Hello Commons!

So it’s week two out here in the Pacific where I’ve learned that I’m not exactly a talented surfer.  That said, my paltry amphibious talents are nothing to feel bad about since there’s never a bad day at the beach.  I was hoping another blog would crop up from a fellow Commoner about their own endless summer and, lo and behold, this week we heard back from Erica Kaufman @ericakaufman who is spending her summer in Colorado.  First off – I’m completely, totally jealous that you get to teach at Naropa’s  Jack Kerouac school.  Congrats!  Thanks for posting about this great conference!  How come the Commons doesn’t have it’s own posthumanism group yet?  I’m down.

Elizabeth Goetz @Egoetz also returned to the blogs after a hiatus.  Welcome back!  Her entry this week was a reflection on form and function in Middle English.  A stubborn translation of Chaucer sparked a series of questions about language, intent and aesthetics that I imagine the lit folks here on the Commons will have some opinions on.  I did feel my heart race a little when she threatened to rearrange Pynchon.  Admittedly it was less out of concern for the text and more at just the thought of being that man’s editor.  On the subject of fussy determined authors; if you’re up for a laugh sometime read the forward to Zizek’s later works where he apologizes to his editor.

Anthony Picciano @apicciano over at Tony’s Thoughts was on fire this week.  The Milky Way video was absolutely beautiful.  This is the only bad thing I’ll say about New York City, and I’ll do it here in front of everyone – you really can’t see any stars and it’s sad.  As Lou Reed puts it though, “There are no stars in the New York sky, they are all on the ground.”  Why yes…I did just quote Lou Reed to justify the destruction of humanity’s nighttime theater for the sake of urban living.  Tony’s Thoughts also brought us an update on Congresswoman Gifford’s recovery in Arizona.  Thank you for pulling this from the news, a lot of us missed it.  Glad to see she is looking well and working hard to get better.

Aaron Knoll @aaronknoll was back as well with a couple of blog posts this week.  The first was a great post about what we’re losing with products that defy the garage tinkerer.  I’m surprised we don’t hear more about this actually.  Even here on the Commons we talk quite a bit (and actively work to support) open source technologies, but inside of that conversation there should be some room for talking about repairing and modifying hardware.  What would that look like?  How could we do that on the Commons?  I’d be interested in a group project or a blog that went step by step through tearing apart something and showing folks how to play with it.  Anyone up for it?

Those were some highlights folks.  I’m excited to see the blogs so busy this summer – Keep it up!

Till next week.