Longest night of the year

benighted, adj. 1. Overtaken by the darkness of the night; affected by the night (obs.). 2. a. fig. Involved in intellectual or moral darkness. b. Involved in obscurity. Obs.*


What is it about the solstice that makes me want to stay up all night watching the best Simpsons episode ever and organizing my books? Is it the fear of literal and figurative benightedness? (What a great word.) Or just a ritual to remind me of apartments past where this very same activity always dependably inaugurated my feeling finally at home?

What I love about this "new" apartment:
-bike room
-record player
-HELLO?! awesome roommate!
-ceiling fans
-quantity of empty jars and jars full of grains and pulses
-huge kitchen table study hall
-remote control bed
-um, ROOMMATE!
-location location location (not a joke)

*Is this some kind of lexicographer's inside joke? Oh, O.E.D.

Happy Solstice 2011, dear reader. What are you doing on the New Year?

This Is a Thing

Wow, wikipedia (and history), blowing my mind again:

Sumptuary laws (from Latin sumptuariae leges) are laws that attempt to regulate habits of consumption. Black's Law Dictionary defines them as "Laws made for the purpose of restraining luxury or extravagance, particularly against inordinate expenditures in the matter of apparel, food, furniture, etc.".^[1] Traditionally, they were laws that regulated and reinforced social hierarchies and morals through restrictions on clothing, food, and luxury expenditures. In most times and places they were ineffectual.^[2]

Throughout history, societies have used sumptuary laws for a variety of purposes. They attempted to regulate the balance of trade by limiting the market for expensive imported goods. They were also an easy way to identify social rank and privilege, and often were used for social discrimination.^[2]

This frequently meant preventing commoners from imitating the appearance of aristocrats, and sometimes also to stigmatize disfavored groups. In the Late Middle Ages sumptuary laws were instituted as a way for the nobility to cap the conspicuous consumption of the prosperous bourgeoisie of medieval cities, and they continued to be used for these purposes well into the 17th century.^[2]

I mean, for real? Apparently so.

Some Book Titles

Two memoirs, one for now, one for later:

The Puberty of My Career

and

The Premature and Tragic Ending of the Puberty of My Career

In bookstores soon.

VOLKSbühne!

What can I find to eat on a plane?

What I ate in the last 24 hours:

-a $4 bottle of fresh-squeezed grapefruit juice from JFK airport*
-crunchy airport apple
-oily chickpea airport salad
-large black airport tea
-mushy orzo and steamed vegetable "sweet and sour" slop on the airplane (one of the more disgusting vegan airplane meals in a while)
-brown airplane roll with margarine
-airplane fruit
-airplane salad greens
-breakfast airplane banana
-nature valley airplane breakfast granola bar
-airplane tea
-hotel coffee
-street falafel
-dinner ramen with vegs
-kimchee
-seaweed salad
-inordinate amount of midnight prezels (Brezels)
-1,5 liter bottle of water...my body begs for home.

*I didn't pay for it. The second time I've gotten a fancy drink as a result of a "clerical error" in my favor in the last week. I'm not giving it back.