What's your expertise?

[anitram]

Science geekdom (immunology)
Rodent surgery & related medical procedures
Pre-Romanesque architecture
Asterix comics

 

[WildHoneyAlways]

Teaching kids to swim
Stuart and Tudor England
choosing the right steak
vacuuming
complaining.

 

[WildHoneyAlways]

i am an encyclopedia of Olympic swimming knowledge.

What were your events?

 

[U2Man]

Economics
Computer Science
Mathematics
Being a geek (look above )
Setlist complaining

 

[Liesje]

Irvine, you swim? I never knew. My uncle swam and was going for the 1980 Olympics, until the boycott. Then he joined the Coast Guard b/c he couldn't think of what else to do after swimming all his life.

 

[yolland]

Dostoevsky (favorite: The Idiot)

Do you like From the House of the Dead? On a trip to Paris last summer (work-related, I swear!) I saw a wonderful opera based on it, Z mrtveho domu by the Czech composer Janacek.

Salman Rushdie said that you can divide music and literature lovers into Dostoevsky/Rolling Stones people and Tolstoy/Beatles people. I've no idea why, but in my experience it really does usually work out that way.

finding connections between seemingly disparate things so that things that appear to be opposites are actually implicated in the same paradox.

Uh, you mean like the Pope and Liberace, or is this another one of your coocoo Walt Whitman/Zen koan moments?

i am an encyclopedia of Olympic swimming knowledge.

Who do you think will be the big teams/people to watch for next time around?

(2) Esoteric philosophy and its influence on music

Which philosophies and what sort of music?

I have a passion for American Politics and Government but am nowhere near proficient.

That's OK, none of them are either.

I don't have any expertises at this point

1) EXCELLENT skills at recognizing the key points in an argument and cutting straight to the heart of the matter.
2) Excellent bullshit detector too.
You are better at both than many of my grad students, trust me. Ever considered a career in political science?

I'd also like to add, my mother an I are experts on the 7th Corps in WWII. We have a huge collection of photos, letters, and other memorabilia that my grandpa so carefully saved. My mom has also done extensive research on the 7th Corps (since my grandpa is dead and didn't like to talk about the war). Eventually, I'll be working with her to put together a digital archive, so to speak, and make sure everything is submitted to the Library of Congress and the Holocaust Museum (7th Corps liberated the Nordhausen camp).

This is fascinating. What materials specifically do you have pertaining to Nordhausen?

2) Classical Clarinet (I was considered one of the top college clarinetists in the country at one time)

Wow!! How often do you play now? Do you want to see one of your kids learn?

& Russian Composers

Favorites?

Rodent surgery & related medical procedures

I once did a brief stint as an assistant in a germfree rat laboratory. Basically my jobs were to make testosterone capsules (prostate cancer research) and to exsanguinate rats for autopsy. They poop a lot when you exsanguinate them, which still amazes me.

Pre-Romanesque architecture

How do you pursue this? Sounds like it could make for some fabulous travel itineraries.

 

[anitram]

How do you pursue this? Sounds like it could make for some fabulous travel itineraries.

It really does. Most of the great (preserved) architectural examples of the era are found on either side of the Adriatic. In Italy, Ravenna and surrounding area is wonderful, and in Croatia there are some great buildings, like the Church of the Holy Cross in Nin (also known as the smallest Cathedral in the world). I'm actually going to the area this June.

 

[tiny dancer]

European history & researching family histories.

 

[BonosSaint]

Do you like From the House of the Dead? On a trip to Paris last summer (work-related, I swear!) I saw a wonderful opera based on it, Z mrtveho domu by the Czech composer Janacek.

Salman Rushdie said that you can divide music and literature lovers into Dostoevsky/Rolling Stones people and Tolstoy/Beatles people. I've no idea why, but in my experience it really does usually work out that way.
============================================
Liked the characters in The Idiot better (Brothers Karamazov too)
than House of the Dead. I'm definitely a character person. I liked Crime and Punishment much better when I was younger than I do now.

Oops. I'm Dostoevsky/Beatles. Have not been able to get past three chapters of any Tolstoy. Depend on my friend who does really great recaps.

 

[Dreadsox]

Wow!! How often do you play now? Do you want to see one of your kids learn?

Favorites?

Do you know Don Henley? The Day the Music Died?

I had just been asked by the principal clarinetist of the Boston Pops to become his student when my parents divorced. From the third grade through my freshman year in college music was my life. I quit the summer they divorced.

I just took the horn out this past week. The music teacher in my school is fixing it up and getting the dust out of it for me.

My daughter plays the piano a little bit already. She will start the clarinet in the next year.

AS for the Russian composers.....

I love Rimskey-Korsakov. I have read his writings as well as studied his music.

