the dead zone

[freckles_and_doubt]

I do not want these sleeping habits, they are skr-aaaaa-tched. Sunday night was rendered hideous by the usual insomnia, and thereafter, once I did get to sleep, horrible dreams, culminating in an episode where I woke up to find myself crouched next to the bed with my duvet held above my head to stop the rain of arrows from the ceiling from actually hitting me. Bloody half-dreaming hallucinations are so vivid, I could damned well hear the beastly things thudding into the fabric. It took me a while to wake up enough to realise that there were no arrows, and to apologise to the cat (who was somewhat bemused and hurt at being flung unexpectedly across the room by my sleep-walking) and get back into bed. I suspect I'm reacting to the slings and arrows of my outrageous academic life.

So I had a headache all of yesterday from lack of sleep, and a codeine hangover most of today. There's a singular terror in spending 15 minutes reading through notes for the lecture you're about to give, only to realise that you haven't taken in a word. Fortunately actual trial revealed that I can, in fact, lecture on Frankenstein more or less in my sleep. Memo to self, teaching material may be stagnating. The lecture appears to have been more or less coherent, although one student did come up to me afterwards to let me know that my habit of referring to "Christian mythology" is causing him emotional distress. Drug-hazed or not, I think I managed to convey my essential and absolute failure of empathy in reasonably friendly and professional terms.

The day was not assisted by me staggering into the kitchen just after waking up and dressing, to discover it occupied by an entirely unknown man in overalls. This was alarming, as I thought I'd heard the Evil Landlord leave for work 20 mins earlier. In fact, it transpired that he was discussing garage-building operations with the architect and builder - they start next week, right outside my bedroom window, oh joy. I wish he'd warn me about these visits, my experience of intruders in the house is sufficient that it gave me an adrenalin jolt that made me shaky for the next half hour. A fact, may I add, that the Evil Landlord finds hilarious. *growl*

Comments

[rumint.livejournal.com]

Sounds like you really get into character for those Frankenstein lectures..shamble. ;P

[extemporanea.livejournal.com]

Insofar as I tend to wear my best Victorian-style long skirt and retro shirt, in suitably gothic reds, blacks and purples, I suppose I do. Next week I get to babble enthusiastically about Frankenstein as The First SF Novel, which is lots of fun and should wake me up a tad...

[ex-wytchfyn.livejournal.com]

my habit of referring to "Christian mythology" is causing him emotional distress.
Tee hee. My mom now claims to start her classes each term with 'I'm going to say some rude things about God and Allah and all those guys in this class. If that bothers you, you should go take another class.'

[extemporanea.livejournal.com]

It's not even that I'm saying rude things about it. I just assume that the Lucifer/Satan and Adam and Eve/Eden stories occupy exactly the same cultural space as the Prometheus myth, which is mostly because they do. The student clearly subliminally expected me to pause and point out that, despite the similarities, one story is obviously true and the other false. I suppose I could do that, but personally I'd rather have Prometheus than the Christian god, so he might not like the result. The Olympian deities may be horrendously flawed, but at least they're entertaining.

I still haven't forgotten the look on a first-year's face when she came up to me after a class to say she'd just realised that the 'everything is a text' bit - all texts have a producer and cultural context etc - could be equally applied to the Bible. Stunned, horrified, fascinated enlightenment. My work here is done :>.

[ex-wytchfyn.livejournal.com]

Yarrr. Although she could always relapse: "if the book IS the world ... and God is ALSO the world (inspired the producer, is/made the context) ... then voila! God is the book, and all is again well." That's why you have to follow up these insights with the occasional jolt of current or yummy sweetie (as appropriate). Get them all the way to godless sodomy, irreverant debauchery, and hard-edged deiphobia before you release them at last.