Zombies, Set Theory, and Hot Buttered Rum

Here are some weekend highlights:

• Friday: attended a grad student workshop on the Tractatus given by an eighth-year student who's finishing up his dissertation on Wittgenstein. There's maybe going to be a Tractatus study group next semester, which would be awesome. We didn't spend a huge amount of time on the Tractatus in college, so I'd be especially interested in going through it more deeply.

• Luke had to cancel his scare-fest on account of rain, which was disappointing until it turned out to mean I got to hang out with the department's Cool Kids two nights in a row instead of one. VTL gave me a ride to his house (he kind of lives in mild, undergrad-y squalor, not to my surprise) where we watched Old School with his roommates and then Shana, Luke, and Mike arrived and after a bit we went out to the Crazy Horse, where Luke warned me about Cufflinks and the way Evangelical Christians are likely to operate. I am willing to take his word for it since he was raised Evangelical (his father is a preacher, which is kind of astonishing when you know Luke) but I still think he was being a bit alarmist.

• After the Crazy Horse, we went to hear a Detroit ghetto-tech DJ Mike and Shana really dig. We danced until last call while Night of the Living Dead played on giant screens on either side of the dance floor.

• In the morning I awoke, fresh as a daisy and filled with high spirits, and read a very cogent essay by Hilary Putnam.

• Later that day I met up with the two History & Philosophy of Science guys in my set theory class to work on the homework. I have resented them a bit ever since they made fun of me in front of the Badger but now we're burying the hatchet, and I'm glad. I'm even gladder that I totally schooled them in set theory and whipped out some fine, fine, superfine proofs on the chalkboard. At the end of one of them, the Australian clapped.

• You know what's attractive? Smugness. Everybody loves a smug girl.

• And then finally it was evening and time to go to Luke's to get our scare on. Luke had built a bonfire and set up some scary mannequins. He's the kind of boy who owns mannequins, which he got at a garage sale. One of them is named Gloria. "It was kind of awkward undressing her in front of my mom," he admitted. (Gloria was tied to a tree in a prom dress and covered in "pig's blood" to be Carrie.)

• Once everyone arrived, we split up into two cars and ventured further into the heart of darkness (as Luke put it) to a very ramshackle haunted house. There, we played a reflex-testing game that gave the loser an electric shock. I played about seven rounds but wasn't shocked once, somewhat to my disappointment. It was really a rather spooky place, though I was right behind VTL, who spoiled the ambiance by talking loudly and touching everything curiously.

• The second haunted house was a little more upscale and more tableau-oriented. None of us wanted to be in the back because there were people who would follow you around, which was unsettling. A guy with no eyes and lots of rotting flesh got way up in my face, too, which was also not to my liking.

• At the end of that haunted house, as you exit and head towards the funnel cake vendors, a guy in a mask chases you with a chainsaw. It is indeed a real chainsaw, although Luke told me afterwards that it has no chain, rendering it harmless. It is certainly loud, however. I did not run (because that would be undignified) but I did walk REALLY FAST.

• After all the scaring we went back to Luke's, where we sat around the fire and drank hot buttered rum and listened to Nick Cave. It was perfect bonfire weather, the company was congenial, and the rum was very delicious. We stayed until around 2:30 and then VTL drove me and Shana back to civilization. I woke up this morning feeling like the last piece of a puzzle, like I fit where I belong. Good times don't last forever, I am well aware, but I am enjoying this good time right now.
  

It has been a fantastic weekend.

Halloween Starts Now

Tonight is Luke's Scare-Fest (as we've been calling it) and, Girl Scout that I am, I am baking gingerbread. Probably beer would be more appreciated, but hey - I've been wanting to bake gingerbread for ages, ever since I saw that the Sahara Mart carries Lyle's Golden Syrup, which Laurie Colwin recommends. I didn't anticipate that her recipe would call for a whole jar of the stuff; it's basically light treacle, and treacle's a pain to work with, I tell you what. Everything gets sticky. I will confess - I really like treacle. On my way to China we had a layover in Heathrow (yes I know I flew to China backwards; don't ask) and I bought a packet of treacle, which was very hard to eat because it was basically one huge fused mass of sugar, but I would whack it against my desk to break bits off and it was very tasty. And then, Grandma, I would always brush my teeth (with antifreezy Chinese toothpaste).

