The written word is nowhere near as concentrated and potent as those sparingly used in poetry.
I've been rather remiss in remarking that this month, April, is National Poetry Month. I'm not sure why they have months to commemorate things. Whatever the month is dedicated for, whether it's poetry, African Americans, or pancakes, these things should be acknowledged the rest of the year.
Some poets: William Shakespeare: You know it's required reading, and yeah, the iambs might start your head spinning for hours, but the bard's words strike something fundamental about us. William Carlos Williams: He made poem distillation an art. Hayden Carruth: Plain-spoken and honest, he's a personal favorite. W. S. Merwin: There's something about his abrupt and active style that I can identify with. I once attended one of his readings at The Getty. He sounds like a narrator for a documentary.
And yes, I generally like modern poets. They don't have to restrict themselves to archaic conventions to express their emotions and ideas.
1. Tell us about your most frustrating experience in dealing with the government, or some kind of authority and red tape.
Usually the checks for anyone working in the biology department are distributed at the main office. So when I went to look for my first check, that was logically the first place I went. My check wasn't there.
I asked one of those secretary ladies if they had any idea where my check would have gone so they looked up a list of people, put in a phone call, and told me to go to another secretary lady.
It turned out that I spent the rest of the afternoon running from one secretary lady to another--some who didn't know what was going on and some who were out to get revenge on another secretary lady by sending the problem (me) to her.
Let me tell you, I don't like being used as a tool for petty vendettas.
2. Tell us your crazy kitty or, crazy dog, or crazy whatever story.
Once upon a time, there lived a cat named Bathtub who never got bigger than kitten-size. She was nicknamed Psycho Cat because she terrorized everyone (her owner was just as crazy as the cat so no one dared complain to her about the problem). The tiny calico prowled the hallways picking fights with the other cats who were bigger than she (they all ran away when they realized there was no hope of pacifying the creature) and stealing other cats' food.
She consistently used somebody's bookbag as a litter box and liked climbing up into people's lofts to mess up their beds. One time she crawled under our couch and didn't come out until my roommate dangled her sandal as a treat.
This was back in the time when there were more of the drinking crowd hanging around. No doubt, the cat probably had gotten hold of a bottle of vodka or rum some time or other.
3. You've decided to buy a vanity license plate for your car. What does it say? If it's not obvious, what does it mean to you?
NOODLE
I like using my noodle. I like eating noodles too.
I missed dinner to finish a short story and what do I get as a reward?
"I don't like dream sequences in stories. They don't belong there."
Those dream sequences were actually thought out. I placed them there delibrately. So okay, the prof thought my story was incomprehensible, but that doesn't mean dream sequences are bad. It had some pretty heavy metaphors and symbolism (and I had thought that maybe I had overdone them) but still it was thought of as "mysterious".
Basically I failed at my attempt at "realism"--I mean how many ways can you write about the grass growing on your lawn at exactly 5 PM on August 21st? How many ways can you "realistically" write about someone dying on a hospital bed or walk to school or ride a bike without going into the character's mind?
Maybe by delving into a character's psyche through dreaming, I've completely lost my audience. I've become too esoteric for my own good.
Links: So You've Decided To Be Evil. Ever wished to be a cartoon villain? Well now you can! With this handy-dandy evilness generator, you'll have your minions running the planet in no time at all! The Pocket Project. A rip-off of The Mirror Project in still life style. Does it count if I make a pocket to contain something I wanted to photograph badly?
I'm not afraid of heights, but I'm afraid of falling. This must have started back when my sister and I had bunk beds. I took the top bunk until one night I dreamed of falling. In fact, I did fall. I woke up when I hit the floor.
Falling is deeply intertwined with height though. When I'm climbing something, I clutch at the railing in a death grip. Once the fear seized me so thoroughly while I was visiting Casa Loma that I practically crawled up inch by agonizing inch the flimsy spiralling staircase that led up to the highest tower while the people behind me were impatiently edging me on.
I still feel uneasy climbing up and down things that don't look too stable. On campus in one of the astronomy buildings, there's the Pit. It was originally dug up for a telescope, but when the hole was finished, people realized that it was more efficient to build one above ground. Now there's just the empty Pit, a four to five story deep hole that is completely empty and useless except for daredevil students. There's one rickety elevator that goes down, but it only holds one person; thus everyone climbs the thin rusty ladder that runs on one side of the Pit.
In a fit of bravado, I went with a bunch of guys to explore the Pit (the girls chickened out). The climb down, to me, seemed infinite. I dared not look down. I constantly worried that my hands would give out and I would fall to my doom.
But I eventually made it, and all I found was dust, an ancient worktable, and a barely functioning Atari. Even below this, was a crossbase--the lowest point on campus. I crawled into that musty hole-in-a-hole and scratched out my name, immortalizing myself with the numerous other Techers that had made it down.
I'm not quite sure if all that effort was worth it.
More links: The Life Cycle of Your Weblog. So does this work for me? I hesitate to name drop now. Loop. Arg! I'm blinded! Whatsbetter?com. Some mindless decision making. My favorite way of wasting time. Google Smackdown. It's not very original but amusing, nonetheless. What emotion are you? I'm neutral. Not surprising--I don't get angry, sad, or excited very often. Maybe I'm a robot. Or maybe I'm just saving up all my emotion for something worthwhile.
A couple months ago, I submitted this site to be critiqued on The Weblog Review. Apparently they're currently being swamped by reviewees and are requesting brave souls to become reviewers. I don't think I'd be able to do it--it's one thing to read someone's blog, but another to put into words how you feel about it.
So I found it interesting to read the review of syaffolee today. I was pleasantly surprised that the reviewer rated the site a 4.5; I was expecting perhaps a rather short blurb and a nearly-passing grade due to the unpredictable nature of having random reviewers do various sites.
At any rate, I was a bit curious and took a look at the reviewer's homepage. Pretty interesting. I think my Dad would do something similar to this if he was interested at all in blogging.
Random linkage: A Kitten Band. Another gratuitous cat link. What High School Stereotype Are You? It says that I'm a blonde. This test is just wrong. I am a geek and a loner. And definitely not blonde. The Next Generation: Biotechnology May Make Superhero Fantasy a Reality. I'm usually an optimistic person--I mean why be surprised that humanity is on the verge of changing? I have no doubt that man will evolve due to his own hand rather than the enviornment around him. Now if people were working just as hard on advancing the space program... Think of the Domo-kuns. What is it about furry blobs with big teeth that make them irresistable?
I was attempting to hypnotize myself with a psychophysics experiment when one of the girls in the computer lab destroyed my concentration with, "I hate 80% of the people here at Tech!"
At the time, I had been studiously ignoring the low key conversation in the background that had something to do with most Techer's naivety towards the revered honor code. Apparently what ticked off this girl was something about Techer behavior. She asserted that most Techers were inconsiderate.
All I have to say is that in her view, I probably fall into that 80% that she was talking about. I only mildly know her as some other guy's girlfriend. I've never had the opportunity to talk to her--she's like one of those people you ocassionally see but never really meet. The only close encounter I had with her was when I was cooking and I happened to be using tuna fish that day. She didn't talk to me directly--she talked about me to her boyfriend in front of me.
Yes, she's the tuna-fish hater.
