Bloglet, the gentleman's mock turtle soup -- Moss made it sweeter than myrrh ash and dhoup
Isn't it great when you're ambling to the bathroom of a morning carrying a bucket of cold spit and you stumble for a moment and as you regain your balance the bucket flies out of your hand and shatters, splattering half a gallon of viscous human gland juice all over the floor and your socks and the wheelchair and the power supplies and your last few crumbs of personal dignity? I love it when that happens.
So yeah. The other night shift person quit without notice, which means that I have to work 6 nights a week (versus four nights and two days) 'til the end of January and can't be a Shakespeare kid no' mo'. Sniffle. It's more money and less footsoreness and more time to read and less flip-flopping between day and night and a Saturday off every week instead of a Monday, but but but... no more 40% discount! No more amusing antics of cheeky coworkers! No more selling Che Guevara to Ivanka Trump! It's very sad. Oh well.
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10:20:48 AM,Wednesday 8 December 2004
1. Lhasa de Sela -- Con Toda Palabra
I'm sort of ridiculously proud that this CD starts and ends on the same sustained note, even though it was completely accidental and I didn't notice it until it was mistakenly set on loop. Her voice is seductive, as all religion should be, and the cello makes me want things I've got no words for.
2. Vivaldi -- Misericordia
I remember one morning I dreamed this song. When I woke up, I realized that my mom was playing it downstairs, but I'll never forget the feeling of it. I've never thought that "fear" ("timentibus") was the right word for either the text or the music (which do agree, I think), but I can't think of a better one. Can you?
3. Mozart -- Domine Deus
When the voices pass that high note off to one another and dive down for a great gulp of darkness, and rise to claim it again -- I can't hear it without trembling. If that's not religion, what is?
4. Mozart -- The Singing Lesson
No one on earth could follow that except the man who wrote it. So that's how it had to be. And, thank god, he's great enough to let me mingle the smart-ass silliness with the best of all things. It was important to do that; I tried to make this mix reflect my own spiritual composition, and while there's plenty of awe and exultation, there's more than enough nose-thumbing to go around, too. But this one's sweet. Two bleating choirboys trying their damnedest to get through a Kyrie while their choirmaster upbraids 'em, cusses the cross, and impugns their toilet training. Great stuff.
5. Petra -- St. Augustine's Pears
Awright, I'm sorry, I know it's very bad form to belittle the True Believer, but this song makes me snerf my ramen. I mean, Augustine's funny enough
without earnest young Christian Rockers interpreting him for the masses. But for crying out loud -- they're pears, dude. Get over yourself.
6. Dar Williams -- Alleluia
This one I like, though. I was exactly this kind of teenager -- the best heaven there is is a heaven that sux. All bland and nicey-nice and full of helpful squares to sneer at. Screw this noise, man. I'd rather play pick-up sticks in hell than surf all day in... heh. Precious innocence. Paradise has changed a bit for me since then.
7. Janis Joplin -- Mercedes Benz
See, this is a great song on its own merits, and makes a pithy point, but the thing that fascinates me is the key she chose to sing it in. It sounds like she's ripping every verse from her throat so she doesn't choke on it. Turns it into a prayer in spite of itself, almost. Or, anyway, something harsher and trickier than just a snide little satire.
8. Leslie Fish -- Natural Theology
Words by Rudyard Kipling (though, in the original, the line is "not to mention the L.S.D", meaning Pounds, Shillings and Pence, which was altered to "Not to mention the parity" for obvious reasons). This is a great one to sing to whiners of all varieties, believers and apostates alike.
9. Randy Newman -- God's Song (That's Why I Love Mankind)
Newman's own note on the song was: "It's a California desert, and a California God." That's good enough for me.
10. Ginny Hawker -- Time is Winding Up
I'm all about this one for the slurpy fiddle playing. Also, it's got what I love in the best of sacred music: its text is so simple you might want to call it trivial; it's got so little substance and so much repetition. But the tune reveals its meaning in a way you never could in speech, and you realize there's something to it after all.
11. Haakonshallens Venner -- Flagellantsang
You thought that bit in the Holy Grail was just a joke, huh? I haven't really been following the thread of my little selection of English joke songs in the middle of this mix. See, it starts with the young delinquents, goes into the mind of the petitioner, and shows what happens when that turns sour, and then it tries to make nice with the big man by whatever blandishments it can think of -- leading to this catchy little number, thuh-WACK. Makes you wince, don't it?
