S05.E04: Old Loves

[Muffyn]

Gay or straight, IMO it's no fun having sex with someone barking directions like a traffic cop.

At moments like this, the best response seems to be to suggest that you sit this one out and let the other person finish by themselves.  After all,  they know exactly what they want!

[Momof2boyz]

What type of school is this?

It is based on St. Ann's in Brooklyn Heights where Lena Dunham went to school.  It is super progressive and artsy.   I am not sure if it is really a Catholic School or just a private school with a Catholic name.  It is definitely one of those schools on the NYC private school circuit (I went to a NYC private school) and several kids in my class at my artsy East Coast liberal arts college had gone there.

Edited March 15, 2016 by Momof2boyz

[qtpye]

Yeah, it looked like a super expensive artsy school to me, where the students have names like Rainbow or Celtic Mail (pronounced Miley). 

 

The tuition for these types of places usually run between $35,000-$45,000.  So Hannah is teaching some very wealthy kids.

 

Does Lena Dunham come from a wealthy family?  I know her parents are well respected artists, but that does not always translate to financial stability.

Edited March 15, 2016 by qtpye

[Momof2boyz]

 

Does Lena Dunham come from a wealthy family?  I know her parents are well respected artists, but that does not always translate to financial stability.

I think so.  A friend of mine has some kind of connection to her, I forget.  Her parents are friends with hers or her aunt is friends with her parents - someone like that, and she is from a very wealthy NYC family herself so I assume so.

[cuecat]

It is based on St. Ann's in Brooklyn Heights where Lena Dunham went to school.  It is super progressive and artsy.   I am not sure if it is really a Catholic School or just a private school with a Catholic name.  It is definitely one of those schools on the NYC private school circuit (I went to a NYC private school) and several kids in my class at my artsy East Coast liberal arts college had gone there.

 

St. Ann's was an Episcopal church/school before it became an experimental schools for rich hippy artists kids in the 70s.  There were a lot of old churches that were sold for not church purposes in the 70s...Limelight for example. Most were protestant churches.  The catholics in NYC didn't start selling off their churches until the 90s.  I think there is also an art center called St Anns that was related to the same church originally.  I assume the hippies thought it was funny to keep the name but in the case of the Limelight club they changed it.  I'm pretty sure the history of St Anns when it was an actual christian church was to convert poor catholic kids to protestants.  So referring to it as a possible being catholic school is a bit insulting. LOL   I know insult was not the intent.  :)

[cuecat]

As a homeowner and landlord, I am mortified by the way these idiots just tear up apartments and do spontaneous construction work.  In what world is this possible??  Isn't Marnie a renter?  And now that she's married to Desi and on a crunchy hippie granola kick, how long before they leave this trashed apartment to pitch a tent to live in Central Park?

 

What they were doing was very illegal.  The wall breaking up the window to start with.  But it does happen.  Especially in buildings like that.  Most likely the landlord is working on a deal to buy out the rent stabilized renter that is paying 300/mo and has been there since 1966.  These deal can take a long time to settle  (years even).  They rent to dumb kids they know are going to do stupid things like make a lot of noise and build walls that would not pass a fire inspection.  Once the deal is done with the long time renter.  The building will be sold and the newer tenants will be given 30 days notice (if they complain the fact that the did something like build a wall will work against them).  The building will either be knocked down or gutted and rebuilt. 

Edited March 15, 2016 by cuecat

[Momof2boyz]

I 

 

What they were doing was very illegal.  The wall breaking up the window to start with.  But it does happen.  Especially in buildings like that.  Most likely the landlord is working on a deal to buy out the rent stabilized renter that is paying 300/mo and has been there since 1966.  These deal can take a long time to settle  (years even).  They rent to dump kids they know are going to do stupid things like make a lot of noise and build walls that would not pass a fire inspection.  Once the deal is done with the long time renter.  The building will be sold and the newer tenants will be given 30 days notice (if they complain the fact that the did something like build a wall will work against them).  The building will either be knocked down or gutted and rebuilt. 

I built a wall in my rent stabilized apartment.  Of course it was illegal but everyone did it at the time.  When I moved out, I told them about it and they said I had to take the wall down, but I just left it.  I knew they were going to renovate the hell out of the apartment anyway to get it back to market rates so tearing a wall down was nothing.  For all I knew they would keep the wall up and rent the apartment as a Junior 4 , so I felt I was doing them a favor by leaving it.  In NYC real estate terms that is a one bedroom with an additional tiny bedroom.  I was paying way below market (still kicking myself for giving that up) and I knew they were so happy to have me finally out of there they would never come after me.

