They say that to find your prince you're going to have to kiss a lot of frogs.
It implies that all men are french and therefore lovers of wine and the finer things in life. Or that we are green like childhood stories. Or that we are slimy.
It is a metaphor meant to relate the fairytale story to the reality of the basic nature of human existence.
But the problem to be studied here is one relating to frogs and witches cauldrons - I borrowed this story from a person much wiser than me.
If you boil water and then try to toss a live frog into the pot, the frog will jump out. And before anybody screeches at the inhuman treatment of our slimy little friends, consider whether or not you've ever eaten lobster. If, however, you place a frog in a pot of ambient temperature water and let it rise to a boil the frog will do nothing about it until it finally perishes into what is a delightfully gamey yet palatable dish.
Three words: Elite Higher Education.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Monday, September 27, 2010
11:11
I think I've started writing at a similar time at some point in the past.
Time (and by extension clocks) are so repetitive it's boring. Not repetitive interesting like a tesselation or two opposing mirrors though - that should be clear.
I have friends I want to visit but dont know how to. In my mind they are brave souls who greet life with a smile and say charmed life as much as I am now prone to do. And while I worry about such petty things about school and people they should know I worry about them - friends. That although my back can't tolerate more than 10 hours in bed theirs might just have to for spells at a time. It's the thing about friendship, I see them once a week if I'm lucky but inevitably I'm the one who feels like the needy one though they should be the ones with a complete get out of jail card. Testament to who's stronger despite the fact that I'm over 200 pounds and 6ft6.
7 hugs. Some of them awkward, some of them real. One of them has that weird end of it where it's almost like you're reticent about ending it and your right arm outstretched lingers in the direction of her outstretched left arm. One given in a bout of emotion. So maybe it's more like a 14, I blame my warmth-driven culture and call it a day.
Blue October. Red October. And November is a day not a month and it's spent in celebration in some parts of my world while in utter concern about things that happened over 20 years ago (Tlaltelolco). And if you want an interesting thought then realize that if you are reading this you are most likely not a Baby Boomer, not part of Generation X but a part of Generation Me.
I'd like to think that the Me stands for Millenium because we were infinitely blessed with luck to be born at just the right time to see it. A sinking part of me has the rising suspicion that it's actually meant to point to our egotistical view of the world. Thank god for blogging, tweeting and bbery updates. Status messages. Away messages. Hotkeys and all that other good stuff. At least we can now stream live video onto the internet.
GenMe is one with a work to live focus but we also have a sense of self-entitlement. A sense that we are on the right path to success independent of whether there are cobble stones or pavement. We need more supervision. I guess that's why I study management.
And for now dear friend, i leave you with a long-winded departing shot that's more like a canon filled with ball bearings. Though I feel like I'm so blessed and so lucky I wish I could get a cleansing (not the magical kind) but one that would rid me of petty worries and leave me with those I care about. I hope the tangled mess of lines and dotted dashes that spells out the rest of my life will inevitably keep those I hold near and dear to my heart in a tightly wrapped cocoon of what I hope is love.
Paz.
Time (and by extension clocks) are so repetitive it's boring. Not repetitive interesting like a tesselation or two opposing mirrors though - that should be clear.
I have friends I want to visit but dont know how to. In my mind they are brave souls who greet life with a smile and say charmed life as much as I am now prone to do. And while I worry about such petty things about school and people they should know I worry about them - friends. That although my back can't tolerate more than 10 hours in bed theirs might just have to for spells at a time. It's the thing about friendship, I see them once a week if I'm lucky but inevitably I'm the one who feels like the needy one though they should be the ones with a complete get out of jail card. Testament to who's stronger despite the fact that I'm over 200 pounds and 6ft6.
7 hugs. Some of them awkward, some of them real. One of them has that weird end of it where it's almost like you're reticent about ending it and your right arm outstretched lingers in the direction of her outstretched left arm. One given in a bout of emotion. So maybe it's more like a 14, I blame my warmth-driven culture and call it a day.
