chris t

A while back I resolved to "stop" reading fiction in English.  I never considered a complete moratorium, but I did drastically curtail my input -- a decision for which I blame Robin "trilogy of trilogies" Hobb.  They're impeccably written.  Can't put them down.  Suddenly I notice the sun's up again.

This has improved my Japanese a bit.  I've been reading a lot of manga, some with furigana, some without.  Occasionally reading stuff like A Game of Thrones (now autographed!  Quoth GRRM: "beautiful covers.")  It's an incredibly slow process in which I recall the original text and pretend I can read the Japanese translation.  Over time the pretense becomes less so, with help from frequent excursions to the dictionary.  (Gene Wolfe: "It is said that it is the peculiar quality of time to conserve fact, and that it does this by rendering our past falsehoods true.")

The downside's been that, in the absence of narrative input, my dreams seem to get a little unhinged.  I haven't really noticed that I have more free time than before either, which rather surprises me.  Nonetheless, an interesting experiment.

Of course, my ability to sustain this kind of thing is limited, so I've been reading considerably more fiction in English than I was.  Yesterday I read Gene Wolfe's Pirate Freedom, which was fantastic.  Pirate adventure story with involuntarily time-travelling protagonist.  Unreliable narrator, which is one of Wolfe's trademarks.  Some extremely difficult unresolved questions barely poking their heads above the narrative, which is another.  Recommended.

Six word story:

"What fallout?" he asked, tail wagging.

I can't believe it's already the 6th of March.  Today's I Ching was unfavorable.  I should really just stay in and pull the covers over my head.  (Hexagram 12, "stagnation".  Of course, responding that way would only make it true.)

In keeping with my policy of seeing only inscrutable art, I want to go and see the giant rock being moved for "Levitated Mass". [1]  It's super local, which is nice, because I'm still juggling my finances from the spot tour.  I always enjoy that sort of display of industrial might.

Lately my dreams have been extra-lucid and more real than everyday life.  Usually not a good sign.

[1] http://lacma.wordpress.com/2012/02/28/levitated-mass-transport-a-gawkers-guide/

Rome, snow over the Circus Maximus.

Now I am in Paris. It's early morning.

So far, everything's been going smoothly, which I define as "only manageable problems, such as getting diverted to Scotland". Only three more galleries to go. Three more cities -- Athens, Rome, and Hong Kong. In practical terms, this means we're about halfway done. (NYC was easy and relatively familiar. London had two galleries and was still Anglosphere. From here, everything gets a lot tougher.)

Last I checked, yesterday, 18 people had completed this challenge. Far fewer than I expected. I'm one of something like 40 to have completed 8 spots. I'm still guessing that the final tally will be a couple hundred, with a giant rush toward the deadline.

Ran into three other challengers, all Americans. We traded routing tips and stories, chatted, looked at spots, moved on.

I've got the idea rattling around in my head to chase Damien Hirst's "Spot Challenge." (footnote 1) Like, seriously thinking about it.

This is stupid. Probably also a colossal waste of money. (Although the NY Times helpfully points out that the price range on Hirst prints is between 3500 and 50000, which I somewhat expect is about to plummet. The art market isn't going to give me much liquidity, I hasten to add. All in all, best to assume the print is worthless. On the other hand, it would certainly class up the place.)

I signed up and went to the one in LA, so now I have a (rather comically large) card for stamping, with 10 blank spaces. The paintings are actually more interesting than you'd expect in person. But that's only the first step. I'd still have to get all my ducks lined up and take a couple weeks from work. Not trivial. And it would be a whirlwind trip. No question, thoroughly ridiculous.

But the truth is that I'm terrible at being a tourist -- I tend to just wander around. I like the idea of having a quest, and if that quest happens to emphasize the stark artificiality of it all, so much the better.

> read footnote 1
http://www.gagosian.com/spotchallenge

I enjoy cooking, but it seems like I never have time.

I mean, I enjoy cooking, but I also read a lot, sleep more than average, have a day job, have a side job, play with my collection of old and rebuildable computers, drink moderately, watch anime, dabble in embedded electronics, and so on and so forth, plus all the stuff that I never talk about for the sake of superstition. Put that way, it sounds kind of miraculous that I ever get anything done at all.

But still, cooking. I do at least try to make full meals for the holidays, and I think they went pretty well this year. No pictures, because I'm just not that hipster.

For Thanksgiving, I made a turkey. Very traditional. Stuffing, mashed potatoes, mashed yams, bacon quiche, asparagus, and some other stuff that escapes me. The turkey came out okay. Drumsticks were kind of tough, but it was moist apart from that. (Should have cooked it inverted for a while, I think.) The sides came out pretty well, especially the quiche, which everyone loved. I still have never made edible biscuits, and this was no exception.

For Christmas, we had Coq au Vin, plus a wide assortment of vegetarian side dishes for my sister. More quiche (one of my favorite foods,) parsnip-and-carrot fritters, lemon cake, spinach salad, some other stuff that I'm forgetting. Didn't attempt to make biscuits -- went with a loaf of french bread from the store. The Coq was tasty enough, but I think it would have gone better if I'd actually ever had it before, rather than working solely off descriptions and guesswork. If I make it again, I'll probably know better. And I spent the next several days eating the leftovers over naan -- delightful.

And for New Year's, I'm making a pork roast. Plus more potatoes, steamed parsnips, spinach, and champagne. Grilled cheese sandwiches with pears. (Planned for Christmas, but we already had too much food.) I'm actually rather pleased with the whole thing -- it was all delightful, and ready at the same time, as if by miracle. If I have some time in the coming days I'll boil the bones down for soup, use up my leftover mirepoix. Bunch of stuff in the fridge that needs eating up.

One day I'll make decent biscuits. Let that be my resolution.

Saw a Blue Line train with a "La Cienega" destination sign. Very exciting. Can't wait for the new line to open, even if I almost never have any inclination to go out to Culver City.

One day we'll have a real light rail system.

For some reason, I have difficulty conveying to flight attendants what beverage I have selected. Normal conversation:

A: "And what would you like to drink today?"
C: "Coke."
A: "No beverage, okay."
C: "No, I'd like a Coke"
A: "Oh, Diet Coke, right"
C: "Er, actually regular Coke."

I don't even know why. I mean, sure, I'm not good at projecting. But I can hold conversations with the people I'm sitting next to. Even when I try to compensate by making my speech a little more redundant, it just doesn't work. (I think, of the last 10 flights I've been on, I've had about a 30% success rate.) And I'm already speaking at maximum non-shout volume. (Probably. I'm not very good at marshaling speech in the morning, which is when I tend to fly.)

Maybe I should just make a sign that says "Coke" and hold it up.

Found a 1963 quarter in my change today. I noticed when I was pulling the change out of yesterday's pants that one of the quarters felt a little different. Lighter, maybe. Stuck to my hand a bit more. Looked different, too, plus it's a slightly different color. It's a very distinctive piece of change, when you pay attention. (One quick way to identify them is to stack your quarters -- silver ones won't have that visible copper band in the middle.)

It's rare to find quarters of that vintage, probably because they contain about 5 dollars' worth of silver, and have thus mostly been taken out of circulation.

Spent the rest of the day wondering how my life would be different if I'd decided to take up coin collecting.