I became insane with long intervals of horrible sanity.
The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all.
Many people would sooner die than think; In fact, they do so
What I have been telling you, from alpha to omega, what is the one great thing the sigil taught me — that everything in life is miraculous. For the sigil taught me that it rests within the power of each of us to awaken at will from a dragging nightmare of life made up of unimportant tasks and tedious useless little habits, to see life as it really is, and to rejoice in its exquisite wonderfulness. If the sigil were proved to be the top of a tomato-can, it would not alter that big fact, nor my fixed faith. No Harrowby, the common names we call things by do not matter — except to show how very dull we are ...
January 25, 2006 - 11:59 p.m.
My mother almost started a fire today. She actually did start a fire but it was a small one. A little before I was going to go downstairs to make her dinner I heard her moving around. Then I smelt smoke. She took her leftover soup in a paper container and put it in the toaster oven to heat it up. The paper of course caught fire. This is the second fire she started in the toaster oven. I unplugged it and I don't think she'll be able to get at it to plug it in herself. I have to remember to tell Penny about it and to remember myself next time I want to use it. This is the kind of thing that gets me so nervous about leaving her alone. Yet I'm planning on doing it next week. WFUV is having their member day and I want to work the 6AM shift before school. It means leaving my mother alone till Penny gets here around 9:15. My mother will be in bed, that will make it easier. We would both normally be sleeping then. I won't turn the heat up and that should keep her in bed till Penny gets here. I checked this with Sue and she thought it would be OK. I'm still worried though.
I started reading Northanger Abbey today. It is great. It seems strange reading such a satiric tone from a book over 200 years old. Austen is just so much fun. That's something I wouldn't have pictured myself saying 10 years ago. There is an added bonus in Northanger Abbey one that reassures my masculinity. It is a passage that I knew was in the book but that I didn't know I'd reach that soon, it is on the third page of my edition:
" ... and it is not very wonderful that Catherine, who had by nature nothing heroic about her, should prefer cricket, baseball, riding on horseback, and running around the country at age fourteen, to books ... "
I have read that this is the first recorded literary mention of baseball. I think there might have been an older one in a forgotten children's book. It is certainly the first reference in great literature. I should point out that this was written in 1803, not only before Abner Doubleday's mythical invention of baseball but also before Alexander Cartwright's more historical contribution. Cartwright formulated the modern rules but the game already existed.
Now I have a query for any English readers of this entry. I copied that quote verbatim from the Signet Classic edition of the novel but I don't think it is what the original version said. Baseball was written as two words, "base ball" till WWII. I'd like some information on how Austen spelt it 200 years ago. Does anyone have an old edition or perhaps an English edition of it? If so let me know.
I had a most pleasant but most disturbing dream last night. It was very short with almost no plot. The only action was a little dialogue and some hugs and kisses. Yet in the dream The four events that I would most like undone were: My father was alive, my mother's mind was fine, my dog Tamsie was alive, and Carey was my best friend. In the dream the first three events simply never happened. There was nothing miraculous about my father and Tamsie being alive or my mother being healthy. In fact my parents weren't even in the dream, they were out dancing. I was expecting them home soon. The entire dream was pretty much getting licked by Tamsie and hugged by Carey or was that the other way around☺
The timing made no sense of course, Tamsie died before Carey was even born. Those things don't bother you in a dream. In some ways it took place when she was alive but Carey was in the present. We had made up and were friends again. She lived in Chicago and was going to call Neal when we were done hugging.
When I woke up I felt great but thinking that none of those things are really true then made me sad. If a Genie gave me four wishes those are the four things I'd wish for.
I signed the Pro-Truth Pledge:
please hold me accountable.
Memories: Not that Horrid Song - May 29, 2018
Wise Madness is Now In Session - May 28, 2018
The NFL and the First Amendment - May 27, 2018
On The Road Again - May 26, 2018
Oliver the Three-Eyed Crow - May 25, 2018
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License.
Horvendile January 25, 2006
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