January 2009
46 posts
“Pharmaco-geological formations take shape in the sand, compacted into strange...”
– Hydro-Parmacology, BLDGBLOG
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http://xkcd.com/404/ →
I bet you’ve never seen this xkcd comic before.
Enter Secret Password →
You obviously know what I’m talking about, Miranda July.
Housekeeping, dishwashing
Being lazy and having plentiful access to free Nalgenes, I have a tendency to ruin them by leaving liquids in them for too long. Long enough and it leaves a permanent odor.
Once, I left the dredges of orange juice in a Nalgene. A week later, it smelled fermented, like citrus wine for brave stomachs. It sits above my microwave now, empty but still unpleasant to the nose.
Another time, I stored...
Children of the Left, Unite! →
magicmolly:
“Marxist principles have been dripping steadily into the minds of American youth for more than a century. This isn’t altogether surprising. After all, most parents want their children to be far left in their early years — to share toys, to eschew the torture of siblings, to leave a clean environment behind them, to refrain from causing the extinction of the dog, to rise above coveting...
Re: previous post. Bourgeois leanings and...
Between The Moth and ROFLThing, I spent a lot of time in New York in nightclubs among white, upper-class men and women (but mostly men) between the ages of 21 and 45. There were lots of scruffy chins, Chuck Taylors, and those godawful square, hipster glasses. I vacillate on whether I find this attractive.
Before I left for New York, I just happened to have a long conversation about class and race...
“Buy this t-shirt for all your white, upper-middle class toddlers!”
– Sara Barron, host and comedienne, at The Moth StorySLAM.
$20 and it’s yours. Me want, but I’m not a toddler, white, or quite upper-middle class.
This is how harems should work. Line of ascension?
What I learned at the Museum of Sex:
The slipper limpet is a sedentary hermaphroditic snail species. Due to their lack of mobility, slipper limpets live on top of one another in stacks that have approximately 15 members.
Within these mating chains, the bottom individual is always female and the top always male. During intercourse, they top male extends his penis to the bottom of the chain and...
Things I Learned at Harvard: Fear of Failure
Failure, not in the absolute sense — I don’t think I can sum up the friends, grades, and extracurriculars of my past semester and call them a failure. No, I have gained and grown in these months. But measured against the promises held by September, I haven’t gained enough. I have retreated; I didn’t give it my all. Failure, as defined by my own standards. It is this kind...
The cutest thing: mini pita bread. Two inches in diameter, like the size of a good cookie. Rip ‘em open and it’s the same amazing pita pocket with just enough for a spoonful of hummus. I don’t have any photos because they are all in my tummy.
Ate these along with gobs and gobs of hummus (20+ different flavors!) at MIT’s Hummus Taste Off yesterday. The best was...
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George W. Bush's Journey: The Cheerleader →
Watching Oliver Stone’s W. right now (excellent mimicry, more psychology than politics) and it’s making me mighty relieved that we have new president. (Right now watching reenacted conversation about Bush’s first inauguration — what a time warp.) W. as a movie is a character study, but it can’t overcome the hump of the fact that Bush is a character made interesting by...
A Retrospective of the Bush Era →
Date on which the first contract for a book about September 11 was signed: 9/13/01
Number of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and North African men detained in the U.S. in the eight weeks after 9/11: 1,182 Number of them ever charged with a terrorism-related crime: 0 Number charged with an immigration violation: 762
Minimum number of Bush appointees who have regulated industries they...
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Winterbells (Orisinal Flash Game) →
One of my Facebook friends (whom I haven’t actually spoken to since freshman year but such is the nature of Facebook friendships) has been updating his status obsessively with his high scores on this game. I went through a Winterbells phase too and thought I was pretty good, except his scores are about 200 times my highest. Pwn’d.
Turns out, he’s been thinking pretty hard about...
I love physics even though it takes over my life.
