ramble through the bronx

Friday, November 21, 2003

I still hate phoning strangers

You'd think that after having worked at EthicScan and calling executives all the time, I'd be over my fear of phoning strangers. Back in the day, my mom tried to school me out of this fear by having me phone around for Girl Guide meetings and so forth. But no, still petrified. And I'm even returning a phone call. I still hate it. Boo!

jane 1:08 PM [+]

you know you need coffee when

I had been sitting in front of the computer for twenty minutes. Nothing was clicking inside my brain. Suddenly, I wondered what that white blob was in the corner of my eye.

It was the coffee I had purchased! Coffee! I have coffee! Who knew!

...you know you need coffee when you forget to drink your coffee, and in fact forget you even have coffee.

This is sad.

(though not as sad as my desire for a cigarette. it would just be a nice excuse to leave this basement office and stand in the sun for a bit. that would be very nice.)

Which reminds me - there should be some research somewhere about the prevalence of smoking amongst graduate students. It seems far higher than in the general population. Further, I'd like to see the research broken down by discipline. Who smokes more, philosophy or theology? Biology or sociology? I'd like to know.

There is, however, a Grad Student Purity Test Purity test. It's almost worth it for the question about quoting Heidegger in bed, or complaining about the second-class-citizen treatment of grad students. I answered "yes" to 75 of 163. (Many of them seem to be Princeton in-jokes)

jane 12:20 PM [+]

viva las vegas

Hey, check it out -- this was in the Economist New York City briefing the other day:

---
New York has more *single people* than any other state, with most of them living in the city, according to a report released in October by the US Census Bureau. The city's five boroughs boast some 2.4m people who have never walked down the aisle. And the New York metropolitan area ranks fifth in the country for its number of young singles with
degrees. San Francisco has lured the most young college graduates.

The report, Marital Status: 2000, also finds that half of the state's adult population is either widowed, divorced or has never been married. But there are only 79 single men for every 100 unmarried women. For better odds, bachelorettes should look to Paradise, a Las Vegas suburb, where unmarried men outnumber unmarried women 118 to 100.
---

Which has of course led San Francisco Josh to mention the superiority of San Francisco (although, to my thinking, a lot of it is probably Silicon Valley related, which isn't particularly exotic or exciting). Too bad the straight-single-men tally isn't highlighted in the report (or the non-Jesuit tally -- hey, what do Jesuits write on census forms and other such things?)

jane 10:13 AM [+]

mmm, men in skirts

just a quick note, since I really do have a lot of work to do, but anyone in new york or planning to be in new york before February 8 should check out the Met's Bravehearts: Men in Skirts exhibit. Really quite a lot of fun. And good people watching (the meta-exhibit).

jane 11:50 AM [+]

oh yeah - Congrats David Miller!

Since I know Paul reads this -- good job! Natalia brought me Eye and Now so I can read all up on this guy. I just want to know -- you think he's good people? Give me hope & I'll believe!

jane 1:35 PM [+]

Happy Remembrance Day

Since I'm not going to hear it around here, and it's tradition, I'm posting Flanders Fields --

In Flanders Fields

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

--

Other Canadians will remember reciting this poem every November 11, and also that it is on our new $10 bill (not the $5, which has the hockey & the paragraph from The Hockey Sweater by Roch Carrier).

--

This was scary though-- I looked up "Flanders Fields" on google, and the first site that came up called itself a Canadian site about "Rememberance" [sic] day, but turned out to be a xenophobic anti-immigration site (at http://www.freedomsite.org/cfirc/our_heritage/rememberance_day/ -- I don't want to link to them; I don't want to encourage them) talking about Canadian "heroes" and the immigrant menace. The titles of the sections of the site are things like "| The Case Against Immigration | Immigration: Canada's Silent Health Threat | Immigration and Crime | Chinese Illegals - Full Coverage | Canadian Immigration Hotline | Our Heroes, Our History, Our Heritage | Government WATCH | Audio and Video Files | Canada is Changing | What the Polls Say? | Immigration in other countries |" The final image on the site has the slogan: "Made with European Culture -- Accept no substitute".

What's scary is not so much that the site exists -- that's fine, it has the right to -- but that it's the first site listed by Google. This means that people are *linking* to the site and referring to it. It doesn't even give the words to McCrae's poem!

So weird. So un-Canadian. Very creepy.

jane 1:32 PM [+]

Things that are obvious... but neat

1. That people feel most comfortable in environments they grew up with. A friend and I were comparing notes. He grew up in the east end of Washington state, near the high plains desert. He feels most comfortable in desert environments, because he feels he can see all around him, and feels anxious in forests, because he feels enclosed and confined. Meanwhile, I grew up right near Pinhey Forest in Nepean and always used to walk through it by myself (often I'd cross country ski right from my back step into the forest, and ski until the sun went down). Consequently, forests to me are cozy and comforting, and I enjoy listening to all the rustling. While I was in the Southwestern desert this summer, I found it beautiful, but unsettling. Getting to the forests of Colorado after driving through Arizona was like coming home. Another friend, who I mentioned this to last night, said that while he'd spent a lot of time in deserts and forests and was not too anxious in either, he really craved the ocean. An obvious point, overall, but neat.

2. It's nice to just hang out with friends in their homes, rather than in bars.
2b. (Corollary) You really don't need alcohol to have a good time.
2c. (Corollary) As long as you have coffee.

3. As a straight single girl, it's great to have friends who are (a) gay men (b) married men (c) Jesuits. (and believe it or not, I'm not even being a little sarcastic.)
3b. (Corollary) I'm serious about the Jesuits.

4. No one is ever really going to wake up early in the morning just to go to the library and read Kant. Not even a little.

jane 11:08 AM [+]

another reason not to be a Christian

I was reminded today that in Christian belief it's possible to sin in thought. (please correct me if this is just a Catholic thing)

Now, wherein does moral action lie if it is not in choosing upon which thoughts to act? If I think, "Hm, I could screw over my friend in not repaying her the money I owe her," the sin/wrongdoing does not lie in that thought, but in the action of not repaying the money. If I never even considered the possibility of not repaying the money, repaying the money wouldn't be as strong a moral act.

This is not such a good example, since I don't generally contemplate mistreating my friends -- I pay them back more by habit than by morality.

But what's the point of having our little private consciousnesses if we can't entertain thoughts that we would never act on? (The example of having naughty thoughts about people we could never have, for instance, comes to mind, as does imagining bad things happening to boring professors). Conflating thought and deed leads to unfortunate and even nasty conclusions, like saying that it was OK if a woman was raped who'd previously had rape fantasies.

Certainly if thoughts become obsessive then there's a problem, but in that case the problem is with the obsession, not with the thoughts per se.

Anyway. Things that randomly come up in discussions in the grad student lounge.

jane 5:50 PM [+]

I'm being corrected

Apparently I'm not drunk. Apparently I don't sound drunk.

I inquire, how I would sound if I were drunk.

It's not that I would sound unintelligible.

Apparnetly my friend has an intuition that I don't sound drunk.

Would I sound less giggly? Less combative? Apparently I'm giggly. Apparently I'm intoxicated. Apparently I'm not intelligible.


...morning after addendum

Well, actually it's the evening after. Note to self - no more of this nonsense. I'm going to work on my brain-to-mouth filter. It'll get me into less trouble.

jane 8:44 PM [+]

drunk!

Woo hoo! I'm drunk! The moral of the story is, don't drink beer on an empty stomach -- food consumed today: one SlimFast, one chicken wing, 2 mozarella sticks. Alcohol consumed: 3 Sam Adams. Surprisingly: drunk! Normally: not! woo hoo!

