email exchange

From my friend to me:

I wanted to see how you were and ask if you are feeling the same psychic gnawing that I am regarding Nov 4. I have the WORST feeling that all frickin hell is gonna break loose, but I can't quite figure out why I am feeling this way.

I spoke to Alvin after his race, he did the 31 miler in just at 6 hours. He said it was brutal.
Later

Reply from me to my friend:

Yeah, man. I'm feeling WAY nervous. weird things have been happening around the house and neighborhood, which just adds to the spooky October-ness of it all, and to the feeling that the end times is near, fer reals.

For example: this morning at about 9 am, i was watching tv and eating breakfast when the tv turned off by itself, and then there was a loud boom outside. it seemed equally likely that a transformer had exploded that there was a roving militia in the neighborhood. i hesitated as to whether i ought to call LG&E first, or draw the blinds, collect my Yarmuth sign from the front yard, and go to the basement and hide. i am ON EDGE. and really wanting a cigarette, but as yet have avoided the temptation. go, me.

i miss you. i miss Alvin. i miss Honors. sigh. i am praying and hoping and volunteering in order for Obama to beat McCain. it's amazing to feel so uneasy given that he's ahead in the polls and way more well-funded. and yet, it does not mitigate my fear of racists and neo-cons.

Ugh.

No more food wars

So, my mom sent me this article Michael Pollan wrote in the NY Times last week. Perhaps you've already seen it--I'm just now catching up on my non-work-related email...

Anyhoo. Michael Pollan, as we all know, is THE MAN. Not like, "Damn the man; save the empire," but like, "You da MAN." I had the extreme honor of hearing him speak at UofL earlier this year and he was AWESOME. It was shortly before I took my first trip to San Francisco (where he lives and works. Well, Berkeley might as well be SF from where I live and look), when I finally understood what it truly means to be a "foodie." The farmer's markets alone are AMAZING, to say nothing of the restaurants, juice bars, and cafes that flourish throughout the city. We truly don't know how underdeveloped KY is. And we have so much potential! We have great land here, and a sense of community not found in other states of similar size.

We should use these existing benefits to GO LOCAL with our food. I mean, a LOT more than Louisville already is (or is trying to be at the whole foods stores). We should petition grocery stores to stop carrying out-of-season foods and to use KY farm products FIRST (or ONLY). Then we don't have to worry about the carbon impact of importing fruit from Honduras. Then we don't have to worry about NAFTA or CAFTA or neo-cons. Then we can improve KY's economy, even without hemp being relegalized! We won't have to worry about how much gas our fruits were given to ripen and color them once the arrive at the store. We can shorten the food chain immensely, and know the faces of the people who grow and pick our food for us. THAT is truly American: agriculture, community, honesty, simplicity, self-sufficiency.

NO MORE FAKE FOOD! NO MORE FREE TRADE!!!!!!

Racism: alive and thriving

This is a copy of an email I received yesterday. It's from the President and Provost of the University of Louisville, and was sent to everyone at the university. THIS IS SCARY SHIT:

This morning a professor at the University of Kentucky discovered an effigy of presidential candidate Barack Obama hanging from a tree on campus.

We join with UK President Lee Todd in calling this action "despicable." As Americans and as an institution of higher education, we know the importance of free speech and free thought. This type of activity, however, is not acceptable as either.

At UofL, we are committed to being a diverse and inclusive university community....

We know you join us in saying within the context of our vision statement and in keeping with our larger mission, that we do not condone hate speech or acts of intolerance that underlie forms of oppression, racism, sexism, homophobia or discrimination; and that we will commit to eradicating all forms of inequality and injustices by building a just, fair and inclusive campus community.

Let's treat each other with civility and respect.

James Ramsey Shirley Willihnganz
President Provost

UofL's diversity statement
UofL's Diversity office

As I have been saying since the beginning of the general election, this election has FINALLY created a clear choice between a moderate candidate and a neo-con candidate; they proudly tout vastly divergent worldviews and policies. While it has been exciting for me to choose from two major party candidates who are actually different (instead of more of the same "Skull vs. Bones", to quote America the Book), it has baffled me (1) that anyone has difficulty making this choice, and (2) that anyone would choose John McCain over Barack Obama. The economy, the war, the last 8 years of neo-con rape of our country and our people, should all make this the easiest, most conscience-clear election of people's lives.

