University professors. We love them, we loathe them: the personal stories, the idiosyncrasies, the elbow patches, the tenure, the old corduroys with rubber bands around the ankle, the power to crush souls and foster dreams, the tattered, Indiana Jones briefcases, the sit down bicycles with the tall orange flag. They have a cache about them, cushioned and propped up by years of extended study, education and a narrow, selective slice of exposure behind them. Oft so myopic in their scope, they can serve as one's personal guru, the know-all and be-all of Micronesian anthropology, nitrate film preservation or marine invertebrates; or, they can be the guy who has no idea who The Bluth Family is, who the Kia Hamsters are or the fact that the Haunted Mansion switches to a Nightmare Before Christmas overlay at Hallowe'en. Sad, really.

No worries for these citizens of the quad; they have the benefit of rarely, if ever, being told they're wrong. Similar to the Green Blazer of Augusta, university professors, even the lowly associate professors, are bequeathed the Cloak of Pomposity: a golden shroud of turgidity that protects the wearer from the slings and arrows of correction and opposing viewpoints. College offers great opportunity for intelligent, sharing discourse and confidence building that gives you a priceless carriage and posture of character that will serve you through life. It can also beat you over the head with a sock full of condescension and feelings of inadequacy, especially if you're a nervous and shy sixteen-year old doing her best just to find the right classrooms and fight all her instincts to hide in the library until graduation. Walt Disney said, "With every laugh, there should be a tear." Professors dole out both with great efficiency.

Be they wizards of political science, studio arts, cultural anthropolgy, graduate psychology, French architecture or, Heaven help you, English lit or Italian film theory, they can tell you the sky is plaid with a imperious certainty that leaves no room for debate and a strong desire to switch to STEM studies: Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. Sure, those can be some of the most brazen and haughty of all species of professor; but numbers and science don't lie, usually can't be fudged and don't take kindly to touchy-feely, social interpretation. If it is, then it is; if it ain't, then it ain't.

Don't mistake me, I love the college professor-as-animal. Dear Old Dad spent more than a few years teaching undergrad and graduate psychology at Chapman University, University of LaVerne and University of Miami: student teacher there, I believe. Note to all freshmen, he loathed you most of all. "Always with an excuse," he'd say. "Hey, Dr. G, I'm like, so tired 'cause of last night.", or, "I have midterms for all my classes this week. Could I maybe, like, take yours later?" Charmers one and all, each more brilliant than the last. As kind, supportive and helpful as he and his elbow patches were, and are, he was also rarely wrong, and still is. Proffer an opposing political view? He'll smile, pat me on the head and say, "Where did I go wrong?"

Case in point wherein not all professors are always correct. My husband, many of you know him as the Viking, endured a veritable bumper crop of the cocksure whilst pursuing both his B.A. in Radio, TV and Film and his M.F.A. in Film and Television Production. No Flashbacks was a strict tenet of one screenwriting professor, a fellow whom had had some success writing for Little House on the Prairie. "Contrived, bad writing," according to Dr. D, was the hallmark of the flashback sequence. Years later, it's still one of the silliest rules of media writing either of us have ever encountered. To date, it brings us regular joy and laughter as we watch countless films and television productions which generously employ flashbacks. Thank you, Dr. D, for years of recurring and evergreen, hearty chuckles.

One final thought: pondering going to your fave prof with an idea that will change the world? You have the next gene splicer, the next data scraper, the next drive-through cataract eraser? You might want to fund your venture privately and then apply for that patent yourself. Depending on the institution, products and inventions, including intellectual property, nurtured under the auspices of a university staff and resources, may very well become property of the school in question. How do you think universities end up with so many patents? (Check with your own family attorney. This is not legal advise and I am not an attorney. I do know a bunch of good lawyer and judge jokes, though.) In the words of Donald Trump, Trust Your Instincts. Want an example? I have one. Wanna see it? Here it goes.

