• Written from Crixa(!) nothing to add. Bliss and all that…
• Another note: I find that when I am happy I am drop-dead boring.
A business plan is one thing I didn’t think I was going to do again ever since figuring out that I might just be able to realize my dream of doing something that I actually enjoy doing instead of working in high tech...
I am surprised though, apparently when you do it for something of your own, something you truly believe in, it is actually fun. Also, I am quite confident in making the humble statement that I am fantastic at it.
So again, everything is going spectacularly well. Again we had a great time with my program cohort – it amazes me each time what a fantastic bunch they are; truly the nicest, most interesting people. Also, I had an interesting day at school. And now I am at Crixa working alongside Y on our project.
written from jupiter's. did I mention it had both outlets and airbears wifi? well it does. we are sitting with our computers. as usual, y is working and I am fooling around with my blog while looking from the window over Shattuck Ave in its evening mode.
Ok. So it was my first day today. I am so tired. really exhausted. It’s funny. I think it is a combination of the run I had yesterday, the bike ride to school which I am no longer used to and the strain of class. One by one we met two people whom we’ve known to be here but whom by some remarkable way managed to avoid us up until today. We were on our way to see a matinee – extremely unusual for us. Mostly we either go to see a film when we are too tired to do anything else or when there’s something extraordinary showing in the PFA or in San Francisco. This reminds me that on one occasion when I was listening in on a conversation in café 504 I overheard that there’s a fantastic film house in Oakland which I must go to (and will on Wednesday!). But today was different. Y had an interview, and I am always up for a good time.
Anyhow, there’s one thing memorable about today (maybe two if you count the German guy who sat next to me in and who made me feel real good about myself): today there was a professor from the University of Tehran in class with me. Prof. Cooter presented him as a distinguished scholar from Iran and then asked that each of us introduced himself. When I spoke I made sure that he knew where I was from. That is because in my mind I could already see myself talking to him, telling him that I hope we could be colleagues, shaking his hand - to the immediate result of being notified by the Swedish Royal Academy that I am to become the 2009 Nobel peace prize laureate, an honor which I was quite benevolently content to share with my new friend.
Natually though, my award-partner just got up and left class following prof. Cooter, without even granting me with a nod or even a congenial back turn.
Written from Coffee Bar. If only they had low fat milk, or at least reduced fat, I would have gladly moved in.
I have to practice.
That is it.
I have to practice.
It doesn’t matter whether I sound foolish or not. I must speak without fancy preparation. Just speak. Say my mind. Make sure I have a mind. I mean it. When you don’t see yourself as a potential participant in the conversation, you adopt this mode of passive absorption. And when you are there, it is not just that you dare not utter word, it is that you don’t have a word to utter.
I am not sure what it is that is stopping me. It might be Zommer and the way he made sure to abase me, or at least to humble me, in our debut class in Thelma Yellin. How different I was that first time, highly engaged, constantly speaking up. I think that was the last time. Perhaps it is Itamar, or adolescence altogether that made me scorn those that did speak. Always suspecting that it was for the benefit of hearing their own voices.
This may have been the reason for my adoption of a particular etiquette for classroom behavior: (1) don’t repeat what has already been said, or the immediate implications of what was said, or what you believe was said. No one is an idiot and therefore there’s no need to stress the obvious. Those who do stress the obvious are laughable. Or at least, they are highfalutin. I don’t want to appear pompous. (2) even less than immediate implications of what had been previously said might be obvious implications to somebody in class. Therefore, beware! Many times the less than obvious is obvious. (3) When you do think you have something particularly intriguing to say, make sure you prepare yourself thoroughly before hand. Even at the price of not listening to anything that was said in the mean time. (4) if you think that while you were preparing yourself, someone may have said something similar, or if you think that the conversation strayed, just relinquish the idea to declare your thoughts. It wasn’t worth the “looking like a full” Expectation. (5)If there is something you know is true for a source external to the classroom, refrain from saying it. Only a louse would feign understanding, when in fact it is prior knowledge. (6) after you have gone through all these steps, if you are still bold enough to speak, make sure you speak as curtly as possible, so that you don’t insult the intelligence of your listeners. If, as a result, nobody gets to the bottom of what you are saying, don’t fret, just wait for the next chance – it may avail itself in a month or so. (7) and last and not least: when you shut up and do it faithfully enough, people think that you are shy, but not that you are idiot. If you break the cycle of silence, you stop being consistent about not making a whisper, people assume that when you don’t speak, it’s because you don’t have anything intelligent to say. Therefore, it would usually not be a good idea to do it.
