1: Sure, I tried to pace myself, using that same song as last time, but I also opened up and really turned on the gas a few times, in addition to trying for longer strides. Thanks for asking!
I can hurl tennis rackets at small animals with deadly accuracy.
I put up some pegboard in the kitchen this weekend. Took me 30 minutes and has already probably saved the household two hours of rooting around and going to other rooms for utensils.
Go Stanley! I've been leveraging my ornery knee and desk job to accumulate doughiness at an impressive clip.
Also I ran a mile in 5:40 last month. Going to switch to swimming next week and see if I can't snap my hips to a similarly speedy (now I don't mean swim a kilometer in that time) kilometer by Christmas, maybe.
7: Holy shit that's fast! Nicely done, sir.
I was really happy with it myself. Had been doing windsprints and interval-type training to complement the pacing runs. It works, but windsprints are several kinds of unpleasant.
7,8: How's that 7:29 sounding now, dude?
Doesn't mean I can't make you feel bad about it. I'm just playing the role of motivator here, Sporto. I studied those guys closely in Jr. High School. "Every man has a temple to build called his body."
I felt bad about discovering the typo in the post title just now. That's about it. Your powers are useless against me, old man bad-at-live-blogging-the-meetup!
7:29? That's at about the pace I was topping out at doing fartleks recently. I've got the :29 part down; I think if I tried to do it for the 7 part my heart might explode.
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Not an accomplishment of mine, but I'm glad that NPR fired Juan Williams. Minor, I know, but it still brought a smile to my face.
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Wow. I can do that pace for a minute on the treadmill doing intervals, but keeping it up for a mile would kill me.
This isn't my minor accomplishment, but I did reap the rewards: my mother, queen of Long Island's yard sales, scored a brand new looking Kenneth Cole leather jacket in my size for six bucks. That approaches her prior yard sale triumph, a sterling cream pitcher for a dollar.
My only recent minor accomplishment: I officiated at the world championships for the sport I do, and was selected to judge the finals.*
My peering face in the bottom of these:
http://mondiauxdesavateparis2010.com/squelettes/photos/2010/600/sbf_d3c7974_bd.jpg
http://mondiauxdesavateparis2010.com/squelettes/photos/2010/600/sbf_d3c8367_bd.jpg
* they select a subset of the qualified officials, based on recommendations from the ring directors who've seen them working.
That's not minor!
Alternatively: I bow before your major accomplishments.
old man bad-at-live-blogging-the-meetup
Oh, snap. And you'll note that I actually did the *best* liveblogging of anyone there.
I'd just like to note that John Williams has been fired by NCR.
15: He's an idiot. I know people who've worked with him and they all think he's basically a dumbass. The fact that he gets nervous seeing someone dressed as a Muslim is just one example: Exactly zero terrorist attacks in the US have been carried out by people dressed in a manner that clearly identifies them as Muslims. Someone who is clearly Muslim is just about the last person you ought to expect mischief from.
FoXRepublicanPAC just signed him to an enhanced deal
.Williams - who just got a $2 million deal for three years with Fox News - said it is making him rethink his previous beliefs about the left wing.
"I've always thought the right wing were ones that were inflexible and intolerant and now I'm coming to realize that the orthodoxy at NPR, its representing the left," he said.
NPR's replacing him with Larry Wilmore, right? Please make that be true.
Let me be the first to suggest that I was a bit of a dick to Stanley in 10 and 12. I apologize. You go, boy!
28: No big deal, he's got 29 left.
15, 22: I know we all hate him for good reasons, but it wasn't smart of NPR to fire him for this offense.
Congrats, nattar, Stanley, turgid, and KR. (Did I miss anyone?)
My marathon training has been sidelined due to a hip flexor issue. The race isnt until Nov 13th so I still might be able to do it. I ran a 10k in the spring which was my longest run at that point, and decided to try a marathon. Prob not a smart idea.
But, my minor accomplishment is that I weighed 197 pounds on Tues. I think that means that I am no longer in the Clydesdale division!
Regarding Juan Williams, I am glad to see him gone.
However, like Jon Stewart said, fire him because he is bad, not just bc of this incident.
Where were all of these outraged people when Nasir or Helen Thomas or Rick Sanchez were fired?
I think that means that I am no longer in the Clydesdale division!
We'll miss you.
NPR's replacing him with Larry Wilmore, right? Please make that be true.
Just what I was thinking.
Is it possible that J-Will is actually telling the truth in #25? It's possible, right?
37: sure. As noted, he's an idiot.
Possible that NPR hews a rigidly orthodox left wing line? No, that's not possible, unless there's some sense in which a rigidly orthodox left wing line is compatible with the right-of-center pap that comes out of my radio on a number of NPR shows.
I just passed my 24 hour urine test! The 24 hour urine test requires an an extraordinary amount of purpose, dexterity and artful concealment. Obtaining a complete sample of course requires some careful aiming as well, so it's kind of like a biathlon. Basically you have to carry around at least one gallon jug, and by late afternoon you're probably into the second, wherever you go, on the subway, in the office, etc. And you have to keep the lid on tight. And you need a shelf in the office fridge and a bag that no one can see into.
