Quick Linkage

A very moving essay on late-term abortion, the Achilles heel of the reproductive rights movement, from a woman who learned that her child would not be able to survive outside the womb, decided to terminate, and eventually got infected when the fetus died. Stories like these, from actual women who have lived the experiences the rest of us feel free to opine about, should be required reading.

On a similar note, I have already contacted my representative about this proposal, which could severely limit low-income women's access to contraception. You should, too.

The G.D.

First, you should really go make this and eat it, as soon as possible. It is amazing like the Mets.

Second, and unrelated to food, here is an interpersonal relations question. Last night Cufflinks and I were watching Road to Brazil and I used the word "goddamn" in conversation, as I occasionally do, possibly as a result of reading a lot of Salinger in my formative years. I try not to swear in front of Cufflinks because of his extreme religiousity, but I guess I don't think of what he referred to as "the G.D." as serious swearing. I guess this is because when I was younger and was considering incorporating swears into my vocabulary, my father told me that profanity was okay, but scatological swears were not.

Cufflinks said that he wasn't okay with "the G.D." and I apologized, but it rankled a bit. On the one hand, we are supposed to say when something bothers us so we can talk it out. This is a good policy that has been serving us fairly well, considering what an odd match we are, each of us finding all of the other's values anathema and appalling. So on that count, I am glad he said it bothered him, because now I will know not to do it again.

But on the other hand, I feel that Cufflinks should not be allowed to tell me what words I can and can't use. It feels a little infantilizing. Not to mention, now I'm worried that the other Batman-and-Robin-style non-swears I use in his presence, like "Holy cats!" might also be unacceptable. I don't know how I should react to this. My inclination is to say he can't tell me what to do, but I'll voluntarily refrain from using expressions that offend him - this I realize is not a consistent position. Thoughts?

(And if you're asking yourself why I keep the guy around, here's an example: he may have gotten us an invitation to a Kentucky Derby party somewhere down South a friend's house, where the women all wear big hats and where he will wear a seersucker suit if we go. Big hats! Seersucker! Mint juleps? I don't even know! The kid's all right, is what I'm sayin'.)

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? )

In

You're not supposed to choose a grad school based on your hope of working with one specific professor, they told me. He or she* might move on to greener pastures (ahem, JC I am looking at you), or it might turn out that you don't work very well with this person after all. I pretty much ignored this advice, and I came out here with the notion that I would be working with the Badger, our resident logician. (I am calling him that because he is badgerlike and probably Google searches his own name from time to time, because don't we all, and he doesn't need to read what I say about him.)

The Badger is extremely terrifying, a quality I appreciate in a professor. He has very courtly manners but always seems to be shouting. He calls me "ma'am." His photograph on the faculty faceboard in the lounge shows him from behind, looking out the window, and probably brooding. I feel a subdued wish to have him tell me how to run my life, and for this reason it is probably for the best that the Badger is not my adviser ... yet.

Therefore I am pleased when the Badger appears to take an interest in me - when he says things like, 'as one logician to another' or offers to let me read the drafts of a paper he's working on, or invites me to participate in a Philosophy of Mathematics discussion group. Because of this last, I am reading Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. It is every bit as long and confusing as the Philosophical Investigations, but without the classic thought exercises and compelling metaphors. Not to mention, who is more dreamy:

or

I thought so.

*On the subject of "he or she," I read an interesting article yesterday in Bitch about gender-neutral pronouns, as an alternative to the clunky "he or she", the "ungrammatical" singular "they", or the sexist "his." Although I am, on the whole, supportive of attempts to make our language as inclusive as possible (for instance, I supported Smith College's decision to change "she" to "the student" in our school constitution), I cannot get behind these gender neutral pronouns. No one uses words like "zie," "per," or "hirself," and speaking as a linguist, rather than a feminist, they should not be made to. New words are introduced into English all the time, but as a rule they are not these sorts of words. Pronouns are structural, and while new pronouns can evolve naturally (the article points out that "they," "them," and "their" were originally from Scandinavian) they cannot be introduced artificially.

That said, if I should meet somebody who really wants to be addressed using gender-neutral pronouns, I'd probably give it the old college try, because I am nice like that.

THINGS I LOVE:

1. The way my subconscious mind is busy cranking out answers to things even when I am not paying attention: I tried to take a nap this afternoon but was shaken from a doze when I figured out how to do one of the proofs on my set theory homework.
2. The skin that forms on top of milk when you heat it
3. Baked lentils with cheese
4. Watching due South
5. Reading Laurie Colwin with a cup of cocoa -- I mean, reading Kant. Yes.