Kindle Lesson #1

My Twitter followers will know that I recently purchased a Kindle 2--it has been mine-oh-mine for about two weeks now, and I use it everyday. I love it.

Today, I contacted customer service because I was having some issues with finding my New Yorker subscription (the new one wasn't showing up on my device!) and a PDF file I had converted and uploaded vanished without a trace, even after I'd read a bit of it and examined how well the conversion worked. I discovered that the PDF file was still on the device when I attempted to re-add it, but somehow I couldn't find it when I searched my items.

Enamored as I was with my Kindle, I did not react with anger. Perhaps something was merely awry, I thought. Maybe the device wasn't accessing the information, or maybe I uploaded it wrong. I e-mailed Amazon; they promptly replied that I should call their customer service number. I did; after about a minute I was greeted by a helpful gentleman who attempted to re-send my New Yorker issue to the Kindle. He then had me restart the device and transferred me to tech support for assistance with my PDF file.

By the time the Kindle restarted, I was chatting with a friendly woman. I described my problem--I can't find my converted PDF document! Oh, and I still can't find my New Yorker current issue!--and she quickly directed me to the top of the screen. If I press the navigation key to the left, I suddenly see that I can display "all items". Somehow, somewhat inexplicably, I had changed my selection to display only books.

"I feel stupid," I told the tech support woman. She expressed satisfaction that she was able to so quickly solve my problem, and I hung up pleased that the Kindle was working perfectly (and armed with new knowledge about display settings).

I blame the folks who played with my Kindle the weekend before last (you know who you are*).

So, Lesson #1: be careful how many individuals fiddle with Kindle's settings unsupervised. Also, Kindle has many, many hidden menus that I'm still locating, despite the ease and intuition with which I have so far operated my beloved device. More Kindle gushing soon!

*Don't worry--I don't actually blame you. Either way, I now know a new, nifty feature!

Bits of This n' That

• In a correction to my prior post, there are apparently faculty who live in my complex. Or something. But I'm right about the other stuff...
  
• Meyer lemons are tasty, especially when baked into a pie, or combined with goat cheese, asparagus, and nuts*. Yum. I'm a fan of these tasty little citrus.
• I'm plodding along on my thesis. A little work here and there, which was derailed by having a stomach bug Tuesday and residually on Wednesday. Yuck. But today--much work will be accomplished. And tomorrow. And Saturday (well, maybe not all day Saturday). And a bit on Sunday too.
• I expect to hear good news from a great friend today.
• The Decemberists released The Hazards of Love on iTunes yesterday. I'm very tempted to buy it, even though I like to purchase actual CDs from bands I like--that way I can take it in the car, etc. I guess I'm old fashioned like that.
• Google Reader (which has changed my blog-reading life) now lets you comment on other peoples' shared items. How cool is that?

All right, folks, back to work!

*It makes a good breakfast too. Mmm...

The Media and the Fire

It's funny to realize how much the media has gotten wrong about our fire on Wednesday. It's really small stuff, but it's still amusing. And it really makes me wonder how much else they get wrong with other stories.

I'm not going to link to any stories in particular (though this one is probably the most accurate), but the general errors include the timeline of events, how much was damaged, who was affected, and what happened. They all claim that swift action on the part of the police department was responsible for getting everyone out safely, when really it was the swift action on the part of residents that got everyone out. And the fact that when you hear a giant explosion and see flames, you're likely to leave the building that's on fire as quickly as possible. Also, a few UA staff members were affected but no faculty. Details, people, details.

Anyway, hopefully our friends in the affected building will be able to go home soon.

Never Shout "FIRE"

I've occasionally been asked the question: if your house is on fire, what would you save? Personally, I'd save Rory, Lance (if he needed saving), and my grandmother's poetry book and our mutual correspondence. Everything else is pretty replaceable.

Of course, the question was purely theoretical...until it wasn't. Tonight, my apartment complex caught fire
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There are two buildings in my complex. I'm on my porch, so my building was fine--but the other building lost several apartments on the end, and everyone in that building had to be evacuated. They cannot return to their homes until tomorrow, and who knows when their power and gas will be turned on, or if they'll even be able to live there.

What caused this splendid display of pyrotechnics? Well, the university hired a contractor to dig out the pond in front of the apartment building above because their recent construction had caused a great deal of sediment to be dumped into our pond. Through a series of mishaps, the big backhoe ended up in the drained pond, sunk into the loose mud and sediment. Then they broke the gas line. The gas company came out and was presumably taking care of the situation.

Lance and I were sitting in my apartment when an explosion rattled our windows. "That's a gas line blowing," said Lance. We dashed out the door--to see what was going on, to rescue our friends in the building, something--and we saw smoke. Then little flames. Then MASSIVE FLAMES. The people in the two apartments that were on fire got out (including our landlord's mother), so no one was hurt, and all the residents and area citizens watched as the firetrucks came screaming from down the road (the advantages of living downtown, two blocks from a fire station).