12. Loreena McKennitt -- Skellig
But, damnit, just when I find the whole thing safely ridiculous, I see a hint of what they call holiness in truth, and I'm thrown into doubt again. The flagellants were fanatic laymen. This one's a monk and a scholar and a beautiful soul. Solitude and books. The words of God and much of history. It's mad; it's extreme; but it's not ridiculous, as much as I sort of wish it was. It piques me and tempts me.
13. The Corries -- The Vicar and the Frog
Then, of course, there's holiness and there's holiness. Snerk.
14. P.D.Q. Bach -- Sanctus
See, this is what you get when you baptize a kid Catholic, let her develop a weirdo monk fixation, and raise her in a sort of modified Hinduism. Goddamn Latin and finger cymbals, that's what.
15. Mira Bai -- Tumhre Karan
And there's the saint herself, my namesake. She danced with bells on her ankles and refused to throw herself on her husband's funeral pyre -- because, she said, her true husband was the flute-playing youth, the god Krishna. Her in-laws were furious, and tried to poison her, but her lips transmuted it to nectar. So they sent her a cobra in a basket -- but she opened it to find a garland of flowers. I've never felt at home in the name; I don't think it fits either my foibles or my better parts. But it's splendid all the same.
16. Mediva -- Quen a Omagen da Virgen
Just a link by way of a funkalicious drum track back from the East to the Western World. And something about the Holy Virgin in there, too.
17. Bach -- Et Incarnatus Est
The first time I really heard this one -- heard and listened both -- I was walking along a road in the middle of the night. It had just started to snow. I saw the flesh of the Son float and quicken and take form. I saw every child in every womb breathing water and turning with exquisite love and slowness inside every mother through time and outside it. I understood the impulse to prostrate one's self before a babe.
18. Bach -- Nun is das Heil
And, like above, only Bach can follow Bach. Only one thing to counter such a mystery, too much of which'll do you in: bright booming shouts. It makes me stomp and screw my face up like the sun's too bright.
19. Hildegard von Bingen -- O Eternae Deus
Can't say much about this one. It's from a time before ours. It's by a genius who turned pain into visions. It feels almost short enough to hold your breath through. Is that a prayer?
20. Leonard Cohen -- There For You
There are so many Leonard Cohen songs I could have used -- the Story of Isaac, the Butcher, Light as the Breeze, By the Rivers Dark... hell. But I chose this one. Partly because it's new; I haven't had a chance to layer on years and years of associations yet. I don't think it's his best writing, lyrically. I expected to hate it. I can't stand that phrase "there for you". It's supposed to be comforting? It's dreck. It means nothing. Except in this one single sense, and he hit on it. That's why I chose it. Also how he sings to "my darling one" -- just like Mira and Lhasa. And the oud.
20. Rosenberg 7 -- Pris vare Gud
There's just kind of a law that I have to put a Rosenberg 7 song on pretty much every blogswap ever. Please excuse. But, guh, ain't it gorgeous?
21. Palestrina -- Sicut Cervus
Like the hart thirsts for springs of water, so my soul thirsts for you, my God.
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06:09:47 AM,Monday 6 December 2004
I don't need to be smarter than I am. I only want to be smarter than I am because I'm lazy, and smarts facilitate laze. But, thing is, I want to be not lazy even more than I want to be smart. 'Cause once I figure the trick of that out, I'll have enough to occupy me so that I won't feel the lack like I do in idleness. And that's living. So hop to. Hup hup hup. Argh.
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02:27:15 AM,Monday 6 December 2004
Eat Breakfast Cereal, Bananas, Milk, and Bananas Foster Ice Cream (garnish)
Take Shower Drawing Bath
Do Laundry Deposit Paychecks Return Proust to Library
Rip Fidelio, Accents, Men and Cartoons, Baroque Brass Burn CDs for Blogswap, Julia, Robert, Ma, and Ariadne
Harrass Superindendent About Mailbox Roommate jimmied the lock open. Yay!
Check P.O. Box and Give Back Key
Study for GRE (Respond to GRE Studying Guy on Craigslist?) My girlfriend made me write down my times tables on graph paper, humiliatingly enough, but I know it'll do me good. I should, um, finish that tonight. Dude, you should see this kid's Greek notebook. Boggling. Inspiring, even. Talk about falling in with the right crowd.
