time for a post?

I had a dream last night that I had posted to my blog, and somebody - can't remember who - commented and said, "that was wonderful, I loved reading it... This is why you should post to your blog!"

But, alas, I cannot remember what I wrote so effectively about... my dreams are of limited guidance, I'm afraid. (But did I ever tell you about my "Mean Year" dream? and the call number I can almost remember?)


William's countdown clock to our departure is down to a day and change.

Soon we're going to go try to sell back some books now - and then I will try to resist buying more books - and I'm afraid I am already anticipating failure. And then abbey road, and then -

Then stripping down four months from the walls and packing them back into suitcases. It's strange that time passes, but stranger, I think, to think that such a thing is strange.

I was reading the other day of a new upstart idea in physics, possibly the start of a new debate where the disputed territory is time itself. If I recall correctly, and we all know brains are leaky things, multiverse theories suggest that time is not essential - we can view all things as coexisting, with time not necessarily a fundamental property of the universe. But some dude was arguing that maybe we should instead pursue the idea that there's just one universe, and that time - passing by, whoosh, there it goes - is an inherent component of this universe, part of its warp and weft. Everything that's real is only real for a moment, and the laws of physics themselves, being tied to time, could change over time (because what doesn't?)

Everything real just for a moment, and not preserved in some eternal timeless coexistence of all things - whoosh, there it goes. Strange, but stranger to think it strange - isn't this the world we all know?


All the thing's we've missed, that we didn't see when we blinked or missed a turn or stayed home with a cough, make William say, "We'll have to come back!" but - knowing how way leads on to way - well, really, it's impossible, you know. It's not simply that the place is different, always changing, but that you're different. Always changing. And seven years later if you trace your footsteps, you're a new person following the path of a vaguely-familiar stranger. And your eyes are new and the stones are that much older, and you've read new things, and thought about new things, and the infinite information before your eyes, you sift it in new ways. What you see, what you think, is different - what you feel is entirely different...

So, yes, don't ever count on coming back. But it's nothing to be sad about - not really. What good would a world be where every step took you back where you'd been before? Where all your breaths were taken as one, simultaneously, where you were everybody you ever had been and ever would be - stagnating eternally - or oh, splitting infinitely, how much worse to be everyone you ever could be?

(sorry i could not travel both/ and be one traveler, long I stood...)


What was I saying? Four months have gone by quickly. And five years, for that matter - and seven - but then again, perhaps they haven't gone by quickly at all. They've just gone. And here I am, and it's time to sell back books I've already read (can you read the same book twice?)

And my tea is cold (entropy in a porcelain cup). Time to stop typing.

Is Amazon.com this polite?

I emailed Amazon.co.uk about a package that never showed up - it was dispatched over two weeks ago, and the mail here is very prompt, i guess because they're such a small country - and here was the reply:

It appears that something may have gone awry with the delivery of your order #202... - the package should have reached you by now. Please accept our sincere apologies.
We have now placed a new order for the same item/items to be sent to the same delivery address.

We will post it to you as soon as possible at no additional charge."

>

"It appears that something may have gone awry..." haha love it!  It doesn't quite have the evasiveness of a passive voice "mistakes-were-made" kind of reply, but it gets close!

two observations

(now that final papers are starting to come due, you'll probably see a lot more posts!)

Okay, so first of all, there seems to be a tendency in British advertising and media to use puns in very unfunny contexts.  Is it a result of the pun-heavy style of the tabloids?  Do they not think puns are necessarily jokes?  Maybe "puns" is the wrong word, because a lot of the ads don't technically use puns, but wordplay for sure.  Here are two examples of ads that struck me as off - one really disturbing one about rape and minicabs and one about road deaths.   Both have been hard to avoid on the tube, and both are graphic and upsetting.  And use wordplay.

I'm not saying American ads don't use puns for serious PSAs - and maybe I just see more ads here - and maybe I'm reading too much into it.  Do either of those ads bother anybody else?

Secondly, I was reminded of my objection to this serious use of wordplay when I read the final line of this Guardian article, about the Afghan woman who was featured on the cover of Time after her husband and the Taliban disfigured her for attempting to escape her marriage.

The article had several moments that made me do a reading-stutter - you know, where your eyes skip back up a few lines and try again - including one passage that made me almost want to write my postcolonialism final paper on nationalism and feminist postcolonialism:

In an obvious sense Aisha's story conforms to a traditional feminist reading of the struggle of women against patriarchal society. Consigned to the status of a domestic slave, she rebelled and felt the brutal force of male-dominated tribal society. And there is no doubt that this is the context in which this vicious crime against a teenage girl took place.

However, it's not the only context, and for many critics of the Time cover, it's not the most significant context. Because, of course, Afghanistan plays host to tens of thousands of foreign troops, most of them American, and as such any efforts to remove the troops are seen by critics of the occupation as all part of a legitimate anti-imperialist cause. From this perspective, to put it crudely, national liberation always trumps female emancipation.

Oh, yes, the feminist reading is obvious and undoubtedly true but WHATEVER, not interesting!  Let's talk about nationalism instead!

Anyway, the article actually featured two separate bits of wordplay that I found inappropriate.  The first was a pun that, as an act of journalistic impropriety, wasn't too - well, wasn't too bad -

She had been given to her husband when she was 12, as payment to settle a dispute – a practice in Afghanistan that goes by the fitting name of "baad". 

I mean, if, say, I were writing an essay on the subject, I would put a pun like in a rough draft for sure, but guess what?  I would take it out during my first rewrite, because one of the first things I do during revision is remove the wordplay that I think is amusing but doesn't add anything substantive.   Unless I think it is splendidly good.  Which, obviously, this isn't.  And especially if I'm discussing a serious subject.   Which, obviously, this is.

