FINAL PAPER
Trevor couldn’t sleep at night. Ever since he had purchased tickets for PAX, two months earlier, he couldn’t find anything that would sufficiently distract him from the excitement of this upcoming convention. He tried reading his Dungeons and Dragons manual, he tried replaying Fable on his X-box, (only this time choosing to be good) and he had tried re-reading JRR Tolkien’s Silmerilian.
He had rifled through his closet every day for weeks, all the time concerned that he had nothing to do this event justice and proclaim his nerd pride to the world. Was it the day to show off his free Halo II tee in the charcoal black, his newly acquired Word of Warcraft: Burning Crusade tee in gunmetal black or the classic, ever popular, black-as-night Legend of Zelda tee with carefully detailed Master Sword in midnight black? After careful consideration Trevor decided that it was of the utmost importance to firstly proclaim his adoration for Penny Arcade in general and thus he decided on the midnight black, oversized, Twix and Weatherby attire, with perfectly coordinated Fred Meyer blue jeans. He chose his knockoff Target Doc. Martens, ‘80s shades and an Office 2007 messenger bag to complete the outfit.
Trevor’s concerned mother had noticed this newfound change in her 28 year-old son, and with a “tisk tisk”, she insured that he ate double broccoli servings at dinner. When she dropped him off the next day at 6:00am in front of the Maidenbour Convention Center she gave him a kiss on the forehead and bade him beware of “Goth girls”, who’s never ceasing attraction to skinny white nerdy boys she had heard about on Oprah. Trevor promised his mother he would be careful and quickly made his way toward the nerd posse waiting for him in the pre-purchased ticket line. At first the nerds were content to discuss whether Pirates or Ninjas would win in a battle of wits but after several hours of waiting, the nerds had become antsy. All had not checked their email, instant messaged their Internet girlfriends, or played WOW in all of four hours. Those waiting in the line to purchase tickets were glaring at the shiny red badges around Trevor and his fellow friends necks.
A large, baseball capped, football player type from the other line bumped into one of Trevor’s friends and didn’t acknowledge this significant faux paux.
“Hey man, watch it,” yelled Trevor.
“Fuck off, you little nerd,” the insolent, ignorant meathead yelled back.
A hush fell over the surrounding crowd. The football player didn’t understand PAX, he had probably come because of the 30 foot screens in which he could more effectively play Madden 07’. He didn’t read Penny Arcade - he’d never understand it. It wasn’t “for him”. The meathead didn’t know what he was getting himself into, he wasn’t in high school anymore and the jocks weren’t on top of the proverbial social ladder. He was in nerd country now, and no one used ‘nerd’ with such an utter lack of respect and in such a degrading fashion at PAX. It was ok for fellow nerds to call each other this term, but it was their word!
This was the once place in which nerds could put aside their feelings of shame and openly declare their unhealthy love of night elves, where they could assemble tabletop villages - complete with hand decorated warriors, and where “all your base” is just generally understood. Thus, Trevor and his fellow nerds could not let an openly offensive comment like ‘nerd’, from a jock, go unchallenged.
“Your mom services more requests than HTTP” Yelled Trevor, to a cheer from the surrounding crowd, complete with clapping and cat calls.
“She keeps all her ports open like Windows ME” Added in Trevor’s friend, holding back rage.
“What the fuck did you just say to me?”
Thankfully the PAX enforcers chose that exact time to open up the front doors and Trevor and friends were swept up in the scramble to get inside. Immediately Trevor led the way to the tabletop gaming arena, intent on testing his new ‘Magic’ deck. As he descended the floors, he caught sight of a set of fishnet tights and spiky black hair going past to the upper floors. They locked eyes in a purple flash and she was gone. Blinking Trevor stumbled off of the escalator.
Trevor spent several productive hours perfecting his strategy with the new cards, and with his friends egging, decided that a caffeine run was in order. Leaving the stand with arms full of Bawls and pockets packed with Bawls mints, Trevor decided to try his luck at the PC gaming arena.
Signed up for a Counter Strike: Team Fortress tournament, Trevor and friends prepared their headphones and microphones for the match. Teams and characters chosen, Trevor smiled at his friends and turning to the other team yelled,
“Well, prepare yourself for some internal fragmentation.”
After two fierce hours of bullets flying, several games had ended and Trevor’s team was still second in gross kills. Trevor spray-painted the brilliant blue color of team on the side of his base, in defiance. He led the way through the ruined surrounding buildings, sure to strife around corners to avoid early detection. Watching his teammates and looking around for the enemies, he stumbled into a side staircase that led the way up to a view of the final enemy flag and watched several enemies re-spawn before his very eyes. This spot was that was too good to be true. Whispering into his microphone, he alerted his teammates of this perfect sniper location, and told them from which angles to approach.
Suddenly brilliant purple eyes pulled him back into reality. There was the girl, in skin-tight leather with black fishnet tights. The roar of bullets from his right headphone forced his vision back onto the screen. His men were making their move, now, and they needed him to have their backs. Focus back on the task at hand, he took out three enemy men in the area, one after another, the red laser visible for less than a millisecond. His men slowly creeped in, in case of hidden reinforcements, but there were none. The ground desecrated, and the final flag taken by the blue, the game ended in victory for Trevor.
“Owned!” Yelled his teammates, as Trevor took off his headset and went in search of the purple eyes. Found at last, Trevor sat down next to the black haired girl watching the game from afar, and looking deep into her purple abyss asked, “What would you say if I told you I roll 20s?”
“Excuse me?” The girl blinked, and Trevor lost focus of his goal.
“Thhhat I roll 20s, you know twenty sided dice?” Trevor’s voice started to falter, his triumphant confidence slipping. How could this girl not understand? Did this girl not speak ‘nerd’? Would she not be impressed by his “Dungeon master” status? Would she laugh at his name being included in the Pong hall of fame at all three of the local arcades back in the day? Would she understand if he told her that she looked just like Arwin from Lord of the Rings?
“I’m sorry, do I know you?” The girl’s milky white face was crinkled in a look of distain.