By the next morning you have two jugs, quite heavy, to get to the doctor's office, sloshing around in the extra size briefcase on the subway. A spill anywhere along the way (including inside the doctor's office when someone else is responsible) and you have to start over. This has happened over the years.
So I successfully navigated the entire path! I passed, too! My wife's kidney is still doing its job properly, three years post-transplant!
And you need a shelf in the office fridge and a bag that no one can see into.
Just label it "APPLE JUICE". No one will be disgusted by the sight of a jug of apple juice in the fridge.
And if they try to drink some, serves them right.
Wait a second. I had thought you were in CA, but now I know it's PA... was your kidney transplant done by the S/tar/zl Institute? And if so, any contact with a tall grey-haired woman surgeon?
I too read it that way, and was thinking of the relevant bit in "Withnail & I".
40: Hooray for unimaginative's urine and his wife's kidney! And their correspondingly low BUN and creatinine levels!
40: Good news on the test. But, it wouldn't be an extra burden for me since I always save my own urine for tax purposes.
Congratulations to all!
I'll deserve congratulations on Sunday for having driven a 15 person van full of undergraduates to a conference six hours away and not falling asleep on the way home in the middle of the night on Saturday.
I remember this happening last pregnancy. Erm... I'm sure school rules absolutely forbid this, but if you're worried about staying awake in the moment, you would be driving around a vanful of licensed drivers, some of whom should be alert, despite their undergradness. (I'm assuming help from another real adult is absolutely unavailable.)
I would make some comment about how totally weird 48.2 seems to me but I think I've made it before.
48: also for not rolling it.
49: see the first part of this comment. I have no idea if heebie's been trained to drive school busses, but she's probably better equipped than the undergrads for the task.
43: Not a match--surgery was at jefferson Hospital in Philly.
42: Urine drug tests are a particular problem for dialysis patients, because many of them don't. When my father ran a dialysis patient support group many years ago (my condition is hereditary), he was called on to explain to someone's boss that the guy wasn't trying to hide anything, he really hadn't taken a piss in years and wouldn't be able to produce just to meet some corporate directive.
wouldn't be able to produce just to meet some corporate directive
"That doesn't sound like a team player! Fire him!"
52: In any case, congratulations on your functioning kidney.
To get liscensed to drive the van, I just had to watch a long video and take an online test, but I didn't have to actually take a driving test. So in a pinch, a competent, wide awake student could take over.
Alternatively, if I feel too sleepy and don't trust anyone, I can spring for 3 hotel rooms and cram 4 undergrads per room, and try to retroactively see if I can find some reimbursement, or just eat the cost.
Congrats on everyone's running times! I despise running, so I'm very impressed.
I've been trying to reduce my time biking to work. The best way to do this is to stay ahead of the bus. This is a very good motivator because the bus driver is always driving into the bike lane to cut me off and frequently starts back up by driving into the space when I'm biking on the road (as a result of him blocking the bike lane). So avoiding the bus is actually a very legitimate concern.
To get liscensed to drive the van, I just had to watch a long video and take an online test, but I didn't have to actually take a driving test. So in a pinch, a competent, wide awake student could take over.
Well, or it's not a particularly good idea for either of you to be driving it while it's fully loaded. But oh well, nobody asked me to run the NHTSB.
57: That's because I haven't become Secretary of Transportation yet.
56.2: indeed, buses suck like that. There was an accident here recently where a bus forced a guy biking on to the trolley tracks, where he got stuck and run over. On the other hand, drafting behind a bus traveling at speed is good fun.
Williams - who just got a $2 million deal for three years with Fox News - said it is making himrethink his previous beliefs about the left wingoutraged over Chappaquiddick.
Dude catches on quick. I predict a marvelous future for him at Fox News.
fire him because he is bad, not just bc of this incident.
Can't we do both and call it comity?
Um, is it too prying of me to ask: dialysis patients don't pee?
The dialysis machine pees for them.
That is, it removes excess fluid and various waste products from the blood.
55
if I feel too sleepy and don't trust anyone, I can spring for 3 hotel rooms and cram 4 undergrads per room, and try to retroactively see if I can find some reimbursement, or just eat the cost.
That sure looks to me like it would require a lot of trust.
I COMMANDED TWO BATTALIONS OF TEA BAG PARTY ACTIVISTS AT FIRST AND SECOND MANASSAS!
I had a dream wherein I went to see Stanley's band and he took a victory lap around the stage to celebrate his new running time.
(Ok, the last part didn't actually happen, but I did have a dream about Stanley's band. I blame reading Unfogged directly before bed; I dream about all you characters.)
I got my Metro card to register after just two swipes rather than my usual embarrassing three.
"Every man has a temple to build called his body."
