Clarissa's Blog

The child in question can be any age between 1 and 101.

A Russian mother is not on here but her reaction would probably be “OK, bye” as she races online to sell all the child’s belongings and his share of the apartment while he’s away and then to barricade the door.

A Russian-Ukrainian couple, as a result, is mega-screwed. Or so I heard. 🤔

Is it true that one can’t drink alcohol at a picnic?? I can’t drink right now because alcohol is worse than cyanide for cholecystitis but if it weren’t for that, we would have taken some drinks to our first picnic of the season yesterday.

OK, I just saw the news. 41 people? There is no other word for this but massacre.

There’s this local fellow called Rob. Working class. Got injured on a construction job, then the 2008 crisis hit, and there were no more jobs even for uninjured workers.

So he started spending a lot of the time at the gym. First, to recover from the injury, but also because there was nothing much else to do. In spite of having a naturally very slight frame, he got quite ripped. People started coming up to him for advice. He developed a following, became a personal trainer.

Then he became part owner of the gym, got married, and started a health-food restaurant.

I’ve seen this whole story develop almost from the start.

Google Playstore gives me free copies of academic books that I can’t borrow from the entire system of Illinois public universities. Of course, I’d rather read these books on paper but our library is a joke and the entire state is failing on staying updated on new acquisitions.

My 2017 book, for instance, has been purchased by only two of these libraries and, shockingly, my school’s library is not one of them. When I suggested to our head of acquisitions that it would be nice to have the book in our library, she reacted with the kind of outrage people usually reserve for much more offensive propositions. My students are very interested in the book and ask about it all the time. Some of them are now buying it with their own money, which I’m begging them not to do because it’s very expensive. (It’s not the price that prevents our library from buying the book. They were as opposed to buying my first book that cost $20.)

Here, by the way, is an excerpt from a review of my recent book on the Choice website that serves librarians:

“This is not an easy read but is well worth the effort. Impeccable research and an elegant prose style greatly facilitate understanding a particular example of how liquid capital fostered economic insecurity, eroded the welfare state, and is leading to explosive inequality that in Spain demands being met with unrelenting resistance both in politics and literature. This book is invaluable for those interested in contemporary Spanish politics and literature. Summing up: Highly recommended.”

So it’s not like I’m expecting the college library to buy some below-par material the school will never see checked out.

While walking in a forest, I met a colleague. No, really. We have many beautiful wooded areas with walking trails around here. The colleague and I had never met before but he identified me because of my university T-shirt.

We chatted for a while before the colleague asked me my name. When he heard ite blanched.

“YOU are Clarissa??” he asked. “I always read your messages on the faculty discussion board and I assumed. . . erm. . . I never would have guessed. . . Hah!”

Based on the tone of my messages, I’m sure he assumed I’m a fire-spewing dragon and was stunned by the difference between the writing voice and the actual human being.

There are opposite cases, too. I know somebody whose online persona is so sweet and kind that it would put a busload of charitable nuns to shame. But in reality, she’s a very hard-core and professionally ruthless person.

“Liberals, You Are Not As Smart As You Think” by Gerard Alexander is the first article in the NYTIMES that I agree with completely. It’s a weird feeling to see something one thinks being said in the press.

Should colleges and universities notify parents when a student is clearly troubled?College officials generally treat students as adults, and officials say that they are constrained by privacy laws. But there are exceptions to those laws, such as a health emergency. And around the country, there are growing questions about when educators should, in fact, call home.

Here is the question, though. If you do start notifying about students suffering from depression, anxiety, etc., whom do you notify if the student is 35? Or 60? I doubt it’s legal to institute a rule where different age groups are treated differently.

Most people have a very unrealistic image of what students look like because the only kind of students featured in news stories are 18-year-olds from upper-middle-class families. Nobody ever talks about how many college students, for instance, are adults with children of their own. What is constantly discussed as issues that matter to students are things that only a small minority knows about.

The media seem fascinated by college students, but it’s a completely unrealistic image of students that they obsessively discuss.

I’m sure refugees are deeply grateful to have such respectful, serious advocates.

This is the most ridiculous, stupid and counterproductive mother’s day ad ever.

Ian McEwan gets a C+ for an analysis of his own novel. It’s not as big of a deal as people make it sound. Writers tend to be as good at analysing their own work as surgeons are at operating on themselves.

A single study that the Wikipedia cited 2,8 million times. It’s easy to guess its subject before even seeing the link.

It’s even kind of touching to see how desperately The Nation fellates the Russians.

I had no idea Julia Kristeva was a snitch. Everything else about her stinks, too. Unfortunately, one is often forced to cite her by forces beyond one’s control.

On turning 40: I love such posts by happy, wonderful people. Happy birthday!

Not very recent but fun. A middle-aged woman pretended to be a high school cheerleader.

Is there administrative bloat in academia?