What I want is to see the world not be so fscked up, so maybe I'll find a reason to want to exist in it. If that can't happen (it's been a while and we haven't seemed to figure it out yet...) I want to live a life where I have a reason to exist in it anyways. A life of rock n' roll, a mix of simplicity and complexity that only tabloids can convey. I don't care if it seems cliche and predictable, that's what I want, to be a rock star. And companionship. That'd be great, to get over the whole "ex-girlfriend/ex-bestfriend/ex-drummer now I have nothing" thing. On that note; anybody here into 80's metal that plays drums in the upstate NY area? (that won't steal my girlfriend?)
Then you are a dumbfvck. It's refreshing to see someone who actually enjoys the profession and does it not because they were incapable of doing anything else but rather that they have a talent and the drive to help others. We need more teachers like Carol, not less.
I agree with crazychester's assessment, Carol. To add, I think this is a global manifestation (maybe "national" is a better term?) of rat race burnout. The bar gets raised higher and higher by those who seemingly can tolerate it, but ultimately that only leaves a larger and larger percentage of people who cannot keep up or give-up out of frustration. These are still good, hardworking people. It's just that the standards of "staying in the game" have reached unreasonable levels (for more and more people). As a teacher, I think you can imagine what would happen to your classroom of students if you graded on a curve and only reward those who made it at the top of the curve, while penalizing those who are merely "average". Assuming there was some powerful incentive (in real life, it would be money, financial security, and professional success, I would imagine) in this classroom, there would always be some small group of people who push the top of that curve just a little farther to secure their own standing while further eliminating lower participants as competition. It's a vicious cycle, and I don't see a lot of people acknowledging that some "point" must be "enough is enough". Maybe it is just the natural cycle of a meritocracy-based system, but taken to an extreme it can become an ugly cycle. Just my 2 cts.
BTW, I'm essentially an engineer (retired at 30, it seems), just eeking out existence on odd jobs. I don't particularly have any motivation to return to engineering, yet subsisting on meager wages of low-seniority blue-collar jobs seems rather unfitting for a person of my caliber, as well. Go figure. I've resided to not worrying where I should be, but just living day to day with simple pleasures in mind.
Also Hassan, a very sweet gesture, and it is appreciated.
FWIW, I'm already walking down that road of medication. I think it is Effexor, as well, except experimental trial grade. For me, these drugs are good at killing the pain, but if you have rationally deduced there are very few things left to live for (i.e., life sucks), you will still be depressed. You just won't be agonizingly depressed.
I know, so that suggest counseling or therapy. I'm looking into it, but it is a daunting gesture if what you really need is daily visits over unspecified months at $25-40 a pop, and you are currently scraping poverty level or outright unemployed (as I have become, as of Fri).
At some point, you have to acknowledge that the hero of this "movie" has run out of options after a valiant and resourceful effort (maybe even "entertaining" effort if God were to be watching from above) to salvage things, and things are looking like this is a movie where the hero doesn't survive. In a "movie", this is where some serious luck happens and all turns out bright, but real life seldomly offers up such a gratuitous deal-saver.
i want the average american to know the fundamental principles of calculus... is that really that much to ask for?
Hi! Do you teach math?
I never had one single good math teacher in my whole life.
I always asked the question "why" - but no one could ever answer me. EVER! And I REALLY wanted to know. Is 'why' not a question one can ask in math and expect an answer? Believe me, to this day I have 'no clue'.
So I memorized "how" to do stuff, but I never really understood it. Know what I mean?
Maybe I'm a typical liberal arts major. Dunno.
But I'm the kind of person who always wants to understand everything. That understanding was perpetually denied me in math classes. It always felt like such a rip-off. Know what I mean? So I just gave up and memorized. Sigh.
I want to work with the Office of College Diversity to:
establish an exchange program with historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs)
launch a massive minority recruitment effort. (my college has less than 7% diversity- including "unknowns")
establish a series of "sustained dialogue chats" among campus groups/ student organizations on any number of issues.
I really need to do something goal-oriented in addition to my coursework, college lit/fine arts magazine editorship, and writing fellowship. Just trying to effect social/educational change while bolstering my resume for the next stage of my career.
