Platypi spend 90% of their lives under water. Hmmm. That sounds good right about now. Living in a nice warm hole by the river; swimming around each night when it's nice and cool out. -ordering out for pizza... I've been extremely busy this past week with work. It's been a good busy though. So that explains the lack of posts. I would have gotten the Platypus to post for me, but webbed paws and key boards don't mix. Instead, I think he's been revisiting Goethe and Calvin and Hobbes. The platypus has plenty of new thoughts, but they'll have to wait until I can type them. In the meantime, I think I'm going to sleep. Platypi are nocturnal. The Platypus wakes!
Thoughts after reading the "Iliad" to prepare a Greece unit for my students: -Hector is a jerk until he's dead. He even advocates the exposure of Achaean corpses and then has the cheek to turn around and ask Achilles to spare his. He rudely ignores Polydamas' prophecies and fights outside the gate to save his pride knowing full well what it will cost his family and city. After he's dead, he becomes a martyr for the cause. -Agamemnon has several moments of true leadership to balance out his pettiness. In this way, he's a haunting foil to Achilles: the two men are more alike than they want to acknowledge. -We see that Achilles is the better man at the funeral games of Patroclos. His lordliness, tact, and generosity there give us a window into Achilles before his fight with Agamemnon and the death of Patroclos consumed him. -Nestor is a boring, rambling, old man who's better days are far behind him, and yet every Achaean treats him with the upmo...
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