Cogito, Ergo Sumana for 2002 February

# 02 Feb 2002, 11:56AM: I packed too much stuff to go to my new place, so now I have to consolidate and tuck away and figure out what can go to Stockton. Example: the flat already has eight saucepans. I'm pretty sure it can do without mine.

Benoit practicaly drooled when I showed him that I had Nutella. He's planning on making crepes with them next weekend.

I find it very restful to actually eat a meal in the new place. There's a dining table with several chairs, there are many choices of food and beverage, and the only food around that I can eat is stuff I want (since I threw out all the old/never-gonna-eat-it stuff I had at my old place). In addition, the dining space is very restful. It's light and airy, with white walls, and it's completely devoted to food. About half of the common space in this apartment is kitchen. I'm beginning to remember what it's like to enjoy eating for its own sake and give myself time to just dine.

# 02 Feb 2002, 12:02PM: About two weeks ago, my sister told me of some incident in her personal life. Attempting to console/reassure her, I found myself saying, "Well, that's its own thing." This may be the most empty phrase I've ever coined. I've been using it to great effect among my friends. And my enemies. No, not really.

# 02 Feb 2002, 12:10PM: The other day I experienced a shock. I heard a radio ad that used the second person and at some point it referred to "your eighth-grade boyfriend." I thought the ad was using the male gaze and it turned out the listener was supposed to be feminine! I'm not used to this!

# 02 Feb 2002, 12:21PM: My logic professor, Daniel Warren, is adorable! He has unruly hair and a distant gaze exactly as a philosophy prof should. He is so precise with his speech, and he makes little errors and then apologizes when he corrects them, and even when he labors over explanations and begs us to tell him to repeat them if we don't understand, it's because he really wants to get across to us how rigorous logic is supposed to be.

Even though I already know something like 80% of his lectures from the text, I still enjoy lectures for the sheer rigor of his thought and his few jests, sometimes inadvertent. Examples:

On why we don't want to treat counterfactual conditionals as valid material conditionals: "[That counterfactual condition] isn't true. It would be nice if it were, but it's not."
"It is important for you to go to discussion section. It's not like those where you go, and you say what your name is, and what's your major, and why you're interested in Logic, and you give each other hugs. We're doing actual work."

The material conditional (if-then) symbol we use is like a backwards-c. We call it the horseshoe, which calls to mind a Moxy Fr�vous song. We, indeed, keep handing out horseshoes.

In other logic-music musings: do truth tables belong in The Honesty Room?

# 02 Feb 2002, 12:26PM: You may have Tolkien on the brain if: I saw some textbook by an author named Aragon and I thought it said "Aragorn."

# 02 Feb 2002, 12:35PM: Relevant authorities (I assume) at UC Berkeley recently installed a cheap paper portrait of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in the lobby of the MLK Student Union. The eyes of this picture are such that they seem to be looking at anyone standing on the right side of the midline of the Reverend King's face. The effect on my paranoid delusions remains to be seen. In any case, I'd rather have King watching me (or watching over me) than, say, Ashcroft.

# 03 Feb 2002, 12:56PM: Someone installed a showerhead in the shower at my new apartment. This makes my life much better. Main things I must do: set up my computer, buy and install a rod from which to hang clothes, do laundry, and separate and put away in inaccessible storage areas those things which I do want to have in the new place but don't need to access often.

I woke up in the new place this morning and felt very much at home. I think I'll like it.

# 03 Feb 2002, 06:17PM: Aiee! I need to do all that stuff for my apartment, but I also need to start on my first Linguistics problem set, and catch up on Russian and Music.

In good news, I got my computer set up here, complete with Internet access. This entry is the first written from my new bedroom. Hurrah!

# 03 Feb 2002, 06:19PM: In two days, I'll perform at the open mic at the Squelch Comedy Night. The evening promises to be fun. I need to write some material, but aside from that, all's looking good on the comedy front.

# 03 Feb 2002, 07:19PM: I swear that one of the songs Nandini and Vinay and I heard four times on the radio today was from Rockin' the Suburbs by Ben Folds, but Nandini refused to believe it. Is there some Ben Folds song that sounds really whiny, contains the lyric "it hurts to be me," and is getting lots of airplay on Alice 97.3 and the like?

We were listening to the radio and other music together because we drove to Stockton and back. We listened to songs from the Rent soundtrack as well. I'd forgotten how some of those songs touch me, especially "La Vie Bohème" and "What You Own."

In other Ben Folds news: while helping me move on Thursday night, Steve and Zack ate Chinese food with me and listened with me to Rockin' the Suburbs. I mentioned that Leonard often notes how Folds starts off songs with allusions to piano exercises. Then "Gone" came on and we cracked up.

# 04 Feb 2002, 08:00AM: Get well soon, Zack!

# 04 Feb 2002, 10:54PM: I gave advice to my many-times-over classmate Jini at the library and watched Seventh Heaven and Angel at my sister's place whilst doing much of the first Linguistics 5 problem set. This is the "learn the International Phonetic Alphabet" portion. I hear (from the prof) that later homeworks will take much longer.

# 04 Feb 2002, 11:02PM: From Angel tonight: the tough detective says, before delivering the crushing blow to a supernaturally obsessed lover: "You love her so much? Start a website."

# 04 Feb 2002, 11:19PM: "I'd like to recommend my essay..."

# 05 Feb 2002, 12:31AM: It's already 11:30. But so much to tell! For example, I visited Professor Warren today. Whilst waiting for him to arrive, I saw John Searle. John Searle! I worked in this building for a year and I never knew that John Searle worked a hundred feet from me! My word!

