Erika's Bloglet

This plays in my head like 17x a day...

Wed, 15 May 2013 13:38:57 -0600

This plays in my head like 17x a day. I forgot about the being shot bit. Consciously. Hm. Ok now that's going to be even more disturbing.
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From my journal from last year: ...

Tue, 07 May 2013 21:25:36 -0600

From my journal from last year:

i don't know why i can't make a bunch of boxes.

here are some boxes:

{[fear, weather, arbitrary, illness, asphalt] [tomes, dust, deliverance, turtles, venemous snakes] [plastic, sweet tart, sharp, definition, wrapped] [thonk, marble, elbow, rose, sand]}

{[smoke, tickets, boots, armor, glass] [air conditioner, pine, highway, gong, in your eyes] [brick, blinky lights, vines, sadness of corridors] [fear, eyes, headlights, euclidean, garlic]}

i should have a whole warren full of boxes and bits and scraps

stuff stuck in odd corners, not neat

but with a logic of its own.

things ordered by color, or scent,

or fragile things packed carefully between soft things,

stacks and shelves and cases and crates

and archival quality boxes full of archives.

i would tear down these little heaps become altars

these seemingly meaningful spots that draw me

always back into myself. to a meaning i

can't share.

i would tear it all down for scrap

and be one of those people

who builds dinosaurs from scrap

in their backyards.
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Just watched Tiny Furniture, by Lena Dunham...

Mon, 29 Apr 2013 19:25:06 -0600

Just watched Tiny Furniture, by Lena Dunham writer/director/star.

I get the sense that it is all nicely composed and would hold up to thinking about the themes and all but honestly I don't feel like it.

I thought I didn't want to watch Girls because I saw a couple of scenes linked to as people's favorites that involved people screaming at each other in a way that wasn't funny to me. This movie had those scenes and in context, honestly, they bothered me just as much. But between them it was poignant and hilarious. Self-consciously Woody Allen-esque. Possibly one of the best films I've seen recently. I'll have to digest.
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I am here going to say what (understandably) no...

Sat, 20 Apr 2013 11:35:23 -0600

I am here going to say what (understandably) no one is saying, that wossname who was captured is absurdly beautiful. It's jarring.
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I'm depressed, but not any more than I was Monday...

Sat, 20 Apr 2013 11:32:24 -0600

I'm depressed, but not any more than I was Monday morning, or much less than yesterday. Hard to respond to things when you're depressed. Hearing an explosion when I was half asleep did affect me, I had nightmares and was glued to the news the next day. It's a great privilege never in your life to have heard bombs. I'm not taking that for granted. Can't imagine living in Bagdhad during the war, for instance, or even now. The fear is of a different nature altogether. Boom boom boom, is my family next. We're still lucky.
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Meditative plant motion and plant motion sounds.

Tue, 26 Mar 2013 18:17:03 -0600

Meditative plant motion and plant motion sounds.
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Mania pisses me off because here I was liking eve...

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 15:01:51 -0600

Mania pisses me off because here I was liking everything and it was fun and pleasant to have zero critical faculty and 100% admiration of things. Now I�m back on earth and things that suck suck and I can�t appreciate some of the stuff I thought was great. I remember my problems with free jazz and Somewhere out There from An American Tale. Everything sounds flat, comparatively. It sucks.

Filed under the "least of my problems" dept.
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I used a vending machine today that used a robotic...

Wed, 13 Mar 2013 13:05:11 -0600

I used a vending machine today that used a robotic arm to grab the bottle and shunt it into a nifty revolving door type thing that opens at hand level. Impressive and also strikingly like an elaborate squirrel-proof bird feeder.
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Hey. Snow.

Thu, 07 Mar 2013 09:54:48 -0600

Hey. Snow.
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Current status: listening to Miles Davis and...

Tue, 05 Mar 2013 16:16:31 -0600

Current status: listening to Miles Davis and filling a bowl with origami balloons.
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There's no such thing as suicide-by-bully...

