15 March 2002 (Friday)
brevity
I've been thinking about my Unified Theory of Predestination lately. (Sarcastic capitalization there, never fear.) It's occurred to me that maybe it's just a cop-out, an escape from my own intellectual inadequacy. I just can't wrap my brain around the idea of true randomness. Everything has causes. Every moment has all moments before it as influence, as forces that push it in one direction or another. So that thing that arises out of absolutely nowhere, unbidden and unpredicted -- where does that come from? Can it exist at all?
I would write a treatise on this, but I have an engineering team meeting to attend, and items to cross off my many to-do lists so that I don't fall into a state of quiet panic again. This tends to happen every six weeks or so. I'm not sure if I'll ever be cured of it; the only way to deal with it is to take little baby steps until the inertia starts to work in my favor. Right now, that means paying my heating bill.
Have a lovely weekend, ladies and gents.
posted by enjelani @ 01:47 PM PST [ link ]
14 March 2002 (Thursday)
payday
Another chunk of change got direct-deposited into my checking account today. Even now, almost two years into my time as a working professional, this amazes me. I do what I do, and then periodically this money magically appears in the bank. And I get to spend it. Man. How cool is that?
Although I suppose the converse also amazes me: every month several hundred gets taken out of the same bank account, just to ensure I have a place to sleep every night, a bit of space to park my belongings. A good portion of what my company pays me doesn't go to me at all, but rather to my government; I'm paying just to be here in this corner of the world, to walk these streets and breathe this air. How weird is that?
I know none of this should be mind-blowing. Money is money. Currency is a good word for it -- it flows, in and out and around again, endlessly cycling. It's a form of energy; I use it to maintain my existence, and to construct new pieces of my life. Pretty straightforward concepts, really. I sit gawking at my online bank statement anyway.
Maybe God is money.
Haha! Now there's an idea. It certainly inspires its share of fanatics...
posted by enjelani @ 02:24 PM PST [ link ]
13 March 2002 (Wednesday)
discounts on planet earth
I just clicked out of a pop-up ad without really reading it, and I could have sworn it said THE WORLD: ON SALE NOW! A kind of Freudian eye-slip, perhaps?
posted by enjelani @ 02:47 PM PST [ link ]
12 March 2002 (Tuesday)
...with flowers!
Gaudior, you goofball.
E: so it's my boyfriend's birthday today
E: i need help finding a good present... ;)
G: hahaha
G: pr0n!
E: dude, he's more of a girly-girl romantic than i am
G: pr0n with flowers!
Debbie Does Dallas and a bouquet of daffodils. Riiight.
posted by enjelani @ 06:51 PM PST [ link ]
whaddawewant?
They may have to revoke my Liberated Woman license, but I found this terribly funny.
Study Finds Sexism Rampant In Nature
"The sexist attitude that child-rearing is 'women's work' is prevalent throughout nature and has been for generations, probably since reptiles first developed mammalian characteristics in the Triassic period," Tannen said. "Sadly, most creatures never pause to challenge these woefully outdated gender roles."
Tannen stressed the need to hold high those rare examples of species that do form caring, mutually supportive relationships.
"Wolves, beavers, gibbons, and a small African antelope known as a dik-dik all live in stable, monogamous pairs," Tannen said. "Other animals need to look to them as positive models if we are to have any hope of one day creating an ecosystem of understanding and respect."
I'm putting my head in my hands. This is the posture I tend to assume when I read the news. To turn back to the subject of earlier posts, religion has been wounding a hell of lot more than it's been healing, of late. There's a lot of God-as-the-big-guy-on-my-team thinking going on, it seems, which is understandable once your children have been gunned down or burned alive by the enemy. Oh, man. Oh, humankind. What are you doing?
Thinking about sensations today. Walking on a deserted street at midnight, right as the threat of rain snaps into a downpour...that internal wince as I scrape gingerly at my contact lenses, trying to take them off after hours of monitor-staring...watching my mind reassemble its concept of reality as I drift awake in a bed that isn't mine, in a house fifty miles from my apartment, with the ceiling a few feet above my head...the instantly recognizable smell of sweat and spilled beer as I walk into a crowded bar...closing my eyes on a brilliant morning and opening them again to find the world has changed colors...the feel of Soren's hair between my fingers, the curve of his smile and the strange telepathy it shares with that spot in the middle of my chest...
Human beings are funny creatures.
Lynn recently sent me an essay she's been working on, regarding her profession as a seventh-grade teacher. She works ten-hour days and seven-day weeks, slowly and surely helping dozens of kids to read, to write, to think critically, to imagine things and turn them into realities. I have yet to do anything useful with my life, and I make twice her salary. Something is seriously amiss with the system here.