Sons of Lapetus

Part one of the Atlas Shrugged film trilogy came out recently.  Critically, it failed.  But I bet it got some Tea Party people fired up.

When Alix and I first started dating, she suggested I read The Fountainhead and told me that I reminded her of Howard Roark, the protagonist.  It was flattering.  But for many years after that I would point out the comparison whenever someone mentioned the book, and sometimes even when they didn't.  I'm glad I stopped doing that.

Jean Jacket

I broke my collarbone when I was in kindergarten.  It's not super clear, but you can see the difference between the right and left bones in the x-ray I got as part of my health exam to work in France.  Apparently x-rays are the most efficient way for them to check for tuberculosis.

I was taking off my new jean jacket to put in my cubby.  My dad had dropped me off at kindergarten that day, and was talking with the teacher on the other side of the room.  I used the kid method of taking off a jacket - grab the collar and pull as you twist your body in weird ways until the jacket comes off - and I ended up with the jacket inside-out, off of me except at the hands where the cuffs were too tight to slip.  It looked like a jean jacket jump rope attached to my hands.  

My dad says he realized, at this point, what I was thinking and shook his head "no" to stop me.  But I had already started to use the jacket as a jump rope.  It was too short.  It caught my legs and pulled them from under me.  And, since my hands were stuck in the cuffs, it also yanked my hands back.  My shoulder took all the force on the linoleum floor.  I haven't had another jean jacket since then. 

Off the Wall

Pretty soon I'll be a teacher again.  Only a long-term substitute, though, so I'm yet to have my own classroom.  When I do, I'll need to get some morale and moral boosting posters for the walls.

Three posters stick in my mind from when I was a student.  The first encouraged students in Ms. R's math class to stick through algebraic frustrations.

Next, I had a somewhat buddhist lesson in mindfulness.

Finally, my social studies teacher had a small quote above the chalkboard.

It seemed ironic given the emphasis on rote memorization of facts in the class, and the possibility that the quote didn't originate with Eleanor Roosevelt.  But it stuck with me nonetheless.

SK8

This video's five years old now, but I thought of it as I washed the dishes the other day and Sigh Your Children came on my ipod.  I'm still impressed by the level of rollerblading my French friends had/have.  I'm also still embarrassed by how poorly I represent skateboarding, as most of my stuff is me falling and then smiling at the camera.  Good memories.

Z-Man

I spend about 1/3 of my life asleep.  If I make it to my normal life expectancy, then the amount of time I've lived so far - all 26 years of it - will go to sleep.  Fortunately, I like to sleep.  And so does my body.  I recently defeated a flu that overtook me when my defenses were down from lack of rest (I played dodgeball until 2AM, then woke up early), and the recovery took hours and hours of extra sleep.  Too much sleep.  I decided in the haze of influenza that if I could have one superpower, it'd be to not need sleep.

On the day I felt the sickness take over, I got to see Donald Glover perform at William & Mary.  It was worth the fever.  Too bad this is the best video I could find:

Nine Years of Love, Today

Jimmy Gatz

Here's a list that Gatsby made as a boy, and which his father shows Nick, our narrator, in the final chapter of The Great Gatsby:

Rise from bed ................................................. 6.00           A.M.
Dumbbell exercise and wall-scaling ................... 6.15--6.30    "
Study electricity, etc. ....................................... 7.15--8.15    "
Work .............................................................. 8.30--4.30  P.M.
Baseball and sports ......................................... 4.30--5.00    "
Practice elocution, poise and how to attain it ...... 5.00--6.00    "
Study needed inventions .................................. 7.00--9.00    "

                          GENERAL RESOLVES

No wasting time at Shafters or [a name, indecipherable]
No more smokeing or chewing.
Bath every other day
Read one improving book or magazine per week
Save $5.00 [crossed out] $3.00 per week
Be better to parents


It reminded me of a list I made, less impressive or ambitious, when I was also a boy:

- Land kickflip over two boards
- Write three new songs for Conformity Crisis
- Talk more with [current crush]
- Unlock levels in Cool Boarders 2

I remember that I wrote this list in freshman English class, although I didn't end up reading The Great Gatsby while in high school.  In fact, I first read it as I prepared to take the PRAXIS exam for my English teacher certification.  I don't know why but I didn't get much from that first read.  This time around, though, I found compelling characters and a rich plot.  And now, years after the first go, I understand why it's included in the canon of great American novels.

Only the Strong

Just like guns, capoeira can be a force for good or evil.  Unlike guns, however, gang violence dealt in capoeira doesn't kill innocent bystanders.  No drive-by cabecadas.  If anything, it makes the onlookers cheer and applaud.  Too bad all gangs can't settle things in a capoeira jogo.

Butterfly Twist

I had my third tricking session last night, but still no b-twist.  In fact, other than sharpening what I could already do, I haven't improved much.  I learned the side flip, except my form is sloppy and I sort of just chuck my body into it.  I felt discouraged, so I was happy take a break from tricking and instead play an obstacle course game in which you eliminate the other players by throwing frisbees at them. By the end of the game there were bloody knuckles and many frisbees to the face.

Then I got home and, after delicious brownies by Alix, saw this video:



As the man says, I guess I now have no excuse not to land it.  Fortunately I also found this video to help me with my technique:

Reading Lolita in Tehran

I'm not an Iranian woman. And as I finished Reading Lolita in Tehran, I decided that I'm glad to be an American man.  Not because of the hardships that Azar Nafisi details for Iranian women during the time of her story, but because my absence of firsthand knowledge of their hardships and experience is the only thing that sustained me through Nafisi's "Memoir in Books."

This is the second book I've read this year that included a "Reading Group Guide."  Both books left me unsatisfied, so maybe the idea is that a book group is necessary to make these books fulfilling.  Or maybe I'm just not the writers' target audience.

In any case, Reading Lolita in Tehran isn't bad, but it's not good - same goes for the other "book club" novel I read.  The subject captivated me, and I enjoyed how the works of Nabokov, Fitzgerald, James, and Austen played into the story.  But the narrative and the narrator both made me want to put the book down at times.