The Sound and the Fury

So tragedy strikes the North Shore again.  Once again involving underage alcohol consumption.  This time [Jessie], 17, was drinking with some friends who then went downtown.  One friend’s father owned a carpet warehouse, and so the group went up on the roof to look at the skyline.  While walking and holding hands with her boyfriend, Jessica stepped on a skylight and fell 45 ft. to the warehouse floor.  She died instantly.  Her drunken friends then tried for two hours to save her by dangling a 20 ft. rope down through the skylight.  Only after the the two hours did anyone get called.  Further details are here.

It might be interesting to note that [Jessie] was dating [John's] twin at the time [John} was killed last fall in a drunk driving crash.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all convictions, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

W.B. Yeats

Con la mente de las mariposas y las tormentas,
miro el mundo con un poquito de meido,
y canto los milagros.

El sabor de verde!
Con luces y flores,
arboles y pescas,
sin preguntas.

Ni yo ni tu podemos
vivir sin masticacion.

A lot of stuff happening recently/going to happen soon. Last night I had diner at Cafe Coco. The food was okay, as usual, but we sat in back and got to hear the tail end of a set by a pretty cool jazz band. They had a guitar, a tenor sax, a string bass, and a drum set, which made for pretty neat instrumentation. They weren’t amazing, but they did play “St. Tomas” which is a plus.

Last week I went to Virago, a new sushi fusion restaurant, with Kevin, Jayda, and Kevin’s friend Nick. Unfortunately I was thoroughly unimpressed. The wait was very long (admittedly we should have made reservations), the seating was terrible/uncomfortable (though apparently they have better seats in the back), the service was kind of slow, and the sushi was fusion (good if you like fusion sushi, but only okay if you’re a purist). I don’t mean to be so down on the restaurant, but It was supposed to be the hippest place in Nashville. Apparently it’s so hip that they can get away with not giving patrons enough light to differentiate between their drink and their chopsticks. Probably a good place if you make a reservation, enjoy fusion, and/or are coming for drinks. It seemed like an amazing place for drinks, actually, though not so much for diner.

I just saw a opposum while I was coming back from diner. It wasn’t the largest I’ve seen, but it was pretty close. It just kind of looked at me and ambled away. Anyway, I’ve got to get working on my papers. Updates as time allows.

Plant of the Post: Bulbophyllum grandiflorum (an orchid)
What you’re looking at are the three sepals of the flower (a.k.a. not the petals). The petals are actually really, really tiny, and are hidden by the sepals in this photo.

Currently listening to:   !!!    (and getting excited for Lollapalooza)
Currently reading:   Gilead by Marilynne Robinson

Sorry for the lack of posting. Life’s been crazy lately. I won’t bore you with the details. Let’s just say I have eight papers and three tests between now and the end of the year (May 3rd for me). Also, Kevin’s brother lives in the dorm next to the one that got fired on at Virginia Tech. (he’s fine, don’t worry), and my good friend’s grandfather just died. I know none of those directly effect me, but it’s still upsetting and difficult, if only because I don’t like it when my friends are upset or hurting.

I’m finally done with my East Asian Traditions class. I’ve turned in the last paper and taken the test. The only thing I have to do for Botany is write up my four greenhouse journals. That shouldn’t be a hard task, but for some reason it’s taking me forever. Paper due Tuesday for American Music, and a final on the 3rd. For Shakespeare I have to write a final paper (only four pages, but a lot of thinking) and edit my first paper to make it to fit a prompt. Hopefully that shouldn’t be too bad. I really should turn that in on Monday, out of consideration for her time; it would be bad if I turned it in with the final in terms of her grading papers. My African Music professor has assigned some crazy final where we have to write the script for a play elucidating ideas about the relationship between music and AIDS in Uganda as outlined in a book that he wrote. It’s one of those assignments that have the deceiving guise of allowing a great deal of creativity, but in reality expect very specific things. In this case I have to regurgitate what he wrote in his book. Sounds easy, but I really don’t understand the way he thinks.

Also, job applications are somehow taking me forever. You would think that filling them out would be an easy task, but forms are considerably more difficult than they should be. I picked my classes for next semester, though. Here they are:
Jewish American Life (to fulfill a requirement)
Introduction to Theater
Gender and Sexuality (from the philosophy department)
Literary and Cultural Analysis: The South and Faulkner….soooo exited for this class!
Intermediate Poetry Workshop …should be pretty intense and very awesome

Here’s perhaps the best t-shirt design I’ve ever seen:

It’s entitled “The Communist Party.” Note Marx throwing the “rock on” horns. Check out other really cool t-shirt designs here.

Plant of the post: Adansonia or the Baobab Tree