Many thanks to Beck's colleague Katy and Katy's out-of-town-going parents who were nice enough to let us hang out in their beautiful home this weekend. That pic is a shot out their front door; this one is a view out the back of their yard which abuts a National Forest. Nice:
It's quite beautiful; even though it's been raining off and on the past couple of days, we've managed to take the dogs on a couple of walks through the woods, and I went for a quick run in the rain a little earlier today. Currently both Beck and Sparkle are asleep on the couch next to me. The house has a soporific quality similar to that of the iPLakehouse, and Beck has succumbed accordingly. I think Sparkle is more just afraid of the thunder / hail sounds and is seeking refuge by burying her face into my thigh. So pretty low key times here: we've got the Olympics (Now in HazeVision!) playing on the TV - a guy from España just took the gold in the cycling road race, tres exciting - and are otherwise lounging, reading, generally having a grand break from the 110s and humid of home.
Speaking of reading, I just finished my advisor's Embryology, Epigenetics, and Evolution: Taking Development Seriously. I'll write a full review later, but the skinny is that it's a very lucid argument against gene-centric reductionism. There's a pretty common metaphor within biology circles (and, for that matter, high school classes, common discussions, etc.) that genes constitute a program that instruct the cells how to behave; for something new and different, things turn out to be far more complicated than this, and though a large deal has been learned via the gene-as-end-all-be-all approach, true understanding is undoubtedly going to involve a more complex, more encompassing account of all the factors involved. Again, I'll treat this more thoroughly soon, so if you're interested you can get a flavor for the argument, but it was very interesting to see some fundamental assumptions of much of biological investigation exposed so thoroughly.
(I've also been meaning to mention that Christastrophe recently inspired a good discussion of the merits and detriments of Guitar Hero. I heart the Christastrophe blog, and continue to recommend it to all).
And I'd be entirely remiss if I didn't mention the spectacle of spectacles, the Olympics Opening Ceremonies. I'm sorry, that's The Spectacle of Spectacles. I hate Olympics coverage as a rule, and often find the surrounding pageantry unbearable, a sort of Super Bowl idiocy to the nth. But China, neglecting all surrounding considerations, did it up right - if you're going to go over the top, go Over the Top. So I appreciated the hyper-cinematic scale and approach; if you've got the most people and the highest GNP or what have you in the world, then by all means, you SHOULD be doing it up in an epic, never been seen by humanity before way. But also, again with all surrounding considerations neglected, I appreciated the over the top message, the one of welcoming, harmony, peace, a looking forward instead of looking back. If mass-produced government sponsored messages are capable of ringing with any kind of sentimentality, this one did, if only a little bit, and that's certainly more than can be said for similar bombast in other settings.
Beck and I lived in Arlington, MA in 2001-2 when China was awarded the '08 games. Our landlords, two of the sweetest people on the planet (who, among other things, excused Wrigley's habit of stealing their shoes with smiles) and Chinese immigrants who barely spoke English, were UNBELIEVABLY ECSTATIC. Out of their heads. I'm having a hard time remembering if I've ever seen anyone so excited about anything in my life. I couldn't not smile, cheer and laugh along with them. It was some definite, real pride, and seemed every bit a sincere desire to celebrate their homeland with the rest of the world as guests.
Now, of course, that pride could be argued to be just a product of the Chinese propaganda machine, the very machine that put on that show last night. In which case however authentic the low-level enthusiasm seemed, it was still ultimately constructed from on high by experts of manipulation, and almost implicated our landlords as suckers at the hands of their government. As could all the citizens of China be implicated - at least the ones currently flag-waving - sucker enthusiasts without the capacity to realize what their country represents on a grander scale. Of course, similar statements could be made about fanatics of Team America, too. Or Cubs fans. Or... anything.
So with the whopping authority bestowed upon me by having been acquainted with a couple of genuinely enthusiastic Chinese people, I watched the opening ceremonies with what I hope was a healthy mix of the usual cynicism (this is propaganda! China = War Crimes! Chinese Citizens = suckers!) and respect for people and a government trying to have a genuine moment. And again, in terms of production values and conveying their message, I'll join the rest of the planet in giving an A+, beaten protesters outside the stadium notwithstanding. There's a lot about China that I, given a fairly limited historical and otherwise understanding, think is terrible: the whole Tibet issue, the suppression of anti-government thought, the limitation of informational access, the religious oppression, etc. I'm not thoroughly informed, but the popular version of the story being propagated here is not a pretty one. That said, "The Chinese Government" is not "The Chinese People." I think there are even some arguments that "The Chinese Government" does not equal "China." So I prefer to ingest this scene holistically, not in the "Should China be hosting the Olympics? First caller..." method I hear so much of. There's good, there's bad, and maybe for once Bush has it right: there's certainly more to be gained by being to peer into the country and talk with its leadership than the closed doors approach of decades past.
Beck just said it well, something to the effect of "I thought the spectacle was great, but I still don't necessarily think China is great." This neglects whatever subconscious, mass effects the opening ceremonies accomplished, but I think it captures as much of an objective take as you can have: you may not buy the message, but its delivery wowed.
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