*Glass slides off tray and splatters all over floor*
Me: Ugh, I'm having problems with friction today.
GF: Are you studying for a physics final?
Me: Hah, yes....
“when you don’t create things, you become defined by your tastes rather than...”
– Twitter / why the lucky stiff (via toolmantim)
This is something I constantly struggle with here at the Tumblr. All my brain power has been monopolized by finals recently, and I’ve just been vacantly reblogging. What’s the use of a Tumblelog, just a collection of objects I find amusing...
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Literary Interlude
I’m joined not one, but two, book clubs today. After a semester of math/science, it feels good to be literary again, but also a little scary. I haven’t written a paper all year, and I’m not sure I can BS my way out of a paperbag anymore. But why worry? I can still read (sometimes even in German) and right now I’m reading:
J.G. Ballard’s Vermillion Sands — I...
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“In the Aeroplane Over the Sea” -...
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Chillaxing in Chillel
Hillel is the hidden culinary secret of Harvard. The big difference isn’t that the food is kosher but that it’s good. Still, I’m not shameless enough to go regularly unless I’m with Jewish friends. But AY phoned and I found myself there for dinner.
AY is one of those people whom if you sit down with at dinner, pretty soon you’ll be surrounded by a flock of people....
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Tessellations on Zen
Asoa Tokolo’s Pattern Magnets can fit together in an infinite number of configurations, each flowing smoothly and perfectly into the each — creating an infinite number of new patterns.
It’s not too surprising that Japanese designer Asao Tokolo went straight from teaching at the Tokyo Institute of Computer Science to tutoring at Musashino Art University. His work not only straddles...
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“Fatalist Palmistry” - Why?
…...
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“That’s the way change happens on the web: The most startling experiments are...”
– - The New Journalism: Goosing the Grey Lady (NY Mag)
A profile of the geek-journalists behind the New York Times Online. Perhaps the Times will cease to be published soon, heck maybe even by this May, but I’d feel little loss, since www.nytimes.com is so much better than the physical paper....
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Me and You = Young Folks + Time Stands Still
Cut...
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A Curious Combo of Mint Peanut Butter
Ways to try this:
Goo factor: chew ONE stick of spearmint gum with spoonful of peanut butter.
Mediate with chocolate: eat TWO Andes Mint Bars with ONE Reeses.
All natural: wrap ONE roasted peanut in mint leaves.
With limited resources, I of course chose option one. (Gum from coat pocket, peanut butter packet from the dining hall.) It was surprisingly tasty, though not recommended for anyone...
*Blew Raspberries*
I would like to meet the manager responsible for quality control on the assembly line that manufacturers scented magic markers.
A: to ask her how she secured the coolest job in the world
And
B: to talk about why blue raspberry exists.
(via Dallas Clayton)
Me too! Blue raspberries? Google and Wikipedia have been no help on this matter.
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“If an infinite number of monkeys working on an infinite number of typewriters...”
– www.maxbarry.com (via juliusseizure)
Wanted: a novel of a dystopic world where all art is illegal under the regime of the COPyrights. They are opposed, valiantly, by the COPylefts.
“I think that people who are losing their jobs are being forced to pursue their...”
– - Former Bankers Turn to a Creative Plan B
A possible answer to this question?
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“What explains our schizophrenic attitude toward the invisible economy? We...”
– Justin Wolfers in “Puzzling over the Invisible Economy” on why we don’t give mp3s or digital books as gifts.
I have been experiencing pangs of analog nostalgia recently. Burning CDs, printing out blog entries to read — generally making my digital and environmental conscience...
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¿Love? at 24 Frames Per Second
If movies were people, which ones would you date, hook up with, and marry?
A casual question tossed out at yesterday’s party. As the night/morning worn on, the conversation became more delirious and soon an entire relationship history was born. Much debt to Liz, whose own cinematic relationship history is wonderfully adventurous.
Amélie would be my childhood sweetheart. From the ages of...