Anyway. Laurie Colwin's damp gingerbread is baking in the oven right now and no doubt it will endear me to everybody at Luke's bonfire.

Last night I went with Cufflinks to the Runcible Spoon, as usual. I actually put on lipstick though, which is sort of a capitulation and which worries me. I'm not sure why an Evangelical Christian like Cufflinks would be interested in me, but the data seems to suggest that that's what's going on, and it makes me edgy.

The Decemberists make very good Halloween listening. Shankill Butchers is the scariest song ever.

Sadly, I do not have a costume for tonight, but I guess it's better to be without than to be the only person with one.

The Badger on Love

The Badger: "Of course not all relations are transitive. What about "loves"? If John loves Mary and Mary loves Elvis, it doesn't follow that John loves Elvis - in fact, the opposite probably follows. It'd be a funny world if love were transitive!

Or imagine if love were symmetric! [he continued, chuckling] That would be terrible. Interesting, perhaps, for a few minutes, but good Lord, no! Or imagine if love were reflexive - we'd be able to tell who doesn't love himself - they'd vanish!"

Found Poetry

I love the Horse's digressions so much I have recently begun making note of them in the margins of my notes. They form a lovely sort of Dadaist poetry.
gators/garters
hockey without a mask
bizarro hair
platform shoes in Venice...
KISS - forget about it -
I know he has a long tongue, but ...
firemen's outfits
in Italy
fabulous airlines

I have made the plunge and ordered two posters for our living room. I almost chose this one but decided it would be a bit odd to have the same art as my parents, so instead I (unknowingly) chose the Chagall my sister Floss has in her room at school and a Klimt I thought was nice. This will hopefully make our space look more lived-in.

Made a rather tasty vinegar chicken tonight - my mother's suggestion. It was extremely vinegary and delicious - I added extra vinegar and now I'm all parched. K's making scones in her bird apron and it's all nicely domestic. Time to do some set theory.

(This nicely sums up my thoughts on the recent Dumbledore situation. Let's not forget the context of the question JKR was answering: does Dumbledore find love? )

Apartment Decorating Tips

Last night Kari and the Werewolf invited a couple of us over for cocktails and I was amazed at how gorgeous their apartment is. Especially compared to ours.

Okay, it is slightly better now than it was when this photo was taken, right after we moved in. There's now a plant hanging above the director's chair, and the tv (which doesn't get any channels - literally, not a single one - and is therefore completely decorative) lives on a stand. Still, one can't help but think, as my friend Andrea said when she saw this picture, "maybe the living room needs some more... it just needs some more."

The thing is, the living room is not entirely mine to do with as I will - any improvements will need to be agreeable to K. as well. So that rules out the most obvious and simple solution, which would be to just hang up the posters I had in my room at Smith. (These included posters for Rushmore, Gigantic, and the New Pornographers - none of which are K's thing.) My next choice would be a nice picture of the Brooklyn Bridge or a Magritte poster, so that my apartment would look like my parents' house. K. and I have also, perhaps not entirely in jest, talked about hanging a bunch of nudes, since we both really like drawing nudes. This would be an interesting statement. (Is it pretentious to hang your own art in your house? (Luke: "If it's not pretentious it's not worth doing!"))

Kari and the Werewolf also have a big red velvet couch which I envy tremendously and little magnetic canisters for spices which stick to the fridge. (I am so copying this idea. Craft project! Our current methodology of keeping the spices, which I buy in bulk at the health food store, in little plastic baggies is driving me crazy.)

