burning like matchsticks in the face of the darkness

Last Tuesday night I was at a visioning session [and yes, I would like a less ableist term for that] for a group I've been involved with for much of this year, and I repeatedly said that social justice isn't where my passion is. And just about every time I said it, I felt a little twinge like I was lying -- because fat pol and disability pol and mental health pol ... these are all issues that have become very important to me. But they're not issues where people are going to say, "Yes, I'm totally on board with that -- or at least as a good liberal I feel like I 'should' be."

And so I frequently don't speak up and advocate for these things I care about, because I am, contrary to how I may appear, frequently a risk-averse confrontation-avoidant person. (Reasons I don't self-identify as an activist.)

So I am owning the things I care about.

( Read more... )

So, Molly sent this to the FCS listserv, and I sent it on to my best friend (though I'm sure she already knows it).  Because we are us, I gender-inclusified it, though I wasn't sure how to make "patriarchs and matriarchs" -- my improvement from "patriarchs" -- non-gender-binary.  I am also open to input about whether the usage of hearing/seeing reads as ableist.  Last caveat: the references to pagans, witches, etc. make me uncomfortable; my way around it is that it's just listing places from whence people might act to oppose you, but I'm not entirely sold on that.  Comments welcome.

    St. Patrick's Breastplate

    I arise today
    Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity,
    Through the belief in the threeness,
    Through confession of the oneness
    Of the Creator of Creation.

    I arise today
    Through the strength of Christ's birth with hir baptism,
    Through the strength of hir crucifixion with hir burial,
    Through the strength of hir resurrection with hir ascension,
    Through the strength of hir descent for the judgment of Doom.

    I arise today
    Through the strength of the love of Cherubim,
    In obedience of angels,
    In the service of archangels,
    In hope of resurrection to meet with reward,
    In prayers of patriarchs and matriarchs ancestors,
    In predictions of prophets,
    In preaching of apostles,
    In faith of confessors,
    In innocence of holy virgins,
    In deeds of righteous persons.

    I arise today
    Through the strength of heaven:
    Light of sun,
    Radiance of moon,
    Splendor of fire,
    Speed of lightning,
    Swiftness of wind,
    Depth of sea,
    Stability of earth,
    Firmness of rock.

    I arise today
    Through God's strength to pilot me:
    God's might to uphold me,
    God's wisdom to guide me,
    God's eye to look before me,
    God's ear to hear me,
    God's word to speak for me,
    God's hand to guard me,
    God's way to lie before me,
    God's shield to protect me,
    God's host to save me
    From snares of devils,
    From temptations of vices,
    From everyone who shall wish me ill,
    Afar and anear,
    Alone and in multitude.

    I summon today all these powers between me and those evils,
    Against every cruel merciless power that may oppose my body and soul,
    Against incantations of false prophets,
    Against black laws of pagandom
    Against false laws of heretics,
    Against craft of idolatry,
    Against spells of witches and smiths and wizards,
    Against every knowledge that corrupts one's body and soul.

    Christ to shield me today
    Against poison, against burning,
    Against drowning, against wounding,
    So that there may come to me abundance of reward.

    Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me,
    Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
    Christ on my right, Christ on my left,
    Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down, Christ when I arise,
    Christ in the heart of everyone who thinks of me,
    Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me,
    Christ in every eye that sees me,
    Christ in every ear that hears me.

    I arise today
    Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity,
    Through belief in the threeness,
    Through confession of the oneness,
    Of the Creator of Creation.

I cannot deal with people talking about having lost weight as if it's an inherently good thing.

I wince every time someone colloquially says "you guys" or "lame."

Today was the second day in a row I had almost nothing to do at work.  (I have a Project for tomorrow, though.  \o/  )  I worked on my sermon and did a lot of blog reading/skimming -- esp. lots of disability blogs.