But whatever, this appears to be a feature/column-style story - although linked under World News - so that can certainly be excused as wry irony rather than somebody taking the piss.  But - but!!

The Taliban, who have minimal support in Afghanistan, understand the deep yearning for peace in the country after decades of fighting. That's why they are prepared to commit the most monstrous violence, particularly against women, to force the Afghans to submit to their order.

Anyone who is serious about challenging misogyny in Afghanistan is required, at the very minimum, to acknowledge this depressing reality. Equally, regardless of whether the troops stay or are withdrawn, it's important, if only for the sake of honest debate, to state clearly what's at stake. Aisha's experience is not the whole story, but it does symbolise a critical subplot that ought not be neglected. That much, at least, is as plain as the nose that is missing from her face.

All right, let's set aside the idea of women's rights being a "critical subplot" because obviously that's the thing to do...

As plain as the nose that is missing from her face?


You wrote that, Andrew Anthony?  And you published that, Guardian and Observer?

I am, as the kids say, "shaking my head."  smh.  smh.  smh 'till it freaking falls off.  But by the way, I wouldn't write that if we were discussing decapitation.  When murdering groups of soldiers rip somebody's organs out, like, say, their heart, you don't call that "a heart-rending act of crime" in a news story in a major newspaper.  Electrical torture should never be intentionally referred to as a "shocking act."  The fact that women set themselves on fire to escape agonizing marriages?  Not "an issue of burning importance."

Common decency, people.

[But is it a British thing?  Do they not find this incredibly disrespectful and distasteful?  Or is it even just a me thing?  Surely not!  Somebody back me up here!]

pilgrimage poilane

This morning: snow on the immaculate gardens of Versailles, white light reflecting down the hall of mirrors and a bitter wind whipping along the courtyards

This afternoon: soggy feet and frozen cheeks and a map falling apart in our hands, we wound our way through the thoroughly confusing roads around St Sulpice metro station until we finally made it to the Rue de Cherche-Midi.  We thought our weary feet would rest, but not quite - then we wandered up and down, blinking and slipping on the slush.   At last we found the shopfront - sign much smaller than the others - and finally, finally slipped inside the warmth with a sigh of relief.  We met the first shopkeeper/cashier who spoke no English, and I pointed and she wrote down prices and wrapped up my massive half-loaf for me, and the crowd of people in the tiny space pushed us right out the door, and I laughed and pulled the paper open and right there, on the side of the street, ripped out my first chunk of Pain Poilâne and ate.  Flour covered my gloves and crumbs fell on my scarf, and the snow fell on the streets of Paris in big, downy flakes, and was it the best bread I've ever tasted? was it really?  there are so many different kinds of bread, after all, it seems a hard thing to say, but...

Do you know, I think it was.  I really think so.  It really was.  Worth soggy feet and ripped maps, oh, definitely.  worth a trip to paris?  maybe!!

And then the snow turned into rain, and we got lost again, and we ordered lunch then didn't have enough cash for ut, and my toes turned past numb back to painful, and later we were just barely too late to get into the catacombs, and I guess the moral of the story is that perfect moments don't last for long.  but while they're there...!

(Oh, and we ALSO got Pierre Herme macarons.  Yes, it has been that kind of day.  And by "that kind of," I mean glorious.)

bonjour

William can be a hard person to be a tourist with... sample quotes from a visit to the Tower of London:

"Well, that's a lot of rocks." (That would be referring to the castle itself)
"They're big and shiny, I guess" (That would be the crown jewels)
"It's really cold."  (Well, yes, it was, I'll give him that)

Oh, and here was his remark on Harrods:

"You know, this all seems excessive."

And Big Ben:

"It's not as big as I thought it would be."

I'm not making these up!  He is just plain hard to impress!

[William would like to interject here and say that it is not that he is hard to impress, but that he just says the first thing that comes to his mind.  Also, that he thinks "that's a lot of rocks" is the only reasonable reaction to the sight of a large castle.  He would also like to reassure my reading audience of 5 people that he is happy to be in London.  But if he wants to tell his side of the story he can start his own blog, so I'll be maintaining that he is a difficult man to impress]

Even William, however, has been wowed by Paris.  We visited the Notre Dame last night, after breathing a sigh of relief for having reached Paris at last (for the Eurostar was brought to its knees by a few inches of snow), so we saw the massive, massively creepy cathedral at its best - on a dark, cloudy and eerie night.  William was flabbergasted.  I will grant you that his reaction was more along the lines of "that must have taken so incredibly long to make!  Why would they do that?  Oh my gosh," than "Oh my, how ethereally beautiful," but at least he was awed, which is rare indeed.

And when we approached the Eiffel Tower, he said - and I quote - "This is so exciting!"  CONGRATULATIONS PARIS!  You have awed the unaweable.

(speaking of the eiffel tower - 704 stairs, people.  I am going to be so sore tomorrow)

In other news: why doesn't Hums have a field trip to Europe?  It should totally be part of the course.  Today I was in the Musee d'Orsay looking at Courbet's painting of himself in his studio - and needless to say I saw oodles of enormous French history paintings throughout our speedy tour of the Louvre - and suddenly I said, "OHH!"  Seriously, out loud in the middle of the museum, and I must have sounded like a prime idiot.  It all clicked and I dragged William over to say "Dr Smith was RIGHT, this IS an important painting - see, he's making this statement-- even the size is a challenge to the old institutions and conventions of art--"

A field trip.  Definitely called for.  Maybe it would also increase enrollment?

Also, I ate 4 meals today and all of them consisted primarily of butter, except for one that was all chocolate.  Ahhhhh paris!