Figure Out Which Class to Take at Hunter and How to Go About It I think I've settled on English 352, Shakespeare Survey. The Grad school chick said I should take a survey class, and since it's 300-level, K. figured it wouldn't be filled with as much dead weight as most gut courses. I wanted Melville, but it's in the middle of the day, and I kinda need sleep. This one's Tuesdays and Thursdays, 7:00 to 8:15 (I'm planning on quitting the bookstore if I can get more hours with the lawyer come January, but if it turns out that I don't, I can switch both shifts from 9:00 to 5:00 and have a little time to chill out and study beforehand. The teacher sounds decent, and maybe it'll give me a poke to spruce up my Lear essay for the application.
Fill Out FAFSA The 2005-2006 one hasn't come out yet. When it does, though, I'll be ready.
Buy Pants
Practice Trumpet
Do Firm Communist Pot-Belly Workout
Pack Up and Mail CDs and Credit Card Statement
Pay Loans Get Imp Information from K. and Make BPAL Order I decided to get Yggdrasil instead of Chiroptera. She's getting Neo-Tokyo, Intrigue, Lear, Athens, Jabberwocky, and Baron Samedi.
Decide Whether $200 Is Worth a Spinal Tap and a Night in the Hospital Nah.
Book Avenue Q Tickets Will do it in January
Eat Litchi Gummies and Read Mortification Having Croutons and Reading From the Borderlands instead.
Clean the Bathroom Beat the Six-Headed Opera Diva Boss in Warioworld 4_
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11:29:54 AM,Friday 3 December 2004
Vindication! Ha! Astrology is a crock! Ha! Take that! Ha!
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(13)
06:29:24 PM,Wednesday 1 December 2004
Blogswap done. Just gotta burn it and ship it and woo.
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01:47:13 PM,Wednesday 1 December 2004
Last night, my employer couldn't get comfortable; she woke up maybe five times, had some breathing constriction, and needed more massaging and adjustment than usual. This morning, though, she was all smiles, and I asked her how she could be in such a good mood after such an exhausting night. She had me get the letter board, and spelled out:
"It is very comforting to have you here. You are so solicitous and kind. I really appreciate it."
I shuffled my feet and cracked some dumb pun about how of course I'm solicitous 'cause she's a solicitor (tax and estate law), but it made my ears jig. I'm lucky to be working there.
It makes me think about the guys I worked with at the group home, though. Several of them were as paralyzed as her, and contorted with malformations and contractures, to boot. Sometimes less than a centimeter's distance of an elbow or a foot will make the difference between ease and extreme discomfort, and she'll make sure I keep fixing things 'til they're right. These guys couldn't communicate their sensations -- I had to arrange 'em as best I could and hope I'd gotten it. When I didn't, I had no way of knowing. Maybe they minded somewhat less because they'd been like that their whole lives, and had adapted to being manhandled. But I think mostly it was inborn stoicism. Oof.
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09:48:45 AM,Monday 29 November 2004
I'm very pleased. It's always been a source of deep personal shame that my Irish accent ain't worth two snootfulls of applesauce. Makes joke-telling a chore, if nothing else. Now, though, after a stiff regimen of Yeats, Dubliners, and Paul-from-the-bookstore (who autographed my Don Quixote poster!), I can pronounce the sentence:
"But I soon beat the master entirely at drinkin'."
with a respectably passable brogue. Woo!
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(4)
08:40:43 PM,Sunday 28 November 2004
You know what was really, really nice? Me having the day off work, and her having the day off school, and it being the same *#($& day. Can't wait for that to come around again, um, sometime in 2005 {fingers crossed}.
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(1)
07:11:34 PM,Sunday 28 November 2004
I keep my perfume vials (a vial is the same as a phial, right? But an ampule is something you gotta bust to get into? I think that's so.) in an old can of beef jerky chaw. 'Cause I'm BUTCH.
I dreamed I had a really effeminate haircut. I mean, I do have a really effeminate haircut. I need a barber so bad I've been tempted to set about my head and neck with my roommate's recording of Vanessa. But this was severely upsie-poof-lolly. A portent of things to come, if I'm not careful. {shudder}
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(1)
04:51:45 PM,Saturday 27 November 2004
Quen a omagen da Virgen
et de seu fillo onrrar?
D'eles sera muit' onrrado
no seu ben, que non a par.