Who Was Responsible For Elizabeth Shin? I'm appalled yet not very surprised. I think something went wrong on both sides regardless. The administration was not as active as it could have been and the parents seemed oblivious (possibly delibrately) of their daughter's deterioration. It's not a very good sign when the article also states that their other daughter is involved in a kazillion activities. Overachievement and perfectionism can be bad things; I've seen this make students neurotic even in elementary school.
Could there be any way to prevent this from happening again? I'm not so sure a crack down on mental health services would do very much good. After the alcohol-related death at MIT, there was a visible tightening down of the alcohol policy at Caltech. Students complained that the administration was doing it to prevent itself from being sued rather than really caring about student welfare. After all, this has only served to drive drinking underground. In the same vein, wouldn't this extra emphasis on health care drive the really needy people underground too? Then we'll never know until it's too late.
I can say that in recent memory, there hasn't been any suicides in the undergraduate community at Tech even though everyone complains that the course load is suicidal. People have said that Tech is a much better environment for grad students than undergrads, but the ironic thing is, the last suicide at Tech was a grad student.
Big HIV Problem Hits Small S.D. College Town (via Yald) One person knowingly spread HIV to possibly over 10% of the college population. Bioterrorism at its worst--because it's much more personal than a bomb.
Scientist Reveals Genome Secret: It's Him. I find this a bit eerie. Now people know they have access to his genetic blueprint. Venter may have done this for his own ego (and it is morbidly amusing that he may want his body preserved in the Smithsonian), but I'm afraid to think what might happen to him if an even more unscrupulous person got their hands on the information. Maybe I've been reading too many apocalyptic science fiction stories.
Man is a hive. A nest. Men are ants so intent on their own tasks and too specialized to handle anything else. That was how I felt when in a fit of desperation I ran into the library wailing, "Help! Does anyone know how to compile?"
Of course, it was a stupid question. The people in the room gave me hard, condescending looks. "What do you want compiled? What program? Where's the code? What language is it in?"
My answer to all of this, "I don't know!"
My own ignorance and cluelessness eventually ejected me from the room of too-busy-for-you computer science people who probably knew more programming languages than a multi-linguist translator working for the UN. Despite this dejection, though, I eventually tracked down others who were willing to answer my stupid questions.
Yes, I go to Tech. And yes, a major option here is to take computer science. But that's not my interest, and I never took any related classes even for the curiousity factor. I'm just not one of those people who think staring at code on the computer screen is fun. But lately (as in since last night) I've been thinking that it may be prudent to learn some programming.
I don't want to be the little ant who gets squashed because all she ever learned was to guard the anthill.
"Book of the Week" (i.e. a book I finished today): Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe. Just a few remarks since I'm sure everyone else has read this in high school. Not surprisingly this book is probably different from the numerous movies out there that make this out to be a period romance. In brief, it's a economical "memoir" of a woman who got married five times (once with her brother), had a couple of affairs, and became a thief before being deported to America. It's very cut and dried, but you've got to forgive Defoe since back in his day he was treading the cutting edge of a new literary form.
Other stuff: The Mini-Mizer. Make a lego clone of yourself. Prime Number Pooping Bear. I know some teachers who would have a heart attack if they saw this. The Campus Squirrel Listing. I'm not surprised Tech ranked so low. As for a Campus Cat Listing, it'll be another story.
Note: Blogger is acting up so I'm posting this manually. So until Blogger is feeling better, there won't be any commenting thingy for this post. But you can still comment. Just use the one below.
I am currently attempting to compile and run software. I have no idea how to do this since I'm not a computer science major. This will probably take me the better part of the night on how to figure this out.
In this round of Blogger Insider, I got paired up with Kacy from She's Not. You can also see her answers to my questions here.
1. You write that you took a health advocate class, but were annoyed by people who got hurt by their own stupidity. Do you often find yourself annoyed by people who seem less intelligent than you?
I'd like to say that I'm tolerant, but yeah, I get impatient with people who ignore common sense. I don't really think that anyone is less intelligent than me--after all, how hard is it to grasp the consequences of downing too much beer (or smoking pot, or jumping off a three-story building)? They probably have personal problems or illusions of grandeur that I cannot even begin to comprehend.
2. What is the strangest book you've ever read?
Strange doesn't surprise me. I grew up on fairy tales and all sorts of speculative fiction so I've actually come to expect something odd and out of the ordinary. So what's strange for me is the ordinary. I think it was around sixth grade when I picked up a young adult novel called "Kite" (possibly by somebody named Murray). It was hardback and the cover jacket had a painted night sky. The summary told me very little. It turned out to be one of those angsty teenaged coming of age novels, which at the time surprised me because I had thought who the heck would want to write about ordinary things?
Well, after observing the borrowing habits of patrons during a stint at the local library, I've concluded that lots of people like reading ordinary things. Just not me though. Nowadays, that stuff bores me to tears.
3. Where do you see yourself in 20 years?
Definitely working in some scientific field. Maybe in academia, but more likely in industry. And probably writing on the side. Other people suggested that I should become a technical writer, a popular science writer, or even an editor for a scientific journal. Actually, at this point in my "career" I don't want to look too far ahead. I just want to survive grad school first.
4. If you only had six months to live (you would be relatively mobile and pain-free), what things would you want to accomplish before you died?
I'm going to be selfish. I would travel. And write like a maniac.
The first thing I'd do would be to type up all the scribbling dreck I've accumulated throughout the years and send it off to all the publishing houses. In the mean time, I'd hop on the train (I'd buy tickets to all of them--from Canada to Asia to Europe). At each stop, I'd sightsee like a stupid tourist and talk to random strangers. And while I'm traveling, I'd write and send the stuff off every time I got to a post office.
And the unselfish thing? I'd tell everyone I love them, even if some of them don't deserve it.
5. What do you regret?
I'm too young at this point to have any regrets.
6. In your opinion, what is the worst feeling in the world?
The stuffy yet tickling sensation that starts in my chest and travels up my throat to my sinuses to end up behind my eyes and nose. And then I realize that my eyes are wet. I feel sad and depressed. Essentially one of those mini-emotional-breakdowns. I don't dwell on these too long though because I soon remember that I'm a lot luckier than most people.
7. Cats or Dogs?
Cats. I don't have one, but I'd like to own one someday. If cats came in lavender, had wings, and were telepathic I'd be even happier.
8. If you found a magic lamp with a genie inside, what three wishes would you make?
There once was an old lady in a pink jumpsuit who claimed to be a genie and I told her my three wishes. They would still be basically the same--with some modifications:
1) Since it's impossible for the wedding people to vanish from campus, at least make them request something different for their receptions, like a random Mozart quartet. Just please don't play anything from the 1950s and onwards.
2) Since crazy drivers can't simply vanish, make them all drive bright pink neon cars so we know who to avoid.
3) Since a blizzard would be impossible in Southern California, make up some random federal holidays so we could get out of school.
9. If you could change one thing about yourself (physical, mental, or emotional), what would that be and why?
I'd give myself a sense of style so I don't look like a train wreck every morning.
10. What is the most interesting or fun city you've been to? What made it so great?
It would have to be a tie between Hong Kong and a little village at the base of the Alps in France (unfortunately I don't remember its name). Hong Kong is great because they've managed to cram everything in as little space as possible. I usually don't like shopping, but if every store were like the ones there, I would be a quick convert. Everything is simply alive and some of the more fascinating venues appear in the evening.
The village in France was a peculiar mix of modern tourist and quaint provincialism. The most memorable thing about it was its spooky church. The door was open and I just walked in. It was dark and empty, except for a few burning candles, and it opened into a small court that was actually a graveyard.
