Wednesday, July 25, 2007
I scheduled an appointment this afternoon to renew the prescription on my pain medication. My hip feels only marginally better than it did the day after my bike wreck a week-and-a-half ago, and my ribs ache more than they did before- I must have aggravated them somehow. Sitting up out of bed and changing into and out of clothes hurts. Bending over to double-tie my shoes hurts. Walking around, sitting down, rising from a sitting position, putting weight on my right leg, pivoting... hurt. Poor Lauree.
My doctor recommended I report the accident, since it occurred on campus and the University might be held liable. I called the number last week, but the office moved or changed the number. I shall try again tomorrow. Because I have not healed, I might have to start physical therapy, on no insurance. That would be very ugly indeed.
I hope someone ran over the asshole who stole my bike and got me into this pickle in the first place. I hope he gets syphilis.
[Lauree Frances Keith concluded this diatribe at 7:27 PM]
I Can Dance If I Want
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
I am dropping money left and right. It also comes from below. I consider all these expenditures a huge, beginning-of-the-school year binge. Granted, school begins a month from now, but I prefer to get a head start on everything.
Motor vehicle A 1989 Dodge Aries, donated by a couple who are moving to Florida. Minor repairs add to the cost, but the total cost is entirely mitigated by the relief from stress this purchase gives me. I place Adrian Hargrove high on my Tolerance Scale, but her driving will get me killed one day. I need to be my own chauffeur.
Laptop Every college student needs a laptop. I have felt entirely inadequate without one. There are vital programs (iTunes, Greek texts) I cannot download at the library. Plus, everyone at the coffee shop has one, even most of the old people. I can't let them win. Nevermind that they don't know we're in competition. I would have spent this afternoon teaching myself to set it up, but I need to wait until after I finish reading for an American government exam tomorrow. It has been pointed out to me that I might accomplish this last task the quicker for avoiding the computer, but I've never been productive a day in my life, and I certainly have no intent to begin now.
More books I'll never read
1. Allen and Greenough's New Latin Grammar, edited by James B. Greenough: A recommend for Latinists.
2. The Clown, a novel by Heinrich Böll. I read a couple of his short stories auf Deutsch in German class a year ago. Sehr gut.
3. Greek Grammar, edited by Herbert Weir Smyth. Dr. Lavigne would be cross with me if I were to appear for class without this text clutched possessively to my chest.
4. The Plague, by Albert Camus. I just read The Stranger and have fallen in love.
5. The Fall, by Albert Camus. It has to be good: how can it not, when the author has a last name with the final letter unpronounced?
6. The Myth of Sisyphus: And Other Essays, a collection of works by Albert Camus. Some time ago (perhaps a year or more), a friend of mine read a paper incorporating analysis of the title essay with another text. I forgot the other text, but I adore the Sisyphus myth.
7. The Sorrows of Young Werther, by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. I could never consider myself any sort of German scholar without having read this.
8. A History of Greek Literature: From Homer to the Hellenistic Period, by
Albrecht Dihle. This was on the must-read list for a graduate program I was researching a few days ago. I need to familiarize myself with this sort of thing over the next few years, anyhow. Again, a head start.
9. The Cambridge Companion to Greek Tragedy, edited by P. E. Easterling. I suspect the university library has a copy or two of this, but I would use it enough that I would prefer to have my own copy.
Musik
1. Oasis - "Familiar to Millions: Live At Wembley" with Dick Carruthers (the DVD). Over winter break, April introduced me to live Oasis, to which a man or two seems to have contributed his voice, as opposed to the nasal-toned images I have retained from my junior high-hood Oasis.
2. "Dangerous and Moving" by t.A.T.u. One of the TAs introduced me to this on a German Club excursion over a year ago. Two attractive Russian lesbians singing together... how could anyone deny the appeal?
3. "200 Km/H in the Wrong Lane" by t.A.T.u. I felt I needed a double-dose of this stuff. I own relatively few albums by female artists, anyway.
4. "Jagged Little Pill" by Alanis Morissette. I listened to this album everywhere and all the time when it came out. I was in the fifth grade. Between then and now, I haven't kept up with her music much, but thanks to the Last.fm application for my Facebook account, I have been reintroduced and consequently/fatally seduced.
