Maybe it's my east coast-iness. Coffee, bagels, and the daily paper at the breakfast table equal happiness to me. Yesterday I had two cups of coffee for the first time in about a month. Coffee consumption comes in three stages for me:
Stage One: Universal love. This is when I think, "I wanna rock! Gotta call some old friends. I knew there was a brotherhood of man. Get yer done! etc".
Stage Two: Detached criticism. In this stage I am best at thinking analytically. Not too much emotion. Super rational.
Stage Three: Apocalyptic Brain Hemorrhaging. In this final stage I realize that the first two stages were not worth the finale. "I live in a war zone/ fragility in human nature..." It's sucks.
At some point combining all three stages yesterday I remembered this extreme genius mathematician that my older brother told me about: Paul Erdos. It was said that he came up with the phrase, "a mathematician is a machine for turning coffee into thermos". He was also a meth addict. During WW2 he would knock on the door of friends of his (he was Jewish and had to escape the Nazi force then) and say, "My brain is open, let me in". Then he would work on mathematical theory for a few days and move to his next house. He carried just a suitcase around, drank tons of coffee, and changed the world of mathematics with this sort of lifestyle. A friend bet him that he could not go one month without coffee consumption. Paul Erdos won the bet but said that the world of math was set back an entire month because of his lack of caffeine. As a really horrible side note (and also a testament of his genius), because of the fragile and war torn time he was living, he could calculate the lifespan of his family members down to the second when he was only four years old.
Actually there are a few in the math world that are like this guy. And I have much more respect for them then many other disciplines. I'll do some research and expand this blog. It's green tea time. Coffee was a bad idea yesterday....
Okay two more. I'm tired and want to get this out. Plus these stories really interest me, hopefully you as well.
Evariste Galois. He was a math genius who was challenged to a duel at the age of 20. He knew he was going to die, so he wrote down everything he knew about mathematics the night before the duel. I don't quite understand what his contribution was to the math community (I'll ask around) but I know his theories are still being built on today.
Finally, my favorite, Kurt Godel. Godel proved (in complex mathematical terms) that nothing can be proved in mathematics. Afterwards he went insane and locked himself in his bathroom and starved himself to death. Now there is a man who wants to understand it! (think the lead character
Friday, April 13, 2012
Thursday, April 12, 2012
Rolled Trousers (for that rude fella with this email in my poly-sci class based on Profrock's Poem...Yes, I have to Spell it out)
(Written last year. I am switching up my blogs due to a mixing of my thoughts)
Saturn Galaxy, you are not big enough
to swallow the entire World.
There are blocks between the stars.
I could excuse myself and walk off the map of the galaxy.
I could stay home drinking wine and crouch down, tiger-like.
Saturn Galaxy, your hair is gone.
Your humor is dry.
Yet dripping sweat like a ripe peach.
You don't attract love.
Is that why you ramble about consciousness?
Pick up a microphone and whale baby.
Put your tears in a jar like the wives of Navy officers.
Wear a color and act that color out. Pink, blue, green.
Sex, Spirituality, Life.
Purple, Red, Gray.
Supernova as you talk.
Melancholy, mysterious, blood passion.
Smell the white jasmine flowers.
Wear an elephant mask and fuck
because no one would make love to you.
Saturn Galaxy, why don't you sweat your fears out?
We will carry you like Jesus in a mosh pit.
Hear my words and you will be saved.
No one gives a fuck if you try to save a tree
from a logger when you have no heart for the World.
Like the Tin Man it's hollow inside you.
Jump on that latter of consciousness
Like dropping a rock into a wishing well.
Hearing a splash echo after forever in five seconds.
The fairy who gathers coins for wishes knows dreams.
It's hard to believe that you
could have had a mother who
wrapped you up in a warm lambskin blanket
soft as cotton clouds,
And rocked you to sleep with whispers.
Maybe that is why you call yourself
Saturn Galaxy. Because you dreamed the
stars and the sun and the moon, and the
planets in your head. You only have the name now.
And a shiny bald head.
The silhouette of you alone against a sunset-
Makes me want to give you the permission to
Fetch me a shooting star.
I'm made of the same star dust as you.
Lasso the stars cowboy.
Saturn Galaxy, you are not big enough
to swallow the entire World.
There are blocks between the stars.
I could excuse myself and walk off the map of the galaxy.
I could stay home drinking wine and crouch down, tiger-like.
Saturn Galaxy, your hair is gone.
Your humor is dry.
Yet dripping sweat like a ripe peach.
You don't attract love.
Is that why you ramble about consciousness?
Pick up a microphone and whale baby.
Put your tears in a jar like the wives of Navy officers.
Wear a color and act that color out. Pink, blue, green.
Sex, Spirituality, Life.
Purple, Red, Gray.
Supernova as you talk.
Melancholy, mysterious, blood passion.
Smell the white jasmine flowers.
Wear an elephant mask and fuck
because no one would make love to you.
Saturn Galaxy, why don't you sweat your fears out?
We will carry you like Jesus in a mosh pit.
Hear my words and you will be saved.
No one gives a fuck if you try to save a tree
from a logger when you have no heart for the World.
Like the Tin Man it's hollow inside you.
Jump on that latter of consciousness
Like dropping a rock into a wishing well.
Hearing a splash echo after forever in five seconds.
The fairy who gathers coins for wishes knows dreams.