This etiquette produces specifically one result => under no circumstances should you speak. However, while writing all this, I cannot but realize how much sense it really does make. And besides, if you don’t speak you might also be able to escape being asked to share your thoughts about the Gaza enterprise…
Saturday morning in the apartment. I have to do all the coffee drinking – paper reading – balloon getting in this joint because Y is asleep.
I was going to entitle this: Men and Laundry, but decided I am not all that bitter yet about men and their worldly ways.
At any rate –
I was done with the colors (cleaning and drying). Yoav was dealing with the whites.
And thus, this morning when I go in the laundry shack to get the key for the Out-going mailbox I encounter a pair of white underwear (of course white! All the colored made their way safely back home four days ago and in pristine state). That white underwear pronounced quite recognizably the word: דלתא and therefore, could not be mistaken for gentile underwear :).
Of course, when you lose underwear in a public place and they can be traced back to you, destiny has it that it’s never your best Sunday pair, if you know what I mean.
Alas.
• Written from home. Morning.Now I realize it is important to record the time of day as well. This metadata stuff is getting too much of a hassle, overpowering the content. Of course, it always does.
We made a truly important step ahead with our project yesterday night. So I am feeling enthusiasm percolating through my exhausted brain joints. It’s funny. You have an idea you truly believe in. You believe that you yourself can do it and in flying colors. You have a presentation in flying colors to prove it. And still, you constantly feel the need to prove it to yourself. So last night I got another piece of evidence. Heck, I got another piece of evidence on our way home from our coffee-shop office when Y shared his ideas of that working day. Shreds of evidence aren’t hard to come by these days. Still, we have so much at stake, which makes us ourselves our fiercest reviewers. We already put a lot on the line that I am almost feeling as though the Angel in us, the one who opted to make that humongous investment, is a separate persona, with different goals, incentives and interests than our entrepreneurial selves. Like a true Angel. However, at this point, both of our psyche shreds are holding their breaths. We’ll be there to see what happens.
Written from E-22. By the way, it’s not that I forgot my plan to specify where I’m writing the post from. It’s simply that Y thought that I shouldn’t write that we are in NYC so that Berkeley burglars who are of course avid readers of my post won’t find it advantageous to come and steal our belongings (which comprise mainly of laundry detergents and not much more but detergent is costly!). I was also supposed to refrain from uploading posts written in NYC. I told Y that it’s impossible to know where I’m at, but he is now claiming that no one writes theoretically about experiences at the MOMA, the living room and Balthazar. I retorted that I am a true academic – I can write theoretically about doing the dishes. But he may have been in fact right (quite extraordinarily. Usually I am the right one).
Ok. So I am mildly concerned about being sued due to an online Yelp review I wrote. I was a bit frantic as I wrote it but decided at the time that since I believe every bit of what I am writing, that I oughtn’t to be scared. That convinced me to some extent, and I quite nearly managed to push it out of the circle of my most pressing neurotic thoughts. Apart from the occasional dream about being sought by savage dogs, I was fine.
However today, there was a SF Chronicle article about a guy who was actually sued for defamation. The rational agent that resides deep within my psyche is telling me that I have nothing to fear because I was careful to write the absolute truth about my own experience at the place. And I am writing this post as further shock treatment (because I am of course now afraid that this post will be used in my trial as evidence that I myself acknowledged my gaffe.)
At any rate, Y actually thinks that it would be good for Israel if I am sued – due to the content of my post. Whereas I, being afraid for my own back, don’t give two hoots about that. I am managing, though, to convince myself that it would be good for my CV to have a rich courthouse experience . Anyhow, start saving your pennies for my bail – I’m too pretty for jail.
what an improvement.
there's air.
you can drink water off the faucet.
people clear the entrance when you are trying to exit the BART.
coming to think of it - i was impressed by something much more modest: that people don't pee in the BART.
everything is shiny. it's funny how resilient we've become - it's 16c and not me nor y thought about wearing our jackets. this is because in comparison
to newyo-sibersk here it is blazing hot.
everybody is friendly. the masseuse on the BART (she had a massage arm chair with her - i'm not inventing this!) chippered happily to the stranger seated in front of her who confessed to back pains.
I bet in NYC the same masseuse would pee on the same stranger talking shop to her in the middle of the day and on the Subway.
Y already started on our Pizza dinner, and i've begun eating raw dough each time he glances away. Indeed we are home!
