social media makes me...

feel bad about myself sometimes.

i'm assuming that back in the day (pre-2005) if you didn't deliberately keep in contact with someone they dropped from your mental radar. had a class together freshman year of college? cool - see ya around, maybe. high school crush? relegated to storytelling moments for social gatherings. that high school crush is getting married? i wouldn't know until they bring their wife to the reunion 20 years from now.

but now social media is making it worse, especially this "married/engaged" thing. i know, i know, i don't want to get married any time soon. in my rational head, i know that. but why must facebook continue to throw it in my face that i, in fact, am nowhere near that time? in this season of weddings, if i have to look at another slew of pictures of the bride held up by all five of the groomsman i'm going to start shoving pencils down my fingernails. that might be less painful.

can't we go back to only knowing about people's relationships when you are invited to the wedding or if you hear if second- or third-hand? and it's not like i have talked to these now married people any time within the last three years. nope. but i know they had a wedding. i also know that they recently acquired a Yorkshire terrier and went to Napa for their honeymoon.

it's masochism at this point -- i know that i don't want to look at their wedding album but i do. i can't tear myself away. so the cycle of self-deprecation continues as long as i cannot tear myself away from the wedding album of my 7th grade P.E. badminton partner to a girl he met rock-climbing.

i think it will continue to be love-hate. without social media, where will i be able to share my witty social commentary? (sarcastic)

damn you facebook! *shakes fist at heavens*

MLA, APA or creative?

the title of my mom's email to me today.

my mom is an adjunct professor at CBC for some early childhood courses, and sometimes she asks me questions about students' writing and such. mostly if she's being too much of a hard ass grader. (she used to be).

today she asked me to look over a works cited page (which these four students labeled 'Bibliography') and see if there is anything in the general realm of a citation style. there really wasn't, but this is what I had to write back to her. proof that one day i want to be a professor so i can give this kind of feedback to my students:

"Yikes.

It looks like each person did a different couple and then put them all together. The books are cited ok -- the first one is alright except the title of the book should be italicized. It looks like they attempted to use MLA format, but just started guessing when it came to the websites and articles on the websites.

The websites are painful to look at, and they should be marked down for copying and pasting a website logo in their Works Cited page. It's not that difficult to type out the website.

They probably used a MLA citation generator, but many times those can't do complicated stuff (e.g. shit from articles on a website). Hence, wrong.

if we're going on GENERALITIES, i guess give them points. but not full points. the whole thing is discombobulated.

also - it's called a WORKS CITED page, not a bibliography. you wrote bibliographies for your 4th grade report about sea turtles. (which i completely copied from national geographic, by the way).

ALSO - WIKIPEDIA?! you should outlaw that as a source. any joe blow can update that crap. it should never be quoted in a paper. you look at wikipedia when you want to figure out when the last czar of russia died, not when you're writing a college paper.

- sarah"

ducks

in a row.

when i was growing up, my mom used to say this most always prefaced with, "she/he never has her..." it was annoying, yes. but now that the time for change has come upon me, i've found myself saying this both out loud and to myself a lot lately.

briefly:

- my organization is growing and needs to get their fiscal year closed out. strategic planning meeting for development and programs in a week. i am still slightly surprised that i even use the term fiscal year regularly. slowly i'm moving towards someone that likes dealing with money that isn't mine. my personal finances? they're filed in a victoria's secret shopping bag.

- i have a place to live next year that isn't in my terrible studio apartment. put down the money and we'll move in late july, early august. it's a house. with a microwave and washer and dryer. it might just be heaven. i still have to fully plan getting my crap from south carolina, but i can't wait to sleep on a real mattress. unfortunately, that punch line won't get used anymore. a small price to pay.

- school starts in a couple of months. still working on the gross money-stuff associated with it. i should prepare now to not see my friends for the next two years. but i'll be smart when i get out of there, dammit. i will.

- i'm pondering tutoring Adult Basic Ed again. i won't have a lot of time with the commuting time and school, but i think i might. i miss teaching.

but as i think about putting all these life ducks in a row, i'm reminded that so much of life is continually out of order. people are sick. friends fall away. you are misunderstood. shit gets lost. afternoons have no agenda. stuff breaks. but i have no answers, and i'm not ever going to. there's solace in that, i suppose.