Hearing Poets Do What They Do

It's always a treat to be able to rub elbows with writers and be able to talk. I'm down in Vermillion at the John R. Milton Writers Conference, where I got a warm reception yesterday for my own reading and have enjoyed others reading their work, especially Brian Bedard reading a new story about a prom queen and a parade and Lee Ann Roripaugh reading a few poems from her new book--On The Cusp of a Dangerous Year and her dad, Robert A. Roripaugh, read from a book of stories about Wyoming. Ed Allen, author of a novel, Mustang Sally, and a short story collection, Ate It Anyway, read from a work in progress that is a novel told in the form of a series of limericks. It worked a lot better than I thought it would!

More today, including Wang Ping, Maxine Hong Kingston, and a host of others.

"I Hate Hamlet" and Other Birthday Goodies

The wife had yet another birthday on Sunday, so we took the day, went to Sioux Falls, debating along the way about whether a movie might be in order or this play we knew little about. We did the play, and neither of us was disappointed. Produced by the Sioux Empire Community Theatre, the performance featured some fine acting, a great set, and a beautiful theater.

The funny and touching play is about a TV actor, played here by Barton Workman, who loses his series and goes to New York to rekindle an old love for the stage, landing the lead role in a production of Hamlet, to be played in the park. He doesn't want to do it. He hates Hamlet. His agent appears from California with a lucrative offer for another TV series, "Night School," to feature an idealistic high school teacher who moonlights as a semi-super hero.

What should he do? Inspiration comes in the form of the ghost of John Barrymore, famed boozer, womanizer, and strider of the boards, played to great effect here by Tom Roberts.

Things get interesting, and these two, along with a fine supporting cast, carry the audience through the struggle to decide what should come. It won't be quite what you expect.

Check out the play, just $15, showing Oct. 30-Nov. 1 and Nov. 6-8, with matinees.

Jimmy Curtis and the Case of the Traveling Skull

I was intrigued by this story on the New York Times about a photographer for the Farm Security Administration, Arthur Rothstein, who in 1936 traveled through South Dakota documenting the drought years. He was apparently fond of the skull, hauling it around and taking pictures of it willy-nilly to document how damned dry it was here then, cows dying everywhere. His photos are in the Library of Congress, still with misleading information about them, at least according to James Curtis, who published a book on the subject in 1991: Mind’s Eye, Mind’s Truth: F.S.A. Photography Reconsidered.

Check out the story; it's got the infamous photos, scans of newspaper articles, and maps of Rothstien's travels, along with commentary on Dorothea Lange and other photographers of the era.

A New York Minute in Years Gone By

Having just returned from new New York, I was interested in this video of it as it appeared over 80 years ago. There's a shot of Times Square, another of Washington Square, and other places that went by too quickly for me to recognize. Hang on!

Back in a New York Minute

New Yorkers probably noticed a significant downturn in the quality of their fair city on Tuesday as Northwest flight 515 left La Guardia with the four pictured South Dakotans on board. Subway riders looked around confusedly when we didn't shuffle through the doors Wednesday morning. Food vendors wondered what to do with their "chunky luncher" platters. Playgoers pondered what might have resulted in the four empty seats, ones usually populated with the most responsive audience members in Broadway (or off-Broadway) history. Empire State Building residents looked out at the Rock and saw that these four were gone (sob!) gone.

Well, at least we noticed. The four of us returned bedraggled late Tuesday with memories of "Playboy of the Western World" at the Pearl, "West Side Story" at the Palace, and lots of activities otherwise. We checked out the Met, watched the Columbus Day parade, had some great New York pizza in Greenwich Village at Johns, walked in Central Park, had a cannoli, ate some fresh croissants, sampled some beers, sipped some martinis, and crashed an opening-night party at the Old Castle for brother Joe's play. We saw a former colleague and ate down in Chinatown after walking across the Brooklyn Bridge at night. The wife went running in Central Park. We visited Times Square, Madison Avenue, and Fifth Avenue and did hardly any shopping! And we avoided landing belly-up on the slippery highways Saturday morning as we left Minneapolis. We got safely home again.

We had a good time, I think. What did I forget?

Mighty Quinn's Marathon Story in Photos

Fans of Mr. Quinn will enjoy seeing his photo collection of marathon moments, many of them captured with the $10 Hannah Montana camera he carried with him on the route. In the last photo, you might think he's melting, but he assured us the puddle was not his doing, despite his weariness.

The Wife and the Gimp at the Fake Finish

Target stores offered a free picture of us standing at a fake finish line at the expo, with a dream time displayed, so we took it. And YOU get to be the beneficiary!

You'll Not See Nothin' Like the Mighty Quinn

He's no Eskimo, but this Mighty Quinn was mighty chilly after finishing his first marathon in St. Paul this morning. He and 11,000 other runners took to the streets at 8:00am to tackle the 26.2 miles that makes up the Twin Cities Marathon course, navigating the streets around the lakes and rivers that make up the most beautiful urban marathon in the US.

Yours truly, still nursing his roofing injury, was on the sidelines, viewing the race from the curb, zooming from point to point with my wife and his to catch Todd as he came past, racking up the miles, each one getting a little tougher. It's clear from the photos here that the marathon takes a lot out of a guy, but MQ hung in there and got the job done. Way to go, Todd!

DSU and SD Higher-Ed Numbers Climb

Dakota State University numbers continue to grow. We've got a record headcount (2861) and FTE (1631) enrollments for this fall. Numbers statewide have grown quite a little since 1996, my first year in the system, 7,279 more students in that time, a 27% increase. Not bad.

