So it's the final rundown to my thesis draft due date. I will be doing little else this week other than maintaining my bodily functions in order to finish the draft on time, which I keep making more difficult by changing the topic. The conclusions I've reached stay much the same, and now I'm basically just changing the questions to fit the answers. I'm hoping that by really nailing the topic, the actual writing of the thing will be easier and faster. We'll see how true that is...
On the party/social front, I'm dealing with the same issues I've been having since at least last year, which is that I don't enjoy a lot of the parties here, yet at the same time I feel like I need to get to know more quality people and bring them into my life. The party I was at last night seemed more like an exercise in making small talk with strangers than anything that could produce real camaraderie. I have therefore decided that I need more video games in my life, to share pursuits with like-minded people. That always seemed to be the way to happiness and friendship before, so I'm not quite sure why I forgot. To this end, I'm thinking seriously about bringing World of Warcraft back into my life - a dangerous idea to be sure. We shall see...
It was actually the music from Blizzard that got me thinking seriously about WoW again. I've put it up in the public folder. Have at it.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Monday, October 26, 2009
Here we stand, on 10/26/09, feet on the ground, facing forward
Hey friends. Looks like I'm gonna have to switch around the daily update thing, since I've already failed to keep up with it. I think I'll try for Sunday - Wednesday, since weekend nights have a habit of leaving me occupied or incapacitated when I would usually be writing these.
Fun events from the weekend:
A friend of Alison's came to visit, and hanging out with him was fun but not without its complications. He also has the strange power, like our friend Zach from back home, of attracting the attention of every female in every room he entered. One can only marvel. And roll their eyes.
On Saturday I went to practice at my Kendo teacher's dojo. For the first hour, my teacher taught myself and a 60 year old gentleman how to do Iaido (居合道, roughly translated it seems to mean "the way of acting in harmony with being"), which put simply is the art of drawing the sword in response to a surprise attack. From what I can tell, Iaido is to Battoujutsu as Kendo is to Kenjutsu - Kendo is derived from fighting forms using an already drawn sword, while Iaido is an art derived from techniques starting and ending with a sheathed sword. Unlike Kendo, Iaido is not competitive and is considered to be an art that is necessarily individual. From what I've read and heard about it, and based on the interpretation of the name, it's supposed to be a very personal exercise, as much about cultivating internal awareness as external technique. For this reason, some people refer to it as "moving Zen". Anyways, it's amazingly cool to watch, and I enjoyed what little I did immensely. Hopefully I can scrape together enough money to buy a sword sometime soon(Iaido is practiced with real, though usually blunt, swords), but in the meantime I plan on going every week with my wooden sword to practice.
After an hour of that came an additional 3 hours of Kendo practice, by the end of which I literally couldn't speak above a whisper from shouting so much. It was a lot of fun, even the part where I had my back to the wall and was getting hit by my teacher faster than I could follow with my eyes. I think the most important implication of this development in my practice of Kendo (and the beginning of my Iaido practice) is that it represents an endeavor that I've excelled at, really enjoy and respect, and can happily incorporate into my identity. I think I generally try to avoid making my identity about anything other than what goes on in my head, but perhaps that's why I feel so adrift so often. Maybe I can take this accomplishment of mine, which I'm really proud of, and hang some weight on it so to speak. Instead of having my identity inform every single thing I do, maybe I can relax a bit and let this pursuit of mine influence my identity a little bit.
Yeah, I'm a swordsman. What of it?
Just the thought makes me feel calm.
Websites:
Iaido
Seven questions that keep physicists up at night:
Music:
Been listening to Laura Veirs, who opened for the Decemberists when Borge and I went to see them last month. Posted a track called "John Henry Lives".
Peace Friends
Fun events from the weekend:
A friend of Alison's came to visit, and hanging out with him was fun but not without its complications. He also has the strange power, like our friend Zach from back home, of attracting the attention of every female in every room he entered. One can only marvel. And roll their eyes.
On Saturday I went to practice at my Kendo teacher's dojo. For the first hour, my teacher taught myself and a 60 year old gentleman how to do Iaido (居合道, roughly translated it seems to mean "the way of acting in harmony with being"), which put simply is the art of drawing the sword in response to a surprise attack. From what I can tell, Iaido is to Battoujutsu as Kendo is to Kenjutsu - Kendo is derived from fighting forms using an already drawn sword, while Iaido is an art derived from techniques starting and ending with a sheathed sword. Unlike Kendo, Iaido is not competitive and is considered to be an art that is necessarily individual. From what I've read and heard about it, and based on the interpretation of the name, it's supposed to be a very personal exercise, as much about cultivating internal awareness as external technique. For this reason, some people refer to it as "moving Zen". Anyways, it's amazingly cool to watch, and I enjoyed what little I did immensely. Hopefully I can scrape together enough money to buy a sword sometime soon(Iaido is practiced with real, though usually blunt, swords), but in the meantime I plan on going every week with my wooden sword to practice.