“No… ” Trevor’s voice trailed off.
“Then why are you talking to me?”
Trevor gulped. Not responding, he stood up, turned around and slowly made his way back to his home base, his mother ship, his nerd posse. Head inclined down, feet dragging, Charlie Brown style.
“C’mon Trevor,” a friend said in an understanding tone, patting him on the back. “We have some nerd-cord rap to hit up.”
“Oprah was wrong, Tad.”
“What?”
“Nothing. Lets go.”
Futuristic Sex Robotz were still setting up their instruments when Trevor and friends descended upon the concert hall. They were thankful that they had planned for this concert in advance and already had bright orange armbands on their pasty white wrists. The smug look on their faces apparently became too much for a fiercely loyal FSR n00b with greasy hair that had the appearance of being died blue, at one time, long ago.
“Office 2007 sucks!”
“What did you just say?”
“I said, Office 2007 sucks!”
“My father worked on that edition you $@#$.”
“Not surprised.” Trevor had half a mind to challenge a “Virtual Fighter” Duel, knowing that the little twerp likely wouldn’t have heard of such an old school Saturn game.
“Yea, that’s right. Don’t be upset that my father could out program yours anyday. He reports to Steve Jobs!”
The Microsoft hit was too much for Trevor, and again he retorted without thinking. “Don’t you throw insults at me when you don’t have any idea what they mean, script kiddie! I was modding out my Atari from before you were born! I have more records beaten in Ms. Pack Man than you could count, and I was playing Vampire the Masquerade in my basement before the video game had even become a distant thought in anyone’s mind! Don’t be upset with me just because you’re frustrated that all ladies are giving you ‘Denial of Service’.
The newbie glared back, not sure to the extent that he had been insulted.
Futuristic Sex Robotz choose that time to take the mic, and it was perfect because the entire lack of any actual physical engagement was becoming awkward.
“… but Sammy J stands up and says “not tonight, I got a job to do, enough is enough, I’ve had it with these motherfucking snakes and stuff. ‘Gonna get this guy to court, safe and sane, I want these motherfucking snakes off this motherfucking plane!”
Trevor was fully enjoying himself and singing along, when he felt a tug on his oversized nerd shirt.
“That was kinda hot.” Trevor turned to face the purple contacts of his dreams. It was the girl. He could only mumble back, not actually string two words together.
“That was sexy, kinda, to see you tear that, what did you call him, “noob”, down. “ She touched his arm, and Trevor looked at it in shock.
“What if your dick was as big as the ocean, it’d be the only snake not encroachin’”….
“Do you want me to freak you?
“I think I’m ok, how bout not.”
“C’mon…” She began to dance with him, and obviously dance, in this context, is defined lightly.
“Talk nerd to me,” she whispered lightly in his ear.
“I can program?”
“No… nerd! Nerd terms, I want to hear you say them to me.”
“I’ll reformat your hard-drive?”
“Yes, that’s it! That’s what I want to hear!” Trevor was happy that the concert was so loud because this girl was yelling.
“My flow is so intense I'll overflow your buffer, corrupt your stack pointer -
making all your data scream with pain and pleasure.”
“Yes! YES!”
“What is your name, anyway?” Trevor asked, bewildered.
“Zelda.” And Trevor had been shot by cupid’s arrow. There was no hope for him now.
Thursday, March 8, 2007
Sunday, March 4, 2007
Averno Reading Journal
The time period appears fairly modern. The tone is fairly solemn and kind of depressing. The narrator is a female who is looking back at her relationships with other, she values expressing herself and remembering memories. The Persephone narrator’s relationship with the earth is a little different than what we are normally used to seeing. There is a fair amount of strain in that Persephone is in hell and resentment by the earth. Persephone appears naïve. The final verse refers to her eating the pomegranate seeds and dually the blood caused by her rape. She second guesses her self when she says ““Did I say ‘suffered’? That was my parents’ way of explaining tastes that seemed to them” The author chose to say the passage to show the way in which she went about coming to the conclusion about her word choice. In part one, Persephone is more of a younger naïve girl as opposed to part two in which she is more mature, less naïve and wishes she still was that young child with her innocence. I don’t understand the myth differently at all, but I did enjoy looking at it from her different perspective, and I think I may look at the myth differently now because I have multiple perspectives, but there is no change of understanding.
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Catastrophic Event StoryInto The Abyss
Into The Abyss
“Authorial Intention”
I was listening to a Song
Inspired, I began to
Type the story formed in front of me
An egomaniac, workaholic
With money
To spare
He doesn’t know what he’s
Doing only got where he is by knowing the right people
What goes around comes around
He gets what he deserves I felt
Like the character in my story
I wanted more time
At the end
For him to regret, for him
To develop
But his time was short
He
Wasn’t a nice guy, but he had regrets
He didn’t
“Deserve to die”
I was trying to go over the latest version of the software, but I kept thinking about the hot piece of ass I had seen on the street last night. Her hair was the white blond only natural for girls under the age of seven and her “little black dress” was just long enough not to give me a heart attack. I couldn’t stop thinking about the asshole she had decided to intertwine her carefully French tipped hand with. He was wearing a face of utmost arrogance and was obviously narcissistic: the size of his pecks told me that he had very little time to do anything but bench press small cars. Clearly she would have benefited from an individual with, well, a Black AmEx.
Suddenly I was jarred out of my musings about whether or not her tits were fake. The “you’ve got mail” icon was flashing in my System Tray. I had received my daily update from our software testers: apparently the Playcenter wouldn’t rip a CD. In my job I did little else but insure that my programmers were on the right track and were doing their jobs effectively and efficiently. I had gone to Harvard to network, and network I had. I was a general Business Administration major, not a goddamn Computer Science major. It was not in my job description to correct the problem, nor was it necessary that I needed to know how. It was my job to know whom to blame, and this time it was the Software Engineers.
Who’s fault could this be? Who was the head Software Engineer that I had assigned to insure that the Creative Playcenter 3 software would run smoothly with Windows ME?
