In Which I Rant About Plagiarism...Again

I find it mildly ironic that a comment left on one of my previous posts is from someone advertising a website that writes papers (for a fee) that are guaranteed to be plagiarism-free. I find it even more ironic that the first question that crossed my mind was, "I wonder if they're hiring?"

The thing is, I am tired. Tired of all the cheating. Tired of people who claim to live by a certain moral/ethical code who then have no qualms about having someone else do their work for them, whether that be in the form of lifting information off the Internet and inserting it into a paper (which is just plain stupid) or in a more crafty form that maybe I can't even discern.

I graded some papers today from a student whom I had caught plagiarizing on another assignment previously. All the new papers went through Turnitin.com without any problems, and yet, it irked me that it felt like the student had submitted extremely well-written papers that had no major flaws but yet weren't quite what I had asked for in the assignment.

Truth be told, I asked myself the question: Is it possible that the student got someone else to write the papers? And the realization I came to was that yes, it was possible--but no, I was never going to be able to prove it.

It's things like this that make me wonder what I see in distance education, how it's possible that I could believe in it. (And I do.)

But the problem isn't the distance. God knows, students on campus cheat and/or plagiarize just as much as online students do. And God knows, the people who are determined to do it are going to find a way.

The problem is that there are so many people who care more about turning their education into a commodity than they do about actually becoming educated people. Because once education is comprised solely in a diploma, then it's an easy sequence of steps that will lead a determined individual to achieve that end.

Tragic waste, if you ask me. For all parties involved.

I Think I Have Forgotten How To Be Creative

Seems crazy, I know. But I've been away from this blog for years, really, and even in that time, there hasn't been much writing. And what little writing there has been has been, well, trite.

I can't exactly remember when I stopped writing, but I distinctly remember when I stopped caring. For so long, I have chosen to bottle up what was in me--perhaps because for a time there was nothing good (or publishable) that would come out, perhaps because I thought the best of me was gone forever.

Time doesn't change everything, but it lends distance and perspective, and for that I am grateful.

Hello, friends. I'm back.

Songs from The Pirate Queen

You see, I love musicals. So I'm always on the lookout for a new one that I might like. Of course, not living in a city like New York, I don't always catch up as quickly as I otherwise might, but I like to think that even if I'm a couple years behind in discovering a show, that's still pretty good.

Case in point: The Pirate Queen, c. 2007.

I've been casually researching this one ever since I discovered Stephanie J. Block's new album "The Place I Know," which includes a song I had never heard before but now love: "Because I am a Wife" from Alain Boubil and Claude-Michel Schonberg's The Pirate Queen. (Broadway fans of course will of course recognize this famous writing duo as the creators of both Les Miserables and Miss Saigon.)

And yet my research had led to a disheartening end. Not only did the show end quickly after a short and disappointing run on Broadway, but when the show had moved from Chicago to New York months earlier, it lost this very wonderful song that I had so recently discovered. Its replacement ("Woman") is also quite nice, but to me it lacked the power of "Because I am a Wife."

Why, I wonder, would they make such a change? Is it because in reworking the story, the song no longer fit with the plot, as was the case with Alan Mencken and Howard Ashman's "Proud of Your Boy," which was cut from the Disney film Aladdin?

Or was "Woman" truly deemed the better song?

What do you think? Or does anyone know for sure?

Eye Drops and Original Sin

"Your corneas are so swollen that they are actually tricking your brain into thinking that you can see better with your glasses off than with them on. But that doesn't actually mean that your prescription is wrong. It's probably right, or very close to right, but you won't be able to tell until the infection has cleared."

That's pretty much verbatim what the eye doctor told me on Friday. And the reason why I'm thinking about it doesn't have much to do with the actual issue; after all, I'm on meds and I'm sure the eyes will clear up eventually.

But, as you know if you have read my past notes, sometimes I see things differently (no pun intended!), and when I heard this statement, it immediately made me think about Augustine and his teachings on original sin.

I am incapacitated to the point where I am incapable of seeing correctly. I am incapable of seeing correctly even with the corrective lenses that have been given to me in order to guide me toward healthy and happy seeing. I might think I'm doing ok because I can take off my glasses and see less blurriness, but in actuality, my eyes are messed up and there is nothing that I can do for myself to enable them to see better. I have to rely on the grace extended to me by the eye doctor, who granted me the authorization to obtain the prescription that should fix the problem (as well as the grace extended to me by my employer in the form of a salary so that I can afford to purchase the eye drops).

Same deal with original sin, if you subscribe to Augustine's teaching here. We are born into this world possessing a fallen nature, and thus, we are completely incapacitated to the point of being incapable of choosing God for ourselves. No matter how hard we strive for the good or how close we think we can get on our own, we are profoundly more helpless than we are even capable of ascertaining. Thus, it is His grace, extended to us, that enables us to accept Him.