If I told you "Your body is a temple," would you invite me to worship?
I dream about all you characters.
I don't think I mentioned it here, but I recently had a dream that I was in the Netherlands with Knecht and McManus (who were like best friends) as part of an international liberation/resistance movement
Free the management consultants! They have nothing to lose but their access to business lounges.
"We will not rest until every man has two dogs and every woman is wearing that special kind of blouse—oh, you know which kind we mean!"
The real news in 72 is that Di skipped a period.
Today I was able to hold off internet slacking (specifically, commenting on unfogged) until 2:28 pm.
Just read up a bit. Yay unimaginative! Yay everyone!
How in the world does one kick properly when swimming? You know the drill where you float facedown and kick your way across? I can't do it. I just make no forward progress.
81: Is Ouagadougou also a band?
82
Ankle flexibility.
Also, try doing it underwater first.
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I've thought a lot about it, and I think my very favorite line is the one that refers to the plane's "aboriginal administrator", but there's an awful lot to love.
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try doing it underwater first
Universally applicable advice, this.
85:
didnt that croc walk away from the plane crash only to die from a machete blow?
82: I was on a swim team as a kid and the kick for the crawl was something I never got. One day, when I was well grown-up and hadn't tried to swim a lap for a decade, it just clicked. The secret is that you need to move your legs like you are pedaling a bike.
85. Pretty fancy translating, Sifu. Engrish ?
89:
Dont doubt the fertility powers of the redhead.
The even was again beatific asymmetric "despite the atrocious efforts of the pilot", said the report.
91: I don't doubt the fertility powers. I do doubt the immaculateness.
OK, I think that 7:23 is a pretty good time. I've always been slow. I have been doing mostly sprinting for a mile, but I'd guess that I'm at least 30 seconds over that time, still.
So, the gym just posted the below as this evening's workout. Note: I have trouble doing three unassisted pullups in a row. Even assisted will be tough.
1 mile run
100 pull ups
200 push ups
300 squats
1 mile run
I'm semi-seriously afraid that I will die tonight.
s/b 7:29, but what's the difference.
And "mile" s/b "while" in the place where it makes sense for mile to be while. If you see what I mean. Basically, fear is making me go insane.
94: Do you need someone to call your cell phone at a certain time with a "legal emergency"?
How do you break up those pushups/pullups/squats? I can imagine doing 100 pushups if I had a really long time to do them in and could take long breaks (pullups, on the other hand, while I can do three chinups, I can't do a single pullup. 100 sounds ridiculous regardless of rest breaks). But how does that work?
Congratulations, unimaginative! Good kidneys are a truly good thing!!
My accomplishment isn't accomplished yet, but in 1.5 hours I'll be meeting the little one for the first time. I'm thrilled and terrified.
I think you can divide them up how you want -- e.g., do 10 pullups, 20 pushups, 30 squats and then repeat. There's no set time limit, but the workout starts at 6:30 or so and the gym closes at 8, so more than 1 1/2 hours is impossible. Oh, and it's a competition for time, so everyone else will be trying to do these as quickly as possible.
99: Yay! Good luck with the first meeting, and of course even if it goes badly, that doesn't mean anything (see the 'three year olds are assholes' theory).
100: Boy, that still sounds rough. And then you go run a mile.
Oh man, I'm genuinely excited for you, Thorn. One thing about sharing your stories with random strangers on the internet is that random strangers on the internet get invested in your stories!
I think you can divide them up how you want -- e.g., do 10 pullups, 20 pushups, 30 squats and then repeat.
Your gym may do it differently, and in fact I think many crossfit gyms encourage people to break the workouts up however they need to (or just flatly modify them) in order to get them done (and that's a bear of a workout, so all's fair), but standard crossfit protocol requires you not break them into shifts like this. I.e., You can break the 100 pullups into as many sets as you need, and take as much time as you need between sets, but you have to get through the 100 pullups before moving on to the 200 pushups, and then through those before moving on to the squats.
I'm not entirely sure I could do 100 pullups in 90 minutes, even if I weren't doing anything else.
do 10 pullups, 20 pushups, 30 squats and then repeat
To clarify 105, CF writes this as "ten rounds of 10 pullups, 20 pushups, 30 squats"
106: I am entirely sure that I cannot and will not do 100 pullups in however much time remains in my life.
Yeah, 108 is right, but I think in this case they may let us move things around. Or not! Who the hell knows!
Anyhow, if I die tonight, I just want people to keep saying "hone in on." Keep the faith!
If you think that's going to work...
I could wear 100 Pull-Ups® (not concurrently, of course), but they don't make the damn things in my size.
112:
Sure they do.
I buy them for my daughter regularly. You are about her size. They are very absorbant.
Yay, Thorn and partner! Yay, Mara!
Anyhow, if I die tonight, I just want people to keep saying "hone in on."
I'm relying on one of you legal types to use the Rule against Perpetuities to invalidate this wish.
What's the difference in a pull-up and a chin-up?
