espirit de l'escalier

things I don't like about my writing.

2010-11-01T16:21:21Z

1. excessive use of the passive tense.
2. long sentences with little variation in structure.
3. repetitive adjectives/jargon-y nouns.
4. unclear/indefinite use of 'this'

(oh, I'm back in singapore! say hi!)

you and me both

2010-07-31T14:06:32Z

"This makes my seventh summer without respite in this country, and I long for the completion of this question of revision in order that I may take some rest, get Japan off the brain and recover lost strength."[1]

this concluded a long note from parkes to the permanent under-secretary for foreign affairs. I felt a twang of sympathy, and a twang of guilt. I need to get Japan off the brain, but I haven't had seven summers without respite.

[1] FO 363/2 Tenterden Papers. August 12 1879. Parkes to Tenterden

today's statistic

2010-05-16T15:09:54Z

I have written 9,274 words in revision notes (yup, timelines, bullet points, etc., no prose) in the last 2 weeks.

claudacity @ 2009-03-12T22:21:00

2009-03-12T22:22:55Z

And at last, in its curved and imperceptible fall, the sun sank low, and
from glowing white changed to a dull red without rays and without heat,
as if about to go out suddenly, stricken to death by the touch of that
gloom brooding over a crowd of men.

Forthwith a change came over the waters, and the serenity became less
brilliant but more profound. The old river in its broad reach rested
unruffled at the decline of day, after ages of good service done to the
race that peopled its banks, spread out in the tranquil dignity of a
waterway leading to the uttermost ends of the earth. We looked at the
venerable stream not in the vivid flush of a short day that comes and
departs for ever, but in the august light of abiding memories. And
indeed nothing is easier for a man who has, as the phrase goes,
"followed the sea" with reverence and affection, that to evoke the
great spirit of the past upon the lower reaches of the Thames. The tidal
current runs to and fro in its unceasing service, crowded with memories
of men and ships it had borne to the rest of home or to the battles
of the sea. It had known and served all the men of whom the nation is
proud, from Sir Francis Drake to Sir John Franklin, knights all, titled
and untitled--the great knights-errant of the sea. It had borne all the
ships whose names are like jewels flashing in the night of time, from
the _Golden Hind_ returning with her rotund flanks full of treasure, to be
visited by the Queen's Highness and thus pass out of the gigantic tale,
to the _Erebus_ and _Terror_, bound on other conquests--and that never
returned. It had known the ships and the men. They had sailed from
Deptford, from Greenwich, from Erith--the adventurers and the settlers;
kings' ships and the ships of men on 'Change; captains, admirals, the
dark "interlopers" of the Eastern trade, and the commissioned "generals"
of East India fleets. Hunters for gold or pursuers of fame, they all
had gone out on that stream, bearing the sword, and often the torch,
messengers of the might within the land, bearers of a spark from the
sacred fire. What greatness had not floated on the ebb of that river
into the mystery of an unknown earth! . . . The dreams of men, the seed
of commonwealths, the germs of empires.
- joseph conrad, heart of darkness

purrs.

claudacity @ 2007-11-17T12:12:00

2007-11-17T12:13:11Z

whenever I am unhappy, I google image search the word, 'kitten'.

claudacity @ 2007-08-09T16:05:00

2007-08-09T08:07:39Z

as previously stated, I am going to india (mumbai, goa, etc.) today and back in singapore on the morning of 29 august. arriving in london on the morning of 5 sept.

in india I will be contactable in the case of emergency on my singapore mobile number (which remains the same as previously).

it's all over

2007-07-22T15:25:30Z

oh god. harry potter. I read my first when I was 12, I wrote fic when I was 14, I fell out of love and into angst when I was 16, and now I am nearly 20 and - it's done.

I feel like a very old and once cherished friend has returned for an afternoon, but just that. oh my.

I'm quite sad. this passage of time and growing up business is shite.

thoughts on the book to come at a later time, perhaps, when more people have had the time to read and reread it.

claudacity @ 2007-05-23T23:37:00

2007-05-23T22:37:54Z

Read my VisualDNA™ Get your own VisualDNA™

my whereabouts

2006-12-14T07:21:26Z

don't panic.

in rome until 19 dec, then in venice until 21 dec, back in london 22 dec onwards.

for leaving

2006-09-18T04:31:34Z

up into the silence the green
silence with a white earth in it

you will(kiss me)go

out into the morning the young
morning with a warm world in it

(kiss me)you will go

on into the sunlight the fine
sunlight with a firm day in it

you will go(kiss me

down into your memory and
a memory and memory

i)kiss me,(will go)

- e e cummings

***

There is a place where the sidewalk ends
And before the street begins,
And there the grass grows soft and white,
And there the sun burns crimson bright,
And there the moon-bird rests from his flight
To cool in the peppermint wind.

Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black
And the dark street winds and bends.
Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow
We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And watch where the chalk-white arrows go
To the place where the sidewalk ends.

Yes we'll walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And we'll go where the chalk-white arrows go,
For the children, they mark, and the children, they know
The place where the sidewalk ends.

- shel silverstein

baggage allowances

2006-09-15T06:41:37Z

I just threw an approximation of my wardrobe into my smaller suitcase and it already weighs a third of my baggage allowance.

sigh! how am I to fit the accoutrements of my life into 57kg[1]?

[1] 30kg checked luggage, 7kg carry-on, 20kg couriered

book sale

2006-06-22T13:16:45Z

hello all,

due to financial circumstances of a BROKE nature, I have been forced to sell a number of my books.

$4, or 3 for $10
We Are The New Romantics, by Niven Govinden
Fred & Edie, by Jill Dawson
Slaves Of New York, by Tama Jonowitz
Romeo & Juliet, by you know who*
Emily of Emerald Hill, by Stella Kon
The Five People You Meet In Heaven, by Mitch Albom

$6, or 2 for $10
Diary, by Chuck Palahniuk
Choke, by Chuck Palahniuk

$10, or 2 for $15
Practical Criticism, by John Peck & Martin Coyle
The French Revolution, by PM Jones*

$20
Economics, 5th edition, by John Sloman

all are in good condition, possibly slightly dusty and one or two may be yellowed with age. those marked with * have been underlined and annotated in various places by me, the R&J was the one I took into my S paper exam as the other had writing all over it.

JC students buying one of the textbooks may or may not receive a discount from me, depending on how sweet you are.

leave a comment if you're interested, and we'll work out a meetup or something!

where is this love?

2006-05-09T12:24:16Z

I have just watched closer - and. gosh. it's like who's afraid of virginia woolf played today, with more vulgarity. that was such a good film.

natalie portman is Amazing. alice and evey are mindblowing. I am in love with her.

(ooh random trivia - mike nichols directed both closer and who's afraid of virginia woolf.)

claudacity @ 2006-04-20T00:15:00

2006-04-19T16:26:10Z

dogville was great. a little slow at first, but quite impressive in the second half. such a harsh and depressing film.

I love paul bettany to pieces. now I've watched dogville and a knight's tale I feel a rush of paul!love. and I watched wimbledon in december last year (and gushed about his cuteness to berneese, who surprisingly enough gushed back) so now I want to watch that again. oooo paul bettany.

I am sleepy, can you tell? oh and I've started reading wuthering heights. it took me a while to figure out what was going on, but after I realised that the first rule of victorian writing is that if there's a more formal word out there, you should use it, I was fine. presently I am progressing at a satisfactory pace in my perusal of the novel, which I believe I will complete after my luncheon tomorrow. I may allow myself some short discourse on it thereafter.[1]

[1] someone please say they will repair to tea with me in short order!

a poem and a song for the new year

2006-01-02T06:11:36Z

e e cummings	&	death cab for cutie: the new year
here's to opening and upward, to leaf and to sap and to your(in my arms flowering so new) self whose eyes smell of the sound of rain and here's to silent certainly mountains;and to a disappearing poet of always,snow and to morning;and to morning's beautiful friend twilight(and a first dream called ocean)and let must or if be damned with whomever's afraid down with ought with because with every brain which thinks it thinks,nor dares to feel(but up with joy;and up with laughing and drunkenness) here's to one undiscoverable guess of whose mad skill each world of blood is made (whose fatal songs are moving in the moon		So this is the new year And I don't feel any different The clanking of crystal Explosions off in the distance So this is the new year And I have no resolutions For self-assigned penance For problems with easy solutions So everybody put your best suit or dress on Let's make believe that we are wealthy for just this once Lighting firecrackers off on the front lawn As thirty dialogues bleed into one I wish the world was flat like the old days Then I could travel just by folding a map No more airplanes, or speedtrains, or freeways There'd be no distance that can hold us back. There'd be no distance that could hold us back So this is the new year

ponderous thought of the day

2005-12-20T03:38:44Z

The universe may have a purpose, but nothing we know suggests that, if so, this purpose has any similarity to ours.
- Bertrand Russell

claudacity @ 2005-11-22T23:30:00

2005-11-22T15:33:09Z

KING LEAR Thou think'st 'tis much that this contentious storm
Invades us to the skin: so 'tis to thee;
But where the greater malady is fix'd,
The lesser is scarce felt. Thou'ldst shun a bear;
But if thy flight lay toward the raging sea,
Thou'ldst meet the bear i' the mouth. When the
mind's free,
The body's delicate: the tempest in my mind
Doth from my senses take all feeling else
Save what beats there. Filial ingratitude!
Is it not as this mouth should tear this hand
For lifting food to't? But I will punish home:
No, I will weep no more. In such a night
To shut me out! Pour on; I will endure.
In such a night as this! O Regan, Goneril!
Your old kind father, whose frank heart gave all,--
O, that way madness lies; let me shun that;
No more of that.

