Music

Debbie and I were chatting away over the weekend and she mentioned the idea of me starting up a band. I've played in a couple of spectacularly non-public bands before, and it was always fun. We talked about which of the people we knew (from school) were musically inclined, and pondered aloud about configurations of people and instruments.

One thing we didn't talk about during this (admittedly brief) conversation was what style of music such a band might play. In the past I've only really tried a couple of styles of music - metal and pop-punk. There was a heavy pop influence in the band that made noise at Superflat. Oh, and I guess there was that 'experimental' band where the experiment consisted of seeing how alcohol consumption affected our musical and lyrical processes. That was fun, and there are hours of tapes as a result, but I don't know that my tired old bones could handle such a debauched approach these days.

So, in no particular order, here are some types of music that I would like to try out:

* Country 'n' Western - with a Johnny Cash type singer

* Full on Cheese Goth - with drum machine, strings, choral voices etc

* Improvisational Jazz - maybe with some brass or other wind instruments

* Acoustic Rock - all mellow styles, with some talented vocalist type(s)

* Hair Metal - with millions of really fast solos, and tights

* Hip Hop Metal Fusion - this just seems like a fun musical style, period

Of course, my preferred activity outside of school is hanging out with Debbie, be it sleeping, watching cool movies, visiting folks and playing boardgames, drinking, RPing, or just chilling in our crib. So the whole band thing runs counter to my obsessive desire to spend time with my good lady wife, and could well entail further damage to my already fragile ears. So it's rather unlikely to happen any time soon :) 

Cameras are fun!

I have just started a filmmaking unit with one of my year 9 classes, and it promises to be a lot of fun. One of the things I like about that class is that I can be reasonably confident that they will actually get something done in the time given. They aren't 100% when it comes to completing tasks, but they're more reliable than any of my other classes.

We started with some very simple stuff today - filming the numbers one to ten in sequence. It was actually quite time consuming, as students figured out how to set up tripods, hpw to put tapes in, and the best ways to roll up their uniforms so that they could hold a piece of paper in front of their crotch and appear naked on screen.

There was some inevitable silliness.

Still, I am a lot less exhausted and grumpy than I thought I'd be at the end of a 5 lesson day. Yay for fun period 5 lessons! 

Less Formal

I suspect that my spoken language at school has become somewhat less formal. I have had way fewer students ask me what country I'm from this year, and I've generally noticed that I use fewer words which students don't grok.

I'm not sure how I feel about this. I think I'm... disappointed? Concerned that my environment is shaping me into a grumpier, less eloquent person?

Then again, I don't think it's a change that has seeped too far into my non-school life. I'm still able to write in the same style as I was accustomed to use before I started teaching here, and I don't believe that my language has changed much in non-work situations, though I am a little more likely to say things like "James got the mad skills at dice rolling" than I once was. This may in fact have as much to do with being exposed to James' language use as anything...

Today I held a meeting for some students interested in a film-making competition. I couldn't help making a string of sarcastic or silly comments. Luckily it was a Y12 and Y13 group, and they all had a sense of humour. Thus, when I said that one camera was sufficient for most small filmmaking purposes, and that unless they were planning to do stunts like setting themselves on fire, they'd probably be OK with one camera, they took it well. They did ask whether I was encouraging them to set themselves on fire, which I clearly wasn't. I also wasn't encouraging them to make porn when I told them that, technically, porn would't breach the guideline on objectionable material as long as they were 18. I told them not to make porn, but I wanted them to be clear that 'objectionable' meant 'would be banned by the national censor', and that porn was obviously not in that category as video stores were bursting at the seams with the stuff.

Maybe I am getting less formal in my role as a teacher?