Global Warm Troopers

Sam and I did our Into the Wild presentation in Lang the other day. All parties agreed--it was a resounding success.

Alright, so first of all Sam had done basically no preperation prior to one hour before we had to present. Luckily he has open fourth and was able to use that time in what I've gotta say was the most efficient possible way. I mean Einstein and Newton had their moments, sure, but I doubt they ever had an hour of productivity like Sam did yesterday.

I gave my big, insightful, ho-hum explination of the themes and meaning of the chapter and all that boring crap, then threw it over to Sam. He gave a couple of pedestrian observations, but then he dropped the bomb:

So at one point in our chapter, Chris McCandless' father, Walt, is quoted as describing Chris as resembling (man, could I have put one more weak verb into that sentence?) Jeremiah Johnson. Sam, Internet sage that he is, did a little digging and found that Jeremiah Johnson, the '70s movie character, was actually based on a real guy named Liver Eatin' Johnson, a disillusioned Civil War veteran if my memory serves me correctly. He wandered off to live in the woods with his Cherokee wife, and they were quite happy there until she was killed by some Crow warriors. Johnson declared a lifelong vendetta on the Crow and spent the rest of his days killing every Crow he met, then eating their livers.

And Sam told this whole story to the class. It was sweet.

I tried to redeem myself a little later, when Mrs. Niemi started talking about the real, dark, creepy, original versions of some fairy tales, by explaining a really horrifying version of Sleeping Beauty I read in Sandman (instead of just kissing Sleeping Beauty, the prince raped her. 9 months later she gave birth, and only when the baby, crawling up her body in search of milk, sucked the poisoned needle out of her finger did she wake up) but it paled in comparison to Liver Eatin' Johnson.

Liver Eatin' Johnson; File Photo