Napoleon's Feet - a graduate student's step(s) between the sublime and the ridiculous

FIFTY NINE

Dec 16th, 2008 6:15:11 am - Subscribe

question:

is all french history the history of the french revolution?

thats messed up. but it seems that an entire semester's readings about modern france have 1789 lurking in their shadows.

pedagogically, a directive question such as this could be a goldmine or a cul-de-sac.

in research, a question like this might be likened to the 'vanishing point' of 1941 in german history. in german history, scholars explain back from the holocaust - ie, how could this have happened?

in french history, 1789 serves an almost reversed role: how could anything since have happened without it?

this is a total simplification. and not.

FIFTY EIGHT

Dec 15th, 2008 8:51:35 am - Subscribe

im listening to a record that brings me back to toronto, spring 2006. im sitting in the back of the cameron, on queen street west, with good friends, listening to this band for the very first time. there were no words that could express how remarkable it was. tonite i feel similarly. my friends in the RAA have truly made something very beautiful. Hometowns is something they should be enormously proud of.

this is my second winter away from the icing-coated cities of southern-easternish canada.

FIFTY SEVEN	Dec 10th, 2008 6:15:24 am - Subscribe
18. go to a show 19. did i say get wool socks? 20. walk around mcgill and try to sneak again to use library facilities without paying "alumnus fee". 21. hats.

FIFTY SIX

Dec 7th, 2008 5:50:03 am - Subscribe

THINGS I WANT TO DO OVER BREAK:

1. sleep for 24 hours, in my bed, on futon, on couch, in mum and dad's bed, in dog's cage.

2. get my hair cut - but not too short. but enough that it doesnt feel like a helmet anymore.

3. have a smoked meat sandwich at schwartz's an ungodly hour with ben and make dirty comments about pickles.

4. buy many pairs of thick wool socks, the kind workers wear outdoors in the winter.

5. read latest michael chabon novel.

6. eat greek food. i dont even care where.

7. have an argument with my sister.

8. squeeze my dog so loud she screams.

9. have coffee at every single café or patisserie on monkland.

10. go through my brother's records, make fun of him, and be secretly jealous.

11. buy canadian-made denim jeans. buy roots sweatpants.

12. go out to shovel snow off of cars to be able to leave driveway, lose faith and patience, and go back inside house.

13. have a hot drink by decarie overpass and listen to the expressway.

14. bacon.

15. take metro. oh metro....

16. shisha.

17. talk my parents to sleep with my research interests.

FIFTY FIVE

Nov 18th, 2008 7:44:06 am - Subscribe

feel a bit more like my old self. i miss the old toronto music scene, i miss shaking it and forgetting about everything for a couple hours. i miss loud drums and cold beer, grainy synth and messy guitars. its not the same here, and i often forget all the things i used to love about going to school in toronto. having a life outside my work is one thing, but having a life completely separate from my work is quite another. it was a luxury to be able to close my books and get lost somewhere else in canada's 'real' capital. my work here is never too far away.