Pictures at an Exhibition is on my list of favorite pieces.

 

[VertigoGal]

1) EXCELLENT skills at recognizing the key points in an argument and cutting straight to the heart of the matter.
2) Excellent bullshit detector too.
You are better at both than many of my grad students, trust me. Ever considered a career in political science?

Thanks, I really really appreciate that. I'd like to go to college and major in that although it'd probably be more practical to minor in it and get some kind of business degree. I mean advertising/PR & politics are essentially the same thing, only I feel like something in business is more feasible. (I have no desire to be the first woman president or anything...although hopefully by that time we'll have had at least one!)

 

[A_Wanderer]

Zoology + Geology = Palaeontology

And I dabble in classics (ancient greek) and am honing my Russian in my spare time. It's all self taught so my pronunciation can be a little off at times, but the Pimsleur method in conjunction with books seems to be great.

At some point I would like to move on to a different form of language, Chinese (Mandarin) would be useful but would require a lot more discipline on my part.

 

[indra]

(I have no desire to be the first woman president or anything...although hopefully by that time we'll have had at least one!)

And you'd have to beat out U2democrat for that......

 

[Irvine511]

What were your events?

yes, i swam for many, many years, sometimes doing the 8-9 workouts a week like VertigoGirl, and i swam through most of college, and i am an expert at teaching kids how to swim, and i'm particularly good at teaching backstroke.

as for myself, i was good at the punishment events: 200 fly, 200 bk, and 400 IM. i was probably best at the 400 IM; i could take a beating.

 

[BonosSaint]

Thanks, I really really appreciate that. I'd like to go to college and major in that although it'd probably be more practical to minor in it and get some kind of business degree. I mean advertising/PR & politics are essentially the same thing, only I feel like something in business is more feasible. (I have no desire to be the first woman president or anything...

Hey, it'd be nice to have a President who didn't spout party line, who cut through the bullshit. We got a maverick here. And I always lean toward the mavericks. Good luck in whatever you do though. You've got the potential to kick major ass.

 

[VertigoGal]

thanks for the encouragement BonosSaint

Irvine...200 Fly was my event, got 3rd in state once (for 13/14s though...not so hard to do). And I remember my first AAAA in the 400 IM. Got DQed early in the race. Good times, good times.

 

[yolland]

From the third grade through my freshman year in college music was my life. I quit the summer they divorced.

I just took the horn out this past week. The music teacher in my school is fixing it up and getting the dust out of it for me.

My daughter plays the piano a little bit already. She will start the clarinet in the next year.

Dread, that is so sad. I've known a couple other lifelong musicians who just lost all desire to play after some major emotional disruption in the lives. I hope your daughter's progress helps bring you back to it.

AS for the Russian composers.....

I love Rimskey-Korsakov. I have read his writings as well as studied his music.

Pictures at an Exhibition is on my list of favorite pieces.

Pictures, that's where they stole most of the Smurfs music from!

I like R-K very much too. Shostakovich and Prokofiev are also favorites.

 

[yolland]

Indian politics, history, culture, philosophy, and theology. My dissertation dealt with mass conversions of Dalits ("Untouchables") as a form of political protest. Lately my research has tended more towards language policy, and the impact of information and communications technologies.

Jewish theology, history and culture.

Food and cooking, most of all South Indian and Greek, but really I'll try absolutely anything that's kosher. We have an absurdly huge cookbook collection, some of which we actually use for cooking, many of which we just read for pleasure and learning about different food cultures.

Travel, domestic and abroad. I've been to a pretty long list of places, and have a far longer list of other places I want to visit.

Hiking, anywhere from a local woods to the French Pyrenees, which is surely one of the most heartstoppingly beautiful places on the planet. Hawai'i is also a mighty fine place to hike.

*Never let anyone tell you that having kids means you won't be able to do the above two anymore! With some extra advance effort on organizing things, and reasonable attention to balancing your desires against their energy levels and attention spans, you really can go just about anywhere with your kids.*

Birding, though I haven't done it much in the last several years. I used to be a very enthusiastic amateur ornithologist.

Scandinavian, Oaxacan, and some subgenres of Jewish folk music. Delta blues--I'm from BB King's hometown and Robert Johnson's final resting place, so I grew up with it all around. And the "Greek blues," remebetika--that's a kind of music brought to Thessaloniki, where my mother's from, by ethnically Greek Turks forced out of Turkey in the early 20th century.

I like to think I know something about good writing, at least the nonfiction variety. If I weren't an academic, I'd probably be some sort of freelance journalist, or maybe work in other media, like melon and Irvine.

Vincent Van Gogh. Mark Rothko.

 

[BonosSaint]

^

Renaissance.