I recently came into a windfall because I was ridiculously overpaid for drawing some comics about logic. As a result, my purse strings are a bit loose at the moment. I am a notorious cheapskate, but yesterday I bought $7 jeans and a sweater on sale at Old Navy, a $4 chess board from Target, and a Tsingtao and an order of Gong Bao chicken at the Chow Bar. I would not be at all surprised if I spent this entire windfall on frivolities instead of, for instance, rent. (I can, of course, pay my rent on my stipend alone. I'm not that out of control.)

Changes need to be made. Suggestions?

Just what I needed

So apparently my new hobby is chess. Got a call from Value Theory Lad the other night around 9:30. He asked if I was up for a game of chess later - "Maybe around eleven?" I was already extremely tired and contemplating putting on my pajamas, but I have a policy about accepting these sorts of invitations so I said okay. An hour and a half and a brief disco nap later, I was sprinting down Kirkwood to Starbucks, where I found VTL drawing a chessboard on a piece of paper. (He had chess pieces, though - apparently he just carries them around all the time. Make of that what you will.)

We played two games and he beat me in both of them, but he said I'm getting better. I castled successfully for the first time, and put him in check three times, which was also unprecedented. I suppose that chess is a useful social skill, especially for someone like me who hangs out with a lot of nerds. But it's not exactly the world's most entertaining activity.

Last night I made butternut squash risotto and chatted with my folks on the phone. Risotto certainly is a pain to make - I stirred so much I got a hot spot on my finger. I overcooked it and it wasn't properly al dente but it was all right.

So excited...

Today I got an email from that sartorial genius Luke. Excerpt:

If you are up for some pagan revelry and if you are stout-hearted enough we will convene at my house in E-ville at 7:00 where you will be debriefed.

You will then be escorted in a convoy of the damned to the Baker's Junction Haunted Train ride in Smithville (about twenty minutes from E-ville--yes, even further out in the middle of nowhere). The brave among you will test your fate against the dreaded *electroshock game*, but only those with the quickest trigger fingers will survive to board the haunted train.

Those who disembark alive will proceed with me to the Harrodsburg Haunted House (another fifteen minutes deeper into the heart of darkness) where, if we are lucky, we will spend another $8 to be forced through a pitch-black maze inhabited by a morally bankrupt
gentleman eager to demonstrate his skill with a chainsaw.

Then, if anyone's viscera are still intact we will proceed back to my place for a bonfire with s'mores and (wait for it) hot buttered rum.

My life is so awesome. I need a costume!

Things That Vex Me 2.0

• BEING STOOD UP. Seriously. Not cool.
• Pretty much anything that happens after being stood up is going to vex me disproportionally as well. Being told to "stop picking at myself." Um, okay, I will just stop. Because you told me to. Because the fact that it hurts to type and wash my hands and my poor bloody Quine book were insufficient reasons, but now that you've offered this brilliant solution a more-than-a-decade-old habit is just magically broken. Thanks, Dad!
• The awareness that I'm being a brat right now. That just vexes me even more.
• Also, being told to go to the dentist.
• Also, the fact that I put on mascara for the date-that-wasn't. I hate mascara. Good thing I didn't wear my contacts, or I'd be going into full ninja-mode right now.

Things That Do Not Vex Me:

• Scrambled egg burritos. Mmm. Eggy.
  

Psychosomatic, or merely psycho?

I've been doing well. I've been settling in to my life, enjoying my work, and feeling cheerful. Yet I have all these weird physical symptoms that seem to speak to reservoirs of tension just beneath the surface. Ever since I can remember I've picked at the skin on my fingers, and I've pretty much decided I always will. However, my fingers right now are a mess. I got blood all over my copy of Word and Object and all over the hooks I bought so we can hang our towels on our new bathroom door (yes! we finally got the beaver-gnawed door replaced! less than two months after they'd said it would arrive!). This happens sometimes and I'm not too worried about it, but much more distressing is this headache thing. I think I've been grinding my teeth or pressing my tongue against my front teeth or something. (Please don't tell me to get orthodontic headgear because I simply refuse. When I'm married I'll get headgear, or when the bloom's off the rose, whichever comes first. Not before. It's hard enough picking up boys as it is. (Maybe if I weren't wearing the exact same clothes I wore yesterday I'd be in a better position to complain about this.)) Whatever the cause, I've been having awful headaches. I never get headaches. What gives?

