imnotasquirrel

I'm actually happy that UCLA won over Tennessee. I know I'm supposed to root against UCLA, being from USC and all, but I save my hate for when we actually play them. :P It only makes our conference look better and stronger if we beat teams from other BCS conferences. So of course I'm going to root for a Pac-10 team over non-Pac-10. Go, UCLA.

So I'm getting ready to move...to the Bronx...initially I decided not to, but now I figure, what the heck?

At my current apartment...I'm getting sick of my door falling off its hinges every couple of weeks!! Last night I had the door propped up against the wall and when I turned my back, there was a huge thudding noise. Turns out that the door had fallen over -- I was just lucky that I had crossed over to the other side of theh room, or I'd be sporting a nasty concussion right about now.

But packing is a nightmare...I have books everywhere...ahahahaha...*going crazy*

Good news is that I think I will be able to visit M in St. Louis for Thanksgiving! This was the email I sent to her (copied and pasted):

HEY ARE YOU GOING HOME FOR THANKSGIVING??? IF NOT I SHOULD COME VISIT YOU AND THEN WE CAN WATCH THE TWILIGHT MOVIE!!!!!

LESS THAN 48 HOURS BEFORE I LEAVE FOR UTAH!!!!!!!!!

I don't know why I was thinking about this today, but whatever…sorry if this seems disjointed, I'm kind of rambling here. I posted this in my Facebook account too...be warned, there are spoilers for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows if you still haven't read it yet.

Many critics describe Simon from Lord of the Flies as a Christ figure, a description that I strongly disagree with. I did a Google search to see what exactly these critics were saying. Most of the evidence seems to hinge on how nice and goodhearted Simon was, how he helped the littluns find fruit and was very spiritual. Oh, and there's also the manner in which he died.

I agree that Simon shows Christ-like traits, but that's a lot different from being a Christ figure. Mainly, in order to be a Christ figure you need to show both of the following:

1. Be pure and good of heart
3. Martyr -- willingly sacrifice yourself for the greater good

Simon fulfills the first, but not the last. What sets Jesus apart is that he willingly made an incredible sacrifice to bring about the salvation of others. And it's in this respect that the comparison breaks down. Many people say that Simon's violent death IS an example of his being a Christ symbol, but there are several key differences.

Yes, Simon was beaten to death by a crazed mob. But mere persecution does not qualify. Simon did not deliberately sacrifice himself. Plus, his death did not save anybody. In fact, I would argue that his death actually precipitated the others' descent into madness and anarchy. It was the line drawn in the sand that the kids stepped over -- once they killed Simon, there was no turning back, they became savages. So in a sense, Simon's death had the exact opposite effect to Jesus's crucifixion.

To look at some other examples in literature -- look at Harry Potter. He is much more of a convincing Christ figure. I mean heck, we were beaten over the head with how much of a GOOD and PURE heart Harry possessed (remember the sixth book? Ew). Also, unlike Simon, Harry willingly went to his death in order to save his friends. His sacrifice directly resulted in the others being protected from Voldemort's wrath. For the record, JK Rowling's lack of subtlety with the Harry/Jesus parallel was a sore spot for me, but that's neither here nor there.

Another example of sacrifice…Ender from Ender's Game. Okay, I know he didn't die, so some people might not agree with him being here. But I don't know if I believe that a character must *literally* die in order to qualify. Because Ender did make some incredible sacrifices in the interest of saving humanity (never mind the fact that the buggers were planning on staying away). He left behind his old life, his childhood, in order to save Valentine and Earth. And the result was, in a sense, the death of his former self. There was no turning back, no way for him to regain what he had lost. So Ender didn't literally die, but in a metaphorical sense... And of course we were once again beaten over the head with how good and pure Ender's heart is (even when he killed other people…:P).

Now I can't decide between anthropology and archaeology. Initially I was leaning heavily towards the first option, but am beginning to think my interests reflect the second. Maybe a combination.

I also really need to stop buying books. Not only am I spending too much money, I literally have nowhere to put them. My room is tiny. I'm thinking of renting a mini storage room for the purpose of stashing the surplus.

Speaking of books, I was able to get copies of the following over the weekend:

Daily Life in Palestine during the Time of Christ
Daily Life of the Etruscans
Daily Life in Ancient India, 200 BC - 700 AD
Daily Life in China on the Eve of the Mongol Invasion
Medieval Times
…as well as some fluffy fiction for light reading (why hello there, Fear Street! Nice to see you again!)

Exciting! My areas of interest are children & education, and these societies' concepts of adolescence. Those are always the chapters I read first. Oh, I always give the chapters on food an early look-see as well, but those always make me hungry.

I already have a book on daily life in ancient Greece, but am trying to see if I can find one with heavy emphasis on Sparta, as I'm particularly intrigued with Sparta's education system.

In college, I used to volunteer at the California Science Center, as an animal care assistant. It was pretty fun -- I got to handle chicks (cute, but stinky), rats, and lizards. There was one frog on exhibit that was very aggressive, and you had to be very careful when dropping food into his tank, because the bastard liked chomping on your fingers (enough to draw blood). Oh, and we had this HUGE container filled with grasshoppers, which provided the bulk of our reptilian friends' diets. So I had to get used to putting my head into the container to get at them. It's unnerving, having these insect swarm all over your hand. I think it took me until the third shift before I could actually do it.

