I find it suspicious that the earlier I go to bed, the more time my body decides it needs for sleep. 11 hours? Baffling.

I finished my Avant-Garde readings yesterday, so I'm doing pretty well on the workload. Perloff is an interesting read. Part of her thesis is that dissemination of "the image" in advertising and via media outlets has influenced trends in poetry, altering it greatly at the levels of form and syntax.

I might take it easy today. Tonight I'm checking out Panic at Funhaus with Ehch - good music, plus MOZFEST, a whole room apparently devoted to the Smiths and Morrissey. Should be cool. Yesterday I watched The Matrix Revolutions, which still has some of the most amazing special effects I've ever seen. The film gets trashed mercilessly but it looks incredible. I'm about a third of the way through X-Files Season Three and the episodes are getting quite good, even the ones that aren't part of the mytharc.

Andrea and I spent a couple of hours online last night trading music back and forth. I learned a thing or two about her.

I went to campus yesterday and to return a DVD and read M. H. Abrams' article on critical artistic theories for my Tragedy course. I've discovered the trick to finding a good location to sit and study in Robarts. On the upper floors there are certain desks wedged in the corners with their chair backs facing windows. It's like cutting yourself off completely from the rest of the library and having a view to boot. The trouble is that others know about the desks, so you have to be crafty and get there early or be patient in the hunt.

I eventually completed the 2-4 page response paper on Abrams and realized that I'd read that Shakespeare play a week early by accident. At least it's out of the way. Today is the day I have stuffed with classes, so I'll be looking forward to getting home.

Last night I watched what used to be my favorite episode of the X-Files, D.P.O. (or as I referred to it, Lightning Boy). Giovanni Ribisi plays a mentally ill redneck teenage kid who can channel lightning. Jack Black plays his friend Zero who works at an arcade. It's interesting to see him young and playing a more dramatic role.

Andrea arrives back in Canada today, and I'll get to see her briefly when I meet her at the airport and escort her to a shuttle that's taking her home to London. She sent me a Facebook message indicating that she's been setting off alarms at airports, so all that hinges on what security decides to do with her. Regardless, I can't wait to see her.

Yesterday I went to campus and had my best intentions cut in half by the U of T bookstore, which is still out of a book I need, and by forgetting a voided cheque for my OSAP installment. I did manage to read Shakespeare's Coriolanus and Aristotle's Poetics before heading home. As if an entire play and a book of philosophy weren't enough for one class, I still have to read a critical essay and Aeschylus's Prometheus Bound and write a response paper. Today I'm focusing on the Avant-Garde material. I'm starting to realize how lucky I am to have five free days to work on assignments.

I walked home from Keele Station and made some vegetarian chili for dinner before breaking into season three of The X-Files. After writing up some bibliographic annotations for Shakespeare and Aristotle, I watched Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, which unlike my recent reviewing of Episode I was NOT such a pleasing experience. The movie was worse than I remember. It doesn't feel as organic as the first film because it's so entirely digitized. You can practically see the actors moving around on the sound stage, talking to themselves. I don't care that the film is overly political. The romantic scenes are painful to sit through due to the lacklustre dialogue, and Anakin and Padme's relationship feels completely forced. More politics, please.

I've started taking Cold-FX for this cough, based on a recommendation from Kevin Smith in a diary entry he wrote in My Boring-Ass Life. Apparently it's the cold medicine Canadian swear by. It's a three-day process (9 pills the first day, 6 on the second and 3 on the third), so it's just a matter of popping them and waiting.

Bibliography went down in the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library today, an intimidating, dimly-lit, closely-monitored tower that forms the head of the Robarts peacock, where we were given a look at incredibly old books and scrolls. I don't find any of it THAT interesting, but it's unequivocally neat to see anything that's been around for such a long time. I found out that the guys in my group for the annotation exercise both play bass, and one of them plays in the band Malfunktion (it seems as though everyone I've met at U of T is in a band). They were talking equipment and I couldn't even remember what make of bass I own (it's a vintage 'M' series Stagg). Honestly, I've never been interested in that side of playing an instrument. I'm much more concerned with the theatrics of any kind of performance than the specificity of the technical side. Guess that doesn't make me much of a musician. I never claimed to be.

