August

I realize I should probably write something in here. It's bad enough that I have such dire thoughts about myself, the nature of the world, the existence of determinism, and all the mad ramblings that come of questioning the world too much. All experiences are either good or bad, but they are essentially the same, like two sides of the same coin. As the philosopher prince put it (Hamlet), "Nothing is either good or bad, but thinking makes it so." I do not need to think that way again. What really concerns me? School. Friendship. A sense of meaning and understanding in the world. Emptiness. I could think of a few people who care and show concern for me, but at the heart of it, I do not think happiness could ever really come. No life suits me wholly. People agree and make jokes as they will, and they entertain me and lighten the mood, but I do not think they take me seriously. Maybe they see what they want to. I do not think it even applies anymore, but I would like to be a part of something. I find myself, too often, pensive and gray. When the clouds are over my head, I write, or I seek out others, or I immerse myself in something completely. My writing is filled with clouds, it's true, but it is only that I want to make something out of my time, and I see something beautiful in what I create too. There is nothing wrong with that. No one will criticize me for filling my writing with sadness. It is not the sole emotion I feel, but it is often the one I write about. Most dramatists are either tragedians or comedians. The ones that write both often show a stronger talent in one over the other. I never consciously chose to pursue one genre, but it is clear what I feel more strongly about.

The Noonday Demon

I haven’t written in here in so long. It looks so empty now, but it hasn’t been because I have stopped writing. I have written this summer as much as I ever did, but almost none of my writing could be posted. It is different this time. Nearly all of my writing has involved other people in some way. Not about bad things necessarily, but private things, and things certainly not within my right to judge or say publicly. It was simpler when I was younger. Then, to tell the truth was only a matter of right and wrong. Now, to tell the truth inevitably means to step on other people’s feet, to betray secrets, and to hurt people who have confided in me. There is a line between convention and the greater good I must be aware of, and I will not cross that line lightly. Conditions are not worse now, but they are more complicated. Things have changed as I have known them as a boy.

But perhaps it is not as serious as I have made it out to be. I have been in a bad mood lately. There can be no harm in telling the two people I know who actually read this journal, …and for the rest of you -- who read idly and say nothing -- if you have enough of an interest in me to read what I have to say, than I suppose you deserve to know anyway. I am going through happiness withdrawal. The pills I have been taking to lighten my mood suddenly seemed to stop working last week, and even at their highest safe dose, I simply sat still and felt nothing. It didn’t happen all at once. I have felt their power slowly diminishing these past weeks, but last Friday was the end of it. I felt nothing. Now, regardless of whether or not I take them, there is no lightening in my eyes-- emotions are less vibrant-- myself, am less inclined to receive and tell jokes-- my mind stays unstimulated, slow and dilapidated-- and everywhere, every thought that I think is mired in sloth and futility. It is as if all the happiness and intensity I felt the day before were drained out of me. This must be what it feels like to be a fallen angel-- severed from the hand of God. To walk, to talk, and to interact with people is like swimming through thick jelly, and that state is too vile and still too familiar to want to visit again. It is better when there are people around. Sometimes, I actually believe in the happiness I convey. My mind can get lost in a conversation and forget itself …but other times, nothing moves. My spirit is not lifted as it once was.

I thought to myself there must be a biological reason for this. Prolonged use could have made my receptors less reactive to the drug. I could be producing less-- there could be fewer receptors on the surface of my neurons. I will have to take a drug holiday. I have stayed away from all drugs this weekend -- and how sluggish those two days felt. It is good enough to see Mike, and have other people around, but to be alone is to be completely remorseful. I will try to stay away from pills this week as well. Maybe if I stay away from them long enough, my receptors will regenerate, grow back to their normal populations, and lose their resistance to the drug altogether. I will have to wean myself off of chemically-induced happiness, at least for a time, and at the least -- if I cannot manage it -- partially. How ironic is it that the only way to find happiness again is to stay away from it consciously? I have kept away from it for two days. I will only take enough this week to pull myself out of the bad spells. Everything should be back in order in a few days, or I will have to try something different altogether.

How odd that I suddenly find myself thinking about philosophy …How foolish those dualist philosophers were, to think the mind and the body are not linked. …I do not even think the mind can exist outside of the body. Tell me you do not believe it and I will show you a drug addict and a schizophrenic. It is as clear as night and day. I am certain of it.

You can't get to Heaven if you're afraid of getting high

This is a great poem.


The Terms in Which I Think of Reality

Reality is a question
of realizing how real
the world is already.

Time is Eternity,
ultimate and immovable;
everyone's an angel.

It's Heaven's mystery
of changing perfection :
absolute Eternity

changes! Cars are always
going down the street,
lamps go off and on.

It's a great flat plain;
we can see everything
on top of a table.

Clams open on the table,
lambs are eaten by worms
on the plain. The motion

of change is beautiful,
as well as form called
in and out of being.

Next : to distinguish process
in its particularity with
an eye to the initiation

of gratifying new changes
desired in the real world.
Here we're overwhelmed

with such unpleasant detail
we dream again of Heaven.
For the world is a mountain

of shit : if it's going to
be moved at all, it's got
to be taken by handfuls.

Man lives like the unhappy
whore on River Street who
in her Eternity gets only

a couple of bucks and a lot
of snide remarks in return
for seeking physical love

the best way she knows how,
never really heard of a glad
job or joyous marriage or

a difference in the heart :
or thinks it isn't for her,
which is her worst misery.

Allen Ginsberg

Quothade

So thrilled with the news!

One of my sonnets, "Thalia", was recently published in a new poetry collection, Quothade.

You can read it here:

http://tinyurl.com/o3l5kup

http://books.google.com/books?id=Yo7omlFkg1cC&lpg=PA5&ots=9waqehNmnb&dq=noel%20darlucio%20pura&pg=PA5#v=onepage&q=noel%20darlucio%20pura&f=false

If you like it, feel free to repost the link (on your blog, website, or facebook page) and tell all your friends. Thank you!

A-tisket a-tasket / A green and yellow basket / I wrote a letter to my love / And on the way I dropped it

So, tomorrow’s my birthday. When my sister asked me this weekend what I wanted for it, I realized that my wish list is rather small. As a hobbyist and an aspiring engineer, most of the things I want are beyond what people can give me. Yet, I’ve narrowed down the list to a few several things.

1. An iPod. An Apple iMac without an iPod is like Dorothy without the Ruby Red Slippers. It’s just not right. I don’t need much storage space because I don’t listen to much music (I have a one-track mind and it gets in the way of engineering work), but it’s nice to have for those long journeys back home. A cheaper iPod shuffle ($99), or a contribution to help me buy an iPod shuffle, is just fine. Of course, if I do get a larger 30GB iPod ($300), I could use it as a portable hard drive…

2. A copy of Microsoft Office created before 2003

3. Money to help me buy data decryption software ($100), but of course I can’t speak too much about this… all you have to know is that I can decrypt things for you as well once I get it…

4. Old computers: Parts can be salvaged. I know.

5. Old software disks: to run on said old computers, or just because the newer versions of some software that are coming out sometimes do less than the old ones because of pesky corporate lawyers.

6. Links to or copies of video game system emulating software. (I can probably find this online myself, but I’m too lazy to and I don’t always have the best copy or version).

