Teachers, if you haven’t asked your students about nonacademic sources, I advise you do so.

Because I don’t want to be in this dispiriting place alone.

A few years ago, Melissa and I started working on a textbook to teach our students how to find, evaluate, and ethically use sources.

We knew a lot of knowledge was lacking, both from decades of teaching and from the current political crises.

Using our draft chapters has shown me how desperately needed this book really is.

Because now I quiz the students on this subject.

One of our chapter is on evaluating nonacademic sources; it explains the difference between academic and nonacademic, talks about when nonacademic sources are necessary in their writing, discusses how to evaluate news sites, warns about reliance on Google and Wikipedia, gives examples of satire news being mistaken for real news, and lists four kinds of sources that just shouldn’t end up in their writing, unless their paper is about unreliable sources.

(We argue that one should not cite 1) other student papers one finds on the internet, 2) cheat sites, 3) sources with no discernible personal or agency author, and 4) religious texts as incontrovertible evidence in what should be secular arguments.)

My reading quizzes ask students to tell me the difference between academic and nonacademic sources and to name one of the four forbidden types of nonacademic sources they should avoid.

The students who do the reading do fine, of course.

But here’s what many of the upper-division students who skip the reading say:

What’s the difference between an academic and a nonacademic source?

• Nonacademic sources are written by people who don’t know what they’re talking about.
• Academic sources are the things our library has. Everything else is nonacademic.
• Academic sources are reliable. All nonacademic sources are unreliable.

What is one of the four nonacademic sources you should avoid in your writing?

• blogs
• news sources
• film reviews
• social media posts
• this is a trick question–you should never use nonacademic sources in your writing

After I take up the quizzes, I have questions for those students. So you can never cite news? If a pediatrician writes a blog about common problems at checkups, can you not use the info just because it’s a blog? How can you write about foreign policy under Trump if you aren’t allowed to ever cite a Tweet? What if you need census data? Will you just have to skip that information because it’s nonacademic? How are you going to write that film paper if you can’t cite nonacademic sources, since films ARE nonacademic sources?

Fellow teachers, if you haven’t had this conversation with your students, I recommend it. It will be eye-opening on both sides. The information generation just isn’t getting enough instruction on how to filter information. If you want Melissa and I to start the conversation for you, our book is coming out soon.

I got myself a Harry Potter backpack at the start of the year. It tore almost immediately, and the tear is getting bigger.

Just this morning, I was thinking about how I should go back to my very old, but not torn, boring backpack.

Then:

Student A: Is that Harry Potter backpack?

Student B: I noticed it on the first day. It’s how I knew I had signed up for the right class.

This week, I had the honor of appearing on Davisville again. We got to talk about one of my favorite things–The Simpsons!

“Wow. That’s brilliant. I never would have seen that,” several of my students exclaimed after the day’s discussion leader had them rewatch the “set up the kids” scene at the beginning of Cabin in the Woods. The discussion leader pointed out that the jock wasn’t dumb, the virgin wasn’t one, etc.

And the other students were flabbergasted.

Which made me flabbergasted.

But it’s happened each time I teach this film. This class is designed for Film/Media Studies majors, and so my heart breaks when they can’t actually read a film correctly.

To watch Cabin in the Woods and miss that the kids are not actually archetypes, which a surprising number of my students do, means that they misunderstand the initial attempts at characterization, all of the clear references to the designers affecting their behavior and cognition, and one character constantly trying to understand what’s happening.

“And since when does Curt pull this alpha male bullshit? I mean, he’s a sociology major, he’s on full academic scholarship, and now he’s calling his friend an egghead?”

I used to teach this film last, but this term, it will be our first. We’re going to talk about it Wednesday. I even told the students why–not about what exactly other classes were misunderstanding, but that other students were managing to majorly misunderstand significant plot points.

So we’ll see how they do.

When I started teaching Writing in Film Studies a few years ago, I was surprised by how many horror films made it onto my viewing list, since I don’t really like horror films.

Or maybe I don’t like “typical” horror films. And I will admit that I really dislike the serial killer ones. Give me aliens, zombies, vampires, gods–I can escape. Watching regular men kill regular women doesn’t give me catharsis. It leaves me feeling upset for days.

