Mrs.

Tonight it's ritards, or, more specifically, ritardando. Abby, right after I posted last week I stopped hearing irritating bridges. But I will write down the song name next time it happens.
Tonight it's the song that goes "love, love, love, love ... crazy love" on this Irish singers compilation I have on repeat. Like, a song is really bad and then they do this grand ritard for the 11th repetition of the chorus. Anyone?
In other news, I rearranged the front room and it is more nice and more cozier. I am doing the exact same thing I was doing last week -- fighting with Netbeans -- only the program looks better now and I learned how to avoid the "anchors," which is basically when the application thinks things should look a certain way and you say, "No, I actually want that button over here," and the software says, "Ok, yeah ... I can see that you want it over there but I'm going to keep it here and also completely reorganize everything that you just spent 2 hours arranging."
Neil is good. My car has a mysterious ailment that is very scary-sounding and prefers not to show itself to anyone except me. Which is why I drove to Tucson Car Care today, emergency lights on, hoping the car wouldn't blow up before I got there, and then drove around Tucson for 30 minutes today with a mechanic explaining that, no, it wasn't the CD player I'd heard.
Yesterday in yoga I was listening to meditative singing and thinking about how when you're really open and listen to certain types of music it sounds like an environment for the spirit to move through. And then I was thinking about Heaven, and how one conception of it is a sort of space for the spirit, and I was thinking about the music -- like, the vibe -- in Heaven and then it seemed like, wait, the spirit doesn't get born when you die -- it's here right now. So what kind of space is my spirit in right now. And the music was so cool and it made sense in a way, that, like, the spirit's environment can shift, so the "music" of it would maybe be a little more complex or a little more bucolic, depending. And if I am to follow that line of thinking, then all the time my spirit has its own environment, which is different from this living room and different from my brain. With some kind of music playing and some kind of mood. And I can tune into it whenever I want.
The concept of environment is very interesting this week. What do you[s] think?

too much caffeine in my bloodstream

Tonight "Take the Long Way Home" sounds especially cool. Supertramp, I think. Maybe I'll listen to it tomorrow, as a palliative measure. Because heaven knows it ain't going to fix my compiler. Speaking of, lately I have been really peevish about bridges in bad songs. Like, I'll be driving to work and listening to the radio, maybe tolerating some lame song because it hasn't fully entered my consciousness that a lame song has come on and needs to be changed, and then the song will go into the bridge and I'll be gripped with indignation. REALLY? This song was so boring and lame and they're giving it a BRIDGE? That is 5x as boring and lame as the rest of the song? I don't know why, but this has struck me lately as such ridiculous insolence.

Lately I have been thinking about braised pears. I'd like to make them ... sometime soon. Also, I wonder if HealthSouth will give away turkeys this year.

I am wearing SPF40 and haven't been outside today

Edit: Didn't go outside today. Because now it's night, so "haven't" implies that I still could. And also, technically, I did go outside today, although it was to get laundry out of the dryer and so was under cover of the patio awning. My friend Beth just texted me "yoga?", which is a really good idea. So I'd better make this short. I think I wanted to say ... that yesterday I realized you could sing Stevie Wonder's "Part-Time Lover" and Hall & Oates' "Maneater" simultaneously. And also "NetBeans," the awesome-and-cutting-edge-yet-imperfect application I'm working in, would sound really good if substituted for "Head Games" in the Foreigner song called Head Games. And also ... no, I totally forget. Hi. Bye. And also I am unable to upload my picture of Paris.

A Day of Rest, even though it's Saturday

My dad said today is a day of rest. I am sitting on the porch. In front of me, on the other side of the screen, the sprinkler is sprinkling daisies and sunflowers and some pink flower and tall green stalks. Butterflies, monarchs and otherwise, are busy amid the flowers. Wow, there's this one butterfly that's bigger than the hummingbird that just passed by. I sort of was under the impression that hummingbirds didn't live outside of the southwest. The air is alternately filled with swells of insects and birds, like finches. And sometimes cardinals stop by.

My dad is drawing a few yards away, inside. He's listening to the shuffle Eliza gave to him a while back ("Tell Eliza I'm going to glue this to my ears"), and he just gave me 1 phone for a sec so I could hear a Joni Mitchell song. Which reminded me of a recent conversation I had with Matt and then Ryan and Jessica.

What 5 singers have had the most influence on your life?

My answers, in no particular order:

1. REM
2. Suzanne Vega
3. Paul Simon
4. They Might Be Giants
5. I can't remember. Kate Bush? The Smiths? I remember that it was good and true, but I can't remember what it was. Matt or Ryan or Jessica, if you are reading this and you can remember, please inform.

And also:

What 5 albums THAT WERE NOT RECORDED BY ANYONE IN YOUR MOST INFLUENTIAL MUSICIANS LIST have had the most influence in your life?

My answers, INPO:

1. Clouds - Joni Mitchell
2. Doolittle - Pixies
3. Substance - New Order
4. In My Tribe - 10,000 Maniacs
5. Outlandos D'Amour - Police

That's, of course, given that Kate Bush and The Smiths are both on the previous list. ... I think Thriller is also supposed to be on the album list, maybe edging out In My Tribe. This is getting really confusing.

