Tuesday, February 24, 2004

Sour Milk.

An all-around bad day.

Sunday, February 22, 2004

Gestures

Over dinner at the ever-annoying Clarke's, Theo and I were discussing how sincerely and wonderfully grateful Allison is. And, it just made us think about how some people he and I know are not as grateful, and how simple an earnest "thank you" is to deliver. It's an effortless action that really makes a difference for a friendship.

And of course, as I type this, I realize how overdue a thank you is to Tim, who gave me--without a doubt--the best birthday present ever. Its perfection stemmed from how simple it was, and yet how meaningful and unforgettable it is. It really serves as a testament to how well he knows me, and I hope that it's proof that our frienship is not as doomed as he once thought.

Saturday, February 21, 2004

Cigarettes and Deep-Fried Chocolate

Life is nothing but circuitous patterns, in which the same situations arise again and again. Why, while some people recognize these patterns and make efforts to transcend them, do others listlessly subject themselves to the same misery over and over again? Perhaps there is no end to our patterns, and like some M.C. Escher portrait, while we think there's a source and an end to everything, there really isn't. Yeah, reading other people's journals, even when you KNOW they'll upset you (I have a list of several), sucks.

Allison came in from Iowa yesterday, and as always, I enjoyed her presence. We saw Rufus' show last night, which was excellent--a few new songs that I had't heard, including one about a 14-year old girl (him) falling in love with her art teacher. I wish we were able to SEE him, but just being there was good enough.

After searching for non-permit parking for the better part of an hour (Theo, much to my dismay, used all the permits without telling me), we parked in a garage. Then we did something I have been DYING to do for years--we deep fried things! We started off with some mini candy bars, moved on to Cadbury's Eggs (kind of a mistake), and had a grand greasy finale with the immolation of a CAR-O-MEL HO HO (Which are the best things ever)! Between that, the smoke alarm screaming, and many glasses of wine, I had one of the better weekends of the year.

I hear chewing. must investigate.

Thursday, February 19, 2004

End of a Short-Lived Era

As unceremoniously as I placed my Howard Dean sticker on my bag--after attending his prophetic Navy Pier speech on a hot, rainy summer day--I removed it today, while traveling to class on the El. As he rightfully claims, Dean introduced a new generation to the political game of baseball, and while he may not have scored any much-needed bases in the latter few innings, it is the home runs he sent soaring out of the park at the game's beginning I will remember most. I'll still vote for him in the upcoming primary, since I'm not ready to take a seat on the John Kerry bandwagon, but with less of that giddy glee that once filled me up when thinking about my first voting experience.

Now, I'm just worried about my future--not as a political yuppie, but as a gay man hoping to one day marry. After Bush stumbled over his words yesterday about how angry he is at the judical processes in Massachusetts and San Fransisco, I'm feeling lost. Very lost.

Wednesday, February 18, 2004

Oh, the Minnesotans...

No offense, Zoe, but..."grey duck?" Give me a break.

The dog has officially caught on to my biggest insecurity. We were playing (well, I was trying to pet her and she was pouncy and riled up), and she bit my nose. Doesn't that only happen in cartoons, and the person whose nose is bitten/honked/squashed/pulled has a really really huge nose? Anyone want to donate $4000 to me for the Save Brian's Dignity Fund?
Another Letter.

Dear friend,

During this year's Super Bowl, you'll see ads sponsored by beer companies, tobacco companies, and the Bush White House. But you won't see the winning ad in MoveOn.org Voter Fund's Bush in 30 Seconds ad contest. CBS refuses to air it.

Meanwhile, the White House and Congressional Republicans are on the verge of signing into law a deal which Senator John McCain (R-AZ) says is custom-tailored for CBS and Fox, allowing the two networks to grow much bigger. CBS lobbied hard for this rule change; MoveOn.org members across the country lobbied against it; and now the MoveOn.org ad has been rejected while the White House ad will be played. It looks an awful lot like CBS is playing politics with the right to free speech.

Of course, this is bigger than just the MoveOn.org Voter Fund. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) submitted an ad that was also rejected. We need to let CBS know that this practice of arbitrarily turning down ads that may be "controversial" – especially if they're controversial simply because they take on the President – just isn't right.

To watch the ad that CBS won't air and sign the petition to CBS to run these ads, go to:
http://www.moveon.org/cbs/ad/

MoveOn.org will deliver the petition by email directly to CBS headquarters.

Thanks.