You may not agree with the theology, and that's ok, but I find the analogy fascinating nonetheless.

Olympic Rewind

I know that it's been forever since I blogged, and to all of my loyal and faithful fans (ha ha), I do offer my most sincere apologies. While I will attempt to be better at posting current posts, this one is long overdue and must come first.

One sunny afternoon during the Olympics, Becky and I had a discussion wherein we speculated on the randomness of some of the Olympic events and wondered what new events might be added to future games. Out of the midst of such wonderings came a list, "Becky and Jana's Top Ten List of Events That Aren't Currently Part of the Olympics--But Should Be."

1. Blindfolded synchronized standing (balance is everything)
2. Steak knife fencing
3. Individual and team competitive watersliding (pretty much the same as the luge, right?)
4. Pole dancing
5. Guitar Hero
6. City driving (two categories: small car and SUV)
7. Paper airplane toss
8. Bird calling
9. Joust (Who says it's only for Renaissance Faires?)
10. Cow Tipping

There are a few others of honorable (or dishonorable) mention, which did not make the official list for various and sundry reasons and yet are being included on this blog because it's my blog and I can write whatever I want.

11. All-around Wii Sports
12. White board writing
13. Speed pooping

Lastly, we determined that that someone needed to petition the International Olympic Committee to add one final event to the Fencing category:

14. Light saber fencing

Any thoughts on other non-events that should really be added to the next Olympics?

But Can They Do It Barefoot?

Admittedly, I have never been one to get into Olympic mania. True, I happily watch various events when they're on and I'm home, but I've never been one to schedule my life around the games.

However, I find myself greatly intrigued this time around because I have discovered several events that I didn't even know were events. This has led me to a path of discovery wherein I examined all of the categories of competion.

Yet this in itself is still a little boring. And so, I thought to myself, why not make this interesting?
Since it's the Summer Olympics, and since one of the nicest things about summertime is the ability to avoid wearing shoes, I decided to examine Olympic events in terms of how many of them can be competed in without shoes. Here's what I discovered:

Without Shoes (100 events)
-Diving (8 events)
-Swimming (34 events)
-Synchronized Swimming (2 events)
-Water Polo (2 events)
-Artistic Gymnastics (14 events)
-Rhythmic Gymnastics (2 events)
-Judo (14 events)
-Taekwondo (8 events)
-Beach Volleyball (2 events)
-UPDATED 8-17-08 Rowing (14 events) (I had initially categorized this event as "up for debate," but I just watched the U.S. win the gold in one of the rowing events, and the ladies were wearing socks but not shoes)

With Shoes (167 events)
-Archery (4 events)
-Athletics (Track and Field) (47 events)
-Badminton (5 events)
-Baseball (1 event)
-Basketball (2 events)
-Boxing (11 events)
-Cycling BMX (2 events)
-Cycling Road (4 events)
-Cycling Track (10 events)
-Mountain Bike (2 events)
-Equestrain Dressage (2 events)
-Equestrian Eventing (2 events)
-Equestrian Jumping (2 events)
-Fencing (10 events)
-Football (we Yanks might call it soccer) (2 events)
-Handball (2 events)
-Shooting (15 events)
-Softball (1 event)
-Table Tennis (4 events)
-Tennis (4 events)
-Volleyball (2 events)
-Weightlifting (15 events)
-Wrestling Freestyle (11 events)
-Wrestling Greco-Roman (7 events)

Up For Debate (34 events)
-Canoe/Kayak Flatwater (12 events) (do you really need shoes in a kayak?)
-Canoe/Kayak Slalom (4 events) (do you really need shoes in a kayak?)
-Trampoline (2 events) (official rules allow either socks or gym shoes)
-Hockey (2 events) (because then you have the question: Are skates shoes?)
-Modern Pentathlon (2 events) (no shoes for swimming; shoes for the other activities)
-Rowing (14 events) (do you really need shoes on a boat? Maybe....)
-Sailing (11 events)
-Triathlon (2 events) (no shoes for swimming; shoes for the other activities)

So, ok. It's apparent that there are still more shoed events than shoeless events in the Summer Opympics. What are your crazy Olympic questions?

Passive-Aggressive Microwave

Not long ago, I read a post on Stan's blog about a site that posts pictures of people's passive-aggressive notes. I thought it was funny, especially in light of the fact that I work with a lot of passive-aggressive people. Hence, I've got a few of my own to share.

Sadly, the signs that were previously on our bathroom doors ("Women ONLY" and "Men ONLY," respectively) were taken down before I remembered to take my camera in to work. It's too bad, because it was really funny to see those signs right below the actual "Women" and "Men" signs.

However, here are a couple shots of the signs that are currently on our office microwave. This is the front:



And here is the sign on top (because 1 sign obviously isn't enough). Note the handwritten comment as well. :)