I’ve been a poor blogger this past week. My apologies. Latin, dissertating and working has been a bit overwhelming. I have recently started re-watching Star Trek: The Next Generation and, this too, has become a time vortex.

Rather than recap episodes of great dinners with friends, dirty escapades and boring Latin complaining i will zoom forward to Sunday evening when i FINALLY sit down (well, lie on my bed to be exact) and start working on the chapter of my dissertation due this Thursday.

It has been a glorious week-end and i spent some of the afternoon sitting outside in the sun, working on my homework. When i came back in, i set-up ye old laptop to charge and STUPIDLY left the adaptor box under a pillow i had thrown on the bed. Zoom forward to 9pm when i realize, to my complete and utter horror, that somehow, i only have 50% power. My adaptor had died. It was so hot i thought my skin would burn.

Panic ensues. The only productive thing i have managed to write (because the first couple of sentences of anything is the hardest) is a working title: “Fiddling while Rome burns: Nero as Tyrant in mid-fourteenth century Florence” and an opening sentence i have re-written eight times. Wow.

Because i am brilliant, i threw the adaptor into my fridge and proceeded to panic. Sending myself all my files since my last online back-up, searching for the nearest Apple store… but disaster was averted. Within ten minutes the charger was functional again. Collective sigh of relief.

I need to be more productive, procrastinate less and sleep more. This close-call hits home. So i promptly blogged about it. An addict is an addict.

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Trying out StumbleUpon, i encountered a lovely set of Street Installations by Mark Jenkins. Whimsical, witty and yet stunning i was mesmerized. They reminded me that i need to spend the next couple of months in Toronto going to the theatre, arts shows and other cultural events i don’t normally manage to find the time for. Mark Jenkins has had shows in cities around the world and his street installations cover a wide array of urban landscapes. My personal favourite was a shot of a walker locked to a street post - but since my bike was stolen i have been paying a lot of attention to locking things up in public.
The shot featured in this post is entitled “Call Waiting” - and although it is not one of my favourites, it was available on a CC Attribution License and i am completely opposed to stealing the work of artists who already have enough trouble getting their work out there.

This first great find through StumbleUpon portends well for the future… Check it out!

So, the conference was Saturday and i think it went well. The paper was submitted on Sunday night, and it is over and done with. The Latin exam was Monday, and though i don’t think i passed, i refuse to cry over spilled milk.

Veronica and i went for all-you-can-eat sushi on Bloor after my exam. The Now Restaurant Guide reviewed the place as mediocre, and i have to say they were right - but Veronica and i are more into tempura than sushi (well, i really like sushi but am not super adventurous and Veronica even less-so) and thus as was ok. We stopped for candy and then went to see Smart People.

Smart People had some great moments. At many times i thought i was watching a caricature of my own life (being an academic is insanely ridiculous), but this also pointed to my overall problem with the movie. All the characters were caricatures. I don’t think this was bad acting, in fact, i think the acting was pretty good considering what there was to work with. The screenplay was leaving much to be desired. Veronica and i also discussed the intended demographic - and couldn’t decide who was supposed to be watching this. I think it might have had the same target group as Juno did, but the latter made it big because the music and screenplay was just so witty.

So… the past five days have been filled with watching of things on my laptop as i attempt to switch gears from class-attending to major paper-writing. I have watched two seasons of Dexter, which is fantabulous. I also watched Eastern Promises, The Jane Austen Book Club, We Own the Night, and Magnolia. Yeah, that’s a lot of movies. i have even taken up reading the discussion boards for literature, history and philosophy on craigslist.

This week-end i am going to go apply at Loblaws for some summer money. Must accumulate the necessary capital to become a world traveller.

The Jane Austen Book Club has in some ways inspired me to join a book club when i get back to Montreal. I am worried about my brain atrophying during my four months off. I need to find a way to keep up my Latin and Italian while also hitting some heavy books i have always wanted to read. Does anyone know of a book club that would be willing to accept me? I worry i am the Prudie character waiting to happen. LOL.

This evening, i am heading to the library to pick up a book that i requested and am going to do work for a couple of hours there. Crossing my fingers. I have been able to justify lounging around over the past couple of days, but i think i am going to start to enter self-loathing again pretty soon if i keep it up.

Oh, and i had one of those dreams again last night. Set in a high school. But we were both 23. It was her high school in fact. And i lost sight of him… i know he was wearing grey and he held my hand as we walked through the crowd. I was happy that my skin is still as soft as it is… even in my dreams i am competitive.