E de tal razon com'esta
vos direi, se vos prouguer,
miragre que fez a Virgen,
que sempre nosso ben quer,
perque ajamos o reyno
De seu fill' ond'a moller
primeiro nos deitou fora,
que foi malament' errar._
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(11)
03:44:19 PM,Friday 26 November 2004
Oh good. Now, me, I know nothing from Alexander the Great ('cause we never study history on the Western Canonball...), but I've been getting a thorough schooling lately. I watched most of the History Channel production with threemassivegroupies, and it was magnificent to see the volleys of gale-force heckling tear it to itty bits. Hell, Plutarch Rodriguez Proudfoot alone was worth missing Treehouse of Horror for nine times over. Ditto the restaurant placemat tie-in with the recipe for honeyed veal in fish sauce. Sadly, one of the above is in California for the week, so it'll only be two little bloodthirsty Macedonian fangirls sicced on the thing in my humbled presence, but I can't wait all the same.
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(2)
10:00:08 PM,Tuesday 23 November 2004
Yee! Porter came into the store! Sweet Porter.
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(3)
03:47:35 PM,Tuesday 23 November 2004
Wizened little old man with downy hair and a tweed cap comes in, delicately straightens a stack of bookmarks, takes one off the top, smiles, and leaves.
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01:45:07 PM,Tuesday 23 November 2004
Also, twice today I was tempted by eee-vil, and both times I reluctantly stuck to good. So w00t.
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(11)
09:43:10 PM,Saturday 20 November 2004
Turns out I don't have to work on Thankgsiving -- the store's closed after all. Yay to that.
Bought one of those cheesy Music-Minus-One book and CD sets today. But it's good stuff -- Bach, Purcell, Palestrina, and them cats -- so if it gets me to practice, I ain't complaining. Would still like to hook up with that English chick who answered my Craigslist ad -- another trumpet and recorder player! But she ain't called back. Hm.
Had a lovely dinner with the roommates last night. Made a killer salad dressing with balsamic vinegar and capers. They did all the rest of the work, of course (lasagna from scratch!) but I also got the ice cream, so hell, it evens out. They're damn cool. We talked music and board games and slang and demographics all evening. Gotta try to intersect with 'em more often; the backwards schedule's a pain that way.
Oh, plus: grape flavored fluoridated toothpaste. Thank you, wacky Japanese import store near Columbia.
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09:14:38 PM,Saturday 20 November 2004
Fat Man boxers and Little Boy socks.
My wardrobe is the bomb, yo.
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02:17:48 PM,Friday 19 November 2004
Hee. Too much of a wuss to do it, but I like this.
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09:23:44 AM,Thursday 18 November 2004
"The first warp-spasm seized Cuchulainn, and made him into a monstrous thing, hideous and shapeless, un-heard of. His shanks and his joints, every knuckle and angle and organ from head to foot, shook like a tree in the flood or a reed in the stream. His body made a furious twist inside his skin, so that his feet and shins and knees switched to the rear and his heels and calves switched to the front of his shins, each big knot the size of a warrior's bunched fist. On his head the temple-sinews streched to the nape of his neck, each mighty, immense, measureless knob as big as the head of a month-old child. His face and features became a red bowl: he sucked one eye so deep into his head that a wild crane couldn't probe it onto his cheek out of the depths of his skull; the other eye fell out along his cheek. His mouth weirdly distorted: his cheek peeled back from his jaws until the gullet appeared, his lungs and liver flapped in his mouth and throat, his lower jaw struck the upper a lion-killing blow, and fiery flakes large as a ram's fleece reached his mouth from his throat. His heart boomed loud in his breast like the baying of a watch-dog at its feed or the sound of a lion among bears. Malignant mists and spurts of fire -- the torches of Badb -- flickered red in the vaporous clouds that rose boiling above his head, so fierce was his fury. The hair of his head twisted like the tangle of a red thornbush stuck in a gap; if a royal apple tree with all its kingly fruit were shaken above him, scarce an apple would reach the ground but each would be spiked on a bristle of his hair as it stood up on his scalp with rage. The hero-halo rose out of his brow, long an broad as a warrior's whetstone, long as a snout, and he went mad rattling his shields, urging on his charioteer and harassing the hosts. Then, tall and thick, steady and strong, high as the mast of a noble ship, rose up from the dead centre of his skull a straight spout of black blood darkly and magically smoking like the smoke from a royal hostel when a king is coming to be cared for at the close of a winter day."
From the Tain Bo Cuailnge, translated by Thomas Cahill (How The Irish Saved Civilization)
In other news, the Hunter catalogue came out today. A quick glance over the 300-level Lit heading yields classes on Melville, Blake, and the 18th-Century Novel. The chick I talked to seemed to want something more in the line of a survey course, but I think I'd rather go narrower. Dunno.
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09:28:35 PM,Wednesday 17 November 2004
Intolerable love for Winamp 5.05.
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09:55:05 PM,Friday 12 November 2004
