Stoic Cookery

"As for the pig, that most appetizing of delicacies, it was created for no other purpose than slaughter, and god, in furnishing our cuisine, mixed soul in with its flesh like salt."

- Porphyry, On abstinence 3.20.I, 3

Mmmmm. Bacon. Ahlrarhahlrahrarlhlll.

On My Way [to a nervous breakdown]

Hey, I just googled my full name (narcissistically) and found that my thesis comes up on WorldCat - and is in 3 libraries! And, apparently, you can buy it for $9.80 from another site. Where are my royalties? And the site selling my thesis happens to have spelled my name incorrectly. Thus it begins, the confusion over my wacked-ass name.

But this is all to say that I will not finish my scholarly career because right now I am mired in translating Latin sentences that go:
"The queen of the island will not give the money to the poets."

And I am on the verge of having my brain implode because I have to give a presentation on Stoicism (yes, all of it) to the pantheon of New Testament gods. I am fucked. Fuckeo, Fuckere, Fuckivi, Fucketis.

I Don't Want To Know (and you probably don't either)

It is always hard when you see the clay feet of your idols. In scanning for news of Studio Ghibli's Gedo Senki, I found the following quote from Goro Miyazaki - Hayao Miyazaki's son, and director of the new film (against his father's initial wishes):

. . . ever since I can remember, my father was often absent. . . I wanted him to look after me, and to play with me. But those opportunities almost never came. . . In this way, ever since I can remember, at the same time as enjoying them, I have been watching Hayao Miyazaki's works to understand my father. For me, Hayao Miyazaki gets zero marks as a father but full marks as a director of animated films.

This is the man who created My Neighbor Totoro? How is this possible?

But then I think of Christopher Milne, son of A. A. Milne, the creator of Winnie-the-Pooh, who wrote in his biography that he felt he was a "part time hobby" of his parents, that his father bought him stuffed animals so that they could provide writing material, and that he resented his father's work.

And then I hear that William Mayne, much celebrated children's author, was convicted in 2004 of sexual assualt of young girls.

This is a very depressing world at times. Is nothing sacred?

Check It Out

Our Coast to Coast diary is finally completed and up. Please take a look, leave a comment, try the trek yourself! Here's an inspirational photo for you:

"I thought you were just walking!" A friend said this to us on seeing some pictures from the trip. This is walking - according to the English. Anything you can do bar using crampons and rope is walking to them. Wish we had known that!! But it was spectacular.