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Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 20th, 2014, 8:36 am
by Adam54
For the stuff that's all at once annoying and not.

For example, I just learned that one of my favorite musicals, Spring Awakening, is being fast tracked for a film adaptation at long last.

The annoying part? It's going to be directed by McG. *sigh*

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 20th, 2014, 9:56 am
by The Swollen Goiter of God
I've never seen Spring Awakening. I read Frühlings Erwachen (the Wedekind play it's based on) back in '98 or '99. I dug it.

I haven't read the Wedekind in translation, but I'm pretty sure some big names have translated it. I think Ted Hughes and Jonathan Franzen both did a translation. I'm going to take a stab in the dark and assume the Hughes translation would annoy me less than the Franzen translation.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 20th, 2014, 10:04 am
by Jubbers
We watched a clip of "The Bitch of Living" in one of my German classes while reading Frühlings Erwachen, but that's all I've seen of Spring Awakening so far.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 20th, 2014, 1:00 pm
by Dalty
I went out on a date on Friday night. I have mixed feelings about it. She was cute and smart and funny and sexy.

She lives a loooooong way away and is more than 10 years younger than me.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 20th, 2014, 2:32 pm
by The Swollen Goiter of God
How long is a loooooong way away for you? twenty miles? Is it a long way away by U.S. standards, or is it a long way away by British standards?












Both?

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 20th, 2014, 2:34 pm
by The Swollen Goiter of God
The previous post was protected by the Basic Strider Protection Package.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 20th, 2014, 7:47 pm
by neglet
Watching the 5th season of "Dexter" and one of my favorite actors, Jonny Lee Miller, shows up. Yay!

He's sporting a American accent. Urg.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 21st, 2014, 10:05 am
by Dalty
250 miles Goiter. 250 miles!!!!

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 21st, 2014, 10:42 am
by Adam54
How did you wind up on a date with her in the first place??

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 21st, 2014, 11:41 am
by The Swollen Goiter of God
Bananarama's Bouncy Bits wrote:250 miles Goiter. 250 miles!!!!
What, does she live in Darlington?

That's nothin'. It's something like 260 miles from St. Louis to Clarksville. Takes about four hours.

Granted, most of that is Interstate drivin'. Maybe it would be a worse drive for you. Then again, you Brits don't even have to drive.

I could get from St. Louis to Clarksville, but I couldn't do a straight train shot. I'd have to go Greyhound the entire way, or I'd have to Amtrak it part of the way and Greyhound it the rest of the way. It would cost somewhere between $70 and $150. It would be cheaper to drive. I'd rather not drive, but it's the only affordable option--not that it's that affordable.

Is she off the island? Would she have to fly?

Whatever the case, it sounds like it could get expensive for her. You'd need to be the one to foot the bill. Why? Because you can. Because you're Money Bags, Money Bags.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 21st, 2014, 12:07 pm
by Adam54
The Swollen Goiter of God wrote:
I could get from St. Louis to Clarksville, but I couldn't do a straight train shot.
The last train to Clarksville is no longer an option?

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 21st, 2014, 12:16 pm
by Dalty
Huddersfield.

It's a long story!!

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 21st, 2014, 1:13 pm
by Adam54
Tell us the story! I'll swap you for the long, tragic, epic saga of me and Lolita.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 21st, 2014, 1:27 pm
by The Swollen Goiter of God
Adam54 wrote:The last train to Clarksville is no longer an option?
Jubbers has to endure a "Last Train to Clarksville" joke every single time we drive through there.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 21st, 2014, 1:36 pm
by Jubbers
We also always play the song, if we have an iPod handy.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 21st, 2014, 2:24 pm
by Dalty
Never visit Trance Central.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 21st, 2014, 3:41 pm
by Adam54
Current Mixed Feelings

Netflix is going to raise their prices $1-2 this summer.

But at least they finally learned the smart way to announce it. "We need to do this so that we can continue to afford more original programming like House of Cards, Arrested Development, etc." MUCH better than the last go round of "We're giving you too much of a bargain. That ends now. Deal with it."

Still will be an absolute steal at $10 a month. Would be a bargain at twice that price.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 21st, 2014, 3:44 pm
by The Swollen Goiter of God
Adam54 wrote:Still will be an absolute steal at $10 a month. Would be a bargain at twice that price.
Well, don't let *them* know that.

