Halloween costume, help!

So I have to go to a party on Saturday, one that I didn't know about until yesterday (thanks, w.). I need a costume and I got nothing--except for this hat. So your job, blog reading pals, is to look at this hat (with me in two different moods, so you can consider a range possibilities) and tell me how to build a costume from it. I'm counting on you all, so let's hear those ideas.

I'll take my Pibb straight up, thank you

The other night I went to the movie over at the Hateway and the line for the Prestige was long (who knew it would be so popular?); we were stuck at the back, around two corners, and the usher kept telling us to squish together because they were running out of room for the line. Squish together? Not so long ago I got stuck in an elevator at the Hateway and that was pretty horrific, but being told to squish up with a bunch of movie-goers seemed worse. The only good thing about being stuck in a big line of people while awaiting a movie is getting to listen in on people's conversations and I found a gem:

Wife to Husband: Well, I guess you could get me a Mr. Pibb, but that will keep me buzzing all night. So, if you want that, get me a Mr. Pibb. But the Coke. . . . Tell you what, get me a Mr. Pibb with a lot of ice and if I can't handle it, I'll dump it out before we get into the theater.


Only in Utah, folks. Only in Utah.

a tale of two classes

This semester I'm teaching two sections of the same class and they meet on alternating days. One class makes me feel like a terrible teacher. While there are a few engaged students, most of them look at me like I am doofus with lame ideas. They make me feel like that teacher in Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Every time the class ends I think I should probably get a new career.

And then the next day comes and I go to class number two and all of the things that failed miserably yesterday work beautifully. They ask questions, they pay attention, they seem to get it--and better yet, like it. They make me feel like the math teacher in Better Off Dead, where the students anxiously await their opportunity to turn in assignments. I leave the class completely renewed, yet dreading the next day.

What to do? I'm not sure that it's possible for me to change so much from day to day. It must be them. But maybe it is me, and if it is, what's going wrong. Does the one class sense that I dread teaching them? Is it because I wore jeans on the first day of the bad class? Fellow teachers, help!

fall break: in which the desert reminds you that summer is over and you may as well suck it up

The thing about the desert is that it never rains. Unless it does rain and then it really rains.

Over the weekend, I went on a much-anticipated paddling trip on the Green River, through Labyrinth Canyon, a 68-mile stretch of flatwater between Green River and Moab. I've been wanting to make the trip for years and trying to plan a trip for at least a year and finally all of my fellow paddlers figured out a weekend that would fit our schedules.

I anticipated that the trip would give me a final dose of hot sun before the inevitable winter blues set in. I expected to be wearing shorts and tank tops and relaxing. I even bought a new cooler to fill up with ice and beer.

Ha, ha, ha.

What I needed was a constantly brewing coffee pot.

It rained at least three inches over two days. The river gained four feet of depth, maybe more. Waterfalls cascaded all around us. The river was full of floating logs, garbage (and we're pretty certain, sewage). We had to make an early morning canoe rescue because the shore had disappeared over night. We did jumping jacks to keep warm on a one foot wide stretch of sand where we stopped to eat lunch. We paddled thirty-four miles in one day and paddled well beyond sunset because all of the campsites were under water. Not exactly what I had expected.

The rain that we experienced flooded Hanksville, a hundred year flood apparently. The trip was wet and soggy and cold, but it was damn amazing. I've always wanted to see a flash flood, but not be in it and I think I got pretty close. Watching the rain tumble down the canyon walls, watching streams form and surge and disappear in a matter of hours, watching pounds of silt shift and collect, I felt like all of the desert's secrets were being revealed.

a fine piece of reporting

That Salt Lake Tribune. Thank god we have them to really help us understand the complexities of gender and incarceration:

Women in Prison: Even Jailed, Girls Can Be Girls


Let me just offer up the article's opening paragraphs:

"In prison, lipstick is more than a concoction of wax and oil that glides on a woman's full, shapely lips.
Ruby Rush, Latte Lush and Cocoa Delicious are shades of feminism, a woman's link to her inner self. Lipstick distinguishes her in a place that is otherwise drab and gray, making her feel human, even sexy, while she bides her time before she can rejoin the outside world."

Which leads me to the question of what shade of feminist am I? Plum Brulee*, since I am the sort of feminist who likes to sport an apron--a third wave kind of girl? Earth Rose, since we're all connected: earth mother, mother, woman, ecofeminism, it's all about the womb, you know what I mean? Beyond Pink, because don't we really just need to get beyond these constructions of gender? First wave, second wave, third wave--whatever. It's all about the lipstick.


*(these lipstick colors courtesy of L'Oreal)

it's not that the music is so loud, it's that the music really sucks

My neighbor listens to his music really loud. . .really, really loud. Every neighbor (including me) has knocked on his door to ask him to please turn down the music. And he does (for an hour or two). The crazy landlord even came by one day and pulled out his cable connection because he was so disturbed by the loud music and the complaints. But it never stops. And here I am, trying to grade papers, and trying to listen to This American Life. And this is what I have to listen to in the background:

Kelly Clarkson
Prince (ok, Prince can be good, but he's listening to "Purple Rain")
Christina Aguilera
and it goes on. . .

Really, it's terrible.