All is quiet on New Year's Eve

It's the eve of the New Year already, and what better way to ring in the last few hours before the new year (this time without capital letters) than by completing my stupid 3-5-3 streak on this blog! Hold on to your heads amigos, this post's shaping up to be a real doozy. I'm thinking about re-thinking what I'm doing here at The Republic in 2008. I created this blog in order to keep in touch with family while I was in college, and to have a reason to make myself write every now and then. Not that I have any aspirations as a writer, keep in mind, but I do enjoy doing it and I thought it'd be good to have an excuse to write something every now and then that wasn't a paper. I still want to have the outlet for the written by-product of whatever it is that my mind does, but I should probably try to give myself something to write about. I guess I just feel very fortunate that both of you read this thing every now and then, and that I owe it to you to give you the best output possible. I think I'll also alter the colour scheme or what-not again, because that's easier, but I really do want to write better than I am right (write?) now. Have I babbled enough? Good. Now's when I really get the hamsters cooking in hollandaise with garlic, not to eat, mind you, but to use as bait for when I finally get that tiger trap put together. If there's one thing a tiger can't resist, it's navigating his web browser away from this blog whilst eating hamster-in-hollandaise-flavored potato chips, which you can only get in certain countries, even thought they're made right here in Detroit at Frito Lay. What? Why? Who? Forget all of those silly questions, and then ask yourself if it's really time (When?) to stop hitting me with that inflated latex glove for no apparent reason. Sigh. Happy New Year, Republic of D.Cous. readers!

Slight of Hand and Twist of Fate

Gweetings, music wuvahs! Huhuhuhuhuhuhu. How's November been to you? Good? Splendid. I don't suppose that you've missed much (or even missed me) if you haven't seen me lately, but I've been getting by alright. I was excited, even though I had sworn never to return, to journey to that city I'd rather not mention if I mayn't, to see indie-rock weirdos The Decemberists in concert, but something, perhaps naught but the unsavory aura of that unholy place, deterred said troubadours from their stated purpose, and in fact led them to discontinue the remainder of their performance tour wholesale. Would that a fissure would open in the earth to blot from its gentle face such a ghastly blemish as that city, so rudely named for one of our Great Nation's worthy progenitors. But enough of such things.

What have you been at?
Composing Haikus perhaps?
I would like to know

I visited the 'dale last weekend, crashed on a friend's futon and went to a rock concert. All of these were fun except the futon, which was uncomfortable but is still very much appreciated. I was shocked by how old I felt, I don't remember college kids being so young. I was always amazed in college at how easy it was to survive and feel normal in an environment where you're surrounded only by your peers, sleeping irregularly and living on terrible food. I'm not sure whether it's more surprising that I used to live like that, or that, for the most part, I no longer do (I still can't cook).

I finished Hawthorne's The House of The Seven Gables a week or two ago, and am most of the way through The Blithedale Romance. Neither is as good as The Scarlet Letter in my estimation, but both have their merits and are quite enjoyable to read. I'm also going through Augustine's Confessions again. Despite my usual aversion to re-reading books (I will admit that this is mostly irrational), I've gone through this one probably three times before, and it's still quite good. I would love to check out a different translation at some point, though this one isn't at all bad ( that is as far as I can tell, I certainly can't read Latin).

That was a brief summary of my thoughts, and as you might have predicted, in no particular order. I shall hopefully post again before Thanksgiving Day, though I refuse to make any promise of this. Do stay warm, it's beginning (halfway through the month) to feel somewhat like November out there.

October

I learned this morning by listening to the radio during my two-minute commute that it's Breast Cancer Awareness Month, of which I was previously unaware. I guess I knew that there was such a month, but I wasn't aware of what month it was, or even if it was the same month every year. In any case, I figure that it's high time that I started doing my part in the valiant fight against the not-quite-leading-cause of death among people with breasts. However, as it seems that lots of people are already out there raising money for research towards finding a cure, there probably aren't enough people out there raising money for future treatment, in case they just don't find a cure. Given that we here at The Republic of D.Cous. are not typically given to a great deal of optimism, it seems like our fund raising efforts would better be spent raising money for future treatment, after we've wasted all of our cancer-fighting dollars on a cure that they probably won't find anyways (I have it on good authority that 1/3 of all cancer research donations go to buying Nintendo Wiis for research scientists and their friends*). So, while the starry-eyed hippies of the world are out there walking for The Cure to our nation's chronic lack of Nintendos, I'll be walking, driving, eating, sleeping, and sitting on my couch watching Jeopardy! for Treatment in the likely event that they don't end up finding The Cure. How does it work? Simple. While I'm doing all these things, probably wearing my as-yet unmade "Save The Breasts" t-shirt and sweat band, you can walk up to me and give me money, which in turn I will (I promise) give to people who are at risk (e.g., women, and certain men). I may even hop onto Cafepress dot com and make up "Save The Breasts" t-shirts for all y'all, and then if you buy them, I'll give the money to the at-risk. I'm not quite sure how that part will work, really. I've never walked up to a stranger, handed them money and said "Hey, save that in case you get breast cancer someday and need money for treatment." Hmm. Talking to strangers. Most difficult. Right.

*This is probably not at all true.