7. If you’re at all inclined to gaming, I would seriously appreciate it if you would play World of Warcraft with me on the Proudmoore, Draenor, or Bleeding Hollow servers. I have two friends at Penn who play, my sister and her boyfriend play, and after I get him the disc, my brother will be playing as well; but this is the type of game that gets more fun as more people become involved. Seriously, if you want to play this game, I will BUY the disc ($50) for you. That’s how much I want you to play. I’ll even protect your character, as I’m gaining levels quickly and can help you while your character grows.

With that said, I’m turning 22! I’m going to celebrate by buying some strawberry cordial, to serve on the brand new cordial set my sister just gave me…

Passing the Year

My exams are finished. I have a wonderful job. It lets me interact with people and do my work without being too demanding of me. I have an apartment, and my loans are steadily being repaid. My sister and her boyfriend have now moved to Philadelphia, offering a familial presence in this city. My parents are moving to a new house. Although some of my friends are graduating, I still have many that will be left here. Small things matter too: this new computer that I’m typing on, and the new toys that occupy my time. My work has been handed in. It’s done. I feel like my back is broken, but my soul and my will are being renewed. I’m done. Done -- that word feels like honey rolling off my tongue…


Paean

So one year passes and here I am,
No worse for the wear,
Tracking the streets
Like a contented fox
With his belly full.

It doesn’t matter necessarily
Who or what incarnation I am or
Where exactly this destination lies.
Nose down and feet pitching forth,
Leaves turn over like yesterday’s dream.

I could go on and lose myself forever.
A year, a city, passes by so easily,
Like a breath or an exalted sigh,
And I hesitate just momentarily to take stock
And feel for the presence of this wayward soul.

Beat, come, and let the steady pulse sing to me,
Press your hand upon this restless heart,
For I am real, and you are there,
And beneath this scrim
Of heart beating, arteries pulsating,
And breath riding in and out,

Lies a treasure, real and tangible.
Hold your breath still and watch!
(Who cares if nothing gold can stay?)
No sense in killing the moment out in measured time…
(I pray never to lose this sense of childlike wonder.)


--Noel Darlucio Pura
Philadelphia, 2006

Pleasant Diversions

The idea of an alternate reality will always appeal to me. To be able to change bodies and consciousnesses at will seems like something that would be superior to mere experience. Yes, it would be like something out of a science fiction novel, but what’s the harm in diverting the rational mind, no?...

Well, to make a long story short, and to nonetheless return to the mundane, my entire existence outside of work has more or less been sucked completely into a certain virtual product by Blizzard Entertainment called World of Warcraft. I started playing it as soon as I established my internet connection. I blame Derek for this, but then again, I’ve always had a certain proclivity for fantasy. It was just waiting for the right time (that is, free time) to come out.

(If you’re reading this, and if you happen to play, be sure to give me your server, faction, and name. Maybe we can go on a quest together. I have four characters on four servers so far, and I’m reading the novels too. I finished one overnight. God help me.)

In terms of other news, my sister moved to Philadelphia yesterday to begin her new job. She has a beautiful apartment on Jeweler’s Row, in one of the nicer parts of Philadelphia.
I’m to go to Jersey City this weekend to help my parents move out of their house. I have a nice package for my dad. Hopefully he’ll appreciate it.
Next week I have exams, and then Sarah’s thesis defense on James Joyce to attend.
Mike had a music recital yesterday, that unfortunately, I couldn’t attend. I want to hear him play again soon.
I started tests on a new cancer patient. She recently had her entire nose removed, and invokes much sympathy to look at, but hopefully it will be reconstructed again soon.
I can’t get too close -- just skim the surface, be objective, and move on.
I need to start studying again, lest this laziness get ahold of me. I have been writing some poetry recently, but I need to make the leap back to engineering again before this exam. At this point, it’s like entering another world. I’ve been so removed.

Booting oneself up by the bootstraps…

Fine, I’ll admit it. From the look of the screenshots, the new version of Microsoft’s Windows, Vista, is beautiful. It’s enough to almost make me want to buy it. Almost. Even at academic pricing, Vista is going to cost a fortune. I don’t know if and how all of my friends will be able to afford it. It’s enough to make me want to stick to Linux and only Linux altogether.

I need to say something about Windows XP. When Mac OS X came out, it made me lose all love for XP altogether. The OS X Tiger was a huge incentive for me to switch to Macs. I don’t regret that decision. OS X is far more beautiful and far more secure than XP. Just look at all the malware, spyware, and adware out there and you’ll know what I’m talking about… Granted, I did silly things with XP that I probably shouldn’t have, but it was the first operating system I really got to know. For that, I at least have some fondness for it. (…For those of you reading this who don’t know, I had a very late introduction to computing because my parents are fairly computer illiterate [some would say downright fearful] and never saw fit to have a computer in the house. I only started learning right before I went to college…)

The Mac OS X just beats Windows XP, but when Vista comes out, I may change my mind again. Luckily (or perhaps, disagreeably), Apple will be releasing their new Mac OS X Leopard at about the same time Vista comes out (late 2006 / early 2007). Knowing me, I’ll probably end up lusting after and buying both. I just don’t know how I’m ever going to afford it. This will probably be one of the few times I’ll relish being a student. Academic pricing is a huge deal when you buy as many computer products as I do… Upgrading hardware is going to be an issue too. Vista will use up a whopping 256 MB of RAM, which is pretty much all that my 2002-purchased laptop has. It won’t be running on that computer. By the time Vista comes out, I should have a whopping monster gaming rig that will rival most business-class computers. Of course, there is a solution from having to having to spend so much on software:

And here he is:


Tux, the Linux mascot.

Macmaker, Macmaker, make me a Mac...

I'm so happy. A certain long awaited-for package just arrived in the mail today. I'm going to spend all night playing with it... (What am I still doing here after class?) Bye!

The Makers Speak

Apple has just released a dual-boot for Intel Macs, or to put it in other words, Macs will now be able to boot Windows. My mind is blowing. Is it the marriage of PCs and Macs? Just about, in my humble opinion… I still can’t wait for the iMac to arrive… It won’t have an Intel processor, but I’ll get one eventually, you’ll see. …I’m also going to get my hands on a copy of the Linux OS this weekend. I met a great gamer (Derek) at Penn yesterday, and if I fall in love with this MMORPG as expected, I may just get / build a fourth computer to use as a gaming rig. It will be a massive Franken-Mac-Monster. I’m dreaming of having one computer capable of running Windows XP, Mac OS X, and Linux. The possibilities are endless.

Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue

New things will always continue to surprise me. These past few weeks have been a time of many “firsts,” and things have been so spontaneous and lovely these days, I haven’t even bothered to record them all.

First, Sarah finally came to visit me after many months-- nearly a year actually-- of not seeing me at all. The last I saw of her was before my graduation, and then we were consumed by academic life. I contacted her out of the blue to tell her about the Margaret Atwood event, and to my surprise, she came! …It’s so lovely to see old friends. It melted my heart a little on the inside, and then she had to go back home.

Margaret Atwood was lovely. She started the talk with jokes about Canada and feminism, very casually to my surprise. She carries herself so well, so effortlessly, as if floating on clouds. It is interesting to know that one so sharp and witty can be so disarming in person. I would have never thought such a small, sprightly woman could write such incisive, dystopian, and at times, romantic prose. …One more thing… but this will have to come later (you’ll see).

