ideas ideas

I apologize for how shitty the new layout may look.

Uh.

Yeah.

It's clean and makes the words stand out more.

So it's morning and I haven't slept all night, trying to make it through this day though. I want to get my sleep schedule back in order, because for like the past month I've been going to bed at like 3-6 am and waking up at 1-5 pm and it is a terrible terrible habit. Like, I waste the whole day. If it were winter, I would be literally sleeping through the entirety of daylight, which I'm sure is not healthy. So I'll try to get that straight.

Because, man, I want to use my days. Not in a oh these days are numbered and few, must use life to its full potential, because that's a lot of crap. I don't think it's terrible to sleep all day; it certainly feels great. Up to a point, of course, after which it seems like your bones are about to shatter. No, no all I mean is that I have stuff that needs to be done, like within the next month or so, and sleeping all day isn't getting any of that done. Important stuff too, like rereading all the Harry Potter books in time for LeakyCon and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 movie release. Which, that should be self-explanatory.

I'm trying to stay awake. I personally think I can do it, because I've always invested in a philosophy of spirit overcomes the body, which is stupid (though interestingly really related to Christian thought, I've discovered, albeit in less of a GOD IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN YOUR EARTHLY LIVES and more like my mind is greater than the physical obstacles that stand in its path) and probably not good for either spirit or flesh.

Anyway, I was thinking about something last night, and then I remembered that earlier in the shower I had thought about the novel title I had thought was pretty cool a few days/weeks ago, inspired by a short story called "Life of the Body" by Tobias Wolff (which I should probably read).

The Spirit of the Flesh.

Starting not to like it already. Too overly biblical images, will probably be mistook for a Christian non-fiction book about achieving your true inner light or whatever it is that is God, which is not what the book will be about, pretty sure. Not sure what it will be about, but I wrote a couple hundred words of random stuff, as well as some notes about what it could be about. Also "flesh" isn't as nice a word as I'd previously thought. I mean for all anyone knows it could be a book about some weird guy getting a spiritual understanding about his penis or something. Which it is definitely not about.

It's weird how people write books! How ideas and words from these human beings are transformed over time into these amazing and often cathartic stories we read so eagerly and empathetically.

Apologies for potential unbearableness in reading this given that I am writing it very tired and on no sleep (well! I mean I've gotten sleep in my life, but--). Better to write poop-colored crap than nothing at all.

poetic representation of a dream i had

&06/01/11&

from new jersey
by train or bus
to philadelphia
or thereabouts

stormy weather
maybe a band's playing
it's cold
how'd i get here?

sleek gray amtrak towards pittsburgh
10 minutes, that fast!
drive me to safety
where the hell is this?

*

this station's real crowded
i'm consumed by the space
everyone's huddled together
but i'm stuck out in the rain alone

man did i mention it's midnight
the trees shade the train tracks
i wander around between
the lobby and platforms

idle idle idle
should have planned ahead
several paths to walk
none of them viable

*

let me stay in new york
or new england, hah
even this dark forest
not waiting for a train

hey, you—
are you guys leaving?
will you need that blanket
cause cement's awful cold

2:40 am i'm tired
no restless
they're back to their families
but it's deserted here

*

pick myself off the ground
hours later, post-sleep
stretch my sore limbs
squint at the sun

try not to cry
when the sounds hit my skull
wait for the fever to pass
ground shaking

0500's coming
mighty and virile
hope it takes me someplace good
i'm tired of waiting

If people died and were resurrected periodically at the rate this blog is reborn the world would be filled with zombies of zombies of zombies of z...

Hi.

It's me.

I'm going to write stuff again maybe.

I dislike being lazy and inert.

But goddamn it is so tempting.

Here is a thing that I've observed.

Metaphor isn't always an improvement.

Nor necessarily a sign of quality.

It's just a metaphor.

Sorry, I've been reading some books.

I got an introductory anthology to semiotics* from Goodwill!

Haha this isn't a substantive post or anything.

Just an update to show commitment that I'll do this thing.

More news: later.

---

* A weird study of "signs" somewhere between linguistics, philosophy, sociology, a bunch of stuff. Crazy stuff.

Numbers and Words: Double Major in English & Philosophy with a Minor in Pure Mathematics, Or, Really Milking Your Undergrad's 50K per annum's Worth

English:

1. [Major Authors] The Ancient World + Late Antiquity and the Medieval World
2. [Seminar in Literature] Tragedy and the Tragic
3. [EN322] British Literature I
4. [EN323] British Literature II
5. [American Lit. before 1900] 19th Century American Novel
6. [Literature before 1800] Something
7. [Concepts and Methods of Literary Study] Literary Criticism I
   
8. Literary Criticism II
9. Modern American Novel
10. Contemporary American Literature
11. Independent Work
12. Independent Work

Philosophy:

1. [PH300] History of Ancient Philosophy
2. [PH310] History of Modern Philosophy
3. [PH160 or PH360] Intro to Logic
4. [PH350] History of Ethics
5. [PH403-439] 19th Century Philosophy
6. [PH400-level] Epistemology
7. [PH200+] Metaphysics
8. [PH200+] Mathematical Logic
9. [Other] Foundations of Mathematics

Mathematics:

• Calculus I
• Calculus II

1. [MA225 or MA230] Multivariate Calculus
2. [MA226 or MA231] Differential Equations
3. [MA242 or MA442] Linear Algebra
4. [MA400+] Mathematical Logic
5. [MA400+] Foundations of Mathematics

Also:

Linguae:

1. Latin I
2. Latin II

1. Ancient Greek I
2. Ancient Greek II
3. Ancient Greek Prose: Plato and Paul
4. Ancient Greek Poetry: Homeric Epic

Knowledge

Manar said...