I pressed the little blinking red button on the intercom and shouted “Lebrouski! Get your fat ass in here pronto!”
A small, young, yet balding man entered my office, “Uhhh, yes boss?”
“What is this shit? How the hell did you manage to fuck everything up already? How?” Lebrouski was a very nervous man, and I knew it was not productive to get him upset, but he had set us back a whole fucking week!
“I I I thought I uhhhh did everything fine, Boss. I d d debugged it several t t times before I sent it off to...” He forced out.
“So you checked for Syntax errors! What about Logic errors? Did you even run the program at all? This is full of bugs! You would have been equally as useful if you had just told the programmers to write it in binary!” I had never been able to understand or memorize all those goddamn 0’s and 1’s. How the hell is somebody supposed to remember what the hell 0110 0010 means anyway?
“Sssorry Bossss, I must ha ha have missed a a bug. I will make sure it gets f f fixed.”
“Without overtime!”
“Without o o overtime…” he sadly replied. He left the office slowly, without turning his back to me. What a lazy slob, god how he annoyed me. If he wasn’t the best programmer I had ever seen, I would have fired him long ago.
I sighed and went back to my computer. I decided the only way in which to get my mind off this stressful situation was to play Command and Conquer, Tiberan Sun. I logged online and quickly found three other people to play against. I allied myself with NOD, and chose dark blue as my color. As I had been to first to join I chose the scenario: ‘Tundra’, most money possible and a redeployable MCV . I changed my name to ‘Bulldog’ and I was just about to press ‘ready’ when a fellow player, ‘Jetblack’ IMd me: “Bulldog: can I request ‘Tundra’?
To spite him, I changed the scenario to ‘Tiberium City’ and pressed start.
Forty-five minutes later it was just ‘Jetblack’ and I. I guess I had really pissed him off because he was playing like a god. I decided that the only way to win would be in an all out attack. I set up a basic military strategy; first I’d take the destroyers out around his base, near the back. When he was distracted with the chaos they would bring, I would send in several engineers, which would promptly take over his barracks, missile defense system, then, finally, his MCV. That would be the end of him. I would bring in several Stealth Tanks to back up the engineers, and a Tanya. I was in the process of constructing my fourth Stealth
Tank when I heard something outside, some kind of rumbling. I looked out the window frantically to see what it could be, but I couldn’t see a goddamn thing. As I turned back to my screen, I saw about twenty brilliantly orange Mammoth Mk2 tanks coming in from all sides. I desperately tried to get my men out, but it was too late. I subsequently tried to salvage my MCV. I redeployed it and as it gradually made it’s way to the core of my base, I gathered my infantry and vehicles in a tight circle around the exterior. I was desperately trying to fight a passageway through the foe to pull my MCV out of what was left of my base and escape to the mountains. The Mammoths would not be able to follow.
I felt the rumbling again, it was quiet at first but it was getting louder. When the windows began to shake, I glanced out at them. I saw a massive commercial plane make an extremely close pass by my building – it was really fucking close. As I turned my head back to my computer screen I saw a little popup window that read ‘atom bomb approaching’.
“Goddamn it!” I yelled as the atom bomb hit my MCV and what was left of my base and the opposition’s men turned into a big flaming ball of fire. It was a suicide mission. The Mammoths were used to distract me from the obvious evidence of the atom bomb, and to keep all my men in one place; had I realized I simply would have moved my MCV out of its path.
The constant rumbling was now loud enough to blow out my eardrums, and as I finally turned around to see what the hell had happened to the plane, I saw the same enormous plane with it’s head aimed straight toward my corner office. In my peripheral vision, I had enough time to see Lebrouski stand up in his cubicle and yell “In your face you fucking asshole! Kiss my ass Bulldog!” and suddenly I was floating. It’s strange what goes through your head in this situation. I had spent my life working at a job I detested so that I could chase down shit that I didn’t need and wasn’t important. I was not my Armani suit, I was not my 2007 beamer parked in the VIP spot, and I was not my double tall, fat free no whip latte. And then my second was over and my eyes and ears exploded out of my head and I could think no more.
Writing Journal
The implications are that people can relate to your story easier because they already have the background information. The story is already naturally more powerful, though dually more cliché. You don’t have to spend so much time focusing on the exterior details and can instead focus on developing a good piece. I read fantasy and thus the point really isn’t to attach the plot to real world events. As a reader you can determine how reliable the depictions in literature is based on how close the actual writer is/was to the actual event. Of course you’d believe everything one said if one had actually experienced the event. I’d say that I would believe a first person account over any other: I generally don’t trust 3rd person accounts nearly as much because of the fact that I have been led astray by many texts. Unfortunately I missed the writings on the walls of the Museo. I chose to write about this particular event because I was actually alive during it and I’d say that I understood it and the context surrounding it the best.
“Authorial Intention”
I was listening to a Song
Inspired, I began to
Type the story formed in front of me
An egomaniac, workaholic
With money
To spare
He doesn’t know what he’s
Doing only got where he is by knowing the right people
What goes around comes around
He gets what he deserves I felt
Like the character in my story
I wanted more time
At the end
For him to regret, for him
To develop
But his time was short
He
Wasn’t a nice guy, but he had regrets
He didn’t
“Deserve to die”
I was trying to go over the latest version of the software, but I kept thinking about the hot piece of ass I had seen on the street last night. Her hair was the white blond only natural for girls under the age of seven and her “little black dress” was just long enough not to give me a heart attack. I couldn’t stop thinking about the asshole she had decided to intertwine her carefully French tipped hand with. He was wearing a face of utmost arrogance and was obviously narcissistic: the size of his pecks told me that he had very little time to do anything but bench press small cars. Clearly she would have benefited from an individual with, well, a Black AmEx.
Suddenly I was jarred out of my musings about whether or not her tits were fake. The “you’ve got mail” icon was flashing in my System Tray. I had received my daily update from our software testers: apparently the Playcenter wouldn’t rip a CD. In my job I did little else but insure that my programmers were on the right track and were doing their jobs effectively and efficiently. I had gone to Harvard to network, and network I had. I was a general Business Administration major, not a goddamn Computer Science major. It was not in my job description to correct the problem, nor was it necessary that I needed to know how. It was my job to know whom to blame, and this time it was the Software Engineers.
