hmm

test, questions, read Crime and Punishment, questions, some other questions, math, paraphrase and memorize Shakespeare's sonnet (#64)

c'est tout je pense
and then call some place for volunteer hours and ...something else, I think

oh...
and scheduling
I think I've gotten sick or something... I hate you mr. rhinovirus.

Wednesday January 21st
...
Obama's speech and something else
something about justice and wonderful things like that (rainbows butterflies etc)
...
Madame Bovary
...
sign up for volunteer hours for Civics
...

TWELVE o'clock.
Along the reaches of the street
Held in a lunar synthesis,
Whispering lunar incantations
Dissolve the floors of memory
And all its clear relations,
Its divisions and precisions,
Every street lamp that I pass
Beats like a fatalistic drum,
And through the spaces of the dark
Midnight shakes the memory
As a madman shakes a dead geranium.

Half-past one,
The street lamp sputtered,
The street lamp muttered,
The street lamp said, "Regard that woman
Who hesitates towards you in the light of the door
Which opens on her like a grin.
You see the border of her dress
Is torn and stained with sand,
And you see the corner of her eye
Twists like a crooked pin."

The memory throws up high and dry
A crowd of twisted things;
A twisted branch upon the beach
Eaten smooth, and polished
As if the world gave up
The secret of its skeleton,
Stiff and white.
A broken spring in a factory yard,
Rust that clings to the form that the strength has left
Hard and curled and ready to snap.

Half-past two,
The street lamp said,
"Remark the cat which flattens itself in the gutter,
Slips out its tongue
And devours a morsel of rancid butter."
So the hand of a child, automatic,
Slipped out and pocketed a toy that was running along the quay.
I could see nothing behind that child's eye.
I have seen eyes in the street
Trying to peer through lighted shutters,
And a crab one afternoon in a pool,
An old crab with barnacles on his back,
Gripped the end of a stick which I held him.

Half-past three,
The lamp sputtered,
The lamp muttered in the dark.

The lamp hummed:
"Regard the moon,
La lune ne garde aucune rancune,
She winks a feeble eye,
She smiles into corners.
She smoothes the hair of the grass.
The moon has lost her memory.
A washed-out smallpox cracks her face,
Her hand twists a paper rose,
That smells of dust and old Cologne,
She is alone
With all the old nocturnal smells
That cross and cross across her brain."
The reminiscence comes
Of sunless dry geraniums
And dust in crevices,
Smells of chestnuts in the streets,
And female smells in shuttered rooms,
And cigarettes in corridors
And cocktail smells in bars."

The lamp said,
"Four o'clock,
Here is the number on the door.
Memory!
You have the key,
The little lamp spreads a ring on the stair,
Mount.
The bed is open; the tooth-brush hangs on the wall,
Put your shoes at the door, sleep, prepare for life."

The last twist of the knife.

