God's in his heaven, all's right with the world

Last night I saw They Might Be Giants at the Bluebird. The opening act was a band called Oppenheimer, who were actually quite good - I have seen many bands open for They Might Be Giants in my day, and I would say these guys were not quite up to the level of Ok Go, but certainly better than, oh, Corn Mo. (Click the link if you dare!) Oppenheimer is two guys from Belfast, one on drums and one on guitar, and they did a good, electronic power-pop-y set. They were super loud - my clothes were vibrating, my heart was beating in time. In certain moods, at certain times, I sure do love loud rock 'n' roll.

TMBG opened with a classic - "Hey Mr DJ, I Thought You Said We Had A Deal" - and afterwards, John Flansburgh remarked, "It may be a little early in the show to say this, but I think this may well be our BEST SHOW EVER." And it was pretty fantastic.

I have rarely seen John Linnell as animated or in such high spirits as last night. It was wonderful - he smiled the whole time, he told little anecdotes, he actually got out from behind the keyboard to move around on stage and DO THE ROBOT, he blew us a kiss at the end of the second encore. He did the robot, people. The man is like unto a god.

Linnell told a story of the first time they'd played in Bloomington, back in the 80's, when their manager's father attended the show and afterwards remarked, "That's how Hitler got started." This story seemed to really ring his bell.

John Flansburgh was also looking well, and I dig their current drummer - he's very animated. They played a good mix of old and new - a lot of stuff from The Else, as expected, but also classics like "I Palindrome I" and "Ana Ng." No real surprises, but no matter what, the opening bars of "New York City" will always be one of the most sublime moments life has to offer.

Another reason to hate Value Theory

You know why I hate ethics? Because ethics forces me to think about cannibalism. You never have to think about cannibalism in logic classes. I'll be having nightmares tonight, thanks to Harry Frankfurt.

Rolled out of Indiana in the back of a pickup truck

I am pleased to report that the Midsouth Philosophy Conference was a total success. We left Indiana on Thursday afternoon – I went with Jonathan, a junior professor in my department who does experimental philosophy and cognitive science, and Sharon, who’s really nice – technically she’s a firstyear like me, but she already has her Master’s. I spent most of the trip sleeping in the backseat. We stopped for dinner in Nashville, at the Loveless Café, where we had fried chicken, amazingly good sweet potatoes, and biscuits with sausage gravy, preserves, and sorghum. Sorghum’s pretty tasty – it’s like molasses only milder – but sausage gravy is terrifying, all white and lumpy. It heralds one’s immanent demise.

We stayed at Jonathan’s parents’ house in the Memphis suburbs. They were very hospitable – we got in around eleven and they were still up, and Jonathan’s mum was taking chocolate chip cookies out of the oven as we arrived. The next morning we slept in and when we woke up there were fresh orange blossom muffins, orange juice, and coffee.

The conference itself was very educational and went a long way towards demystifying the whole conference thing for me. Paul Boghossian gave the keynote address, which was on the naturalization of meaning. It would have been right in my wheelhouse if only I’d been able to hear him. Alas, it was one of only two talks in my area during the whole conference.

After the keynote, we all split up and went to different talks. I made the very poor decision of going to a talk on “Ironic Racial Humor” because race is interesting and I’d never heard of the philosophy of humor. (Apparently it’s a branch of aesthetics.) Honestly? I was hoping there’d be jokes. But as it turns out the only joke in the philosophy of humor is that there are no jokes in the philosophy of humor, except for this one. Which isn’t very funny. I found this talk, in which the speaker argued that “ironic racial humor” can somehow fight racism, actually kind of racist. It presupposed that it’s black people’s job to educate white people, and completely ignored the possibility that other black people might find such humor affirming or, you know, funny.

As a matter of fact, the talks given by my fellow Hoosiers were by far the best I attended. This may have been partially due to my poor choice of talks, although apart from the ironic racial humor talk, they all sounded like interesting ideas. But I went to a talk by a fellow who claimed that desire satisfaction is the only requirement for well being (then what is well being? Why, it’s what you get when your desires are satisfied! It cannot be cashed out in any other way! So the child molester who successfully molests children has well being, as does the person whose only desire is that there is a non-prime number of atoms in the universe (as long as that’s the case, whether or not he knows it’s the case), as does the person hooked up to the experience-machine. LAME.)

