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Sunday, November 22nd, 2009
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10:29 pm - Regev's Unpopular Sentiment du Jour
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I had fun at ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) orious's party last night, certainly. He turned 30, got to be a living fundoshi demo, made out with a straight guy, and was covered in silly string that, as profundojoe pointed out, smelled like household cleaner and has probably left a huge hole in the ozone layer over Iceland.
However, the night dragged on and I came to the conclusion: being the small guy at a big boy party can really make one feel amazingly unattractive. :: nodnod ::
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| Thursday, November 19th, 2009
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12:50 pm - 古文・漢文DS
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Being a linguaphile can be downright lonely at times.
I saw the game above, Kobun Kanbun DS, for the Nintendo DS, which teaches and drills on use of older/obsolete characters and Classical Chinese marked with kanbun, which indicated how to reorder a Chinese sentence and pronunciation of more obscure characters, for Japanese readers/speakers. Works were written in kanbun were fairly common in Japan because Classical Chinese was the language of the educated, and several of my old Japanese books are in kanbun.
And I've always wanted to learn kanbun, so I showed the game to Carl, and he gave me a "yeah, and?" look.
And that's when I realized: I'M THE ONLY ONE THAT CARES.
Yeah, that's an isolating feeling.
current mood:  lonely
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12:12 am - Dreams
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Last night I had a dream that I was at work, and got a phone call that my mother shot my brother for some reason, and after she killed him, pointed the gun to her temple and blew her own brains out. The details of the dream were all wrong -- for example my boss is someone that in the DREAM I recognized as my boss but was NOT my current boss, or even someone I know; my office is different; my mother would NEVER off herself; etc.
But somehow, during that dream, everything was so vivid and so REAL that I bolted up out of a dead sleep, as it was just that disturbing to me.
Tell me about some of your more disturbing dreams.
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| Wednesday, November 18th, 2009
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12:32 pm - Not who you think it is
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So the proofreader sitting next to me was scrolling through his FaceBook on his lunch and I glanced over, and saw he was on some blond woman's picture.
And I don't know why, but I mentally grokked the profile as that of my sister. And my heart skipped a beat, and ... I can't even explain WHY it is, that I interpreted it as such, but it's almost as though my brain interpreted this piece of scant evidence -- which isn't even evidence at all -- as all it needed to negate the fact that my sister's been dead since 2007.
I asked the guy looking at the proofreader to scroll up, and ... of course, it's NOT my sister. She didn't even look that close to her.
It really makes me feel stupid, and foolish, and I think this is the first time this ever happened. I'm used to rational logical evidence-based thinking, so something like this? Yeah, it's new to me.
current mood:  embarrassed
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| Tuesday, November 17th, 2009
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9:54 pm - عيد الأضحى
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if there was one immediate thing I could say that I hated about the immediate Jewish circle I'm in, it's the lingering Islamophobia that is so readily displayed.
Example: yesterday in Hebrew class we were reading headlines, and one of the news blurbs mentioned a חג הקורבן, xag hakorban, "Holiday of the victim/sacrifice", and we were all unsure of what holiday this referred to, and the name was translated literally from the Arabic.
Immediately one of the older class members blurted out, "Figures those people! Making a holiday for suicide bombers!"
Fucking idiot. Shut the fuck up. You don't know what you're even talking about.
And indeed, he's far off -- the holiday being referred to is عيد الأضحى, or Eid al Adha, a holiday commemorating Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son, so the "sacrifice" here is, indeed, not someone with a bunch of C4 strapped on.
It just annoys me -- what does it say about someone if they're so ready to make that connection right off the bat? I wanted to tell him off and I bit my tongue, but still -- oy. What the fuck.
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8:53 pm - Yay poetry!
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大足子熊と呼ばれている
大きな足からだけじゃなく
大きな足跡からも
愛すると大きく愛して
仕えると大きく仕えて
危険を冒すと
君は大きな子熊
と受け取られるも
時々、躓くいても
大きくで起こるぞ
大足子熊、 人々に
影響を与えるんだ
I'm still tinkering with it because ... yeah, I can't leave well enough alone. Seriously, I've modified this poem about 7572 times now.
