Primrose Road

Jews and Power: A Nextbook Festival of Ideas, May 18th in NYC.

I plan to attend the Culture, Taste, and Power and Authority and Revolt panels, as long as I can get in (it's first come, first served). This definitely sounds like an exciting event.

::breathes fresh air::

So the SigOther and I saw a movie this afternoon and thanks to the previews, I am now REALLY EXCITED about Hamlet 2:



Especially because "Rock Me Sexy Jesus" pretty much sums up every Protestant Hamlet/Catholic Hamlet/confused Hamlet debate in the history of academia. ;)

My work has at last boiled down to the following question: How do you cite a MMOG (Massively Multiplayer Online Game) in MLA style?

Where is Jewish intellectualism now?

Why can't we ask questions about the Israeli military's "eye for an eye" policy, about the insistence that one must believe in God to be a Jew, about the idea that Jews should only marry each other even if more and more genetic illnesses arise, about why New Yorkers complain about the occasionally anti-Semitic graffiti tag while there are still genocides going on elsewhere in the world, without being accused of being self-hating anti-Semites ourselves?

I'm not answering these questions. I'm just wondering why we can't be open to more debates about a variety of issues -- lively, informed debate -- instead of screaming anti-Semitism. Where's the thinking? Why have young Jewish people forgotten that many of their grandparents and great-grandparents' generation were atheist socialists? Why are young people emerging after four years of college, something that many of their grandparents didn't have, unable to ask questions?

Why can't we scratch our heads when the Haggadah says we should recline like masters now because we were once slaves in Egypt, as though those are the only two options? Why can't we talk about the chill that runs through our spines when the Haggadah tells us to thank God for taking the Egyptians' property and giving it to the Jews, and then to thank him again for killing our enemies' firstborn (even if they were infants!) sons? Why can't we point out what's off about these mythology-based political statements?

Israel is a beautiful country. I understand why Israel had to happen; I understand why Jews in the 1940s needed to know that they had a homeland to turn to. I can't wait until the next time I get to eat falafel and read a book on the beach in Tel Aviv and admire some ancient ruins while finding discarded plastic spoons in them. But as American Jews, we need to be able to feel free to ask questions and to openly discuss some of the reasons why we might not be able to idealize Israel and its every political and military move. And we don't. I know that were I to make these statements in a less-anonymous forum, I'd be shouted at rather than argued with, accused of siding with the enemy.

Jewish intellectuals of a previous generation knew that fascism wasn't just about oppressive governments suddenly rising to power; it was about people carefully 'forgetting' the personhood of those who frighten them. So why not ask a question or a hundred about prayer, God, politics, personhood, history? May critique and debate spring eternal ...

It's Will Shakespeare's birthday (maybe; it's a guess based on his baptismal date and the fact that it would be kind of cool if he was born and died on the same date). If you're in Washington DC by any chance this weekend, be sure to catch the Shakespeare's Birthday Open House at the Folger Shakespeare Library this Sunday. There will be Shakespeare-related fortune telling. And a "Happy Birthday"-singing Queen Elizabeth. I'm excited. ;)

On the ridiculous-beyond-comment new game show Bingo America:

Host: "In Shakespeare's sonnet, he writes 'Shall I compare thee to a summer's ....'?"

Loud Excited Balding Contestant: "ROSE!"

Though Homeopathy Awareness Week has now come to a close, I couldn't help further investigating the homeopathic claim that gunpowder cures the bone infection osteomyelitis. I contacted a couple of local homeopaths (they're in the phone book? what?) using the pseudonym Vittoria Corombona (naturally) and described to them the jaw infection I had at twenty-one years old, as though I were still 21 and still had the infection.

I'd share direct quotes, but I'm a grad student and don't have the $$$ to defend myself in case of lawsuit. And from what we're learned here on the ol' In-tar-webz, scammers and generally drippy people who believe in their own scams tend to be rather litigious.

First, several noted my condition was unusual, a fact that is easily Googlable. (Bette Davis and I are pretty much the only healthy women in the Western world to have had it. ;)) I was also told that homeopathy is excellent for inflammations and infections because it'll strengthen your immune system. One homeopath even said that by strengthening my immune system, I'd kill the infection without antibiotics. Now, I haven't taken a science class since 1999 -- my only memories of the last science class I took are singing the periodic table and pretending to "be" the Big Bang while shouting "Boron, boron, release the boron!" -- and even I know that you want a normal immune system because a strong immune system can kill you.

Goal: make non-dry, non-burned Apple Matzoh Kugel two years in a row.

Granted, last year I made a "test kugel" first, which I shared with fellow grad students at a bar. God bless Nebraska.

Newsweek's pretty excited about a children's book written by a plastic surgeon in Florida that explains to the kinderlekh why Mommy's having plastic surgery to look prettier. While this is definitely hilarious, and certainly gives me more insight into why it's always one of the ever-expanding cadre of cars with Florida license plates cutting me off or driving 90mph on the Long Island Expressway, what's far more hilarious is that the book is, as Teresa Nielsen Hayden happily notes, "published" by a vanity press.

Though I have to give the press credit (even though it charges $1995 - $2440 for a printing package) for at least presenting itself as a vanity press rather than scamming authors into believing it's a "traditional publisher" that wants to fulfill writers' hopes and dreams. (::cough cough::PublishAmerica::cough cough::).

Tip of the hat to squib, who has some good ideas for sequels.

From the Daily Nebraskan last Friday:

Virtual avatars may affect real life decisions

Apparently, watching digital representations of yourself as overweight, middle-aged, and/or pretty in "virtual reality" can help you lose weight, save money, and make more friends.

I think what this study implicitly suggests about Gen X / Gen Y narcissism is far more interesting than what it overly suggests about weight loss, savings, and making conversation: we're so narcissistic that we either (1) can't see ourselves for who/what we are or (2) can't change for the better when given good advice or assistance, but can change when we play video games about ourselves.