He aquí los pensamientos aleatorios de un epistemólogo andante.
I dream of a world where chickens can cross the road without having their motives questioned.
피할수 없는 고통이라면 차라리 즐겨라
As of June, 2013, I have assumed a new identity: I am a cancer survivor. "Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose."
"A blog, in the end, is really not so different from an inscription on a bone: I was here, it declares to no one in particular. Don't forget that." - Justin E. H. Smith
재미없으면 보상해드립니다!
"All things are enchained with one another, bound together by love." - Nietzsche (really!)
Leviticus 19:33-34
Donc, si Dieu existait, il n’y aurait pour lui qu’un seul moyen de servir la liberté humaine, ce serait de cesser d’exister. - Mikhail Bakunin
Solvitur ambulando.
"Sometimes I wonder why I even bother to soliloquize. Where was I?" - the villain Heinz Doofenshmirtz, in the cartoon Phineas and Ferb.
My name is Jared Way. I was born in rural Far Northern California, and became an "adoptive" Minnesotan. I have lived in many other places: Mexico City, Philadelphia, Valdivia (Chile), Los Angeles. And for 11 years, I was an expatriate living in South Korea. In the summer of 2018, I made another huge change, and relocated to Southeast Alaska, which is my uncle's home.
For many years I was a database programmer, with a background in Linguistics and Spanish Literature. In Korea, worked as an EFL teacher.
In June, 2013, while I was in Ilsan in South Korea, I was diagnosed with cancer, and underwent successful treatment. That changed my life pretty radically.
Currently, you could say I'm "between jobs," somewhat caretaking my uncle (to the extent he tolerates that) and getting adapted to life in rural Alaska after so many years as an urban dweller.
I started this blog before I even had the idea of going to Korea (first entry: Caveat: And lo...). So this is not meant to be a blog about Korea, by any stretch of the imagination. But life in Korea, and Korean language and culture, inevitably have come to play a central role in this blog's current incarnation.
Basically, this blog is a newsletter for the voices in my head. It keeps everyone on the same page: it has become a sort of aide-mémoire.
For a more detailed reflection on why I'm blogging, you can look at this old post: What this blog is, and isn't.
If you're curious about me, there is a great deal of me here. I believe in what I call "opaque transparency" - you can learn almost everything about me if you want, but it's not immediately easy to find.
A distillation of my personal philosophy (at least on good days):
I have made the realization that happiness is not a mental state. It is not something that is given to you, or that you find, or that you can lose, or that can be taken from you. Happiness is something that you do. And like most things that you do, it is volitional. You can choose to do happiness, or not. You have complete freedom with respect to the matter.
"Ethical joy is the correlate of speculative affirmation." - Gilles Deleuze (writing about Spinoza).
Like most people, I spend a lot of time online, although I try to limit it somewhat. Here is a somewhat-annotated list of the "places" where I spend
time online.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Knowledge and News
I spend about half of all my time online reading Wikipedia. It's why I know stuff.
I get most of my world news from Minnesota Public Radio which includes NPR, BBC and CBC, depending on when I listen.
I don't really "do" social media. I have a membership at Facebookland but I never log in
there. I don't like it.
I have a membership at The Youtubes but I mostly use it for work. I also listen to music on youtube, frequently - I prefer it to typical streaming services, for example.
Humor and Cat Videos
Cat videos and other internet novelties: Laughing Squid.
Geofiction - this has evolved into a significant "hobby" for me. I like to draw imaginary maps, and there is a website that has enabled this vice.
I worked as a volunteer administrator for the site OpenGeofiction on and off for a few years. I created (but no longer maintain) the site's main wiki page: OGF Wiki. I am not currently working as administrator but I remain active on the site.
The above work has required my becoming an expert in the Openstreetmap system. Openstreetmap is an attempt do for online maps what wikipedia has done for encyclopedias. I have considered becoming an openstreetmap contributor, but I feel that my current location in Korea hinders that, since I don't have a good grasp Korean cartographic naming conventions.
