Feeling Fructuous Today

Listening to: Kraftwerk - TransEurope Express
Weather: It's stopped raining!!!
Mood: Feisty

I guess I'm pretty wound up today. Some days you read the news and everything just gets you going... and some days there's almost nothing of interest in the news at all. Today belongs in the former category. Or maybe I'm just in more of a verbal mood than usual?

I was writing before about keeping a journal... something I did with the same religious fervor as a monk illuminating a new version of the Gospels. The process of journalling for me evolved dramatically during college. The first note book from 1989 was little more than proof that I had completed teh massive reading assignments that went with Jerzy Rosenberg's History and Theory of Architecture. Though for someone with such a broad spectrum of interests the notebooks quickly became a map of my education and philosophy. Reading notes on just about everything I read went in; drawings of interesting structures, forms, building ideas; water color paint; thoughts about movies I'd just seen, programs on TV; minutes from some late night caffeinated conversation with a fellow student... and of course the usual writings you put in a journal when you need to vent at 4AM and your room mates aren't conscious to lend an ear.

What this leaves me with today, is a great glimpse back into time to those college days. I mean everyone knows that their opinions and interests change over time, but until you can sort of meet yourself again it's hard to imagine how much they change. I am genuinely embarrassed by some of the idiocy I wrote down and I've spent a lot of time considering how I got to thinking a lot of that crap in the face of obvious errors and misconceptions. Well, today I have an unexpected insight to that process through my wife. She started back to college today and encountered what can only be described as your typical looney college professor. Now this particular one also happens to be a sociology teacher (or socialism teacher perhaps.) She spent her first day in class listening to this woman (who's name has graciously escaped me at the moment) state that she had "spent time abroad" and that while abroad she found out that rape doesn't ocurr in other countries unless it is committed by an American... OK, now take a moment and pick your jaw up off the floor.

In a blinding flash it suddenly ocurred to me where these crazy ideas come from... it also suddenly ocurred to me why Americans perform so poorly on standardized testing. We have lunatics teaching our children complete and utter lies. I can't believe a sociology teacher could stand there in front of a class and same something which is so blatently and provably untrue to a group of 18-20 year olds who don't know to look up things crazy people tell you. Students who need to memorize this woman's opinion for a grade... Students who trust that they are learning something rather than being fed rogue information.

One of teh many reasons I married Ashley is that she knows B.S. when she hears it. This story was relayed to me immediately after leaving class and proceeding directly to Add/Drop to relieve herself of this class and find a better one. When asked for a reason for dropping the class she informed her consellor that the teacher was "a left wing loon." :)