Making Sure I'm square-- For future tutors

I figured that this post can't hurt and might help, so here goes. If you ever have the ability to go and work up in the Athletic study hall bring a whole heck of a lot of good reading, especially if you are a fast reader, which I am not. It was completely dead tonight. Thankfully the Writing Center also, was completely dead during my shift today, allowing me to get some more preparation for a math final in. For all of the times I've put off this blog, I'm actually going to miss it; it's nice to have a public forum to set down your thought, and to have your friends respond. It's kind of like opening Christmas presents when you get on the computer. You start looking forward to seeing other people's comments about what you've said. It gives you a place to “hang out” when you’re bored and at a computer (though another place I highly suggest is www.addictinggames.com. Go to Hero Machine 2 if you’re on a school computer that can support it, it’s INCREDIBLE). It’s like playing solitaire, only better.
For any future tutors in this class I’d like to mention “don’t worry too much.” You’ll feel a little bit stressed at the beginning of this process, but (as Qui-gon Jinn says) “credits will be fine,” you’ll do great, and while you’re doing great I’ll be in the midst of a great legal battle with George Lucas about not citing the earlier quote form one Qui-gon Jinn, so, for the sake of my future assets, I will go back and do that now.
Done and done. Not nearly as hard as I expected. (j/k) The other thing that I would like to mention is, don’t forget to have fun with this. For all the serious things that you have to deal with in the Writing Center, for all the training sessions that you have to have about what to do if there’s a bomb threat at the same time your stalker is trying to interrupt you and the student who’s sobbing on your shoulder because they’re emotionally distressed while the student that Derek is tutoring is trying to get your phone number—don’t forget that it’s fun. Don’t forget to enjoy helping the students who come to you, because if you enjoy it, they’ll enjoy it. Now if that wasn’t platitudinous enough for you, I can offer one piece of advice that has never stopped being pertinent in my life—and since it’s not mine I don’t feel so pompous in giving it to you. “Have faith and faith shall be given unto you,” or in other words, fake it till you make it. It seems insensitive when you’re feeling low, but it really works. If you don’t know things, just ask someone else, or look them up and act like it’s normal, because it is. Good luck “homies.” Be well.

Bug Zappers

“Oy vey,” classic words to vent by. I’m going to take this opportunity to fill in the peer tutors who might be wiser than me next year on some of the things that I wish I knew coming into this class. The previous people to pass through this thing were right, start the bibliographic essay earlier. Those journal articles will rip your brain apart. As someone who put it off WAY too long, expecting that they would be able to pull through it alright, you can, but you don’t want to. You’ll have flashbacks for years, and you’ll figure out an interesting topic that you might want to do a conference paper on during or after the fact. DON’T PUT IT OFF.
Also, just so you know (I certainly didn’t realize it), the class readings are the best foundation you’ll get for doing your bibliographic essay, read them carefully, with an eye for what topics in writing center literature you’re interested in. I would also suggest using their bibliographies as a means to expand your research.
Now for the random rambling part of this blog entry: I have 1000 MB of e-mail space total. 1000 Mega Bytes. Do you realize all of the stuff that I could cram into this folder and the fact that I’ve never, ever had to use anything near that much? As a researcher I could see it. If I had a lot of PowerPoint presentations coming through my e-mail I could probably use it up too, but right now, MAJIMMINY! It’s huge! It’s an e-mail warehouse. I could probably fit everything I’ve ever received except for those dang daily bulletins in this thing.
Now back to venting. I should have written this blog last week when I was really stressed enough to want to vent. I had my math final this morning, and my bib essay has been in for a bit, so all of the big things that were really “stressing me out” are over. Except for this blog entry. I keep starting up on tangents, and I think that my brain has just given up. Finals week has taken me to that wishy-washy “I just can’t communicate with other human beings anymore” stage where you can’t really do anything except drool on your pillow and stare at the ceiling. Unfortunately for me I have no pillow here, and the ceiling has some Japanese looking lanterns that kind of remind me of those bug zapping lights. Ohhhhhh beautiful beautiful zappy lights. How much we’ve shared. It brings a smile to my face just thinking about you.
The narrator of this story then proceeded to recline back in her oh-so-fuzzy chair and imagine herself touching the lights. Since we all know that people can die of fear in dreams, it will be no surprise to the reader that as this “daydream” (or just dream at this hour) came to a climax, and the light was reached, the narrator felt a horrible searing pain, and died from the shock of it. In other news, the same thing happened to another tutor in Ontario Canada when, upon waking, they discovered that Keith Richards was still alive. This has been Robby McJamma saying, goodbye, good luck, and watch those test proctors.

A Last-Ditch Effort!

Okay, so I haven't been nearly as good about keeping up with the blog as I should be. There's actually a reason for that (beyond laziness, which I assure you is not the issue here), and I think for a finale, that's a damn good start.

