Something Worth Trying

explore-blog: Faulkner was a postmaster, Kafka an insurance...

Wed, 30 May 2012 01:03:08 +0800

Faulkner was a postmaster, Kafka an insurance agent, Brontë a governess. The day jobs of famous authors.

guardian: Photograph: Guardian How Kipper Williams has captured...

Wed, 30 May 2012 00:40:49 +0800

Photograph: Guardian

How Kipper Williams has captured the Eurozone crisis in cartoons:

Guardian cartoonist Kipper Williams is having a good eurozone crisis. He aims to capture the ‘tragi-comedy’ of the crisis, with cartoons that are ‘often silly, fanciful but a whisker away from reality’. Tackling yields, credit default swaps and eurobonds in a cartoon isn’t easy, he says, and his aim is to bring the crisis ‘back down to earth’. He has clearly thrived on the twists and turns of the Greek crisis, playing on what he describes as the ‘handy, accessible and familiar’ classical myths and legends. And he has a canny knack of anticipating events, imagining a return to the drachma last June – a fanciful idea at the time but now under serious consideration. Here are some of his best cartoons of the crisis …

lookingformendiola: “You cannot pass,” he said. The orcs stood...

Fri, 25 May 2012 02:56:39 +0800

lookingformendiola:

“You cannot pass,” he said. The orcs stood still, and a dead silence fell. “I am a servant of the Secret Fire, wielder of the flame of Anor. You cannot pass. The dark fire will not avail you, flame of Udun. Go back to the Shadow! You cannot pass.”

From The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien.

A Map of the World, by Ted Kooser

Wed, 23 May 2012 00:08:46 +0800

A Map of the World, by Ted Kooser:

poetbabble:

A Map of the World

One of the ancient maps of the world
is heart-shaped, carefully drawn
and once washed with bright colors,
though the colors have faded
as you might expect feelings to fade
from a fragile old heart, the brown map
of a life. But feeling is indelible,
and longing infinite, a starburst compass
pointing in all the directions
two lovers might go, a fresh breeze
swelling their sails, the future uncharted,
still far from the edge
where the sea pours into the stars.

Ted Kooser

(via lexically)

lookingformendiola: Come on. Tell me. Tell me the truth, Frank....

Tue, 22 May 2012 23:51:21 +0800

lookingformendiola:

Come on. Tell me. Tell me the truth, Frank. Remember that? We used to live by it. And you know what’s so good about the truth? Everyone knows what it is no matter how long they’ve lived without it. No one forgets the truth, Frank, they just get better at lying.

From the script of Revolutionary Road, directed by Sam Mendes. Based on the novel of the same name, written by Richard Yates.

The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows: sonder

Tue, 22 May 2012 23:47:39 +0800

The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows: sonder:

dictionaryofobscuresorrows:

n. the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives that you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk.

"Dudes. Imagine life here in the US — or indeed, pretty much anywhere in the Western world — is a..."

Wed, 16 May 2012 16:41:47 +0800

“Dudes. Imagine life here in the US — or indeed, pretty much anywhere in the Western world — is a massive role playing game, like World of Warcraft except appallingly mundane, where most quests involve the acquisition of money, cell phones and donuts, although not always at the same time. Let’s call it The Real World. You have installed The Real World on your computer and are about to start playing, but first you go to the settings tab to bind your keys, fiddle with your defaults, and choose the difficulty setting for the game. Got it?
Okay: In the role playing game known as The Real World, “Straight White Male” is the lowest difficulty setting there is.
This means that the default behaviors for almost all the non-player characters in the game are easier on you than they would be otherwise. The default barriers for completions of quests are lower. Your leveling-up thresholds come more quickly. You automatically gain entry to some parts of the map that others have to work for. The game is easier to play, automatically, and when you need help, by default it’s easier to get.
Now, once you’ve selected the “Straight White Male” difficulty setting, you still have to create a character, and how many points you get to start — and how they are apportioned — will make a difference. Initially the computer will tell you how many points you get and how they are divided up. If you start with 25 points, and your dump stat is wealth, well, then you may be kind of screwed. If you start with 250 points and your dump stat is charisma, well, then you’re probably fine. Be aware the computer makes it difficult to start with more than 30 points; people on higher difficulty settings generally start with even fewer than that.
As the game progresses, your goal is to gain points, apportion them wisely, and level up. If you start with fewer points and fewer of them in critical stat categories, or choose poorly regarding the skills you decide to level up on, then the game will still be difficult for you. But because you’re playing on the “Straight White Male” setting, gaining points and leveling up will still by default be easier, all other things being equal, than for another player using a higher difficulty setting.
Likewise, it’s certainly possible someone playing at a higher difficulty setting is progressing more quickly than you are, because they had more points initially given to them by the computer and/or their highest stats are wealth, intelligence and constitution and/or simply because they play the game better than you do. It doesn’t change the fact you are still playing on the lowest difficulty setting.
You can lose playing on the lowest difficulty setting. The lowest difficulty setting is still the easiest setting to win on. The player who plays on the “Gay Minority Female” setting? Hardcore.”

