TO THE BEACH

What can't you do in grad school?

QUIT YOUR MOTHER FUCKING DAY JOB

goodbye office, hello beach!

ADVICE FOR GRADS

MF DOOM on overcoming writer's block

 

DID MY TIME, TOOK MY CHANCES

Don't mind my more than 2 week hiatus, I've been entertaining friends from near and far, rocking out to my long-time anthem mashed into the best 54 seconds on the internet (below), wrapping up office life, planning expensive vacations that I'll never be able to take again until well into the 2020s, beach partying, festival going, picnicking, all around summering. And GRAD LIFE is still nearly two months away!


 

HIGH TECH SOUL (D95-97)

Today will be a day I will later look back on with extreme nostalgia once I begin grad life.

The work day that I had the luxury of elegantly wasting in its entirety by reading about the Amen Break and the history of different subgenres of electronic music while also reminiscing about the days of drum and bass, and then the somewhat more recent by also bygone good old days of Dogzstar.




Yeeaaah

GRAD LIFE BOOK REVIEWS: THE GLASS BEAD GAME (D91-94)

GRAD LIFE BOOK REVIEWS: THE GLASS BEAD GAME by Hermann Hesse

If you too would like to abandon luxury and live a life not unlike that of a medieval eunich to better enable you to endlessly investigate frivial intellectual pursuits, including an elaborate game that can take weeks to play that makes absolutely no sense to anyone else, you should try out Castalia, home of the GLASS BEAD GAME (and also the famous Magister Ludi). Only students who are simultaneously highly intelligent, incredibly weak willed and possessing no desires to accomplish real, tangible goals are allowed into the province of Castilia, and you can check out any time you like but YOU CAN NEVER LEAVE. Well maybe, but that would be a SPOILER.

BREAKING NEWS: HIGGS BOSON (AND CHAIRLIFT) PUT THE SEX BACK IN PHYSICS (D90)

Back in GRAD LIFE I always relished social opportunities to interact with physics students. After the first 25 seconds of conversation when you've been forced to establish your disciplinary commitments, there is usually a somewhat awkward lull heavier than dark matter itself. I found that a way out of this was talking about the sitcom The Big Bang Theory. Turns out, with my limited sample set, this is usually a good topic of conversation with physics students because they realize that no one gives a fuck about anything they do and its the best PR they've got (that or physics dudes were just excited to talk to a girl outside of their department).

Oh, those poor physics grads, toiling away although nothing has happened in their field for so long, and all they've got to argue about is string theory (more proof that everything I know about physics I learned from aforementioned sitcom). Do a google image search for "sexy physicist" and you'll find Calista Flockhart on the first page and Stephen Hawking on the second; not much to dispel the stereotype of the tragically unattractive geek.

BUT hey, smug social science and humanity grads, with all this buzz about Higgs boson the flow of campus social capital has been irreconcilably disrupted. When is the last time you did anything that fundamentally changed our most basic understandings of the ENTIRE UNIVERSE? No, Toward an Sociology of Extraterrestrials would not count.

This shit puts the sex back in physics, hopefully to be reallocated from critical and film theory, if there is any justice in the universe.  Loyal readers of TYCDIGS, go find a physicist and show your appreciation, physically. Wouldn't we all like to start here?



Although perhaps Chairlift called this sea change with their [choose your own adventure] video earlier this year about all the parallel universe in which their singer Caroline is a sexy yet charmingly doe-eyed PhD student rocking GRAD LIFE.

LETTER FROM A READER: HAPPINESS (D89)

Dear TYCDIGS,

I am a miserable grad. Show me the way to something slightly resembling happiness.


Thanks,


Glum in college suburbia


Dear GiCS,

I think the best way to arrive at real happiness is to become a fanatic for some sort of pointless sport. But if you study any of the social sciences I'm familiar with, your graduate education has no doubt taught you that allegiance to any sort of sports team just some pointless derivative of nationalism. So you could try a hobby that fits into your budget, like bottle collecting, especially if you live in a state with cash deposits.

Love,

TYCDIGS

I CAN WELL UNDERSTAND WHY CHILDREN LOVE SAND (D88)

One thing that is great about not having a GRAD LIFE but being somewhat familiar with it is you can pursue any pseudo-intellectual thread you desire and feel good about yourself for it in the way only grad students can but without other grad students around to criticize you for any misinterpretation along the way, such as figuring out with the help of Wikipedia that Wittgenstein's Mistress is not surprisingly strongly influenced by Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, and then having PDFs of both open on your computer as you go back and forth between them, feeling really damn good about yourself, because you completely disagree with Wittgenstein's approach to language but nevertheless really enjoy both texts.

And then you can say to yourself, and no one else except your poor blog readers, oh dear, doesn't the overemphasis for Wittgenstein on the relationship between language and reality and simples and complexes seem oh so similar to my man John Wilkens, who (centuries before Wittgenstein) tried to create a perfect philosophical language from the little kernEls of truth and materiality that words represent but got not much further in real terms than translating the Lord's prayer and making funny charts like this:

And then, rather than saying anything rigorous or new or even very interesting, you make a blog post and feel productive for the day!


Hey everyone, listen to Turks in space!

[UPDATE 15:33: LOVE WITTGENSTEIN BUT HATE ON PHILOSOPHERS]

TYCDIGS CATCH-UP EDITION (D79-87 BACKDATED)

Oh dear, more than a week without a single post! I was occupied by an emergency trip to the south to consume emergency rations of delicious seafood, listening to great music by yet another beach although I was too lazy to get there in time to actually swim, etc etc.