One of the things I read was "What We Talk About When We Talk About Language" (by meloukhia on FWD/Forward).  I have posted about this before, but she says some really smart things I hadn't quite thought of in that way before but which really resonate for me.

when we talk about language, we don’t talk about what it used to mean, or what it is supposed to mean, or what you think it means. We talk about how society uses language, right now.  [...]

One of the most common defenses I see of ableist language is “well, it doesn’t mean that anymore.”

So, my question is, what does it mean?

One of the things I like to do when I am illustrating why language is exclusionary is I plug in a commonly-known original meaning of the word in question into a sentence. Let’s take “lame,” which is generally taken to mean “has difficulty walking” or “limps,” although the original use was actually just “broken.”

So, if someone says “this television show is lame” and you turn the sentence into “this television show has difficulty walking,” it doesn’t really make sense, right? Just like when you say “this social activity which I am being forced to do by my parent is a homosexual man,” it doesn’t really make sense. And this should tell you something. It should tell you that the word you are using has an inherently pejorative meaning.

Which means, actually, you’re totally right when you say a word “doesn’t mean that anymore.” In fact, it’s gone from being a value neutral term used to describe a state of being to being a pejorative. A pejorative so universally accepted that you can expect users to understand exactly what you mean when you say it. When you say “this television show is lame” you mean it’s bad, not worth your time, boring, etc., and here’s the trick: People understand that meaning and they derive it from the word that you have used, because that word is universally accepted as objectively bad.

[...]

Using inclusionary language is actually fun. You get to explore the roots of words you use, you get to find new and exciting words to use, and you get to learn more about the structure of a language you speak every day. It constantly amazes me to see how quickly exclusionary terms trip to my tongue when I’m in a hurry, because they are so ingrained as appropriate pejoratives. I’m actually relishing the process of eradicating them from my spoken and written language, because I love words and language play.

And I loathe essentialism. I loathe “well, it’s a value neutral term.” No, it’s not. If it was value neutral, it would not be in use as a pejorative. I loathe “no one really means that anymore.” Yes, they do, because if they didn’t, they would use a different word. Just like no one calls a “train” an “iron horse” anymore.

It makes me cross when people make fun of the UCC's "God is still speaking (never place a period where God has placed a comma)."  (And ironically, given my next point, my reaction is: "Don't you understand the kinds of Christian church they are reacting against?")

It REALLY bothers me when people talk about their progressive faith congregation as being a Speshul Unique Snowflake because it explicitly states that Communion is open to everyone or whatever.  I know, I know, I should honor people's lived experiences and the fact that many people have been hurt by the church and so Church X is a really important healing, affirming, etc. experience for them.  But srsly people, we are in the Boston area.  There are progressive churches of every denomination.  And there are things that some of them do better than your church.  And my churches aren't perfect -- I am WELL aware of that -- and I WANT people to tell me what we're doing wrong, how we're failing to live in to the claims we make.  If we are hurting people I want to KNOW so that we can stop that (or at least so we can warn people so they can try to keep themselves safe).

I have turned into that radical feminist who notices that we don't use any gendered language for the Triune God except for all the times we talk about Jesus -- which with a Reflection on the Gospel plus Communion is A Lot -- and the "Our Father," and thinks this is a Problem.  I understood why that woman in the story that Marla tells found it so powerful to hear a Bible story told with no gendered pronouns, heard herself in that story for the first time.

After service was over I turned to Chris who was standing next to me and ranted to him.  He knows how to receive my criticisms, which I appreciate.  (I had really wanted to go up to the presider and say, "So, Communion really offended me.  Would it be best for me to tell you why in person right now, in email, or not at all?" but it was probably better that I just told Chris and not him.)

I went to Transcriptions Open Mic but left after the open mic part (well, I stayed for the ~15-minute intermission chatting with people) because it takes me an hour to get home and I get up at 6am and I enjoy not operating on a sleep deficit ... and I wanted to blog.