1. I hate journals. No, really, I do. I've never been good with them. I've had to keep them for several classes, and I always...ALWAYS...fall behind. Mainly, I just don't feel like writing constantly. I don't particularly write for fun, and I don't particularly feel like I have anything clever or amusing to write.

Now, you'll note the 1. That logically suggests that there's a 2. There is. I figure for the rest of this "Dear God Dr. Rogers Don't Flunk Me I'm Not A Lazy Useless Slug I Promise!" post, I'll just do a reflection on this class, this semester, and my job over that time period. That all will make clear what my #2 is for not keeping up with the blog.

This semester started off beautifully for me. Classes went well, I learned new things, etc. etc. and all that funky jazz. That part, I'm pretty sure, can be left to a "fill in the blank" approach. I had issues, and lots of them, with wrapping my head around the reading responses. They required brevity and directness, two things that I'm particularly un-good at. As a matter of fact, if there was anything that I was un-goodest at, brevity, directness, and math would be waging a three-way war, winner take all, for that honor.

For some reason I just envisioned those three concepts as huge, burly, vaguely homo-erotic wrestler type guys, ready to throw down in the ring. I'm not sure who I'm gonna blame that mental image on, but never fear, it'll be one of you.

Working as a tutor started out wonderfully for me. I enjoyed it, I seemed to be good at it, and it gave me spending money. It was a challenge, of course. I'm not the kind of guy that likes to get broadsided and feel like I can't articulate what I want to, and tutoring loves to hit you with that particular dirty stick. Every time I found myself stuttering, trying to figure out what the hell to say about the paper, or to explain why the sentence seemed awkward, whatever, I'd replay in my head afterwards. Try to plan out how to smooth out that wrinkle in the fabric of my sessions, if you will.

Random aside here - I may be all kinds of "anti-foundationalist, post-process, "down with the man!", as Andi put it, but I used to run my sessions with one hell of an iron fist. I've gotten better about it. If you catch me calling the tutees "comrade", feel free to smack me around a bit. I'm trying not to be authoritarian to my poor little subjects, most of whom I'd really rather huggle than lord it over.

I'm not good at juggling classes. I'm simply not. I fixate on one, get all obsessed with mulling it over, and completely forget about the others. English 3840, unfortunately, got the short end of the stick this semester. It's not that I didn't think about the class a lot (I most certainly did), it's just that as I worked, I was able to put the lessons to practical use. This left me feeling like I'd "done my homework" a lot of the time, simply from tutoring. It was pretty damn hard for me to talk myself into sitting down and putting a lot of thought or effort into the responses when I'd already picked what we'd read over for its useful bits and cast the rest into the rubbish heap.

I do that a lot. With everything. If I actually had a religion, it'd be this crazy-ass mix of all the things I like about Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Shinto, and various animistic religions that never managed to get an official name here in the West. Then all the annoying stuff (for instance, sex-is-a-sin) would get pitched and buried in the backyard. Then, of course, some crazy-ass bearded redneck would join forces with a pissed-off Tibetan and beat me up for their missing beliefs -- mug me for my loose commandments, as it were.

Anyway, to continue onward: I absolutely loved this class. I looked forward to it constantly. Well, maybe not so much when we were waxing pendantic on Works Cited, but for the most part this class was a blast. It's too bad my grade won't reflect how much I really did absorb and enjoy here.

It seems like the bad stuff always happens right when it's the most inconvenient, doesn't it? The past six months have been more or less nothing but a long string of really, REALLY weird shit broken by occasional lapses into calm. Actually, now that I think about it, that's been pretty much the past year. Hell, it goes longer than that. That's where the typical Derek flakiness comes from. I'm not really a flake, I promise. I'm normally pretty laid-back, and I DON'T actually feel the need to be sarcastic about everything under normal circumstances. It's just that I feel a life-induced embolism coming on pretty soon here, and I think I'm subconsciously trying to vent what little pressure I can before it pops and I fall over. So for all those times when y'all couldn't predict exactly where in the hell I was coming from, or even what in the hell I'd act like if you tried to be nice and say "hi" to me, I apologize.

So anyway, the middle of this semester started to go right down the ol' poop-chute for me, and it didn't stop. This, obviously, made the last part of the semester an absolute bear. I was always playing catch-up. ALWAYS. This was another factor in my inability to keep up with the journal -- I was usually two responses behind, with a presentation looming over my head, and what the hell is a logarithm anyway?!? It's really not anything that a normal college student would find out-of-the-ordinary... but I can do better than that, dammit. So stack a heaping, huge piece of self-castigation on top of all the other stuff that I'm skimming over, and you've got an idea on why I didn't keep up with this journal.