I would absolutely love to spend two years in the Teach for America program after college. Basically, it's a highly-selective program (2000 positions per 16000 applicants) that places recent college graduates of all majors in inner-city and rural school districts. You're expected to go above and beyond the demands of a regular teacher- your goal is to raise the performance of an entire class of children who are 3-4 grades behind their peers to the state level. I just get excited thinking about the experience...
Hopefully, I would do it on a 2-year deferment from Penn Law School. I just spent four days on the campus for the COOL Idealist National Conference. I have to say that it's becoming my top choice... Penn Law 2011! (Christ, I'll be 28 years old!)
I never had one single good math teacher in my whole life.
I always asked the question "why" - but no one could ever answer me. EVER! And I REALLY wanted to know. Is 'why' not a question one can ask in math and expect an answer? Believe me, to this day I have 'no clue'.
So I memorized "how" to do stuff, but I never really understood it. Know what I mean?
Maybe I'm a typical liberal arts major. Dunno.
But I'm the kind of person who always wants to understand everything. That understanding was perpetually denied me in math classes. It always felt like such a rip-off. Know what I mean? So I just gave up and memorized. Sigh.
It's ok to ask why. I've lucked out with my calculus professor because she does explain the why that she even admits most professors refuse to even touch.
That was always my problem with math, I would ask why, and my teachers would buckle. Sometimes I'd get the answers, but usually I'd get the how again(in a different form) or I'd be asked to do it myself.
I think I'd like to invite Carol to my loft for a week before her world-travels, cook my world-famous 'meatless meatloaf' for her (now that she's a veggie), have a sordid affair with her (my cooking skills *are* that good), and then join Kickaha's commune...or BR's cult. I can't decide between the two.
I never had one single good math teacher in my whole life.
I always asked the question "why" - but no one could ever answer me. EVER! And I REALLY wanted to know. Is 'why' not a question one can ask in math and expect an answer? Believe me, to this day I have 'no clue'.
So I memorized "how" to do stuff, but I never really understood it. Know what I mean?
Maybe I'm a typical liberal arts major. Dunno.
But I'm the kind of person who always wants to understand everything. That understanding was perpetually denied me in math classes. It always felt like such a rip-off. Know what I mean? So I just gave up and memorized. Sigh.
I have taught math, but no I am not a math teacher. I was the student that got it in middle school and to whom the teacher looked when he just wanted to shoot the breeze while i was up at the board going over the how and why of the homework. The why is very esoteric in most cases or very very complex or so I have found. Of the courses I took in college, I enjoyed the combination of theory and praxis in linear algebra. At all levels I used a physical system to understand what the math was doing. I don't think that that is such a good approach towards theoretical math but from my perspective there is a lot of knowledge in the limitations on how a math can be used. I actually think that an understanding of math at the level of calculus makes it much easier to think about a lot of things in a way that allows for a great deal of independent discovery.
I would absolutely love to spend two years in the Teach for America program after college. Basically, it's a highly-selective program (2000 positions per 16000 applicants) that places recent college graduates of all majors in inner-city and rural school districts. You're expected to go above and beyond the demands of a regular teacher- your goal is to raise the performance of an entire class of children who are 3-4 grades behind their peers to the state level. I just get excited thinking about the experience...
Hopefully, I would do it on a 2-year deferment from Penn Law School. I just spent four days on the campus for the COOL Idealist National Conference. I have to say that it's becoming my top choice... Penn Law 2011! (Christ, I'll be 28 years old!)
I think I just found something to tell my wife to add to her prayer list. Pick L.A. I would love to see how liberal you are, and how "oppressed" you think those children are after 2 years in L.A.
I'm sure "excited" isn't the word you would be using to describe the experience after about, oh... say a week.
Originally posted by Randycat99 I agree with crazychester's
We agree! Hooray! See if you'd ask me where I thought you were coming from in those other threads, I would probably have assumed you were a well-off, privileged American who was too comfortable and insular to appreciate others misfortune. Just proves how dangerous assumptions can be. I just see this stuff and what's being discussed in the political threads as one great continuum. The world is full of societies that are toxic to varying degrees and the planet wears the human misery of all of them like great scars across its face.
Quote:
Originally posted by Randycat99
At some point, you have to acknowledge that the hero of this "movie" has run out of options after a valiant and resourceful effort (maybe even "entertaining" effort if God were to be watching from above) to salvage things, and things are looking like this is a movie where the hero doesn't survive. In a "movie", this is where some serious luck happens and all turns out bright, but real life seldomly offers up such a gratuitous deal-saver.
