Live long and prosper...

It's not the first time I've thought about this, but if I was a Star Trek alien, I would probably be a Vulcan. That whole superficially emotionally distant persona is actually the vibe I tend to give out to people these days. In truth, it's not entirely by choice, but it's one of the symptoms that you get from moving around too much. You feel the need to hide your emotions because otherwise if you let it out you wouldn't be able to get anything done. There's a constant need for mental discipline, to not freak out when you realize you don't know where you're heading, what you'll be doing in a couple of months time, and who you're going to have to say goodbye to.

Unfortunately, the reality is such that you actually do get that well of emotion inside about certain things, certain places and certain people. Sometimes it doesn't even matter how briefly you've come across them. And it does corrode your mental resolve. That's why Vulcans go crazy every seven years with pon farr I suppose.

But all in all, I've got to say I've done a pretty good job keeping it from the surface so that most people don't see it. At times I'm a bit afraid of how good a job I do about it.

Regretably, I feel I've not done enough to keep in touch with old friends nor enough to get to know the new ones better. Frankly I don't completely understand why not, but it's become a habit (a poor one) nonetheless.

Yet in the end you miss them all the same.

Comfort food...or cooking?

For me comfort food isn't actually something I eat. Rather it's what I cook.

No matter how crappy my mood, how horrible things get, or how stressed out I become, somehow cooking a simple meal for people makes all the bad things go away. There's this feeling of catharsis that envelopes you as you dig into the food and see the faces of others around you enjoying it - you go from being grumpy and self-loathing to being as light as a feather!

There's not any other feeling quite like it. That natural high...you just can't get it from anything else. And I'm glad I'm fortunate enough to be able to feel it, because so far I've met only one other person who can "feel the love" so to speak.

Hmmm...maybe someday my epitaph should read:

"Cooking saved my life from everything short of death itself."

It sure feels that way.

p.s. I think somehow with time, my comfort "dish" has turned out to be roast chicken. It's easy, cheap to make and you can have it in so many variations. Yet it takes tender loving care to make sure it turns out just right - with that brown, crispy skin and moist luscious breast meat. And that jus on the side just makes it extra special without much added work!

Religion...

I have little faith in religion,
But I do have faith in god.
I know that doesnt exactly sound,
like two peas inside a pod.

But for every religious fanatic,
There is someone suffering pain.
From some idiot who thinks dying,
for religion is a gain.

Why must I believe in your god,
To get a ticket up to heaven?
What about all our fellow other,
Good but non-believing brethen?

Are they simply to be forsaken,
For one man's word against another?
Are we simply to be damned,
For being labelled as the other?

I truly cannot believe,
That all of decent human kind,
Could be as stupid to insist,
That their god would seem to mind.

If they didn't profess the name,
Or they didn't bow down in prayer.
I don't think god's that insecure,
To be like a bling-bling flashing player.

For if there truly was a god,
I think he'd rather that we all,
Just be compassionate towards ourselves,
Rather than passing pamphlets at the mall.

So if you come across someone,
Whose chosen god is not the same,
Give that fellow man a hug,
Rather than blowing out his brains.

Baking for comfort...

In the past few weeks staying in my new student flat, I've noticed that two of the three new residents in the corridor have baked something on the first or second day after moving in. Of course, I did the same too.

It's not difficult to explain why I suppose. For some reason, when you move into a completely new environment where everything and everyone is unfamiliar (and not always so keen to get to know you off the bat in this case), you kinda feel the need to bring something familiar into the picture. Something that allows you to set up a bit of your comfort zone in your new surroundings.

The other resident who didn't bake something happened to know the existing people in the corridor quite well already. So I guess there was no "need" to.

It seems like a logical theory.

Should I be worried that I've been baking so much lately?

Or then again, maybe it's just something I like to do anyway...

Is the human mind half full or half empty?

So why is it that our natural progression in life often means that we have to become more cynical as we age?

Adults always regard young people as being "naive", that they don't know how the "real world" works. But who determined that the "real world" should be crappy and horrible, full of all things that make people fundamentally unhappy anyway?

Why can't it be that we grow up thinking that the world is going to be horrible, but then realize as we grow older that it's really a wonderful place to be and this is due to the general kindness of the human spirit? That the "real world" is really frickin' amazing with sunshine, ponies, rainbows and all that? It just doesn't make a whole lot of sense if you think about it.

For one thing, how many genuinely evil people do we meet in our life?

I, for one, have not met anyone who has intentionally attempted to harm others just for the sake of doing something evil. Most of the time, we just tend to do harm to others as a consequence of our inner insecurities or due to our drive for healthy competition gone wrong. As far as I know, I've never met anyone who constantly schemes to hurt someone else either physically or mentally, just because.

People who actually do so are most often insane, something of which in other words rules them out of having any real intention of causing harm for evil's sake.

So does that mean that we live in a world full of crazies? And does the craziness of other wear off on us and hence makes us crazy ourselves?

Is that the real reason why we think that our natural progression in life means that we have to become more cynical as we age, that the thought is essentially a product of our insane mind?

So by deduction the solution to the problem, in order to break this hegemony of illogical cynicism, is to be more optimistic and to trust in the human spirit and kindness of others.

At once - the reactive thought that comes after reading the former statement is that it's too difficult and too naive.

But, well, at least maybe it's a lot less crazy.

Full of sh*t...

So while taking a call of nature at the office, a thought suddenly popped into my head - who's responsible for urinal and toilet design?

By this I don't mean the aesthetic aspects of how they look but rather the functional properties necessary to build a good toilet/urinal.

I'm sure you need someone to think about the physics related to, *ahem*, "movement". What is the falling speed? (Because otherwise you could get a real nasty splash effect.) Does one have to calculate the parabolic function related to the male process of micturation in front of a urinal? (Or is it an intrinsically unsolvable mathematical problem, since they always have that shoot the target/bulls-eye/frog as guidance?)

Then the designer/engineer would have to translate their mathematical calculations into how the toilet/urinal bowl should look. The exact height, width or curvature, etc. I'm sure in the past they thought about what kind of material as well, though these days we all use good ol' incorrodable porcelain (sometimes stainless steel for those trough-style urinals though).

Somehow urinal design tends to be more dynamic than for toilets. A lot of different shapes, sizes, styles and fixture heights. So if anyone wants to pursue further studies in functional toilet design, I suppose urinals are the way to go! More room for experimentation!

Weirdly enough, in Holland, they have these crap bins where there is an elevated plateau where the doo-doo lands and remains until you flush it (as oppossed to the kind where there is direct deposition into the aqueous environment that everyone else in the world uses). A Dutch friend once told me it's because Dutch people used to be concerned about having tapeworms in their bellies so checking your own stool samples for larvae was a means of finding out if you had them. But, with modern standards of sanitation, shouldn't they have stopped obssessing by now!? Why do they still design them this way!?!?

I'm pretty darned sure there must be people out there today who have "toilet physicist" or "toilet engineer" on their business cards (who probably have a hard time explaining what they do at dinner parties). And what a mighty great service those men and women are doing for the rest of society.

They're figuring all this stuff out so we don't have to sit on it to think about it. Instead, we can just read our magazines.

Must stop listening to Billy Joel...

What am I looking for?
What do I seek?
The river of dreams?
It's divided to creeks!

Can't seem to focus,
On forging ahead,
Thoughts are distracted,
I can't get to bed.

Restless in spirit,
Body and mind.
The long road before me,
Looks daunt and unkind.

Yet stride forward I must.
Keen, driven, despite,
Feet threading gingerly,
My heart full of fright.