it’s very late and i’m lying to the blog about the time because i don’t remember if it handles it correctly when the week is on the wrong day. it probably does and i think i’m misremembering something misconfigured long ago on some wordpress and emacs org-mode setup from another lifetime.

there’s an episode of clarissa explains it all where she says “I’ve seen the future of poetry and its name is PC Poem”. she gets the computer (a “multi-megabyte mind”) to write her one.

“why wrack my brain when i can let the computer wrack its hard drive?”

she types in some words.

the computer computes.

it prints something out.

her and sam just cannot decide if it’s the worst thing they’ve ever read or if it’s, like, pretty good.

after contemplation she decides it feels like cheating, not like writing, and it seems like she might throw it away.

wave or squeeze? like kat hepworth, nokia 3210, fastest coldest texting fingers in bow street. program your own ring tone. winnie the pooh and the blustery day. snugglepuss or rabbit, and everyone in the shop heard about it too. disappear with no goodbye when it’s time to go, just slip away when no one’s looking. on the bridge when the dark night gets darker, orange light all shining off the water.

and i met astrid who also likes ladybirds and there were two foxers wearing necklaces made of dental floss and shoe clips and then it was 2am and i felt so lucky again and now it’s 4am and i’m looking at my notes and they seem so sad and strange and unbefitting.

and there’s another thing that never did exist before and it’s with us now. and it’s been a long week. and every day. long weeks and short months. did i tell you i got ID’d buying a can of red bull? she said she would not believe “in a million years” that i was over 25. one of the top 19 highlights of my week. another was a tweet. another was “treat of a lifetime”. alex doesn’t like it when trees grow arbitrarily in unexpected situations — like jack and the beanstalk. we laughed until we cried. it was a thousand years ago. maybe it is time to let go

i love being alive sometimes.

i had one of the nicest, most exhausting, funny, beautiful days at work. felt as though i’d been passed through a victorian clothes mangle. it’s hard to explain why that’s a good thing.

the next day was good, packing. and the night was intense and funny and near and good. the social had great talks. it was so nice to see the people it was so nice to see. dr basman was there with his vibrant sparkling eyes that seem strong enough to cut through metal and so gentle and precise and so joyful. he brought along an issue of his father’s chess magazine (rabbits review). me and mimi read through it with considerable delight.

and then we hopped on the Caledonia Sleeper. yes, wave goodbye in KC, up to Euston, on the night train. i ate haggis at midnight (my first food of the day). couldn’t get to sleep because i kept laughing myself awake. d in the morning i went to wh smith and i bought some babybels and text lily. we walked down to the Royal Scot’s Club and checked in. out for breakfast at the new town fox. back in the lobby we talk patchwork until grjte arrives and it’s time for lunch. pvh gave us a breakdown of the programme. i had salami and cucumber. we went back to the hotel where i lay in my bed feeling desolate and bereft until i received an SMS and bounced readily, full of energy, resurfaced and further discussed patchwork.

and so then everyone went to dinner. i find it hard to be hungry in groups, so i stayed behind. some dentists sat down beside me and started to talk. one of them said “it’s gotten to the point where i’m going to work to do my hobby. yep. you get to a point with dentistry where you just want to enjoy it”

the days were long and interesting. maybe i’ll get into that a few paragraphs from now i’m not strong enough at this second but imagine living in a world where everybody speaks a language that sounds exactly like english, with the same structure, but shares none of the vocabulary.

on Friday i guested on sweet lily’s radio programme at noonish. it was heaps of fun. i managed not to swear for an hour which i did not know was possible. it was quite the event. talking with lily is such a breeze. she described it like when a dog comes in and shakes off the day. i’ll jump three points ahead and she’ll be right there. it’s like solving tricky puzzles from memory. wired to the moon.

we talked about:

• how i was greyfriars bobby in a past life
• a spirit child that was freed from a microphone and is terrorizing the studio
• the night we met (one marked in the stars with an undying light)
• a man who who was eaten by wild boars who confused him for a large strawberry
• my hobby of orchestrating an orca hating and orca culling campaign
• that time i strangled a penguin while dressed as a penguin
• crawford on the ferry, a horseman full of wisdom
• my love for all animals, particularly marine life

several other items. it was only an hour but it had so much time in it.

another good day.

lily and me having matching tattoos now.

i’m in a place where people use acyclic hypergraphs to represent morphisms in a symmetric monoidal category and they aren’t even ashamed

i love it though. it’s cool being around people who really care about stuff, and it’s fun talking to people who think so much about something i didn’t even know you could think about.

sitting in these rooms. people pull out paper draw boxes and lines and say “i think this is it” and everyone agrees and asks questions about the boxes and thinks for a while and someone says “and this line is the write?” and the person says “no that’s the ability to write” and everyone says ahh and is satisfied.

and i don’t know half the nouns. and the ones i recognize are living in exciting new habitats. but a picture starts to form from little pieces of how i can be of service. and i don’t need to know the nouns as much as how they move around.

i feel so lucky to be here, among these people i work with who i love and cherish and respect. i feel so lucky to be in the room. and to occasionally feel as though there is the possibility that i might one day say something worth hearing.

you get to a point with dentistry where you just want to enjoy it