damn, I'm never going to use that phrase lightly again.

e e cummings

2005-11-03T02:28:25Z

If you can't eat you got to

smoke and we aint got
nothing to smoke:come on kid

let's go to sleep
if you can't smoke you got to

Sing and we aint got

nothing to sing;come on kid
let's go to sleep

if you can't sing you got to
die and we aint got

Nothing to die,come on kid

let's go to sleep
if you can't die you got to

dream and we aint got
nothing to dream(come on kid

Let's go to sleep)

*

what if a much of a which of a wind
gives the truth to summer's lie;
bloodies with dizzying leaves the sun
and yanks immortal stars awry?
Blow king to beggar and queen to seem
(blow friend to fiend: blow space to time)
-when skies are hanged and oceans drowned,
the single secret will still be man

what if a keen of a lean wind flays
screaming hills with sleet and snow:
strangles valleys by ropes of things
and stifles forests in white ago?
Blow hope to terror; blow seeing to blind
(blow pity to envy and soul to mind)
-whose hearts are mountains, roots are trees,
it's they shall cry hello to the spring

what if a dawn of a doom of a dream
bites this universe in two,
peels forever out of his grave
and sprinkles nowhere with me and you?
Blow soon to never and never to twice
(blow life to isn't: blow death towas)
-all nothing's only our hugest home;
the most who die, the more we live.

*

come on kids. days more.

what else? books.

2005-09-28T03:54:25Z

Noisy Outlaws, Unfriendly Blobs, and Some Other Things That Aren't as Scary, Maybe, Depending on How You Feel About Lost Lands, Stray Cellphones, Creatures from the Sky, Parents Who Disappear in Peru, a Man Named Lars Farf, and One Other Story We Couldn't Quite Finish, So Maybe You Could Help Us Out

this is a book I would like to get for my siblings. make them read something good for a change.

on other books, here are the 100 most frequently challenged books, presumably in the USA as it's from the american library association. the list makes me balk. it reminds me of this list of the 10 most harmful books of the 19th and 20th century.

... makes me want to go out there and READ THEM ALL. intellectual disobedience!

From an Atlas of the Difficult World

2005-09-25T11:26:23Z

I know you are reading this poem
late, before leaving your office
of the one intense yellow lamp-spot and the darkening window
in the lassitude of a building faded to quiet
long after rush-hour. I know you are reading this poem
standing up in a bookstore far from the ocean
on a grey day of early spring, faint flakes driven
across the plains' enormous spaces around you.
I know you are reading this poem
in a room where too much has happened for you to bear
where the bedclothes lie in stagnant coils on the bed
and the open valise speaks of flight
but you cannot leave yet. I know you are reading this poem
as the underground train loses momentum and before running
up the stairs
toward a new kind of love
your life has never allowed.
I know you are reading this poem by the light
of the television screen where soundless images jerk and slide
while you wait for the newscast from the intifada.
I know you are reading this poem in a waiting-room
of eyes met and unmeeting, of identity with strangers.
I know you are reading this poem by fluorescent light
in the boredom and fatigue of the young who are counted out,
count themselves out, at too early an age. I know
you are reading this poem through your failing sight, the thick
lens enlarging these letters beyond all meaning yet you read on
because even the alphabet is precious.
I know you are reading this poem as you pace beside the stove
warming milk, a crying child on your shoulder, a book in your
hand
because life is short and you too are thirsty.
I know you are reading this poem which is not in your language
guessing at some words while others keep you reading
and I want to know which words they are.
I know you are reading this poem listening for something, torn
between bitterness and hope
turning back once again to the task you cannot refuse.
I know you are reading this poem because there is nothing else
left to read
there where you have landed, stripped as you are.

-- adrienne rich

claudacity @ 2005-09-17T22:35:00

2005-09-17T14:47:13Z

I find this habit of posting regular excerpts very satisfying, somehow, because I go back to authors I haven't looked at in a while, books I started reading but never finished, and it just feels... good. maybe I'll set up an LJ for this sort of thing. I was reminded of this story today: Anton Chekov's The Huntsman.

A SULTRY, stifling midday. Not a cloudlet in the sky... The sun-baked grass had a disconsolate, hopeless look: even if there were rain it could never be green again... The forest stood silent, motionless, as though it were looking at something with its tree-tops or expecting something.

