It has almost been half a year since I have read anything literary. I realized that in this quasi-break of ours (after all, there are no classes and exams) I needed to catch up on my literature, even if by a little. I actually had a title in mind, and it was Solomon Grunsky Was Here by Mordecai Richler. It just popped out of my mind one morning while I was sauntering around, and that was also the morning where I visited a second-hand bookstore with a cheap but well-tended copy of the novel. Despite the length, I bought the book and started reading it a week ago.

Remember the yellow butterflies?

I am extremely glad that there are still people who read my new posts. They are most certainly not as frequent or constant as six months ago, but then again I wasn’t in medical school that time. Nevertheless, I promise to update (and this time, I will fulfill this) at least once a week. I have little ability in writing, and I feel that if I don’t use it I will lose it altogether. Medical school has been full of scientific and sequestered writing, and I feel that to retain this small creative edge I have to keep on writing, despite everything. I have made medical school my excuse, but if I only spent a little time everyday in cooking up a short post, I’m certain I will be able to have at least one post in a week. (more…)

I was never good at anatomy. I didn’t study for it when I was still in college (I didn’t study much of anything), but I do study for it now. I’m glad to have passed the past two exams on it, especially because the only books I had were a dated reviewer on anatomy, and a 1901 facsimile of Gray’s Anatomy. I also don’t like anatomy much because I feel that it’s so disorganized: it most probably is just a personal stance, but there’s just so many things one has to learn by rote and not analysis, like the where the muscle is under or over, or how it articulates, or what nerves connect to it. There are a lot of things one has to just know, and I don’t like that. Anatomy, especially, is most unlike chemistry and physics that way. There are no simple basic formulas: there are just lots and lots of stuff to identify and then relate. The difficulty of it is quite elevated, and I’m proud of the task of having passed two exams with just those books (and a lot of resourcefulness). I’m pretty elated right now, but I still have three more exams to take care of (comprehensive exams are next week).

As regards anime, I have seen two episodes of Hatsukoi Limited in the previous month, and I must say I was pretty impressed with how J.C. Staff animated the series. There are a few episodes to go, but it’s shaping up to be one of the better series I’ve seen.

While other post-graduates were busily preparing for what to bring the next day, I was on the computer looking at a red-and-black screen, dodging a missile at one point and ducking an alien at another. While they were excited to open a new chapter in their life, I was totally focused on vanquishing the ecclesiastico-military palette.

I was playing the Super Cobra (using the Adventure Vision BIOS) on the MESS and I sought to finish the game (by myself) without infinite Cobras to see whether the game would present an alternative ending or not. I was so besotted with the completion of the game because it would give me closure, a closure that I desperately needed to prove to myself that my lust for that failure of a handheld system was juvenile. I vowed to myself to finish it before classes would start primarily to prevent any distraction from my studies. While I had quite a few misgivings regarding medicine, I am a man who sticks by what he has chosen, and as I had chosen medicine I am going to stand by it (despite the fact that I barely slept yesterday and probably wouldn’t later). After about five days of persistence, I was finally able to finish the game with a limited number of Cobras and I also finally discovered that there was no difference in the ending whether one had infinite Cobras or not: the game kept on without end.

Having played as if demon-possessed for a few days, I could not help but notice the different flaws that the Adventure Vision system had. For one, it was very fragile: a short fall and the rotating mirror mechanism that allowed the game to proceed would break. There would be no more game, and no more system. Another flaw to its design was that it was primarily built with red LCDs. The VirtualBoy was merely an upgrade from this console: both have the same red LCDs that cause eye tiredness, headaches, nausea, and dizziness. Finally, the games other than Super Cobra have barely any replay value: the system possessed mediocre graphics at the time, and once one finished with Super Cobra there wasn’t really anything else left to do but to start all over again (or stop playing, which was what I did).

My finishing of the game came at the most opportune time, because after I completed it I could finally disassociate myself with the game and with the obsession that plagued me for a good few weeks. I could also finally focus studying for the medical profession that I have chosen; and while I am still not quite sure of the decision that I have made I am extremely certain on my commitment to my choice. I can only hope that I can surpass the obstacles that I am encountering currently and the even bigger ones that I will face in the future.

Thank you for everyone who has supported me throughout my stint of blogging. While I probably will not stop watching anime, and while I will probably still blog, it will most certainly be not in the same volume or length as before. Right now I have dealt with three-hour night sleeps: I will probably have to deal with worse.

As Samuel Beckett most aptly put it, ‘I can’t go on, I’ll go on.’

Other than the recent stub, I haven’t really been writing much: I have had to deal with more pressing matters, such as the choice that would dictate all my future endeavors. Writing was among the least of my priorities, if you catch my drift.

