Happy Hall of the Ween!
Appropriately enough, I had something of a bad dream. It was probably because I was sleeping right on my injured arm, judging by how much it hurt when I got up (Corinne, it needs the fixing!). But damn, it was pretty vivid. It started out with the people I usually hang out with and me setting up for me to teach a martial arts class; unfortunately, I desperately needed a ball for some reason, so had to run home to get one. By the time I got back, it seems everyone had left.
So I started wandering, and came to an odd building that looked like a house from LA, and found some guys from work and a couple friends of my dad's. They were all looking at computers, and somehow I was made to look at one, which had a kind of myspace picture gallery of what was supposedly an ex-girlfriend...but that was where the bad part of the dream was. Certainly not for looking at pictures of this random girl, who I guess resembled by ex-girlfriend, but had straight hair and a narrower face, and piercings in only some of the pictures. But I felt like something mean was being done to me, I'm still not sure what, and there was that...discordance, of being forcibly told the photos of that person were someone else I had once known very well; I think that was disturbing in the same way I've read schizophrenics are disturbed when their brain thinks their friends' faces have slightly changed enough to be creepy.
Ugh, discordant morning.
Anyway, in honor of the day that it is! And ten points to Mr Bryce for dressing as Jason and stalking around the warehouse scaring people, heh. Also, the candy of the land of sushi.
Things of Note: A Weekend in La (for the one or two people I might get that place-name reference)
-hot damn we made good time going both ways to LA, like seven hours or a little under; my right hip is sure stiff, however, and my voice is a bit raw from belting out random songs
-congrats to Ms Kim (and Rooney) for doing well at the dog show, which happened to be set upon a beeyootiful lake, which would be great for camping at
-chalupas sure are tasty when you eat them next to zillion-dollar homes that overlook a huge bay with sparkling city lights and a huge refinery torch
-oats plus molasses equals nauseating smell; horses seem to like it, though
-what are you, Daphne's? A sit down place...a fast-food place? Though we eat your gyros, will we ever know?
-chinchillas are made for slinging, and/or tossing
-Pakistani/Indian food is pretty good, especially as we ordered having no idea what we were ordering
-we somehow caught the first episode ever of Samurai Champloo (wikawika!) and the last episode ever of Cowboy Bepop - an amazing occurrence
-"If I had never smoked marijuana, I would never have learned to play this flute *acid jazz riff*;" alas, Venice Beach actually had little to take pictures of, though it was fun
-Manhattan Beach was also nice, it would be perfect for hill sprints, and is just aesthetically pleasing, generally, as well
Huo Yuan Jia (Fearless), with Jet Li, Collin Chou and Shido Nakamura. As Mr Scott pointed out, it's a complete movie; but I'd say it was kind of a shallow one, nonetheless. Which is fine - it's a martial arts movie (and, since it's with Li, one with hell-good fight scenes)! I think the discordance was that the cinematography was such that I was expecting a more artsy movie, but it was more like a regular martial arts movie with higher production values. I greatly enjoyed seeing the different national styles pitted against each other (I wish they'd do that more, haven't seen much of that since Bloodsport, really) and also especially how they adjusted the editing and cuts in the fight scenes to reflect the main character's state of mind, that was well done and clever.
-and wow, I just thought it was a conceit of the movie: Leitai
-and damn! Why would they cut out scenes with Michelle Yeoh and a Thai fighter?
Midnight Nation, by J. Michael Straczynski and Gary Frank. Hmm...well, it's damn good comic, for true. But it wasn't quite a page-turner like the other comics I've bought lately (Stormwatch: Team Achilles and Clockwork Thugs, Yo, say). I think that was because as much as it was a story about a character developing, there really wasn't that much actual character development that I could see. At the least, it was an interesting take on the archetypical Lucifer-story that I enjoy so much.