I meant to ask Professor Warren about counterfactuals when I went to his office hours, but I found myself telling him that I was ready for more logic than he's giving the class, and he showed me the sort of thing we'd be doing later in the course by making up a truth-function and asking me to show whether it was associative and whether it was commutative.

Taking that chalk in my hand thrilled me. It turned me on in a way that few events have. And I did it! I showed that it was associative, and it wasn't commutative, and he said that I had gone about it in the right way. That felt great!

And he told me about Gödel, and completeness, and consistency, and he reassured me that the system of deductive logic that we're using in this course is weak enough to be both complete and consistent (although I may be getting my terms wrong there).

I had to go because other students wanted to see him. I could have stayed there for hours, drinking his thoughts.

I never did get to asking him to clarify why we're not treating the counterfactual as a valid material conditional. Sorry, Leonard.

# 05 Feb 2002, 12:43AM: I can usually count on Modern Humorist -- even when it's temporarily crippled. Subverting the genre, yet again!

# 05 Feb 2002, 01:06AM: A few more notes before I turn in, hit the sack, grab some Zs, hit the hay.

My Logic TA resembles the actor Michael Keaton. No one else sees it, though, even when I point it out to them.

On Monday, as I sought my Russian textbook (which still hasn't arrived at the Bear Student Store, grrrr-ah), I saw ready-made study sheets arrayed in many subjects and colors. One pair caught my attention:

Greek Mythology: GODS
Greek Mythology: Mortals

Also on Monday, Professor Warren acted as I might expect a Logic professor to act. In an attempt to disambiguate a sample sentence, he said, "Fido will hungry today, Fido is hungry...what is today, the fifth?"

Professor Warren also sought a particular transparency to show us on the overhead projector, and lamented, "That's the problem with using these newfangled technologies." I cracked up.

"Today" my left foor and lower leg inexplicably cramped up something awful, but my sister massaged it with ointment and now it's all better. I wish I knew what caused the pain so that I could avoid that condition in the future.

And today in Logic lecture I sat next to Mike Carns. Mike Carns whom I knew freshman year, Mike Carns who was once my good friend, Mike Carns who -- I only realized today -- walks, like Leonard, with a characteristic shuffle. Mike -- Rent, Phantom of the Opera, Dilbert, A Prairie Home Companion, Angel Island, the Berkeley Rose Garden, Land's End, AtreNet, Danville, blue, death, long white fingers, Ming's cello, a Celtic cross, a gurgling cough, rigidity, Puzzlefighter, tears, hugs, paleness, "cold hands, warm heart." Is this web of connections the measure of intimacy?

# 05 Feb 2002, 02:48PM: Paulina and Benoit made a great dinner on Sunday night to welcome me to the house. Paulina prepared food that resembled tacos but that contained mashed potatoes and cactus salad, among other ingredients. Very yummy! Then Benoit made us crepes for dessert, and we spread Nutella on them. Holy EU, they were tasty. What a decadent evening! The emphasis my flatmates place upon food shames me.

I'm glad Zack's feeling better. An excerpt from his diary:

Furrfu, you would think people who write published papers should be able to tell what is relevant to the subject and what isn't.

I realized upon the third reading that he did not mean to speak directly to a person named "Furrfu."

# 05 Feb 2002, 03:19PM: Wow, I have two performances today! First I sing for my supper, or at least my Music grade, and then later I'll do stand-up at Blake's. (I hope to look less eighties than I did last time. Seriously, doesn't that picture remind you of the very first episode of Seinfeld? Or Newhart?)

# 06 Feb 2002, 08:17AM: I got three great paper letters in the past week, from Seth and from John. I laughed out loud several times whilst reading all of them. Thank you!

Yesterday I didn't do nearly enough productive work, considering I had only one class. However, I did work on my comedy act a great deal, and if I hadn't rambled so much in the beginning in an attempt to fill time, it would have been very, very good. As It Happened, people I know tell me (e.g., Seth and Leonard) I was good, and the audience responded well (relative to some previous audiences). I'm willing to perform the good part(s) of my act last night for anyone who asks me in person.

Jeana: Russians have a similar custom. They don't gift-give things that connote cutting and sadness (knives and handkerchiefs), so instead they give money earmarked for such things.

Lore Fitzgerald Sj�berg opens this article in a terrific, Neal Stephensonian way:

While advertising as a form of support for independent Web sites has proven about as effective as sugar-frosted dental floss, the Web still manages to serve as a massively multiplayer open mic night for many the aspiring writer/artist/poet/revolutionary.

Finally, before I dash to Logic discussion: the CD in my roommate's alarm clock contains a Belle and Sebastian song. Alexei lent me a CD by Belle and Sebastian (fold your hands child, you walk like a peasant) a year ago; I'd forgotten how much I liked them.

# 06 Feb 2002, 03:30PM: "Oh please god no. Vampire fairies? Can we add a little goose in an apron, and carrying a Confederate flag, and bundle ALL the varieties of kitsch into a single package?"

# 06 Feb 2002, 03:42PM: Just today, I acted as though I was telling Adam the function of the OR operator so that I could cause a smile on the face of my passing Logic TA (the one who looks like Michael Keaton). And then Joel Spolsky pointed to an exlcusive-OR problem.