So, whoever is reading this, please submit your top 5 + 5, if you wish.

Being away for 8 weeks is interesting. It takes, I don't know, 2 weeks to have a New Experience? Like, maybe you are thinking about something today. And tomorrow you can think about it and the next day you can think about it and it still has essentially the same level of temporal relevance. But in two-ish weeks it will be what you were thinking about two weeks ago. Because in two weeks you will be thinking about slightly different things, in a slightly different way. So 8 weeks is a long time.

When I first got here, life in Tucson pretty much seemed, in my brain, like it did when I was in Tucson. But now it's different. Life in Tucson has been sifted through, so when I think of it, I think of Neil and my friends and family (in Tucson/Phx, Phx) and the warmth and the LACK OF HUMIDITY and the Catalinas and Yoga Oasis and walking to the coffee shop and crickets and stuff. Tucson 7 weeks ago was all these things, plus stress from school and anxiety about the internship and anxiety about I have to stop at the dry cleaners and anxiety about I have to find time to take the car in, etc.

It's nice to be away for more than An Experience Unit so the reality of now can kind of be distilled. There are other pink flowers I didn't notice before, in the distance. They are more of a hot pink, and huge! Like pink butterflies.

Write back.

la vida loca

"In the midst of life we are in death, et cetera"

Last night I went out with friends it was fun.

In text messages I write in this telegraphic way and I noticed it's leaked into my emails. ... How will the next generation of children be composing letters I wonder?

Remember letters? Remember when mail used to come on Saturday? Wait, I am ahead of myself. Remember when we were thirtysomething ... I remember when I was 16 or 17 I would listen to songs like, "These are the days ..." or "Look at me, proud of being 17 ...", and I'd think, "Yeah, I am so in it, I am so there, so 16 and-a-half and loving it and it is really great and don't forget it because I feel really great."

Remember when we didn't know Ricky Martin was gay?

My friend and I were discussing last week how tired the observer-of-life trope is. Particularly in music lyrics. You know, like, everybody else is in it except me I am detached can I have some more gin please.

Bo-ring. Unless maybe if it's ironic.

I think, specifically, we were thinking of Jackson Browne, who is not really ironic.

But I like "Running on Empty."

I wonder if that show Thirtysomething would be any good today.

Today I read something about the Discovery Channel's Planet Earth and Life shows. I never watch the Discovery Channel but they look so cool I can see myself quieting down in this alternate universe and putting them on. Happy Easter.

thursday night

It might be fun to have a rock band called The Delicates.

"Dry Clean Only" could be the first hit single.

My left trapezius huuuuuuurts.

But I got a Tiger Balm patch that I may break out at work tomorrow.

Does anyone have any ideas for peace?

aspirations

I want to work in databases or informatics for genetic research.

I want to work in cancer research.

I want to work in international health, like documentation and sharing and collaboration and researching who does what with what with what resources. (Like in Atul Gawande's book "Better" -- is it always expensive surgical equipment that determines success, or are manual skill and a deep comprehension of the task sometimes underrated?)

And also, in international health, what diseases are seen more and less in what countries among what populations, and WHY?

I want to work in governmental research, like at a policy institute.

I would LOVE to be part of some project that would streamline the federal government so that we were putting tax dollars into systems that worked and returned in dividends, rather than endless bureaucracies. E.g., our educational system is atrocious.

So does anyone want to give me an internship this summer?

I have no work experience in CS whatsoever, but I have a lot of school learning and a great attitude and I will wash your car.

in tha house

I am briefly moved by the awesomeness of paul simon.

This week at work I almost fell over when a patient's family member complained that the reason the patient wasn't getting more coverage from AHCCCS was because AHCCCS is busy covering U.S.-born children of "wetbacks."

Maybe that language/logic flies in Michigan?

No offense.

I have been in a bad mood this week. I go to yoga and my backbends feel anchored by gravity. I want to be pulled up by the moon. Today was my first class. I like the energy coming from the professor. He runs. He runs marathons in Australia and Rome. He is roughly my age. Sarah's age. He said each week-long homework assignment will take a minimum of 20 hours. No late days. My brain felt like what just happened when I put half a cup of coffee in the microwave and (for the first time, since I only recently discovered the button) pressed "reheat." The coffee boiled over, perplexingly. I hurried home and threw myself into cleaning the spare room, goodwill bags at hand. I guess that's where the analogy ends: My brain wants All Clutter To Go Away -- it's distracting and wasteful and, arguably, pulls me down. Especially when I need to focus on algorithms. The coffee problem was solved with a couple of paper towels. Maybe the brain/coffee issue has a similar prevention tactic though, along the lines of know what you're getting into? No ... Don't collect dust? Ok, so there's no similarity.

Last night in yoga one of my favorite teachers said something to the effect of, If you're confused or feel lost or overwhelmed, just show up to where you're at.