Loose Cans

Just watched Bend It Like Beckham and Oh man, yes, it is that good. The movie was fine, yeah. But Keira Knightley. Whoo. Not since Miss Frost in the latest Bond movie, Die Another Day, has a screen actress made me hyperventilate like that--though admittedly, much of her breath-taking here can be called residual effects of her performance in Pirates of the Caribbean, which just about killed me. Woof. I don't know. I have a thing for women in bandannas with soccer balls and/or swords. But it's really the bandannas. Also the sweatshirts. Definitely the sweatshirts. Damn. What a woman.

Fucking Juventus beat Olympiakos 7-0 and I can't even watch the fucking highlights? Arsenal (my team; undefeated in the Premiership) flop and gasp their way into the 2nd round of Champions League, but I don't get to see them trash Celta Vigo? And worst of all--I mean, can you fucking believe this?--Real Madrid meets Bayern Munich--and I haven't gotten to see one Real match the entire goddamn year--and does anyone care? NO! Fuck. I'm leaving.

It was brought to my attention earlier this morning that early rejections and deferrals have started to come in to the school we will never, ever, ever, as long as live, actually leave behind us. Harvard, UPenn, Cornell, et. al. have all come in, resulting in much wailing and hair-rending and sackcloth-and-ashes-donning. The last big one everyone's waiting on is Yale, which comes in Tuesday, I believe. Apparently, with no less than 32 out of 170 or so applying early to Yale, there is bound to be no shortage of tears there either. So I propose that we all crash the party ASAP, purely for the sake of publicly offering condolences and privately basking in the schadenfreude.

In any case, I have a hankering to get back to HM, and not just to laugh at the misery of seniors (no, I wouldn't really laugh at them. At least not until I had left the campus). I've been thinking for a while--as in, since last April--about writing an article or two for the Record, that throbbing organ of mind control, exhorting people to look, look, look to the rainbow, or at least the other side of the Atlantic. I firmly believe that more people should go abroad, and that there is no shortage of people for whom that is indeed the perfect option, but who are too wrapped up in what Comrade Pareles has termed the "Ivy cartel" to consider foreign college that isn't Oxford. Because it's a different sort of education: we don't so much go to college as we go to work. It's like having a job. We don't live anywhere near campus, though that's where all the resources are. If we need to get work done, we're basically obliged to stay at the library until closing at 10:30. Similarly, an office drone frequently finds himself at his desk well past his bedtime, scrambling to finish a report or some such. But this is a poor metaphor. But the analogy is sound. We're not swaddled in college life, like American students--and this is neither a good nor bad thing; each situation has its pluses and minuses, for instance, you all are having more fun--instead, we are basically thrust into a real-world situation for which high school never thought to prepare us. Some of us have the 'luxury' of living at Halls, which gives us something of a spare facsimile of the "college life" we've been groomed for, but next year, that's all done. We have to fend for ourselves. There is little campus life: little to nothing happens on campus proper; everything college-related goes on in Dublin city. My Essay tutor (an American, incidentally) doesn't meet in her office, she sets up shop in the café at the Irish Film Institute. I think I hardly need elaborate further (this blog has, for the past two months, been elaboration enough), but I think it's worth saying that I think this suits me. It is not a laugh a minute. We are not perenially merry, nor are we generally bent double with the oppressive weight of our academic requirements ('cept maybe for the science students). It is not Fun, per se. We are not thrilled, but we are satisfied.

So here I sit, half-dressed, waiting for the long-suffering ironing fairy, bless her, to tend to my shirt, which emerged from the voyage overseas in less-than-pristine condition, so that she and I can go to the opera tonight. Berlioz's Benvenuto Cellini, orchestra fucking seats (we are used to nosebleed or higher). We're guests of Tony's friend George, from Boca Raton, who is a very generous fellow, even though he's not reading this. It was to be my father going, not me, but he is come down with an attack of the Icky sickness, which brings with it a racking cough which looks very unpleasant and we are all very sorry for him, though an entire theatreful of people would not be so much if he were to go and cough his brains out the whole time.

Just had sushi for the first time in two months. And gyoza. Gyoza gooood. I am wearing virtually none of my own clothes: pants, shoes, and jacket are all der vater's. I have to get dresed real pretty, see. Jacob is blasting--and I mean blasting--Shostakovitch 7, which smacks perilously of Bolero (which everyone else generally runs to turn off) in here. Okay. Time to go.

THEY GOT RID OF PETTITTE.

Sam, help me. I'm going to die.

I'm so distraught I can hardly speak. I look at the paper this morning and just oh my God I mean what the FUCK YOU STUPID BASTARDS. God fucking damn it all to hell. I'm going back to Ireland.

Few documents in existence are so brilliantly comic. The "I-94W Nonimmigrant Visa Waiver Arrival/Departure Form," required for all non-U.S. citizens, is without doubt a masterpiece of humour, and its recognition as such, I feel, cannot be soon enough in coming. That is why I have decided that here and now, it must be enshrined in the pantheon of comedy, and take its place alongside such iridescently funny documents as the Starr Report.

I picked one of the forms up at Dublin airport while I waited out the two-hour delay on my flight back, intending to post it on the blog, for the general merriment of all. So here it is. These are the questions all non-U.S. citizens are made to answer pending entry to the country:

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DO ANY OF THE FOLLOWING APPLY TO YOU? (Answer Yes or No)

A. Do you have a communicable disease; physical or mental disorder; or are you a drug abuser or addict?

B. Have you ever been arrested or convicted for an offense or crime involving moral turpitude or a violation related to a controlled substance; or been arrested or convicted for two or more offenses for which the aggregate sentence to confinement was five years or more; or been a controlled substance trafficker; or are you seeking entry to engage in criminal or immoral activities?

