On the Verbiage

Often the appeal of all these quirky indie flicks is that people in them find each other on the same page about the craziest and most specific things. What are the odds of this happening: I stand in front of my open window, sipping some sort of merlot, looking into the distance somewhat wistfully and somewhat short-sightedly, a passer by slows the pace because I'm playing "Holland, 1945" and says: "Have you heard, Neutral Milk Hotel have reunited for a tour?" and I say "Yeah, but only in the U.S. and Japan. Japan!" "Yeah, how fucked up is that?".

Coming out of the capitalist closet

This was the last straw. And this is the end. I've considered myself a sympathizer to the Marxist cause for quite some time. But now I know even better. The Frankfurt School perhaps speaks to me. And so does Althusser. The state of being terrified has always been crucial to my intellectual development. I was first truly terrified when we read Bloom's The Closing of the American Mind (which I should re-read perhaps). And he terrified me into very important decisions. The minds have been closing ever since.

In other developments. Spring break, yay. I have just half-assed in six hours a fabulous paper on Shakespeare, delivered a presentation the preparation for which made my legs hurt physically, and have checked my weight which has reached 73 kilos (so much for the disenchantment with capitalism).

I have also re-read some Borges. Which I keep on doing. The more I learn about this world the richer his short stories become. Will it ever end? I hope so. Because I really want to learn to write like him. And not only in the gesture (easy) but also in the substance.

Oh, horror

I was reading Althusser's 'Ideology and Ideological Apparatuses', wondering, how was it not just a more specific (Marxist) reiteration of what 40 years earlier Heidegger called Das Man. Or how it is not a reiteration of what Foucault was writing roughly at the same time.. And if so how come he's become so influential? And how most of the second half of the 20th century philosophy is a variation on the same theme..  It is true, of course, that these people might have not been reading each other very carefully. But the horror part is that it had dawned on me how I am still very much at the very beginning of my (speculative-philosophical) journey. How I have finally learned to discern very broad brush strokes of thought and how I still am not able to see the nuances. I can only compare it to my knowledge in music. I can easily discern between big genres, but there is only a couple in which  I can claim some proficiency. I don't know much about the classical or jazz, but I can name them when I hear it. Some genres of rock, however, I can hair-split until all of us faint (and, not to be surprised, those sound the same to most of the people I know). But philosophy is so much more demanding in this respect, especially for an alcohol-impaired mind which had never been very effective about remembering things in the first place... When I'm done with philosophy I will focus on wine, coffee and cheeses.

Notes

I have been filling notebooks with certain things that come to my mind and which I would otherwise inevitably forget. Most of it becomes outdated rather quickly as I roll through more readings. But some of them seem to beat even me on re-read. From the red book: "8. Dutch dam connoisseurs". What? The yellow book: "41. Cloud, not timeline.", "76. Pirate philosopher.", "81. Change the venue!". But I like this one (whatever it means): "14. Underground, in the middle of a sentence, dusting off my old jacket, we sang".

Ze Vikend

Many a thing has happened! Well, it is finally warm so it is not as shitty to live anymore. One can travel through all the major cities in the Netherlands in one day. The Hague is such a pretty place. I can see now how Amsterdam got all the hipsters-potheads and how the Hague got all the decent people. And all the decent architecture. Here in Amsterdam all the modern builderly escapades look like they had been created by an army of deranged architects. In the Hague the modern and the old look as if they had been built by only one deranged architect. It is extremely pleasant and coherent. And they have access to the sea!

My bicycle was finally stolen. I am now quite free to claim a full Amsterdamite experience. And as a true amsterdamite I know that it is absolutely pointless to report it stolen. I will, instead, celebrate the good riddance and just get another one. Everyone, by the way, in anticipation of exactly this situation, rides ugly used bicycles in here. What is the source of new pretty ones is still a mystery to me.

I am going to Bruges in two weeks. There is a basilica there where they have a phial holding a cloth with Christ's blood. Allegedly. No one has ever opened it. And why would they. It would be a bit suicidal for tourism.

And I have finally made peace with the steep museum prices. Even at almost 20 eur per ticket the van Gogh exhibition is so full it is almost impossible to enjoy it. 

Delightfully Decadently

Tonight there is some special pleasure in sitting on a plastic chair (fuck you ikea couch, fuck you swivel chair) in the middle of my room, pigging out on belgian pralines and a 6.50 bottle of shitty merlot i bought an hour ago in a night store, and having to care about absolutely no one at least for a little while.

Paris Paris Paris

I did like Paris. Even though it made me feel slightly unsafe. It was also very dusty. But every day since I had left, my heart has been growing fonder. What is this? I really want to be back in Paris.

Les Lapins

I am not a parking lot gazer. But my window overlooks one, right behind a canal. It is mostly empty and full of shrubs. There is a big park nearby, probably that's why, as I have finally noticed today, the parking lot is full of rabbits. They are black and gray, exploring. It is still strange how they got there because the parking lot is surrounded by the water from all directions but one. The fourth direction belongs to AMOLF, a very prestigious research institute. Nanophotonics and physics of biomolecular systems. It is strange to realize that they are apparently a big deal: if they wanted to, these people could see what I have for lunch every day; our buildings face each other.