Yesterday was the first day I felt 100% again, as evidenced by my staying up until 3 in the morning as usual. I'm here for another two weeks...it seems so surreal to think that. But I've been eating (!) good food and doing...the usual, basically. Spending time with people.
Last night the midwife who delivered me, Ruth, came over for dinner. It's a little odd to talk to the person who yanked you out of your mom, but it was nicely not awkward at all. Dinner was very enjoyable and Ruth is a very interesting woman. It's always fascinating to see what people tell each other after not having seen each other or really talked in 17 years. I can't imagine.
On tap for today? Who knows.
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Monday, August 27, 2007
Link
Not so much a post as a link.
Ever wondered about Aztec philosophy? What? No! Does that even exist? Well wonder no longer.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/a/aztec.htm
And my mind continues to be blown...
Ever wondered about Aztec philosophy? What? No! Does that even exist? Well wonder no longer.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/a/aztec.htm
And my mind continues to be blown...
Sunday, August 26, 2007
Failure
This weekend I have failed completely and utterly to do nothing, and this week looks to continue in that vein of failure. Today I finished the Illiad (which I started much earlier this year stopping every 25-100 pages to read something else). I'm certainly glad I did it, and if nothing else it sparked a huge interest for me in the fate of all of the characters before and after the events. Oedipus obviously predates the Illiad and is mentioned several times, but what is the exact time frame? What are Patrokolos' feelings down in Hades about having undeliberately by his death caused the destruction of Troy and of Achilleus? The question is raised in the end, what happens to the Trojan women (answered in another saga, I know)? What about Aias? Hektor's and Achileus's sons? When and where in relation to Troy are the Peloponysian wars? All excellent Wikipedia questions!
I went with my parents to dinner and baby-watch at an ex-students house (she's a professor herself now), which ended up being a good relaxing time to watch my cheeks swell up like puffer fish.
On tap for this week: Rehersal with Cheolseung, hopefully get my license, hopefully get Windows working on my Mac, make it down to New York.
I went with my parents to dinner and baby-watch at an ex-students house (she's a professor herself now), which ended up being a good relaxing time to watch my cheeks swell up like puffer fish.
On tap for this week: Rehersal with Cheolseung, hopefully get my license, hopefully get Windows working on my Mac, make it down to New York.
Day After
The day after I lost all my wisdom (teeth) and it's been hectic. William arrived at 7 this morning to have a nightcap (he works a night shift and was on his way home). I hadn't seen him since Hawaii and we had some catching up to do--then Grandpa Paul and Grandma Robin came in on a layover between Oregon and Missouri and we went out to breakfast, where I did just fine with solid food. Heading home I slept for an hour or so, read some more of the Illiad, then got on the computer. I have a site with Kafka short stories bookmarked which was perfect for my mindframe. I read "In the Penal Colony" and "A Country Doctor." Kafka is a bizzare storyteller, but somehow you can't help but be compelled by it. "A Country Doctor" was surrealist shit (as I interpreted it...maybe I just missed the point), but "In the Penal Colony" was really quite good. It's about a man's tragic love for corporal punishment in a humanitizing age. I'd also reccomend "The Hunger Artist," about a man who fasts as an art form in an age that has lost interest in it. But are based around very concepty concepts (fasting as an art and the specific torture/death machine) but with them lead their characters to very human ends.
The website is http://www.mala.bc.ca/~Johnstoi/kafka/kafkatofc.htm if anyone is interested.
Then I went to Robbies and played video games and got ice cream and watched "28 Days Later" (a BAD horror flick). Life really is very strange.
The website is http://www.mala.bc.ca/~Johnstoi/kafka/kafkatofc.htm if anyone is interested.
Then I went to Robbies and played video games and got ice cream and watched "28 Days Later" (a BAD horror flick). Life really is very strange.
Friday, August 24, 2007
Venus
I watched the move Venus with Peter O'Toole tonight with my parents. Not a great movie, but a very provocative one.
As I see it, the movie raises two central questions, two major themes. The first is old age and death: appropriate since there is only one major character in the film who is not just about on her deathbed. The characters talk about death constantly, and their loss of memory, their trivial old-person joys and their rage and bitterness at age and decrepitude are the real heart of the movie. The last line of dialogue is especially beautiful (no real spoiler here). Two characters are discussing their friend's death with obituary in hand. The last line is delivered with failed nonchalance which betrays its urgency. "How many collumns did he get?"
The second theme is pleasure. To what extent is people using each other for pleasure justifiable? Peter O'Toole plays an aged actor who takes a very physical, romantic interest in his friend's twenty-something niece. He buys her things, tell her things, and every time she is not looking we see him eye her. But she needs him too. A troubled girl, his attention becomes an affirmation of her being, and she has no problems being assertive when she feels things have gone far enough. Both of their wants and what they do to satisfy them feel sleazy to the hundredth power, disgusting and base. But human. And really, if they are fulfilling each other's warped desires, isn't what matters that they are both happy--not how twisted each desire is?
Which brings me to a philosophical/psychological/biological point that I can't help but throw in here. Human beings are not hardwired for happiness--if we were, we would sit around all day smiling until we starved to death. Rather, we are wired to be eternally discontented, trying to reach goals with the purpose of being happy but the knowledge that--if only because it is how we must be to survive as a species--as soon as we reach the goal and the happiness it becomes not enough, and we must set a new goal. Self-help crap always says "don't try to be happy, you can't force that, instead try to set and meet achievable goals." Do our brains provide a scientific grounding for this philosophy?