[Dewey Decimate]

Rice to Riches opened in 2003 (and was probably part of a money-laundering operation) so I don't think pudding shops are a trend so much as just one of those weird little businesses that populate New York but probably wouldn't work outside of a big city.

I was working at the Manhattan DA's office nearby at the time and we all assumed it was a money laundering cover! The product is friggin' delicious (the coconut and cinnamon varieties especially), but how the heck does a rice-pudding-only operation make a profit?

 

During Jessa and Adam's awkward fucking I kept thinking "why not move it to the floor??" That's not necessarily bad sex, just bad sex choreography.

 

He looked so familiar, but I didn't realize until the credits that was Corey Stoll. And now I'm both weirded out and laughing hilariously at the idea of Dr. Eph, vombie hunter, gettin' it on with Elijah.

[kieyra]

Actually, my take on it was the opposite.  She wants Adam but her friendship with Hannah was holding her back.  So she "broke up" with Hanhah.

 

I read the scene so literally this way that I actually expected Jessa to say "I broke up with Hannah" when she arrived at Adam's apartment. 

[CofCinci]

I'm surprised that Adam Driver was able to continue with the graphic sex scenes with his Disney/Star Wars contract.

[represent]

 

Yeah, it looked like a super expensive artsy school to me, where the students have names like Rainbow or Celtic Mail (pronounced Miley).

The tuition for these types of places usually run between $35,000-$45,000.  So Hannah is teaching some very wealthy kids.

Does Lena Dunham come from a wealthy family?  I know her parents are well respected artists, but that does not always translate to financial stability.

 

 

 

It is based on St. Ann's in Brooklyn Heights where Lena Dunham went to school.  It is super progressive and artsy.   I am not sure if it is really a Catholic School or just a private school with a Catholic name.  It is definitely one of those schools on the NYC private school circuit (I went to a NYC private school) and several kids in my class at my artsy East Coast liberal arts college had gone there.

 

Yep, my godsister went to this school. My godsister's father is Jewish, but my godmother is Catholic, they weren't very religious so.... I know they didn't send her to Saint Ann's because it was a Catholic school, that's for sure.  They sent her there so she could get into Yale, and she did, LOL.

[Readalot]

Marnie sure has come along way from working in an Art Gallery and being in a "normal" relationship (well if you count never seeing were your boyfriend lives as normal). I think one day she is going to wake up next to Dezi and think "WTF?!?!!"

[WhosThatGirl]

I just don't get why Marnie even liked Desi. I think back to when we first met at Hannah's congratulations party for Adam and both ellijah and Marnie like we're in love with him. I think he was some famous Broadway actor but even so once Marnie got to know him he wasn't very nice to her. I have all these feelings towards that relationship that I have when I tried hardly to understand why everyone loved Edward Cullen and Bella from Twilight before I turned that movie off, I was so confused by the dynamic.

Jessa is a bitch. She has never been a good friend after season one. The only thing she has going for her is her hair. It is quite awesome at times.

[Tara Ariano]

In case you missed it, here's the Previously.TV post on the episode!

 

That's Torn It On Girls
Lines are crossed and walls go up, both relationship-wise and literally.

[LCanterbury]

I didn't get my bond back once because we left dust on a windowsill so the wall building is wtf to me. Different country so different rules perhaps!

What on earth was Fran teaching when Hannah barged in? He was saying something about the Queen and Prince Phillip not sleeping in the same bed/room?

[represent]

Oh I forgot, the funniest part in this episode for me was Jessa's women's group session for recovering alcoholics I think it was...that woman who hated motherhood, was bored by it and frustrated that her kid was a year and a half and couldn't speak English yet, LOL. 

 

Oh my lord that was hilarious to me, she's holding on by a thread.

[Accidental Martyr]

Does Jessa have a job?

[Armchair Critic]

I have thought Jessa was too rude in the past but I loved her telling Hannah off in this episode. Preach!

[lucindabelle]

I write for a living as an editor at a newspaper and I also copy edit the work of contributors. In no alternate universe does creativity mean no copy editing. In my opinion it's ok to do mild corrections even on creative work but not necessarily grade on them. If I had a penny for every writer who makes dumb errors and some even our proofreader misses.l. And my editor in chief didn't know about the conditional tense! -- I'd have a substantial raise. These are not babies they are in high school (middle school?) if you don't correct those errors now they will be writing "between she and I" forever and thinking it's ok because they're so creative.

