another weekend

The weeks are truly flying by. There is something about how our week is structured that lends itself to such flying, a very busy monday through wednesday, and then an easing through until the weekend.

this weekend in the city has been wonderful, lots of exploring, trying of new things, and even..shopping? well for like shampoo and stuff, so i guess that doesn't count. The store where i got shampoo gave me all of these little like fragrance samples that smell really weird, although one of them actually smells kind of good. this afternoon i went to a park i hadn't gone to explore and took some lunch there. very crazy statues with shrubbery grown around them but then carved away.

i'm starting to think about spring break plans, and in a whirlwind of investigation this morning i debated a number of things...sicily to tunisia to the southern tip of italy? rome to istanbul? rome to berlin to amsterdam? rome to amsterdam to florence? rome to marseille?? sicily to malta to sardinia? ATHENS? athens then the greek isles?

we go to sicily very soon for a week long field trip. the other day i learned about wine and was able to tell (before i was told) that there was a hint of vanilla in the white wine that we tried. i really like vanilla, and as a result i was probably too tipsy for dinner.

tomorrow is another monday!

my band has released our cd on oberlin campus, sorta like a little pre-release.

to end with an interesting little tidbit from a roman historian:

I mention this for the sake of the improvement of the readers of this history. For there are two ways by which all men can reform themselves, the one through their own mischances, the other through those of others, and of these the former is the more effective, but the latter less hurtful. Therefore we should never choose the first method if we can help it, as it corrects by means of great pain and peril, but ever pursue the other, since by it we can discern what is best without suffering hurt. Reflecting on this we should regard as the best discipline for actual life the experience that develops from serious history; for this alone makes us, without inflicting any harm on us, the most competent judges of what is best at every time and in every circumstance. Well, on this subject I have said enough.

pretty much saying....look: when something horrible or unexpected happens to you, you have the opportunity to learn a good lesson and change in some way for the better. this way of changing is fairly dramatic, as something has just happened to YOU. another opportunity is given by studying what happens to other people (through history). he says you never choose the first way of change (because you can't choose to have something horrible and unexpected happen to you), but we can choose to learn through studying history, and this is a safe and unharmful way to improve yourself.

not sure how i feel about that, but i thought it was pretty interesting.

gabe