Connie Kassor

Portuguese editorial cartoonist Zez Vaz reaches back to Tiananmen Square to call on American defiance.

The ABA supports the rule of law. Read full message: www.americanbar.org/news/abanews...

I came over here a little more than a year ago, and promptly forgot about it. But now I suppose I'm back. Looking to follow accounts related to higher ed, Buddhist studies, and surviving the general mess that we're in right now.

Spent my thanksgiving weekend watching the David Beckham docuseries on Netflix. TIL that he has his wife’s name — transliterated into Devanagari — tattooed on his arm. It reads व्हिक्टोरिया. I feel like this could’ve been spelled better in so many different ways.

New here as of Nov 26, 2023. Searching for Buddhist practitioners and academics, philosophy, climate change, and other odds and ends.

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A good 20% of my day yesterday involved this kind of labor.

How Tibetans in Karnataka’s Dhondenling put down roots in refuge The lush home gardens in India’s southernmost Tibetan refugee settlement tell stories tracing 50 years of exile

Tibetans have cultivated an astounding variety of fruits, vegetables, flowers and herbs in their home gardens in Dhondenling, a refugee settlement in rural southern Karnataka.

Hanna Geschewski writes:

I'm preparing to talk to some music students in a class called "How to Practice." Intended to bring in Śāntideva's writing on diligence, focusing on his definition of diligence as practice that's done joyfully. But now I'm re-reading chapter 7 of the Bodhicaryavatara, and man... this book is weird.

We read Jay Garfield's book, _Losing Ourselves: Learning to Live Without a Self_ (following a couple of weeks of reading classical Buddhist views on anātman, and Evan Thompson's _Why I Am Not a Buddhist_)

Today was the kind of day in the classroom that makes my heart full: I walked into class and everyone was already in a heated discussion about the reading. I offered students a break halfway through class, and they refused to leave. Everyone was engaged, and we all learned something from one another

This is the start of some kind of awful koan: If an academic submits a grant application to a federal agency and no one reads it, is the project worthy of funding?

The US government is facing another shutdown. This is concerning for a lot of reasons, but selfishly, I'm peeved because I'm about to submit an NEH grant application, and if the government shuts down, nobody is going to be there to read it.

40% of the faculty have resigned since this nonsense began. I suspect that most of those who are sticking around are doing so because they can't afford to walk away. What's most disgusting about all of this is the fact that students are caught in the middle.
www.cnn.com/2023/08/26/u...

I am generally okay with houseplants at home, but my office plants are frequently neglected. I've saved them with self-watering planters. You fill a reservoir with water, and a wick draws moisture into the soil. You can ignore them for a long time this way, but they stay happy.

100% this. I got a lego bonsai kit last spring, and I spent a few minutes after class each day snapping a few bricks together. Game changer.

An electric water kettle is something I use daily. For tea, coffee, or instant oatmeal or noodles if I need food and forgot to bring a lunch. A yoga mat, a comfy chair, and a little area rug. Floor/desk lamps to avoid awful fluorescent lighting. Plants in a self-watering pot so they don't die.

Triceratops and/or stegosaurus

She was so tiny!!!

Too real.

omg

Question for folks in Higher Ed: What are some words/phrases that we can use to talk about the humanities other than "humanities," "arts & sciences," or "liberal arts"? I.e., what are some words we can use to talk about the humanities to regular folks outside of the academy?

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I just finished reading Cloud Cuckoo Land and the Southern Reach trilogy. Any suggestions for a novel based on the fact that I really liked those stories?

Definitely the best swag to ever come out of an AAR meeting.

Hello, folks. Nice to be away from that other place run by that guy. I hope this becomse a better, kinder, nicer, more interesting place.

Being on a system of three 10-week terms, we don't start classes until mid-September. This time of year makes up for the agony I experience every May, when my friends at other institutions are talking about summer plans, and I still have another month to crawl across the finish line.

woohoo, thanks!