Probably secondary considerations: Up early this morning. Lack of sleep carried over from last week + weekend. Out with friends I trust. Discussing (lack of) love life. Choice: morose or cocky. Conclusion: cocky!

Addendum: Kant. kant kant kant! Doug, the monad. Not getting mugged. Should talk to him as soon as he's done class. Topic of conversation.

Doug, in clericals! not usually so. First time, in fact, that I've seen him as such.

Further addendum: Doug the Jesuit, not Doug Pollock, who has commented on cats. Important distinction.

jane 8:32 PM [+]

Guess who I met today!

guess! just guess!

your hint: CBC! CTV! Canada AM! Consul in New York!

the answer: Pamela Wallin!

She came to give a talk today at Fordham about Canada-US relations.

she's so cute! and I got up the courage & asked a question! (about trade relations, values, and Kyoto). and after the talk I thanked her & shook her hand.

Pamela Wallin!

jane 5:58 PM [+]

Canada - not a panacea

Prowling about others' weblogs (for instance, the comments in one thread on Making Light - there's 2 references), and listening to my friends here in New York -- I don't know if it's joking, or being frustrated, or what -- everyone keeps talking about how "given things are this bad in the U.S., I should just move to Canada." Or "I guess we could always move to Canada!" Or "Hey, that Canada place - they've got it figured out" (and then they mention things like healthcare. And good public schools. Usually healthcare. Nothing to attract a graduate student's attention like state-covered healthcare. Very few people I go to school with right now have health coverage - Fordham's plan is pretty expensive). (I wonder how much of the "move to Canada" rhetoric is passed down from the Vietnam war era and draft dodgers)

These are usually offhanded comments, for the most part. I've had friends who talked about wanting to move to Canada who don't know the name of the current Prime Minister, for instance (or that in February or thereabouts he'll be replaced by the centre-right Paul Martin). (Then again, I was completely out of the loop for a while about the Progressive Conservative party being about to become to Conservative Party... damnit, they were my prime example for a long time of the reasonableness of the Canadian right).

Canada is fantastic from a number of angles (my favourite, of course, being that it's my home, and I'm perpetually homesick). Healthcare, yes. Affordable universities (even with the relatively astronomical increases of the last eight years, the best schools in Canada are still less than the SUNY public/state schools here in NY). A system of politics that includes an "Official Opposition," which means that no matter what the governing party does, someone is Obliged to argue against it without fear of being called unpatriotic (my friend Josh particularly loves the concept of "Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition" - especially when I told him of the days that the Bloc Quebecois filled that role!). I could go on.

But all the fuss about impending legislation that Chretien is pushing through before he leaves -- all of that is at the mercy of whatever Paul Martin decides to do once he comes in.

Many Americans are rightly frustrated with their government, but ultimately conclude that they should stay in America and fight the good fight for what they believe in. Canada is experiencing the same rightward shifts, the same shifts away from conserving the things they value (a small-c conservative, I suppose?) and toward money-driven instant-political-gratification kind of nonsense. I'd ask the Americans who talk (or joke) about moving to Canada not only to read the stuff on the CBC archives about the October Crisis & the War Measures Act (1970, civil liberties suspended in Canada in response to terrorism), but also about Paul Martin and his CSL company (see Fly our Flag, an NDP site).

My overall point? Canada - not perfect. Same need to fight. If an American, frustrated with America, were to move to Canada in hopes of a socialist utopia, they would find many of the same battles. I guess a battle fought for better priorities in politics is a battle worth winning anywhere...

--
Two caveats -

(1) The religious right is Much Less Scary in Canada than in the US.

(2) At least we're signed onto Kyoto, the Ottawa agreement on landmines (yay Ottawa), the International Criminal Court, etc., etc.

---
An anti-caveat -

We're just as corrupt. While Canada didn't participate in a bunch of the US's conflicts, we still made weapons for them. woo hoo.

---

I guess my argument doesn't really come through clearly. I've been working like mad this week trying to get a presentation together as well as a conference to be held this weekend. Maybe my comments will be working again and someone can put all this together better than I. I just feel like I've been having endless conversations about Canada since I moved here, and I wanted to try to put some of it down to see where I had ended up.

jane 10:38 AM [+]

comments?

Hey y'all. I don't know what happened to my comments function. Alas. But I'll deal with that sometime later. I have a bad headache & a whole pile of Dewey to get through, not to mention some more conference stuff. In the meanwhile, if comments aren't back up, email me anything relevant & advise me to post it.

In other news, I re-watched the Trudeau miniseries with Colm Feore. yum! (while I could have been working on Dewey).

jane 9:53 PM [+]

everything means nothing to me

I heard it on the radio just twenty minutes ago -- apparently it's beginning to leak out from California, though I didn't see a reference to it on the internet (arbiter, of course, of all things newsworthy). WFUV said that they'd heard & sources now seem to confirm. - no wait, here, at a fan pageSweet Adeline.

Elliott Smith is dead. At age 34. His body was found yesterday afternoon by a friend. Police believe it to be suicide (is the story so far).

The Rolling Stone biography says: "There are few tunesmiths who can tackle delicate issues -- heroin addiction, alcoholism, heartbreak and self-loathing -- with more sincerity and sensitivity than folk crooner Elliott Smith."

All I can say is... the scene in The Royal Tenenbaums when Ritchie is slashing his wrists and Elliott Smith's song "Needle in the Hay" is playing... it takes on a ... well I guess it couldn't be a darker tone, given that it was already dark... oh dear.

anyway.

The lyrics to "Everything means nothing to me" (from Figure 8, released 2000)

Someone found the future as a statue
In a fountain
At attention looking backward in a
Pool of water
Wishes with a blue
Songbird on his shoulder
who keeps singing over everything

Everything means nothing to me
Everything means nothing to me
Everything means nothing to me

I picked up the song and found my picture
In the paper
The reflection in the water shouted
"Are your men still
Trying to salute
People from a time when he was
Everything he's supposed to be?"

Everything means nothing to me...

jane 10:26 AM [+]

buying their own toilet paper

check this article from Military.com out. this is ridiculous.

A few quotes:

" FORT STEWART - Hundreds of sick and wounded U.S. soldiers including many who served in the Iraq war are languishing in hot cement barracks here while they wait, sometimes for months, to see doctors.

"The National Guard and Army Reserve soldiers' living conditions are so substandard, and the medical care so poor, that many of them believe the Army is trying push them out with reduced benefits for their ailments. One document shown to UPI states that no more doctor appointments are available from Oct. 14 through Nov. 11 - Veterans Day."

Also,

" Soldiers here estimate that nearly 40 percent of the personnel now in medical hold were deployed to Iraq. Of those who went, many described clusters of strange ailments, like heart and lung problems, among previously healthy troops. They said the Army has tried to refuse them benefits, claiming the injuries and illnesses were due to a "pre-existing condition," prior to military service.

"Most soldiers in medical hold at Fort Stewart stay in rows of rectangular, gray, single-story cinder block barracks without bathrooms or air conditioning. They are dark and sweltering in the southern Georgia heat and humidity. Around 60 soldiers cram in the bunk beds in each barrack.

"Soldiers make their way by walking or using crutches through the sandy dirt to a communal bathroom, where they have propped office partitions between otherwise open toilets for privacy. A row of leaky sinks sits on an opposite wall. The latrine smells of urine and is full of bugs, because many windows have no screens. Showering is in a communal, cinder block room. Soldiers say they have to buy their own toilet paper. "

The Nation's Daily Outrage says: "Since UPI broke this story, CNN has reconfirmed it, and the Pentagon says today it will send a team to Georgia to investigate. CNN also quotes a sergeant who says Fort Stewart soldiers are afraid to talk to the news media about their poor treatment. 'Here we all were overseas, ready to get ourselves killed in order to bring democracy to these countries, and we get home and we don't even have freedom of speech anymore,' she says."