Starting in April, 2018, I decided somewhat capriciously to build my own "OGF stack" on my own server. This was not because I intended to abandon the OGF site, but rather because I wanted to better understand the whole architecture and all its parts. I built a wiki on the Mediawiki platform (the same as wikipedia). This wiki has no content. I built a map tileserver and geospatial database, which contains a very low resolution upload of an imaginary planet called Rahet. And I built a wordpress blog, which is a separate, low-frequency blog intended to focus on my geofictional pursuits rather than this more personalized, general purpose blog. All of these things can be found integrated together on my rent-a-server, here: geofictician.net
TEFL - my "profession," such as it is.
Online English Grammar reference Grammarist. Useful for settling disputes over grammar.
It is reported that Seoul has been saved from anihilation. The below is apparently an utterly true transcript.
Dramatis personae: the new space emperor, Kanye West, Jim Brown.
"MR. BROWN: And I like North Korea.
THE PRESIDENT: I like North Korea too.
MR. BROWN: (Inaudible.)
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah. Yeah. Well, he’s — turned out to be good. Dialogue. We had a little dialogue. And Secretary of State just came back — Mike. He just came back from North Korea. We had very good meetings, and we’ll meet again. But we’re doing good. No more nuclear testing. No more missiles going up. No more nothing. And it’s — that was headed to war. That was headed to war.
MR. BROWN: Yeah. I mean, it was — to me, it seemed like that.
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah. It was so close. We spoke — I spoke to President Obama. I will tell you, that was headed to war. And now it’s going to be — I believe it’s going to work out very well.
MR. WEST: You stopped the war —
THE PRESIDENT: We really stopped the war. Saved millions of lives. You know, Seoul has 30 million people. You don’t realize how big. Thirty million people who are right near the border; 30 miles off the border. Millions of people would have been killed. And I will say, Chairman Kim has been really good. Really good. And we’ve made a lot of progress.
That’s nice that you say that, because that’s a big — that’s a big thing. These folks were covering — they were covering North Korea not — I think not very promisingly. And there were a lot of problems. President Obama said that was his biggest problem. And I don’t say anything is solved —
MR. WEST: You, day one, solved one of the biggest problems.
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah.
MR. WEST: We solved one of the biggest problems.
THE PRESIDENT: It was a big solving. And not solved yet, but I think we’re along — I think we’re on the way."
This made me laugh a lot. Plus, I like that old song.
Arthur and I went shopping in town today. I also made progress on constructing my storage facility. Finally, we saw a bear cross the road during our afternoon walk.
The bear did not play a drum solo, however. Sometimes the wildlife lets you down, I guess.
I had trouble with Rubik's Cubes, when I was young and they first appeared.
I felt I should be good at doing one - it was my teenage ego, maybe, thinking, "I'm smart, I should do this."
But I didn't enjoy trying to solve it. It's not that different from my relationship with all kinds of puzzles and intellectually demanding games, like sudoku or chess. I feel like I should like them, but I really don't like them at all.
Eventually, I successfully solved a Rubik's Cube. Once.
I considered that I'd done my duty, and haven't touched one since.
Here, finally, is a Rubik's Cube that I can fully enjoy and support.
I keep intending to write something longer. But then I lose myself in some other undertaking, and I don't get around to it. I'm trying to keep up the discipline of regular blog-posting, but it feels a bit low-quality lately, to be honest. Not that it's that great to begin with.
Meanwhile, here's a joke:
'i' before 'e' except after 'c' - disproved by science!
And here is a picture I took of a photogenic bumblebee this morning. It's a bit blurry, though.
This heartwarming little video appeared in my facebook feed the other day (h/t my own dad - heh). Given that I'm recently returned to facebookland, despite ambivalences, right?
I was curious about the song's provenance, because it seemed a good, positive song for my CC classes at Karma. So I did some google-fu, and found it.
What I'm listening to right now.
Matisyahu, "One Day."
Lyrics.