After class I went by Media Commons to find out if I could transfer my VHS copy of Touch of Evil to DVD, and they referred me to the media centre after much hmming and hawing and not agreeing with the principle of what I want to do. Right. I'll figure out a way. I've got a torrent downloading very slowly that may provide me with the footage I need. My goal for my final project is to make comparison clips of the previous cut and the re-edit done by Murch to show exactly what changes were made and how dramatic they are. Could be great if I can pull it off.

When I got home I watched The Truman Show and lounged around being unproductive. I listened to a very good SModcast about Bryan Johnson's chemical imbalance and anxiety - a lot of the stuff he said rang true both of the way I act and the way people I've known have acted. It's beyond interesting to me to hear three intelligent guys sit around talking about that sort of subject matter, especially when one of the guys is Kevin Smith. I know I've mentioned the show before. If you're interested in checking it out, go here.

A date has been set for the new X-Files movie: July 25th of next year. I'm going to line up on Monday.

I started reading "Notes from the Hyena's Belly: An Ethiopian Boyhood" by Nega Mezlekia and I'm about 50 pages in, so I suppose today wasn't completely unproductive. I've made a schedule for myself that stretches into next week and lines up what I want/need to accomplish, starting tomorrow. Here's to hoping I can keep up.

I read a fascinating article by George P. Landow today on the implications of hypertext on electronic publishing - a refreshing change after slogging through Kristeva and Greene. It seems to me that the difference between the reader of a physical text and the reader of a virtual one is activity - to use Landow's language, the hypertext reader is active. He/she is able to engage with the text on levels that far surpass in interactivity their engagement with a physical text, via numerous practices of linking. However, it's up to the reader to take advantage of these practices.

Vannevar Bush came up with the idea for the Memex system and predicted the existence of Wikipedia over sixty years ago: "wholly new forms of encyclopedias will appear, ready-made with a mesh of associative trails running through them, ready to be dropped into the memex and there amplified." I find the idea of the dynamic online text very interesting. When I ask people about reading books on their computers, the answer is always similar: they'd rather hold a book in their hands. I think what they're really talking about is more associative. People spend hours at their computers every day: reading, making trails, absorbing information. But when it comes to the idea of reading a novel, they dissociate it from the computer, itself a signifier of open-ended information, a wellspring far too large and seemingly infinite to comprehend actually finishing a text. When we read online, we do so to learn, which is a continual process. We don't regard a novel in such a way. A novel is physically finite and armed with a beginning that proceeds to an end, regardless of our poststructural interpretations.

I have a feeling that this society will evolve to become increasingly active in their engagement with texts of all sorts. Landow makes the argument that books presented the same kind of technological impact when the printing press made documents available on a mass scale, and hypertext is no different. Eventually we're going to see texts existing in a completely dynamic state. There will be no such thing as a novel without visual and theoretical aid, without the option to access parallel studies, contexts and critical opinions including those of our own. We'll be able to build bridges between all texts and immerse literature so far into the intertextual that the notion of authority will completely break apart. The implications are astounding. It's just a matter of how it will be marketed.

I bought a copy of Beetlejuice at the grocery store today and watched it along with some X-Files over dinner. I'm almost finished with Season 2 and it's featured half of the members of Hard Core Logo in roles (half the fun of watching a US series filmed up north are the familiar faces that pop up). I also finished putting together Andrea's present, but given that she reads this page I won't divulge its contents (patience cookie).

Bywords sent me a check for a poem of mine they published in their Quarterly Journal. It's the first time I've ever made money off of my writing. $5. I'm thinking I might frame it.

Well, I figure the written part of my grant application is about 85% done. I just need Kathryn's information for the personnel list before I go over everything else with a fine tooth comb, and then I'll work on supplementary materials.

