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Coffee Creates Blogs

You probably don't believe me, but it's true. Anyway, I am blogging from a coffee shop, and that seems to be the most convenient thing in terms of trying to keep up with all this. So here goes the weekly rewind:

The weeks go more and more quickly nowadays, but what can you do. Prep for class 3 days a week definitely takes it out of you, as I'm always either teaching or preparing. It's sometimes difficult to think up a good masterplan on how to make philosophy exciting at 10am to people who may or may not care about philosophy. The issues that grabbed me at 17 apparently (and go figure) don't grab everyone. How do you grab with abstract ideas and theories? If the notion of the immortality of the soul doesn't grab you, or the Forms or the Socratic method, or....hmmm. Anyway, it's a day to day process. The mock trial of Socrates was a huge success, complete with teams chosen from a hat with smiley faces and x-eyed faces to represent a dead Socrates = you are prosecuting Socrates.

We're doing a new hire in the department for a junior position in aesthetics. The first candidate came this week, and he seems like a cool guy, works on music, and we have philosophically similar interests. I met him in the morning for coffee, after class, and then went to his job talk. It was interesting, but I'm not sure that it hung together philosophically (but how does this bode for his potential appointment?). Interesting talk, yes. Interesting issues, yes. Hang together? Not sure there. Usually the professors ask lots of questions, and now and then a grad student busts something out...and this time it was me -- asking for clarification about the relationship between production / reception aesthetics and the shift of authority to the audience --> and what this means if audience is mixed and / or uneducated. (He was advancing this bit about deliberative and critical audiences, and I was wondering about the impact on the authority or ability / desire to be critical if the audience doesn't have the proper tools to make such judgments (or at least not authoritative ones to my mind.).) I got props from another professor of mine, who will more than probably be part of my dissertation committee and who works on language, logic, meaning and identity issues, etc. It always feels good when I know that I can talk the talk and have these conversations with real philosophers.

Not much else to report. Went to see Lucas last night and we played some music, as we're working towards a project of sorts that may get recorded one of these days. The only other thing to mention is that Leonard Cohen tears my shit up, particularly "The Stranger Song." It makes too much sense for too many reasons.

 
A Party (?) Perhaps Only in My Mind

After a long bout of wondering what the status of this thing called blog is, I've decided for another go round, despite the particularly negative tone that this entry might have. My mood has been on the foul side for a while, and this weekend, I could more directly ascertain why. I have been out of circulation lately, after seeing a rather young med student before winter break and being rebuffed in the way these things sputter out. Being in no mood to try to stoke the non-existent flames of an "we're not going anywhere" situation, and realizing quite clearly that I was going somewhere without him (both physically and emotionally -- from Nashville to Knoxville to NY to Mexico to NY to TN again and the fact that I live in the land of emotional maturity and the land of phone calls), I needed a pick me up, I suppose. So then happened a pagan festival on the 21st -- which showed me more than luminaires could tell, and I was hit on in one of the nicer ways I had been in quite a little minute, cementing my decision about the med student and how I don't want anything to do with someone who doesn't know how to try -- I've done that before, and was in no mood to continue. So much for backstory. Anyway, swinging the setting to this weekend, there was to be a party on, and I was excited about it because F.P. aka the "Senator" is known to throw a pretty good shindig, so what the hell -- but I wanted to show up with someone. Enter another part of my past -- a really cute , rephrase, HOT barista I know. We've gone out on a couple of dates that I dodgily don't acknowledge as dates, but there's no future in it -- both in terms of what sorts of conversations we have and in terms of what sorts of substances he uses. Due to my own history, at this point, I've made a promise to myself never to date someone like that again, no matter how tempting it may seem. So I was doing pretty well, because this barista is quite nice and sweet and hot. But I was feeling a bit saucy and looking for trouble, so I decide to indulge myself and flirt a bit. Long story short, don't get involved with Capricorns. We were supposed to get together for a drink before this party / maybe he'd join me. 20 minutes can turn into 2 hrs really quickly...and so I headed off to the party solo, determined not to let this ruin my evening. So...it was an all right party, and I had a good time, despite the fact that I can count on one hand how many of the throng of people there that I'd actually like to speak to...maybe 3 or 4 people. All the other patronizing 30 somethings who dismiss me in not so many words can kiss my fucking ass, as can the hoity music industry types who are really condescending, and all the other assholes. The Senator is one of the few I wanted to see, and he played some Sonic Youth for me. Chris was also a pleasant encounter, and Sarah. Yep, that's a big 3., oh and Matt, so 4 total. This sort of sums up how I feel about the dept as late: they can all kiss my ass. I had a bout of wondering if I was a misanthrope after such an evening -- but the funny thing is that I had a good time. What does that all mean? And why do I spend increasing amounts of time alone? I don't think it's quite misanthropic, but I know better than to try this try this try this. --- and so I feel better off by my damn self.