Sometimes I lay Under the moon And thank God I'm breathing Then I pray Don't take me soon 'Cause I am here for a reason
Sometimes in my tears I drown But I never let it get me down So when negativity surrounds I know some day it'll all turn around
Because All my life I've been waiting for I've been praying for For the people to say That we don't wanna fight no more There will be no more wars And our children will play One day (one day), One day (one day) One day (one day), One day (one day) One day (one day), One day (one day)
It's not about Win or lose 'Cause we all lose When they feed on the souls of the innocent Blood-drenched pavement Keep on moving though the waters stay raging
In this maze you can lose your way (your way) It might drive you crazy but don't let it faze you, no way (no way)
Sometimes in my tears I drown But I never let it get me down So when negativity surrounds I know some day it'll all turn around
Because All my life I've been waiting for I've been praying for For the people to say That we don't wanna fight no more They'll be no more wars And our children will play One day (one day), One day (one day) One day (one day), One day (one day) One day (one day), One day (one day)
One day this all will change Treat people the same Stop with the violence Down with the hate One day we'll all be free And proud to be Under the same sun Singing songs of freedom like
One day (one day), One day (one day) One day (one day), One day (one day)
All my life I've been waiting for I've been praying for For the people to say That we don't wanna fight no more They'll be no more wars And our children will play One day (one day), One day (one day) One day (one day), One day (one day) One day (one day), One day (one day)
[daily log: walking, 7.5km; carrying heavy box to post office, 0.5km]
This Japanese TV commercial is quite funny. The cultural issues surrounding English education mean that the scenario applies equally well in Korea. Even the students who learn almost zero English nevertheless know how to answer, "Fine, thank you. And you?"
This video (in the embedded tweet, below) is interesting to me, not because I necessarily would want to make any kind of linguistic prescription vis-a-vis the Spanish language, but rather because it represents a spontaneous, "folk-linguistic" solution to the the perceived need for truly gender-neutral language in Spanish, which makes the non-gender-neutral aspects of English look pretty minor by comparison.
This young girl uses "los," "las" and the gender-neutral "les" — watch her explain why. pic.twitter.com/gBCalPxpuY
I think the substitution of "-e" for "-o/a" is perfect, and much more natural than the annoying, text-based substitutions I've seen before, like -@ or -x, which are unpronounceable and unnatural.
As a linguist, I retain my skepticism about the need for these kinds of solutions, but I nevertheless understand why people want them. I would only point out, by way of semantic counter-example, that the Korean language has a complete lack of gender markers (nouns, pronouns, etc.): it is literally impossible to know the gender of someone out of context, on linguistic cues alone. Yet this fact has hardly managed to create or support a gender-neutral culture. The belief that such is true (or necessary) is just a sort of naive and unscientific Sapirwhorfism.
Heilung, "Krigsgaldr." This looks like part of some weird Scandinavian neo-Paganist thing. But it is interesting. I find these "back-to-roots" European nativist movements culturally intriguing, but feel it's regrettable the way they get coopted by various racist and authoritarianist ideologues. I have no idea what specific ideologies are associated with this Danish group, but if they turn out to be offensive, I offer my apologies in advance. I mostly just find it linguistically and culturally interesting, and would remark on the interesting coincidences with ancient cultures all over the world - these performers are not that different from e.g. efforts to recover or reconstruct Native American pre-contact cultures. I think the non-English parts, below, are no variety of modern Scandinavian, but rather intended to be some kind of "proto-Nordic" as recovered from some ancient runic inscriptions - that's what is linguistically interesting to me.
Lyrics.
