Tempus fugit.
Right.
Time for one last post, one last flibber of nothing into the ether and then I'm going to dismantle my computer and put it boxes. It's going to be picked up on Monday morning and hurled northwards.
I can't quite believe this is actually happening. Starting my PhD. In 3 years time, I'm going to be a doctor. Crazy.
Well. So, onTuesday I am flying out from Stanstead up to Scotland. Then I'm getting a bus. Then I'm getting a train. Then my mate is picking me up and driving me to my new halls where I will meet the 4 other people with whom I will be living for the next year. I suspect they've been in situ for the past week. I'm heading up there with a bag of dried pasta and some coffee. Hoping that I'll get some more helpful shopping done on Wednesday, when I also have to register and somehow move all my possessions from where they're going to my room.
Next time you hear from me, then... I'll be in Scotland.
Until then...
Bye.
Whip-crack away
Just watching some TV with mia madre and stumbled across "Hollywood Sex". Mm-hmm. Bit of footage of a veiled dominatrix wandering round her "Chateau" giving a guided tour; "This is the inquisition room, here's the cross and the manacles, here's the rope-rack... oh, and here's a nipple-clit clip" . Excellent parental viewing, obviously. Anyway, my mum scoffed at the program and suggested that it was all pretend and set-up. "This isn't real", she said. I let it pass, but then ventured, "uh, yeah, I think it is".
"But it's all just fantasy," she exclaimed.
"Yeah, that's kind of the point."
"But people don't actually
do that, this is silly"
"Um, no... I think more than a few people do actually do it. I think maybe that's why places like that exist"
"
Really?"
"'fraid so"
She looked genuinely shocked. Then concerned. "How do you know?", she asked. I explained I'd seen a lot of TV and had a computer. I further suggested she take a tour of the internet on her own computer if she wanted to know more about the contemporary world's sexual mores. Then (just because) I told her one of my friends was kind of into that sort of thing.
I actually think she came close to telling me not to see him any more. I saw it flash across her eyes.
Deary me.
Faux pas
It seems somehow like a terrible breech of ettiquette to discuss the state of one's statistics, but have just checked my tracker and noticed a sudden flurry of American hits.
Who are you, random Americans? And who are YOU, especially random Hong-Kong IP?
Nunc est bibendum
Trying to organise a leaving bash for myself. Somehow this seems wrong. I'm sure other people are meant to organise leaving bashes. I mean, I've never organised one for anyone else. Not that it matters. Anyway.
It's so tricky. Trying to get everyone together in the same place at the same time. Tricky tricky.
6 days to go.
Les regles du jeu
Searching memespace for a game theory simulator similar to those I can find
here, but downloadable. Need to test something. Anyone got any ideas?
Papio hamadryas
Aforementioned Bristol-bound chumley has been playing with baboons. Real ones. I seethe with jealousy and remind the world that I am due some time playing with non-human primates. Hmph. Bloody geologists, having all the fun.
I have a great deal to accomplish. My rooms here are a hideous mess, oh it's a nightmare. I have to go through my warmer clothes and put them in a pile ready to come with me on my plane. I might just sling them in a suitcase today and then have very little to wear for the next few days. For the next 6 days. Six.
Fuck.
It is very weird to be going back to University again. I mean, I know I did it last year as well, and after a longer pause, but that was to the same uni. This is a whole new insitution, with whole new rules and places and things. Also, a discipline change for me. 4 years honing my skills as an extremely competent Biological Anthropologist and what do I do? Hurl myself gamely into a Psychology doctorate. Ah, fuck it. It'll be great. I know it'll be great. Just a bit nervous.
Autumn is well and truly here. Conkers line the streets, leaves begin to drift down. The nights get darker, the weather colder. A perfect time to be moving North to live next to the sea. Ah well. At least I get to wear my big black coat again.
I even dreamed about baboons last night. Where's the justice?
A whole lot of shakin'...
Well, been surfing around Blogspace again. There's alot of weird out there. A pleasing amount of rational, too, so that's ok. Mind you, one man's rational is another man's whooop flimdoo, after all.
Still worried about depressed youth. One does not sling the entire lyics to a Boyzone hit into a post if one is entirely well. Particularly without comment. Hmm. Mind you, I have enough to worry about without entangling myself in the problems of someone I have never met.
Scary words. But you know what I mean.