Well, I got about half of them right - do they all look the same? (from Ms Xuemei)
It begins. Dun-dun-dunnnnn! (from my dad)
Guest post:
So, it's Friday. Not sure what to say about that. This week's spun itself out pretty fast. All hallows weekend ahead, the summer behind. It's Fall. Or Autumn, or whatever. I never understood why that's the only season that gets two names. All the others have to be content with one. Spring has to be happy with a verb...but I guess "fall" has one of those too, huh? Only seasons described by what they do rather than by what they are. But why Autumn? Was it Autumn first, and then Fall? Or Fall first and then Autumn.
A seasonal stream (or spring) of consciousness, brought to you by Connie.
Song of Susannah, by Stephen King. As usual with a Dark Tower, I won't write too much because I'd really just be going on and on. And anything I'd have to say probably wouldn't make sense to anyone who hadn't gotten this far in the epic, anyway, much like the novel really wouldn't make sense to anyone who had read each of the previous. Well, it would, but there would be none of the massive weight of character development and narrativee behind it, and that would be a sin to read this and not have that. I will at least note that it reads incredibly quickly, and has one of the most interesting instances of metafiction that I've ever come across (ie, I actually kind of liked it, even). Well, really, it's like metafiction turned back upon itself and...hm...contact me otherwise if you want to hear me ramble, heh. And I want to be a gunslinger when I grow up.
Ah-HA
Yes, I realize it's completely out of context and random - but I thought it was interesting, so there!
"The traditional and main naval strategy employed by the Japanese was that of "grapple-and-board", whereby sailors would attempt to board an enemy ship and fall to sword fighting on the decks. This method was mainly used because Japanese soldiers excelled at hand to hand combat. The Japanese Navy's concept of sea battle was therefore one of a fight between crews rather than the vessels themselves. This was the most common naval strategy in the world during this time, and was as common among the Europeans of the day. The Korean Navy, however, utilizing superior warships and firepower to burn and sink the enemy vessels, thus engaged in a more modern type of naval warfare. During Hideyoshi's invasions of Korea, Japan's transport ships were largely destroyed by Admiral Yi-Sun-Shin's leadership with superior firepower and knowledge of strategic points on the home field."
I mean, actually, all of these are pretty interesting - naval battles of the Seven-Year War, I mean
Woo! New Dan Abnett novel approaching.
Random, Out of Context Line of the Day:
"I...I know I'm not a man...do you think you could you bury what's left
of me in the Earth--like a man?"
Fever Pitch, with Jimmy Fallon and Drew Barrymore. Cute, and well-structured; it had its funny moments, and was nice and fluffy. There was one point where I thought Barrymore's character was going to cheat on Fallon's character and I was all, "whoa, surprising drama," but nope they took a different route for injecting a bit of depth into the marshmallow. I thought the ending was a bit silly, but I liked it fine, anyway. The integration of contemporary real-life baseball games into a completely fictional narrative was a vaguely interesting affect as well, I wonder if that's been done with anything besides sports.
I thought this was a fun wiki cluster - I'll note the Swedish entries, offhand...
A History of Yoga - huh...I think I'm still mostly a hatha yogi, but I think I've been kind of drifting towards tantra yoga
I think the idea of the polymath should be brought back as an attainable goal. That's my arbitrary, un-based statement for the day.
This reminds me of Sensei Tony telling us how he's going to bash us over the head with a cane when he's older
Quote of the Day, for Ms Connie (and her 'tude):
"Live so that when you wake up, and your feet hit the floor, the devil says, 'Oh no, she's awake!"
Days Gone Bye, The Walking Dead Vol. 1, by Robert Kirkman and Tony Moore. Solid stuff. I'm definitely going to get the next TPB in the series - I mean, the first thing the author does is go on about how it's going to be a character-driven story. Oh hell yes. It's kind of in between Dawn of the Dead and 28 Days Later in setting, and follows their general archetype (even down to the trope of it not really being the zombies that are the scariest thing, but regular humans, when it comes down to it). Black and white, but nicely clearly drawn art, though I think this first volume was really for setting up the characters - I'm quite curious to see how they change after that ending.