Min Warb Naseu Wilr Made Thaim I Bormotha Hauni
Hu War Hu War Opkam Har a Hit Lot
Got Nafiskr Orf Auim Suimade Foki Afa Galande
What am I supposed to do If I want to talk about peace and understanding But you only understand the language of the sword What if I want to make you understand that the path you chose leads to downfall But you only understand the language of the sword What if I want to tell you to leave me and my beloved ones in peace But you only understand the language of the sword
I let the blade do the talking... So my tongue shall become iron And my words the mighty roar of war Revealing my divine anger´s arrow shall strike
All action for the good of all I see my reflection in your eyes But my new age has just begun
The sword is soft In the fire of the furnace It hungers to be hit And wants to have a hundred sisters In the coldest state of their existence They may dance the maddest In the morass of the red rain
Beloved brother enemy I sing my sword song for you The lullaby of obliteration So I can wake up with a smile And bliss in my heart And bliss in my heart And bliss in my heart
Coexistence, Conflict, combat Devastation, regeneration, transformation That is the best I can do for you
I see a grey gloom on the horizon That promises a powerful sun to rise To melt away all moons It will make the old fires of purification Look like dying embers Look like dying embers Look like dying embers
Min Warb Naseu Wilr Made Thaim I Bormotha Hauni
Hu War Hu War Opkam Har a Hit Lot
Got Nafiskr Orf Auim Suimade Foki Afa Galande
Hu War Hu War Opkam Har a Hit Lot
Ylir Men Aero Their Era Mela Os
I found some vague gestures at translation, and will only offer that the part I used as this blog post's title, "Foki Afa Galande", seems to correspond to a meaning "land of shining meadows".
The official video of the same song released by the group is interesting, too.
I recently learned that the famous classic rock song, "Smoke On The Water," by British rockers Deep Purple, was written about events at Montreux, Switzerland, which took place there in 1971 at the same time that the famous Russian-American author Vladimir Nabokov was resident there. It's interesting to imagine Nabokov and the members of Deep Purple interacting in a small French-Swiss town. Nabokov was of a different generation, but he might have been interested in rock music, given his fascination with other aspects of emergent pop culture.
What I'm listening to right now.
Deep Purple, "Smoke On The Water."
We all came out to Montreux On the Lake Geneva shoreline To make records with a mobile We didn't have much time Frank Zappa and the Mothers Were at the best place around But some stupid with a flare gun Burned the place to the ground
Smoke on the water, fire in the sky Smoke on the water
They burned down the gambling house It died with an awful sound Funky Claude was running in and out Pulling kids out the ground When it all was over We had to find another place But Swiss time was running out It seemed that we would lose the race
Smoke on the water, fire in the sky Smoke on the water
We ended up at the Grand Hotel It was empty cold and bare But with the Rolling truck Stones thing just outside Making our music there With a few red lights and a few old beds We make a place to sweat No matter what we get out of this I know, I know we'll never forget
Smoke on the water, fire in the sky Smoke on the water
There is a website that generates artificial cat purrs. Just what any normal person needs. Actually, it's pretty well done. But of what use is it? Entertaining, I guess, like most cat-related things online.
The Speculative Grammarian site has this very clever and utterly wrathful satire of the crypto-creationists' "Intelligent Design theory", here. Given the site it's on, bear in mind that it's a rewrite of the ID theory transferred from biology to linguistics, and called "Wrathful Dispersion" theory, alluding to the Tower of Babel tale in Genesis.
I particularly liked:
One cynical observer has likened WD ["Wrathful Dispersion" theory] to Scientology, which “is a religion for purposes of tax assessment, a science for purposes of propaganda, and a work of fiction for purposes of copyright.”
And:
In particular, a satirical Web-based grassroots pseudo-cult has grown up around the theory that all modern languages were in fact “shat out of the arse of the Flying Stratificational Grammar Monster,” with adherents claiming to have achieved enlightenment upon being “touched by His Boolean Appendage” or “washed in the blood of Sydney Lamb.”
There once was Moby, a white whale and some narrator named Ishmael and these guys on a boat that soon failed to float with digressions, and prose that was stale.
- this is my own "retelling in limerick form" of a well-known work of literature, quite inspired by this post on the languagehat blog, in turn inspired by some discussion on a site called wordorigins. I spent a good hour browsing the comments and links for these two sites. Entertaining. My favorites, seen at those links:
There once was a girl named Lenore And a bird and a bust and a door And a guy with depression And a whole lot of questions And the bird always says "Nevermore"
... and:
“Utnapishtim,” cried Gilgamesh, “Why Do you get to live, while I die?” “I can see that you’re vexed,” [There’s a gap in the text] The walls of Uruk are quite high!
