| slum dogs |
[Nov. 17th, 2009|07:29 am] |
"Instead of the gratitude she knows she ought to feel, Bhima is shocked to feel a deep resentment at Viraf's words. Easy for him to talk about getting rid of Maya's baby, she thinks. After all, he and Dinaz baby are going to have a child of their own, a child who will never know what it is to have adults plot its death. A child who will be welcomed into the world. Who will never cause his parents shame or dishonor. She feels a moment's blinding fury that is so large it encompasses Maya, Dinaz, and Viraf. All these young people, all these children about to be born. She is tired of it all -- tired of this endless cycle of death and birth, tired of investing any hope in the next generation, tired and frightened of finding more human beings to love, knowing full well that every person she loves will someday wound her, hurt her, break her heart with their deceit, their treachery, their fallibility, their sheer humanity. Bhima feels dried out, scooped out, as hollow and wrinkled as a walnut shell. She has nothing left to give, no love left to spare. For this reason, she refuses to feed a morsel of leftover food to the stray dogs in the slum colony, who wag their tails and sigh expectantly each time she steps out of her hut. She cannot stand the sight of their matted, mangled, crippled bodies, their heartbreaking eagerness, the hunger for love in their eyes."
thrity umrigar ~ the space between us |
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| with apologies, from these mean streets |
[Nov. 2nd, 2009|08:44 pm] |
no no no
no no no
no no no no no no no no no
no no no no no no no no no no no
no no no no no
no no no no
no no no
no no no no no no no no no no no
no no no no no no
no no no no no no no no no no no
vivian girls ~ no |
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| i feel the tension |
[Oct. 28th, 2009|07:31 am] |
i feel the tension
i feel the tension
i feel the tension
i feel the tension
vivian girls ~ tension |
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| social games |
[Oct. 18th, 2009|08:35 pm] |
"I'm most terribly tired. I didn't sleep a wink last night. I've got a marvellous new lover."
I began to put out the tea. Sally gave me a sidelong glance:
"Do I shock you when I talk like that, Christopher darling?"
"Not in the least."
"But you don't like it?"
"It's no business of mine." I handed her the tea-glass.
"Oh, for God's sake," cried Sally, "don't start being English! Of course it's your business what you think!"
"Well then, if you want to know, it rather bores me."
This annoyed her even more than I had intended. Her tone changed: she said coldly: "I thought you'd understand." She sighed: "But I forgot--you're a man."
"I'm sorry, Sally. I can't help being a man, of course... But please don't be angry with me. I only meant that when you talk like that it's really just nervousness. You're naturally rather shy with strangers, I think: so you've got into this tick of trying to bounce them into approving or disapproving of you, violently. I know, because I try it myself, sometimes... Only I wish you wouldn't try it on me, because it just doesn't work and it only makes me feel embarrassed. If you go to bed with every single man in Berlin and come and tell me about it each time, you still won't convince me that you're La Dame aux Camelias--because, really and truly, you know, you aren't."
christopher isherwood ~ goodbye to berlin (1935) |
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| perspective on climate change policies |
[Sep. 16th, 2009|02:22 pm] |
This is the most interesting article about climate change policy I've read in a long time: http://www.nybooks.com/articles/21494. It really puts things in perspectives and has altered my impressions of the different options.
In the book being reviewed, the author is an economist that models the purely financial impact of a variety of climate change policies over a hundred year period, independent of the environmental changes they produce. The options are business-as-usual, the Kyoto Protocol, an optimally chosen carbon tax, the Nicholas Stern proposal (strong emission limits), and the Gore policy (strong but gradually applied limits, e.g. 90 percent cut by 2050). The other option is a low-cost backstop (e.g. low-cost solar, nonintrusive climate engineering, genetically-engineered trees). The results...