My OSAP finally kicked in today, the day after I emailed the financial aid office about its whereabouts (of course). I'm still waiting on my new driver's license, my new VISA, my Future Shop credit card statement, and Pixie's CD in the mail.

I started looking into travel fares and passport information online today. It looks like I'll be able to visit Andrea in Berlin over the winter holiday. It's definitely something to look forward to, as I miss my girlfriend, and I've never been to Europe. I've only been out of Canada once and went as far south as Manhattan. But I want to make sure I've got my cards and such in order before I start buying plane tickets. It's exciting to think about, nonetheless.

Today I watched Million Dollar Baby, another of Jay's movies I'd never seen. I have to hand it to Eastwood, Freeman and especially Hilary Swank for playing incredible roles. It's an emotional story with a seemingly very simple execution, but the way it's lit speaks volumes for what actually happens on screen. I tend to enjoy boxing movies, as it is. Boxing is a healthy metaphor, though I don't watch the sport myself. MacLennan uses it in "Each Man's Son" to great effect.

I finally finished watching my X-Files Season One boxset, and the season finale was great; it made me want to pick up the second season. All of the Mytharc episodes are solid. The series is weak early on when it deals in offshoot stories about idiot savants and Mennonite cults and woodland creatures with no effects budget.

I really need to download a copy of Touch of Evil, or find out how to rip it to my hard drive. I want to capture clips for presentations. It's embarrassing that I have a diploma in Multimedia Design and can't even rip a DVD successfully.

I was watching Star Wars (that's Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope for anyone born after 1989) today. It's a movie I've seen many times, and I couldn't really provide you with a cohesive description of its plot, but that makes it great for repeat viewings. I paid close attention this time around to the final assault on the Death Star, and finally understood that one of the pilots who accompanies Luke is an old friend of his from Tatooine. He's one of the last three pilots including Luke, and he's the last member of the Rebellion to bite it in the film. The other pilot is of course Wedge, who is in all three films and delivers an ass-whooping time and again WITHOUT the Force and really without assistance from anyone. He evens saves Luke's ass in the final assault, when Luke's old "buddy" is SUPPOSED to, but is nowhere to be found. Now, Wedge is hit by enemy fire and has to pull out of the trench. But he's the only member of the Rebellion besides Luke, Han and Chewie to survive the attack. So why isn't he at the fucking awards ceremony with the others when the film comes to a close? What, they couldn't have moved one of the extras they hired as a token elder senator out of the frame to clear a space? I mean, it's not like he even had to walk IN with the main characters. Lucas could have placed him already standing off to the side, with a tinier, SILVER medal, just to show that he'd already been honoured for his dedication. Bottom line, Wedge saved Luke's ASS, and that grand hall would be a floating assemblage of Yavin IV bits and pieces complete with digitally added explosion halo if it weren't for him. Respect Wedge.

Anyway, I've obviously been taking it easy today. I picked up some more clothing at the Village, and started into the meat and potatoes of Whylah Falls, which is incredibly beautiful, reading as if Ondaatje had written James Baldwin in stanzas. I'm nearly halfway through Generica as well, and it's holding my interest. I also listened to the latest SModcast, continued my online Scrabble losing streak, and watched some first season X-Files (some of those really early episodes are painful to sit through; as big of a fan as I was of the show, it really didn't hit its stride until a few seasons in).

I picked up tickets to see the Hives next month, and I'm taking Matt as his birthday present. Toronto has far too many good shows going on at the same time. It's completely overwhelming. I'm almost thankful that most of the shows are out of my price range (I'm not paying $37.50 to see the Kaiser Chiefs unless they somehow morph into Catherine Wheel partway through their set).

And I started writing again, a story I had only begun scratching at a couple of weeks ago. I had an idea, opened up Word, wrote it down until it was fleshed out enough, saved it and closed it up. 333 words without driving myself crazy. It's a good sign, and I wager last night's ramble definitely helped.