Tuesday, February 17, 2004

Overload

I've officially begin my semester sliding ritual. In said ritual, I find myself sliding behind in one or more classes--in this case, four of the total five. For Thursday, I have 1.5 novels to read, as well as thirty pages of St. Agustine's dry Confessions, a book meriting no correlation to my history class. Somewhere between these three texts, I must study for my massive Hinduism midterm, slated for Thursday afternoon. Why do I do this to myself? Or, better yet, how do I do this to myself?

The answer to this latter question seems rooted in my inbalance of work and play. While at the time, my "play" (including reading Newsweek cover to cover, watching The Simpsons, scouring the Internet for religious-based groups, such as the Alliance Defense Fund, who hate homosexuals, exercising my dog, eating, and sleeping, among other things) seems justified and minute, in retrospect, I realize that those precious hours could have been spent prewriting papers, reading assigned texts, and preparing intelligent things to say in class (an activity I generally shy away from). Work, therefore, occupies my hours of 8:00PM-1:00AM, Monday and Wednesday (IF I have a paper to write or an entire novel due the following day), and 7:00AM-9:00AM Tuesday and Thursday (to read as much as I can before class). This is radically unhelathy, and while my grades thus far have been nothing short of stellar, it opens up the possibility of future failure. I'm just not sure how I can escape my lethargy.

Thursday, February 12, 2004

Fantasies and Realities

Thank you, San Francisco. Although this will probably not become a trend among metropolitan cities--especially not Chicago--it still tickles me.

I had a relatively good day, that was mired by one bothersome trend. I got an A on my first Border Literatures essay (Thank you, Cyndi!), but my prof. suggested I not be so wordy. Later, in a "response essay" (waste of time essay with no grade) for my Feminist Theory course, my prof. write something along the lines of, "Great ideas--if you'd like, come see me so we can talk about some of your choices of words." WHAT? This is quite frustrating. Not since junior year of high school, when my AP Lit. teacher called my writing "circumbendibus" has my actual style been criticized (content notwithstanding). I happen to enjoy reading my own prose. I suppose I'll have to conform to the wishes of these two word-conservationalists for the semester.

My weekend was good--Theo and I went out to dinner on Friday, and Saturday my parents and sister came down to visit. Theo bought me a new wallet, with sort of a linen-y pattern in the leather. For the big day, my parents bought me a fun camera cell phone, a new rug, some wine (that I distinctly recall seeing in their fridge, unopened, at Christmas), and dog things. We ate at Erwin, my favorite Lakeview restuarant, and came back to our apartment to open some gifts and eat cake. Yuki, in the midst of all this, decided to urinate on the new rug that my parents JUST gave me. Of course, my parents were horrified, and did not touch her for the rest of the evening. I was much more angry at them than the dog--she was just a bit overwhelmed by all of the people. My parents, on the other hand, probably assume this is a regular thing (it's not) and think that this "dog thing" was a terrible idea. Otherwise, 'twas a good weekend.

I bought some fun new spring clothes today at H&M. Before this season, I'd never really distinguished spring clothes from the rest of my seasonal wardrobe. For whatever reason, this year I've had a fashion epiphany and decided to adorn myself in a very Gatsby-esque palate of white and pastels. (This will only last for about a week, since I now own...five "spring"-ish tops, but it's fun to pretend.) (I pulled off a snazzy ensemble last week, with slim-fitting khakis, a white Oxford, and a black-and-pink-striped tie coyly tucked between the buttonfolds of my shirt.) (Buttonfolds? You know what I mean.)

I've also considered undertaking yet another field of study--the Asian Studies minor. My Hinduism professor happens to be the chairperson of the organization, and she passed the propaganda-esque brochures out today, outlining the requirements. I'd like to extensively study South Asian literature--that of the diasporic cultures established in "Western" countries, and of the region itself. Wouldn't that rock?

Friday, February 06, 2004

"Beautiful beautiful"

That was my scribble in the margin of Toni Morrison's Sula, after ruminating momentarily on the sheer powerfulness of the following passage. Of all the books I've read, of all the intimate moments ever recorded in American literature, I think Morrison has created the most delicate, beautiful, and mind-tingling love scene here.

