The Most Arduous Time of The Year
New Year's (and it's eve) runs hot and cold with me. Every December 31st I have the choice to either go to some party where everyone is too loud and too drunk, or stay at home with Dick Clark and feel like a loser. The past two occassions I've done the loser-thing and curled up on the couch with my journal, taking inventory of the events that transpired since the last time around. The trials and tribulations of my youth is evident in that I'm a completely different person now than I was, heck, six hours ago. But thankfully, there is no lock-box on the human condition.
A resolution-- if it is to be maintained-- shouldn't be pitching pennies into a fountain. "I want to lose thirty lbs by bathing suit season" is a wish, not neccessarily a realistic goal. However, something like "I will stop interrupting others in coversation" or "I'll be more assertive when people take advantage of me" are the kind of thoughts you can keep in the back of your mind, so an alarm will go off if you offend the new maxims.
Then there is Christmas (or irreverantly and annoyingly "X-mas".) I need not get into what a bloated bourgie sanctimonius nigtmare it is, although, do feel free to peruse my Amazon wish list. And I'm not going to explain how I ended up on the Hot Topic website, or why I spent as much time there as I did, but just take a look at this: It's been five years since any of those products had relevance to me, still I'm surprised they removed the "Punkin' Go-Nuts" t-shirts from stock. Though, maybe it was only a hit in my home state. In and around Boston, Dunkin' Donuts is an inexplicably cool hangout. Almost as cool as Newbury Comics.
Saturday, December 7, 2002 07:43 p.m.
Where the Boys Are
Once again Alina and I are singled out for our femaleness. Thanks for noticing, but no, the blogosphere isn't male-dominated. I'd be willing to bet even that women have a slight majority. However, the number of women who extend their virtual soapbox to any use beyond "What I Am Wearing Today," is shamefully slim.
I am dismayed by the predominence of websites that seem to exist only as call for help, "Please look at me. Please like me. Please think I'm sweet and cute." But please don't ever think I think.
Whether women will admit to it or not, there will always be a tight dichotomy of two essentials: looks or brains. You can have one or the other or neither-- but not both; cause, you know, having both would just be unfair. So to exhibit the latter is to exemplify you lack the former. Right?
I don't really feel like a long drawn-out discussion of this matter, but I would like to remind these offenders that focusing on your appearance is faulty judgement because it is something that is not sustainable. As you grow older, the time it takes to maintain your looks increases exponentially. And if anyone should appreciate you primarily for this aspect, you can expect him to leave you for a foxier new thing. Instead, invest time into building a compelling character; one who is kind, intelligent, caring, independent, honest, and other good qualities. Then you are not easily replicated ... or replaced.
For women, intellectual maturity is often hindered by universal insecurities. Before one can think independently, she must come to terms with two things:
- I look the way I look. Nothing will ever change this. If anyone has a problem with my looks they can take it up with my biological parents because I had no say in the matter
- I may or may not find a life-partner. I have no control over the odds. However, I can maximize my happiness in other areas of my life.
So that is why there are billions of useless vanity projects flying about the blogosphere. Everytime a women types out something worthless, she gets an instant gratification that she doesn't need to do better. It's easy to delay inward-thinking with secondary thoughts, but in the end, you're the one who has to live with you.
Saturday, December 7, 2002 01:26 p.m.
Help the Aged Talking Points Memo reminds us Strom Thurmond ran for president against Harry Truman. He also married his 22 year old intern -- a former Miss South Carolina -- at the age of 66. What a freak. Happy 100.
Friday, December 6, 2002 03:50 p.m. Me Talk Trash One Day David Sedaris thinks Dave Eggers is a tool:
Dave Eggers is a huge pain in the ass. A huge pain in the ass. I went on a tour last year and he had just been on one before me, so I was visiting a lot of the same bookstores he'd been to. And I would go to stores that were actively unselling his book. Like, someone would go to the counter with the book [A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius] and the staff would say, ‘Actually, that book's not very good. No one likes that book. You should read this instead.’ Because Dave Eggers would have been in that book store the week before and yelled at the people who worked there and treated them horribly. He's a horrible person…but he's a really good writer.
Friday, December 6, 2002 12:24 p.m.
"Thomas Pynchon on bad acid couldn't dream up the paranoid nightmares now pouring out of Washington" Check out John Perry Barlow list of reasons to join EFF
Dominion is replete with examples of pseudo-scientists who still maintain that animals cannot feel pain, let alone agony. (By "agony" I mean pain accompanied by fear—protracted, repeated anguish and misery.)
The dumb academics who mouth this stuff are legatees, whether they know it or not, of René Descartes, who held that animals were machines and that their yelps or cries were the noises emitted by broken machinery. One doesn't require much conceptual apparatus to refute this, and Scully is, I think, taking its current advocates too seriously. The morons who torture animals would obviously not get the same thrill from battering a toaster.
