Linguistics, Dancing, and a Few Good Books
Wherein I post about the excitements and mundanities of life in Providence, RI| [blog home] |
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| Don Blaheta is a sixth-year PhD student in Computer Science at Brown University, studying Natural Language Processing; he just finished up an AM in Linguistics across the street in the Department of Cognitive and Linguistic Sciences. In his copious free time, he does competitive ballroom dancing, sings in two choirs, hangs out with the Brown-RISD Catholic Community, knits obsessively, and reads sci-fi, fantasy, and alternate history novels. |
19 December 2002
I saw The Two Towers at the midnight show Tuesday night, in costume. It was awesome! And a bunch of people seemed vaguely impressed at my costume. I really should've asked that one girl where she got her elf ears---they were very realistic.
In other news, Knox just asked me for an interview. Go me!
'...Also, I think the plural of "ex" is "ices."' --Mike Peil
Posted 6:47 PM [+]
16 December 2002
Howard Dean is the governor of Vermont, and he is running for president in 2004. Please go look at his site. If you're in a hurry, just read the "on the issues" part.
On the Mother of God: "C'mon, it's a well-established fact that Mary was an alto." --Pat Duggan
Posted 7:35 AM [+]
15 December 2002
I went dancing tonight, and I had the weirdest conversation. This really nice little old lady came over and complimented the Brown kids on their dancing; we thanked her. Various of us were making plans on getting to TGI Fridays afterwards, and the lady overheard and said some kids-these-days comment along the lines of "huh, I need to go to church in the morning". (Reading this over now, that makes it sound like she was trying to invite herself along, but it wasn't at all like that, just a vague comment on our ability/desire to stay up late.) I said, "yeah, me too; I just get less sleep on Saturdays." She was all surprised, "oh, you go to church?" I said that I sing in the choir. She said that was so nice, and---get this---"that's better than doing drugs. You don't do drugs, do you? No, you shouldn't do drugs."
Let's see, first of all, she set up a dichotomy between going to the church and doing drugs; then by implication---since she was surprised any of us would go to church---she thought that we (all college students?) do drugs. And they're bad. (mmkay?) I'm trying very hard to figure out what all was going on in her head just then, because I feel like it would give me some excellent insights into how most Americans (i.e. those not in the ivory tower) think about drugs and the drug war. But really, I just find the whole thing baffling.
"I'm not sure whether this is sarcasm, irony, meta-irony, post-postmodern quasi-meta-ironicism, or mere stupidity." --Pete McFerrin
Posted 1:50 AM [+]
| Don Blaheta / blahedo@brown.edu |
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