(and yes, "子熊" was intentional!)
current mood:  busy
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| Monday, November 16th, 2009
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10:47 pm - [Multilingual Monday] Another Game Review!
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8:57 pm - Wow, that was fast.
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12:29 pm - [Multilingual Monday Music] Foreign covers, vol. 7572
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Today we look at two popular English-language songs, covered in other languages:
アンジェラ・アキ / Angela Aki - Kiss From A Rose
Angela is a popular singer, songwriter, and piano player in Japan, and here she covers Seal's song of the same title, with two thirds of the lyrics adapted into English. I say adapted as, though the basic idea of giving into a love as strong as a drug is still implied, the Japanese lyrics are NOT a translation, as seen by the line in the chorus, "愛で死ぬなら キスで殺して", ai de shinu nara, kisu de koroshite,, "If I die from love, kill me with a kiss."
מיי פיינגולד - הללויה / Mei Feingold - Hallelujah
Mei Feingold was one of the stronger competitors in Koxav Nolad, Israel's answer to American Idol. Here she sings Leonard Cohen's song in Hebrew. Her grittier voice has won her fans throughout Israel; I first heard about her through Tzachi, who insists that she needs to go to Eurovision this year to represent Isarel.
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(7 comments | comment on this)
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| Sunday, November 15th, 2009
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2:33 am - Little Golden Book's "My First Awkward Hookup"
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| Friday, November 13th, 2009
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6:50 pm - And now, "Roger Sexualizes Everything," Episode 7572!
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12:51 pm - [Memories] Loving the bears, even growing up
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Where I live, and where I work, I have to explain a lot of things about my life, and answer a lot of questions. Many here have never MET an openly gay man, and all the questions pop up...
"Well how did you know you liked guys??"
"How long have you been gay?"
And whether or not you believe it, I happen to be very aware of the fact that even as a child I was, well, very very gay. There's no two ways about it -- even as I look as pictures of myself as a child, I have to wonder: how did my parents NOT know? Was the power of denial TRULY that strong?
I remember being drawn to the men that I find attractive now, but I can't say it was because of attraction. Really, I can't explain WHAT it was, but there was something ... INTERESTING ... that was there that I couldn't explain, but now, twenty plus years later, it all makes perfect sense.
I mean, how many seven year olds fixate on Sebastian Cabot??
current mood: sad
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| Thursday, November 12th, 2009
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4:57 pm - LOLJewz
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| Wednesday, November 11th, 2009
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2:31 pm - Printer Ponderings
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So, here's the Readers' Digest version: my work is pretty hard-up to get rid of our Epson Stylus Pro 7600, and I've thought of snagging it as I could get it for next to nothing.
THE PROS:
Dude! Wide printing!!
This would allow me to make my own prints and then who knows? Maybe sell them at bear runs or something.
It actually functions and would, initially, cost me next to nothing.
THE CONS:
It's huge; seriously! And I'm in an apartment!
Because it's for professional printing, the equipment is much more expensive.
The heads need to be cleaned, which adds to cost.
Oh, and Carl might kill me. :: laugh ::
As much as I'd love it, I'm not sure it's a wise purchase, as much as I would love to have this as a designer/artist, will it really be worth it in the long run?
What do YOU think?
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(12 comments | comment on this)
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| Tuesday, November 10th, 2009
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11:24 pm - Picture Pages, The Cell Phone Edition
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| Monday, November 9th, 2009
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10:34 pm - [Multilingual Monday] Grammatical Gender
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Today the topic is grammatical gender. If you've ever studied a language like German, Russian, or Spanish, you know about grammatical gender. While, in English, we think of everything as "it" except for living beings (which then become "he" or "she"), in several languages like Spanish your only choices are é and </i>ella</i>, or "he" and "she". This means, then, that everything is assigned a gender -- el libro, "the book" (masculine), la fruta, "the fruit" (feminine). certain signs usually indicate whether a word, in Spanish, is feminine or masculine (though plenty of exceptions exist -- usually words ending in -o are generally masculine and -a are feminine, yet el mapa, "the map," is masculine and la foto, "the photo". These genders are then "matched" with the appropriate article ("a/an" or "the": un/el for masculine words, una/lafor feminine) and adjectives (el libro rojo, "the red book" vs. la fruta roja, "the red fruit"). Depending on the language, the gender might even be "hard-coded" into the verbs that you use.