What else? In the past three weeks, I’ve bought three computers. These are three more computers than I’ve ever bought in my life. The first was a gift to Mike, an IBM laptop that I bought him for his birthday. The second was an iMac flat-panel G4 that I bought for myself. It was a compromise between the price and the newer G5, but I’ve always wanted a Mac, and this one is beautiful. Powerful too. I can’t wait for it to arrive in the mail. The third computer was a much older PowerMac G3, that I bought yesterday from a local merchant for a sweet deal. It’s definitely not powerful enough to do what I anticipate on doing, but I wanted a cheap Mac I could disassemble and play with. I cracked open the case yesterday and the internal architecture was beautiful …spectacular …breathtaking. I’ve never had the élan to open a computer before, and now that I’ve been studying computers so fervently, each step took on new meaning. I’m going to upgrade everything I possibly can, and when I’m done with it, I’ll have a powerful little Mac-monster.

I went to an Apple Store for the first time in Ruby Soho. I was in Mac Heaven. The walls were white and ephemeral and everything fit into place perfectly. The stairs where made of chrome and glass and white lights permeated the entirety of the room. I climbed the stairs and touched the wonderful machines on display. Everything was perfectly made. Perfectly.

Yesterday, I went to a lovely dance performance with Jaamil and some others he introduced me to. In one night I met another painter, a poet, several dancers, and a professor. I went to an after-party afterwards where they served wine and cheese over Mexican food and tequila.

My creative nerves have been piqued. I probably won’t be doing as much journaling lately. I have to return to writing poetry. The manuscript is only 70 pages long… after being reduced from 130… My nerves are charged, my heart is a-floating, and this weekend I’ll see old baby blue again. He’s in DC, and the weather is  just lovely now.

The Many Voices of Margaret Atwood

She's coming to Penn! She's coming to Penn!


THURSDAY, MARCH 30, 2006
5:00 P.M., 17 LOGAN HALL

Jane S. Pollack Memorial Lecture in Women's Studies

MARGARET ATWOOD, Acclaimed author of many books of fiction, including A
Handmaid's Tale

"An Evening with Margaret Atwood on the Penelopiad"




Helen of Troy Does Countertop Dancing
by Margaret Atwood


The world is full of women
who'd tell me I should be ashamed of myself
if they had the chance. Quit dancing.
Get some self-respect
and a day job.
Right. And minimum wage,
and varicose veins, just standing
in one place for eight hours
behind a glass counter
bundled up to the neck, instead of
naked as a meat sandwich.
Selling gloves, or something.
Instead of what I do sell.
You have to have talent
to peddle a thing so nebulous
and without material form.
Exploited, they'd say. Yes, any way
you cut it, but I've a choice
of how, and I'll take the money.

I do give value.
Like preachers, I sell vision,
like perfume ads, desire
or its facsimile. Like jokes
or war, it's all in the timing.
I sell men back their worse suspicions:
that everything's for sale,
and piecemeal. They gaze at me and see
a chain-saw murder just before it happens,
when thigh, ass, inkblot, crevice, tit, and nipple
are still connected.
Such hatred leaps in them,
my beery worshippers! That, or a bleary
hopeless love. Seeing the rows of heads
and upturned eyes, imploring
but ready to snap at my ankles,
I understand floods and earthquakes, and the urge
to step on ants. I keep the beat,
and dance for them because
they can't. The music smells like foxes,
crisp as heated metal
searing the nostrils
or humid as August, hazy and languorous
as a looted city the day after,
when all the rape's been done
already, and the killing,
and the survivors wander around
looking for garbage
to eat, and there's only a bleak exhaustion.
Speaking of which, it's the smiling
tires me out the most.
This, and the pretence
that I can't hear them.
And I can't, because I'm after all
a foreigner to them.
The speech here is all warty gutturals,
obvious as a slab of ham,
but I come from the province of the gods
where meanings are lilting and oblique.
I don't let on to everyone,
but lean close, and I'll whisper:
My mother was raped by a holy swan.
You believe that? You can take me out to dinner.
That's what we tell all the husbands.
There sure are a lot of dangerous birds around.

Not that anyone here
but you would understand.
The rest of them would like to watch me
and feel nothing. Reduce me to components
as in a clock factory or abattoir.
Crush out the mystery.
Wall me up alive
in my own body.
They'd like to see through me,
but nothing is more opaque
than absolute transparency.
Look--my feet don't hit the marble!
Like breath or a balloon, I'm rising,
I hover six inches in the air
in my blazing swan-egg of light.
You think I'm not a goddess?
Try me.
This is a torch song.
Touch me and you'll burn.


From Morning in the Burned House by Margaret Atwood.



This Is a Photograph of Me
by Margaret Atwood


It was taken some time ago.
At first it seems to be
a smeared
print: blurred lines and grey flecks
blended with the paper;

then, as you scan
it, you see in the left-hand corner
a thing that is like a branch: part of a tree
(balsam or spruce) emerging
and, to the right, halfway up
what ought to be a gentle
slope, a small frame house.

In the background there is a lake,
and beyond that, some low hills.

(The photograph was taken
the day after I drowned.

I am in the lake, in the center
of the picture, just under the surface.

It is difficult to say where
precisely, or to say
how large or small I am:
the effect of water
on light is a distortion

but if you look long enough,
eventually
you will be able to see me.)


From The Circle Game by Margaret Atwood.

The Long Road to Ithaca

Seductive sirens, monstrous whirlpools, a series of troublesome suitors, and men turning into swine -- mere fiction? I kid you not. I’m beat, weary and exhausted. I just want to find the time to sink lightly and effortlessly into the warm, comforting mattress of a king-sized bed. Sweet blissful tranquility I say. At last -- at least -- the worst part of it is over. It’s been a long week.

It all started when I emailed Elizabeth about going to Cornell for the weekend. She said it was fine. I’ve always wanted to see the campus and she’s always wanted visitors (at a beautiful Ivy League campus in the middle of nowhere, who could blame her?). I’m prepped and all ready to go. Ithaca is beautiful I’ve heard, and I just took the mother of all midterms from hell. (Escaping from the work of that class has been like avoiding the wrath of Poseidon on the high seas). Then, half-way there, after three hours of traveling from Philadelphia, she sends me a message that she’s overbooked with work. I can’t go. I’m stuck in Jersey City.

I try to make the most of it and spend the entire weekend at my parent’s house. To celebrate and show off the bounty of my new job, I get my dad a Reduced-Calorie Diabetic Cookbook. He hasn’t been able to eat decently in months, and so I make a marvelous (and I must say, completely experimental) salmon dish with a cauliflower calorie-alternative side dish; and an eggplant, tomato, and parmesan entrée to boot. He loves it. My mom buys tons of Filipino food for my brother and I, and as usual, I only eat half of it before I’m stuffed. The next day, I go to New York to haggle with merchants over computer prices and features. I don’t find a good deal and go back home empty-handed. Admitting defeat, I call my brother on the way back and ask him if he wants me to bring back burgers and fries.