There must be some sort of meme floating around, because at the moment I am fixated on Everything Is Illuminated and so, apparently, is everyone else in my area, because all the copies of the book are checked out of the library (both the public library and the school one). The public library also has six copies of the movie, all of which were out this weekend, but last night I checked again and found one had been returned, so I went to the library as soon as it opened this morning and snapped it up; the librarian was nice enough to find it for me on the to-be-shelved cart. I watched it this afternoon and am currently resisting the temptation to watch it again. The book is due back tomorrow, so hopefully whoever has it will be a good citizen and return it so I can eat it read it. We'll see.

One strange thing about this book is that the author, Jonathan Safran Foer, is also one of the main characters. It's never been clear to me how much of the book is based on a true story - in particular, I wonder whether Alex, the Ukrainian translator, is real. (And if so, how real?) The movie is dedicated to "Alex" and it gives his dates, so someone named Alex is dead, but is it the Alex in the book? If so, that makes me really sad, so I am pretending it's just some other Alex. I actually have a complicated possible worlds account of this which I'll spare you. Possible worlds: is there anything they can't do?

I'm also listening to John Cale's "Paris 1919" on repeat - the song, not the album. I'm feeling a little autistic today, I guess - listening to one song again and again, and wanting to watch a movie over and over. A little autistic, but not as autistic as the ever-creepy Saul Kripke, whose talk I attended today. His voice makes my skin crawl. I am really glad I made the choice I did.

Recipe: Persimmon Rice Pudding

Ingredients:
1 pint fresh persimmons
2/3 cup Arborio rice
3 1/2 cups milk (I used half skim, half whole)
1/4 cup honey
2 T sugar
1/4 t salt
zest of 1 blood orange

Procedure:
Gently rinse the persimmons and remove the stems. With a spatula, press the persimmons through a sieve to separate the pulp, seeds, and skins from the relatively tiny amount of usable persimmon glop. You can suck on the seeds but apart from that I doubt they have any real use. You won't end up with a lot of glop, but you don't need that much.

In a large saucepan, combine rice, milk, honey, salt, zest, and sugar. Bring to a simmer, stirring frequently, then reduce heat to lowest setting and leave it, stirring from time to time
until the pudding is quite thick and the rice is soft. This will take ages. You can read philosophy while this is happening, or talk to your sister on the telephone, or bang your head on the table and think about the awkward email you got from the Werewolf this morning, about how sorry he is you're afraid to go in your office and how he'll try to make you feel more welcome from now on. Feel terrible about making the Werewolf feel guilty. Contemplate skipping town.

Oh, right, the pudding! Ah, it's looking nice and thick now, time to take it off the heat and stir in the persimmon goop. Serve warm and awkward.

My Dinner With Crispin Wright

Today Crispin Wright gave a talk on higher order vagueness. Since I know the readers of this blog are not too well-versed in semantics or fuzzy logic (nor am I, honestly) I will gloss over the content of his talk and say merely that it was very interesting. I wasn't able to understand it completely, but that's probably all right - I understood more than at last year's logic lecture at Smith, where I understood more than the previous year, and so on. In other words, I'm learning, and though progress is slow, I can tell it's happening. I'm getting there.

Afterwards there was a brief reception, and one of the professors had brought a lovely selection of noshes - including baklava, apple cider, dates stuffed with cheese, and fresh guacamole. Very delicious. The Horse tried to use baklava as props to show us where the dinner afterwards was to be held, but it made little sense to me and when the time came we just all walked over together.

The dinner was at a very nice Afghani restaurant I'd never been to before. I'd never had Afghani food, either, so it was a novel experience. The emphasis on cilantro and dill was not to my liking, but the Horse gave me some of his Cornish game hen, which was delicious, and we had a very nice baba ganouj and I had some nice vegetable dumplings.