Since it was a gas fire, it took a good half hour to contain. Meanwhile, we bounced from outside to a friends' apartment across the street. It is cold, after all. I offered floor space to my now homeless friends (two of whom are now staying here). Everyone's okay, though it was pretty frightening.

So what would you save if your home caught fire?

Rain Rambling

Caveat: this post contains a major amount of rambling and slightly jumbled thoughts.

So remember my last post where I talked about getting some kind of weird virus? Well, I passed it to Lance last week. And then we were both healthy again, and I managed to develop a sore throat that I'm increasingly suspecting is the result of the weird weather and vigorous Arkansas vegetation growth. Thus, I've been taking it easy yesterday and today, sipping on Masala Chai* and reading.

Speaking of rain, I ran a race in the rain on Saturday, while I was still well. It was an interesting experience, since usually the rain deters any exercise attempts or causes me to head to the HPER instead. I actually found the experience fun, although the stream of water into my right eye was a little annoying. I see why runners often wear hats.

The rain also brings me to a link I'd like to share with you: Robin McKinley's blog**. I love Robin McKinley; she's a fabulous writer and is responsible for several of my favorite books. Her blog is entertaining and quirky, and I'm enjoying reading about the personal life of a favorite author. Of course, now I remember that I wrote about this last time. Duh. Oh well, I'll just leave it.***

So now on to my reading. I've finished three, no, four books in rapid succession (man, I love the start of the summer, when I can gulp down novels that have been tempting me all semester). I started off by reading The Jane Austen Book Club, followed by The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, which led me to polish off In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto. I then moved on to The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, which is a YA book, so it read REALLY fast. Yum. I promise to talk about each of these books individually for the rest of the week.

Well, I'm off to do some more reading. A trip to the library brought me Lady of the Snakes, Lost and Found, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, and Bee Season. And yes, I do realize I need to do thesis reading. Soon, I tell myself.

*Thanks to this guy. It's almost all gone, so I'm trying to savor the last few cups.
**She's been complaining about the rain. She's also the reason I'm using lots of footnotes lately.
***See caveat.

Genre Theories! (and Blogger Vistors)

I blame Secret Knitter for my lack of posts. Yeah, that sounds good...

Well, actually he is visiting the grand state of Arkansas, so I've been busy with showing him around my town (and making sure he's well fed), which has been loads of fun. Check out his recent posts for his take on The Natural State.

Monday, the day I took of to show Secret Knitter around, also was the day I had a class meeting, so I spent part of it finishing reading Amy Devitt's Writing Genres. This is an excellent book for introducing genre theory. Interesting to read, it touches on the major issues in genre theory right now, including the separation of rhetorical and genre theory. Good stuff.

And because I'm lazy, I'm just going to let you read the assignment I had to type out. It pertains to my thesis, however, thus you might be vaguely interested. We were asked to address three questions based on our readings: which genres are we interested in, what are the interesting questions, and where can I go for more information.

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Which Genres?

I am interesting in the genre of student writing. Student writing and the assignments students are asked to complete for composition courses are particularly tricky to form into a genre because, according to Devitt and those she cites, the genre is itself unstable. Students from one class to the next rarely share the idea that their writings are linked in anyway, nor do they often see their writing for class assignments, be it composition or a lab report, as connected beyond the category of schoolwork.

I am also interested in the professional writing that engineering students will be asked to create when they enter the work force. Students may not see their freshman composition (or any writing they do in school, except for lab reports, perhaps) as pertaining to their future careers. However, as genre theories (and the concept of an underlying genre theory for writing) discussed in all of the readings, different forms of written discourse are connected and genres influence and shape that discourse. Devitt’s book is interesting in this regard because she discusses both the genres used by tax accountants and literary genres and believes that they share commonalities, at least as genres.

Interesting Questions:

Some questions that arise from my particular genre interests are as follows:

How can skills used student writing be transferred to professional discourse?

• What are the skills used (or presumably used) in student writing?
• What’s the purpose in an educational setting for student writing?
• It is it effective, educationally? (I.e. does it meet the goals set by the genre?)
• What are the intended goals set by the genre?
• How can we provide students with a meaningful rhetorical situation they can use to shape their writing?
• How can an understanding of genre help students?

Where to Go? (For Information?)

Devitt’s book has been particularly enlightening for my purposes. She discusses at some length the generic issues associated with freshmen composition courses and student writing—namely, the lack of genre stability and the issue of teaching students genre to empower their writing. Her research has directed me to other interesting articles and books such as David Russell’s work with activity theory and genre, and his book Writing in the Academic Disciplines: A Curricular History. The Rhetoric and Ideology of Genre also provided some interesting articles and directions that I could turn to find more information on my particular interests and questions. Both volumes contain not only good information, but sources that I could read and study.

Student writing is increasingly important as more researchers (and universities) turn their attention to composition classes, student writing, and what students actually take away from these courses. Just from David Russell I find more sources dealing with questions on making composition more effect, and I believe genre in many ways comes to bear on that problem. Devitt’s chapter on teaching genre awareness in turn provides directions and ideas that will be useful to my own research.