Who’s fault could this be? Who was the head Software Engineer that I had assigned to insure that the Creative Playcenter 3 software would run smoothly with Windows ME?
I pressed the little blinking red button on the intercom and shouted “Lebrouski! Get your fat ass in here pronto!”
A small, young, yet balding man entered my office, “Uhhh, yes boss?”
“What is this shit? How the hell did you manage to fuck everything up already? How?” Lebrouski was a very nervous man, and I knew it was not productive to get him upset, but he had set us back a whole fucking week!
“I I I thought I uhhhh did everything fine, Boss. I d d debugged it several t t times before I sent it off to...” He forced out.
“So you checked for Syntax errors! What about Logic errors? Did you even run the program at all? This is full of bugs! You would have been equally as useful if you had just told the programmers to write it in binary!” I had never been able to understand or memorize all those goddamn 0’s and 1’s. How the hell is somebody supposed to remember what the hell 0110 0010 means anyway?
“Sssorry Bossss, I must ha ha have missed a a bug. I will make sure it gets f f fixed.”
“Without overtime!”
“Without o o overtime…” he sadly replied. He left the office slowly, without turning his back to me. What a lazy slob, god how he annoyed me. If he wasn’t the best programmer I had ever seen, I would have fired him long ago.
I sighed and went back to my computer. I decided the only way in which to get my mind off this stressful situation was to play Command and Conquer, Tiberan Sun. I logged online and quickly found three other people to play against. I allied myself with NOD, and chose dark blue as my color. As I had been to first to join I chose the scenario: ‘Tundra’, most money possible and a redeployable MCV . I changed my name to ‘Bulldog’ and I was just about to press ‘ready’ when a fellow player, ‘Jetblack’ IMd me: “Bulldog: can I request ‘Tundra’?
To spite him, I changed the scenario to ‘Tiberium City’ and pressed start.
Forty-five minutes later it was just ‘Jetblack’ and I. I guess I had really pissed him off because he was playing like a god. I decided that the only way to win would be in an all out attack. I set up a basic military strategy; first I’d take the destroyers out around his base, near the back. When he was distracted with the chaos they would bring, I would send in several engineers, which would promptly take over his barracks, missile defense system, then, finally, his MCV. That would be the end of him. I would bring in several Stealth Tanks to back up the engineers, and a Tanya. I was in the process of constructing my fourth Stealth
Tank when I heard something outside, some kind of rumbling. I looked out the window frantically to see what it could be, but I couldn’t see a goddamn thing. As I turned back to my screen, I saw about twenty brilliantly orange Mammoth Mk2 tanks coming in from all sides. I desperately tried to get my men out, but it was too late. I subsequently tried to salvage my MCV. I redeployed it and as it gradually made it’s way to the core of my base, I gathered my infantry and vehicles in a tight circle around the exterior. I was desperately trying to fight a passageway through the foe to pull my MCV out of what was left of my base and escape to the mountains. The Mammoths would not be able to follow.
I felt the rumbling again, it was quiet at first but it was getting louder. When the windows began to shake, I glanced out at them. I saw a massive commercial plane make an extremely close pass by my building – it was really fucking close. As I turned my head back to my computer screen I saw a little popup window that read ‘atom bomb approaching’.
“Goddamn it!” I yelled as the atom bomb hit my MCV and what was left of my base and the opposition’s men turned into a big flaming ball of fire. It was a suicide mission. The Mammoths were used to distract me from the obvious evidence of the atom bomb, and to keep all my men in one place; had I realized I simply would have moved my MCV out of its path.
The constant rumbling was now loud enough to blow out my eardrums, and as I finally turned around to see what the hell had happened to the plane, I saw the same enormous plane with it’s head aimed straight toward my corner office. In my peripheral vision, I had enough time to see Lebrouski stand up in his cubicle and yell “In your face you fucking asshole! Kiss my ass Bulldog!” and suddenly I was floating. It’s strange what goes through your head in this situation. I had spent my life working at a job I detested so that I could chase down shit that I didn’t need and wasn’t important. I was not my Armani suit, I was not my 2007 beamer parked in the VIP spot, and I was not my double tall, fat free no whip latte. And then my second was over and my eyes and ears exploded out of my head and I could think no more.
Writing Journal
The implications are that people can relate to your story easier because they already have the background information. The story is already naturally more powerful, though dually more cliché. You don’t have to spend so much time focusing on the exterior details and can instead focus on developing a good piece. I read fantasy and thus the point really isn’t to attach the plot to real world events. As a reader you can determine how reliable the depictions in literature is based on how close the actual writer is/was to the actual event. Of course you’d believe everything one said if one had actually experienced the event. I’d say that I would believe a first person account over any other: I generally don’t trust 3rd person accounts nearly as much because of the fact that I have been led astray by many texts. Unfortunately I missed the writings on the walls of the Museo. I chose to write about this particular event because I was actually alive during it and I’d say that I understood it and the context surrounding it the best.
Sunday, February 25, 2007
Primo Levi Reading Journal
Levi’s poem was one of the first times I’ve read a poem before the actual work. I like the way in which it sets up the story, sort of puts you in a mood before you read on. I’d say the poem is trying to say “Remember the Holocaust and make sure you pass it on to insure it never happens again” The way in which I’d describe the narrator would be that he is rather naïve and that is also reflective. I think being naïve certainly adds to my sympathizing with him. The moments in the text that stand would be points that seem personal and extremely emotional, specifically the part in the beginning where Emilia died.
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Week 7 post
Judith sorted through her closet with an unusual crease in her perfectly arched eyebrows.
“My lady, what has you so concerned?” Judith did not answer immediately. She threw her soft pink silk dress down heavily and turned back to the window, breathing hard.
“This will not do, none of it will do!”
“What would you have me fetch for you? Do you dislike pink today?”
