Back to School

This week's poem is more famous, yet for some reason I never knew there was more to it than the two lines about the tired and poor. It's The New Colossus, written by Emma Lazarus and emblazoned on the plaque of the Statue of Liberty. I mean, how could I have missed, "Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" That is such an American thing to say... even if we do seem to not want the tired and poor anymore. And with Google, I got to learn even more about this sonnet that I must have skipped in school.

It's a four-letter word

I've decided it's time to get serious about one of my New Year's Resolutions. I mentioned earlier that I was making acceptable progress, but since then I have been stuck. The up-side is that I'm not gaining. However, I'm not losing like I want to either.

That means it's time to make some *real* sacrifices. For the month of March, I am going to cut way back on going out for lunch and eat homemade meals. This will be difficult because a big part of my personal stress-management is being able to laugh and talk with coworkers at lunch while away from the office. So I'm going to try and just go home so that I will still be away from the office, but I won't have as much social interaction. Of course, I won't have the temptation to eat lots of bad food either.

So three and a half more weeks to go. We'll see how far that gets me before I decide if I can give up the sacrifice, or get even more brutal with myself.

I need a vacation

And to second that thought, this week's poem is John Keats : Sonnet VII, where we are taken away from the hustle and bustle of city life to the great outdoors and are reminded that the human spirit is renewed and reconnected best when out in nature.

Update: Lern 2 spellll... doh

Post-a-week Project

I have decided what I will start "journaling" about, to mimic my sister's photo-a-day efforts. As I mentioned I already knew that doing something every day would almost certainly ensure failure, so I planned to post once a week. At first I thought I would just do a full movie review per week, but I'll be watching movies anyway so that doesn't really stretch myself. Then I thought about something more along the "creative" side of myself, like doing a sketch, drawing, or painting a week. This was putting the pendulum back on the "too hard" side again. I haven't been drawing much lately, and although I think this might be a worthy goal for next year, I'm just not there yet. Finally, I figured out something that not only allows me to post on the blog once a week, but also gives me a good excuse to keep up with my reading of Americans' Favorite Poems, which I received as a gift two years ago.

So the plan is to pick my favorite poem of the week and add some of my thoughts, reactions, what-not. And I'll go ahead and kick-off the project with one of my favorite poems of all time, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.

This is a long one, and there are so many different sections that really resonate with me. Even though most of the obvious theme about social life I can't directly relate to since I'm not a "party" person, there is an under-current of self-doubt and fear that I still struggle with from time to time. As you may guess, this poem was first discovered by me in high school, in the middle of adolescent angst, where questions of "Do I dare?" seemed to haunt me all the time. And now looking back as I am older, I am satisfied that I did bite the matter off with a smile, and it was worth it after all. So let us go then, you and I, and listen to the mermaids sing.

What'cha watching?

By the way, you may have noticed that I haven't posted a movie review in awhile. This is because I haven't watched anything memorable lately, as well as the fact that I've been ensnared in TV-land. In addition to keeping up-to-date on Heroes, Justin and I have caught up on House, Boston Legal, and are almost there with Numb3rs. I am really enjoying the last, not only because it shows one of my early loves in a good light (mathematics), but it also has a nice balance of drama, comedy, suspense, education, and character development. I am very glad that it hasn't gone too "soap opera" yet -- the characters get their short moments, but they don't dominate the episode plot-lines. And how can you look down on an entertainment medium that teaches about the uses of graphs, equations, data collection and more!

Inspired by the younger generation

Okay, so my sister isn't exactly an entire generation younger than I am, but she definitely has that youthful attitude that often inspires me. Lately, she's started her own blog that I'm thinking about completely ripping-off: Sandra's photo journal. I mean, how cool is it to have an excuse to use your camera all the time? I don't know.... I don't want to be the copy-cat. So I am trying to think of something else that I could post on a semi-regular basis. My hope is to have it planned out by the time I'm due for my second post-of-the-month here.

Night sleeper

We watched The Night Listener last night. I'm rating it a 4, because it was just plain boring. The story felt like it belonged in an hour episode of the Twilight Zone and not a full-length movie. Plus, there were several story elements that just felt "shallow" -- like they'd plant a friend here and there, but you'd never learn much about their personalities or anything. Not one of Robin Williams' best, to be sure.