Monthly Archives: April 2011

Xylography is the art of woodcut wherein the artist takes a block of wood and carves out the parts of the design that will not be inked. This obviously requires an ability to foresee a thing in reverse. It takes a special kind of person to be able to create an image in its negative state. (ThinkContinue reading “xylography”

People often react badly to the phrase, “I’m sorry.” At least this has been my experience. I think I need to be more specific here. If said as a genuine way to communicate remorse for a misstep or wrong against another person, then it is usually accepted. He yells something in anger at her duringContinue reading “i’m sorry and i’m sorry”

I was not alone when I first saw the new Wendy’s ad for their ‘Natural Cut’ french fries and wondered what the heck that meant.  According to a recent article on Yahoo! Finance, what it means is that “inside the processing plant, the potatoes skip the step of getting steamed at such a high temperature thatContinue reading “go natural”

In her book, The Poet’s Pen, Betty Bonham Lies has innumerable suggestions of prompts to use in a writer’s notebook and, more importantly, to use as a way for students “to look at themselves through the somewhat distancing lens of language.” (Betty Bonham Lies, The Poet’s Pen: Writing Poetry with Middle and High School Students (Portsmouth, NH: Greenwood PublishingContinue reading “letter to yourself”

“All around the Mulberry bush,the monkey chased the weasel.The monkey stopped to pull up his sock.Pop goes the weasel!” For the longest time, the phrase “pop” would most likely take the listener’s brain back to something from his childhood — the nursery rhyme, pop-up toys themselves, a jack-n-the-box, soda ‘pop’, or even that feeling ofContinue reading “pop-up”

Tomorrow I challenge you to consider the ideal community. The island of Utopia is in the middle 200 miles broad, and holds almost at the same breadth over a great part of it; but it grows narrower toward both ends. Its figure is not unlike a crescent: between its horns, the sea comes in elevenContinue reading “utopia”

No, the theme for Friday, April 15 will NOT be at all related to taxes, taxing, or being taxed. Isn’t it enough that they exist? Rather, an item of interest. April 15 is the birthday of, among others, Butch Cassidy (1866-1908), the infamous outlaw of American’s Wild West and the ringleader of the Wild BunchContinue reading “Butch Cassidy & The Wild Bunch”

Tomorrow’s theme sounds needlessly reckless, I admit. I don’t mean for you to close your eyes while driving, to skip critical meetings at work because you would rather search around town for the best Cuban sandwich, or to let your kids run rampant all through the house because you are packing up for Mykonos. No,Continue reading “lose control (a.k.a let go)”

I may have enjoyed that list of things to do when I’m not turning my brain to mush (see 65 Things to Do While Watching TV) much more if it had included the following: play parlor games. The Victorians were a tightly wound bunch. According to Foucault, “[n]ineteenth-century ‘bourgeois’ society — and it is doubtlessContinue reading “parlor games”

Over the weekend (when I should have been grading about a million essays, projects, tests, and other assignments as our school’s quarter came to a close at 8am this morning), I re-watched A River Runs Through It with my boyfriend. Early on in the film, there is a scene where Norman is being home-schooled by his strict,Continue reading “being concise”