For some reason, over the past week, I've had Adam's voice in my head. I'm remembering his proof-by-absurdity that John McLaughlin (host of The McLaughlin Group) is not a guitar player. Adam asked, "Could you imagine him playing a Bob Dylan song?" and then did an impression of McLaughlin saying, in the characteristic blowhard voice, "The times they are a-changing!" That last part's stuck in my head. It's not as unpleasant as other sticky bits, e.g., pop songs.

I know there must be two parts to this story, but holy due process, that's incredible.

# 06 Feb 2002, 04:03PM: I'm done with homework for tomorrow; yay! (After lunch, Adam the Linguist corrected my transciptions into IPA -- the only exercise with which I had trouble in the Linguistics homework.) TV, here I come!

Last night's Comedy Night starred Kenny Byerly as MC. You may know him as author of "Microsoft Bankrupted by Foolish E-mail Giveaway", but he's also written a Bonfire Rally parody, a mass email to people who studied with him in Europe, and other stuff.

# 07 Feb 2002, 08:46AM: Last night's Enterprise had ten minutes of slash fiction in it, only it wasn't fiction. As Leonard said, "They're gonna have to move this to cable!"

The West Wing had its repetition-motif all during the first five minutes, even before the theme song (that is, three different people asked a person whether he'd known anyone on the plane to D.C.). In addition, Toby gave a speech that holds the current record for Didacticism In A Show That Is Not Seventh Heaven.

# 07 Feb 2002, 09:21PM: As much as I've enjoyed this week, what with learning very challenging material both curricular and extra-, I'll be glad when the weekend arrives. I love the fact that it always does, right on time.

Oh, yeah, I have the CBEST on Saturday morning in Oakland. Better not forget that! People who know me, remind me of this, please!

Recently, in my Russian class, I smelled that many of my classmates were drinking coffee. Even though my parents both drink coffee, and often, my mind most strongly associates coffee with the summer I volunteered at KUOP six years ago. The smell of strong coffee permeated both floors, all day, every day. Scott Mearns, then station engineer, explained that he could only drink decaf for his health. He often traveled to Mt. Oso, near Modesto, to conduct maintenance on the KUOP transmitter. Once, his kiddies and wife made him a piece of art that asked him to be careful when he was "Oso far away!"

# 08 Feb 2002, 12:41PM: From Steve: "(Hypocritical? Sure, why not? All the cool kids are doing it!)"

From Matt and Adam, over lunch:

Matt: What does it take to become a taxi driver in this town, anyway? Do you have to have the ethnic in, or can anyone do it?
Me: Well, it's like rent control, you know, it's so hard to get a medallion.
Matt: Yeah, I guess you're right.
Adam: I think the first step would be to find out where "Khalistan" is.

# 08 Feb 2002, 06:05PM: I'm listening to Sixteen Scandals by the Capitol Steps. Wow, how very dated, and yet better, fresher, than when I first heard them. It's the reminiscence value. Value!

# 09 Feb 2002, 02:16PM: I done took the CBEST. Oakland Technical High School featured quite a mix of young, old, male, female, and many ethnicities, many carrying two to five new-looking #2 pencils (which reminds me of the old sexual euphemism "sharpen a pencil," which someone had to explain to me back in sixth grade--Lisa Hedricks, who's now a mother, I think).

I saw Marie Adams, of Tokay High School fame, who attends Mills College in Oakland and now intends to teach for a living. That, plus filtering through masses of humanity in the halls, made me feel as though I might be late for P.E.

The front cover of the test booklet contained a copyright notice.

Test Secure
The information contained in this document is confidential and proprietary. Discussion, copying, or disclosure by any other means of any part of this material is strictly prohibited.

But we didn't sign the little things, even though I saw a "signature" line beneath the notice. Hmmm. So can I tell you that the three portions of the CBEST test readin', ritin', & 'rithmetic? Maybe I'll even reveal an essay topic! *gasp*

# 10 Feb 2002, 11:21PM: Now that I have a roommate, and we differ in our waking hours, and I use dialup to access the Internet, I've turned my modem volume down to zero. I wish I could continue listening to that sweet, familiar melody every time I get online, especially since it helps me diagnose difficulties, but I'll give that up if it lets Paulina stay aslumber.

The last time I turned my modem volume down to zero was in high school. As I told my classmates, I sometimes wanted to go online without waking my parents. Robin Yamaguchi told me that he stuffed cotton balls in the speakers of his CPU. I eventually found the "modem volume" dialog box and didn't take his suggestion.

# 11 Feb 2002, 08:01AM: Last night I gave Camilla (my Italian flatmate) a little lesson in early US history. You know, the colonial days, the Revolution, expansion, the Civil War, and so on. She's reading Gone With the Wind, you see. She got momentarily confused as to whether the Civil War and the Revolution overlapped, but that got straightened out pretty quick.

I like American history! Maybe that's something I could teach. Usually I think of American history teachers as idealistic men, but I could do well anyway.

# 11 Feb 2002, 11:55AM: From Leonard:

From JOHO, here's a series of thought experiments to help ferret out to which theory of personal identity one hews. Few surprises for me, as I already knew I was a psychological reductionist; I waffled a bit on the answer to #1, but either answer is compatible with PR.
The thing that disturbs me is that apparently 1/3 of the test-takers have an internally inconsistent idea of personal identity. I can only hold out hope that most of those were people trying different responses to questions to see what would happen.