At the edge of the clearing a tall, narrow-shouldered man of forty in a red shirt, in patched trousers that had been a gentleman's, and in high boots, was slouching along with a lazy, shambling step. He was sauntering along the road. On the right
was the green of the clearing, on the left a golden sea of ripe
rye stretched to the very horizon. He was red and perspiring, a
white cap with a straight jockey peak, evidently a gift from some
open-handed young gentleman, perched jauntily on his handsome
flaxen head. Across his shoulder hung a game-bag with a blackcock
lying in it. The man held a double-barrelled gun cocked in his
hand, and screwed up his eyes in the direction of his lean old
dog who was running on ahead sniffing the bushes. There was
stillness all round, not a sound . . . everything living was
hiding away from the heat.

"Yegor Vlassitch!" the huntsman suddenly heard a soft voice.

He started and, looking round, scowled. Beside him, as though she
had sprung out of the earth, stood a pale-faced woman of thirty
with a sickle in her hand. She was trying to look into his face,
and was smiling diffidently.

"Oh, it is you, Pelagea!" said the huntsman, stopping and
deliberately uncocking the gun. "H'm! . . . How have you come
here?"

"The women from our village are working here, so I have come with
them. . . . As a labourer, Yegor Vlassitch."

"Oh . . ." growled Yegor Vlassitch, and slowly walked on.

Pelagea followed him. They walked in silence for twenty paces.

"I have not seen you for a long time, Yegor Vlassitch . . ." said
Pelagea looking tenderly at the huntsman's moving shoulders. "I
have not seen you since you came into our hut at Easter for a
drink of water . . . you came in at Easter for a minute and then
God knows how . . . drunk . . . you scolded and beat me and went
away . . . I have been waiting and waiting . . . I've tired my
eyes out looking for you. Ah, Yegor Vlassitch, Yegor Vlassitch!
you might look in just once!"

"What is there for me to do there?"

"Of course there is nothing for you to do . . . though to be sure
. . . there is the place to look after. . . . To see how things
are going. . . . You are the master. . . . I say, you have shot a
blackcock, Yegor Vlassitch! You ought to sit down and rest!"

As she said all this Pelagea laughed like a silly girl and looked
up at Yegor's face. Her face was simply radiant with happiness.

"Sit down? If you like . . ." said Yegor in a tone of
indifference, and he chose a spot between two fir-trees. "Why are
you standing? You sit down too."

Pelagea sat a little way off in the sun and, ashamed of her joy,
put her hand over her smiling mouth. Two minutes passed in
silence.

"You might come for once," said Pelagea.

"What for?" sighed Yegor, taking off his cap and wiping his red
forehead with his hand. "There is no object in my coming. To go
for an hour or two is only waste of time, it's simply upsetting
you, and to live continually in the village my soul could not
endure. . . . You know yourself I am a pampered man. . . . I want
a bed to sleep in, good tea to drink, and refined conversation. .
. . I want all the niceties, while you live in poverty and dirt
in the village. . . . I couldn't stand it for a day. Suppose
there were an edict that I must live with you, I should either
set fire to the hut or lay hands on myself. From a boy I've had
this love for ease; there is no help for it."

"Where are you living now?"

"With the gentleman here, Dmitry Ivanitch, as a huntsman. I
furnish his table with game, but he keeps me . . . more for his
pleasure than anything."

"That's not proper work you're doing, Yegor Vlassitch. . . . For
other people it's a pastime, but with you it's like a trade . . .
like real work."

"You don't understand, you silly," said Yegor, gazing gloomily at
the sky. "You have never understood, and as long as you live you
will never understand what sort of man I am. . . . You think of
me as a foolish man, gone to the bad, but to anyone who
understands I am the best shot there is in the whole district.
The gentry feel that, and they have even printed things about me
in a magazine. There isn't a man to be compared with me as a
sportsman. . . . And it is not because I am pampered and proud
that I look down upon your village work. From my childhood, you
know, I have never had any calling apart from guns and dogs. If
they took away my gun, I used to go out with the fishing-hook, if
they took the hook I caught things with my hands. And I went in
for horse-dealing too, I used to go to the fairs when I had the
money, and you know that if a peasant goes in for being a
sportsman, or a horse-dealer, it's good-bye to the plough. Once
the spirit of freedom has taken a man you will never root it out
of him. In the same way, if a gentleman goes in for being an
actor or for any other art, he will never make an official or a
landowner. You are a woman, and you do not understand, but one
must understand that."

"I understand, Yegor Vlassitch."

"You don't understand if you are going to cry. . . ."

"I . . . I'm not crying," said Pelagea, turning away. "It's a
sin, Yegor Vlassitch! You might stay a day with luckless me,
anyway. It's twelve years since I was married to you, and . . .
and . . . there has never once been love between us! . . . I . .
. I am not crying."

"Love . . ." muttered Yegor, scratching his hand. "There can't be
any love. It's only in name we are husband and wife; we aren't
really. In your eyes I am a wild man, and in mine you are a
simple peasant woman with no understanding. Are we well matched?
I am a free, pampered, profligate man, while you are a working
woman, going in bark shoes and never straightening your back. The
way I think of myself is that I am the foremost man in every kind
of sport, and you look at me with pity. . . . Is that being well
matched?"

