Weekender: Friday Aug. 7th thru Sunday Aug. 9th, 2009

[JonPorobil]

What a weird day I've had!

I woke up to a call from a staffing agency I've been working with. Good news and bad news. The good news is that I got a job, and it starts Monday! The bad news is that the job's schedule won't let me attend The Austin Live Music Academy, which accepted me a few weeks ago.

I knew I nailed that interview Thursday, and I'd been anticipating having to make this decision. That didn't make it any easier. My wife promised to support me 100% until I could find a job with a more amendable schedule, but I decided to own up to my current situation, take the responsibility, and stop accruing debt. I e-mailed the Academy and told them I'm sorry, but I won't be able to attend this fall.

Later in the evening, Allyson and I went to a party at the home of two friends of hers, a gay couple. One of the men drank too much and the other felt excluded from the conversation, and a very bad, very awkward fight ensued. That was a bit embarrassing.

Question of the Weekend: If you could go back to school, what would you study?
(If you're already in school, what is your major?)

[fluffy]

I would study alcohol and its effects on me.

[Märk]

+2 to fluffy.

I would study "The Limits of Modern Prophylactics Coupled With Alcohol in a College Setting, and Their Effect on Having an Awesome Time With a Lady" , although I'm prolly just horny right now. Truthfully, I'd be all about the computer sciences classes.

[Paco Del Stinko]

I would go to art school where I almost did, and should have. Yeah, another starving artist, but so what? I reckon it'd be the same situation as my lame-o music, doing it just to create and scratch the itch. Or something like that.

Jon Eric: I still have the envelope your cd came in. Can I send you something in the mail? I promise to dispose of your address afterwards.

[rone rivendale]

QotWE: Well, I took a nite class back in 2000 for Introduction to C++ Programming at our local CC. But despite my many years of QBasic text rpg experience, all that stuff went way over my head and I never went back to take the next class. So I guess it'd be nice to take another crack at that again. But I probably won't ^_^.

[inevitableguy]

I would study alcohol and its effects on me.

If my college had offered this as a degree program, I probably would have had a much higher GPA.

[Caravan Ray]

I would study alcohol and its effects on me.

If my college had offered this as a degree program, I probably would have had a much higher GPA.

My university offered advanced level "Alcohol and its Effects on Fluffy". Seemed strange at the time, but it made me what I am today.

[nyjm]

I'm never leaving school and that's the way I planned it. I study a lot of things: pedagogy (that's a fancy word for teaching methods), cinema (that's a fancy word for movies) and contemporary feminist visual media (those are fancy words for "Battlestar Galactica," and "Doctor Who.")

No, seriously. I teach French and I undergo a yearly review by the department and have a third-year review by the college coming up; they take it seriously and I need to stay current on best practices. I have a book on French War Films coming out later this year; and the next project is - tentatively - French road movies (or at least the theme of travel in contemporary French cinema). Last October I presented a paper about women's roles in TV remakes (Bionic Woman, Doctor Who and BSG) and that should be published in an anthology sometime soonish. I'm currently working on a paper that makes parallels between the adaptation of literature to film and the writing of history.

It's some fun stuff, being an academic. But mostly, I get long paid holidays.

[signboy]

If I had the money/time to go back, I'd study electronic engineering so I could mod my stuff efficiently, or just ground my freaking guitar.

[Reist]

qotd: I'm in my BA of English Lit, third year. I'm switching schools this year though - going to U of C. It looks pretty legit.

[roymond]

Astrophysics.
And girls. It took five years to finish the two year course.

[king_arthur]

I actually did get to go back the past few years, for an A.A. in "Audio Production Technology" and a B.A. in "Interdisciplinary Arts and Performance." Unfortunately, neither one of those has helped in terms of getting back into the workforce, so if I were to go back again, it would be into a very focused program that is practically guaranteed to turn into a job when you graduate...

Charles (KA)

[Caravan Ray]

I did a masters degree in natural resource management that focused a lot on coastal management and ecology type stuff. I'd like to go back and expand that into broader oceanology and zoology. Sadly though employers keep sending me to law and management courses. I don't like them. They are full of lawyers and managers. And very few dolphins.

[JonPorobil]

I actually did get to go back the past few years, for an A.A. in "Audio Production Technology" and a B.A. in "Interdisciplinary Arts and Performance." Unfortunately, neither one of those has helped in terms of getting back into the workforce, so if I were to go back again, it would be into a very focused program that is practically guaranteed to turn into a job when you graduate...

Charles (KA)

What would that be?

[HeuristicsInc]

i think if i were doing that, i'd probably see about getting into a phd in statistical natural language processing. i'm studying that right now in a "in my free time" basis which is, uh, not much. but really i could do that... tho maybe not right now with a 6-week old kid at home and wife not yet back at work
-bill