Sun, 10 Feb 2013 23:01:14 -0600

There's no such thing as suicide-by-bully. The idea blurs our whole moral framework gives too much credit to bullies. I wish the press would stop going on about it.
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We have the backyard light on and the indoor...

Fri, 08 Feb 2013 20:00:12 -0600

We have the backyard light on and the indoor lights off and all the snow is all sworls and stops and sworls and gusts and streaks and dots and dude. Better than the Fourth of July.
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I just watched Young Adult...

Sun, 27 Jan 2013 23:00:06 -0600

I just watched Young Adult. Instead of a black comedy about an ex mean girl, I got a heavy drama about mental illness, which wasn't exactly how I wanted to spend my evening, but it wasn't bad. I mean I've been there, I've had that delusion, I know how it goes, that is how it goes, and my god is it depressing to watch. To see her insulated from reality and projecting her fantasies onto little events, throwing herself against a brick wall and not even knowing it... that's not scheming bitchiness. That's not hilarious self-centeredness. That's madness. She doesn't have a real need to get back together with this guy, but it's also not fake and conniving. It's this pseudo-romantic thing where this dormant flame lights up in some delusional atmosphere, and glows big in it, thin and vapory, but big big big. A real thing pumped up, because the excited mind needs some excuse to get up and go driving across the state now now now! Before getting dressed! With that old tape, whee! I don't care what you call it, I know that state of mind. I found watching it from the outside purgatorial.
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Why isn't it as good to watch a slug on a brick on...

Sun, 27 Jan 2013 17:44:15 -0600

Why isn't it as good to watch a slug on a brick on the internet as to watch a slug on a brick in your own backyard?

The framing. The poor photography of course, but besides that. The holding up as an object of curiosity. Half the interest in a slug is that it's there, in front of you. And it's not there. Something in a frame, held up as a curiosity, has to be a hell of a lot more interesting to be interesting than something right there. I am the type to watch a slug. I am the type to watch a wall. But on the internet, I don't get into that relaxed spaced out spot. I go around sucking at the marrow of these bones, and then pronounce them awesome or not-awesome and move on. I don't relax into them. I don't want to. If I wanted to space out, I'd find a slug, or a wall. I want my attention managed. I want to commune with the buzz of the hive. The frame implies a person, the frame means you-are-not-alone.
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I just watched Lincoln, which I wasn't...

Fri, 25 Jan 2013 22:40:31 -0600

I just watched Lincoln, which I wasn't particularly thrilled with. So I'll tell you about Trees Lounge, which I was. I saw it a few weeks ago on Netflix Instant, and it's such a slight movie it's already slipping from my mind, so I wanted to jot a few notes.

Trees Lounge is a 1996 movie starring Steve Buschemi as an alchoholic layabout who just kind of hangs out and stuff just kind of happens but it's great because stuff is just kind of happening like it does in real life if you're an alcoholic Steve Buschemi. Now he's at Trees Lounge, the dive bar where he lives (and sleeps above). Now he's hanging out with some dude he met at the bar. Now he's being kicked out of that guy's car. Later, back at the bar, the guy is offering him a job. He's at a funeral. He's selling ice cream. He's being a creep. The dialogue is totally convincing, I would believe that regular people said those exact things at those types of parties. The sense of place is perfect, that kind of vaguely gritty strip mall with hair salon type world; 1996 captured in a bottle. Nostalgia was a big part of the appeal for me. The movie neither celebrates nor condemns its main character's lifestyle. It takes this guy who you'd meet and be like "what a loser, what an asshole", and lets you go around with him for a couple of days and see it from his point of view, without letting him off the hook.

Overall, a relaxing little film. Winner of the "best thing that's been in my queue for years that I just randomly clicked on" award.
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Planning new project = happiness...

Sun, 20 Jan 2013 22:22:46 -0600

Planning new project = happiness. Researching web development platforms = sadness. Questions such as "do I really need to spend $250 on the Adobe development environment for Flash?" are not inspiring.
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This video makes me want to be stuck at a bus stop...