"But we are married, you know, Yegor Vlassitch," sobbed Pelagea.

"Not married of our free will. . . . Have you forgotten? You have
to thank Count Sergey Paylovitch and yourself. Out of envy,
because I shot better than he did, the Count kept giving me wine
for a whole month, and when a man's drunk you could make him
change his religion, let alone getting married. To pay me out he
married me to you when I was drunk. . . . A huntsman to a
herd-girl! You saw I was drunk, why did you marry me? You were
not a serf, you know; you could have resisted. Of course it was a
bit of luck for a herd-girl to marry a huntsman, but you ought to
have thought about it. Well, now be miserable, cry. It's a joke
for the Count, but a crying matter for you. . . . Beat yourself
against the wall."

A silence followed. Three wild ducks flew over the clearing.
Yegor followed them with his eyes till, transformed into three
scarcely visible dots, they sank down far beyond the forest.

"How do you live?" he asked, moving his eyes from the ducks to
Pelagea.

"Now I am going out to work, and in the winter I take a child
from the Foundling Hospital and bring it up on the bottle. They
give me a rouble and a half a month."

"Oh. . . ."

Again a silence. From the strip that had been reaped floated a
soft song which broke off at the very beginning. It was too hot
to sing.

"They say you have put up a new hut for Akulina," said Pelagea.

Yegor did not speak.

"So she is dear to you. . . ."

"It's your luck, it's fate!" said the huntsman, stretching. "You
must put up with it, poor thing. But good-bye, I've been
chattering long enough. . . . I must be at Boltovo by the
evening."

Yegor rose, stretched himself, and slung his gun over his
shoulder; Pelagea got up.

"And when are you coming to the village?" she asked softly.

"I have no reason to, I shall never come sober, and you have
little to gain from me drunk; I am spiteful when I am drunk.
Good-bye!"

"Good-bye, Yegor Vlassitch."

Yegor put his cap on t he back of his head and, clicking to his
dog, went on his way. Pelagea stood still looking after him. . .
. She saw his moving shoulder-blades, his jaunty cap, his lazy,
careless step, and her eyes were full of sadness and tender
affection. . . . Her gaze flitted over her husband's tall, lean
figure and caressed and fondled it. . . . He, as though he felt
that gaze, stopped and looked round. . . . He did not speak, but
from his face, from his shrugged shoulders, Pelagea could see
that he wanted to say something to her. She went up to him
timidly and looked at him with imploring eyes.

"Take it," he said, turning round.

He gave her a crumpled rouble note and walked quickly away.

"Good-bye, Yegor Vlassitch," she said, mechanically taking the
rouble.

He walked by a long road, straight as a taut strap. She, pale and
motionless as a statue, stood, her eyes seizing every step he
took. But the red of his shirt melted into the dark colour of his
trousers, his step could not be seen, and the dog could not be
distinguished from the boots. Nothing could be seen but the cap,
and . . . suddenly Yegor turned off sharply into the clearing and
the cap vanished in the greenness.

"Good-bye, Yegor Vlassitch," whispered Pelagea, and she stood on
tiptoe to see the white cap once more.

and now, for an excerpt from a play: Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest.

Jack. This ghastly state of things is what you call Bunburying, I suppose?

Algernon. Yes, and a perfectly wonderful Bunbury it is. The most wonderful Bunbury I have ever had in my life.

Jack. Well, you’ve no right whatsoever to Bunbury here.

Algernon. That is absurd. One has a right to Bunbury anywhere one chooses. Every serious Bunburyist knows that.

Jack. Serious Bunburyist! Good heavens!

Algernon. Well, one must be serious about something, if one wants to have any amusement in life. I happen to be serious about Bunburying. What on earth you are serious about I haven’t got the remotest idea. About everything, I should fancy. You have such an absolutely trivial nature.

Jack. Well, the only small satisfaction I have in the whole of this wretched business is that your friend Bunbury is quite exploded. You won’t be able to run down to the country quite so often as you used to do, dear Algy. And a very good thing too.

Algernon. Your brother is a little off colour, isn’t he, dear Jack? You won’t be able to disappear to London quite so frequently as your wicked custom was. And not a bad thing either.

Jack. As for your conduct towards Miss Cardew, I must say that your taking in a sweet, simple, innocent girl like that is quite inexcusable. To say nothing of the fact that she is my ward.

Algernon. I can see no possible defence at all for your deceiving a brilliant, clever, thoroughly experienced young lady like Miss Fairfax. To say nothing of the fact that she is my cousin.

Jack. I wanted to be engaged to Gwendolen, that is all. I love her.

Algernon. Well, I simply wanted to be engaged to Cecily. I adore her.

Jack. There is certainly no chance of your marrying Miss Cardew.

