Ow.

So, again, it's been a little while. Sorry. I've only recently managed to scratch my way out from under a pile of grading and genius level self-sabotage. And what greeted me in the free and rarefied air?

A tooth extraction.

Now, I've needed to get this sucker yanked for the past year. It's not that I've got bad teeth (best my parents' orthodontist could provide) and I do take care of them, but I have a small jaw. A VERY small jaw in a rather round face. I also inherited my father's enormous teeth, and they just don't fit. My roots poke out through my gums, become infected, and I want to die of pain. Ergo, I had my lower back molars root canaled ages ago. It might have been six or seven years now (holy shit, am I really that old?!) and once the root is gone, the tooth is dead. This effectively means that no matter how precious you are about what you chew and how well you brush, they become brittle and crumble like chalky cement. It's no fun, and if you'd like a story, ask a friend of mine what it's like when yours truly turns to you just before holy communion and holds out her hand with a visible chunk of tooth in it and smiles, leaking blood from the corner of her mouth. Yeah, I have good friends.*

This whole matter is complicated by the fact that I've still not managed to get registered at a dentistry here in the UK. It is almost entirely covered on the NHS, but the demand far outstrips supply. Additionally, I don't have a car, so if I can't easily get there via bus (wherever there might happen to be) I don't go. Luckily, there's the Dental Information and Advice Line and the kind people there sorted me out an emergency appointment at the dentist office here on campus. This is where this gets unfortunate.

The dentist was a tiny little polish woman who clearly knew her stuff but just couldn't generate the leverage or strength to RIP THE MASSIVE, DISINTEGRATING MOLAR FROM MY ACHING HEAD. Pliers only crumbled it further, and even with a very kind, soft-spoken hygienist holding my hand the pain and pressure was dizzying. Eventually the dentist had to cut it out and that's where the trouble lies-- in addition to using the rest of my jaw for leverage, tearing the corner of my mouth with just the pressure of trying to twist it out, and bashing the rest of my teeth to get to it in the first place, I have a raw red cavity where the tooth finally gave it up.

They prescribed me an antibiotic, the most interesting thing about which being the repetitive and numerous strongly-worded warnings from everyone who mentioned it not to drink any alcohol at any point whatsoever lest I be instantly violently ill (and maybe cause a fleet of Chinese mathematicians to divide by zero and end reality as we know it). What they didn't mention was that a FULL WEEK ON I would still be awoken at night by searing, stabbing pain. I've now finished my course of antibiotics and, while shivering in agony in bed in the wee hours of this morning, I decided to call the emergency help number on the paperwork with which they sent me home and see precisely what was up. I get an appointment at 11 this morning. If this is socialism, sign me up.

The good news is that it isn't infected and it seems to be healing well. She referred to it as a "very traumatic extraction" and apparently the gum around where the tooth used to be bore the brunt of the assault and that's what's causing the stabbing pain in what feels like my ear canal. I'd never felt like I'd been shanked with a stiletto in the ear before, and the lance of pain down my neck/throat was a new and exciting twist to the devil's grab-bag of masochism I'm collecting. The dentist flushed the socket for me, repacked it with more antiseptic gauze (half of which has already fallen out) and sent me on my way with an antiseptic mouthwash to use twice daily for the next week or two (but not any longer because apparently it stains the teeth... fantastic).

It's not infected. It's healing well. It may very well and in all likelihood continue to hurt this badly for the next week. Awesome.

Thoughts on those who keep badmouthing public health care

I found this reposted on Facebook this afternoon. I have no idea who wrote it or where it came from, but I feel like it pretty much makes the point.

"This morning I was awoken by my alarm clock powered by electricity generated by the public power monopoly regulated by the US Department of Energy. I then took a shower in the clean water provided by the municipal water utility. After that, I turned on the TV to one of the FCC regulated channels to see what the National Weather Service of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration determined the weather was going to be like using satellites designed, built, and launched by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. I watched this while eating breakfast of US Department of Agriculture inspected food and taking the drugs which have been determined as safe by the Food and Drug Administration.

At the appropriate time as regulated by the US Congress and kept accurate by the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the US Naval Observatory. I get into my National Highway Traffic Safety Administration approved automobile and set out to work on the roads built by the local, state, and federal departments of transportation, possibly stopping to purchase additional fuel of a quality level determined by the Environmental Protection Agency, using legal tender issued by the Federal Reserve bank. On the way out the door I deposit any mail I have to send via the US Postal Service and drop the kids off at the public school.

After work, I drive my NHTSA car back home on the DOT roads, to a house which has not burned down in my absence because of the state and local building codes and fire marshal's inspection, and which has not been plundered of all its valuables thanks to the local police department.

I then log on to the internet which was developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration and post on freerepublic.com and Fox News forums about how SOCIALISM in medicine is BAD because the government can't do anything right."

... Take that.

Something for Myself

I know it may not sound like much, what with all the novel posting on here lately, but it's been a damn long time since I've done something for myself. Because I wanted to do it. Independent of the opinions of whims or schedules of others.