Jeff was one of the people I talked to during the intermission, and we talked about personal growth and what's been going on in our lives and etc. and I talked about how I've been trying to critique in a more generous and kind and loving manner, and I referred to myself as a "bitch," like I do.  Jeff said, "You're not a bitch; you just have a bitchy way of saying things; you actually have a big heart."

In other news, when I left work today the women's room at my end of the hall was occupied, so I decided, "Fuck this noise," and used the men's room.  I mean, they're both single-stall bathrooms, so we could make the signs say "bathroom" or something and it wouldn't make a difference (and if I were more of a radical/activist I probably would).

So, what I want to be posting about, and what I know you want to be reading about, is: WriterCon, church, and possibly the lectures from my extension school classes.

What I am actually posting about, apparently, is marginalizing people with the language we use.  (This is the shorter version of the "things that offend me/make me uncomfortable" post.)

***

One of the things I've been thinking about recently is the use of the word "lame" as a derogatory adjective.  Which gives me an excuse to link to a blogpost I read a while back -- "Why Not to Use the Word Lame: I Think I’m Starting to Get It" [Posted by Mandolin | June 16th, 2009]

Excerpt:

Let’s start with that point from earlier that it DOES suck — in this society — not to have the same freedom of movement an abled person. (Although of course, here, we’re already starting in with ableist assumptions, because a big portion of the reason it sucks is because society is set up for people with bodies we consider normal.) OK, so let’s rephrase. Having functional legs is useful. Therefore, the state of having legs which are not as functional as other legs is not as nice as the state of having normally functional legs. (Again, there’s some ableism around the concept of normal, but moving on.)

But even accepting that impairment to mobility is itself a sucky thing, MAYBE DISABLED PEOPLE DO NOT APPRECIATE BEING THE CULTURAL GO-TO FOR THINGS THAT SUCK.

The first commenter (Lexie) points out:

You are on the right track, but here is the thing about saying something like “the logic of having a mobility impairment totally sucks is self-evident.”

It’s not, really. People with disabilities most of the time do not go around saying, God! It sucks so bad that my legs don’t work! They are just who they are, a whole person with varying characteristics, some of which society has labeled as a disability.

Take being gay, for example. One could argue, and some have, that this is a form of disability and that it sucks. Gay people inherently have things to deal with, like fertility issues or the fact that they have to find different ways to socialize within a smaller range of people (the arguable 10% of the population that is gay). Or, to get really technical and TMI about it, they might have to find different ways to be intimate with each other. Doesn’t this inherently suck? Isn’t it logical to think that being gay is inherently inferior to being straight? Isn’t it easier to be straight? And that isn’t even counting the artificial attitudinal barriers of being gay. They can’t marry, or get on each others health insurance plan, or adopt as easily as straight people. It must suck so bad to be gay! Its logical that gay must mean sucky!

Right?

Well, no. What LGBT people have done exceptionally well (and are still working on) is to show people that their lifestyle and sexuality is on a continuum of normal. That gender does not have to be binary and people should be able to express gender in a way that feels comfortable for them and that is a normal part of the human condition. They are not mentally ill, or some kinds of freaks who have a horrible condition, they just are who they are…humans.

So, people with disabilities are the same way. The body comes in all shapes, sizes and conditions and all are part of the normal condition of human existence. Disability is a normal part of life. Do some things suck about a specific disability? Sure. Just like it must suck for LGBT people who want to have children and can’t go about it as easily or as cheaply as heterosexual couples can. Just like everyone on the planet has something about themselves that they can’t control that sucks. (Run faster, be better at math, sing better, not be bald, whatever.) It goes beyond saying that logically, being lame sucks but we shouldn’t hurt disabled people’s feelings by using that word. It goes to trying to get people to stop singling out one physical (or mental) aspect of ourselves as being sucky and having that thing define who we are–our entire life experience. To us, whatever characteristic we have that makes us disabled is just a part of our whole selves, and most of us are quite fond of our whole selves, thankyouverymuch. Many people will tell you that being disabled has given them experiences and opportunities that they wouldn’t exchange for anything.

