(no subject)

( Русский язык )

Some days I just shouldn't do words. Or, more accurately, some nights I just shouldn't do languages. And should go to bed first. Or possibly do guitar first, since that seemed to jump start the brain.

But this morning is just copying the dialogue in Russian so it doesn't matter if I have brain or not. Hah.

I'm amused at some of the cultural notes in here about medicine in Russia. One of them highlights the state of chaos/flux the Russian medical system is in, which makes sense. But one says that the doctor-patient relationship is much more, doctor says, you follow orders. And there are more extended hospital stays for observation. (Which, considering the level of secondary infection contracted by hospitals in this country, not to mention the level of medical malpractice in some I've had friends and relatives stay at, I think I'm glad!) And that paragraph concludes with Emphasis is not placed on a calming bedside manner. And then another paragraph talks about how English speakers might automatically say someone looks great when they're looking or feeling terrible, Russian speakers are "more likely to comment on the actual appearance of health." And this just makes me think of every stereotype ever.

Ahem. Um. Stuff and things. I had something more positive to say, I'm sure of it. Apart from, I actually managed to do almost my full set of exercises today. About the only thing I didn't do was my full set of parkour jumps, owing to not really stretching out properly beforehand what with sleeping in. So that's something. Damn, I was thinking something I wanted to share with y'all when I was out for my walk and I can't bloody remember what it is for the life of me. Argh. Oh well.

Right. Off to work. For two more days this week because today's Thursday, and god knows why I keep having trouble remembering oh god. I just remembered what I was going to tell you all and now I'm not sure I want to. Because it's partly terribly embarrassing. But, so I downloaded three Backstreet Boys songs today. And they're on my iPod. Because, yes, I lived through that particular set of boy bands and that craze, and out of all of the boy bands they were the ones that actually ended up getting played in my house. No, I have no idea why. My younger siblings got their hands on a videotape of the music videos of a few songs, the choreography intrigued me. So now I am listening to Backstreet Boys at work and you all may mock at your leisure.

(no subject)

( Deutsch )

Note to self: This is awesome. This is your guitar scales. Learn them.

(Oi, that's a lot of scales to learn.)

I need a) this headache to go away and b) to find my brain again. I seem to have misplaced it somewhere. I also need to stop trying to do twenty things at once. Three is quite sufficient.

Of course, then I got completely derailed from everything else I was doing when Kiki pasted me a link to Jacqueline Carey discussing research and mentioning reading Jared Diamond and I went into a Pavlovian rage. Seriously, and there are classmates from at least one of these classes on LJ who can testify, I had to read Guns Germs and Steel not once but twice in college. I don't even remember much of the facts listed, however truthful or erroneous they were, or the opinions given, just that it left me with a feeling of apologetic ethnocentrism and a very bad taste in my mouth regarding everything he did in terms of research, structure, writing, and method. Ugh. Ugh ugh ugh.

Head pounding now. Spent about two and a half hours on my feet walking back and forth along a table making fiber kits, which is basically a sampling of all the fibers we offer to spin. I passed enough wool through my hands to probably re-fleece a sheep. Fortunately there wasn't much shipping, so I was able to get most of it done in those two and a half hours, but oi. Now I'm just plain tired. And still didn't finish editing last night's Japanese. It's definitely go home and bruise my fingertips on the guitar time.

(no subject)

( 日本語 )

Ow. Ow. And ow. Fucking fingertips. Fucking scales. That make me jump over four frets. Which is why I practice, yes, I know this, headvoices, but that doesn't make me any happier about it. On the other hand, guitar practice was easier today than it has been in a while, I'm making headway on Who By Fire, and I've learned a scale. Blues scale C, for those of you keeping track at home. This is really kind of awesome, it's reinforcing my idea that yes, I can do this and yes, I should be practicing like this. It makes me feel good. Also, Ben&Jerry's Red Velvet Cake ice cream is fucking phenomenal. Yes, those two things are related.

Oof. I'm debating what to do about my website and webspace, since my original hosting provider person, well, there are Circumstances. We'll leave it at that. And I think what I'm going to end up doing is relocating my fannish website somewhere, maybe with less fanfic and more random fanspew like big fanfic works, mixes, etc. Those Dark Tower Beam poems I keep saying I'm going to write and lately might actually do so. And also making a website that has more professional person stuff on it. Would anyone like to weigh in on what a professional person website should even have? Leaning more towards professional author person, but possibly also adapted to other stuff, depending. When I actually get to making more than a bare bones site I'll probably peruse some advice blogs/lecture notes/etc to see what they have to say, but for now, interwebs! Enlighten me.

So glad tomorrow's Friday. So glad it's a three day weekend. I've got my list of stuff to do, meat to marinate, things, stuff. I might even go to the library and get out Guns, Germs & Steel because from what people are saying, my belief about Jared Diamond's ethnocentrism is misplaced. His shoddy methods, maybe not so much. Memory might not serve me as well as I could wish seeing as it was ten years ago and I hated it with a fiery passion, but then again, eh. You never know. On the other hand by the time I finally free up time to actually read it I might have forgotten all about it. Right now, Bio-Informatics for Dummies calls. Which is not the most scintillating of books, but it's useful as research. Next up, Astrophysics for Dummies. Or maybe just Physics. Does Space Travel for Dummies exist? Hmmmmm.