Monday, February 15

Today is Monday of Week 4. Because of the winter weather, campus is closed. I hope you are all staying warm at home! There's nothing due in this class on Mondays, but if you want to get a head start on the new week, you can do that now; here is a link to Week 4 (and for those of you who are using the grace period this morning, here is a link to Week 3). Meanwhile, STAY SAFE in this dangerous cold! 

Class Procedures and Reminders

Project Stack. As usual, the stack is HUGE on Monday, and I'll start working through the projects in the order they were turned in, beginning with items left in the stack from Friday. Meanwhile, you can check the stack to make sure I received your project. (I'll be at work as usual on Monday, assuming my power stays on here.) 

Check your progress. The class is now 20% over, and you can use this Progress Chart to see if you are on track for the grade you want. If you are not on track, you can start doing more of the regular work, plus you can make up past missing work with extra credit now or later in the semester when you have some available time. Also, there will be a break next week; more about how that works here: Week 5 Break.

The following items are for fun and exploration:

Blog stream. I really like the graphic that Isha found and shared here: Feedback Strategies, and you can read more about the RISE model if you are curious (I was!).

Twitter stream. There were some great pictures of the ice and snow that people shared at Twitter. Prof. Amy McGovern caught these pictures of frozen fountains on campus before the snow:

And Dr. Daphne LaDue went to photograph the rime ice at Lake Thunderbird on Saturday, also before the snow:

Folklorist and fairy tale expert Jack Zipes will be giving a talk next week; here's an article about his work: Folklore expert Jack Zipes explains how fairy tales offer an alternative to fascism and racism. 

And here's a trailer for the talk:

Meanwhile, if you've ever wondered about how books get digitized, check out this item from Internet Archive:

At the Internet Archive, this is how we digitize a book.

We never destroy a book by cutting off its binding.
Instead, we digitize it the hard way--one page at a time.#digitalbooks pic.twitter.com/ZqPw3w41I5

— Internet Archive (@internetarchive) February 6, 2021

The Philbrook Museum shared another hidden emoji challenge; more info here.

Sometimes I like to share something from Twitter just because it is lovely, so here is a lovely piece of ancient Egyptian jewelry: VERY ancient!

Some of you in Myth-Folklore have been reading the Iliad, so I thought you might enjoy this video of a Homeric song: 

And here's some Homeric humor: Odysseus and Facebook.

February 15: Matt Groening. Today is the birthday of Matt Groening, who was born on this day in 1954. Groening is best known for being the creator of The Simpsons... but before there was Bart Simpson, there was "Life in Hell" and the rabbits! The "Life in Hell" cartoons were a staple of my undergraduate college life; you can read about them here in this Wikipedia article. Below is a book cover for his "School is Hell" series. You can see the beginnings of Bart Simpson in that rabbit for sure:

And here's a video about his creative evolution:

Check out the Twitter stream for information and fun stuff during the day, or click here for past announcements.