Synaxis TV

I have fallen in love with index cards. I only use one side because then you can lay them flat and see all of the information you have collected. It is like having a screen that you can resize at will. (I wonder what that use of a computer metaphor means, not the metahphor itself but the fact that I used it.)

I look forward to grocery shopping now just so I can take out an index card, make my list, then mark each item off one by one as I go down the aisles. It is so much more efficient now. Before I used to go down each aisle at least twice, going back to get things I rememebered once I was on the other side of the store.

I would never have used my Moleskine for something such as a grocery list. I already had it in mind that it is meant for archival information. But the barrier to input is still slightly higher than using index cards and index cards have a pretty big advantage in terms of output. I will have to reassess my input/output schemes (as I am always in the process of doing) (my PDA is included in this process somewhere) and figure out where my Moleskine fits in. But for the time being it may very well be dead.

Buzz buzz buzz buzz buzz… Yep. Dead. Hark. A new era.

• Mojoe's Cafe
• I went to Mojoe's with Hannah and her boyfriend/fiancee. It was good times. Hannah dropped a bunch of cinnamon into her coffee. Then her boyfriend got this scab looking bagel. There was a guy there with a baby that talked to us because we looked like fun people. We talked about music some too (they played the Shins), but they didn't know Kraftwerk.
• Chipotle
• After coffee with Hannah and co. I went over to Chipotle to have lunch with Jen. I advised her on using earplugs to protect her hearing. Then I told her the story of me becoming an atheist, which was interesting because there were parts I had forgotten, like when I was calling myself a neo-Catholic. Jen talked about being happy with her life and embracing the notion that people can do and become what they want, but I told her that I was very suspicious of self-actualizing narratives because they put so much focus on agency.
• One of the interesting things that Jen said was that it made her sad to read my journal since she knew my relationship with Laura was coming to an end while reading it, since we weren't together anymore when Jen and I met.
• Ragstock
• Jen and I stopped at Ragstock on the way back to the car. They had these Morrissey/Smiths shirts I really wanted, but I didn't get any. I looked at tux coats and some Nightmare Before Christmas coats, but I didn't get any of them either.
• The Drive Home
• Before leaving Hannah showed me this movie she made. It was pretty random but very interesting. Hard to describe. It was part of this contest. She got the word terra firma then had to make a movie around that.

• The drive wasn't bad. I got home and dropped off some of my stuff then picked up Kristen to go grocery shopping. private It turned out that I stayed up late for no good reason reading feeds and making notes for updates.

• Woke late again
• I did the breakfast and Family Guy again and it was pretty nice.
• Read Stealing Fire
• Saw the movie Nobody Knows (Dare mo Shiranai) with Larisa
  • I went and picked Larisa up in Hyde Park and I didn't think we'd make it, but we did. I tried taking an alternate route, and even though I botched it a bit and there was a bunch of traffic, it still worked.
• The movie was based on a true story and quite great. It was about a mother with four children who left them by themselves for extended periods of time to be with her boyfriend then eventually never came back. The kids held things together for a while after she was gone but things eventually deteriorated. I won't give away the ending, though it was terribly sad… Hard to imagine some of the things us humans have to put up with.
• Boston Market
• On the way back to Larisa's I stopped at Boston Market and got some chicken. Larisa half-joked about me bringing it into her house. When I was done she wouldn't let me throw it away in there. She's a vegetarian. I figured all of this was good enough reason to tell her about my sister's meats class.
• Chat with Larisa
• Larisa seemed contentious, dismissive, and worn. She told me about this Marx class she is taking where he is presented uncritically and said that she is having serious thoughts about her path in life.
• I told her about an article I read on the bad effects of raising children on a vegan diet. She said, of course, that she isn't a vegan, and I told her that she was more on their side than mine, which she dismissed as nonsensical. I wasn't really sure why she didn't see the connection, but I didn't see the point in contesting.

• When I was leaving Larisa said she was glad I was doing better and mentioned how hard it is to console me since I see through most platitudes.