- John Scalzi tells it like it is. (Go and read the whole essay, then read the comments.)

ellobofilipino: So CNN has decided to feature the country. And...

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 14:04:20 +0800

ellobofilipino:

So CNN has decided to feature the country. And this infographic caught my eye. The sources by the way are the World Bank and the CIA World Factbook.

I never thought our GDP per capita was that big (ah kids, that’s the amount of money which estimates the standard of living of the average Filipino).

And I also didn’t expect that the percentage living below the poverty line has decreased. That used to be more than half of our population in my younger years. Still, we have to admit though that 33 million Filipinos living on less than a dollar a day, is a huge number.

But these figures show some improvement.

In my childhood days, we were always told apocalyptic tales about the country; about the national debt which we (and our future sons) owe to the IMF-World Bank even before we were born; about the systemic flaws in our political system, economy and even people; about how the country was a lost cause.

This time, it seems there’s a bit of a turn-around.

I was never into Pinoy pride things. And this does not also make me feel that. There’s still a long way to go and much still needs to be done in this country. And we still need to help out the 33%. But for now, this is a sign that we are bouncing back.

Bangon Pilipinas! Sulong!

You Want a Physicist to Speak at Your Funeral, by Aaron Freeman

Wed, 25 Apr 2012 00:10:12 +0800

You Want a Physicist to Speak at Your Funeral, by Aaron Freeman:

thereisafish:

You want a physicist to speak at your funeral. You want the physicist to talk to your grieving family about the conservation of energy, so they will understand that your energy has not died. You want the physicist to remind your sobbing mother about the first law of thermodynamics; that no energy gets created in the universe, and none is destroyed. You want your mother to know that all your energy, every vibration, every Btu of heat, every wave of every particle that was her beloved child remains with her in this world. You want the physicist to tell your weeping father that amid energies of the cosmos, you gave as good as you got.

And at one point you’d hope that the physicist would step down from the pulpit and walk to your brokenhearted spouse there in the pew and tell him that all the photons that ever bounced off your face, all the particles whose paths were interrupted by your smile, by the touch of your hair, hundreds of trillions of particles, have raced off like children, their ways forever changed by you. And as your widow rocks in the arms of a loving family, may the physicist let her know that all the photons that bounced from you were gathered in the particle detectors that are her eyes, that those photons created within her constellations of electromagnetically charged neurons whose energy will go on forever.

And the physicist will remind the congregation of how much of all our energy is given off as heat. There may be a few fanning themselves with their programs as he says it. And he will tell them that the warmth that flowed through you in life is still here, still part of all that we are, even as we who mourn continue the heat of our own lives.

And you’ll want the physicist to explain to those who loved you that they need not have faith; indeed, they should not have faith. Let them know that they can measure, that scientists have measured precisely the conservation of energy and found it accurate, verifiable and consistent across space and time. You can hope your family will examine the evidence and satisfy themselves that the science is sound and that they’ll be comforted to know your energy’s still around. According to the law of the conservation of energy, not a bit of you is gone; you’re just less orderly. Amen.

Fuck Yeah, Poetry!: What Lot's Wife Would Have Said (If She Wasn't A Pillar of Salt) / Karen Finneyfrock

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 18:37:10 +0800

Fuck Yeah, Poetry!: What Lot's Wife Would Have Said (If She Wasn't A Pillar of Salt) / Karen Finneyfrock:

librariesandlemonade:

Do you remember when we met
in Gomorrah? When you were still beardless,
and I would oil my hair in the lamp light before seeing
you, when we were young, and blushed with youth
like bruised fruit. Did we care then
what our neighbors did
in the dark?

When our first daughter was born
on the River Jordan, when our second
cracked her pink head from my body
like a promise, did we worry
what our friends might be
doing with their tongues?

What new crevices they found
to lick love into or strange flesh
to push pleasure from, when we
called them Sodomites then,
all we meant by it
was neighbor.

When the angels told us to run
from the city, I went with you,
but even the angels knew
that women always look back.
Let me describe for you, Lot,
what your city looked like burning
since you never turned around to see it.

Sulfur ran its sticky fingers over the skin
of our countrymen. It smelled like burning hair
and rancid eggs. I watched as our friends pulled
chunks of brimstone from their faces. Is any form
of loving this indecent?