From the link in 119:
The unique promotions, bright colors and intense fruit flavors of fruit-flavored snacks from General Mills make snacking fun.
Because, as everyone knows, the problem with snacking in general is that it's insufficiently fun.
Good grief, I don't see how the routine in 94 is even possible unless you're in very seriously good shape already. You could hurt yourself trying to do all that in 1.5 hours! I doubt I'd be able to lift a pencil the next day. Well, frankly, I'd not be able to do the routine in the first place.
Not to make Halford anxious or anything.
She s exquisite! I'm the luckiest girl in the world!
Man, why do they need every drop of your urine over 24 hours? If they need a lot to test reliably for certain compounds, couldn't you just fill up some jugs at home over the course of a week?
"yah" s/b "yeah". I'm cheering, or trying to.
That would have just been an emoticon, but I don't want to get banned.
Wonderful, Thorn! Very happy for you!
Man, why do they need every drop of your urine over 24 hours?
It's not quantity they need. They want a full 24 hours' worth because your output contains more of this and less of that at different times of the day. Testing just a morning sample, or an afternoon or evening sample, doesn't cut it for certain purposes.
(I had to do a 24-hour urine collection a few months ago as well, and will again next month. Lugging the jug around, keeping the collection in the fridge, etc. is a trip, yep. I only got one jug and was concerned that it wouldn't be big enough ....)
Congratulations, unimaginative, at it coming out well!
Teo made a nerdy alphabet joke. Yay!
122: Maybe tied for luckiest with the kiddo, I think. Congrats!
I only got one jug and was concerned that it wouldn't be big enough
How low your fruit hangs, milady.
139: How low your fruit hangs, milady.
Said Clarence Thomas to the intern.
My floor has a separate refrigerator just for urine, so I suppose that would be nice if the need ever arose and there was space in the pee fridge.
139: Heh. I was far too distracted wondering why unimaginative received two receptacles, considering that I should demand two myself, imagining a fight with the clinic over this, etc.
I've seen a three year old fill a potty chair to within an inch of the top in one sitting, so I could see why you'd worry about running out of jugs.
145: Well, if you must know, I needed only 3/4 of the jug as it turned out, which surprised me a bit.
Oh the things we don't know about ourselves.
Nothing says "I'll skip the coffee" quite like knowing you have to cart it home even if you finish it in the store.
I know! There's something peculiarly, erm, exposed about knowing that the lab folks are going to know everything tomorrow: hm, this person drinks an awful lot of caffeine [I don't, myself], and whoa, what's with all this dilution, the person is chugging water all day long or something?
Of course they're making no such judgments, and are just going to test for whatever's been ordered. It's still slightly nerve-wracking; I understand unimaginative's sentiments completely. Or those of anyone who is routinely plugged into the medical testing mill. It's a sharp reality check.
Sometimes I'll save my piss for a couple days in jugs just for the endorphin rush.
Those tests don't sound like fun. I tend to drink a lot of water.
If you have enough, I think you can tan leather with pee. Or maybe that bleach cloth.
150: I normally do as well; for that test I tried not to. Only one jug, you know.
THE ONE JUGGALETTE YOU'LL NEVER FORGET
[Actual graffito seen in 2008 in Mpls.]
153: That's why you watch your salt intake.
151: you can tan leather with it I think
155: Really? I wondered if that might be it.
Don't just stand there. Go skin a cow, piss in a barrel, and learn.
No. If I'd have known about barrel peeing, I would have joined.
Also there's an old saying that every animal has enough brains to preserve their own hide-one way or another.
Congratulation, Thorn! Please don't hold back on the exquisitely cute stories. What a beautiful moment, when a family is born.
Oh, and congrats, Thorn! Any plans for a whimsical pseudonym for her, like Briar?
166: I keep wanting to read that like, "To the battlements!" as if we are needed somewhere to wield our comments in the defense of all that we value.
To the (original subject of the) thread, my most recent personal victory was seriously impressing a girl last night with my knowledge of the difference between polyandry and polygyny.
So you're thinking of becoming a brother-husband?
It's a little premature for that at this point, but we'll see what happens.
167: Every Thorn has its Rose.
Also, of course, congratulations!
Consider this a free zone for boasting about your own recent personal victories, be they minor, life-altering, or otherwise.
I rode my bike home from work. This still feels like an accomplishment. Oy, especially today, because it was chilly and I was riding into the wind and it took for-damn-ever. Can I whine about a personal victory instead of boasting?
yay thorn! congrats! in other thread-related news I was a) confused by the fact that carrying around milk jugs (of water, to drink) is in fact a way to beat a drug test (you take b vitamins and stuff to color the pee), and b) thought of knecht while wearing his favorite short, in black. I realize this information is useless without photos, but...
My most recent personal accomplishments were mailing off a job application (which required only a cover letter and a cv), and making a positive impression on Ph—p Pet—t.
I too mailed off a job application this day. Also, I collected my three delinquent paychecks.