Although there are still forty-five minutes left in this day, i am not hopeful that anymore of that paper that was supposed to be written by this evening will get hammered out. That means i have written NOTHING today.

What have i been doing? Well, in case you hadn’t noticed, i finally worked on the colour-scheme of this blog and added the logo graphic commissioned from Sheena. I also read three articles for a class on Wednesday. I also translated about 100 lines of Latin for class today. I made 2.5 hours of collection calls (money in my pocket).

I tried making paprika popcorn. The lid came off the pot… there was popcorn everywhere. I already have a mice problem. Ugh. It wasn’t any good either - by the by. So far the curry popcorn is still winning.

As per Arieh’s suggestion, i read some Harry Potter fan-fiction (so shoot me). It’s fantastic. I highly recommend it for those of you going through HP-withdrawal: The Original Naked Quidditch Match.

Oh, and i wasted time on facebook trying to figure out if i like the idea of playing Knighthood. I still don’t really understand how it works, but if you have rec’d an invitation to the game from me - you’ve already done me a huge favour. Just by sending you the invitation i am able to build for a while - so please be kind and tolerate me even if you don’t respond at all. Thanks!

I should not be making buttermilk pancakes and drizzling blueberry jam over them. Alas, when The Joy of Cooking said they come out best if the batter is refrigerated for 6 hours or longer - i knew i was doomed. Although i have to get up very early for school tomorrow (and the day after that) at least i have something to look forward to for breakfast.

By the by, pancakes are an excellent midnight snack. They took me 20 minutes from start to finish (i fried up two) and the rest is now in my fridge for the rest of the week’s breakfast.

Other than that, i have been good today. My schedule has gone off track, but because an article i was going to just skim turned out to be pertinent for my larger paper unaffiliated with a course. I went to Italian even! I went to Latin (despite getting up an hour late because i fell asleep at like 3am again)! I started to read an article on Montaillou! I read an article on Dante and Boccaccio’s influence on Chaucer. I am reading a chapter from a book on the same topic right now (after my snack break). Encourage me! Be wowed by both my productivity levels and my lack of advancement on the papers i have to write in the next three weeks. Yes, there is still essentially no research accomplished. I am on it…

A slight oversight on my part - bringing only Camus’ La Peste to read on the bus as “break” reading from my school reading - the introduction to the Decameron when i am, myself, suffering from a bout of sinus cold. Loverly. just loverly.

Wikipedia is, by far, one of the greatest innovations of our age. It does for the information available on the internet what Boyle’s innovation did for the scientific method (he got a group of reliable witness to attest to the “fact” of the vacuum created within his laboratory - the facts were now represented by the people, taking people out of science, effectively). What i love about Wikipedia is the list of sources and further readings at the bottom of any good page - SO much more effective than a google search.

Now, i realize the problem with Wikipedia being used as an authority for those of us unable to discern the grains from amongst the chaff, but, frankly, it’s not like Britannica or the OED are the be all and end all of their respective types of reference works either.

So, what have i been doing lately? Writing the entry in Wikipedia on my FAVOURITE work in the entire world (LOL), Boccaccio’s De casibus virorum illustrium. It is taking me a long time to write out all the lives included, translate them into English and then find the appropriate wikipedia page to link to. It is nice to play with the text. I’ve never had access to a complete edition before and now i have to take the time to figure out which figures are included, how they are, and why they’re important. It’s procrastinating - but to an end.

Of course, reading all these other wiki pages has inspired me to edit other errors, add references that should be there and correct errors i encounter (like the erroneous claims that Boccaccio’s On Famous Women has 106 (it’s 104) tales and is the first example of a collection of women’s biographies in Western Literature (it is the first SURVIVING example - we know of others that were written but destroyed or lost).

Ah. Harry Potter, Peter Rabbit, Curious George, Doctor Seuss, the Berenstein Bears, Clifford, Olivia, the Babysitters’ Club, The Borrowers, Watership Down - how i love thee.

Veronica and i share a childish passion for literature aimed at people supposedly less intellectually developed than us. Ha. Yesterday hours, and yes i mean hours, were spent wandering around the children’s section of the local Chapters. We are amassing collections of the classics (sadly, only two books of the “classics” section have not been read by me: Anne of Green Gables and A Wrinkle in Time. Veronica owns both) in consumer-frenzy and procrastination.