While I’m working hard at my hard upper lip, we went to MOMA. And what can I say! They do make a fantastic chocolate chip cookie! I’d recommend that everybody travel to Manhattan, walk over to the Museum of Modern Art, go right through the entrance, walk straight, don’t look left or right (there are picture and sculptures… nothing too fancy) push the white door knob, place yourself in line, advance slowly to the register, ask for a cookie(!) , grab your number flag, sit down in a conspicuous place, wait for your cookie and then eat it in one bite lest your party (Y) has time to develop strange ideas (like asking for a taste).
Then you can have coffee to restrain the urge for another cookie. Then write a post to restrain the urge to have another cookie. Then go to see a film at MOMA (Anjeska Holland) and sit in the middle of the row so that you are unable to run out and get another cookie. Then make sure that they close the Museum before you leave the theatre. You should be fine.
(yes, I know, I know, ich bin eine Berkelynere – but why ruin a good simile?)
What can I say – NYC just doesn’t cut it. It is simply not SF. I can’t believe that there are people that disagree with that claim. When you ignore all the flashy lights, you can’t help but realize that SF is much more beautiful, both its natural beauty – the topography, the ocean, etc. (I’m cutting the list here because I don’t want to be too boastful, but it is long…) and the architecture. The NY art scene might be slightly better, but I think it is true when you are considering the giant museum arena and not at all sure where the balance strikes when it comes to small galleries. And Yoshi’s simply offers the exact same jazz menu as the Blue Note… I’ll check and post my opinion about the SF classical music arena, but I am sure it is more than adequate – I mean, even the level of the concerts on Zellerbach hall is a telling sign, a hint that I am not going to be disappointed. And SF has Yosemite, Lake Tahoe, Marine, Carmel, etc. at its back yard! NY seems to have New Jerzey(!) (Ok. I know I am exaggerating a little here, but I am making a point.
I was going to end by saying something like – “still, both are not more than Tel-Aviv’s rubble”. Let’s pretend I did.
Y and I have just returned from the best New Year ’s Eve party we’ve been to for ages. I mean, I don’t recall being in a better New Year ’s Eve party for at least the past 11 months.
So you see, this is the hard American truth: the bestest of parties… what can I say.
Actually, it was kind of nice actually, but mostly it was a learning experience. Getting better and better at Americanism.
• Always say you are having the time of your life.
• Always say the place is beautiful.
• Always compliment the food, drinks and the entertainment
• When you leave, don’t forget to say you had the best experience of your life.
• Kiss & Smile.
Anyway! I love you! Really! Love you truly and deeply! Each and every reader of this post. Actually, I love each and every non reader of this post! Happy new year everybody!
• Written from Jupiter
Thanks to being literally kicked out of Fertile Grounds, Y and I just found out that it is possible to sit at Jupiter’s with one’s computer (!) This is really great.
The only downside is that you need to sit upstairs if your laptop needs feeding (there are no plugs downstairs) and that upstairs they don’t serve any food during the day…
Still, this is a great discovery and I am going to be a regular come Spring semester time.
Well, I don’t have anything to tell. I’m still shaken up by that nasty experience in FG, so I’m finding it hard to start working. I’ve already read the NYTimes and my blood pressure is still too high. And during the first part of the day I didn’t do any work because I started off by talking to both my parents, then went out for a run, then was too tired to work only to be followed by too hungry for work. Well! Anyway! Tomorrow is NYC!
I need to say something about the fighting that is going on in Gaza.
12/29/2008 10:31:06 AM
* writing from home. editing from E-22
I read my post from yesterday, incredibly aware of its frivolity. I am sitting in a fantastic coffee shop, reflecting about myself, blablabla. I almost want to bring the post down – I am so ashamed. But I won’t. I need to document the fact that I am living in an imaginary world.
Writing this post can serve as my amendment – it’s a type of punishment. I don’t want to be writing it. Mainly because I don’t want to have the opinion that I have and naturally, I don’t want to put it on a piece of paper. What’s more, I was quick to adopt that Israelis in Gola feeling – that I don’t deserve to have an opinion, exactly because I am able to sit in a coffee-shop and indulge in the Jewish art of self deprecation while not giving a moment’s thought about the “poor children” of both sides – those being killed and those having the rooftops shatter on top of their heads due to missiles.
Anyhow, I am painfully aware of the asymmetry of it all. Ours get shell-shocked their get buried under ruins. I also don’t accept the common notion that our fight is indeed with civilians – because they elected Hamas, because they allow for launchers to be placed among them, because they expose their children to hostilities, etc. etc. And this is because I don’t think people deserve to be targeted in combat because of the name of the faction they put on their ballot (yes, even if it was the ominous ‘H’ for Hamas), and of course, the poor children, the innocent children didn’t do that even.
