Ready for a Road Trip

The list of songs above is for the CD I just burned, something I plan to have going in the car as I hit the highway tomorrow for a six-hour drive to Pennsylvania. The important thing about a road-trip CD for when I'm driving alone is that it must contain songs that embody the maximum potential for singing as loud and long as possible. I admit that this CD looks a lot like a current playlist for your typical top-40 radio station. In fact, the other day I was driving to campus and heard four of these songs right in a row. But, hey, that's what's getting me singing and car dancing (shoulder movements and hand gestures).

I'm off to State College for the Rhetoric Society of America's seminar on Visual Rhetoric: Photojournalism and Public Culture. The readings look great, as you can see on the website, and I'm looking forward to it. It should be quite a switch from my time at NYU last week. First of all, that was in a loud, crowded city, and this is in central Pennsylvania surrounded by trees and mountains. At NYU, the attendees all taught at smaller, teaching-intensive schools where I, at 3/3, had one of the smallest teaching loads of everyone there. Scanning the emails of participants at this week's seminar, I'll be surrounded by people from much larger, research schools. I think I'll be from the smallest school there. And I stayed in a dorm at NYU where I had to bring my own sheets and towels and did not have any internet or other media outlets in the room except what I brought with me. And in PA, I'll be in staying at a major hotel chain with television, internet, and daily maid service. And I stayed at NYU for free, while paying for RSA on my own. But none of this is a negative about either place or workshop. It's just another time where I'm living in liminal space, which I've grown to love.

All that said, I am looking forward to July, when I will have much, much more time to myself. Still, I'm actually looking forward to tomorrow's drive. I'll be the freaky guy singing and dancing by himself on the Pennsylvnia Turnpike.