I would actually love to go on in this vein, criticizing the talks I attended, but it occurs to me that this is poor form, so I’ll stop. Suffice it to say that I could totally submit a paper to this conference, and next year I shall. This is something I can do.

Other highlights included a mighty nice pulled pork sandwich, cheese grits, talks on experimental philosophy, extended mind, and Kierkegaard, and a long, intense banter session with the Werewolf which culminated in one careless comment from me that brought our fragile rapport down like a house of cards. Just when I think the Werewolf and I have turned a corner, it turns out that we haven’t. It’s honestly weird to like and respect someone so much and yet be utterly unable to get along with him.

On Saturday Jonathan’s parents hosted a big party for the conference-goers, where those who were inclined watched the basketball game and the rest of us sat around the kitchen table and gossiped about our colleagues. We talked to a very congenial philosopher of logic from Mississippi who gave us tips on departmental politics and who made fun of me for my fangirlish love for Wittgenstein and Graham Priest. It was very entertaining.

So now I’m back in Bloomington, way behind on everything and planning to eat nothing but raw spinach and brown rice for a month, charged up and freshly determined that this philosophy thing is something I can by God own.

Their biscuits would make you cry

My last two soups have not been winners. A few weeks ago I made an acorn squash soup with apples and caramelized onions - and doesn't that sound good? But it was sort of icky. And yesterday I made "Winter Pesto Soup" which had me suspicious from the beginning because basil is not a winter food, but I tried it anyway and it, too, is kind of odd. I blame the red potatoes - I left the skins on, and they're kind of biting, and the potatoes themselves have an odd, waxy quality. Very disappointing.

On Thursday I am leaving for Memphis for the Midsouth Philosophy Conference, where several of my colleagues (including Kari and the Werewolf) will be giving talks. I am not giving a talk, but I am going along for the ride because I have never been to Memphis or to a philosophy conference. The university gives us $300 a year to go to conferences, which is pretty sweet - I reckon it'll take care of gas and conference registration. As for lodging, we're staying at the home of a professor's parents, which will be nifty - I love seeing other people's houses. And Jonathan - the professor in question, who is from Memphis - has alluded to biscuits and gravy and other southern delicacies.

Oh, man, when I was in China I used to crave biscuits. My roommate, Bai Kunning, would wax rhapsodic over the biscuits at Popeye's - "Tamen de biscuits hui rang ni ku," she would say - "Their biscuits would make you cry."

In the meantime, I have to finish part one of Transcendence of the Ego, plus a bunch of soggy metaethics on lurve. The Metaethics of Lurve. Conceptual Analysis of Lurve. Stupid Frankfurt. And then I have to start my paper on perverse desires, which may actually be kind of fun. If I can ever actually start writing on it.

Blue Moon Curry

The other day I was in the library and they were having a book sale, and after flipping through a thousand crummy old records I saw that they had old magazines for a quarter each, and I bought a few for collages. And among them were a couple of old Vegetarian Times from 1994, and in one of these I found this recipe, which I modified for convenience and cost.

Blue Moon Curry
Rice:
4 cups water
1 Tbs. curry powder
1 tsp. minced ginger
2 cups jasmine rice

Sauce:
2 medium sweet potatoes, peeled and sliced 1/2 inch thick
3 cups fresh baby spinach
1 red bell pepper, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 tsp minced fresh ginger
2 dried Thai chili peppers, split
1 cup coconut milk (I like the reduced fat kind)
3/4 cup water
1/2 cup whole basil leaves (if you have any) or a tablespoon of chopped basil from a jar
1 cup chopped canned pineapple (or fresh if you've recently come into an inheritance)

In a medium saucepan, add water, curry powder, and ginger and bring to a boil. Add rice and simmer until water is absorbed (about 20 minutes).

Meanwhile, steam the sweet potatoes until just tender. Quickly steam spinach in a separate pot. Plunge spinach into cold water and drain. Roll spinach into balls, squeeze dry, and set aside.

In a nonstick pan over medium heat, saute red pepper, garlic, ginger, and chiles about 5 minutes. Add coconut milk and water. Cook, uncovered, about 10 minutes. Add sweet potatoes and cook until tender. At the last minute, add spinach, basil and pineapple; heat through. Serve over rice with chopped peanuts, coconut flakes, sliced bananas, and lemon juice (optional, but sounds good.)

