Tuesday, October 17, 2006

I'm a seasick sailor

Waking up to these dark mornings and rain. The weekend was one last outpost of summer. Tomorrow may be the last litter of light and warmth for a while.

But today it's pouring, that long steady shush of falling water.

***

I have a new job: grading SAT essays. I was turned down for ditch-digging. It's all done online, this grades, and if you imagine it to be some cruel factor of tedious, multiply it by at least a billion.

I fear I will not be one of their better graders: at its base, their grading system is based on a six point scale. In the training, and there's a staggering amount, I only matched the "true scores" 60% of the time. Which seems not so good. But I think there are several layers of redundancy built in. It's chocolate redundancy cake.

***

So I used the recent sales of Exit Interview to do something really sexy for myself: buy more copies of Exit Interview.

Yes, as Heather remarked, poetry is totally a giant pyramid scheme. Except you're scamming yourself. And you know it. Very odd.

So I have more copies to sign, seal and deliver for 9 bucks. Email if you'd like.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

No, no, no. I said that it could, be turned into a very successful Pyramid scheme. Remember? Door-to-door salesmen, free samples, that sort of thing. There could be levels like in Amway or something, but appropriately named. For example, instead of "Platinum Level" there could be "Jack Gilbert Level," or "Sharon Olds Level." There could be little pins.

This would be the best AWP panel presentation ever. Just saying.

cK said...

This reminds me: I found a poetry contest from Hamline University (Jane Kenyon poetry prize, Water Stone Review) here in my city, Saint Paul, Minnesota. I had this idea I'd send you the sawbuck reading fee if you thought you might submit a poem or three. (I believe up to 3 / 10 pages) are allowed. And I recall you had a whole extra book of poems, if not more.

Deadline: December 29.

Any interest in having a poem entry sponsored? I'd like to see one Paul take down the more saintly Paul.
-cK

Justin Evans said...

It's all based upon the six writing traits, right? Some of it's a really good idea when kids are just learning to write, but it falls apart when students need to make the transition to more complex writing assignments.

Melanie said...

eerie, how kindred. Houston flooded again on Monday, and the rain went on and on and on. . .and I graded about a hundred essays in less than two weeks. . . I feel your blah