I cannot stand technology!! If I have to grapple with blogger.com with every post and reiterate how I can't work under these conditions, I will explode in a blast of greasy Chinese food. I kid you not. Be careful, those green tea pumpkin seeds can be lethal when half-digested and aimed towards your eye.
And to get this off to a better start: happy chinese new year! My mother and I couldn't decide whether the appropriate translation ought to be "sheep" or "ram", but the family unanimously decided that "goat" was altogether undignified, and that the Chinese zodiac was badly off enough with the inclusion of the rat to not even hazard including an animal that licks tin cans. In any case, I managed not to offend a single family member, senior or otherwise, on the most important day of the Chinese year, so I figure this year (lunar year, for those nitpickers out there) is starting off decently. Besides, my grandmother had these awesome beef jerky/candy things that reaffirms my faith in Shanghai cuisine -- not to mention those aforementioned green tea pumpkin seeds, but that was my other grandmother, and best not to confuse the two especially when food is involved.
Leaving out all the sappy family bits that no one besides me holds dear, I have to say my faith in capitalist oppression has been reinstated with twice the vigor as before. Blame the culprit, the "Sunlife Chinese New Year Festival" at the PNE (and when *are* they going to tear that thing down? the suspense kills me) and infrequent leaves of absence from the Ivory Tower of the university. I'll warrant a bunch of Chinese merchants and random families stuffed into a small space describes the everyday interactions of over a billion people, but as I remarked to my father, it proved a telling reminder of how true Agent Smith got it: we are a parasitic race, a disease of this earth, and morality will only get in the way. Looking around (mostly at a sea of black hair, thanks to my towering five-foot-six), one feels how easy and natural capitalist exploitation is -- completely undoing the work of 3 theory/philosophy courses and putting my leftist leanings into retirement for awhile. I felt so sinister. My siblings and I formed a pact to one day command the Fortune 500. I wanted to take over the world by buying out small, nuclear-capable countries. Selling out never looked so good.
A last thought about the Colombia disaster -- the space junkie in me hasn't died yet, which surprised me -- before signing off; I wish I could stay in that constant state of wonder enjoyed only by small children, grandparents, and physicists. Now that I'm none of those, it takes disasters to capture my attention -- and past dreams.
Here's to a new year, and everything we ever left behind.
And to get this off to a better start: happy chinese new year! My mother and I couldn't decide whether the appropriate translation ought to be "sheep" or "ram", but the family unanimously decided that "goat" was altogether undignified, and that the Chinese zodiac was badly off enough with the inclusion of the rat to not even hazard including an animal that licks tin cans. In any case, I managed not to offend a single family member, senior or otherwise, on the most important day of the Chinese year, so I figure this year (lunar year, for those nitpickers out there) is starting off decently. Besides, my grandmother had these awesome beef jerky/candy things that reaffirms my faith in Shanghai cuisine -- not to mention those aforementioned green tea pumpkin seeds, but that was my other grandmother, and best not to confuse the two especially when food is involved.
Leaving out all the sappy family bits that no one besides me holds dear, I have to say my faith in capitalist oppression has been reinstated with twice the vigor as before. Blame the culprit, the "Sunlife Chinese New Year Festival" at the PNE (and when *are* they going to tear that thing down? the suspense kills me) and infrequent leaves of absence from the Ivory Tower of the university. I'll warrant a bunch of Chinese merchants and random families stuffed into a small space describes the everyday interactions of over a billion people, but as I remarked to my father, it proved a telling reminder of how true Agent Smith got it: we are a parasitic race, a disease of this earth, and morality will only get in the way. Looking around (mostly at a sea of black hair, thanks to my towering five-foot-six), one feels how easy and natural capitalist exploitation is -- completely undoing the work of 3 theory/philosophy courses and putting my leftist leanings into retirement for awhile. I felt so sinister. My siblings and I formed a pact to one day command the Fortune 500. I wanted to take over the world by buying out small, nuclear-capable countries. Selling out never looked so good.
A last thought about the Colombia disaster -- the space junkie in me hasn't died yet, which surprised me -- before signing off; I wish I could stay in that constant state of wonder enjoyed only by small children, grandparents, and physicists. Now that I'm none of those, it takes disasters to capture my attention -- and past dreams.
Here's to a new year, and everything we ever left behind.