"""Here are the net values of the various policies as calculated by the DICE model. The values are calculated as differences from the business-as-usual model, without any emission controls. A plus value means that the policy is better than business-as-usual, with the reduction of damage due to climate change exceeding the cost of controls. A minus value means that the policy is worse than business-as-usual, with costs exceeding the reduction of damage. The unit of value is $1 trillion, and the values are specified to the nearest trillion. The net value of the optimal program, a global carbon tax increasing gradually with time, is plus three—that is, a benefit of some $3 trillion. The Kyoto Protocol has a value of plus one with US participation, zero without US participation. The "Stern" policy has a value of minus fifteen, the "Gore" policy minus twenty-one, and "low-cost backstop" plus seventeen.
...
The main conclusion of the Nordhaus analysis is that the ambitious proposals, "Stern" and "Gore," are disastrously expensive, the "low-cost backstop" is enormously advantageous if it can be achieved, and the other policies including business-as-usual and Kyoto are only moderately worse than the optimal policy. The practical consequence for global-warming policy is that we should pursue the following objectives in order of priority. (1) Avoid the ambitious proposals. (2) Develop the science and technology for a low-cost backstop. (3) Negotiate an international treaty coming as close as possible to the optimal policy, in case the low-cost backstop fails. (4) Avoid an international treaty making the Kyoto Protocol policy permanent. These objectives are valid for economic reasons, independent of the scientific details of global warming."""
A corollary is that it's in the world's economic incentive to spend up to 14 trillion dollars on researching the low-cost backstop technology. I get the impression that we are not spending that much money on it though... |
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| this city this city |
[Sep. 14th, 2009|07:59 pm] |
Feeling an ambivalence of sensory overload and spiritual apathy, combined with an ambivalence of too-much-structure and too-much-freedom, I think I just achieved some kind of release. Racing up some blocks and sprinting down others, I just ran up to Buena Vista park and back, with earphones blaring Of Montreal. This city, will not defeat me, this city, it is my bleeping playground. And now I feel more genuinely happy.
Things that have occurred in the last few months:
- Grandfather and his wife passed away.
- Saw the play Osage County. Wow that was good.
- Nearly attacked by an elk up near Eureka.
- Got a traffic ticket for driving through a stop sign. In San Francisco. Like as if.
you have to sleep late when you can
and all your bad days will end
the flaming lips ~ bad days |
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| conscious undemonstrative distrustfuless, or death! |
[Aug. 17th, 2009|01:23 pm] |
E. M. Forster reviewing Billy Budd in 1947:
"""He also shows that ... innocence is not safe in a civilization like ours, where a man must practice a "ruled undemonstrative distrustfulness" in order to defend himself against traps. This "ruled undemonstrative distrustfulness" is not confined to business men, but exists everywhere. We all exercise it. I know I do, and I should be surprised if you, who are listening to me, didn't. All we can do (and Melville gives us this hint) is to exercise it consciously, as Captain Vere did. It is unconscious distrustfulness that corrodes the heart and destroys the heart's insight, and prevents it from saluting goodness.""" |
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| (no subject) |
[Jul. 25th, 2009|09:10 am] |
"Stepan Arkadyich was dressed in brogues and leggings, tattered trousers and a short coat. On his head was the wreck of some hat, but his new-system gun was a jewel, and his game bag and cartridge belt, though worn, were of the best quality. Vasenka Veslovsky had not previously understood this true hunter's dandyism - to wear rags but have hunting gear of the best make. He understood it now, looking at Stepan Arkadyich, shining in those rags with the elegance of his well-nourished, gentlemanly figure, and decided that before the next hunting season he would be sure to set himself up in the same way."
leo tolstoy ~ anna karenina |
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| life in the desert |
[Jun. 28th, 2009|08:29 am] |
"""
"...and he hates me because I let Jill die."
"She let herself die. Speaking of that, that's what I do like about these kids: they're trying to kill it. Even if they kill themselves in the process."
"Kill what?"
"The softness. Sex, love; me, mine. They're doing it... They're burning it out with dope. They're going to make themselves hard clean through. Like, oh, cockroaches. That's the way to live in the desert. Be a cockroach. It's too late for you, and a little late for me, but once these kids get it together, there'll be no killing them. They'll live on poison."
"""
john updike ~ rabbit redux |
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| one two three |
[Jun. 26th, 2009|09:26 pm] |
"It's pretty safe to say that I am the only person in the history of Virginia to be elected to statewide office with a union card, two Purple Hearts, and three tattoos."
