I looked over their page for the MLB because I realized that the Cubs were on the verge of elimination. (And at the time of this writing, they have, in fact, been eliminated from the playoffs for the second consecutive year. Swept. Again. Dang you, Steve Bartman!) I then showered and I was in the process of throwing on a clean pair of trousers and a navy polo shirt when I heard a rapping on my door. Opening it, I saw that it was Zack, dressed in sweats and cleats, a look of ambivalence on his face. "Are you coming to baseball?" He asked.
"We have it today?"
He nodded.
Crap. "I'll be ready in a moment," I returned, and hurriedly shutting my door, I tossed on my ball cap, black sneakers, white t-shirt, gray hooded sweatshirt, and basketball shorts. Practice was held at Colney Lane, which is a large open space to the south and west of campus just beyond the Broad and is a good step from the Village, so we didn't really begin till one-thirty, I estimate. Having never played baseball on any kind of formal basis before, I have to admit that I was somewhat bewildered by many of the drills, particularly those intended to develop your fielding abilities. Unless you've played before, it simply isn't self-evident watching from the stands or your sofa that in order to turn a double play when the ball is first fielded by the first baseman, the second baseman must immediately hurry to cover first base, so that the shortstop can toss him the ball and complete the play. Or maybe it is. Perhaps I am just giving everyone an idea of the depth of my ignorance about the intricacies of baseball.
In either case, I learned a great deal about the sport and I have an idea as to where I will end up playing: second base. I don't have the arm strength to play shortstop, first or third base, centerfield, or right field; and I don't have the range to play any of the outfield positions. Second base, in light of those realities, appears to be the closest to a perfect fit. I do not say that it's the perfect fit for two reasons: (1) I am still trying to get a feel for catching the ball with the pocket of my glove instead of the palm; and more fundamentally, (2) I am simply not athletic. I have the quickness of a sloth, the speed of a three-legged cheetah, the power of a Yugo passenger car from the 1970s, the coordination of a gawky thirteen-year-old, the bad knees and back of a middle-aged office professional.
Besides practicing fielding, we also worked at hitting, which, considering the overall crappiness of the weather yesterday, was a positively brilliant idea. Zack and Duncan both have pretty good arms, matched with a reasonable amount of control, and so they ended up taking turns at pitcher. When it was my turn to hit, I managed to make contact between the ball and my bat in the case of both pitchers, but since the latter tended to throw with a little more velocity, it hurt much more when I made contact with balls he'd thrown. Afterwards, it really felt as if my fingers were on fire--I'm almost certain that it would have been kinder to the old digits to douse them in battery acid. But I have to report that I am pleased with my batting stance--it's becoming more and more comfortable for me--and I think I have a fairly good idea of what I can hit and what I can't hit, so I should manage to draw a fair number of balls over the course of the season (punctuated by the occasional base hit, if I'm fortunate); my on-base percentage (OBP) is going to my best statistic. That's not to say that it's going to be what people generally think of as "good"--it's not going to exceed .400 or .500--but it's certainly going to be better than my batting average (BA) or slugging percent (SLG). Who knows? If it needs elevating at some point during the season, I may have to step in front of a few pitches.
Baseball practice lasted till four o' clock. I then headed back to my flat where I changed into my navy polo shirt and dress slacks. I originally intended to drop by a party they were having in Flat #8, but around that time, my flatmates decided that they were going to order Chinese takeaway which happened to sound pretty good at the time, and so I elected to stay upstairs. Rob and Dwight stopped by for a while, not too long after we had finished with dinner. They were curious why I hadn't stopped by the party, but more generally, they had stopped by simply to say, "Hello." Lauren and Meghan also arrived around that time, and together, we all watched Stanley Kubrick's "A Clockwork Orange," which is an excellent (albeit very violent and incredibly disturbing) film. Arguably, it was the best of his films that I've seen, though I have to admit that I remain partial to "Dr. Strangelove" and "The Paths of Glory." I certainly savored its use of music--and of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and its famous Fourth Movement, in particular--I really thought that it helped to shape the film and to advance the action of the film very nicely. I'll also admit to reading it like a historian might, noting (among other things) the fact that the protagonist, Alex DeLarge, lives in a poorly maintained government-owned housing complex as a possible rebuke of such housing projects which were appearing to spin out-of-control in countries all across the Western world during the late 1960s and early 70s. I appreciate that everyone isn't a particular fan of it--or can even apprehend its worthwhile qualities or the questions it poses about the nature of punishment and moral responsibility--but I think I'm going to make it a point to read the original book before this year concludes.
Once the film concluded, the evening soon followed. I returned to my room, read still more from The Metaphysical Club (which I am enjoying immensely), wrote a few sentences that I may one day develop into an essay on the whole idea of "progress," and then I went to bed around one-forty in the morning.
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