The next day, the Gods have their revenge. My throat is burning, my mind is spinning, and my innards are retching from all the bad mojo. The next day is a mystery to me, shrouded in a misty haze of anti-diarrheals and painkillers. I do remember one vision. The Great Vortex: head leaning over a swirling whirlpool, watching my food and innards spinning round and round in a partially-digested mass before I flush. Terrible. Just terrible. I’ve gone from a man to a retching, puking pig at the mercy of a witch.

I take Monday off from work. I take Tuesday off too. I start to feel better by the afternoon, but my mother won’t let me go. My dad cites keeping me for “observation” purposes. I miss my one Engineering class. I have a presentation in seven days and my group meets without me. It’s a mutiny. I’m pissed. I go to the corner store with my dad and smuggle in a mango by the cash register. My mother takes it away, telling me I’m not well enough to eat exotic fruit. I’m forced to sustain myself on a diet of stale crackers and soda, held captive for what seems like an eternity on the small island of Ogygia (or fine, Jersey City).

I finally break free on Wednesday, after seeing a doctor and invoking the supreme authority of her opinion. My father wishes me well and anoints my head with healing oil (which he believes can cure anything from headaches to hemorrhoids). I leave and the wind is high and I set full sail on my makeshift raft. I cross the Hudson River to get to the jeweled isle of Manhattan. There, my efforts are rewarded: I search several electronic boutique stores and find a merchant willing to sell me a laptop with all the features I need at an attractive price. I pay immediately and leave the store with a spanking new laptop (well, new in the theoretical sense, as technically it’s parts have been remanufactured from corporate computer stock). I visit the Great Oracle and have him install a new operating system and productivity software on my computer. Then I make a few modifications myself, and the Golden Bow is good to go.

I return to Philadelphia for a mere two days of work, and the week is already over, but the weekend has finally arrived! I give the laptop one final checkup and stick a big red bow on it before boarding my train.

I unboard the train and Mike and his mom are there to pick me up like a beggar (but a king in disguise? -- well, who knows?). His mom stuffs me full with more fresh fish from the sea and disappears. Mike shows me his huge, huge 30-gallon fish tank and gets distracted and starts talking to people online. All distractions aside, I get him away from the computer, the cell phone, and anything that has remotely to do with a weather station. We sit on the sofa in the living room alone. Then I bring over the gift and unzip the case, and tell him to look at the present I got for him. He opens it, looks at me, and gives me a big hug.

It seems like I never did make it to Ithaca after all, but sometimes, the pleasant reality of things can serve just as well.

"Bohemia, Bohemia is a fallacy in your head. This is Calcutta. Bohemia is dead."

LAST HOUR. Walking home through the streets laden with newspaper, the electric heat of neon signs, and the remains of broken glass bottles, the sound of sirens pierces through the night air like a razor. I arrive at my doorstep, reach into my pocket for the key, and open the door. Flopping into bed, eyes melting into … heavy-lidded sleep … into … walls melting … yellow candle wax dripping drip drip.

DREAM: hours pass and the ticking of the clock continues, beating like a death march into my solitary brain, craving want of more release out. I out. Want out. Want more out out. Find. Voice. Own. No. Someone, something else. Want. Want to be Led. Led. Dead like Lead. More. There is a woman, muse or siren. She extends her hand and calls to me. I (sweetly, coquettishly), mother of all things, promise you

reasons,
answers,
immortality
The works.
Here is the door.

An escape
from all the poverty,
the uncertainty,
and even,
the unmentionable of all things
(family).

I wake.

I opened a book.

Enchanted

by the soft, melodic tunes,
dances of dark-haired gypsies
patchwork clothes and hand-crafted instruments,
writers smoking inside cafes,
Parisians drinking absinthe,
and painters on the local street corners panning sun-swept scenes with their hands,

the vision was
PURE HEAVEN.

I searched for her like a Romantic on the high seas, sniffing out music like blood on a hunt, turning musty old pages, raiding forgotten libraries. I went down on all fours, upturning rocks, searching for signs of intelligent life.

and found
the words:

VACANT. NO LOITERING. KEEP OUT.

Whole cities, decimated from abuse, or not abuse so much as neglect

Like Lucy Gray,
Or Solitude.

The life gone out, snuffed out like a case of DDT, gone elsewhere. There’s going to be one long Silent Spring in America. Childhood dreams and cold regimes just don’t make for very interesting themes.

I hit Alphabet City like an amnesiac on a binge. Craving, the direst, rabidest hunger of all things: MEMORY. Help! My name is Icarus and I’ve fallen and I can’t get up. I was thirsty and I drunk the waters of Lethe, and now I can’t remember a DAMNED THING.

Where have all the FUCKING ARTISTS gone? Where the IDEALISM? Where the stronghold of our dignity, our vanity, and wit? I’ve been led by faeries and spriggin gnomes on a wild-goose chase, chasing shamrocks, shadows and illusions! …as if it were some,

some fantasy,
or an aforementioned vagary,
to fill a post-modern vacancy?

Echo: I’ll tell you where they’ve gone.
(Resigned to universities).

Point. (Don’t hide your shame. Just nod and smile. They won’t know).
Let he who has not sinned cast the first stone.
--It’s so young and blissful to be naïve.
--Or so blissful and naïve to be young.
--Or want to be so.

Forego the foregoing. Suck it up and be useful. Forego. FOR EGO.
To be or not to be: the aristocrat, the capitalist, the work-for-pay anthroposophist. Thinking: Think as you like, but act like others. Be the black sheep, but wear white,

and be dazzling.

--Come smile now.
--(Why are the talented so depressed?)
--I’ve given too much life to gold and glitter.
--Why give a care?
--Life is only temporary.

Too much spirit, too much of that good immortal soul.
I’m still burning in that impenitent flame of longing, you see.
Too young to give up on the dream.
Too old to absolve myself of the responsibility of life.

Come all ye wise men.
Follow that star. Dance with me.
Let us remake this city.
Our image is as divine as any.
Shake off this mortal coil.
And when the night is through,
Let us go forth, singing.

On Being Whole

Today I saw a cancer patient for my job -- a nice, grizzled, grandmotherly old woman with light hair and a tired face. She was sitting in the testing room waiting for me. Some of her lower jaw had been removed for oral cancer, and we had to put a towel on her chest to catch the dripping from her mouth. She was one of the kindest people I ever met. I gave her sample after sample to try to measure her responses, and she would kindly ask questions, laugh, and make conversation in between tests. During a break she asked me if I cooked my own meals, and she told me that she used to be a lunch lady at an elementary school.

I couldn’t help but be reminded then of my days back in public school, when my teachers would spell words out on the board and recite times tables to the class. One of our teachers loved reading the story of Amazing Grace, and would gather the class sitting on the floor around her to listen. At lunchtime, the lunch ladies would come in hauling huge carts with food trays, because the cafeteria was too small for every class to have their lunchtime in it. No one minded though. It was more fun to eat in class. When the day was over, the lunch ladies would say goodbye to everyone and haul out the garbage bags.

I didn’t tell her this, but it was clear from the short conversation we had that she liked doing her job. She had four sons that she liked to cook and make things for, and she had grandchildren now.

In the end, it seemed that she had come to terms with her cancer and was living normally. Despite having her jaw removed, she had a sense of humor and still loved to eat chicken. I saw her out and went to cleaning out my solution bottles. I looked in the mirror and felt briefly for my jaw. It was oddly comforting to feel the hard bone beneath, thinking to myself how nice it is to be whole.