And it further points out: "Then again, if we wanted to divert some of the $87 billion (billion!) the President wants to spend in Iraq to places like Fort Stewart we could do so easily -- because that $87 billion isn't even necessary right now. According to a study by the non-partisan Congressional Research Service, we've already approved hundreds of billions of dollars for military needs, both general and Iraq-specific, and the White House has enough cash to play with through early May. Apparently Bush is trying to pile up as much slush for the war as he can now because he doesn't want to ask later -- during an election season."

...

in other news, who thinks I should go as Valerie Plame for Hallowe'en? (Has the Canadian media been pushing this one at all?)

jane 3:00 PM [+]

Cat in Box Experiment

No, nothing to do with Schroedinger.

It has been observed that Cats Like to Sit in Boxes. (Most notably, one cat named Ajna)

Now, the question has been raised: Does the Size of the Box Matter? What is the cat Attempting to Achieve through Box-Sitting?

Please, submit observations/comments/evidence/theories. We must do what we can to keep our cats happy (else witness Neil Gaiman's "Dream of a Thousand Cats", from Sandman Dream Country!)

jane 1:19 PM [+]

Ottawa!

Ottawa!
Is beautiful in the fall, standing out behind the Parliament buildings, looking at the coloured leaves, smiling at the stray cats, giggling politely at the tourists, chatting up the cute guy at the LCBO (thanks for the Henry of Pelham recommendation, wherever you are), driving around the Experimental farm, driving down to Barrhaven, wandering along the canal, eating maple candies, visiting Record Runner on Rideau Street, walking to the Tim Horton's on Greenbank, hanging out with old friends, loving it all.

Ottawa!
Is beautiful because whenever people ask me where I grew up I'm quite insistant that it was not in fact Toronto, lovely though that city may be, and often I remember that I in fact grew up in Nepean, but given that I took the 95 bus from Baseline Station along the Ottawa River Parkway to downtown Ottawa every time I had the opportunity (from my dad taking me to the Nature Museum to admire the dinosaurs followed by ice cream at the Mayflower pub, to going down with friends in high school & drinking pints of Guinness at now-defunct Irish pubs, to clubbing or whatever that may be at Zaphods and other such places), I think Ottawa - the whole bloody new amalgamated city of Ottawa, yes, the whole damn thing - is home.

Ottawa!
Is beautiful because I can take the train up from New York to Montreal and have friends meet me at the train station & go out for very yummy sushi (though I actually just had salmon teriyaki). And then drive through crazy mist, stopping at Tim Horton's on the way, on to Ottawa.

Ottawa!
Is beautiful because I've been slowly managing to convince a Californian (yes, a Californian!) that being able to skate along the Canal as a regular activity may, in fact, be almost worth the coldness.

Thanks to everyone I saw in Ottawa, for making me feel at home in a place I haven't actually lived in for over five years. I love you all.

jane 12:47 PM [+]

mccabe's knee

everyone wish bryan mccabe luck as he goes through arthroscopic surgery.

hockey season starts soon.

jane 1:07 AM [+]

Oct. 20 -- replaced post with the oh-right-other-people version.

Lessons learned today.

So, I guess everybody's lonely.

I was unable to focus on work today so I went onto the Internet and discovered that Game 5 of the National League Division Playoffs (baseball, for the non-baseball minded who may be reading this... prior to this year I had no idea what such things meant) between the Cubs and the Braves was on tonight. I figured I'd phone my friend And-then-nothing-turned-itself-inside-out and ask him if he wanted to come over to watch the game, since (a) he has no T.V. and (b) he's a big baseball (giants) fan and can explain the finer points of the drama of the game to me (very important and useful). So And-then-nothing agreed and came over and brought beer and I made nachos (double layer of cheese, salsa & chips, yum!) and we watched the game. (my roommate, stuck around for the first few innings but alas, she has a cold, and retired to her room).

While we watched the game, we chatted about various things, like, oh, relationships and so forth. Baseball is very conducive to good conversation. Baseball is good for a society of story-telling. Baseball is about story-telling, and personal histories, and personal interactions, and drama. Baseball, unlike hockey, has enough pauses to allow stories to be told. Hockey is the drama happening Very Quickly over three periods. Baseball is a series of moments, followed by stories about those moments, for nine innings (plus a conveniently timed stretch).

The following people are lonely.

- people whose partners live far away

- people whose partners are real busy

- people whose partners broke up with them

- people who broke up with partners when they moved far away

- people who live with people who are happy and engaged, regardless of whether they have partners far away or no partners at all

- people with no partner at all

- not sure about Jesuits.

I guess I'm lonely, but at least I'm lonely in good company. It would be interesting to figure out the precise differences in loneliness between those who are lonely with partners far away, and those who are lonely because of a complete
lack of partners. Or prospects. Or permission.

I think the loneliness felt by those who have partners, but far away, may be more bitter.

There doesn't seem to be any way to really solve that problem, though.

I wonder how many people around me, who seem like fantastically wonderful well-adjusted graduate students (a possible oxymoron), secretly cry into their pillows at night. I wonder how many would be surprised if they found out who did.

And I wonder if it is easier after high school, or if it's just that I haven't hit anything that was as bad as high school again, and will at some point in my future.

I guess all we can do for each other is listen when someone is calling. And tell stories to each other during baseball games.

Go Cubs go.

jane 1:00 AM [+]

Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day!

Stop by the Official website to find out the details -- which, roughly, consist of talking like a pirate.

Arrr! where's me pirate booty!

The British headquarters is here. They have piratey ringtones for WAP-enabled mobile phones, whatever WAP is (I be clueless with these things).

jane 12:34 PM [+]

erin mckeown!!!

Anne, and Chris and Brian the Jesuits, and I all wandered down (via Jesuit-mobile) to the Bowery Ballroom last night for a fantastic show -- Bishop Allen opened (they were pretty good - check 'em out if they're playing near you; Brian knew them from college) -- and Erin McKeown was absolutely stellar! so much energy! so cute with her big huge pigtails! so fantastic with her guitar & bass skills! such a great performance!

go buy her CDs! Go to her website and check her out! There are little samples of some of her songs.

I'm listening to Grand right now and loving every note.

Thanks to WFUV, which played "slung-lo" one evening as I was walking home from the Tinker and listening to the radio on my walkman. With the opening notes my walk turned into a dance.

go! listen! buy! listen! fantastico!

ok. I'm done now. but go do it.

jane 10:42 AM [+]

and we're lettin' the kids out soon, eh, maybe?

aww, what a nice US government, to think about the children it's been holding in Guantamano. According to the BBC (a few weeks ago, I'm sorry to be so out of the loop), the US may release the children!.

According to the BBC,

---
The commander of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp has told the BBC the US military is hoping to release children it is holding there.

The BBC's Gordon Corera, in Guantanamo Bay, says the US's interviews with the three children - aged between 13 and 15 - reveal they may have been coerced into fighting in Afghanistan.

General Geoffrey Miller who leads operations at the camp is seeking to have the children released in recognition of their age and co-operation, our correspondent says.

"These juvenile enemy combatants were impressed, were kidnapped into terrorism. They have given us some very valuable intelligence. We are very close to making a recommendation on their transfer back to their home countries," General Miller said.

Special treatment

The children have been kept separate from the 700 adults being held at the camp, located on the southern Cuban coast.

They have been held with no access to a lawyer or understanding of what will happen to them, our correspondent adds.

But the children have been given access to games, even videos, as well as an extensive education programme.