Blue October. Red October. And November is a day not a month and it's spent in celebration in some parts of my world while in utter concern about things that happened over 20 years ago (Tlaltelolco). And if you want an interesting thought then realize that if you are reading this you are most likely not a Baby Boomer, not part of Generation X but a part of Generation Me.
I'd like to think that the Me stands for Millenium because we were infinitely blessed with luck to be born at just the right time to see it. A sinking part of me has the rising suspicion that it's actually meant to point to our egotistical view of the world. Thank god for blogging, tweeting and bbery updates. Status messages. Away messages. Hotkeys and all that other good stuff. At least we can now stream live video onto the internet.
GenMe is one with a work to live focus but we also have a sense of self-entitlement. A sense that we are on the right path to success independent of whether there are cobble stones or pavement. We need more supervision. I guess that's why I study management.
And for now dear friend, i leave you with a long-winded departing shot that's more like a canon filled with ball bearings. Though I feel like I'm so blessed and so lucky I wish I could get a cleansing (not the magical kind) but one that would rid me of petty worries and leave me with those I care about. I hope the tangled mess of lines and dotted dashes that spells out the rest of my life will inevitably keep those I hold near and dear to my heart in a tightly wrapped cocoon of what I hope is love.
Paz.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Writing about candidacy
I once wondered what it would take to make me a good candidate. A candidate for what you might ask (as I cringe at the Plato-ic stylings of my writing right now) and I would be forced to answer - a candidate to play in the field of life.
But faux deepness aside.
Imagine a dream in which you find yourself stranded on a single strip of land that runs for as far as you can see both in front and behind you. On one side are the calm waters of your favorite childhood lake (complete with orange guppies and the one corner of the lake with a patch of high grass somehow (magically) floating and thriving strictly on the water). On the other if your favorite childhood sea (the kind that took you under its wave, flipped you inside and out and made you lose a bathing suit but that you still ran for eagerly every time your parents finished parking the car and inflating your floaties).
An interesting excercise is not to judge a book by its cover but attempt to describe its plot line based entirely on the title. In some instances, like Oscar Wao's, it's easy to make something up. In other, like Suite Francaise or Relativistic Physics the problem gets exciting. The excercise is akin to the idea of coming up with a story for random strangers in the waiting room of a bus terminal.
My mind is a cat chasing the light from a flashlight, trying to untangle the tangled mess I've made of the ball of string without the benefit of opposable thumbs.
But I'm running.
not physically, dear god, never that.
But I am and I hope to tell you what it feels like.
But faux deepness aside.
Imagine a dream in which you find yourself stranded on a single strip of land that runs for as far as you can see both in front and behind you. On one side are the calm waters of your favorite childhood lake (complete with orange guppies and the one corner of the lake with a patch of high grass somehow (magically) floating and thriving strictly on the water). On the other if your favorite childhood sea (the kind that took you under its wave, flipped you inside and out and made you lose a bathing suit but that you still ran for eagerly every time your parents finished parking the car and inflating your floaties).
An interesting excercise is not to judge a book by its cover but attempt to describe its plot line based entirely on the title. In some instances, like Oscar Wao's, it's easy to make something up. In other, like Suite Francaise or Relativistic Physics the problem gets exciting. The excercise is akin to the idea of coming up with a story for random strangers in the waiting room of a bus terminal.
My mind is a cat chasing the light from a flashlight, trying to untangle the tangled mess I've made of the ball of string without the benefit of opposable thumbs.
But I'm running.
not physically, dear god, never that.
But I am and I hope to tell you what it feels like.
Monday, September 20, 2010
Je me souviens
Yo me acuerdo de una cancion en frances que cantaba el yo recuerdo.
I remember a song in french that sung the I remember.
Je me souviens.
The truth is that tonight I write in spanish because I woke up this morning and spoke in spanish for a second and thought in spanish for a minute before I caught wind that that was no longer the useful approach to life. You see I know my language inside and out and I like to think that I ellaborate complex puns with the same ease in 2 languages as I quote old wife's tales in three languages and say no in 4.
Pero la verdad es que de vez en vez extragno mi casa.
Extrano la letra egne.
