"cars are so wierd. Don't you think so? (without waiting for response) they're like people. And when they're at gas stations they're especially wierd. Its like their tired"
thought of the day, selon amanda.

Is their anyway we can minimize the load time for the blog?

posted by aimee   [11:27 AM]

On a sadder note, I wanted to share this with you:



O tragedy that is my life!
(My highest record's still 157 - from TASP. care to beat it, John?)

posted by Tae-Yeoun Keum   [11:49 PM]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JOHN!

posted by Tae-Yeoun Keum   [11:48 PM]

if the longhorns make the rose bowl, it means cal (alma mater of my mother, grandfather, grandmother, and countless other relatives) will have been screwed royally out of a bcs bowl spot. as for tara, i can't imagine watching the game with a former member of the corps (her dad) was much fun.

happy belated thanksgiving (insert grim comment about killing indians here)!

posted by Kelsey   [11:32 PM]

I recieved a birthday/thanksgiving call from Tae-Yeoun just the other day, and it reminded me that she is perhaps the coolest person I know. That, in turn, reminded me that I have not mentioned her coolness lately, which, i turn, reminded me of this:

UT Longhorns won their crucial game against hated rival, the Aggies of A&M. This could mean a Rose Bowl for them. Now this may not be earth-shattering to east coasters, but, from where I am (in Texas visiting family), it seems pretty blogworthy. Kelsey, Tara, where is the wild wooping and drunken blogging of the winners?

posted by john owens-ream   [7:59 AM]

This man just keeps popping up, doesn't he.


Thanks For Remembering Us

The flowers sent here by mistake,
signed with a name that no one knew,
are turning bad. What shall we do?
Our neighbor says they're not for her,
and no one has a birthday near.
We should thank someone for the blunder.
Is one of us having an affair?
At first we laugh, and then we wonder.

The iris was the first to die,
enshrouded in its sickly-sweet
and lingering perfume. The roses
fell one petal at a time,
and now the ferns are turning dry.
The room smells like a funeral,
but there they sit, too much at home,
accusing us of some small crime,
like love forgotten, and we can't
throw out a gift we've never owned.

- Dana Gioia

posted by Tae-Yeoun Keum   [11:03 PM]

It's odd that Yale would quote Vico's description of Princeton's "Approaches to Western Civilization: An Overview of the Humanities."
We can all stop worrying. In two years Jacob will be receiving tenure here at Princeton. I look forward to taking his classes.

posted by Matthew Schmitz   [11:34 PM]

That quote's actually been around since March at the latest, and it was the reason I applied to that program.

Jacob sends his love to everyone. He thanks Kelsey for the care package, and Alex for the letter - he has written back; he just hasn't posted it. He has not dropped any hints as to which Bring Jacob Eigen To group he loves more, but claims to be very flattered that he's in such high demand. But as we all know, if he's said no to a certain school once, he can do it again. Bring it on!

posted by Tae-Yeoun Keum   [2:20 PM]

Do I have the honor of telling the epic story of my Odyssey to and through Boston?

So. Harvard-Yale game today. The morning buses leave Yale at 7:30. I have stupidly deprived myself of sleep all week and, save for a two hour nap yesterday afternoon, ran a movie marathon last night and didn't get to bed till 4:30. I wake up to my alarm at 6:30.

[I have no idea what happened in between]

I wake up again at 8:00. I spend fifteen minutes staring at the clock and despairing. I do not have the heart to call a Harvardian to let them know I can't make it. In utter despair, with no agenda whatsoever, I go out.

And it turns out: there's a bus that hasn't left yet! Apparently they have this bus every year for sad cases like mine. This year, I was the only sad case. The only people in the entire bus are the driver and myself.

Two and a half hours later, I am dropped off in the saddest edge of Harvard's campus, just where Harvard ends and Cambridge begins. Alternating phone calls between Olga and Kevin (a really really good friend of mine from Manila) and feeling really really lost I walk down this one street against the flood of people flocking towards the stadium, and I somehow spot Olga, scream, jump on her and nearly knock her to the floor, and give both Olga and her boyfriend James a terrible scare. Bryan and my friend Kevin joins us later, and after lunch amidst the crowd of Those People Who Are Actually There To Watch The Football, we meet up with Eunice and Adam. Lots of screaming and hugging and jumping up and down - I believe I've been compared to a catapult. (why??)