Picture it. Orange County, California. 1988. A young, energetic, tow-headed undergrad approaches his Communications Law professor wit

h an idea that would time shift television. The idea? Pre-record to an external hard drive everything coming into a television; play TV off the hard drive and skip the commercials. The would-be adviser in question claimed succinctly and with a sureness only a uni prof could posses, "They would never let that happen." Today, They call it Tivo. Trust your instincts.

Notably Flashback-based Films

Amadeus

Interview with the Vampire

Hugo

The Hangover

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

My Last Five Girlfriends

Riding in Cars with Boys

Hannah and Her Sisters

Forrest Gump

Slumdog Millionaire

Titanic

Moulin Rouge!

127 Hours

Ditto for TV

Doctor Who

How I Met Your Mother

Lost

Once Upon a Time

Family Guy

Poirot

Highlander

Clearly, there are scads of others fine, and poor, examples: vintage as well as contemporary. Hit me back with your fave flashbacks!

Looking for more film and TV talk from Moi? From Cecil B. DeMille to Bob's Burgers, I dig it and love to write about it. Hop on the H-town Celluloid Express and head to JennyPop's Film and TV Review tab!

So, it was a road trip of rugged proportions. Dr. Lucy, her pet octopus Onslow, my Little Lindy and I finally made it to see the yeti crabs and the ghost octopi of Antarctica! It took some planning, but natch, any road trip does. As far as those energy miles I’d saved up, this trip was a doozy. Sorry, Dr. Harvey & Hildy, your little girl ain’t headed home to Beantown this Christmas. I’m stuck at The Del for a while now. Energy spent or no, our Jules Verne trip into the deep absurd was well worth being pinned here for a while. No worries, though; been to the Hotel del Coronado lately? Not a bad place to spend eternity, especially the Resort Suites, Wheat!

As far as the trip down south, try spending two weeks under the sea at some six miles down. Sure, the sea vents are warm. Yet, I think I’ve said it before; when you’re a ghost, you’re always cold. I was just as cold at the bottom of the Antarctic Ocean as I am at the hotel pool. The difference in the water is one of speed: water slows us down a bit. There’s also the matter of pressure: 16,000 heady lbs. per sq. inch, if you’re counting. Downright nasty, but in the end just a gnarly headache for we ghosties and worth it for all the curious little creatures we saw down there.

Photo: NOAA

Onslow and Lindy made some friends in the deep and Lucy and I had a cheery old time messing with the “brave” crew of the HMNZS Wellington: a New Zealand tugboat on which we hitched a ride to our final dive spot. Nice folks, but skittish. It’s pretty creepy that far south at sea, even for me. Of course, a little ship haunting kills the time and you’d be shocked at how high a seaman can jump when goosed during a quarterdeck midnight patrol. Ha! Pranks aside, record-depth, deep sea exploration isn’t for everyone. Don’t you mooks try this at home: a sure brodie if you do! Now, if you’re two firecrackers named Richard Branson and James Cameron … what a couple of butter and egg men!

As of late, the adventure-lit of Edgar Rice Burroughs has captured my interest with a pleasant focus. The travel narratives of 19thC. adventurers have forever suited me well: Mark Twain, Richard Henry Dana, Charles Darwin, Henry James and Thomas Jefferson with his 18thC. accounts of Italian and French sojourns. To that end, contemporary travel essayists fill a healthy portion of our nearly 2,000 volume library: Bill Bryson, Peter Mayle, Hunter S. Thompson. Perhaps these travel writers and novelists have fueled my Wanderlust; perhaps I am drawn to them because of said-lust.

I have certainly been intrigued by adventure-lit since I first flipped through a fave and well-dogeared volume of Mom's 1940s  I Married Adventure by Martin and Osa Johnson. Tales of a 1930s power couple, he a photographer and contemporary of Jack London (another childhood fave of mine), she the devoted and steel-spined wife and protective riflewoman, they travelled South America and Africa well before the likes of Margaret Mead, Diane Fossey and Jane Goodall: all ladies whose works were also regular reading material about the house. (Mom was an anthropology major when I was wee and I suppose the lure of travel, questions of man's origins and the eternal quest for social knowledge set in early. Her degree was largely focused on Southeast Asian Studies; but I always thought it was Southy Station Studies, as in people who rode trains in the South. Silly girl.) Natch, I could go on here ad nauseum about all this twaddle, but I must save zee leetle grey zells' work for my current endeavour ... which brings me to the animal-loving Brit in the loin cloth.