Algernon. I don’t think there is much likelihood, Jack, of you and Miss Fairfax being united.

Jack. Well, that is no business of yours.

Algernon. If it was my business, I wouldn’t talk about it. [Begins to eat muffins.] It is very vulgar to talk about one’s business. Only people like stock-brokers do that, and then merely at dinner parties.

Jack. How can you sit there, calmly eating muffins when we are in this horrible trouble, I can’t make out. You seem to me to be perfectly heartless.

Algernon. Well, I can’t eat muffins in an agitated manner. The butter would probably get on my cuffs. One should always eat muffins quite calmly. It is the only way to eat them.

Jack. I say it’s perfectly heartless your eating muffins at all, under the circumstances.

Algernon. When I am in trouble, eating is the only thing that consoles me. Indeed, when I am in really great trouble, as any one who knows me intimately will tell you, I refuse everything except food and drink. At the present moment I am eating muffins because I am unhappy. Besides, I am particularly fond of muffins. [Rising.]

Jack. [Rising.] Well, that is no reason why you should eat them all in that greedy way. [Takes muffins from Algernon.]

Algernon. [Offering tea-cake.] I wish you would have tea-cake instead. I don’t like tea-cake.

Jack. Good heavens! I suppose a man may eat his own muffins in his own garden.

Algernon. But you have just said it was perfectly heartless to eat muffins.

Jack. I said it was perfectly heartless of you, under the circumstances. That is a very different thing.

Algernon. That may be. But the muffins are the same. [He seizes the muffin-dish from Jack.]

Jack. Algy, I wish to goodness you would go.

Algernon. You can’t possibly ask me to go without having some dinner. It’s absurd. I never go without my dinner. No one ever does, except vegetarians and people like that. Besides I have just made arrangements with Dr. Chasuble to be christened at a quarter to six under the name of Ernest.

Jack. My dear fellow, the sooner you give up that nonsense the better. I made arrangements this morning with Dr. Chasuble to be christened myself at 5.30, and I naturally will take the name of Ernest. Gwendolen would wish it. We can’t both be christened Ernest. It’s absurd. Besides, I have a perfect right to be christened if I like. There is no evidence at all that I have ever been christened by anybody. I should think it extremely probable I never was, and so does Dr. Chasuble. It is entirely different in your case. You have been christened already.

Algernon. Yes, but I have not been christened for years.

Jack. Yes, but you have been christened. That is the important thing.

Algernon. Quite so. So I know my constitution can stand it. If you are not quite sure about your ever having been christened, I must say I think it rather dangerous your venturing on it now. It might make you very unwell. You can hardly have forgotten that some one very closely connected with you was very nearly carried off this week in Paris by a severe chill.

Jack. Yes, but you said yourself that a severe chill was not hereditary.

Algernon. It usen’t to be, I know—but I daresay it is now. Science is always making wonderful improvements in things.

Jack. [Picking up the muffin-dish.] Oh, that is nonsense; you are always talking nonsense.

Algernon. Jack, you are at the muffins again! I wish you wouldn’t. There are only two left. [Takes them.] I told you I was particularly fond of muffins.

Jack. But I hate tea-cake.

Algernon. Why on earth then do you allow tea-cake to be served up for your guests? What ideas you have of hospitality!

Jack. Algernon! I have already told you to go. I don’t want you here. Why don’t you go!

Algernon. I haven’t quite finished my tea yet! and there is still one muffin left. [Jack groans, and sinks into a chair. Algernon still continues eating.]

give me bradshaw, sing me a love song.

2005-09-13T13:23:51Z

an excerpt from the first chapter of GK Chesterton's The Man Who Was Thursday:

"An artist is identical with an anarchist," he cried. "You might transpose the words anywhere. An anarchist is an artist. The man who throws a bomb is an artist, because he prefers a great moment to everything. He sees how much more valuable is one burst of blazing light, one peal of perfect thunder, than the mere common bodies of a few shapeless policemen. An artist disregards all governments, abolishes all conventions. The poet delights in disorder only. If it were not so, the most poetical thing in the world would be the Underground Railway."

"So it is," said Mr. Syme.

"Nonsense!" said Gregory, who was very rational when anyone else
attempted paradox. "Why do all the clerks and navvies in the
railway trains look so sad and tired, so very sad and tired? I will
tell you. It is because they know that the train is going right. It
is because they know that whatever place they have taken a ticket
for that place they will reach. It is because after they have
passed Sloane Square they know that the next station must be
Victoria, and nothing but Victoria. Oh, their wild rapture! oh,
their eyes like stars and their souls again in Eden, if the next
station were unaccountably Baker Street!"