This has led to the belief that they can be rehabilitated.
---

Rehabilitated, eh? You mean, so that they don't think it's OK to invent bits of international law, and to ignore the bits that they don't like? So they behave nicely & not like big bullies? So they learn it's not OK to keep children away from their parents & families for two years?

so, the other thing I want to know is -- games. Do you think they're sitting in Guantanamo Bay playing John Madden's NFL football game for X-box?

jane 10:58 AM [+]

Girl Blog From Iraq

Check out this blog by riverbend, specifically her post on Bush's Sept 7 speech. But just read it in general. At one point she also links to turning tables, the blog of an American soldier in Iraq (he's going home soon).

Here's the last little bit of her Sept 9 post. :

---
Everyone is asking, ‘What should be done?’. Pull out the American troops. Take them home. Bring in UN peace-keeping troops under the Security Council- not led by America.

Let real Iraqis be involved in governing Iraq. Let Iraqis who actually have *families* living in Iraq be involved in governing their country. Let Iraqis who have something to lose govern the country. They aren’t being given a chance. As long as any Iraqi isn’t affiliated with one of the political groups on the Governing Council, no one bothers to listen.

We have thousands of competent, intelligent, innovative people who are eager to move forward but it’s impossible under these circumstances. There’s no security, there’s no work and there’s no incentive. AND THERE’S NO ONE WHO WILL LISTEN. If you’re not a part of the CPA or one of Ahmad Al-Chalabi’s thugs, then you’re worthless. You can’t be trusted.

I read Bush’s speech… just like I’ve read/heard what feels like a thousand different speeches these last few months. Empty words, meaningless phrases.

The abridged version of the speech…

“Friends, Americans, Countrymen, lend me your ears… lend me your sons and daughters, lend me your tax dollars… so we can wage war in the name of American national security (people worldwide are willing to die for it)… so I can cover up my incompetence in failing to protect you… so I can add to the Bush and Cheney family coffers at your expense and the expense of the Iraqi people. I don’t know what I’m doing, but if you spend enough money, you’ll want to believe that I do."

----

And an excerpt from riverbend's post from the previous day ---

"As the tanks and Apaches invaded the city, they shot left and right at any vehicle in their path. The areas that got it worst were Al-Dawra and Al-A’adhamia. People in residential areas didn’t know what to do with the corpses in the burnt vehicles that had come from other parts of the city. They were the corpses of people and families who were trying to get away from the heavy fighting in their own areas, some of them had been officially evacuated.

The corpses sat decomposing in the heat, beyond identification. Some people tried asking the troops to help deal with them, but the reaction was mainly, “That’s not my job.” Of course not, how silly… your job is to burn the cars, we bury the corpses.

Finally, the people began to bury the corpses along the roadside- near the burnt vehicles so that family members looking for the car would find their loved ones not very far off."

---

Oh, and the previous day, about Rumsfeld is good too.

just read her bloody blog. :)

and on a personal note

things are going well with me; Eric came to visit this weekend, which was fantastic, and then after he left I talked to Jennifer, Preetom, Annie, Melanie, and Kathleen on the phone as they were all at a party at Jennifer's house in Riverdale (the Riverdale area of Toronto, not the Riverdale area of the Bronx). They passed the phone around; I felt like I was mingling, it was fun.

and I've been running twice in the last week, with Holly. Here's hoping this is a new leaf, instead of a momentary abberation.

but I'm in desperate need of doing laundry, and having coffee this morning.

and of course I've put off doing anything useful, other than reading online news, blogs, and other fun things. Oh, just for the hell of it -- Paul Kendal told me about the Dalton McGuinty eating kittens thing, and I laughed, but then I saw that Neil Gaiman (the picture of me with him, by the way, has now been developed and is sitting in a frame on the bookshelf holding all my Sandmans, my copy of American Gods, Smoke and Mirrors, Good Omens, and Sandman: Book of Dreams) mentioned the story on his journal, so I thought I should include a link to the globe and mail version of the events too, in order to perpetuate the pointless mayhem.

I thought the most salient part of the globe and mail article was its demonstration of Eves's true evil -- cutting down on coffee for his staffers!

---
Conservative Leader Ernie Eves blamed the release on a staffer who apparently "had too much coffee this morning ... too much time."

But he refused to retract the statement.

"I'm not apologizing, but I am acknowledging that it certainly went over the top," he said. "Somebody had a weird sense of humour and we will try to ensure that it doesn't happen again. We'll give the [staff] less coffee."
---

yes. speaking of coffee. I should go make some.

jane 10:31 AM [+]

and we love that administration so

In Alternet's Iraq News Log, the following post:

"WMD? What WMD?

"Posted by Oj on September 9, 2003 @ 10:48AM

"The search for Saddam's deadly arsenal is now merely a footnote in the war. In what amounts to a political "do-over", Bush has recasted the mission in Iraq into Ground Zero in the broader war on terror. Rumsfeld didn't even ask about the weapons in his recent Baghdad visit. They've changed their minds about why they went to war and their sticking to it -- at least until that reasoning also fails them."

Who else watched the Bush Address on Sept. 7th? Who else wasn't sure what to make of it, other than to shake one's head with dismay?

So suddenly it doesn't matter that no WMDs have been found? Suddenly it's all just still the war on terror? Which war is which?

Bush: "Our strategy in Iraq has three objectives: destroying the terrorists, enlisting the support of other nations for a free Iraq and helping Iraqis assume responsibility for their own defense and their own future."

Define terrorist in this case. Which terrorists? For which cause? Baathists? Saddam Hussein loyalists? Al Quaida? Random terrorists? Random Iraqis who want to govern their own country? (see Liberating Iraqis, American Style for a view of what's going on with some local elections).

Bush: "The heaviest burdens in our war on terror fall, as always, on the men and women of our Armed Forces and our intelligence services. They have removed gathering threats to America and our friends, and this nation takes great pride in their incredible achievements. We are grateful for their skill and courage, and for their acts of decency, which have shown America's character to the world. We honor the sacrifice of their families. And we mourn every American who has died so bravely, so far from home."

Right. Not to bring up old news, but remember the June 30th issue of the Army times? The Nation's Daily Outrage summarized the point; here's an excerpt from the Nation summary:

"What has Army Times upset? They don't like the White House's griping and opposition to a proposal to double the $6,000 now paid to families of troops who die on active duty. (An additional $6,000 multiplied by 212 dead so far works out to $1.27 million -- or, for perspective, about 0.00032 percent of the nearly $4 billion per month the war is costing us.) They also want to cut monthly imminent-danger pay to $150 from $225, and cut the family-separation allowance down to $100 a month from $250. The anti-tax Administration is doing nothing for the military -- it won't even step up and ease residency rules to help frequent-traveling service members who sell a home qualify for capital-gains exemptions. The Administration plans to cut more than a billion dollars out of next year's budget for military housing. "The chintz even extends to basic pay," Army Times fumes, noting that Bush's proposed 2004 budget would cap raises for some ranks at 2 percent."

Anyway. I know this is all old news. Back to the good old brave fight against terror. Doing everything we can to keep Americans safe. Ah yes.

But yes. All I want to know is, did the Sept. 7th address clear things up for anybody? huh?

jane 11:00 AM [+]

remember Velvet Underground's "The Gift"?

Check this out -- a man shipped himself in a wooden crate from New York to Dallas.

(In a related note, the Nation points out that "the Administration has blocked legislation being pushed by Representative Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, that would require automated or manual screening of cargo shipped on passenger planes. Currently, most of this cargo--unlike travelers' checked baggage--is not screened. The House approved Markey's amendment by a 278-to-146 vote. But the Senate--pressed by the aviation industry and the White House--has ignored the issue." Thanks, Bush administration!)