Waaah, I'm one of the one-third. Here's my beef with the test (SPOILERS AHEAD!): only at the last question did I find out that, hypothetically, I have a "soul" that only lives whilst my body lives, and that upon my death is reborn in some new body, and that dies with no hope of rebirth if I'm cryogenically frozen. (Whew!) This would have changed my answer to the previous questions (e.g., "shall we destroy your body and recreate it elsewhere or shall we transport your body physically?"), since I had been operating on the there-is-no-soul assumption. It's completely consistent for me to change my beliefs when I receive new information! I've been assessed unfairly!

# 11 Feb 2002, 11:57AM: Authenticity is contrast.

# 11 Feb 2002, 11:59AM: Moira Redmond points out a particular nuance of the institutionalised idiocy of St. Valentine's Day, namely, the effect on schoolkiddies (won't someone think of the children?):

And there will be conversations like this one in my house:

Boy: "I can't think of anything to say about Stephen."
Mother: "Tell me something about him."
Boy: "He's an idiot-head."
Older Sister (helpfully): "Well, could you write 'You are not an idiot-head' as the compliment?"
Boy: "It would be a lie."

# 11 Feb 2002, 05:55PM: Taking a break from installing the hooks I just bought at a hardware store. I feel like Frances or Elise with all this remodeling new-house jabbering.

The music quiz I took today felt harder than the CBEST had. Speaking of the CBEST, yes, Seth, it's true that I recall agreeing to some sort of non-disclosure agreement (as part of the rules of participation) upon registering for the test. But I assume (since I can't recall) that those rules specified "discussion" as one of the prohibited means of disclosure. Also, the aspect that intrigued me: the cover of the test booklet contained an NDA that we didn't sign even though the line underneath indicated a signature.

# 11 Feb 2002, 11:27PM: I don't ordinarily hear people worry about seeming "tribaler than thou".

Scuttlebutt has it that Prof. Daniel Warren (or, as I have dubbed him, Dr. Logic) has both a Ph.D. and an M.D.

My roommie is speaking on the phone in Spanish, which I don't know, but I'm pretty sure she just mentioned my name.

# 12 Feb 2002, 09:07AM GMT+5:30: Every year I try not to pay attention to Valentine's Day or the Academy Awards, and every year I kinda do. Hey, Lagaan is up for Best Foreign Film! Adam, it'll be a deathmatch between your Am�lie and my Lagaan, eh?

I finished Wobegon Boy by Garrison Keillor last night, er, early this morning. And then I basically cried myself to sleep because Keillor is particularly gifted at arousing yearning and sorrow and the impulse to find someone to love to stave off death. I'm really glad I've found all these friends and a few readers, people in whose memories I'll live on, but they'll die too, all of them, everyone on every bus I've ever taken, everyone in every class I've ever taken, everyone I've liked and everyone I've hated (a short list), and every thought experiment of teleportation and prosthetics and the nature of the self just counterpoints my inevitable winking-out.

As I see it, there are a few main schools of thought with regard to the afterlife. One is the reincarnation or heaven/hell/purgatory-style belief system. I don't believe this; I see no good reason to believe it.

Another is the Rent paradigm:

How about love?
How about love?
How about love?
Measure in love.
Seasons of love,
seasons of love.
-"Seasons of Love"

Certainly I wish to experience much love before I die, but that's only a way to maximize the years I have on Earth (or Mars, or whatever), and to influence the memories people have of me after I die. They'll die, too.

And then there's the legacy system. This strikes more of a chord with me. I want to create works that will continue after everyone I know and have ever known dies. I've always had a heightened sense of the ephemeral -- comes from my family moving around so much when I was a kid, perhaps -- maybe this is why I'm such a packrat, to keep a simalcrum of continuity about me -- so this is less rampant arrogance than rampant fear of death, although I suppose they're two sides of the same coin.

Filed under: Reading

# 12 Feb 2002, 04:24PM: A week or more ago, upon moving in to my new place, I listed things I needed to do. Now I have to do more laundry and make a better system of putting-less-relevant-things-away, but overall I've actually accomplished goals. How unexpected!

# 12 Feb 2002, 04:29PM: I muse to Jade in Logic lecture. For example, I consider the savings to be had at Truth-Value Hardware, and make up bizarre "neither-noir" stylings. Ex.: "It was a dark night in the city of logic, as cold and hard as an if-then." I get zany, you see.

# 12 Feb 2002, 11:54PM: I had terrific conversations today with Steve and with Leonard. Steve and I even watched The Daily Show together. I simply can't get over how smart the show is! Tonight Jon Stewart interviewed John Stossel and they talked for seven minutes about libertarianism. To me, that's awesome.

# 12 Feb 2002, 11:55PM: Way to go, Dad!

# 13 Feb 2002, 08:19AM: This morning, as I awakened, I happened to stretch and reach beneath my pillow. What did I find? A pair of socks. How did it get there? Completely beats me.

I have a huge Russian class now, fifteen people, and although we're talking about interesting things like cheating and literacy, I still wish the population were around four instead.

This is extremism, in case you were wondering.

# 13 Feb 2002, 03:55PM: When I was younger, back in high school, I watched Mad About You often. In retrospect, Mad About You provided me with my most constant and inspiring model of how a love-match marriage could work.

Now I find myself watching Seventh Heaven and finding in it an inspiring model of American family life.

# 14 Feb 2002, 10:53AM: Tapenade is terrific. Try some today.

# 15 Feb 2002, 07:14AM: Wow, it's Friday already.

McWhorter yesterday, trying to impress upon us that the textbook will help us do our homework, said, "You don't have to read it as though it's Talmud, but..."

