Britt's Blog

I’ve been thinking a bit more about choice being bad. What happens when you take choices away from yourself? What happens when other people take your choices away from you?

I just finished Galileo’s Daughter by Dava Sobel. The eponymous daughter, Suor (Sister) Maria Celeste, spent the majority of her short life, from the age of 12 to her death at 36, behind the walls of a convent. As in, she was never allowed to leave. The nuns were even separated from visitors by an iron grille; she could never touch even the members of her own family or view them unobscured.

Astoundingly, she was downright chipper about the whole damn thing.

Despite her confinement and the many demands of a life of toil and prayer, Suor Maria Celeste flourished. She did a brisk trade in handicrafts, candies, and nostrums. Somehow Galileo managed to foist her off on the cloister, and yet still have her do his laundry, mending, and a significant amount of cooking. She also did secretarial work for him, at times keeping his accounts, transcribing manuscript pages of A Dialog Concerning Two Chief World Systems, and running his household when he was called before the Inquisition and then imprisoned.

Read more

Because you are fascinated by my ears, and all things Britt-ear-related, you will surely recall my previous battles with ostitis externa, also known as “swimmer’s ear.” I didn’t bother to blog in April about yet another recurrence, as it was just more of the same: excruciating pain, trip to acute care, antibiotic eardrop prescription, eventual relief.

When my ear canals started getting uppity again, though, I went to an actual otolaryngologist (that’s an ENT, or ear-nose-throat doc, for those at home) who after hearing my symptoms immediately pronounced a diagnosis of dermatitis of the ear canal. Then he looked into my left ear, and said, “Wait, this is the good ear?” Which is what they always say. They always want to look at the “good” ear first, and they always tell me the good ear is really, really bad. *sigh*

Read more

We’re back from a little weekend trip. I visited my mom and my nephews (my sister and her husband were out of town) and went for a lecture/cruise that was part of Winona University’s University on the River. My mom loves these cruises and was kind enough to invite me along for a couple this year.

It was a beautiful day for a trip on the river. We went out in a very nice excursion boat, and cruised north, locking through Lock & Dam 5. The lecture was provided by Rusty Cunningham, publisher (!) of the LaCrosse Tribune and the Winona Daily News. He spoke on many newsworthy controversies in the history of the upper Mississippi. We saw a bald eagle’s nest on one of the islands, and, using Mom’s camera, I snapped a nice picture of an immature eagle roosting near the nest.

I find it soooo relaxing to get out on the water. I swear, the second I set foot on a boat, I feel the tension melt away.

I’m looking forward to another University on the River cruise with Mom in August. I might have possibly volunteered to do a stargazing cruise for next year. :)

I read pretty much everything Haruki Murakami publishes, aided and abetted by Jason, who tends to secure the latest Murakami for most major gifting occasions. I figure I should probably read something other than science fiction on a semi-regular basis, and Murakami is of the highest-quality snobby non-genre genre—trendy and well-reviewed—so, intellectually speaking, I’m balancing out the fact that I’m rereading Podkayne of Mars for the fifteenth time.

After Dark would make a great introduction to Murakami, because it has the Murakami weirdness but not on the omgwildsheepchase level. Also, the weirdness is rather nicely segregated from the main plot, while of course turning out to be absolutely integral to what is going on, which makes me kind of think of Hard Boiled Wonderland, my first Murakami love. And there’s also a bit of the “WTF? That dude seemed way too important to the plot for me to not to have the slightest clue who the hell he was and what the hell he was doing,” à la Kafka on the Shore.

But at its heart, I think After Dark is really all about the gaze: What it is to look at others, and to be looked at by them. How we gain power and lose power, how we get connected by looking and by being seen. And, maybe, how technology interferes with this fundamental relationship. I think I’m going to have to reread the book again, because, as usual, I didn’t catch on to the stunningly obvious theme until somewhere around the halfway point. Luckily, After Dark is fairly short, so it’s not so onerous to read and the re-read—or maybe I should skim it.

I’ve been doing some reading about reading—that is, how to read well—in preparation for teaching a course in the fall, and I keep coming across this “skimming” idea, but frankly I don’t know if I’m capable of it. I seem to be able to skim for a few pages, but then I get sucked in and I’m reading again, which defeats the purpose of skimming. But perhaps skimming, and only slowing down for important passages, is a skill I should learn. If it works out I’ll let you know.