The ONE thing I couldn't get used to was the cockroach exhibit. The CSC has (had?) a bunch of Madagascar hissing cockroaches -- if you google it, you will see that these particular cockroaches are on a lot of "scariest creepy crawlies ever" list. They're not mean; most websites I've been to say that they're actually very docile and make good pets. But…ahhhh, they're so CREEPY! Occasionally we were supposed to clean the cockroach tank and…ugh ugh ugh…blargh. My supervisor gave me gloves to wear, but even that couldn't help the shivers than ran up my back any time I had to pick up a cockroach. It was…so…gross. Fortunately we didn't have to do this all the time, otherwise I might've had a nervous breakdown. My supervisor thought it was funny…but cockroaches freak me out. Especially the ones that hiss. Good grief. That is one part of the position that I don't miss…those blasted insects. Yuck.

I'm stealing the following questionnaire (about books and reading habits) from another blog.

Do you prefer hard copy or electronic? Hard copy by far!

When going into a store to buy a book, have you then bought a second title? Yes, but I hardly ever go into a bookstore with a particular book in mind to begin with. I am the browsing queen, I spend a great deal of time just poring over the shelves (or searching through Amazon). OT: Once someone said to me, "You read the most random books…" and that's probably because I don't limit myself to what's received the most press and attention. I actually don't trust bestseller lists that much -- I've found out that my tastes rarely match up with what's popular.

Have you bought a book based on the cover alone? No. An intriguing cover will make me pick up the book and read the flap of the dust jacket, but that's about it.

Have you ever bought a book based on the back cover copy? (what the heck, let’s ask). No. If it's intriguing I'll try reading the first few chapters. If the writing doesn't grab me, forget it.

How often have you bought a book based on a friend or family member’s recommendation? Never. Similar to what I said above, my tastes don't really match up with my friend and family's. If the book sounds interesting, I will look it up. If it still sounds interesting (which usually isn't the case), then I might get it. Although I can't remember if that's ever actually happened. ETA: Wait! I remember once that E gave me a book for my birthday (The God of Small Things), and I enjoyed it. The author's stylistic pretension got on my nerves because it seemed too affected, but I still liked the story overall. Even though I didn't actually buy the book myself...

Have you ever bought a book because I mentioned it on this blog? If so, which book(s). (oh boy!) No. I ganked this survey from a literary agent's blog -- she represents a lot of romance fiction (some with a supernatural/SF bent) and that's not really my thing.

How many books do you buy in a year? Way too many. I don't have enough room in my apartment.

How many books do you check out from the library in a year? Ah, I used to check out the maximum number per week (about 30) when I lived in CA. Nowadays, I hate the NY library system, plus it's inconvenient for me in terms of travel, so I hardly check out anything. I don't think I've been to the library for almost a year.

Oh, and I'm going to post this quote that I have on Facebook, because I love it:

"The sure mark of an unliterary man is that he considers "I've read it already" to be a conclusive argument against reading a work.... Those who read great works, on the other hand, will read the same work ten, twenty or thirty times during the course of their life. " -- C.S. Lewis

Random blogthing quizzes…

What the Beach Test Says About You

You are a loner, and you're fine with that. You find the most fulfillment in solitude. And you never feel more lonely than when you're in a crowd. You have cold feet when it comes to love. You have a lot of uncertainty until you convince yourself to dive right in. You are deeply passionate about several things in your life. You're not passionate about much... and the few passions you have are truly obsessions. Your sense of humor is very physical. Your facial expressions or spot on imitations of people are hilarious.

Your Power Bird is a Vulture

You are always changing your life and the lives of those around you. You aren't afraid to move on from what holds you back. Energetic and powerful, you have a nearly unlimited capacity for success. You know how to "go with the flow" and take advantage of what is given to you.

But vultures are so ugly. :( I = superficial.

Blech. It is incredibly hot and humid here right now. The worst part is knowing that this won't even be the worst of it. July will be much, much worse. I finally caved in and bought a portable air conditioner. Expensive, but I want to be able to actually sleep at night.

Top 30 animated movies according to Yahoo users

Some impressions from the list:

1. Nemo = OVERRATED.

2. Mulan should be higher. Way higher. Like, how did Horton Hears a Who, Shrek, Shrek 2, Cars, Monsters Inc., and Ratatouille (!) outrank it?

3. Nemo = vastly overrated.

4. Notice the overrepresentation of CGI movies on the list. Any list that would have Horton, Cars, Over the Hedge, and Ice Age: The Meltdown is a joke. I think moviegoers have a short memory. It's like when a list comes out of the best movies of all time, and 50% of the movies are from 1990 or later. Not that they're not good movies (although personally I don't think much of any of the four movies I mentioned), but the best animated movies ever? Heck no.

