How to Cope with Being Suddenly Famous, Thursday Second Period

[jaegerbombdad]

"Right, so," Herc said as he breezed into the classroom today, Max on his heels--and immediately looking around for Chuck, naturally. "First rule of finding yourself suddenly known to the public: don't Google yourself. Or, rather, don't seek out information on yourself. Don't look at the newspaper, or the comments on that YouTube video. Don't eavesdrop on a conversation about you. If you see your face on a magazine cover, don't pick it up. Don't...click on your tag on Tumblr." Was that a thing in 2014? Christ, he could barely remember, it had been a lifetime since then. "And whatever you do, don't Google yourself. If you're lucky, all you'll find is people talking about how you're ugly and stupid and all wrong for that girl you're dating and wrong about everything, and some fan fiction in which you have sex with your brother," which he wouldn't have brought up except it had featured so heavily in Shatterdome prank wars Chuck couldn't possibly be unaware of its existence, "but that probably won't be all you find.

"Now," he said, "each of you has been assigned a scenario, something you might find upon self-googling. We're going to have a group discussion about how everyone would react. Any questions? Let's get started."

Sexual Health ; Thursday ; Third Period

[beyonce_pad_thai]

Today's class was picking up where last week's had left off: the models of the reproductive system were back on Mindy's desk, correctly assembled this time.

Erica Everywoman the puppet was still around somewhere, but not on Mindy's hand. Maybe she'd make an appearance next week.

"Welcome to class, everyone," Mindy chirped. "Today, we're going to be learning all about how babies are made. As you've probably figured out by now, not all sexual intercourse is reproductive, and we'll be talking in later weeks about other kinds of sex, but for today we'll stick to the ways that compatible genitalia can produce a child. And we're going to do it with a story."

There was a PowerPoint. She switched the projector on.

After the traditional "Once upon a time," Mindy began by introducing "the main characters" involved. These were a group of individually named cartoon versions of the ova which all lived together "in the world's most chill sorority house, Delta Kappa Ova," and a group of sperm cells "who all rock out together in a cool punk band called Vas Def." Other characters were introduced as well, and there were in-depth explanations of the layouts of the groups' respective "apartments," which featured curious architectural marvels like "the fallopian room" where it became clear that Mindy could have worked harder on this extended metaphor.

After a series of comedic but ultimately irrelevant misadventures at parties and the like, eventually the main ovum and the main sperm cell got together ("it was a magical night; really mutually enjoyable," Mindy assured the class). They moved into a new part of town together, eventually producing a zygote, which then went through various stages of development until it was old enough to leave home "to go be on The Real World." Mindy beamed proudly after that reference, then checked with the class, "Did you get my joke there?"

After her story was over, Mindy smiled and asked if there were any questions. She was sure that the students had a lot to think about at this point, so she decided to avoid overloading them with more factual information, although she had some prepared. Instead, she said, "Now that they're living happily ever after, you guys get to illustrate! I have lots of markers and colored pencils up here, so just come grab some and you can spend the rest of the class period illustrating your favorite scene. Feel free to talk amongst yourselves!"

Plus We Have a Motorcade [Thursday, January 16, 2014, 1st period]

[professor-lyman.livejournal.com]

Josh was dressed in the winter uniform for bureaucrats in Washington--dark suit, taupe trenchcoat--as he stood on the lawn of Mount Vernon, because who didn't love a good field trip, even in January? He took a sip of his coffee (thanks, Gert!) as he let his students wander around for a bit, exploring the grounds of the home of the first American president (or at least the first in any dimension he'd ever heard of).

Finally he gestured for them all to come back around. "Welcome to Mount Vernon," he said, "the home of George Washington, the first president of the United States, at least in all dimensions that I'm aware of." He passed out copies of the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution "Before you explore the house an outbuildings, give these a quick glance. How much power does a president have now, compared to what he'd been given in the Articles of Confederation? Bear in mind that the US had just broken off from a fair micromanage-y dictatorship, which colored the way they looked at things. Then you get to wander around and find the answer to this question for me: how much power did Washington have in comparison to the modern presidency?"