Sometimes I wonder if I'm really socially inept or I'm not arrogant enough. Sure, I'm afraid of putting my foot in my mouth (I often do, that's why people always look at me funny) and I'm intimidated by people who walk around with their nose in the air and jab emphatically, "Go do this!" but I rarely physically back down.
Sometimes I wonder if I'm really invisible. I open my mouth and say something, but someone else has to verbally bulldoze me. Should I continue talking so that there's a confusing babble? Or should I begin talking even louder, turning myself into a screaming fishwife? I wouldn't think listeners would find it very polite.
The problem is, I'm not very aggressive. If you know me in person, you wouldn't give me a second thought. My parents tell me I should act more aggressively so it would be easier to get my way with other people but that's just simply not me. Sometimes I half-heartedly try, but the image of maniacal Jerry Springer guests always comes back to haunt me.
For some reason I don't believe aggressiveness is a civilized trait. Maybe I'm being too idealistic. Or maybe I've sat through too many conversations where a pompous airhead spewed mindlessly. There were times when I jumped into a conversation and the whole thing just stalled. Maybe I chose the wrong topic.
I wonder if my lack of grade school friends had anything to do with it.
Links: Looking Back at the Days of the Locust. (via Charles Murtaugh) Perhaps one reason locusts (and similar "pests") are studied so little is that they don't appeal to everyone. Out of control mosquitoes and fire ants provoke most people to break out the destructive chemicals instead of their magnifying glass. I liked the last bit of the article though--it has a creepy feel to it. Who wouldn't want to find out if the locusts are just simply hiding out until the good times roll around again? Locusts in Afghanistan. Maybe they're hiding out here.
1. In your state/country is there a required registry for sex offenders? Do you think there should be, and why, or why not?
In California there is; you can get it on a CD-ROM since it's not on the web. More info is located here. In Tennessee, not only do they have everything online, they include pictures and location. You can search them out and start egging their house if you wanted to.
But unless they can't tell right from wrong (in that case, they should be in some mental institution), yes, tabs should be kept on these criminals. In fact, tabs should be kept on all criminals, not just sex offenders. They've proven once that they can't live with society and with that, they've forsaken their right to live relatively anonymously.
2. What did you want to be when you were a little kid? Did you become your initial occupational choice?
In first grade, the teacher made us do drawings of what we wanted to be when we grew up. At the time, I was surprised because I had not thought about it before. So after a little haggling with myself, I decided to draw myself as a teacher. After all, teachers did little each day besides standing up at the blackboard and handing out worksheets.
Later, that idea became replaced with the notion that I could be some sort of scientist. Why? Because the teachers never had the answers for everything. They never introduced me to anything new or exciting. Or maybe I just got lucky and was assigned to teachers who were horrible at explaining things so they gave students busy work. I had to go find what I wanted to know by myself.
3. If you haven't already done so take this test, or if you have provide a link to your prior earth shattering results.
I'm pretty sure I took this one before, but I'm too lazy to hunt up the link in my archives.
Newbie (40%) You've started to learn that there is more to the internet than AOL. You've recovered from that email virus that wiped your hard drive and are thinking of getting DSL. You still tend to forward too many jokes and inspirational thoughts via email to your entire address book.
I'm slightly offended that this quiz thinks I'm a newbie. I thought I would score higher. Oh well.
I'm still not sure how to feel being referred to as a "young writer with special knowledge." It makes me sound psychic.
The professors (or at least the ones I've come across) in the humanities department treat the students as if they are literate. But when students start talking science, the instructor gets a glazed look and throws out a comment that makes science sound like voodoo. It's a shame that there's such a large divide between science and liberal arts.
Anyways, I attended a seminar with the speaker Alan Cheuse, a fiction writer and a book reviewer at NPR. It was more amusing than what I was expecting. He had plenty of funny stories. He is also a very prolific reviewer. When he was younger, he worked for Kirkus, and pretty much reviewed a book a day for three or four years. Nowadays, he has to hire a small moving truck to lug all the wannabe-reviewed books to the local library for donation.
But he had a very interesting point--that it's also very important to be a reader, not just a writer. Anybody can be a writer. But without the readers, we'll just have shelves of typed pages.
Somewhat unrelated: HHGG Infocom Adventure. I'm really bad at these type of games. I always do things in the wrong order, at the wrong time, and get myself stuck in a dark hole which I can never get out of.
A Pill to Stretch Your Day. If this goes into the main market, how can you stop fanatical bosses forcing their employees to take this drug to get higher productivity levels? How will you stop students from taking it to do several all-nighters in preparation for finals week? There are studies that show people hallucinating if they get sleep deprived. Heck, I've hallucinated when I went without sleep for too long. Humans are not robots.
Asian Americans rip retailer for stereotypes on T-shirts. Apparently every Asian American has something to say about this. Well, check out Ernie's post (and comments) which pretty much sums it up. Plus, I don't even like the idea of putting slogans and pictures on shirts. It just strikes me as a big fashion mistake that no one bothered to correct. And yeah, I've lived in places with less than 1% Asians. Believe me, it was a big surprise when I came to California where Asians weren't considered a minority.
Irresponsibility makes me want to take something like a very large glass vase and throw it off the roof with all my might. It's another reason why I admire health care professionals who manage to treat idiots without throwing up their hands immediately in disgust.
At the beginning of my sophomore year I signed up for a "health advocate" class where I got to learn emergency first aid procedures like CPR, delivering babies, and caring for people who get physically injured. I thought that was cool, and still do. I don't mind treating people who've been cut or burned or otherwise accidentally hurt.
What I do mind, however, is injury due to stupidity--particularly people who've gotten themselves smashed with binge drinking. I don't like it when people start pounding my door in the middle of the night, panicked because someone is passed out somewhere. Instead of calling 911 or driving to the hospital, students usually go to other students first. Why? Because they're afraid that if some sort of authority is called in, the incident might somehow get back to the administration.
I am not against drinking. But they wouldn't have to face this situation if they drank in moderation. If drinking was portrayed as a fact of life like eating spinach or going to the beach instead of something that is cool or a rite of passage, I wouldn't doubt that this particular problem would be reduced.
Guys perpetually complain about the mysteriousness of females. Well, guess what, I'm as clueless as you. Or perhaps I'm really naive.
For some unexplicable reason, I mostly have the fortune of catching my fellow female comrades in their bad moods. And before you ask, I did nothing to provoke them. Or perhaps my mere presence made them go off with their very short fuses.
I say "hi" and they frown, walking past me as if I have some contagious disease. I ask a question, and they refuse to answer even though I'm pretty sure they heard me. They just sit there, slumped giving me an evil look. One time, I knocked on a girl's door and asked if she was heading to class (I was positive she was awake because I saw her up and about earlier). She told me no, angrily, and slammed the door in my face.
Maybe it's PMS. Maybe it's the fluctuation of hormones or something horrible happened in their personal lives. It's okay to have a bad day. It's healthy to vent it (as evidenced by the numerous angsty journals and blogs on the net), but it's another thing to take it out on innocent people who had nothing to do with your problem. I don't like the psychological equivalent of a mugger surprising me, beating me senseless, and robbing me.
I usually shrug these particular antics off. Perhaps it's a twisted way of garnering attention. Sometimes I tell myself it's not my concern if other people have poor coping mechanisms for dealing with a crisis. But maybe it is me. I know I haven't done anything to them--I don't move in their social circles. Maybe there's something so patently offensive about me that they have to act like bitches. So I try making myself scarce.