Stormwatch: Team Achilles, Vol. 1, by Micah Wright and Whilce Portacio. Intelligent social commentary (in regards to the standard superhero archetype), action-packed, and full of hilarious dry-wit, it's a winning combination. Unfortunately, the research shows that's as far as Team Achilles got before it became too satirical for its own good, so I think I'll stick with just this first volume. Still, having regular humans just using their wits and real-life tactics and equipment subvert the violence-glorifying superheroes-without-consequences is fun for at least this much - my favorite line, after a soldier breaks a superhero's arm:
"You're...using...super...powers..."
"Nope. Just jujitsu."
In other news, I think I have a teensy bit of a mancrush on film critic Phil Villareal from the Arizona Daily Star. His part on the Frank Show on Fridays is awesome. Sorry uber-nasal film critic from KXCI on Thursday afternoons - you're sardonic and interesting, but Villareal's witty.
Stealth Chess, kind of like Pratchett's novels, in which this finds its origin, I'm not sure if it's dippy or awesome
Random Quote of the Day:
"I, with a deeper instinct, choose a man who compels my strength, who makes enormous demands on me, who does not doubt my courage or my toughness, who does not believe me naive or innocent, who has the courage to treat me like a woman." - Anais Nin
Things of Note. End. Week. Whatnot.
-congrats to Ms Kim for kicking ass in Buckeye! Hoorah! And for Wyatt, yes, it's always Buckeye
-no one told us that Southern Fried Murder was theatre with (pretty okay!) food; we were accordingly wide-eyed...also, Kevin had a paunch, and tormented a gay man
-conversations about sex with gay men seem to go in predictable directions
-why are there damn politics in everything?! Damnit! Can't Ieven just go and workout anymore without some kind of awkwardness?
-the horribly overgrown grass in the backyard has a use - a stalking/pouncing playground for dogs! I'll take that as a solid excuse to be lazy.
-now that I finally understand the rules in roller derby, it's a lot more interesting; good times! our favorite was one of the jammers, Fisti the Kidd - not only did she wiggle her tush when she was starting, she was a badass.
-the announcers seemed to be half the fun at the derby, but for the cute girl in the cop outfit, with the incredibly strident voice - she was sure enthusiastic, though, so I didn't mind too much
-new brakes are exorbitant; multiple trips to Walmart and Home Depot are annoying, but, one sees 'interesting' people in the former of those stores
Behemoth: Seppuku, by Peter Watts. Wow. Quite an ending to the Rifters trilogy. As The half-novel prior to it was kind of an extension of the first novel, Starfish in its introspective and relatively quiet tone, Seppuku is more like the second novel, Maelstrom, with its more frenetic and extroverted path. I'm kind of torn, though, as much as I enjoyed the novel; the narrative was rife and rich with semantic nets that would be great to go back and parse with a much closer reading, but I can't help but feel the ending was a little...anticlimactic? But, that said, that's not taking the aforementioned symbolism into account, nor does that opinion accept that perhaps the ending mirrors a Herbert-style ending-that's-not-an-ending wherein it's almost encouraged to have loose-ends and almost start a whole new story.
Phew.
Anyway, a corollary: I just started the next Dark Tower novel, Song of Susannah, and realized something. As much as I like certain authors because I feel like reading their works changes my perception of myself and the world around me, and because I learn things from their narratives (McDonald, Herbert, Watts), I just realized something. And already said that, damn. Anyway, I was comparing in my head Ken Lubin (a Watts character) and Roland Deschain (if you don't know who he is, then you can just go right to hell), and wondering whether Lubin could perhaps be called a sort of dystopian gunslinger. I think in some ways he's comparable, but he really isn't one in the end, but that's besides the point.