What’s more, and this has increased ever since moving to Berkeley, I have a lot of appreciation for Pacifism as an ethical doctrine. Still, I am extremely uncomfortable with preaching people who for years now had to get into shelters due to constant threat of being shot at from a distance that they ought to turn the other cheek. My holocaust-cognition doesn’t permit this type of feeble acquiescence – my mind alerts me against it. Also, it did feel like a perpetrating danger – the missiles did increase in distance daily and Hamas was becoming increasingly cocky – and cocky is perilous.
So, as much as I’d really love to be able to be a part of the humane left – I do, I do want to belong to the peace mongers, to those who have their priorities straight - don’t kill, don’t die - that sort of mantra, I just can’t. I fully believe that IDF is doing all it can to direct the most precise and close-bounded attacks. The only criticism I am able to muster is that we should provide for the care of the wounded, and even that I see Israel is trying to do, allowing the Red Cross in, doctors for peace, and more international aid.
Yesterday I was content to entertain the idea that we can’t choke Gaza in a way that would make it impossible for their Palestinians to treat their wounded for weeks on end before the war. I concentrated on the fact that we can’t hold the moral ground of self-defense against a people over which we hold control – that it’s not a state Israel is fighting, that it provides for their every need and thus that it is burdened with their protection. But, who are we kidding! This is a sovereign state – Israel has a fight with their elected authority, it’s impossible to even afford the Palestinians the defense of being tyrannized by an illegitimate regime.
At any rate, I’d appreciate being convinced otherwise… really I would – but right now I am sorry to say that I fully condone this operation – at least to the extent of the current decisions that are being made.
• Coffee Bar – fantastic place. We are bound to return. Great place. Great seats. Great wifi (stupid MsWord is suggesting that I use “wife”!). Great Coffee (I wish they had the kind of milk that I like, but well, that’s the small blot of inherent imperfection), great toilets (excuse me – restrooms!). Greatgreat Sandwich for Y. Mine was very good, but not the best I’ve had. Still, extremely sorry to see it disappearing…
More than ever I am aware of how uncool I am.
Cool is being comfortable and easy-going with people. I’m not. Just to serve as an example. The people working here look really really nice. This guy, who I think owns the place, came to unplug his iPod from underneath my feet. All I could manage was to mumble “sorry sorry” and then the verbose “thank you”. What glorious scriptwriting! Really, I sometimes believe I should have been an orator – what a waste!
New Year’s resolution: must improve in the easy-going arena.
I ought to practice. But of course, the entire notion of practicing defeats any “easy-going” concept… and writing a post about it! Noo noo… I’m hopeless.
Hoola-walla?
• This post is written while sitting in the Piedmont Cinema house
We were just standing in a long long long line for Slum Dog millionaire and we met a Hoola dancer. I have a vague recollection of “hoola lines” but I’m not really sure what those are….
Ok. So there was a trailer for Waltz with Bashir. How fat and falafel proud that made me! I’m almost embarrassed to say…
Anyway, I’m home and too tired to finish this post.
Writing from Fertile Grounds – a nice enough coffee shop (coffee - illy’s) with Arabic style food (Hummus, “Lebna” which I translate to myself as Labane, but I’m not really sure and stuff like that. Also, the occasional free Palestine poster. Still, the owner does speak Spanish which is truly baffling – I can only try and imagine their migration route… )
Slowly and surely going through VC and Startup papers. Kind of boring but essential. It is a beautiful sunny day.
Y is working. I am contemplating our next meal… typical chore distribution between the two of us.
The two not-not-gay guys behind me spoke quite passionately about the differences between Lebanese, Syrian and Israeli Hummus.
Now they left and the woman who’s sitting in their table keeps poking me with her elbow. I am no grumpy hag so I’m not even flinching, but this is so damn annoying that I am going to get up and overturn her table any moment now. Better yet, I’m going to ask Y to go over and knock her table down. Right, this has a more realistic air to it.
I wonder if that lady is looking behind her and glancing to this paper. Maybe in a bit she’ll come over and turn my table upside down. Maybe. Then my Schraffenberger Mocha will spill on the floor with the residue chocolate all gone. This will be a reason to be truly upset. I would be free to unleash the monster on her then.
Anyhow, I don’t have anything to say really. I’m just writing in order to substantiate my new decision and that is to note my location each time I write a post.
