Chris Kern

12:45 pm: This seems to be the tentative plan for me:

Now - Summer (09): Continue taking Chinese, decide on a dissertation topic
Summer '09: Teach the intensive Japanese courses as an Instructor
Fall '09: Work on grant applications for foreign study
Winter '10: Take candidacy exam
Fall '10-Summer(?)'11: Research year in Japan
Summer '11-???: Finish dissertation, find job.

Phew.

09:40 am: Luckily I was able to get my car fixed at the dealership last night; they also fixed a couple of other things that I had been meaning to get looked at so it's all good.

03:17 pm: Arrgh, my car won't start and I couldn't get it jumped; now I have to get it towed. At least I'm thankful for two things -- first that my living situation is such that I don't need to use my car very often, and second that Progressive's insurance covers things like jumping and towing.

But probably I won't get the car back until at least Monday since the dealership's service area closes at 5:00.

skuldnoshinpu, let me know if you go to the store tomorrow. That's what I was going to do when it wouldn't start.

10:56 pm: I'm reading Lord of the Rings again -- it's interesting to read the book carefully again after having recently been perusing Tolkien's letters. Tolkien was a devout Catholic, and he considered Lord of the Rings to be a work of Christian fiction; in one letter to a reader he said that LotR was not ultimately a story of good and evil, but a story about "God and his sole right to divine honor".

This is not particularly explicit in the book but there are a lot of little hints, so to speak, scattered around the book, some of which are explicitly connected with Christian theology by Tolkien in his letters. For instance, when Frodo accepts his quest after the Council of Elrond, it says that Frodo felt as if "some other will" was using his voice; this is meant to represent the grace of God.

I always find the Christian themes and connections of LotR interesting because typically, fantasy fans are non-Christians, so to have one of the founding works of the genre written by a devout Catholic is kind of interesting.

10:20 pm: The Bengals finally won their first game of the season; of course I wasn't watching.

Also Atlanta today had a time of possession of 45:15 against Oakland. If you don't watch football that may not mean much, but it's staggeringly bad; I haven't found confirmation on this but it may be a new record for ToP in the NFL. And this was a home game! How did Oakland win two games?

08:56 pm: I just saw on the news that AEP is considering a surcharge on our electricity bills because of the costs involved in restoring power during this previous power outage. Nothing is decided yet, but that seems sort of like a store charging you extra money because they were out of a supply you wanted.

07:44 am: After OSU's disastrous loss to USC last week, they beat Troy with their usual Tressel-coached small margin this week. Conference play starts vs. Minnesota next week then we've got the tough game against Washington.

The Bengals shocked everyone on Sunday by actually playing the Giants competitively. The offense looked like they had their old spark back, and the defense actually made some key stops. Unfortunately they lost in OT due to terrible play calling (run it up the middle twice in a row?) and so they're 0-3, but at least the game was fun to watch.

02:43 pm: 9/11
The incoming students this year that I'll be teaching were in elementary school when 9/11 happened.

I'm getting older.

10:47 am: The college football season started this weekend. OSU played their first game vs. Youngstown State (a 1-AA team) yesterday; it was a good chance to see the team in action. They looked fine, although it's hard to tell vs. a cupcake team, and they didn't even keep the starters in for the first half. The big test for OSU will be the third game against USC.

The worst part was that Beanie Wells, our Heisman-candidate running back, got hurt. There's no word on the severity yet, although X-rays came back negative.

The upsets are already starting, with Virginia Tech losing to East Carolina and Pittsburgh losing to Bowling Green. Michigan looks to be a mediocre team this year; losing to Utah (not really an upset, but generally people would hope for better out of Michigan.)

The pro football season kicks off on Thursday. The Bengals look terrible this year; the worst I've ever seen them since I started following the team.

05:06 pm: It's been a while since I updated with life stuff. I'm looking forward to the Autumn quarter starting since this summer job is very boring and I'm not doing much else. The problem is that I need to be deciding on a dissertation topic, which is not easy. I have some ideas, but I don't know which ones will best turn into dissertations, and reading other dissertations isn't helping all that much.

This year I'm on a fellowship to do Chinese, which means I better do really well in Chinese class or I'll be in trouble. This gives me an extra year of TA funding, so an extra year to "waste" in Columbus studying.

Preseason NFL football has already started; the Bengals look to be on their way to another ~.500 season, but we'll see. For NCAA, OSU is ranked #2 in the preseason AP poll...we'll see how that goes.