The point! Is that it's funny when reading a dystopian post-bioapocalyptic novel with inherently dysfunctional characters that you're really into, you might'nt realize that it might kind of bring your mood down. I didn't notice that till while reading King's novel, I realized my mood was suddenly lifted, and I started to get a "Bring it, world!" feeling back, from my mostly broken-feeling week. Yes, there is something rich and changing that is kind of shared between those narratives - but I didn't realize that they could have such bright or shadowed aspect to them.
In the Peter Watts novels I've been reading, characters occasionally use phrases such as "r-selector" or "K-selector," and I could never figure out quite what the author was trying to say when those phrases were used to describe other characters. But then I ran across this nice little bit:
"Typically, r-selected species produce many offspring, each of which is unlikely to survive to adulthood, while K-selected species invest more heavily in fewer offspring, each of which has a better chance of surviving to adulthood."
So I would take that (along with running off remembered contexts in the narrative) to mean that someone referred to as an r-selector would be of a more promiscuous bent, ie, they might not be looking to actually have a lot of babies, but there behavior of sleeping with a lot of people might seem as such. Whereas a K-selector would be someone of a more monogamous, relationship-focused bent. Or, from a different angle, someone of a particular religious background that encourages mass production of younglings might be considered an r-selector as well.
Either way, it's an interesting way of looking at the people around oneself, all of a sudden from a more...ecological perspective. Kind of a reminder of humans still being animals, as it were. Also, it would be funny to say "r's and K's" instead of "ladies and gentlemen," as it would eliminate gender from that equation and speak to a different level of thought. And be kind of sardonically funny.
For AZ peeps, Save Our Trust
Things of Note, from a Whirlwind Weekend:
-don't get comfort food at a bar, really, please just get burgers - learn from our experiences; little flat-screen tv's at each booth were interesting, though
-scorpions are interesting - not insects, but like little land-crabs...or big, in the case of the one we saw; I wonder whether they'll have have a soft-shell scorpion roll at sushi places, it would make a good Halloween seasonal thing
-I was surprised to learn that pickled red cabbage isn't that bad...except I also can't eat it without getting sick...but I can eat bratwurst covered in spicy mustard and drink Octoberfest beer while watching people do odd jigs to Octoberfest music while we shiver in the cold on Mt Lemmon!
-I think we met the Mayor of Pasadena...well, sort of, it's a kind of a collection of interesting stories...but yay for people rambling into Tucson from LA!
-I'll never, ever look at the glove compartment in Natalie the same way...especially when it starts singing...seriously, it's creepy
-I think if I were to get married in Tucson, I would get married in that place south of Congress that I already forgot the name of - it was really nice for a wedding, though!
-my girlfriend caught the bouquet. ruh-roh.
-Clint was charismatic enough to convince the bartenders who weren't allowed to serve shots to serve shots, get his crotch-grabbed by a cokehead (while dancing with another girl), and also to hear some really scandalous gossip from a complete stranger
Children of the Corn, with Linda Hamilton and Peter Horton. No idea who they are. But what's important is that the movie's based on a story by Stephen King. While it wasn't really scary at all, it was very interesting in several conceptual ways. Like, if nature/religion's usual path and purpose is self-propagation, what does it imply about the children's cult that they do the opposite and basically winnow themselves down over time, in isolation? I think it's a remarkable, subtle characterizing detail about the cult, personally, making it a kind of antimatter of the "natural order," as it were. And there's a whole wealth of things like that, from the uncanny nature of children to the driving force behind the cult, to questions about the expanded setting (especially with King's penchant for such).
Best in Show, with Parker Posey, Will Hamilton, Eugene Levy, and a bunch of other vaguely familiar people (and apparently some famous real-life handlers). Kind of like a really long, deadpan-humor montage-sequence, or a pretty damn funny collection of character studies. It wasn't exactly like the dog show I've been to (inside vs out) but I could see how there could be real-life analogues of those characters. It made me curious to go to more dog shows and start looking for them, actually. And Fred Willard at the announcer was the best. In show.
