1. I had my very first parent-teacher conferences this week. They went pretty well overall; the parents were supportive and engaged, and we had a few fruitful conversations about what their children can do to improve. Though more often I just had to say “yes, Offspring is doing well in my class and not causing problems. Nothing to see here.” Which, I suppose, is about the best outcome that can be hoped for (apart from “Offspring is a hoot and a half to have in class,” which was also more or less the conclusion of one conference).

2. Anyway, the first quarter is over and the second quarter begins, meaning I have to spend part of this weekend planning strategies for the rest of the semester.

3. I haven’t read the Song of Ice and Fire books and have no intention of doing so. Some people say they’re well-written and well-plotted, others say they’re just gross, but they hold little interest for me. As for Mr. Martin himself, I feel like I’ve gotten the measure of the man when I heard his famous “I want to know what Aragorn’s tax policy was like” quote.

What’s so revealing about this statement is not just that I’m about a hundred percent certain that Tolkien could have told him Aragorn’s tax policies, if he’d thought it worth bothering about, nor that there are obvious storytelling reasons why a skilled author wouldn’t get into that. Similar to what I said last week, greater specificity (past a certain point) tends to be harmful to audience engagement. This is especially true in socio-political matters, where the author is almost certainly speaking outside his area of expertise and unless he spends a lot of time on it (and often even if he does), will inevitably raise more questions than he answers and come across as generally unconvincing.

No, what is revealing to me about this is that all I just said is pretty easy to figure out if you are genuinely curious. That being the case, I conclude that what Mr. Martin is really saying there is not that he wants to know how a King of Gondor would handle taxes. What he’s saying is “I am a nuanced and realistic thinker who considers these complicated historical issues, unlike Professor Tolkien or his fans.” That is, it’s not a statement about Tolkien so much as it is a statement about himself; one that conveys a rather different message than what he intended it to.

4. Pushing my way through Love is War, determined to finish it this time. Again, the evil family element really doesn’t work; it feels out of place, unnecessarily exaggerated, and kinda mean-spirited. The humor and romance elements are still strong, the main characters are interesting, though, so I do want to finish it. I’m almost back up to where I dropped out last time.

Again, I keep thinking how much better Fruits Basket handled the “screwed up and corrupt aristocratic family” element, with plenty of twisted traditions, hostile influences, and downright evil characters, but mixed with a great deal of empathy, positive elements, and the potential to be turned to good. It’s a much more interesting and nuanced take on the idea, as well as fitting the overall tone of the story better.

It’s possible, I suppose, that the evil family element will get more interesting later, but I’m not betting on it.

The ‘weird father of the hero’ character, however, is worth the price of admission.

5. I am thoroughly sick of Harley Quin and hope not to see her again for a good long time. Of course, it doesn’t help that the most recent incarnations have jettisoned everything that made her interesting and sympathetic and just turned her into a narcissistic co-ed’s self-insert fantasy figure. The ‘quirky and crazy girl who beats up all comers’ trope has long since run its course and is stumbling along like a forty-year-old varsity football star who imagines everyone’s still impressed by his winning touchdown.

6. Had a conversation with a friend the other day on why the Transformers franchise seems to be growing more popular and more prestigious as time goes on, even despite the fact that the most prominent examples – the live-action films – have been mediocre at best (check out her interesting take on Transformers One, by the way). My own thoughts were that, despite having more than its share of junk outings, the franchise retains a degree of positivity that most other major sci-fi / fantasy series have lost or discarded. The films might be generally poor, but they’re at least still straight-up good versus evil tales of iconic heroes against iconic villains. This is especially due to the fact that, whatever other issues the films might have, heroic lead Optimus Prime has remained pretty thoroughly unsubverted (possibly due to Peter Cullen’s famous integrity regarding the role).

Positivity and heroism in a major franchise is a rare commodity these days.

7. One of the ways I’m trying to help my students remember names is making puns of them, e.g. Diocletian > Diet-quiche-an: the Emperor who saved Rome with low-fat egg pies.