Life Outside the Square

1.  Handed in my last assignment for the semester.
2. Attending my last tutes for the semester.
3. Downloading my last lectures for the semester.
4. Am pretty sure I'm sitting on HDs for all my units so far.
5. Have only two pages left to memorise of the third movement of the Beethoven sonata I'm learning.
6. Discovered that Hugh Laurie has released a blues album.
7. Downloaded abovementioned blues album.
8. Listened to aboveabovementioned blues album and found out that it is awesome.
9. My Monday students all did heaps of practice and finished all of their theory homework
10. My Tuesday students also did heaps of practice and are starting to identify important patterns without me having to point them out first.

 Dear Semester One,

I am sick of your ugly face.  You suck.  Go away.

Hugs and kisses,
Me.

 The Christian Union has put up posters at uni - "Killing Christians and Why It Doesn't Work"

I think I laughed a little more than was appropriate.  It's not bad enough that I picture Zombie Jesus every Easter, now I've got the picture of all his followers coming back as Zombies too!

 I found this while researching for a presentation I've got to give at uni...

"Ever inventive, though, humans solve the problem of enlisting help from several adult males by other means. In some cultures, mothers rely on a peculiar belief that anthropologists call partible paternity--the notion that a fetus is built up by contributions of semen from all the men with whom women have had sex in the ten months or so prior to giving birth. Among the Canela, a matrilineal tribe in Brazil studied for many years by William Crocker of the Smithsonian Institution, publicly sanctioned intercourse between women and men other than their husbands--sometimes many men--takes place during villagewide ceremonies. What might lead to marital disaster elsewhere works among the Canela because the men believe in partible paternity. Across a broad swath of South America--from Paraguay up into Brazil, westward to Peru, and northward to Venezuela--mothers rely on this convenient folk wisdom to line up multiple honorary fathers to help them provision both themselves and their children. Over hundreds of generations, this belief has helped children thrive in a part of the world where food sources are unpredictable and where husbands are as likely as not to return from the hunt empty-handed."
Wish our society worked that way!

 Is there anybody else out there who'd rather take a pickaxe to the head than try and navigate Centrelink's phone system?  (Or anything else to do with Centrelink for that matter...)  Well, now you don't have to.  If you get stuck in that endless loop with the stupid robot voice, simply shout "TALK TO HUMAN" as loudly as possible into the phone and, after waiting on hold for the better part of 15 minutes, you will be transferred to a disinterested human who was probably dropped on their head at birth and cannot help you with anything at all, but at least you won't have to listen to the robot anymore!

Got the surprise urge to go and look for my linguistics textbooks at the second-hand shop at UWA today.  At first I couldn't find the linguistics section at all, and neither could the shop assistant.  After some searching, we managed to locate the shelf which held a measly 5 or so linguistics books, one of which happened to be one that I needed and in excellent condition.  Had a quick look in the surrounding sections for the other book, but to no avail.  As I went to pay for the first one, the lady at the counter said that she'd just put a linguistics book on the trolley to be shelved.  Apparently they keep a lot of books hidden behind the counter so that they don't get stolen, but she figured it would be alright to put this one on the shelf because they've never had a linguistics book stolen before.  I'll refrain from the temptation to rant about how dumb it is to keep the merchandise hidden where customers can't see it and don't know that it exists since the lady and the boy running the place today were both rather nice and helpful.  The book that she'd put on the trolley turned out to be the other one I needed, also in excellent condition, and I paid $80 for the two which would have been a little over $150 new.  I love second-hand books!

Peace and love.  :)

 My Beautiful Piano got tuned last week, and since then one of his keys has been sticking really badly and another one is ringing after being played because the damper is out of alignment.  He is overdue for his action to be serviced, but I'm a bit suspicious that these glaringly obvious problems have appeared right after somebody was fiddling with his insides.  The thing is though, a tuner should not have been touching the hammers or the dampers.  Tuners are only supposed to do the strings.  The rest of his keys don't feel right - like all of the hammers have suddenly gone clunky.  The whole thing just feels really wrong to play.  He's never been this unresponsive before.  I'm really stressed out about this.  I need my Beautiful Piano.

I'm pretty sure that in order to get the action redone he'll have to be taken away for at least a couple of weeks, maybe longer, and I can't be without him for that long - especially not during the school term!  I'd have to hire a piano, and it just wouldn't feel good.  But I can't let him just sit there and decay either, and I can't really play him in the meantime.

This Sucks Hairy Balls.

 Whilst catching up on linguistics lectures I have realised that what I consider to be normal, everyday words may not actually be words that a lot of people use or even know at all.  When I did that creative writing unit a couple of years ago and submitted a poem to be workshopped in a tute, everybody commented on my use of "archaic" and "unusual" words - at the time I thought that they were just a bunch of idiots with extremely limited vocabularies.  One word in particular that I remember them commenting on was "pilgrim".  They also picked at my sentence structure a bit, saying that it was very formal and precise.  That was also something that I didn't think about myself at the time - I thought that I was just speaking/writing the way everybody did.  The line I'm thinking of went something like "this pilgrim in the lonely darkness".  (Haha yeah a bit emo, the whole poem was a bit of a cry-out I think.  I kind of liked it though.  It was quite structured compared to what else I was writing at the time.)

So my question to you guys:  Does my use of language, my 'ideolect', seem overly precise/snobby/archaic/weird/other?  I'm just curious, so please answer and do so honestly.  I don't have a problem or any sort of insecurity about the way I talk/write anymore, but I'm curious to see what others think of it.

I'm also struck by the notion that you lot seem to know exactly what I'm talking about when I use, shall I say 'obtuse' language, whereas most of my old workmates and a lot of people in my tutes get lost pretty quickly and I find myself simplifying my language for them.  Is it maybe not an ideolect (my own personal way of speaking) so much as a sociolect (the way of speaking/forms of language used by the people I hang out with i.e. fellow geeks who read a lot)?

What sort of language do you guys use with workmates/strangers/acquaintances/etc?  Do you find yourselves naturally using more jargon and 'unusual' vocab when you're surrounded by fellow geeks?

Most interestingly (to me at least), have you ever been accused of snobbery just because you use big words in natural conversation?

 So it turns out that having the threat of a linguistics exam looming over me works wonders for my ability to finish projects I've had on hold for a number of months...

I just completed the draft of "Foundations of Music" which is a piano book for beginners, primarily under the age of about 5 or 6.  Now I've just got to do a little editing and get somebody to help with some illustrations *cough* BRITT-DANICA*cough* but other than that it's quite presentable and modern and spiffy looking I think.

Britt how's your schedule looking in the upcoming weeks when you've finished uni?  I just need a few small drawings, but we all know I'm hopeless at such things lol.

Also, I'm going to start on book two soonish, and I will need to come up with some more short rhymes to put with some of the pieces.  Can anybody suggest some topics?

I went shopping at Big W for prizes for the kiddies this morning and was disturbed to find that they'd moved things around since last time I was there.  I hate it when shops change where they put stuff - it's very disorienting.  But they redeemed themselves by installing self-service registers!  Self-service is fantastic.  No dealing with dead-eyed store clerks and no being forced to make awkward and pointless small-talk with strangers!  WootWoot!  I don't normally shop at Big W, but now I'm going to be a regular there.

And yes, I'm aware that I am a strange and antisocial person.  I just really don't care.  :)

I found the sheet music for this song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhN7SG-H-3k which is awesome.  It's called "River Flows in You" and it's by a Korean dude called Yiruma.  It's very pretty.  He's written lots of beautiful pieces, but this one is my favourite at the moment.  Papillon is really nice as well.