Only time will tell, I suppose...
I made one very, very fateful mistake at one point that cost me ten years of my life and a whole lot more besides and, while never really having been one to suffer from depression, I hit rock bottom big time (financially, socially, you name it - several times over in fact). Rock bottom has several advantages. Firstly, the only way is up. Secondly, finding yourself in a position of having nothing left to lose can be incredibly liberating. Thirdly, being happy and content with life is great but it's the periods of suffering that teach you the really powerful lessons.
I think I'd like to invite Carol to my loft for a week before her world-travels, cook my world-famous 'meatless meatloaf' for her (now that she's a veggie), have a sordid affair with her (my cooking skills *are* that good), and then join Kickaha's commune...or BR's cult. I can't decide between the two.
Hell, we can find space on the commune grounds for at least *one* more cult...
10. I want to play water polo for a masters team as well as swim
11. I want to be in one of those calendars with all the buff fire fighters in it so women all over the world will want a piece of me.
Hi DMBand -
Heh. Well, if you play water polo, then you must be in fantastic shape. I read during the last Olympics that of all the athletes, the water polo guys were probably in the best shape of anyone.
I checked out the most recent firefighter calendar at Barnes and Noble in January. I didn't buy it though, mainly because I was already spending $165 on travel books, and I felt tapped out. You probably *could* eventually get in that calendar. (If so, may I have your autograph? )
It's funny, because in real life (as opposed to movie stars, etc.), the best-looking guys I have ever seen all in one place were the paramedics who came to check on a little neighbor girl who had taken some pills out of a bottle. (She was three, and did okay.)
But I was in my neighbor's living room with all these paramedics standing around in their dark-blue t-shirts and dark-blue shorts, and I was wide-eyed in disbelief. ALL of them were total babes - serious, drop-dead gorgeous, hunky babes. God. I had to roll up my tongue! hahaha
Ever since then, I have honestly wondered if the employment criteria for paramedics included being breathtakingly delicious! The guys in that calendar were okay, but my very own local paramedics were ten times cuter. heh.
Comments
Originally posted by Messiahtosh
Yeah, ok...
Someday you might get it...
What I want is to see the world not be so fscked up, so maybe I'll find a reason to want to exist in it. If that can't happen (it's been a while and we haven't seemed to figure it out yet...) I want to live a life where I have a reason to exist in it anyways. A life of rock n' roll, a mix of simplicity and complexity that only tabloids can convey. I don't care if it seems cliche and predictable, that's what I want, to be a rock star. And companionship. That'd be great, to get over the whole "ex-girlfriend/ex-bestfriend/ex-drummer now I have nothing" thing. On that note; anybody here into 80's metal that plays drums in the upstate NY area? (that won't steal my girlfriend?)
Originally posted by Messiahtosh
What I never want is for you to be my teacher.
Then you are a dumbfvck. It's refreshing to see someone who actually enjoys the profession and does it not because they were incapable of doing anything else but rather that they have a talent and the drive to help others. We need more teachers like Carol, not less.
You are what is wrong with society.
Originally posted by BR
You are what is wrong with society.
We have been trying to convince him of this in so many other threads but to no avail...
1. Enjoy life. Go river rafting and camping more.
2. Continue to go to the gym and drop weight. I'm down 40 in 4 months and I'm on track for completion in June.
3. Finish my MBA and MHRM (I'll be done in June and sometime in 2005 respectively).
4. Start on my new astrophysics career by taking classes at UCSC.
5. Get the business that my friend and I are working on off the ground.
BTW, I'm essentially an engineer (retired at 30, it seems), just eeking out existence on odd jobs. I don't particularly have any motivation to return to engineering, yet subsisting on meager wages of low-seniority blue-collar jobs seems rather unfitting for a person of my caliber, as well. Go figure. I've resided to not worrying where I should be, but just living day to day with simple pleasures in mind.
Originally posted by Carol A
Ganondorf and Randy -...
Also Hassan, a very sweet gesture, and it is appreciated.
FWIW, I'm already walking down that road of medication. I think it is Effexor, as well, except experimental trial grade.