That doesn't work.
If anyone understands why some females take an irrational dislike to people they rarely know, please let me know because I don't want to turn myself into a hermit just because of a few nasty people.
Links: 2002 Hugo Award Nominees Announced. Mostly the big names have been nominated again. godless vs. Murtaugh on McWhorter. Ah, incestuous blog linking at its best (or worst?). I stumbled upon this comment after reading the original sources in question. I found Razib's last thoughts on the matter interesting. Why does a black linguist have to focus on black culture? Or in the same vein, why would a woman have to sympathize with a feminist view? Why do authors of particular ethnicities have to write about their own race? Sadly, society at large will continue pressing these preconceptions. Therefore it's every individual's responsibility to pursue what they want and not what everyone assumes that they want.
A guy in a bright red sweatshirt with the school name emblazoned in navy on the front stopped in front of my room's doorway and leaned against it like a stuck-up starlet.
"Hey, remember me?"
The voice jerked me from my work and I looked up, frowning. Who the hell was he? "Sorry, I'm really bad with faces and names." This was not an entirely true statement. I'm good with faces, but awful with names.
"Oh, remember I roomed up here in this room last summer? I was one of those high school students in the summer program. Sort of like a summer prefrosh weekend, y'know? And so this is my second time here, and well I guess I'll be coming here."
Oh, goody. I'll be gone by the time you matriculate. I nod my head like an idiot as he rambled on about how great Tech is. At this point, he has entered the room and is standing next to me as if he and I were already friends. Get away from me, weirdo!
I was saved in a few seconds by my roommate and Canadian Boy. The strange prefrosh sauntered out--perhaps to annoy other upperclassmen. Who was he? I know I've never met him before. And nobody had stayed in my room last summer. Even though I moved out for two weeks, my room had only been briefly converted into a computer lab.
"Change the combo to your door," Canadian Boy advised.
Today is officially the first day of Caltech's Prefrosh Weekend 2002. I'm not kidding when people act funny. When the prefrosh began trickling in this morning, there was a noticeable lift in the "happiness factor". No, people did not suddenly start gushing about how Tech is so great, but everyone's attitude was a little more upbeat.
"I haven't heard anything good about this place!" exclaimed a prefrosh in exasperation. His brother is currently a junior here. No wonder he hasn't heard anything good.
"Yeah, most people aren't too positive," agreed an upperclassman. "But you can find a small number of people here who do like this place a whole lot."
Of course, the situation is perpetuated by the fact that a significant percentage of Techers are wearing the Crippling Depression Prefrosh Weekend T-shirt that says, "You're Doomed!" That'll scare away prospective students. All the nay-saying might backfire, though. Reverse psychology. They'll come despite what's being said.
Admissions, apparently, has also tried to counter the typical Techer's negative attitude by accepting more applicants this year than last year. That's because they had to dip into the waiting list last year. They didn't want to do it again.
I don't think I really care too much about the hoopla anymore. I'll answer questions and maybe say a little about my experience here, but that's it. I'm not going to try to influence anyone to come here or not. I'm assuming that they're going to be smart enough to decide for themselves.
Only one piece of advice though: If you're willing to get up even after getting kicked in the ass repeatedly for four years, this might be the place for you.
Some links: The Attractive Person. If you can't tell already, I like reading retellings of fairy tales. This one is based on Goldilocks and the Three Bears--with a different message. I sympathize with the "bears" in this story. If an attractive person ever took notice of me, I'd run screaming to the hills. Attractive people are scary. Rasputin. My friends recommended this song. Now I'm shamelessly listening to it over and over again. I must try to divert myself soon or I'll start singing the lyrics aloud.
Actually, the only person I know who does any research on guinea pigs is the father of one of my high school classmates. He is a geneticist.
But this morning, instead of getting my genes rearranged, I got electrocuted. All in the name of science. I was a volunteer for a psychophysics experiment done by some very smart people at the Koch lab. Sure I got paid, but I was more curious about being a subject of an experiment than anything else. I've heard about those game theory experiments the economics department always advertises. But being pitted against another person in a tit-for-tat situation never appealed to me.
So bright and early today, I headed off to the basement of the Beckman Institute where a grad student hooked two electrodes on my pinkie and fourth finger of my right hand and two sensors on the middle finger and index finger of my left hand. Typically when I heard a tone in a pair of headsets, I would get shocked. And while this was going on, I had to perform a visual task by selecting target numbers that popped up on a screen that flashed a stream of random numbers.
Being electrocuted was not bad. (But then again, I'm not like most people.) Each shock felt more like a violent vibration. Honestly, I had expected something akin to a static shock--which feels like a thousand pins and needles if you get one of those particularly large jolts that cause bright sparks to arc from the metal doorknob to your fingers.
During the experiment, however, my mind wandered and I began thinking about how college students liked to take voluntary risks while lab rats had no say whatsoever in being injected with some engineered virus and then dissected a few days later. Unfortunately, that skewed my results halfway through the test since my alertness to the audio cues completely diminished.
Or it could have been the early morning hours.
When I walked out of the building, I was greeted by a cheerless sky, a couple of blackbirds with irridescent feathers on their backs, two odd metal and wire sculptures that had appeared out of nowhere, and a squirrel chewing on an orange flower.
So you want to be an experimental subject? Tell them I sent you.
Somewhere else: Human For Sale. So this may be a joke, but this is just plain wrong. I've heard that several decades ago, some people paid living drug addicts a couple hundred bucks for their body to be donated to science (i.e. dissected by medical school students). The addicts would use the cash for more drugs and when they died (sooner than later), their bodies got taken out of the morgues to the med schools. Do they still do this today?
Comment Bombing. Okay, so I'm just a sneaky bastard who likes reading everything on somebody's blog--including the comments (sorry about that JF). Now that I think about it, comment bombing is a lot like mass guestbook surfing and signing. I know I'm guilty of the latter; the evidence still comes up under certain search queries. I've honestly quit doing that, though. It's not worth wading through pages of random crap.
There's just something about my roommate's mattress that screams "kitty bed."
I had to haul a fat fluffy orange and white cat who had managed to climb up the loft to stand triumphantly among her pillows and blankets.
"No! Bad idea!"
The cat meowed and hissed and tried grabbing onto the curtains to prevent being dragged back down to carpet level. I dropped her off at the front of my door, but left it open. Now the cat is sitting on the couch on top of one of my roommate's blankets, idly pawing at it.
This cat does not belong to me or my roommate. She actually belongs to someone at a different house, but the feline has taken to wandering here (perhaps to eat the other cats' food). I like cats (and wish that I might own one someday) but having a cat around is just not feasible. I'm not home most of the time and I believe cats deserve more attention than that. Maybe I should just get an aquarium and a plump gerbil.
Also, this cat is not the only cat who prefers my roommate's mattress. I've had to throw several other cats out before they made themselves at home. Hm. She must be putting on some mysterious cat pheromone or catnip perfume before she goes to sleep.
A link: Treasure Planet trailer. Yes, it's a Disney film--supposedly coming out just before Thanksgiving of this year on IMAX. There's some pretty cool sci-fi scenes. And even though James Newton Howard may be doing the music to this film, the music in the trailer is from John Williams' score to Far and Away. (Don't even think about trying to argue with a soundtrack fanatic.)
