WAHAHA

HUBERT: “No. The reality is that teens are resonating with the message of abstinence education in increasing numbers. There’s trends data to show that more and more teens are abstaining.”

ABRAMS: “That’s not what the studies show! You’re losing on the studies.”

HUBER: “No, that’s not true. In fact, a recent study just released –“

ABRAMS: “From who?”

HUBER: “Virginia’s abstinence education program.”

and later...

MADDOW: “Whenever I evaluate myself, I turn out to be doing awesome.”

Although Knocked Up Was Sexist...

This disparity is on display in a whole series of recent comedies, from School of Rock to High Fidelity. It's also powerfully familiar to anyone who follows the so-called Mommy Wars. In that proliferating literature of family friction, women's lives seem to shrink to a series of pragmatic decisions about achieving balance, while men are concerned with domestic stuff only to the degree that they choose to be. In this regard, Knocked Up is in keeping with the zeitgeist: If, as Heigl delicately put it, the movie is a "little sexist," that is because it is the natural product of a culture evidently sold on the notion that women are so focused on domestic mechanics that they simply don't know how to allow themselves the playful inner lives men do, whether they're free-associating brilliantly with their friends, or lazily absorbed in video games. (The trope cuts both ways, of course: It allows men to be comedic geniuses, but it also means that husbands get portrayed right and left as childish dopes.) Just glance at a book like The Bitch in the House, where female essayists portray their male partners as slouches who don't get the job done until they're given a to-do list.

Stories about boys who have more fun than girls go back to Wendy and Peter Pan. But there was a time when romantic comedies, as Denby points out, were more egalitarian in their assignment of playfulness. These days, romantic comedies routinely depict a loss of some essential autonomy for the man, and a lesson in "balance" for the woman. A culture that assigns all that weight to what "men" and "women" want only makes it more difficult for couples to establish their own fruitful ratio of intimacy to privacy. The best moments in Knocked Up are those that suggest the world doesn't have to be this way—that of course women can possess playful inner lives too. There aren't quite enough of them. You leave feeling that what poor Debbie—and Alison—really wants is not a husband who knows to bring home pink cupcakes for a birthday party, but a culture that grants them the same indulgent latitude their partners get: the luxury of not having to be relentlessly responsible. Slacker, starring a woman. Barring that, of course, there's Juno, the story of a knocked-up girl from her own irreverent perspective—written, as it happens, by a female scriptwriter—now playing in a theater near you.

Enlightenment: that's what I want too. That's why my last serious relationship ended, so long ago, I think. I didn't always want to have to be the responsible one. It's taxing. Now I'm much less responsible (seeming), so others hopefully won't ask me to be constantly on top of things. That's not my job. At work as a lab tech it is, maybe, but if you're at home and have a significant other it should not just be your job. Bollocks to that.

Wiki wiki

I just fixed an article on Wikipedia. I feel good about myself.

Anti-Science has gone meta!!!!

Abstinence Clearinghouse is Sad That Science is Being Misrepresented and Taken Selectively to Thwart Abstinence Only Education

Awwwwwww. Cry me a river, abstinence-only educationalists. Now, it would be one thing if the research ACTUALLY proved that abstinence-only education worked (although that probably wouldn't bode well for the continuance of humankind). But the vast majority of the literature seems to show conclusively that it doesn't work. Abstinence education proponents aren't even bothering to mess with the literature now, as the "global warming is a hoax" and "smoking doesn't kill you" folks have been doing; instead, they are whining that scientists have done so to them. Aw, how unfair!

Thanks to Pandagon for the link.

Oh, You Know

In terms of social interactions I am consistently rated FAIL.

I CAN HAZ REAL FOODZ???

"Food vouchers for women and children overhauled"

This goes in the rare category of news which doesn't just depress the hell out of me.

So W.I.C. has changed the foods it subsidizes to include whole grains, fruits, and vegetables. This is great news! Programs that provide food for low-income people are notorious for providing food which is just plain awful for you - anything from just candy and chips to canned and highly processed foods (Read Nickel and Dimed if you don't believe me, or just look it up on the internets). The idea that we should look out for the health of the people we're providing the food to, and not just the health of the food industry, is long past due a solid revival.

Comparisons to the Nazis? Never OK

You would have thought that more people would have heard of Godwin's Law by now.

Obviously, this idiot hasn't. Jeez, not only is he extremely anti-immigrant, but also either supremely unaware or stupid, or both. Makes you wonder about the people that we elect to represent us (granted, this is in Italy, but I'm fairly confident the situation is even worse here).