"It is you who are unpoetical," replied the poet Syme. "If what you
say of clerks is true, they can only be as prosaic as your poetry.
The rare, strange thing is to hit the mark; the gross, obvious
thing is to miss it. We feel it is epical when man with one wild
arrow strikes a distant bird. Is it not also epical when man with
one wild engine strikes a distant station? Chaos is dull; because
in chaos the train might indeed go anywhere, to Baker Street or to
Bagdad. But man is a magician, and his whole magic is in this, that
he does say Victoria, and lo! it is Victoria. No, take your books
of mere poetry and prose; let me read a time table, with tears of
pride. Take your Byron, who commemorates the defeats of man; give
me Bradshaw, who commemorates his victories. Give me Bradshaw, I
say!"

"Must you go?" inquired Gregory sarcastically.

"I tell you," went on Syme with passion, "that every time a train
comes in I feel that it has broken past batteries of besiegers, and
that man has won a battle against chaos. You say contemptuously
that when one has left Sloane Square one must come to Victoria. I
say that one might do a thousand things instead, and that whenever
I really come there I have the sense of hairbreadth escape. And
when I hear the guard shout out the word 'Victoria,' it is not an
unmeaning word. It is to me the cry of a herald announcing
conquest. It is to me indeed 'Victoria'; it is the victory of
Adam."

Gregory wagged his heavy, red head with a slow and sad smile.

"And even then," he said, "we poets always ask the question, 'And
what is Victoria now that you have got there?' You think Victoria
is like the New Jerusalem. We know that the New Jerusalem will only
be like Victoria. Yes, the poet will be discontented even in the
streets of heaven. The poet is always in revolt."

"There again," said Syme irritably, "what is there poetical about
being in revolt? You might as well say that it is poetical to be
sea-sick. Being sick is a revolt. Both being sick and being
rebellious may be the wholesome thing on certain desperate
occasions; but I'm hanged if I can see why they are poetical.
Revolt in the abstract is--revolting. It's mere vomiting."

The girl winced for a flash at the unpleasant word, but Syme was
too hot to heed her.

"It is things going right," he cried, "that is poetical! Our
digestions, for instance, going sacredly and silently right, that
is the foundation of all poetry. Yes, the most poetical thing, more
poetical than the flowers, more poetical than the stars--the most
poetical thing in the world is not being sick."

"Really," said Gregory superciliously, "the examples you choose--"

"I beg your pardon," said Syme grimly, "I forgot we had abolished
all conventions."

♥! and I bring you more reading material, from Iain Banks' Espedair Street:

No room at the inn; I sighed and walked back to the big hotel at the road junction, ready for another rejection. They let me in without a murmur, a wee lassie getting me to fill out the Access voucher there and then; it was a double room and she talked me into having not only breakfast ('Oh, you might as well, Mr Weir; it's inclusive'), but dinner too.

I agreed to dinner because I'd stopped feeling tired and started feeling hungry, and it was still not half-past four. Long winter nights. I hadn't allowed for any of this. I was shown to my room. I observed its anonymity for a while, wondering how many hotel rooms I'd been in in my life. I had a shower and dried my clothes over radiators. I dried my hair and watched some kids' television for a little, then turned it off. I dressed, went to the bar, had a few drinks, bought a packet of cigarettes and smoked half of them, had dinner, then went back to the room.

All that time, I was waiting.
Waiting to feel something, waiting to suddenly burst out crying, or to suddenly
feel all right again, better once more, or go hysterical and take a running jump
out of the nearest high window... but none of that happened.

It was as though some autopilot had taken over, as if a temporary government was
running things, some skeleton crew of the mind; the king is dead, long live the
regent ...

On Iona it might be possible to know again; that was where I was heading and
everything had stopped while I got myself there.

Once I'd arrived, when I was facing those blue-green waves; then I'd start
thinking again; then, when I was finally faced with it, the reality of killing
myself and just not being any more; opting out of this insane, tasteless,
murderous circus where the freaks are too often wiser- but also more despised -
than the thronging marks. I was still convinced I'd do it. I was almost looking
forward to it. I'd heard that old people could accept death and there was some
sort of meta-tiredness which had nothing to do with the quick sleep of night; a
lulling, draining, glacial sapping of life's own life over the years, winding
up, powering down... I'd thought it was just some sort of excuse, a lie the old
told to convince themselves they wouldn't mind dying and so draw the sting of
fear. But now... now I wasn't so sure. I thought I understood that tiredness.
I lay down fully clothed on the bed with the lights on, staring at the ceiling,
waiting for something to happen.

I must have fallen asleep.

When I woke up I didn't know what time it was. It was still dark and there was
music playing in the room next to mine. There was no clock in the room. I turned
on the television but there was only white noise on all the channels. I rubbed
my face and yawned, then took off my clothes (and thought: For the last time.
I'll go in fully clothed tomorrow; quicker, less ridiculous, somehow). I climbed
into the wide, cold bed, put the lights out.

The music was too loud. It was going to keep me awake, I knew it, too, which
would make it even harder to ignore. It was...