Extrano noches de fogata con la luces de los carros, las ventana abajo para alegra el silencio con un poco de musica y chela. Donde no hacia mucho frio pero igual usabamos sudaderas. De buenos amigos que han cambiado agno con agno y mes con mes pero con los que igual se terminaba la noche explicando porque todos seguiamos siendo el rey.
Con dinero y sin dinero.
Y mientras tanto me trato de acordar de como sentia esa situacion en la prepa donde buscaba mi propio lugar que no encontre hasta cambiarme de pais. Veo el mapa de la ciudad semi grabado en mi mente, claro que sin nombres y no me acuerdo de muchas cosas.
Alzheimer de la memoria.
I remember a song in french that sung the I remember.
Je me souviens.
The truth is that tonight I write in spanish because I woke up this morning and spoke in spanish for a second and thought in spanish for a minute before I caught wind that that was no longer the useful approach to life. You see I know my language inside and out and I like to think that I ellaborate complex puns with the same ease in 2 languages as I quote old wife's tales in three languages and say no in 4.
Pero la verdad es que de vez en vez extragno mi casa.
Extrano la letra egne.
Extrano noches de fogata con la luces de los carros, las ventana abajo para alegra el silencio con un poco de musica y chela. Donde no hacia mucho frio pero igual usabamos sudaderas. De buenos amigos que han cambiado agno con agno y mes con mes pero con los que igual se terminaba la noche explicando porque todos seguiamos siendo el rey.
Con dinero y sin dinero.
Y mientras tanto me trato de acordar de como sentia esa situacion en la prepa donde buscaba mi propio lugar que no encontre hasta cambiarme de pais. Veo el mapa de la ciudad semi grabado en mi mente, claro que sin nombres y no me acuerdo de muchas cosas.
Alzheimer de la memoria.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Sphere
Some of the ancients considered the sphere the most perfect shape in the world. Point and case - the earth. Before you get finicky about stuff that doesnt matter and utter the word "geoid" - when was the last time your eyes discerned anything with 97% certainty.
So I met a man in this lofty pursue today. Round as a ball; head, round as a ball. I suppose his legs fell a little out of place but let's ignore the picture. His glasses, twin circles. The man is serious.
And though I've lunched and dined with him several times in my life today we looked for granularity in his rotund state. Not dirty.
I've seen him eat and he does so with gusto. He eats a lot but he does so enjoying new and unexpected flavors every time, is always willing to try new restaurants and foods and cooks up storms (the kind seen on the surface of the sun). He enjoys every mouthful and sits at meals like most people sit at mass. He has a ritual and enjoys the little things that hardasses (both literally and figurative) focused on rigorous diets and specific ingredients cannot. Butter on roll. Real oil when it is required, eevo only when the flavor enhances things.
A poached egg rather than scrambled egg whites.
So at least a significant portion of his shape is due to his passion.
But he has two.
He's a well known researcher published in Medical Journals in the US and Latin America. He's studying the effects of controlled obesity on diabetes and hypertension.
He might be on to something being patient zero.
Utter commitment.
So I met a man in this lofty pursue today. Round as a ball; head, round as a ball. I suppose his legs fell a little out of place but let's ignore the picture. His glasses, twin circles. The man is serious.
And though I've lunched and dined with him several times in my life today we looked for granularity in his rotund state. Not dirty.
I've seen him eat and he does so with gusto. He eats a lot but he does so enjoying new and unexpected flavors every time, is always willing to try new restaurants and foods and cooks up storms (the kind seen on the surface of the sun). He enjoys every mouthful and sits at meals like most people sit at mass. He has a ritual and enjoys the little things that hardasses (both literally and figurative) focused on rigorous diets and specific ingredients cannot. Butter on roll. Real oil when it is required, eevo only when the flavor enhances things.
A poached egg rather than scrambled egg whites.
So at least a significant portion of his shape is due to his passion.
But he has two.
He's a well known researcher published in Medical Journals in the US and Latin America. He's studying the effects of controlled obesity on diabetes and hypertension.
He might be on to something being patient zero.
Utter commitment.
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