Blog - February 8, 2:45 PM
So far today has been incredible and I haven't even done anything out of the ordinary! I hung out with Seth and Beth last night and finally got out of the room. Then this morning I woke up to that Hoku song: Perfect Day. I went to German where for the first time the class started talking to one another with some vitality. We talked about various German beers and German life. It was rad. I then came home and played computer games for a while (that wasn't so exciting, but hey, it was fun). Here's where it gets great. Today I lost and replaced about half of my views and opinions in my Interpretation of Literature class. We were interpreting Herman Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street," and I was thinking my standard thoughts "What's the point of discussing literature, It will mean different things to everyone." So, for discussion points I raised my hands and made some comment about how I'd read "Moby Dick," and this was what the story meant. The instant it came out, I realized that it actually made sense and it wasn't just jargon to make me look good. Here's my interpretation of the story:
The narrator and main character represents "the man" so to speak, and Bartleby, the queer fellow represents counterculture existentialist folk. Now this is very simplified, so let me further explain. The narrator is your average boss, and good Christian. He wants to help Bartleby because there's obviously something wrong with him. Bartleby is existentialist. He says who cares, let's go look at flowers. Here's the kicker: Bartleby thinks he knows himself, but obviously doesn't. He pretends to be in the know and in tune with what really goes on. So why does he never leave the building and experience that which he claims to understand and desire. Answer: He's deathly afraid of the unknown.
This is true of so many punks, goths, hippies, academics, and any other person who believes themselves to be above the regular hum drum blue collar life. They claim independence and rebelliousness, but in the end they've traded one group with rules (their "society") for another (the counter culturists). Now some might say this is ridiculous, obviously these free persons have no rules, regulations. Look at the way they dress! Walk up to a "goth" and tell him you love Britney Spears with a passion. His reaction is usually one of distaste or even hatred toward you. You are part of the mainstream. You are sheep. Walk away cattle.
The narrator, on the other hand, is no more sophisticated in his philosophies. As far as he is concerned, Bartleby is a lunatic and should be helped into our way of life. (We also see this in Moby Dick through Queequeg). The good Christian society is the one right choice. The main point of this story is that nearly everyone has a superiority complex.
Don't take this blog to mean that if you are a goth or a member of any other subculture listed, you are a pompous dick. The mindfuck that occurred to me was the revelation that the person who doesn't feel superior for any reason is hard to find. Mostly when people claim to have found a new way of life they are still confined to their offices. I realize this blog was uberlong, but I just had to reveal how bedazzled I was.

[THOUGHT FOR THIS DAY],
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies. " -Fredrich Nietzsche... I should probably remember that...

Blog - February 6th, 11:06 AM
Well, I just got done being shown how little I know about the German language. Then I fell asleep in Roman Civ. I'll be going tomorrow morning as well. I also had to write a paper on some story we read in Interpretation of Literature (It's actually quite good. Its IND AFF by Fay Weldon -ed).
I've taken up crossword puzzles! So far, I've just been doing the Daily Iowan ones, but I think I might subscribe to the New York Times just for the puzzles =) Of course, I might also want a decent source of news, that which the DI is not. They only have two sections - the news and sports. On the back page of sports they're nice enough to add three comics, the occasionally funny jokes of the day, and a one line horoscope for anyone that cares. Whoop de do. Oh well, It's free and it makes good entertainment for when I'm on grab n go on Wednesdays.
I've also decided to take up photography! It will take a few weeks to get the money together, but I have my eye on a few cameras that my pops is going to help me pick out. After that I can get a scanner to put those pics on this page. Wahoo! (I typed woohoo and Word auto replaced it with Wahoo what the hell, bill?).
I suppose I should go learn conjugations for words in German. Der Himmel ist blau. Ja! Sehr gut! Je suis ubercool! (That last one was about three languages -ed)
TTFN

[THOUGHT FOR THIS DAY]
Find beauty in all things. You'll be infinitely happier

Blog- February 3rd, 1:37 AM
Well, I suppose this is the grand opening of "Not at all affiliated with the republican party." How nice of a name is that? I thought it was great personally. Well, I decided to make this page a big conglomorate wad of all the pages I've ever tried making and not had the gumption to finish. I've been just as successful at maintaining a webpage as I have at keeping a journal (I have about 15 notebooks/journals/sketchpads bouncing about with 2 entries in each.
I'm just going to use this page to kill two kiwis with one boulder and do blogs on a regular basis. the word regularity always makes me think of a "BM." Ok, I'm blithering, so I'll stop.

[THOUGHT FOR THIS DAY]
I didn't really think much that day…