Susan, I speak Chinese, but that doesn't make me Mao Zedong

Today I had my coffee date with a Hungarian mathematician I met last semester at Speed Friending. He seems nice enough, if a little hard to understand, but the real reason I agreed to meet up with him today was that the last time we spoke, he told me he was playing Santa Claus for some Hungarian children at a party (of Hungarians, I guess. That part was never made entirely clear) which I found quite charming. It made me think of the scene in The Miracle on 34th Street where Kris Kringle speaks to the little orphan girl in Dutch. We talked about math, and it was fairly okay.

There is nothing in the house for dinner. Holly Sturgis would be appalled.

Pappagallo

Yesterday in class we were talking about translation and Joan wrote on the board, "'Ralph è uno Pappagallo' is true if and only if Ralph is a parrot." I giggled and Joan smiled at me. "You like the word 'pappagallo'?" she asked.

"It doesn't mean 'parrot,' does it?" I replied. Over Thanksgiving, my sister had described a boy she fancied and my mother had said he was a pappagallo, a kind of boy she advised us to eschew.

"Yes, it does. What did you think it meant?"

I started to blush. "Kind of a ... a heartbreaker? A player."

"Well, that may be slang, but literally it means parrot." Good to know.

whine

Not much to report. This week is pretty busy for me, with Computational Linguistics and philosophy of language assignments due today, piles of laundry piling up, coffee with a Hungarian tomorrow (why? God I do not feel like making chitchat with another stranger) and millions of errands to run. We have five kinds of flour in the house (whole wheat, stone-ground whole wheat, rye, soy, semolina - no white) and basically nothing else. I am very tired.

Apparently in the Hoosier State they don't believe in salting the sidewalks or even putting down molasses like they used to in Massachusetts, and so the streets are very slidey. I fell down the library steps on Sunday and I'm still very sore. I think I am tired of winter now.

Community Kitchen

Yesterday was my first shift at the Monroe County Community Kitchen. Although I didn't get to cook or even prep, it was a very satisfying experience - I put frozen vegetables on trays, made baggies of Nilla Wafers, wiped tables, arranged chairs, cleaned windows, and broke boxes down for recycling. I am hoping that after I have been there for awhile they'll let me move on to peeling potatoes or something, but I'm okay either way, really.

The other volunteers were an interesting mix - a lot of retired people, of course, two guys from a local bank, a Special Ed kid who goes every day with his teacher as a sort of occupational therapy, some totally hardcore dudes with sleeve tattoos and piercings, and an IU student from Taiwan. Everybody was really nice - the Special Ed kid's teacher says that after awhile you get to know everyone and it's just like a big party.

At the risk of being like the hypocrites who hire trumpeters to follow them around when they give alms, I will also mention that yesterday was the first test of my Lenten resolutions: I went out for Chinese with a couple of people after the lecture and although I *wanted* Kung Pao chicken or lo mein, I ordered Mapo Tofu instead. Afterwards, at the departmental party, I wanted a glass of wine, but I had pear juice instead.

I was kind of dressed up for this occasion - it's not every day we give hiring candidates the trial by fire - and as usual I was wearing gloves - my fawn-colored wrist-length ones that I love. The Horse noticed the gloves and said, "The gloves - is that a fashion statement or something else?"

I never know what to say when people ask me this - I wear the gloves to keep from mangling my fingers when I'm nervous or bored, both pretty common states at parties. But although no one wants to know about my disgusting self-injury habit, I find this sort of harmless, helpful lie very difficult. So I said, "Something else."

"I thought so," said the Horse, and Cufflinks piped up, "So you're saying they don't look good?"

I told him not to instigate, and the Horse backed down. It was very uncomfortable. I need to learn how to tell better polite social lies - would it be so bad if people thought I wore gloves just because I like gloves, or because I'm an eccentric dresser rather than an insane finger-mangler?

THIS I DO CONCEDE:

Pulp Fiction is awesome. I was completely wrong. I will have to go read The Brothers Karamazov now, too, because I may as well just do what Floss tells me.

Man there is some good eating in that movie, too - it really made me want a milkshake or a hamburger or a Pop Tart. Blueberry pancakes, blueberry pie ... after it was over Cufflinks and I had buckwheat pancakes and listened to George Gershwin.