“I need something sultry, something that will make his head spin. He needs to want me so badly he’d be willing to die for me.” Margaret’s cheeks flushed, she looked back to the closet hoping to discern something new in its depths.
“My lady I believe I have just the thing,” Judith took in the fine material of her mother’s ancient gown with a sigh, remembering the delicate stitching and subtle blue brocade...
“I never did like blue; I’ve always found it rather dull.” Artemisia jumped and a long blue streak appeared over the broidery. Her face carefully set in a look of concern she turned to face his accusatory stare.
Artemisia chose her words carefully, “The virgin Mary is very often portrayed in such a regal color.”
“Yes, but the Virgin Mary is not a temptress, I don’t feel that this scene will be effective without showing how sinful women are, and how the only power they wield is of the flesh. It will not be believable that she conquered such a general as the chaste Virgin Mary, she needs to be portrayed in a more believable and powerful color.”
“I will do whatever you wish of me…”
Margaret’s delicate white hand was all that was first discernable while she held open the tent flap for Judith to enter.
“My god...” Holofernes’ eyes roamed over her body, like a dog looking at a rare piece of steak. “I see that you’re happy with your decision to entertain the idea of ‘us’, you’ve dressed up to impress me. Don’t think I don’t notice your feminine tricks.” Holofernes chucked deep in his throat, the laughter that could be heard when between the sheets when a man and a woman are alone together. It made the hairs on the back of Judith’s neck stand up.
“I thank you sir,” she felt his eyes upon her as she made her way towards the dinner table, the folds of her golden dress trailing behind her.
…
“This wine is deuuullissshhhh…. Delllllisshhhiiioous… deeeeliiissseesssccchhh…”
“I’m glad you like it Sir, I had it delivered from the North, especially for you. I really do like this idea of ‘us’ that you keep bringing up...”
“Yes… yeeeeeessss. USSSSSSS,” He made the last word into a snake’s hiss, eyes drooping and spit flying onto the table. He was obviously attempting to focus on her, and wavering back and forth, his elbow slipped out from under him and he almost fell from his large wooden chair.
“….and so this is exactly why I took up your invitation tonight, I really wanted to experience you, I have heard tell of your magnificence in battle, and I knew I had finally found a man that was suitable for my needs.”
“Yesssssssssss, suutiiiiiaable.” He had begun to list off his chair again.
“My lord, you are clearly not well, I will fetch your servants to help you to bed.”
“Noooooo, I feel fiiiine. FINE!”
“Yes my lord we will help you, don’t worry I’ll take care of you. I’ll insure that you get to bed.” She gestured to his servants. They picked him up and dragged him towards his bedchamber, Holofernes attempting to fight them off all the way.
“She doesn’t look attractive enough, how such a woman have seduced this man of such a powerful position?”
“Other artists have been criticized for the gentile and innocent look of Judith, that she wouldn’t have the strength necessary to accomplish the slaying.” Artemisia explained with pleading eyes. This painting was essential to her reputation, she needed everyone to take notice of her, and she needed their support, their understanding.
“Sigh…. Well at least make her cleavage more pronounced!”
Judith thanked the lord for Holofernes’ vociferous snoring, which was enough to cover the metallic sound of his sword unsheathing. She pulled up the sleeves of her dress past her elbows, and steeled herself for what she had to do for her family and her people. Her face finally set, she took in a deep breath. Bringing the sword above her head she spoke firmly, and her voice gave her power as it didn’t waver.
“Give me strength this day, O Lord God of Israel!”
The sound had awoken Holofernes, but it was already too late, and she felt the warm rush of the red liquid spray over her.
Artemisia stood up from the painting, the justice now dolled out, though only for a moment.
Journal questions
I chose to do what I thought would make the most believable and best piece. I hope that the way in which I chose two different options will suffice as a writing piece, because I did more than one! Writing believable dialog is challenging, and also trying to write in a way that isn’t modern, but obviously couldn’t be ancient. I hope the way in which I accomplished this isn’t comical. Obviously showing not telling is always difficult too, and is no different when writing dialog. I very much enjoy writing dialog, because it tells a lot about the character that cannot be told simply by utilizing other methods. I enjoyed the fact that it can be more abstract, and requires more thinking on the readers part to discern exactly what is true of what the character is saying and what is not. It was difficult but enjoyable. Visual works very much distract from my ability to be imaginative, because you cannot say anything that conflicts with the people shown, and the way in which the event is depicted. The maid had to be an integral part of the story, obviously, because she is depicted clearly in the painting.
I think the overall feeling of the city is very different; Naples is less touristy in my opinion, which makes it feel more real somehow. It is even more different than America and what I’m used to than Rome and feels more intense somehow. I don’t believe that Naples really changed how I wrote this story, because I have to be sitting on a computer to write at all, anyhow.
“My lady, what has you so concerned?” Judith did not answer immediately. She threw her soft pink silk dress down heavily and turned back to the window, breathing hard.
“This will not do, none of it will do!”
“What would you have me fetch for you? Do you dislike pink today?”
“I need something sultry, something that will make his head spin. He needs to want me so badly he’d be willing to die for me.” Margaret’s cheeks flushed, she looked back to the closet hoping to discern something new in its depths.
“My lady I believe I have just the thing,” Judith took in the fine material of her mother’s ancient gown with a sigh, remembering the delicate stitching and subtle blue brocade...
“I never did like blue; I’ve always found it rather dull.” Artemisia jumped and a long blue streak appeared over the broidery. Her face carefully set in a look of concern she turned to face his accusatory stare.
Artemisia chose her words carefully, “The virgin Mary is very often portrayed in such a regal color.”
“Yes, but the Virgin Mary is not a temptress, I don’t feel that this scene will be effective without showing how sinful women are, and how the only power they wield is of the flesh. It will not be believable that she conquered such a general as the chaste Virgin Mary, she needs to be portrayed in a more believable and powerful color.”
“I will do whatever you wish of me…”
Margaret’s delicate white hand was all that was first discernable while she held open the tent flap for Judith to enter.
