Since the beginning of the semester I’ve been trying to learn to juggle. Anna, who lived in my room before I moved in, left some learn-to-juggle balls behind. I figured that a few minutes worth of practice each day would inevitably leave me a master juggler. Though I still believe it be the case, I’ve been remiss in my practicing.

Juggling causes, at least in me, another instance of gold star laziness. I say gold star because of a girl Rachel who first communicated to me a deep problem of mine. You see, Rachel, now a third or fourth year graduate student in computer science on her way to a PhD in systems engineering, almost failed the third grade. She never did her homework. It’s not that she couldn’t do her homework. Indeed, it was precisely the opposite. Rachel was so confident that she could do her homework and do it correctly, that she decided not to. While a perfect homework resulted in the highest distinction a grade schooler might receive—the coveted gold star sticker—she was just as happy to know that she could have one whenever she wanted. The homework, then, was redundant.

Now I’m not proposing that someone will give me a gold star if I practice my juggling. And I haven’t rushed out to buy a sheet of star-studded stickers. But I did read a book on learning theory by Seymour Papert. In it, he details what he calls “algorithmic thinking.” As an example, he explains how one might teach a computer to juggle. I use this sort of thinking all the time, especially when swimming. And somehow knowing the mechanics of juggling is satisfying enough for me not to learn how to juggle. Another case of all theory and no application.

It would be instructive, I think, to actually juggle, rather than merely to muse about it, though. But my ethnomusicology paper requires my attention, and for hours earlier today my computer would not comply. Having wrestled with DEM [a memory management safety valve built into Windows XP that I don’t fully understand, but effectively crashes Explorer every time I try to turn my computer on] and won, I should turn to that. This paper: the Dunster House Thirty-Third Annual Messiash Sing-a-Long; in eight to ten pages, I aim to say what I could say in only three. College!