After an hour of that came an additional 3 hours of Kendo practice, by the end of which I literally couldn't speak above a whisper from shouting so much. It was a lot of fun, even the part where I had my back to the wall and was getting hit by my teacher faster than I could follow with my eyes. I think the most important implication of this development in my practice of Kendo (and the beginning of my Iaido practice) is that it represents an endeavor that I've excelled at, really enjoy and respect, and can happily incorporate into my identity. I think I generally try to avoid making my identity about anything other than what goes on in my head, but perhaps that's why I feel so adrift so often. Maybe I can take this accomplishment of mine, which I'm really proud of, and hang some weight on it so to speak. Instead of having my identity inform every single thing I do, maybe I can relax a bit and let this pursuit of mine influence my identity a little bit.
Yeah, I'm a swordsman. What of it?
Just the thought makes me feel calm.
Websites:
Iaido
Seven questions that keep physicists up at night:
Music:
Been listening to Laura Veirs, who opened for the Decemberists when Borge and I went to see them last month. Posted a track called "John Henry Lives".
Peace Friends
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Look around, it's 10/20/09
Today I resolve to be an unstoppable juggernaut of self-confidence.
I think I have the intellectual capacity to understand, and possibly even excel, at whatever I put my mind to, and therefore the only impediments to achieving everything I can reasonably desire to achieve are time and my own character faults. As to the latter, I intend to identify and eradicate them to the best of my ability. I will identify what I want and then use my reason and intellect as a vantage point both to survey the best way to attain it and circumvent my own weaknesses. I'm gonna win this thing dammit.
I also need to figure out how best to simultaneously and effectively continue my study of music, programming, and astronomy after school. Perhaps I can become one of those brilliant shiny people that's good at everything and seemingly never sleeps...
Site of the day:
http://www.collegehumor.com/article:1792544
Song of the day (up at public folder):
I've wanted to post this one for a while but it's kept slipping my mind. How sad it was that we could not believe...
Hallelujah, by the Helio Sequence
I think I have the intellectual capacity to understand, and possibly even excel, at whatever I put my mind to, and therefore the only impediments to achieving everything I can reasonably desire to achieve are time and my own character faults. As to the latter, I intend to identify and eradicate them to the best of my ability. I will identify what I want and then use my reason and intellect as a vantage point both to survey the best way to attain it and circumvent my own weaknesses. I'm gonna win this thing dammit.
I also need to figure out how best to simultaneously and effectively continue my study of music, programming, and astronomy after school. Perhaps I can become one of those brilliant shiny people that's good at everything and seemingly never sleeps...
Site of the day:
http://www.collegehumor.com/article:1792544
Song of the day (up at public folder):
I've wanted to post this one for a while but it's kept slipping my mind. How sad it was that we could not believe...
Hallelujah, by the Helio Sequence
Monday, October 19, 2009
Daily Wave - 10/19
Ok let's play a new game.
In addition to longer entries, which I intent to write soon, every day I'm going to post things I run across or thoughts that I have or things that I'm listening to. It'll be something like this:
Astronomy is becoming a bigger and bigger fascination for me, and this week I've been treated to news stories and pictures regarding planets and moons within our own solar system. In particular, I've read about how Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moon Enceladus both (almost certainly) have vast underground oceans, possibly capable of supporting life (either ours in the long run, or life that might already be there that we don't know about). Anyways, in Saturn news, there's this site:
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/10/saturn_at_equinox.html
which I've shared with most of you already probably. The site is just generally awesome so you all should keep it bookmarked, rssed, whatever.
A thought provoking article about flu vaccinations:
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/print/200911/brownlee-h1n1
Been listening to a bunch of random stuff recently, from Bach to Tchaikovsky to Arvo Part to Massive Attack etc., but I think I'll make the song of the day: Small Time Shoot 'em Up by Massive Attack. It'll be up on the public folder.
Thought of the day: How do you beat yourself?
So. Pictures, websites, music of interest, daily.
Let's see how long I keep this up...