I took it upon myself...

In celebration of Ash Wednesday, I took it upon myself to go to the gym. After all, is there a better way to celebrate the intelligent designer than by perfecting his intelligent design? Right after work, I headed to the studio rooms and joined a kickboxing class, right next to pilates and salsa. To my pleasant surprise, the kickboxing class was much better than expected. Our instructor was a peppy athletic girl with cheerleader in her voice. She taught us how to punch and kick, and all this while swinging to the beat of pop-rock and dance music. While executing my jabs, hooks, and roundhouses; I was listening to dance remixes of Madonna and Cher! Where else can I combine fighting with club music? It’s like clubbing, but without the prima donnas and the drama queens. To top it off, no one seemed to catch on to me. I chatted with the instructor after the class, and to persuade me to buy a full membership, she mentioned being able to check out girls while working out. I was flattered. I gathered my things and hit the weight room. I may never look at working-out the same way again.

I’m trying to prove if whatever doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger. I haven’t succeeded yet.

Note to readers: No, that doesn’t actually mean I’m here drinking or taking various substances, although I did have a wonderful sangria last week in D.C… It means, rather, that I’m here all lonely and alone on a restless Friday night, waiting for a certain warm and fuzzy someone to arrive by train.

It does get cold in the winter.
I need a hug!

Turning a new page

I’m choosing to work for the chemosensory neuroscience lab at Monell. At this point in my life, I have to value application over pure science. It’s the potential to make a difference, and not simply love of the technology that drives me. There will be many people to interact with, scientists and study subjects alike, and I’ll learn a thing or two about conducting a clinical study and psychology. This will serve me better than working at the ivory tower, even though the research will probably teach me more about research methodologies and statistics over the quantitative molecular sciences. It will be fun, something vital, entirely new and exciting. Let’s see how it goes.

The Question

The phone rings. Nose embedded in a thick stack of papers, the noise fails to elicit a response. It rings again. I pick it up. I hear a vaguely familiar voice with a thick French accent on the other end of the line. It’s the second scientist, the one I interviewed with for a position at the university. He tells me I’ve been offered the job. Shock. Surprise. Breathless Elation. I’m in a conundrum. Now the new variable is entered into the equation.

C'est Moi!

A Meme and a pleasant diversion, stolen affectionately from another friend’s journal. I didn’t think to do it then, but I’m glad to have done it now.

1. What did you do in 2005 that you'd never done before?
Visit Philadelphia.

2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I don’t make resolutions.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
My boss actually back at the bio lab, *and* my biochem. professor too for that matter!

4. Did anyone close to you die?
Alas, my pioneering spirit… it withered away with the autumn leaves.

5. What countries did you visit?
Does Quaker country count?

6. What would you like to have in 2006 that you lacked in 2005?
A friend who is a poet. (Read: Sarah is gone and has left me all alone at Penn!)
Furniture would be nice too.

7. What date from 2005 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
April 16, but I’m not saying why… ;-)

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
I’m here, aren’t I?

9. What was your biggest failure?
I’d like to think of mine as a multitude of tiny insignificant ones that can be beaded on a string like pearls.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
I got a nasty email from someone that was totally unnecessary and which, I proceeded to ignore.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
A three-piece suit, finally!

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
Again, alas, not all of us can be blessed so bountifully…

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
I have a list. They’re all getting a lump of coal for Christmas.

14. Where did most of your money go?
Sallie Mae and CVS.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Oh my god, look at the size of that LIBRARY!

16. What song will always remind you of 2005?
La Vie Boheme!

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder? Ask me the same question tomorrow
ii. thinner or fatter? I lost what I had gained. In the end I was even.
iii. richer or poorer? I haven’t checked the Nasdaq yet. Hold on.

18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
I’d always wished for time to do NOTHING.

19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Walking. Someone needs to buy me a car, quickly before the soles wear out.

20. How did you spend Christmas?
Making Cheesecake, eating with the family, watching the Stock Market (which, stubbornly, was closed for the holidays), and then seeing the cutest boy in all the world. ;-)

22. Did you fall in love in 2004?
Has it been that long already?

23. How many one-night stands?
I’m made people!

24. What was your favourite TV program?
Gilmore Girls, Teen Titans, that Evolution special on the Discovery Channel, CNBC

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
*Now* you say? I think I stopped hating people after eighth grade.

26. What was the best book you read?
This year the award goes to WICKED by none other than Gregory Maguire.

27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Mikey!

28. What did you want and get?
small things: some cash, a watch, several books, and a life

29. What did you want and not get?
I still want that 20’’ flat-screen G5 iMac.

30. What was your favorite film of this year?
I would have probably said RENT, if someone had only gone to see it with me...

31. What did you do on your birthday?
I don’t have a birthday. I was genetically engineered. :-(

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Just one? Don’t wishes always come in threes?
…let’s see, should I ask the Wizard for the brain, the heart, or the courage?

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2003?
I can’t remember that far back. People still used 3-and-1/2-inch floppy disks back then.

34. What kept you sane?
As Akira Kurosawa once said, “In a mad world only the mad are sane.”

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Queen Elizabeth I

36. What political issue stirred you the most?
The signing of the Magna Carta. Boy was that a big mistake.

37. Who did you miss?
Sarah, come back from Greece! America needs you!

38. Who was the best new person you met?
All the wonderful people here at Penn, but, I would have to say especially Adi, my boss, and Zeen.

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2005.
Let Einstein tell you: “Insanity [is] doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.
Thank you for the music, the songs I’m singing…

And now, back to our regularly scheduled programming!

GREAT NEWS EVERYONE! I just got a job offer! I’m to work at a research institution right next to UPenn’s campus, for an organization of scientists dedicated to studying the chemical senses. I’ll be working in NEUROSCIENCE!

I’m going to spend the rest of my night in a mad frenzy reading science journals. I’m still psyched. I can’t contain myself. I’ve been thinking about neurons ever since the phone call. I’m going to get out my neuroscience and behavioral psych books and start studying right away! Everything else is just noise to me now.

The Simplest Cause of Pain

Faced with the question of what kind of person I wanted to make myself, I looked to literature, at those characters so entrenched in fiction they show more truth than our actual selves. After much deliberation, I came to an impasse. On one pole lies Ayn Rand’s Howard Roark, a man as driven, cool, and confident in manner as he is competent in intellect. He stands for empiricism, rationality and capitalism at its finest. Naturally, businessmen and engineer-types are attracted to him. He gets the job done. I’ve always adored Howard Roark. On the other hand lies Oscar Wilde’s creation, Dorian Gray, the new Galatea to an age-old Pygmalion -- or an effete dandy’s solution to an age of English propriety. Dorian Gray is sleek, cool, calm, admired, and confident. I'm careful to say "admired" and not "loved." Dorian Gray is, to say the least, the face of charisma -- the embodiment of youth and joy. Artists and dreamy, romantic-types are attracted to him, but then again, so is everyone. He represents society at its finest.