5. "XO" by Elliott Smith. This album contains the first of his songs I ever heard (way back in junior high, again).
6. "Our Constant Concern" by Mates of State. The only band I have seen in Lubbock. Kimmy took me out to see them freshman year, and I actually had a decent time, in spite of my usual refusal ever to have a good time. But then, that's probably just Kimmy- she's a doll.
7. "Hittin the Hi Spots" by Joe Brown. I first heard him on the tribute album made in memory of George Harrison. He apparently played in Hamburg as the Beatles were starting out.
8. "21 #1 Hits: The Ultimate Collection" by Buck Owens. After listening to a few of the songs, I decided I had to have this. His version of "Johnny B. Goode" exceeds expectations.
9. "Modern Life Is Rubbish" by Blur. This group is another throwback to junior high: they had one hit I remembered, after which I have sought out and come to like other things.
10. "Blur" by... Blur. A shocker.
11. "The Wildest Organ in Town!/Club Meeting", apparently a combination of two hit albums by Billy Preston. He is as well an artist of whom I hadn't heard, until I listened to the George Harrison tribute. He covers several famous songs. What I heard, I liked. So I need this.
12. "Alanis Unplugged", a second necessary item featuring Alanis Morissette. I like the whininess.
Starbucks I have no excuse for spending $3.85 + tax on a frappuccino.
[Lauree Frances Keith concluded this diatribe at 4:28 PM]
May Cause Sleepiness
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Yesterday I went to a bike shop and had myself fitted for a street bike. Es war sehr teuer. Then I took a public policy exam, which went fairly well, considering that I had not studied nearly as much as I could or should have. I walked my bike to the shop afterward, because I had discovered upon riding it that the seat sat too high. On the way back to campus, I ran into Amanda and Steve, who informed me a new high school in Raleigh has offered him a Latin teaching position. Steve will make these kids happy to be alive.
Afterward, I met with someone who works in the basement of the mass communications building about purchasing his laptop. It is lightweight, doesn't heat up too much, and will fit neatly into my backpack. Ausgezeichnet. He promised to set it up for me today and this evening, and will call later today or tomorrow so that I may fetch it. I am thrilled.
But, I am incredibly sore and sleepy. Last night I took the new bike out around campus, to get used to it, and managed to wipe out. The bike absorbs very little shock, and when I went over a dip in the road, it veered sharply left and began to tip. I suppose I over-compensated and subsequently crashed to the ground, with the entire right side of my body hitting the pavement.
Against all sensibility, I had worn heavy black pants on a searing-hot day, which spared my leg any nasty road burn. However, my temple smacked against the concrete, bled, and swelled a little. The road scraped plenty of skin from my elbow, which also began to swell immediately. The fall bruised a couple of the unconnected ribs behind my breast. That still hurts, even after the narcotic pain medications I have been prescribed.
The worst pain comes from my thigh and hip. Without pain medication, I cannot walk. Last night I lay in the street, moaning, for about thirty seconds, then spent an additional ninety or thereabouts trying to get up. I hobbled to the dorm, walking the bike. A young man driving by in a minivan paused to talk to me, for as he approached, he thought I was some kid walking a bike he had had stolen earlier. I explained the situation in which I had found myself, and he offered advice on where and how to acquire insurance.
As he drove off, I chastised myself for not having asked for a ride. When I finally came to my room, I was almost too tired to dress the wounds. But the pain in my leg and hip made getting into bed a torturous process. Around one-thirty I woke up, needing to urinate, but almost could not get out of bed. But I then remembered I still had a few pain pills from last month, which worked well enough to get me through the morning.
To condense and conclude this narrative, I checked into the emergency room for a CAT scan and a little prodding. My brains are not leaking, so I was released with one prescription for painkillers and another for inflammation.
The painkillers make me sleepy. It is bedtime.