1. It's your job to come up with a new national anthem. What is it?
I once took a music writing class, but I don't think this will help me here. I'll probably fob the job off to someone like John Williams (who already has the experience of writing Olympic anthems under his belt). Just to make his job easier though, I might end up doing the lyrics.
2. There's no getting out of it. You must do karaoke at the next town meeting. What do you sing?
Probably the only song I know the lyrics of at the top of my head. "A Whole New World" from Aladdin.
3. You've been called naive before, but this is ridiculous. Why are they charging you with that this time?
For thinking that telemarketers are just randomly calling me.
No one noticed that I was pissed off when the fiction prof said, "Men write about wars, news, current events, and philosophical ideas. Women write about relationships, inner turmoil, and the like. And no one disputes the fact that what the men write about are more important."
Of course, she never implied that what men wrote were more important, just that they seemed more important, but I was quite ticked, nonetheless. What she did assume was that all women wrote about relationships. No one, of course, realized my immediate reaction because I had none. Perhaps only the twitch of my mouth would have betrayed any of my thoughts (I'm very good at physically hiding my emotions, as any of my friends can attest).
I'm taking this as a challenge. I will write something that has nothing to do with human interpersonal relationships. I will use "lofty ideas" to drive the plot. I will use hard, curshing, jarring detail to drive the point home. I will be as subtle as a sledgehammer. I will avoid fuzziness and excessive emotion.
She picked the wrong class to say that she hopes one of us will write a happy, sappy wedding story. Happily ever afters are out. Grim reality is in.
Don't get me wrong. I'm far from being a militant feminist. I just don't like the idea that all I'm capable of achieving is dreary and dull "women's fiction."
Random linkage: Google in H4x0r. If you understand this, you're much smarter than me. Beer: The Journey Begins. I know so many people who would sign up for a beer tasting tour in a heartbeat. She Walks in Beauty by Lord Byron. Sure, we all analyzed this to death in grade school, but seriously have you just read it just for its sake? Yep, Byron ole boy just had some ink ready while he was deep in his cups.
Book cover designs. You either love them or hate them. Most of them looked like they were pieced together by a trigger happy editor. At best, a sub-par graphics art designer on a 50 sodas a day diet. Sure, the design is supposed to convey the subject matter in a wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am fashion, but often this gets a bit nauseous for people who prefer the more subtle approach.
Take for instance the most obvious examples: the romance novels. You find them pretty much everywhere, particularly displayed prominently on supermarket shelves. The cover has the hero and heroine in the classic "cinch" position which most of the time looks anatomically impossible. Racy pictures are a big turn-off (at least for me). At the moment, the only alternative are the books with flowers on them or countryside scenes--but that for some reason makes me think of dirty old grandmothers.
Science fiction and fantasy novels aren't that much better. True, you can tell that the covers are definitely illustrated (more likely from the artist's mind than using a live model), but I can't shake the feeling that the artist just said, "Oh, another sci-fi commission" and proceeded to dab bits of paint on his canvas haphazardly. They all begin to look the same: planets and spaceships, or people riding unicorns. The same thing could be applied to mystery and horror. A silly representational graphic is stuck in the middle of the cover and then the title and author are lettered in a generic font. Horror novels are black while mysteries are generally subdued in color.
The only "good" covers are reserved for what the publishers think are important, literary fiction. But ocassionally these covers can be brainless too. Some books are slapped with a painting by some great master like Vermeer or Monet. Sure it elevates the book, but it also makes it appear snooty (no offense to artists or authors).
The best cover, however, would be the blank cover. It wouldn't matter what color the cover would be (as long as it's not an eye-straining neon). The author's name and the title should be printed modestly in the front and on the spine, reserving the back for a brief teaser. Publishers should leave all the imaginings between the reader and the printed word.
The Serpent's Shadow by Mercedes Lackey. Well, the covers of Lackey's books are certainly unique. They're all by Jody Lee--I'm not too sure I like her artistic style though. Anyway, I breezed through this book in a couple of hours. Most of it is light fluff with not much to think about. There are plenty other review sites out there that will spill the beans on this story but the basic premise is this: Snow White.
Yep, it's another of those retellings, but The Serpent's Shadow is not nearly as mind-bending or provocative as other versions (like Tanith Lee's White As Snow). I would have liked more in depth musings on the problems encountered in the early twentieth century like racism and sexism and the interactions between western and eastern magical systems. But as it is, Lackey only hints at these issues and instead throws out cardboard characters.
I find the genre historical fantasy very interesting. But this book only reaffirms why I very rarely read Lackey.
Unrelated links: Man Shoots Off Brain Tumor. Oh boy. Are the doctors sure that the bullet missed the vital parts? What if he starts behaving strangely, like Phineas Gage?
People watching is like scanning the highway for out-of-state license plates.
Most of my people watching is done on the run--walking to work, walking to class, walking to a store--so it's more like a hurried glance and my impressions are usually quick and decisive. So if you're wearing a sparkly boa, I will definitely remember you in contrast to the guy standing next to you in khakis and white shirt.
I don't stare, though. Or at least I hope I don't. (If you do catch me staring, don't hesitate to tell me to stop. I only want to suck up the details so I can write it down later, somewhere.) Often I glance at something, it registers in the back of my brain, and it stews there for a couple of hours. I don't actively think about anything while I'm looking at people although sometimes I consciously chant to myself, "Blah, blah, blah" because I'm afraid some people in the world are mind readers. So far there's no scientific evidence for telepathy, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. So just to be on the safe side, I usually try not thinking at all while walking alone.
It's one of the reasons that I enjoy "getting away from home." I get to see strange, different people and pretend that I'm in another country, or even another world.
I didn't see many people today, unfortunately. I was stuck all afternoon in the lab. But I did see wedding people (not surprisingly) and some assorted random visitors. Two wedding guests struck me though. One was a haughty woman in sharp heels. She was wearing an outrageous white dress trimmed with black mink. She was strolling ahead with her husband (I assume) in tow who was wearing a tan suit. His hair was slicked back and he was lugging a large box covered in silver wrapping paper. These two made a jarring composite next to the guy walking the opposite way. This guy had on a rather loud leafy green shirt and baggy purple pants. He was walking his huge white shaggy dog that was probably as big as me.
It would have been funny if the dog jumped the woman. Too bad the animal was too well behaved.
Gratuitous cat links (because I don't have a cat): Library Cats Map. I used to work at a library where the next oldest librarian was 40 years older than me. They looked down upon animals. Shopcat. However I did visit a bookstore in Ohio once that had a bunch of cats. Don't Let This Happen To Your Cat. Some people just don't know how to pick names.
Good Riddance to Oprah's Book Club, and Her Literary Amateurism. I agree with the opinion that people shouldn't talk about what they know nothing about, but I'm ambivalent about the book club. Sure, I didn't like it because this club smacked of elitism and the type of books recommended were not that remarkable. But it also got a lot of people to read, and that is a good thing.
People who are presumptious enough to tell you what to read are not only brainwashing you, they're trying to control how you think. I've always hated required reading. Most of the books were dry and pompus (or at least the teaching of those books were). Literature should be left up to the choice of the reader. If this was a perfect world, I would be able to pick up whatever book I want without anyone else giving me weird looks.
Because I don't care what other people read (as long as they're reading). I only wish other people would give me the same courtesy. Of course now, I can shop online for my coveted books to avoid the outside hassle completely.