To be Roark is to be in control. Roark is pure production, and the master of his domain. The caveat of course is that the more and more a man becomes like Roark, the less spontaneous and creative his life becomes. He becomes entrenched in discipline and ritual. Eventually, he becomes what he desires most: a robot, an automaton that can get the job done with no cause for concern, worry, or error. No man wants to become that: to stand up, get the job done, sit back down, and do another. Any man that admits so is purely a masochist! No one is an assembly line. Where then is the sense of pride, and the joy in one's work? Of course, Ayn Rand portrayed Roark as a man on a mission and one driven by a fierce passion and intellect to move the world. What I think is the reality, however, is that the job gets done with or without his input, and the work gets tedious after some time. We’ll always want for something more.

A man hasn't lived until he's seen every bit of the world: each tower, each alleyway, and each street there is to cross. That's the way we’re meant to live. I’d want to be immersed in it: the big, beautiful, noisy, and hard-paved world. I want to be able to look in the eye and see that I've conquered it, seen every sight there is to see and experienced everything worth experiencing. I'd be filled with fright to do otherwise. Shear fear of missing something alone should be motivation enough. I know that one day, I too will be settled in my grave, and I will want to look back on my life at the very end and not have a regret for those things I never got to do. That's what drives me. That's what wakes me up in the morning, to climb ever higher and fall flat on my face crying, and to want to go up to a random stranger and hug every damn person I see.

I guess the problem is purely one of the heart and the intellect, or as Greeks saw it, of maintaining the delicate balance between the Apollonian and the Dionysian. What Roark stands for is Reason, and Dorian, sheer Passion. They’re opposite ends of the pole, two ways of living. Apollo, the Sun God, represents classical order and reason triumphing over the entropy of nature. In Apollo’s light, magnificent cities are built, wild pastures are tamed, and great statues are erected in tribute to the creative powers of man. Dionysus, the God of Wine, represents something entirely different. In Dionysus’s fleeting night; wild inhibitions are released, beasts are unharnessed, and secret pleasures come to fruition. To worship Dionysus is to give in.

As a person, Dorian Gray was neither born nor made. He is too artificial to have been born of man and woman, and too natural to have been contrived. He simply is. He is like Athena, springing in full armor from the head of Zeus, belonging neither to man nor woman, mother nor father. People see him like a nymph, in its insular sacred beauty. They want to possess him, or aspire to be him, or both; but little things get in the way. People are too shy, they never say the right things, don't have the right clothes, or don’t think they can compare to other men, or gods. To be Dorian Gray is to defy reality. People appreciate his style, his charisma, his immortality, and the way people gather around him like ants to honey; but his shallowness is to be mistrusted; and his lack of responsibility, abhorred. Someone who gave thought as much intensity as feeling would want more than that from life. He would be capable of so much more.

To move mountains, to make something useful, to believe that an Anybody can be a Somebody -- there’s the true source of pride. There’s the sense of validation. It’s all one big game at the end of the long haul. A person can’t long to possess one world, and have some of the other. It just doesn't work that way. Now, take Howard Roark and Dorian Gray for instance. Both were artists in their own right, and both tempted destruction. Everyone sought to destroy Howard Roark, for his spiritual vision and his disregard for appearances. Everyone accepted Dorian Gray, for his lack of a vision and complete immersion in appearances. Yet, he eventually destroyed himself. To live, in accordance with or despite one’s best self -- that is the big question, and the simplest cause of pain.

Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.

~Benjamin Franklin

On the subject of clubbing, men seem to be fiercely divided. The seasoned seem to think of it mindless prattle, pointless grinding, and an endless cycle of repetitive flirtatious episodes. Not to say that it couldn't be fun, but not all nights end equally. The rash see it as a natural release of energy, a favored compulsion, or a giving-in to spontaneity -- or choose not to put it into words at all. I don’t think I’ve been rash enough to make that decision.

Throwing in the Towel

Just you wait, Apple. I will buy a computer from you, but just not at this exact time. I’ll start by buying an external DVD+RW drive. I’ll install more RAM later. I don’t know what I’ll do after -- maybe buy peripherals. The iMac will have to wait, but I’m definitely buying one. I went to the store today and the four they had on their shelves were already sold out. I was right. I’ll have to wait.

The Cult of Macintosh

I’ve been thinking about getting an Apple computer for a long time. It all started when the rainbow-colored iMacs came out, featuring a processor built into the monitor. Fine, my reasons for wanting one at first weren’t entirely honorable or technical. I wanted one because it came in blue and orange. I must have been in my early teens at the time. It was the only computer that I thought wasn’t boring and ugly, but alas, I didn’t get one. My family didn’t have any computer at all, let alone a new iMac that wasn’t available at discount desktop prices. A few years later, Apple came out with the flat-screen iMac, an interesting little thing that resembled ET more than an actual computer. I wanted one then too, but knowing so little about computers back then, I would have probably been happy to use it as a paperweight let alone a computing device. My family finally bought a computer when I was in high school, when my grandfather bought my brother, sister, and I our first computer. It was a Compaq, and I was so happy with the thought of getting one, I forgot about Macs altogether. So I lived in PC world for the following five years, all through the rest of high school and college.

I thought I would never visit Macs again. I had doubts. I thought that a computer so small and pretty could never match up to the likes of the big, bulky, desktop PC’s. I was thinking of getting one only as a (mostly visual) secondary to a PC I would use for most of my computing functions. Then I started working in science, which is apparently considered a niche market. Apple owns anywhere from a measly 3-10% of the total computing market, but in the science world, an amazingly disproportionate percentage of people use Macs. They’re apparently very good for protein and molecular modeling, and editing all of the detail-sensitive photographs biologists take. The same is true in art and graphics. Macs are just great for animation, 3-D imaging, and carrying out the equations involved in complex vector graphics (maybe it has something to do with their affiliation with Pixar…). Adobe applications seem to be used more frequently by Mac users, and the PowerMac G5 has all the tools a graphics designer would need: huge RAM, multiple dual-core processors, advanced video card, potential to grow. It’s all too intense. It’s easy to see why designers would have a leaning towards Macs – just look at them!

Well, at the very real risk of being a promotion whore, I’m seriously considering buying a Mac. I’ve been looking for an alternative to my Compaq laptop, which by now crashes after every hour of use. I’m so tired of having a computer crash from WORDPROCESSING, of all things! People just don’t make viruses and spyware for Macs. There aren’t enough users out there to make it worthwhile. I went to the local store to ask about them, and they were actually on sale! Apparently, fewer people want to buy the iMac G5s since the new iMacs with Intel processors came about. Along with the student educational discount, I could buy one for 23% less than the purchase price, saving myself some $300 dollars in the process! I almost had a heart attack when I found out. I wasn’t planning on buying a new computer till after I found a job, but I just can’t pass on this opportunity. Granted, I could still get a cheaper deal if I were to assemble new and used components, but one look at the thing, with its wide-screen display, DVD-RW SuperDrive, and computer components/ports/drives built into an impossibly thin monitor had my mouth watering. It was too intense. I don’t know if I could get a new, late model this cheap again… I won’t have to settle for used… I could have a brand new iMac. Technically, it’s treason (you know, being a minority Intel shareholder and all…), but they just made the switch recently anyway and I feel that at this point the IBM PowerPC G5 processors are still better. I would have to shell out the money soon though. (Do I really want to charge $1000 to my credit card?). It’s just so …breathtaking. God. If I were a Windows computer, I’d probably need a boot disk about now. I need to come up with a decision by tomorrow, or Friday. How to decide? How to decide?

