Sunday, April 26, 2015

Off-the-cuff remarks on hoarders, or "Stuff and nonsense"part 2

I'm obsessed with hoarders. Not exactly sure why but I guess I do have a strange fascination with how people "arrange themselves" in their everyday lives, their Alltag.
In German hoarders are called "messies" and are said to be suffering from the "messie-syndrome".

As far as I can tell there seem to be two subtypes of hoarders: the actual hoarders, junk collectors, (and obsessive shoppers) whose collections get out of hand, and then the true messies-people (more often women than men?) whose inner turmoil has led them to turn their living spaces into literal trash heaps. (E.g. the lady who feeds her pets from the can and throws the can on the ever-growing heap in her bedroom). The extent of their messiness is truly mind-boggling, not to say dangerous.

The German wiki describes the messie-syndrome as a “Wertbeimessstörung”—which is a fantastic way to describe it imo—a disorder connected to in inability to accurately or realistically assign value to objects/things. 

I can relate to this in the sense I sometimes tend to make mountains out of mole hills (not literally like some of the hoarders) which is probably one reason why they fascinate me. My own compulsions lean more towards an obsessive desire for symmetry and neatness,or to do things in a specific order. 


Perhaps I’m more obsessed with obsessive behavior than with hoarders specifically. More on that another time. In the mean time here is a link to my ”People and Things I’m obsessed with Pinterest board. 

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Stuff (and nonsense)

Stuff (and nonsense)

Would actually be a good name for a blog…anyway/how/who the 365 project is still going on just not here—but rather here. Check it out! Figured out a way to do it all on my phone, since I’m committed to not taking the laptop with me to Germany. It’s too heavy and too distracting and not taking it will give me a good excuse to buy pretty German notebooks to write in….
We’re buying a house! Bill will move “us” in while I’m in Germany. I’m talking myself into him being ok with that. (He says he is…)
The past semester has been fun but very busy. Teaching a work-intensive “big” course on German film. It’s a blast because well German film!!! but because it’s the first time I’m teaching this exact course with almost 65 students (some a perpetually absent) I haven’t finagled the logistics yet to the point where the workload is more manageable. It will happen, but right now I just need to get through this semester.  
I leave for Germany to teach a section of the Miami Summer German course on May 18. Before then a lot of things need to happen—packing, grading, resting-up (ha!), quality time with cats and Bill or should I say Bill and cats. I also need to get a clearer sense of what I want to look for during my week long sojourn to Guernsey in June, where my sister and I will trace our Le Mesurier ancestors, plus also hike the cliffs and eat lots of yummy fish and chips. It will be good. I’m wondering how strong the pull will be to see Alderney-which is where the Le Mesuriers were Governors till into the 19th century.

Maybe I’ll get into writing/updating on here a bit more frequently…stranger things have happened as my mother used to say…..

Thursday, April 16, 2015

DAY ONE of a new year in pictures! 04/15/15--04/15/16

So I've decided to kick off another year in pictures--one a day for 365 days. Start date is 04/15/15. This is a shot from the Weekly German coffee hour, which takes place on the King library cafe every Wednesday from 4-5:30 ish pm. Students from German classes or who just like to speak German come and chat about everything. I try and bring German goodies and have made my bobble-head Freud the mascot. Next semester I might try and bring a flag or something to identify us more clearly.

I just realized that updating the blog won't be as easy in Germany--I'll be there for some weeks in May/June. I think during that time I'll just upload and share the pics to flickr and instagram. But during the times when I'm at home and have easy internet access I'll post the pictures here too.  We'll see how it goes....