The Horse was there, and his wife JW (who is my logic teacher and mentor), and my philosophy of language teacher GE, and two other grad students: my roommate K and a boy called Tim who is, K and I always think, very standard. The bulk of the dinner-table talk was philosophical - in particular, philosophy of logic. I was fascinated and tried desperately to hang on. There were some other topics where I was able to contribute more conversationally; I did my best to represent, as I doubt we were invited along to sit mutely. The Horse was very amusing as usual, and I utterly adore JW and GE, and Crispin Wright was awfully smart and personable. It was all in all a wonderful dinner from soup to nuts, and the sort of thing that makes me so happy I'm in academia. There will be many such dinners in my life.

Things That Vex Me

• Having to walk seven blocks to the laundromat with my arms full of two weeks' laundry.
  
• Having to carry my laundry back seven blocks, still in bags because I can't carry a basket as easily, so when I get home it's completely wrinkled
• Having it also be damp, despite three cycles in the dryer. Damp wrinkly laundry was one of the worst things about living in Beijing, and I do not enjoy reliving it.
• Not laundry-related: I do not appreciate how the cufflinks-wearing religious fanatic invites me to the Spoon every week but doesn't talk to me when we get there or before, during the break, or after our class together.
• Nor do I care for the way he replies to questions like, "Have you read Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close?" - somehow he made me feel as if I am illiterate or shallow for reading a popular, contemporary work of fiction. His supercilious "I don't really read pop fiction" really annoyed me.

• The Darjeeling Limited is not coming to Bloomington. EVER. It is a new Wes Anderson movie and it has Jason Schwartzman, Owen Wilson, and ADRIAN BRODY, and it is NOT COMING to stupid Bloomington! Why am I thwarted thus?! I can only hope that it will still be playing when I'm in New York next month.
• Not really a thing that vexes me, but just a thing: Saul Kripke is giving a talk here next week. Last year I was offered a fellowship at CUNY, which, if I'd accepted it, would've meant I'd be working on Kripke's tapes and papers, sifting through his old scribbled-on cocktail napkins and recordings of him coughing and mumbling, trying to paste together stuff for publication. Saul Kripke is one of the greatest philosophers of the 20th century, and I often wonder if I was crazy to pass up this fellowship. I won't go into all the reasons behind my decision, but it is weird to think that I could have been living in New York right now, in a rat-infested basement apartment in Queens, instead of out here. I could have at least seen the Darjeeling Limited, if I could have afforded tickets.
  

Sometimes you're the Louisville Slugger

Sometimes my moods don't seem to relate to the external world in any way whatsoever. I have been walking on sunshine all day, and the only real reason I can think of is that the weather is deliciously cool - I woke up this morning and NPR told me we'd be having a high of 60 and I almost kissed the radio. I got to wear corduroy pants, a sweater, and my gray tweed jacket! And it was all uphill from there!

• Since I didn't have class until 11:30, I got a nice leisurely morning drinking coffee, listening to music, and quilting
• Then I stopped at the public library on my way to school and took out a book on chess
• When I got to school, Value Theory Lad loaned me another book on chess, which he assures me is far superior.
• In Set Theory we learned about the Axiom of Choice, which is very interesting, and I didn't say anything stupid or lose my temper at the Badger or anything
• Then I had a tasty lunch of Laurie Colwin's vegetarian chili, carrot sticks, and an apple, and read Quine
• I was craving bergamot, so I went to the Union and got some Earl Grey, which I enjoyed during my afternoon logic class, which was particularly wonderful because we're finally starting derivation rules.

And of course, nothing but the weather was really notable, and even that - it's October and it's cool - not so much, but I just had a smile on my face and a song in my heart the whole day. It's funny how good days, like bad days, gather momentum and get worse or better as your mood steeps like delicious tea.

(Also not hurting my mood: getting lots of messages on OkCupid from boys who think I'm cute. Even if it never results in decent dates (for me - I know people who've been very successful), that site does provide some nice ego boosts.)