What book have I finished recently? Robinson Crusoe. Everyone knows what this is about so I'm not going to bother putting up a review here. I have a one word opinion on this though: silly.
A link: Evap-o-cam webcam. Out of commission now, but amusing nonetheless.
Getting the Girl. This is where science starts out with good intentions (letting couples with sex-linked diseases have healthy children) but is quickly perverted to suit others' selfish needs (and I'm not using the non-negative aspects of the word "selfish" as the author does).
Sure, some people would want to have a boy. But that's due to current society--carrying on the family name, inheritance, greater social status--this desire will change once equality is recognized everywhere. The same argument can go for people who want girls. They've been conditioned to play with dolls in their childhood. And what is the gender of these dolls? Female. So it isn't surprising that there are anecdotes of women buying girly clothes for their imaginary daughters.
I think this me-me-me attitude for sex determination is both self-destructive and narcissistic. Making "mommy's little girl" is not just making a clone. It's making a super clone. The parents have all these expectations for their unborn (artificial) child. It's just one step beyond the parents who live vicariously through their kids by shipping them off to a kazillion activities and making them apply to law school.
Sometimes I wish some parents acted more reasonable. For instance, my parents didn't know whether I would be a boy or girl. They didn't have any expectations for me either. They picked out a male and female name. They also didn't want to disasterously anticipate by buying blue or pink baby clothes. Instead, they chose green. (Green, incidently, is my favorite color. I wonder why?) After my sister was born, my parents decided having two kids was enough to handle and that was that.
After a while, I began noticing other relatives making snide remarks to my parents, not so subtly hinting that it was bad that they had only girls. Because (gasp!) who will carry on the family name?
Well, at least I'm going to carry it on. I'm not changing my name for anything. I like its (lack of) length. I like how well it goes together. And in this case I'm completely disregarding traditionalists. I'm deeply disturbed by some people's lack of perspective on priorities. Caring about the personality of an individual is the only thing that should be important. Gender and other superficial qualities like height and attractiveness should be ignored.
And I don't like the author's generalization that mothers and daughters never greet each other on the phone. I always say hello to my Mom.
Every year, Tech holds a Prefrosh Weekend during April. This is to lure prospective undergrads to come and matriculate in the fall. I find the entire affair superficial. Personally, I've never experienced Prefrosh Weekend as a prefrosh. The required forms for the event arrived too late for me to attend. At any rate, if I had attended, my choice for a college education might have been drastically different.
Prefrosh madness began today when the house secretary barricaded the lounge with sofas and spread out prefrosh interest sheets on the pool table. I sneaked in from the courtyard doors to avoid the foaming, rabid crowds held at bay by the sofas. At 10:30 PM exactly, the crowd was let loose to descend on the interest sheets.
So what's so important about these interest sheets? They help match the prospective students with their hosts. Sure, the prefrosh can list a whole bunch of things to specify in a host: somebody from their hometown or school, somebody who doesn't have pets, no loud music, someone who can stick around to show them places, somebody in their major, etc.
But in reality, it is the host who choses the prefrosh. If you don't have anything annoying on your interest sheet, someone will happily host you. However, if you're obsessed with computer games, play country music loud, indicate antisocial behavior, wake up at an obscenely early hour, or brag about all your academic honors, you're sure to be read and tossed aside by every potential good host. In the end, the house secretary will randomly assign you to someone who didn't really want to host anyone in the first place.
I always try to be the non-annoying yet honest host. I tell it as it is. So far, I've only scared off one potential student (who, incidently, had graduated from my hometown as valedictorian--I've only corresponded with him by e-mail). One girl already had her mind set to go to MIT and the others (four of them) decided to stick around despite my less than stellar recommendation.
Unless last minute prospective students are faxing admissions with interest sheets, I'm currently only hosting one prefrosh this year. I'm happy to disclose that she has indicated no annoying quirks and doesn't want a host to hound her all the time. Perfect combination, I'd say.
Unrelated but fun links: BlindDateBlog. Looks interesting and hilarious. I'll never have the guts to do this though. What if I secretly submitted an entry for another person? (via Raymond at the Tiger Cafe) Which Storybook Character Are You? I am the Little Prince.
Famous People, Mexican Food, and (Yet Again) Cellos
While I was walking back to the cafeteria for lunch (ugh, Mexican food again, can't they at least get it right?) I passed by Stephen Hawking. He was "(st)rolling" down the walkways in his motorized, state-of-the-art, wheelchair with some younger guy in trendy baggy clothes. I'm always amazed how much the physicist gets out despite his disability.
This was not the first time I've seen him. He often drops by the campus every so often to give guest lectures. About two years ago, the social director of my house invited him and Kip Thorne over for dinner. It was here where Hawking and Thorne made their bet about the possibility of time travel.
Of course, what do you do with yourself after you've met all these famous scientists? Well, for one thing, you have to realize that they're no different from anyone else. And you have to take into account that they are very busy (like the guy I work for). The only time you're ever going to see them is at a lecture or some special symposium.
I remember back in early 2000 when Craig Venter, the head honcho of Celera, came to announce the breakthrough of sequencing the entire human genome. Everyone was there--the faculty from biology, chemistry, and biochemistry, the post-docs, the graduate students (no other undergrads, unfortunately)--and the lecture hall was crammed past capacity. If fire saftey had come by, they would have fainted at the number of people in that room--it was beyond standing room only. I, a piddly undergrad, had managed to find a seat at the back.
Most of the lecture was about the techniques they used to sequence the genome and statistical comparisons to other organisms' genomes. I won't go into the details here. But the big surprise was when he gave the estimated number of genes: 30,000. There was a collective horrified gasp among the audience. Both amusing and kind of scary. I still wish I had that moment on tape.
What I don't wish on tape is a detailed analysis on the preparation of Mexican food. The cafeteria serves it way too often because it's cheap and easy to make. Having a lot of workers here of Mexican descent is no excuse for feeding us burritos and tacos every day. They're not even very good burritos and tacos. If this institution is paying the chefs a six figure salary (and I pay on average eight bucks a meal), I demand something more solid. I don't want to be one of those people who've decided to subsist on clam chowder for the rest of the year because everything else looks disgusting.
And on yet another completely unrelated note, yes I'm happy another Techer cellist decided to join the orchestra. Music is good. Music keeps you sane. I don't understand why the other cellists whine and complain that they don't have time to keep up with rehearsals (which are only once a week!). If I can do it with a full course load and a part time job working in a lab (and still survive) they can do it too.
I don't want to point any fingers, but take for instance the King of Spoons who's also a cellist. Is he taking a full course load? No. Does he work in a lab? No. So what the heck is he doing in his spare time? Visiting the beach.
Arg!
Update: Bush Presses Senate for Cloning Ban. I think this is for witholding federal funding. But that leaves it wide open for private funding. I, too, believe cloning is morally unacceptable but that doesn't mean that somebody won't do it. And what about those people who delibrately have a kid so that there's a bone marrow match for their other kid? Don't tell me that's ethical.
1. What's your opinion on age ranges and intimate relationships? Does it matter? Is it okay for the man to be older, but not the woman? How much older is too old?
I'm the worst person to ask about relationships because I know almost nothing about them. All I can say is that people can do whatever they want as long as they don't take advantage of me or anyone else around them. I have no problems with either gender being older, but if the age gap gets too large, well, I can't do anything but shake my head and say, "Silly people."