Am knackered. Not in a literal sense, that would be unfortunate. I'm pooped. Dog-tired and dust-done. Ready for beddy. Instead, I sit here typin' away masking the fact that I have absolutely nothing of any interest to post about whatsoever. Nothing. Nada. Foom.
Chumley's gone off to Bristol to work with the Beeb. Well done him (well done you). For some reason, he texted me from Golder's Green to tell me he was in Golder's Green. For those of you unaquainted with British geography, Golder's Green is an area of North London and is between his starting point and Bristol in the way that Venus is between New York and Australia. He refused to elaborate, stating only that it made his journey cheap. Also impossible, I would think.
Ah well.
My spies inform me that the new undergrads have all arrived in my new Uni town. First years. All that stuff to go through. No doubt all have arrived assuming they are now grown up, that they know themselves. Heh heh. What fun they have ahead.
Off to lie down for 8-10 hours and pretend to be dead.
Cheers all.
There is always one more imbecile...
Right. So.
The lovely secretary in my lovely new department has said I can have my stuff sent to her and it can all sit in her office. Hooray.
I have to go have my eyes tested shortly. My opticians are moaning because I haven't been to see them for 2 years. This, however, is not true. I only joined them in May, or something. I don't think I was even in this fair city on the date on which they claim I had my last test. Fools.
There's always one more imbecile than you counted on.
Went for a wander through a "gadget shop" today. A surprising number of things that electrocute people on sale. Lie detectors, laser guns, remote control tanks, some game where you have to press a button on time, roulette... even a cigarette box which electrocutes you if you try to open it before the timer says you can. Crazy. Ah well, it is the dawn of the electrocution meme.
Right, gotta dash.
(I start my PhD in 8 days... there are no words to describe my agitation)
Mens sana in corpore sano.
Thoroughly disturbed by similarity in look of my blog to that of a depressed youth with poor grammar. Inspired to redecorate.
Thoughts?
Not sure myself. Of course, if I bothered to read the crazy web-design book I bought myself ages ago, I might just be up to making my own page. Ah well, until that day, there's always the templates.
Coefficient of relatedness.
The euphoria of last night fades into a dim, beige ache somewhere in my parietal lobe.
So, the wedding was lovely. My cousin looked gorgeous, her fella grinning like a melon. Excellent. Nice food, free booze. Got a bit drunk. Spent an entertaining evening meeting new family members. Notably, my cousins' cousins, on their mother's side. 0.016 genetically identical to me. Nice lads too. Fear I may have come across as a bit of a drunken fool. Ah well. My other cousin's girlfriend was increadably drunk and grabbed the father of the bride's tummy. Ha ha.
Bit of dancing. Then poured self into a cab and shuffled home with post alcohol fuge on me. Expensive cab ride too. Hmm.
Like a melon? Maybe I'm still drunk.
Consitutional right.
Politicians on the radio discussing freedom of speech etc. Apparently freedom of speech covers my freedom to offend those people with whom I disagree.
I aim to exercise this right as much as possible in the next few weeks.
Going to my cousin's wedding today.
Metablog
Surfing around other blogs just now. Curious. A lot of Spanish. Quite a lot of politics. An awful lot of introspection. I heartily suspect that it is the introspection inherent in a diary or blog that may link it to depression (see earlier). I get the impression from some of the entries that people are trying really hard to sound maudlin, as if it makes the project worthwile. I mean, there's
this one, where the pretty colour scheme and the smiley face of the blogger don't really match the title. Then again, some of her posts are pretty serious. Then there's
this particularly scary example (which, worryingly, has the same colour scheme as mine). This guy offers 5 posts and then stops on June 3rd (my birthday...). Hey, hang on. In the last few minutes he's posted again. Thank heavens, thought he might have done something drastic. Not cheered up much, though. Poor guy.
I think possibly people should be encouraged to talk to people, rather than type their problems into the ether. I suppose the hope is that someone with similar problems contacts you and you form a sort of kernel of support, gathering more and more like minded people from across cyberspace, drawn over your expanding event horizon by the virtual gravity of your very own emotional singularity. Oh yes, I am king of metaphor. Anyway, then you can form a "support group" and all sit around feeling miserable and propping eachother up. Maybe you could all form a sort of hierachy of misery ("this week's most miserable is... ") so that the least miserable has to support the weight of the entire group, while the particularly despondent (yet oddly satisfied) individual at the other end of the scale props no one and can rely completely on the support of his or her entire network.