I went to the bookstore and started reading all the books they had about Macs. I still have a (rather daring and potentially problematic) inclination to build a PC. I would learn much more from it and it would cost me less, but it’s just not practical to build a Mac. They’re too unique, and Apple does nearly everything in-house. The case just seems too pretty to break into, and I would probably do some serious damage if I tried. I should choose something simpler, in a tower case, and with larger parts for a first-time job. I just don’t want to have a second PC after my first. Macs are different, they look like little alien people, and they run on Mac OS X. The tiny little Mac’s heart beats to the true core of Unix. I’m almost tempted to give mine a name…

I realize that owning a Mac isn’t just about having a neat little computer that modern artists would be content with. Mac users also belong to the counter-culture of computing. They’re the little guys, defending their toys despite their more-limited software options and obvious lack of market share. To make a quaint and geeky comparison, they’re like tiny little Luke Skywalkers battling the Galactic Empire of Microsoft and Dell. Mac users are fiercely loyal. They stay true to their brand. Do I want to belong to the Cult of Macintosh?

Aubade

Aubade
by Louis Macneice

Having bitten on life like a sharp apple
Or, playing it like a fish, been happy,

Having felt with fingers that the sky is blue
What have we after that to look forward to?

Not the twilight of the gods by a precise dawn
Of sallow and grey bricks, and newsboys crying war.

I climbed up the steps to the lab, boarded the elevator, and got off at the eleventh floor. Then I saw my boss, asked her if she had some time to talk, and told her everything about what’s happened to me these past couple of weeks. I really enjoyed working in the developmental mouse lab. It was worth the extra hours aside from school. There is so much I still want to do, to learn. I’ll find that too in the next lab, but I’ll really miss this one. It was the first time I worked with mammalian tissue, made histology sections, and saw, through the smooth reflective walls of a microscope tube, a mouse embryo beating its tiny little heart. The other day, the lab was closing and I stayed behind. The workers had gone home, and it was quiet and misty in the halls. I looked out the window into the black, shining night of Philadelphia, thinking about what I was leaving behind. The spotlights were searching and somewhere, a helicopter flew off, into the unlit recesses of the night. This is a vital and necessary step, but its never easy saying goodbye to something you loved.

Coda

I wrote this sometime last week, on bits of spare paper I gathered after my exams. I didn't have time to type it up until now:


Today I stepped outside and the campus was empty -- quiet, serene, almost eerie from the lack of noise. I walked slower, pattering my feet through the paved walkway. I had just taken my last exam that day, and as I left the building I couldn’t help but feel a great weight lifted from me. Gone were the days of staying up late, skipping meals, and cramming for exams I seemed to care less and less for. There I was, free, with nothing to prove to anyone but my own. “Free,” I kept repeating that word over and over in my mind. I reminded myself: learning is not a cage -- it never was -- but deadlines were, studying for exams was, and I never did learn to overcome that inherent fear of performance... I walked to the library and stared at its blank windows, dark now from the lack of activity. I spent hours in that place. It had been my second home. Now that it was dark and vacant, I could see my own reflection staring back at me. I didn’t like the feeling. I walked to the statue of Ben Franklin, and sat by his feet once more. Only one other time did I come here that sticks out in my mind. It was the beginning of September. I hadn’t resolved yet if Penn was right for me. I had fears, financial worries, and social insecurities. Somewhere in the midst of worrying for it all, I think I had forgotten what I was here for. The fundamental reasons were: to learn, to be educated, to specialize, and to make something better of myself. I fear that what it became instead was: relief, validation, a way out, freedom from what I thought was a mundane existence. Classes started, exams were scheduled, I sought out part-time jobs, and soon I had my own place in the world. I had a niche to call my own and a small voice to play in the grand organ of the university. The music was exquisite, beautiful, even intoxicating. It was the music of energy, the dance of innovation -- with ideas taking shape, hopes taking form, and dreams materializing into technologies, inventions, molecules, poetry, and works of art. It was also a play of constant movement: movement to finish tasks on time, movement to study presentations, to read books, meet with people, memorize equations, and take care of anything else that needed attending to when the time allowed. Somewhere along the way, the work became my life. It was the pattern and I could emulate it, crawl inside it, lie down, look back on it and say, "the Pattern is good." I would close my eyes and the sweet thought of completion would drift me off to sleep. Now, with the work done and ended, the hustle and bulk of ritual tasks is gone, and along with it, what I fear was my sense of meaning. I can almost stay still and listen to the tiny voice inside my head yearning for something more, as if there was a quiet but resolute pain of something missing. I feel like I didn’t make enough friends, let the semester pass by too quickly, didn’t get to explore the city enough, the world enough, and here I am, still aching for something more. I didn’t get to enjoy my time here without the pressing burden of work over my shoulders. I know that I did everything to try to prevent it, but these are the complaints I make silently to myself, knowing that a first experience can only occur once and never again. My time here was imperfect, but I can live with that. Perhaps it's as close to perfection, or happiness, as I could ever hope for, ...and I was happy here. The time I spent here was well spent. I'll cherish it for the rest of my lifetime. I just can’t help it. I love people. I love this place. I just don’t want to leave it. I want to go on thinking that my time here was meaningful.

Fine as wine.... and this seems oddly appropriate for today

Dreams
by Langston Hughes

Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.


Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.



Life is Fine
by Langston Hughes

I went down to the river,
I set down on the bank.
I tried to think but couldn't,
So I jumped in and sank.

I came up once and hollered!
I came up twice and cried!
If that water hadn't a-been so cold
I might've sunk and died.

But it was Cold in that water! It was cold!


I took the elevator
Sixteen floors above the ground.
I thought about my baby
And thought I would jump down.

I stood there and I hollered!
I stood there and I cried!
If it hadn't a-been so high
I might've jumped and died.

But it was High up there! It was high!


So since I'm still here livin',
I guess I will live on.
I could've died for love--
But for livin' I was born

Though you may hear me holler,
And you may see me cry--
I'll be dogged, sweet baby,
If you gonna see me die.

Life is fine! Fine as wine! Life is fine!

One sight for sore eyes

The Van Pelt Library at UPenn, on a weekday night during exam period is surely a sight to see. Every desk, chair, and computer terminal was occupied. There wasn’t even a place to sit on the sofas and lounge chairs. The little space that seemed available from far away revealed papers and bookbags on closer inspection, evidence that some late-nighter would return. I was actually crowded out of the library. (It’s sad). I laughed, chatted with the security guard, and went to the lesser-known Engineering lab instead.

Excerpts from a Letter

Didn't get as much work done as I wanted to. Plenty earlier, but not now. Spent too much time losing heart about work. Wrote the following earlier to a friend, not included in its entirety, but enough to paint a picture

"I’ve been working so hard in the past few weeks, I haven’t had much time to get out and socialize. I feel like I’ve sacrificed one need for another, and placed career once more before friends. It isn’t exactly that dire -- nothing, physically, has changed. I have not lost or angered any new friends, but I feel like I spent so much time working, I haven’t been able to forge new ones! This is my first semester here, and (breathless) what a rush everything has been, but now it is ending, my finals are eminent, I am contemplating what to do when the majority of the students leave for winter break, and I am confronted with the harsh reality that I really haven’t nurtured many friendships at all! It isn’t so bad -- I’m not here to network or win a popularity contest, but when I look back on my day, I see all that I’ve accomplished, but also that I have no one to share it with, no one! It is then that I entertain notions of life being sad, work being futile, and all of those nihilistic, cynical, existential views of life being true!"