2. Should stem cell researchers be given the green light?
Definitely. I think there's a lot of good that stem cell research can accomplish. I don't see anything wrong in gathering cells that are going to be killed off and discarded anyway to do the research, but I admit the matter is a bit murky. The problem I still have is with creating this "unwanted tissue" in the first place. I'm leery of creating extra embryos via IVF and I don't believe in abortions except in extreme cases.
So yes, stem cell research should go ahead (and will probably do so regardless of what the government does), but there's also a lot of other side issues that need to be sorted out.
3. Googleclimbing, (similar to a googlewhacking) but now your job is to make your site come up as the first result, or at least on the first page of google's results. Ideally you want your site to be #1 of thousands, tens of thousands or if you really want to impress us #1 of millions of results! You may use up to four words, but they may not be in quotation marks.
I'm first at syaffolee out of 181. At sya, I'm on the first page, 8 out of 1,010,000. Also: sya about me, 1 out of 43,300. This is always contingent on misspelling say as sya.
The seemingly innocent question shatters the meticulous imaginary bubble that I've formed in my mind. I want to be alone, able to drift wherever the wind takes me like a hapless dandelion seed in the breeze. Nosy questions like these should be put on the list of things that increase blood pressure--like steaks, lack of exercise, and cholesterol. I don't want to tell anyone where I'm going because they'll get this smug smile on their face as if I've just thrown myself into a garbage incinerator.
I'm definitely going somewhere. But who really cares, except maybe to put me in my place? I don't want to be put into some place to rot.
Along the walkway, a toddler with golden curls on a red and yellow tricycle squeaks by. Her short legs pump up and down on the peddles. I smile in passing (I'm a sucker for cute kids) and she stops peddling, her cherubic face gaping like a land-bound fish gasping for air. She stares at me and I turn away, trudging. I guess I'm not that cute.
A couple walk hand in hand a few paces ahead of me. As they turn on another path, I hear the girl say, "He's so stupid." Her boyfriend dumbly nods. At the side of the walkway, white bedsheets are hung from the second story window. A film is played against the sheets. Some cheesy sci-fi flick; it looks like Mars Attacks. Two people are fiddling with a projector and a computer, both connected by cables of various colors. The audience had dragged a black leather couch outside and are draped over it, staring at the make-shift screen.
A man, black hair speckled with silver, stands on a grassy patch underneath a tree. His arms are crossed and he's holding a brown coat. An angry frown is sketched across his face. Another man, black hair thinning, strolls by, a lighted cigarette dangling from his fingers. The smoke drifts behind him.
I cough.
Other things: The 2002 Pulitzer Prizes. Have I read any of the stuff they've listed? No. Will I ever read them? Probably no, again. M&Ms About Caramel. I don't like caramel all that much, but hey, I like new things. I might give these a try if the stores around here start stocking it. Meatcake 1.0 Hey, don't give school cafeterias ideas.
Time is trying its best to trip me up this weekend. That's because I woke up this morning and realized after an hour I was late to work. I had completely forgotten that today is the beginning of daylight savings time. But it wasn't that bad because several other people also forgot. Good thing my computer automatically changed the time, otherwise I would be still ignorant tomorrow.
I don't understand why daylight savings time is still implemented. Almost no one goes by the sun anymore. If you do, I bet it's easier to shift your sleeping schedule than to remember that the clock was changed.
Browsing: Slow Food. Another big hint to sloppy cafeterias everywhere. Hatemail Generator. Don't try this at home, kiddies.
This was one of those days when I roll out of bed, glance at the clock, and panic.
Yes, it's Saturday, and you know what banks love to do on Saturday. Close early. So I got ready in five minutes and ran out the door. I was very relieved when the bank was still open when I arrived, breathless and muscle-tired. It was only fifteen minutes until closing time.
I'm both amused and annoyed by bank hours which almost all the time coincides with working hours. Nobody is able to go to the bank then because they're working. And when they are able to, the bank is closed. Why doesn't the bank ever change working hours to say, after 5 PM when there's a bigger probability of getting more customers?
Nah. They'll never do it. They'll do whatever they want because they hold my money hostage.
Aside: At this very moment the King of Spoons is yelling in the halls. "69 days until graduation!" Guess who's going to watch porn and get drunk in celebration?
Links: Behavioral Elements. I have half the mind to make up my own periodic table. The Periodic Table Challenge. I memorized the entire periodic table in high school but forgot it all afterwards. I'm not going to attempt this because I know I will fail miserably. Deconstructing the Blog. What a hoot! From now on, I'll avoid all his tips to make sure this blog is the most unpopular in the universe.
The room is grayed out. The only light that petters in comes from an open window near the front, the shades strung up haphazardly like a row of pickup sticks terrorized by a four year old. Outside there's iron railing and a sole frond of dark green ivy.
What I can see is wooden podium stretched across the room. A tall thin man with an aquiline nose stands behind it. He's wearing a dark shirt and a bright red vest knitted with psychadelic designs--a psychophysics experiment in progress.
He's ranting about Penrose's theory in his thick German accent. The girl beside me is softly giggling. Graduate students at Tech are weird. I lean away from her.
Other stuff: The Official SPAM Homepage. I don't have the guts to eat this stuff. Flynn's Effect. The idea of IQ is ridiculous anyway. I don't see people getting smarter. But I do see people ignoring common sense. Jobs that really suck. But somebody's got to do them.
Words are like children. You should love them all equally.
The first time I realized I was exposed to a bad word was in third grade--the same year that someone convinced me to vandalize the school with pink chalk. I was caught and sent to the principal's office. Anyway, someone had carved the offending letters into the wood of the jungle gym. I didn't realize "fuck you" was such a big deal until a friend pointed it out.
Okay, so it was a bad word. But what did it mean? None of my friends knew. I didn't want to ask my teachers. They would have sent me back to the principal's office. I didn't ask my parents because they didn't understand English all that well. So I asked my uncle.
He was furious. "Never say that word again!" he bellowed. I was sincerely chastised. But I still didn't know what it meant. (On another note, my cousins curse and my uncle ignores them. Was there some sort of double standard?)
So I labored under my own ignorance for a few years until I got my hands on a dictionary of offensive words. Now I'm enlightened, but I still don't know what the fuss is about. Why is this word (and its ilk) taboo when its meaning is splattered everywhere in public? We should be able to use whatever words we want to express ourselves.
But it could also go too far in the other direction. I've heard "fuck" used as a noun, adjective, verb, adverb, and pretty much every other part of speech. Rather than being offended, I'm bored. It's like the joke about the linguist, who in a stroke of genius, simplifies the entire language to one word--"chicken".
After a while, no one remembers there were ever other words in the language.
Backstabbers. Women just waste their time by being catty to one another. If someone wants to knock me down a peg with verbal abuse, sure go ahead. I might cry for a while, but I'm an eternal optimist. Just avoid the potholes in the road, ladies and gentlemen.
In the world of Web logs, talk is cheap. Funny article. Start with the rebuttal by James Lileks and just follow the links. I really shouldn't be posting this, but I'm feeling rather woozy and wacky today. Who doesn't like belly lint gazing on occassion?
But seriously, this made me think about why I started blogging in the first place. I started keeping a diary (or more aptly a journal since I didn't write every day) around fifth grade. It had a cheap dark green cover with "my diary" written in gold in the front. The brass lock was hardly a lock at all. Each page had been predivided into five sections so you could use it for five years. And it fit in the palm of your hand. Most of my scribbling had been in pencil, in bubbly childish scrawl, and about daily events.