“My god...” Holofernes’ eyes roamed over her body, like a dog looking at a rare piece of steak. “I see that you’re happy with your decision to entertain the idea of ‘us’, you’ve dressed up to impress me. Don’t think I don’t notice your feminine tricks.” Holofernes chucked deep in his throat, the laughter that could be heard when between the sheets when a man and a woman are alone together. It made the hairs on the back of Judith’s neck stand up.
“I thank you sir,” she felt his eyes upon her as she made her way towards the dinner table, the folds of her golden dress trailing behind her.
…
“This wine is deuuullissshhhh…. Delllllisshhhiiioous… deeeeliiissseesssccchhh…”
“I’m glad you like it Sir, I had it delivered from the North, especially for you. I really do like this idea of ‘us’ that you keep bringing up...”
“Yes… yeeeeeessss. USSSSSSS,” He made the last word into a snake’s hiss, eyes drooping and spit flying onto the table. He was obviously attempting to focus on her, and wavering back and forth, his elbow slipped out from under him and he almost fell from his large wooden chair.
“….and so this is exactly why I took up your invitation tonight, I really wanted to experience you, I have heard tell of your magnificence in battle, and I knew I had finally found a man that was suitable for my needs.”
“Yesssssssssss, suutiiiiiaable.” He had begun to list off his chair again.
“My lord, you are clearly not well, I will fetch your servants to help you to bed.”
“Noooooo, I feel fiiiine. FINE!”
“Yes my lord we will help you, don’t worry I’ll take care of you. I’ll insure that you get to bed.” She gestured to his servants. They picked him up and dragged him towards his bedchamber, Holofernes attempting to fight them off all the way.
“She doesn’t look attractive enough, how such a woman have seduced this man of such a powerful position?”
“Other artists have been criticized for the gentile and innocent look of Judith, that she wouldn’t have the strength necessary to accomplish the slaying.” Artemisia explained with pleading eyes. This painting was essential to her reputation, she needed everyone to take notice of her, and she needed their support, their understanding.
“Sigh…. Well at least make her cleavage more pronounced!”
Judith thanked the lord for Holofernes’ vociferous snoring, which was enough to cover the metallic sound of his sword unsheathing. She pulled up the sleeves of her dress past her elbows, and steeled herself for what she had to do for her family and her people. Her face finally set, she took in a deep breath. Bringing the sword above her head she spoke firmly, and her voice gave her power as it didn’t waver.
“Give me strength this day, O Lord God of Israel!”
The sound had awoken Holofernes, but it was already too late, and she felt the warm rush of the red liquid spray over her.
Artemisia stood up from the painting, the justice now dolled out, though only for a moment.
Journal questions
I chose to do what I thought would make the most believable and best piece. I hope that the way in which I chose two different options will suffice as a writing piece, because I did more than one! Writing believable dialog is challenging, and also trying to write in a way that isn’t modern, but obviously couldn’t be ancient. I hope the way in which I accomplished this isn’t comical. Obviously showing not telling is always difficult too, and is no different when writing dialog. I very much enjoy writing dialog, because it tells a lot about the character that cannot be told simply by utilizing other methods. I enjoyed the fact that it can be more abstract, and requires more thinking on the readers part to discern exactly what is true of what the character is saying and what is not. It was difficult but enjoyable. Visual works very much distract from my ability to be imaginative, because you cannot say anything that conflicts with the people shown, and the way in which the event is depicted. The maid had to be an integral part of the story, obviously, because she is depicted clearly in the painting.
I think the overall feeling of the city is very different; Naples is less touristy in my opinion, which makes it feel more real somehow. It is even more different than America and what I’m used to than Rome and feels more intense somehow. I don’t believe that Naples really changed how I wrote this story, because I have to be sitting on a computer to write at all, anyhow.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Week 7 Reading Journal Entry
What is “noble” according to Juvenal’s narrator? Cite a passage from each of the four satires by Juvenal which amused you and say why. What literary mechanisms or rhetorical devices did Juvenal use for each of these?
Juvenal describes wealth as essentially something immoral or bad, whereas Twain generally talks about how wealth affects relationships between people. Somehow, Twain appears less angry at the whole situation and Juvenal more open about his anger at the rich. The Hypocrisy can be seen in the fact that in Juvenal the rich are completely hypocritical about how they believe they are and how they actually act: they believe themselves to be so high above everyone else, yet they allow their artists to starve and they act essentially act foolish and uncivilized. In Twain, he satirizes the same things about the church: allowing their people to starve while they spend waistful amounts of money on useless things and the monks inside enjoy it. The themes of sedition and free speech in Juvenal appears to be the fact that no one has anything worthwhile to say when they do speak out, vs in Twain when people are generally crucified (generally in the non literal sense of the word) when speaking out. Both writers satirize the way in which artists and poets have lost their honor and kind of “sold out” to the patrons, and will do anything for money. According to Juvenal’s narrator, “noble” means more than your class, it is seen in every aspect of how you conduct your business and act in relation to your family and you also have to honor and celebrate god. Honestly, I have no passages that I can find that amused me, I found the entire piece rather dry and not amusing.
Juvenal describes wealth as essentially something immoral or bad, whereas Twain generally talks about how wealth affects relationships between people. Somehow, Twain appears less angry at the whole situation and Juvenal more open about his anger at the rich. The Hypocrisy can be seen in the fact that in Juvenal the rich are completely hypocritical about how they believe they are and how they actually act: they believe themselves to be so high above everyone else, yet they allow their artists to starve and they act essentially act foolish and uncivilized. In Twain, he satirizes the same things about the church: allowing their people to starve while they spend waistful amounts of money on useless things and the monks inside enjoy it. The themes of sedition and free speech in Juvenal appears to be the fact that no one has anything worthwhile to say when they do speak out, vs in Twain when people are generally crucified (generally in the non literal sense of the word) when speaking out. Both writers satirize the way in which artists and poets have lost their honor and kind of “sold out” to the patrons, and will do anything for money. According to Juvenal’s narrator, “noble” means more than your class, it is seen in every aspect of how you conduct your business and act in relation to your family and you also have to honor and celebrate god. Honestly, I have no passages that I can find that amused me, I found the entire piece rather dry and not amusing.
