Symptoms of Cretinism

The Dead Sylvia Plath Revolving in oval loops of solar speed, Couched in cauls of clay as in holy robes, Dead men render love and war no heed, Lulled in the ample womb of the full-tilt globe. No spiritual Caesars are these dead; They want no proud paternal kingdom come; And when at last they blunder into bed World-wrecked, they seek only oblivion. Rolled round with goodly loam and cradled deep, These bone shanks will not wake immaculate To trumpet-toppling dawn of doomstruck day: They loll forever in colossal sleep; Nor can God's stern, shocked angels cry them up From their fond, final, infamous decay.

Some people talk consistently about boys or girls, or the latest fashion thingamajigs, or the last gimik they had. Me, I have Mondays. More often than not, the first working day of the week has always managed to keep me in a slump. Especially of late, when the chill is the type that cuts down to the bones and all I want is to stay under the blankets. And so today, the first of my twice-a-month, two-day deadline, my head is empty as a -- see, damn it, I can't even think of anything to finish that sentence properly. Ampf . ============= While House continues to be my so-far-favorite-television-series-of-all-time, I decided to widen my horizons and watch "Numb3rs", which is sort of like CSI , except that it has a bit more action and instead of forensic science, the good guys use mathematics to track down the bad guys. While this brings back the all horrible recollections of math lectures in high school and college and memories of the exams I flunked, I nevertheless find the...