Tilting at Windmills

At this point they came in sight of thirty, forty windmills that there are on plain, and as soon as Don Quixote saw them he said to his squire, "Fortune is arranging matters for us better than we could have shaped our desires ourselves, for look there, friend Sancho Panza, where thirty or more monstrous giants present themselves, all of whom I mean to engage in battle and slay, and with whose spoils we shall begin to make our fortunes; for this is righteous warfare, and it is God's good service to sweep so evil a breed from off the face of the earth."

--Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote (Ch. 8)

What a calling, to be both crazy and to work to restore a golden age; to restore a sense of peace and happiness to the world...er through battle (of course in this case it happens to be windmills). Of course the word restoration may be too far-fetched as I cannot recall such an age in human history. A little help?

Perhaps that last bit came across as a wee bit of a downer. I just really enjoy Vonnegut's take on life, and I think that the word "used" is usually based in a negative sense, so to see it here as he describes it is a bit different. I recently read a charity book that Vonnegut did for NPR called "God Bless you Dr. Kevorkian" which is a quick book of shorts compiled from bits on NPR where he undergoes supervised near-death and interviews people from just outside the "pearly gates;" the subjects are diverse and include John Brown, Mary Shelley and Newton (and a few more). The cover shows his cartoon self on a gurney smoking a cigarette. I can't help but enjoy the dark sense of humor and commentary that it provides. I mean, c'mon, this is a man who has been saying he's going to sue the cigarette companies because he's been smoking for decades and the cigarettes haven't killed him yet (thank goodness).

"The worst thing that could happen to anybody, would be to not be used for anything by anybody."
-- Kurt Vonnegut

Working the corner has a whole new meaning...

I'm sure that this phenomena is not exclusive to where I live...however, I imagine, or at least I hope that it is not undertaken in less climate friendly areas....But I've noticed over the past few weeks that the favored mode of outdoor advertising is people dancing with signs on the street corners. It's really quite disturbing to me. I bike past them and wonder how they can stand there twisting a sign around loking like they care about the content, which is usually somthing like "senior housing" or "new apartments" and the sign is in the shape of an arrow. I can't even figure out what they're pointing at...and I know that if it was me, I would stand on the wrong corner with the arrow pointing the wrong way just to piss people off.

Too much Potter on the brain

I was watching Joe study for his weekly exam and thought to myself how wondrous it would be to study for tests with the aid of a pensieve :)
(Image courtesy of OOTP, JK Rowling)