I baked a challah today, my first yeasted bread.
122 -- Second luckiest, imo.
Not much to report here. Took the wife to and from colonoscopy appt, took dog for 90 min walk (during which she again demonstrated strong babe magnetism), sat around doing nearly nothing. Tomorrow, the height of the ridge on the southwestern horizon. Petty Mountain still doesn't sound like a very big deal. Hope we don't get shot.
Petty Mountain still doesn't sound like a very big deal.
It wouldn't, though, would it.
167: Online she's Mara, short for Maryam, just because that's long been a favorite name of mine. And you will be guaranteed some cute stories, starting with the day she comes here and no longer sleeps on a mattress in the floor while the other two (white, already adopted) kids have a princess bed and a racecar bed. Oh wait, I said no more ranting about the foster family's deficits until we have secure placement, right? I'll try to stick with that.
But now I'm going to work on dissassembling the Ikea bunk beds I put together this summer so the bottom one with the rail can be her bed. That'll be an accomplishment of sorts. And then this afternoon we see her again!
177: Do you need to make a negative impression in plaster or something first?
182. Thorn, I'm just not saying anything until the kid and the documentation are all together under your roof, cos I'm totally superstitious like that, but when is go live scheduled for?
Chris, I hear you and we're not making formal announcements until she's with us full-time. The plan is next weekend for that, maybe even Friday night since the foster family doesn't seem to want extra time with her.
Well it isn't my accomplishment, but my toddler hasn't had any accidents yet today, and just pooped in the toilet unbidden (first time)!
Oh hey, I thought of one. I've had my current phone for 16 months without putting it through the wash.
177: Tightrope-walking demonstration?
Tightrope-walking demonstration?
That Janelle Monáe song is pretty played-out at this point, isn't it?
I had to Google it, so not for me, apparently.
My "accomplishment" for the day:
http://www.filedropper.com/13songsforhalloween
Didn't get shot!
Didn't quite make the main summit -- we were on a south summit, about 3/4 mi away (and maybe 100 ft lower) when the southwestern sky looked a little dark and wet, and the wind picked up. So, turned around. Got soaked. Saw triple rainbow. Dog took off after deer, managed to shed her hunter's orange outfit, and probably lost 500 feet of elevation, before coming back. People walked maybe 13 miles all in, up and then down maybe 2,500 ft. Stopped for a shot of RoughStock at the Lumberjack Saloon on the way home.
Snow tonight, maybe.
RoughStock
"The First Best Whiskey in the Last Best Place!"
I bet the penultimate best place's whiskey distillers are pretty pissed about that slogan.
I went running today for the first time in almost two months. I mailed off a package of used clothes to my sister. These are my accomplishments.
I'm almost caught up on Mad Men. Wait, that's not really an accomplishment, is it? (I'm like 15 minutes from the end of the last episode and finding it actively painful to watch.)
Wait, that's not really an accomplishment, is it?
Not until you actually catch up, no.
I scored a red Members Only jacket at Goodwill today for $3. Hot shit!
I read about half of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory's Solar Technologies Market Report today.
I finally, with much nudging, got this particular piece of code that I downloaded a week ago to compile. Then I ran it, and it silently crashed everything. Also, I just realized that even if it did work it wouldn't quite do what I need, so I have to start over and write everything myself.
202: Don't start watching Veronica Mars on Instant. Unless that's all you want to accomplish ever again.
Okay, that scene with Joan and Peggy in Joan's office totally made the whole thing worthwhile.
204: Nah, first up in my Instant queue is La Grande Illusion. I watched a fair chunk of VM when it was actually broadcast, and will probably go back to it at some point, but there's a lot of other stuff that comes before it.
Oh wait, another accomplishment: I actually got my TV/TiVO/PS2 setup to display the highest resolution it can. So many different places you can set that...
there's a lot of other stuff that comes before it
Understandable. Zardoz being on Instant is pretty damn tempting.
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"When you're not worried about potential dangers, the world can be a far less threatening place."
Thanks for that pearl of wisdom, Travelers Insurance!
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198: instead of "watching Mad Med" you could just "watch Jessica Paré."
The most advanced gaming console in our house is a fully functional Sega Genesis. The game Road Rash is currently loaded and ready to play at any moment.
214: Yeah, I'm old-skool like that. Up until this week I was watching TV on a 21-inch CRT, so upgrading the console didn't seem like a high priority.
Ah I see, Sifu knew and was merely scoffing in his usual bullying manner.
For a brief moment I thought it might have been this.
21-inch CRT
I have a CRT HDTV. Weird.
182: Oh wait, I said no more ranting about the foster family's deficits until we have secure placement, right? I'll try to stick with that.
I suggest you stick to that forever. It's not good for you and not good for the kid.
Meanwhile, I cleaned the cat's water fountain, diagnosed the internet outage, replaced the cable modem, and figured out yet another tiny and obscure icon on the new camera's dial and menu screen.