C. Have you ever been or are you now involved in espionage or sabotage; or in terrorist activities; or genocide; or between 1933 and 1945 were you involved, in any way, in persecutions associated with Nazi Germanyor its allies?

D. Are you seeking to work in the U.S.; or have you ever been excluded and deported; or been previously removed from the United States; or procured or attempted to procure a visa or entry into the U.S. by fraud or misrepresentation?

E. Have you ever detained, retained or withheld custody of a child from a U.S. citizen granted custody of the child?

F. Have you ever been denied a U.S. visa or entry into the U.S. or had a U.S. visa canceled? If yes, When?___________ Where?__________

G. Have you ever asserted immunity from prosecution?

IMPORTANT: If you answered "Yes" to any of the above, please contact the American Embassy BEFORE you travel to the U.S. since you may be refused admission into the United States.

WAIVER OF RIGHTS: I hereby waive any rights to review or appeal of an immigration officer's determination as to my admissability, or to contest, other than on the basis of an application for asylum, any action in deportation.

...(at the bottom:) WARNING: You may not accept unauthorized employment; or attend school; or represent the foreign information media during your visit under this program. You are authorized to stay in the U.S. for 90 days or less. You may not apply for: 1) a change of nonimmigrant status; 2) adjustment of status to temporary or permanent resident, unless eligible under section 201(b) of the INA; or 3) and extension of stay. Violation of these terms will subject you to deportation.

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I would like to comment that, with the exception of a quick word with the customs man, and two hours in the Garda National Immigration Bureau a month later to get my resident card, I basically just walked right into the Republic of Ireland. I was not asked if I had anything to do with Bloody Sunday.

I love this asshole country.

It's so nice to be back, fighting with Blogger again. The counter suddenly went on the fritz, so I had to set it up all over again, and ended up restarting it from 1200 hits, which was a less-than-wild guess. Also managed to change the damn subtitle. Let me know what you think. And I suppose a definition is in order?

If you only bother to read one of the essays, or were in any way involved in that lovely fodder-providing fracas on the subject a month ago, I recommend the poetry essay. It's sort of my final word on the matter, and I get a lot of mileage out of ripping poor e.e. a new one, too. Breaking the "Kiss"

I promised to post my essays. This is the first one, because I'm putting them in separate place. It's the Wilde essay, which, while almost entirely unedited (ran out of time), is worth reading, if for no other reason than the use of the word Shit no less than 21 times: Portrait of the Artist as a Toilet Bowl

Trying to change the damn subtitle up there; I'm sick of the one I have. I rejected "Taking the fun out of everything" in favor of "Putting the 'fun' back in 'ecphonesis.'" I like that one. But stupid Blogger isn't working right today.

Haven't dropped blog in the past 36 hours or so because I felt like letting "Home" just sit there and grow mold for a while. Posting will now resume, and emphatically so.

I think maybe today is a day for taking stock. A little reflection, which promises, hopefully, to be less wearisome for you than it sounds. I may also get a jump on an essay or two: I have 5,000 words due the day I get back. The second one, though, I might appreciate some help on; it's 3,000 words on "Critique your own education." I got permission to do it Woolf-style (which is to say, personal, animated, occasionally festive, and rambling. Perfect), and I'm sure you all will have no small amount to contribute; if you've been thinking anywhere near as much about HM as I have, then you should have no trouble cobbling together a full essay on it. I'm happy to quote people, incidentally; if anyone remembers the RAL-Profiles we did in 11th grade, that's going to be a model too. So let's hear it!

I'm going to cut this one short now and come back later after breakfast. It's 7:15am (bloody jetlag) and I'm hungry. And I have a coffee maker again! More on the evils of instant coffee later. Much love.

The impulse to rhapsodize is massive.

Because yes. Because there's no shock like that of rediscovering the forgotten routines. How you used to pace the hallway while brushing your teeth. How at midday, you used to lie on your side on your bed and read before you drifted off for a good long nap. How you always used to stumble down the hallway in the mornings in your underwear, unlock--bottom bolt, then top--and open the front door, and pick up the New York Times, look at the weather report in the top right corner, then come back inside, swiftly shutting the door because if you didn't do it fast it would creak awfully, plus it was cold, then you'd ignore the headlines since they were generally bound to be depressing and flip to the arts section, and throw the paper on the counter and peruse it while you made coffee, six cups to six cups, from the jar of grounds that was and is still in the same place above the refrigerator, and then the cat would mew so you'd feed it, shaking the cat food tin so everything would come out, then if it wasn't already chunky, you'd have to mash it up with one of those three forks reserved for that particular purpose, and these, these are the things we miss. And these are the things that tingle when touched again.

There is a joy in the sudden newness of the old. You don't know what I mean. Trust me.

These are the beautifully mundane things that, like good writing, seem to erupt in a "blue crackle" of sparks they are, one by one, recognized. A shock, yes. Electrocution, shortcircuiting. Habit, says Beckett, is literally a second nature, a nature laid on top of the original one, and it is only in those moments where habit is interrupted, broken by the memory of a time before that habit was born, that we have these vicious flashes of lucidity. Because nothing, but nothing, is like coming home.

Got back from 30 hours in Paris a while ago. Lovely time with Marie. It's amazing, though--discounting commute to and from airports, it takes me only slightly more time to fucking fly to Paris than it ever did to take the 1 train up to HM. It's like, poof, and I'm there. Europe. What a brilliant idea.

And so tomorrow, at 1pm, I touch down at Newark. It's nice to come home.