[Lauree Frances Keith concluded this diatribe at 4:11 PM]
The Wildest Organ In Town
Saturday, July 14, 2007
Over the weekend I shall endeavour to a) acquire a new bike for cheap and b) study for a political science exam Monday. I also need to complete readings and take an on-line exam for the other political science course in which I am enrolled. I hope to make these two easy GPA-boosters, since I received several Bs sophomore year that dragged me down to about a 3.7.
I love NetFlix. A couple of days ago I watched The Producers with a friend. Broderick was boring and predictable for the most part, but Nathan Lane always makes me giggle. Roger Bart had hilarious scenes as well. Tomorrow morning (during an office shift) I have scheduled Nosferatu. Ausgezeichnet.
[Lauree Frances Keith concluded this diatribe at 1:35 PM]
I Will Cut Them
Friday, July 13, 2007
Some conscience-less son-of-a-dousche stole my bike from the rack outside the coffee shop last night or ridiculously early this morning. I am upset, for I had finally grown accustomed and comfortable with riding it around my usual lurks. I spent much of this morning scanning the bike racks on campus, but my little black-and-red Mongoose with its mangled seat (chewed upon by a teething black lab puppy) surfaced nowhere.
I chose not to sit through my noon class, for I had forgotten to read the on-line article assignment and, moreover, simply felt too exhausted from having arisen early, on little sleep, to sit through a lecture. I checked e-mails at the library, then returned to my dorm room for an hour-long respite from full wakefulness. Afterward I felt less tired but increasingly depressed and broody, besides being somewhat anxious about an appointment I had scheduled to meet with Dr. Lavigne at four, to notify him I cannot/do not want to serve as Classical Society President.
At the end of the spring semester, he essentially twisted me by the arm to accept leadership of a club that has no real reason for existence, other than perhaps to secure funding for guest lecturers. Undergraduates rarely, if ever, attend meetings, I find the events boring, and I feel too disconnected from everyone who does participate to genuinely enjoy myself. The whole situation only makes me more depressed, and after three years of going nowhere I am entirely jaded and unmotivated. I understand that the club, and the classics program in general, needs to expand, but I can do nothing for it, and at this point I need to focus on getting into a decent graduate program.
After breaking up with Dr. Lavigne, I still felt miserable and weary of life, so I called one of the Latin teachers and invited myself to dinner with her. Thankfully, she was as bored as I, and suggested we eat Vietnamese. This lightened my mood tremendously, and I reciprocated with the suggestion that we eat frozen custard. The custard probably weighed more than the noodles and pork in my dish, but it made me feel much better, although in the back of my mind I am still disturbed about the disappearance of my bike.
I would like to wake up one day and not feel completely miserable, for once. Considering that I have all my limbs, I hardly have anything to complain about. My greatest concern is that I will die by velociraptor attack, because it could only happen to me.
They're everywhere.
[Lauree Frances Keith concluded this diatribe at 7:22 PM]
A Contradiction In Terms
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
After classes ended at two this afternoon, I (mostly) finished reading an old Penguin Classics edition of Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War. I ordered it a long time ago from an independent seller somewhere, who did not bother to inform me the last forty pages were never printed- instead, a duplicate copy of the four appendices, a guide to the classical Greek monetary system, the bibliography, a selection of further readings, and more books one might purchase from the Penguin Classics series consumes the space where pages 560-599 rightly ought to be. How the Peloponnesian War ended remains ever a mystery.
I enrolled in the two introductory political science courses and dutifully attended the first day of class, with my usual apprehension toward core curricula that I have already demonstrated proficiency in, having graduated from public high school. But both professors are engaging enough and reasonable insofar as concerns expectations. After the first class I stayed in the room (for my next class was initially located therein) and conversed with the professor about post-bacc study, how to make academic connections, demographics and the political climate of Lubbock versus Houston, etc. I had been one of the people answering questions and making comments during class, so he was curious about my interests. The next professor listed off names alphabetically from the first half of his roll sheet, to notify the lot of us that we were to go downstairs as part of another section that hadn't quite achieved the enrollment quota. The move at first upset me a little, until I discovered the required books for this section are cheaper. This professor posts lecture slides online and uses a text that reduces topics and definitions to their most basic forms. I am pleased, for I certainly have no desire to be challenged.