And then we all went to Olga's room to enjoy the pies she and Eunice made the night before: banana cream pie and Creative and Mysterious pie; both were absolutely heavenly. And looked through Adam's TASP photo album and awwwed over how young we looked and how much we missed all of you. Then we cursed Alex and Adrian for not making it and bickered over who gets to take Jacob after he gets out of Nevada. (I was a bit outnumbered.)

Wow. Post getting too long. So. Adam had to leave, and Olga had to catch the second half of the game, so Bryan, Eunice, and Kevin toured me through their rooms, and sometime during the tour I realized that I left my phone in Olga's room, and then we had cheesecake at a cafe. Susan joined us here.

The panic that followed: my phone was still in Olga's room. Bryan gallantly went to go find it (and Olga, who would let him in). [thank you Bryan!!!] I was supposed to be back on the other side of campus at 4:30. Bryan calls to say he's on his way, and we wait. It looked like it was 4:20, and we wanted to have a picture taken. Susan goes off to buy a camera. Susan calls, saying that it's 4:30. Eunice turns to me with one word: "run."

Kevin and I run while Eunice waits for Susan. We're about to cross the river (the halfwaypoint of the distance, I guess), maneuvering through the flood of people coming back from the stadium. Suddenly Olga's boyfriend appears out of nowhere and hands me my phone. And then Eunice joins us. We marvel over how lucky I am. Bryan comes running, and we're all panting but happy that I at least get to say proper goodbyes to them before I go. Someone suggests that the scenario be made into a movie. We settle for blog post.

We reach the remaining buses that haven't left yet. Standing conspicuously in the middle of the parking lot (so that we'll know if they try to leave without me), we talk about how we have to meet up again, and soon. Then hug mushily. And then talk about how ALL of us taspers have to meet up again, and soon. And hug again. Then Olga and Susan show up (considering how far they've run to get here, Olga is almost disappointed that the buses didn't abandon me: "So wait, was the whole 4:30 thing a lie?") and we take a group picture. Susan suggests that we all show our TASP shirts in the picture but that plan fails because only she and Olga remembered to wear them today. But I'm sure it's a gorgeous photo nevertheless.

Then I get on the bus and miss you guys all over again. The end.

posted by Tae-Yeoun Keum   [4:56 PM]

Anybody remember this place? It's snowing in Omaha, but I'm betting it's still pretty nice in Austin.
by john

posted by john owens-ream   [1:47 AM]

2nding Aimee's question: yeah, no really why? I thought it was just my browser doing in. I also have had a blog with my brother and sister where I keep in touch with them, and for the last few weeks it has been counting down in numbers of posts. I'm worried that someday soon we'll log on and blogger will say: "sorry, we don't exist anymore."

posted by john owens-ream   [12:35 AM]

why does our blog keep shrinking?

posted by aimee   [4:50 PM]

In the vein of Russian composers, I'd like to recommend Scriabin. (As Jamie recalled correctly, he was the one I mixed up with Schoenberg in my TASP interview--it's because I like Scriabin so much more.) His earlier works have a Chopinesque quality--and his later works are also incredibly interesting. Scriabin was an interesting character, but instead of telling you about it myself, I will quote what I took from the Scriabin Society of America:
"Scriabin's thought processes were immensely complicated, even tinged with solipsism. "I am God," he once wrote in one of his secret philosophical journals. He embraced Helen Blavatsky's Theosophy. In London he visited the room in which Mme. Blavatsky died. Scriabin considered his last music to be fragments of an immense piece to be called Mysterium. This seven-day-long megawork would be performed at the foothills of the Himalayas in India, after which the world would dissolve in bliss. Bells suspended from clouds would summon spectators. Sunrises would be preludes and sunsets codas. Flames would erupt in shafts of light and sheets of fire. Perfumes appropriate to the music would change and pervade the air. At the time of his death, Scriabin left 72 orchestral-size pages of sketches for a preliminary work Prefatory Action, intended to "prepare" the world for the apocalyptic ultimate masterpiece. Alexander Nemtin, the Russian composer, assembled those jottings and co-created the Prefatory Action. Its three vast movements have been performed with great acclaim under conductors Cyril Kondrashin in Moscow and Vladimir Ashkenazy in Berlin with Alexei Lubimov at the piano."

posted by Eunice   [7:37 PM]

Sorry for posting so often but this is the most amazing site. It's an ongoing project that takes apart and analyzes accents - and while I don't understand half the generalizations they draw, nor the scary symbols they have for particular phonemes(?) - it's still fun to listen to the recordings. Lovely way to kill time on a Sunday night.