• Woke Late
• I had a fun time watching Family Guy on TiVo while eating breakfast, then got ready for the show, deciding to pack Stealing Fire (from linguistics) as my reading material.
• Modest Mouse
• I stopped and got some money on the way to the show, as well as one of those Take 5 candies. I love them but they always feel like a ripoff. I went to the venue and spent some time finding a place to park then started the wait. This guy Phillip was there and I talked to him some then his friend Cara showed up. They were both under 21 and had moved to Chicago from Louisiana. Cara told stories about her crazy relatives. One of them attacked a chair, and I said it was probably good at least that he was sticking to inanimate objects. Phillip talked about being in DC Talk, among other Xtian bands, when he was younger and admitted that he still liked some of their stuff. He said that the sucky thing he realized about Xtian bands when he was actually into them was that they were always behind the times, picking up on whatever was popular. It got to be pretty cold out there and Cara did a number of strange dances to keep warm.
• Once we got into the venue they made us wait again inside and then everyone ran to the stage messing up the order of those who had gotten to the venue early. It worked out ok for me for the most part though—I was behind two people then one then I was at the stage for most of Modest Mouse. Before anyone came on they played Trans Europe Express by Kraftwerk, which was quite pleasing. One of the black bodyguards was dancing around to the title track, which was sampled for Afrika Bambata's "Planet Rock."
• One of the openers was good but the other sucked. I guess the OK one was Two Gallants. The other was just the guy's name. It was folky in a bad way. Sounded like open mic type stuff. Just didn't like it. Pretty much horrible.
• There seemed to be some sound issues for Modest Mouse which marred the show. But the songs that used a banjo were great, like "Satin in a Coffin." Overall it was a good show. I think they do Mexican wrestling there, because a masked guy came out on the stage during their set and picked up the guy playing bass, then the lead singer looked at the bass guy with a, "What the hell was that?", expression.
• I saw Cathryn on the way out and advised her to go to Clarkes, but I don't think she was up to heeding my advice.
• Neo

• I stopped by Hannah's, ate some cereal, then we went to Neo. Jen was there and we chatted a bit. She said that she hadn't realized they had made the book for Monster into a movie until she came across my entry about it here in my blog. They played some really great acid songs. Then at the end of the night they started playing crap so Hannah and I left. I had earplugs on during the concert but not at Neo, which was not a good idea. My ears were ringing extremely bad when we left.

• Urban Sociology
• It was an excellent lecture. Sandra talked about how usually "bad women" are poor women. She also talked about how some women have to have three boyfriends to make ends meet instead of one, but it is still "giving to get." She said that under capitalism one set of values is just privileged above the other. Though she said, "I'm not saying we shouldn't life it up. Remember, I'm a minister, but I'm also a thinking person."
• Visual Anthropology
• We watched Nanook of the North, about the eskimoes. I thought it was interesting that at the end there was verbiage to the extent that the eskimo existence was solemn and gray. They killed various animals in the film and a girl in the back had to cover her eyes.
• Development of Modern Anthropology
• We had a great lecture on Khaldun and Maimonides. Andy said part of the reason for the lectures was that other people were thinking about the history of mankind as well. One of the interesting things about Khaldun was that none of his explanations depended on God. And Maimonides tried to reconcile Judaism with Greek philosophy, showing how each of the commandments had a rational basis.
• Trip Preparation
• I spent some time figuring out what I needed to take with me to Chicago and printed out some maps.
• Dinner with Kristen
• I figured I had to eat at some point, so I decided to go ahead and go. Kristen was out of school money so she had to pay for it with plastic. Sucka. She and another friend teased yet another friend that was there about sex. The teased friend said it wasn't polite to talk about such things around the dinner table and that normal people didn't do such things.
• Drove to Chicago
• I had planned on seeing the Motorcycle Diaries then going to Chicago the next day, but I decided to go ahead and go early. The drive wasn't too bad and Hannah's place was easy to find.
• TV: Lost
• Hannah had to be up early and was already a little happy, so we just stayed in and watched TV. I finally got to see Lost. I suppose it was ok. I don't think I could watch it regularly though. Hannah did say that it had good writing though. Not sure I agree. It just seemed too contrived, like the girl who slept with her step-brother.

• Hannah's place was terribly cool. She had some Sexodent in the bathroom and a fuzzy pink swing in the attic.

• Office Hours
• Not sure what I did…
• Culture and Personality
• Gene talked about this guy Stark's theory that one of the reasons that Christianity spread was that they took care of each other and people noticed that more of them fared better when plagues came through.
• Japanese
• The kids did skits. There was this hilarious one about someone being run over. There was a part where one kid opened some bottles of beer with a sword. High hilarity.
• Reading

• I stayed in the office pretty late reading for development of modern anthropology.

