The writer born Mary Ann (later Marian) Evans, better known to her readership as George Eliot, fell in love with writer, editor, and scholar George Henry Lewes.

Lewes, however, was a married man. Although he and his wife Agnes had been in love when they married years vefire, affections had long cooled by the mid-1850s. But the two remained amiable, and when Agnes bore a love-child for her paramour Thornton Hunt, Lewes declined to take any action and gave the child his own name. Agnes would bear three further children for Hunt, who never took full responsibility for his illegitimate offspring, the burden of whom would fall on Lewes (and, more directly, on Eliot herself) for the rest of his days.

Lewes met and fell in love with Marian who, although deemed 'hideous' to look at by no less an authority than Henry James and 'equine' by numerous others, had what is arguably the sharpest intellect (and I don't gush here--I simply partake in a widely held opinion) of her time and any previous or since. In her thirties, already an old maid by society's standards, Marian had had few and unsatisfactory chances at love when she found the man who would become her friend, lover, and protector (the last is the apt word most often used to describe Lewes).

However, Lewes's choice not to initiate divorce proceedings against Agnes after her first extramarital dalliance proved an altruistic act that would have dire consequences. In so doing, he had no legal grounds to seek termination of the marriage, and any separation between the two would cast Agnes in the light of abandoned wife and Lewes as the irresponsible absconded husband. Society knew otherwise--the diaries and correspondence of Thomas Carlyle, for instance, demonstrate that Thornton Hunt's paternity of the younger Lewes children was an ill-kept secret. But such was Victorian hypocrisy that any transgression of the rules of appearances must be punished.

Marian, years before the wealth and fame that 'George Eliot' would earn were even a cherished hope, gave up family, position, and social esteem so she could be with Lewes. Her brother Isaac, patriarch of the Evans clan since the passing of their father, disowned her when she most needed support, and the rest of the family was ordered to do the same. Numerous estrangements followed.

The pair shared a relationship that was symbiotic to an unbelievable degree, one that is reflected in the inseparability, when defining character, of Dorothea and Will in Middlemarch (whether on purpose or by accident I don't know). The journals and correspondence of both register little discord in more than twenty years of partnership, and Lewes's death was, in a sense, Marian's, and unquestionably George Eliot's.

To the few friends who remained loyal, Marian insisted that Lewes be called her husband and that she be referred to as Marian Lewes. Certainly, there was some small concern for expediency and convenience in this self-ordained marriage. But the pair were in very public disgrace, and no sham of an assumed married name would shield the pain and make the ordeal much easier to bear. The deeper root of Marian's choice to become Mrs. Lewes, to claim for herself a marital bond that a hypocritical society denied, was a knowledge to herself of what was right, fair, and honest.

--biographical details from Gordon Haight's George Eliot: A Biography.

We continue our love-hate relationship. Eight months ago when I first got it, biking back home from school--which, granted, is largely an uphill climb, but only for a mile--would do me in each time. Slowly, however, it became easier and easier, and now it's a matter of no consequence.

However, while I've been very good this summer about going to the gym, I've been very lax in my biking because of the scary-high temperatures outdoors. But I figured that because I'm in better shape now than I have been in a long while (not that that's very good shape generally speaking, but it's an improvement), coming off losing ten pounds in the last five weeks, I'd be able to try a longer bike route of two-and-a-half miles each way. So I called Momo the fantabulous (otherwise known as Maureen) for company, and we set out on a bike trip to Candler Park.

Hitch: the route we take, designated as bike-friendly by my biking map, has very near the start a very long and VERY steep hill. Result: Marc was dooed in by said hill, which I walked up halfway anyway. Add another three or four merciless hills to that tally and find Marc, about a mile and a half into the journey, pooped and deciding to turn around. So I curtailed the journey and we biked back to my neighbourhood and then to Starbucks instead of the coffeeshop in Candler Park that was the original goal. So the net result was that I biked about three miles to Starbucks and one mile back home (I checked it on Google's nifty pedometer application). Short of the total five miles that I'd originally planned, but not drastically so I guess.

It's still an unaccomplished goal, but one that I hope will become less of a bugaboo after making the attempt a few more times. Updates to follow.

One thing I'll tell myself the next time I try, which will be (I resolve) the first day the outide temperature's below 75: my habit of perpetually riding in second gear, while doable on the moderate hills from campus to home, is not a good idea on hills that would make Sisyphus blush.