Ooh, and music recommendation: Shostakovich. All of them, even the ones I haven't listened to (most of them, then). I feel like I can just pass out on the floor and listen to him for hours on end and everything will be okay.

posted by Tae-Yeoun Keum   [7:05 PM]

snow!!! Tae-youen, i felt so hippy-goofy but I couldn't resist either. Hahahah my silliness was just kindof stupid though because i had been in our house lobby in a tank-top (no clean warmer clothes) with a blanket- so when it started to snow i ran outside bare armed with bedroom slippers. So dumb. And then I realized that i didnt have my key. Soooo dumb. :) Logically and with no other option, I made like a punk rocker and jumped up and down continuously until someone came around (fortunately) to save me.
Despite the fact that i probably looked pretty cool, such incidents are probably not in my best interest. : )
A little later i went back outside with a few more people, more clothing and my key- and its so pretty! It was so wonderful that we had to start throwing it so it grew into a massive snowball fight.
The cold is so nice in general-To everyone who knows winters and everyone who doesn't: happy winter! It begins! i hug you all non-spacially :)

posted by aimee   [9:57 AM]

Posting twice in a row, and about nothing substantial, and I know Adam is rolling his eyes at me right now, but I have to get this out there and squeal about just how excited I am.



I'm going to cry if the forecast is wrong.


addendum two hours later:
it wasn't.
:)
i ran out in sleepwear and a coat and jumped about with my tongue sticking out and hugging equally dazed californians and texans and singaporeans. now my hair is frozen solid, but all is wonderful. now if only y'all were around to tell me to stop being a tourist--

posted by Tae-Yeoun Keum   [8:34 PM]

Bryan, welcome back. :)

I'm in the midst of diligently putting off a paper. Current means of procrastination is Reading Every Single Email I've Gotten Since July 2001, and here's something my friend sent me some time ago that's just absolutely beautiful. (I realize some of you have read it already, but anyway.)


And the priestess spoke again and said: Speak to us of Reason and Passion.
And he answered saying:
Your soul is oftentimes a battlefield, upon which your reason and your judgement wage war against your passion and your appetite.
Would that I could be a peacemaker in your soul, that I might turn the discord and the rivalry of your elements into oneness and melody.

Your reason and your passion are the rudder and the sails of your seafaring soul.
If either your sails or your rudder be broken, you can but toss and drift, or else be held at a standstill in mid-seas.
For reason, ruling alone, is a force confining; and passion, unattended, is a flame that burns to its own destruction.
Therefore let your soul exalt your reason to the height of passion, that is may sing; And let it direct your passion with reason, that your passion may live through its own daily resurrection, and like the phoenix rise above its own ashes.

I would have you consider your judgement and you appetite even as you would two loved guests in your house.
Surely you would not honour one gues above the other; for he who is more mindful of one loses the love and the faith of both.

Among the hills, when you sit in the cool shade of the white poplars, sharing the peace and serenity of distant fields and meadows- then let your heart say in silence, "God rests in reason."
And when the storm comes, and the mighty wind shakes the forest, and thunder and lightening proclaim the majesty of the sky,- then let your heart say in awe, "God moves in passion."

And since you are a breath in God's sphere, and leaf in God's forest, you too should rest in reason and move in passion.

- from Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet

posted by Tae-Yeoun Keum   [7:42 PM]

I woke up this morning. The statement itself isn't as self-evident as it seems. What I mean to say is that I had an epiphany upon opening my eyes this morning. It occurred to me that I have a garden...

I find that I used this blog more as a morning pages... but I type and type and type and then at the end... look up and think, that's me. even if i spent 6 weeks with you guys, i can't put in words that identify the deepest corners of consciousness with you. and so, i tend to never post. i figure however, that i would at least give you the beginning of my random writings so that you know im still alive.

posted by Bryan Lee   [6:30 PM]

I can't make it Alex. Is it ok if I send my brother instead? What time is it and where, he loves improv. And have you seen Too Much Light Make The Baby Go Blind? The improv group is called the neofuturists and I think they perform near lincoln park just a few blocks from the 'L. Best indie comedy in the world as far as I'm concerned. Midnight shows on friday and saturday. If you haven't seen them, look them up and go, or ask around on campus and find someone else going.

posted by john owens-ream   [8:37 AM]

Has anyone been following the shark's circling Arlen Specter? I mean, cut the guy a break, he just barely beat out a no name democrat, solidifying republican control of the senate, and already the neocons are trying to bring him down! Read about it at townhall.com if you dare. They're getting really vicious- what Jon Stewart called the "Righteous Anger of the Enfranchised."

