Instructions: sign in to your blog. Take one of the items for your “Ten things about me and technology” list, and make that item the title of a new post. Now, take that item and flesh it out—write 200 words explaining this statement, going into more detail, or free associating. Post it.
My title: I've had a computer in my house ever since I was born.
The first computer I remember using was an IBM desktop that my dad set up. It had a modem before there was actually anything called "the internet"--my mom used it to directly connect to WestLaw and Lexis/Nexis, two databases that she used for teaching. It ran DOS but my dad set up an interface that allowed me to use it easily, even though I was a little kid. There was a menu where I could choose between different games I had on it. They were mostly shareware games that he found for me--my favorite was this thing called Captain Comic, where you played a spaceman and jumped around. For some reason, the computer had two monitors, and it only booted up through the first one, which was really old and monochromatic (it was orange and black).
When we bought a new computer after that, I remember it being very important that I never bring food anywhere near it, at great peril to myself. I was really afraid of messing up the brand new computer. It had AOL on it, and that's where I first started sending IMs, and going to chatrooms. We had games on it but a lot of them were really hard (Myst, anyone). The favorite of me, my dad, and my brother was something called "Master of Orion" but we also had Sim City and Tetris and Chip's Challenge and a bunch of other random games. I still have never beaten Myst, but I think my dad did. I had to help him with the music puzzle though.
Showing posts with label in-class writing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label in-class writing. Show all posts
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Welcome, WRA 110!
Hi to all my WRA 110 students. This is going to be a great semester, and I'm excited for us to all learn about writing together.
Our first exercise in this class will to get to know each other a little better, through writing. I don't know how many of you participated in the wave of people writing "25 things about me" lists last year, but I know I made one. Today, I would like you to make three lists about yourself: "Ten things you didn't know about me", "Ten things about me and writing", and "Ten things about me and technology". This will help me get to know you and your background as it relates to this class, as well as help you get to know each other (you will be posting these to your public blogs). To be fair, I will be writing these lists as well, and will post them here later.
Our first exercise in this class will to get to know each other a little better, through writing. I don't know how many of you participated in the wave of people writing "25 things about me" lists last year, but I know I made one. Today, I would like you to make three lists about yourself: "Ten things you didn't know about me", "Ten things about me and writing", and "Ten things about me and technology". This will help me get to know you and your background as it relates to this class, as well as help you get to know each other (you will be posting these to your public blogs). To be fair, I will be writing these lists as well, and will post them here later.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
25 Things Meme
So, today in class, we are working on writing 25 Things lists. This is a meme that has been circulating around facebook for a little while now. (It's not particularly new to me, I have written similar lists back when I used Livejournal all the time.) The purpose of this assignment is to practice the kind of casual personal writing that is more common to blogging that a lot of what we have written so far in class for our blogs, and also to get some experience composing our identities for the audience of the internet.
Here are the instructions from the meme:
Rules: Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it's because I want to know more about you.
You can't really tag people on Blogger in an entry (I think...can you?) so I invited my students to post this list to their facebook page, or other social networking site as well if they like.
As an example, I showed students my list. It is a little more...confessional than I usually am with them, but that's what is expected of this genre of writing. So, in the interest of fairness, here is my list.
1. I love chocolate desserts to be a little bit salty. My mom made me some chocolate cupcakes and I have been sprinkling sea salt on them before eating, for example.
2. I own a copy of Archie Meets the Punisher, one of the silliest comics crossovers ever.
3. I was as a kid and remain a pretty huge Babysitters' Club fan, and as an adult bought a bunch of the terrible straight to video adaptations on VHS. The graphic novel adaptations, however, are actually good.
4. I also collect Barbies and my favorite is Barbie's friend Chelsea, who has a nostril stud, wants to be a singer-songwriter when she grows up, and whose favorite food is gardenburgers. Queerest barbie doll ever. Thank you 1999.
