I was almost halfway through a great post on Sarah Palin's comparing herself to Shakespeare
when I decided that I wanted to write something positive instead. I hardly blog anymore. I wish I could say that it was because I was too busy, but the simple truth is that I've just been out of the mood.

Truth is, the vast majority of my blogs are negative in nature. When I'm not posting the sentimental 8th-grade philosophy paper bullshit stuff, I'm posting the hey-hey look how witty, condescending, and misanthropic I can be stuff. As much as I hate to admit it, that's what my entire blog routine has become. No deviations. Sure, every once and awhile I'll hear or read something that makes me happy and optimistic and think "I should blog about that later!" But as quickly as it appeared, the enthusiasm evaporates into the cynical, egotistical ethos that is my mind.

It literally makes me sad when I step back and evaluate myself like this and realize what kind of cliche faux-intellectual cynic I've become.

(I know this all seems very self-depricating, and I'm sorry, I know how annoying that kind of shit is, but I promise there is a valid point in all of this...somewhere.)

Anyway, as I was writing this blog I was listening to Mozart's variations on "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star"^* on YouTube, and all the sudden I didn't want to bitch about Sarah Palin anymore. I was happy, and I wanted to stay that way. That's when I decided to scrap the Palin post for one on why this particular piece of Mozart is so amazing that I could, well, write a blog about it. Since we're a good 5 paragraphs in, I think it's safe to say that this post is less about Mozart and more about the act of blogging itself.

I'm glad. As corny and predictable as it sounds, I really hope that someone will read this and remember it next time they're inspired to blog by something negative. There's enough negativity in our everyday lives, and I think that it is time better spent expressing yourself in a positive way than in a negative one. I'm not saying I'm no longer a Cynic, old habits die hard, but I am expressly making an effort to be a little more positive, and I truly hope that by reading this one of you will do the same.

Oh, one last thing. I feel like an ass doing this, but I'm going to do it anyway: rec this post. This is one of the few blogs that I write specifically so other bloggers will read, and if asking you to push a button ensures that more bloggers will read it, I'm willing to look like the ass.

^*Actually, the technical name of the piece is 12 Variations on "Ah vous dirai-je, Maman" by W.A. Mozart, but I was worried that if I threw too much French in Bill O'Reilly might boycott my blog (old joke, admittedly).

“What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.”
-Oscar Wilde

“It's hard to argue against cynics - they always sound smarter than optimists because they have so much evidence on their side.”
-Molly Ivins

“In the end we shall have had enough of cynicism and skepticism and humbug and we shall want to live more musically."
-Vincent van Gogh

Synesthesia is my favorite neurobiological condition. Seriously, it's awesome.

Synesthesia is a condition in which the patient experiences one sensory experience in 2 different ways. For example, many synesthetes (that's what you call them) inherently experience letters and numbers as various colors. A could be blue, f could be orange, it's completely random, but it's consistent. Sound cool? Not really? Well wait...

Another type type of Synesthesia involves associating dates with precise positions in space, or viewing a period of time as a seemingly 3-dimentional map. Studies are now even starting to show a type of synesthesia where the patient hears sounds as (s)he experiences visual motion.

My favorite type of synesthesia, however, can best be summed up by a story my piano teacher once told me:

A few years ago, I was teaching an unremarkable young boy, about 6 or so, who was proving to be completely mediocre at the piano. One day I asked him which piece he would like to play for me, and he promptly said "the blue one." I asked him to be more specific, I was trying to think of pieces in his book with 'blue' in the title, but nothing was coming to mind. Finally, I just told him to play the piece. When he'd plunked out the first 3 notes, I knew exactly which song he was playing, it was a short piece called "Butterfly's Ball." When I asked him why he referred to it as the "blue" song, he was puzzled. "Because it's blue," he said. The book was an ugly pale yellow. I'd always heard of synesthesia, but I hadn't ever actually met anyone who had it, much less diagnosed one. To test my theory, I had him stand on the other side of the piano, where he couldn't see my hands. I played a D Major triad, and asked him what color it was. "Blue," he said, "just like the Butterfly song." I played an f major chord, which he perceived as yellow. A minor was green, b-flat major was orange, and no matter how many times I switched chords, his colors always matched the chord he associated to it. It was remarkable. I spent the rest of the hour playing songs for him and having him tell me what he saw, to him it was all completely mundane, like explaining what a picture looks like to a blind man. His family moved about a year later, I haven't spoken to him since, but I'll certainly never forget that day.

As I was browsing YouTube, I came across a concept that blew my mind. This is as close as we'll ever get to experiencing synesthesia, enjoy!



"Since a subtle interaction exists between sound and shape, I see q as browner than k, while s is not the light blue of c, but a curious mixture of azure and mother-of-pearl,"
-Vladmir Nabokov, in his autobiography Speak, Memory

When my brother, my sister, and I were little, our parent's made a big deal of giving each kid, one by one, a "Texas Native" birth certificate. They were mail order, and they weren't cheap. If I remember correctly, I believe the total cost was around $60. And that was in 1990's money. Anyway, that's not the point. The point is that Texans have a sense of pride stronger than any other state in the Union. It's true, trust me. But tonight, that pride escapes me. I've seen Texas do some pretty stupid things in my 21 years, but I've never been as embarrassed to be from Texas as I am right now. As outlined in this fantastic ABC Article, some seriously crazy right-wing evangelicals have hijacked the state board of education. Think I'm being melodramatic? Here are some actual amendments that have been proposed, are up for tonight, and actually have a chance at passing:

• Putting serious emphasis on the founding father's supposed devout-Christianity, and changing language in questions to replace "Natural Laws" with "God's Laws." Little details, big problem.
• Emphasizing Republican leaders like Reagan and Gingrich.
• Reducing the material covered on subjects like the Civil Rights era.

Some people may see these are relatively miniscule details, but as someone who went through school from Kindergarten through High School and onto the state's largest (and country's 2nd largest) Public university, take it from me: Texas has surprisingly good Textbooks. Our education system is as close to a failure as you'll find in America, but I've found our textbooks, in all areas, to generally be fantastic. I never once heard anyone in West Texas where I (and George W Bush, kind of) am from complain or mention any kind of liberal bias. These details aren't "correcting" anything, as some of the board members have said. They simply serve to instill a not-very-subtle ideological message. I'm not conspiracy theorist, but this is some seriously Orwellian shit.

I'm not going to reference Goebbels, because that would be a gross overstatement and insulting to Holocaust survivors, but the fact that Glenn Beck hasn't in response to this travesty, is as surprising as it is ironic. This is the blatentest example of propaganda in recent history, if anyone should latch onto this shit, it's Glenn freakin' Beck. But he doesn't. Hmm. Oh, and this isn't just about Texas, either. We're the second largest consumer of textbooks (next to California), and publishing companies very often base nationally-utilized textbooks to Texas' standards.

I'm not going to sit here and pretend like this is the single greatest threat to Texas, because it's not. As a matter of fact, right now it falls pretty damn low on the national priority list, and I get that. I'm simply afraid that all of this will simply slip into the annals of history, not to be thought of or argued again, and for a few decades, until we reexamine the books and start the whole debate up again. I donno, it just seems like this should have been prevented. Maybe it hints at a larger problem in the lower parts of the system themselves. I don't know. I just know that I'm glad that I got through the public school system before this shit can become mandatory.

"I'm not so naive that I don't understand that the board's political leanings will be a part of it but I just think that it swings the pendulum too far. Right now it's moving too far to the right." -Rod Paige, a Conservative who worked as Education Secretary under President George W. Bush.