... us.

I hadn't recognised it at first; music always sounds different through walls,
but it was Frozen Gold all right; MIRV. It was side one; 'The Good Soldier'
faded, and was replaced by '2000 AM'. So I'd slept through 'Oh Cimmaron'. Next
'Single Track' and then 'Slider', and then, very likely as this was probably a
tape played on a ghetto-blaster, side two as well.

Too loud. Loud enough for me to be able to make out Christine's voice, Davey's
guitar. I lay there, listening, unable to stop it, paralysed and transfixed and
frozen.

And at first I laughed, because there is another song, on Personal Effects,
which contains the lyrics,
Just an old rock star in a cheap hotel,
He's sung too many songs about love.
Kept awake all night in his en-suite hell,
By his old hit played too loud above.
And it was a low, despairing sort of laugh, the laugh of bitter appreciation
that life could always kick you when you were down, just to make sure you were
still watching the show, and with that laughter came an odd, half-appalled
revelation: there was no real division between tragedy and comedy, they were
just tags we'd stuck on our hooligan consequences as we stumbled and stampeded
through the world's definitive grotesqueries, just a set of different ways of
looking at things, from person to person and time to time, and a set of
different moods to see them in ...
And Davey sang 'Single Track':
Ash blonde criminals abound in my mind
And you snow-princess were the worst I could find
And Christine sang 'Whisper':
But this is only what you say,
One single way in all the ways.
I hear the flood within the drought,
I hear the whisper in the shout.
And Davey sang 'Apocalypso':
'The dam has just gone,' said the cripple we passed
'But we shall live on,' he said, breathing his last.
'Oh please allow me,' said the young cardinal
But the wafer, we've heard, tastes a little too real
And Christine sang 'The Way It goes':
Well I suppose this is the feeling,
That pretends to true love's wonder,
Finds you standing, finds you kneeling,
Never fails to push you under...
And together they sang 'Across From The Moon And Down':
You put your shell-like ear to a shell,
Just to know what the bone will tell.
You hear no roaring ocean's flood,
Just the sweet, salt sea of your blood.
And I listened, and my laughs died away, and I just sat there, my heart
thumping, and my breath coming quick and shallow, and gradually - only lightly
at first - the tears came.

10 things.

2005-08-20T16:20:39Z

now's a time, if any, to count my blessings, so: 10 things that make me happy.

beautiful photographs of things I see everyday.
cooking a good meal.
long, meandering conversations with intelligent persons.
watching my little brother play and chatter.
designing and then translating that into code, successfully.
rain in the dawn when I can sleep in.
observing and looking inside gadgets and ideas.
being coddled.
finding a new favourite album.
expressing something perfectly, succinctly.

every day in every way I am getting better and better.

2005-08-11T21:50:46Z

fitter, happier, more productive,
comfortable,
not drinking too much,
regular exercise at the gym
(3 days a week),
getting on better with your associate employee contemporaries,
at ease,
eating well
(no more microwave dinners and saturated fats),
a patient better driver,
a safer car
(baby smiling in back seat),
sleeping well
(no bad dreams),
no paranoia,
careful to all animals
(never washing spiders down the plughole),
keep in contact with old friends
(enjoy a drink now and then),
will frequently check credit at (moral) bank (hole in the wall),
favors for favors,
fond but not in love,
charity standing orders,
on Sundays ring road supermarket
(no killing moths or putting boiling water on the ants),
car wash
(also on Sundays),
no longer afraid of the dark or midday shadows
nothing so ridiculously teenage and desperate,
nothing so childish - at a better pace,
slower and more calculated,
no chance of escape,
now self-employed,
concerned (but powerless),
an empowered and informed member of society
(pragmatism not idealism),
will not cry in public,
less chance of illness,
tires that grip in the wet
(shot of baby strapped in back seat),
a good memory,
still cries at a good film,
still kisses with saliva,
no longer empty and frantic like a cat tied to a stick,
that's driven into frozen winter shit
(the ability to laugh at weakness),
calm,
fitter,
healthier and more productive
a pig in a cage on antibiotics.
- fitter happier by radiohead

slept at 6 yesterday, woke up at 1. most productive day for a week.

Edge - Sylvia Plath

2005-03-20T03:08:13Z

The woman is perfected.
Her dead
Body wears the smile of accomplishment,
The illusion of a Greek necessity
Flows in the scrolls of her toga,
Her bare
Feet seem to be saying:
We have come so far, it is over.
Each dead child coiled, a white serpent,
One at each little
Pitcher of milk, now empty.
She has folded
Them back into her body as petals
Of a rose close when the garden
Stiffens and odors bleed
From the sweet, deep throats of the night flower.
The moon has nothing to be sad about,
Staring from her hood of bone.
She is used to this sort of thing.
Her blacks crackle and drag.