The other night I was at a bar, and I go to take a piss.
The first bathroom had two baseballs embedded in the door around waist level, and the second door had two doorknockers embedded in the door around chest level.
I was confused at first, and then I felt affirmed in my decision to always try to remember to go to the restroom in every bar I visit.
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Friday, February 10, 2012
Book burning.
The other day I was studying Hebrew vocab with my book spread out on the counter as I cut up garlic for the hummus that I was getting ready to make, and I smelled something burning.
I checked the pot of boiling garbanzo beans, and then I noticed that the edge of the Hebrew grammar book was singed from being an inch away from the edge of the pot; though not near the flame, the heat had poured out from under the pot and signed the cover and the pages at the upper corner.
So, I blew on it and put it out.
The next day, I showed it after class to my instructor, as a fun thing.
He pointed out that according to rabbinics, I would have to deposit the grammar in a genizah, since it contains biblical passages and should neither continue to be used or destroyed.
I checked the pot of boiling garbanzo beans, and then I noticed that the edge of the Hebrew grammar book was singed from being an inch away from the edge of the pot; though not near the flame, the heat had poured out from under the pot and signed the cover and the pages at the upper corner.
So, I blew on it and put it out.
The next day, I showed it after class to my instructor, as a fun thing.
He pointed out that according to rabbinics, I would have to deposit the grammar in a genizah, since it contains biblical passages and should neither continue to be used or destroyed.
JUST BOUGHT...
2 Madonna tix for her upcoming tour!
I'm going with my one lawyer friend from Missouri (who I just found out dressed up like Madonna on Halloween when she was in the 4th grade).
I'm going with my one lawyer friend from Missouri (who I just found out dressed up like Madonna on Halloween when she was in the 4th grade).
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Dog troubles.
A yuppie bakery has taken over the empty storefront below my apartment, 2 stories down, and just opened up.
Like the 1st or 2nd day it was open, I wake up at 7:40am-ish to a dog barking in a high-pitched yelp, and whining.
I was lying in bed, but it kept happening, and so I get up at like 7:50am, go to my window, look down, and see an unattended sheepdog mix tied to a tree outside the bakery.
I had a glass of water and stood around groggily, and the dog kept whining nervously, so I put on clothes and went down to the bakery (it was like 7:55am; this had been happening for like 15 minutes).
There were a few tables of people talking quietly, so I asked the counterattendant if she knew whose dog that was outside, and she was like, "His," and pointed to a guy sitting at a table with a coffee cup.
"Hey," I was like. "I live in this building, and your dog has been barking for like 15 minutes solid," and explained that I had worked till past midnight and had to go to work again today, and it had woken me up.
"Don't worry, I'm leaving soon, as soon as he gets his coffee together," the guy said, and pointed to some other guy with him.
"You know," I was like, "I've already had to tolerate your dog barking long enough, so hurry up and get your shit together so I can go back to bed. Dude, that is just not cool."
The guy said something nasty, but I left, and as I left, he was like 20 paces behind me in coming out the door, so as I went in the gate of my building, I called out to him, "And you're not being nice to your dog when you do that, either!"
At that, the guy said something nasty too, but I didn't catch it.
In retrospect, I should have asked the counterperson about the dog and if it was okay, since it seemed so upset; making it all about the dog's welfare and not mine might have shamed the guy more and kept him from being an asshole.
Like the 1st or 2nd day it was open, I wake up at 7:40am-ish to a dog barking in a high-pitched yelp, and whining.
I was lying in bed, but it kept happening, and so I get up at like 7:50am, go to my window, look down, and see an unattended sheepdog mix tied to a tree outside the bakery.
I had a glass of water and stood around groggily, and the dog kept whining nervously, so I put on clothes and went down to the bakery (it was like 7:55am; this had been happening for like 15 minutes).
There were a few tables of people talking quietly, so I asked the counterattendant if she knew whose dog that was outside, and she was like, "His," and pointed to a guy sitting at a table with a coffee cup.
"Hey," I was like. "I live in this building, and your dog has been barking for like 15 minutes solid," and explained that I had worked till past midnight and had to go to work again today, and it had woken me up.
"Don't worry, I'm leaving soon, as soon as he gets his coffee together," the guy said, and pointed to some other guy with him.
"You know," I was like, "I've already had to tolerate your dog barking long enough, so hurry up and get your shit together so I can go back to bed. Dude, that is just not cool."