I bought and read Le Petit Prince last week. i had never read it before, if you can believe it. It was glorious. It was quaint. It was moralizing. It was sweet. It was pedantic and at times predictable. I couldn’t decide what it was about… ok, i am relatively sure that the flower is supposed to be a stand in for womankind, and that would be highly chauvinist, but i don’t give a damn. I love stories with pictures. I also love woodcuts (and, hence, Gustave Dore).

A Wrinkle in Time is my new “fallin’ asleep book.”

Are there any suggestions?

Supposedly if you’ve seen over 85 movies, you have no life. There are 240 movies on this list. Feel free to steal my “work-avoidance” material. This week began with the best intentions for actually getting work done - but i’ve since rec’d a curveball of minor car accidents, class cancellations and one horrible, dry cough to ensure i feel vindicated in my lazy-assness.

(x) Rocky Horror Picture Show

(x) Grease

(x) Pirates of the Caribbean

() Boondock Saints

(x) Fight Club

() Starsky and Hutch

(x) Neverending Story

() Blazing Saddles

(x) Airplane

Total so far: 6

(x)The Princess Bride

()AnchorMan

() Napoleon Dynamite

() Labyrinth

() Saw II

() White Noise

() White Oleander

() Anger Management

(x) 50 First Dates

(x) The Princess Diaries

() The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement

Total : 9

() Scream

() Scream 2

() Scream 3

(x) Scary Movie

()Scary Movie 2

() Scary Movie 3

()Scary Movie 4

(x) American Pie

(x) American Pie 2

(x) American Wedding

() American Pie Band Camp

Total : 13

() Harry Potter 1

() Harry Potter 2

() Harry Potter 3

()Harry Potter 4

() Resident Evil 1

() Resident Evil 2

(x) The Wedding Singer

( ) Little Black Book

(x) The Village

(x) Lilo & Stitch

Total : 16

(x)Dirty Dancing

(X) Finding Nemo

(x) Finding Neverland

() Signs

(x) The Grinch

( ) Texas Chainsaw Massacre

(x) White Chicks

(x) Butterfly Effect

(x) 13 Going on 30

(x) I, Robot

(x) Robots

Total : 25

() Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story

() Universal Soldier

(x) Lemony Snicket: A Series Of Unfortunate Events

(x) Along Came Polly

() Deep Impact

() KingPin

(x) Never Been Kissed

(x)Meet The Parents

(x) Meet the Fockers

() Eight Crazy Nights

() Joe Dirt

() KING KONG

Total : 30

() A Cinderella Story

()The Terminal

() The Lizzie McGuire Movie

() Passport to Paris

(x) Dumb & Dumber

()Dumber & Dumberer

(x)Final Destination

() Final Destination 2

() Final Destination 3

() Halloween

(x) The Ring

()The Ring 2

( ) Surviving X-MAS

() Flubber

Total: 33

() Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle

(x) Practical Magic

(x) Chicago

( ) Ghost Ship

() From Hell

() Hellboy

(x) The Secret Window

(x) I Am Sam

(x) The Whole Nine Yards

(x) The Whole Ten Yards

Total: 39

(x) The Day After Tomorrow

()Child’s Play

() Seed of Chucky

() Bride of Chucky

(x) Ten Things I Hate About You

(x) Just Married

(x) Gothika

() Nightmare on Elm Street

(x) Sixteen Candles

(x) Remember the Titans

(x) Coach Carter

() The Grudge

(x) The Mask

() Son Of The Mask

Total:47

(x) Bad Boys 2

() Joy Ride

() Lucky Number Sleven

(x) Ocean’s Eleven

(x) Ocean’s Twelve

(x) Bourne Identity

() Lone Star

() Bedazzled

() Predator

() Predator II

() The Fog

(x) Ice Age

() Ice Age 2: The Meltdown

() Curious George

Total: 52

(x) Independence Day

() Cujo

() A Bronx Tale

() Darkness Falls

() Christine

(x) ET

() Children of the Corn

(x) My Bosses Daughter

() Maid in Manhattan

() Frailty

() War of the Worlds

(x) Rush Hour

(x) Rush Hour 2

Total: 57

() Best Bet

(x) She’s All That

(x) Calendar Girls

() Sideways

() Mars Attacks

() Event Horizon

(x) Ever After

(x) Wizard of Oz

(x) Forrest Gump

() Big Trouble in Little China

(x) The Terminator

(x) The Terminator 2

(x) The Terminator 3

Total : 65

(x) X-Men

() X2

() X-3

(x) Spider-Man

(x) Spider-Man 2

() Sky High

() Jeepers Creepers

() Jeepers Creepers 2

(x) Catch Me If You Can

(x) The Little Mermaid

(x) Freaky Friday