Ah, the Y Chromosome

Interesting how some people attribute so much by ways of intelligence to the lilliputian Y chromosome. That poor guy must be packed with all sorts of good shit... the math genes, abstract thinking, self-reliance, ability to be more than sort of a semi-autonomous incubator on legs... my goodness.

Except WAIT... the Y chromosome is almost entirely composed of second copies of genes needed in two copies also found on the X chromosome, with the majority of its length consisting of non-coding DNA*. There is essentially only one gene, the SRY gene, which is involved in the determination of masculinity and all it entails.

That means the difference between men and women is determined by one gene, and then what? The ENVIRONMENT, you say? What a naughty word. Surely how we are brought up has no influence on our behaviors or our psyche. This would be tantamount to saying that society influences how men and women feel they need to behave. Never, I say. I am programmed by my genes to want to shave my legs and wear dresses, as well as to be bad at chess. No conditioning or lack thereof has caused these behaviors. No siree.



*Ridley, Matt. Genome. Figure out the rest of the citation yourself.

Sadly, I never had any barbies...

That out of the way, this stuff is what has got me so riled up:

Cheerleader Barbie!

As if girls didn't have an unreasonable enough standard to live up to! Woo!

as well as:

Barbie Serves Ken!

ARGH

Swimming was good for one thing, I've discovered. Whenever I used to get really angry (which perhaps was even more than I do these days) I'd just go thrash out a few kilometers in the pool, and even though I hadn't addressed the root cause of my anger, I was at least less aggressive about it.

These days, I get angry, and have to resort to listening to The New Pornographers really loudly (comparatively loudly, I have crappy speakers) and spitting out bile on this blog, if I have the time. I need to work out more perhaps.

I’m Sorry I Destroyed Your Country - from the Dilbert Blog

I’m Sorry I Destroyed Your Country

In life, there are some situations that beg for an apology, but there is no easy way to do it. For example, suppose you are a senior citizen attending a funeral for a friend of the family. You lean over the open casket and your false teeth plop out and clamp on the nose of the deceased. You panic. You don’t think many people saw it happen, so you pluck the teeth off the stiff’s nose and shove them back in your mouth as discreetly as possible. Unbeknownst to you, someone caught the whole thing on video and it becomes a worldwide sensation on Youtube before the deceased is in the ground.

My point is there’s no way to apologize for that situation. For one thing, the guy who most needs the apology is dead. And his widow probably isn’t in the mood for it.

I was thinking about this apology problem in respect to Iraq. Whatever you think about the reasons for invading, everyone seems to agree that we botched the occupation, and the results have been a disaster for the Iraqi civilian population. I feel like I owe them an apology for letting my idiot government screw them so thoroughly.

Your first reaction might be to explain all the rationalizations, and how war is messy, and it was really Saddam’s fault, and blah, blah, blah. But apologies don’t work that way. I could be wrong, but I think the Iraqi people who were minding their own business would like to hear an apology.

But how? My idiot government won’t apologize on my behalf. And if I fire them and get a new idiot government, they won’t do it either, until fifty years are past. That seems too late.

So here’s my public apology to the Iraqi civilians who did nothing to deserve their current situation: I’m sorry I trusted my idiot government to handle things correctly. I should have been watching more closely. To be honest, I never once thought to even ask if there was a post-war plan. That was clearly a mistake on my part. For that, I am sorry.

We’re putting a lot of lives and money into making things right in Iraq, and that’s appropriate. But in addition, and for whatever small comfort it provides, I’m genuinely sorry for my part in allowing things to get this bad.

The Streets Lyrics

The end of the something i did not want to end,
Begining of hard times to come.
But something that was not meant to be is done,
And this is the start of what was.

Awk

This week is apparently "foot in mouth" week for me. Witness:

The confusion of "Palestine" with "Pakistan" - how did this happen???? I must have been drunk.

Telling the boyfriend that he and Sean were now somehow "even" - did this objectify women? I didn't even think about it. That was awkward.

Not being able to physically tell Lucinda about my Halloween party preparations - am I just unbelievably lame? Maybe I didn't want her to think that, but it turned out that way anyway.

Walking in on the roommate and her boyfriend well, not doing anything really awkward, but slightly awkward nonetheless. Argh whyyy.

My Biochem paper being labeled as "Redundant." Well, you know what else is Redundant????? Your face! God already gave you one ass!

Err... fleeing the Halloween party. At least twice. A solicitous Jamelle thereafter asking whether the Jeffsoc crowd was too big. Nice, but I'd rather handle my own awkwardness lest it become even more embarrassing/intolerable.

