jaimeblt's Xanga

Thursday, December 08, 2005

Thu, 08 Dec 2005 07:34:51 GMT

I just found out that I'm on the Black Student League's listserv. That makes me so happy - I asked them to put me on there over a year ago. Now if only god could show me some love too and make it warmer....

Exam Schedule:

- 10 page paper

- Take-home final

12/14: BIG final exam

12/14: 20 page final paper due

12/21: 15 page research paper due

12/21: 25 page final paper due

Monday, December 05, 2005

Mon, 05 Dec 2005 06:11:55 GMT

The further into senior year I get, the less I feel the need to please anyone (other than the professors). I could really give a shit about the politics of this place anymore. (By politics, I mean the way that the school community (not administration, but the students) runs, operates, functions; I don't mean politics as in the presidency and current issues).

Anyways, I'm surprised I've managed to get this far without any time management skills. i simply don't have any. I need structure and order to operate, and college doesn't provide that. I need an office or a cubicle, and a daily check in time. When I'm working an actual job, I get the shit done. It may even more boring than my classwork, but there's order to it. I need to be in an environment that's structured for me to get stuff done, or else my ADD nature kicks in. I miss high school, where each day basically had the same schedule. I still had time management issues, but they were better than now.

Time for the Wawa run for caffeine.

Also, if anyone knows where you're supposed to find meaning in life, let me know. Someone told me it's faith, but I'm not particularly religious. I know you don't find it in your job - I'm sure the cafeteria workers at this school could tell you that. Perhaps in your friends and family? It's just that I'm such an, for lack of a better word, existentialist. I don't think that there is any inherent meaning out there, or that there is supposed to be. I'm not sad about this, nor do I think that life is pointless. I just wonder, where do we go from here, philosophically? How do you reconstruct the world (and meaning, and definitions, and all of that) after it's been deconstructed so terribly? How do you find reality when it has been put through the prism to show its relativistic nature? Meaning, reality, etc are by nature relativistic - i.e. dependent upon the context and the person deciding what they are - and how can you compare the unadulturated, universal truths of the past with the personal, contextual, fallible truths of our modern philosophy?

Isn't this where Christianity is going? It's going from a inherently hierarchical framework (the priest interprets Scripture, and guides his parishoners) to a democratic one (the laity personally talks to/prays to/etc God/Jesus and receives any advice directly). It's more complicated than that, I know, but you get my drift.

Perhaps this philosophy is a byproduct of democracy. Going from a framework where the individual is subservient to society to one where the individual is freer would surely have an impact on the reigning philosophies. There's less of an impetus to placing one's faith in higher institutions (the church, etc), or even to just not challenging them, when he or she can truly make decisions for himself or herself. People are by nature self-interested, and if given the choice between a philosophy that curtails their choices and one which allows greater flexibility, they'll by and large go for the latter. Think about it. Poor people + Middle Ages = enslaved, might as well believe this cock-and-bull philosophy society propogates because it makes me feel like there's a reason for the way things are, and tells me that if I'm a good little serf I'll go to heaven and be infinitely rewarded. Versus, poor people + the West now = more opportunities, hmmmm, I think I'll go do what I want, thank you very much. I don't think democracy and liberty are bad, but the downside to them is that society is much less coherent, and universal truths are challenged constantly by affected groups. Society is heterogenous (more than before at least), and no truth seems able to encapsulate all of it. (Of course, globalism also plays a part, with previously unheard groups being able to propogate their perspectives on the world stage).

Damn, I just took the content of an entire library of books and completely messed them up. I make so little sense, and I reference way to many thinkers, schools of thought. And I'm leaving out so much. Here's my basic premise: heterogenous, democratic societies with largely economically independent individuals develop inherently non-universalistic belief structures. Belief structures and all of that reflect the needs of society, and those aforementioned societies can't support universalism to a large degree. Plus, people are going to challenge it and it'll be destabilized.

How do you say all of this without sounding like you've not slept all night and you barely know what you're talking about?

Gotta get going - work.

Friday, December 02, 2005

Fri, 02 Dec 2005 10:46:10 GMT

Just got my take-home final. Excuse me while I prepare to be F*CKED IN THE ASS.

ROYALLY.

