American food.

I've always wondered, what foods do Americans eat that other countries think is weird? I think PBJs would be weird for Asian countries, and I've heard that cinnamon is offensive to foreigners at first because it is so pungent. My neighbor is half German now living in America and he positively says that  for many Europeans, peanut butter is considered gross. He also stated that the Chicago Dog has simply to many things going on at once atleast for a regular German. Give him a bun, bratwurst and some Mustard and he's good lol.Also Germany has hardly any spicy ethnic foods like Mexican even our Chinese fastfood is missing stuff like Kampao chicken.
 A guy in my English class was telling me that he had my cousin visiting a few years ago and while she liked vinegar-based Carolina-style, she was disgusted by sweet-tasting barbecue. She called it 'meat candy.' Other family back in her  home are also weirded out by bacon and eggs for breakfast. When it came to bread she said that American bread is wretchedly soft and sweet. "All normal super market bread tastes very sweet, it has a distinct flavour that isn't just a normal bread flavour. Even a loaf of plain white or wheat bread has a tasty sweetness and some other flavour I can't pinpoint. But yeah, doesn't taste like 'bread'. Of course if I go to the bakery and buy some sourdough or something then yeah that's fine and familiar." Her cousin concluded  really hated the "Chicago-style" pizza. It just did not look like a pizza to her and isn't very appetizing. But for the most part, she did not find anything weird about American food. Some of it even looks pretty good. She was most intersted in wanting to try some Southern country-fried steak and grits." All in all Chicago got a bad rep. for something, not me though i love Chicago's gastronomy lol. What are some stories you have heard about American food compare to other countries?

Frank O'Hara

I'm doing some research on Frank O'Hara so I just thought I'd share a poem or two with you. If you like them (or O'Hara) we can have an O'Hara general discussion. My favorites include 'In Memory of My Feelings', 'A Step Away From Them', 'The Day Lady Died' and others. I'm going to post some different ones that have recently made me smile. Picture is the book thatI'm currently reading, The Collected Poems of Frank O'Hara.

Song

I am stuck in traffic in a taxicab
which is typical
and not just of modern life

mud clambers up the trellis of my nerves
must lovers of Eros end up with Venus
muss es sein? es muss nicht sein, I tell you

how I hate disease, it's like worrying
that comes true
and it simply must not be able to happen

in a world where you are possible
my love
nothing can go wrong for us, tell me


Poem

The eager note on my door said “Call me,
call when you get in!” so I quickly threw
a few tangerines into my overnight bag,
straightened my eyelids and shoulders, and

headed straight for the door. It was autumn
by the time I got around the corner, oh all
unwilling to be either pertinent or bemused, but
the leaves were brighter than grass on the sidewalk!

Funny, I thought, that the lights are on this late
and the hall door open; still up at this hour, a
champion jai-alai player like himself? Oh fie!
for shame! What a host, so zealous! And he was

there in the hall, flat on a sheet of blood that
ran down the stairs. I did appreciate it. There are few
hosts who so thoroughly prepare to greet a guest
only casually invited, and that several months ago.

A Small Look on Art

I once read an essay that its main idea was that with the advent of anti-depressants and anti-anxiety pills culture has been ruined, because the great art and literature was born out of depression, and without depression there is no great culture. I cannot recall the name of that say essay right now, but if any of you know it please do tell.
It is true that anti-depressants make you stop being depressed. They don't remove your capacity to think and feel as a human being though. They're prescribed too much and too often, I find that a truth easily swallowed.
The other thrust of the argument I dislike is that creativity or genius comes from depression. I think if anything my favorite works were always the ones which to me depicted the heights of many or all of the emotions we as humans experience. To say that great culture comes from depressed artists is an insincere look at art, and it denies the necessity of emotional intelligence for development of mature works. I hate it when people try to place restrictions on artists. Oh, to write you have to be depressed. Artists have to be poor. Musicians have to smoke pot or be addicted to heroin. You have to be an alcoholic, you have to see someone die. These are all meaningless, people should just stop trying to define an artist by how he is or acts in everyday life.

Law Schoo? Not so Fast!