Motivated by this year's themes for San Diego Comic-Con -for which I am anxiously awaiting press passes for the purposes of reporting from the convention floor for GoodtobeaGeek.com, as my alter ego/pseudonym Miss Hannah Hart, ghostdame- I have dipped my feathered quill and now sit pensively, pondering my submission to the official Souvenir Book, my inky nib aloft and hesitating just inches above my parchment. My theme of choice? The 100th anniversary of Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan of the Apes.

I utilize this casual canvas, similar to my previous post wherein I gathered some Savannah of Williamsburg thoughts -how to formulate my fourth book in this series- as a sounding board to crystallize some free-radical ideas in my noodle. It seems to be working; I feel the gears moving, like one of Dr. Lucia Devereaux's steampunk contraptions sputtering to life. (If you read Hannah, you'll know of Dr. Lucy.) Some of you may know I was published in the 2010 Comic-Con Book: lead story even for the 60th Anniversary of Peanuts segment! My task at hand this time is considerable. These Tarzan geeks are tough competition.

Now, being the weird combination of she whom reveres original fairy tales -Grimm (Little Red Riding Hood, Hansel und Gretel), de la Fontaine (The Grasshopper and the Ant, The Tortoise and the Hare), de Ségur (Blondine), etc.- yet also adores the Disney reiterations thereof, my Viking and I ventured to Disneyland to get my noggin revving and skittered amidst the branches of Tarzan's Treehouse in Adventureland. In fact, the attraction used to be the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse and far superior ... to the Tarzan Treehouse, not superior to the Robert Louis Stevenson book. Ha! It was a subtle homage of vintage suitcases, silver hairbrushes and antique china to the durable and genteel, accidental survivalists from the mind of the man from Edinburgh. Happily, some of the props have remained in place.

Once again, merci pour écouter, thanks for listening; I think I have some ideas brewing. I imagine, alongside reading more of Mr. Edgar Rice Burroughs, a few more trips through the treehouse may very well be in order.

Update to Post: I did indeed come up with an article for Comic-Con 2012 and it was published in the annual Souivernir Book. Read it here!

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Valentine's Day issue of Skirt! 2009  Photo by Eleise Theuer

Apropos to the fervid and flirty month of Fevrier, the above snap is an excerpt from a St. Valentine's Day issue of Skirt! magazine, featuring yours truly and Monsieur Yours Truly during our sojourn in the Old Dominion. A women's lifestyle publication available nationwide with regional, mostly Southern, emphases, this particular issue of Skirt! highlighted "strong women" -aw, shucks- and I was chosen from amongst a bevy of Virginia lassies, to share a Valentine's musing or two.

By way of introduction, I present to you the chanteuse and lyricist, Miss Jannie Funster, Yellow Rose of Texas. Jannie's tagline? Writing songs and singing for donuts and beer! How do you not like a gal like that?! Songbird Jannie brings to mind, in an instant, the bistro stylings of France's Femme Premiere, Mrs. Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, with a little Disney princess tossed in to flavour. Miss Jannie and I became aware of each other one fateful, cyberday when her blog and mine rattled sabers on the subject of Mrs. Cindy McCain. In fact, the clash was sorely mistaken; for it came to be known we both shared an opinion of Miss Cindy and it was a favorable one: It's her beer money ... don't Cindy-hate!

Serendipitously, Miss Jannie and I found each other to be weird and unorthodox free spirits and though we have differing views on music (she-Rolling Stones/Bob Dylan; me-Weezer/Marilyn Manson) and SPAM (she-likes it; me-puke) we both agree having a wine drinking-tree is a fine idea and that pets and husbands make the best friends ever. We also agree yoga and Guinness are equally good for you, museums and book stores are an excellent way to spend a day and that a random row of yellow Mini Coopers is worth stopping to take a snap.

