12 November 2004
radiators and broadband
moving up in the world, now I can wash dishes in hot water and stay online for more than 10 minutes. I have also putatively joined a...jazz band: myself on oboe, a saxophonist and a mandolin player. It's really not gonna sound pleasant is it? There's a good reason why 'jazz oboe' never really took off I think. Still, various parties are trying to convince me that I should stop being so down on jazz all the time, and what better way to change my mind than getting me to play some. Unfortunately, all my musical training was at the most pompous level of classicality (choir, orchestra and oboe lessons at Trinity College), so not sure I'm really gonna be able to 'swing it' with much ease ('but what's the time signature?', 'what key are we in?', 'this doesn't sound like Bach' etc. etc.). Oh well, it'll be the others who suffermost (it's much better as one word).
Reading groups are really the new getting drunk, at least as far as infinite thought is concerned. Have been to one already this week, on Lacan, women and God. Tomorrow sees a four-hour group discussion of Althusser's 'Contradiction and over-determination', plus Schelling on human freedom next Tuesday (it's like Oprah's reading club, but with more men).
Am losing my ability to hate, which is unfortunate. Have a strong desire to be affectionate all the time, sort of like a lobotomised kitten. But k-punk has a proper argument about why affection is deemed to be 'obscene' in the age of 'quickies' and self-promotion, and I think he's quite right.