Ajax came sopping wet into the room and lay down on the bed to let the air dry him. They were both still for a long time until he reached out and touched her arm.
He liked for her to mount him so he could see her towering above him and call soft obscenities up into her face. As she rocked there, swayed there, like a Georgia pine on its knees, high above the slipping, falling smile, high above the golden eyes and the velvet helmet of hair, rocking, swaying, she focused her thoughts to bar the creeping disorder that was flooding her hips. She looked down, down from what seemed an awful height at the head of a man whose lemon-yellow gabardines had been the first sexual excitement she'd known. Letting her thoughts dwell on his face in order to confine, for just a while longer, the drift of her flesh toward the high silence of orgasm.
If I take a chamois and rub real hard on the bone, right on the ledge of your cheek bone, some of the black will disappear. It will flake away into the chamois and underneath there will be gold leaf. I can see it shining through the black. I know it is there. . .
How high she was over his wand-lean body, how slippery was his sliding sliding smile.
And if I take a nail file or even Eva's old paring knife--that will do--and scrape away at the gold, it will fall away and there will be alabaster. The alabaster is what gives your face its planes, its curves. That is why your mouth smiling does not reach your eyes. Alabaster is giving it a gravity that resists a total smile.
The height and swaying dizzied her, so she bent down and let her breasts graze his chest.
Then I can take a chisel and small tap hammer and tap away at the alabaster. It will crack then like ice under the pick, and through the breaks I will see the loam, fertile, free of pebbles and twigs. For it is the loam that is giving you that smell.
She slipped her hands under his armpits, for it seemed as though she would not be able to dam the spread of weakness she felt under her skin without holding on to something.
I will put my hand deep into your soil, lift it, sift it with my fingers, feel its warm surface and dewy chill below.
She put her head under his chin with no hope in the world of keeping anything at all at bay.
I will water your soil, keep it rich and moist. But how much? How much water to keep the loam moist? And how much loam will I need to keep my water still? And when do the two make mud?
He swallowed her mouth just as her thighs had swallowed his genitals, and the house was very, very quiet.

I'm looking forward to a calm Friday.

Thursday, February 05, 2004

Blues in the News

Dean Says He Will Quit Race if He Fails to Win Wisconsin
I'm rather upset about the impending failure of Dean's campaign--how can one man have so many people supporting him one week, and then lose them all to a less-capable candidate the next? The media really took the "Howard Howl" story too far; why can't a man show an affective response to things? Kerry's stone-faced delivery of his speeches evokes less memories of great Democratic leaders than of men like George W. Bush. I'm not going to be happy if/when I'm going to have to vote for Kerry in November.

Court Deems Civil Unions Insufficient, Discriminatory
Ok, this is a great thing, but the fact that 38 states have passed bills opposed to this same thing is not such a great thing. I like how a state that takes a pro-gay stance receives throngs of media attention, while a state like Ohio, which recently passed stong, horrible anti-gay laws only gets minimal coverage. It's like they want the gays to be surprised when they suddenly have no rights.

FCC to Examine Super Bowl Halftime Show
Thanks to the Christian right--whose power has infiltrated our political system and controlled practically everything since the Regan administration--the childish, immature Jackson/Timberlake "scandal" may be paid for in the millions by CBS and/or MTV. Because Ms. Jackson had to prove her youthfulness and counteract her lack of talent with "sex appeal" and her "rebellious nature," the FCC may be able to persuade America that strict limitations on not just live shows but all television and radio programming must be enacted. (And, just for the record, this was clearly NOT an accident, and the entire breast was CLEARLY supposed to be revealed, not just her bra. Otherwise, just the hideous latex "boobcap" would have detached, not the cap and bra cup as well. They think the American people are incredibly gullible--which they/we are.) As Cyndi put it, "...hasn't everyone who owns a television seen a breast?" So, thank you, Janet and Justin, for allowing the Federal Censorship Comission to run amok.

I don't have a link to my next story, because none exist. To commemorate Black History Month, Loyola asked Amiri Buraka (Black Power poet, one of my faves) to be the key-note speaker. But, because of some anti-Israel epithets he included in one of his more recent poems, about September 11 and the chaos of the world, the Hillel Center at Loyola (the Jewish society) requested that he be "dis-invited." First of all, that's incredibly rude--to ask someone to speak, and after all plans have been made, ban him from speaking--and unprofessional. Second of all, as my feminist theory prof. (who seems quite passionate about how ludicrous this situation is) noted, "Universities are supposed to be about bringing diverse and provocative ideas together, so that students can form their own set of values. When an institute of higher learning starts filtering personal philosophies, something is very wrong."

Aah! Everything is falling apart!

Monday, February 02, 2004

"Waaah."

And so, as I'm reminded every day, it is not Theo and I who adopted a dog. It is I who adopted a dog.
About Photos and the Perils of "Webhosters"

I am angry at everything having to do with the Internet and why no one will let me store my pictures and show them to other people and have each picture have its own URL. So, until then, just click here.