Stuff

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So I finally got sick for the first time since I've been down here. I think it was an egg torta... the worst part was that I went to a buffet, but couldn't eat... That is like the grandest shame in the history of shames that I can imagine. But luckily it was a well-priced vegetarian buffet... so I didn't miss out on too much.

I was sick so I didn't have to come to school. I graded papers and updated my ipod... a very productive day in my opinion.

In geography class we are learning about the atmosophere. It turns out that a country owns the air above it until you reach outter space... thats like 1,000 miles or something. Lichtenstein is not as small as you thought.

In the grammar classes I am teaching past tense. It turns out that the past tense of GO is WENT.

In the advanced class I am teaching the history of comedy. I once wrote a 90 page tome on the subject, so I know a little bit. Last week we discussed the prevalent theories of comedy, and then watched American Pie.

It was a very inappropriate to show to a high school class. (Possibly more inappropriate to show to a pre-school class.) I forgot that the entire plot of the movie is about sex. I forgot about Stiffler drinking semen, or Shannnon Elizabeth's excellent tits. But it made for well developed essays.

"When Jim cums before having sex with Nadia... we laugh, according to Aristotle's Superiority Theory, because we are better than him... we wouldn't prematurely ejaculate."

"Sherman is a nerd, and shouldn't get sex... but he has sex before the other guys... we'd expect to laugh at Sherman because we are better than him (ie. Superiority theory) but he is actually better than us... this is Incongruity Theory... we don't expect what actually happens."

True comedy lies in the academicizing of teen comedies.

(I think the funniest thing in the movie is when one of the characters goes on a date with a girl studying Postmodern Feminism... that is pretty funny for a stereotypical major.)

This week we are studying Greek comedy... it turns out that there used to be these festivals commemorating Phales, has something to do with dicks, and Dionysus, god of partying... At these festivals groups of dudes would dress up with fake dicks on their heads (possibly foreheads if they passed out with their sandals on the night before) and get drunk as fuck... They would follow a flute player around the city, singing songs holding torches. This group was called a Comus... the songs they sang were called Comoedias... which became the word Comedy, then that shit got all comodified and put into plays and things.

But essentially this is a proto-proto-Holyland... (ie. http://daviswiki.org/Holy_Land)

There is a kid here, who dresses hella hip hop... probably it's just reggaeton... He thinks he is a bad ass... today he was wearing a white glove. So I kept making Michael Jackson noises to him. He got embarassed. But that is pretty bad when the school bad-ass is being made fun of by a teacher. Yeah that's right I fuck with fifteen year olds. That's how much of a bad-ass I am.

-Love Josh

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