Arsenic Lobster (and a bit about teaching and technology)

I've got four poems in the new issue of Arsenic Lobster. Lovely, lovely stuff in there. I've just barely had a chance to nose around. Can't wait to read the rest.

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I'm quite fascinated with Digital Ethnography and am wondering how I might incorporate some of Wesch's ideas into my comp classes (or even poetry, perhaps) the next time I teach (I'll be doing all my hours in the office this coming semester, no teaching until the fall). I think this video would be a great conversation starter in a classroom:

escape

After many days of hanging around the folks' house, running errands with my mom, and only slipping out now and then for "me" time, I've finally hit my limit. I ran away from home.

I'm at Angel Falls in Highland Square, feeling very nostalgic (the smattering of UA professors isn't helping) and lo and behold, my friend Kristina is here. I knew I'd run into someone I'd want to see. Chances are, I'll also run into someone I don't. (No one in particular, in case you're wondering.)

So, I won't blog much today. I came here to write. That's the thing--I can sit around the kitchen table and flip through magazines while Fox News eats away at my soul in the background, but I can't write poems when there's parents, sisters, and doggies everywhere to distract me. Better to come here, where the background noise is unintelligible and the people are wrapped up in other things. Now, to the poems!

my roots

The one in the middle is my great-grandfather.

My dad, circa 1941(ish)

My parents, as newly-weds.

My grandparents, in Mexico. This is the bank-robber grandfather, btw.

My parents' wedding.

spreadsheets, snowboots, & goodreads

I've been building a ginormous spreadsheet of all the lucky journals who are going to have the chance to consider my poems in the next month or so and when I need a break from the geeky Excel stuff, I work on poems. The poems are in worse shape than the spreadsheet. I have a lot of rough drafts, a lot of half-formed ideas. I haven't sat down to make the poems do what poems do in a long time. I'm going to have to before the big winter submission. The HUGE winter submission.

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My Barberton day went swimmingly. The students were sweet and sharp and asked great questions and it was toughtoughtough. I don't know how you high school teachers do it, 5, 6 classes a day, 5 days a week. I admire and am awed by you.

I don't think I'll be banned from Barberton after all.

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I bought a pair of snow boots today. I'm going to hate myself for saying this later, but right now, I can't wait for it to snow so I can wear them. They're cute and furry, but in a subtle way. You know, they're not giant fur leg-warmers like Chippendale dancer boots.

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Flood Year is on Goodreads. I hadn't logged into Goodreads for at least six months, so I didn't know until today. I have one review (from Karen) one person currently reading (Brandi) and I'm on one person's to read list (Susan Slaviero). It's a darn good beginning, I'd say.

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Did you know Costco sells diamonds?

Visiting Writer

Tomorrow, I'm visiting Barberton High School and a dear friend's English classes. This is my first time as a visiting writer and I am extremely excited/extremely nervous. My chapbook, as those of you who've read it know, is sometimes a little...hrm, how do you say...risque? inappropriate for teenagers? As someone who chose to teach college so that I wouldn't have to worry about such things, I'm waaay out of my element here.

I've developed a prompt that is based on my poem "Stella Takes Me to Tucson" but inspired by John Gallaher's post on writing prompts. I'll be asking the students to write about going somewhere they've never been before with someone they think they know well, but maybe don't. If the exercise goes well, maybe I'll post it here, but for now, I'm keeping it to myself.

An interesting coincidence...one of the primary settings of the poems in the chapbook is Barberton. The kids I'll meet tomorrow will have their own stories about Lake Anna, the Dollar General on Wooster Ave...but hopefully not the Star Inn. Should spark some interesting conversations/questions.

Will be back soon to let you know how it went.

Time for change, perhaps?

So, I just claimed saratracey.wordpress.com as my own. One of my sisters goes around the internet signing up for every blogging/free web hosting service using her name as the url just to make sure no one gets it before she does (even though she doesn't blog often) and though I thought this was silly when I first heard it, now it's making a lot of sense. Especially since I've hated the title "Mindful Ramblings" since about five minutes after I decided on it. And because it's not likely I'll ever grow to hate my own name, having that in a url makes a lot more sense. Plus, it'll be much easier to find me at the new blog, so it's all good, right?

I'm going to hang out here a while longer while I get used to how wordpress works and tweak my blog list and that sort of thing, so don't abandon me yet. I'll let you know when it's time to update your links.

Anyway, here's where you come in, faithful readers. What should I call my new blog? "Sara Tracey's Blog" just isn't going to cut it, and though the new title won't be as permanent as MR has felt, I still don't want it to suck--or to decide it sucks five minutes after I name it. The first thing to pop into my mind is "a nickel to tell me," a phrase from this poem (scroll down), but I'm always afraid that it only makes sense to me (I've thought about using it as a section or manuscript title). Any other ideas?

In which I do not work on my paper or study for my Italian exam

I'm manning (err--womaning) the office for the afternoon, and then off to take my Italian exam at 6pm, and in the meantime, I should be doing some homework (studying for said exam, perhaps) but it seems all I can do is toggle back and forth between email and facebook without the energy to actually write any emails or say anything interesting on facebook. I had a little burst of productivity at the beginning of the weekend, but Sunday and so far today have been rather uninspired. The semester is nearly over: in terms of work, I just have the exam, revising 3 poems, finishing the paper for the postcolonial class, and grading 12 portfolios for intro to poetry. In terms of time, I plan to be done with the semester before I start my yoga class at 5:30 on Thursday.

On Saturday, I leave for Ohio, where I'll be for 3 weeks (bring it on, house robbers) hanging out with the folks and their crazy (but lovable) dog.

Looking forward to doing some pleasure reading (too bad there's no new Twilight-esq series to read--or is there?) and getting together some poems to submit--I never managed a fall submission and almost all of my spring/summer subs have come back...no good news. My ego is slightly bruised, so hopefully the next batch will have a better reception.

I guess that's all for now. Have a nice Monday, folks.