Rata is rather neurotic.

Song Lyrics

Because I will be your ambulance if you will be my accident
And I will be your screech and crash if you will be my crutch and cast
And I will be your one more time if you will be my one last chance


Oh sweet tree, fall with me
Fall fast, fall free, fall with me

Irresponsible (Awesome) Weekend Plans

I love my life! Only it leaves precious little time for studying, which may prove to be a problem come Monday.

Thursday:
Class
Teatime - free food and good company
Throw a frisbee around outside the IRC
Run for 45 min
Eat dinner/study for a tiny bit w/ Jamelle
Visit Grey's Anatomy for free food and get sucked into two hours of Guitar Hero (I'm so irresponsible)...
More studying?

Friday:
Class
Work
The Week that Was
Watson Suite Reunion
Soccer game?
Perhaps studying, but that seems exceedingly unlikely. More plausibly, hanging out with awesome IRC people.

Saturday:
Farmer's Market?
Vegetarian Festival
Jeff Soc Tailgate
Random movies are most likely, although perhaps studying (yeah right)

Sunday:
Run
Study like whoa

Global Warming Pt 1

The Disgruntled Chemist, on talking about Global Warming, makes an excellent point here:

"One more thing: perhaps there are some of you sitting there now saying "this guy's an alarmist! No way will it be this bad". Well, maybe you're right. But think about this: on almost every issue, the scientific community has one outlook and the general public has another. On almost every issue (GM crops and microwave ovens come to mind), the scientists are less alarmed about potential problems than are the public. In the case of global warming, the people who most closely study the situation are the most alarmed, and the public is telling them not to worry. Why is that? It's because the government tells us not to worry about it, without giving one shred of scientific evidence to back themselves up. Well, I'll go with the evidence, and with the scientific community. If that makes me sound alarmist to you, then maybe I am. And maybe you should be alarmed too."

I may have said this before, but this is a freaking excellent point. On all of these other issues, the scientists aren't alarmed. We don't cry wolf. The public may be alarmed, but scientists are still looking at the evidence.

But for Global Warming, scientists are very alarmed. Shouldn't this signify something to you?? Let's make a diagram:

Scientists think something will have mostly positive consequences (i.e. microwave ovens) -----> Public doesn't care.

Scientists think something new won't have positive or negative consequences (will just be a new tool, such as perhaps GMOs) -----> Public freaks out and decides all consequences will be bad.

Scientists think something will have potentially devastating consequences -----> Shouldn't the public be running for the hills?

Or is there no correlation here?

It was only a matter of time

Giant ads set for world's busiest runways

Waa, ads in one of the last ad-free spaces. How appalling.

Come On, Guys, Free Speech is Still OK

F**k Bush! (like this is really news)

Why is his resignation neccessary here? Why is it that, if someone spouts an opinion in a paper that the majority doesn't like, we suddenly get all of this clamoring for that person to resign from their post? Limiting what people are allowed to say simply because we don't like what they're saying is censorship. Soon we'll be editing old movies to remove people's cigarettes (:-P) and shortening Hamlet to a 10 word soliloquy simply because someone thinks it contains subversive material.

To be clear, if someone wrote an article stating F**k Gore! or F**k Obama! instead, I think I would be more angry about this. Still, they have a right to express this sentiment. It endangers no one (except, apparently, the writer themselves) and so, while offensive, it should be ALLOWED.

Transparency, Please

I'm convinced. We need transparency today, in every endeavor possible. Only when there is transparency in the government will people discover, and change, the corruption inherent in that institution. Only when people can, say, see into the CAFOs (concentrated animal feeding operations) and kill floors will the meat industry change itself into something less inherently cruel, and based less mindlessly on the bottom line.

I don't see a future in which no one eats meat. However, I do see a future where everyone is forced to think about where their food comes from. We're increasingly entering into an age in which ignorance is not an excuse, nor a viable defense. Many people now have the ability (financially and otherwise) to take accountability for their decisions. You can afford the farmer's market tomatoes; you can splurge on the free-range eggs. You can find out all the information you need to make a moral (?) decision. So, Homework Assignment: Think about where your food comes from.

More From "The Omnivore's Dilemma"

To Do, Someday:

Work out true economic price of a grass fed cow versus a corn fed cow, to soil, oil, public health, the public purse.