Cover your eyes tight,
husband, until you see stars, convince
yourself you are looking at Heaven.

Because any man weak enough to hide his eyes while his neighbors
are punished for the way they love deserves a vengeful god.

I would say these things to you now, Lot,
but an ocean has dried itself on my tongue.
So instead I will stand here, while my body blows itself
grain by grain back over the Land of Canaan.
I will stand here
and I will watch you
run.

"But also it is about your life"

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 18:26:53 +0800

bookofwriting:

“No poem is about one of us, or some of us, but is about all of us. It is part of a long document about the species. Every poem is about my life but also it is about your life, and a hundred thousand lives to come. That one person wrote it is not nearly so important or so interesting as that it pertains to us all.”

— Mary Oliver, Blue Pastures

Spring Comes to Ohio, by Joseph Campana

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 01:47:52 +0800

Spring Comes to Ohio, by Joseph Campana:

apoemaday:

The first gesture is despair
because the snowdrops
have fled and the cold
came back anyway. You
are far from your love
and you will be nothing
but the space between
the hand and what it is
accustomed to grasping.
The first gesture is cold
but the rain still comes
down and like the rain
you lean your head down
on someone’s shoulder
because it is too heavy for
you to carry by yourself.
Outside the boys are like
flowers and the flowers
are like boys because they
don’t give what they say.
All the evening flowers
are coffins bursting with
possibility. Why not pick
one, why not let your
sorrow sink into the dirt
where it will die? The first
gesture is the hope that it
will die before you will
or that you will learn to
read it like a book. Come
read, come to the flower
beds and the mowed-down
fields where the heads of
yellow soldiers burst in
the grass. If anyone ever
gave you something, that
gesture of fading beauty
was the first sign that
the price of generosity
is the flower that would
rather not be ripped from
its heart. Come read all
the flowers: they were
printed here just for you.
Come read your heart
which has shriveled
into a flower receding
before night. If the sun
ever will come back here
the first thing you’ll do is
reach right out to touch it.

"You’re in a car with a beautiful boy, and he won’t tell you that he loves you, but he loves you. And..."

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 15:01:22 +0800

“You’re in a car with a beautiful boy, and he won’t tell you that he loves you, but he loves you. And you feel like you’ve done something terrible, like robbed a liquor store, or swallowed pills, or shoveled yourself a grave in the dirt, and you’re tired. You’re in a car with a beautiful boy, and you’re trying not to tell him that you love him, and you’re trying to choke down the feeling, and you’re trembling, but he reaches over and he touches you, like a prayer for which no words exist, and you feel your heart taking root in your body, like you’ve discovered something you didn’t even have a name for.”

- Richard Siken (via whenwetalkaboutlove)

theurbanhistorian: I NEED VITALIANO AGUIRRE ON MY BLOG. I also...

Thu, 01 Mar 2012 11:52:36 +0800

theurbanhistorian:

I NEED VITALIANO AGUIRRE ON MY BLOG. I also need to study now. Bye!

Let’s, let’s, let’s. Also, please spread the...

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 18:16:47 +0800

Let’s, let’s, let’s. Also, please spread the word.

LOVE WON'T SAVE US: I’ve always wanted to begin a poemwith the line, “I’ve always wantedto...

Fri, 24 Feb 2012 15:13:53 +0800

LOVE WON'T SAVE US: I’ve always wanted to begin a poemwith the line, “I’ve always wantedto...:

hey, this is me! thanks for posting, man.

ahuntersheart:

I’ve always wanted to begin a poem
with the line, “I’ve always wanted
to begin.” Now I have. Best to end here,

but then the universe is expanding
back into its black beginnings,
and space, aware of its own looming demise,

is singing of possibilities. I’m almost over, it sings,
it’s almost over…

Civilization, by Carl Phillips

Fri, 24 Feb 2012 15:11:25 +0800

Civilization, by Carl Phillips:

ahuntersheart:

There’s an art
to everything. How
the rain means
April and an ongoing-ness like
that of song until at last

it ends. A centuries-old
set of silver handbells that
once an altar boy swung,
processing … You’re the same
wilderness you’ve always

been, slashing through briars,
the bracken
of your invasive
self. So he said,
in a dream. But

the rest of it—all the rest—
was waking: more often
than not, to the next
extravagance. Two blackamoor
statues, each mirroring

the other, each hoisting
forever upward his burden of
hand-painted, carved-by-hand
peacock feathers. Don’t
you know it, don’t you know

I love you, he said. He was
shaking. He said,
I love you. There’s an art
to everything. What I’ve
done with this life,

what I’d meant not to do,
or would have meant, maybe, had I
understood, though I have
no regrets. Not the broken but
still flowering dogwood. Not

the honey locust, either. Not even
the ghost walnut with its
non-branches whose
every shadow is memory,
memory … As he said to me

once, That’s all garbage
down the river, now. Turning,
but as the utterly lost—
because addicted—do:
resigned all over again. It

only looked, it—
It must only look
like leaving. There’s an art
to everything. Even
turning away. How

eventually even hunger
can become a space
to live in. How they made
out of shamelessness something
beautiful, for as long as they could.