General Wade, a neighbor of my family's for many years (courtesy of Wyatt)
Mmm, Friday the 13th. A small Thai guy named Jason just threatened to go on a rampage with a machete, a.k.a. a lawnmower blade. The last Friday the 13th that sticks in my memory I got two traffic tickets, then that weekend led directly and inexorably to an execrable weekend from the bowels of something foul. Good times. This time at least I just slept in, was late for work, and then scraped my bumper while trying to fix my poor parking job. The day's not over yet, of course! How exciting!
Except not really, no.
Guest Poem post! Woo!
Morganatic
Sinis tree pruned bare
Bones bleaching under glaring sky
Bud, flower, nut and leaf
Freeze and drop and feel no grief
Branches bare since colored fall
Deaf to dryad's beck and call
Accelleration forward
Force
No mass
Right left
And left
And left
Ahead is a wall, sometimes brick
Rainbow graffiti prose's
"The earth on which we walk is flat
memories flee…a deserting rat.
Half our soul can help, abet
The elephant will, for now, forget"
Speed of light
Of sound
Of silence
Left
And left
And left
A candle wick sits still and calm
As night draws close around it
Fire flares, flame so bright
Day brought forth from stagnant night
Morning comes, none too soon
Muse's candle is the moon.
Sinis tree
Left
Sinis tree
Left
Sinis tree
And right
Completely unrelatedly, Joshua Norton seems to have been an interesting fellow
Behemoth: ß-Max, by Peter Watts. I hesitate to write about this novel just yet, as it's really quite literally only half of a novel, because of publishing snags. Anyway, in short, it's got the character-driven and setting-based feel of the first book in the trilogy, Starfish, with the energy and activity of the second novel, Maelstrom. Not as much hard sci-fi as the latter, though, but the characters and plot generally make up for that. Anyway, more to say when I finish the second half - and then on to SoS, I promise, Connie!
Clockwork Thugs, Yo (Livewires, Vol. 1), by Adam Warren. First, I'll just list the names of the characters: Stemcell, Hollowpoint Ninja, Gothic Lolita, Cornfed, and Social Butterfly. That and the title are kind of an indication of the sassy, self-aware, and ironic humor of the writing (SOP for Warren, one of my favoritest authors). The other thing that's well utilized from his repetoire is the profusion of science-fiction ideas that are spread throughout the story, and that are just plain interesting. It's funny to feel real empathy for characters which are essentially emotionless, which especially ties into the pretty disturbing ending. Good stuff! Though unfortunately the TBP comes in digest form (ie, shrunken), sadly for the trademark Dirty Pair-esque art.
Word of the Dizzay! Haven't done that in forever:
concinnity \kuhn-SIN-uh-tee\, noun:
1. Internal harmony or fitness in the adaptation of parts to a whole or to each other.
2. Studied elegance of design or arrangement -- used chiefly of literary style.
3. An instance of concinnity
Reading about the basis for that movie I'm so excited about, I came across this fun little tidbit: "On the first day of the siege, when Xerxes demanded the Greeks surrender their arms, Leonidas is said to have replied Μολών Λαβέ ('Come and get them')."
Chess Boxing - can't decide whether it's stupid, or interesting
an interesting definition in terms of the idea I'd previously brought up, and that's explored in Peter Watts' novels -
"A psychopath is defined as having no concern for the feelings of others and a complete disregard for any sense of social obligation. They seem egocentric and lack insight and any sense of responsibility or consequence. Their emotions are thought to be superficial and shallow, if they exist at all. They are considered callous, manipulative, and incapable of forming lasting relationships, let alone of any kind of love. It is thought that any emotions which the true psychopath exhibits are the fruits of watching and mimicking other people's emotions. They show poor impulse control and a low tolerance for frustration and aggression. They have no empathy, remorse, anxiety or guilt in relation to their behavior. In short, they truly are devoid of conscience."