(Oh, and in the lower right hand corner of the Globe and Mail article, the following joke, which I'll cut & paste here. Thanks Globe and Mail):

"An aspiring wizard was dismissed from school for trying to change a golf club into a cat. Unfortunately, he ended up creating a hairy putter. Ronald Vadeboncoeur"

groan.

Now playing: Sarah Slean's "Night Bugs." Fantastico.

jane 10:36 AM [+]

Virgins With Guns

Believe it or not, if you do a google search for "virgin" "guns" (as opposed to the string, "virgins with guns"), the first page of entries has NO PORN AT ALL! Surprising, huh?

Instead, some stuff about Virgin Valley Guns, the Virgin Islands, and Virgin Records.

"Virgins with guns" brings up nothing at all about Virgin Utah's gun ordinance (discussed below), but rather an entry about the children's crusade..

How not-at-all titillating.

Back to work.

jane 10:10 AM [+]

Comments on googling

So a little while ago I posted about the ethics of googling, and received a reply from a friend of mine:

"no, it's not unethical. anything up there is public domain, and likely stems from something intentional. the nice thing about us at our age is that we for the most part aren't being followed by investigative journalists or papparazzi. so no embarrassing stuff should be up there that's too bad...

"oh, and part 2: just don't bring it up. if you find something embarrassing on someone, you have to make sure you know them well enough to bring it up before doing so. always err on the side of caution, I always say...

"feel free to look me up if you want. oh, maybe I should check into this... "

Shortly after that Paul sent me a further email:

"Subject: ok, just tried it

"howdy

"ok, this illustrates the danger of looking people up. I'm not a jazz musician, and I've never remixed nin and nitzer ebb etc.

"nor was I born in 1870.

"but even the stuff that does come up that's accurate is misleading in certain cases. I'm not gay, f'rinstance, even though we seem to have blurred that line in some of the press releases...

"neat-o.

"p :)"


So there we go.

I still feel awkward about googling friends without their knowledge. Is there some sort of "coming out" statement that would be appropriate? "Hi, X. Just to let you know, I was surfing the internet the other day and thinking of you, so I googled you out of curiosity. Guess what came up?" But what if something embarrassing comes up? Should I mention it? Should I deny having seen it? Should I deny having clicked on that particular link? "No, I didn't think that was you..."

Anyway.

A general notice about the Conference on Ancient and Medieval Philosophy to be held at the end of October here at Fordham, down at the Lincoln Centre campus. I just finished proofreading the program, so I can vouch for the niftiness of the contents. Should be fun.

Biking through the Bronx

Paul K (a different Paul K from the one who contributed his thoughts on googling) lent me his bicycle pump and I finally restored my bike to working order on Sunday. Taking advantage of the fantastically beautiful weather that has finally hit us (perfect september weather -- dry, warm in the day and just a little bit cooler in the morning and evening, just enough for a light sweater, absolutely fantastic), I went cycling along Pelham Parkway over to Pelham Bay Park, and up just to the edge of New Rochelle in Westchester (mansions!!). Did you know that Pelham Bay Park is NYC's largest park? (At least, that's what the sign says). And yet it's not famous, like Central Park -- to the best of my knowledge (please chime in if you know anything!) there are no songs about Pelham Bay Park. But it's so lovely....

Just a short bike ride from my neighbourhood, which, while I like it, is dirty and filled with razor wire and broken sidewalks, is this cool and breezy park with trees, bike paths, horse & pony rides, picnic areas -- but, unlike the Botanical Gardens, free to go into and explore. I didn't even make it over to Orchard Beach.

I biked staight through the Park and ended up on Park Rd in Pelham Village. I pretty much figured I wasn't in the Bronx anymore... for one thing, as this fact sheet states, it's pretty white. And filled with really big stone houses. So close to New York. Wow. It was kind of a shock to emerge from the park (given that I went in not far from Co-op City, which isn't the height of poshness) and find this neighbourhood. For instance, I went right past the New York Athletic Club at Travers Island building/grounds/whatever. There were lots of children playing, but not in the street, or in fire hydrants. On "handsomely landscaped" grounds.

It was a little bizarre.

The world is a strange strange place.

I will go back to work now.

jane 10:05 AM [+]

Summer does indeed seem to be over

... all the kids are moving into the dorms

... I need to pick up my new ID

... I've bought my new coursebooks

... I haven't paid my bill yet, but Fordham owes me money from working for Dr. Tress this summer

... I suddenly need to hurry up and finish the last few things (4 hours of work or so) for my summer employment in order to have earned the money that Fordham owes me!

... It's chilly enough, what with the rain, that I wished I had a light jacket on

... People are back from wherever they went over the summer.

... The new kids are showing up! So far, the two new women in the Philosophy Department seem delightful. Huzzah!

... I missed the Jesuits. I'm glad they're back.

Well, off to work!


and a promissory note

My friend Paul wrote me an email with his opinion of the googling matter. However, in the interest of not procrastinating on the work that I need to get done today, I'll put off telling you all what he said. And put off providing my own answer. Until the work is done. Yes. I will do the work first. Yes. Yes I will.

jane 2:00 PM [+]

back in belmont!

complete with coconut bread from Kensington Market, nettles and raspberry leaves for Meredith, plans for the evening, and a new roommate all hooked up, from Denmark!

The busride back was uneventful. I sat next to an Israeli man who was doing business with Lockheed Martin in Syracuse. I didn't ask him much about his business, as it was 2 am. He did ask me whether I read Feuerbach and Schopenhauer along with Hegel. I kind of grunted. Sleepy post-Customs. The customs man gave me the usual snarky look & raised eyebrow when I said I studied philosophy. Luckily he didn't want to inspect the nettles.

Thanks everyone who made time to come out and see me in Toronto! and sorry I didn't make it to Ottawa. I'm a horrible person.

ethical question of the day

Is it nosy, prying, or sneaky to google friends and acquaintances? and then, if you find things out about them (say, geeky websites they maintained in high school, or that sort of thing), can you bring it up without being embarrassed or ashamed that you googled them in the first place?

To show that I'm vulnerable to this too: google "jane a. dryden" and look about four entries down... yup, I called myself the Noyster at one point. Long story. (well, not even that long. just not really that funny, almost ten years later). ah yes, and the dragons-inn. oh the fun.

jane 1:24 PM [+]

who knew?

I hadn't realized that my yahoo email name (which I also use on various internet things), little miss hegelian, wasn't quite original... good old woody allen beat me to it, as this movie site shows. (I have the terms 'little' 'miss' and 'hegelian' highlighted, so you can find the quote to which I refer).

They have it here explained: "Miss pseudo-intellectual neo-fascist Hegelian. "Pseudo-" is a useful prefix meaning false or fake. "Neo" means new, and "Hegelian" refers to the philosopher Hegel."

How helpful.

Now I feel horrible that I've never seen Sleeper. I'll get on that...

(I think this ranks about as high as Marshall McLuhan's cameo in Annie Hall. Well, only for me. oh well.)

jane 3:21 PM [+]

yay, comments!

although, of course, since I'm rambling into the void, the numbers are all "0", but it's nice to know that the potential is there.

huzzah!

jane 3:06 PM [+]

Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds

...so nifty. I saw the link to it in Terese Neilsen Hayden's blog. what fun!

It was right after this post and comments about the blackout & energy deregulation / regulation.

