Hey. Wait. What happened? How is it … 1:30 am? Wasn’t it just 9:00 a few minutes ago?
Herbert Hoover once wrote, “Bessed are the young, for they shall inherit the national debt.“
Yaar! This theater is eating my life. Eating it whole and raw. My grades this semester are going to suffer, (suffer, suffering, suffered) accordingly. Last week, logging my hours, I came up to 59.5 between Monday and Friday evening. To date, I’m at 417 hours. Logged. Plus however many countless hours not logged, like tonight … reading forums. Learning about screen masking to keep things looking good when we show Flat prints (as opposed to Scope). Learning about lummens per square foot, about aperture sizes and the differences between a lamphouse and a console. Three-phase vs. single-phase power. Stereo vs Dolby Stereo SR (really cool, actually–encodes four channels of data into two analog audio tracks using phase-inversion, which is then extrapolated into six semi-discrete channels) vs Dolby Digital (six true discrete channels) vs Dolby Digital EX (7 discrete channels) vs DTS vs SDDS (8 discrete channels). About a thousand things that are unique and important to the theater industry … that 99% of the world doesn’t even know exists. And it just eats my life. Consumes hours and hours. It’s interesting. And, at times, applicable.
Mostly, I just wish that the people involved with planning and designing the new Procrastinator Theatre had spent a little time doing research … were moderately versed in the subject. Had SOME clue about the difference between a Scope print and a Flat print. Knew SOMETHING about projection booths. About … ghaa.
Oh. I wrote a term paper, the other day. Sat down at 8:00 pm. Finished at 9:00 am the next morning. Rocked steady, the whole night through. And the result … well, I hope my Prof finds it rather interesting, anyway. (Mostly, I suspect he’ll be thrilled by the time he gets to mine just to read complete, grammatically correct sentences…). Here’s the first paragraph:
In his The Genealogy of Morals, Friedrich Nietzsche paints an image of the “noble classes” before the ascendancy of Christian morality. In this paper, I will broadly reconstruct this portrait, examine Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness as a case study of this unfettered noble spirit, and put both works in a modern context relating to the War in Iraq.
Intrigued? Oh, I’m sure you are.
Here. Just for you. A link! …
https://eateggs.com/files/2007.12.04-PericlesInIraq.pdf
It’s a character study of Mr. Kurtz (The Heart of Darkness), operating from the framework of a Periclean “noble”, as described in The Genealogy of Morals. Man, it’s fascinating stuff. Let me tell you. Actually, you might find it slightly interesting if you’ve read both of the aforementioned works recently. Otherwise, it’s completely inane and academic. Actually, it’s not even that academic. But hey…
Along the way, I came across a quote that I rather like:
One skill is needed—lost today, unfortunately—for the practice of reading is an art: the skill to ruminate, which cows possess but modern man lacks.
Friedrich Nietzsche, The Genealogy of Morals
Clever, eh?
