Monday, December 29, 2008

Life in No-Time

I am not an efficient person if I don't have some sort of schedule. The very act of going to work five days a week is enough to keep me on track...buying groceries, cleaning the litterbox, actually getting dressed. Without that schedule, though, I'm jelly.

Right now I'm in the middle of a two week enforced vacation. For the most part I've been living a dreary half-life of sleeping, eating, and shuffling around aimlessly. Part of this time has been sent making sure my Sims graduate from university, but I'm proud to say that I AM in the process of accomplishing a few tasks, and I did in fact clean the litterbox this afternoon.

First, I've been reading Boswell's "Life of Johnson," which is by turns interesting and tedious. Samuel Johnson is still remembered as a man of language and wit, but it's apparent that his celebrated dinner-table ramblings were deliberately contrary and too often half-baked. What's more, they were usually little more than nasty gossip about OTHER 18th century men of wit, which means I can rarely care much about his subject matter.

Every page of "Life of Johnson" is pretty much like this:
The following night I was priveleged to dine with Samuel Johnson and his guests [Notable Reverend], [Famous Playwrite], [Respected Politician], and [Silly Annoying Person]. [Silly Annoying Person] was unfortunate in espousing his respect for [Much-Admired Scottish Poet]. Johnson wasted no time in cutting the poor man to shreds, calling any who so much as READ [Much-Admired Scottish Poet] a "blockhead," and then, turning on [Silly Annoying Person], making the pointed remark that "those who go so far as to read and then ADMIRE [Much-Admired Scottish Poet] are twice-over blockheads, who see in poetry little more than a reflection of their own inadequacies, and who are no better than the Scottish people themselves," which I felt a pretty cruel statement from so great a man.
Anyway, when I'm not wishing I could poke Samuel Johnson in his single remaining good eye, I am learning to play the bass.

Surprise! I borrowed a bass and an amp from my father, and I'm pleased to say I'm picking it up pretty well. I haven't even reached the "beginner" stage yet, but since I started last week with no knowledge of what a fret even WAS, I'm to the point where I can at least play the C Major scale and make my way through a two-octave tetrachord, which probably sounds harder than it is.

Pictures coming eventually (because it's all about the image of course).