Is this a real life?
Is this bad fantasy?
Stuck reading novels
From the 19th century.
Open the books,
Come take a look and see:
I'm just a poor boy, I need your sympathy,
Because it's hard to get, my brain's gone dead,
Not much in my great big head,
Everything these critics said, does it really matter to me?
To me...

Mama,
Can't write a word,
Put my pen upon the page,
Held it there almost an age...

Mama,
I have just begun,
But now I've gone and found new stuff to read...

Mama (ooh ooh oooh),
Didn't mean to read no more,
If I'm not back again this time tomorrow,
Search the stacks, search the stacks, rescue me...

Too late, my time has come,
Prospectus due today,
Still on the very first page.

Goodbye, everybody, I've got to go,
My adviser's going to kill me with a spike

Mama (ooh ooh ooh),
I don't want to die,
Sometimes wish I'd never been born at all...

I see a bookshelf full of heavy books
Middlemarch! Middlemarch! Will he marry Dorothea?
Uncle Tom and Eva,
Jane Eyre's quite the diva,
Boz!

Charlie Dickens? Charlie Dickens!
Charlie Dickens? Charlie Dickens!
Charlie-Dickens' Chuzzlewit--and Sairey Gamp!

I'm just a poor boy reading Thomas Carlyle...
(He's just an old guy with an icky prose style,
And sexist, racist, xenophobic, everything that's vile.)

Dickens, Bronte, Eliot, will it ever end?
Vic-tor-ia! No, never will it end--let it end!
Vic-tor-ia! No, never will it end--let it end!
Vic-tor-ia! No, never will it end--let it end!
Never will it end--let it end!
Never will it end--let it end!
No, no, no, no, no no!
Victoriana, Victoriana, Victoriana, let it end!
The library has a carrel set aside for me,
For me,
For me!

It all really matters,
Anyone can see,
It all really matters,
But it might be fatal,
To me.

In doing my research for the dissertation, I came across the stray fact that Dickens was never able to begin writing a novel without first coming up with that novel's title. That's not usually my case, but it was this time. I wait for something to annoy the hell out of me before I start venting my spleen in a blog, and then said spleen precedes the title that heads it.

But this blog wasn't inspired by me being pissed off. It was inspired by me sitting in bed, as I've done for most of the day, recovering from a stupid cold brought on, I imagine, because of the rapid and dramatic rise in the mercury this past week (I have no idea of the science behind it, but I've just noticed that I manage to get colds and other unpleasant things involving sinuses whenever the temperature changes dramatically in either direction). I spent most of the day reading and finished Uncle Tom's Cabin, getting a bit emotional when Eva died and when Eliza and Cassy were reunited. Sorry if I spoiled that for anyone. The rest of time involved DVDs of Britcoms, and I'm now extremely fed up of the TV. Anderson Cooper's now on yapping in the background, and I give him a moments' appreciation every few minutes, but even he's starting to wear on me now. My energy's starting to return at 11 p.m., which proves an extremely inconvenient time for a reunion with absconded verve.

So I decided to see what was up with the old blog and noticed, to my amazement, that it's been three months without me posting a word. In almost four years of blogging, such a long period has never passed without me writing a blog. Did I really go that long without something annoying me? Let me check: the Iraq war's still on; I faced a major hurdle in conceptualizing my dissertation; there've been at least two Republican debates during which I was dangerously close, in my unprofessional medical opinion, to having an aneurysm; my cat's developed the charming habit of waking me up at some point during the 6.00 a.m. hour so I can play with her... Nope, that's at least the usual quota of things to annoy me that would warrant blogs, and it's not a comprehensive list.

So why haven't I written? Could I have developed some kind of phobia that there are only so many words left in me and that I should save them for the prospectus and dissertation, hoping I would now and then thereafter find some kind of magic mushroom (the allusion here is to the Super Mario games, not to hallucinogenic fungi) that would increase capacity and replenish supply to fuel the odd academic article and sustain a quest for tenure? In such a case, wasting words on silly blogs would be decadent and downright irresponsible. But I haven't developed any such phobia of logopause.

I honestly don't know why I stopped writing, but I know this sense of a day wasted and the need to do something productive (being at least partially under the influence of cough syrup prevents me from doing any actual work, in the interest of not having to redo it later) has brought me back to the good old blog. But even now as I draw to the close of this entry that, were I in the mood to read what I've written, might prove to lack coherency and structure and be guilty of the occasional grammatical or orthographic transgression, I still feel unfulfilled.