I mean, I know I'm one to talk. More than a few of my posts are a bit introspective. I imagine there's more introspection to come... but I just don't think that's what the internet's
for, really. Not that I propose to know what the internet's actually for. I suspect that question is similar to asking what a tree is for, or a cave painting, or a rabbit. I mean, what it
is is a wonderful and unprecedented ocean of information. A breeding ground for memes of all shapes and sizes. It's a new communication medium, an entirely new species of
thing , the likes of which humanity has never before encountered. Is it any wonder, therefore, that we have absolutely no idea how best to use it? See the hysteria with which the notion of "internet crime" is greeted. See the reaction of people to the realisation that identity on the internet is entirely fluid. See repeated attempts by governments to regulate, to legislate something that actually trancends traditional notions of space, boundary, maybe even time. China tried to firewall their entire
country. It's amazing. Of course, given that it is also a new medium for communication and given that humans are extremely social animals, we're going to try and communicate through it, but as yet no one really knows how best to do it. Flinging things into the information superhighway and hoping that someone's going to come to your rescue seems a strange way to go about it. At least to me.
But then, what do I know? I'm a hopeless twenty-something with no job, no partner and no idea where I'm headed.
Sigh.
Keeping you posted.
Tweaking with the settings a little. Hoping to create a generally more interesting blogging experience for all concerned.
There is a problem couriering my computer and belongings where I need them to go. The problem is that no one will accept delivery of my things in advance of my arrival, and having arrived, I am going to be quite busy and can't really sit around and wait for my trunk and computer to turn up. Don't really know what to do about that. Also, am realising slowly that I haven't put quite the thought into the "self-catering" aspect that maybe I should have done. Clever boy.
God, I hope I get paid soon. I have absolutely no money. My immune system seems to have hummed into life today as well, so I will doubtless want to go out a-socialising tomorrow.
Mind you, my cousin's getting married on Saturday. First family wedding. Well, first family wedding on that side. Looking forward to it, actually. Picked up my morning suit today. Gonna look grrrrreat. Heh heh. Slightly dissapointed that top-hats are no longer
en-vogue at weddings. Never mind. One of these days, I'll be in a top hat. Just you wait and see.
I have nothing to read. Having just re-read (and re-enjoyed)
Watch Your Mouth , I now just don't know what to do. Or read. I suppose I should get going on the old academic hoohah, but somehow I just can't quite face it at the moment.
I think part of me might be in denial about this whole thing, you know.
Just a suggestion, obviously.
Systema Naturae
Blech.
I'm ill today. Was ill yesterday also.
Had a tour round the
Darwin Centre in the Natural History Museum the other day. Lots of animals in glass jars. Kind of spooky. Kind of cool. Got me thinking about classification and taxonomics and things. Apparently, some guys are busily inventing a new classification system based on cladistics rather than phylogenetics. Not a bad idea, I suppose, seeing as the Linnaean system's been in place since 1758 or something. Not that I have anything against Linnaean classification in itself, but how do we know if something's working unless it's challenged? Moreovrer, the Darwin centre had a chimpanzee and an orangutan in the same freezer. The man wouldn't tell me if they were complete. If so, they must be folded up somewhat. It was quite a small cabinet.
Coelocanths are much bigger than I suspected.
Most mind-boggling; in order to reduce an animal to its skeleton and tendons, they pour flesh eating beetles over it and leave it. I mean... logical, but crazy. Reassuringly lo-tech.
I didn't ask him what sort of beetles they use...
Hey ho.
Flammis acribus addictis.
You know, I think I might be scared by my forthcoming location change. Hmm. Woke up in the middle of the night thinking I was meant to be there already. Mild panic ensued until I realised that I wasn't actually meant to be there yet and that all that had woken me up was the insistant pressure in my bladder. Problem dealt with, some hours of
new-location-angst-full dreams romped through my lobes. Great.
Apparently, people who keep diaries are more likely to suffer from depression than people who don't. No direction in that as yet, but a significant correlation. Hmm. I suppose persistent bouts of introspection could lead to a sort of hyper-self consciousness. Could easily lead into obsession with worries etc. I wonder if it works for blogs too. Mind you, I was told by an old friend (also the guy who got me into blogging many moons ago), that blogs are perfect for dealing with "shit" because "it just gets the stuff out there". Not quite as private as a diary. Perhaps room for more catharsis. Mmm. I stopped keeping a journal some years ago. Have a volume and a half of brooding adolescent angst in a drawer. Keep toying with the idea of destroying them. I mean, I remember perfectly well what that time of my life was like.. I'm not sure what keeping the books would do for me. And then there's the old "but if I die, people might read them". Hmm. But THEN there's the old "trashing them would be like betraying your old self". But then... I am my old self. Still me.