Tuesday: The Badger and the Horse

The Badger has reappeared; last week he skipped town without telling us and left a young man of my acquaintance as a sub. My philosophy of mathematics discussion group met while he was gone and since he's the only philosophy faculty member in the group, none of us knew how to proceed in his absence. We just sort of puzzled over what the hell Kant is trying to say, and concluded that we'd ask the Badger when he returned.

So when the Badger asked me today how the group had fared in his absence, that's basically what I told him. He said, "Well, the Oracle has returned." What the heck, Badger? I am pretty sure I did not want to call you an oracle. If I was being obsequious I am sorry.

Last Spring one of my Smith professors commissioned me to do some comic strips about logic. We didn't discuss an actual dollar amount of payment, but it was very clear that money would change hands. The comics have been in his possession since the end of August and so today I emailed him and asked, "Did we ever agree on compensation for those comics?" He wrote back, "You suggested $x and I agreed. I will send you a check tomorrow."

I never suggested $x. I was thinking more along the lines of $x/3. $x is a lot of money. I feel very guilty about this, but I guess I should just be grateful. I'd have gladly done them for free, but he offered to pay me and I accepted. There's nothing wrong with accepting money for a job satisfactorily done... yet I feel so guilty.

The Horse was not as amusing today as he sometimes is, but he did deliver a few gems. He was talking about how, if you want to endorse a crazy theory like skepticism, you have to walk the crazy walk and never say you know anything or behave as though you do. You have to, when you're a juror, say to yourself, "Sure the witness says she saw the accused standing over the victim's body with a smoking gun, but how does she know? She could have been dreaming." Then you have to vote not guilty. And no one wants to walk this crazy walk, so they should not be talking the crazy talk, whether in the philosophy room or in the courtroom.

"Of course," the Horse went on, "there are plenty of people who talk crazy talk and walk crazy walk, and this won't be any objection for them. People like religious fundamentalists, who say, for instance, that all moral authority comes from the Bible, and any statements that deviate from this one interpretation of the Bible should be rejected as false, and who try to get you to believe their crazy views and try to pass laws to make you walk their crazy walk and so on."

And this of course was AWESOME, because there were at least four such people in that very room, including the cufflinks guy I mentioned before, who talked that very crazy talk to me the other day at the Spoon. I found it delightful that the Horse was willing to take it for granted that we're not crazy religious fundamentalists because we are doing serious epistemology.

Then just to cap it off he digressed, prompted by the idea of a smoking gun, "Or a smoking plug - that happened to me earlier today, I plugged something in and there was this big spark and smoke started coming out of the socket... but I was like the burning bush. I was not consumed." He paused. "But I did just consume your time with that story."

But the Horse can consume my time any day.

(That reminds me of one more thing about the Horse and then I swear I'll stop: I was at my friend Sam's house and we were talking about how people always like to sit in the same seat each class. I said, "That epistemology class is two and a half hours long. I can't pay attention for that long unless I am right up front. I need to be as close to the Horse as possible." I paused. "I didn't mean that the way it sounded," I said, but it was too late. "I am so telling [the Horse's wife, who is also my advisor]," Sam hooted.)

One More Thing!

I get to have dinner with Crispin Wright on Friday. Whenever there's a speaker, three grad students get to go and have their dinners paid for by the department, and this week I pounced on it because hey! A logician! Passing through Indiana! And so I whipped off an email to the chair saying I wanted in, and he wrote back: "You're the last lucky winner." This filled me with glee.

Darn those pesky tsetse flies!

As usual on Mondays, I am barely conscious, owing to a weekend of staying out late and waking up early, since you're supposed to sleep best if you wake up at the same time every morning and I like to get my weekend chores - marketing and bread baking - done by noon. Normally I have class on Monday afternoons, but today I did not, since my prof is out of town, and so I napped all through the time I would've had class. I did, however, go into the office this morning (what a grownup turn of phrase! And it's true: I went into my very own office, despite the presence of The Werewolf, my scary officemate) and turn out another draft of my analyticity paper. It is now in a form which could be turned in, should I slip into a coma until Wednesday afternoon, and this is comforting, though I will diligently continue to tweak it until the buzzer sounds.