1996 26,508
1997 25,719 -2.98%
1998 26,560 +3.27%
1999 26,616 +0.21%
2000 27,134 +1.95%
2001 28,446 +4.84%
2002 29,533 +3.82%
2003 29,716 +0.62%
2004 29,844 +0.43%
2005 30,720 +2.94%
2006 30,901 +0.59%
2007 32,148 +4.04%
2008 32,943 +2.47%
2009 33,779 +2.54%

Taking a Knee

It's probably a good idea that I'm not running the Twin Cities Marathon this weekend. I was out in back, running the chain saw, cutting up some small chunks of wood, and one caught on the chain and jumped up and bit me in the knee-bone. Here it is just getting a good start on the swelling. This on the same leg that sports the damaged foot at the end of it.

My brother called as I was sitting on the couch with an ice pack (thanks, Todd!) on my bulging knee, and he asked what I was doing.

"Sitting here watching the knob on my knee grow," I said.
"It's African-Americans!" he said, "and they're not yours!"

He's a witty fellow.

I think my knee has grown since then (and since I had the wife shoot this profile shot). Tomorrow it will probably be back to normal, but it's good I'm just using my legs Sunday to stand and watch the marathoners go by, not covering 13.1 miles with this bumpy fellow (leg #2 is just fine, thanks).

Working Women at DSU

I love this picture of all these women at DSU displaying what position our university has in the recent rankings among public universities in the midwest, according to U.S. News and World Report.

Two Small Pieces of Pie

Okay, so you're wandering in the aisles of Sunshine Foods, the pleasant treasure of a spinach quiche riding in your midsection, just along for the ride since your spouse has asked you pleasantly to go along for company, and you've got it in mind to ferret out a little dessert item, something to top off the quiche, tamp it down with a lump of sweetness, passing by the Oreos, the "home-made" O'Henry bars, the four-dollar brownies in the bakery section, and then the thought of a little pie takes hold of you like a mental lasso, towing you down the frozen foods aisle, where Mrs. Smith and her ilk linger to lure the appetite with real pies--apple, peach, French silk--but you resist, one hand clutching the cold chrome handle of the case, and your eye lingers on the smaller boxes, Mrs. Smith's sidekick Edwards, an unassuming product offering of two pieces of pie--Key Lime--and you waver, your hand reaching in to bring it in, bring it home, where, on a plate, it's not to be denied, small as it may be, fresh from its yellow cardboard wedge, a serious, albeit small, piece of pie indeed, and the first taste is golden, the next better, the rest delicious, creamy, lime lime lime, a very fine pie indeed, worth the trip, worth eating slowly, slowly, every bite a miracle.

Trojans Win

The wife and I enjoyed a great volleyball match last night between the Lady Trojans and the Mount Marty College Lancers. It was a back and forth battle, but in game five the T's were rolling and put away those visitors. Read more about it here.

Meanwhile, I'm liking the new Trojan warrior logo, although not the one with the thick legs.

Will Ferrell and the Race to Save Health Care Execs

I enjoyed this tongue-in-cheek version of an appeal on the effort to improve health care coverage.

Protect Insurance Companies PSA from Will Ferrell

Making the Desktop Smaller Yet

ACU Mobile Learning from ACU Videos on Vimeo.

The move toward the laptop as a device for having students be online all the time has been growing, and there is evidence that students and faculty are getting used to the new teaching and learning methods that the devices allow. Now Abilene Christian University is suggesting that they can take the mobility one step further, not just netbooks, but Apple's iTouch or iPhone, which they're distributing to students and faculty. The move is described in "The Mobile Campus," on Inside Higher Ed. Are we ready for that? One of my consistent concerns is that the course materials and actions occur in the same stream as all the other things that vie for students' attention, coming through the same channels as Facebook, Myspace, YouTube, and all the other cool stuff that students do online.

DJ and the Bear

Dr. Dan had a companion in his most recent journey between home in MN and work in SD. Hand-made by Ms. Montgomery as a fund-raiser, the bear laid in wait at our for someone to claim it, and Dr. D recongnized the furry fellow as a potential charmer for his offspring. No word yet on the chemistry between the two. Stay tuned!

My Better Half-Marathoner

The wife climbed out of bed this morning with running on her mind, just like about a thousand other people in the Sioux Falls area, and she showed that 13.1 mile course what she was made of--lots more spice than sugar. I stayed on the sidelines today, resting that sore leg, cheering on my girl in the crowd. She did great, a bit slower than the Deadwood race, but only by a few minutes, and on a lot less training.

An additional treat was seeing some former students--Chris Heezen, from Miller, SD, who ended up in second place over all; Laura Carrow, of Pipestone, MN, who ended up fourth female finisher after a duel at the finish, and Mike Vetter, who was running his first ever half-marathon.

My colleague Rick Puetz and his daughter were also proud finishers.

Check out the photo slideshow here. Some folks keep smiling through the pain, all the way to the glory of the finish line.

Ratbikes Galore

I appreciate simplicity. Complex systems have more opportunities to crash than simple ones, and you might think that an evening of battling internal combustion engines might deter me in appreciating that four-stroke invention, it's interesting to see how ingenious folks have simplified what were once much more complex motorcycles. Hail to the Rat Bike.

Hanging Out in the Wrong Neighborhood

As school starts, one of the things a faculty member has to do is prepare his or her office for working in. Sometimes that means simply dusting things off, watering plants, and tidying up one's desk. Sometimes, however, one must send summer visitors packing, as the wife had to do with this little fellow who wandered in to the wrong place.

Burritos, Lawn Chairs, and a Quiet Back Yard

Getting ready for a semester of teaching several college courses is a lot of work, and in the midst of it all getting together with people in the same boat--madly planning, writing, hoping--is a good thing. Here's a little video of some folks enjoying some food, drink, and conversation on the last Saturday of the summer. Thanks, DW, for taking the video (and risking the wrath of those being filmed).