If I don't get back to you this weekend, or generally seem not to exist, this is why.

And do not tempt me with offers to go out. I will throw my course books at you.

Kill me now.

Monday, November 28, 2005

Mon, 28 Nov 2005 23:48:46 GMT

All of the places I've ever been. Red counties are places I've actually done something in, yellow ones are ones I've driven through. There's a lot of the US I've never seen. If it weren't for my two summer college visit trips, I wouldn't have seen a lot of these places (Vermont, New Hampshire, Rhode Island).

- The two random counties in Maine are from a ski trip.

- That long yellow line on the east side is from driving up and down I-95 so many times.

- I have never seen much of the west coast of Florida.

- The random yellow blip in Utah is from a layover in Salt Lake.

- I have been to every big city on the eastern seaboard except for Trenton, Wilmington, and Savannah. (And Richmond if you count that as being on the eastern seaboard). Some notes: Miami is fun, but you need to know Spanish. Atlanta seemed boring. Washington, DC is extremely pretty, but the run down parts are scarier than Colombia. New York has the most energy of any of them. Boston is a really pretty if slightly mellow town. Atlantic City puts (the worst of) Orlando to shame in terms of how tacky it is. West Palm Beach has more palm trees than people. New Haven is DIRTY.

Monday, November 28, 2005

Mon, 28 Nov 2005 12:01:52 GMT

I just heard about a party called "CEOs and Secretaries." The women come as secretaries, the men as CEOs.

That is one of the most degrading things I've ever heard of. Unless it is done in the most ironic way possible, it reinforces and serves as a visual statement of male-domination. I don't care about "Pimps and Ho's" parties because 1) there is a power to be had in sexual liberation, 2) it's entirely escapist and not relevant to the partiers' daily lives, and 3) there is not a real power hierarchy expressed and reinforced by it.

"CEOs and Secretaries," however, reinforces the subjugation of women as servants to males. There is no agency in being a secretary. You exist to serve the (male) CEO. I cannot believe that the girls at the school it happened at didn't say, "What the h*ll? I am not a secretary. I am not about to play around at being some guy's lap dog."

This is not meant as an attack on secretaries, fyi. It's an attack on the notion that being a secretary is a female position and being a CEO a male one. We need to move beyond gender and stop excluding people from power because of their gender.

For some reason, nothing gets me more upset than gender-based discrimination. Race-based stuff gets me, along with sexual orientation stuff and religious stuff and all of those other identity characteristics American society has determined to be important, but gender gets me the most.

Saturday, November 26, 2005

Sat, 26 Nov 2005 19:36:51 GMT

So, I saw "Rent" with my mom over Thanksgiving. And I heard the warbling emanations of my mother unrealizingly singing along while in the theater. But more on those warbled emanations later.

So when I go home, I feel like my mother does all that she can to make me feel loved. She makes me food. She cleans my mess. She makes my bed. In sum, I feel rather awkward - almost incapacitated. But I don't speak up, because I know that this is "[aggreived sigh] her way of saying that she loves me."

My mother, however, does speak up. I have yet to finish a phone call with her without her saying, loud enough to be heard to passers by from my cell phone, "Love you!" Every time I open the mailbox, I worry if I am to receive yet another newspaper clipping that she found relevant to me. My virtual mailbox is even worse: I often find it overloaded from the emailed videos of cute little animals singing, "Have a nice da-aaaa-aaaay!" I used to wonder if my mother has acute ENSWHFOM - Empty Nest Syndrome Which Has Found an Outlet with ME. However, the last time I suggested that horrible acronym to a psychologist, they told me that wasn't the case. Unfortunately, according to their expert opinion, she has a case of BAMS - Being like Any Mother with a Son.

So, it was with this in mind that I went grudgingly down to Baltimore for Thanksgiving to see my mother. I had a lot of work to do, but I forced myself to put aside the time to spend with her. When I got there, she appreciated it, and set about, like she always does, preparing me food and catering to my needs. After the dinner, she asked me, "Would you like to see 'Rent?'" Considering I was about to burst from the food while falling into my plate from exhaustion (school), I wanted to say no. But, I thought of how happy it would make her and agreed.

