Friday, October 24, 2003
Questionnaire de Proust
the main lineaments of my character.
adaptability, intellectual vigor, and conviviality ( i guess i could just say i think i'm friendly).
a quality I desire in a man.
independence.
a quality I desire in a woman.
audacity.
what I appreciate most among my friends.
we laugh until we wet our pants.
my principal defect.
laziness.
my favourite occupation.
either camper or lakeswimmer, I can't decide.
my dream of felicity.
oh god, I don't know if this is an appropriate forum for such a question... um, i'll just say "a blissful future" and you interpret what you will. i will offer this: there will be lots of post-coital headrubs. Lots.
what would for me be the biggest misfortune.
to fall into the easy groove of temperance and/or righteousness.
whom I would like to be.
a field researcher for the CDC or the NIH.
were I would like to live.
somewhere alpine, or anywhere in france. i'd also be quite happy to come back here, my home of the past 23 years.
the colour I prefer.
maroon (specifically, perylene red, pr179) .
the flower I love.
apple blossom and lycoris radiate esthetically, gardenia or mimosa for fragrance.
the bird I prefer.
the sparrow--this tiny non-native bird that is reviled because some dumbass brits released it into the u.s., resulting in the displacement of other species of birds. Hey, it's done--deal with it, don't fucking kill the sparrows.
my favourite authors.
michel houellebecq, mary doria russell.
my favourite poets.
thomas lux, a.e. housman (and maybe richard brautigan... poet status debatable).
my heroes in fiction.
(sigh...) emilio sandoz.
my heroines in fiction.
(sigh...) anne edwards.
my favourite composers.
air, boards of canada, mahler, and debussey.
my favourite artists.
mark ryden, john kushmaul (local), kembra pfahler, megan mattax (local), joseph beuys.
my heroes in real life.
amy and david sedaris ("hero" is gender neutral nowadays, right?).
my heroines in history.
betty page, virginia woolf (i wish they could have dated--think of the potential soft-core porn and individualist literature THAT would have produced).
my favourite names.
for boys the french "achille;" for girls i've always liked "lydia"
what I hate most.
colonial evangelism.
the historic characters I dislike most.
most western royals born after 1700.
the military enterprise I like the most.
what? umm, I have no idea. the american revolution, perhaps?
the reformation I appreciate the most.
predictably, the equal rights amendment.
nature's gift I would like to have.
shit, i just wish i could maintain a productive garden.
how I would like to die.
i shan't be picky, i only ask for sufficient notice.
my soul's present condition.
assuming that "soul" is a metaphor for one's self image: tired, incomplete.
the faults I can bear.
so far, i suppose all of them--under the caveat, that is, that I don't equate "to bear" with "to accept".
my motto.
"poor is the man whose pleasures depend on the permission of another" (thanks madonna).
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adaptability, intellectual vigor, and conviviality ( i guess i could just say i think i'm friendly).
a quality I desire in a man.
independence.
a quality I desire in a woman.
audacity.
what I appreciate most among my friends.
we laugh until we wet our pants.
my principal defect.
laziness.
my favourite occupation.
either camper or lakeswimmer, I can't decide.
my dream of felicity.
oh god, I don't know if this is an appropriate forum for such a question... um, i'll just say "a blissful future" and you interpret what you will. i will offer this: there will be lots of post-coital headrubs. Lots.
what would for me be the biggest misfortune.
to fall into the easy groove of temperance and/or righteousness.
whom I would like to be.
a field researcher for the CDC or the NIH.
were I would like to live.
somewhere alpine, or anywhere in france. i'd also be quite happy to come back here, my home of the past 23 years.
the colour I prefer.
maroon (specifically, perylene red, pr179) .
the flower I love.
apple blossom and lycoris radiate esthetically, gardenia or mimosa for fragrance.
the bird I prefer.
the sparrow--this tiny non-native bird that is reviled because some dumbass brits released it into the u.s., resulting in the displacement of other species of birds. Hey, it's done--deal with it, don't fucking kill the sparrows.
my favourite authors.
michel houellebecq, mary doria russell.
my favourite poets.
thomas lux, a.e. housman (and maybe richard brautigan... poet status debatable).
my heroes in fiction.
(sigh...) emilio sandoz.
my heroines in fiction.