I have lately been reading, however, and within the past two weeks (barring my failure with Barthes‘ S/Z), I’ve finished reading Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy and a textbook on neuroanatomy. While more insights could be obtained from Jude the Obscure with most people (and it would also probably be more relevant to them) I rediscovered something in my choice of reading Neuroanatomy instead of other literary texts: in a statement, taste is simply incomprehensible. While I would like to have blown my horn and say that I did it in preparation for medical school (hyuk hyuk), the truth was that I purchased it and read it primarily because the cover appealed to me (it was purple). As most people say, don’t judge books by their cover. There is some truth, however, in that despite my utter lack of understanding with the content as I read the book, it has prepared me for the grueling task of reading a few hours everyday, something I would have to be very familiar with when medical school comes, and something that is currently alien to me (I haven’t exactly been an excellent student in university). For all the reading that I’ve done I could honestly say that I only understood about 10% of the book; and that may even be a gross overstatement. Despite that, at least I could also honestly say that it has somewhat contributed to me honing my patience and perseverance in reading more academic texts.

I think the same can be said with regard to my tastes in anime. I do think that Honey and Clover, Cowboy Bebop and Ocean Waves are great anime, and a lot of people would agree, but I also appreciate and like ToLoveRu, something that erudite and elevated individuals would dismiss as rubbish. I sometimes prognosticate wrongly, like what I did with Toradora (by comparing it to Honey and Clover). I can even bear finishing series like Gin-iro no Olynssis, and I think I’m among the few people who did. It’s ultimately puerile and stupid, not to mention hypocritical trying to comprehend the tastes of others; yet I admit I am sometimes that. Biases just inherently exist within us, I guess, and Roland Barthes explained (in the twenty pages I’ve attempted to understand in S/Z) why subjectivity and objectivity don’t really exist for the most part in reading, or in the appreciation of media: the I who reads (or watches, or listens) is himself a compendium of texts (or music, or video, or movies, or anime). How he perceives a text is grounded in the texts that he has encountered before. Furthermore, reading (or any appreciation of media), isn’t actually a parasitic act. We also write something as we read it. This is why no two texts are appreciated by the same way with different persons. My reading of the neuroanatomy text was merely to complete what I’ve started and simply was due to an irrational impulse; to an aspiring neuroanatomist, however, the text may be a godsend. The difference in appreciation is among what ultimately makes us human.

Introduction

Ever since I started reading about and experimenting on file-sharing programs, I have had this quixotic fondness of it. Ultimately, I know that it’s not with the program itself but its userbase that provides the files, but that doesn’t stop me from experimenting with the different programs and their corresponding gimmickries: I have mulled over and studied different instances and permutations of file-sharing programs over the past week. After finally completing all the requirements prior to graduation, I have once again found the study of its different programs interesting and consuming. (I still watch anime, but the bulk of my time was spent attempting to scientifically observe the different properties of different file-sharing programs.) (more…)

I honestly never put much stock in Murphy’s law because I always sought to be the ‘true optimist’ in Sartre’s words. In his seminal essay ‘Existentialism is a Humanism’ Sartre describes the true optimist to be the ultimate pessimist. Man can rely on and must rely on nothing else except himself. He must not find fate, God, or others to blame, because ultimately it is only he, and not these others, who can do anything about it. This is not to say that I’m perennially happy, but Sartre’s existentialist viewpoint has helped me put things into perspective. His existentialism is not the Gurren Lagann type of existentialism: he recognizes that we are situated in this world and we are all, as humans, characterized into a human condition. As humans, we are limited; we must, however, rely on no one but ourselves as we explore and develop within the world.

I had some time to, so ...

The key to understanding this episode is through its title. At first it may initially seem nonsensical, but Mercury retrograding is very relevant, especially in astrology. It is true that astrology is not a science; however, it is also true that astrology was utilized for thousands of years to explain human behavior and natural occurrences.

And the ball drops.

The Sound and the Fury, written by William Faulkner, is universally acclaimed to be one of the best novels ever written by an American. It’s also recognized to be one of the best books of the twentieth century. Its intricate construction and its well-written streams of consciousness underlie a tragedy so total and so complete because the Compson members are unable and unwilling to love one another. From the man-child Benjy, to the selfish Jason, the family is torn from within because they remain inflexible in the face of cataclysmic change. Each of the featured characters end up tragic in their own unique way; it is arguable, however, that the least sympathetic tragedy among them was Jason’s. His tragedy, compared to Quentin’s and Benjy’s isn’t a moral tragedy: the novel itself suggests that Jason is extremely amoral and immoral, that he cannot love beyond a miserly notion for money. His tragedy was the most physical as compared to the torturous mental disintegration of Quentin and Benjy’s permanent entrapment into the mind of a retard. His was a tragedy he himself could rectify. Ultimately, his tragedy was that of an utter resistance to empathy and positive change.

This was the original film poster.

Well, I haven’t updated in quite some time (again). Reasons for this are multitudinous: I have once again returned to reading; I watched some movies; I watched well-written serial dramas; I met with my friends; and finally, I finished watching ToLoveRu (yes, I watched until the end of the 26th episode).

I'm sure you're all looking like this right now.