# 15 Feb 2002, 03:40PM: Note to self: It is not uplifting to try the "random user" link on LiveJournal. Don't do it.

The week is over. If I could do it over again, I'd spend more time cleaning and less time surfing the net, and I'd remember to do my music homework the night before.

Adam: "It's not just that women be different from men, though that be true."

And, from page 63 of William Duckworth's A Creative Approach to Music Fundamentals:

...using the device of repetition, a device he uses not once, but twice.

# 15 Feb 2002, 04:01PM: The Jurassic era, at your fingertips. Scientifically accurate.

# 15 Feb 2002, 04:23PM: I should read more SatireWire and less The Onion. Example: "Enron Admits It's Really Argentina."

# 15 Feb 2002, 05:11PM: Feb. 20th is another Comedy Night, AGAIN with Brian Malow. I like Brian Malow, but I probably won't go.

On the other hand, I adore all a cappella, and (it's that time again!) The International College A Cappella Association has a competition tomorrow night at 8 at Cal (go to "West Shows"). I heartily recommend this event and will probably go myself, probably leaving another event early.

# 15 Feb 2002, 06:43PM: Zack wrote an essaylet on the flaws of current renderings of mathematical notation in HTML. XHTML and regular HTML version.

# 16 Feb 2002, 12:37AM: I fed and comforted Steve this evening, yet I did not get to reap the rewards of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Such is life.

However, I did play some darts. And I did (earlier) learn that Steve doesn't use a bookmarks page, just my homepage -- neat.

In home-remodeling news, I hung a shelf above the head of my bed. Since the walls here are, as Benoit would say, merde, it'll only hold my textbooks. And a dreamcatcher.

# 16 Feb 2002, 08:59AM: I just sent an email containing the sentence: "Blah blah Scott McCloud blah?"

# 16 Feb 2002, 09:21AM: More neither-noir: "As unsatisfiable as a woman."

# 17 Feb 2002, 01:22PM: Logic just got a lot harder. I received problem set #2 on Friday. When I received problem set #1, I could easily imagine solutions in my head to eight of the ten problems. In contrast, I've been wrapping my head around problem #1 of this assignment since early yesterday. Eeek! I'm quite glad that Jade and I are logic study buddies.

In related observations: what would be a good name for a supervillain who wickedly perpetuated fallacies? Leonard and I are a bit stumped. The Fallacer? Q.E. Dead?

# 17 Feb 2002, 01:43PM: I invited down-feeling Steve to the a cappella concert, but I never expected that Jeana would actually take my recommendation and come to it as well. I got to re-meet her roommate Cheryl, who offered me Scripture Mints but did not have any SacraMints, and her sister Samantha, whom I had met a year back (oh, the time a year ago when I was teaching Politics of Modern Science Fiction! I miss performing twice a week) and who does indeed resemble Jeana in external appearance. Hmm, I bet Jeana would be a cool older sister for a girl to have.

I'm quite glad I went, and I only have a few things to add to Jeana's comprehensive account of the event.

The Golden Overtones made my jaw drop with every number. It started its set with a phenomenal arrangement of "Play" by Moby. Oh, and Jeana, it was the Overtones who did the award-winning rendition of "Either Way" by Guster. And yet, not even third place! The hell?

The Stanford Mendicants did a song entitled "Shambala." Shambala is an FTP utility for Windows.

Hey, Stanford groups! Not every song should be properly interpreted as though it were a Backstreet Boys number! Especially "Insomniac"! (I still don't know exactly who wrote that song and originally performed it. The Mendicants' web site requires Flash. What for?!) I've heard good Stanford a cappella before, and this wasn't it. My notes state, "[Stanford] Mendicants = N'SYNC". And all the pretty boys! I felt as though I had been transported back to the mid-eighties and New Kids On The Block was onstage and all the rage.
In addition, why is it that groups from Cal and U of Oregon and College of the Sequoias are, say, eight people each, and the Stanford Mendicants and Harmonics are fifteen people each? Stanford has at least four a cappella groups (Counterpoint, Everyday People, Mendicants, and Harmonics), so it's not for scarcity of opportunities. Why? Does this somehow correlate with the greater separation between soloists and backup singers in the Stanford groups? Aha, Stanford is an elitist, hierarchical school! Just kidding. I know Stanford is a fine institution. I just wonder why these differences occur.

The College of the Sequoias in Visalia, CA sent us USDA Approved. (I've been to Visalia once, for a spelling bee. I think I won.) USDA Approved only did barbershop quartet, and I enjoyed it, especially a neat tune entitled "All I Want is Love to Stay."

On the Rocks, quite simply, rocks. They got the most standing-ovation-like response of any group last night. I should buy one of their CDs. Oh, and a fella in that group sort of resembles Matt Weinstein.

The Stanford Harmonics started out its set with a patriotic medley ("America, America," "God Bless America," that sort of thing, no Woody Guthrie). I don't think any of the Berkeleyans were quite ready for it. We have many reservations re: the concepts of God and America. As I put it to Steve, " 'God' 'Bless' 'America' 'on' 'DVD'."

The judging was rather, shall I say, Olympic. The Overtones put on a fantastic performance. Did they run overtime or something? I may never know.

Hugs, as well, for Jeana. She led me to the Durant Food Court and facilitated my purchase and consumption of a pearl milk tea at Mandarin House, something I haven't done in a year. And so, caffeinated, I stayed up far too long conversing with Steve. An enriching evening!