Looking back now, I'm overall okay with the way this semester went. I could have done a lot better, and really should have, but I also realize that I've gotta take baby steps sometimes, whether I like it or not. This sort of thing doesn't really come natural to me. I'm still fighting loads and loads of ingrained weirdness from earlier in my life that tells me to coast until someome gives me a task, and throw myself at that task face-first. In college, you can't coast. You don't get Op-Order: Homework. It's really just up to you, and I'm still trying to figure out how reliable "me" is.

Well, that's it for my last-ditch attempt to wring a few percentage points out of a class assignment that I ignored so totally for most of the semester that I often forgot it even existed for days at a time. Here's hoping I'll still have a job next semester.

~Derek

the The Thesaurus

Alright, so it was a little longer than ten seconds… oh well, I’m sure no one is even reading these catch up funness posts so it doesn’t matter I suppose. Although, in respect for the fact that my last post was rather crappy in its connectivity to the world of the writing center and English at large, I suppose I’ll try to do something this time that actually correlates. Yes it is getting late and my crappy usage of big words has come out. Look at me I’m like an English 1010 student! WEEEE!! Misuse of big words to sound all cool and college like! Woot!

I suppose as I’m on that topic I might as well run with it, the topic being…I’m not quite sure but my ramblings will probably stumble across it in a second. Perhaps it’s the The Thesaurus. Next to the dictionary it is probably gods greatest gift to man…and then along came the masses. The end result is rather predictable I’m sure anyone might have noticed. Misuse. The terrible injustice visited upon the beautiful book of word usage. The reason being, people just snag nifty words. The biggest thing I’ve run across in my tutoring is students using words they’ve heard in passing. It could be something a teacher said and the student clung to its ‘big wordiness’ with all claws extended. Then when it comes to writing something the problem arises of exact usage and the student will just stick it in for the heck of it and pray the teacher doesn’t notice. And if that is not the case then the student may simply hate the currant word that is coming to mind for a project so a quick peek into the The Thesaurus and snag a word that’s under the same heading as the other word. And VIOLA! Instant big word and coolness is rained upon the head of the student and the paper can be turned in with a great feeling of accomplishment. GAAA!!! It drives me nuts!!! It is a TANDAM deal people!! You find a word in the The Thesaurus and THEN you look it up in the dictionary to make sure that correct usage has been applied. Unless your lazy and/or not turning it in to anyone that will care… which is the case for most of my big word usage I’m sure. Anyway, BACK to my story…or rant really. I do a lot of that don’t I? Anywho, the fact is that the student is then SOOO impressed with the magical wordiness of the word that any attempt to make a parting with it is meet with open hostility. As a tutor, nothing is more aggravating…okay, so maybe a couple things are, but the facts remain the same. ABANDONE THE WORD!! I can not stress that enough! To bad that the only people who MIGHT be reading this…already know that. Le sigh, sometimes I feel my brilliance is wasted…and then people remind me that it was used up in the fourth grade. Well…until next post I suppose.

^^
Ja!

The joys of rediscovering you....

Well, I suppose I should really get my butt in gear and catch up with this oh so wonderful things. Nothing against blogging of course, but it’s simply against my nature. I can not even BEGIN to tell you the amount of times over the years that I have sat down and thought to myself, alright, this is the day, today I will actually start and KEEP a journal…and would you like to know how that’s ended up? I’ll tell you, it’s ended up with me owning an amazing collection of really cute notebooks that have absolutely no purpose other than to annoy me with their blatant reminders of only one entry and a failed attempt and preserving my memories of the present for the future. Wow, that was a long ass sentence. Well, anyway, the fact of the matter is I simply CAN NOT keep up with this journal entry thing. I mean, what do you say? Am I supposed to ramble on in this fashion day after day for the rest of my natural life? Would anyone actually want to READ that drivel? The workings of a barely sane mind are not my idea of entertainment, worse, can you imagine what my decedents-if I ever had any-would think when they read them?! I would rather fade away completely, or live on in the infamy of really garbled fables in histories own version of telephone rather than have my rather pathetic thoughts trapped forever in time for someone else to dig through. My thoughts and feelings of today would seem so…trivial in my own future, what would it be like if even MORE years had passed?! I can just imagine someone reading those poor entries and wondering what in the HELL this freaky person was thinking?! Being an archeologist I tend to think either entirely in the past, far DISTANT past, about what has happened with other people, or way into the future for what people would be thinking of me. Let me tell ya, one way or another no archeologist hundreds of years from now will be digging up MY journals and thinking that they were the thoughts of an entire nation. Could you imagine that?! Everyone thinking that American’s, or hell, EARTHLINGS, thought like ME?!!! I shiver at the thought alone.

Um… well…now that I’ve ranted and raved and done absolutely NOTHING I wonder if I should shut up now. Humm, yes, I most defiantly think that I should. SO! Until the next ten seconds when I post another one of these wonderful things to make up for lost time….the crazy rantings of a tutor who DIDN’T speak about anything remotely related to class or her tutoring experience.

^^;
Ja!