occupy skype

David: (In the middle of a story)
Me: Oh, I really like your hair right now, by the way. Sorry, I got distracted.
David: Thanks! No, I like it when my hair is girl-distractable.
Me: Yep.
David: (Points to head) This could be my cleavage!

I'm skyping with David. The nice thing about skype is that you can stare at yourself the whole time in the lower right corner.

David: The other day he tried to convince us that Lady Gaga was dating an eastern european philosopher.

David's Spanish teacher sounds certifiably mad. I'm glad Brown isn't the only Ivy to have completely insane professors. I was worried it was unique to us.

David: My mother had an opinion! She's giving those away like she's going out of business.

Moms do that. David and I discussed the fact that parents tend to have this ridiculous notion that they have a right to comment and exert control over our life choices. Hogwash! Balderdash! (Frankly, though, by the time they have kids in college, they need to just trust that they raised us with good judgment.)

David: I would support the Occupy Wall Street thing, with the compassionate addendum that they bathe.

I'm not sure how I feel about Occupy Wall Street. I'm glad someone is blaming someone other than Obama for the economic shitshow. I do agree that bathing is something everyone should do (If only the 1% bathed, the world would be a smelly place). I kind of wish they would define a position, but apparently the lack of focus is what makes the movement so cohesive, in a backwards way. If no one is expected to agree on anything, there can't really be infighting, and no one gets alienated.
I just don't know how long that can last.

David: Maybe I need to sprinkle some Descartes into my cauldron.

Love always,
Clara

"dragons are bad!"

Today I'm going to talk about dragons.

It turns out, the theme of the-hero-slaying-the-dragon happens all over the place in old mythologies. It makes sense, because stories need heros. Heros need to do heroic things, and they need to do indisputably heroic things. They need to kill someone that everyone wants killed.

That's where dragons come in.

Professor: These dragons are evil. Antisocial. Every single one. Just awful.

There's never a question whether a dragon is bad. If the hero killed an evil sorcerer or something, maybe the evil sorcerer has a family. Dragons are always bad.

On one occasion, the goddess Inaras overcomes Illuyanka [the dragon] by inviting him to a feast and getting him drunk (Watkins, 405). 
- Handout of 10/17

Naturally we were learning about these dragons in English class. It turns out that in most of these mythologies, dragon-slaying is described using archaic language (more similar to the original Indo-European). Who knew!

Love always,
Clara

kabob friends

I was in the Post- office for most of the afternoon yesterday. It was a little frenzied but the magazine is at the printer and will exist in a physical way tomorrow, so all of that is quite exciting.

Sam: Did you know that they call this room the library?
Me: Really? Weird. Why?
Sam: I think it's all the books.

Regardless of all the books, our office is our office. The Herald should just accept that. They should also buy us a new computer, and pizza, and maybe a pony. That would be pretty cool.

Yesterday I managed to sound racist in Italian class, because my only Turkish friends in Switzerland were the guys down the street who worked at the kabob stand.

We really did have a great rapport, myself and the kabob stand guys. My german was just getting conversational, and they would make fun of my inability to differentiate "tisch" from "tasche" and they learned that I don't like peppers. We were friends, kind of!

That wasn't supposed to imply that I only talk to Turkish folks who make me kabobs - it's more indicative of the fact that I had like, five friends when I lived in Switzerland, and I think most of them were embassy brats in some way shape or form. I didn't even have any Swiss friends! Much less Turkish friends!

Anyway, all of these subtleties are pretty hard to convey in a foreign language.

Me: Avevo.... i kabob amici.
Katerina: Conosci i loro nomi?
Me: ... no.

Note to self: Learn future kabob-friends' names. Seriously. That would have helped a lot.

Love always,
Clara

english, it turns out, is interesting

I have vivid memories of disliking English class in middle school. We had to read dumb books and underline uses of symbolic language and do awful vocabulary worksheets (It's actually really hard to come up with a sentence using the word . It all seemed silly and redundant and a waste of time.

English teachers were often targets of my animosity. I very specifically remember learning that Ms. Scott, my seventh grade english teacher, hated click-pens -- so I bought a ton of click-pens. (I might have been the worst seventh grade girl ever.) (For the record, about a month later I decided Ms. Scott was my favorite teacher.)

Fast forward six years or so, and I'm spending my lectures learning the alphabet. Linguistics, I've decided, is totally my jam.


I'm taking History of the English Language this semester, and it's pretty much the most awesome class I've ever taken, and I'm not exaggerating at all. The professor is a boss, and he's been teaching the course for the last thirty years or so, so he knows his stuff and tells it like it is.

Professor R: Determinism is the theory that you could predict the future by closely observing the present. Nobody ever made any interesting discoveries based on this theory. Ever.

I think what I'm enjoying most about the class though is that it raises all of the questions that I raised in my English classes (right after I bought my clicky pens, all for the explicit purpose of being a pain in the ass). Like, why did we have to answer the questions on homework sheets in complete sentences, when a word would do? That's not what we do when we speak. If someone asks you, "Where are you going this weekend?" you say, "Boston." If you feel like saying a lot of words, you could say "I'm going to Boston," I guess.

Professor R: 'I am going to Boston' is just wrong! It's weird! It would raise a titter!

That's what I tried to explain to Ms. Pronko all those years ago, but of course she would have none of it. Maybe I just like linguistics because it means I was right all along about English teachers. Some of their rules are totally arbitrary.

Professor R: As if colloquy were an evil thing.

I, for one, like colloquy. I mean, read this. Do I seem like I'm into the formal writing style? I've almost made a conscious decision to ignore it.

And on that note...

Vivian: Actually no, I don't make decisions, I just sit around and rap about philosophy.

Yesterday, that happened.

Love always,
Clara

since i've been gone

A number of things have happened.

• Blogger changed its user interface! You are unlikely to notice this, but from my side of the looking glass things are very different and new.
• I came back to college, have settled myself in, and am feeling just wonderful about it.
• My social life has taken several new turns, not the least of which being the Buxton house lifestyle (AFTERPARTY IN THE SUITE!)
• There was an earthquake! And a hurricane!
• Classes have started, and after briefly flirting with the idea of taking five classes, I realized that ENGN0090 is not at all my style, even if the professor is fantastic. Mom was wrong.
• I've realized I have things to blog about! And I look forward to blogging about them very soon.
• I decided to color code my class notes. I have a color set aside for "Insane professor quotes"
• I've begun to decorate my nails with sparkly stickers.

That's pretty much the gist of it. I've also taken to studying (read: rolling around in the grass) with Val. We have some pretty good times, mostly because I'm allergic to nature and all of the little particles get up inside my head and make me feel giggly. Grass is like catnip for Claras. Then I get a grass-hangover and want a nap.

Yesterday we discussed at length the ways I was misinformed about sexual activity as a child.

Dad: So you're half my DNA and half Mom's DNA, and so is your sister, and you both grew from an egg in your mom's tummy.

Me: But... how does the dad's DNA get to the mom's DNA?

Dad: ... When you get married, god does it.

Don't worry, I'm posting more later. (I know you were going to be worried. It's okay. Calm down.)

Love always,
Clara