Cabin in the Woods is one of the best of the horror films I love. I didn’t really know what it was going to be about when I headed to the theatre in 2011. But I knew it was a Whedon thing, so it wasn’t going to be ordinary.

The theatre was almost empty. A woman who appeared to have a nice buzz came in and sat down right beside me. Halfway through the movie, she yelled, “This movie is fucking awesome.” The other seven of us in the audience just laughed. Cause it was true.

I was disappointed that Goddard, the director, chose to open the way he did, since it gave away so much of the twist away. But I also know that moviemakers don’t worry too much about spoiling things for professional geek overanalyzers. And it didn’t spoil the fun.

I watched the film again over the weekend, flinching as one character makes out with a wolf head (ick–so much dust!–even though I know it’s actually sugar).

And I found myself even more mad than usual that the virgin has to suffer to save us. Especially when one of the people she’s saving is the married professor who seduced her and then broke up with her via email. Why can’t we ever have to sacrifice that guy?

And I watched the documentaries about the effects–the approximately 100 practical monsters they created, the little details like the glowing coals in the reanimated mother’s belly.

And this time, I found a new favorite line. When I get my students’ first screening response on Wednesday, I hope they present them in the right way: “This we offer in humility and fear.”

Denise and I had the opportunity to be interviewed for a great podcast.

You can listen here.

Desired spin-off: The Odd Couple, featuring Thor and The Hulk

Whom I most want to cosplay: Hela

Best Prop: Tony’s Duran Duran shirt, which Bruce borrows

Best music: whatever Flash-Gordony stuff is playing when they’re on the trash planet

Reason to watch the extras: More Jeff Goldblum

Line that sums it all up: Thor, what happened to your hair?

Why I like it: Thor is many things, but the mythology makes it clear that sometimes he’s an oaf. This film shows us that, with impeccable comic timing.

Live Plays and Performances: 36

Antony and Cleopatra; Come from Away; Keith Lowell Jensen’s Not for Rehire; Kinky Boots; Metamorphoses; Slowgirl; A Winter’s Tale; Home; Two Pints; The Other Place; Keith Lowell Jensen’s What I Got Arrested For; A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Bridge Theatre with Brianne of Tarth; Blithe Spirit; Small Island; Aaron Simmonds’s Disabled Coconuts; Heidi Kills Time; Macbeth; Wuthering Heights; The Lehman Trilogy; Weird Al Strings Attached Show; Hamilton; In the Heights; Hannah Gadsby’s Douglas; Oklahoma; Life Sucks; Sleep No More; Play Time; Margaret Atwood: Live in Cinemas; Between Riverside and Crazy; Fat Kid Rules the World; Ranked; Burst; White Noise; The Humans; Hansard; Present Laughter

Davisville interviews: 1

Podcast interviews: 2

Other interviews: 3

New books published: 1

Herniated discs: 1

Ligaments strained: 2

Surgeries and injections: 4

Incredible butt bruises from falling down in DC: 1

Times I went into shock after a blood vessel getting nicked during an allergy shot: 1

New doctors broken in: 7

Osteopath appointments in Oxford: 4

Times I got to fly in the fancy class across the pond: 2

Times our little blind kitten got himself lost: 1

Times my cocky little Thoth got himself lost, except the neighbors thought he was just out on his usual stroll: 1

Visits to the Dallas/Ft. Worth Airport Pappadeaux Seafood Kitchen: 2

Visits in which I was able to eat the amazing grouper at the Pappadeaux Seafood Kitchen: 1

Times I cried in a German airport: 1

Times I found a bed and a chain in a bathroom at UCD: 1

Times I watched Good Omens all the way through: 3

Times I held a chicken: 1

Full books finished (not counting issue comics, magazines, online reading; counting rereads): 61

