Discovery!

[highlyeccentric]

I have hit upon a method of ensuring a more balanced response to returned Anglo-Saxon essays. Normally, I read them through from the begining, become dismayed by all the very obvious errors therein, and grow so cranky at myself that by the time i get to the nice comments at the end I don't believe "well done, excellently researched essay with some great ideas". Then I stomp around the house for interminable lengths of time, cranky with myself for obvious errors, wishing i could be angry at my awesome teacher for being right, and wondering why i didn't stick with nice granddad lecturers who return essays with "well done Amy, you got 84 things right, but you discount Adela of Blois" and little more. And I write entries like this.

Melanie returned my essay on Þyncan yesterday. My new Balanced Approach entails me not looking at the essay immediately. In fact, it entails me not looking at it at all until both Kate and I are home. Then I get Kate to get the essay, flip it open to the back, tell me what the mark is and read me the comments at the end. Only when I have properly internalised this positive overall feedback am I allowed to read the detailed constructive comments. (And if the overall feedback turned out to be negative, then, well... I was going to be really really cranky anyway, wasn't I?)

As a result, today I am alternately stomping and smiling my way around my room.

Comments

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

I'm genetically incapable of waiting to see what a mark is! How the hell do you put up with the tension of having the essay sitting there, smiling at you, saying "I know something you don't know" while you wait for Kate to arrive and become tenser and tenser?

I couldn't do it. I'd go mad first.

[highlyeccentric.livejournal.com]

i actually forgot about it. i was *going* to get you to read it to me before or after Cosmology, but i seriously did forget.

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

The entire concept is alien to me. I'd go mad in about five minutes.

[phrasemuffin.livejournal.com]

why can't you just flip to the back of the essay by yourself? You seem to have enough self control to not read any of it until Kate gets home, so why the inability to ignore all but the best? Doesn't waiting just get you more nervous and anxious?

[highlyeccentric.livejournal.com]

incapable of not looking at the pages on the way through. weird, i know

and no, it maketh me not anxious. as i said to B, above, i actually forgot about it!

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

That icon is "Pretty When you Cry," from VAST.

Just, um, lettin' you know. Because you didn't.

*hides*

[phrasemuffin.livejournal.com]

actually, you're right - I didn't know :)

it's also not the correct words, if I remember correctly. When I made the icon, I'd seen a similar one somewhere else, but couldn't find it, so I was working from memory.

*waves*

[highlyeccentric.livejournal.com]

Random David, meet Brenton. Brenton, this is Random David.

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

im in ur LJ, harassin ur friends

[highlyeccentric.livejournal.com]

it occurs to me that it must have been quite a task for that girl to play river

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

Yes, I imagine so. But she did a phenomenal job.

[phrasemuffin.livejournal.com]

"I think I swallowed a bug" *panic!face*

I think that would have to be my favourite River Moment. Apart from, you know, all the other River Moments. I love how she's the typical Unlikely Heroine In A Man's World, but she's different because she's "sick". She's flawed. So she's not a Mary Sue.

*river-related squeeing*

[highlyeccentric.livejournal.com]

i love Kaylee :D:D

[phrasemuffin.livejournal.com]

Kaylee is my second favourite. She's all "I speak to machiiiines!", so she's all sorts of awesome in my books.

That, and she has some of the best more-than-innuendo-but-less-than-crude lines :P

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

Man, if I start on River squeeing, or Firefly-in-general squeeing, I will be here all night.

[phrasemuffin.livejournal.com]

are you talking serenity?!

or am I butting in inappropriately?

[highlyeccentric.livejournal.com]

we are talking Firefly :D

and feel free to butt in ;)

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

"I didn't want to hurt you, but you're pretty when you cry."

"I didn't really love, but I'm pretty when I lie."

The lyrics aren't next to each other, but that's not important.

Uh. Hope that helped. I don't normally tell people they're wrong (highlyeccentric will tell you that is a LIE), but you said on the thing that you didn't know, so I figured I could tell you. Because I did know. And I like VAST.

Anyway. Hello!

[phrasemuffin.livejournal.com]

When I saw the icon, it really struck a chord with me. It was, in retrospect, a complete summation of my relationship with The Ex. Except that I'm not the sorta guy who beats up on a woman. Crimes against women. Australia says no.

Oh... on- on the thing you say... okay... :S

Telling people they're wrong is fun, though. "If you don't raise your hand, then no one will ever hit you, and you will never learn." Or something like that. It's a good feeling, knowing you've helped someone learn something by inflicting them with public humiliation. :D

Is VAST their name, or is it an acronym?

Hello!

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

On your icon list, you said you didn't know the lyrics. That's the 'thing' I meant. I am Creepy Stalker Guy! When I see people interesting, I check them out. It is What I Do.

It is a very good song. I could email it to you, if you like? Email me at goblinpaladin at gmail dot com.

VAST (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VAST) is an acronym.

And, yeah, that was a lie. I tell people they're wrong all the time. Haha.

[phrasemuffin.livejournal.com]

OH! That thing! Right. Ok. Cool. It all makes sense now.

I think that's a fairly common response in an environment like this, really. That doesn't make you a Creepy Stalker type. It just makes you well informed, and better able to tell whether you want them clogging up your flist with their whining, or filling it with insightful... things.. and stuff... :D

Tee hee - I love that icon!

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

It is a pretty awesome icon. I have an excessive collection of fantastic icons, because I am a whore and I collect things.

I like you, and am going to add you. Because that is how it is done. If you want that song, email me.

[phrasemuffin.livejournal.com]

I used to collect icons, then I learnt about crediting the creators. I stopped, once I realised I had no idea who created 90% of the icons I'd collected, and therefore "couldn't" use them.

That was a sad day, indeed.

I like you, and am going to add you. Because that is how it is done.
If only that was how dating was done.
And I have added you back, btw :D

I probably will email you. Just not tonight. I don't do things in logical order, or orders that end in _logical. Like chronological orders. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if I have indeed emailed you already, even before your offering to email me the song. Of course, the fact that no such offer existed yet would have made it a blank email until such a time as the offer existed, and seeing as it is mail (even if of the electronic sort), it will probably have been mislaid somewhere, and arrive three weeks late smudged with unidentifiable fluids (even if of the electronic sort).

Um... yes. This is why I should not be allowed to write things late at night. Especially not presentations and essays and other assignments.

[highlyeccentric.livejournal.com]

he's right, it is a LIE.

[phrasemuffin.livejournal.com]

Of this I had no doubt - how could anyone resist a good correction?