Wednesday, August 27, 2008

On the Origin of the phrase and accompanying tune of "Nanny Nanny boo boo"


My dear readers, for some time I have had one great question preying upon my mind. This of course is - from whence comes the phrase "Nanny Nanny Boo Boo"? It appears to me as if everyone, from the very earliest ages on, are acquainted with this form of derision. Is this a comparatively recent development? Fifty years ago did some child of an age prior to that of schooling coin this phrase?

Perhaps, I should look even further back for the origin of this phrase. Could it be as old as Cain and Abel? It may have been this same fatal phrase which so enraged Cain as to commit murder. Unfortunately I still as yet have no answer to this question. If you could elucidate me on this matter I would greatly appreciate it. Perhaps there is an obvious answer to this question and if this is the case I would entreat you to please correct my ignorance at once.

Monday, August 25, 2008

Guidelines on how to avoid having a fat head

I would like to share with my readers some good ways I've thought up of avoiding acquiring a fat head at NSA.

1. Try not to look like this :

Folks, this is just too obvious. If your head looks like this, you obviously have issues. It becomes especially apparent if you are stroking your chin. This either means that you are indeed thinking, you wish others to think that you are thinking, or can't think of anything else to do with your hands besides applying them to your chin.










2. Don't study so much and fellowship so little that you look like this:

This is a clear case of what I like to call the mushroom effect. The upper portion of the head, containing the brain becomes bloated, which of course leads to the face (which is mostly responsible for any kind of conversation, let alone intelligent conversations) becoming deficient. This is especially a danger when reading books such as "Gorgias", as you see me doing in this illustration. You see my friends, "Gorgias" is so enthralling that your head can mushroom before you even realize it. I suggest draining your head of cranial fluid immediately after reading this book. This is best done through video games and/or Bucer's.


3. Two heads are better than one. . .


Especially when they look like mine ;)













note for those interested: my head was in no way harmed (or, uh, duplicated) in the creation of this post.

Whoa! Silent speed reading

I recently discovered, for the first time (through my first Rhetoric lecture with Mr. Wilson), the technique of reading silently (without sub-vocalizing (to use the term Mr. Wilson used). I had thought before that reading silently meant that you weren't speaking aloud. I mastered this type of reading soon after I learned to read. However, in the past when I've read I've always heard the words in my head as I read them. I don't even mouth them with my lips but it is still as if I'm reading aloud. It's kind of cool sometimes because if the author has a distinctive voice (like a foreign accent or something) the words are heard in my head in his accent. Like I said, Sometimes this is great (like when I'm reading poetry; or just for recreational reading) but at other times it's just plain annoying (like when you are trying to read 300 pgs. of Augustine in just one night).

So, I'm just starting to be able to read without that little annoying voice in my head saying every word I read for me. Now, the words go straight from the page, to my eyes and then to my brain. This has lead to a great revolution in the speed and efficiency of my reading. It's truly amazing how much faster I can read if I forgo the audible translation process.

The only catch is that I can only pull this off for roughly half a page and then the words revolt, if you will, and burst into audible form. I hope to get better at this as time progresses. Stay tuned for more news of my mad reading skills.

Sunday, August 24, 2008

I am Rob's questions of "what did I just watch"?



I watched a very interesting movie the other day. I needed to unwind after a day of studying so Kaleb and I rented and watched "Fight Club." This is, by far, the strangest movie I've ever seen and my thoughts on it are not solidified yet. As a result, I'm going to treat you to my thoughts on the matter and I simply ask you to bear with me.

I am going to summarize the movie's themes a little for those of you who haven't yet had the pleasure of subjecting yourselves to "Fight Club."

The movie seems to be about the shaky personal identity of modern consumers. The modern media and the ethics of consumerism have trivialized life to such a degree that no one truly knows who they are anymore. A name is not good enough, a name is simply an identifier; it's not an identity. My parents could have named me something different and it is conceivable that I would still be the same person overall. Even if I can trace my family name to two or three hundred years back, I have not truly learned anything about me. There most be something else, something more basic that defines me as a person.

It seems to me that people tend to define themselves by their religion. If someone asked me "What are you?" I could answer in a number of ways but I would probably answer with "I am a Christian. I am a child of God, born in sin but redeemed by God's grace - the blood of Christ." My identity as a Christian is the most meaningful and the most identifiable thing that I can point to illustrate to others what I am.

Consumerism is essentially a religion in disguise. For quite some time people have been inadvertently turning Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness into a very redundant list. This is, perhaps, a strange way of saying that people are slowly equating these three terms. And sadly, many people equate "the pursuit of happiness" with "getting as much stuff as we can." Therefore, these people believe that life (and the job of the government) is about being free to acquire as many possessions as possible.