Thu, 03 Jan 2013 23:22:11 -0600

This video makes me want to be stuck at a bus stop staring at puddles.
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I laundered my Android phone a couple weeks ago...

Thu, 03 Jan 2013 23:01:14 -0600

I laundered my Android phone a couple weeks ago and I don't miss it. I feel kind of sad that I don't. Like, the fact that it enabled my internet addiction shouldn't have outweighed all the other nifty features of the device. Oh well.
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Vegetarian Christmas menu: ...

Tue, 25 Dec 2012 11:52:36 -0600

Vegetarian Christmas menu:

French onion soup (without the cheesy bread)
Foccacia
Potato mushroom casserole
Green beans
Peppermint cookies

...and whatever Ling and his fiance bring for appetizer and dessert.

I had a panic about the french onion soup yesterday, it seemed that the dark bits on the bottom had been too dark and cast a burnt flavor over the delicious delicious onions. But this morning it had mellowed and was excellent. After chopping 3 pounds of onions and stirring frequently for 120 minutes to make caramelized onions that were delicious and scarce like a an edible precious metal and then shamelessly drowning them in water, I'm very glad the final result worked out.
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I don't know why this thing doesn't seem to...

Wed, 19 Dec 2012 16:53:27 -0600

I don't know why this thing doesn't seem to dispense cozy. It has so many things on it, I must have misplaced it. What's, like, something nice on the internet?
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It's troll Erika week.

Tue, 18 Dec 2012 12:28:47 -0600

It's troll Erika week.
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I seem to be having a polyhedra type of day.

Tue, 03 Jul 2012 14:20:09 -0600

I seem to be having a polyhedra type of day.
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Easter reading of Four Quartets. ...

Sun, 08 Apr 2012 12:32:59 -0600

Easter reading of Four Quartets.

Desire itself is movement
Not in itself desirable;
Love is itself unmoving,
Only the cause and end of movement,
Timeless, and undesiring
Except in the aspect of time
Caught in the form of limitation
Between un-being and being.
Sudden in a shaft of sunlight
Even while the dust moves
There rises the hidden laughter
Of children in the foliage
Quick now, here, now, always--
Ridiculous the waste sad time
Stretching before and after.

From Burnt Norton by T.S. Eliot.
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In my continuing quest to police quotation...

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 20:43:14 -0600

In my continuing quest to police quotation attribution everywhere I see it, I eyed a sign on the T the other day:

God designed the human machine to run on Himself. He is the fuel our spirits were designed to burn.

--C.S. Lewis

I thought the chances were pretty good for this one to be genuine because it was creative and bizarre enough. Tim thought churches were unlikely to be careless with their posters. Well, I don't know if either of those bits of reasoning actually works, but in a rare win for truth in quotation, this is in fact a quote from C.S. Lewis, from Mere Christianity, in the chapter entitled "The Shocking Alternative".
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I would like to lodge a formal complaint against...

Thu, 29 Mar 2012 21:16:48 -0600

I would like to lodge a formal complaint against this cold. I was all ready to be a productive non-sick human being. I was! And now my lungs are in rebellion and my head feels like it's stuffed with cotton. I've got enough custom Erika problems, I don't need normal problems on top of them. Then again, normal problems are at least easier to complain about. So they do have that going for them.
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Tim and Ling

Sat, 17 Mar 2012 17:10:22 -0600

Tim and Ling
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tidal pool

Sat, 17 Mar 2012 17:09:40 -0600

tidal pool
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rockpiles gather here.

Sat, 17 Mar 2012 17:08:45 -0600

rockpiles gather here.
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There are harlequin ducks out there.

Sat, 17 Mar 2012 16:51:20 -0600

There are harlequin ducks out there.
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frothing

Sat, 17 Mar 2012 16:49:45 -0600

frothing
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