is the word 'diary' better than the word 'blog'? probably not.
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Non-Quaker Weekend, Plus: En-shoe-siasm!
Non-Quaker Weekend, Plus: En-shoe-siasm!
My weekend was not at all Haverfordian. I went to a brunch, and a party, and I got in the car and drove places, and went shopping, and made a purchase. Any one of those occurrences would make a weekend stand out in my Quaker-Bubble existence, but all of them together make for quite a whirlwind of activity.
The brunch was thrown by my friend and colleague Raji. It was an Indian brunch and she cooked the shit out of some spectacularly tasty Indian foodstuffs. I could not stop eating. Until I did stop eating, and then I talked for a while, and then I went home and took a nap. Then my friend Joshua (who was in Italy with me two years ago, and who lives in Philadelphia but whom I have not managed to see in Philadelphia yet this year, because he is writing a dissertation and I am a lame-ass shut-in) called and was all, I am at a bar in South Philly, and you are coming here to meet me, and then we are going to a party, and I�m all, man, it is late and I am tired, and he�s all, have some coffee and get over yourself, and I�m all, OK, so what train do I take, and he went, you can�t take a train here just get in your goddamned car like a suburbanite does and get over here. So I did. He gave me excellent directions, too. He always looks smashing in his artsy clothes with his strangely Rod-Stewart-like hair.
It was fun. A party full of philosophy people, most of them much, much younger than me. It was very smoky, and today my clothes smell disgusting. Why do people smoke? I had some good conversations, and one tasty beer. I heard some great saucy anecdotes about last year's Collegium (the Italy thing). And so on. Remember the story I told about the guy at SPEP (back in October) who had interpreted a question I asked him after his paper presentation as hostile when it wasn�t? (Not the same one as the one who grabbed my arm as if he knew me, though I think they are friends.) He was there, and kept refusing to look at me. Which just seemed ridiculous, so I decided I was going to forcefully charm him into submission. No one gets to be my enemy for so stupid a reason, I tell you. Turns out, I didn�t even have to use force because as soon as I sat down with him (he was conveniently sitting with someone else I knew from Italy two years ago), he brought up a new translation of a book by Alain Badiou that I am reading right now because I�m supposedly writing a book review of it, so I immediately had something quasi-worthwhile to contribute to the conversation. And soon he was smiling at me and joking and well aware of how wrong he was about my hostile character. The end.
At some point in the evening, around 1:30 I think, I paused and listened passively to all the different noises in the party, and all the different conversations around me, and there were some really funny overly enthusiastic philosophical declarations being made, like �Nietzsche is not German, he�s NIETZSCHEAN, and Hegel is a fucking freak and Heidegger is Heidegger so I HATE GERMAN PHILOSOPHY� to my left and �If you ignore the history of metaphysics and just READ PLATO then you already are a Heideggerian, so I guess my schooling made me into a continental philosopher� to my right. Etc. Here�s my favorite group of sentences uttered by me, which might have been amusing to someone had they overheard them: �That�s a book that very few people are trained to read. Which is exactly why it�s a book that many people should read. But, because of how it�s written, it�s a book that very few people will read.� (I�m talking about Alain Badiou�s Being and Event.) Also, the music at the party was perfect, as if someone had burrowed into my head to select all the best songs from the history of Jill�s parties. No dancing happened. I left around 2.
Today I really should have been working. But I was thinking of bidding on some pink dresses (sister�s wedding) on eBay, but I haven�t tried any of this year�s BCBG dresses on in person, so I wanted to make sure my size was still the same, so I drove out to an outlet mall and went to the BCBG factory outlet. I tried on lots of dresses and ascertained that my size has not changed, but also that different cuts of dress fit me very differently, no duh. There was nothing pink there. I almost convinced myself that an ivory dress would be OK, but then realized that that would only be OK if it were like June 20 and desperation were setting in. So no dress today. BUT. Something happened at the outlet mall that was strikingly similar to a MIRACLE.
Last year, my mom and I were out shopping for my birthday, as we do every year, making a fun day of it and usually starting off in the Rotunda restaurant at the SF Neiman Marcus. Anyway, last year after our meal during which we of course had to make jokes about whether the Rotunda waiter was trying to say we were fat, etc., we stopped by the shoe department and I showed my mom a pair of Prada heels that I so very much wanted but of course could never have because they cost $960. They are a pale pink satin heel with a mary jane strap, and are beaded along the toe, sides and back of the heel with a filigree of jet beads. So. Amazingly. Amazing. But anyway, you walk away because it�s not possible, not even conceivable.
So today I�m looking at the shoes in the Neiman Marcus Last Chance store, and there they are, one pair, in just my size, the only pair, right there. I look at the tag and it says $452, but there is this strangely elaborate coding deal at the store so I�m thinking the shoes might really be $175. In my mind I�m all, is that something I�m allowed to do? So, while I�m thinking this I go to the customer service desk and ask how much they are because math is hard, and she says, wow, today is step-up day, so instead of 50% off they are 75% off, plus 10% customer appreciation, makes them $101. I walked RIGHT OVER TO THE CASH REGISTER. And now they are mine. And it isn�t even against the law (you know, the law Jill has given to herself about shopping) because THEY ARE PINK. I know what shoes I�m wearing to the wedding. See!
11:41 p.m. - April 09, 2006
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