Our latest work in German class has been the famous compound nouns. We think it's hilarious that Germans jam words together into huge compounds.

According to our professor, a native Austrian, German-speakers think it's funny too. It's a game for both children and adults, to come up with the longest parsable word. For adults, it's sort of a party game, where each person in a circle has to add another segment onto the head of the word; the loser is the first that forgets part of the enormously unwieldy word that results. Sort of like "Antidisestablishmentarianism," but much more complex.

Anyway, there is also a game to make the worst possible tongue-twisting agglutination. The exemplar is the following monstrosity (although it can be further extended): "Die Rhabarberbarbarabarbarbarenbartbarbierbierbarbärbel," which translates as "'Bärbel' [the name of] the bartender at the bar [that serves] the beer [prefered by] the barber [that cuts] the beards of the barbarians [that frequent] Barbara's Rhubarb [-serving] Bar."

Pronouncing that mouthful takes we students a significant length of time. But here's a German video that makes everything crystal clear:

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Saturday evening, I went to my old college buddy Krispy's birthday party. He's hitting the big three-oh. Krispy possesses a happy-go-lucky nature, so it didn't seem to bother him.

He's got a nice house in a not-nice part of town, of which Buffalo has many. (With the city's decline in population, housing is crazy cheap.) I am still wondering how old the building was; it had some stained-glass windows, but the kitchen had a chimney with the circular hole indicating it once had a freestanding stove with a stovepipe.

At any rate, there was a big crowd, as Krispy is good at making friends. "Genial" is a good word for him. I brought along the first angel-food cake I've even made, which came out quite well. A cake needs topping, but I figured icing would be too sweet; instead I took a cup of cream, added a teaspoon of sugar and half a teaspoon of lemon juice, and whipped it until it was just about to become overwhipped. I then folded in a cup of blueberries and called it done.

It was a big hit, far more popular than the conventional commercial cake someone had bought. The regular cake was really really sweet, and I think our crowd has aged enough that pure sugar is not the rush it used to be.

Another guest brought something I'd never seen before: "Birthday Cake Milk." It's a plastic pint bottle of milk, colored blue, flavored with the artifical cake flavoring used for birthday cake-flavored ice cream, then with 60 grams of sugar added. Yes, sixty grams sugar. I did the math: 60 grams is slightly more than two ounces. A fluid ounce of water weighs one ounce. A pint is sixteen fluid ounces. This beverage was 1/8 sugar. That's about as sweet as Mountain Dew.

I suspect the "milk" got opened eventually, but I didn't stay. As it was nearing midnight, I was getting more and more tired. I left at 12:15 AM, and was tired enough perhaps I shouldn't have been driving.

Last time I was in college, I could pull all-nighters with much greater ease.

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For my German test today, I had to "write a paragraph describing your best friend". However, I could not recall all my vocabulary words. So I claimed he was short, blond, and stupid, his hobby is playing soccer, and that he worked in a GM factory. For the record, that is a bundle of lies. I did, however, mention that he came from Regina, Canada, and that his father's father's brother was an American author.

Leaving the class, a classmate admitting that he had claimed his best friend had several children, so he could use more vocab to describe them. I was annoyed that I didn't think of that: I remember the words for family members, so I could have invented for my friend a wife, son, and daughter. "Seine Frau heißt Mildred. Mildred und Paul haben zwei Kinder: ein Sohn heißt Corwin, und eine Tochter heißt Cattie-brie. Corwin ist neun Jahr alt, und Cattie-brie ist vier Jahr alt."

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I'd like to go on to graduate school. Today, I realized that I intend to graduate next May, so perhaps I'd better look into the process.

In essence, I need to take the GRE Real Soon Now, line up three letters of recommendation, and not least of all, figure out which universities to apply to.

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In the news this week, I read with some pleasure of the arrest of Roman Polanski by Swiss authorities. An Associated Press story yesterday quoted the Swiss Directors' Association as saying his arrest was “not only a grotesque farce of justice, but also an immense cultural scandal.” I concur. It is indeed a grotesque that a man could drug a 13-year old girl, rape her, and escape his just punishment for decades, while enjoying a lucrative public career in a nation that claims to follow the canons of civilization.