~ Jim Webb |
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| dreaming of a bed of one's own |
[Jun. 26th, 2009|09:23 am] |
they can tell me what to read.
they can tell me what to eat.
they can beat me and send me the bill,
but they tell me what to feel.
i might need you to kill.
the thermals ~ i might need you to kill
while i still have eyes,
wait for me, wait for me.
while i still have feet,
wait for me, wait for me.
while i still have faith,
if i ever had faith,
wait for me, wait for meeee.
the thermals ~ returning to the fold |
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| long-haired creatures in bed |
[Jun. 25th, 2009|09:51 am] |
Rabbit is the 36 year old father of the 13 year old Nelson. Last night Rabbit cheated on his separated wife and his son has just found something...
"""
"Dad, something moved in your bed!"
"My bed?"
"I looked in and saw it!"
Rabbit offers, "Maybe it was just the air-conditioner fan lifting the sheets."
"Dad." The child's pallor begins to recede as some flaw in the horror of this begins to dawn. "It had long hair, and I saw an arm. Aren't you going to call the police?"
"No, let's let the poor old police rest, it's Sunday. It's OK, Nelson, I know who it is."
"You do?" The boy's eyes sink upon themselves defensively as his brain assembles what information he has about long-haired creatures in bed. He is trying to relate this contraption of half-facts to the figure of his father looming, a huge riddle in an undershirt, before him. Rabbit offers, "It's a girl who's run away from home and I somehow got stuck with her last night."
"""
john updike ~ rabbit redux |
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| twitter |
[Jun. 21st, 2009|04:25 pm] |
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I forgot to mention this earlier but I am now also on twitter. Among other things, you'll find there some terse documentation of my current European trip. http://twitter.com/drnuk |
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| peter stillman |
[Jun. 11th, 2009|07:45 am] |
I've been enjoying Paul Auster and his pseudo-detective stories lately...
"""Quinn had never seen anyone move in such a manner, and he realized at once that this was the same person he had spoken to on the phone. The body acted almost exactly as the voice had: machine-like, fitful, alternating between slow and rapid gestures, rigid and yet expressive, as if the operation were out of control, not quite corresponding to the will that lay behind it. It seemed to Quinn that Stillman's body had not been used for a long time and tat all its functions had been relearned, so that motion had become a conscious process, each movement broken down into its component submovements, with the result that all flow and spontaneity had been lost. It was like watching a marionette trying to walk without strings.
Everything about Peter Stillman was white. White shirt, open at the neck; white pants, white socks. Against teh pallor of his skin, the flaxen thinness of his hair, the effect was almost transparent, as though one could see through to the blue veins behind the skin of his face. This blue was almost the same as the blue of his eyes: a milky blue that seemed to dissolve into a mixture of sky and clouds. Quinn could not imagine himself addressing a word to this person. It was as though Stillman's presence was a command to be silent."""
paul auster ~ city of glass |
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| flaneur |
[Jun. 11th, 2009|07:31 am] |
From the "I get creeped out when a random blog post is actually pretty accurate about me" files, I present this snippet from Confessions of an Introverted Traveler:
"""Introversion and extroversion are inborn traits, and the difference between them is not that one is gregarious and at ease in the world and the other shy and awkward. Rather, extroverts are outwardly motivated and gain energy from interaction with the outside world while introverts are more inwardly directed and drained by interaction with others. Introverts’ thinking tends to be deep and slow, we require copious time alone, we prefer probing conversation to shallow chitchat, and our social lives are geared more towards intimate one-on-one interactions than “more the merrier” free-for-alls."""
Also it contains some snark :-P
"""I once read about a B&B where the owner collected antique hats that guests were encouraged to wear to breakfast. Really? That sounds fun to people?"""
And the followup blog post is pretty good too.
"""As someone who can't even strike up a conversation with the cute girl in english class or approach someone at a show, I have been plagued with anxiety for traveling overseas.
...