Bed of Roses, with Christian Slater and Mary Stuart Masterson. And a cute supporting actress that apparently does the voice of Bobby on King of the Hill? How funny. And ah ha! I was right, Gina Torres from Firefly! Anyway. I think this story could have easily dropped into "trite," but skirted the edge of taking itself too seriously with a few well-placed aware-of-irony lines, and some nice acting. Just a nice romance, quite pleasant.
I don't understand the advertising logic (I thought Li had done his "last movie") but Mr Scott found this amazing little hint of a thing: Jet Li plus Jason Statham equals aweso. I'm almost gibbering, internally, between this and 300.
Things of Note, from the End of the Week:
-wow, Scorsese films are long; not that I didn't already realize that, but it's funny to go into a movie theatre one day, and emerge from it the next day
-for the first time in years, I brought "homework" back upon myself: thank you Mr Jeff, and your kicking drills that are oh so pleasant to do
-there's a Mongolian barbecue on Campbell, now (ie, within walking distance of Adelaide): aweso!
-any band that sings about drinking and Irish girls, and ends with "Turtle Power!" is pretty rocking
-yes, an Aussie can have Matrix-like agility that surpasses a mountain goat, but it doesn't prevent me from wanting to clap hands over my eyes when she bounds playfully along the edge of cliffs that overlook spiky tree-tops
-shelties jumping = cutest thing ever; it's like an old-school Mario Bros game come to life (boing!)
-apparently, slightly upscale sushi places sometimes hire stippers to be their hostess; that, or the poor gal just really, really needed to do her laundry and only had a single clean nightie (and I'll admit, on some levels we really weren't complaining at all)
Aw man, there was a weather alert this morning for a storm system just outside of Tucson, I feel bad for the people who probably woke up into it. I mean, I'm sure "nickel-sized hail" and "continuous cloud-to-ground lightning" are cool and all, but when the emergency alert is telling you to get the hell inside, now, that's a bit ominous.
Emotions in Motion - interesting article on emotions and body-memory
The Departed, with Matt Damon (say it Team America style), that guy from Titanic, one of the Sheen's, Marky Mark, a very eeevil Nicholson, and one of the Baldwin's. I knew this was a re-make of a Hong Kong flick that I'd wanted to see, even before I heard that on the radio! I had just never gotten around to seeing it (aw, man, and it has Andy Lau in it and everything...). Anyway, for as much as it's a re-make, as everyone seems to be saying I'm sure Departed will be in contention for all sorts of awards; it was a bit long and convoluted, but you know what, we only realized that in retrospect, as during the movie we were pretty well focused and attentive. So, definitely worth seeing, in the end. And Marky Mark - you make the bestest asshole ever.
"It's funny because it's true" - from Mr. Phil
For people in Tucson, No on 202
I liked this, especially with the amazing weather Tucson's been having-
"One way to understand the distinction between concentration and meditation is by using rain as an analogy. When rain starts, the moisture of clouds and fog (everyday awareness) coalesces into concentrated moisture and becomes distinct raindrops. These raindrops represent dharana—intermittent moments of focused attention. When the rain falls to earth and creates a river, the merging of the individual raindrops into one stream is like dhyana or meditation. The separate raindrops merge into one continuous flow, just as individual moments of dharana merge into the uninterrupted focus of meditation."
In re-finishing up the amazing novel Maelstrom, by Peter Watts, I ran across an interesting idea contained within basically a sentence. Which is really par for the course with Watts, with huge chunks of story suddenly going from ambiguous to goosebump-inducing clarity with a single phrase or even word.
"Conscience is overrated anyway," Jovellanos said all around them.
"Give it a rest, Alice," Desjardins said, rubbing his wrists.
"I'm serious. Think about it: not everyone even has a conscience, and the people that do are invariably exploited by the ones that don't. Conscience is--irrational, when you get right down to it."
What I’m most interested in is the second posit Alice Jovellanos brings up, that perhaps not everyone has a conscience (and I’m sure that’s not a black and white, conscience or no conscience thing). I guess, just looking back, I remember people I’ve known or know, or met at the hospital, hell, that I’ve been intimate with, that were as honestly baffled by my expression of being troubled by my conscience as I was baffled by their inability to understand the concepts within the family of guilt/remorse/having a conscience.