And I never thought that I would be better off, power-wise, in New York than in Toronto. But I'm getting used to the dim lights here. And I guess the reduced air conditioning in all the Toronto office buildings will help settle (for the time being) the perpetual war between the always-too-cold-at-the-office and the men-in-wool-suits-who-want-the-AC-cranked-on-high.

jane 2:40 PM [+]

back at Robarts library

For people who have never been on the campus of the University of Toronto, there's no real good way of describing the madness that is Robarts Library. It is also known as Fort Book. Legend has it that Umberto Eco was at a semiotics conference at U of T and visited Robarts & there had the idea for the library in The Name of the Rose. It's 14 floors. One set of elevators stops at the 2nd, 3rd, 6th, 7th, 8th, and 14th floors, and the other set stops at the 1st, 4th, and 9-13th floors. The building is the shape of a peacock. The man for whom it is named, John P. Robarts, killed himself. (he had been premier of ontario for a while and killed himself in 1982).

Here's the Wikipedia entry for Robarts.

Shouldn't a library be homey rather than brutalist?

Anyway. I'm there doing some editing work for my professor. And checking email. And enjoying the (very meagre) air conditioning (a true luxury in Toronto at the moment).

jane 1:20 PM [+]

The subways are running again!

I love how the number of arrests made Thursday night (850) was less than the average number of arrests in NYC per night (950). That's fantastic.

Now that things seem to be up & going in New York, I'm off to Toronto, where, as the Star puts it "Lights come on, outlook still dim". oh well. At least I'll be home...

jane 9:29 AM [+]

so I didn't manage to make it to Toronto last night

obviously.

I was stuck in the Bronx, but it's OK, since I met up with my friends, and we had a big ol' party on Joe's front porch, before I went to crash at my friend Matt's, since my apartment was a little too far away on a very dark street (and on the 5th floor -- fairly warm!), and to be absolutely frank, going back to my empty apartment would have been far creepier than sleeping on Matt's couch. so there.


The New York Times, obviously, has some great pictures.

and looting in Ottawa and Toronto! so bizarre! who thought it could happen?

Hope everyone else in the East is OK.

jane 12:55 PM [+]

oh, and I have to add this link on "Mirages in the desert" -- weird stuff to be seen on road trips. It includes the tree of Utah as one of the "strangest". yup. so is the whole salt desert (please click on that. you need to see the picture. you really really do). Look! it's all bloody salt!!

also, in honour of Virgin, Utah (near Zion National Park, one of my new favourite places in america),

Virgin Utah - Concealed Weapons Course and Gun Safety Training

(rachel and I drove past that antique store and loved its sign)

Virgin, seems like such a friendly place... but Meredith would not ever be able to get a Unicef job there, since it's a UN-Free zone.

huh. so how about that gun ordinance.

(wanna dare me to do a Google search on 'Virgins With Guns'?)

jane 1:28 PM [+]

on my way back home

I'm at work, preparing a lesson (I'm teaching a friend how to read French, in order to pass the departmental exam this fall), and am very excited about getting on the night bus tonight to Toronto.

I have two cities that qualify as home: Toronto and Ottawa. I have a parent in each (well, my mom lives in the Toronto suburb of Mississauga, but she grew up in Toronto and lived in Toronto and hates where she lives right now), good friends in each, and strong emotional attachments to each. I think, ultimately, I'd prefer settling down in Ottawa, the city in which I was born, and which is smaller and more comfortable, and is marginally less pretentious (government employees show up to work in sweats. I can deal with this).

While I'm visiting Toronto this time around, I'm going to head to Ottawa over either Canadian or American Thanksgiving. I need to spend time in both.

Anyway. just another homesick canuck...

***

three rocks

There are three rocks on my desk in my Bronx apartment.

One is a pinky orange piece of rock from Wyoming. I grabbed it near the Ames Monument when we got lost near there, in the fog. (The adventure in which we saw the black SUV with New York plates). We were delirious.

One is a blue-and-yellow painted piece of ceramic from the "Tree of Utah (Metaphor)" in the Great Salt Desert of Utah. (it had broken off, and was lying on the salty ground). We were delirious.

One is a blue-veined piece of red rock from near the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. Looking over the edge, along Bright Angel trail, and walking along, seeing shell fossils 8,000 ft up from sea level, and.... I was delirious.

So. Lucky rocks. Lucky, delirious rocks.

I think they're lucky.

jane 1:04 PM [+]

the whole blog thing

this is bad. this is really addictive. I've been surfing & looking at others' blogs. there are so many really interesting people out there. I especially liked Fighting Loneliness With Vodka and there's a monster at the end of this blog. I wish these people well, even though I don't know them and will likely never meet them. Maybe it's time for me to go home.

jane 6:55 PM [+]

now I get it...

Larissa is a county within Thessaly, Greece! That's why the character in Sandman is known as both Larissa and Thessaly... (this is the fun thing about working in my professor's office -- she has a great map of "Cities of the Philosophers in the Ancient Western World"). neat!

also, randomly found as I should have been typing up Aristotle reading lists, is another Sandman site, Who Killed Dream of the Endless?.

done now. back to work...

jane 3:54 PM [+]

thunder!

jane 2:46 PM [+]

things to brighten up your day

I know I have a link to the left to the Nation, but I wanted to also point out specifically the Daily Outrage blog. Whenever I feel overly calm, hopeful, complacent, etc., etc., etc., I turn to this. It never fails.

one of my favourite recent posts was this one about napalm.

oh, and for more fun, if you haven't yet subscribed to the emailed Harper's Weekly Review, you're really missing out.

ok. now REALLY back to work.

jane 2:29 PM [+]

albania... albania... albania...

Well, Meredith and I sat and had some coffee and chatted, and she said she hadn't heard anything about possibility of being sent to Albania, and just then the phone rang. She has a phone interview with the Albania people tomorrow morning. Yay, fun with Unicef. So I sent some emails around to people who might know people looking for housing... I guess there's some sort of Rubicon-crossing going on.

There's a website called Albanian.com, Home of Albanians Online, which is running a survey on "What is the main factor you consider naming your Albanian baby" ... that's more or less the only thing in English. (I didn't answer the survey, since I'm not going to have an Albanian baby any time soon, although it's entirely possible I might meet a nice Albanian man here in Belmont, since there's a sizable Albanian population).

Meanwhile, Lonely Planet's Albanian entry says that "The security situation in Albania remains unstable. Visitors need to exercise extreme care, maintaining a high level of personal security awareness. The presence of unexploded munitions along the Albania/Kosovo border is suspected, and travel to the Bajram Curri and Tropoje area in particular should be avoided. Crime is rampant, with armed gangs operating." Should I be worried about Mer? will Unicef take care of her? Although they (Albanians, not Unicef) do have very good turkish coffee... our locksmith made me some turkish coffee once in his shop and it was absolutely lovely. He told me all about moving to New York from Albania and how he built himself up by working two jobs until he could start his own business.

All right. Here's the Unicef Albania link.

Is it just me, or is Albania a frequently-cited "random" place? It crops up in the fourth Harry Potter book, since Voldemort surfaced in Albania, and that's where Bertha Jorkins was killed. It was also the country, in Wag the Dog, with which a fictional conflict is invented... if memory serves, the movie has lots of lines about the relative obscurity of Albania. This site describes it thus: "Why Albania? DeNiro's spin doctor is asked. His response: Why not? Nobody knows anything about Albania. And unfortunately, this is the truth." When I mention Albania to people, they seem to get it confused with Armenia. Even though everyone got the phrase "ethnic Albanians" drilled into their heads during the Kosovo conflict! such craziness.

