![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
In Which I Babble About the Past Week
Jan. 9th, 2005 01:30 amFolding socks at one in the morning. Whee! But that's all done, and my laundry is all put away. Which is good, because for months I didn't fold anything and left everything clean in the spare room, which I think irritated my mother. But now, being on break, I have time to be not slobby. Also, I had time to wade through the piles of old mail (most of it crap) on my desk. And what did I find? A brand-new, unactivated Discover card. Yeah, the one I thought was missing when the other one expired? On my desk the entire time. It must have arrived months before the other expired, and so I set it aside and promptly forgot about it. Yes, I am a dumbass. But an educated one, so I have some sort of redeeming intellectual quality.
Went shopping for pants the other day, found nothing. Except for new pajama pants, which I also needed. But no cargo pants. None that fit, anyway. Time to quit conforming to my gender, I guess, in order to get what I want.
Also, I got some of my books this week. Only one of the two books for History of the English Language (hereafter referred to as HEL) was in. The ones for the Outlaws class were nowhere to be seen. For the Honors classes with the number 222, they had sections one through eleven. And mine? Is section twelve. So, will have to wait on that one. And for the Tolkien class, I have most of the books already. Including three of the four optional ones. Of course, I think I still have a couple more to get for that class, because the reading list has changed a bit. Leslie sent out an announcement about the class to the MSSA list, and that included the course description, and what I assume is the most up-to-date reading list. There are two books listed that weren't there before.
Tonight I was supposed to go eat Greek food with a bunch of people. But that didn't quite happen, because the Olympia Cafe was closed. So we went next door to BrickYard Pizza. I had a calzone that was yummy. But I could eat only half of it, so the other half is now sitting in the refrigerator. Anyway, there was still a bunch of people. Six others, only two of whom I'd met before. After food, we went to the Vortex to see Shel's Shorts. We sat with the guy doing box office, and between us we took up an entire back row of seating (back row has an extra seat because it doesn't need aisle space, see). Anyway, the show consisted of thirteen short plays by Shel Silverstein, whom you may remember from such childhood classics as The Giving Tree, Where the Sidewalk Ends, and A Light in the Attic. But perhaps you are familiar with some of his adult work, like his essay on polyamory. The show is definitely in the adult work column. Good stuff, though. And mostly well done. There was one, called "Do Not Feed the Animal" that went way over my head. And apparently over anyone else's head. It would have been much improved by better delivery, but as it was, the humor got terribly lost, and the whole thing was just confusing. I wondered why this person on stage was getting all worked up over, well, nothing, really. Somebody involved with the show, when Gabrielle asked about that piece, mentioned something about the actress not taking direction. Which... yes. It was rather painful to watch. And it made me very sad deep inside. But otherwise, the show was good, and quite funny.
I've been reading Thomas More's Utopia. Well, actually I've finished it and have been reading stuff about it. (I have the Norton Critical Edition, which comes with all sorts of supplementary stuff.) I think it's strange that 1. the main character in Ever After is almost obsessed with it, and 2. the way we have come to think of the concept of "utopia." Because etymologically, it means "no place," not "good place" as we have come to think of it, and then invented an opposite for it, "dystopia." I think "no place" makes more sense, because while More's idea of utopia solves some social problems, I can't say that I'd want to live in it any more than I would want to live in Huxley's brave new world.
The other day I finally saw Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. It is now one of my favorite movies, one worth owning. It's so good. It has Jim Carrey in a very atypical Jim Carrey role. And Kate Winslet being not seduced by Leonardo DiCaprio (one of my least favorite actors). Most of the other characters in the movie I want to slap silly, but that doesn't decrease my enjoyment of the thing at all. My favorite part of the movie is where Joel is remembering the time he first met Clementine, and she asks if she can "borrow his chicken" and then just takes it in a way that he describes as "so familiar, like we were already lovers." That part reminds me of something that now saddens me but eventually won't.
Went shopping for pants the other day, found nothing. Except for new pajama pants, which I also needed. But no cargo pants. None that fit, anyway. Time to quit conforming to my gender, I guess, in order to get what I want.
Also, I got some of my books this week. Only one of the two books for History of the English Language (hereafter referred to as HEL) was in. The ones for the Outlaws class were nowhere to be seen. For the Honors classes with the number 222, they had sections one through eleven. And mine? Is section twelve. So, will have to wait on that one. And for the Tolkien class, I have most of the books already. Including three of the four optional ones. Of course, I think I still have a couple more to get for that class, because the reading list has changed a bit. Leslie sent out an announcement about the class to the MSSA list, and that included the course description, and what I assume is the most up-to-date reading list. There are two books listed that weren't there before.
Tonight I was supposed to go eat Greek food with a bunch of people. But that didn't quite happen, because the Olympia Cafe was closed. So we went next door to BrickYard Pizza. I had a calzone that was yummy. But I could eat only half of it, so the other half is now sitting in the refrigerator. Anyway, there was still a bunch of people. Six others, only two of whom I'd met before. After food, we went to the Vortex to see Shel's Shorts. We sat with the guy doing box office, and between us we took up an entire back row of seating (back row has an extra seat because it doesn't need aisle space, see). Anyway, the show consisted of thirteen short plays by Shel Silverstein, whom you may remember from such childhood classics as The Giving Tree, Where the Sidewalk Ends, and A Light in the Attic. But perhaps you are familiar with some of his adult work, like his essay on polyamory. The show is definitely in the adult work column. Good stuff, though. And mostly well done. There was one, called "Do Not Feed the Animal" that went way over my head. And apparently over anyone else's head. It would have been much improved by better delivery, but as it was, the humor got terribly lost, and the whole thing was just confusing. I wondered why this person on stage was getting all worked up over, well, nothing, really. Somebody involved with the show, when Gabrielle asked about that piece, mentioned something about the actress not taking direction. Which... yes. It was rather painful to watch. And it made me very sad deep inside. But otherwise, the show was good, and quite funny.
I've been reading Thomas More's Utopia. Well, actually I've finished it and have been reading stuff about it. (I have the Norton Critical Edition, which comes with all sorts of supplementary stuff.) I think it's strange that 1. the main character in Ever After is almost obsessed with it, and 2. the way we have come to think of the concept of "utopia." Because etymologically, it means "no place," not "good place" as we have come to think of it, and then invented an opposite for it, "dystopia." I think "no place" makes more sense, because while More's idea of utopia solves some social problems, I can't say that I'd want to live in it any more than I would want to live in Huxley's brave new world.
The other day I finally saw Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. It is now one of my favorite movies, one worth owning. It's so good. It has Jim Carrey in a very atypical Jim Carrey role. And Kate Winslet being not seduced by Leonardo DiCaprio (one of my least favorite actors). Most of the other characters in the movie I want to slap silly, but that doesn't decrease my enjoyment of the thing at all. My favorite part of the movie is where Joel is remembering the time he first met Clementine, and she asks if she can "borrow his chicken" and then just takes it in a way that he describes as "so familiar, like we were already lovers." That part reminds me of something that now saddens me but eventually won't.