Really, I do not need a special setting for short white guys on pogo sticks at dusk near the ocean. Sometimes the Japanese can be seriously silly.
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God, this game is a nail-biter. Are you people not watching? One out left!
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225: Yeah, I just read all about that pitcher's beard. I figured it was a gimmick.
And my neighbors let me know that I was watching the game on a 5-second delay!
Man, caught fucking looking, too, on a solid pitch. Ouch.
232: I was referring to Beethoven's Werke ohne Opuszahl, of course. Truly he was a giant.
WOOHOO MISCATALOGING doesn't have the same ring to it, I admit.
To a rogue musicologist it might.
And it's too late at night for me to be deciphering German, since I clearly shouldn't have said "fuck an opus number" but "fuck a work without an opus number".
I chose to overlook that, essear, but I suppose others might not have.
Another minor personal accomplishment: brewing pals and I just divvied up what promises to be a very nice IPA into kegs. At last, beer on tap at home.
I spent my day subciting for a journal. This is a particularly silly practice in legal academia that's fed by a lot of egos, and probably it reflects badly on me that I even got involved.
It was fun, though, to learn how to cite Israeli statutes (the official English publication is Laws of the State of Israel, abbreviated LSI, volumes divided by Jewish year), and even more fun to go down tot he basement of the international law library and retrieve some volumes. It struck me as a great place to have sex, if you ever needed someplace untrafficked on campus.
It struck me as a great place to have sex, if you ever needed someplace untrafficked on campus.
Noted.
I'm mostly kidding. There isn't even a law library on this campus.
I congratulate myself for making it safely home, with all little undergrads presumably tucked snugly in their beds.
Seven hours after leaving the conference.
It's so good to be home. Goodnight.
I am halfway through the weeks' grading.
243: Decent train service from where you are to Boston in a pinch though, right?
I didn't shit my pants for about 20 years now.
Nah, first up in my Instant queue is La Grande Illusion.
I think that is one of the movies that has helped define my category of "things that sit on my queue to make me feel like a more well-rounded person in potentiality, but are always pushed down the queue in favor of something a little less taxing." The Treasure of the Sierra Madre sat on the ol' queue for years before I admitted to myself that I had no desire to watch it.
250:Treasure is entertaining, if somewhat machismo. Huston is terrific. A double feature with Dodsworth would be neat. I don't like Grand Illusion it meanders for me. Rules OTOH, is great fun, until it isn't.
Thesis:Extending the concept and including the corporation, free market, and the nation/state as patriarchy, Ozu is always always about a failed patriarchy and the sacrificed (not! sacrificing) woman and abandoned/abused children. This is not at all dependent on biography, although doesn't matter the origin of the metonym.
(Ozu:Only women's anger can be justified.)
Question:Does this extend patriarchy too far, since for a moment so much modernism seems about failed patriarchies and the absent father? Joyce, Buddenbrooks, Gide, Rhys.
Question:If a common modernist metaphor, has it, why has it, become so much less common in our post-modernist age of 3rd wave supposed feminism? Is this based on agency and liberation, or based on delusion? Sexualized, particularized, violent, materialized and vitiated even trivialized as metaphor. The difference between the arranged forced marriage and cup size/10% pay difference.
Bordwell on Ozu is available at Umich for online reading, apparently with permission from before a recent reprinting. Probably a classic.
I adore La Grande Illusion -- it isn't taxing at all! And I am . . . kind of a wimp about taxing movies. CA rents (or whatever we call it with Netflix these days) a constant stream of what I call "Heilige, Heilige, Heilige" films (based on the opening -- and closing! -- lines of Bergman's Winter Light): dire, depressing, devastating, incitements to suicide. No, honey -- a hungover Saturday is *not* the time I want to watch the 5-hour Fanny and Alexander.
Bob -- Have you seen any Catherine Breillat? Romance, Fat Girl, and Anatomie de l'enfer are all worth watching.
Also, everyone in the world should watch Les enfants du paradis, even though I have not been the same since I learned that Arletty is wearing a turban throughout the second half of the film because her head had been shaved as a "collabo horizontale."
Go back to bed, oud. CA and I are going to hang out and watch a double feature of Nostalgia and The Sacrifice, and maybe listen to some Gesualdo.
Decent train service from where you are to Boston in a pinch though, right?
Decent by American standards, sure, but expensive.
This is America. We put prices on everything.
I didn't shit my pants for about 20 years now to be dismissed out of hand as a crank!
253: Don't even joke. Also, are you in the tenor range? CA is more like a bass-baritone. You guys may as well sing a mass while you're at it.
Bass-baritone myself. That's okay, we can rock some plainchant.
Speaking of singing a mass, let me heartily disrecommend the 2009 movie called Pope Joan, which is basically a ham-handed Mary Sue. (However! The main character is very pretty!)
260 -- Have you seen North Face?
The Wind That Shakes The Barley has totally ruined Michael Collins for me. Oh well.