That said Fran was presumptuous. But Hannah is an awful teacher... The snippet we got over her lecture on Philip Roth made that clear.

[Hecate7]

I think it's ok to tell students, though, that this assignment does not involve grammar, and then stick to that promise. In no universe is it ok to set parameters of grading, then change them while you're grading. You stick to the requirements you set. It's not ok to grade another teacher's papers unasked. She set the parameters. She knows the rubric they were following. He doesn't.

 

Knowing Hannah, who is as you say a pretty awful teacher, she doesn't bother with grammar much of the time, but it's ok to have assignments which aren't about structure or grammatical correctness. Poems are very often ungrammatical. Look at e. e. cummings.

[cpcathy]

I was just about to bring up e.e. Cummings before I got to the end of your post.

[bunnywithanaxe]

What on earth was Fran teaching when Hannah barged in? He was saying something about the Queen and Prince Phillip not sleeping in the same bed/room?

I wondered that, too. What kind of school is this? St. Fuckups's School of Perpetual Inappropriateness?

[bunnywithanaxe]

Is a school or a middle school teacher suppose to teach creativity or fundamental things like grammar?

Both.

[lucindabelle]

E.e. Cummings no doubt could write properly and use capitalization when he was writing prose. I agree that grading parameters should be set ut I dont agree that it's ok not to even note where errors occur, and I was assuming that was in the essay part of the assignment. Hannah is setting up a false dichotomy between usingegishcorrey and beng creative,

[WhosThatGirl]

I wondered that, too. What kind of school is this? St. Fuckups's School of Perpetual Inappropriateness?

Yup. Pretty much. And Hannah is the worst teacher. Remember her great teaching style last season when she took Maude Apatow for some piercings? 

[bunnywithanaxe]

Mentors! Does nobody understand the importance of mentoring in teacher development? Auugh!

Edited March 18, 2016 by bunnywithanaxe

[Hecate7]

E.e. Cummings no doubt could write properly and use capitalization when he was writing prose. I agree that grading parameters should be set ut I dont agree that it's ok not to even note where errors occur, and I was assuming that was in the essay part of the assignment. Hannah is setting up a false dichotomy between usingegishcorrey and beng creative,

 

 

I don't think she is. Poems are not about grammar, nor are most poems grammatically correct. It's ludicrous to correct the punctuation of a poem. Look at Langston Hughes, Emily Dickinson, or, again, e.e. cummings. Try correcting the grammar or punctuation of Ginsberg's Howl. It's just not relevant to most poetry, and so "correcting" the punctuation or grammar of a poem is pretty asinine.

 

Maybe the essay part, but again, if Hannah told the kids that she wouldn't look at the grammar or spelling on their essays for this one assignment, then nobody has any business trying to do that for her.

Mentors! Does nobody understand the importance of mentoring in teacher development? Auugh!

 

Nobody has time to mentor. They are too busy doing all the work that used to be done by secretaries, assistants, etc... Moreover, they're not being paid enough to mentor.

[bunnywithanaxe]

 

 

Nobody has time to mentor. They are too busy doing all the work that used to be done by secretaries, assistants, etc... Moreover, they're not being paid enough to mentor.

True enough. I though maybe it was better in private schools.

[qtpye]

It is based on St. Ann's in Brooklyn Heights where Lena Dunham went to school.  It is super progressive and artsy.   I am not sure if it is really a Catholic School or just a private school with a Catholic name.  It is definitely one of those schools on the NYC private school circuit (I went to a NYC private school) and several kids in my class at my artsy East Coast liberal arts college had gone there.

 

 

Yep, my godsister went to this school. My godsister's father is Jewish, but my godmother is Catholic, they weren't very religious so.... I know they didn't send her to Saint Ann's because it was a Catholic school, that's for sure.  They sent her there so she could get into Yale, and she did, LOL.

 

 

I had an education very focused on discipline and "progressive" schools always fascinate me.  The media always makes it seem like this type of education is useless, but if going to that school gets you into the Ivy leagues, then they must be doing something right.

Edited March 18, 2016 by qtpye

[represent]

 

I had an education very focused on discipline and "progressive" schools always fascinate me.  The media always makes it seem like this type of education is useless, but if going to that school gets you into the Ivy leagues, then they must be doing something right.