Bush has revoked a pardon he has given only yesterday! In light of my previous blog, this is really too baffling for words. Reading the circumstances of the case, I keep rubbing my eyes in amazement. I realize that the revokating is due to reasons of apparency - pardoning somebody because of political contributions does seem a bit crass. Still, what does it say about what a crime is? The administration cannot really say with all seriousness that the one who was a criminal two days ago, was no longer yesterday, and today a born-again malfeasant? And why? because of a curtailed procedure - a new "field tribunal" instance, a presidential appeal system?
What is the message carried by pardoning run-of-the-mill criminals, sometimes after their death, like in the case of Charlie Winters, and always years after they paid for it.
Does it have an internal-legal meaning? That the crime wasn’t a crime then? That these were purely mistakes in the application of the law? Or perhaps that it’s not a crime today? If so, does that mean that there are inter-temporal differences? That a one-time crime is truly an action which navigates through space detached from particular time & place circumstances, and therefore regardless of its existence as a criminal action in one scenario, it is decidedly not one when looking at it from a less reproving future?
What about the ethical implications? One option is that this act of pardoning is devoid of ethical implications – that the pardon is a one-time deal which is the result of pity, or some other social sentiment which has nothing to do with new-found blameworthiness. I don’t think that to be true – a punishment is never just incarceration or a fine; in fact it invariably carries with it a mark of Cain. What changes is the conspicuousness of the sign of ignominy. Therefore, blurring the mark is simply the curtailment of the punishment. If so, then the pardon does mean something with regard to the social stance. But what does it mean that when environment changes, that the prior conditions mean nothing? Is it a palatable concept that what society once thought immoral is irrelevant? To clarify, this means that prior-time culprits of acting in a way which was once perceived noxious – to the extent that the law did reflect the belief-system of society - are no longer responsible.
I would agree that usually those run-of-the-mill crimes don’t correspond to their title: crime. They are not even misdemeanors. But I do think that one crime lingers, and that is the one of acting against the commonality. I think it essential to underline that the pardon is for the direct content of the crime and not for the criminality.
It is almost scary to write something for a post when one is well aware that there was ample analysis of the same question and that it is callous to refer to it without reading any of it. I remind myself the type of the medium – it can’t be anything but superficial, and I don’t think that that should render anyone mute. Everyone, including my future self, is free to dismiss it all as pure inconsequential ranting.
No matter what I do – it doesn’t matter if it’s washing dishes, writing a paper or sleeping – there always comes the moment of nausea, the moment when I am just fed up. It doesn’t have to be after a long time of engaging in the activity, sometimes it takes a mere 15 minutes for that acid taste accompanied by self-pity to percolate. At that moment I have to start doing something else. Doing can be starting a laundry or eating chocolate. I am now experiencing such a moment, and so I am writing a post. Hopefully that would suffice as a break. I’m not sure. Sometimes the time of day also says something of the length of the recess that I require, and for me, 19:08 is late. It’s late because it’s after 9 hours of work, and I’m tired. I’ve already tried most of my other beloved pastimes. For example, I looked for nice places to spend the day tomorrow, I plucked at my eyebrows, I read some of the paper – the parts were I believe I can identify great stuff to do in NYC. Still, nothing worked. I am just not as industrious as I am in the morning.
Well, tant pis.
Thing is, that if I don’t do much more today, I’m going to have to deal with that glorious feeling of pressure in a couple of days, when I realize that I have done nothing about either of my thesis, the preparation for the IP course, or writing stuff for the convention I’d very much like to partake in. Gosh, I also have my modest share in Yoav’s project. Here it is a preview for Sunday’s pressure. It’s a good thing that it’s rainy, or else I’d be obsessing about not having enough time to explore glorious California or fly to Seattle as I had intended.
The pleasure of being me… what can I say…
It’s in San Francisco, and it goes by the name “Tartine”. My allegiance remains with Crixa cakes, don’t get me wrong; it is less ritzy, it has outlets for my laptop, and its cakes are unearthly. But Tartine would do especially if you head to Berkeley’s suburb known by the name SF. It doesn’t match Crixa – it doesn’t have its own wifi, its pastries are a bit too sweet, and unlike the grand Austro-hungarian Crixa atmosphere, it feels French! But, its menu is likewise extraterrestrial. I am currently in the midst of the post-cake consumption grief – trying to milk my plate for extra morsels, inspecting the other patrons whose plates are still not empty with the loathing they deserve for still occupying that place in heaven.