Today I have my first shift at the soup kitchen, a metaphysics lecture by a hiring candidate, and a shindig at our head of department's house, which is always fun. I'll let you know how all that goes.

(Man, I know I've already geeked out over Common Rotation's cover of "Don't Let's Start" but seriously, if it made me smile any harder the top of my head would fall off.)

Magenta soup

The neat thing about making your own stock is that it's different every time. Last night I took the vegetable scraps saved up in the freezer and made broth so I could have lentil soup to break my fast tomorrow night. K and I have been making soups like whoa lately; I made an acorn squash and apple soup which was not nearly as nice as it sounds and K made a cabbage soup the other day and put the outer leaves in the stock pot, along with some apple peels. The result of this stock was a striking shade of magenta, but the soup smells pretty good.

Okay, so, Lent. I recognize that I probably shouldn't be posting about this because it violates my own standard that discussion of religion in a public forum is in poor taste, plus Jesus said to do your religion in private and wash your face when you're fasting and so on. But, in violation of these guidelines, I will say that this year I am planning to do Lent right. I have reasons for this, but I won't go into them here. I am going to give up not going to church for Lent, and also fast on Ash Wednesday and not eat meat on Friday (which I almost never do anyway because Saturday is market day and on Friday we never have anything in the house).

The question is, when is it okay to give something up for Lent? It kind of seems as if you shouldn't give up something if it's something you ought to give up anyway, on general principles. For example, giving up smoking for Lent. I think of this as the Piety Diet: you should not be thinking of Lent as a time to lose weight or kick a bad habit. On the other hand, it seems stupid to give up something like Facebook or Pop Tarts - things that are frivolous, but don't have anything to do with your relationship with God. If, every time I want to go on Facebook, I think about Christ and refrain - well, that just seems ... lame. So what does that leave? Is it okay to give something up if abstinence will be good for you in some not-necessarily-spiritual sense? Everyone who reads this, apart from LCA, knows more about this stuff than I do - can somebody help me out?

Caught!

Tonight is Peasant Disco and a pre-party at VTL's place, so I went by the package store to pick up a six pack of the nice local IPA and who did I run into but the Horse and his wife, my mentor. I saw the Horse and, suave as usual, jumped about a foot in the air and tried to hide, but he'd seen me and he came over and said, "Philosophy is tough, you know? We're asking the big questions, and it doesn't always seem like there are answers, and then we turn to -" he gestured at my Dragonfly IPA - "medicine."

"You caught me," I managed after a long pause.

"Well," he said reasonably, "you caught us, too."

A very nice evening last night as well - after Tractatus group, I went with Mike to the GPSO happy hour at Nick's, where I made pleasant smalltalk with a cute, large-nosed Poli Sci major. I deserve major props for this, because I just went right up to him and used the classic line, "You look familiar - do I know you from somewhere?"

"I don't think so," said the boy.

"Well, you can meet me now. I'm Emily," I said, extending my hand.

I am pleased with myself for that.

After the GPSO thing I went for pizza with some of the other firstyears in the department - Sam, Scott, Josh, and Krista - which was really pleasant. We hung around Mother Bear's until almost eleven, at which point we went to a free showing of the Darjeeling Limited at the Union. It's no Royal Tennenbaums, of course, but I wasn't disappointed. Adrian Brody is lovely as always, and Jason Schwartzman was quite good, and visually it was spectacular, as Wes Anderson's movies always are. And there was even a little Angelica Houston, who always reminds me pleasantly of my mother.

So on the whole, good times fore and aft. I love it when things work out like this.

Maybe I had too much coffee this morning...

Also, OMG, my iTunes just OF ITS OWN ACCORD played "Heart of Glass" right after "The Ballad of Lucy Jordan." This sequence is so familiar I swear it must have been on one of my dad's mix tapes when I was a kid. What're the odds? Probably higher than average if you're like me and have cribbed your musical taste wholesale from your Baby Boomer parents.

Couldn't be geekier

Oh, man, Adam Busch's band covering one of my all-time favorite They Might Be Giants songs: most dorktastically hot thing ever.


Seriously. It's Warren. Singing "Don't Let's Start." It's a good day to be me, folks.