From Caterina, via Dana at Apophenia: 1. Grab the nearest book. 2. Open the book to page 23. 3. Find the fifth sentence. 4. Post the text of the sentence in your journal along with these instructions. A group of turn-of-the-twentieth-century German psychologists known as the Würzburg school explored some of these introspective issues in great detail, and their conclusions must have been very depressing to anyone who valued the primacy of consciousness. From this book.

Some moments from the last few weeks: A roomful of giggly young female students respond to my question, “What am I doing?” with the response, in perfect unison, “You is pucking us!” Yeah, they all mean “fucking”, and they are saying that because I’m holding up my splinted finger, which happens to be the middle finger on my right hand. I correct them: “You’re being rude, Gord!” and they chime it back at me. From yesterday afternoon. A pack of freshmen students pass me as I limp distractedly down toward the bus stop. I hold my umbrella aloft, lost in …

This is funny. I personally don’t get this annoyed when I go shopping, but over on Incestuous Amplification, Kevin asks a few questions (incestuousamplification.blog-city.com) of the ajumma (the older married woman) who peeks into his shopping cart. It’s such a familiar scene I can’t help but laugh. Dear Ajumma in Costco, What the fuck did you expect to see??Did you think my shopping cart would be filled with the heads of Iraqi children??Maybe a bakers dozen of double-ended dildos? I realize that whitey with a shopping cart is a novel concept, but seriously…what the fuck is so interesting about what …

Discovered this fascinating blog out there… haven’t had time to dig as much as I’d like but I shall post this in part to remind myself to return to Overboard and see what fascinating things Andi has to say. Andi, you’re over in Gunsan? Have you read Pascal Boyer’s _Religion Explained_? I know, presumptuous title, but actually a good science book about religion, least for explaining its presence in relation to our evolutionary history. You can see more about that over in the discussion archives at a philosophy page a buddy and I run called New Sophists’ Almanac, and if …

Last week’s poll is now closed with twelve votes. For the question, “If Gord were to write something about you, what would you want it to be?”, the winning option, with 25% of the votes, went to, “A simple, short, and beautiful poem.” The runner-up position was a foure-way tie between four other options. To see the results in more detail, please click here. And please remember to vote in the new poll, in the right sidebar. Which is about my busted finger.

spending hours together in the warmth of afternoons and never feeling like it’s quite long enough. how do people from such different worlds find their ways into one another’s lives? saw a good band live, tonight; two, actually: mine playing without me (they’re good that way) and a Seoul banmd called Zzam. got their CD; would link to them but can’t find a thing online. will try later. sorry for the short form.we’re socializing with the band and i’m being antisocial. also hard to type with this huge finge splint. ungh.

Hey, guys, I have a new poll done up but I am waiting for the tiebreaker vote on the last one. If you’ve not voted, please do: the poll’s down to the right in the sidebar. Come on, the next one is timely and funny.

You are a GRAMMAR GOD! If your mission in life is not already topreserve the English tongue, it should be.Congratulations and thank you! How grammatically sound are you? brought to you by Quizilla (Via a whole schwack of blogs I’ve seen of late…)

Jeff over at “Ruminations In Korea” has posted an article about a story that has been circulating among foreigners in Korea for the last little while, maybe a week or so. His post on the subject is ominously titled:Teacher Beats Student. Which is exactly what happened. You can see the video on his site, or at the Chosun Ilbo’s site where an article is also available. The short version is, an asshole teacher stood a girl up in class and told her off—I heard a rumor he was giving her hell for drinking coffee, of all things—and then he hit …

I got into two bike accidents yesterday, and only one was my fault. The one that wasn’t, though, turned out to be more injurious than I thought. This idiot pulled out into the traffic, deciding to merge as slowly as possible while I was barreling down the road (with, I may add, the right of way). Well, I braked and in a split second decision decided to brake so that I’d hit the ground instead of the car, for fear of broken glass and so on. I was thrown from the bike and landed on my left knee and right …