Whether or not it's a steal, some of us couldn't afford it if they doubled it.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 21st, 2014, 3:53 pm
by Adam54
Fair enough, Goits. I'll keep that between you and I.

I do wonder, however, if this rate increase is also in small part due to the extortion that the evil motherfuckers at Comcast are making them pay now.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 22nd, 2014, 10:47 am
by The Swollen Goiter of God
Here's something:

http://homeiswheretheinternetis.blogspo ... eling.html

I'd never dream of taking away a person's right to travel, and I think it's a good thing not to fall into the trap of becoming an over-protective island-unto-yourself. The world's not necessarily out to get you. That said, the strip also serves as a reminder to me that people of means and privilege are more worried about dying and having things taken from them than most everybody else.

Jubbers tells me I'm in danger of becoming "Mr. Old Grouchy Pants."

BECOMING?!

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 22nd, 2014, 1:33 pm
by Mal Shot First
Current Mixed Feelings:

We're leaving St. Louis and are moving to the Boston area (Waltham, MA) at the end of May. My postdoc contract with WashU is running out and my wife found postdoc employment at Brandeis University, where she will most likely stay for 3-5 years. I've been looking for faculty positions in German since October, and out of the 50+ applications I submitted during that time span, I've gotten four interviews. Granted, two of those interviews were this past week, so it's still too early to tell whether I've been rejected by those two universities as well.

Since I can't rely on landing an academic faculty position, even on a limited one-year contract, I began looking for alternative avenues of employment in March, primarily in the publishing industry. Finally, I heard back from a publisher who actually has an office in Waltham and wants to meet me for an interview. Great news! ... Except they want me to come in THIS THURSDAY MORNING. Even if I didn't have teaching obligations that day, there's no way I could book a flight and get out there on such short notice. I could drive, of course, but then I'd have to take Wednesday AND Thursday off of work in order to apply for different work.

Anyway, I've e-mailed the HR person who contacted me about the interview and asked if we could reschedule or conduct the interview via Skype (which I've done more often in the past year than actually interviewing in person). The guy hasn't gotten back to me yet, so I called him and left a message. I am way more excited about this prospect than I am about continuing my academic career track, but I would hate it if the whole thing fell through because I can't be physically present in their office on one particular day. :-/

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 22nd, 2014, 1:41 pm
by Dalty
It's a bummer, but they have to understand you have professional commitments in your current role, right?

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 22nd, 2014, 2:16 pm
by The Swollen Goiter of God
They don't have to understand. They don't even have to pretend to understand. They're the ones with the power.

That said, Mal's a catch. If they're smart enough to recognize this, they'll bend.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 22nd, 2014, 2:21 pm
by Dalty
They should value that he values his commitments and is willing to find a plan B.

Re: Current Mixed Feelings

Posted: April 24th, 2014, 11:39 am
by Mal Shot First
Follow-up to my post above:

After I didn't hear from the HR guy regarding a possible rescheduling of the interview, I re-read the e-mail he sent me and realized that they're conducting a group interview with all the candidates (probably because it's more practical for them to call in everybody at once and just devote one block of time to interviews instead of dragging out the process over several days), so they probably wouldn't accommodate just one person.

Then I had to decide how much I cared about getting this job and came to the conclusion that I can't afford not to care about it. I got a colleague to sub in for me in one of my classes (she owed me a sub-in from when I subbed for he while she was gone on an interview) and I rescheduled my other class for Friday. Booking a flight and a hotel on short notice sucks, but it wasn't any more expensive than it would have been to book a flight for next week, so I bit the bullet and did it.

I arrived in Boston last night and took the commuter train out to Waltham this morning. The publisher is a neat little company called UpToDate. They publish articles by professionals in the medical field that serve as go-to reference material to physicians when they need to read up on an issue with a patient they're treating. My job as editorial assistant would be to maintain contact with the contributors in one particular topic (e.g., dermatology or oncology) and to proofread and format/edit their documents in preparation for online publication. The environment seems pretty relaxed and all the people I talked to were very nice and not intimidating at all. The job itself is quite different from my current career path, but I've done this sort of work as a research assistant for my thesis advisor and I always enjoyed it. The prospect of leaving academia has stirred something in me that's making me look forward to trying something else.

I think I've become pretty excited about exploring other ways of making a living, and after this interview I'd actually be pretty disappointed if I didn't get the job.