Good morning, Lee Carter. I'm here to help you!

You should see this.

London Love #2: Riding the tube.

It's true. I love riding the tube. Sure, there are lots of people, and sometimes your face is shoved into the unwashed armpit of the man next to you. Sometimes you're jostled and shoved more than you'd like. And everything has some kind of icky, greasy coating -- sometimes black, sometimes clear. But it's great! I wouldn't want to do it every day for the rest of my life, but it's exhilarating. It's one of the experiences that makes such a huge city feel alive.

Plus, as we are all learning, I love to people-watch, and there is no better place than the tube. What I find most funny about riding the underground is watching all the people avoid looking at each other. It's the awkwardness of pretending you're alone on an elevator times ten.

I think many of the riders like people-watching more than I do, but they don't want anyone to know. You catch the end of their gaze in your direction, or watch them bashfully look away when someone else notices their glance. Sometimes I like to do the opposite: One of my favorite things to do is try to catch someone's eye and smile at them. They never smile back. I don't think it's happened once. It cracks me up.

Oh. I could go on. There are just so many things to love about the tube. The interesting stations, the voices telling you to "mind the gap," the wind as the trains rush past you. The advertisements. There is an exhibit here of the last 100 years of tube "adverts." It's fascinating.

Underground, I will miss you.

Yes, We Can.

Say what you will about his sweeping promises, his great ideas without a real plan to implement them (which I believe is probably the broadest criticism); I'm so excited to have a President who expects something from Americans, and encourages and inspires us to be more:

Part 1: Things I Love About London

I suppose my post about cloned mice doesn't really count. So, I'm starting a series: Things I Love About London. I kind of wish I had a small camera. It's hard to whip out your big ol' SLR and inconspicuously take a snap shot. However, I'm going to become better at this, so future posts can include pictures, dag-nab-it. (Even if they're only cell phone pictures.)

(Also, my pictures from class aren't that interesting right now. One week we learned all about aperture and shutter speed. The next: lenses. Basically, this means a lot of the same photo over and over with different lighting and movement, but nothing fantastic. If something fantastic comes out of it, I'll be sure to share.)

Love #1: European fashion. We're all aware that Utah has its own fashion sense: in some ways we're at the forefront of the industry; in more ways, we're not. Somehow I've always connected with European fashion -- which is not to say that I LOOK like I do. But, I wish I did.

For instance, European women rock scarves and stoles. I would love to be able to pull that off a bit more successfully, but also find scarves and stoles worth wearing. They're on every corner here. I guess that means one thing: shopping.

But, sometimes it's not necessarily the outfit I'm dying for when I think of European fashion. I mean, I'm not exactly yearning to wear a short, black sweater dress with bright blue tights, brown slouchy boots, and a brown, purple and orange jacket. Or bright-pink-and-purple-mottled knit legwarmers under some jeans, peeking out over athletic-style heels. Or a purple tank-top, grey shrug and a bright green poofy-slip-looking skirt, with black tights and blue ballet flats. And yet? I kind of dig it.

European women can wear ANYthing, and it's desirable. And so are they. How does one get that accessory? The slightly-quirky confidence. If I can only take one thing home with me, that's it. (Which might start with a purple tank-top, grey shrug, a bright green poofy-slip-looking skirt, black tights, and some blue ballet flats.)

(P.S. For more fashion things I'm interested in right now, see this post from Little Muggy.)

(P.P.S. I hope you're all voting today.)

Jurassic Park

was one of my favorite movies. My tiny "scrapbook" from my growing up years includes my ticket from opening night. There were lots of cool ideas in that movie, starting with graphics that redefined "special effects" to -- of course -- the idea of growing baby dinosaurs from ancient DNA.

This article (frozen mice cloned) has everyone wondering if Jurassic Park will be a reality. I'm not sure I'm that interested in the idea, but I do think the science is interesting. Check it out.

What do you want?

Why is it that we never really want what’s good for us? We either recognize what’s good for us and refuse it despite that knowledge, OR we know it’s bad for us and go after it regardless. Or, I suppose, we don’t go after anything at all and let life happen to us instead of trying to influence the outcome. Why?

Ironically, I’m convinced it comes from selfishness and self-absorption. Sounds ridiculous, right? If we were doing what’s selfish, we’d clearly pick what’s best for us. Not so, dear reader.

It’s like we’re on a game show: “Well, contestant one, you’ve got some great prizes here.

• “Door # 1: A vacation to Ghana: where you’ll be steeped in culture, go on a photo safari, and have the opportunity to build 15 water wells and help implement a new educational curriculum in several local grade schools.
  
• “Door # 2: A vacation to Las Vegas: where you’ll stay at the luxurious Bellagio, see Cirque de Soleil and Blue Man group, gamble away a year’s worth of savings, and get so drunk that you cheat on your significant other. But boy, will it be fun.
  
• “Door # 3: Mystery vacation: You could end up in the middle of Death Valley, CA or escape to your own private island at the Banyan Tree Vabbinfaru, in Maldives. (Small print: chances of Death Valley are significantly higher, given the number of spaces allotted to it on the roulette wheel.)”

I contend that an unfortunate majority of people would choose number two or number three. They’d look at three and say: “Pure luxury! One of the Top 10 beach resorts in the entire world. So what if I end up in Death Valley? At least I tried!” Never mind that the odds are in favor of this choice being worse than either of the other two options.