And yet.

And yet racism lives on, so tenaciously. People are so blinded by the cover of the book that they don't want to even pick it up and leaf through it, let alone buy it. Leaving aside the consideration of how arbitrary and stupid it is to dislike someone because he looks different from you, racial discrimination is just self-defeating, both in this election and in life! If nothing else, it should be a matter of self-interest, right? In the case of this particular man, Barack Obama, he is the obvious best choice in this election. In a general sense, white racists should learn that “[Taking] the world as a whole, it’s an eccentricity to be white,” as George Orwell says well in Burmese Days.

So when I hear about Obama being lynched in effigy, I get really worried--for him, for us, for the world. I get worried about the election too: Democrats and Obama supporters are getting a little strident this week. Not Obama or Michelle, but their supporters, have started "measuring the drapes," as John McCain likes to say so often; it would behoove those enthusiasts to know about this incident at UK.

That is to say: the election isn't for 5 days. The inauguration isn't for 2.5 months after that. So don't count yer chickens before they hatch, you optimists. The man isn't president yet, and there are plenty of people who still look at that accomplished, intelligent, eloquent, vibrant, (half-white) lawyer, public servant, and son-of-an-anthropologist, and all they see is a n*gger they ain't votin' for.

the SLAYER

I'm not one to post on celebrities much, but I was doing my film class homework and there was a picture of Olivia Hussey and Leonard Whiting in the chapter I'm reading, and I just thought, "OMG. He was the Zac Efron of the boomer generation." So now you can have a side-by-side analysis in order to agree or disagree with my well-reasoned opinion, after years of careful study.

That is to say,

Unto each generation a Heartthrob is born.
HE ALONE shall stand against the weak chins, limp hair, and the forces of thin eye-browedness.
He is THE HEARTTHROB.

C For Cookie / V for Vendetta

I know there are "certain people" who think that I don't actually write enough on my blog, but I simply recycle or re-post things from the web. WELL--that might be so sometimes... but in this case, ISN'T IT SO WORTH IT?

My step-daughter spent the better part of a month a few years ago when this first came out, watching it OVER and OVER and OVER dozens of times in a row. That's autism for ya. But it's so classic, who can blame her? Easily the best use of Sesame Street ever.

For those in Louisville, this is basically mandatory

For those of you who don't already know, I did my senior thesis last year on human rights in Palestine. I examined creative nonviolent resistance to the Wall being constructed around the West Bank by Israelis to ghettoize the area and ruin Palestinians' lives, in violation of the UN Human Rights Declaration and international law.

Please please come to this if you can, as it is a topic very dear to me.

SEPARATE IS NEVER EQUAL: STORIES FROM SOUTH AFRICA AND PALESTINE
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 7:30 P.M.
UNIVERSITY OF LOUISVILLE,CHAO AUDITORIUM in EKSTROM LIBRARY

Reverend Eddie Makue and Doctor Diana Buttu

World leaders including Nelson Mandela and Jimmy Carter have called for the world to recognize that the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza has created a society strikingly similar to South Africa under apartheid. Diana Buttu will describe conditions on the West Bank and Gaza where four million Palestinians live on nonviable pieces of land, cut off from the outside world and from each other by a concrete wall and more than five hundred checkpoints. In contrast to the dire poverty of the Palestinian population, Israeli citizens consume most of the country's resources and move about freely on modern by-pass roads. Eddie Makue, from the South African Council of Churches, will describe the many parallels between the current situation on the West Bank and the former system of apartheid in South Africa ; where the majority of the population was concentrated in Bantu lands.

Diana Buttu holds a Law Degree from Queen's University in Kingston , Ontario and a Ph.D. from Stanford University. She was a legal advisor to the Palestinian Liberation Organization on negotiations with Israel.

Reverend Eddie Makue is the General Secretary of the South African Council of Churches. He has been an activist in the struggle for South African civil rights since 1982.

