Things that Resonate

First let me say, Orangina: the Champagne of orange juices.

It's a weird run here, chucks. I've got two weeks left in Chicago. The furniture is gone from the ol' apartment, Casey is in Morocco, it's just me, a camping chair and the cable televizions. I am watching CSI as I type; it is awfully quiet without the TV on.

But the acoustics! Who knew this apartment was so damn echoey. I sneeze; the building rings with the rage of my respiratory reflex. It is as though I have shattered the sanctitude of a temple I did not realize existed, until I broke its stillness with my thoughtless fits of allergic hypersensitivity. It is dusty without the furniture here.

Speaking of resonance, I find myself bursting into song these days. Any place with promising acoustics, I try on for size: quietly, if I must; resounding, if I may. Deeply, richly, robustly, if I am drunk. (It seems to me that I sing well, when I am drunk. This feels like tautology, but it is too late for me to work that out properly.) I digress; location-location-location. Bathrooms, bathtubs, banks; all hold promise, some deliver on it. The public aspect of publicly bursting into song has yet to hit home; there is glorious anonymity in wandering a big city alone. Though I must say: good acoustics make me happy, but other people who notice/enjoy good acoustics make me even happier. (This is an invitation for you all to belt out a tune in my presence, should you wish to do so.)

Another topic: Some of you have noticed that my Facebook page has become a repository for E.M. Forster quotes. Truth. I have confessed to some already, and here I make a general statement: A Room with a View -- a novel, a 176 page comedy of manners and societal mores -- is the fountainhead of a good deal of my personal philosophy. I recommend it.

Let me first say: I do not identify with Mr. Emerson, certainly not with Lucy, nor with anyone else in the novel (though in Freddy Honeychurch, I declare a favorite). Rather, I appreciate the fabric, the environment of this story. Below the romantic current, there rests a riverbed manifesto against repression, restriction, the rubbish that cumbers the world. ("The rubbish that cumbers the world." E. M. Forster. A Room with a View. Hayes Barton Press, 1908. Chapter 13. I quote this book constantly, naturally. I lost the reflex long ago to make "air quotes" with my fingers.) This world-cumbering rubbish seems particularly appropriate food for thought in the present day. Though we speak freely about sex, bodily functions, and the letter "S" (stomachs), confusion, conflict, and willful self-deception abound as strongly today as in any other period of history. Though society as a whole may never move beyond the rubbish, as individuals, we would all do well to see across it.

Alright, that's enough philosophy for tonight ('"I say, what about this bathe?" murmured Freddy, appalled at the mass of philosophy that was approaching him.' Chapter 12. Echoes in my head). Spike has switched from a CSI marathon to a thinly-disguised infomercial for unnatural male enhancement, and I think this is a signal for me to wrap things up. Since I have made heavy use of quotation marks in this post, I will end with a sign we saw on the bus today:

"Do not drill here"
Electrical wires

I leave it to you to puzzle out the rationale there. Farewell, and goodnight,

-RP

Light Skin, Dark Skin, My Asian Persuasion...

Saw this at a club last night and thought, this video is so me:



I'd heard the song before, and noted the amazing lyrical snippet above. But Janet Jackson! Space rocks! Planets! Shiny spider-spacewalk-dancers! Dancing on planets! Also, supertight group dance sequence. Only thing missing: some lasers in space.

Hot.

Missed Connections

You were the angriest baby I'd ever seen. You sat up in your stroller, your hands clenched in tiny fists. You glared at the people who walked through the quad: undergrad drifters looking for lunch, grad students blinking in the daylight. You did not cry. But I thought to myself: man, that baby looks pissed.


* * *

Also, I found a gigantic wrench.

It was buried in a scientific debris pile in the high-pressure mineral physics lab, which has been abandoned / inhabited by vagrants for decades. It's more than two feet long, two inches thick, and weighs something like 25 lbs. You might ask, so what? It's a long wrench. But it's not just a normal wrench that has been stretched out, length-wise. It's a normal wrench that has been blown up, proportionally, into a comical Novelty Wrench made of solid steel. It's Wayne Szalinzki, "Honey I Blew Up the Kid!" except he missed, and hit the tool box.

The funniest thing about this wrench is that it was, I think, actually functional. Somebody (here I envision a brawny, tanned high-pressure mineral physicist) wielded that thing, swung it up and used it to tighten some massive bolts. I wonder if the bolts are lying around somewhere, too.

* * *

This brings me to my last point. Have you ever encountered something so strange and wonderful that you felt a need to broadcast, to shout it from the mountaintops? I did this today with the wrench ("I found a gigantic wrench!"), and all of my conversations (real and electronic) came to a glaring halt. Glorious non sequitur; electronic silence. Well, once you write it, you can't take it back (can you? is there an 'undo send?'). I'll make up for it by being robustly sane for the next few weeks. That ought to take care of it.

Meditation on a Treadmill

There's a certain zen to the feel of sweat running down your face. Remember when you were a kid, tracing raindrops with your finger as they zigzagged their way down a window? It's like that. Except rain is beautiful, and sweat is kind of gross.

Also windowpanes are cold, and my face is very hot.

Crime, Punishment, Assorted Curiosities! Scenes from the daily UChicago grind

Redacted. -- Ed.
Click here for the full post, or email me for access.
* *

Alright chucks.