HAHAHAHA.
You know Arka, you could totally have your own online comic strip.

Don't give me ideas!

Okay so.

Here are the things I want to learn/know/understand:

• all the math ever
• quantum physics on a mathematical basis
• how biology/the body works[1]
• literary theory
• all the religions
• English, Latin, Ancient Greek, French, Dutch and/or Swedish and/or Spanish [Russian too if I want to literally kill myself!]
• all philosophy
• how language works
• something about art
• psychology
• religion
• really basically every topic covered by Very Short Introductions.

Really, money and grades and all aside, I wish I could stay in school forever and just learn about everything.

---

Haha whoops forgot about this [thanks Manar]:

1. yeah this is just so Lindsay will stop being horrified at my lack of knowledge about the structure of life

my life every week

This happened like five seconds ago.

So I'm sitting in my room, chilling, listening to The Mountain Goats and looking at t**** and stuff, and so suddenly, I hear something vaguely through my thick dorm room walls. Coming from behind me, who am sitting facing my computer which is at the wall... fuck it I'll draw it.

Okay see so I was hearing this particular set of guitar notes being played in a fashion I am familiar. And it went on for a while, as in maybe five more seconds. And I knew what it was.

I burst out of my door into the hallway, and slid into the room adjacent mine, on the left at least. My neighbor Ethan was there sitting with his guitar, strumming his guitar in that familiar pattern, stopping to look up at the apparition at the door.

"Is that... is that a Bright Eyes song you're playing??" I asked, anxiously.

"Yeah, it is!" he said. "I didn't know you liked Bright Eyes..."

"Oh, I do," I replied.

"Dude, 'Something Vague' is my favorite Bright Eyes song!"

"No! Me too!"

"Really, it's your favorite?" he inquired

"Yes—well, maybe also 'Bowl of Oranges.'"

"Get out, no way. You like The Mountain Goats too, right?"

"Yes."

"How many songs, or albums, of theirs do you have?"

"Uh... at least over 500...."

"Sweet! We need to share this stuff. Like, soon."

[...]

Etc.

Music is nice. I need to get a guitar soon (and also not suck).

Feb. 1

Lysh said:

So I don't know why my google reader isn't working for this blog and then it suddenly fed me like 20 blogs. ANYWAYS, I love your blog! It's a very good blog. I just spent a good portion of my blizzard-hibernating night reading it. You write interesting things, so keep going!

So I decided that since I like comments a lot but I can never really find a good way of replying to them on damn blogger (in this way t*m**r is superior), I'll just reply to ones I have replies to somewhere sometime[1] in a post, like thus:

Yeah I do enjoy writing this when I do, especially when I write all obnoxiously and wittily. But yes, I'm glad you like it :) There's not much point in writing in an open medium if it doesn't please anyone. I shall earnestly keep going!

Anyway, so semester II of college is going pretty well. I'm stuck indoors a lot due to weather/laziness, but that's okay.

• English is off to a bumpy start owning to my professor being late all the time because of the harsh weather, but the readings are really interesting, since man I love literary theory. I've not been terribly diligent with it, though, but I've tried. Hey, I wrote my papers decently, and that's what matters, right?[2]
• Ancient World II is pretty okay, the works we're reading aren't as dynamic as the Odyssey or Republic, but they are sufficiently intriguing. We're spending a month on Eastern stuff, which is surprisingly up-to-date for a classics class.
• Fuck, I love calculus. Math is so fun; I just love sitting here and working through problem sets and knowing I'm getting them right because I'm so awesome[3]. We finally started doing real calc II stuff (integration by parts) which is neat. My professor is amazing, too. He compared working out integrals to finding a lost kid at a train station ("and you, since you know your kid pretty well, you know that he's probably going to be at station #4, because, as you know, he enjoys doing drugs at station #4. So, correspondingly, you can skip right to u-sub." [4]).
• Second-semester Latin is not bad. It's really just starting off learning a language and learning the forms that's really frustrating. Now that I have most of the conjugations and declensions and syntactical stuff down, I am pretty confident with most basic Latin. I can even translate fairly quickly. And now we're just doing little nitpicky stuff like participles and gerunds and indirect statements that are fairly simple.

It's been snowing pretty generously today, and the snow is pretty, I'll admit, and I am kind of hoping for a snow day tomorrow.

---

Missed you, blog.

1. I think I am correct maybe in saying that the different between a while and awhile, some time and sometime, is that the former is a noun/object, the latter more adjective.
2. That is not what matters.
3. ...and Asian....
4. This is paraphrased, but only slightly since most of these words were things he'd said.

this blogging is going terribly :(

1:23 am jan 27 2011

This counts for January 24th, okay?

I need to read Harry Potter more. I had lent my RA my copy of DH and got it back today, and holding it in my hand made me realize how kind of detached I've become from the Potter canon. Which I used to be able to recall significant parts of from memory.

Agh my laptop is kind of working now but it's not very reliable in that it could stop any second.

I wonder if sometimes what people call coded and hidden messages are really just messages expressed the only way the speaker can possibly express it without causing much self-pain.