In my case, my PC word peeve is “blind”. (I’m deaf blind) I’m not talking about the word “blind” itself. I’m fine with people calling me blind and prefer it to all the many euphemisms people come up with like “sight impaired” or whatnot. I hate it when blind (or deaf for that matter) is used in place of the words unknowing or stupid. i.e. She was blind to the fact that her use of the word “lame” was offensive. Blind people actually do not walk around in the dark completely unaware of what is going on around them. We actually know stuff. My point is, I think it is a matter of looking at the word (lame, blind) and really understanding what you are using that word to mean (sucky, stupid). Is that a fair use of the word? Does it really represent the people that are usually defined by that word? If not, maybe it is time to think of some better, more fitting words to describe things.

Ableism is something I really don't think about much, which is a problem.  (This also connects to conversations Ari and I were having tonight about church accessibility -- ASL interpreters, gluten-free communion bread, stair alternatives, bathrooms, etc. -- which is a whole nother topic.)

More food for thought (via coffeeandink's ableism tag): jesse_the_k's "(Color) Blindness as Metaphor to Racism"

***

Browsing metafandom, looking for posts from a while back about the problematics of the word "retarded," I was reminded of the "pimp" issue [e.g., saeva argues against the colloquial fannish use of the verb "pimp" and Zvi posts an Alternatives to "Pimp" poll].

***

This is hardly a comprehensive post on problematic language or even problematic insulting language or problematic ableist language, but I am giving myself permission to post things that are not comprehensive works of nigh-perfection.

Happy Birthday, paper_crystals and musesfool.

( gym )

Wow Luna Sunrise Bars are sweet.  (I had a Strawberry Crumble this morning.)

At lunch, walking from Spangler to the Baker-Morgan patio, there were sprinklers going and I couldn't resist walking through them even though it wasn't actually that hot out.

I actually had work to do today -- what up?  I spent the morning getting full text versions of a couple dozen of articles for Prof.D. (plus fixing an expense report) and then I was gonna go to I was going to go to Gutman to photocopy an article that wasn't available online but instead I proofread an article on organizational trust.

A guy with a thick Spanish accent called me at work needing my email address (it was legit) and I actually busted out the NATO phonetic alphabet (though on repeat I did "sam" and "nancy" for "sierra" and "november").  He was having no end of trouble with "Y," though -- kept thinking I was saying "J" or something.  I was wracking my brain for what else besides "Yankee" begins with "Y" (I literally said, "the letter before Z, the second-to-last letter in the alphabet," but that was not helping any) and literally Googled it and said "Yahoo" and he got it.

Tonight I was making mac&cheese and realized I hadn't taken a stick of butter out of the freezer after I used up the last one.  So I took one out and figured I'd just try to cut it.  I wasn't really paying attention, though, and I wasn't cutting straight down, so the knife of course failed to cut the frozen butter very much and went right across.  I saw the big gouge and was like, "Ooh, that's gonna scar."  I kept pressure on it and kept it elevated, and it kept pouring blood, and I was beginning to think with annoyance that I was going to have to trek to the hospital, but no, I can has platelets.

I think I may have whatever it is that Kate bought me for dessert.

I actually don't have much to say in terms of actual life update.
* Wednesday, Allie and I went to see a Japanese film at the MFA and had dinner at Qdoba afterward.
* Thursday, Cate came and had lunch with me at work (and took back the UK cell phone she'd loaned me last summer, in preparation for her own return trip to Scotland).
* Talking to CAUMC!Ian (not to be confused with "my" Ian -- i.e., my coworker Ian) on Thursday night, I realized that a major source of my work stress recently has been that there's been stuff (Prof.B's trip to the MidEast primarily) that I haven't been fully looped in on, have been only partially coordinating, and that makes me feel out of control and anxious.
* I've been unimpressed with the food at work recently, which is sad.  I feel like I've been living on pasta and burritos.
* Friday was the last day of teaching, so there was much drinking and celebrating.
* I feel sort of like a bad friend that I'm not going to Smith College Commencement this year, but everyone I know who's graduating is so busy that I wouldn't really see them much.