Well, it seems to me the girls are everywhere fun and free spirit is to be found, wherever a life is free of concern, but full of care. They are in Austin, San Diego and Napa: NorCal home to Miss Bonney's girl, the one with the banana seat soul whom gifted me Miss Sadie Schwinn. Though they don't allow bicycles through the hallowed gates of Disneyland, when one is there the banana seat souls cycle down every sparkling inch of Magic Kingdom paths. If you have a banana seat bicycle soul, I urge you to join the odd and fantastical Janniverse. If your soul is not of the banana seat ilk, maybe Jannie and I can help you!

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#summertime #songs #SPAM

First of all, a very special thank you to my dear pal, Miss Hannah Hart, ghostdame of the Hotel Del! Since Christmas, I have had limited ability to connect with the outside world. When I have been able to, I've seen that Hannah took excellent care of all my friends and even took a stab at writing some guest-posts. Thank you, Hannah! Of course, she writes of her own spectral adventures at another site: GoodtobeaGeek.com. Her latest is a lovely tribute to Edgar Allen Poe and his secret admirer: Inspector Hannah: The Curious Mysteries of the Poe Toaster & the Antarctic Ghost Octopi

Zowie, babies! I'm Hannah, nice to meetcha!

Well, I, Jennifer Susannah Devore, have returned and for the most part, after reading Hannah's guest-posts, starting with the initial accounts of my mysterious whereabouts titled Meet Miss Hannah Hart, reports were mostly accurate. I have been indisposed and though exact memory escapes me, most of my missing days were spent inside Pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland with one overnight, marathon spinning on The Mad Hatter's Tea Cups and a New Year's Eve party to die for inside the Haunted Mansion. Forgive the pun. Lazy writing, I know. Cut me some slack, though. I barely recall where I live or what I do. I think that pirate in the mud with the two pigs slipped something in my grog and I know that Madame Leota gave me some bad Jujubees. By the way, that ballroom bash going on 24/7 in the Haunted Mansion? Man, that bash is bonkers once you're actually in on the party! As Hannah would say, Zowie!

It's a strong lead and we've got the proper authorities on the case. Author, blogger and dorkette Jennifer Susannah Devore, best known for her Savannah of Williamsburg Series of Books and soon-to-be-released novel The Darlings of Orange County, is reported to be lost somewhere on Pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland. At last report, a longtime resident of Rivers of America, a rather animated mallard named Theo, said he saw a woman of her description head into the Pirates attraction with a Viking and a strawberry blonde of questionable moral fiber, sometime prior to Christmas Day.

No comment

Disney waterfowl and cast members familiar with Jennifer have been searching the ride day and night; thus far, if they are inside, they are blending in remarkably well. Volunteer investigators have been instructed to keep an extra sharp eye around all Captain Jack Sparrow audio animatronic displays. Reports from The Happiest Place on Earth shall continue. Please report any findings or post any possible lead photos from inside Disneyland to Twitter@JennyPopCom.

Meanwhile, Miss Hannah Hart, ghost dame of the Hotel del Coronado is still covering the paranormal lifestyle and travel desk for www.goodtobeageek.com .

Latest report from Pasadena's 2012 Tournament of Roses Parade ... kind of.

For those of us robbed of a snowy holiday season in California, aliens landed last night and planted lei-bedecked Christmas rock-trees to proffer us a tropical holiday ... or, to distract us and divert our attention while they commence colonization.

Psst ... they must be the aliens. It appears they have divined the sculptures in self-portraiture.

Merry Merry to All!

(Hannah Hart here, btw and still looking for Jen ... maybe lost somewhere in Disneyland? For the continuing stooory of moi, Miss Hannah Hart, ghostdame of the Hotel del Coronado, jazz on over to my geek site! There's been a change of my holiday plans; I also intend to check out the Rose Parade this year. Check back at www.goodtobeageek.com.)