Thursday, December 5, 2002 10:20 a.m.
What the Hell? CNN asked its readers for WTC memorial ideas. Some results are... demented:
Thursday, December 5, 2002 09:01 a.m.
No, His Mind is Not for Rent to Any God or Government
Alina's new post "Escort me to your brain," is provocative to say the least:
A woman who considers it a real "choice" to pick between different johns misses the point of being able to choose in the first place. Men who prefer to pay for sex are not only cowardly, but also ethically unstable. Can you really say that a man who frequents hookers respects women anymore than he respects a hole in the wall?
If Chablis understands that she plays a role in a more elaborate scheme of self-deception for these men, and she likes it, so be it. But don't call self-flagellation freedom. Don't tell yourself that being a tool in the masculine shed accords reason for self-respect. The increasing sophistication with which women lie to themselves bores me. All the lovely little ladies who wear mini-skirts as a sign of their "independence", or who read Cosmo articles on "how to give good head", and then talk about living for themselves are living a lie. Get a life. Then come talk to me about your "self". I'm sick and tired of dealing in delusions.
Elegently expressed, but off the mark. One can respect women and visit hookers. Your argument against prostitition sounds like what people used to say about masturbation. Who are these virtuous men that would never ever dare degrade a female by making sex a paid transaction? Certainly no one I've never shared an intimate conversation with; late at night, in private, drunk, and in sworn secrecy.
Prostitition is cut and dry. Sex workers have arguably more control over their lives than the piteous females that allow their partners to walk all over them because they are "in love." Each of us has his own ethical motivations, and some are more left-brained than others. Say what you will about prostitutes, but they've perhaps abstained from a more deplorable human condition known as codependency
People degrade themselves in many ways. Yeah, I despise "the increasing sophistication with which women lie to themselves." But I'd guess as many women fall into that category, as men who -- in the deep dark reccesses of their minds -- have considered visiting prostitutes.
The best way to avoid lying to oneself is continually asking the question "am I free?" -- and have visualized an escape route. We can buttress our emotions, but should constantly check if it is just another facade.
Wednesday, December 4, 2002 03:56 p.m.
What's John Kerry's Problem? Yes, Zoe, everyone is talking about John Kerry, mostly because there's just something immediatly-- although abstractly-- unappealing about him. As Mickey Kaus writes,
What is it that makes so many people, myself included, intensely dislike Sen. John Kerry? This is the great mystery surrounding his 2004 presidential campaign. I don't think "aloof and arrogant," the traditional Kerry negatives, are exactly it -- he may be aloof and arrogant, but there are plenty of aloof and arrogant people I don't rule out instantly due to their gross characterological deficiency, which is what I do with Kerry. It's not just his "long record of opportunism," though again that's part of it.
He's bothered me since I can remember, and is part of the reason I considered myself staunchly "Republican" until my Atlas Shrugged phase in high school. Kerry came to speak at my high school and I took the photographs for the school newspaper. One of them came out hideously: his neck is tipped back and his mouth is agape in a sort of sneer like the aliens in Alien. I have the photo somewhere. Maybe I'll scan it and start a website if he runs for president
Another Day, Another Enemy In June a US Army vehicle crushed two South Korean girls to death. This week, after President Bush's "apology" and martial aquital of the vehicle driver, there were street protests demanding the 37,000 US troops based in S Korea withdraw. An electronic protest attacked the White House computer server with "mail bombs" It was uneffective, but a second attack is in the works
Tuesday, December 3, 2002 01:05 a.m.
It Gets Lonely at the Top
Again, I've reached the
end of the internet and found a weird site full of Mount Everest fan fic. What are the odds that the main characters -- climbers and best friends -- are named Alina and Joanne? Well, the SSA actuaries have Joanne at 423 in 1980 and Alina at 975 in 1978... I'm sure I know the equation for this but I think those numbers alone suggest that the odds are very small!
I also found from the SSA site that the name "Joanne" dropped from the 547th most popular in 1990 to the 941st in 2000. But it's a great name: rare, but not weird sounding, completely classic. Ok then, add another Ashley to the mix.
Nine states ban consensual sodomy for everyone: Alabama, Florida, Idaho, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Utah and Virginia. In addition, Texas, Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma punish only homosexual sodomy.
States argue that the laws, some dating back more than 100 years, are intended to preserve public morals. The laws are rarely enforced.