The guy said something nasty, but I left, and as I left, he was like 20 paces behind me in coming out the door, so as I went in the gate of my building, I called out to him, "And you're not being nice to your dog when you do that, either!"
At that, the guy said something nasty too, but I didn't catch it.
In retrospect, I should have asked the counterperson about the dog and if it was okay, since it seemed so upset; making it all about the dog's welfare and not mine might have shamed the guy more and kept him from being an asshole.
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Latin fun!
I saw a college kid wearing a t-shirt with the Hogwarts crest, which has the Latin motto "draco dormiens nunquam titillandus" (='a sleeping dragon should never be tickled').
So, I cut-and-pasted it onto a word file, and will have my Latin students sightread it and then guess where the crest and motto are from.
So, I cut-and-pasted it onto a word file, and will have my Latin students sightread it and then guess where the crest and motto are from.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Recurring dream: waking up.
I've been having this recurring dream for weeks, right before I wake up:
I dream that my alarm goes off, I roll over and shut it off, and then crawl out of bed and get up.
Then, my alarm goes off and I actually wake up, and do that.
So odd.
I dream that my alarm goes off, I roll over and shut it off, and then crawl out of bed and get up.
Then, my alarm goes off and I actually wake up, and do that.
So odd.
Monday, February 6, 2012
...my night of #500...
After Chinese, I stopped through with friends to a basement karaoke club with a white doorman but Asian staff, where a a huge group of (Asian and Asian-American) tweens were drinking and singing some song with characters, and a background video about a(n Asian) piano-player and his terminally-ill (Asian) girlfriend.
Three of the four people couldn't stand it and left immediately to go wait outside, so me and my one (light-skinned black) friend from Arkansas chugged and left, and since the group wanted to head downtown to an area I'd already hit up, I split off on my own, since my one Czech literature professor friend was thinking of meeting up with me.
So, I headed south through Chinatown, and ended up at a nameless bar with lots of white people, including some in motorcycle gear, and a raised tier area with a table and a fax machine and a snow shovel leaning against it. I ordered "your cheapest beer" from the (blonde) (white) woman at the counter, and she was like, "How are you?", and when I was like, "Good," she was like, "WOOOOOOOOOOOOH!!!!!!" and high-fived me. Some drunk (older) (white) woman was also staggering around to random people and shouting out, "SHOTS!" every once in a while.
My professor friend joined me there and brought along a (Mexican-American) friend of hers, and after they finished there drinks, we went to the next place, a sports-bar on the 3rd floor of an Italian restaurant located underneath a huge highway overpass. The bar is only accessed by elevator, and so we stood in line with these chunky (white) girls in tight spangled dresses that were too short for them.
After, we walked down to bar #500, which is a brunch place that turns into a bar at night, and draws regulars from the (white) (Italian-American) neighborhood and some students from a nearby university. The bartender was this (white) (Italian-American) guy in his late 30s with a ponytail and chest hair under an open shirt, and down at the end of the bar was a(n Italian-American) guy in a light blue sweater, with a gold necklace and a glass of wine. For a while we talked to a late 30s (Italian-American) woman next to us, who had a kind of black-and-white animal print shirt that was hung off one shoulder to expose her bra strap, and who was very kind.
My professor friend then called it a night, and me and her (Mexican-American) friend decided to do a nightcap and walked down to this other bar people had told us about, which was not that crowded and overlooked a park where a young (black) kid had been beaten to death within the last decade for bicycling into the wrong neighborhood. I'm not sure if anyone else in the bar kept thinking about that.
Three of the four people couldn't stand it and left immediately to go wait outside, so me and my one (light-skinned black) friend from Arkansas chugged and left, and since the group wanted to head downtown to an area I'd already hit up, I split off on my own, since my one Czech literature professor friend was thinking of meeting up with me.
So, I headed south through Chinatown, and ended up at a nameless bar with lots of white people, including some in motorcycle gear, and a raised tier area with a table and a fax machine and a snow shovel leaning against it. I ordered "your cheapest beer" from the (blonde) (white) woman at the counter, and she was like, "How are you?", and when I was like, "Good," she was like, "WOOOOOOOOOOOOH!!!!!!" and high-fived me. Some drunk (older) (white) woman was also staggering around to random people and shouting out, "SHOTS!" every once in a while.
