Metafilter has a post about Roald Dahl today. As you might imagine, I’m all over that.

Matt linked to an amazing collection of Barbie dolls that have been repainted and costumed to look like Hollywood movie stars. It sounds cheesy, but give them a look. This guy is amazing. If he can transform a mass-produced doll into Liza Minelli, why can’t the toy companies make an action figure that looks anything like the real actor?

I’ve been thinking about teaching. I was whinging to the Snook the other day about my dissatisfaction with I.T. work when he suggested that I go back to school. Since I had so much fun leading training courses in London, he thought I should look into getting teaching credentials here. It’s an interesting idea. My friend Max teaches, as do my friends Liz and Kel in California. Ma Snook is a teacher-librarian. If you’d asked my second-grade self what I wanted to be when I grew up, I’d have said “a teacher” without hesitation. So I decided to look into it.

Unfortunately, it seems it’s a lot more difficult than I anticipated. Not only would it take two full years for me to get my Masters of Teaching from Sydney Uni, but as I’m still classified as an “International” student (because my permanent residency won’t be fully “permanent” for two more years), I’d have to pay about four times the tuition that Australian students would. Then there’s the question of whether my enthusiasm for training eager adults would in any way translate into enthusiasm for teaching sullen and obligated young people. I’m not sure. I just finished reading this five-part story about a journalist who took a year off to teach seventh grade English. His experiences are pretty eye-opening. I was always a good student, and in class I resented the teacher having to go so slowly and repetitively for the sake of other kids who couldn’t care less. Apparently, though, that’s exactly what teachers are forced to do. I like the idea of “breaking through” with a difficult student and teaching them something new, but realistically, how often does that happen? I’m not sure I could deal with putting out a lot of effort and seeing it go to waste. Someone once told me that journalism and education are the most cynical professions and that you lose your youthful idealism pretty quickly. I get depressed enough in I.T.; would it really be wise to make a move? (Article link courtesy of Moire.)

Nooo! Lance is not going into space! All my work was in vain.

Here’s a nice interview with R.E.M.’s Mike Mills as he reflects on Chronic Town twenty years after its release. (Link courtesy of Kevin.)

Sommelier, here I come!
The Snook and I almost missed our first wine-tasting class tonight because somebody misread the date on the acceptance letter. Tsk, tsk. Anyway, we’re doing this class through the Sydney Uni CCE with Huon Hooke, who’s this pretty famous Australian wine judge and writer. Tonight we learned all about how wine ages and why every wine doesn’t necessarily get better as it gets older. We tasted four different wines, two reds and two whites, and within each we had an older and younger version. (The oldest as a 20-year-old cabernet savignon. Snookums thought it was a bit past its peak though.) It was pretty cool for a novice like me, because comparing them like that made it easy to see the changes. I even managed to ask a good question: “If the big variable in how the wine ages – and whether it goes bad – is the cork, why the heck are we still using them?” Turns out Mr. Hooke is a big advocate of using other things, like plastic corks and screw tops. Huh. I also had a lot of fun watching the hoity-toity grown-ups spitting out each mouthful like professional tasters. Not me, babe. That wine was too good and expensive to waste. The “young” vintages were all, like, $60/bottle, and the older ones didn’t even have prices listed (because apparently the only way you get them is at auction). I believe wine exists to be drunk, so I downed ’em all. Lest you think I was the only lush, though, I’ll have you know that the woman on the other side of Snookums not only drained each glass before we even discussed it, she admonished the guy pouring for not giving her enough. I at least made a pretense of being there for the learnin’. 🙂

What a glorious spring day. Mmm, I wish you could smell our garden right now. Too bad that whole Internet odor thing was a bust. You’ll just have to look at these pictures I just took and pretend.

           

That first one is just a bit of the waterfall of jasmine that is cascading over the fence between our place and the neighbors’. It smells so amazing. A couple other houses on our street have it too, and you can smell it the second you open a door or window. That second picture is the little lemon tree Mama Snook got us last year. It’s doing much better in our garden than it was on our apartment balcony. In fact, it’s got some little buds and we thing it’s going to flower! The third picture shows some of the gigantic peace lilies we have growing in the back corner. It’s the same plant we used to have on our clothes dryer in London, except much bigger with several large flowers. And last is our neighbors’ lemon tree, which has dozens of large fruit the size of baseballs dangling from it. The closest branch is only a couple feet from the fence, so I’m hoping a stiff breeze might knock some over our way. 🙂

Notre Dame won their first game 22-0. GO IRISH!

In honor of the Salvador Dali exhibition opening in Sydney, the Herald has compiled a list of Sydney’s surreal masterpieces. I’ve seen the weird talking dog statue, but that’s pretty much it (other than Dance Dance Revolution, of course). I’d really like to go to the Grotta Capri Seafood Restaurant that was featured in Muriel’s Wedding. Is there anything surreal in your city?