Monday Loves III

... whenever Monday comes/You can find me cryin' all of the time.
-The Mamas and the Papas, "Monday, Monday"

Things I love today:

The Word Nerds - I do love words, and language is endlessly fascinating to me, so this podcast is right up my alley. Three teachers talk about how language evolves, and why we use the words we do. Also, there is a segment called The Rude Word of the Week, which is maybe my favorite part; I don't know why.

That's What She Said - Another podcast, this one is about The Office (U.S.) which is my favorite tv show. Each week the hosts talk about the most recently-aired episode and analyze the characters' lines and discuss what might happen next and all the good stuff that my family and I talk about to ourselves. Plus, this one is also produced by a teacher.

The Actor in You - My theater students have been having a very difficult time performing scenes. In particular, they break character CONSTANTLY, and this is both annoying and frustrating to me. So I am using the lessons in this book to teach them, first and foremost, and focusing on their objectives in their scenes. To that end, I had them do my favorite exercise from the book, which involved them, one by one, sitting in a chair in front of the room for two minutes while the rest of the class stared at them. Now, this is just as frightening as it sounds, except that I gave each actor an objective: count the tiles in the ceiling, or say the alphabet backwards in your head, etc. And dang if they didn't get up there and go off into their own little worlds and complete those objectives without once breaking into a fit of giggles. That is real progress, right there.

My improved plumbing abilities - Yesterday I replaced the broken knob in the shower without incident. I don't know if it's because I've finally learned to use a screwdriver or because I was chanting, "Pleasedon'tcomeoffpleasedon'tcomeoff," the entire time I was working.

This was pretty much my reaction:

This song at the Oscars - The whole ceremony was pretty grim, I thought, and LOOONG. But this was the highlight for me.

My own power - Today I noticed that the weird graffiti has been painted over. I don't think it's a coincidence that this happened ONE DAY after I posted it. I rule, y'all.

[added later] OOH! I almost forgot - I am a top friend on Shawn Spencer's MySpace page. Obviously, he is a fictional character, but it IS one of my favorite shows. So that is another thing I love today.