(x) Reign of Fire

() Equilibrium

() The Skulls

(x) Cruel Intentions

() Cruel Intentions 2

() The Hot Chick

(x) Shrek

(x) Shrek 2

Total: 75

() Swimfan

(x) Miracle on 34th street

() Old School

() The Notebook

() K-Pax

() Krippendorf’s Tribe

() A Walk to Remember

( ) Ice Castles

() Boogeyman

(x) The 40-year-old-virgin

Total: 77

(x) Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring

(x) Lord of the Rings The Two Towers

(x) Lord of the Rings Return Of the King

(x) Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark

(x) Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

(x) Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

Total 83

() Baseketball

(x) Hostel

() Waiting for Guffman

() House of 1000 Corpses

() Devils Rejects

() Elf

(x) Highlander

() Mothman Prophecies

(x) American History X

() Three Amigos

Total: 86

() The Jacket

() Kung Fu Hustle

() Shaolin Soccer

() Night Watch

(x) Monster

(x) Titanic

(x) Monty Python and the Holy Grail

(x) Dawn Of the Dead

( ) Willard

Total : 90

() High Tension

() Club Dread

()Hulk

(x) Hook

() Chronicle Of Narnia The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe

() 28 days later

() Orgazmo

() Phantasm

(x) Waterworld

Total: 91

(x) Kill Bill vol 1

(x) Kill Bill vol 2

(x) Mortal Kombat

() Mortal Kombat: Annihilation

() Wolf Creek

(x) Kingdom of Heaven

() the Hills Have Eyes

() I Spit on Your Grave aka the Day of the Woman

( ) The Last House on the Left

( ) Re-Animator

(x) Army of Darkness

Total 96

() Star Wars Ep. I The Phantom Menace

() Star Wars Ep. II Attack of the Clones

() Star Wars Ep. III Revenge of the Sith

(x) Star Wars Ep. IV A New Hope

(x) Star Wars Ep. V The Empire Strikes Back

(x)Star Wars Ep. VI Return of the Jedi

() Ewoks Caravan Of Courage

()Ewoks The Battle For Endor

Total: 99

(x) The Matrix

(x) The Matrix Reloaded

(x) The Matrix Revolutions

() Animatrix

() Evil Dead

() Evil Dead 2

() Team America World Police

() Red Dragon

()Silence of the Lambs

() Hannibal

Total: 102

Last Sunday evening i helped Veronica study for her astronomy test. during the course of this very interesting task, the status of Pluto as a dwarf-planet came up for discussion.

Apparently ‘planethood’ is not defined as a body orbiting the sun, but rather a body of a certain size orbiting the sun - and this size is defined as ‘having enough gravitational force to clear it’s own orbit.’ For those of you who are having a similar reaction to mine (what the hell does that mean?) - Pluto is not big enough to ensure that it does not go catapulting into stuff on it’s way around the sun.

Ok. Now - why the sudden change? What could possibly possess astronomers to strip Pluto of planet-status all of a sudden and to the chagrin of a generation of schoolchildren who learnt the catchy mimetic device My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas to learn the order of the planets.

Firstly, apparently a rather large asteroid has been discovered in the belt between Mars and Jupiter that would be a planet if the size criteria were in place. Apparently it made more sense to reduce the number of planets orbiting our sun to eight rather than increase it to ten (or eleven… i think there’s another dwarf-planet past Pluto). Ironically, the astronomer who came up with the ‘orbital clearance’ criteria refuses to call Pluto a dwarf-planet.

So… is Pluto a planet or not? Depends on who you ask. It’s amazing how even the most concrete things can get bogged down in definitions.

Lastly, i provide a thought-experiment for your general amusement. Yes… it is reductio ad absurdium, but i don’t care. I think it’s funny.

If i were so fat, stinky and otherwise unattractive that as i walked around on the planet Earth i repelled all other people… might i too be considered a planet? I would, in effect, be orbiting the sun with a cleared orbit… LOL.

Thanks to Wikipedia and Veronica’s astronomy textbook, which i will not go searching in her room for because that would be rude, for this science lesson.