Charged to the taxpayer (in the form of subsidies)
the health care system (in the form of food-bone illnesses and obesity)
and the environment (in the form of pollution)
not to mention the welfare of the workers in the feedlot and the slaughterhouse, and the welfare of the animals themselves.

vs: consistency, mechanization, predictablility, interchangeability, and economies of scale.

Floating on a sinking sea of petroleum?

The food industry burns nearly a fifth of all the petroleum consumed in the United States (about as much as automobiles do).

Today it takes between seven and ten calories of fossil fuel energy to deliver one calorie of food energy to an American plate.

Growing food organically uses about a third less fossil fuel than growing it conventionally; yet only a fifth of the total energy used to feed us is consumed on the farm; the rest is spent processing the food and moving it around.

I don't understand Republicans

Here's why:

I was talking to some the other evening, and they seem to have such contradictory beliefs:

1. GPS watches and Ipod trackers are bad - some skeez could potentially hack his way onto the internet and find exactly where you were running - how bad is that????

2. I fully support the Patriot act. Umm, so it's ok if people in the government are all up in your business? But the moment it's an individual, that's a bad thing.

First Rebuttals:
a. There are individuals in the government. Like the ones that leaked the identity of the CIA agent in the Middle East and essentially forced her into early retirement.
b. This point is just me shaking my head in dismay. I don't know. Are Republicans just not private people? Do they not care if their private business remains their own private business? Myself, I don't think it's anyone's business at all what I do in my spare time. What I spend money on. What I do in my own home. Is this distrust in big government something that separates Democrats from Republicans? Because I thought it was the other way around, that Democrats trusted in big government. I don't know.

"He still believes in his heart that people are honest and good," the former manager said about Kenny. "And he's wrong."

Oh Shit

Shit! Was that wise????

Meta Title

Changed the name of my blog to something a little more creative! (I hope)

Rata's a beautiful tree from New Zealand with red flowers.

I also sort of like it because it's a play on words with "Rät", which is German for advice or counsel. And it's close to the word "rant" too, which is much lot closer to what this blog actually is.

Cooking Food!

I'm really glad that both Kat and Willa (and Andrea, and Julie I think, come to that) don't have meal plans this year either. Hopefully we can cook some! Jamelle I think has one, but he's going to be cooking a little soon too. Excitement.

That being said I think I have the easiest class schedule ever known to man. Biochemistry would be my only reasonably difficult class. Then I have Botany, Bio Lab, Religion 101, and Independent Research. Only 12 real credits. I'm lazy.

Today I ate:

Toast w/ Cashew butter and strawberry and rhubarb jam
Smoothie: Strawberries, milk, honey, strawberry yogurt, vanilla
Burrito and a salad
chocolate pudding

All of which I made myself. The chocolate pudding definitely needed more cornstarch in it though - it was way too runny. But still really tasty.

Also sat through "Pulp Fiction" with Jamelle, Willa, Andrea, and Julie. It was ok. I felt a little left out because they (esp. Jamelle) were all referencing Chappelle show or random other things I hadn't seen, but I guess that isn't unusual. Just made me wish I was back in California, again. There people actually listened to me when I had something to say.

Had a good conversation afterwards about art which became much more broadly philosophical as the evening went on. A tipsy girl who came in and joined the conversation said that we should really all be high to be having the kind of talk that we were. I, for one, agreed.

Those of the Male Persuasion

Alas, I don't think he actually likes me at all... well, the more fool me then, I suppose... although I realize that realistically it wouldn't have worked out. Being distance from the beginning and all that. Still, that wouldn't have prevented me from trying though!

The problem is I don't think I can tell the 'just a nice/considerate guy' guy apart from the 'complimenting and doing things for you because he actually likes you' guy. I was hoping I could actually distinguish between the two, but it seems to be next to impossible.

I also think I'm incredibly dense when it comes to the latter type of guy, because I hardly ever notice that someone's being nice to me because they like me until waaaaay too late. Took me about a week to con on to the last one, but now I'm second-guessing that as well (see above). Although Michael Mayfield did inform me that if a guy is being nice to you, he probably likes you. Guys seem a lot more straightforward like that. Good for them. Still, I can doubt and second-guess on this end more than enough to make up for any directness on the other person's part.

Proving Smart People Wrong

There's nothing I like more than proving someone very intelligent to be wrong, at least in my own estimation of what is "right" and "wrong". Which is pure opinion, of course.

So: Someone said "Biology is based on Chemistry. Chemistry is based on Physics. Physics is based on Math. So everything can be explained in terms of math - so math is the most interesting thing."

