And the whole congregation said "Amen"

For reasons too intricate and, well, too geeky to get into here, I have just had my day made by the fact that Andrew Gurr eliminated the part of the Dauphin from 3.8 of his New Cambridge Shakespeare edition of Henry V.

Ditching the anonymity

I realize now that if I'm going to be net-stalked, (a) there's nothing much I can do about it, and (b) I should probably take it as a compliment. Also I'm finding that attempting to maintain the anonymity of my home and University of employment means that I can't successfully blog about the truly weird and remarkable world around me. So I'm giving up referring to it as Quadrilateral State University or anything else. I live in Reno and I teach at the University of Nevada. Wow. That felt vaguely like an introduction at a twelve step meeting. TONY: "My name is Tony and I'm a recovering Nevadan." EVERYONE: "Hi, Tony!"

And Nevada is equal parts beautiful and bizarre. High desert sagebrush and snow-capped mountains, alpine lakes, icy rivers, hot springs and sun-bleached creek beds vie for attention with garish casinos, legally regulated brothels, and more libertarians than the number of angels that can dance on a pinhead. You can't tell what party any of the politicians belong to because they all run on the same cowboy rhetoric. There are three congressional districts and two area codes. There are only seventeen counties, some of them larger than Wales. Lots of space, not many people, except in the two urbanized valleys on the edge of California. Every day I see something that makes me shake my head and say "that is so Nevada." Yesterday it was the man riding his dilapidated Schwinn bicycle to work on a busy highway, wearing cowboy boots and an Indiana Jones hat. The big basket on the back of the bike held nothing but an enormous American flag, the kind you see flying outside Perkins restaurants. Hell yeah, man. Nevada. And that guy is probably a district court judge or something.

The strength of the pack is der pudelhund. The strength of der pudelhund is the pack.

I am not a poodle person. Not by any means. Luckily my new dog, of whom I have had custody now for a week, has no idea that he is a poodle. Lucifer is only twelve inches tall, but he jets it at the dog park like a prince among men. Huskies and Weimeraners cower at his dwarfish majesty. Bullterriers are put soundly in their place when they invade his comfort zone. He is like the Richard III of dogs. I am hoping to grow his hair in such a configuration that he can pass for a Schnauser.

This is him at the moment:
















I hate those people who buy their dogs sweaters and treat them as though they are humans. I will never refer to myself as Lucifer's "daddy" because that implies interspecies copulation or some other biological monstrosity. I am slowly being convinced, however, that proximity with me is screwing up his behavioral patterns. He has recently worked out that the way our pack (he and I, that is) signals approval and affection is not by nuzzling, jawing, or other typically canine activities, but by the strange action of stroking another pack member with a forepaw. So he's been experimenting with trying to pet me. It's clearly difficult for him because he has no opposable thumbs and the muscle control isn't quite right, but he keeps lifting himself up and concentrating on gently petting my leg with a forepaw. It's not scratching or batting, it's an atempt to pet. All of which means he's either a genius dog or a psychopath dog, I reckon.