March and April gone, with nary a post from me. Some of you have noted that I only write when something extraordinary, outrageous, fantastical! happens my way. This is, in general, true; however, it's true by default rather than design. Tonight I steer the blog towards calmer waters: waves may be lower in amplitude but higher in frequency. But why?! you might ask. Well reader, extraordinary is by definition rare, and this is boring, for me and for you. So let's put extraordinary aside, and set our sights on curious.

Things that I have found curious (which have come to my attention within the scope of the past two months, and which I have failed to address in the course of daily conversations, these being sadly limited) are:

(1) Marathons. Not the kind where you run. The kind where you sit on a couch, toss your remote, and submit yourself to the will of a single cable television station, only to find that it has devoted its entire daytime lineup to a [addictive network TV show] -dash- marathon. I love this. I have watched Scrubs-marathons, House-marathons, separate and distinct marathons of CSI, CSI: Miami and CSI: New York, marathons that render entire days useless, marathons that glide seamlessly into nights of untroubled sleep. In the process, I have convinced myself that I have Cushing's syndrome (thanks House), and grow ever more mistrustful of my potentially-homicidal officemates (thanks CSI). Also, thanks Jorja Fox. Nothing specific. Just thanks.

(2) Germans, specifically Emo-Germans, extra-specifically the Emo-German Thomas. Thomas is stuck on a rollercoaster ride of conflicting emotions towards yours truly, aka his personal chauffeur (no joke, this is how he introduced me to his friends in Houston).

(3) Shark Bites!! (fruit snack) How are they so delectable? It seems wrong.

It's Not Delivery; It's DiGiorno! Wheat Futures in Record Territory

Eat pizza, boost economy.


From the Wall Street Journal:

The little-known Minneapolis Grain Exchange is suddenly one of the hottest spots in the global financial markets as the price of its flagship commodity -- the wheat used to make bread and pizza crust -- shatters records, enriching farmers and fueling fears about shortages.

What a photograph. Kudos, Associated Press. What range! What expression, played out across the faces of these honest Minnesotan folk. Monumental triumph, anticipation, earth-shattering restraint! All come crashing out of the great solution of human emotion, drawn down by the prospect of wheat futures.

However! While Bald, Portly Gentleman in Blue brings us a certain joy with his irrespressible personal optimism, Purple Shirt, Yellow Jacket (aka the guy from Ferris Bueller?) does well to exercise caution. Fear runs in rivulets, out there in the trading pits. Unprecedented volatility draws disbelief and worries of market collapse.

Keep an eye on this one.

The Moonstone

LOST: Silver bracelet, set with moonstone jewel.

(If the title of this post got you all hopped up and ready for a riveting discussion of the 1868 Wilkie Collins novel of the same name, apologies. The book happens to be sitting on my desk. As soon as I do finish it, I'll write something up.)

This post is actually about a recent minor catastrophe. I lost my moonstone. Years ago, a Hindu astrologer, having channeled the dictates of various star charts and arcane numerological calculations of unassailable veracity, determined that I should wear a moonstone as my birthstone, and also that I should beware my coworkers, for they are untrustworthy.

Well you take the good with the bad, and there you have it. I have worn a moonstone on my wrist ever since, and in the back of my mind there ever lurks a dim mistrust of officemates.

One's birthstone is a thing of some importance in my family. It is the single object that belongs to one from birth, sort of a spiritual possession. I am particularly fond of moonstone in general: it's a cloudy sort of stone, and holds light in a calm sort of way; a soothing foil to the skittish brilliance of other cut stones. The bracelet I've been wearing every moment for the past 2.5 years was made for me in India--commissioned by my mother from a prominent Calcutta jeweler, its authenticity guaranteed by a threat of professional exposure by her daughter, the Harvard geologist (I loved this -- thanks Mom).

And I lost it. Lost it! Yesterday, between shopping for groceries and walking to the bank. So, for the past two days I have been (a) methodically retracing my every step from Saturday 1pm to 530pm, and (b) struggling to convince myself that my identity has not been lessened or lost, though the stone is beyond my sight.

In my anxiety for bracelet-recovery, I trudged up and down 53rd street, left phone numbers with every store I had entered, then drove to Target Store #3722 and wheeled my way through each and every aisle, scanning the floors for a glimmer or shine. I resigned myself; the bracelet is probably lost.

And yet this afternoon, I realized that I'd been fundamentally going about this the wrong way. Having realized that, I became free to go about this the right way. I have decided that my bracelet, being part of my identity, has been granted a traveling allowance. It is now free to roam, to see the world on my behalf. It may even see in the inside of a pawn shop -- a most interesting locale.

Having settled that, I should address the sole lingering worry. The lasting failure here, in losing this bracelet, revolves around plans I held for the distant future. A notion of posterity, of heirloom, of future's interest in past. I imagined this piece would be passed down in the family collection for at least two generations, and that someone would show my grandchildren the jewel that their grandmother wore at her wrist. Well, that's out. So:

Dear grandchildren,

The bracelet is made of sterling silver chain, with five or six rings and a hook at the ends; it is set with an oval-cut moonstone sized at about half an inch the long way. It was lost in Chicago in 2008. Go find it. Check the local pawn shops.

But I know you won't find it, because I didn't, and I looked all over the place. Ah well. Don't obsess, brush your teeth; eat oatmeal, it does wonders. And if you don't know what a moonstone is, look it up, for shame.

There ends my converse with the future, for now. I have addressed all my major concerns in this affair, and therefore close the document with a heavy sigh, last tribute to lost treasure. From here on out, I look to the next moonstone (there will be a next), and I'll be sure to let you know when I get it.

Goodnight,
RP