In addition to longer entries, which I intent to write soon, every day I'm going to post things I run across or thoughts that I have or things that I'm listening to. It'll be something like this:
Astronomy is becoming a bigger and bigger fascination for me, and this week I've been treated to news stories and pictures regarding planets and moons within our own solar system. In particular, I've read about how Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moon Enceladus both (almost certainly) have vast underground oceans, possibly capable of supporting life (either ours in the long run, or life that might already be there that we don't know about). Anyways, in Saturn news, there's this site:
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/10/saturn_at_equinox.html
which I've shared with most of you already probably. The site is just generally awesome so you all should keep it bookmarked, rssed, whatever.
A thought provoking article about flu vaccinations:
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/print/200911/brownlee-h1n1
Been listening to a bunch of random stuff recently, from Bach to Tchaikovsky to Arvo Part to Massive Attack etc., but I think I'll make the song of the day: Small Time Shoot 'em Up by Massive Attack. It'll be up on the public folder.
Thought of the day: How do you beat yourself?
So. Pictures, websites, music of interest, daily.
Let's see how long I keep this up...
Saturday, September 12, 2009
We carry each other
My friend posted this, and for some strange reason I couldn't reply on the blog directly, so I'm going to do it here. He wrote:
"
I have dreamed a dream, but now that dream is gone from me.
.
..
...
That is really all that need be said, but I suppose for lack of anything else to do in this hotel room, I'll pontificate. Briefly.
The matrix it turns out was right about everything as the quote above would seem to indicate. Also matrices are bad as is clearly indicated by a) the movies and b) mo-mor-puggers.
Sigh, I feel so damn emo right now. I really don't want to turn this into a rant. I do want to shape my feelings into arguments, mold my convictions into unwavering logic that would solve all the problems before me, and convert the non-believers to my manifest conclusions ( also possibly converting them into radioactive vapor).
Maybe I just deal poorly with change. I had this naive theory that we would all live together at some point. This theory is clearly flawed in its assumptions that this would be plausible. I don't know.
Coherence. I crave the ability to extract from my imagination the wisp of an idea and brand it into form. A form like prose. This would be most useful. If only I was an artist.
"
My reply:
Funny, you sound like someone I know...but I would reply with the words of a great friend of mine:
"You just gotta belieeeeeeeeeve."
I think I've been down this same road you seem to be describing far, far too often, and it doesn't really even go anywhere. As much as I want to be able to get a grip on my life, to really decide how I'm going to approach every day based on my convictions, it seems the harder you try to hold on to anything, the more easily it slips by. Again, as you told me, our best hope seems to be in possibility - allowing for it and embracing it. And even though the greatest challenge might be relinquishing the desire for this control, or even the desire for any of this to MEAN anything, ultimately I think we'll be happier when we can finally let go...
I had that dream too, and just as you do I feel it slipping away, but it's not the end of the story. I think we still have a greater dream that the world and all the convoluted shifts in circumstance can't take from us, and that is to keep our eyes open and see what there is to take from this life. Our greatest triumph is yet to come, and it'll take more than this to stop us. Paul isn't leaving us, not in the really important ways, and I don't think he'll ever lose what it is that ties him to us. I can't say what exactly that is, but I think it's there, and I think it'll hold us together even when we don't know how things are going to work out. It's part of who we are, and the people we have made ourselves and each other into.
I had a funny thought yesterday as I was carrying the piano keyboard back to my dorm. It was all boxed up in cardboard and tape, and as I was carrying it on my shoulder, it felt to me like I was a pallbearer carrying a casket. I tried to shake off the thought, but it makes a weird kind of sense. We're always carrying our life, and in turn our death, around with us. We are the keepers of our life story, and we carry it with us everywhere, and so too do we carry our friends with us. After all, they're a part of our lives too. As I said before, we've made each other this way, and just like how we are never without our home, so too are we never without each other. Even when we're alone, we all carry each other. It is the reason for our strength, and there is no greater honor.
"
I have dreamed a dream, but now that dream is gone from me.
.
..
...
That is really all that need be said, but I suppose for lack of anything else to do in this hotel room, I'll pontificate. Briefly.
The matrix it turns out was right about everything as the quote above would seem to indicate. Also matrices are bad as is clearly indicated by a) the movies and b) mo-mor-puggers.
Sigh, I feel so damn emo right now. I really don't want to turn this into a rant. I do want to shape my feelings into arguments, mold my convictions into unwavering logic that would solve all the problems before me, and convert the non-believers to my manifest conclusions ( also possibly converting them into radioactive vapor).
