Wit & Whim

Sick. I hate the phenomenon and it happens seldom enough that I have difficulty coping with the inactivity and mandatory stupidity. There are some things that help me cope. Oddly enough, books do not help me very much when I am actually sick. I can read, but retention and comprehension are minimal. I read the prologue to some interesting non-fiction last night, but my head hurt by the time I had finished an introduction to the commonalities between Epaminondas, Sherman, and Patton, and I went distinctly foggy. In dire straits like these television is actually of some small use to me. But greater still, video games. My stupidity is enough to render my strategy games a challenge, but not impossible. The best games for these deathbed moments are FPS and action type games, one in particular standing out. Portal. I find myself chuckling at the promises of cake and other "enhanced truths" told to you by your little guide. It has to be the most innovative game I've ever played. ...

I think that reading is the thing I miss most about pre-college life. I really notice it now that I'm back to my several book a week regimen. And I really don't think that I gained more from that English class than I do from my normal 14 weeks of reading and writing. At least a couple of my classes this semester will be using real books for our materials. While one could certainly argue that some of my reading is much more substantial, it is not necessarily the substantial reading that gives the greatest benefit. I think that I gain a lot more as a writer from good books which capture my interests and emotions than great literature which bores me. *coughbrontecough* The Hunger Games was well written and absolutely gripping. One of those books that made me laugh and cry and caused my dry tongue to cleave to the roof of my mouth in some of the more intense portions. Her varied tempo with the sentence structure is excellent and she manages to make it feel like natural human though...

Finished Hunger Games a few minutes ago. Will blog more about it later. Aside from being very well written, it was also an emotional reaming.

One might think that having oodles of extra time would be conducive to increased blog traffic. One would be quite mistaken. During school my blog is more valuable as a repository for any thoughts which won't stop flitting around my brain. When I am home and totally relaxed I do not need such a device quite so much. I think today I found the greatest factor. These last few days have been tremendously lazy; consumed by books, movies, and shopping. Today, however, I stayed home and cleaned like a little maniac. Suddenly, after the last sweet phrase of my third album, I felt the burning need to write something. It can then be assumed that I write more when I am busy. Activity provides food for my brain, which makes sense because I think better when moving. You are free to assume that, if I have not blogged for a few days, I am acting the part of the lazy little layabout. Moving on... I went back and read Oliver Twist. Horridly depressing, as I expected. The facetious irony was good for...

I didn't think that I had garnered any -A or any such thing. But confirmation is always nice. Three A's and a couple +A's. Now I can really rest. Will post about Christmas with the Harris family when I feel like writing.

English was a cinch. Nowhere near as difficult as I thought...and I really did think it would be easy. German is my last final, and it is not a question of whether I do well, but whether my score is as high as the other boy wonder in the class, J.D. He consistently scores a little higher than I do, and since most of my errors are carelessness, not ignorance, I think I might do it this time! *Rapid shift of thought and Topic* I must be careful about using this facebook thing again. I realize that it is winter and that outside is not exactly the place to be. But I need to be sure I don't cut into my constructive time with that brain eating cancer of a social networking site. Alright. Time to go find people.

Every morning I face the same challenge; a veritable dance of death. When I stumble my way down the hall--rather in the manner of a stunned moose--toward the shower, I do so with the constant company of danger. As I go down the hall I wonder exactly how my end will come? Will my end come from a sideways tumble down the stairs? Perhaps a sudden heart attack? Maybe it will just cut off my legs and maul me? No matter where they were three minutes before, there is almost always a cat sprinting to position itself beneath my raised foot. I say: there is danger in the morning. As surely as there are cats; there is danger.

You cannot understand the present unless you understand the past. The present is only the momentary continuation of the past and is part and parcel with the same. So why is it that when American history is discussed, be it in schools or books, that we seem to skip from the freeing of the slaves right to the beginning of the first World War? One would almost think that slavery ended with the end of the civil war. It did not. It might have ended in name, but it was not over in reality. The 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments were obeyed in the south only because the union troops, underneath the command of the brutal but efficient Sherman, ensured it with force. The black populace voted for the republicans; the party of the abolition. Republican power during this short span was greater than it ever was and will ever be again. And the black populace enjoyed greater civil rights than they would until the mid twentieth century. 1866 saw the formation of the KKK; the, evil, white trash, scrub bas...

Girding my loins for tonight's final, I feel no stress. This is history; it comes so naturally and makes perfect sense. None of it is purposeless. It is a million threads which wind together to create a breathtaking tapestry of humanity. No thread hangs alone and none is without its purpose and meaning in the tapestry. This final is going to be fun. It is the same way for my other finals that lie ahead. German will be difficult; a puzzle. But it will be an enjoyable puzzle. English will be English, which is to say, second nature and totally comfortable. My only tedious final is already behind me. Now my greatest source of anxiety is those late library books that I need to return tonight. I hope I don't get one of the surly librarians. Now, I must finish up with this and go practice disarming smiles.