5. Did I mention that Nemo is overrated?

6. Lion King so totally pwns Nemo's clownfish butt.

I absolutely love Mulan. Yes, I know it completely bastardizes the source material. But it's still a good story in its own right. The songs aren't the best (although I have a guilty pleasure adoration of "I'll Make a Man Out of You" and "Reflections"). And Mulan is one of the few Disney heroines who actually seems kick-ass. I read one interview that starts off with this line: Female heroes permeate most of Disney's animated movies, but this is the first time they've given her real strength. So very true. And the one scene where the Huns appear on top of the snowy mountain? That action sequence was better than a lot of live-action movies.

Mr. Rogers was the awesomest person to have ever awesomed.

2. He Made Thieves Think Twice
According to a TV Guide piece on him, Fred Rogers drove a plain old Impala for years. One day, however, the car was stolen from the street near the TV station. When Rogers filed a police report, the story was picked up by every newspaper, radio and media outlet around town. Amazingly, within 48 hours the car was left in the exact spot where it was taken from, with an apology on the dashboard. It read, “If we’d known it was yours, we never would have taken it.”

See, even criminals liked him! Although I think the tale is a bit apocryphal...

Children's television just isn't the same without him. What role models do kids have now? Hannah Montana?

My two coworkers (the ones in my department) are both guys. They're really nice, but such sports nuts! Haha…harmless enough, I guess…we all have our passions in life. And at least they're not psycho crazy about it.

Still, though…I couldn't care less about sports (unless it's USC football, and even then it's only to a limited extent), so we don't have a lot in common. :P

I need to be somewhere where people like to talk about books and stuff. It sucks that E's in China right now. She's usually the person I talk to about the most random things. Just…you know…whatever pops into my head.

Speaking of books, what's up with all this craziness surrounding Twilight? I tried reading it. Bella is useless, and OMG ALL OF THE GUYS KEEP FALLING FOR HER!!! Mary Sue Alert! And Edward…um, okay. The guy is a stalker. And in the movie trailer, Robert Pattinson plays him like a choirboy serial killer.

The books are entertaining to read, but in the same way that Eragon is entertaining to read. That is, I love to hate them.

Speaking of Eragon (repetitive segue, I know), the third book is coming out in September. It's called Brisingr. Tee hee hee. Sadly, I will most likely purchase a copy as soon as it comes out. Skipping the midnight party though, that would just be embarrassing.

Moving on to something different…I first got interested in linguistics when I picked up a copy of Orwell's 1984. Most people focus on Big Brother, but for me, it was all about newspeak, baby. But something about Orwell's newspeak always bothered me. Okay, so Syme talks about how thoughtcrime will be impossible because newspeak is in the business of destroying words, not building them. He points out how they are getting rid of the word "bad" and that the destruction of such words will effectively prevent thoughtcrime. But that implies that "bad" inherently means something, um, bad. Really, newspeak isn't getting rid of the bad words. After all, "ungood" (and "doubleplusungood") is a synonym for "bad." The concept (i.e. the opposite of good) is still there. Consequently, thoughtcrime WILL still occur. It will only be eradicated once the very idea is erased -- when words don't exist for it.

It's been over a decade since I read the book, though, so I might be forgetting some details.

Something I asked E…language supposedly shapes how we think and view the world. And by that, I mean how our brains are wired. There is a language out there in the world where people do not have words for any number higher than two. Anything after 2 is simply classified as "many." So does that mean that the speakers of said language literally cannot differentiate between 4 and 5? Like, if you had 4 people in one group, and 5 people in another, would they be able to tell which group is larger? I don't remember what language this is, though...

My mom came to visit me over the weekend. It was mostly fun. We saw Grease on Broadway, my first time ever watching the show. The songs were fun -- I was already familiar with "Summer Nights" because so many people sing it for karaoke -- but I hated the story. Especially the end. So, okay, Sandy decides to completely change her image to fit in with the less-than-welcoming greasers. And for some reason this is portrayed as awesome and cool, as Sandy is then accepted into the clique.

Am I supposed to feel good about this sort of story?

Apparently restaurant Babbo (here in NYC) is considered to be one of the toughest places in the whole country when it comes to booking reservations. From one article I read:

As Randy Ross, assistant chief concierge of New York's Four Seasons Hotel explains, they call Per Se every day to waitlist guests, so they know the restaurant's managers well; out of 100 requests, they have a success rate of 10-15. But even with the Four Seasons' clout, there are some tables that elude them.

"Babbo [Mario Batali's Greenwich Village Italian that has been sold out 30 days in advance since its opening in 1998] is our worst nightmare," he says. "It's always no. They don't have a waitlist so if there's a cancellation, they don't play favorites. Generally if guests ask for it, we try to make other suggestions."

This is funny. When E and T came to visit a year ago, T really wanted to try this place out. So E and I were all, "Okay, whatever, go for it," and she snagged a table. I don't know how far in advance she called...maybe we just got really lucky.

The food is good. But is it that good? Well, I don't think so. There's an awful lot of hype that comes with being called one of the hardest spots to book a reservation. How could any restaurant live up to that? I suppose I should be glad that I didn't know about this when I actually went, or else I'd have been sorely disappointed.

The quail (I think) was yummy, though.