garden city

+ what i write about now is books. what this means when what i meant to write about, two years ago, was music, i'm not quite sure. i have less to say about music, and a lot more to explain, or rather document, about books.

today i finished upstream, which is the first of sharon butala's novels i've read which did not feel forced or awkward at some point. each of luna, fourth archangel, and gates of the sun felt flawed in some way, but upstream, felt far stronger, as though she'd aimed lower and scored.

i've pulled myself together to read delillo's falling man now. there is a unique and unexplainable terror about reading a new novel my my favourite author. it says a lot about me, or anyone, to have a favourite author, and any addition to that author - i.e. a new novel - has the chance to irrevocably change my relation to that author - which is of course only through their books - for better or worse. if some measure of who i understand myself to be is based on my favourite author, well, what then. well, it's also just a book. but after 29 pages it's a really good book.

+ but i have a midterm due for tuesday, and i haven't written anything for it yet. but i know what to say, vaguely. 1)international organisations do a poor job of fulfilling the traditional roles of the nation state - the creation of behavioural norms and the ensuing socialisation - at the international level. and 2)i agree that the impact of globalisation in the area of culture has been one of both fragmentation and consolidation, by virtue of at once strengthening bonds across nation-states with regards to diverse identities and at the same time weakening traditional ties to land and country. sure.

+ we went to richmond yesterday, me and amanda. we took the skytrain to 22nd street station and rode our bikes across the queensborough bridge, heading along the north arm of the fraser, looping south under sea island and then across it, then back across lulu island along westminster highway to the skytrain. 6 hours. exhausting and really beautiful.

+ it doesn't get more lazily nostalgic than reading record store 'weekly updates' archived from 2000/2001. i used to read these in surrey and want to hear it all, understand. i'm much more comfortable now. well, obviously, but this is another example for myself of growth and change. but there are gems here: saint etienne is 'the elevation of the mundane into art'. and isn't that what all art should be? or, isn't that what the mundane always should be? why worry about it?

+ this time last year i had class downtown, and was using what money i had to de-stress from school et al by buying lots of records after class at a & b. burritos from taco del mar on granville, not because they were good but because they were there. writing my peak columns from the harbour centre computer lab all afternoon. i remember writing one column from amanda's dorm room and doing laundry while she was grocery shopping with her mother.