 

[melon]

I'm a media person by trade, whereas my various intellectual pursuits here are just hobbies of mine. But I think the best media people know a little/lot about everything, so I try to do my best.

Melon

 

[yolland]

I dabble in classics (ancient greek)

If you enjoy Ancient Greek lit in translation as well, check out Guy Davenport. A brilliant translator, no longer with us unfortunately.

At some point I would like to move on to a different form of language

Farsi? It is certainly becoming more important.

I predict Hindi will become an increasingly important language as well, as India grows in influence (and its ruling classes' English continues to decline). Of course, I've also been predicting that South Asian studies will become an important subfield of political science for about 15 years now, and here I am still isolated in this "rareified" specialty focusing on a fifth of the world's people.

 

[BonosSaint]

Where did your interest in India start, Yolland?

 

[yolland]

My dad. He was an education professor, and he happened to get appointed to a commission sent to India to study their secondary education system when I was still a kid. He went over grumbling darkly about how grueling and snafu-ridden the whole thing was going to be, and came back three months later raving about the mindblowing cultural richness and diversity, the astounding beauty of the landscapes and old cities, the warmth and ambitiousness of the people, the fascinating whole new world of Eastern thought that had just opened up for him, and on and on and on. And he never did stop raving about it. He also from the beginning kept insisting to me specifically that "you must do something involving India when you grow up!" I've never known why he honed in on me (out of his 5 kids) for this, and I never got a chance to ask, as he died on my sixteenth birthday.

I have a couple gigantic silk prints he brought back with him and framed on our wall in front of me right now--my mom gave me all the stuff he'd brought back with him when I got married.

 

[BonosSaint]

He must have seen something in you that would share his passion.

 

[yolland]

That's a lovely thought BonosSaint, thanks.

 

[Dreadsox]

Dread, that is so sad. I've known a couple other lifelong musicians who just lost all desire to play after some major emotional disruption in the lives. I hope your daughter's progress helps bring you back to it.

DO not be sad. I have no regrets other than not keeping up. I have friends who have gone on and had success in the music field. I just saw an old friend playing in the pit orchestra for White Christmas.

I have no regrets because if I had not made that decision my life may have turned out quite different. I most likely would not ever have met my wife. I would not have had the children I have. I would not be in education.

No regrets....

 

[WildHoneyAlways]

yes, i swam for many, many years, sometimes doing the 8-9 workouts a week like VertigoGirl, and i swam through most of college, and i am an expert at teaching kids how to swim, and i'm particularly good at teaching backstroke.

as for myself, i was good at the punishment events: 200 fly, 200 bk, and 400 IM. i was probably best at the 400 IM; i could take a beating.

I, too, was a backstroker and IMer. I quit when I went to college b/c 10 years of practice had taken it's toll on me. Turns out '2 a days' will do that to a person.

 

[MacHat]

- The Holocaust (by the end of the year I'll be a super expert on Auschwitz and Ravensbrueck, cos of my honours thesis)
- Ancient Greek mythology
- Roman art and architecture
- Classical playwrights, esp. Aristophanes and Sophocles
- Led Zeppelin, AC/DC and Manic Street Preachers
- I'm a random facts sponge, I soak up random knowledge!



I love the German language and want to sharpen that up in the next few years as well

 

[Liesje]

This is fascinating. What materials specifically do you have pertaining to Nordhausen?

What are you looking for? I have some photographs and probably letters. Most of our most helpful information is the research my mom has done. She basically has a history of all the soldiers in my grandpa's group. Most of the knowledge is in her head and her own notes, so eventually we'll work together to make the digital archive so I'll learn it at the same time.

My mom was talking to someone recently and they got on the topic of WWII. The acquaintance mentioned that some friend or relative of hers was a Holocaust survivor and had been looking for information regarding the liberation of his camp. My mom asked which one and the lady said "oh, you won't know. It wasn't one of the major death camps." Turns out it was Nordhausen. This prisoner had mentioned that there was a black US soldier present during the liberation. Since this is very rare (b/c back then the military was still segregated), he hoped this would help identify his liberators. Turns out, we have pictures of part of my grandpa's group including a single black solder. My mom did some more digging and also believes she knows the identity and history of this black soldier.

I've looked at grandpa's pictures of Nordhausen so many times....they're so gruesome and terrible it almost puts you in a trance. It's an amazing feeling to finally make a connection with someone who survived the whole ordeal.

 

[anitram]

LivLuv's post reminded me about my own family tree - I'm a descendant of the Cornaro line, which ruled Venice for about a millenium. My uncle, a professor at the University of Cape Town took a year off for his sabbatical and went to Venice to work on our family tree. We have a pretty amazing, professionally printed one, dating back to the 13th century.