2 book reviews and one of the best commercials ever

I finally finished reading Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell today. That was a long read that had about 800 pages leading up to a great 100 page conclusion. I'm not saying that any of the first 100 pages was bad, boring, or even bland, but it never seemed to go anywhere. The plot moved along so slowly, that it often seemed like you were reading some things for no reason and the multi-page footnotes were in there to break up the monotony of the narrative. That being said, I'll repeat that it was not boring at any point. There are basically three separate stories contained in this behemoth, but I'm not sure than any one of them alone would be worth reading. It may be the case that the author actually needed that many pages to tell the story. I'm actually a bit confused by my experience with this book because although I kept wanting it to get over, once it was, I wanted more of what was written towards the end. The treatment of magic, while a fantastical entity in its own right in the book, is so mundane, that it doesn't feel like you are transported into a different world. I guess I'd say that it's a good book, but probably not one that I'll read again.

On the other hand, after I finished that first book, I got to read Odd and the Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman. Even with a couple of kids running around, I flew through that book. It was really good. I really like nNorse mythology and Gaiman told a Norse myth. It read and and the feel of the various sagas and compilations I've read. He really captured the feel of the world and rhythm of the myths. I think I'm going to try to start reading it chapter by chapter to my daughter at night.

Finally, I just caught this post of Facebook today and it has to be one of the best commercials ever. All I can say is, "I'm on a horse."

Cell phone in classroom convert

For the past 3.5 years I've been on the front line waging war against students with cell phones in my classroom. From the accidental ring to the kid playing during testing, I've come to know the cell phone slouch very well. Much like the war against drugs, I'm starting to feel that it's a losing proposition. Rather than spending all of that time and effort enforcing rather unenforcible rules, I think we need to focus on education and productive uses of cell phones.

I spent the day at a CSIU workshop on technology in the classroom. The first couple of presentations were ok, but nothing exciting. The first wasn't even on technology, but reading. The second focused on using spreadsheets and web apps, again, nothing too exciting. After lunch, however, I met the man who changed my mind on allowing cell phones in the classroom. He made some excellent points about cell phone use and I'm not saying that I want kids texting and talking during class, but as proliferous and ubiquitous as they are, I might as well harness their potential. We saw some great polling sites (Wiffiti and Poll Everywhere) that can be used in the place of expensive classroom response systems that are free and use texting as their means of response. We saw other applications that turn the phone into a mobile podcast recorder (Yodio) that can be used to record presentations or other such things. Our school currently has a policy that cell phones are not allowed out of the lockers. I'm sure that parent pressure is going to end up changing that policy as well. Education is about attracting student interest and keeping them engaged. Anything that I can do to keep them actively engaged with the material is most likely a good thing. If that means relying on cell phones, I'm all for it.

On another note, I had a great run today. Healing from my nasty cut has not been fun. I now have a very thick scab on my left shin and just wearing pants and having them rub along it creates a very unpleasant burning pain anywhere the scab is touched. On Monday, I decided to see how running felt. Being too cold for shorts, I had to wear the running pants and I figured their mesh interior would really be painful. More than that, though, I was worried that the pounding would produce unbearable pain. I was very surprised that neither happened. I went for a brief run and went on to worry that I missed my training window for the Humdinger on March 6. I went for a 5.6 miler Tuesday and it felt a little rough. I went for a 7.2 miler today and it felt great. I did the return trip about 3 minutes faster than the out and I finished with an overall good pace and feeling strong. My goal is under 71 minutes and beating my former student again.

I finally saw Avatar last weekend. It was the most expensive movie I ever saw. Not only were tickets an extra $3 for the fashion glasses, but we also had the $30 for the babysitter. I liked it. I'm not sure it was worth $50, but I liked it and 3D has really come a long way since the last movie I saw. I'm not sure if every movie needs to be 3D, but it did make things a bit more immersive. The best part may have been the Clash of the Titans preview.

Rough week, no action

To celebrate my birthday, raise some money for a good cause, and reinforce my image, I participated in the Lewisburg Polar Plunge last Saturday. It was great! We had a big snow the night before, temperatures were below freezing, and all was set. We got there a little late - children are very good at causing that, so instead of being part of the mass plunge, I was part of the slow post mass plunge trickle. It was so slow in fact that I was the only one entering when I went in. I rushed in the mighty Susquehanna and reaffirmed the force of gravity as I plunged in up to my neck. It felt good though. I got up and then felt a bit silly as I was the only one in the water surrounded by people in wet suits with the shore packed with all of the voyeurs. Being the only one in the water, and feeling said silliness, I walked out. As I walked out I look down at my leg and noticed a long scrape, apparently from a helpful river rock that decided to stop me from falling all the way to the bottom of the river when I first went in. It didn't seem bad and I figured I'd have quite a bruise. As the circulation in my legs restarted, more and more blood started finding it's way out of my body through what was clearly not a scrape, but rather a nice gash. By the time I got back to the car (running behind the stroller as my son let everyone know how displeased he was with being strapped in), I had a nice blood trail on my leg.

It's still a very ugly, red, painful blemish on my shin and I haven't run for a week. I could handle a week off if the Humdinger weren't in 3 weeks now and I was just hitting my stride increasing my mileage to be ready for the 7 mile trail run. I have to start running this week, regardless of how much it hurts. It really only hurts when something bumps it, which my daughter kindly pointed out to this evening with a well-placed, albeit accidental, kick; it still throbs. But because it doesn't hurt from the stresses of moving, I think it will be ok.

We finally had some decent winter weather this week as well. Not only did we get a good snowfall last Saturday, we had another Tuesday night and an actually justified snow day on Wednesday. I got my son on his first sled ride that ended with a good face full of snow.