Any guesses who might have said that? :-P

Rebuttal: Saying that Biology, that life, all comes down to Chemistry is true but boring, equivalent to saying that all soccer is physics. True, life is and Biology concerns itself with what boils down to the chemistry between carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen atoms (98% of the atoms in people). However, it is the emergent properties of these atoms, such as DNA, AIDS, and terriers, which are interesting, not the constituent parts. Once you can use physics to describe amino acids and chemistry to describe the human brain and 'free will', well, then I still won't concede that physics is better; rather, that will be the day which all the many and varied scientific disciplines will be one and the same. Until then, Bio will still be the most fascinating.


Whew, that only took... what, three years? See what an amazing fiend I am at debate?

The Great Outdoors

Kickass day yesterday! Spent most of it outside - went to Barton Springs in the evening and had our longest swim ever there, from maybe 4:45 to 8:30. The water was very murky green, and the visibility was only about 6 feet in front of you or so, but it was still insanely fun. I dived to the bottom as much as I felt brave enough to, and saw lots and lots of fish, (20+ at last count) muddy brown ones and pearly white and maroon ones and so forth. Orange-spotted narkled gudgeons and such :-P. It was glorious just to float in the water and look up at the pecan trees and the bright blue sky. If you kept moving you could stay in the water a really long time, too.

Jessie and I decided that it was so nice outside that we should sleep outside, too. This was also amazing. We set up some blankets and sleeping bags in the backyard, and apart from the M's warnings about the skunk which apparently lives under our deck, we were all set. Although in retrospect, I think I spent way too much time looking at the stars (10-11, 2-3) and reading (and looking out for the skunk). I'm tired now, but nothing a good deal of coffee can't take care of. Woken up this morning by a bunch of dragonflies flitting around overhead :-). What a way to wake up! I don't think I've ever slept under the sky before, without a tent or anything.

Booklist

Wonder why I've been so discontent lately. I couldn't tell you.

I hear that women like to talk about how they're feeling. Men like to talk about issues. I'll try and do both here, although I'm already noticing a penchant for talking about, you know, the feelings, more than the issues and the solutions to them (if there are any).

Books I've read lately:

The Princess Bride
To Say Nothing of the Dog
Howl's Moving Castle
Student's Vegetarian Cookbook (mmmmmm food!)
Scientific American (magazine, but close enough)
The God of Small Things
The Human Stain (sadly, didn't finish)
Bambi vs. Godzilla: On the Nature, Purpose, and Practice of the Movie Business

Yup, not nearly as much as I'd like though.

Scattered Thoughts

Here's hoping that this blog won't be as empty as the last! Although that seems relatively unlikely to me. Although perhaps not having a sketchy ex as the only regular reader of the blog will persuade me that I actually have something of substance to add to the internets.

Uninformed Opinions: I've changed my mind completely on organic food. And vegetarian food. Although I was cognizant at the time that I didn't really mean what I was spouting to Jamelle, that organic food was a waste of space and not very efficient, I now hold the complete opposite opinion.

General Complaints: I don't want to finish this paper (for my nanotech job over the summer). Hence the procrastination and blogging of this incohate mess. I'm terrible at finishing anything if I don't have a strict deadline for doing so, and this paper is a perfect example of that. True, I have to get it in to my PI well before the September 14th deadline, so he can proofread it. Also, I have to go back to school in less than a week, and that involves tiny details such as packing, last minute visits with all number of friends and family, the purchasing of fifteen different items I never knew I needed (and the forgetting of another few vital buys I should have made), etc (a wonderful English teacher told me to never use the word etc; instead, just add the few extra things being left out/forgotten to the list. Sound advice, but it's much too difficult to sit here and remember the other things I need to do. They'll come to me. Quite late, the night before I need to leave. I'm quite certain of this, actually.) Getting to the point, this week would be an excellent time to finish this paper - today, in fact, would be best, as no one is home and there are as yet no demands on my time (the M in fact thinks I am working on said paper - optimistic of her.) But try convincing my body of that. It'd rather read trashy magazines and kids books and bang out something which, in a former life, may have resembled piano music.

I'd much rather still be in California, with a bunch of science people who, apart from being a bit self conscious and critical, and thus somewhat dull, were actually LIKE me and actually seemed to, well, enjoy my company (LIKE me :-P). Which was great. CJ and Nikhil were awesome, and Syad and Derek were cool in their own slightly standoffish ways. I've never made friends so quickly. *sigh* Santa Barbara was gorgeous, and had the best weather I've ever experienced, outside of in New Zealand. In fact, it reminded me of New Zealand in a number of ways, which is perhaps why I liked it so much.