The same AP article quoted the French Culture Minister, who said that France's Prime Minister “is following the case with great attention and shares the minister's hope that the situation can be quickly resolved.” I also have a hope: that Mr. Polanski be quickly extradited to the United States, to serve his sentence for the crimes originally committed, and be tried as well for his flight from justice.

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I was feverish from Wednesday through Saturday, but Sunday I began feeling better. Today, I'm back up to about 80% capacity, which I hope is good enough. We had no classes today for Rosh Hashanah; the three-day weekend to recover was a stroke of luck.

The weather today is brutal. We've got a High Wind Advisory with gusts greater than 50 mph, and a Coastal Flood Watch, as the winds can push the Great Lake's water to one end, kind of like sloshing around in a tub. Thunderstorm cells have been rolling through; a friend that lives ten miles to the west got hail. None of that here, though. Which is a pity, because I'd like to gather it up and use it in my ice-cream machine, just for amusement's sake.

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I'm sick with the flu now, I started feeling bad Wednesday. I've only missed one class*, as most of my classes have mandatory attendance policies. Which means I was spreading around my germs. But I respond to incentives.

* I was also late to class this morning. It normally takes a half hour to walk to that class, but I had to take two rest breaks on the way, which nearly doubled my time. I am embarassed to admit that, even with illness as an excuse.

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Academic work is grinding and cheerless. For homework, I had to translate the following German audio:

Sadly, the beginning and end of that is cut off, because it was part of a movie. Here's the whole thing, minus the video:

To be clear, I didn't have to translate from listening, we were provided the lyrics, to wit:

Ich esse gerne Sauerkraut und tanze gerne Polka.
Und meine Braut heißt Edeltraud, sie denkt genau wie ich.
Sie kocht am besten Sauerkraut und tanzt am besten Polka.
Deshalb ist auch die Edeltraud die beste Braut für mich.

Ich sing' die Sauerkraut-Polka, die Sauerkraut-Polka Tag und Nacht,
Ich sing' die Sauerkraut-Polka, weil sauer lustig macht.
Ich sing' die Sauerkraut-Polka und sage laut:
Ich bin nur für Sauerkraut und meine Braut gebaut.

Ich esse gerne Sauerkraut.....

Wenn ich im Gasthaus warte und hungrig bin,
leg' ich trotzdem die Karte gleich wieder hin.
Ich brauch' nicht nachzudenken, ich kenn' mein Ziel.
Ich sage dem Ober gleich, was ich will:

Ich esse gerne Sauerkraut......

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Here at UB we have an Asian Studies Program. It's related to history, as Asian Studies is basically a combination of history of Asian nations or peoples, combined with study of their languages and current organization. Note that it's distinct from Asian-American Studies, which tends to be about the immigrant experience in America.

Anyway, I am now tangentally involved with the program, in that the Modern History of Korea class I'm taking is cross-listed in the program, and the professor teaching it is a member of the Program, instead of the History Department.

What the hell's the difference between a Department and a Program? Money, prestige, and administrators.

Anyway, UB is considering elevating the AS Program into a full Department. As part of their consideration, a couple of professors from schools eminent in the AS field are visiting UB and talking to the profs, the administration, and the students. Which is where I come in.

The visitors wanted to talk to current students in the program, but also current students taking classes in the program but that are members of other departments. Free lunch was offered as an inducement. I have a nice long lunch break of Thursdays, so I was all over this.

It turned out to be a nice informal chat. We met in a conference room, two visiting professors and six undergrads. (The session with grad students was later). It wasn't a rubber-stamp kind of thing, where they were here to say "Yes, there should be a full department." We talked about the ups and the downs of program elevation. (Upside: prestige, money, internal advocacy. Downside: paperwork, wasted money, somewhat more difficult to maintain interdisciplinary character.)

There were lots of burritos left over when we wrapped up. Someone had a nice afternoon snack.

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I've been really busy recently, and neglecting my blog. Then, I watched a video to unwind: a video of a blowfly larvae being removed from someone's scalp. That's going to haunt my dreams for a while! The following video is the antidote.

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