I guess it just makes me question my assumption of yore that our inability to come to terms on that aspect of self was simply miscommunication – maybe, instead, it really is something like the novel describes on other pages, that they’re just not as physically (in the brain structure/chemistry sense) able to have a conscience. Which brings up the questions, is it rather that it’s rather flipflopped, and having a conscience is more like having a handicap? And if true, would it really be that much of a ‘nature’ thing – how much would ‘nurture’ play into it?
I have to say, I'm already very enamored of 300. One, it's based off an epic graphic novel. That's got me going to it already. Two, it's by Frank Miller, which means stylized in my mind, and if you know me, you know that's what I like. Three, it's about Sparta and Persia, one of my favorite historical periods. Four, it looks awesome.
Randoms.
What a strange, odd night. Besides the initial, somewhat flustering and blink-inducing news, class went fine...except for all of us being physically messed up. Kevin gets props for being hardcore in the final grappling rounds, though his body handed him a nice adrenal dump afterwards. Michael gets props for learning what happens when the aggresion of Western wrestling runs into the yielding of jujitsu, though his shoulder is probably going to be swollen after he set himself up for a beautifully executed pile-drive right onto it. Hugh gets props for climbing nearly every day this week, and pushing himself to the point of killing both his biceps anyway. And I messed up my shoulder, again, pretty much leaving my right arm annoyingly useless, and I'm so ashamedly out of shape I've got sore spots on my torso an knots in my posterior hips (ok seriously this time, who wants to rub my butt?). Then we get home, and Ms Kim shows us how a 65 pound dog went loco at work at pretty much mangled her poor legs; I've not seen such big bruises with so many colors since the hospital. So props to her for still being relatively polite to the client in the middle of all that.
An anti-ode to bullthorns. Note my restraining myself from any sort of profanity or expletives. I'm not sure what they're actually called, but that's what Ms Xuemei called them many years ago, and it's stuck and propagated ever since. These little seeds are basically nature's caltrop, pointy in a blunt way no matter how they're oriented. The plant they spawn from is a weed that sticks completely flat to the ground in a viney form, clinging tenaciously even after herbicide has long killed it. I'm not sure which is worse, the seeds' tendency to stick to footwear, and then ambush bare feet later on in the house, or walking outside with bare feet and planting both soles into the center of a plant (which inevitably has a wide diameter, so stepping back off of it means stepping on even more bullthorns). So here's a big honking middle finger to you, Mr Plant.
Three, I don't know why I thought of this, but some self-exposition on the name I use for the blog, Jinn, in terms of what it's referencing, in different senses. One, djinn from Islamic folklore. Two, the word "jin" in its various definitions in Japanese. And three, that definition of "jin" contrasted with its use as a term in bonsai.
Interesting time-based map
For some odd reason in browsing through articles at lunch I ran across some profiles of serial killers. Oh! It was when I was reading a synopsis of Silence of the Lambs, and then got sidetracked by being intrigued in those other articles for a similar reason - humanity at an extreme of some aspect of itself. Anyway, for one, what those serial killers did was actually a good deal more disturbing and scary than any horror movie synopsis I've read, which I didn't really expect for some reason. But the part I was really interested in was more one step back from the murderers in question - the mothers.
Consistently, each of the killers I happened to read about had a domineering mother that would psychologically and emotionally abuse them, and in a less striking sense, a similarly abused or just plain absent father. So, one thing I would like to understand better is what connection is there between that parent-child relationship and the subsequent actions of the child - say, why would one killer feel an urge to pretend to be his mother (a la Hitchcock's Psycho, but in a much, much more disturbing way)? The thing I'm actually more interested in, though, is to take another step "back," and see what drove the mothers to their particular dysfunctions, as that seems like it's been ignored in conventional thought upon the matter.