I also enjoyed this observation, by a commenter named Trond Engen:
"A limerick needs a dose of offbeacity or else it will often sound flat."
That comment, in turn, inspired another work of my own:
If you want limericks to have a capacity to show anything more than verbosity and to thusly afford some readers unbored Then they'll need to include some offbeacity
I don't have much to offer today. I was being obsessive with a computer thing, and didn't give myself time to think of a post for blogland. So here's this.
"When all you have is a database, everything looks like a segmentation problem."
I have not idea how to attribute this quote. It circulates online.
I found myself distracted by this amazing animated tool called EarthWindMap, by something (someone?) called Nullschool, that allows you to surf the global climate, including temperature, winds, pressure, humidity, precipitation, and other factors. Here is a view with my current location in a small green circle.
Currently I am a long-term expat. I observe my home country, the US, from a distance both psychological and physical. The whole "gun thing" seems both tragic and absurd, from my perspective. I currently live in a country with one of the lowest incidences of gun violence in the world - a cursory examination of a list of countries by incidence of gun deaths shows South Korea as being the 3rd lowest, only after Hong Kong and Japan.
Anyway, it's pretty safe here, from gun violence. I have sometimes wondered if there exists any kind of "gun culture" in South Korea. Actually, I speculate that there does, in fact, exist such a culture - but it would be inextricably linked up with the military. Since military service for males is obligatory, that means that, in theory, at least, every Korean adult male in the entire country has fired a gun at some point in his life, and the vast majority have probably qualified with a rifle. That's interesting, vis-a-vis the non-military culture, right? It makes it a far different situation than either Hong Kong or Japan, where military service is, in the former instance non-existent, and in the latter instance, extremely rare and utterly voluntary (given Japan's relatively small military, in per capita terms, compared to South Korea). What it means is that any Korean man who wants to "play" with guns in a safe and responsible manner has an easy way to do so: he can continue to serve as a "reservist" - which many Korean men do. Then he can go out on the range and shoot as much as he wants, several times a year, I can imagine.
My own experience with guns is broader than you might expect, given my liberal white privilege. I qualified with a rifle during my Army service - as an expert, even - though I sometimes felt I had simply had some very lucky days on my qualifying days. I had even gone on to take the first steps on qualifying with a pistol, as well, before I mustered out.
Further, despite having avoided seeing any actual action in the first Iraq war (1991) - which took place during my military service, and which I watched on the barracks televisions while stationed here in South Korea at that time - I have nevertheless had the experience of having been shot at, directly. I was lucky, in that the man shooting at me was too drunk to aim well. I was not hurt. There is no doubt I might have died - I consider it one of the several times in my life when I have had to look death right in the eye.
Additionally, I once witnessed a man being shot dead. This was during my time traveling in El Salvador, in 1986 - which was during the civil war. It was not clear to me if I witnessing a crime or an act of "enforcement" - there were plenty of uniforms present but it wasn't clear to me if the uniforms were military or rebel forces, and how it all worked. I suspect that during the Salvadorean civil war of that era, the line between crime and military enforcement was pretty blurry. My main reaction was to get away from the situation as quickly and as unobstrusively as I could manage. I boarded a bus and let it take me away.
In the end, my view of guns and gun violence is complicated. I think I have no issue with the type of allegedly draconian gun laws as exist in Japan or South Korea. I think it hardly makes these societies "less free" - there may in fact be ways that these societies are "less free" than in the US, but I don't think the relaxing of gun controls would impact that in any positive way. My libertarian tendencies are undeniable, however. In principle, I have strong sympathies with the "2nd ammendment types" who will brook no infringement of individual rights. My biggest concern with those people is that they are, almost without exception, utter hypocrites - they are libertarians on gun control, but if you ask them to opine on issues like women's rights or immigration, they are all about control and restrictions. This is "libertarianism for me but not for thee." It makes me much less sympathetic to their position - when I find mostly hypocrites holding a given political position, my gut-level response is to assume this is strong evidence of some kind of flaw in that political position.
