New Department and Course Offerings!

[_Daniel Peterson]

Hey: calm down, Dr. Peterson. There's no need to get upset. If I hurt your feelings, please let me know, and I'll apologize.

Upset?

LOL!

I'm entertained.

In a single post, while attacking me for "name-dropping," you dropped the names of Jessica Hagedorn, Haruki Murakami, Bharati Mukherjee, Chinua Achebe, Chang-Rae Lee, Mulatu Astatqe, and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.

My little list of "Jessica Hagedorn, Haruki Murakami, Bharati Mukherjee, Chinua Achebe, Chang-Rae Lee, Mulatu Astatqe, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Mars Volta, Bat for Lashes, John Wray, and In Bruges" came from just two of your ostensibly non-name-dropping posts!

I think I'll share that I often like to end my evenings with a post-prandial brandy snifter-full of warm milk. I like to sit back, with my feet propped up on my ottoman, while I indulge in the ultimate guilty pleasure: Bye, Bye Birdie, which I listen to on my old Victrola.

I could never really stand Bye, Bye Birdie. Don't think I've ever heard or seen it all the way through.

But here's the difference between you and me in this regard: If you really liked Bye, Bye Birdie, I absolutely wouldn't care.

Nor do I care generally what your tastes in music, art, and literature are.

See: I am hip! I do like to have fun! How dare you insinuate that I'm a square!

I just think it amusing, in a sad sort of way, that you're so pathetically desperate to have the handful of inmates on this little board think of you as cool, hip, edgy, and sophisticated. Do the people in your real life not grasp your inner edginess? Do they think of you as a sullen and socially maladroit nerd or something?

[_Doctor Scratch]

In a single post, while attacking me for "name-dropping," you dropped the names of Jessica Hagedorn, Haruki Murakami, Bharati Mukherjee, Chinua Achebe, Chang-Rae Lee, Mulatu Astatqe, and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.

My little list of "Jessica Hagedorn, Haruki Murakami, Bharati Mukherjee, Chinua Achebe, Chang-Rae Lee, Mulatu Astatqe, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Mars Volta, Bat for Lashes, John Wray, and In Bruges" came from just two of your ostensibly non-name-dropping posts!

Hi there, Dr. Peterson. It's true: I did drop those names. I won't deny it. I'm more than glad to admit that I dropped a few names when, in fact, I did drop a few names. So, I'm not sure where you are getting this "ostensibly non-name-dropping posts!" They were name-dropping posts. I admit it.

I think I'll share that I often like to end my evenings with a post-prandial brandy snifter-full of warm milk. I like to sit back, with my feet propped up on my ottoman, while I indulge in the ultimate guilty pleasure: Bye, Bye Birdie, which I listen to on my old Victrola.

I could never really stand Bye, Bye Birdie. Don't think I've ever heard or seen it all the way through.

But here's the difference between you and me in this regard: If you really liked Bye, Bye Birdie, I absolutely wouldn't care.

You mean you wouldn't make fun of me and accuse me of a desperate need to feel "hip" and "cool"? Phew! That's a relief! Gee, to think: here I was, worried that you are grimly humorless and devoid of a sense of irony. It's good to know that you have no intention of retaliating or lashing out.

See: I am hip! I do like to have fun! How dare you insinuate that I'm a square!

I just think it amusing, in a sad sort of way, that you're so pathetically desperate to have the handful of inmates on this little board think of you as cool, hip, edgy, and sophisticated. Do the people in your real life not grasp your inner edginess? Do they think of you as a sullen and socially maladroit nerd or something?

Well, I'm trying to do better. For instance, I'm considering inviting everyone over for Family Home Evening this Monday so that we can enjoy a risible screening of The Godmakers. Maybe we'll get really wild and break out the caffeine-free cola. Do you think my pals will think I'm a "fun" guy if I do that? Or, do you think I'd be better off going with a silent anti-Mormon film instead? Also: what about hors d'ouvres? Cucumbers w/ cottage cheese (a.k.a. "Mormon nachos")? Or unsalted lentil paste? Which do you think would make me more popular with the "in-crowd"?

In any event, this is all very interesting, and I'd like to discuss it with you further. Unfortunately, I have to leave to view an exhibit of 8th century Native American weaponry, and after that I'll be listening to a lecture on the more obscure works of Carl Orff.

