Recent Reading: Music: A Very Short Introduction

One of the benefits of using public transport intensely is the opportunity to read copiously. I do not own an iPod or similar device, and therefore cannot descend into that form of solipsism while navigating the Bay. I bought Music: A Very Short Introduction, by Nicholas Cook, in Berkeley on Saturday at University Press Books after much debate between it and its fellow books in the same series. All of them possessed the advantage of convenient portability (which is one of the flaws of newspapers I have never understood). I decided that I would read up later on Kantian philosophy and Freudian psychoanalysis.

Cook's writing is clear and concise, but I doubt anyone who has never learned or forgotten how to read for information could quickly absorb much of it. The Introduction was more oriented towards an understanding the underlying philosophies of musical practice and language rather than musical history, which has its own formidable challenges. Cook seems to be trying to educate the reader how to think about music without allowing the very same reader to fall squarely and finally into orthodox thinking about music. This is a difficult task, and Cook succeeds at the price of some cognitive dissonance. Music: A Very Short Introduction is a dense, thought-provoking libellum, and well worth the time of the intellectual who is not a music major.

Training for the Mister Babel Competition

My strength has always been languages, ancient or modern (although I did drop and run from the Russian orals), but it took me a while to formulate the most effective plan for acquiring new ones and resuscitating old ones. Ever since I went into business with Aidan, I've thought that I needed to learn Spanish as a business skill (he certainly won't), but was too preoccupied with amending my dearth of business courses.

When I was a little kid at Cathedral, I did learn some Spanish, albeit in a disorganized fashion, but when I received a choice, I chose to take French instead; in those days, not everywhere offered Chinese. I have forgotten much.

Some of you may have noticed my abortive attempts to jump start language acquisition. This was the case before I got a new public library card and discovered the foreign language CDs. I concede that these might not be the highest-rated programs, but I can't justify the expense of buying the more extensive programs such as Rosetta.

So here's the plan as it stands: I will learn to speak Spanish as a business skill, at a micro and macro business level. I will learn to speak Mandarin Chinese, because China is one of the big economies, and it might be useful in Berkeley and San Francisco. I have studied some Sanskrit, but learning Hindi, while potentially fun, is not a priority since Indians who are businessmen (no, teledrones don't count) already speak English, and frequently do so better than some of the riff-raff littering American cities. So what's language Number 3? That would be Russian - one of the sources of labor at Tahoe; last summer I surprised one of our Russian employees by spelling her name in Cyrillic! French, sadly, does not pass the expediency test, since I also need to review my Latin and Greek.

A Thursday In Late November

What a strange world I live in! This Thursday I went over to Berkeley. Bruce had asked me to reformat a list of Eagle Court speakers, so I had my laptop with me. I set to, but soon discovered to my dismay that the list did not start at 1990, as I had supposed, but in 1984! I noticed a strong pattern of two relatives presenting the Oath and Charge - in one case, there were three brothers sharing one of the presentations! I did some Christmas shopping with Amy - super-bargain-hunting, of course - and then we took a pleasant walk across the Berkeley campus.

I attended a panel at the Commonwealth Club on the issue of privacy in modern society, especially online, a topic on which Amy had expressed no interest. But then, my parents have quite different interests. The panel included representatives of civil liberties, law enforcement, Google, and Facebook. The anecdotes and concerns ran the gamut, from the stupidity of the self-incriminating to the surprisingly nuanced definition of privacy among social network users.

Then Amy returned. We the Geary, which is indeed "dirty-eight" - I was glad that Amy did have to endure the sight of some of the undesirable elements. Such disdain and distrust may arise not so much from elitism as from the male's urge to protect his woman (a natural feeling, even if it appears sexist in this age). We went to a Chinese bible study on Euclid. The park there looks so decievingly flat on Google Maps! The Bible study seemed fairly mellow, but we were at a disadvantage because they were using a book and were halfway through it. I was the only "English" there.