Lamentation by Ken Scholes; Lucy & Andy Neanderthal by Jeffrey Brown; The Rook and Stiletto by Daniel O’Malley; The Healing of America by T.R. Reid; The Secret Loves of Geeks by Hope Nicholson (ed); No Apparent Distress by Rachel Pearson; Nelvana of the Nothern Lights by Adrian Dingle; Space Opera by Catherynne M. Valente; Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann; Fire and Hemlock and A Tale of Time City and Howl’s Moving Castle and Dogsbody by Diana Wynn Jones; La Belle Sauvage by Phillip Pullman; TransAtlantic by Colum McCann; Above the East China Sea by Sarah Bird; Meaty and Same Year, Same Trash by Samantha Irby; People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks; I’m Just a Person by Tig Notaro; How to Marry a Werewolf and Impudence and Competence and Reticence by Gail Carriger; Down Among the Sticks and Bones and Beneath the Sugar Sky by Seanan McGuire; The Rooftoppers by Katherine Rundell; Among Others by Jo Walton; the four Murderbot Diaries books by Martha Wells; Fangirl and Wayward Son by Rainbow Rowell; There There by Tommy Orange; The Butchering Art by Lindsey Fitzharris; Bitter Medicine by Clem and Oliver Martini; The Deepest Well by Nadine Burke Harris, MD; a book of short stories edited by Neil Gaiman; Heavy by Keise Laymon; first two books in the Inheritance Series by NK Jemison; The Testamants (twice) by Margaret Atwood, along with Alias Grace and Cat’s Eye; The Fellowship of the Ring; Alice in Wonderland; Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban; The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by CS Lewis; A Discovery of Witches and The Shadow of Night by Deborah Harkness; Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents by Octavia Butler; How to Talk to Girls at Parties by Neil Gaiman; A Very Scalzi Christmas by John Scalzi; The Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter and European Travel for Monstrous Gentlewomen by Theodora Goss; So, Anyway by John Cleese

Purses stolen: 1

Drivers licenses obtained, because the replacement license I had to get after my purse got stolen expired six months later: 2

Epic battles with the credit card company after they accused me of lying about my purse being stolen: 1

Epic credit card battles won: 1

Performance of my one-woman show: 2

Stand-up performances (other): 7

Museums and Exhibits: 54

British Museum, Sally Lunn Museum, American Museum and Gardens in Bath, Jane Austen Centre, Bath Abbey, The 9/11 Museum, Neue Gallery, Old Royal Theatre and Masonic History Tour, Wellcome Collection, British Library, Victoria and Albert food exhibit, Design Museum Kubrick exhibit, The American Writers Museum in Chicago, Bampfa in Berkeley, Native American Museum where I had bison, African American Museum, Natural History Museum in DC, FDR monument, MLK monument, Whiskey Museum, Little Museum of Dublin, Famine Exhibition, Dublin Gaol, Dublin Castle, Trinity College Library and the Book of Kells, EPIC Immigration Museum, The Divinity School, Natural History Museum in Oxford, The Sheldonian Theatre, Christ Church, Magdalene, The Oxford Botanical Gardens, The Harry Potter Studio Tour, Stonehenge, Prague Castle, Wilton House, The Acropolis, The Museum of Cycladic Art, The Acropolis Museum, Athens’a 1st Cemetery, National Archaeological Museum of Athens, MSU Museum, Sedlec Ossuary, Kupta Hora Cathedral, Brno Ossuary; The Church of Loreto in Prague, The Temple of Poseidon, Underground Market Labyrinth in Prague, Saint Charles Bridge, Uncomfortable Oxford Walking Tour, Trinity College Oxford, Wadham College; Bodelian Library exhibits; the Roman Baths

Attendees at this fall’s UC Davis stand-up club performances: Hundreds!!!

Non-California cities visited: 16

Chicago (twice); Washington DC; Anaheim; Cincinnati; London; Bath; Gerrards Cross; Oxford; Dublin; New York; Prague; Brno; Vienna; Kupta Hora; East Lansing (and Lansing–I can’t count this as two); Athens

Exciting new ice cream flavors tried: 2

(G&T and Black Currant and Clotted Cream)

Times Anubis ate rum cake: 1

Conferences: 8

The first jacket I’ve ever cared about, bought at WonderCon, which I think might begin a new era in which I care about clothes sometimes (my new prescription sunglasses make it a verified trend): 1

New nephews and cousins: 2

Gin distilleries: 2

Whiskey distilleries: 4

Ouzo distilleries: 1

New pubs tried in Oxford: 7

Times I couldn’t tell the difference between a packing crate and a shopping basket in Oxford: 1

Baby showers hosted: 1

Courses taught: 16

New courses taught: 1

Christmas ornaments I had the energy to put up: 2

Times I probably irritated Weird Al by making him sign his tiny gold record: 1

Trips to Nandos: 8

Times I got to eat fried okra in a hotel room with a view of the Acropolis: 1

Incredibly bad flus I currently have, which have knocked me down harder than I’ve been knocked down in years and that probably guarantee I’m forgetting some stuff for this list: 1

A little over a year ago, I broke up with someone and decided to take a break from dating.