[Guest]

Incidentally, Die Zauberflöte -- that's The Magic Flute, for those of you who object to foreigners and their ridiculous, pompous-sounding "foreign languages" -- was the earliest opera that I came to love (I first saw it in Zürich, on my mission), and it's still a huge favorite of mine. I have large portions of it memorized.

I don't think anyone objects either to foreigners or to foreign languages. There may be some, however, who objective to pedantic use of foreign terms by show-offy (albeit insecure) internet discussion board posters.

Auf Deutsch, of course.

Of course.

I must say, the Mission rules for those in your era certainly appear more lax than those of my era.

The Magic Flute certainly beats "My Turn on Earth."

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Hello,

If I may be so base...

I had the opportunity to meet with both Dick Cheney and, believe it or not, Barack Obama. During the course of our pleasantries I asked them their opinions about Mormonism.

Vice President Dick Cheney laughed a sort of short laugh. A sort of "chortle" as it were... And he he shook his head and said, "I suppose every country has its weird little sub-groups, no?" And that was it! I stand all amazed...

Barack Obama, while on the campaign trail was a little more diplomatic. He said, "Aren't those, you know, those cats who have a bunch of wives in Arizona or something?" And then he laughed. I corrected his view briefly, and he said, "America has a room for everyone, even the most fringe groups have a place here."

What a stunning statement on Mormonism.

Very Respectfully,

Doctor CamNC4Me

[_Dr. Shades]

I've read Haruki Murakami (though I still prefer Endo Shusako) and Chinua Achebe. Have you read Naguib Mahfouz, Salma al-Khadra al-Jayyusi, Yashar Kemal, or Yusuf Idris, O cool, edgy, hip, non-name-dropping one?

(Among the names you, um, haven't dropped in your pathetically desperate quest to seem hip, edgy, cool, and with it, we can now list Jessica Hagedorn, Haruki Murakami, Bharati Mukherjee, Chinua Achebe, Chang-Rae Lee, Mulatu Astatqe, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Mars Volta, Bat for Lashes, John Wray, and In Bruges.

Reading is for people with no ideas of their own.

[_solomarineris]

Reading is for people with no ideas of their own.

[_Daniel Peterson]

Well, I'm trying to do better. For instance, I'm considering inviting everyone over for Family Home Evening this Monday so that we can enjoy a risible screening of The Godmakers. Maybe we'll get really wild and break out the caffeine-free cola. Do you think my pals will think I'm a "fun" guy if I do that? Or, do you think I'd be better off going with a silent anti-Mormon film instead?

This obsession of yours is genuinely fascinating, Scratch One. And I mean that seriously.

It's one of the chief points of interest on this message board, so far as I'm concerned.

[_moksha]

Incidentally, Die Zauberflöte -- that's The Magic Flute, for those of you who object to foreigners and their ridiculous, pompous-sounding "foreign languages" -- was the earliest opera that I came to love (I first saw it in Zürich, on my mission), and it's still a huge favorite of mine. I have large portions of it memorized. Auf Deutsch, of course.

The syllabus for this proposed course will need to be rewritten. Attention to memorizing passages needs to be emphasized. Get it right this time or else!
- Dean Vernon P. Wormer, memorandum, 2009

[_Doctor Scratch]

Well, I'm trying to do better. For instance, I'm considering inviting everyone over for Family Home Evening this Monday so that we can enjoy a risible screening of The Godmakers. Maybe we'll get really wild and break out the caffeine-free cola. Do you think my pals will think I'm a "fun" guy if I do that? Or, do you think I'd be better off going with a silent anti-Mormon film instead?

This obsession of yours is genuinely fascinating, Scratch One. And I mean that seriously.

It's one of the chief points of interest on this message board, so far as I'm concerned.

Hi, Dr. Peterson. I'm glad that you've put the hysterically angry, grimly humorless DCP back in his bottle, and that the jovial, cheerfully dismissive and snide DCP is back in his place. It is interesting to see the real person behind the mask, though.

[_Yoda]

The Magic Flute certainly beats "My Turn on Earth."

Having sung roles in both, I agree. LOL