Pilosopo Tasyo: A Space Between Sides: Discoursing the Impeachment

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 20:50:30 +0800

Pilosopo Tasyo: A Space Between Sides: Discoursing the Impeachment:

admuphilo:

The Department of Philosophy,
invites the Ateneo Community
to a forum titled

A Space Between Sides: Discoursing the Impeachment

on Wednesday, 29 February 2012, 4:30 PM at CTC 105.

In this forum, the Department of Philosophy has invited Ms. Carmela Abao, of the Department of Political…

lookingformendiola: Here’s what not beautiful about it: from...

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 17:34:43 +0800

lookingformendiola:

Here’s what not beautiful about it: from here, you can’t see the rust or the cracked paint or whatever, but you can tell what the place really is. It’s not even hard enough to be made out of plastic. It’s a paper town. I mean, look at it, Q … All those paper people living in their paper houses, burning the future to stay warm.

From Paper Towns by John Green.

Ateneo posts invite to noise barrage, takes it down when things heat up

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 17:25:19 +0800

Earlier today, the Ateneo de Manila Facebook page put up an invite for a noise barrage, to be held later today along Katipunan. I shared it on my own FB page, then went back to work. By mid-afternoon, I revisited the page, and saw it flooded with posts criticizing Ateneo for, well, putting up an invite to it. The call to silence and apathy appalled me, and I proceeded to engage the posters (at least one of them an obvious pro-Corona, pro-GMA troll).

In the span of perhaps half an hour, the original invite was taken down. I then called out the page admin on their own wall, which apparently isn’t public. They replied. I’m posting the exhange below, with minor edits for typos on my end.

(My status update calling them out): Ateneo de Manila University deleted the picture on the noise barrage later. Admin, please do not alienate your students/alumni who actually care about the truth more than they do about UAAP baseball and voleyball scores. Put the pic back up and let public discourse on this issue ensue.

(Their comment on my post):

Ateneo de Manila University: Hello, Mikael.

The picture and post that we removed pertains to an activity of the Simbahang Lingkod ng Bayan. The activity is not an official university activity, and does not reflect an official position taken by the University.

We initially agreed to assist the SLB in getting word out, notwithstanding a policy of not posting or allowing the posting of any content that may be construed or misconstrued as partisan political statements or activities.

After evaluating the reactions to the post, some of which included valid vehement objections we initially released another post that clarified that the activity was an SLB activity, not an Ateneo activity.

The Ateneo has not declared an official position regarding the impeachment of Chief Justice Renato Corona.

Since the clarification was met with similar reactions, we have decided that it will be more prudent and fair to take the post down.

The University respects the right of members of the community to participate in peaceful gatherings and to engage in discourse regarding political issues that the nation is facing. Engagement is encouraged.

However, we must be clear about the fact that until an official university position is taken, we must be careful to respect the right of all members of the community to discern and act on their own, and avoid any actions that may be mistaken as an action on the part of the university when there is none as of the moment.

We thank you for your comment and feedback.

(Me again:)

Just as there were valid objections, there was also valid debate taking place, and valid praise for Ateneo for posting the invite. Fact is, you put it up; objections came in and it stayed up. When discourse began taking place, you put it down. How should one take that?

We Ateneans have been criticized for a seeming policy of conflict avoidance. At times, this has been called apathy. That is understandable. But never have we stifled debate on issues.

I understand where you’re coming from, and in fact don’t expect you to put the picture back up. However, your reaction— taking the picture down— strikes me as one driven by panic rather than sobriety. You could’ve kept it up and released a statement saying that you haven’t yet taken a stand. You chose to bring it down, which can be interpreted than something worse as an “official stand.” It can be interpreted as the castration of an institution; a stand for silence. Worst, I guess: a stand condoning the stifling of truth in the impeachment trial. I hope, as an Atenean, for both our sakes, that this is not spun the wrong way.

(And finally, them:)

Thank you for your feedback, Mikael. We will take this into consideration the next time something like this happens.

So there. I’d have wanted to call them out some more. Ask for balls. Pero ano pa ba ang mararating nu’n.