Perhaps I should elaborate on that allusion to The Werewolf. He's writing a dissertation on Kierkegaard (amazingly the Blogger spellcheck has no problem with "Kierkegaard" so maybe someday when I'm a famous philosopher it will stop telling me my last name is "Neutered" or perhaps I meant "Neuterers" which is a new one) and is in the office ALL THE TIME, and never says a word, and every time I go in there I want to announce, "My name is on the door!" because I feel like I'm intruding. But it is silly and babyish to be afraid of my own office, so I'm sucking it up.

Oh, and I call him the Werewolf because he kind of looks like a blend of Oz-from-Buffy combined with my mental image of a young Remus Lupin (i.e. not like this). Plus he's just kind of lupine. (His girlfriend Kari is very cool and gave me a ride once.)

Um. Where was I? I just finished The Orange Tree, by Mildred Walker, which was pretty good - it is apparently kind of a modernization of Chekhov's Three Sisters and it's published by Nebraska University Press, which perhaps partially explains its occasionally jarringly bad editing. To be fair, the editor was trying to reconcile several different versions, as Walker apparently kept fiddling with it for years and years after it was rejected, but since this editor didn't feel any compunctions about inserting references to an orange tree so the title would make sense, you'd think she could've somehow smoothed some of those scene changes. I was constantly thinking I'd skipped a page.

And it's Columbus Day, which, despite its dubious political correctness, I kind of love, because when I was little, my grandparents would take me and Floss and our cousins on an outing every Columbus Day. We'd go to an orchard and each pick one apple, have lunch at a hotdog stand, go to this beach with lots of neat rocks and interesting driftwood and debris, and then on the way home stop at the Dollar Store, where we were each allowed to choose any item to buy. It was super great. (I've just dashed off a letter to them, since this made me think of it, so no need to tell me.)

Weekend Highlights, bullet-pointed and with a minimum of personal pronouns

• Went to the Farmers' Market, of course, which featured lots of flowers and way more crafts than usual, which was cool. Music, of course, and a butternut squash which will, in the fullness of time, become butternut squash risotto, and an overpowering sense of sun-drenched wellbeing
• Drew and inked several comic strips, which made me happy, as I hadn't drawn in a little while and I'm getting to the fun part of the story. Listened to a lot of Death Cab.
  
• Drank red wine and played Fictionary with a ton of amiable people at the lovely Susan's house. Talked probably way too much but at least got a few laughs. There was one word that I really didn't know, but we were almost done and I was bored, so I wrote "having to do with awesome robots" as my definition, and bluffed very convincingly, so that Sam, who didn't know what I'd written of course, wrote "what Emily wrote" as his definition
• Went to Mass, where we prayed that people who work with animals be kind and humane like St Francis of Assisi and that we all become closer to the Virgin Mary, and I'm down with both those things
• Baked three-flour bread, except that I forgot to buy soy flour yesterday, so I left my starter mixed with molasses, oil, and dry milk and ran to the store to get some, but they didn't have any, and of course by the time I got back it had begun to rise without flour so I just hastily threw in all the whole wheat flour I had and some white flour and hoped for the best. It rose like crazy but I haven't tried it yet.
• Chess with Value Theory Lad at the Spoon - I haven't played chess in years and I was never any good, but he's going to loan me a book, and oh look I think I just found a motivation to learn how to play.
  

Slowly but Surely, Fall Comes to Bloomington

Friday Night

Friday night was very jolly, as my roommate would say. I went to the GPSO Happy Hour, which is supposed to be a way to meet people from other departments, but, though I talked a little bit to a library science major and a criminal justice guy, mostly it was an excuse to hang out with people from my own department, including Value Theory Lad; Luke (the departmental Beau Brummel); Shana, another ethicist, and Mike, a logician. We five ended up going to several different bars over the course of the evening, and had lots of good conversation, which was lovely. They were all very fun, interesting people, and it made me happy to get to spend time with them.