They’d look at number two and say: “Hey! That sounds fun. A few minor side-effects, but I can work through it. How nice it would feel to run around with abandon.” This would be life-changing, more than anyone would willingly admit to themselves. But it’s a good time. To heck with consequences.

And they’d look at number one and say: “What? No way. It’s dirty, not at all luxurious, and I’d have to work! Maybe the safari would be cool, but not at that cost.” Of course they’d discount that it would get them outside of their narrow world view, encourage meaningful service, allow them to make a difference in the world and that this would change their lives forever, too – for the better.

I’ve no doubt that some of you, dear readers, are offended by my assumptions about your character. Of course these scenarios are exaggerated to make a point, and I implicate myself, not you, among the historically poor decision makers. Even the fear of the unknown is not enough to dissuade me from the fear of the known good sometimes.

Why? I’m selfish.

I’ve wondered some about my decision to come to London. It wasn’t something that was actively on my radar screen (it was always beeping, somewhere in the distance, thanks to kind offers from my family), but making it a reality popped in my head months ago, and I couldn’t remove it. More than that, everything seemed to work out to promote my coming over here: generosity on the part of my workplace, my family here in London, and my family in the States, support and encouragement from people that are meaningful to me, and of course a program that provided exactly what I was interested in. I’m so grateful for the opportunities I’m given in my life, and I’m not ignorant of all the people that make them possible. But back to the point at hand: Am I choosing door one, two, or three?

Is there some greater purpose to my time here? (I’ve had some experiences and made some realizations that could support a yes answer.) Is it completely selfish? (Again, I’ve had some experiences and made some realizations that could support a yes answer.) Or am I just throwing my dice on the table in game of Craps, hoping that life will bring me something good?

The problem with answering these questions often comes not from purposeful selfishness, but from the selfishness created by not knowing what one wants. It sounds silly, I know. But people overcome the desire for door two and the silly risk of door three all the time. Every day. These are the people who know what they want — and won’t settle for less than the guaranteed method of achieving it. And while acting based on what you ultimately want is a form of selfishness, usually most people’s ultimate goals also benefit others.

When you don’t know what you want, what’s the risk in door three, or the harm in door two? And although the consequences are still real, they don’t seem to matter so much in the short term. Hence the above thinking about door one; selfishness from short-sightedness. Maybe the need for door one increases with the people least likely to select it. One of my favorite adages is: “You can have anything you want, but not everything.” Life is full of trade-offs, but the problem with not knowing what you really want is that you may discover you made a bad trade: got the Maserati, but can’t afford food or a house anymore.

So, how do you decide what you really want? By being less selfish. It’s a bit of a Catch 22, isn’t it? Now my question has to be, can you become less selfish while you’re still in the middle of experiencing door two? Can you be drunk in Vegas, attending Zumanity (bleh) and even gain enough self-awareness to be less selfish?

Luckily for me, I’m pretty certain I didn’t pick door two, but I have to ask myself, just in case.

Tag: Six quirky things.

1) When I'm scared, I like to have my hands covered. Somehow it makes me feel safe.

2) I like to have the silverware evenly distributed in the dishwasher. It's not obsessive; but I'm somewhat meticulous about it.

3) I'm not sure if it's a quirk or a compulsion, but I get bored with my hair easily. Speaking of which... Saturday can't come soon enough.

4) I like to begin sentences with "And." I don't know why. And it's not all the time. (See?! I can't help it!) It's just kind of fun.

5) I'm probably most comfortable in skirts. I wear them a lot. I like them. I mean, jeans are great. But I rarely get home from work and change unless I have somewhere to be.

6) I don't like sleeping with my head in the middle of the pillow. I always sleep with my face at the edge of the pillow.

Mixtape.

I admire people who share themselves readily. I'm going to work on that.

Today, I have a whole slew of quotes from "Gigi" rumbling around in my head. I think everyone should watch this movie forthwith! (Most especially: me.) The quote that got me started, though, was, "I'd rather be miserable with you than without you." It just popped in there, not entirely unprovoked, and the flood gates opened; Oh, Gigi! Am I a fool without a mind? Quite possibly.

Yesterday, my class was a review of kindergarten: "This is a triangle. This is a square. What's this shape, class? A circle? Good!" Today, we got a much harder (read: 8 hour) assignment on comping type. This class reminds me of my friend Sarah.

I've been trying to find the soundtrack to my life lately: something that I can listen to and think, "That's it exactly!" I've been doing a little Priscilla Ahn, The Weepies, Kings of Leon, Joshua Radin, Damien Jurado, Fleet Foxes, Jenny Lewis, TV on the Radio, Keane, Tristan Prettyman, Jose Gonzales. Missy Higgins. Radiohead. Despite the excellent choices, my aesthetic connections feel a little fleeting. I suppose soundtracks are almost always mixtapes.

Inundation

Hello, my dear readers. I'm sorry to overwhelm you with photos today, but I have to post my assignments to the web. I'll write something more interesting soon, but for now: PHOTOS GALORE! (I suppose I could use Flickr or something, but I'm doing it this way for now. Hee. Also, some of these might be awesome in black and white. What do you think?)

Only on the street where [I] live

Variations on a theme:




I'm not sure what I think about how these worked out. But, hey, I'm learning, and it's a cool idea.