- "Rhapsody on a windy night" by T.S. Eliot

Tuesday January 20th
3:32 p.m.
french, precalc, acting tomorrow

Twenty Ways to Insult a Nose

Ah no! young blade! That was a trifle short!
You might have said at least a hundred things
By varying the tone ... like this, suppose, ...
Aggressive: 'Sir, if I had such a nose
I'd amputate it!' Friendly: 'When you sup
It must annoy you, dipping in your cup;
You need a drinking-bowl of special shape!'
Descriptive: ''Tis a rock! ... a peak! ... a cape!
--A cape, forsooth! 'Tis a peninsular!'
Curious: 'How serves that oblong capsular?
For scissor-sheath? Or pot to hold your ink?'
Gracious: 'You love the little birds, I think?
I see you've managed with a fond research
To find their tiny claws a roomy perch!'
Truculent: 'When you smoke your pipe ... suppose
That the tobacco-smoke spouts from your nose--
Do not the neighbors, as the fumes rise higher,
Cry terror-struck: "The chimney is afire"?'
Considerate: 'Take care, ... your head bowed low
By such a weight ... lest head o'er heels you go!'
Tender: 'Pray get a small umbrella made,
Lest its bright color in the sun should fade!'
Pedantic: 'That beast Aristophanes
Names Hippocamelelephantoles
Must have possessed just such a solid lump
Of flesh and bone, beneath his forehead's bump!'
Cavalier: 'The last fashion, friend, that hook?
To hang your hat on? 'Tis a useful crook!'
Emphatic: 'No wind, O majestic nose,
Can give THEE cold!--save when the mistral blows!'
Dramatic: 'When it bleeds, what a Red Sea!'
Admiring: 'Sign for a perfumery!'
Lyric: 'Is this a conch? ... a Triton you?'
Simple: 'When is the monument on view?'
Rustic: 'That thing a nose? Marry-come-up!
'Tis a dwarf pumpkin, or a prize turnip!'
Military: 'Point against cavalry!'
Practical: 'Put it in a lottery!
Assuredly 'twould be the biggest prize!'
Or ... parodying Pyramus' sighs ...
'Behold the nose that mars the harmony
Of its master's phiz! blushing its treachery!'
--Such, my dear sir, is what you might have said,
Had you of wit or letters the least jot:
But, O most lamentable man!--of wit
You never had an atom, and of letters
You have three letters only!--they spell Ass!
And--had you had the necessary wit,
To serve me all the pleasantries I quote
Before this noble audience ... e'en so,
You would not have been let to utter one--
Nay, not the half or quarter of such jest!
I take them from myself all in good part,
But not from any other man that breathes!

- Edmond Rostand "Cyrano de Bergerac"
I loved this part

Thank you ani
for the paper and stationery and pens and ink

I was using the pen a few minutes ago
It's so thrilling
I feel like Lewis Carroll
or someone

The paper smells like something I remember from 5 years ago
one scene in particular...and how the lighting was
I don't know particularly why

something to do with neurons creating little waves of applause through my mind as if the just watched some very well done film or opera

smell tends to do that to memory
Especially if I can relate it to the texture of paper

merry christmas
I'm not a christmasy person
I absolutely detest christmas music
but the gift idea is ok
I guess


Lewis Carroll once wrote a poem about it
and it had to do with fairies too I think

"Christmas Greetings [From a Fairy to a Child]"

LADY dear, if Fairies may
For a moment lay aside
Cunning tricks and elfish play,
'Tis at happy Christmas-tide.

We have heared the children say---
Gentle children, whom we love---
Long ago, on Christmas-Day,
Came a message from above.

Still, as Christmas-tide comes round,
They remember it again---
Echo still the joyful sound
Peace on earth, good-will to men!

Yet the hearts must child-like be
Where such heavenly guests abide;
Unto children, in their glee,
All the year is Christmas-tide.

Thus forgetting tricks and play
For a moment, Lady dear,
We would wish you, if we may,
Merry Christmas, glad New Year!

Christmas, 1867.

Currently reading The Sense of Paper by Taylor Holden
It's a very interesting book
I picked it up because it had to do with paper
and I love paper
the story has to do with the artist JMW Turner
he used watercolors
That's his painting in my background

School resumes on January 5th

What's a good ringtone?
other than Trio op. 8 b major allegro
something mellow
maybe with piano and violin

vendredi
one more week
oh look...a newspaper
dimanche - du matin
psych precalc french earthscience english chem ethics ...
and then I have extra credit to do for some of these
for precalc earth and....I think that's all
oh! by the way CT
I saw your mother yesterday
and by yesterday I mean saturday

One more page
and it will be 12

6:40 p.m.
10 ½ of 12 pages of research paper finished
finished math and french at school today
just have psychology notes
which are usually easy
haven't eaten a proper lunch or dinner yet...but not hungry...so I'll wait.
The weather was lovely today. the sun illuminated the trees so they were burning. and the grass had little patches of yellow...because of the leaves and there were squirrels prancing about.
I hope I can sleep tonight
I had the most intriguing dream this morning
too bad I've forgotten most of it
I knew this morning
I even told Sara about it
I should have written it down
my memory has been dying dramatically recently
probably why I'm so bad with tests
oh well