Thrall

Had a rather gloomy day today. Nothing major, just a slightly chillier current making its way to the foreground.

For the life of me I can't figure out what triggered it, so I guess it's random. Unless my ebb and flow is actually affected by the movement of celestial bodies. Which would be weird. And fascinating.

Immersion

I was always tickled by how seamlessly Bollywood actors switch back and forth between English and their native language, even in the middle of very intense exchanges. It just seems so natural, like they're instinctively drawing upon whatever tools best express their emotions at that particular moment. Fascinating as it is, I still had mixed feelings about it, what with the residual stigma of collonialism, and all.

But now I was just flicking through some Swedish film, and noticed the exact same thing. It's not yet as pronounced - the English bits are sparse, and sometimes delivered with such a thick accent that even their own subtitlers seem to treat them as an integral part of the source message, and parse rather than transcribe them (for example, at one point a girl finishes her sentence with You can go now and the English subtitle states Go away). Then again, there's also a scene where a highly agitated guy yells at his cheating girlfriend and halfway through, without missing a beat, chucks in an almost textbook, pronounciation-wise, IN YOUR FUCKING DREAMS.

The stigma? Not so much residual this time, but for some reason I find this sort of hegemony far less objectionable. Some part of me rails against the encroachment, but at the same time it's so... exciting. Another tantalizing whiff of Cyberpunk Now.

Not there

I went to visit Kaska and Piotr yesterday. Piotr made pizza (or rather: two pizzas), we had a few good laughs and more than a few moments of extremely non-PC behavior. Kuba - their son - was adorable, as always. I'm still tickled by how matter-of-fact Kaska is about him. No doting whatsoever. It's such a welcome change from borderline hysterical mothers. Piotr, on the other hand, is very affectionate, which I find equally entrancing. Just not used to seeing that side of him, I guess. A moment in time:

Wiska is playing with Kuba, dangling a plastic bag in front of him, and then hiding it behind her back
Kuba: Not there!
Wiska, extremely excited: He just said "Not there!"
Kaska, barely looking up: Yeah, he does that.
Wiska: But he actually said it a propos, I took away the bag and he went: "Not there"!
Kaska: Well, he says it about a 100 times a day, so chances are he'll sometimes get it right.
Kuba, smiling proudly: Not there!

Friendly fire

Go out to dinner with friends and have your private life inadvertently summed up in 2 sentences.

Alternatively: eat a bagel and stab yourself with a fork.

The choice is yours.

Give

Sorry, haters - TVAB is my favorite, so I was unable to resist this one.

Burn

I came home on one of the new subway cars last night, the ones with a red LED time/date display. Mine read:

So 09.05.09 23:11

And I thought to myself: Wow, subway car. You're incredibly specific in your condescension.

Lokomotywa

Wpadlem na chwile do domu rodzicow wydrukowac umowe. Tym razem wzialem klucze. Matki nie ma, ojciec spi. Nie obudzilem go.

Gdy zasiadlem do komputera znalazlem oparta o monitor pocztowke z parowozem jadacym przez jakies sciernisko (rodzina byla w weekend w Wolsztynie na jakims zlocie starych parowozow z calej Europy).

Pocztowka zaadresowana do nich samych, zgodnie z ojcowska tradycja.

Tak jechalismy.

Wagonow bylo wiecej.

I lato w pelni.

Wyniki w poniedzialek.

Pooh

Turns out the last.fm radio thing isn't broken - it's just that my trial has ended, and now they want me to pay 3 bucks a month for it to continue streaming. I'll have to meditate on it.

If I ran away

On a day like this, there are worse things you could be doing with your time than playing Frozen Charlotte and taking a few minutes to stare at the lilac outside your window.

Just saying.

Grooves

If some alien lifeform were studying my daily routines, they'd probably notice a particular pattern I have followed since my 2nd day here: Take a lemon out of the fridge, slice off a small chunk and squeeze its juice into tea, place the remaining part of the lemon under a small glass dome, doubtlessly designed just for that purpose, proceed to ignore it until it's rife with mold, toss it out, wash the dome, take a lemon out of the fridge...

I went to two recordings today, and was reminded just how much I hate them. For me they're always a game of "spot all your failures". I loathe listening to the lame jokes, and my even lamer attempts at translating them. It turns out some good has come out of the absurd anal retentiveness of the new contract guy - I might have spent an entire week on something I'd usually do in a day's work, but my text was so polished, had been thoroughly checked by so many people, that the recording session was virtually painless. Plus, it was a documentary. That always helps.

Met a cute translator at the studio, I think we even got introduced, but of course the name bounced right off my brain. Also had a bit of a laugh with the nexus girl. Recession is so funny. Ha ha.

My parents went to Cracow for the weekend (and Wroclaw, and Wolsztyn, and Kalisz, and Lodz, all in all, they covered 1500km), so I stopped by today to learn how their trip went, and tell them about Berlin. Halfway through one of mom's stories I caught myself feeling this little spike of misty-eyed exuberance, the sort you sometimes get when you're kind of drunk and having a really good time talking to someone you like. Which was pretty awesome. Dad's going in for tests on Thursday, but they seemed in really good spirits, so... Well, we'll see.

I've been watching the new season of In Treatment and was a bit disapointed at first,that none of the patients' stories drew me in, and some of them even annoyed me. I'm on week five now though, and find myself really looking forward to the Mia sessions, even though I used to find her completely unpalatable. April's ok too, and Gina - the one constant - never fails, because I find Dianne Wiest just too damn engaging. So that makes 3 out of 5. Not bad, I guess. I still liked the first season better, but I also admire how they actually moved shit forward. Paradoxically, I almost like seeing Paul, the main character, reveal in the Gina sessions what an asshole he is, or use these kind of low, transparrent gambits during his own sessions with his patients. It makes him feel so real. And it's quite a progression - it wasn't so pronounced in the first season. The signs were there, but you didn't see him openly struggle with his life.

Aaand that's that.