Still addicted after two days away

Got back to my desk, turned on the computer, opened Firefox, the last session restored, and suddenly Ke$ha was blaring in my ear. What was it? THIS!

For some reason that was on top of my browser when I shut the machine down right before leaving. I really like this video — something about the coordination of the editing with the percussion and the way that those sequences are specifically cut highlights the famous Armitage microexpressions. It’s an inane song, but something about it focuses our attention on the details. (And I say inane advisedly, insofar as I just bought the CD. Sigh. But it’s great music to write to, strangely. I can type in rhythm with the drum track, which is a lot of fun, also strangely. At least I bought it used.) Love this video! Go over there — even if you’ve seen it before — and give the author some love! That last little tag at the ending is so appropriate and made me laugh out loud when I saw it the first time.

So, yeah. Two days without Armitage, but I think it would take more than that to create either real withdrawal or real disinterest on my part. Actually, I think if I ever went really long without looking at his stuff, I’d get even more excited when I came back to it. I’ve had that experience with some things that I haven’t looked at for awhile when I have come back to them.

After the Royal Maundy, Queen Elizabeth II of England receives congratulations, flowers, and cards, from pupils at the St Saviours Primary School on her 85th birthday. My cap. Congratulations, Your Majesty! Happy Birthday and Many Happy Returns! Wishing you all the best for your grandson’s wedding in about a week, ma’am!

So, I’ll be catching up with my Armitage blogging plans starting tomorrow, and I hope to write up a storm in the current calm before the storm (classes finish May 6). I have made a decision, though: I had decided to be financially responsible and not buy a new laptop until I knew I’d have a new job. One thing that’s clear to me after the two days away and all the reflection involved is how much doing this centers me. And the being centered here has been a bridge to being more centered elsewhere. So I need to continue doing it, and my old laptop (a very cheap Acer I bought in a pinch (previous laptop just died) in the spring of 2008 with a Vista system that only speaks German) is not going to cut it — I used it last summer, but at that point I was only writing and just beginning to screencap, no video editing. I need a Mac laptop. (If you have one you love, I’d love to hear suggestions / commentary on which one to get.) And the only way to make that viable is to do it while I still have the educator’s discount available to me — another month, approximately.

The best thing, I realized today, is that I’m done with prophylactic grading, which is the hardest. You know what I mean: the grading done not only to assign scores, but also to reward good work and identify deficiencies, and get around problems. All that’s left is the final grading, and unfortunately it’s part of culture on this campus that only a very few students pick up their graded final papers. I always make an offer to provide detailed feedback on the final assignments, but it’s almost never taken up and so grading the last work of the year is usually limited to filling in the rubric sheets to make sure I’m being consistent, comparing notes with my TAs about the assignments they have graded, and filing the grades. It’s conceivable, as I’m leaving this job and maybe this profession, that I’ll never have to do prophylactic grading ever again. Oh, please, G-d.

Taking a page out of bccmee’s book here. Lucas North (Richard Armitage) uses his magical brain beam to defeat all comers in Spooks 8.1. If I had a superpower like this, would I grade more happily? Maybe not. Lucas never seems all that happy. Source: Richard Armitage Central Gallery

And just for laughs, I’ll leave you with a picture of one of my favorite parts of Richard Armitage’s anatomy, from one of the many sloppy edits that made the camera work on Spooks 8 look so shaky and amateurish.

Lucas North’s (Richard Armitage’s) nose consults with Ros (Hermione Norris) about a terrorist they think may be associated with Harry’s kidnapping in Spooks 8.1. My cap. Yes, for several seconds, it’s Armitage’s nose in the frame with Norris.

OK, time for bed. More tomorrow!!! Even if Armitage is a rather frivolous topic for Good Friday.

~ by Servetus on April 22, 2011.