5. I've been to London, Mexico City, and Los Angeles, but I've never been to New York City.
6. I correctly predicted the end of the last Harry Potter book.
7. I used to be kinda goth and I drew this squiggly Death line (faux eye of horus thing) on my face every day with eyeliner. Once I stopped doing it I found out a lot of people i went to college with had thought it was a face tattoo.
8. My family used to make fun of me for liking a lot of foods that smell like feet.
9. Among lots of other things, I'm allergic to mangos, they make my mouth break out.
10. I'm not a really big trekkie by any means, but I've had regular dreams that I was on the Enterprise with Picard and everybody for about the last 15 years.
11. I love Victorian medical manuals.
12. I only have one ear pierced. So does my mom, but she has two holes in it.
13. Deep down inside, what I really want to do is rove around with a pack of friends and solve mysteries.
14. I think Bull Durham is one of the sexiest movies I've ever seen, minus Susan Sarandon's terrible wardrobe.
15. The most upset I've ever gotten over a celebrity's death was when Shari Lewis died. I cried.
16. I have a really good ear for identifying voice actors, developed from watching a lot of Warner Brothers and Nickelodeon cartoons in the 90's and reading the credits obsessively.
17. There are only two movies I got creeped out and couldn't finish watching, Se7en, and Eraserhead.
18. My girlfriend and I were the stars of a stock photo that the State News used a couple times when they needed a picture of gay people to go with AP wire stories. It was a bad photo too.
19. I think my favorite raw vegetable is kohlrabi.
20. I used to identify as "anthrosexual" to protest the gender binary implied by "bisexual" but I went back to "bisexual" because I got really, really tired of explaining my unique snowflake sexuality.
21. I tried to write a novel this one time and it didn't really work out but I think it helped me get chicks. Or maybe, chick. Uh cause female Holden Caulfield drives freshmen in college wild.
22. I have a signed picture of Julie Newmar in my hallway. She was nice.
23. I have a week's worth of webcomic t-shirts and hoodies, and a week's worth of t-shirts that say "vagina" on them from being part of the Vagina Monologues for a number of years.
24. I like dry, dirty martinis, and I get a lot of compliments from waiters and waitresses for ordering such a thing. I guess they are bored with serving people beer. This has happened at Pizza House twice lately.
25. I got to have a guest appearance in my friends' webcomic. They drew me very flatteringly. Although I really hope they turn my character into a supervillain.
Here are the instructions from the meme:
Rules: Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it's because I want to know more about you.
You can't really tag people on Blogger in an entry (I think...can you?) so I invited my students to post this list to their facebook page, or other social networking site as well if they like.
As an example, I showed students my list. It is a little more...confessional than I usually am with them, but that's what is expected of this genre of writing. So, in the interest of fairness, here is my list.
1. I love chocolate desserts to be a little bit salty. My mom made me some chocolate cupcakes and I have been sprinkling sea salt on them before eating, for example.
2. I own a copy of Archie Meets the Punisher, one of the silliest comics crossovers ever.
3. I was as a kid and remain a pretty huge Babysitters' Club fan, and as an adult bought a bunch of the terrible straight to video adaptations on VHS. The graphic novel adaptations, however, are actually good.
4. I also collect Barbies and my favorite is Barbie's friend Chelsea, who has a nostril stud, wants to be a singer-songwriter when she grows up, and whose favorite food is gardenburgers. Queerest barbie doll ever. Thank you 1999.
5. I've been to London, Mexico City, and Los Angeles, but I've never been to New York City.
6. I correctly predicted the end of the last Harry Potter book.
7. I used to be kinda goth and I drew this squiggly Death line (faux eye of horus thing) on my face every day with eyeliner. Once I stopped doing it I found out a lot of people i went to college with had thought it was a face tattoo.
8. My family used to make fun of me for liking a lot of foods that smell like feet.
9. Among lots of other things, I'm allergic to mangos, they make my mouth break out.
10. I'm not a really big trekkie by any means, but I've had regular dreams that I was on the Enterprise with Picard and everybody for about the last 15 years.
