I wish I could give more presentations. I love to present; I generally don't get a full grasp on what I'm doing until I'm standing in front of my audience, giving the presentation. I tend to get feelings, or inklings, or ideas, and just put them together and hope for the best. For example, in a few short minutes, I'm giving a presentation on Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. All I have so far is alliteration and this scene from V for Vendetta. No idea what I'm going to do with all that, but I'll be doing something. And I'll figure it out when I get up there.

Presentations, though, are butchered 99% of the time. The group presenting right now (yes, I'm being a bad audience member and blogging while people present) is literally reading their bits off a piece of paper, standing in a line across the front of the room, one at a time. No character, no personality.

In a few weeks, I'll be teaching a class. I know it will be about grammar and essay construction, I know the students will only be allowed to call me Captain (or "Oh Captain my Captain" if they're ambitious), I know I'll be handing them eye-patches as they enter the classroom and informing them that they will be graded on their ability to wear the eye-patch for the entire period, but that's really all I know about that lesson. And it's all I'm likely to know.

Why must people butcher such an art form? A person's attention is valuable. Don't waste it, when they're required to give it to you.