I will conclude with a humorous video I ran across - a tongue-in-cheek "European perspective" on the American gun problem, which could probably just as easily represent the typical (informed) Korean position.
There is an immense epic poetic tradition in Tibet and Central Asia about a mythical King Gesar. There are thousands of variants in dozens of diverse languages and cultures, and the King seems to not really have been a specific historical person, although the name, at least, has been linked to the adoption among some Turkic peoples of the steppes of the title "Keser" or "Gesar" from the Byzantines, who continued using the title "Caesar" until their downfall, and who had many contacts with Mongols, Turks, and other Central Asian peoples through their long history. This has parallel in the Slavs' adoption of the same title from the same source, which became the modern word 'czar.'
I found an interesting translation-in-progresson this website, of the Gesar epic, by a scholar of Buryat shamanism. Buryat is an ethnic group from northern Mongolia and the Baikal region of Siberia. As far as I can figure out, the scholar, Sarangerel Odigon, is working directly from some oral source - that is, the English translation is just a running translation of the oral tradition. That seems pretty cool, in itself.
In case you haven't noticed, I've been quite 'into' Central Asian cultures, lately, especially their literary production. So here is a tiny sample of this fascinating epic poem, one of the few which still has an active performative tradition in multiple cultures. For reference, I found a Russian translation of some version of it, here. I'm sure there are interesting original-language versions out there on the web, somewhere, but my google-fu is not strong enough to find it.
In the earliest of early times, In the most ancient of periods, In the first of first times, In the time of the beginning; When the highest bright heaven Was swirling with fog, When the earth below Was covered with dirt and dust; When the grass had not yet begun to grow, When the broad long rivers had not begun to flow, When the great Milk Sea was but a small puddle, When the world mountain Humber Ula was a hillock, When the sandalwood tree at the forest's edge Had not yet put out branches, When the greyish deer was but a fawn; When the giant yellow snake was but a little worm, When the giant fish were only little minnows; When the earth did not have any continents, When the center of the universe was not yet finished; When the great giant bird was small as a crow, When the first horse was the size of a foal; When the khan's many roads were not built, When the people's many roads were not laid out; This was a good age, This was a beautiful time It has been said!..
When the many gods of the heaven did not compete with each other, When the many tenger of the skies did not quarrel with each other; When the many tenger of the west were not arrogant, When black and white were not different from each other; When the many tenger of the east did not argue, When appearance and color were not differentiated; When Esege Malaan Tenger was not an old man, When Ekhe Yuuren Ibii was not an old woman; When Han Hormasta Tengeri did not brag of his strength, When black and white were not estranged; When Atai Ulaan Tengeri did not boast of his greatness, When hatred and jealousy did not sow discord; When those of Oyodol Sagaan Tengeri had not yet gathered, When those of Oyor Sagaan Tengeri had not yet flowed over; It was a time of beautiful things! So it is written on the thin paper!
Adriano Celentano, "Prisencolinensinainciusol." This song is nonsense. Literally. It's an Italian comedian's effort, in 1972, to sing in English without using English - he said he wanted to make a song about the failure to communicate. Which makes sense - more than the song does, right? Anyway, the melody and beat are quite earwormy, actually.
Lyrics
Prisencolinensinainciusol In de col men seivuan prisencolinensinainciusol ol rait
Uis de seim cius nau op de seim Ol uait men in de colobos dai Trrr - ciak is e maind beghin de col Bebi stei ye push yo oh
Uis de seim cius nau op de seim Ol uoit men in de colobos dai Not s de seim laikiu de promisdin Iu nau in trabol lovgiai ciu gen
In do camo not cius no bai for lov so Op op giast cam lau ue cam lov ai Oping tu stei laik cius go mo men Iu bicos tue men cold dobrei goris Oh sandei
Ai ai smai sesler Eni els so co uil piso ai In de col men seivuan Prisencolinensinainciusol ol rait
Ai ai smai senflecs Eni go for doing peso ai Prisencolinensinainciusol ol rait
Uel ai sint no ai giv de sint Laik de cius nobodi oh gud taim lev feis go Uis de seim et seim cius go no ben Let de cius end kai for not de gai giast stei
Ai ai smai senflecs Eni go for doing peso ai In de col mein seivuan Prisencolinensinainciusol ol rait
Lu nei si not sicidor Ah es la bebi la dai big iour
Ai aismai senflecs Eni go for doing peso ai In de col mein seivuan Prisencolinensinainciusol ol rait
Lu nei si not sicodor Ah es la bebi la dai big iour
Pointer Sisters, "You Gotta Believe." The remarkable video is by Nina Paley, who has been blogged here before.
