English 12:  Begin Grendel.  Discuss the 5 Colors philosophy from last week's vocabulary test in conjunction with the philosophies of Grendel. Watch The Matrix/The Cave Allegory and discuss comparisons to the beginning of Grendel.  Grendel Reading and Philosophy Guide Ch. 1-3.

5 Colors: Discussing the philosophy of the Tao, Alan Watts explains what he believes Lao-tzu means by the line, "The five colours will blind a man's sight." "[T]he eye's sensitivity to color," Watts writes, "is impaired by the fixed idea that there are just five true colors. There is an infinite continuity of shading, and breaking it down into divisions with names distracts the attention from its subtlety." Similarly, the mind's sensitivity to the meaning of life is impaired by fixed notions or perspectives on what it means to be human. There is an infinite continuity of meaning that can be comprehended only by seeing again, for ourselves. We read stories -- and reading is a kind of re-telling -- not to learn what is known but to know what cannot be known, for it is ongoing and we are in the middle of it.

English 10H: In class work on GC.  Essays on 438 and 448 in textbook. (Writers on Writing: Nonfiction, My Two Lives)