# 17 Feb 2002, 01:48PM: Yesterday Leonard and I clinked empty glasses to toast something that we really dislike.

# 17 Feb 2002, 01:51PM: Okay, On the Rocks tells me that the original of "Insomniac" was done by one Billy Pilgrim, which has got to be a Vonnegut reference. Now I just have to pull a Steve/Adam and go buy music.

# 17 Feb 2002, 02:37PM: John Stange replies that one good name for a supervillian who wickedly perpetuates fallacies would be "The Evening News."

# 17 Feb 2002, 11:31PM: Thanks, Leonard! I now have almost all my K5 journal archives within my personal webspace, which makes me feel a little better. I'll have to do some cleaning up, but somehow that feels like a smaller task now that the substance of my entries have been copied to a less unstable medium than the kuro5hin server.

In more wide-ranging news, I immensely enjoyed this week's A Prairie Home Companion (great monologue, great "Guy Noir" sketch), and I'm trying to convince a few of my shy friends to break out of their shells. It astonishes me to find that some people honestly don't believe that it's a useful, irreplaceably good thing to have a network of face-to-face friends.

# 18 Feb 2002, 08:01AM: "It makes no sense." BAH-DAH!

Gray Davis predictions warm my heart because I made one successfully in my senior year of high school.

# 18 Feb 2002, 12:01PM: I just had one of the most productive study sessions I've had since high school. Jade and I tangled with the second Logic problem set and we're confident of our strategies for solving almost all the problems. The one stinker we'll stew on for now; I hope our less conscious minds will work on #8 while we do other things.

Of course, she and I yakked a bit during the study session. Most logic-influenced sentence: while pondering what-ifs and romance, I ended up saying, "But counterfactuals aren't truth-functional."

Whilst walking back on Frat Row, I saw people loading ski equipment with cars. Tahoe is the collective dacha of Northern California's middle and upper classes, I suppose.

Red vs. Blue, The Way It Should Be!

# 19 Feb 2002, 08:11AM GMT+5:30: I'm reading Teaching as a Subversive Activity by Neil Postman and Charles Weingartner. Enjoyable and thought-provoking.

So now I have over a year of my life here in my journal at this website. I started back in December 2000 and I'm glad. Thanks to Seth and Leonard for inspiring me.

Adam and Leonard visited me yesterday. I attempted to make lunch. Tip: beans need soaking overnight before they can transform into food. Take note!

We played Scrabble and I had a great stroke of luck the very first turn, using up all my letters with UNIFORM, but Leonard later achieved SULFITES. Hey, is TA really a word?

Great quotes via Postman and Weingartner:

Ernest Hemingway: "In order to be a great writer a person must have a built-in, shockproof crap detector."
Father John Culkin: "A lot of things have happened in [the twentieth] century, and most of them plug into walls."
Jerome Frank: Up until about 1920, almost the whole history of medicine is the history of the placebo effect.

Filed under: Reading

# 19 Feb 2002, 11:10AM: Huh?

# 19 Feb 2002, 03:34PM: I hung a dreamcatcher over the head of my bed and, by suggestion or by something else, it might be working. I've dreamt rather often since I hung it up, and one of those dreams was a rare nested dream, a dream-within-a-dream.

I am wearing a tie, and as I ate a samosa at brunch, I dripped tamarind sauce on the tie. Fortunately, this tie is the color of tamarind sauce and the stain doesn't show.

I'm scheduled to donate blood today. I'm going to postpone my blood donation appointment again because I want to donate blood on a day when I've slept a lot, eaten a lot, and drunk a lot of water.

# 20 Feb 2002, 12:58PM: Last night Seth and his sister (Rebecca) and mother (Stephanie) visited me. Rebecca asked me, "So, will you write about us in your journal?" And I said, "Of course!" And that's what I'm doing.

That last para was at Rebecca's request.

Care for another logic pun? "P or not-p is valid, except in Canada."

I'm having a terrific time in logic. In fact, I have to go to logic lecture right now!

# 21 Feb 2002, 11:01AM: Recent conversations with Seth, Adam, and Leonard (not to mention Jade and Marisa, my friends in my Logic and Linguistics classes respectively) make me ponder topics in linguistics and ethics of rhetoric. More specifically, am I a prescriptive person? Am I just inherently normative in believing that how I try to speak should be how others try to speak and how I try to behave should be how others try to behave?

I speak rather formally, with "May I" and "Excuse me" and "sir" and "What would you like me to call you" and "I shall take my leave of you" and constructions like that coming rather naturally to me. I know the world would be pretty boring if everyone did that. But I do it, and I don't change my presentation style very drastically for most audiences, partly because (as I claimed to Adam yesterday) authenticity is consistency. Also, I think my formalisms help lend civility and grace to conversation (especially in interactions with strangers), and emphasize my politeness.

But then there's behaviour that isn't as primarily linguistic. I wish my shy, solitary friends would feel less nervous about interacting with strangers and acquaintances. I think people do better when they have friends, plural, with whom they often interact in person. But I hesitate to take that step of saying "ought" and "should." Because who am I to say? If he thinks he's fine living the way he does, with just one close friend, then how do I know whether to shut up or write him out a prescription?

My sister used to call me judgmental, because I was. But I've gotten over a lot of my immature beliefs, such as "no one should use alcohol." Is this one of them? I've already reduced "people should have friends" to "people usually have happier lives when they have friends," but then I'm just trying to convince myself of the prescriptive version without using "ought" or "should."