The movie was a musical, and a good one at that. But that's not the point. The point is that there was one song called, "La Vie Boheme," in it. And that during that one song, my mother sang along. Audibly. Normally, I would cringe, perhaps excuse myself to the restroom, because that's just plain embarrassing. However, as I heard her sing, it reminded me of who she is. My mother is a woman who, aside from not caring what (quite reasonable) strangers would think, believes in transcendence.

Let me explain. She is a woman of faith. Not your debased type of faith that focuses on the minutiae of religious laws and the nominations of Supreme Court justices, but the kind of faith that believes in the possibility of living a higher, transcendent life. And, for her, "Rent" is transcendence. It is the culmination of her ethos. It probably reminds her of her own bohemian past.

And seeing her, hearing her, remembering who she was, was a moving moment for me. It became clear to me that my mother is a woman reaching for transcendence; with every note you could hear the yearning to be a part of the vie boheme on the screen. And then it hit me: I am her transcendence. Every time she makes me food, every time she sends me a letter is a time that she reaches for something higher: her dreams for me are her hopes to find meaning and worth. Every parent, I'm sure, has these sorts of feelings about their children, but this was the first time I understood.

I continued watching the movie and pretended like I hadn't heard, but long after that song had ended and we were leaving the theater, I resolved to appreciate more what she does for me. After we stepped outside and the bitter, bitter cold hit, toughts of transcendence fled my mind for warmer pastures, and I decided this newfound appreciation didn't include warm and fuzzy, but oh so annoying, animals singing, "Have a good daa-aaaa-aaaay!"

Hope you had a great Turkey Day!

Monday, November 21, 2005

Mon, 21 Nov 2005 17:35:52 GMT

I've been entirely productive today, which is nice. It gives me a real sense of getting things out of the way. Not quite accomplishment, because that's not what's most important to me. It feels like getting a huge weight off of my shoulders. This school work has been hanging over me like a dark cloud all weekend. There's still a whole lot more work to do, but at least I've proven to myself that I can get it done.

Oddly enough, I've found that the key to motivating myself to do work is to think about how I'm doing this particular classwork to procrastinate from doing this other particular classwork. Basically, "Ugh I don't want to do that paper, I'll work on this presentation." Once I finish the presentation, it's "Ugh I don't want to do that research, I'll do this paper," and so on. The work is never ending, so I can trust it'll work for a long while haha.

Sunday, November 20, 2005

Sun, 20 Nov 2005 00:33:56 GMT

I've seen these stats in "And The Band Played On", but I'm still surprised. Here are the chances of getting AIDS from unprotected, non-"rough" sex:

There's a 1 in 122 chance of infecting your partner if you're positive and you top him (or her) in anal sex.

There's a 1 in 1,666 chance of infecting your partner if you're positive and he tops you in anal sex.

There's a 1 in 1,666 chance of infecting your partner if you're positive and he (or she) sucks you off.

There's virtually no chance of infecting your partner if you're positive and you suck him off.

Lesbians and straight men apparently don't have to worry about vaginal oral sex. The article said there was a "negligible" risk of transmission either way.

And for straight people, if you're positive and you are the inserter in penile-vaginal sex, there's a 1 in 111,111 chance you'll infect your partner. If it's the woman who is positive, then the chance is one in a million she'll infect you.

It is certainly not a good idea to take this information and have unprotected sex, but it's interesting none-the-less. Of course, these statistics mean nothing if you happen to be that one person in the 122 who gets infected. And I am not liable if this information is out-of-date or anything.

Saturday, November 19, 2005

Sat, 19 Nov 2005 12:29:55 GMT

On Xuqa.com, I get all of these females sending me friend requests and digital kisses. I'm not joking - it's a large number. And none of them even know anyone who goes to UPenn. Is this normal? Does Xuqa get a lot of women trying to befriend and kiss men? Or is it just something about my profile that I don't realize?

Thursday, November 17, 2005

Thu, 17 Nov 2005 08:00:38 GMT

I need to go into a detox program, except for stress and not for drugs. I think am melodramatic on this xanga because I don't usually feel comfortable whining to people, and this as if I were typing in a diary.

Anyways, I just have too much work. I need to get on a proper sleep schedule. College life fucks up your sleep habits.