MoodyTunes

Welcome news from the Land of Arbitrary Rules I Love: more and more professors are banning laptops in college classrooms.

This isn’t exactly news — laptop bans show up on many an English department syllabus in my neck of the woods — but it did re-stimulate my amazement at students tapping away on laptops in classes. I sat in on an undergraduate class on Ulysses last year and every day I watched two students pull out their computers and play on Facebook or instant message people for the entire class. That irritated me on three levels:

#1 — I hate distractions of any sort, and people tapping on keyboards is right up there with the sound of apple-chomping when it comes to driving me crazy. It’s even worse when I know the tapping is unrelated to whatever meeting or class I’m in.

#2 — Why come to class at all if you won’t even pretend to pay attention?

#3 — (probably most important) I’m jealous. Do you know how awesome it would have been to have a little laptop or iPhone to play with during boring economics classes? Really damn awesome. Instead, my brain was infected with the type of mid- to late-90s theorizing that got us into this horrible world-wrecking economic mess we’re in today. I’d have given anything to be playing Mafia Wars on Facebook during those lectures, and maybe we’d all be better off if everyone else had been distracted, too. All you jerks who got As in Econ during the 90s: THANKS A LOT. I’ll take my C-average (but A-average in my major, English) self over world-wrecking any day. At least I can sleep at night. In my cardboard box.

Anyway, I banned laptops in my classes solely because of a corollary to Irritation #3: If I couldn’t have one, you can’t either. Because, future students of Professor MoodyTunes who are reading this, I know what you’re doing. I was a bad student, and now I’m a teacher. That’s the worst possible scenario for you because I know how tired/bored/lazy you are, and I know your tricks, and I enjoy arbitrary rules.

And really, isn’t that the best lesson I could possibly teach? Welcome to adulthood, and please grab your List of Arbitrary Rules at the door. Memorize the List for a quiz tomorrow. But be aware that, by tomorrow, the List will be completely different.

P.S. — NO. There is no extra credit. Never. In fact, I’ll lower your grade for asking. Don’t even get me started on extra credit because that morphs into entitlement issues and I’m not smart enough to express my feelings on that.

…I’d had my camera phone with me when I was in the gas station that had “Lady Bubba” walking sticks for sale. You can build one yourself online, but you should definitely try one out in the aisles of a mini-mart first.

I’ll be rambling around a bit for spring break week so such musings might be all I have for the next few days. I think Monday polls will start up again soon. I just didn’t have any energy for polling the past two weeks. Polling is hard work! I’ve been happy to see that our toilet paper poll percentage (71% over, 29% under/other) matches the toilet paper commercial poll that’s been showing up on TV lately. As I’ve said, we’re determining the fate of the universe with polls…the mainstream media/advertising complex is merely following in our footsteps.

So, now that the power of the poll has been confirmed, next week we’ll do something fun like select winning lottery numbers.

I completed the final version of my thesis this weekend, and during one of my procrastination breaks I found a couple videos I thought I’d share. Here’s a kid named Sungha Jung jamming on his guitar. I went in search of classical music clips — that’s what I’ve been listening too lately, and that’s how I justified the hour-long hunt — and up pops Sungha. I think he’s 14 now, but in the clip below he’s 12 or 13 and playing U2’s “With or Without You.”

He’s got a ton of stuff up there…it’s worth a few viewings.

Then, thanks to Sungha, I remembered how much I like the guitar riffs in that U2 song so I found a live version of it. I can’t tell if it’s creepy or cool — Bono lays down on stage with a woman he pulls out of the audience. I’ll vote for cool. She does a good job not Tasering him when he goes in for the kiss.

I told someone last week, when I was talking about Barry Hannah, that every time I picked up “Airships” I felt happy that someone out there had made those stories — that Barry was out in the world, doing stuff, thinking how he thought, talking how he talked. I was sad because that’s all past tense now. But the thing is, there are artists doing amazing stuff all over the place. Maybe some kind of continuum. You lose one, and find another, or rediscover something you forgot.

I’m now going to sleep for about 133 hours. Have a good, musical start to the week.

Strange, strange feeling to learn that Barry Hannah died yesterday.

When I re-started my writing life in 2006, I found one of those Books Every Writer Should Read lists somewhere on the Internet. The list was sorted by titles, and a book called “Airships” was at the top. I thought I’d start from there and work my way down. I read some others, but that Hannah collection stuck with me.

Then, when I was paging through a magazine, I saw an ad for a summer writing conference and Hannah’s name was at the top of the list of faculty. I decided that come hell or high water, I was going to make it up there — it was the 2007 Juniper Summer Writing Institute at the University of Massachusetts. And make it up there I did…where I heard Hannah read and answer questions, exchanged a few words with him at lunch, and completely missed an opportunity to drive him to the airport at the end of the week.