As I see it, the movie raises two central questions, two major themes. The first is old age and death: appropriate since there is only one major character in the film who is not just about on her deathbed. The characters talk about death constantly, and their loss of memory, their trivial old-person joys and their rage and bitterness at age and decrepitude are the real heart of the movie. The last line of dialogue is especially beautiful (no real spoiler here). Two characters are discussing their friend's death with obituary in hand. The last line is delivered with failed nonchalance which betrays its urgency. "How many collumns did he get?"
The second theme is pleasure. To what extent is people using each other for pleasure justifiable? Peter O'Toole plays an aged actor who takes a very physical, romantic interest in his friend's twenty-something niece. He buys her things, tell her things, and every time she is not looking we see him eye her. But she needs him too. A troubled girl, his attention becomes an affirmation of her being, and she has no problems being assertive when she feels things have gone far enough. Both of their wants and what they do to satisfy them feel sleazy to the hundredth power, disgusting and base. But human. And really, if they are fulfilling each other's warped desires, isn't what matters that they are both happy--not how twisted each desire is?
Which brings me to a philosophical/psychological/biological point that I can't help but throw in here. Human beings are not hardwired for happiness--if we were, we would sit around all day smiling until we starved to death. Rather, we are wired to be eternally discontented, trying to reach goals with the purpose of being happy but the knowledge that--if only because it is how we must be to survive as a species--as soon as we reach the goal and the happiness it becomes not enough, and we must set a new goal. Self-help crap always says "don't try to be happy, you can't force that, instead try to set and meet achievable goals." Do our brains provide a scientific grounding for this philosophy?
15 of the fuckers
Before we went to Chile, they pulled seven baby teeth, four and then three, because they had not come out yet and they wanted to make sure there were no complications.
Before I got braces, I had four adult teeth pulled. My teeth are too big for my mouth, and for all them to fit comfortable two uppers and two lowers had to come out.
Today, before I got to college, I got my four wisdom teeth out.
If teeth were lotto tickets, I'd have won by now.
Before I got braces, I had four adult teeth pulled. My teeth are too big for my mouth, and for all them to fit comfortable two uppers and two lowers had to come out.
Today, before I got to college, I got my four wisdom teeth out.
If teeth were lotto tickets, I'd have won by now.
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Points of interest...
Two fascinating tidbits that I discovered recently, or at least hadn't thought about before.
1. Biology is a new science. I don't know why this is so revolutionary for me. Chemistry has been around since antiquity in various forms--gunpowder, alchemy, etc. Physics, especially mechanics, has been explained and re-explianed from the idea that all objects had a natural resting place. Medicine, perhaps the closest thing to biology, and human anatomy, have been wildly speculated on (the humors, etc) as an obvious area of interest. But biology, macro and micro, has only been around for a short time. Classifying species--even knowing accurately what animals looked like, let alone how they functioned--is something not much older than Darwin's explination for it all. And the very first microscope was invented in the 1600's. So why, biological engineering aside, does biology seem like such a dead, obsolete science, a collection of dry facts and names? Our model for how the world works phyisically is always changing, people are always trying to fiddle with elements and discover new ones--using biology as a tool is great, but why are we assuming we have it all "right" and not intelligently challenging it's base assumptions?
2. This is a bit about psychology. "Since Freud, we have placed far too much importance on psychology. It's become a religion for atheists: a scientific way to explain it all and figure out how to live a good (or, to be PC, 'functional') life. Psychology is the newest religion." Agree or disagree, there seems to be at least a grain of truth in this statement.
I recently read that Siddhartha Gautama first preached Buddhism not as a religion or philosophy, but as an almost medical entity—a prescription for the mind toward the cessation of suffering. As remedial psychology. Do we, as a society, worship psychology? Yes. But have we always?
1. Biology is a new science. I don't know why this is so revolutionary for me. Chemistry has been around since antiquity in various forms--gunpowder, alchemy, etc. Physics, especially mechanics, has been explained and re-explianed from the idea that all objects had a natural resting place. Medicine, perhaps the closest thing to biology, and human anatomy, have been wildly speculated on (the humors, etc) as an obvious area of interest. But biology, macro and micro, has only been around for a short time. Classifying species--even knowing accurately what animals looked like, let alone how they functioned--is something not much older than Darwin's explination for it all. And the very first microscope was invented in the 1600's. So why, biological engineering aside, does biology seem like such a dead, obsolete science, a collection of dry facts and names? Our model for how the world works phyisically is always changing, people are always trying to fiddle with elements and discover new ones--using biology as a tool is great, but why are we assuming we have it all "right" and not intelligently challenging it's base assumptions?
2. This is a bit about psychology. "Since Freud, we have placed far too much importance on psychology. It's become a religion for atheists: a scientific way to explain it all and figure out how to live a good (or, to be PC, 'functional') life. Psychology is the newest religion." Agree or disagree, there seems to be at least a grain of truth in this statement.
I recently read that Siddhartha Gautama first preached Buddhism not as a religion or philosophy, but as an almost medical entity—a prescription for the mind toward the cessation of suffering. As remedial psychology. Do we, as a society, worship psychology? Yes. But have we always?
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