I should get back to the work that I'm supposed to be paid for doing... although payment at this point is still highly hypothetical... if all goes well, I should be paid $700 August 22nd for the work I've been doing this summer, and then the second week of September I should start receiving my assistantship money. who knows whether this will actually occur?

jane 1:46 PM [+]

I put up some different links, just to brighten the place up a bit. I'm going to go get some coffee, and keep tinkering with this later. I'm not sure there's any real rhyme or reason to what's up there right now -- it was just what i thought of at the time.

jane 9:34 AM [+]

The Goth Thing, or Theory of Wonderment

Written June 18, 2003:

The Goth Thing

Yes, I admit it. I am reprehensible on both sides. I was a goth in high school, when it was somewhat trendy (note that I was in high school from 1994 - 1998; note however also that I never succumbed to the Marilyn Manson fandom thang -- I was somewhat "purer", being a fan of Dead Can Dance, Cocteau Twins, Bauhaus, and Sisters of Mercy); and I "outgrew" it when I hit college and a change of city. Thus, I am neither free of the gothic taint, nor do I have the merit of being consistent throughout. I confess.

What I further want to admit is that now, as I'm technically an adult (I have moved countries, I am in graduate school, I'm paying rent and utilities and debts and my friends are marrying and having kids and divorces and so forth), I want to go back to my gothic phase. Not so much that I want to paint my face white and my eyes black and run around in velvet, but I that I long to regain the sense of mystery, of mystique, of everyday glamour that I had during that time. I would come home, light a candle, sing, and write poetry. Now, I come home, open a beer, and watch T.V. This is not progress.

So what is acceptable, and what is merely escapism? The university I attend now, while in New York City, is fairly conservative. While I used to be an honest NeoPagan (which indeed calls for a separate essay), the philosophy I study leads me to a more agnostic position (cf. David Hume) and I feel like a poseur rather than a pagan wearing a pentacle.

I wear a large amount of black. I have black pants, black sweaters, black t-shirts, black tank-tops. My glasses are black plastic (yes, the trendy square kind). When I wear jewelry, it's silver. I feel comfortable with these things. And yet the black that I do wear feels more like grad student wear, rather than Mystical Being of the Night. I guess this is reasonable, given that I'm far from being a Mystical Being yadda yadda. But I see people on the street who fill me with further ambition... Maybe I should wear a bit more black eye-liner, and extend the edges slightly?

I used to write a lot of short stories and a lot of poetry. I cannot write either anymore; my imagination does not tend toward those things. They were a way of living a mystical existence -- I'm going to use that term, problematic as it is, to represent living somehow beyond the everyday. I'm not sure it's authentic, in the Heideggerian sense, but it's something beyond just "getting by".

Any suggestions for how to regain this sense of the mystical are welcome. It's not, I emphasize, that I've lost my sense of wonder -- I do philosophy all the time, and I wonder plenty about that. But philosophy can sometimes be less... less transcendental (not at all in the Kantian or Husserlian sense! just in a layman sense!) than I'd like. Maybe what I need is religion? spirituality? But I can't force myself to believe in things of which I'm skeptical. I just want a sense of extraordinariness to pervade the everyday.

Addition, August 13, 2003, 12.43 am:

Theory of Wonderment

After having reread two of my favourite books, Forests of the Heart by Charles de Lint and American Gods by Neil Gaiman, and having recently gone to a booksigning by Neil, before which I'd reread some of his Sandman graphic novels, I think I understand what I was getting at back in June. They both seem to have captured what I mean about a sense of extraordinariness in the everyday, a sense of gods, monsters, and assorted fey figures walking among us, hidden from us except for certain times, to people who are observant. One of the Sandman books, Brief Lives (the name taken from John Aubrey's book, which is worth reading for its anecdotes of the lives of people like Hobbes and Descartes), opens with the overview of those who have lived far longer than the "normal" human life span - those who remember woolly mammoths, the last ice age, the first Atlantis, that sort of thing. Clearly they're smart enough to stay away from scientific examination. Why not?

I don't seriously think that there are such 10,000 year olds, but why is it more likely that there is a personal god, than that there should be fairies and djinn and people who pass among us who are not the same as we are, in some deeply magical way? Why? Why not?

Listen. I'm willing to carefully examine claims, critically and with detailed argument, when they concern something the outcome of which will affect human life and well-being. I'm not anti-scientific. I try to avoid being flaky. I just think that it's possible that part of an honest agnosticism is also an admission that magic could be real, for the simple reason that it can't be proven either way to be real or not real, just the same way that agnosticism involves the admission that god may or may not exist. (That's why it's so much more fun to take the agnostic position than the atheist one. And that's why "Brights" are so dull.)

I don't want a surgeon to say that she's using magic to implant a heart, or scientists and politicians to think that the solution to the whole in the ozone layer is prayer to genies rather than implementation of Kyoto and stronger agreements and efforts. Really, it's a difference that is no difference. There is nothing, I think, empirically different about the observed world if I admit to the possibility of magic or magical beings. But my outlook, my reaction to a moonlit night, to a moment of stillness within me, to missing keys, to hope, to despair -- this changes.

jane 9:09 AM [+]

america. and roommates. roommates who aren't american. americans who aren't roommates.

August 12, 2003, 11.41 pm

I'll post this tomorrow, but for now just believe the time written by hand (or rather, by keyboard, but with my very own fingertips pressing down upon the keys, rather than the automatic timestamp of a distant system clock) above.

There's a strange sort of roommate politics (ethics?) around one roommate planning to move out while the other plans to stay. One has no incentive to put anything into the shared home (since that person is about to leave), and yet the other does not want to seem ungracious or nagging. And yet, in this situation both are friends, and genuinely wish the other the best, and genuinely want a good home, just not the same home. Meredith wants to paint the bathroom, and while I'm excited to paint, I'm not sure how seriously to take her painting suggestions, especially in areas where we disagree. If I'm going to be here for at least another year, whereas she's going to leave as soon as the new place is settled, why should I oblige her in agreeing to paint the bathroom green? (Although the point may be moot, as I seem to have won the argument by pointing out that green walls won't do our faces any justice as we use the bathroom mirror for applying makeup, as we do regularly, since we have no other major mirrors in the whole apartment. Rusty orange may yet win the day).

By the way. I think I'm going to set up a separate blog, attached to this one, for discussing issues of ethics and politics, since I'm interested in pursuing the difference between them, or the similarities between them, for my dissertation. I will invite comments, questions, criticisms of my reasoning, and the like, as things go by. Given that I have at least a full year before I can even begin to propose my dissertation (I can't do it until after I get through comprehensive exams), that should be enough time to have gained an idea of the issue through the blog. So stay tuned for that.

(Of course, that last note presumes that I have a readership. Clearly, I don't, and even if I did, they would long since have left, as I didn't post for over a year. But someday someone may read what I've written, and think that it's mildly interesting, mention it to a friend, and it goes on and on. Alternately still, I'll mention my blog as an example to the friends from the department who'd never heard of blogs --see the last post-- and they'll question and criticize me. How can I go wrong?)

So... I believe that I promised that I would write about my road trip. Here it goes.


My Road Trip Across the Alien Land of America with R. the Republican

Graduate school makes for strange friendships. One of my strange friendships is with R., a woman with whose politics I sometimes agree, and definitely I think she has goodness at heart, but who sometimes holds opinions that I disagree with strongly (example: liking the Bush administration). That said, she's fun, and clever, and caring, a good friend, and always up for a good time, etc., etc. I really do like R.

You know how there's a stereotypical split between East and West Coast people, between NYC and LA, between North and South California, between public transit people and car people, between cat people and dog people? On every part of that split, R. falls into the latter, and I fall into the former. Well, maybe not the North & South California split, since I've never lived in California at all, but from having talked to San Francisco people and Los Angeles people, I know where my loyalties lie.