I know, so that suggest counseling or therapy. I'm looking into it, but it is a daunting gesture if what you really need is daily visits over unspecified months at $25-40 a pop, and you are currently scraping poverty level or outright unemployed (as I have become, as of Fri).
At some point, you have to acknowledge that the hero of this "movie" has run out of options after a valiant and resourceful effort (maybe even "entertaining" effort if God were to be watching from above) to salvage things, and things are looking like this is a movie where the hero doesn't survive. In a "movie", this is where some serious luck happens and all turns out bright, but real life seldomly offers up such a gratuitous deal-saver.
Only time will tell, I suppose...
Originally posted by billybobsky
i want the average american to know the fundamental principles of calculus... is that really that much to ask for?
Hi! Do you teach math?
I never had one single good math teacher in my whole life.
I always asked the question "why" - but no one could ever answer me. EVER! And I REALLY wanted to know. Is 'why' not a question one can ask in math and expect an answer? Believe me, to this day I have 'no clue'.
So I memorized "how" to do stuff, but I never really understood it. Know what I mean?
Maybe I'm a typical liberal arts major. Dunno.
But I'm the kind of person who always wants to understand everything. That understanding was perpetually denied me in math classes. It always felt like such a rip-off. Know what I mean? So I just gave up and memorized. Sigh.
- establish an exchange program with historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs)
- launch a massive minority recruitment effort. (my college has less than 7% diversity- including "unknowns")
- establish a series of "sustained dialogue chats" among campus groups/ student organizations on any number of issues.
I really need to do something goal-oriented in addition to my coursework, college lit/fine arts magazine editorship, and writing fellowship. Just trying to effect social/educational change while bolstering my resume for the next stage of my career.I would absolutely love to spend two years in the Teach for America program after college. Basically, it's a highly-selective program (2000 positions per 16000 applicants) that places recent college graduates of all majors in inner-city and rural school districts. You're expected to go above and beyond the demands of a regular teacher- your goal is to raise the performance of an entire class of children who are 3-4 grades behind their peers to the state level. I just get excited thinking about the experience...
Hopefully, I would do it on a 2-year deferment from Penn Law School. I just spent four days on the campus for the COOL Idealist National Conference. I have to say that it's becoming my top choice... Penn Law 2011! (Christ, I'll be 28 years old!)
Originally posted by Carol A
Hi! Do you teach math?
I never had one single good math teacher in my whole life.
I always asked the question "why" - but no one could ever answer me. EVER! And I REALLY wanted to know. Is 'why' not a question one can ask in math and expect an answer? Believe me, to this day I have 'no clue'.
So I memorized "how" to do stuff, but I never really understood it. Know what I mean?
Maybe I'm a typical liberal arts major. Dunno.
But I'm the kind of person who always wants to understand everything. That understanding was perpetually denied me in math classes. It always felt like such a rip-off. Know what I mean? So I just gave up and memorized. Sigh.
It's ok to ask why. I've lucked out with my calculus professor because she does explain the why that she even admits most professors refuse to even touch.
ah well.
Originally posted by Carol A
Hi! Do you teach math?
I never had one single good math teacher in my whole life.
I always asked the question "why" - but no one could ever answer me. EVER! And I REALLY wanted to know. Is 'why' not a question one can ask in math and expect an answer? Believe me, to this day I have 'no clue'.
So I memorized "how" to do stuff, but I never really understood it. Know what I mean?
Maybe I'm a typical liberal arts major. Dunno.
But I'm the kind of person who always wants to understand everything. That understanding was perpetually denied me in math classes. It always felt like such a rip-off. Know what I mean? So I just gave up and memorized. Sigh.
I have taught math, but no I am not a math teacher. I was the student that got it in middle school and to whom the teacher looked when he just wanted to shoot the breeze while i was up at the board going over the how and why of the homework. The why is very esoteric in most cases or very very complex or so I have found. Of the courses I took in college, I enjoyed the combination of theory and praxis in linear algebra. At all levels I used a physical system to understand what the math was doing. I don't think that that is such a good approach towards theoretical math but from my perspective there is a lot of knowledge in the limitations on how a math can be used. I actually think that an understanding of math at the level of calculus makes it much easier to think about a lot of things in a way that allows for a great deal of independent discovery.
Ah well...