11. I love Victorian medical manuals.
12. I only have one ear pierced. So does my mom, but she has two holes in it.
13. Deep down inside, what I really want to do is rove around with a pack of friends and solve mysteries.
14. I think Bull Durham is one of the sexiest movies I've ever seen, minus Susan Sarandon's terrible wardrobe.
15. The most upset I've ever gotten over a celebrity's death was when Shari Lewis died. I cried.
16. I have a really good ear for identifying voice actors, developed from watching a lot of Warner Brothers and Nickelodeon cartoons in the 90's and reading the credits obsessively.
17. There are only two movies I got creeped out and couldn't finish watching, Se7en, and Eraserhead.
18. My girlfriend and I were the stars of a stock photo that the State News used a couple times when they needed a picture of gay people to go with AP wire stories. It was a bad photo too.
19. I think my favorite raw vegetable is kohlrabi.
20. I used to identify as "anthrosexual" to protest the gender binary implied by "bisexual" but I went back to "bisexual" because I got really, really tired of explaining my unique snowflake sexuality.
21. I tried to write a novel this one time and it didn't really work out but I think it helped me get chicks. Or maybe, chick. Uh cause female Holden Caulfield drives freshmen in college wild.
22. I have a signed picture of Julie Newmar in my hallway. She was nice.
23. I have a week's worth of webcomic t-shirts and hoodies, and a week's worth of t-shirts that say "vagina" on them from being part of the Vagina Monologues for a number of years.
24. I like dry, dirty martinis, and I get a lot of compliments from waiters and waitresses for ordering such a thing. I guess they are bored with serving people beer. This has happened at Pizza House twice lately.
25. I got to have a guest appearance in my friends' webcomic. They drew me very flatteringly. Although I really hope they turn my character into a supervillain.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
My slogan
Today in class, I had everyone choose a sticker from Srini Kumar's Sticker Nation: The Big Book of Subversive Stickers Volume 1 and write about it (there is also a Volume 2 but I don't have it). It was a simple exercise, but I am very happy with the interesting writing that it generated. Also, people love stickers, and I am happy that everyone was so enthusiastic.
To be fair, I participated in the writing exercise as well. Everyone is posting their responses to their blogs, and so am I!
"YOU ARE NOT WHAT YOU OWN"
I have followed Unamerican.com for many years, through two (maybe 3? I can't remember when I first went to this site) presidential administrations and I have seen these slogans evolve.
This slogan has always stuck otu to me. I am a collector--and I tend to hoard things, even immaterial things like files on my computer or memories. When asked to do that 25 Things meme, a good number of the things I have thought were most interesting about myself were things that I own. I was embarrassed to realize that when i saw other people's lists that I had focused so much on my posessions. I try not to get too attached to material things but collections--comic books, toys--are sometimes easier to deal with than people. Oh, life.
This slogan is subversive because American (and global capitalist) culture values posessions as status symbols so much that ownign more stuff becomes people's motivation in life and defines them. This sticker challenges us to re-think our consumption and our drive to die with the most toys.
To be fair, I participated in the writing exercise as well. Everyone is posting their responses to their blogs, and so am I!
"YOU ARE NOT WHAT YOU OWN"
I have followed Unamerican.com for many years, through two (maybe 3? I can't remember when I first went to this site) presidential administrations and I have seen these slogans evolve.
This slogan has always stuck otu to me. I am a collector--and I tend to hoard things, even immaterial things like files on my computer or memories. When asked to do that 25 Things meme, a good number of the things I have thought were most interesting about myself were things that I own. I was embarrassed to realize that when i saw other people's lists that I had focused so much on my posessions. I try not to get too attached to material things but collections--comic books, toys--are sometimes easier to deal with than people. Oh, life.
This slogan is subversive because American (and global capitalist) culture values posessions as status symbols so much that ownign more stuff becomes people's motivation in life and defines them. This sticker challenges us to re-think our consumption and our drive to die with the most toys.
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