why trail mix has nuts, or, death on the bove

Man that's an awesome title. Seriously, doesn't that just fill you with anticipation for the entry to come, the shocking and awesome exposition to such a tantalizing glimpse? Oh, believe me, it'll be all that and more. I mean, we're talking parenthetical-remark-apalooza 2005 here. Unfortunately, it'll be quite lengthy, and loaded with Peircean analysis, so I expect few to hang on the entire ride, but ah, what awaits the dedicated.

I've been ridiculously yellow lately (see, warned you), which kind of annoys me; I pride myself on being a bluish green, and am far more willing to flip purple than slide yellow. (In fact, my own quantum-mechanically simultaneous green-purple duality led me to stubbornly assert the existence of subtractive blue in the face of denial by Dr. Manning himself; green-purple grey doesn't seem to adequately describe the blending.) Nothing personal to Uffish or Geneva, of course; while I may only grudgingly accept the yellowness inherent to moving to a new city, yellow hope is probably, in fact, precisely what I need right now.

In fact, I've been all over the triangle lately, having purchased Age of Empires 2 Gold; while it's clearly escaping from reality, and I focus on economy and technology until combat is largely an afterthought, my trash talk alone makes it blood red. "Okay, Cortez, I'm here to steal 20 horses. Now, I have that number both of arbalests and champions outside your gate, and unless I get those horses, one of these arbalests is putting an arrow right in your eye. And we're talking hardcore Aztec-style poison-tipped arrows. You don't even want to hear what I do with my trebuchets." Speaking of Cortez, it's really quite amazingly educational. I highly recommend it for those of you with inordinate restraint or free time.

Anyway. Life's been grand, as expected any time I can get up at two in the afternoon, have leftover Indian, walk up to the Wilkinson Center, spend the day on my laptop, and have some pizza delivered before hitting the sack as the sun rises, so long as my full coffer and empty sense of social responsibility sustain such a lifestyle. I had anticipated far greater urgency in the former than the latter, but while my constant traveling companions apathy and complacency have remained true, a vexatious lassitude of body and mind has come upon me, and in hopes of bursting both my bonds in sunder, I embarked for Y Mountain Saturday afternoon, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith and The Essential Jung in hand.

It was delightful walking through the neighborhoods south of campus, of course, and the elements seemed nicely tepefied. (No, seriously, it's totally a real word; I found it in a dictionary the other day playing Upwords. Try it in a Strong Mad voice. You'll find yourself saying "tepefy" often and liking it. It's even cooler in Latin: tepefacere. Oh, speaking of jaw-droppingly wonderful linguistics, check out this history of "ing".) Unfortunately, having been decieved by Daylight Savings Time, I embarked not as the sun dwindled but as it climaxed.

Furthermore, the walk to the trailhead is even farther from my apartment than from Heritage, which, while by no means insurmountable in and of itself, left me quite weary before even starting the hike proper, in combination with the heat, the altitude, and the blood blister growing steadily more irate on the ball of my left foot. Starting up the mountain, I found that my breakfast of chocolate left such exhaustion from dehydration and malnutrition as rest of no frequency or duration seemed able to abate. I fought only to make it up in fits and starts without collapsing, and had not a lass of particular comeliness begun keeping pace with me near the end, I do not imagine I should have done even that. Finally at the Y, I sat down to begin reading, but soon realized my thirst for knowledge to be quite negligible in my sum thirst and stumbled back down.

By incredible fortune, some girl was out washing her car, and a sip from the hose sustained me back to the Creamery on Ninth East, where Jill Perkinson sold me four bottles of fruit juice and a loaf of French bread, intended as a goodwill gesture on my part but taken as a flood of quail by my digestive system. Nonetheless, I enjoyed the first chapter of The Essential Jung as I rested. I'd share a quote, but I'd end up including half the book; it's positively brilliant. Very much like my talks, in that the editor strings together poignant quotes with minimal clarifying analysis. The trek had lasted nearly three hours. On the other hand, I suppose, three hours in the sun probably gave me quite the tan, so if any of you girls in Provo favour really, really ridiculously good-looking guys, 460 N 100 E #4's where it's izzat. Third door on your right.