University of Louisville Sponsors:

Louis D. Brandeis School of Law, the Departments of Pan-African Studies, Anne Braden Institute for Social Justice Research, Women's and Gender Studies, Anthropology, Minor in Social Change, Commission on the Status of Women (COSW)--Women and Global Issues Committee, Office of Diversity and Outreach-College of Arts and Sciences, Muslim Student Association, Commission on Diversity and Racial Equality (CODRE)

Louisville Community Sponsors:

The United Nations Association, Committee for Peace in the Middle East, Fellowship of Reconciliation, Louisville Chapter, Committee for Israeli and Palestinian States, The Ramallah Club.

Los Americanos

This is hilarious. We watched it in my teaching and research methods class. Please see below for a translation and please watch it! It's so true, so true...

"Los Americanos" (por Piero)
(Translated by Clare Gervasi Kalb)

They are born old
And they get older
Across their lifetimes
The Americans

And they are born convinced
That there's nobody in the world
More important
Than The Americans

Napoleon for them
was an Italian guy
Who organized something
Without Americans

And they are more than sure
That he would not have lost
At Waterloo with the help
Of the Americans

If they know history
It's not for having read it
But for having seen it
In American movies

With grand stages
And grandiose music
In the subtle style
Of the Americans

With big jaws
From chewing so much gum
It's common to see them
The Americans

Displaying a thousand colors
Everything but black
Which they don’t consider
To be American taste

When they get older
They dress like tourists
And go around the world
The Americans

On organized tours
With romance included
Paid for in the long run
By Americans

If there is something to admire
Where one wants them to go
It’s the great elegance
Of The Americans

With typical attire
They mix with the people
And nobody realizes
That they’re Americans

And besides that
They buy valuable antiques
Recently made old
For Americans

And later in their homes
They receive friends
Who praise the good taste
Of The Americans

And in the night clubs
After a few drinks
They feel inspired
The Americans

And it’s very common to find them
Dancing ceaselessly
Brimming with the grace
Of The Americans

And so my dear friends
Enough for now
I told you what I could
About The Americans

And if you see them...
If you see them, give my most respectful greetings
To The Americans

Ambivalence

"Ambivalence: The holding, at the same time, of 2 opposing emotions, attitudes, ideas or wishes toward the same person, situation, or object. The coexistence of contradictory emotions, attitudes, ideas, or desires with respect to a particular person, object, or situation." (cita)

I have been writing a paper on the myth of Simón Bolívar for my Symbols, Myths and Legends class. Here is a supercool thing I read in a supercool (albeit old) book called Culto a Bolívar (Cult to Bolivar). It says:

Obervación. La ‹‹aflicción›› no suele ser sólo una verdad psicológica real, sincera en muchos casos; menos, o nada sincera en otros; sino también un recurso literario legítimo, a menos que se negara todo valor a la literatura, a la poesía, a la elocuencia. Pero, ¿es que esas formas de la expresión—como fenómenos humanos que son—no tienen función alguna legítima, según ocasiones, público, etc.? ¿Es que sólo existe, con legitimidad, el ‹‹discurso histórico›› científico, analítico, sin emoción, sin pathos? Yo creo que ambas formas de expresión humana conviven legítimamente. En efecto, aquí se peca a menudo tomando todo por ‹‹historiografía››, cuando hay otros géneros, también válidos... (Joaquín Gabaldón Márquez 7)

My bad translation is thus:
"Observation. The 'affliction' [referred to in the book--the 'cult' to Bolívar] isn't just a real psychological truth, sincere in many cases; less, or not at all sincere in others; but also it is a legitimate literary resource, unless it negates all validity of literature, poetry, and eloquence. But is it that those forms of expression--as human phenomena that they are--don't have some legitimate function, depending on occasion, audience, etc? It is just that only the 'historical discourse' exists legitimately, scientific, analytic, emotionless, without pathos? I believe that both forms of human expression live together legitimately. In effect, here we err sometimes taking everything as "historiography," when there are other genres, also valid..."

That is what I'm talking about. So, if that didn't work for you, don't worry--it was an anthropology book. Just look at my photoshopped picture of Bolívar for my paper instead and be amused. teehee.