Sunday, February 11, 2007
Week 6 Writing Assignment
Week 6 Satire
Kristina Dahlberg
Trevor couldn’t sleep at night. Ever since he had purchased tickets for PAX, two months earlier, he couldn’t find anything that would sufficiently distract him from the excitement of this upcoming convention. He had rifled through his closet every day for weeks, all the time concerned that he had nothing to do this event justice and proclaim his nerd pride to the world. Was it the day to show off his free Halo II tee in the charcoal black, his newly acquired Word of Warcraft: Burning Crusade tee in gunmetal black or the classic, ever popular, black-as-night Legend of Zelda tee with carefully detailed Master Sword in midnight black? After careful consideration Trevor decided that it was of the utmost importance to firstly proclaim his adoration for Penny Arcade in general and thus he decided on the black-as-night oversized Twix and Weatherby attire, with perfectly coordinated Fred Meyer blue jeans.
Trevor’s concerned mother had noticed this newfound change in her 28 year old son, and with a “tisk tisk”, she insured that he ate double broccoli servings at dinner the night before PAX. When she dropped him off the next day at 6:00am in front of the Maidenbour Convention Center she gave him a kiss on the forehead and bade him beware of “Goth girls”, who’s never ceasing attraction to skinny white nerdy boys she had heard about on Operah. Trevor promised his mother he would be careful and quickly made his way toward his nerd posse waiting for him in the pre-purchased ticket line. After several hours of waiting, the nerds had become antsy. All had not checked their emails, Instant Messaged their Internet girlfriends, or played WOW in all of four hours. Those waiting in the line to purchase tickets were glaring at the shiny red badges around Trevor and his fellow friends necks.
A large football player type with a baseball cap from the other line bumped into one of Trevor’s friends and didn’t acknowledge this significant faux paux.
“Hey man, watch it,” yelled Trevor.
“Fuck off, you little nerd,” the insolent, ignorant meathead yelled back.
A hush fell over the surrounding crowd. The football player didn’t understand PAX, he had probably come because of the 30 foot screens in which he could more effectively play Madden 07’. He didn’t read Penny Arcade - he’d never understand the jokes. The meathead didn’t know what he was getting himself into, he wasn’t in high school anymore and the jocks weren’t on top of the proverbial social ladder. He was in nerd country now, and no one used ‘nerd’ with such an utter lack of respect and in such a degrading fashion at PAX. This was the once place in which nerds could put aside their feelings of shame and openly declare their unhealthy love of night elves, where they could assemble tabletop villages - complete with hand decorated warriors, and where “all your base” is just generally understood. Thus, Trevor and his fellow nerds could not let an openly offensive comment like ‘nerd’ from a jock go unchallenged.
“Your mom services more requests than HTTP” Yelled Trevor, holding back rage.
“She keeps all her ports open like Windows ME” Added in Trevor’s friend, to a cheer from the surrounding crowd, complete with clapping and cat calls.
“What the fuck did you just say to me?”
Thankfully the PAX enforcers chose that exact time to open up the front doors and Trevor and friends were swept up in the scramble to get inside. Immediately Trevor led the way to the tabletop gaming arena, intent on testing his new ‘Magic’ deck. As he descended the floors, he caught sight of a set of fishnet tights and spiky black hair going past to the upper floors. They locked eyes in a purple flash and she was gone. Blinking Trevor stumbled off of the escalator.
Trevor spent several productive hours perfecting his strategy with the new cards, and with his friends egging, decided that a caffeine run was in order. Leaving the stand with arms full of a case of Bawls and pockets packed with Bawls mints, Trevor decided to try his luck at the PC gaming arena.
Signed up for a Battlefield 1942 Tournament Trevor and friends prepared their headphones and microphones for the match. Teams and characters chosen, Trevor smiled at his friends and turning to the other team yelled,
“Well, prepare yourself for some internal fragmentation.”
After two fierce hours of bullets flying, several games had ended and Trevor’s team was still second in gross kills. Trevor spray-painted the brilliant blue color of team on the side of his base, in defiance. He led the way through the ruined surrounding buildings, sure to strife around corners to avoid early detection. Watching his teammates and looking around for the enemies, he stumbled into a side staircase that led the way up to a view of the final enemy flag that was too good to be true. As he watched several enemies re-spawned before his very eyes. Whispering into his microphone, he alerted his teammates of this perfect sniper location, and told them from which angles to approach. Suddenly brilliant purple eyes pulled him back into reality. There was the girl, in skin-tight leather with black fishnet tights. The roar of bullets from his right headphone forced his vision back onto the screen. His men were making their move, now, and they needed him to have their backs. Focus back on the task at hand, he took out three enemy men in the area, one after another, the red laser visible for less than a millisecond. His men slowly creeped in, in case of hidden reinforcements, but there were none. The ground desecrated, and the final flag taken by the blue, the game ended in victory for Trevor.
“Owned!” Yelled his teammates, as Trevor took off his headset and went in search of the purple eyes. Found at last, Trevor sat down next to the black haired girl watching the game from afar, and looking deep into the purple abyss asked, “What would you say if I told you I roll 20s?”
Journal Entries
I chose my character based on what I believed would be easiest to parody that I also knew something about. My character and the focus of my story changed a great deal as I wrote, especially as I thought about what I found to be the most important in the story. My character was essentially mainly flat, as he really didn’t change during the story, or in my idea of who he was and what he would do. He was always rather cocky for a nerd – he yelled out things to a much larger jock early on in the story, but he may be seen as round by the reader, as I suppose I released more about his character as the story progressed, so he may appear to change. I found the satire itself to be challenging. I’m not sure if my end product is a short story with a few satirical elements rather than an actual satire, but it certainly was making fun of nerds from my perspective. I found it extremely challenging to write so out of character for me, though I’ve had experiences around such huge nerds. I couldn’t remember the logistics of video games, so that was hard to describe. I didn’t refer back to Twain at all because that wasn’t the kind of satire I wanted to write.