Also, the sequence in the denouement of Almost Famous, where Billy Crudup's character goes to visit the Cameron Crowe character? Fucking brilliantly shot. In a very subtle and unassuming way, but it captures the narrative of disorientation perfectly.
264:Besides an Ozu, I watched Brick for the nth time last night. This time, having learned a little, I noticed things like jump cuts and other displacing effects.
252:Seen Fat Girl, Last Mistress, and Sex is Comedy. SiC is pretty much a commentary on FG, and I found it devastating. FG makes a point about film voyeurism, but our voyeurism is still mediated by the lead (and darkness etc). SiC puts us in the director's chair, one step closer to responsibility.
I think Breillat is saying in SiC something like either a filmed sex (simulated or not) scene is erotic, consensual, exhibitionistic etc on the part of the actors...i.e. pornography...or it is some kind of rape or simulated rape.
I was aware that FG was, in possibly the more important way, about actors and film. Breillat says she isn't making pornography. Don't imagine there are many safe and tame alternatives.
I painted the dining room red today, not in the sense of actually having painted it, but in the sense of having paid someone to do it. But they also serve who stand and create jobs, right?
I finally finished my sister's Cthulu-themed birthday card. It's totally awesome! and only two months late...
My only accomplishments in the last few days have been to let myself be bullied and/or guilt-tripped into agreeing to do extra work or go places that I don't want to go. Sigh.
Listen, essear, yeah. Mm, huh. I know it's getting kind of late on a Sunday, but I was talking with a bunch of the other front-page posters, and, well, yeah, here's the thing: we're gonna need some extra commenting out of you tonight. I mean, if it's not too much trouble. We'd hate to put you out or anything.
I almost let myself get talked into an unwanted ski trip to Aspen, but I had to draw the line somewhere. Commenting I can probably manage, though.
How much extra work do you have to do to get out of a ski trip to Aspen?
I'll be really happy when I achieve the incredibly momentous achievement of sleeping through the fucking night. I've suddenly acquired - according to people in the know - a menopausal woman's sleeping habits.
(Also, I cooked a very yummy and well-received meal last night. That made me happy.)
I painted the dining room red today
A more solitary party than painting the town red.
I have been vocally humorless on Facebook, because I'm a feminist. That counts as an accomplishment, right?
I threw a birthday party attended by 10 two-year-olds with remarkably little stress, and the baby-sat three-month-old twins. Although I'm now sitting in the ER waiting to be seen for, essentially, the smallest possible health complaint, so the day isn't a total win.
I like to imagine the typo "the" in 277 is best corrected as "they"; emdash arranged a party game where the ten two-year-olds babysat the two three-month-olds.
Were not being systematic. Is it bigger than a breadbox?
How can a typo be bigger than a breadbox?
My bread is very small. ... laydeez
All good guesses! I'm also inexplicably in the largest exam room on the floor, so while I sit here pointlessly people keep coming in and out for medical supplies.
I'm trying to reconcile "ER" with "smallest possible health complaint". So it's an emergency, but a very tiny one. Maybe he's been infected by a single, tiny ebola virus, and has to root it out before it multiplies.
A stray eyelash in a basketball court with two pairs of twins, none of which belong to you?
so while I sit here pointlessly
Sympathies. Although losing your point is a small complaint, it can be painful.
Like in Innerspace? Emdash, did you inhale mini Martin Short and now you're suffering from terminal amazement at how unfunny he is?
Although losing your point is a small complaint, it can be painful.
Are we talking about circumcisions again?
I'm feeling mildly uncomfortable about my humorlessness, especially after the recipient didn't really back down, but it's not so okay to call a public intellectual a "milf", is it? I mean, all in good fun, whatevs. But... erm.
Milf is not okay, and I find it particularly unfunny, so good job.
The other day I heard that 90s song with the line "Everybody needs a bosom for a pillow! Everybody needs a bosom!" and boy did I get extra humorless over that stupid line. For some reason it irritates me on many many levels.
299: maybe emdash misheard it as "boson".
Because of the nanobots in his ear-holes?
Why did the nanobot cross the road?
Because it was doing some incredibly complex task that no one has thought of yet, but which was way awesome and will like totally change everything forever.
It wasn't a road. It was a canal. An ear canal.
but it's not so okay to call a public intellectual a "milf", is it?
So it's good enough for Emerson but not good enough for you, is what you're saying?
Granted, he used the word primarily to refer to attractive heads of state d'un certain age, IIRC, but that's just splitting hairs.
MILF is stupid, but I don't think it's inherently any more objectionable than any other reductive comment about appearance. It depends on context; who was the lucky lady?
it's inherently any more objectionable than any other reductive comment about appearance.
It depends what you have in mind, but it grates on me way out of scale with the casual manner in which it's tossed around.
but that's just splitting hairs.
To the ER!
Tossing around nerf balls is less grating than tossing around the word MILF.
Alternatively, I don't know who we're dying to fuck when we use the words HALF and NERF.