(sigh...) anne edwards.
my favourite composers.
air, boards of canada, mahler, and debussey.
my favourite artists.
mark ryden, john kushmaul (local), kembra pfahler, megan mattax (local), joseph beuys.
my heroes in real life.
amy and david sedaris ("hero" is gender neutral nowadays, right?).
my heroines in history.
betty page, virginia woolf (i wish they could have dated--think of the potential soft-core porn and individualist literature THAT would have produced).
my favourite names.
for boys the french "achille;" for girls i've always liked "lydia"
what I hate most.
colonial evangelism.
the historic characters I dislike most.
most western royals born after 1700.
the military enterprise I like the most.
what? umm, I have no idea. the american revolution, perhaps?
the reformation I appreciate the most.
predictably, the equal rights amendment.
nature's gift I would like to have.
shit, i just wish i could maintain a productive garden.
how I would like to die.
i shan't be picky, i only ask for sufficient notice.
my soul's present condition.
assuming that "soul" is a metaphor for one's self image: tired, incomplete.
the faults I can bear.
so far, i suppose all of them--under the caveat, that is, that I don't equate "to bear" with "to accept".
my motto.
"poor is the man whose pleasures depend on the permission of another" (thanks madonna).
Thursday, October 23, 2003
Three cheers for Vilain et. al.
I sighed a heavy sigh of personal validation when I read this. I hate to admit it, but I did.
In a single, modest publishing stroke, a few researchers have finally found evidence demonstrating that sexual determination presages even the hormonal flush that serves to differentiate between male and female morphologies. I knew that it would be put simply like this, concisely conscripted in satisfyingly terse journalspeak. And thank god, you know? Thank god. I needed this. I wanted something swift, a foundational change that acted independently of my participation, that just said, "hey everybody, it's genetic... you can stop talking about it now." Something that acknowledged in print that the "nature vs. nurture" conflict was nothing but circular reasoning; a scientific voice to point out that 'nurture,' the environmental influence, has to act on 'nature,' the genetic template that accepts modification. No one needs to get as excited about this as I am as there is undoubtedly more follow-up research that will be done to confirm or debunk this work, but in the meantime I'm going to make a copy of this study and frame it on the ceiling above my bed, right beside the mirror.
In a single, modest publishing stroke, a few researchers have finally found evidence demonstrating that sexual determination presages even the hormonal flush that serves to differentiate between male and female morphologies. I knew that it would be put simply like this, concisely conscripted in satisfyingly terse journalspeak. And thank god, you know? Thank god. I needed this. I wanted something swift, a foundational change that acted independently of my participation, that just said, "hey everybody, it's genetic... you can stop talking about it now." Something that acknowledged in print that the "nature vs. nurture" conflict was nothing but circular reasoning; a scientific voice to point out that 'nurture,' the environmental influence, has to act on 'nature,' the genetic template that accepts modification. No one needs to get as excited about this as I am as there is undoubtedly more follow-up research that will be done to confirm or debunk this work, but in the meantime I'm going to make a copy of this study and frame it on the ceiling above my bed, right beside the mirror.
You dirty switch!
My friend and former professor runs the American Native Press Archives. Said prof is, understandably, quite the walking reference of Native American issues, historic and contemporary. He's in the process of procuring grant funds to develop what is now just a few rooms in the university library into an impressive free-standing institute, freed from university money by its own robust endowment. It's great to get him off topic occasionally and listen to the more vicious, modern accounts of the desperate measures certain groups go to simply for the sake of eliminating the potential threat that Native American interest groups pose to reservation-oriented business ventures. Of course, my filthy mouth dictates most of my interests, so here's a gem of a Lakotan insult I've learned from him:
Oglala shan oglala
In its roughest translation, this is approximately "she who throws dirt into her cunt," a randy little number that refers to girls who don't want to give it up on account of their supposedly mud-filled nether regions. Sometimes history makes me smile.
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Oglala shan oglala
In its roughest translation, this is approximately "she who throws dirt into her cunt," a randy little number that refers to girls who don't want to give it up on account of their supposedly mud-filled nether regions. Sometimes history makes me smile.
Wednesday, October 22, 2003
What's that smell?
Motherfucker, it's another weblog. I'm unclear of the direction in which I want to drag this personal experiment, but at the very least I plan on forcing myself to obey some sort of work ethic to get myself in the habit of thinking again. It's been over a year since I graduated, and I'm sensing (hoping?) that I'm finally dragging up from the lazy goo I've been in since. Practice in the public forum will hopefully have the voyeuristic spiciness that writing in a tablet and studying in bed totally lacks. Bear with me, folks, I hope to contribute some interesting shit.
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