science is the new black (now a series)

so until my smart science sister has that science blog of hers i told you about up and running (yes it's still in 'development' phase) i'm going to do my own version of vague-she'll-laugh-at-me-science-ish posts until she finally can't take it anymore and gets so embarrassed for me that she just decides on a title for her authentic science blog, registers it, and writes her first entry (which, by the way, i encouraged her to write about when she recently explained to my parents how to make a home-remedy disinfectant using a bottle of vodka-- or at least-- that was the story they gave me when i found the empty bottle of really old vodka on the kitchen counter, that's what they claimed to have used it for.)


and since science is the new black, today my vague science-ish topics will be as follows :
(because i personally believe that in science organization and lists are probably important)

• the book my sister is reading
• a quote from darwin (that i got from my sister)
• the effects of medications on creativity (a personal anecdote from yours truly)



the book my sister is reading right now sounds fascinating, i'm actually dying to read it. and that never happens when she's reading about proteins or cells. this book literally combines our two passions, our two ways of looking and thinking and understanding, our two worlds of thought-- literature and science, poetry and uh-- you know-- science... just kidding. but seriously it sounds like an clever and involved book that she will read slowly and digest every detail and i will read sentence by sentence and get such inspiration with each sentence that i'll stop to write for a day and them come back the next day to read the following sentence. the book is called proust was a neuroscientist by jonah lehrer a young writer who has now got my attention. i'm going to pick up this book in the next few days.



next on our agenda is something i keep thinking about, and she (my sister) keeps thinking about -- and i'll let you think about it now. it's her 'status' online, a quote by darwin. read it. over and over.

"it is not the strongest species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the ones most responsive to change"

charles darwin

and lastly, since we're discussing neuroscience and change, we can touch on the recent happenings in my headache saga. this new treatment i've been on (aka the reason for my blog absence, twitter disappearance and unprecedented block of the writing kind) is an anti seizure medication, the latest method in migraine prevention. but here's what i've noticed. (other than the obvious side effect of losing my thoughts in mid-sentence-- everything just goes on pause--- the ideas and words evaporate and i completely forget what i was saying) it's as though it has literally stopped the 'seizures' of thought, of passion and inspiration in my head. let me insert here, poetic surges of inspiration and passion and thought, because other things like focus on work and developing curriculum for my writing students has increased, productivity and creativity in this area has expanded, but where, i keep asking myself, are my desires to immerse myself and wade out too deep in poetic words and flashes of haiku that stop every other happening in the world, every other thought, poems that come over me like-- (see this is where the words would have come over me, or simply flowed from my fingertips and metaphorically showed you the arrival of the poems, instead, there's a pause--- a slight hollow buzz) or perhaps i'm putting too much pressure on myself and i'm still in the adjustment phase. i know. the words are in here, but perhaps a seizure of words isn't so bad every once in a while, when all of a sudden i fall down because this idea hits me like-- well like-- well-- you know--

the first in the science is the new black series : here : the beginning of the end some might call it, my sister might call it etc...

x c

classic.

somehow opened up to this article in the paper (no kidding, the real newspaper) the other day. the san francisco chronicle features classic articles from years (and years and years) past... i thought this one from june 3, 1963 by stanton delaplane was really great.

Chronicle Classic :
Delaplane flying high

The new TWA polar flight is nonstop from the U.S. West Coast to Paris, France. 

It takes 10 hours and 5 minutes and is crammed with so much passenger activity that everybody must work hard and seriously to accomplish his task before the wheels touch down. 

Each passenger is expected to eat a five-course luncheon and a six-course dinner. Between these he must view a full-length feature movie. He should - TWA expects every man to do his duty - precede each meal with an appropriate martini. 

The airline surveyed martini drinkers recently. It found West Coast lushes were ordering the bottled Heublein's martinis. Then they would order a straight gin. They were spiking their martinis. 

Therefore, TWA ordered West Coast martinis mixed at new odds of 16-to-1 - gin versus vermouth. Two of these and the stewardess resets your controls to automatic. You are no longer considered fit to fly yourself. 

On the west-to-east crossing, the movie is a late, late show. The jets simply eat up time. So you go to the movie in the afternoon and you get out in the middle of the night. 

Coming back the situation is reversed. 

You start lunch at midday. And when you finish it is still noon. 

This is very confusing and TWA is justly proud of it. It is not only on its toes with competing airlines. It is way ahead of the passenger.

(article continued-- full version-- and other classics : here)

dear abby

robyn glaser

i confessed to abby, one of the 12 year old girls that i tutor in writing, that i'd never finished reading the book island of the blue dolphins {that was back in 4th grade, mind you} she looked at me in disbelief, "you mean you never found out what happened to her?!" abby was reading the book again {on her own accord} for a second time. she proceeded to pull a copy of the book out of her bag, "i have two, you take this one so you can read it again and finish it" and she put it on the table in front of me. and so, i will be reading island of the blue dolphins. the whole thing this time. i'd say i learned my lesson, but really, the reason i so firmly remember not finishing the book, lies in the fact that this was when, at a young age, i discovered my own reading style. i don't generally read for the story, i read for the words, the crafting of the sentences, and if i can't get something out of almost every sentence, i'm often not compelled to continue reading it. and if i do get something out of almost every sentence {virginia woolf!!}, i read each sentence over and over, and forget what was happening in the story. this sort of reading i like to call métro reading, as i often read the same book in the métro {mostly virginia woolf} because i could get distracted, the lights could do that momentary dimming thing then come back on and i'd be right back on enjoying the same sentence. {hmm..writing this now, i hesitate to wonder if this could potentially be deemed a.d.d. reading, but i dismiss this thought, because i do in fact concentrate on every word, often getting lost in the rhetoric somewhere under the streets of paris...}


julia galdo

anyway. i'm in the middle of maybe 15 books and enjoy them all in their own moment. this is not to say that i never read books for the story, and that i never finish, because on occasion i do both. but all through high school and college as a dramatic art and english major, i don't recall finishing many books. one night i had a paper due the next morning on shakespeare's love's labour's lost, and though i'd acted in it, i'd never fully read the text {but talk about a writer whose every line can stand alone} so, at about 2am i decided to write the paper on the placement and meaning of the apostrophes in the title. we proceeded to spend the entire next class researching and discussing the importance of the apostrophe in this play's title and the professor was very pleased. this was more of a creative attempt to get that paper written without finishing -- or even starting -- the reading process, and it was a time issue more than anything, as i adore shakespeare and getting lost in his sentences... and really, i've seriously been know to take interest in the use of apostrophes... but this is neither here nor there.


julia galdo

i just have the image of abby handing me the book and i was so enthralled and delighted with the fact that there's a 12year old out there who reads for pleasure, who doesn't live to spend every free moment on that wii thing, who adores writing as much as i do, and who {as i came to discover} reads multiple books at once and enjoys them all in their moment. we both believe that we get something different from the same books every time we read them. when abby and i work together, i sit across the table from her in the cafe where we meet, and i see myself in her, and know exactly how the spinning mind in that shy, genuine, sweet head is mulling over the details and the fantasy, the spectacle and wonder of everything that dances before her in her reality and plays in the imagination....but anyway, i should go, i have another book to read...

bonne nuit.

robyn glaser

“I love sleep. My life has the tendency to fall apart when I'm awake, you know?”

Hemingway