Several other languages feature THREE genders -- masculine, feminine, and neuter. This doesn't mean, however, that the arbitrary assignment of gender doesn't happen here Indeed, you might be familiar with The German Awful Language by Mark Twain, where Twain mocks such seemingly random gender assignments (why IS das Mädchen, "the girl", neuter???). But German is NOT alone here for many languages exhibiting grammatical gender have at least SOME oddballs lying about. After all, one of the more common words for "penis", verga, is feminine, and that's just bizarre to me, even if its meaning developed from other meanings (like "rod"). ^^;;;;
Certain languages have had their genders "condense"; Swedish used to have masculine, feminine, and neuter, but now has neutrum, "neuter", and </i>utrum</i>, "common", but this means that nouns still have seemingly random assignment of words of these two "genders"(and there's really no way to differentiate them) -- en stol, "a chair" is "common" and ett bord, "a table", is "neuter". It should be noted, though, that gender doesn't play AS big of a role in sentence formation as it would in, say, Spanish, as adjectives and the like don't depend on the gender of a noun of which they're modifying.
Certain languages exhibit NO gender at all. While it might be tempting to say "English," keep in mind that there are "he", "she", "him", "her", etc. Also certain times inanimate objects may be referred to as "she," like a boat or the Enterprise. :: laugh :: But languages like Turkish don't even specify that -- its third person singular pronoun is o, which could be he, she, or it; in other words, the gender isn't even specified HERE, let alone in verb, adjectives, or anywhere else, and this is true for several other languages (Basque, Hungarian, Finnish, and others).
So everyone: let me hear your tales or insights on grammarical gender! I'd love to hear them.
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12:18 pm - Hot Santa
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A coworker asked me to scan a picture of her son visiting Santa at the mall, and I agreed. Of course, what's the first thing I think of when scanning the pic?
"Wow, Santa's HOT." Yeah, I'm a dirty old man minus a few decades. :: laugh ::
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| Sunday, November 8th, 2009
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10:37 pm - Show Your Suspenders Sunday!
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So I haven't had a Sunday Sketch here in forever since the demise of my puter, but here's something you might enjoy. Several gents have posted pics of themselves in suspenders -- one of my favourite clothing items -- and hell, if you can't beat them, join them, ne? This was before we went to dinner last night. Which means, yes, this is how I looked at the police station too ^^;;;
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| Saturday, November 7th, 2009
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11:38 pm - Police Custody
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| Thursday, November 5th, 2009
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10:27 pm - Turtles And Bears
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Carl and I went to Steak 'n Shake for a quick bite, and after we got seated we noticed a man across the room. He was adorable -- a little taller than myself, hefty, nice beard ... and wearing pajama bottoms.
"... is it late enough to be in your PJs???" I asked Carl.
"I'm sure it is SOMEWHERE, yes."
So Cute Pajama Man gets up to go to the bathroom, and comes out a few minutes later without buttoning his fly up, and this was immediately noticed by Carl.
"Oh my, did you see that?? His fly was completely undone. I saw a 'turtle'!" he said while doing his trademark cackle.
The rest of the meal went without incident (or eye candy), and we went to pay the bill. The lady doing drive-thru started to ring us up and started to eye the both of us.
"My son would adore the BOTH of you!" she remarked.
"... excuse me???"
"He's one, and he LOVES facial hair, so he'd love just tugging at both of your beards!"
She continued on about her son's beard fixation (including with Santa!) before finishing ringing us up, and I couldn't help but give Carl some uncomfortable looks. I mean, wow, this totally sounds like the beginnings of a fetish. ^^;;;
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horny