This is what I wrote at the end of the trip:

I do want to post a brief bit about Barry Hannah. I listened to him read two stories Wednesday night, then participated in a Q&A session Thursday morning. If you haven’t read his stories, read them. If you can ever attend a reading, do it. The Q&A itself made this trip worthwhile, for many reasons, with the most important being his thoughts on writing, living, goals, and defining success. He’s a great teacher and a one-of-a-kind storyteller. And probably one of the funniest people I’ve ever heard speak. I wish I could write up his 2-3 minute riff on wanting to join Mel Gibson in “Braveheart,” wearing a kilt and face paint, running down a hill to bury a sword in an Englishman (”We just don’t get to do that enough anymore,” he said). Or about how he’d love to condense Shakespeare — “I wish Hamlet would just kill himself and stop all that talking.”

There will be plenty of Hannah stories popping up over the next few weeks, and I don’t have anything as cool as other people will, but I can say that Barry Hannah had one of the most unique and amazing presences I’ve ever encountered.

When I had to pick a story collection to talk about in my fiction workshop this semester, I chose “Airships.” Then, this week, I finished my MFA thesis. I’m not sure it ever would have come to be if I hadn’t read that collection…

Here’s a link to Hannah doing an interview and reading some stories.

Here’s a profile written by Wells Tower.

The line in the post title is from the story “Mother Mouth.”

I’m not really sure what else to say. I’m just going to leave this post up for a while.

This weekend I’ll be leading a fiction workshop for high school creative writers as part of the Nashville Young Writers’ Workshop program. It’s a day-long event with workshops, readings, panels, etc., all for the young folks out there. It’s heartening to see so many students dedicating a Saturday to creative pursuits…last I heard, over 125 people had registered.

Lydia Peelle, whose story collection “Reasons for and Advantages of Breathing” hit the streets recently, will be giving the keynote address. I’m excited about that, too.

And yes, after my diatribe about unoriginal angry chopping scenes in fiction, film, TV (and probably real life now that I think about it) I will be dedicating the majority of my workshop to “Expressions of Anger in the Home: What Not to Do.”

It’s been a treat to get involved with workshops and teaching opportunities like this…it’s a far cry from my cubicle life.

Congratulations go out to Lorraine Lopez, whose story collection “Homicide Survivors Picnic and Other Stories” was named a PEN/Faulkner finalist yesterday.

Buy the book buy the book buy the book buy the book buy the book buy the book buy the book buy the book buy the book buy the book buy the book buy the book buy the book buy the book.

I’ve had the privilege of working with this wonderful writer and teacher a teeny bit, and I assure you this is a well-deserved honor.

I found an interesting article at The Guardian, via The New Yorker, yesterday — they (Guardian) asked a bunch of writers to send in their random tidbits of writing advice.

Margaret Atwood, Richard Ford, Joyce Carol Oates, Anne Enright, Neil Gaiman, and others responded. It’s a fun list of lists to read over if you’re a writer, or if you’re curious about how writers talk about their work and process.

Some of my favorites:

“You most likely need a thesaurus, a rudimentary grammar book, and a grip on reality. This latter means: there’s no free lunch. Writing is work. It’s also gambling. You don’t get a pension plan. Other people can help you a bit, but ­essentially you’re on your own. ­Nobody is making you do this: you chose it, so don’t whine.” (Margaret Atwood)

“A problem with a piece of writing often clarifies itself if you go for a long walk.” (Helen Dunmore)

“Trust your reader. Not everything needs to be explained. If you really know something, and breathe life into it, they’ll know it too.” (Esther Freud)

“Honour the miraculousness of the ordinary.” (Andrew Motion)

…and finally…

“Keep a light, hopeful heart. But ­expect the worst.” (Joyce Carol Oates)

I get a kick out of reading interviews with writers, or lists like these. There’s never any consensus, and I don’t expect any. I enjoy all the different ways people say what they say.

What would my tips be, you ask? Well: train yourself to observe the world, read a lot, write a lot. The rest — when you write, what you choose to write, how often, who you show things to, writing program, no writing program, etc. etc. — is really just a matter of personal preference. Find what works for you, and do it.

Before we get to the important poll business at hand, I’m excited to see that there’s a new Clem Snide album due out this week. I’ve mentioned Clem Snide singer/songwriter Eef Barzelay here before — I really enjoy his work, and I’m fortunate to have seen him perform live. So this is good news.

Also good news: “Over” won a convincing victory last week in the Great Toilet Paper Debate. I’m surprised “under” got any votes, but I guess some folks probably hit the wrong button. It happens. It’s okay.

Now, for my poll. This is personal. Have you noticed how many angry vegetable chopping scenes show up in TV, movies, and books? No? Well, it happens all the time, I assure you. It’s a surefire way for a writer to show you an aggravated character…just plop them in the kitchen, talking on the phone or to someone at the sink, and give them a knife, and some carrots and celery and lettuce, and have them start chopping. Not just regular chopping – angry chopping. Why? Because the character is MAD.

Writers for the TV show “Caprica” — you’re on notice. Adama’s grandmother and her chopping toward the end of the show…come ON. Can’t you think up any other way to show an angry person in the home? Can’t they run around dusting furiously? Or launder clothes in a ferocious manner? Or plunge the toilet like it’s never been plunged? Or defrost the freezer? Or go totally crazy, and ride a lawnmower through the living room while singing “Old McDonald Had a Farm”?

My question, then: Does anyone else care about things like this, or do you accept the chopping?

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