The State of Nature

Yesterday's Schubertiade went swimmingly well. Each year, as you may recall, Old Ivy College honors Franz Schubert's birthday with a Schubertiade, which Wikipedia defines as "an event held to celebrate the music of Franz Schubert." During Schubert's lifetime, these events were generally informal, unadvertised gatherings, held at private homes. While in those years many Schubertiades included the composer's participation, this is no longer common practice as Mr. Schubert is long since dead.

Schubertiades in early 19th-century Vienna were typically sponsored by wealthier friends or aficionados of Schubert's music. In addition to Schubert's music, they often also featured poetry readings, dancing, and other sociable pastimes. Attendees numbered from a handful to over one hundred. Schubert's friend Leopold Kupelwieser claimed to hold them on his own, writing, "I treat myself to a Schubertiade now and again". Mr. Kupelwieser lacked Schubert's musical talent, which is why Kupelwieseriades are rare.

Anna, Roderick and Molly played Der Hirt auf dem Felsen (The Shepherd on the Rock). For a recording of the event, which lasts about eleven minutes, click here.

This morning, Megan resumes reading Mr. Strnk's text

Elementary Principles of Tweet Composition

(5) Respect cultural differences when using emoticons. Emoticons are culture-specific and certain emoticons are only found in some languages but not in others. For example, the Japanese equivalent of emoticons, kaomoji (literally "face marks"), focus on the eyes instead of the mouth as in Western emoticons. They are also meant to be read right-side up, as opposed to sideways. Compared to emoticons used in Western cultures such as the United States, kaomoji play a very distinct social role in online discourse.

(6) Avoid Leetspeak. Leetspeak is an alternative alphabet for the English language which uses various combinations of ASCII characters to replace Latinate letters. For example, Wikipedia may be expressed as "w1k1p3d14". It originated from computer hacking, but its use has been extended to online gaming as well.

(7) Refrain from flaming. Flaming refers to the use of rude or profane language in tweets. It can be caused by any subject of polarizing nature. Remember that Twitter debates are like the Special Olympics: even if you win, you're still retarded.

(8) Use Padonkaffsky jargon only if you want to be incomprehensible. If you don't know what Padonkaffsky jargon is, read this.

Megan clicks through on the link and reads about Padonkaffsky jargon. Hmmm, she thinks. A Padonkaffsky version of Pride and Prejudice, perhaps?

Later in the afternoon, Roderick stops by the dance studio for no reason other than to watch Emily Pointe pirouette, something she does rather nicely. Seeing Roderick, she pauses in mid-pirouette, then executes a perfect pas de bourree in his general direction, ending in plié. Roderick applauds.

Emily inquires about his day.

Roderick proceeds to explain the differences between Hobbes and Locke regarding the state of nature.

Emily feels all tingly.