Ragan put his hands on an ice sculpture once for a over an hour at a party after a poetry slam in Austin, just randomly after he and some friends got talking about endurance competitions in reality shows. By the end his hands were burned. He thinks he won that contest. Brendon jokes but he lost when he took his hands off. Ragan says he won in being a moron.
Ragan wanted to be a theater major but there were no parts for him. Ragan tells Brendon about how he got into doing poetry slams. He thought poetry was boring but then he saw they weren't like traditional poetry. He took second place in his first one. He was saying things from a gay perspective in Texas, which was different, and people were very welcoming of it. Brendon once almost did a poetry slam in Long Beach. His grandmother passed away the year before and he wrote a big long poem and he would have liked to read it, but you had to memorize it and he couldn't memorize it. Ragan was part of the Austin poetry slam scene from 2000-2001. Ragan had the highest finish for a gay or lesbian in a national poetry slam tournament in its 20+ year history. You can't repeat poems until you make it to finals. Brendon says he is a big fan of poetry slams because he likes free verse -- when he was younger, his poems were more Dr. Seuss, but once you get out of those confines of like stanzas ... Ragan says his poems rarely rhyme. Ragan does not participate in poetry slams anymore but still writes poems. Brendon's sister did her BA and MA in English, and likes teaching.
Brendon and Ragan talk about teacher evaluations. Ragan says that students rate teachers better if the classes are easier, which encourages dumbing down. Brendon agrees. |
