MZ got me to try this Keirsey Personality test. By the power of its crazy magic (accurate) voodoo, I now know that I am an Idealist Champion. Apparently, we passionately believe in things and really want to tell you about them. I can only resort to snarky sarcasm, because the results are an creepily dead-on description of my (ideal) self-image.
Anywho, give it a whirl (it only takes about five minutes):HumanMetrics Jung Typology Test
We're down in Miami for chemo visit number 3. Everything with Rowan's cancer looks good--her tumor reduced to the point that she didn't even require preliminary laser treatment this time. She will lose her eye during our next visit, November 14th.
I can't say it gets any easier, necessarily, to do this, although we have developed a sense of what to expect--essentially we're better at coping. Cancer is difficult; you leave pieces of yourself all over the place--in waiting rooms, along the side of the road in traffic jams, in the grocery store while searching for good string cheese. As the disease grows, you fragment. But, luckily, you meet other people who give you replacement parts in the form of kindness and concern. Thanks to all of those people who help us hold it together.
And can you believe the Sox came back from 7-0 in the 7th? Crazy.
Watching the Red Sox play in the playoffs is comparable to sitting in a crock-pot for me: a slow, agonizing, gut wrenching cooking of my nerves. That will be intensified tonight with Dice-K on the mound. I know he doesn't have the greatest stuff, so he has to mix up his pitch selection and location to keep hitters of guard. Still, he so pitches to the edges of the plate and throws ridiculously bad pitches when he's ahead of the count that it pains me to watch. But watch I will.
I wanted to throw in a quick two-cents on the MVP races this year. I'm a fan of "money ball"; for those who don't know, its a statistical approach to baseball that steers away from many traditional stats (particularly batting average and RBIs) in favor of a few other, more influential statistics (like OBP and SLUG) and some completely new stats (Runs Created and Value Over Replacement Player).
I bring these up because in the NL this year many people are calling Ryan Howard the MVP. Certainly, he led the league in home runs (important) and RBIs (almost meaningless). But his batting average is only .250, and this on-base percentage--an even more important stat--is a less impressive .333. That's ridiculously low for a guy with his power since so many pitchers are going to refuse to throw him a single strike. Perhaps that's why he struck out almost 200 times this season! Instead of Howard, I'll go with Pujols (OPS: 1.114, Runs Created: 160, Total Bases: 342, at bats per HR: 14.2) over Howard (OPS: .842, Runs Created: 113, Total Bases: 331, at bats per HR: 12.7). Chipper Jones is a close second place. To me, the MVP stands for the one player who, if removed from a team, would leave their franchise worthless. I think you could make a very strong argument for CC Sabathia this year, because the Brewers would have never made the playoffs without him... maybe I just talked myself out of Pujols!
Slim picking in the AL this year--no one really had the monster year. Perhaps I'm a homer, but I'd give it to Pedroia for the Sox. With all the injuries the team had, he and Youk were the only two consistent players. And Ped stole 20 bases on top of 54 doubles-- that's getting yourself into scoring position. Oddly enough, most of the AL batting leaders in the important categories played for lousy teams this season, so Ped has a chance...
I just came across this story in /. on a new Chinese policy demanding that corporations importing electronics into China provide the government with all source code for their products. The story, of which I've heard nothing in our country, has become a point of contention in Japan--where companies such as Sony are worried that the Chinese government will pass sensitive information on to Chinese corporations (which, um, are owned and operated by the Chinese government).
In his recent book Source Code China: The New Global Hub of IT Technology, Cyrill Eltschinger argues that today's companies are missing out on China as a potential resource (and cites a number of companies who are shifting their outsourcing from India to China). He gives a number of reasons for considering China, most of which would make someone interested in global human rights cringe. What he doesn't comment on (at least on the website), is the dubious position the Chinese government holds regarding Western intellectual property laws. (I admit that I am relying on the website--I have not read the book. I use it as an example).
I am no expert on global relations. But to this outsider, it seems that China is practicing global economics as the USA and USSR practiced espionage during the Cold War. I might be paranoid. I might be disillusioned. But if I were Bill Gates, I wouldn't be pushing Windows into China under these conditions.
The American economy is fragile--as we are now all aware. The decimation of the American dollar isn't primarily tied to our inflated real estate market (the current crisis). The underlying problem is our massive trade deficit. Or so tells my stock broker every week as he laments our demise and warns of worse times. For those who don't dabble in the market, let me assure you that its worse than you think. Here's how to tell, the price of gold. Gold is an international standard, to see that gold prices have tripled means that, on a fundamental international level, our dollar is worth a third of what it once was. It doesn't help (as some might assume), that other countries are experiencing a similar state. It means that a bigger market correction lies on the horizon, a global correction. It means things could get much, much worse.
In an era when our exports are tied almost exclusively to digital/intellectual products, we must protect this property as if it were our land.Sometimes, in the middle of the day, I think of this shit and it makes me want to scream. I can't wait for that next wave of meaningless presidential ads.
On a side note, the /. forum discussion is quite interesting and some of the best public dialogue I've seen in awhile. Sigh.
First, let me say that Rowan is doing fine. She's sort of rejecting the concept of sleep today (its 11:30 and still no nap--a very bad sign), but otherwise o.k.
In Marc news--official Marc C. Santos news--I've been asked to design an undergraduate course in Rhetorical Theory. I spend some time Googlin' around the net to see what I could find, and basically saw two approaches. The first relied heavily on either Bizzell or Hawhee; these courses offered a pretty broad/historic survey. The second approach was heavily (heavily) steeped in 20th century pomo--but often looked more like a literary/cultural studies theory course than a rhetorical theory course. I'm going to try to split the difference (which means I bound to fail) and go for something like this:
I've taken the "paper weeks" from Rickert who took them from Frank who took them from ????: on a paper day, everyone in the class distributes a short paper and reads it to the class. I'm interested in this pedagogically in terms of delivery and kairos--two elements that are often a bit more muddled (Rickert might say) in traditional academic [for class] writing.
As far as the final project, I believe this will be on a per-student basis. I will allow traditional papers, disciplinary annotated bibliographies, wikipedia projects, multimedia projects (perhaps something out of Ulmer)--just about anything the students can offer.
I've still got to write up the course description, but I know I'll be leaning toward providing students with a thorough understanding of the history of rhetoric and of the principle rhetorical concepts and techniques. Such historic understanding should help them to understand the fundamental positions underlying the work they do as technical writers. Familiarity with traditional rhetorical concepts and conventions should help all facets of their writing process, from invention to revision. I'll have to clean this up and look at the other new course proposals in my department to get a sense of length/depth/sophistication. But I think I've got a legitimate course brewing here...
I usually leave the political comedy commentary up to others, but I had to share this. Via the Blogora (via 23/6):
That was a direct quote.
