burning like matchsticks in the face of the darkness

( gym )

I think the Monday holiday helped make today's being Friday feel kinda surreal.  Plus, the working part of my workweek didn't really gear up until mid-week.  (This is always a bit of a transition -- shifting back from summer mode to academic year mode.)

We went to Market in the Square [Yelp] for lunch.
    Their buffet kind of confuses me 'cause there's no clear order/direction for the lines, and what the food is is written in marker on the glass above the food, and the containers are on top so I initially didn't see them.
    We got out our food to go 'cause the seating was all full, and the cashier asked me if I wanted a bag and I said yeah 'cause the food was hot and just holding it from the buffet to the cash register was more than I really wanted to do, nevermind walking all the way back to HBS.  As I took my bag, a little like Gerbera daisy (blue, purple, white) fell out, so I've been carrying that around like all day.
    I got mac&cheese, which was standard issue fine, and lasagna, which was v. good.

I now have a 24" computer monitor (sans speakers) at work.  But only for a week (or month? I forget).  Because we're communists.  Or something.  (It's a long story.)

Katie and Leslie are excited about the rain tomorrow 'cause then they can feel justified in staying inside being lazy.  My plan was already to stay home, but to catch up on political blogging (though I do have to buy milk).

Possibly I will be motivated to do more housecleaning by the fact that Katie and I have tentative plans to do Target run to get me some more shelves (possibly the same night we go to Finale, because we are just that classy).

I am really looking forward to these highs in the mid-80s shenanigans ceasing.

[next in the gelatin-free yogurt series] Wallaby Organic Banana Vanilla = good

Yesterday I was feeling like I'm really kind of over this warm weather (though I was willing to wait until September/after Labor Day to complain, 'cause before that it's still legitimately summer) 'cause being warm and damp when I arrive at the T/gym after walking just doesn't make me happy.  But it got down to almost 50 last night!  I was quite pleased.

( gym )

***

After the CNN hype yesterday, I had kind of wanted to watch Michelle Obama's speech last night, but I'm so out of the habit of actually sitting down in front of a tv (fall tv starting is gonna be WEIRD).  Yay Google.  Huffington Post -- summary, video, and text  [and the text of her brother's speech, which preceded hers -- and the CNN transcript of Ted Kennedy's speech]

***

Cailin was saying that she feels like most of our peers don't listen to classical music, and she doesn't actually expect it to die out, but's interested to see what happens.

***

I had coffee with LauraRuth at Mr. Crepe.  Near the end (she had to leave to go have dinner with her girlfriend) she asked if there was an agenda for this meeting or if I'd just wanted to say hi.  I said I'd just wanted to say hi -- and that I'd learned not to have an agenda in mind when having coffee with clergy, that especially the first time I have coffee with clergy it turns out to be a getting-to-know-you thing even when I went into it expecting that we had an agenda for our meeting.

She did actually have a couple agenda items of her own.  One was that she and Keith were gonna be meeting tomorrow to discuss the Rest & Bread service, which they've been doing for 3 (!) months now, and she wanted my input because I'm so thoughtful and considered and because I "think liturgically."  I had to laugh at that one, though I did talk about how I'd learned that actually I am attached to certain ways of doing things (e.g., Benediction = "Now may grace, mercy, and peace, from God the Father, Jesus Christ the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, be and abide with you always.") and as I've been in various churches, I've picked up preferred scripts for different parts of the service.

The second agenda item came out of a conversation.  She asked where I was from, and I told her, and she asked if I'd moved to the city for school and I said no, I went to school out in Western Mass. and she asked where? Amherst? and I said no, Smith, and she smiled, and I laughed and said, "Yeah, I went to a super-queer, ragingly liberal college -- which was awesome -- and came out of it with a hatred for the American Left."

She asked what "pot" I would put myself in if not "progressive" or "liberal."  I said that if forced to pick a political party I pick (small l) libertarian, and that certainly I am aligned with the progressives/liberals on lots of things, but as I often say, I hang out with the liberals because they make me "less uncomfortable" than the conservatives.  She asked me about that and I briefly explained my Smith experience and my issues with "inclusive" churches -- the latter which conversation I had just had with Sean and Carolyn on Sunday night.

She said she asks because they (First Church Somerville) are trying to put together a vision statement that doesn't use the word "progressive" or "liberal."  (Her distance from the term "liberal" is a class thing -- that she hears the word "liberal" and thinks of people who believe that just because they say the right words they've done good in the world, like just by saying you're anti-racist you've done anti-racist work.)  Thinking about it on my way home, it occurred to me that the answer is obvious: just talk about your guiding principles (justice, peace, whatever), with possibly secondarily listing the issues of primary importance.