I suppose my answer is that I can be prescriptive with grace and tact and respect, and that "the proper behavior" is not a law that I can memorize and apply but rather a set of parameters and guidelines to consider. Wait, I've run into this before -- could this be a pattern? Guards!

# 21 Feb 2002, 12:14PM: Tell ya what, I'll give you the rundown on my recent academic triumphs.

Linguistics: I've been getting very good scores on the past few assignments. Some of this is me and some of this is due to Adam's gracious acquiescence to his role as Sumana's Linguistics Homework Checker. This week I didn't get the assignment done in time to have him look it over, so I fear that the era of high marks may soon end. I wonder about the scope of several questions (i.e., how much detail should I provide?), and I worry that my answer to the last question, on morphology, shades into phonology.

Logic: Terrific news: Jade and I got high 90s on the first problem set! *high-five* I'll strive for a similarly spectacular score on this assignment; thank goodness I have all of today to finish it. Even if those guys from my class ask me for assistance as they said they might, teaching them will only fix the logic more firmly in my synapses, so I don't mind.

Yes, Seth already solved my problem #8, but now that I have a strategy it probably won't take long for me to also find the solution. "Long" is "more than thirty minutes of rather intense concentration."

Music: I must compose two short original melodies for tomorrow's session. I figure it's probably legal to listen to Tchaikovsky for ideas, as I am now. I'm thinking that one melody will be some pretty Nutcracker-inspired tune, and that the other will be my attempt to get the riff from the As If TV ads out of my head. Or maybe one of them will attempt to beautify a modem handshake.

Now, back to my regularly scheduled logic assignment.

# 21 Feb 2002, 02:37PM: I am almost in favor of open standards for vampire movies but I wouldn't want people to construe me as some sort of, I don't know, prescriptivist or anything.

# 21 Feb 2002, 02:46PM: I am foursquare against ridiculous copyright extension.

# 21 Feb 2002, 02:53PM: I try to loathe Friends, but Salon is right yet again (isn't it always?): I'll miss it when it's gone. No, really.

# 22 Feb 2002, 08:22AM: Have you ever asked yourself, "Why should I learn the Unix way to do this when there's probably a web applet somewhere that can do it for me?" Case in point.

# 22 Feb 2002, 06:11PM: Twice, now, I've had to turn down fellows on Sproul Plaza who tried to give me information about some dating game ("Singled Out") to be held by some campus organization. I've had to explain that I don't need such an activity to find a hot date. I have more than enough opportunities for hot dates!

I finished my logic homework and turned it in and was sad that Jade couldn't check it with me. As it is, I'm expecting a B+ or A on this assignment. The prof just today told us not to worry too much about getting good scores on the problem sets, since we're supposed to achieve mastery doing them and display mastery on the tests. But I like the idea of getting 99s and the like once a week!

I wrote two melodies. The far inferior one isn't worth discussion, except a general description as "riff on tonic triads." The good one is "Modem in B Flat." If you see me I'll hum it for you and you'll laugh.

# 22 Feb 2002, 11:55PM: Paul Conrad on the difference between soft money and hard money.

# 23 Feb 2002, 10:14AM: All of this is true. Jeana and I visited the oxygen bar and relaxed, but I don't know if the oxygen was the causative agent. I'd want to try an oxygen tent with no focus on breathing before I'd give the O2 a nod.

As Leonard pointed out, "you could open an ambient oxygen bar."

My flatmate asked, "will your voice get all high?" I responded, "no, that's Helium. Wrong element from the top part of the Periodic Table."

What are relative doughnut prices like? Kingpin on Durant near Telegraph sells regular doughnuts for 75 or 95 cents apiece. Is that cheap compared to other joints?

Jeana and I discussed whether it's really true that my online journal is "the opposite" of hers. I report, you decide!

# 23 Feb 2002, 10:16AM: The other day I woke up with a sentence in my head, fully-formed: "I probably grew up in a town called Satellite that you've never heard of."

# 23 Feb 2002, 10:23AM: I evidently got the second-highest grade in the class on the second Linguistics problem set. Go me! And Adam! Behind every good Linguistics problem set is an Adam.

The rhyme "reduce/deduce" came to me the other day in Logic, and it's worthy of Leonard.

Now that I've actually seen the huge flag referenced in "The Flag Burning Amendment Makes Me Want To Burn The Flag" I appreciate it more.

He said "I hold this truth to be self-evident
Anyone can see
It's not the Constitution, but the flag that makes us free
I see these commie pervert freaks and I just have to laugh
You say you want to burn the flag, well what reason could you have?"
What reason could you have?
What reason could you have?
What reason could you have?
I said what reason could you have?

# 23 Feb 2002, 10:29AM: Back when I was in high school and Nandini was in college, she called me for ideas sometimes. Once she had to design a simple experiment for a psych class just to show that she understood the scientific method. We settled on testing the hypothesis that people actually like the way they look, as George Zimmerman guarantees (in telegram form?), wearing clothes from the Men's Wearhouse.

# 23 Feb 2002, 10:29AM: Q. What would a Roman farmer take for minor coughing?
A. Agriiicolaaaaaaaaaa!

# 23 Feb 2002, 10:36AM: I only recently realized that I got some of my interest in political science from Star Trek: The Next Generation. Many of the Hard Questions raised in TNG concern government policy! The Prime Directive is the opposite of the Marshall Plan. How does the Federation work? Why? Contrast to the Ekumen in Le Guin's Hainish series.