Then there's the question of HOW to destroy a diary. Burning seems traditional. Hurling into the sea is an option, if a somewhat less eco-friendly one. Burial? Too morbid. Melting in acid? Intriguing... Maybe I'll stick them in a safety deposit box and forget about them... a project for calmer times.
It's not as if they have any intrinsic literary worth, in any case. And, millennia from now, it would be truly embarassing if extra-planetary archaeologists stumbled across my diaries and used them as a source for reconstructing our society. Blimey. Scary.
That's it. They burn. And soon. It was the alien archaeologists that did it.
The smell of inevitability.
Oh today I am hungover. I crave sleep and lasagne, and I just had some sleep.
I'm not sure I've ever craved lasagne before. It is a strange feeling, not entirely unpleasant.
Was asked to explain my research interests to a group of non-science people. Well, to accountants as it happens. The girl doing the asking kept apololgising for asking stupid questions. I was thinking, though, that although my work has immediate validity within my field and discipline, I suppose my training has no purpose unless I can clearly and succinctly explain what I'm doing to a lay audience. Then again, that takes time. Rather like teaching, I suppose. And she did ask a lot of... strange questions. It's hard when people just don't listen. Ah well. Then I threw beer over a girl I was sitting next to.
An evening of contrasts, you might say.
An evening of beer, in any case. Blech.
Cor, it's windy. The sunny extravaganza of the past two weeks gives way inexorably to autumn. The chestnut trees have started looking sincerely conker-like and everything. And soon I will be by the sea in a whole new city. Apparently, they're going to make me play 'getting to know the postgrads' and make me sit in a circle and talk about myself. Excellent, that's just my cup of tea.
While you're there...
Have now fully enabled 'comments', so whoever wants to can... well, comment I suppose. Feel free so to do.
Off to pub now.
Hmm.
The inevitable consequences of the laws of physics.
My illustrated atlas to the human body fell out of the window a while ago. Got it back and everyting, but still.
It's so hot. There's a storm trying to happen outside, I think. The sky was purple and bruised earlier. Now the wind's risen and there's drizzle. Although the weather forecast on telly RIGHT NOW tells me the rain and cloud will vanish by tomorrow. Ah well, at least I can work on my tan whilst contemplating a complete lack of finances. Hooray.
There's a new meme lurking downstairs. Actually, not a completely new meme. I've encountered it before. I can feel it working is memetic magic on my synapses e'en now. The apparatus responsible for the reintroduction is, I think, called an 'ab cruncher' or something. It looks a bit tortorous. I suppose some exercise before my hourney may well be in order. Ah well... I welcome the return of the six-pack meme. Let us see ...
That aside, nothing of any interest has really happened. I have some random bods bidding for control of my courier needs, keep getting texts and emails of the most recent quotes. Strange thing is, after a few initial bids, they've started going up again. £300 is a bit steep anyway (especially since I can get the same job done by another company for £35). May stop the bidding tomorrow.
How fascinating.
And the kids all looked so crestfallen when I told them that humans would never evolve functional wings.
Quo vadis?
In what can only be described as a foul mood today. Shame. Quite fancy one of those days from a few posts ago, it'd be quite nice not be around people just for a little bit. Ah well. I think I'll have a cool bath and that might just perk me up. Have I mentioned it's very hot? Lovely day and all that, but I just don't function well in high temperatures.
Humans don't do the vigilance thing. Walking through a park earlier, groups of people gathered around a lake. Fair enough, it's a decent water source and all that. Lakes should be dangerous, though. Big cats and predators need to drink too. Anyway, in big groups of animals, you can normally see one or two of them displaying vigilance. Think merecats standing on their hind legs. Baboons looking off into the distance. Zebras... fish even. Not humans. I suppose, what with being comfortably positioned atop the foodchain, we have few predators to be scared of. Indeed, it is a foolhardy animal that attacks a group of humans. Not surprising that we've lost the vigilance thing... just wondering when that would have happened.
If it has happened. I may investigate further.
Syntax error.