***

( gymmage )

***

( Hillary Clinton, West Virginia, etc. )

***

( Jeremiah Wright, racism, etc. )

***

Thursday I watched some of "Breakfast with the Sox" on NESN HD on the tv in the weight room.  I got to watch Manny Ramirez high-fiving the fan, and giving a one-handed neckrub to the guy he was sitting next to (Jacoby Ellsbury?) in the dugout.

***

( Boston Pride interfaith services )

***

Thursday: California Supreme Court Overturns Gay Marriage Ban (NYT link via oyceter) ( Read more... )

***

Friday links from soundingsea:
* Stuff That White People Like
* XKCD

***

( I can barely bring myself to read the_red_shoes' twlight_spork posts in their entirety, but omg, I was dying laughing  ) ( and a moment of more serious critique )

The link I had to the Dolhouse Upfront video has been taking down due to copyright concerns, but I took notes when I watched it on Friday.  ( commentary )

***

saeva argues against the colloquial fannish use of the verb "pimp."  [Edit: Alternatives to "Pimp" Poll -- link via metafandom]

( gym )

+

Morning news included a 7-alarm fire in Philly.  I didn't know the scale went beyond four or five alarms.

+

I feel like I had such a lazy weekend that I was actually kind of glad to come in to work and Do Stuff.  And I knew there would be stuff that would need taking care of and while it could wait until Tuesday it would make my Tuesday more stressful to be starting off behind.  And yeah, not gonna lie, I also have an ego complex and always feel a little like my portion of the office would fall apart in my absence.  [For those of you who are not local: today's a sort of holiday, and on Friday Prof.B. had said I could take today off if I wanted -- provided I got the okay of the other prof I support.]

+

I still have mixed feelings about my haircut, but I got another flurry of compliments on it today, which helps.

Greg said there things one says in Hebrew that don't really translate -- one translates as something like "enjoy the newness," for example; and there's one that's like "wear it in good health" but for hair.

Peter said, "The shorter the better."  I said I agreed -- but that I didn't think I would be getting mine cut quite as short as his :)

+

In class tonight we talked about Social Darwinism, which ended up being a lot about economics -- e.g., Microsoft bundling (you can only run browsers other than IE on a Microsoft OS due to a court ruling? I did not know that), Standard Oil buying up city trolley systems to dismantle them and drive up demand for cars (which the prof pointed out couldn't happen if it were a public utility), the concentration of wealth and the power that gives those wealthy people.  I was going to post thoughts, but apparently I don't so much have thoughts.

+

Remix rec:
[Good Omens] "Unconscious, as some human lovers are (Sympathetic Resonance)" by [anon].  Original: "Messenger of Sympathies" by vulgarweed, which I read and enjoyed some time back.
    In this Remix, DEATH comes for Percy Bysshe Shelley, and they go visit Shelley's friend "Ezra Fell" and Ezra's acquaintance Crowley.  It's pretty hysterical -- and thoughtful, too.

On friendsfriends, swatkat24 wrote:

A lot of you mentioned wanting to read up more on Pakistan in order to understand why things are the way they are now. You might want to take a look at this post, on language in Pakistan. It might be difficult to comprehend just how *important* language is in this part of the world, but that is how it goes. East Pakistan became Bangladesh *because* of language.

I've yet to be sold on the idea that language death is an inherently bad thing, but it was useful to learn about the different dynamics in Pakistan's history.

---

joy sadhana for Christmastide (5)

"Joy Sadhana is a daily practice in the observation of joy." -mylittleredgirl [more info]

The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light.  And they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined.
-Isaiah 9:2

Five good things about today:
1. Sleep.
2. Fic.
3. Fresh air.
4. Food.
5. Ari.  (There was commentage, ergo, totally counts.)