One reason I considered this lately: my class on Politics in Modern Science Fiction. Also, last night, Jeana bought tickets to tonight's midnight show of The Matrix at Act I&II on Center Street. And she told me that she remembered with great fondness that one day in class that I asked, "name a philosopher whose work you see reflected in The Matrix," and we filled half the blackboard. How terrific that was! I'll be glad to teach again.

# 24 Feb 2002, 08:49AM: Possibly Steve's best-ever diary entry. Very funny.

# 25 Feb 2002, 08:18AM: Leonard and I saw The Muppets Take Manhattan on Saturday evening. We borrowed a copy from Michelle when we serendipitously hung out with Seth, Andy, and Michelle that same day and we noodled on guitar and dulcimer and synthesizer. Gosh, I love the Muppet movies. Next, I'd love to see some of the old television Muppet Shows from decades back.

I hadn't seen the film for about a decade, and thus noticed new jokes. At one point, describing one such joke to Steve, I used the phrase, "the diaspora of Muppets," and Steve loved it. I think "Muppet diaspora" is right up there with "Texas in a bottle," according to him.

# 25 Feb 2002, 12:41PM: "A bizarre piece reports that the owners of a crematory in rural Georgia were stashing bodies (almost 300) all over their property and passing off potting soil or concrete dust as mortal remains." Is the piece bizarre, or just the story it's covering?

# 26 Feb 2002, 08:06AM: My roommate Paulina made a dynamite pasta sauce last night with eggplant, tomato, garlic, and I don't know what all. It was spicy and thick. I loved it.

In other Paulina news, when she doesn't want to get up in the morning, she grunts in the same manner as my sister while moving to and from the alarm clock to hit 'snooze.'

# 26 Feb 2002, 08:17AM: Why I read InPassing.

# 26 Feb 2002, 08:32AM: SHOCKER OF THE CENTURY! I passed the math and reading portions of the CBEST with much-higher-than-adequate scores. Now let's see how my essays did.

# 26 Feb 2002, 10:00AM: Last night Anirvan came over and I discovered that Anirvan : me :: me two years ago : Seth two years ago. Anirvan reads this journal "religiously" (hi, Anirvan!), and he has no weblog at all, so the information asymmetry just abounds.

I'm afraid Anirvan wasn't nearly as impressed with the opening of American Desi as I was.

Tonight I will see some combination of Matt, Adam, Anirvan, and Steve. They will come pay homage to me, and after the obeisance, we'll drink Earl Grey and watch The Daily Show. Funny thing is, even with all this socializing, I'm more productive than ever. Finally, in my last semester, I've hit my stride.

# 26 Feb 2002, 04:20PM: Today I conversed with John McWhorter, my Linguistics professor. I surprise him, it seems, since I use "whom" and enjoy the odd bit of Gershwin. He surprised me by not knowing that online journals even existed, let alone the term "weblog."

He lent me his books Losing the Race and (newest) The Power of Babel. When informed that a local Barnes and Noble's had shelved The Power of Babel under "New Age," he said, "Those bounders!"

# 26 Feb 2002, 04:25PM: McWhorter quote of the day: "Okay, as long as you don't be gettin' all prescriptive."

# 27 Feb 2002, 08:13AM: I did four loads of laundry last night and now virtually all of my clothes are clean for the first time since I moved. I don't have drawers anymore; all my clothing is viewable at a glance, either on shelves in the porta-closet or on hooks next to it. This has never been true before. It facilitates comparison between items, and "how do I want to look today?" may actually become a relevant question for my mornings. My sister will be glad; I'm not sure whether I will be.

# 27 Feb 2002, 03:53PM: Pre-Logic banter just gets wackier and wackier. To the tune of "The Farmer and the Cowman":

Oh, the p and the not-p should be friends
Oh, the p and the not-p should be friends
One of them likes to be p
The other likes to be not-p
But that's no reason why they can't be friends

# 28 Feb 2002, 07:19AM: The Eagle has landed!

# 28 Feb 2002, 02:53PM: At the bus stop near my house, I've noticed some unusual litter in the gutter. Among the dust and cigarette butts lie about ten used teabags. My theory: it used to be, very recently, that some woman ran every day for two weeks from her door nearby to the bus stop. She was always running late. She poured hot water over her teabag in a paper cup or a thermos just before she ran out the door. As she waited for the bus, the tea steeped. And just before she stepped on the 43 she squeezed out the Lipton "BRISK" teabag and tossed it into the gutter.

# 28 Feb 2002, 03:16PM GMT+5:30: Even though Bad Subjects is usually full of grad-student wankery, I still read it. Case in point: it's fun to skim such a perfect embodiment of the genre, especially when it's queer theory being applied to "why the life of a teaching assistant stinks".

On the other hand, sometimes Bad Subjects gives you a useful introduction to some fun contrarian.

As long as I'm pointing you to cute culture analysis, I'll quote from an instance of Michael Kinsley's brand of astonished common sense:

America is not, as it sometimes seems, a society lurching from one acute social crisis to the next. It is a basically healthy society with lots of chronic problems that exist simultaneously, can and should be ameliorated, but will never go away.

And Leonard is right. Read the NYT article on the revolutionary entrepreneur Farsi satellite TV station. The last page is hilarious -- P.G. Wodehouse for the twenty-first century.

Filed under: Reading