Originally posted by ShawnJ
I would absolutely love to spend two years in the Teach for America program after college. Basically, it's a highly-selective program (2000 positions per 16000 applicants) that places recent college graduates of all majors in inner-city and rural school districts. You're expected to go above and beyond the demands of a regular teacher- your goal is to raise the performance of an entire class of children who are 3-4 grades behind their peers to the state level. I just get excited thinking about the experience...
Hopefully, I would do it on a 2-year deferment from Penn Law School. I just spent four days on the campus for the COOL Idealist National Conference. I have to say that it's becoming my top choice... Penn Law 2011! (Christ, I'll be 28 years old!)
I think I just found something to tell my wife to add to her prayer list. Pick L.A. I would love to see how liberal you are, and how "oppressed" you think those children are after 2 years in L.A.
I'm sure "excited" isn't the word you would be using to describe the experience after about, oh... say a week.
Nick
Originally posted by Ganondorf
I'm not depressed. I just want to die.
Careful Ganondorf, you aren't allowed to feel like that in this culture.
Too many biomedical companies want to pump you up with their latest offerings.
Better to channel it into a painting or a guitar etc rather than trying ot suppress it with drugs and mind control.
Good luck.
There's no rush you know. We'll all die eventually, I figure why rush it?
Originally posted by Randycat99 I agree with crazychester's
We agree! Hooray! See if you'd ask me where I thought you were coming from in those other threads, I would probably have assumed you were a well-off, privileged American who was too comfortable and insular to appreciate others misfortune. Just proves how dangerous assumptions can be. I just see this stuff and what's being discussed in the political threads as one great continuum. The world is full of societies that are toxic to varying degrees and the planet wears the human misery of all of them like great scars across its face.
Originally posted by Randycat99
At some point, you have to acknowledge that the hero of this "movie" has run out of options after a valiant and resourceful effort (maybe even "entertaining" effort if God were to be watching from above) to salvage things, and things are looking like this is a movie where the hero doesn't survive. In a "movie", this is where some serious luck happens and all turns out bright, but real life seldomly offers up such a gratuitous deal-saver.
Only time will tell, I suppose...
I made one very, very fateful mistake at one point that cost me ten years of my life and a whole lot more besides and, while never really having been one to suffer from depression, I hit rock bottom big time (financially, socially, you name it - several times over in fact). Rock bottom has several advantages. Firstly, the only way is up. Secondly, finding yourself in a position of having nothing left to lose can be incredibly liberating. Thirdly, being happy and content with life is great but it's the periods of suffering that teach you the really powerful lessons.
Originally posted by 709
I think I'd like to invite Carol to my loft for a week before her world-travels, cook my world-famous 'meatless meatloaf' for her (now that she's a veggie), have a sordid affair with her (my cooking skills *are* that good), and then join Kickaha's commune...or BR's cult. I can't decide between the two.
Hell, we can find space on the commune grounds for at least *one* more cult...
Originally posted by DMBand0026
10. I want to play water polo for a masters team as well as swim
11. I want to be in one of those calendars with all the buff fire fighters in it so women all over the world will want a piece of me.
Hi DMBand -
Heh. Well, if you play water polo, then you must be in fantastic shape. I read during the last Olympics that of all the athletes, the water polo guys were probably in the best shape of anyone.
I checked out the most recent firefighter calendar at Barnes and Noble in January. I didn't buy it though, mainly because I was already spending $165 on travel books, and I felt tapped out. You probably *could* eventually get in that calendar. (If so, may I have your autograph?
It's funny, because in real life (as opposed to movie stars, etc.), the best-looking guys I have ever seen all in one place were the paramedics who came to check on a little neighbor girl who had taken some pills out of a bottle. (She was three, and did okay.)
But I was in my neighbor's living room with all these paramedics standing around in their dark-blue t-shirts and dark-blue shorts, and I was wide-eyed in disbelief. ALL of them were total babes - serious, drop-dead gorgeous, hunky babes. God. I had to roll up my tongue! hahaha
Ever since then, I have honestly wondered if the employment criteria for paramedics included being breathtakingly delicious! The guys in that calendar were okay, but my very own local paramedics were ten times cuter. heh.
Originally posted by Defiant
I want a spanking. If I remember correctly, you still owe me one, Carol.
Actually, right now, there are not many things I want. I don't really want anything at all. I'd just like to be happy, that's all.
Hi Defiant -
I owe you a spanking, do I?
Can you remember what it was for?