Three things I did well today:
1. I went for a long (hour plus) walk ('cause I had not exited the house in like 48 hours).
2. I read and feedbacked more fic, both Yuletide and non.  And worked on my recs page update.
3. I made myself actual food for three meals (okay, maybe more like two and a half) and didn't eat myself sick on chocolate (much).

Two things I am looking forward to (doing [better]) tomorrow:
1. Going to church.
2. Doing laundry.

I did weight room this morning and was distracted, so I wasn't being particularly intentional -- but I did do my usual machines, and I don't think I was particularly sloppy.  I've done something at the gym every workday morning since the day after Labor Day.  I'm impressed by me.  And fully intend to keep this up.

Man, I miss having reading comprehension.  I totally put a 3pm meeting on Prof.B's calendar for 4pm.  *fails*  (Thank God he was already in the office.)

I am so blessed.  Seeing various LJ folk struggling to pay for going back to college or just stay on their feet, having fucked-up families and/or mental illness of their own, and so on . . . I am so grateful for all that I have.

I keep bumping into A.S. (the prof I worked for my second temp gig at HBS) recently, and he's always happy to see me.
    Today:
A.S. (showing up on my floor by accident): "I'm pathetic -- but you already knew that."
me: "You're wonderful."

***

via friendsfriends . . . copperbadge writes:

I found FreeRice.Com on del.icio.us the other day and it seems to be not only a simple and soothing exercise but completely legit -- for every word you get correct, one of the site's sponsors will donate ten grains of rice to those in need through the United Nations World Food Program.

While the definitions are not always 100% accurate and I can't seem to discover who is behind the site and thus have no way of verifying their claims, there is no registration, no request for money, and no pop-up advertising; the sponsors' logos simply appear at the bottom of the vocabulary box. It is one of the loveliest fusions of corporate culture, education, and social responsibility that I've ever encountered.

And hey -- even if there is no rice donation, you're still getting a vocabulary workout that can't possibly hurt. :)

Much like the SATs, I often just guessed, so when I got a guess right it wasn't like I actually learned the word.  I did retain alate [Level 45 -- mostly I was around level 40,41] = winged.  I knew "cataract"="waterfall" from The Blue Faience Hippopotamus.

I do wish they were phrased as "best synonym" rather than "means" -- "violin" doesn't mean "fiddle," for example.  (Yes, I told them so on their About/feedback page.)  Okay, I noticed later that when you first begin, the "How To Play" sidebar says "Click on the answer that best defines the word."  But still.

Friday

I downloaded Firefox 2.0.0.4 on my work computer.
I'm not sure how I feel about the glossy gray rounded edge style.
It gives me the red-underline spellcheck in all windows where there's a composing box, which is neat.
I'm really not sure how I feel about the fact that the close tab is on the active tab itself, not off at the end -- so you can't just quickly click closed a lot of them (unless you start at the far right end).
Also interesting (and kind of annoying), only a limited number of tabs are shown, so you have to use the drop-down menu at the end of the bar to select other ones -- though this does mean you can actually read the titles of your open tabs (the ones that are showing) which ultimately makes navigation easier.

In other news: I am tempted to switch to S2 so for the ease of seeing what other tags an entry has when viewing by tag [I also really like the sidebar of tiered tags -- as seen on emotionalperil, marginalia, nikitangel, etc.,], but I hate S2 on principle, and it's so unwieldy.  Okay, my S1 mainpage ("lastn") style is tweaked from one that someone had already customized, but still, not that hard -- whereas S2 so often feels non-intuitive to me.  *growls*

[I also continue to be annoyed by people who force their styles on the comment page.  I have my flist set to give me ?style=mine, but when I'm browsing other journals, or visiting from Message Center or Memories, I have it inflicted on me.  Yes, I know there are GreaseMonkey scripts for that.  But still.]