It's hard to believe that you
could have had a mother who
wrapped you up in a warm lambskin blanket
soft as cotton clouds,
And rocked you to sleep with whispers.
Maybe that is why you call yourself
Saturn Galaxy. Because you dreamed the
stars and the sun and the moon, and the
planets in your head. You only have the name now.
And a shiny bald head.
The silhouette of you alone against a sunset-
Makes me want to give you the permission to
Fetch me a shooting star.
I'm made of the same star dust as you.
Lasso the stars cowboy.
Sunday, April 8, 2012
Sparrow's Song
For me to accept that there is no afterlife was hard, having spent my golden childhood hearing stories of God and Heaven. I am God-God created me as a mirror of himself, from stars and color, and told me to shine; for I one day I will be dust. My brother had a super nova of a life. Now I am responsible for containing his star in me.
I'm going to die, and there is no Heaven afterward. Just a lullaby from DMT, our last dream before an eternity of rest. I'll be laughing about bills while wishing my family strength in my last breath. I'm a strong star. Bathe my body in music. In love. In rooms with flowers and lit candles with colorful pictures and jewels on Japanese silk. Open windows for fresh night air and for my soul to wander out in it's dream world. I am a star generating my own heat, brighter then the sun my body needs.
William Blake believed that God created man first. Man got bored so he created himself, but in the image of a woman. The image was so ethereal and stunning that God dropped to his knees and shattered the woman with himself. God as a man and God as a woman became star dust on Earth, forever trying to repair themselves to be together. Beauty created Blake's world view. The beauty of the female form.
I am a star. Music, love making, sweat, swimming, oceans, blue sky days, clouds like cotton balls, running my fingers over flesh- to eternity in a tear drop- I'll take my role till I super nova. My heart beats for love and to music. There was one day out in nature and in deep love, when I realized that I'll never have enough time to enjoy all the beauty in this world. But I'm trying.
I'm going to die, and there is no Heaven afterward. Just a lullaby from DMT, our last dream before an eternity of rest. I'll be laughing about bills while wishing my family strength in my last breath. I'm a strong star. Bathe my body in music. In love. In rooms with flowers and lit candles with colorful pictures and jewels on Japanese silk. Open windows for fresh night air and for my soul to wander out in it's dream world. I am a star generating my own heat, brighter then the sun my body needs.
William Blake believed that God created man first. Man got bored so he created himself, but in the image of a woman. The image was so ethereal and stunning that God dropped to his knees and shattered the woman with himself. God as a man and God as a woman became star dust on Earth, forever trying to repair themselves to be together. Beauty created Blake's world view. The beauty of the female form.
I am a star. Music, love making, sweat, swimming, oceans, blue sky days, clouds like cotton balls, running my fingers over flesh- to eternity in a tear drop- I'll take my role till I super nova. My heart beats for love and to music. There was one day out in nature and in deep love, when I realized that I'll never have enough time to enjoy all the beauty in this world. But I'm trying.
Batman as a Sadist?
Below is an e-mail exchange between my friend Alex, who equally loves Batman, and me:
Alex,
Someone gave me a different take on Batman yesterday. They said he was an aristocrat that owned Gotham and controlled most of the corporations there through Wayne Enterprises. By day he hob knobs with young, beautiful woman, and at night (when the corporations are shut down) he beats the shit out of anyone who threatens the status quo.
This person told me his motives were far from moral.
He even said Batman was a sadist, the evil one, the one that picked on the misfit, etc. What do you think of this?
Rose,
I've heard that. The Republican take on Batman. Certainly makes sense in a way. I don't agree with it, but it taps into a vital question: Is everyone who wants to restore order to chaos authoritarian, even dictatorial? Can one establish order without the brutality, force and singularity of mind that Batman represents? I dunno. It's interesting to see that V FOR VENDETTA (the book) was Batman in reverse: the main character was the Joker (down to the smiling mask and sense of levity and absurdity) and he was fighting to tear down totalitarianism with the only tools he had: brutality, force and anarchy. (The movie waters everything down on the assumption that we can peacefully win back rights taken from us, the Velvet Revolution model. The book made no such argument: if one is to escape totalitarianism, one must tear everything down.) So could Batman be the opposite argument: in order to destroy anarchy, one must be resolute to a fault?
Alex,
Someone gave me a different take on Batman yesterday. They said he was an aristocrat that owned Gotham and controlled most of the corporations there through Wayne Enterprises. By day he hob knobs with young, beautiful woman, and at night (when the corporations are shut down) he beats the shit out of anyone who threatens the status quo.
This person told me his motives were far from moral.
He even said Batman was a sadist, the evil one, the one that picked on the misfit, etc. What do you think of this?
Rose,
I've heard that. The Republican take on Batman. Certainly makes sense in a way. I don't agree with it, but it taps into a vital question: Is everyone who wants to restore order to chaos authoritarian, even dictatorial? Can one establish order without the brutality, force and singularity of mind that Batman represents? I dunno. It's interesting to see that V FOR VENDETTA (the book) was Batman in reverse: the main character was the Joker (down to the smiling mask and sense of levity and absurdity) and he was fighting to tear down totalitarianism with the only tools he had: brutality, force and anarchy. (The movie waters everything down on the assumption that we can peacefully win back rights taken from us, the Velvet Revolution model. The book made no such argument: if one is to escape totalitarianism, one must tear everything down.) So could Batman be the opposite argument: in order to destroy anarchy, one must be resolute to a fault?
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