Tap that French Baguette

You see it in a quite a lot of movies. "Top Gun" comes to mind. There's a shot where Goose taps the gas gauge in a futile attempt to will the indicator to show there's more fuel (maybe it was Merlin). Occasionally, I'll notice that in movies. I don't know why I see that kind of stuff, but somehow I can pick up on it when it occurs. I suppose it's a device used by the director to emphasize just how dire the straits are for our heroes.

What I DON'T comprehend is the seemingly ubiquitous appearance of the French baguette in movies. You might not have noticed it before, but it's there. The pretty young woman on an adventure in a cobblestoned village, riding her bicycle, a French baguette resting comfortably in her basket. Why?

I've got it in my head to make a note of every movie I see the woefully uncredited French baguette appear in.

By the way, bonus points if there are carrots accompanying the baguette, with the green tops still attached, or whatever it is that's green and leafy. Both in a paper bag? Hat trick. Join in if you wish. Maybe we could turn it into the American Film Institute...AFI's Top 100 French Baguette movies. I'll start:

Blade: Trinity - Jessica Biel plays a vampire hunter undercover as a frumpy lady with a baby strapped to her chest. Nestled in her right arm? Hat trick.

**Dateline: 10/5/12 - Breakfast at Tiffany's. One in bag and later two in bag. Sweet.

Eat My Ennui

From an email to Trish:

Tuesday was the first Composition class and the instructor told us then that we'll need a composition journal (specifically) and a pen in a color ink other than black or blue, because we will be correcting each other's papers on occasion (I'm think I'm gonna get beat up after class when that time comes). Not only did she speak that out loud, but it's clearly written on our syllabus.

Today (Thursday) I was early because it's been snowing all night and I didn't want the Comp Professor to give me the hairy eyeball, so I got to school about 20 minutes early. She was not in the room, but popped in at one point before class, talking on her cell, and wrote on the board, "I will be 10 minutes late," and then left again. One young lady walks in with a weary sigh, starts unpacking her stuff and sits down. I'm quietly engaged in The Man in the Iron Mask on my iPhone (Stanza app....free books!) (that's where the sesquipedalian quote came from that I sent you earlier, but you probably knew that). She blurts out, "What time does this class start, anyway?" Mind you, this is the second class we've had, she has a schedule of her classes, AND it's on a PRINTED SHEET ON THE WALL OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOM. I answer without looking up "10:25" and she goes back to the sighing. I go back to the reading.

An acquaintance of hers enters the room and sits next to her. They are chatting and now I can't read this smarmily written book so I just start screwing around with the other apps on my phone. They go into great length about the instructor's request for a different color ink pen.

"I don't know why the woman wants different color inks. You'd think blue or black would be easier to read than these other colors."

"My mom's friend is an English teacher and she gets the composition journal but she didn't get the different color ink, either."

"I told my aunt, 'My Composition teacher is mean, and she wants us to call her Professor or Doctor.'"

"I think I might transfer out of this school to UWEC. They don't even start till the 18th and they get, like, a week off in a month and, like, another week off for Spring Break."

I myself don't quite understand why recent high school graduates are here. Globe is TWICE the cost per credit hour that UWEC is. I would think the only people I'd see here, which is pretty much a business school (with commercials...does this mean I'm in a cheesy school and no one will hire me with a degree from "Acme U"?), is people like me who are already in the workforce and need a faster and, therefore, more aggressive pace to get BACK into the workforce. Globe is 12 weeks on, 1 week off, through the entire year, so technically you could get a Bachelor's degree in three years at the most.

I'm a dick. I get that. But you can imagine how hard it was for me to keep my mouth shut. I didn't even want to explain to them the reason for the different color ink. AGAIN. It's like I'm into mental S&M. I'm LOVING just listening to the dumb, but TORTURED by not wanting to correct them, because I TOTALLY do. It's intoxicating, I tell you. But I'm keeping my mouth shut. I have this unreasonable, if not snotty, fear that I'm going to be found out as the "smart kid" in class and then everyone's gonna be making me cut open their GD frog, copy my notes, do their homework and then hang me by my drawers from a coat hook. All for my mad skillz, yo. Screw that. I'm here to get in, get an edumacation, and get out. With the exception of one guy in two of my classes, who, incidentally, sounds like Larry the Cable Guy (but is smarter and funnier than he lets on), I have NO faith in finding any other students in there I find intellectually stimulating or amusing enough to befriend. The Introduction to Software Development class though, shows promise. That's like hanging out in a garage with a bunch of dudes...if it was a computer room filled with stereotype geeks...good time. One of the conversations was between the instructor and a couple of students about one student's dog and peanut butter.

* * *

So the Composition Professor eventually arrives. She is apologizing profusely for the delay because, "I have cancer. I'm currently receiving chemo and radiation treatments and I was late because I needed to schedule surgery for next week." I look over at those two girls for the first time and now they're looking at me like they got caught. Sure I told you she sounded tough, but she's also looking for some measure of quality out of her students and it seems like I'm the only one in there who gets that. So far, she's the only instructor like that. Unfortunately, she also, like most of the instructors in there, has to cater to the weakest link. I actually kinda like her. She's an actual instructor. She has integrity, standards, expectations. I can respect that.

In my poor opinion, post-secondary education should only be something that people attend when they WANT to be there, not HAVE to. I think it makes a huge difference. Granted, lots of people want to be in college right after they graduate high school, but I figured it was because they wanted to escape their parents and behave badly. I realize that could be a generalization on my part...

Anyway, the Professor passes around the attendance sheet for us to sign. I'm the second-to-last person to sign the sheet and it has about 6 or 7 signatures in orange, green, pink... The Prof gets her sheet back and says, sincerely surprised, "Oh! Look at all the different colors! That's pretty!"

This college thing is gonna be SO fun mentally. Just not Algebra. :)

Buck Up Little Camper! We'll Tackle That Slope Together!

I, along with the one other employee at our print shop, was let go from a job that I enjoyed and a place that I loved to work on December 8. On December 9, I was in the admissions office of a local business school on my way to digging in for a bachelor's degree. Between that time and now, I've been forced out of my childlike, "fun" world and into the grown up world. And hey, it BLOWS out here.

So, in trying to find a part-time job, applying for student loans ("I just signed my financial life away and all I got was a lousy t-shirt" ....seriously, I got a t-shirt), ordering textbooks from all over the planet just to save myself 300 bucks down the road, and generally panicking about how to keep myself in the lifestyle to which I've become accustomed (oh iPhone, I heart you so, you expensive fucker), I'm finding it difficult to have a sense of humor about anything, really.

So as I sit here on the eve of my first class (algebra...I might as well get the crap I hate out of the way first), I am filling out an income adjustment form to apply for a Pell grant. I get to the second page that states, "Write a personal statement describing the circumstances leading to this request." There are sixteen blank lines and they encourage you to attach additional pages "as necessary."

I am imagining myself writing down all manner of tragedy...my dog took acid and hijacked a school bus full of penguins, to steal an example. Then something dark and evil crosses my mind. I put pen to paper and write, "I. Was. Laid. Off."

Nope. Still no sense of humor. However, the dark, sharp sarcasm seems to have stood the test of time. Honestly, I should think the last paycheck I received, dated the first week of December and the unemployment check dated the second week of December, should speak volumes.

Oh hey, thanks Obama. Swell job. Hmm, maybe I should add, "Check with Obama, he probably knows why."

I have my Tiki, I have my Tiki, I have my Tiki...