So what did your embattled heroine do, you ask?

She went to a concert.

The BBC SSO (Scottish Symphony Orchestra) were playing the Aberdeen Music Hall (see below) to the tune of Overture and Venusberg Music from Tannhäuser by Wagner, a selection of songs by Strauss, and the real draw of the evening: Beethoven's 7th Symphony. It was fantastic. It was everything I could have hoped for-- the venue, my cheap ticket, my seat, my ability to listen, all of it. It was a fantastic evening.

I'd been to a ceildh or two at the Music Hall, and saw Buena Vista Social Club there with Alpha 6 months ago, but to see a Symphony which performs with such surgical precision, which plays so cleanly and responsively, was an unaccountable treat. The conductor, Donald Runnicles (below), danced and capered on the stand, his leonine hair bouncing and knees bent to the militantly happy strains of a symphony which can simply be described as a race of endurance.

The Wagner was well done. Now, I'm not the biggest fan of Wagner (certainly not a fan of the man, but the music must be considered independently) but this staging was clean, crisp and entirely well-turned. There was a riff about 4 minutes in which brought tears to my eyes and that symptomatic swelling in my chest that indicates just how visceral my reactions to this kind of music can be. It's not unlike the pinch I get for the strains of patriotic tunes or the pitches of bagpipes-- I'm conditioned for this response, I refuse to either apologise for it or deny it.

As far as the songs (Allerseelen, Wiegenlied, Cacilie, Ruhe meine Seele, Befreit and Zueignung), the soloist did a lovely job. I was a bit disappointed by the smirking of a fellow audience member who I later recognised from my Monday reading group-- these pieces require a bit of the gusto and wild vibrato and pulling the Brumhilde face isn't clever. Regardless, Christine Brewer has a set of pipes she's not afraid to use and I'm glad for it.

Now, what could I possibly say about the Beethoven? Other than that I love it, naturally. The massive opening movement was appropriately bright and bombastic. The second was held to precisely the right pace-- too slow and it's a dirge, too fast and it misses the tenderness of the motifs-- and the full section of double basses set my heart atwitter. There a glimmer of major in the minor movement that hits you like a ray of sunshine between cold buildings: not enough to break your stride, but with just enough weight for you to involuntarily turn your face towards it. The third and fourth movements were a delight, with the latter being held to just that hair short of breakneck. The look that passed between Runnicles and his first violinist was priceless as she lowered her shoulder and prepared for the onslaught. It's militantly, defiantly joyous-- a snow shovel of happiness to the face, one might say.

All that said, it was a lovely night. I walked back to the nest and basked in the rounded tones ringing in my ears the whole way.

Hey, look-- I can read!

... Yay, literacy!

So, after struggling with deep philosophy for the past, I don't know, it feels like forever, I'd become convinced that it was no longer possible for me to read more than a few pages of anything in a sitting. 6 pages of Blanchot and I have to get up and do some dishes, pick at my face, iron my bedsheets, anything to keep from passing out in a sludge of drooling intellectual stupor. 20 pages seemed to be my daily limit, between Blanchot, Nancy, Hallward and Hegel. Ack.

It was in a furious bout of charity shop shopping that I picked up two gently used books. The first was purchased simply to get people off my back. To all of you who have asked: "Miss Melville, have you read the new Cormac McCarthy book? You know, the one they're making/have made into a movie? The one starring Viggo?" The answer is now: "Yes, you bastards, now leave me alone!"


The book, needless to say, is The Road. The Times Literary Supplement says it's the best book of the past 10 years. I don't know about that. It is, however, a terrifying read.

I'm not much of one for zombie movies, and not because I teach film and I think they're all hack jobs. Quite to the contrary: they scare the absolute piss out of me. Anything post-apocalyptic gives me the most severe anxiety. So, thanks to all you miserable sons of whores to harassed me into reading this.

All that said, it's a brilliant book. The literary merit is solid, and I do appreciate the way he plays with a lack of punctuation to further underscore the lack of possession in the novel. It's powerful stuff. Redemptive? I don't know. Parts of it quite reminded me of King a la Cell. The description is vivid and chilling, the characters bleak and torn, the setting unsettling. The cannabalism is a horrific touch, but not overdone. All that taken in, I liked it. If anyone has a copy of Blood Meridian they'd like to loan me, please go ahead.

I read The Road in a day. Yes, that's right: ONE DAY. I started it on the bus in to Uni in the morning and finished it in the dark of night (considering I'm in Aberdeen where the sun is down by 6pm, this isn't that impressive). Inspired by this success, I moved on to another work.

More about this after the break!

Books

So, I finally bought the book that we've been discussing in my Monday reading group since last September. Yeah, I've still not read it and yet participate in every discussion as we go along. I love half-assed intellectualism on my part.

Anyway, I suck no more! Amazon.co.uk will deliver onto me the most recent addition to my Blanchot collection: The Step Not Beyond. Woot, fair reader, woot indeed.

