Long time, no blog

It's been, what, a week? (How's that for a lovely example of spoken grammar?)

End of session coming up, term paper due, material getting more complicated. Here are the highlights of our latest days.

Sunday: went to drive to church, car wouldn't start (made a clicking noise)

Monday: Class as usual, heavy homework day for Rob; I spent more than 2 hours trying to do his grammar homework and couldn't get a handle on it. Every theory I came up had a single piece of data that 'broke' it. Got discouraged.

Tuesday: Rob discovered in afternoon grammar class that no-one else could get the homework either; I breathe sigh of relief. That's the problem with homework that accurately reflects all the complexities of actual language. Sure, you get the benefits of working with real data. But when the data selected is too complex to be done in a few hours, that's demoralizing. Part of me says, "Hey, the guy who collected this data probably took weeks to figure this out: I shouldn't be discouraged that I'm not getting in in a few hours." But there is another part of me that says, "Hey, this wouldn't be your daily assignment if it weren't doable in a day." Sometimes I have to shut down that second voice so that I don't develop negative self-image. I know I have aptitude for this stuff. Language is not rocket science; it's more human and complicated. You don't truly analyze or deduce from a language; you come to knowledge of through relationship with a language. Who does that in a day?
These courses are like speed-dating in preparation for a marriage. Imagine for a moment that you are a language and your potential spouse is a linguist. Now imagine that there are people determining whether or not people are good potential spouses for you on the basis of observing how they interact with you for a few hours. Sure, they may get a fast connection with you, sparks might fly. But are they capable of really achieving true emotional intimacy with you in the long haul? And how could an outsider judge their innate capability for intimacy based on a short interaction or a series of short interactions with a number of people? You'd end up for sure with an aggressive extrovert. Similarly, one-night-study linguists may have the capacity for understanding the question and picking out the answer but who will have longevity and intimate comprehension in the long haul?
Rob finishes homework earlier than usual; we do dishes and play Neverwinter Nights together. [sigh of joy].

Wednesday: We watch a National Geographic video in R&W class in the morning, challenging stuff. Look at land-diving in Vanuatu, fire-walking in Greece and voluntary crucifixion in the Philippines. I get help with term paper in the afternoon, get some guidelines for paragraph charting. In the evening, breakthrough! I finish a chart that works for the data! Now, I can start drawing conclusions.

Thursday: Still haven't called the mechanic; keeps slipping my mind. Must do that today.