• Urban Sociology
• We went over the video from thursday and talked about how it relied on dramatic instance. Sandra said she can't watch anything without being critical, not even cartoons.
• Study
• After helping Aubrey set up for a presentation I did some last studying for my midterm.
• Development of Modern Anthropology
• It weren't so bad. I thought I got questions I didn't want but I was wrong. I also didn't think it'd take long but I spent the whole time writing.
• Office Hours
• The radio transmitter that I ordered to play my PDA over radios came so I had fun with that for a while.
• Feminist Theory
• We talked about the Mommy Myth a bit but Pat left early. Before she left Josh mentioned how justice is seen as masculine and care is seen as feminine. We also talked about how the ideology set in places influences the media to report a certain way.
• I talked about childcare and how some of the issues brought up in the Mommy Myth made me reassess my reading of The F-Word. I talked about how this might be a way of getting third wavers to come around, especially by stressing that political involvement was cultural change, but Pat said that they are marginal in numbers, though Josh brought up the notion of feminism being "in the water."

• After Pat left Kara and I spent a lot of time talking to Josh about his political beliefs. He's preparing for the end of the world and it was difficult finding common ground. We were going to go somewhere to eat but the sushi place was mysteriously closed on this one day so we all took separate paths.

• Office Hours
• I proofread my linguistics paper on folksonomies.
• Culture and Personality
• I talked to Gene on the way to class about atheism. In class we watched the rest of the Greeks video. He mentioned this notion of a porous self again. Surprisingly he took attendance. He was going to take it on Friday but he said that a lot of people were gone so he didn't.
• Japanese
• Our teacher is so crazy. One time she tiptoed over to Lane-san on the tips of her heels. We went over the grammatical form for not knowing which decision to make.
• Linguistics
• We watched this video on Boas. Then we talked about neoteny and the high pitched voices people use to talk to babies.
• Library
• Went over to get books with the crap from the readers. I'm so cheap.
• Fiesta Burrito
• Got the tacos. Steak, chorizo, and something else. It was good stuff and I got real full. The salsa was so very good. It's the cilantro.
• Study Session at Aubrey's
• Her dogs are crazy. One is calm and the other claws at you over and over again. I told here that Mark said she wouldn't tell him what movies she had and she said he was nuts.
• Originally George was going to share work with us but he wasn't going to provide it early enough and he didn't get back to me until I was already on the way over. We listened to Pavement and David Bowie while going over the questions. I tasted spiced rum. It was good times.
• Almost forgot that I talked to my sister before and after Aubrey's. She said that Vlad got a sweet internship and that he really liked Modest Mouse. Her court thing got taken care of too. It was expensive. But maybe she told me that on Sunday.
• Today's Internet
• There was an odd article in the NY Times about intelligent design.
• These extra baby head stories always creep me out…
• Koko has a nipple fetish?
• Some gays are responding to this new AIDS/HIV threat...
• Wheee, Japan is in a recession...

• Hello, Miss McDonald!

• Woke Extremely Late
• Wow. I didn't wake up until 1:30. It was quite disorienting. But oh so nice. After I woke I worked on midterm questions then gave Aubrey and George a call but they weren't around.
• Updates, Feeds, and Reading
• I spent the evening doing my thing then read for feminist theory.
• Went to Sleep Early

• I got tired enough to sleep around midnight so I did.

• Upgrade, Waste, Reading
  • There were a few features added to the new stable version of Wordpress, so I went ahead and upgraded. Since all of my changes were in the theme and in plugins, it really wasn't much work at all. I was quite pleased.
• Other than wasting some time online I worked on questions for the midterm in development of modern anthropology on tuesday.
• Life Aquatic

• Mark and I went to see this in Fowler Hall. They didn't do the wide screen version, which was annoying at some parts, and the colors looked kind of weird, but it was fine. Could have been louder too. A lot of people on the other side of the theater laughed more than I did, but it was a good movie. B+. One of my favorite part was when Jeff Goldblum, who was surprisingly sexy, smacked this dog. I suppose it sounds cruel, but there were just so many things going on that made it absurd.

  

  • Bev's
• Mark and I stopped over after the movie for a chat. She had some friends over and they were watching this randy film set in Victorian England. There were lesbians and leather strap-ons. Quite amusing. After it was over I had some Italian beer and strummed the guitar. Mark and Bev chatted about wood dwelling folk. Bev loved my unintentionally ironic (to them) toothpaste inspired Christ t-shirt.
• IHOP
• Mark and I went over to have a bite. I got the strawberry and banana fruit-filled pancakes (they just flip it over like a taco). Good stuff.
• Some people at a table nearby talked about going to the Star Wars convention. Mark told me about his friend taking leather from the back of his vest and sewing it to the front.
• Today's Internet
• Humorous parent's guide to computer slang.

• An excellent guide to flirting. This part hit me like a brick: "You may also have come across the equally irritating strong, silent type who makes you do all the 'work' in the conversation – who never asks a question, never expresses interest and makes no effort to keep the conversation flowing." It all comes down to economic transactions.