Between classes and between studying and work, I read through most of the introduction for the Penguin Classics edition of Ovid's erotic poetry. I had begun them in high school, but I seem to have reshelved the book without finishing, for I discovered a bookmark in the middle of it some months ago. The Ars Amatoria are entertaining, as I recall from the snippets I've read here and there.
I put Benjamin aside, but hope to finish him this evening, after I read the first chapter from one of my government texts. After Benjamin, I intend to tear through a play by Camus.
I love books and I hate people, although either smell odd sometimes.
[Lauree Frances Keith concluded this diatribe at 9:53 PM]
Experience Recalled Through Scent
Sunday, July 08, 2007
Yesterday morning, as I hitched my bike at the student recreation center, I inhaled several deep whiffs of animal (presumably dog, possibly wild rabbit) shit mingled with bedewed grass. The smell recalled my time at a summer day camp between fifth and sixth grade: specifically, of an instance when a boy named Levi stepped in some deer crap one wet morning and released precisely this noxious odour. He traisped around for some while, carrying the scent with him, before one of the counselors noticed and chastised him, as though he had stepped in the stuff for the express purpose of disturbing the stillness of the morning via gaseous fumes of excrement. I was of the opinion that the unfortunate Levi had merely failed to perceive the pile of shit into which he stepped.
It's hardly worth cataloguing all the shit I stumble into. Oi weh.
[Lauree Frances Keith concluded this diatribe at 8:35 AM]
Mommy, Daddy Slammed My Face In The Door
Friday, July 06, 2007
Yesterday I consumed a goodly chunk of Illuminations: Essays and Reflections, a recommendation for which I am grateful, as it does not hurt my head. The first essay concerns reflections on book collecting and, as I read it last night, it relieved me of the anxiety I sometimes suffer due to the fact that I have a voluminous library collection that consists mostly of books I have not flipped through since their purchase. The list (and what follows is by no means comprehensive) is a little ridiculous: Thus Spake Zarathustra, The Travels of Marco Polo, Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature, Angela's Ashes, Dolores Claiborne, The Peloponnesian War, Wuthering Heights, The Cambridge History of Medieval English Literature, The Bonesetter's Daughter, Archaeology of Knowledge, Ulysses, Jude the Obscure, The Latin Sexual Vocabulary, The Collected Poems of Emily Dickinson, Candide, The Foundation Trilogy, The Weimar Republic: The Crisis of Classical Modernity, Queen of the Damned, The Greek War of Independence: The Struggle for Freedom from the Ottoman Oppression and the Birth of the Modern Greek Nation, Not Much Fun: The Lost Poems of Dorothy Parker, The Web and the Rock, The Cambridge Illustrated History of Ancient Greece, Player Piano, The Making of Modern Japan, Groucho Marx: A Photographic Journey... I'll read them someday, when I get around to it.
[Lauree Frances Keith concluded this diatribe at 3:16 PM]
The Moon Sometime Also Look Like A "C"
Monday, July 02, 2007
...but you no can eat that!
The green gel pen I used to take notes from an article I read this afternoon thrice ejaculated on my inner arm below the wrist. The contrast between the three splotches and the tone of my flesh moves me to seize the pen and colour my entire forearm green, if only to live with a green arm for a few hours. The thought of so much ink wasted, however, restrains the urge.
I wish I could write well. Perhaps if I drop out of school and quit my job, I shall have time to read everything I want to read and to write about everything that occurs to me as it occurs to me. As the situation now stands, I forget most of any ingenious, planet-altering notion before I've even thought it.
Usually, when I find any time to think, I realize I am sitting around, twiddling my thumbs, wondering how I am going to die and whether that might have any profound impact on the life of an ant or my friends or old people who play bingo. Last month I avoided death by spider attack, but nothing can convince me I might successfully navigate through the rest of my life without being attacked by an arachnid again. The little beasts lurk everywhere. They probably come out at night from between the books on my shelves, to leer with eight beady eyes at me as I slumber.
I would be just the sort of person to die from spider attack.
[Lauree Frances Keith concluded this diatribe at 2:59 PM]