At one point she asked me how old I was and said I seemed older than 25 (she didn't quite say "old soul" -- which I was glad of, because I think that implies more gravitas and wisdom than I have -- but it was that sort of idea) and I grinned and thanked her.  As we were saying goodbye, she said she really enjoys being around me, which I was kind of touched by.  And I got multiple long hugs :)

***

Had the first of my haul of gelatin-free yogurts tonight.
Whole Soy & Co. Raspberry yogurt = quite acceptable.

***

( excerpt from IM conversation with Joe )

***

( excerpt from IM conversation with mjules )

Is it drier today than it was yesterday?  'Cause I went outside ~2:00 when it was ~91F and it wasn't deathly.

My second-floor, not-air-conditioned, residence was even comfortably habitable.

I forewent (yes, that is correct) getting my hair cut after work due to hunger pangs, but of course when I did get home I wasn't inclined to cook dinner. (It's still summer heat.) Sigh.

However, I bought a cookie sheet when I was at Target yesterday and wondered why I had done that since I'm really not gonna bake, but tonight it occurred to me that I could bake my frozen french fries on it (esp. since our toaster oven isn't very big).

*

Harvard - Radcliffe Summer Theatre is doing You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown.  Should I go?  Would I like it?

*

I was looking at my yogurt container at lunch today (Yoplait, Peaches&Cream) and it said something about how consuming dairy helps your body burn calories ... I forget the exact wording (maybe it was about this?), and the containers I have in the fridge don't have it, but it was definitely weird.  I've been reading Food Politics, so I've been sensitized to how the meat and dairy industries influence what kinds of notices get put on food.

Midday news: Nestlé bought Jenny Craig.  They own Lean Cuisine and a whole lotta other brands.  Reading Food Politics also made me want to boycott Nestlé because of the whole marketing infant formula in the Third World thing.  As I was reading the book and thinking about boycotting Nestlé, I was also thinking about how I'd certainly at least heard of this boycott before and had just brushed it off as I do all things from The Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy.  It's kind of sad how my instinctive reaction to anything resembling The Left is to disagree/oppose.  (Four years at Smith plus a contrary nature will do that, I suppose.)

I already boycott Philip Morris ['cause they're selling death which I just don't truck with], which means abstaining from all Kraft and Nabisco (and Miller beer, but I barely drink beer -- ew -- and never remember that Philip Morris owns a beer company when I am out drinking), and reading Food Politics makes me feel like I should boycott every food corporation evar -- which is obviously not practical; Nestlé might be worth the effort, though.

Back to the yogurt: Its ingredients list says, "kosher gelatin."  *stabs*  The web tells me that "Some Kosher gelatins are made with agar-agar, most are not."  I was gonna phase out yogurt at some point in my attempts to approximate veganism (sidenote: anyone have non-dairy milk-like beverages they love?) but it looks like after I finish the yogurt I have I won't be getting any more.  I knew gelatin was used in jello and marshmallows (which I thus refuse to eat) and some photo emulsion and swallowable tablets (which I'm less scrupulous about avoiding) and some sweets (which labels I try to remember to check) but I totally hadn't realized it was in so many food products.  Guess I'm gonna have to be much more conscientious about reading labels.

*

Today, lunabee34 wrote:

My birthday is tomorrow, and in honor of this blessed day *g*, I wanna start a meme--the I Love My Friends Meme. It seems like a lot more wank than usual has been floating around lj and lots of people have been feeling down or ill or just not as available as usual, like me. So to celebrate my birthday, tell your flist how much they mean to you. If you've got a huge flist, split it up over a few days or even weeks, but tell your fandom friends how much they've enriched your lives.

Leaving aside the problematic generalization of "fandom friends" (I know various people on LJ whom I knew through meatspace first, many of whom are not at all fannish), I have recurrent angst (not quite accurate, but the best word I could come up with) about the fact that I have various people on my flist whom I don't really feel connected to.  There are many people I don't communicate with that often but whom I still consider friends (and I would hope the feeling is mutual) but there are also people whom I find myself wondering, "Why do I still read this person?"  This leads to ponderments about why people have me friended and also about what the heck I want in friends.  I don't care all that much about people's personal lives until I'm invested in them as people, so I've got nothing as for why people (who aren't previously invested in relationship with me) still have me friended.  As for what I want in people, the only thing I've been able to come up with is that I want people I can have discussions with. And I'm gonna stop now before this turns really negative, as that would be even less in the spirit of what Lorraine wanted.