And so often I'm browsing journals of people who do have S2 and it makes me sad that their entries aren't (consistently) tagged.  Hi, "cataloguer at heart" = no lie.

/complaint (for the moment, on that topic, anyway)

***

The book my mom's boss is co-writing, turns out they don't need the References, which is good news for her in that she doesn't have to format them, but this makes the baby jesus me cry 'cause it's a nonfiction book, how can you not include References?  And it's easy to list them all in the back, so it's not like they're gonna infringe on your reading experience.  Are people really gonna be intimidated by the presence of superscript numerals?  Oh the irony that the title is: "Come on, People! On the Path from Victims to Victors."

I felt tired after dinner (had kinda napped on the train ride home) but obviously 7:30pm is a bit early to go to bed -- especially when you're sleeping on the living room couch.

Excluding West Wing at work, this is the most tv I've watched in I don't know how long.

We watched Jeopardy (trivia learned: W. H. Harrison was the first POTUS to die in office).

My brother channel-surfed during the commercial breaks, so we watched a large chunk of The Simpsons -- "Eight Misbehavin' " [11.07] -- and some snippets Malcolm in the Middle -- "Secret Boyfriend" [7.06].

I was frequently like dead from laughter at The Simpsons.  For shame.  Hi, that show is not allowed to be that funny.

Malcolm in the Middle had a character who struck me as a Topanga knock-off, and my brother said I should know the actress, and indeed, it was Hayden Panettiere.

A couple minutes before 8:00 it was pointed out that Smackdown would be on soon.  Aww, father-daughter bonding.  ( Read more... )

I also saw more commercials than I have in ages. ( Read more... )

Saturday

My great-aunt Grace died early in June, and we went down to Falmouth for the Memorial Mass.  ( Read more... )

I finally went to Keegan's to get my watchband fixed/replaced. I also stopped by the library -- in part because I was purposely postponing going home to where OriginalRoomie's high-energy chatty family would be waiting.

I was wearing my light blue shirt, Beth said it was a great color on me, was in fact my color.  I tend to prefer darker colors, but I can see that.  (And she didn't ask me if I'd lost weight!  Which, okay, is Marcia's schtick, but still.  I don't actually have weight issues, but I get so tired of the idea that looking good clearly equals looking thinner.)  She said, "You look great -- better than you ever have before.  Whatever you're doing must agree with you."

I told her I was learning ASL, and she said she'd learned some way back in the day but forgotten most of it now.  But she signed that sentence, which I was impressed by.

I really should check out Simmons' night school program.  She said she thought if I went into librarianship I should become an academic librarian -- academic or some specialty like business, law, medical library.  People tell me this, and I'm honestly not sure it's true, but I haven't hashed out exactly what "being a librarian" would look like for me ideally, so I just nod at people.
She said she can see me running my own library (♥!) and if I ever need reference letters, let them know :)

I forget how it came up, but my dad and I finally looked up "que sera sera."  Was nice to know that we're right that in Spanish it would be "Lo que será, será.

There has been some minor controversy about the reputed language of the song title. The phrase "Que sera, sera" was an alteration by the songwriters of a quasi-Italian phrase, "Che sara, sara," a fictional family motto in the 1954 film The Barefoot Contessa. It is not Spanish, Italian, or French (but is acceptable in spoken Portuguese). The correct Spanish, Italian, French and Portuguese renderings of the phrase are: 
* Portuguese: O que será, será
* Spanish: Lo que será, será
* Italian: Quello che sarà, sarà
* French: Ce qui sera, sera.
-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Que_sera_sera#Trivia

I saw Mrs. Leary on my way back to the train, and she mentioned Glasgow.  I'd heard about London, but Glasgow was news to me.  Sigh.  Last time I flew overseas people worried (it was summer of 2003, so people were still recovering from 9/11; I memoried this entry as "i'm not afraid of flying overseas even with a war") and I'm not enjoying starting to have these conversations again.