The point though is, Matt- how soon can you run for elective office? You'll be just barely of age to be in the NE legislature in 06... convieniently, your current republican state rep from O'Neal Sen. Douglas D. Cunningham, is term-limited out. So how about it? Take back your party? I'll be your first campaign volunteer, and now that my hair's cut, no one will even know I'm a liberal.

Who else wants to join the "Draft Matt" movement?

posted by john owens-ream   [7:56 AM]

I just learned that there's a Michigan 03 tasper here, a Tom Ledbetter from Arlington. At least he's not a Cornell infidel (I mean the TASP, Aimee). Hurrah for writing literature papers!

posted by Matthew Schmitz   [6:00 PM]

1003rd now - I am so impressed. I love our blog almost as much as I love you guys.

The 2005 (2005?!) TASP program titles are out, even though the course descriptions aren't. Five TASPs going on next summer - here they are:

Cornell I: Truth in History?
Cornell II: War and Terror: Ethical, Legal, and Historical Perspectives
Michigan: Music of the Everyday: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives on Popular Music in the United States, 1880-Present
UT: War, Violence, and Story-Making
Washington: The Transformation of Twentieth Century American Cities

posted by Tae-Yeoun Keum   [9:02 AM]

Well noted Eunice. I think I'm (mostly) past the blame stage and into the mourning stage. Tomorrow I am cutting my hair and rending my clothes. I will post photos sometime later. Fasting was my first consideration, but my parents talked me out of it with health considerations.

But make no mistake about it- this is not about anger at republicans. I have nothing but high regard for anyone who cast a ballot out of good faith and reasonable consideration. It is about mourning and sympathy for the future.

I grieve for the men and women who will be drafted and for the families whose lives' savings will be turned into monopoly money when America's national debt passes our GDP. I grieve for the million women who will have abortions once again in the basement bathrooms and inner-city alley-ways. I grieve for the tens of millions of homosexual couples who will not be able to marry in my lifetime. I grieve for the hundreds of millions of Iraqis and Saudis and others who will die because of our neocon crusades in the mideast.

For some reason matt, your friend who is fasting is a woman after my own heart. There were many things on the ballot this election, and not all of them spelled out in print.

posted by john owens-ream   [9:07 PM]

Another four years. Sigh.
On a more appreciative note, I find it wonderful that our 1000th post should coincide with Alex's admirable tolerance in the aftermath of this presidential election. The election is a conglomeration of individual perspective into a common result. Though it's hard to appreciate the product of uniqueness in this situation, the post underscores the importance of our attempt to appreciate such differences--morally, politically, and otherwise.

posted by Eunice   [3:24 PM]

Many of my Kerry-supporting friends are not speaking to me. I asked one girl if she would like to watch Bush's speech with me. She said, "No. I do not want to see his face. I do not want to see a Republican face." I later brought her a home-made cookie, which caused her to say, "No. I can not eat this now. I am fasting. After sundown, yes."

Even so, come Lord Jesus.

posted by Matthew Schmitz   [1:01 PM]

i think my feelings about the last election are best summed up by the (sadly deleted) words of alex yablon:

"basically, my ass is drunk. i don't think i should have to explain myself. my shit is probably going to be real angry tommorow morning. ps. i love olga, matt, and all the other republicans here because you didn't make a difference. did ANYONE vote in a swing state? jesus chirsto. me gustas las personas liberal pero no hay los numero que necesito. senor kerry necesito mas votes. i am drunk, cleary. the bill of rights is going to need all the help it can get. donate all your money to the ACLU and not the impotent democratic party."

also, dejected liberals please find solace in the wisdom of that late great american social commentator tupac shakur: "we ain't meant to survive, cause it's a setup/and even though you're fed up/ya got to keep your head up." and remember, ain't nothin but a gangsta party

posted by Kelsey   [12:26 PM]

I hate to say it, but this is obviously all Brian's fault. He was wandering the tulgy woods of Vermont and not rounding up the other 10,000 votes we needed from Ohio. Quick, help me come up with other people to blaim so that I can stop crying.

blame blame blame! (mourn mourn mourn) Organize! Organize! Organize? I can not yet pull myself out of bed.

posted by john owens-ream   [11:49 AM]

So one of my friends was Alex from Clockwork Orange for Halloween, and she gave me permission to post the pictures (and her photoshopped versions) because the costume was just, real horrorshow.

posted by Tae-Yeoun Keum   [11:02 AM]

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