Kristina Dahlberg
Trevor couldn’t sleep at night. Ever since he had purchased tickets for PAX, two months earlier, he couldn’t find anything that would sufficiently distract him from the excitement of this upcoming convention. He had rifled through his closet every day for weeks, all the time concerned that he had nothing to do this event justice and proclaim his nerd pride to the world. Was it the day to show off his free Halo II tee in the charcoal black, his newly acquired Word of Warcraft: Burning Crusade tee in gunmetal black or the classic, ever popular, black-as-night Legend of Zelda tee with carefully detailed Master Sword in midnight black? After careful consideration Trevor decided that it was of the utmost importance to firstly proclaim his adoration for Penny Arcade in general and thus he decided on the black-as-night oversized Twix and Weatherby attire, with perfectly coordinated Fred Meyer blue jeans.
Trevor’s concerned mother had noticed this newfound change in her 28 year old son, and with a “tisk tisk”, she insured that he ate double broccoli servings at dinner the night before PAX. When she dropped him off the next day at 6:00am in front of the Maidenbour Convention Center she gave him a kiss on the forehead and bade him beware of “Goth girls”, who’s never ceasing attraction to skinny white nerdy boys she had heard about on Operah. Trevor promised his mother he would be careful and quickly made his way toward his nerd posse waiting for him in the pre-purchased ticket line. After several hours of waiting, the nerds had become antsy. All had not checked their emails, Instant Messaged their Internet girlfriends, or played WOW in all of four hours. Those waiting in the line to purchase tickets were glaring at the shiny red badges around Trevor and his fellow friends necks.
A large football player type with a baseball cap from the other line bumped into one of Trevor’s friends and didn’t acknowledge this significant faux paux.
“Hey man, watch it,” yelled Trevor.
“Fuck off, you little nerd,” the insolent, ignorant meathead yelled back.
A hush fell over the surrounding crowd. The football player didn’t understand PAX, he had probably come because of the 30 foot screens in which he could more effectively play Madden 07’. He didn’t read Penny Arcade - he’d never understand the jokes. The meathead didn’t know what he was getting himself into, he wasn’t in high school anymore and the jocks weren’t on top of the proverbial social ladder. He was in nerd country now, and no one used ‘nerd’ with such an utter lack of respect and in such a degrading fashion at PAX. This was the once place in which nerds could put aside their feelings of shame and openly declare their unhealthy love of night elves, where they could assemble tabletop villages - complete with hand decorated warriors, and where “all your base” is just generally understood. Thus, Trevor and his fellow nerds could not let an openly offensive comment like ‘nerd’ from a jock go unchallenged.
“Your mom services more requests than HTTP” Yelled Trevor, holding back rage.
“She keeps all her ports open like Windows ME” Added in Trevor’s friend, to a cheer from the surrounding crowd, complete with clapping and cat calls.
“What the fuck did you just say to me?”
Thankfully the PAX enforcers chose that exact time to open up the front doors and Trevor and friends were swept up in the scramble to get inside. Immediately Trevor led the way to the tabletop gaming arena, intent on testing his new ‘Magic’ deck. As he descended the floors, he caught sight of a set of fishnet tights and spiky black hair going past to the upper floors. They locked eyes in a purple flash and she was gone. Blinking Trevor stumbled off of the escalator.
Trevor spent several productive hours perfecting his strategy with the new cards, and with his friends egging, decided that a caffeine run was in order. Leaving the stand with arms full of a case of Bawls and pockets packed with Bawls mints, Trevor decided to try his luck at the PC gaming arena.
Signed up for a Battlefield 1942 Tournament Trevor and friends prepared their headphones and microphones for the match. Teams and characters chosen, Trevor smiled at his friends and turning to the other team yelled,
“Well, prepare yourself for some internal fragmentation.”
After two fierce hours of bullets flying, several games had ended and Trevor’s team was still second in gross kills. Trevor spray-painted the brilliant blue color of team on the side of his base, in defiance. He led the way through the ruined surrounding buildings, sure to strife around corners to avoid early detection. Watching his teammates and looking around for the enemies, he stumbled into a side staircase that led the way up to a view of the final enemy flag that was too good to be true. As he watched several enemies re-spawned before his very eyes. Whispering into his microphone, he alerted his teammates of this perfect sniper location, and told them from which angles to approach. Suddenly brilliant purple eyes pulled him back into reality. There was the girl, in skin-tight leather with black fishnet tights. The roar of bullets from his right headphone forced his vision back onto the screen. His men were making their move, now, and they needed him to have their backs. Focus back on the task at hand, he took out three enemy men in the area, one after another, the red laser visible for less than a millisecond. His men slowly creeped in, in case of hidden reinforcements, but there were none. The ground desecrated, and the final flag taken by the blue, the game ended in victory for Trevor.
“Owned!” Yelled his teammates, as Trevor took off his headset and went in search of the purple eyes. Found at last, Trevor sat down next to the black haired girl watching the game from afar, and looking deep into the purple abyss asked, “What would you say if I told you I roll 20s?”
Journal Entries
I chose my character based on what I believed would be easiest to parody that I also knew something about. My character and the focus of my story changed a great deal as I wrote, especially as I thought about what I found to be the most important in the story. My character was essentially mainly flat, as he really didn’t change during the story, or in my idea of who he was and what he would do. He was always rather cocky for a nerd – he yelled out things to a much larger jock early on in the story, but he may be seen as round by the reader, as I suppose I released more about his character as the story progressed, so he may appear to change. I found the satire itself to be challenging. I’m not sure if my end product is a short story with a few satirical elements rather than an actual satire, but it certainly was making fun of nerds from my perspective. I found it extremely challenging to write so out of character for me, though I’ve had experiences around such huge nerds. I couldn’t remember the logistics of video games, so that was hard to describe. I didn’t refer back to Twain at all because that wasn’t the kind of satire I wanted to write.
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