Since, consumerism is a sort of religion it follows that people would tend to define themselves using its terms. However, consumerism only manifests itself in people's material possessions. So, in the same way that I identify myself as a Christian many people inadvertently identify themselves with their possessions. But because this identity is hard to illustrate to others they simply decorate their lives with a myriad of possessions and people will slowly start to figure out what kind of people they are. So the movie asks: "What if you lose everything?"

Spoiler warning: I might not be able to resist telling you the ending

The movie is a psychological drama. The film makers invite the audience to enter into the mind of a man who goes for days without sleeping. He is a recall coordinator who has to travel all over the country doing inspections. He describes himself as being a compulsive buyer of household items. He tries to solve his problems of identity with the kinds of things he uses to decorate his house. After trying to solve his problem of identity with his possessions he tries going to numerous support groups to get a high off of sympathy and crying. This fails when he realizes that there is a woman attending all of his support groups that obviously does not have the diseases the support groups are for. He ends up going four days again without sleep and this is when some part of him rebels. He begins to develop an alter-ego named "Tyler Durden" who personifies rebellion against established consumerism, radical existentialism, and charisma. Since we are seeing everthing through his eyes, the film makers very successfully make the audience think that Tyler Durden is a real person. Tyler Durden blows up our hero's condo and forces him to redefine his life. He has imaginary fights with this person (while really simply beating himself up) and sets up clubs all around the country called "Fight Club." This is where all the men who are sick and tired of their normal consumerish lives go to beat themselves up. Eventually, these clubs form into a terrorist organization called "project mayhem." Project Mayhem's main goal is to destroy everything that makes a modern consumer's life possible. Although, our hero remains involved with "Fight Club" project mayhem evolves without the knowledge of the first personality (the one who imagines Tyler Durden) and thus his alter-ego does things which he cannot control. He rigs up all the buildings of credit-card companies with demolition explosives and manages to get all civilians out of the buildings through the extensive "Project Mayhem" network.

As the story progresses, our hero becomes more and more like Tyler Durden (as personified by Brad Pitt). Even though the two characters stay separate (in a mix between Multiple-personality Disorder and schizophrenia) he begins to act more like his alter-ego, the man he wants to be. When he no longer needs his alter-ego, he shoots his alter-ego through the head (don't ask me how this works) and becomes an authentic human being, defined only through his actions - the marks he made on the world.


That's just what I think about it. This by no means exhausts the subject. I could be completely wrong and I'd be interested to hear your thoughts about it (especially the part where he shoots himself in the head and he manages to survive, but Tyler Durden disappears; that was weird).

I am helping cure racism . . .

By posting this.



NB: Please don't go randomly clicking on Flight of the Conchords videos, dear young readers. They can get rather mature rather quickly. And by mature I mean immature yet dirty. Funny, isn't it?

For legality - I downloaded this video using Google video. I'm obviously not using this for profit, just to make a few friends laugh. And this is easier than getting the embed thing off youtube, etc. I love the flying conchords, and if this is infringement I'll pull it at once. I just don't think it is.

Saturday, August 23, 2008

First Week of NSA


I would like to apologize to my loyal readership for leaving you all in the dark as to how my first week of NSA classes is gone. I can only imagine all the heartache and soul-searching I have subjected you to. I intend to set this straight right now.

I'll start with the academic side first. . . Classes started on Wednesday August 20 but as every NSAer knows, the pain (and fun) begins before classes even start. At the end of convocation all the Professor chaps in their cool robes come up
and tell their students what they want them to do for their first class. My class had to prepare for a small Latin vocabulary quiz (DOWN WITH BUSH, I've got political Turrets), read 190 pgs. of "How to Read a Book" (for Thursday), and finish C.S. Lewis' introduction to "On the Incarnation", and the first five books of St. Augustine's "Confessions." This was light compared to what the uppaclassmen [sic] had to do. They like had to answer the question "What is the meaning of life?" with an answer that doesn't involve a number, solve all the issues behind world debt, and cure cancer and AIDS (as long as they're curing cancer they might as well cure AIDS).

Anyway, my point is WE HAD IT EASY!!!

Anyway, I did all that with the help of my compadres who stayed late up into the night with me comforting me that it would "be alright."

Speaking of compadres, I still haven't spoken of any of the wonderful people I have come into contact with in this, my first week of NSA. I can't name them all but let me just tell you that they are wonderful. All the homework does not seem as daunting when I am around people with such good attitudes.

God Bless Us Every One.

and this my friends, is a dead muskrat:

P.S. my apologies to Charles Dickens; that last part just slipped out on its own