god will not bless an educator driving a BMW who doesn't even seem to recognize the fact that she is driving around with an extra apostrophe. This car parks every day in my SCHOOL parking lot!

science and art

Same school. Same art teacher. Same art lesson. Same family.
Evidence for genetic variation?

if culture cast were in la....

I'd want to be covering this exhibit at the Paul Kopeikin Gallery.

Running the Numbers
An American Self-Portrait
by Chris Jordan

"This new series looks at contemporary American culture through the austere lens of statistics. Each image portrays a specific quantity of something: fifteen million sheets of office paper (five minutes of paper use); 106,000 aluminum cans (thirty seconds of can consumption) and so on. This project visually examines these vast and bizarre measures of our society, in large intricately detailed prints assembled from thousands of smaller photographs. My underlying desire is to affirm and sanctify the crucial role of the individual in a society that is increasingly enormous, incomprehensible, and overwhelming."

some pics to whet your appetite:





here's the full scoop.

good book spoiler

Stole this one from the tech dude at my school.
caution: don't scroll down if you really don't want to know....

thoughts on harry p. 1-401

I certainly would not want to presume to have any anything original or enlightening to say about Harry Potter. I'm the one who has to keep asking my husband for clarification about events/names/spells in the past six books, since my memory for details has always been hazy. He fills me in, as does my 8-year-old son who just finished Order of the Phoenix , when I ask them if they remember what a Squib is, or just what, exactly, the Fidelius Charm does. Heck, I just now made the connection that Sirius Black's animagus form was a dog! I know, you're thinking, she really doesn't have any authority whatsoever to speak about the adventures of the Boy Who Lived. Undesirable Number One. But as I've been reading Deathly Hallows, and thinking about kids all over the world reading it, I have begun to feel a bit hopeful about the future. I know how influential a story can be when you're 12. The pre-pubescents and adolescents may not get it now, but the seeds are being planted somewhere deep inside of them, and will reveal themselves later on by the choices they make, the beliefs they hold, the values they cherish. These are the things I like to think they will remember:
1. Always take umbrage at the Umbridges of the world.
2. Never trust what the Prophets say.
3. Tattoo also means a constant drumming sound.
4. When evil finally takes over all our trusted institutions, you will be standing outside feeling very, very alone. This is normal.
5. Latin is a cool language.
6 People with Power lie.
7. There really is a place apart from the known world.

in 451 words.....

Bill Moyers says it all.

You can catch Bill Moyers Journal every Friday on PBS at 9.
My mom had SUCH a crush on him!

funny sad things

deflated balloons in dark alleys
a moment worth capturing and no camera
addictions
locked doors
how long will it take me to get my GED?
inability to see shadows because you're standing in the way
you have no friends
7 is enough

this mortal coil

It's still rather magical to me how the internet can take me from here to here to here and then instantly, transcendently, bam! To 1987, age 20 (half my lifetime ago), wandering through campus in the drizzle and the dark at 2 am with It'll End in Tears by This Mortal Coil in my Walkman, mourning (to put it mildly) my lost love up on the 9th floor of Tingelstad Hall. Ironically, this music helped me keep my sanity during one of the lowest, most self-absorbed times of my life. The raw power of music in youth. The exponential power of the world wide web. Here's to the future: Gary (my lost love and now my found friend) and his wife Allison are expecting twins!


lyrics to "Song to the Siren" by This Mortal Coil

On the floating, shapeless oceans
I did all my best to smile
til your singing eyes and fingers
drew me loving into your eyes.

And you sang "Sail to me, sail to me;
Let me enfold you."

Here I am, here I am waiting to hold you.
Did I dream you dreamed about me?
Were you here when I was full sail?

Now my foolish boat is leaning, broken love lost on your rocks.
For you sang, "Touch me not, touch me not, come back tomorrow."
Oh my heart, oh my heart shies from the sorrow.
I'm as puzzled as a newborn child.
I'm as riddled as the tide.
Should I stand amid the breakers?
Or shall I lie with death my bride?

Hear me sing: "Swim to me, swim to me, let me enfold you."
"Here I am. Here I am, waiting to hold you."

scc update

here's me:
In Segment 45 of Springs Culture Cast, reporter Sue Spengler interviews zombies, drag queens, religious homophobes, and Mike Jones at the 17th Annual PrideFest Parade.


In Segment 51 of Springs Culture Cast, reporter Sue Spengler goes behind the scenes of a dress rehearsal at the Colorado College/Opera Theatre of the Rockies Vocal Arts Symposium.


if you wanna see Craig (and JOHN WATERS!), go here.

mama merit badges

So many of you reading this right now have earned all ten of these, and I just wanted you to take a moment and remember that every thing we do as mothers in this fucking world MATTERS and is significant not only to our families' lives, but to the planet we so often do not gracefully inhabit. Browse the website, read some stories, know that if I were rich I would buy for you all these little token gems of appreciation. But here they are, in virtual form, as my gift, for all the diapers we've changed, years we've nursed, choices we've made, and tantrums we've endured (both our childrens' and our own!)
P.S. Sorry, guys, I couldn't find any papa merit badges.....
P.P.S. Nor any for mamas of school-agers or teenagers.....

enjoy

2007-08

all the sharpies
are safe in their drawer
unable to ink on
unsuspecting, though orderly, desks
the diaspora from years of clinging
has been flung into piles of relativity
you would not be able to see the order amongst the chaos
i'm not ready yet
for the men and women who will come to me
seeking not only past tense verbs and the pythagorean theorem but
love
acceptance
worth
respect
welcome
friendship
meaning in the past and pythagoras' problems (damn right triangles!)
i give it all
all the while
safe in my drawer
with the sharpies

space is sexy...

.... in a lonely sort of way
a place for you
who like names and numbers
and six more

grany's dethday...

is what my 8-year-old son Grant wrote in the August 2nd square on the calendar hanging on our kitchen wall. At least he got the apostrophe right anyway. He's been reading the Harry Potter series furiously, and has gotten through books two and three in the past week (having read The Sorcerer's Stone a year ago), and is at my feet presently with The Goblet of Fire. He reminded me that Nearly Headless Nick had a "deathday party" with rotten food and raucous ghostly guests and musicians playing "not even real music".

He then most wisely informed me that in death years, Granny is only one year old! I'm wondering now if all our living years are like the negative numbers on the number line, and when we hit death, it's ground zero, and then the years we are no longer among the living can be counted into infinity. Or at least as long as there is someone left to count. Nearly Headless Nick was celebrating his 500th deathday. We will be dead for so many more years than we are alive.....