As I read Rachel's post about her culture's pioneer stories and the Schank readings, I was reminded of the surprising interest folks up this direction seem to have about my Florida Cracker culture. At home, we often seem to be an embarrassment to the dominant culture, IE, more recent imports, but here the stories are viewed as unique and interesting. It has prompted me to explore my family history further and to value my heritage to a greater degree.

Listening to Bill Moyers on PBS this evening, I heard the president use several key story skeletons in a speech: 'inspired ideology' and 'Al Quida.' He used inspired ideology only once but the picture my mind drew was that the ideology was 'cooked up' rather than authentic; Al Quida popped up in almost every sentence - certainly every paragraph of the speech, keeping militant Muslims and their potential for violence at the forefront of the thought process as he spoke.

As with Danny, I enjoyed our time at the theater today, finding it an inspiring, exciting and vaguely dangerous place to be. After the critique session I realized that I should have pursued Bellerophon and Pegasus' adventures more aggressively. Instead, I used the 'The Chimera' from Hawthorne's Wonder Book, edited by Mabie, my book of myths from childhood. It has been with me all the years I can recall and I have loved the story always, but now I see how simplistic it is. Further reading still has not given me the Pegasus I am looking for, but I'm getting closer.