Rarely, not never enforced. Virginia has used the laws to bust gay sex parks and Marv Albert. Two years ago, the Log Cabin Republicans among others, tried to kill the "Crimes Against Nature" sodomy law to no avail:
Among the witnesses whose testimony failed to move the Senate panel was Loree Erickson of Richmond, whose
disabilities have required the use of a wheelchair since her childhood. She told the lawmakers, "Under Virginia law, I'm
a felon. It's now considered a felony for me to express intimacy with the person I love the only way I can."
The Independent Gay Forum has a lot of good articles on this, I don't think I need to say more.
Monday, December 2, 2002 12:04 a.m.
Chinatown to Chinatown Competition within the legendary Chinese bus circuit means you can ride roundtrip DC-NY for 15 dollars. "So the drivers don't speak English," someone is quoted, "What do they need to tell you? When the bus is here it's here -- and so you get on it."
Sunday, December 1, 2002 06:44 p.m.
Please Do Not Judge Our Love! This is a clever headline: "EchoStar Wants DirecTV Bad;" as if the FCC and the Justice Department are Montagues and Capulets determined to keep amorous businesses apart. Keep your chin up EchoStar, sometimes persistance pays off.
Sunday, December 1, 2002 04:29 p.m.
We Didn't Start the Fire
People who talk about music all of the time tend to have bad taste. It's because they have so little else to occupy their minds besides that which we all enjoy. This applies to the record geeks who will never recommend an album anyone's heard of, or the teenagers with boy band posters on their walls. If I thought any of you cared about Isotope 217 or the Idyll Swords, I'd post about it, but instead I'll offer a more populist list of what I'm listening to this month:
Belle and Sebastian -- If You're Feeling Sinister Depending on what side of the bed I woke up on, "Seeing Other People" or "Fox in the Snow" is my favorite track
Faraquet - The View from the Tower
Farquet is the Betamax to The Dismemberment Plan's VHS. Rational ignorance and random walks is why the better of the two similar-sounding local bands never caught a following
Modest Mouse - Everywhere and His Nasty Parlour Tricks I've resisted this band a while, mostly because of Isaac Brock's alleged crime. After five years, I can give him the benefit of the doubt. I got this EP from a friend. It's an EP, but every track is listenable. Blimey.
Jimmy Eat World - s/t Yeah, roll your eyes. Mhmm. You find some song that rocks as hard as "Bleed American." Fifty years from now you can play "In the Middle" at my funeral
The Mendoza Line - Lost in the Revelry Everyone who hears the song "What Ever Happened to You" loves it. It's impossible to dislike. The other strong track is "We're All in This Alone." I crank up the volume and press "repete" whenever I'm angry about something
Slint - Spiderland A classic. Every talented band playing today was influenced by this.
Sunday, December 1, 2002 12:41 a.m.
Aim High. Fall Short Meet quantum theory genius and hot brunette, Fotini Markopoulou Kalamara. That reminds me of what physicist and dharma scholar Jeremy Hayward says in the new Wired, "I fell in love with quantum physics while reading a book that suggested the universe is more like the thoughts of a great mind than a great machine." Wow. So without segue, I'll jump to this interviw with Peter Singer as a reminder to print it out at the lab tomorrow
Saturday, November 30, 2002 04:55 p.m.
Let Them Eat Kitsch I heart Tech TV. Almost enough to get cable. There are only three shows in rotation but that's all they need. There's one for gamers, another, called "The Screen Savers," is something of a talk show for Techies. They discuss things like the WSJ article "If TiVo Thinks Your Gay," that Ram has posted here, and answer questions about basic pc mantainance. The rest of the day is devoted to syndication of The Thunderbirds.
Look, it's not just some ironically-enjoyable entertainment, the show has suspense and intrigue. It's really brilliant and now clicked into my Netflix queue.
Saturday, November 30, 2002 04:42 p.m.
Jurrasic Yawn The new Red Herring cites nanotech as one of the "Top 10 Trends for 2003." No surprise there, but they are cautioning investors that Chicken Little "bioethicists" will swoop down and declare the business "immoral." Now, I can see why people are a little creeped out by cloning, but the argument against nano seemes limited to, "It's just so... little!" The article is not yet online, but here's something they do have on patents killing nano before it can kindle
And Michael Crichton has some candy for precocious eleven-year olds and the adolescent middle-aged with his new one, Prey.
Within hours of his arrival at the remote testing center, Jack discovers his wife's firm has created self-replicating nanotechnology--a literal swarm of microscopic machines. Originally meant to serve as a military eye in the sky, the swarm has now escaped into the environment and is seemingly intent on killing the scientists trapped in the facility. The reader realizes early, however, that Jack, his wife, and fellow scientists have more to fear from the hidden dangers within the lab than from the predators without.
Oh, I'm shaking... in anticipation ... for the blockbuster! Fingers crossed that Jeff Goldblum signs on to this one!