I told this young man that first of all, approaching cute members of the opposite sex is doctoral-level extroversion. I’m not even sure I trust guys who can easily chat up that cute girl in English class. No, that kind of confidence is suspect to me. Give me the awkward blurter any day.""" |
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| my new favorite show |
[May. 29th, 2009|11:10 pm] |
"I'm sorry, what were you asking me? Oh, yes. That stupid plastic container I asked you to buy. You see hydrofluoric acid won't eat through plastic. It will however dissolve metal, rock, glass, ceramic. So there's that."
breaking bad ~ season 1, episode 2 |
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| how to be a badass |
[May. 23rd, 2009|09:02 pm] |
General Walter Bedell Smith is a badass. During WWII, he rose from humble beginnings and through the ranks from private to being Eisenhower's chief of staff and hatchet man. Notably, he personally accepted the Nazi surrender in the battered little red schoolhouse in Rheims, France. Here's a description of what then happened when President Truman later appointed Bedell Smith to lead the newly created CIA in 1950.
"""The general's task was to learn the secrets of the Kremlin, and he had a good idea of his chances. 'There are only two personalities that I know of who might do it,' he told the five senators who confirmed him at an August 24 hearing where he wore the newly acquired fourth star, a prize from the president. 'One is God, and the other is Stalin, and I do not know that even God can do it because I do not know whether he is close enough in touch with Uncle Joe to know what he is talking about.' As for what awaited him at the CIA, he said: 'I expect the worst, and I am sure I won't be disappointed.' Immediately upon taking office in October, he discovered that he had inherited an unholy mess. 'It's interesting to see all you fellows here,' he said as he looked around the table at his first staff meeting. 'It'll be even more interesting to see how many of you are here a few months from now.'"""
Tim Weiner ~ Legacy of Ashes, The History of the CIA
When I am appointed to be the head of the CIA, I'm going to follow Bedell Smith's lead :-) |
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| cultural activity |
[May. 11th, 2009|10:52 pm] |
Was just at The Vaselines concert. They're a Scottish band who were briefly on to something in the late nineties just before they broke up, and are probably most known for then being covered by Nirvana. It was their first time in San Francisco, and they were playing their 1989 album Dum-Dum. So, they're doing their thing, a mix of alternative and distortion laced with sexual and theological references. And, Frances McKee has a bit of a dirty mind (don't we all?), and in between songs is cracking jokes about muffs, prison, and things one should not do with a capo. And then, there was this wonderful moment, when Eugene Kelly asked Frances McKee (whom at this point was down to five guitar strings), "What is your beauty secret? How do you stay so young and pretty?". Not to disappoint, and not to beat around the bush, she replied:
I take semen from young boys and spread it all over my face. You don't need a face lift. It really works.
Wow, just wow. |
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| (no subject) |
[Apr. 11th, 2009|11:54 am] |
"By the time we reached the top the music was blaring. The group ahead of us had melted into the doorway and disappeared into the kitchen. Yvonne was crouched at the stereo, her back to us. Most of the crowd was clustered in the airless kitchen: tall thin women with shining clavicles, men pushing back damp bangs. The women from the doorstep moved purposefully toward a table laid out with chips and salsa. One of them had a tiny ring in her belly button, showing just under her shirt; she dug a chip into the salsa and a loose glop of it fell onto the floor. She touched her friend's shoulder and pointed to it, and they both squealed with helpless laughter."
aoibheann sweeney ~ among other things, i've taken up smoking |
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| galatea |
[Apr. 1st, 2009|07:14 pm] |
"It seemed to me I had changed. I was Galatea, the statue turned to flesh in her creator's hands. I had come from my island in Maine in my foul-weather gear, typing and cleaning and drawing in my room, and Nate brought me gifts and made me warm to the touch, a girl in the city like any other. But then when I walked him to class at the university, and watched as he disappeared easily into the throng of students outside the buildings surrounding Washington Square, I would look at the girls with their books pressed to their chests, laughing, talking, walking in short skirts and long pants, high boots and little sandals -- and wonder why, in the end, I was still not like them."
aoibheann sweeney ~ among other things, i've taken up smoking |
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