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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.
3 comments:
One reason to be glad you are NOT at CCNY is the following quote:
"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."
Another would be "rat-infested apartment in Queens".
I'd complain to the laundromat people about the damp laundry. That shouldn't happen according to MJA who ran one for a while.
It could have been even worse. While a law student, I interned at a certain federal agency and my tasks included transcribing tapes of bad guys' tete-a-tetes. Believe me, mumbling and coughing are sometimes the least disgusting part of what recordings can pick up.
It probably wouldn't have been rat-infested, but it would likely have been an illegal conversion the size of a walk-in closet and requiring you to share a bathroom and kitchen with six other people.
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