'And February Grew So Long That It Lasted Into March...'

[rushthatspeaks]

Have-Done List: Took Greek midterm. It could have been worse. It probably could have been better.

To-Do List: 8-10 pg. Roman History paper, calculus homework, 4-hour library shift, attend classes, pack.

Wish I Could Do List: just get the hell on the bus and get out of here. I need a vacation very, very, very, very badly. The weather has been awful, I've been ill for too frickin' long, I find new gray in my hair on a daily basis, the rate at which I am losing weight is scaring me (I've lost twenty-five pounds this semester and counting), I spend too much time futzing around on the Internet because it has so little to do with anything, I haven't been able to go to Scottish for weeks because of being ill, and I have just had way too much work lately plus the ever-present feeling that if I don't write the novel soon I will have a nervous breakdown. Don't get me wrong. This is Home. I love it here. I love my life here. I just *NEED* a vacation. New place. No stress. Different things to worry about. Different food. Girlfriend. Cats. Boston. Anime. Time to write. Time to get over this cold/flu/generalized misery of an illness. Frankly, I think I'll be fine in a week, as long as said week is a vacation, and believe me, this vacation will be a genuine vacation; I am not doing any academics at all over it so help me gods.

My Present Feelings On The International Situation: Dulce et decorum est pro patria vivi.

Last Book Read: still the Makura no Soshi of Sei Shonagon.

Comments

[eredien]

*cough* I don't understand Latin. My first thought was that it was the end-line of that WWI poem, but I don't think it is. Is it something like "it's nice to live in the fatherland?"

[wayman.livejournal.com]

It's almost the last lines from Owen's "Dulce Et Decorum Est" (said lines of which were lifted from Horace, who held them as a Roman ideal, and were turned on their head by Owen in light of the atrocities of chemical warfare), but Rush changed the last word. The original/modified glosses something like "It is a sweet and noble thing to die/live for the fatherland".

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

I changed it from 'die' to 'live', since I don't have the weight of sarcasm that the WWI poem has to make 'die' into an irony. So the translation is 'It is sweet and proper to *live* for one's country', meaning that I don't think anyone should be running out and dying for it about now. Sorry for being obscure. Thanks, Wayman.
Lila

[khava.livejournal.com]

Interesting. Should the oppressed Iraqis be living for their country too? The country that beats and murders and rapes them (literally) and doesn't allow them to change their leadership?

How about the North Koreans, whose government withholds food to increase its power. Should they be living for their country? They're certainly dying because of it.

Sometimes, if your country is evil, living for your country can be morally wrong.

And should we be just living for our country, safe and happy, and ignoring those suffering elsewhere? Should we continue living for our country, doing nothing, when we're attacked like we were on September 11, 2001? Sometimes, living for your country means being willing to die for it.

I'm all in favor of your sentiment that it's better to live than to die, and better to be able to live in and for the full glory of your nation's goodness than to find yourself in the situation of putting your life on the line to defend your nation's principles. But we're not always that lucky.

[fiddledragon.livejournal.com]

*hugs* You'll live - just two days left until break!