The Weekend

After a rather dull Friday, more notable for my contemplation of the Great San Francisco Bay Oil Spill rather than any particular work I accomplished. Mom and I went to ACT to see The Rainmaker, of which I had a vague memories due to a hazily remembered movie verison of the broadway version of the play. The performance was wonderful and piercing, ddep thoughts expressed in vivid language.



On Saturday, I had the first half of Scouting for Food, in which the Scouts hang the bags on the doors. This year, however, the bags had been replaced by door hangers in an attempt to reduce litter. The sky was beginning to cloud over. The cubs, a chief component of this outing, arrived late, and too few of our own were in attendance. I would have preferred to go with one of the Scout groups rather than sitting at Broadway and Lyon, but I accepted my role.



After the Closing Circle, I returned to Maple Street and Mom and I rushed over to Berkeley to see the CCA (California Classical Association) performance of Argonautika written by Mary Zimmerman. I found it remarkable how different yet equally true interpretations of a character such as Jason could be. There were occassional moments of pretentiousness. Theorizing in drama should be in character, and I found the zodiacal interpretation awkwardly presented. It also occurred to me that the figure of St Christopher may have more to do with Jason bearing Hera than the grim chthonic ferryman Charon.


Once the curtain had fallen, the rain had increased greatly. I went over to Another Change of Hobbit and picked up the copy of Donaldson's Fatal Revenant. Then I read it as I awaited the return of my beautiful Amy, for I had foolishly left my key in San Francisco. Initially, my plan was to got a certain restaurant along Shattuck, but Amy persuaded that she was tired and that I ought to get some food to eat in. So trudged through the rain and acquired the comestibles. She returned and we had dinner together.



This Sunday, Rod Dugliss spoke at St James on the state and office of the diaconate, to which I remember his appointment, Later, there was a sale of goods and trinkets to benefit Palestinian Christians, and I attended the last Via Media discussion, which was on mission (although not quite what Amy would mean by 'mission'). When I went to Kaju for coffee, Seiko was harried and Lindsey Berkovich was there with her husband.

A Berkeley Weekend

Saturday, I went over to Berkeley for two reasons: to help Zhang Han (aka Ashley) with her memorizing of botanical terms and to discover whether a Little Change of Hobbit had copies of Naomi Kritzer's latest and Donaldson's Fatal Revenant (the latest in the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant). Since the appointment with Ashley was not entirely expected, I had to lug my reference books with me as well as my laptop. A parade in Chinatown thwarted my journey on the 1 California, and I temporarily thought I had lost my bus pass. I walked down to the BART station, and later found my bus pass.

When I got to Berkeley, I met with Ashley at the McDonald's on Shattuck and University. It is always difficult to explain the case and gender endings to an English-speaker, and more so to a Chinese-speaker. I visited A Little Change of Hobbit and somehow failed to forget the title of the books as I entered, as I have done consistently previously. My budget and temporary dearth of a credit card, however, prevented me from acquiring the book immediately.

Then I went to Amy's apartment and worked on prepping Chapter 6 for Ashley and ate Amy's delicious tangerines. I cooked dumplings and had dinner with Amy.


On Sunday, I returned to Berkeley, but first I evacuated Puff, whom I had been dog-sitting, and attended the service at St James. The attendance was scant because many people were at the parish retreat. Mother Mary Moore was likewise absent, although she had left because her sister in Virginia had died.

I returned to Berkeley with my laptop and headed to Amy's apartment. I recovered some of my lost sleep from yesterday's long adventure by taking a nap on Amy's bed. I still, however, had plenty of time to use my laptop for various catchups. When Amy returned from worship practice, we ended up taking Alberta for a bath. We also went to dinner with Kao Chi (aka Lydia) and Wang Beibei (sp?), a visiting scholar from China. We ate at the 168 Restaurant, which serves Taiwanese cuisine.