In sixth grade, my grandmother bought me a larger, fancier journal. The metal lock still didn't work but the cover was a pleasing purple and pink abstract design. I wrote in it nearly every day and kept the book out in the open because no one in my family was really interested in reading it.
Later I bought those journals with Van Gogh or Monet paintings on the cover and after that, I simply didn't care any more and just used a plain spiral notebook. Because no one was interested in my life or my secrets, I saw no need to hide anything.
Then I discovered web page publishing. Ooo! I could now put all my scribbling "dreck" on the net for all to see! Maybe now I could find an audience. That turned out to a dismal failure. Hardly anyone read the Daily Angst, and when someone did, they wrote me to tell me that Millikan Library was a great feat of engineering because it was a phallic symbol. I used to have a media review section where I wrote up reviews on movies, books, and music. But the only regular visitor was my sister who only checked in occasionally to see what I've recently bashed.
Then about a year and a half ago I stumbled upon weblogs. I was looking through writing webrings from Webring.org when I spotted stuff like "Grrls who blog" or "Teen blogs" or something on the variation of blog. At first I thought it was some dirty British term like "shag". It certainly bolstered that particular illusion when I clicked a couple sites by random and discovered sites talking about sexual discrimination, gay life, and typical teen angst about not getting any.
After that I forgot about blogs entirely and continued plugging away, writing fiction that ended up not panning out at all.
One day in late October (2001), someone on a writing list posted something about Nanowrimo. It sounded intriguing. I told all my friends about it and they thought I had completely cracked. I joined and discovered some of the participants called themselves journallers. Doing some online research, I came across some articles on the history of the weblog. I also found out what a weblog was originally intended to be.
I had rediscovered the weblog.
The application of one to a website seemed so easy. So I switched from manual updating the Daily Angst to Blogger. And you could say the rest is history. There are still hardly any visitors. People I know in real life never visit because they don't believe I have anything to say. It's partially my fault. I have to mull things over before I voice an opinion and so I get labeled as "quiet".
So I guess writing online is just like writing in my fifth grade diary. I write for all to see, but no one bothers.
So why don't we pretend? Jonathon Delacour from The Heart of Things asks this question after purusing a relationship advice column in Salon. Well, don't we all pretend to some extent? Otherwise the world would be a cold, harsh place. If that were the case, I would have slit my wrists years ago. People pretend when they smile. People pretend whenever words come out of their mouths. I pretend to be a writer. I pretend to be a biologist. I pretend to be a semi-intelligent individual. I pretend to be a nice person. Oh, we pretend all right. Why, civilization is just pretend--a giant imaginary castle where we can play house and not think about peeing in our pants.
Southern Jubilee. A blogger's advice column. If you're into that kind of stuff.
My shadow is a hulking, limping figure. I'm dragging along my cello case--it's a black coffin. "You can stuff a body inside that thing," my friends tell me. "In fact, are you sure there isn't a body in there?" Yeah, there's a body in there. The body of a dead tree.
Walking to rehearsals is a pain. I could probably convince the registrar to sign up "hauling your instrument back and forth campus" as a PE course. Call it alternative weight training. In the dark, a bicyclist whizzes by me. Another musician. But his instrument is compact and strapped to his back. A girl with wispy golden hair breezes by me on foot. She also has a smaller instrument. Her eyes look downward to the pavement, ignoring me. I guess a simple "hi" is out of the question.
A family of five wanders past. A little boy hums. "Nah. Nah. Nah." He could be a songwriter, but he's only six or seven. "Nah. Nah. Nah." The father is walking a giant black dog with curly hair. At first I thought it was a bear. The animal was grinning crazily, its tongue dangling out of its mouth like a wet ribbon.
My shadow continues to labor up the path. My shoes scrap along the pavement. The girl with the golden hair is five paces ahead and getting further. The bicyclist has already disappeared behind the corner of a desolate cafe.
2. What do you think about the relatively new phenomenon of student rioting after games?
It's a stupid waste of time. There are better things to do. Like read a book. Go to the movies. Catch up on homework. Spend time with your loved ones. Refraining from playing bad music. Avoiding shark infested waters. Visit Canada. They should do what we did during first term.
3. Show me your googlewhack. If you don't know what one is go here.
Earlier this morning, my sleep was disrupted by the caterwauling that passed as singing. Someone had started blasting songs from the Pokemon CD on speakers. Good thing someone got up and turned it off.
So for the love of God, do not buy the CD. Do not burn it from somebody else who has a copy. Do not download the mp3s or get a hold of the recordings in any way. And if you must play the songs, use headphones.
Because if I see you playing it, I will personally do something very, very nasty to you. (And no, it's not the oo-la-la type nasty. Get your head out of the gutter. It's the Mommy-Get-Me-Away-From-The-Evil-Lady type nasty.)
These people have the right idea: Britney's Wee Bit Of Bother. Excellent idea, in fact. Even if it's a hoax.
What can I say? I'm a glutton for punishment. Once again, I've signed up for a writing class (a writing workshop, the profs would insist) to improve my writing skills. Sometimes I'm wondering if I'm really taking it for fun or just punishing myself because sometimes I'm not too fond of the writing assignments.
This particular class is focused on realism. No surprise here that most of the students in this class are male. Guys (especially at a tech school) pride themselves on being analytical, rational, logical. No wonder they're attracted to the nitty-gritty name realism. On the other hand, more girls enroll in the poetry or imaginative fiction class.
I'm not quite sure what I'm getting myself into. I like writing in general, but I don't like reading realism. I don't like reading "literary" works because they come off sounding pompus. (Diaries and journals are another matter entirely. Non-fiction somehow ends up sounding honest than simply realism.) I don't like reading realism because a lot of it is so artifically depressing.
I'd rather read sci-fi. Science fiction can be realistic. Ask anyone. The prof for the realism class also agrees. But I'd have to say, the head of the humanities department puts a damper on things. He hates sci-fi. So he won't let anyone teach it. Seesh.
Related: Dear X. I love the idea of writing prompts for letters. I've never tried writing a fiction letter before--maybe I'll try it sometime. (via Eve)
Yeah, yeah. April Fools. Honestly, I'd rather have the fish.
This time I'm pissed off at the registrar because I never got my schedule. Not having very much sleep doesn't help either. And my ID card doesn't work. The fat guy working at the card office doesn't have a clue what's going on.
There's also the dreaded graduation stuff going on today. The vendors set up their wares outside the bookstore. "Today only! April 1, 10AM to 2PM" a sign proclaims. The prices for their gowns are atrocious. You could literally hear everyone gasp when the vendor quoted the sum. Some people are getting class rings. I'm not. They're guady, expensive, and ugly. I never wear rings anyway.
At the bookstore (the one at school that sells all the textbooks), I noticed the magazine rack. There were some science magazines, but the rest of the space was taken up by the swimsuit issue of Sports Illustrated. There was no sign of The New Yorker. Or Harper's. Or anything remotely literary. Dirty scientists.
Links: Odyssey of the Mind. Some people I know are starting some sort of support group for kids interested in doing this. I did OM for one year and unfortunately, I never found it very enlightening. M4 and K5 together at long last! Well, actually no. A redesigner's joke for April 1st. Also see the very bottom of this article. (via Mefi, er...M4)