(By the way, I've tired of Anderson for the moment and now have Alton Brown as my background noise).

Think of the many writers and philosophers who have produced profound works of philological splendour with ennui, restlessness, and confinement as their sole raw materials. I have a whole day's worth of such yarn--why can't I spin it into like gold? Hell is... other TV shows. The great majority of men lead lives of... quaffing cough syrups.

Doesn't work for me. Oh well. Alton's demonstrating how to dismantle a lobster. I guess I'll pay attention to that.

So the latest bit of evidence that we're moving closer and closer to some type of Orwellian dystopia comes with a revelation today by an ex-Smithsonian official about last year's exhibit on the arctic. Turns out that the Smithsonian toned down warnings and conclusions about global warming and its consequences after reviewing the exhibit (causing the opening to be delayed six months) because it didn't want to get the Bush administration's back up (article here).

Now what's most disturbing about this is not that the Bush administration has been strongarming organizations and agencies into painting a rosier picture about global warming. Excrutiatingly revolting as it is, that's become established fact. What's most disturbing is that the Bush administration DID NOT have anything to do with the changes made to the exhibit. That the Smithsonian, for the most part funded publicly, made the decision to make the changes IN ANTICIPATION OF tsk-tsking by the government and possible snubbing in the future.

The Smithsonian, one of the most respected institutions in American culture and education, is now cowtowing and brownnosing and compromising the dissemination of knowledge because it wants to remain on the good side of the idiots who happen to be in control. Is there any difference between this and the 'how it all started' portions of dystopian literature?

On the last episode of Marc's Next Myspace Friend: you were introduced to the ten contestants vying to be Marc's Next Myspace Friend. On today's episode, only six will continue in the hopes of being Marc's Next Myspace Friend. Who will buckle under the pressure and lose her chance of becoming Marc's Next Myspace Friend? All this and more, on today's episode of Marc's Next Myspace Friend!

Our first challenge: Spelling and Grammar!

Karen: MEET MYSPACE SINGLES GR0UP-CLICK HERE would like to invite you to join the group MEET MYSPACE SINGLES GR0UP-CLICK HERE

Julia: qib wkq yoca.

Jamie: Don't miss Martha January 30th

Hollie: "A Greek?" country hug voice murmured the overcome Count of Morcerf.

Hazel: GET FREE CASH RIGHT NOW! has invited you to an event on MySpace:

Diana: Fool, FREE Shipping - Shop from home! Starts Nov. 24

Destiny: Undisc0vered and Unc0vered Smallcap

Christine: Romance on the job, Decadence on the rise

Alana: Rising st-ar st-0cks

Lauren: September Gallery Exposure: Take portraits, learn about zoom & more.

Wonderful job, ladies! Now: evaluation and elimination!

Karen, while you did a fine job in stringing together a marginally coherent thought, your random capitalization and inadequate punctuation seriously threatened your chances, but you are safe. Jamie, you were the winner of today's competition, and only the lack of a preposition and end punctuation compromised your attempt. Lauren, you were a close second. Hazel, Diana, and Christine, you did okay jobs, but I expect to see you step it up next time.

Hollie: I'm afraid we must ask you to withdraw from the competition. Some questions have been raised about your integrity and the possibility that your attempt above was culled from either a Harlequin romance or a Lifetime evening movie.

Destiny and Alana: your downfall today was mixing letters and numbers. Although both are spherical, zeroes and Os are discrete entities. Please pack your bags and leave.

And the last persion eliminated is Julia: you crazy, girl.

On the next episode: makeovers! No, not really. But wouldn't that be cool?

Over the past few weeks, I've been inundated with numerous requests from people wanting to be my friend on Myspace. Now I could be cynical and think that these were robot-generated profiles intended to lure people into clicking on links for sundry shady internet products and services, but given that so many of them want to be my friend, I believe it's obvious that I'm just an extremely desirable myspace buddy. But I'm neither easy or cheap, and if any of these people wants to be my friend, they're going to have to earn it, by golly.

Thus I give you the contestants in this epic battle royal:

Stay tuned as, over the course of the next few posts, contestants are eliminated, bringing us ever closer to the final showdown that will decide with one of the ten people above will become Marc's... Next... My... Space... Friend! (Was that staccato enough to reflect the Tyraness?)