I planned to go to bed early Saturday night, but two hours in fruitless meditation left me too annoyed to sleep, so I stayed up for a while with Age of Empires. It was precisely the kind of annoying yellowness I referred to earlier: I seem to have misplaced my axioms. It's the main reason I've stopped updating; the philosophical epiphanies upon which I idly happen are lately rare, and generally taken to blue-beta, though I still have occasional enjoyable conversations with Grant (Bradenian survives yet, amusingly), and stumbled upon this pleasant proof that two-dimensional infinity is the same as one-dimensional infinity while driving to Utah.

inf = 1 + inf
inf = 1 + (1 + inf)
inf = 1 + (1 + (1... + inf)...)
inf = inf + inf
inf = 2 * inf
inf = 2 * (2 * inf)
inf = 2 * (2 * (2... * inf)...)
inf = inf * inf
inf^1 = inf^2

I'm pretty sure I could do it formally, in fact, given the Peano axioms, equality elimination, association, and a decent definition of infinity.

It was a day of healthy failures, I think. The arduous hike has convinced me to eat regularly, which unfortunately compels me not only to be active, to avoid fatness, but to work, to pay for food. (I assume you would like a word at this point, Father. The comment password's "elven.") The intellectual wandering has no obvious remedy, I suppose, but the orangeness in the endeavour is laudable in itself. (Sigh, ridiculous Braden claiming red in video games and orange in philosophy.)

Sunday was legitimately orange, though; I somehow convinced myself to act normal, and showed up snazzy and chipper. Yaargh, I grumble recounting it now. I suppose homogeneity and conformity don't actually run counter to my values and goals (in fact, they're probably beneficial), but it sure feels like it. In my defense, my bold tie probably clashed a bit with my greyish suit, so it's not as though I had been gunning for Elder's Quorum President. Still at least an hint of dependency.

In less grumbly matters, I walked in as the bishop announced that Lizzy Burnett was speaking, and I hadn't even walked into the wrong room! She gave a thought-provoking talk on the beatitudes, objecting to our use of past participles in blessed, chosen, etc., on the grounds that they encourage a certain passivity, and encouraging us to think of how we can be blessing to others, rather than simply blessed ourselves. I also ran into a girl from my Phil 201H class, who informed me that the afternoon we spent playing around with Latin under Lacie's tutelage for Dr. Siebach had inspired her to take Latin up to the junior level...I should like to use an exclamation mark there, but sheesh, more than one in a paragraph is just sick!11!

Lizzy suggested I come over to her place for dinner, and after discussing our limited ingredients, we decided that she'd come over to my place so I could make my spaghetti. She brought garlic bread, green beans, and peaches, so we actually ended up with a delightful meal, with a little left over for my roommate, Brad. (He's a great guy, by the way. 30, chemistry major, works at the Stouffer's plant down in Springville. Really easy-going and kind-hearted, probably a yellow.) I quite agree with Uffish on the fun of cooking (if not of spaghetti in particular); nothing makes me so cognizant of my own adulthood as having dinner with someone, as when Sara invited Grant and k_t over for an excellent casserole and I tagged along and did the dishes.

I got up around midnight this morning to face Cortez after going to bed around six. Trying to nap around four, I found myself preoccupied with this entry and wholly wakeful, so I kept my red streak alive and walked to the Wilk. Now I think I will hit up the Scoreboard Grill for breakfast, and hopefully apply at Ottavio's this afternoon. I really ought have started the job hunt earlier, but eh, I'm pleased enough with myself just for being social. I've spent a couple hours talking to Brad out in the living room, and even took out a random Xanga girl last week, which was pretty Elder-Oaks-core, though I ought have planned it less around things I enjoy and more around...not...food. Mmmm. I even found myself wishing to go hang out with people a few nights ago, having quite enjoyed the bonfire I went to with Smurfs. Yay extroversion. Myers-Briggs types are largely based on Jung's work, actually.

Don't expect another entry soon. Those of you reading this through Blogspot, I repeat Misaneroth's recommendation of Sage for Firefox; it's a great way to keep up with irregularly-updated feeds. (If you aren't using Firefox, punch yourself in the face. Err, download it.) I dunno, we'll see. As Jassa said, I've just stopped planning entries out in my head, the hike being an exception, and I no longer get any satisfaction from recording minutaie, let alone inflicting daily food logs on an unsuspecting public. Ideally, I suppose, I would start following Marshall's example, crafting each entry as delicately as a lithograph, sweeping strokes of parallelism and dense alliterative hatching meshing intricately until meaning becomes not an object but a medium, the very ink in the grooves. However, my attempts at prose already prove quite sufficiently vague and elliptical for my taste; while imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, it would in this case be hardly the most pleasant.