Maybe I just deal poorly with change. I had this naive theory that we would all live together at some point. This theory is clearly flawed in its assumptions that this would be plausible. I don't know.
Coherence. I crave the ability to extract from my imagination the wisp of an idea and brand it into form. A form like prose. This would be most useful. If only I was an artist.
"
My reply:
Funny, you sound like someone I know...but I would reply with the words of a great friend of mine:
"You just gotta belieeeeeeeeeve."
I think I've been down this same road you seem to be describing far, far too often, and it doesn't really even go anywhere. As much as I want to be able to get a grip on my life, to really decide how I'm going to approach every day based on my convictions, it seems the harder you try to hold on to anything, the more easily it slips by. Again, as you told me, our best hope seems to be in possibility - allowing for it and embracing it. And even though the greatest challenge might be relinquishing the desire for this control, or even the desire for any of this to MEAN anything, ultimately I think we'll be happier when we can finally let go...
I had that dream too, and just as you do I feel it slipping away, but it's not the end of the story. I think we still have a greater dream that the world and all the convoluted shifts in circumstance can't take from us, and that is to keep our eyes open and see what there is to take from this life. Our greatest triumph is yet to come, and it'll take more than this to stop us. Paul isn't leaving us, not in the really important ways, and I don't think he'll ever lose what it is that ties him to us. I can't say what exactly that is, but I think it's there, and I think it'll hold us together even when we don't know how things are going to work out. It's part of who we are, and the people we have made ourselves and each other into.
I had a funny thought yesterday as I was carrying the piano keyboard back to my dorm. It was all boxed up in cardboard and tape, and as I was carrying it on my shoulder, it felt to me like I was a pallbearer carrying a casket. I tried to shake off the thought, but it makes a weird kind of sense. We're always carrying our life, and in turn our death, around with us. We are the keepers of our life story, and we carry it with us everywhere, and so too do we carry our friends with us. After all, they're a part of our lives too. As I said before, we've made each other this way, and just like how we are never without our home, so too are we never without each other. Even when we're alone, we all carry each other. It is the reason for our strength, and there is no greater honor.
Friday, August 21, 2009
Dig
We all have a weakness
But some of ours are easy to identify.
Look me in the eye and ask for forgiveness;
We'll make a pact to never speak that word again
Yes you are my friend.
We all have something that digs at us,
At least we dig each other
So when weakness turns my ego up
I know you'll count on the me from yesterday
If I turn into another
Dig me up from under what is covering
The better part of me
Sing this song
Remind me that we'll always have each other
When everything else is gone.
We all have a sickness
That cleverly attaches and multiplies
No matter how we try.
We all have someone that digs at us,
At least we dig each other
So when sickness turns my ego up
I know you'll act as a clever medicine.
If I turn into another
Dig me up from under what is covering
The better part of me.
Sing this song!
Remind me that we'll always have each other
When everything else is gone.
Thanks everyone. See you soon.
But some of ours are easy to identify.
Look me in the eye and ask for forgiveness;
We'll make a pact to never speak that word again
Yes you are my friend.
We all have something that digs at us,
At least we dig each other
So when weakness turns my ego up
I know you'll count on the me from yesterday
If I turn into another
Dig me up from under what is covering
The better part of me
Sing this song
Remind me that we'll always have each other
When everything else is gone.
We all have a sickness
That cleverly attaches and multiplies
No matter how we try.
We all have someone that digs at us,
At least we dig each other
So when sickness turns my ego up
I know you'll act as a clever medicine.
If I turn into another
Dig me up from under what is covering
The better part of me.
Sing this song!
Remind me that we'll always have each other
When everything else is gone.
Thanks everyone. See you soon.
Friday, August 7, 2009
Reflections 8/7
They speak another language. I speak their language. I am from an other country. But I am here. I live here. I live in this moment. I am here. I AM!
My own waggling fingers are so alien to me. I wonder if I tell enough people that my stories will be famous that they will believe me. I wonder if I will believe me. The raindrops fall on my face - they know me better than I do.
I hope you'll call me in the morning.
Maybe you'll be the one to wake me up.
My own waggling fingers are so alien to me. I wonder if I tell enough people that my stories will be famous that they will believe me. I wonder if I will believe me. The raindrops fall on my face - they know me better than I do.
I hope you'll call me in the morning.
Maybe you'll be the one to wake me up.
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