River of Play

Wendelynne!

She's now almost a week old, so I've been neglecting the blog. To make up for this, I'll post a few pictures. 

Poetry in a Threatened Habitat

Who says poetry makes nothing happen in the world? It riles up Xians! And in the UK no less!

Administrations and Administrating

I should be paying more attention to the Obama environmental team because I'd like to think that they'll do something useful, but we've been burned in the past, so I'm not altogether excited. 

The other reason I haven't been paying attention is that I've been pounding out the final version--final for now, as I tell my students--of my paper "Writing the Place You Know: Toward a Sustainable Workshop." It's the expanded (and then contracted and profoundly revised) paper I gave at the SW/TX PCA/ACA last year. And now it's part of a book proposal making the rounds, so I won't be re-posting it here. It's been a lot of work, but I've enjoyed thinking about my teaching, and I'm pretty excited about getting back to teaching and using these strategies/theories. Also, a few of the new TAs and I have been talking about pedagogy, about their interest in pedagogy, so that's added a nice level of social support. So the process was trying, but it got simply tedious once I rewrote the citations for the Chicago Manual of Style. Oof. But it's done, now. Off to the lead guy/editor of record. 

We're at T minus x for Wendy. At some point, I'll be able to fill in the x, but right now it's just a lonely variable. 

Nebraskiana

The national media came and touched us not so long ago, but not to worry. The wind scours everything pretty clean. And it was in the single digits last night. The Daily Show rolled into town to do a segment on some university research and used one of the owners of a local coffeeshop as an example. The coffeeshop in question is a short walk from our apartment, so when I write about being in a coffeeshop, it's this one. If you go and watch the spot, you'll see a brief shot of the storefront. Right next to the coffee place is the health food co-op where we shop, and our video store is at the other end of the strip mall. 

On the Wendy watch: the child keeps getting lower, the contractions are still random, we're just waiting...

Almost Level, West Virginia

It would be one thing if the coal money stayed in the state(s). Maybe you could make some kind of economic argument, then. But it doesn't. The poor get more poor. And now they get even more than their share of poison, too.

If you want to blow a gasket, click over here.

Evil Elves and Gary Snyder

The countdown continues--or maybe it's a count up? I mean, with a countdown you know when you reach zero hour. With a baby, you just keep counting. But everything's in position. So. Counting.

I'm into the final stages of the initial draft of the focus essay. And I should hope so. The fucker's way too long already (15,500 words. Are you kidding me?), but I'm still working on fleshing parts out (and that's a joke that will go in search of a punchline until the end of the post). I've been reading responses to Gary Snyder--also referred to as lord god king ecodude--and I've been amused at the way both of the commentators (in this case, the late Leonard Scigaj and the very lively Bernard Quetchenbach) have avoided Snyder's, um, excesses. Part of Snyder's overweening didacticism comes from his generation; a lot of older poets have this essayistic quality to their work that makes for dry going. But Snyder couples the essay quality with lengthy tales of ecological mismanagement. There's a dead whale poem that's a risible nadir--or at least I think it's about dead whales. Maybe just whales. Anyway. "Axe Handles" is nice. And given the man's reputation, I should be doing more bowing and scraping. But I'm not.

And now... These aren't very sustainable, I guess, but damn. Seasonal cards. For those who resist grasping after tiresome mysteries. And those who don't mind getting a little blood on their elfs. And lots of other cards that, as they say, you won't find at Hallmark. Sweet.