Meditations
trippingly on the tongue
A few days ago, I started a blog post and then my laptop froze. It’s been doing that quite a lot lately.
I’m going to throw it out into the aether here, but I’m wondering if anyone can help me out with my intermittently-freezing laptop? It’s an HP tx2524CA running Windows 7 Professional 64-bit. It doesn’t seem to have any rhyme nor reason to the freezing then crashing (often accompanied by a blue screen but not always). If there were a pattern, I might have figured out the diagnosis with some Googling but as of late, I’m utterly at an impasse. Help?
Back to my post. I was feeling an overall paralyzing feeling of dread, of inadequacy of self-awareness and (dare I suggest this?) the slightest tincture of self-loathing. I resented myself and pitied myself at the same time. I wanted to bemoan my sorrows to the world, imagining that, as the proverb goes, a shared sorrow would be half sorrow, a shared joy would be a double joy.
Experiencing technological failure mitigated that pity party of a post. Why am I suffering inconsolable malaise? I don’t know. It’s unlikely that I will figure it out. But what’s important is that I hitch myself by my bootstraps and get out of this hole.
That I’m always pressed for time isn’t something new. I had chosen that path at the beginning of this school year. I don’t really have anyone to resent but myself. With that attitude in mind, I hope I can stop wailing over my perceived and supposed misfortunes and focus upon getting things done.
Chin up and shoulders back! Let’s push on.
now you’re calling me up on the phone
To the innumerable guests currently in town, I wish a very belated welcome to our humble city!
The Olympics are finally (and I mean finally) upon us and even though I’m not an international sports enthusiast, I do feel a little warm inside.
Detractors can argue that the Olympics stand for everything we ought to be fighting in an enlightened society. Wasteful spending, misplaced priorities, runaway government budget overruns. It can’t be denied.
But really, protesters, can’t you be civil? Thoreau and Gandhi were major supporters of civil disobedience, suggesting that only in impossible cases should force be used. I think the Olympic organizers have been more than accommodating by establishing safe areas for dissent and protest. We can suggest government conspiracies (e.g. governments trying to localize dissenters for later identification and removal) but I like to imagine that they’re people too, not evil automatons.
Besides, the property you damage, the people you hurt, these aren’t politicians or corporate fatcats. They’re Joe the Plumber living down the street who works at the Bay or Sally the ISU Volunteer. They don’t deserve to be in the crossfire; they’re not trying to be complicit in whatever you think the Olympics are doing – they’re just trying to get on with their lives.
After two days of watching Olympic protests get out of hand, I just want to see the protesters realise that far from changing anyone’s minds towards their causes (and using this social momentum to effect change at the voting polls during the next election), their irresponsible, damaging actions are really hurting their causes. Already fringe, they continue to distance themselves further and further from the mainstream.
I care about issues of Native sovereignty and poverty too. But make a compelling case for people to care; don’t damage and disrupt so that people will listen to the temper tantrum. Be peaceable.
On, on, on, on, on! to the breach, to the breach!
So I have been rather negligent with this blog, I’ll admit it, mea culpa. I’ve made up several excuses to myself about this already – why blog when I use other things like Tumblr, Last.fm, etc. ? Is there really any need?
And then I realise, of course there is. This is my scratchpad. I’ll have to preface that metaphor though.
I notoriously vacillate among positions on things. Hesitant to think about decisions, loathe to make them. The track record is pretty clear – choosing to (not) go to IB, choosing Science over Commerce, etc. And I justify them (the decisions, that is) to myself somehow, someway later, post factum.
It all happens in my head which is often a bewildering and confusing place. So I blog. It’s ridiculously mundane and painfully dull, but I’ve firmly convinced myself (for now) that there is a purpose, a teleology to all of this and I have to compel myself to begin again.
Of course, it doesn’t help that my laptop has broken down. I’ve reformatted a few times but the problem still reoccurs – I love my HP tx2500 but I think it’s on its dying days with some sort of hardware problem. I’ve suspected for a while that it could be the motherboard but my dad reasons that it must be the hard drive. At any rate, the RAM seems fine and it’s 2×2GB so if I can salvage them, I will.
It’s been odd, transitioning back to paper notes for classes. I guess I do listen a bit more, lacking the distractions of the internet but at the same time, I fell as though I’ve been unplugged and am now laying dormant. I’m not as updated with news and when I do find out, I’m certainly not the first. I hardly play any games on Steam anymore, mostly because my desktop is old (but reliable). This technology detox may yet do some good.
Here is hoping that I can keep this writing thing going.
Oft him anhaga are gebideð
I will be the first to admit it, I’ve really reduced the number of posts here in favour of easier alternatives such as Tumblr, Google Reader Shared Items, etc. That’s not to say that I don’t see value in this blog, though.
This is a promise to myself (and anyone who still reads this) that this blog will continue, but in a different way. Not as a melange of daily idle thoughts and musings, but as a place to reflect, regenerate and refine.
And for anyone who’s counting, my commitments this term are
- BIOC 302
- BIOL 337
- BIOL 360
- BIOL 362
- ENGL 343
- ENGL 348
- ENGL 357
I’ll be taking my driving test (N) this coming Monday. Fingers crossed.
Also, I’ve given you fair warning so keep out of Richmond if you don’t want to cross my path!
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew
I’d use this post to write an obligatory “year in review” but I actually can’t recall the high- (and low-) lights of this year. It’s probably for the best!
Here’s hoping everyone a very happy new year. Drive safely and always use protection.
Anyone have any resolutions they think I ought to try? (Writing more often, for example?)
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