The Game of Good Cooking

(Which no one ever wanted to play with me as a kid. It was an actual board game, which I got as a prize in my sixth grade home economics class.)

My new version of the game is simple, though - for every use you find for an item, you get some points. So, for instance, this weekend, I roasted a chicken, which meant chicken sandwiches all week (5 points), plus I made broth with the bones (10 points) and the vegetable scraps I'd been saving in the freezer with that end in mind (10 points for planning ahead, plus another 10 points for making something instead of buying it). The broth was used to make lentil soup (5 points).

I was invited to the Spoon again last night, though I didn't go - apparently it's a standing invitation. This is ... nice, and I enjoy the music, and it's important to make friends, but must these friends talk so much about the Bible? I need to find a way to steer the conversation in a better direction. He does wear cufflinks, that's appealing. Maybe we can talk about that.

Tonight there's a Graduate and Professional Students Organization Happy Hour, so I'll probably go to that though I won't know anybody, and tomorrow Susan has invited a bunch of people to her house for a games night, which should be fun. So I've got a good weekend ahead of me.

How to Cook When You're Really, Really Manic

After my logic exam today I felt light as a feather and decided that I ought to either cook something extremely complicated or cut off all my hair. Because it was swelteringly hot, I decided in favor of the former.

We still had half a pumpkin left over from the pumpkin soup, so I wrapped the pieces in tinfoil and stuck them in the oven. I considered making this, since I am still on a quest for a good rice pudding recipe, but eight egg yolks? No way. Then I thought maybe the More With Less Cookbook's pumpkin custard, which only involves three egg yolks - much more reasonable. I'd also been considering some sort of pumpkin ravioli for awhile, though I don't remember how I'd come up with that - I've never tried such a thing. Anyway it seemed worth a shot.

While the pumpkin baked, I skipped off to the Co-op for cornstarch, ricotta cheese, semolina flour, and cream of tartar - since the custard used only egg yolks, I'd have the whites left over and I could make meringues.

When I got back the pumpkin was about done, so I unwrapped it and pureed it in the food processor. I thought better of the pumpkin custard somewhere along the line and, since we're out of bread, thought of pumpkin bread to tide us over until Sunday - but the only recipe I had called for shortening, which I didn't have, so instead I made pumpkin muffins. While they were baking, I mixed up a (slightly sticky) pasta dough with another couple of globs of pumpkin and stuck it in the fridge. Then I called everyone in my family, but could only get ahold of my mum, so I talked to her and ate pumpkin muffins until it was time to finish the pasta. I also ate the rest of the pumpkin puree right out of the food processor with a spoon - it was delicious!

My roommate came home to find me covered head to foot in flour, toasting walnuts to mix with ricotta cheese for the ravioli filling. I showed her how to run pasta through a pasta machine and then she wisely retired to her room.

Now I'm boiling some of the pumpkin linguine I made when I ran out of ravioli filling, and the mania is beginning to fade.

I've had a lot of beta-carotene today.

ETA: Pumpkin linguine is bloody DELICIOUS. I'm a genius.

Not a great day

Things that happened to me today:

• I overslept.
• I was late for my philosophy of mathematics discussion group
• I was unable to say anything particularly intelligent about Kant because he's incomprehensible
• I tried to get help on set theory from the guy who's subbing this week, but couldn't really understand him either
• I was really rude to Value Theory Lad, who was in his office eating a sandwich while I was getting set theory help from his office-mate and who was being cheerful and friendly, but in a way which made it harder for me to focus on what the set theory guy was saying, and I said, "Don't you have something you could be doing? Sandwiches to eat?" Which was not called for.
• I couldn't understand what was being said in my philosophy of language class. Am I, in fact, a native English speaker? Everyone around me just seems to be going "buzz buzz buzz" all the time.
• I fell off my bike.
• I couldn't do one of the proofs on my set theory homework.
• I burned my tongue on very hot lentils.

I think I'll move to Australia.

How did this happen?

Midterms already?