Why all educators are Anne Sullivan

We teach blind, deaf, and dumb children how to see, hear, and speak.

The Privilege of Being Jesus.

When Jesus healed a man on the Sabbath, he broke God's commandment to keep the Sabbath holy.

I reckon when you are Jesus, you can pretty much do whatever the hell you want.

Sick again.

I woke up yesterday morning sick. I have been sick once a week for the past three weeks, plus two other times since August. I'm not sure why my body has decided to reject what I eat, but it has.

Maybe I should stop eating like I'm fifteen-years-old.

Gustave Flaubert quote.

"Be regular and orderly in your life so that you may be violent and original in your work."

On Being Sick and Well.

Mom once told me that you never realize how sick you were until you start feeling better. I have been sick so much this past month that I'm beginning to realize how well I was before I started feeling sick.

I'm not sure when it happened exactly, but sometime in the past nine months my body got old.

My Angel.

My son is a vomiting angel.

Joke about paint.

This week I read this joke:

"What's blue and smells like red paint? Blue paint."

This is either the dumbest joke I've ever read, or the most brilliant.

Student Reflection on "Shoes."

I had my video production class write a reflection on "Shoes," which can be seen on YouTube.com. The project tends to elicit strong reactions, but the reaction I got from one student really stood out:

"First of all I just want to say that I can not believe you made us watch that mess and that I felt like I was getting dumber each second I watched it, so thanks for that. The director did a good job making the video look as dumb as the song sounded. He avoided a few jump cuts by switching from one object to another and then back again. The scenes went with the beat or lack thereof of the song. To me it seemed like the whole video followed all the rules we have discussed in class except maybe that all the shots seemed to be medium shots. I don’t think changing the kinds of shots would have made the video any better though so that doesn’t matter. Since the song was stupid it only made sense that the shots be of stupid things and almost seem to have no order. Especially towards the end it seems as though the shots are just of random things in a random order with no real point to them, just like the song. I have nothing else to say about this assignment because I am still angry that you made us watch this video."

Good and Bad Drafts.

I think one of the best ways to write a good draft is to start with a bad draft. So, I am writing a bad draft of a new manuscript.

Typing.

All of my computers clack now. I have set up my two Macs and my office PC with software that makes the keyboard keys clack like a typewriter when I type. My PC even dings when I hit return.

I feel like this noise gives me more weight when I write. It's like I'm waging war against a blank screen, and each clack of the keys is like a gunshot that spills ink on the page.

Good writing should make a lot of noise.