Lyrics.
[Intro] Doodle wop a-rat-a-tat boom I'll make the sound of a jet plane zoom Doodle wop a-rat-a-tat boom I'll make the sound of a fire
[Hook] You got to believe in somethin' Why not believe in me? You got to believe in somethin' Why not believe in me?
[Verse One] What have I, I done to you To make you mean And treat me the way you do? Go on and wave your flag, brother Start your revolution I'm willin' to let you do your thing Tell me why are you plannin' a compromise?
[Hook]
Take the chain off your brain Take the chain off your brain Stop, take a look at yourself Stop ridiculin' everybody else
The internet wins the day. It turns out that H.P. Lovecraft's apocalyptically-themed poem "Nemesis" is a perfect metrical fit for Billy Joel's "Piano Man."
And then someone made it happen.
What I'm listening to right now.
Julian Velard, "Nemesis" - lyrics by H.P. Lovecraft, melody by Billy Joel.
Lyrics - "Nemesis."
Thro’ the ghoul-guarded gateways of slumber, Past the wan-moon’d abysses of night, I have liv’d o’er my lives without number, I have sounded all things with my sight; And I struggle and shriek ere the daybreak, being driven to madness with fright.
I have whirl’d with the earth at the dawning, When the sky was a vaporous flame; I have seen the dark universe yawning, Where the black planets roll without aim; Where they roll in their horror unheeded, without knowledge or lustre or name.
I had drifted o’er seas without ending, Under sinister grey-clouded skies That the many-fork’d lightning is rending, That resound with hysterical cries; With the moans of invisible daemons that out of the green waters rise.
I have plung’d like a deer thro’ the arches Of the hoary primordial grove, Where the oaks feel the presence that marches And stalks on where no spirit dares rove; And I flee from a thing that surrounds me, and leers thro’ dead branches above.
I have stumbled by cave-ridden mountains That rise barren and bleak from the plain, I have drunk of the fog-foetid fountains That ooze down to the marsh and the main; And in hot cursed tarns I have seen things I care not to gaze on again.
I have scann’d the vast ivy-clad palace, I have trod its untenanted hall, Where the moon writhing up from the valleys Shews the tapestried things on the wall; Strange figures discordantly woven, which I cannot endure to recall.
I have peer’d from the casement in wonder At the mouldering meadows around, At the many-roof’d village laid under The curse of a grave-girdled ground; And from rows of white urn-carven marble I listen intently for sound.
I have haunted the tombs of the ages, I have flown on the pinions of fear Where the smoke-belching Erebus rages, Where the jokulls loom snow-clad and drear: And in realms where the sun of the desert consumes what it never can cheer.
I was old when the Pharaohs first mounted The jewel-deck’d throne by the Nile; I was old in those epochs uncounted When I, and I only, was vile; And Man, yet untainted and happy, dwelt in bliss on the far Arctic isle.
Oh, great was the sin of my spirit, And great is the reach of its doom; Not the pity of Heaven can cheer it, Nor can respite be found in the tomb: Down the infinite aeons come beating the wings of unmerciful gloom.
Thro’ the ghoul-guarded gateways of slumber, Past the wan-moon’d abysses of night, I have liv’d o’er my lives without number, I have sounded all things with my sight; And I struggle and shriek ere the daybreak, being driven to madness with fright.
Here is another version - nicer implementation (more true to the darker spirit of Lovecraft), but incomplete.
"A shutdown falls on the President's lack of leadership. He can't even control his party and get people together in a room. A shutdown means the President is weak." - DJT, 2013.