I have always wondered when university transferred its mission from education for educations sake to career orientation and training. When did their focus morph from creating thinkers and refining minds into creating employees and glorified merchants? I think I found part of the answer earlier. After WWII we passed a GI bill that allowed American veterans to go to college free of charge. The rates of student graduation plummeted into the low 40% area and it never made it back to the previous rates in the 80-90% range. We are now hovering just below 60%, which is about 10% lower than our rate in the 70s. The GI bill permanently changed the nature of the American university system. The young veterans of WWII were not there to study human nature or the course and formation of history. They were there because they thought it was the way to get ahead in life, and the system, led by the enticement of doubled and tripled budgets, changed to accommodate them. Only about 25% of the WWII GIs eve...

There I was, gloomy, tired, and downcast, no inspiration daring enough to venture into the presence of my melancholy. My research paper just wasn't coming along. I needed to find certain statistics, not flattering to the current administrators of the university system. I did not lose faith, the fact that the opposition had published no statistics in favour of their position on the issue heartened me. But the total lack of evidence from the opposition did not necessarily mean that my needs would be fulfilled; the haughty poobahs of the arcane tower do not publish their research if it does not agree with that which they hoped to find. But... Even arcane poobahs slip up. I caught a series of inconsistencies and hypocrisies that lend me all the munitions I require. I can finish my piece much stronger than I hoped to this morning. Funny enough... This revelation, this majestic Whim of Wit which shattered my uncertainty and gloom, struck me after hours of fruitless toil. Why did it wait ...

There are multitudinous bonuses to having a brilliant and gorgeous older Sister. The bonus we are concerned with in this entry is food. Namely, the worldly lawyers throw feasts and I get invited for no other reason than the Shewoof's goodness and generosity toward lesser beings, like me. So, this night, I joined in the revelry of her office Christmas party at Chops. I feasted. I will sleep soundly with the remembered taste of lamb chop and creme brulee tickling the tip of my tongue. Tonight, I am the Moocher King.

I woke up this morning to a morbid reality of taupe and white. The soft pall of white announces this land as dead and covers over all the grass that would try to say different. The flowers wither and everything takes on a stillness. The world is in mourning. But even as we pass into winter, we do so in the knowledge that spring is coming. Light and color will return to the world. The white pall will be cast aside and the grass and flowers with burst forth more splendid than when last we saw them. Song will return to the air and our mourning will at last be over. Winter has come. It is not a happy thought. However. Be of good cheer. Spring is coming.

I almost feel guilty when I hear about the daunting mountain of homework that Win is laboring under. Almost. Self study for the final is not exactly difficult. Two or three hours of my time, at my leisure and good pleasure, seems easier than the hour and fifteen minutes spent in the company of the professor. Here I have endless supplies of coffee. I may stretch and walk around when I please. I can even listen to my music while I am working. It is an easy schedule and I find myself unwinding very nicely from all accumulated stress that I collected during my research process. However, not being in the presence of the professor does make it difficult to drag feedback out of them. I am still waiting for a certain professor's feedback, in light of which I was supposed to begin my revision on a certain paper. While there is oodles of time before I really need this info, it is usually my preference to get all this nonsense out of the war early. I dislike last minute jobs. Having finishe...

I do not know why it is that I so love the sight of them. There is something about the bleary, radiant, veiled quality of that light that I love. Better even than the sight of them; walking on a dark rainy night with said orbs as the only illumination on the path and that tangy worm-smell in the air. And also, the soft caress of rain, even if bitter cold, I have always found so soothing. It is like the drops, which roll off of my face, carry my worries and stress away with them. Even after the longest days, the rain always makes me feel light again. With the darkness and the solitude and the steady, measured, and ceaseless patter of the rain, the smallest spark of imagination or breath of a whim leads to the most wondrous realms of thought. It really is a pity that it is so late and I have class tomorrow; I should love a little walk in the rain. Or better yet: a long walk.

Basketball, every single class, someone says we should face the IPFW women players. Everyone would then agree that this was crazy talk and that the individual needs be institutionalized. We would be destroyed. Today, three intrepid teammates and I put that assertion to the test. I had already been working out since eight, as had the other three, yet we were the only ones from the class who had the energy to play the girls. We were easily the strongest physical specimens. We would have to see how it went. Playing to fifteen by ones and twos, we took them best two out of three in 2 sets. We went ahead and played the third, but they beat us at that one, partially because it was half-court and cut down on our speed advantage. Still, for not having played basketball in a long time, winning that match against legit college players felt good. If only I could play as well during class as I did in those matches. More suspicious free food today. The grilled cheese turned out to be edible. I did ...

The front page of the Journal Gazette Metro section sickened me. There were two stories at the top. One of the stories was about a pizza delivery man who was murdered, the thieves apparently killed him in order to take his pizzas. The second story was about a man who had a twelve foot blue spruce in his front yard; had is the operative word. Someone cut it down and stole it during the night. What the hell is wrong with people. Murder for pizza. How can you look your children in the eyes as you decorate a tree that you stole from someone's front yard? Sickening