My professor friend joined me there and brought along a (Mexican-American) friend of hers, and after they finished there drinks, we went to the next place, a sports-bar on the 3rd floor of an Italian restaurant located underneath a huge highway overpass. The bar is only accessed by elevator, and so we stood in line with these chunky (white) girls in tight spangled dresses that were too short for them.
After, we walked down to bar #500, which is a brunch place that turns into a bar at night, and draws regulars from the (white) (Italian-American) neighborhood and some students from a nearby university. The bartender was this (white) (Italian-American) guy in his late 30s with a ponytail and chest hair under an open shirt, and down at the end of the bar was a(n Italian-American) guy in a light blue sweater, with a gold necklace and a glass of wine. For a while we talked to a late 30s (Italian-American) woman next to us, who had a kind of black-and-white animal print shirt that was hung off one shoulder to expose her bra strap, and who was very kind.
My professor friend then called it a night, and me and her (Mexican-American) friend decided to do a nightcap and walked down to this other bar people had told us about, which was not that crowded and overlooked a park where a young (black) kid had been beaten to death within the last decade for bicycling into the wrong neighborhood. I'm not sure if anyone else in the bar kept thinking about that.
FIVE HUNDRED!!!
On Sat. I got to bar #500 (and #501, as well as bars #494-499, with a break for Chinese food).
Feb. 26th will be my last day for a full year of comprehensive barhopping, since I had the idea on Feb. 27th of last year (though I didn't actually go to any bars till March 2nd or something; I'll have to go back and check my "BAR LOG").
On another note, today when I was waiting in an empty dining hall at school to teach a Latin lesson, besides the few people in there studying, there was some huge Chinese(-American?) students association meeting for coffee and bagels. You would simply not believe how many people were chewing with their mouths open in a very very quiet dining hall. I could hear them from 15 feet away.
Feb. 26th will be my last day for a full year of comprehensive barhopping, since I had the idea on Feb. 27th of last year (though I didn't actually go to any bars till March 2nd or something; I'll have to go back and check my "BAR LOG").
On another note, today when I was waiting in an empty dining hall at school to teach a Latin lesson, besides the few people in there studying, there was some huge Chinese(-American?) students association meeting for coffee and bagels. You would simply not believe how many people were chewing with their mouths open in a very very quiet dining hall. I could hear them from 15 feet away.
Translation spiel: "give birth to".
I'm finding that I'm getting a translation spiel down for tutorees.
Usually, people say they want to translate "literally", and then I gently re-direct them from that term to the word "faithfully", which is what most people mean when they say "literally".
Then, I say that within the domain of translation, you can render "word-for-word", and you can render "by sense", and sometimes those are the same thing, but sometimes there's a disjunct between the 2, and that's where you have to make a choice.
The example I use for that is the English phrase "give birth to".
In Latin, you would say "genuit" for "gave birth to", as in - "genuit puerum" ('she gave birth to a son').
Now, if we were reverse translating from English to Latin, would we translate each separate word of the phrase into Latin, and come up with something like "dedit (=gave) nativitatem (=birth) puero (="to the son")"?
Of course we wouldn't, that would be hash!
For some reason, I find that example really makes things click for my students, and makes them start thinking about 'turns of phrase' in English and Latin and how they're not commensurable.
Usually, people say they want to translate "literally", and then I gently re-direct them from that term to the word "faithfully", which is what most people mean when they say "literally".
Then, I say that within the domain of translation, you can render "word-for-word", and you can render "by sense", and sometimes those are the same thing, but sometimes there's a disjunct between the 2, and that's where you have to make a choice.
The example I use for that is the English phrase "give birth to".
In Latin, you would say "genuit" for "gave birth to", as in - "genuit puerum" ('she gave birth to a son').
Now, if we were reverse translating from English to Latin, would we translate each separate word of the phrase into Latin, and come up with something like "dedit (=gave) nativitatem (=birth) puero (="to the son")"?
Of course we wouldn't, that would be hash!
For some reason, I find that example really makes things click for my students, and makes them start thinking about 'turns of phrase' in English and Latin and how they're not commensurable.
Sunday, February 5, 2012
A dream for 3-4 years from now.
When I'm a professor, the 1st year after I teach, my academic project will be tracing the roots of biblical harmonization in non- and pre-Christian religion, and I'll rent an apartment in some major city in Spain (maybe Madrid?) for the summer and go there with a suitcase full of critical editions of pertinent texts to read through and work, while I get to see a new country and - learn Spanish!
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