I've also ordered The Unavowable Community and a few other gems off of Amazon.com (because the exchange rate blows) which will be delivered to a friend's house (also because international shipping blows). I'm hoping they love me enough to ship them to me in a padded envelope of acceptable dimensions. That would be great.

But anyway, I'll have the major text before the massive conference here at the Uni at the end of the month. You know, the one with the major international scholars on Blanchot all in attendance. I've basically read it over Sergi's shoulder, but now I can apply my own soft lead pencil to it. I officially declare this a win.

Grading

So, my film students (all 8 billion of them) had their first assessment due yesterday my 3pm. It's a shot-by-shot analysis of a scene of their choice from one of the films we've screened thus far on the course. Simple? Absolutely. Straight-forward? Couldn't be more so. Or so I thought...

Where did I go wrong? I read the handout to them in class, pulled it up on the computer and projected in front of them, showed them where it was on the website. I begged them to email me if they had questions. I brought it up ever class for three weeks. How did they still manage to cock it up?

They were supposed to submit a chart of the shot breakdown and then 2-3 pages of analysis in paragraph form with complete sentences. The interpretations of "chart" are truly awe-inspiring. And half of them just didn't do one. Turned in the analysis without a chart or list of bullet points or ANYTHING.

*FACE/PALM.

YAY!

So, Yours Truely did, in fact, peer desperately at her laptop screen in breathless suspense for the duration of the Canada-USA Mens Ice Hockey match yestereve. Needless to say, I was rooting for the Canadians (I mean, honestly...) and my viewing experience would have been vastly improved had my internet connection not COMPLETELY freaked out midway through the second period and left me hanging onto every posting on the LiveTwitter portion of the BBC Sport website. Apparently I just wasn't good enough for iPlayer to not screw me over. There was much gnashing of teeth. MUCH GNASHING.

Regardless, hang on I did, and text in twice. Here's what the BBC wrote at the conculsion of the overtime period:

1503: Sidney Crosby was already a legend, at the age of 22, coming into these Games. Every young Canadian wants his name on their jersey. Every young Canadian wants to be him. He was always going to have a hard time living up to that reputation and, in the early games of this tournament, he was just another name on th...e roster. 'Sid the kid' was quiet. Now, with millions from Kampala to Baghdad to Vancouver to Aberdeen watching (and I know that, they've all been texting me), he has enshrined his name in Canadian folklore. Sidney Crosby has scored the biggest goal of the biggest game of the biggest tournament, for the biggest nation in the sport.

Yeah, that's right!! I texted in and Aberdeen gets the shout-out! Properly chuffed, thank you very much. Oh, and Canada winning is pretty cool, too.

Christ, how long has it been?

Honestly, this is ridiculous. I keep meaning to put things up on here, but the combination of ragged Internet and epically low sustainable enthusiasm has left me bereft and fruitless. Also postless. Sort of the same thing.

Anyways, NO MORE. For neither love nor money will I let this continue (not that I have either of these things to wager, but that's a technicality, right?).

So, it's a Monday... time to start something new and repeatable. Like a post and a time to write it:

Here I sit, working my fingers and tail to the bone as a receptionist at the Student Union where I tell people I don't know the answer to their question and that they should come back tomorrow when someone else is behind this desk. And I get paid for this. It's brilliant. I answer the phone and take messages and get paid above the minimum wage. All this counts in the plus column for the day.

I also taught my first tutorials for the term-- they've got me back on Intro to Film again this spring, but it's an entirely revamped syllabus. SO many new shorts and artsy, cutting edge films which are not Braveheart... it'll be lovely. I've got at least one student whom I failed last year, but she didn't show up this morning anyway, so that's off to a brilliant start. There are also a few carryovers from the Intro to English tutorials I led this past fall (not that I told you about them, my poor, neglected, invisible readers). The one is a pretentious prig of a gent, but who isn't at 18, right? Especially one who wanted to go straight into film school but didn't make it? Yes, these are the young minds with which I have been trusted.

I'm still living in the same old flat, though perhaps not for long. It is the scuttlebutt around here is that the owner will be back in the Granite City on his next rotation and me and mine will have to find a new hole in which to hide. The rub lies in that this may happen in April, which is dash inconvenient. You see, housing here in Aberdazzle is extortionate. Honestly. On par with London. Aberdazzle is NOT LONDON. And in mid-April, there's nowhere to move. If it could wait until the end of May when the plague of undergraduates lifts, then maybe something might be had, but April? I shudder to think. Additionally, it's not just me I have to worry about, as there is the Flatmate. It's no longer DangerMuffin, she's moved on down to the Kingdom of Fife where she is making her own way in the postgraduate-dom in St. Andrews. No, the new girl took the room in September last with the understanding that she'd have it for a year... oops. She didn't sign a contract or anything, but that was the understanding. I haven't mentioned anything to her yet so as not to borrow trouble, but I don't have a superbly positive feeling about this.

Not that I do about most things, though. It's a happy thought.

I'll backdate the entries regarding Teitur and Lil' Jimmie Reed, which were both amazing. I promise to be better about this!