A month or so ago, I decided that I did not get enough regular exercise, so I started going out for walks regularly. At first, the distances were relatively short, but after a week or so, I decided to stretch them out so that each walk lasts about 2.5 hours and travels somewhere between 3 and 4 miles (I'm estimating on this one; I haven't actually measured the distance).
It's odd how it works - and it comes about really automatically. After a few weeks of doing this regularly ("regularly" meaning somewhere between three and five times a week) your legs get used to it in a very odd way: if you skip enough days in a row between walks, your legs almost beg you to go back out and walk. I'm still not entirely sure how it works; I've heard that the body can come to crave regular exercise, that exercise improves one's psychological state, and there are some theories that exercising may release endorphins, the same as doing something like eating chocolate. (And eating chocolate, of course, kind of cancels out the benefits of the exercise).
I've always been slightly ADHD (I suspect; it has never been diagnosed officially); I've always had a difficult time paying attention to something for more than a specific amount of time and I've always had trouble sitting still for longer than a certain period of time. The more that I walk, the more that this becomes a problem. And as a graduate student, the time that I spend in front of the computer is obviously quite a lot. But after an hour or two of sitting in front of the computer, I simply cannot take it anymore and I have to put on athletic shoes (or Crocs or sandals) and go out and walk a few miles. It's odd how it happens - I used to hike plenty and this never happened to me then.
Believe it or not, though, I find that I actually rather enjoy it.
Before anyone goes crazy on me, let me say this: I'm all for womens' lib. I am a woman, after all, how could I not be?
But I will admit: I am a woman who enjoys things like cooking and decorating. So sue me. When IKEA sent me (without my having asked for it) a 2009 catalog, I spent several hours looking at all the room set-ups and deciding what I liked and what I did not like. I'm all about bright colors and natural light; I never understood peoples' insistence on lighting rooms with dozens of fluorescent lights when you can simply open the windows - or even have windows. And then there are rooms which are decorated with all manner of furniture and rugs in very dark colors; burgundy and brown, and so on and so forth. I don't really understand that, either. Okay, it might pass for what one calls "classic" but it doesn't really make good use of whatever light the room gets - dark colors like this don't reflect light. Now, burgundy can still be a great color, if used in combination with walls that are bright and sun-splashed during the daylight hours. That, to me, is another kind of classic, mature look - albeit with an entirely different intent.
But these, of course, are just my opinions.
As for cooking, I think that this ought to be a skill required for both men and women. I don't think that it is anti-feminist at all to be able to cook. To declaim these elements of home life simply for the purpose of declaiming anything that might be associated with what is often called "traditional roles" is simply ridiculous. I used to experiment with all kinds of things in high school and college; I used to try and make shawarma and falafel on my own (the former came out better than the latter) and I used to try to mimic my mother's Latin American recipes that she grew up with. It's kind of fun to be able to say "see? I made this." Perhaps it's just another form of "creating." Perhaps both of these are.
Some would argue that it isn't smart for a graduate student to waste an entire day watching Harry Potter movies. Well, this is exactly what I did yesterday. Think that you can't watch three Harry Potter movies in one day? Oh yes, my dears, you most certainly can. Everyone needs a day off (or ten), right? And what could be more comfortable than relaxing under covers and just watching movies all day?
I went through Harry Potter 4 (Goblet of Fire), Harry Potter 2 (Chamber of Secrets) and Harry Potter 1 (Sorcerer's Stone) - in that order. For those doing the math, that is a minimum of about six hours of movies, if not more (some of the Harry Potter films are quite long). But what could be better than imagining oneself able to do magic? It's kind of like reading, except instead of taking in words and letting your imagination run, you're taking in images and letting your imagination run. For those who enjoy an occasional day of solitude and quiet (which can be a surprisingly restful thing), such a day might be what they might call a "mental health day." Not that everyone's job allows these - but there are always weekends.
And maybe some of it is a way to distract those of us quieter types from the fact that we are quieter types. It isn't really socially acceptable to have such a personality (at least, not in the United States) and in a way, it can be like living in some kind of underground subculture. And some of us spend much of our young years chasing after things that can be done quietly and alone. This doesn't mean that social interaction becomes taboo or looked down on; not at all. It is simply a way for those of us to be able to "recharge" as some call it.
I never know the names of the flowering plants that I see on the streets, on trees, and on peoples' balconies. I live in a country that seems nearly obsessed with using natural things as decorations (something which I admit that I love) and as such, I see a lot of different kinds of flowers all over the place...and I never know any of their names. I would keep plants in my own apartment, if there was any space in which they would get enough sunlight. The problem is that I know what I like, but I don't know the names of any of the different kinds of flowers - and especially not in a language which is not my own native language.
This afternoon, I was sitting with a friend on her rooftop as the sun was beginning to set. I turned around and saw an opening in a roof...kind of like a window but less formal and with no glass. Splayed across this "window" were some of the most beautiful flowers I had yet seen - which I had seen before and to this day still am not sure of the name. Someone once called something similar bouganvillea - pinkish-purple flowers that grow almost vine-like over walls and across windows.
I got out my camera and took a few shots of these across the window, half looking out on the city beyond. I have yet to attempt to edit them in Photoshop but when I saw the image, I knew that it just screamed to be photographed. It has this sort of old-world style charm and quiet; an indescribable quality which denotes peace and happiness (hippie-like, in a way, if you will). This is one of my favorite things about photography - the ability to take something that is very every-day and very normal and turn it into something else.
He's the least-known musician that you deserve to know. His name is Jonathan Coulton (and his website is Jonathan Coulton dot com) and he is a geek rocker.
Yes, a geek rocker. What does that mean, you ask? It means that he is a geek who makes music. And he has quite a following though he doesn't get a lot of publicity. But his following is what one might consider a subculture. They are mostly people who are geeks or nerds, often tech people or science fiction fans (or both) because he writes for them.
I'll give you an example of a geek rock song: "I'm Your Moon," in which one of recently-deplanet-ed Pluto's moons sings to the planet. Or how about "The Future Soon" in which he sings "'cause it's gonna be the future soon/and I won't always be this way/when the things that make me weak and strange/get engineered away." Or "Code Monkey" about the computer programmer who gets tired of being jerked around by his boss and just wants to live his own happy life. Or "Re: Your Brains" about the zombie who wants to make a zombie of his coworkers and attempts to convince them to be bitten.
It's underground, the culture of the most intelligent people that you never paid attention to. It's music that celebrates that segment of the population; one that is often ignored.
Jonathan Coulton often plays live with comedy music duo Paul & Storm (paul and storm dot com). I went to a show a few months ago, and had the time of my life. I was there until 1 AM helping them to clean up after the show and separate the stuffed animals from the money that had been attached to them and thrown from the stage.