Before my older brother moved to Canada he simply left me with just one advice, "Law school...don't do it!"
At first I thought he was joking or quoting something but after some experience with some law professors, my brother may be actually right.

First, people should think pretty  hard about the reasons why they are going to law school before anything. It's a huge investment (100,000$), it's soul-crushing work and the field of law is going through a revolution of sorts right now - the days of high status/high paying jobs are gone. The job market for new lawyers is quite horrible, as there's a number of new grads since everyone went back to school during the recession. Oh, and all the jobs dried up in 2008 and probably aren't coming back.

That being said, if you have a passion for something and you want to change the world (this is me), give it a shot. The work itself is fun if you like debate and argument (if only there wasn't 10 metric of it to do!), and there's still an aura of status about the job that drops panties to the floor (or boxers I suppose - more female lawyers than male nowadays). If are computer 15hrs+ p/day-autistic kind of person and can't talk to people, it's going to be really hard. If you're in it for the money, create a business instead. If you have connections from your rich family/corporate buddies you plan to exploit then hey - let me send you my resume! All in All law school is not what it used to be and people should really consider the reasons why they would even think about giving it a chance.

True Ambition

If I do really well in my career, I one day hope to having savings in excess of five million dollars. That means that if you took twenty of me, you'd be able to cover Larry Ellison's annual salary. If he saved that salary for twenty years, he'd have the net worth of Ted Turner. On the other hand, it would take more than twenty Ted Turners to buy a Bill Gates.

On the other hand, with five million dollars I'd be able to conservatively spend about a thousand dollars a day for the rest of my life without really worrying about working down the base.

If  I only look upwards, I will always be miserable.

It's the same with smarts, really. My adviser is pretty hot shit in our field and he talks pretty reverently of a few people whose contributions have been even more important. And whenever I get a chance to talk to those guys, they're always going on about how much they wish they could do really hard math... the kind that wins Wolf prizes.

It's always endless if you look upwards. The next level always seems unapproachable and if you do get there, there's always another level to go.It's good to have ambition, but its critical to have a sense of scale.

Besides, twenty years from now when you get a call from a hospital about my love ones dying, none of this will matter at all.

What is it that makes people (try) to be monogamous?

Tonight I went to class and we were discussing the psychology of human pairing and relationships. Now I accept the fact that pairing is, from an evolutionary point of view, a necessity. However, the Evolutionary Psych point of view leaves itself open to criticisms, such as in the case of homosexuality, infertility, birth defects (specifically of the reproductive organs and the brain), and most importantly, of why there is such a desire to become paired. I've read many studies and seen many statistics on depression, anxiety, and suicide, and one of the leading causes seem to be this phenomena of human bonding; whether it be an individual in a relationship, or lack thereof. This seems counter-intuitive to evolution as this behavior, while beneficial to procreation, may also be detrimental to the individual(s) involved. Likewise, it still doesn't explain why there is (pardon the Freudian term) such a drive for humans to WANT to have relationships. Keep in mind, that procreation can and does happen outside of relationships (i.e. single parent families, etc.) As a I mentioned before homosexuality really complicates things even more. Individuals in relationships, especially long-term ones, consistently rate their happiness higher. I don't see a contradiction there: relationships increase the odds and survivability of offspring, so we're designed to want to be in them. Homosexuality may not be adaptive, or it may. Looking into kin selection, which makes sense in this context. Or it could be something else entirely. Homosexuality exists throughout the animal kingdom, so it may serve the same purpose in humans, or not; human sexuality is complicated.

Got a New Rescued Dog

Has anyone here ever had a rescued dog before? yesterday, my sister got a terrier from friends of hers, and while not necessarily a rescued dog, he's a bit underfed and has been picked on by other dogs. when we introduced him to out rottweiler today, she actually was nice to him, surprisingly enough, and we're introducing him to my malibu tomorrow. my question is, how long does it take for a rescue dog to learn to trust someone? while my sis has made friends with him fast, he gets the shakes whenever i start coming towards him, and will even back up while i'm petting him. do i just let the trust grow over time, or look up a dog book online about "making a dog learn to love" or something like that? i think it might have something to do with my build, as i'm 6'2.