OriginalRoomie's family was actually not overwhelming (and they did dishes and bought lots of food including booze and ice cream).

My "For the Next X: A Benefit CD for RAINN" arrived, and I am underwhelmed.  Anyone want it?

Sunday

I thought my string of dreams of destruction was over, but this morning I had an extended dream which was not only full of destruction but also actually hit me on an emotional level, as the previous string of dreams hadn't.

As I walked to the laundromat, a car drove by and a guy in it yelled, "Happy Canada Day."

OriginalRoomie's mom's chattiness is starting to grate on me.

However, she asked about where to go to get a new parking pass.  I hadn't realized mine expired Jan. 1 rather than 12 months after I got it, so that was good.  I have definitely been loaning them to visitors, though, and no one has told me they've gotten a ticket.

And they keep washing our dishes, so I can't complain too much.

Do I want to even have a birthday party this year?  I'm already planning to party two weekends in a row, and the Saturday that looks like it'll work better for more people is the date of the CWM benefit concert.

Monday

I slept for ~9 hours.  Rock.

OriginalRoomie's mom gave me a heart-shaped throw pillow with an American flag design.  Um, okay.  Last time she gave me a couple of nice gold-and-black ones.

I did a couple errands and went to the gym.
I was kinda tired, so I started in the weight room, did a few of the machines.
I decided to try the the StairMaster.  Intensity ranges from 1 (lowest) to 20 (highest).  I started at 1, which felt obscenely slow, and ended up spending most of my time at 7 (my average was 6.3).
I am not a fan of the machine.  I kept stepping too far forward and thus smushing my shoe, and I felt like I had to keep watching the stairs because if I wasn't I would get off rhythm and that would be bad.  I also felt like I was being bad to my back, like I was leaning down funny or something, but I couldn't figure out how to do it right.
I had plugged in 20minutes (Fat Burner program, 'cause why not), but I stopped at 10min 'cause I didn't feel like dying.
workout summary: 41 flights of stairs, 0.84miles

I stopped by the office to see if Katie had killed herself from boredom yet :) and chatted with her and Greg for an hour or two.
Katie said her mom has been stressing for the past 8 weeks trying to find a dress to wear to her cousin's wedding.  This led to conversations about how when it's your own kid's wedding, and I insisted that my parents were not of that sort, was like, "They will wear clothes..." though this then prompted ideas (which I did not voice) about having a nude wedding.  Which then reminded me of a recent conversation with Katie about a wedding one of her roommates is going to which will have a pig roast.  I'm a vegetarian so of course I'm opposed to this in principle, but I also thought it would be such a great visual to have a giant pig roasting on a spit.  Katie was joking about going dressed in tattered clothes with a nametag saying "Simon" and going off to die in the bushes.

I felt like I should go clothes shopping but was really not excited about that.  Meh.  Tomorrow will be more productive.

I saw Katherine from CHPC on my way out of the T station.  She's reading Jasper Fforde, on her son's recommendation.  Yay.
I hadn't realized they lived right on Curtis St. so close to Davis Square (for some reason I thought they lived up toward Medford).

What is up with our disappearing trash barrels?  I know we started out with 3 (I recall boggling that we filled them up since there were only 5 of us living in bathe house, and my family of 4 growing up would fill up one trash bag maybe 3/4 of the way each week) but we've had 2 for a while now, but tonight we were down to 1. [Edit: Turns out DownstairsNeighbors are moving to a place closer to the Square, but I think all the trash barrels pre-dated them anyway, so that doesn't help.]

I do not react well to people fussing over me -- which I think is a control freak thing.
OriginalRoomie's grandma was moving stuff in the fridge so I could fit my stuff in when I came back with groceries, and I was like, "No, it's fine, I'll make it fit, don't worry about it {flaps hands}."

Hi, it's my birthday in a week.  Craziness.