Well, I guess it helps, a school like Saint Ann's...but my other god sister, her older sister went to a public high school in NYC called Stuyvesant, and she got into University of Pennsylvania/Wharton School of Business. Now Stuyvesant is I think the number one if not one of the top public high schools in the city but, it's still public. So I'm giving my godmother and her smart genes and her parenting skills quite a bit of credit here.  

 

 

On a different note, I've never liked Jessa, and since I haven't watched this show from the beginning I have no idea what makes her seem like she has such an evil streak, but she does IMO. Hannah and Marnie are annoyingly, frustratingly self absorbed to me, but they don't seem like evil bitches. 

 

What is Jessa's story exactly?

Edited March 18, 2016 by represent

[represent]

True enough. I though maybe it was better in private schools.

Nobody has time to mentor. They are too busy doing all the work that used to be done by secretaries, assistants, etc... Moreover, they're not being paid enough to mentor.

 

 

 

Mentors for teachers all depends on the money each school district has when it comes to public schools.  I've seen mentors in some schools but not in others. It's all about the money.

 

Also with private schools, the parents in many cases are schelling out the money for the best, so they DON'T expect that their money is going toward someone as inexperienced and down right inappropriate as Hannah, no way.  They don't expect that their kids are being taught by teachers who need mentors. I know I'd feel that way, spending all that money, and I have to walk into my kid's classroom to see some teacher getting "tutored," yeah, no.

 

No way, that one if not more of those parents wouldn't have already been up to that school to bitch on Hannah, no way.

Edited March 18, 2016 by represent

[LCanterbury]

Is Hannah even a trained teacher though?

[represent]

Is Hannah even a trained teacher though?

No, didn't she interview for the teaching job after she left the writing program in Iowa?

 

I don't even remember how she even came to choose the school? Is the school private?

 

Did they give us any details on the school, because I totally missed them if they did. 

 

I just remember her in a scene, in a restaurant, talking to her friends trying to decide what to do next with her life and Jessa saying something to the effect of, "Those who can't do, teach..." something like that. 

Edited March 18, 2016 by represent

[tennisgurl]

On the one hand, the stuff Jessa said was true, for the most part. Hannah is remarkably self centered, and she does expect everyone to drop everything to help her with her latest drama of the day. But, Jessa`s whole reason for her outburst was extremely selfish as well. She wanted to make it so that her and Hannah weren't friends anymore, so she could be with Adam, guilt free. They're both pretty awful, but I am siding more with Hannah on this one. Plus, I think I just understand Hannah more than Jessa. Jessa just does awful things in the name of "free spiritedness" or something, while Hannah is all neurosis and self esteem issues, but with moments of a goofy likableness that keeps her from being completely awful.   

 

Very few shows make sex look as unappealing, awkward, and gross as this show does. Its really pretty impressive. 

[WhosThatGirl]

Above post, Jessa totally does things and calls it being free. It's why I said Marnie called it, in the pilot episode Marnie awesomely told Hannah that she wasn't all that excited for Jessa to return home from I think somewhere in Europe because Jessa wasn't a good person and that she would come in and make Hannah do something crazy and then disappear again and leave Hannah all depressed. And Jessa did do something like that the following season, she and Hannah went to see Jessa's father and then Jessa left Hannah there. With a note. 

[Readalot]

From my experience working at a private school, half the parents would love Hannah's hip style of teaching. The other half would be knocking down the Head of School's door demanding s/he fire her while clutching their pearls. The teachers know the parents own them (seriously one Upper School teacher I knew had a SHRINE to the parents she prayed to every night). And at most privates you need just need a BS/BA to teach. No credential required.

[wendyg]

I went to the sort of private school Hannah's teaching at, and we certainly had some fairly young - 25, 26 - teachers when I was in high school, when the school seemed to deliberately seek out some new blood.

 

That said, I'm with luncindabelle. I've been noticing lately how many more people (it seems like) can't get their pronouns right. "They gave it to her and I"..."Please inform myself if...," "Her and me went to the store..." It will soon be impossible to teach people correct grammar based on how people normally speak. And don't get me started on "lay down" as in, "I'm going to lay down" - that's LIE down. I wouldn't mind so much if I could believe it was the character and not the writer, who didn't know. But when Joan in MAD MEN says to her newborn son, "Do you want to lay on the bed with Mommy?" I'm pretty sure it's the writers. Someone with Joan's age and background knew it was "lie down".

[Neko]

I just realized that Adam's niece is named after two girls he has slept with.  Erm. :/

Edited April 2, 2016 by Sweet Summer Child