(I took a break from that when I was in Oxford.)

After much reflection, I’m not going to restart dating any time soon.

Now, I’m not saying that if I meet someone out in the wild and feel a spark that I won’t succumb, but the active search is off.

The very thought of activating a dating profile fills me with exhaustion and existential dread.

I’ve spent a lot of this year just staying alive, including surviving another herniated disc. I’m never bored, never lonely. There aren’t large gaps of time waiting for a guy to fill. I’d have to create gaps for one, and I don’t have the energy to do it.

And now for the existential dread. I’m not sure exactly what I even want. I just know what I don’t want. I don’t want to get married. I don’t want more kids. I don’t want to live with someone.

And in looking back at a factor of some failed relationships, I don’t want guys in my workspace. I can almost never take a whole weekend off, which is both a product of my workaholism and of the financial circumstances that have me teaching way more than a full-time load every year.

It’s sometimes okay when I’m grading papers at a guy’s place.

But I just can’t seem to do it when they’re at mine. I mean, I get the grading done, but it takes longer because I have to turn on the tv or whatever to keep him entertained in a space that’s not his own. And it wears on me a bit, having to work so much. And then I find myself getting annoyed by this person who isn’t working. And I feel pressure to finish faster cause he’s at my place.

This isn’t how it is at first, of course. In the honeymoon phase, I want to spend as much time as possible with the guy. Nothing annoys me, not even the objectively annoying stuff.

But the honeymoon phase is shorter and shorter as the years go by. I don’t know if this is because I’m getting more intolerant or just more honest. Or both.

I think, though, that the phase lasts longer if I only see him when I can actually carve out that time or when we can be at his place when the work has to overlap with the notwork.

I miss the sex, of course. And I definitely need more oxytocin.

But right now, I don’t miss having a boyfriend. I feel relieved I don’t have to negotiate someone else’s feelings with I’m suffering with this incredible flu.

I know all of this might change. But for now, don’t expect a lot of entries in this thread.

I’m gonna start this by saying it’s the absolute best time to get this sick. I’m trying to be thankful this isn’t happening to me during a quarter or at a conference.

Because I’m fucked up.

I was having an amazing time in Greece (more on that in a later post). It was my penultimate night (Saturday); I headed out for some seafood. But then, all of a sudden, I couldn’t eat the seafood. I hit a wall. I thought I was just tired from pushing myself so hard.

So I went home and put myself to bed. A few hours later, I woke up with a stuffy nose and a very sore throat.

In the morning, I went down for breakfast, to a lovely staff who knew how I took my tea. And then I couldn’t finish my breakfast or my tea.

So I spent the last day in Greece in my hotel room. I tried to have room service a couple of times, but it didn’t go well (who puts a whole bottle of mustard on a sandwich before sending it up)?

On Monday, I got up at 3 a.m. and took my sick ass to the airport. On the first of my three flights, my eardrum perforated, making the rest of the day even more awful. About 24 hours later, I was home.

I keep thinking that I’ll wake up feeling better. But everything just keeps trading off. The better the sinus congestion gets, the worse my throat does. The better my ear congestion gets, the more I get pink eye.

My headache is extraordinary–my TMJ is totally triggered by the congestion and the ear pain and having go breathe through my mouth. Right now, I feel like something’s trying to squash the whole right side of my face and neck. My back keeps reminding me that it hasn’t enjoyed six plane rides and a week in a strange bed.

Writing this blog is the most my exhaustion has let me do.

I’m not sure what I have. All the signs point to flu, except I don’t have a fever.

Just to top it all off, I’m having my period, although my lady parts doctor says on my birth control, they’re not periods, they’re just break-through bleeding (that happens just like periods do). I don’t have an acronym or a cute name for that.

And I’m too exhausted to figure one out.

I’m going to have to lie down after finishing this sentence.