a few thoughts before bed

i'm working on a research paper - i think it is about tailoring a unit of study to a high school english class. i'm not sure, my teacher enjoys being vague and gets upset when we question her. the unit must incorporate some sort of grammar, as well as a primary source of literature and a few secondary sources.

my primary source is 1984, with the grammar unit being a lesson in newspeak (the language that is meant to stamp out independent thought), and the secondary theme of the unit will be an awareness of political and consumer rhetoric. when i was searching for materials, i found a lot of sources from the late 80s, because apparently the word propaganda is not the 'it word' anymore...it had a different word now. (which, for those of you who are familiar with 'orwellian terms' is disturbing unto itself.)

1984 revolves around the principle that 'those who control the past, control the present, and those who control the present, control the future'. this being said, whenever oceania (one of the three superpowers in the novel) redirects it's fury from superpower a to superpower b, there is a flurry of activity while all historical records are changed so that whatever superpower oceania is fighting presently is the superpower oceania has always been fighting. (the citizens must then forget that oceania was ever allied with superpower a, and must now know that they are at war with superpower a, then forget being conscious of that switch, and believe that they were always at war with superpower a).

anyway.
like i said, a lot of my research for this paper is coming from sources in the late 80s. and a lot of my sources talk about president bush and the war in iraq.

coming straight off of reading what i just summarized, i found it highly unsettling that nearly 20 years later i am reading the same words i can find in any current news source. it's like someone has already gone back through the historical records and changed the names and places, so what i'm reading is as it has always been.

of course i am not a conspiracy theorist.
i just think it is weird, and want to share.

also, i have mystery pains in my legs that feel an awful lot like shin splints, though i have no clue where they could have come from.
and, i owe my parents an apology for all the times they told me i was smart, but i just didn't apply myself, and i didn't believe them. apparently when you take away beer and a social life, i wind up in the top 15% of my class, with an invitation to the golden key society. (i find these two things almost as weird as the aforementioned weirdness, but not quite.)

it's bedtime.