I'm guessing "How i'd love to fuck ALF, the lovable alien from outer space, and NERmal, the Feline from garfield"?
Sore throat, basically. Although I've learned a new word: hemoptysis. Finally home, with a referral to a ENT. Joy!
Cheese graters vs. the word MILF: the tossing around of which is more grating?
314: I bet that was some next-level Exorcist-style hemo-expectoration.
I'd rank from worst to least worst:
William Saletan
The word MILF
Tossing cheese graters
NPR
314: Ah. I had a somewhat similar ER trip recently.
The real answer to 291 is the unavailability of after-hours care in anything other than an emergency department setting.
307: It was a case of someone I knew in high school talking about someone I know (albeit not well) but he doesn't, about whom a similar question has come up here before. (And the fact that I can find this with a search engine worries me, despite the misspelled name.)
And on a questionably related note, this blog post irks me for a number of reasons.
317: Ranking may vary if at a nudist colony.
322: not least the misplaced apostrophes.
Yes, 322 is a stupid blog post.
299 - But it's a song about filmi music (the "Asha" of the title is Asha Bhosle) and escapism. I don't think it's particularly sexed, even.
Who's getting all pissy about the Moro Islamic Liberation Front?
I don't think it's particularly sexed, even.
Yeah, it's more "everyone needs to regress sometimes."
"Milf" is dreadful, though, I can certainly agree.
Thinking about this, and about 'middle age' in a recent Edge post, I wonder just what exactly MILF signifies when used by someone over 15. I suppose that if I regard anyone younger than .5x+7 as a kid, maybe then someone who is approx 2(.5x-7) is at about MILF age? Or is it simply x+25? Or y>25?
The other day I heard that 90s song with the line "Everybody needs a bosom for a pillow! Everybody needs a bosom!" and boy did I get extra humorless over that stupid line.
Who on your breast pillows his head now,
Jubilant to have won
The heart beneath on fire for him alone,
At dawn will hear you, plagued by nightmare,
Mumble and weep
About some blue jewel you were sworn to keep.
Wake, blink, laugh out in reassurance,
Yet your tears will say:
"It was not mine to lose or give away."
"For love it shone - never for the madness
Of a strange bed -
Light on my finger, fortune in my head."
Roused by your naked grief and beauty,
For lust he will burn:
"Turn to me, sweetheart! Why do you not turn?"
what exactly MILF signifies when used by someone over 15
Has a kid.
I think there's another element too.
According to 322 I guess I have a "feminine intelligence" (intuitive, prefer working on multiple problems at once, prefer collaboration). If only I had known this before, it would have been much easier to write a diversity statement.
332: Moro Islands Liberation Front?
Finally home, with a referral to a ENT.
"Drink some of this draught, young hobbit, and call me in a couple of years if it hasn't cleared up."
OT: Anyone going to the Jon Stewart rally in DC this weekend?
I don't think it's particularly sexed, even.
Yeah, it's more "everyone needs to regress sometimes."
No, I don't think it's sexual, either. I get that it's about comfort.
It irritates me because I assume they're talking about getting the mommy-comfort from your heterosexual partner (but hey, maybe not), which means that "everybody" is "male people". And female people get to be bosoms. Win-win.
I'LL HAVE YOU KNOW THAT ONCE UPON A TIME WE MANLY MEN HAD THE CORNER ON THE BOSOM BUSINESS
I assume they're talking about getting the mommy-comfort from your heterosexual partner
I think they're talking about Bollywood movies.
http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2003/8/7/12518/77483
I didn't know the backstory of the song; just assumed they were being catchy. I don't know that I'm conceding that there's not an everybody=male bent to it still, though.
Maybe it's an everybody=child bent. That is, the bosom is not the female lover but perhaps the mother. Still sexist about reducing the woman to a bosom, but more inclusive in terms of everybody.
bosom is not the female lover but perhaps the mother
Definitely. Everybody needs [a childhood experience they can retreat to for comfort], mine's [the music of this soundtrack singer from my parents' generation who I grew up listening to on 45 rpm records].
You can rest your head on my man-bosom if it would make you feel better.
Bosom used to be less of a gendered term. I remember the "bosom of Abraham" from the Bible and nobody was saying he had moobs.
You try living to 175, Moby, and see what gravity does to your perkies.
I will try living to 175. I can haz LipItor?
Back to the topic!
I called my department to start the officially-getting-the-MA process started, went grocery shopping with my roommates, and went to a literature lecture because it sounded like it would be fun. (And it was--it was on 'contamination,' and the prof played songs by The Pogues, some Irish band, and some northern Italian band that does Irishy-folk music, and he quoted from China Miéville.)
Woo! Tomorrow, I shall go to the gym, and mail things.
Three miles in 26:52 this morning. Not fast by any objective standard, but fast for me.
Running after a spring and summer of biking is nice. The biking was never hard exercise -- I kind of loafed along for an hour each way -- but the sheer volume of it did a lot for my fitness level.