Will Hollie and Destiny's friendship survive an argument about which of them looks more like Jessica Simpson? Will Alana's debilitating neck problem that prevents her from holding her head up straight hurt her chances in this competition? Will Karen, Julia, and Christine be able to overcome the fact that they can sometimes look a bit alike and stand out? Will Jamie's remarkable flexibility intimidate the other challengers? All this and more in the next episode!

Note: producers take into account audience response in determining the outcome of this competition. Persons concerned that this competition reflects producers having too much time on their hands will kindly note that the producers are kicking back for a bit.

So today's my birthday, and I spent the day first teaching my class, then attending a seminar, then reading for a few hours at Starbucks. I didn't resent it at all, cos I got to celebrate my birthday a day early, thanks to the wonderful people who bought me dinner at Trivia, and Lynn who bought me my birthday fruit tart, and all of them who sang the birthday song to me. I think it was near the top of the list for my favorite birthday celebrations.

But I digress. So I was at Starbucks this evening, not resentful, but very tired. The orals process is winding down into its last weeks, and I still have a bunch of reading and synthesizing to do. I'm glad that it's almost over, though, cos I'm mentally tired. It's been months of the same, and I'm ready to move on to the next phase of my life--I only hope I do well enough on the exam to.

But I digress again. So I was at Starbucks this evening, not resentful, mentally tired. The thing that made my day today was observing someone across the room, obviously a student of music, getting so caught up in the music he was reading or writing or whatever it was that he started to conduct right there in the middle of the coffeeshop. There was no band, and no music--all in front of him was his computer. And it wasn't affected or poserish. He just obviously had gotten into his work and forgot everything else.

That kind of careless abandon was refreshing and fun to watch. It made me feel good, happy, better about my own work. It reminded me that I, too, get to do what I love. And while, perhaps, I'm most times too self-conscious to be able to abandon myself like that and get caught up in my work, I've definitely experienced that passionate feeling over a great passage in a book, over a class that went really well, over observing a student at a moment of realization or understanding.

Thanks, Conductor Guy.

So last year when my old Dell started being a major pain in the ass because of the power jack being broken, I ended up having to fork out hundreds of dollars for a new computer at a time when such an expense really wasn't on my budget. I didn't make the decision lightly. I called Dell's helpline and spoke with someone who informed me that I would definitely need to replace the motherboard just because of the screwy power jack (a new motherboard costs $350, and that's before labour). I called a couple local repairmen to find out if this was the case and whether there wasn't in fact a simple repair that could save me the trouble and expense. They told me that there wasn't.

Screw them all.

Looking up discount printer cartridges a while ago, I saw out of the corner of my eye a link for computer power jacks. Why did such a thing not turn up last year when I was frantically looking to see if I could simply replace my old power jack? Sure enough, there are power jacks available to suit my old computer, costing less than $20. Factor in about $50-$80 for the repair costs of someone removing the old jack and soldering in the new one, and I could have had my old machine repaired for less than $100.

I'm so extraordinarily pissed now. Why did I not find this information when I was looking for it? Why did those screwjob repairmen lie to me?

Argh.

Well, at least now that I know I can repair the old machine relatively cheaply and either have a backup or sell it. But still, argh.

So I'm still pretty wretched, but I'm still trudging along. I had about seven student conferences today in addition to teaching and going to my Victorian Lit seminar, but I survived it all. My class was actually really fun--after an intense three weeks reading Hardy's Tess, we toned it down today and discussed language development in children by analyzing--get this--Kermit the Frog, Elmo, the Count, and Cookie Monster from Sesame Street. In addition, thanks to Emory's wonderful Freshman Seminar dealie, we had lunch provided, so I think a great time was had by all in this last class before Spring Break.

But that's not the part I'm most proud about. I still have not much energy, got only three hours sleep last night, and am coughing like an old dog, but I still decided to try biking in to campus for the first time (I used my insomnia productively last night and read the Georgia traffic manual from cover to cover; I understood it all except one badly written instruction for left turns, but Lauralei drew me a diagram). Granted, it's only about a mile and a half on the route I take, but that's a hilly piece in places. I almost collapsed on making it to campus, but I made it! And I'll do it again tomorrow! Woohoo!

Cough.