The fundamental subtext of the road trip R. and I made, from June 21 to July 7, 2003, was our disconnect with respect to this split. I think R. hates New York for the same reasons I love it, and I think my antipathy to Los Angeles (though I was only there 36 hours, to be fair) was caused by the same reasons that she loves it. I like places where people are close together, where walking, cycling, and public transit are the norm and cars are awkward and out of place, and the nearest (very excellent) coffee is within walking distance and not a Starbucks. R. likes good roads and driving and driving to good coffee (to her credit, while she does like Starbucks coffee, she shares my desire to try to buy local, where possible). (should I point out that R., while claiming to be a Californian, actually grew up, to the age of 14, in Michigan?) So all of these sorts of reactions are going on, and I'm attempting to remain open-minded, since I'm just a random Canuck who's wandered into this bizarre country, and what do I know from California?

Capisce?

R. had to move her stuff back to Los Angeles since she will be teaching (adjuncting) at her alma mater this fall, and she had a couple weeks free from her NY summer teaching gig, and thus was going to drive out there, move her stuff into a storage facility, then drive back out to NY, teach some more, and ultimately fly back to LA, teach her first week, then fly back to NY, then drive back to LA for good (this last bit will occur over Labour Day weekend). She asked me if I wanted to come along for the first NY to LA to NY jaunt. I pointed out that can't drive (literally - I've never learned, and until the week before the trip I didn't even have a learner's permit). She said, that was OK, if I got a permit she'd teach me to drive along the way, and in any case she loved driving and my role would be navigator & entertainment & company. Alright then, I would love to, I said nervously & excitedly & shyly.

America!

The proverbial road trip! To the other coast and back!

Examine a map of the United States. Note Interstate 80, more or less the Lincoln Highway, and note its directness. It runs from the George Washington Bridge (which I can see from my window, here in the Bronx) to the Bay Bridge in San Francisco. On the way, it passes through New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, and California. Now note Interstate 5, as it runs from Sacramento to Los Angeles in an almost completely straight line through the Central Valley. Now note Interstate 15 from Los Angeles to Las Vegas -- the desert doesn't come across on the map, but if you look closely at the map you'll notice that the areas you pass through on that stretch of 15 are all military testing sites or military training sites or just generally places you won't want to be, with titles like "Roach Lake (Dry)". Now look at the windy stretches of highway from Las Vegas to Utah to Arizona to the Grand Canyon to the Navajo Nation to Four Corners up through Colorado to I-70. Now look at I-70, note I-76 from 70 back up to I-80 in Pennsylvania near Pittsburgh, and the easy route home.

Our lives, for just over two weeks, were completely determined by the idiosyncrasies of the land we crossed on those highways. Weather, climate, people, everything changed with the highways. America is well-observed by highway. I'm sure trains run in many of these areas -- 70 follows a Union Pacific line for quite some time -- but I believe the highway has replaced the railway as the most American of transport systems -- all apologies to Woody Guthrie and his ilk. (Though I'll have to visit Germany and its Autobahn system sometime to continue to evaluate this claim).

Did I discover America? To quote Neil Gaiman in the Acknowledgements section at the end of _American Gods_, thanks his family, who "put up with my going away both to write and to find America -- which, it turned out, when I eventually found it, to have been in America all along." [Neil Gaiman, _American Gods_ (New York: HarperCollins, 2001; reprinted in paperback 2002), 592].

I discovered something about America. I'm still not sure what it was. I discovered so much of it that is empty of signs of humanity. It's one thing to pass through areas of the midwest that are heavily farmed and don't have so much in the way of population, but that look farmed and look like humans have been there, and something else to pass through certain areas of, say, Wyoming or Arizona or Nevada or what have you, and wonder how people ever ended up in such a place. (Of course, if you do this in Arizona, you're probably near some thousand year old ruins, which goes to show that people have been in a lot of places that a naive northerner would never believe).

Should I write out the trip in detail? Maybe I will sometime. It's all in a notebook, the trip log, and when I get the pictures developed maybe I'll come up with commentary from them. But I'm not sure I'm willing to commit the trip to digital imprint yet...

I will confess that I fell in love with the vastness of Wyoming, and the complete beauty of Colorado. Those were my two favourite states. California is too obviously beautiful, and I think Californians (well, those of the middle and upper classes, at least... Californians with income) have it too easy. I'm suspicious of the perfect climate of Los Angeles. I'm suspicious of all the flowers. Where's the grit? Where's the difficulty? Where's the angst? Where are the cold cold winters? How can you trust someone who's never had to shovel a walk in -30C weather, with windchill? How do you know they appreciate the important things in life? What's to stop them from electing a movie star to governor, for the second time?

Alright, that's enough for now.

jane 9:02 AM [+]

I've spent the day learning about the Lovsan virus and getting it out of my system, which is also essentially a way of distracting myself from doing anything actually resembling work. Work, at this point, involves sitting down and finally hammering out the necessary changes to a couple of papers that I want to submit for publication, finishing a database I'm preparing for a professor on scholars working in the field of Neoplatonism, and preparing a lesson for my next meeting with a friend whom I'm teaching French. I think most of my trivial knowledge comes from procrastination -- so, if I actually got my work done as soon as it came up, I wouldn't be so good at Trivial Pursuit. Possible theorem? No real way of testing -- I don't know if I can avoid procrastinatory Internet poking-around for long enough.

So this is what my life has come to, over a year, I suppose. I had forgotten about this particular blog -- or, if not quite forgotten about it, not thought about updating it. Maybe there's some sort of yearly impulse to disclose my thoughts to the world -- or at least, that particular section of the world that reads blogs. I hadn't realized that the whole blog thing wasn't the blindingly obvious part of the Internet and modern communication that I thought it was, until I was at a local bar (Howl at the Moon, in the Bronx, just off Arthur Avenue), and mentioned having read something in a blog. I believe it was something about Pirates of the Caribbean being entirely enjoyable (which it was). None of the other five people at my table had ever read a blog, and only one of them had even heard of them. These are PhD students! I was quite surprised. Anyway...

I'm still living in the Bronx, near Fordham University. Here's a link to my department, by the way, from which you can get a to a list of faculty members, information about the FPS (Fordham Philosophical Society), and other things that sort of come up in my life.

Random post-breakup nonsense with Dan, of course, lasted throughout the year (the details of which I'll spare you). In the meantime, I dated a lovely fellow student named Sterling, but it didn't work out and we're back to being friends now. He, and others in my department, are all writing comprehensive exams in a couple of weeks. I have to write them next year.

The Bronx... well, what can I say about it? I sometimes feel at home, I sometimes feel entirely alienated (though it could be a result of living in the United States right now); I sometimes feel thrilled and excited that I'm in New York City, and sometimes I feel bored yet don't want to face the long subway ride downtown in order to do something other than the usual run to the Jolly Tinker (a bar on the other side of campus).

My roommate Meredith is sick and tired of her lengthy commute to & from Manhattan/Queens/Brooklyn (i.e., where most of her life is spent) and is looking to move out with some other friends of hers into an apartment in Chinatown. Thus I'll shortly be on the horrible roommate hunt. That's how it goes, I guess. We still love each other, but I understand her need to NOT commute an hour to an hour and a half both ways every day.

What am I doing right now? Loving the view out my window, of the George Washington Bridge at night. Listening to WFUV, Fordham's radio station (check it out if you like folk or americana). Listening to traffic and the odd sounds of car alarms or breaking glass. Feeling the breeze blow in, aided by my fan.

Now I will head over to Cafe Maggiolino, to meet up with my overworked friend Rachel, with whom I went on a two week road trip across America. Whew! That was craziness. I'll write it up and post it here when I get the chance, now that it looks like my heart wants to keep up with regular blog posting. We'll see if that worked out better than last year...

jane 9:29 PM [+]