It will, doubtless, thrill you all (as if I have an audience) to know that I am not in any way hungover. Hurrah. I'm all about the milkthistle.
Ain't language great? The last sentence in that paragraph actually makes no sense whatsoever. The closest literal meaning I can conjure is me, having somehow achieved wave/particle duality, encircling a quantity of herbal goodness in some sort of quantum snare. Needless to say, this is not what I meant. The wonder of it all is, that is extremely unlikely to be what you thought I meant.
Going to have a bath now, get sexy and go to lunch with women. Will doubtless face excited questions about my sex life. Yey.
Watch ye for the mark of the meme.
A classical diversion.
Roughly an hour ago, I had an idea for this post.
Time, however, passes.
As of now, for this moment, all I can truthfuly say is; I am a little drunk. The forthcoming blatherings as a consequence of which I hope you can excuse.
Yeah.
So.
Pandora was the first woman. According to the Greeks. Loose interpretation follows; Zeus makes man (MAN), very little happens. Prometheus brings Man fire and teaches him various hidden (forbidden) things. Zeus, in a fit of righteous, godly rage grabs Prometheus and binds him to a rock. A vulture (
the Vulture?) eats his endlessly regenerating liver for Eternity. Presumably, is still eating said liver. For his punishment, Zeus gives Man Woman. Pandora. Zeus creates woman (as Man's scourge) and gives her a box... the rest is history. And determined.
Sounds familiar?
Pandora. 'Pan' ALL. 'Dora' Gifts.
Strange how it all works out.
So, here I am, drunk again. Blithering on about tangentially related classical tumtee. Funny. Har har.
Outside my window, I can hear someone watering their plants. A noise somewhere between silver and leather. A noise that has stopped just as I start to write about it. The absence makes my ears ache.
Time, I think, for bed. I think.
Nothing of any importance.
Another lovely day, as if the city were trying to convince me to stay. Ah, but it cannot be.
Gotta book plane ticket today, having established that no one really seems to care when I arrive at my destination. Keeps life simple, I suppose.
I really don't have all that long left. A few weeks, really. Quite a lot of sorting to be done in that time. Books to sort and pack and things of that nature.
Had a friend in tears on the phone yesterday. Always interesting. Perked up, ultimately, in the face of my insistant enthusiasm. We lost the pub quiz anyway. Off to lunch tomorrow with 3 lovely ladies. 2 lovely ladies. Can't really remember.
Very much want to collect the new set of memeplexes penguin have released. Small, beautiful volumes of great thought. Excellent.
I have absolutely nothing of any interest to say today. How frustrating.
Actually, there is something burning away at the back of my head, but I'm finding it hard to articulate. Something about choices, about assumptions. Something probably about sex. Being human, most things seem to boil down to sex. Nuts and bolts and all that. At least, I hope so. My entire academic life is founded on a false foundation, if not.
Anyway. There are people who seem to find the idea of (already, I can see where this is going... I don't think I like it) the idea of physicality for physicality's sake alien. Who assume that a night spent together means more than it necassarily does. Not the people concerned; what makes this more peculiar is that these people are not people with whom I have spent a night (although, I have been caught up in that one). Assumption. The coy glance, the knowing smile, "how are things with you and...?", fine thanks. As if, which it could (unarguably), a shared bed necessitates an intertwining of the ways. I do feel an attachment with those I have slept with, and a close one. In itself, it guarantees nothing. Nor does it require fidelity.
Rate the following statement from 1 to 9 where 1 = 'strongly disagree' and 9 = 'strongly agree':
"Sex without love is ok."
That's not even what I'm talking about.
Oh memes, memes ... they use us for their sport.
ACCENTS VARIOUS
It's a lovely day / early evening. From my window, I can see a woman talking into her mobile phone on her balcony. Because my window is open, and because she is talking at sufficient volume, I can hear her talking spanish. She is so far away, however, and my spanish so limited that I have no idea what she is talking about. Ah well.
The teaching gig wound up a week or so ago. Some surprising results. Met up with one of the results last Thursday, to send a chum of mine off to finish his doctorate. Came home with me, said goodbye at 5.30 the following morning. All very pleasant. Maybe a trip to Dublin in order. Always been a sucker for an Irish accent.
No time for jaunts. No money either.
Hey ho.
Gotta sort couriers out. Book flight and train. Really gotta tidy room.
So much to do... so little volition.