"I received your last letter warmly. ... How I wish you were here, and we could reminisce, and talk about our families, teachers, frustrations, and theories. UPenn is everything I wanted it to be, but my time here has not been perfect. I took on too many obligations to save a little time and money, and I’m not sure how far it has all gotten me. I try not to worry every day. There is no one to listen to me. I have one friend who I see regularly, but he breaks schedules and does not listen very well."

"You really shouldn't let me wander off on tangents so much. There is just so much that has gone on since I saw you last. I miss you. I did not want it to be this way exactly, but I suppose more has gone right for me than has gone wrong, and that is something to be grateful for. I have so many things to do now. You'll hear from me again. Take care."

Impulse arrested spills over

Some light reading before heavy exam time. …I must motivate myself to learn science, true science, which is deep and realistic, and not the superficial stuff science fiction is based on. Revisiting passages from Brave New World. This is fiction, and dystopian at that, but it’s well written. Makes one want to study and feel that one’s work is important. So divided on opinions on Aldous Huxley, (love his intelligence, but hate his convictions) but not enough time to explore that now. What I need now is motivation. I have it. Time to get to work.

“Mother, monogamy, romance. High spurts the fountain; fierce and foamy the wild jet. The urge has but a single outlet. My love, my baby. No wonder these poor pre-moderns were mad and wicked and miserable. Their world didn't allow them to take things easily, didn't allow them to be sane, virtuous, happy. What with mothers and lovers, what with the prohibitions they were not conditioned to obey, what with the temptations and the lonely remorses, what with all the diseases and the endless isolating pain, what with the uncertainties and the poverty–they were forced to feel strongly. And feeling strongly (and strongly, what was more, in solitude, in hopelessly individual isolation), how could they be stable?”

“Impulse arrested spills over, and the flood is feeling, the flood is passion, the flood is even madness: it depends on the force of the current, the height and strength of the barrier. The unchecked stream flows smoothly down its appointed channels into a calm well-being. (The embryo is hungry; day in, day out, the blood-surrogate pump unceasingly turns its eight hundred revolutions a minute. The decanted infant howls; at once a nurse appears with a bottle of external secretion. Feeling lurks in that interval of time between desire and its consummation. Shorten that interval, break down all those old unnecessary barriers.”

--Aldous Huxley, Brave New World, chp 3

"Oft expectation fails, and most oft there / Where most it promises; and oft it hits / Where hope is coldest, and despair most fits."

--W.S., All's Well That Ends Well (II, i, 145-147)


Some days are just long -- long, long, boring and shadowed with the cloud of inescapable tasks. I have an exam this Wednesday, and another one (a final) immediately following on Thursday. I may not see the light of day this week.

Curbing my enthusiasm

I went to the video store tonight and someone had actually rented Gilmore Girls Season 4 before I could. I narrowed down the alternatives to two TV series: The Nanny and Curb Your Enthusiasm. Out of want to try something new I chose Curb Your Enthusiasm.

I found the show rather crass. I appreciate what Larry David is trying to do in portraying his life, but there are simply too many dirty jokes in it for my tastes. I find them “cheap shots” in terms of making the audience laugh. It only takes one show to realize that Larry David is appealing to a primarily male audience. Call me a pansy, but I tend to prefer shows with witty dialogue, local color, an intuitive sense of conflict, and a light-hearted sense of humor without having to refer to racial and social mores. If these shows tend to aim for a sophisticated, verbally-inclined female audience then so be it.

The Corporate Wish List

Ah, Christmas. Here is Santa's wish list of stocks:

Apple Computer (AAPL): I know what I'm going to be thinking about when I cut into that scrumptious apple pie this holiday season: the ongoing success Apple Computer has had in its product line. Many people thought Apple was dying with the huge market share owned by PCs, but that all changed with the inception of one monumental product: the iPod. This little gizmo saved Apple's revenues and jacked the stock up -- way up. I love what Steve Jobs has done to Apple Computer. The company now pursues intelligent design to differentiate its product, and its iMacs and Power Mac G5's run on Mac OS X, different from all the rest. The company had a two-for-one stock split on February 18, 2005, and it's stock has been climbing steadily ever since. Apart from the financials, my entire biomed research lab uses the Mac, and after using it for a while, I think my next computer will be one too. I love the chic design and reliability of Apple. I love almost everything about the Mac actually; with the sole exception of how their windows take up much space and leave you less to work with on the screen. I should also mention that Steve Jobs, the CEO of Apple, is also the CEO of Pixar Animation Studios (PIXR). Pixar has produced Toy Story, Finding Nemo, and The Incredibles -- three of my favorite movies of all time! Yet another reason to love Apple, Inc!

Google, Inc (GOOG): This is another story similar to AAPL, and it's even more dramatic. I remember the days when GOOG was at $250 a share, and people were saying it was overvalued. Then it climbed to $300, then $320, and soon after their second IPO, $400. It's currently at $420 a share. It's obscene. I watched in blank horror as it's stock kept climbing and I knew I didn't own a single share! I wanted it, but I already owned one tech stock, and according to my diversification standards (which I follow religiously), I couldn't own one more. (Plus, I admit, it's multiple was too high and it was just too rich for my blood... with the pennies I invest with, I would have only owned one share!). Oh, the humanity!

Yahoo Inc. (YHOO): Yet another tech success story, when will the pain end!??? Fine, I don't own YHOO. I've been riding on Intel (INTC) all this time, and I still believe it's a good play. Under most considerations, I'd prefer Google over Yahoo (this blog is written with Google technology after all...), but Yahoo is still unmatched in several areas. Take Yahoo Finance, or Yahoo GeoCities for instance. Yahoo Finance alone makes Yahoo all worth it. It offers a humongous number of user-friendly finance tools I couldn't dream of, and the internet (Yahoo and all its competitors combined) has really changed the way I live and interact with the world. Take the stock market for instance. How else would a simple street urchin like me be able to research stocks and trade securities like a broker? This is a bit of an extension, but I attribute some of this power to Yahoo, for making the web friendly for all of us, and this stock definitely gets my approval rating of the year.

Amgen (AMGN): Where would $60 in June have gotten me today if I had invested in AMGN? $22 richer per share if you ask me. Amgen is a great biotech company to invest in. They have a stable pipeline, and they're relatively young, with room left for growth. The biotech mine is still largely untapped. Amgen's products are based on sound science and it's interesting how they've managed to study and "mimic" the biology of cells to produce innovative new products like Epogen for treating age-old diseases (as opposed to researching small drug molecules for targeting certain cell receptors). I'm not going to get into this too much right now, but I certainly wish I owned this stock.

McDonald's (MCD): This is more of a stock for last year, but I'm listing it because I wanted to buy it when I first saw it in 2004, and I was completely right about it when I checked the numbers a year later (if I had invested in it the time that I wanted to, I would have made about $7 a share). McDonald's is like a tried-and-true friend to me. The company gets a bad rap because they target a lower-income market, they don't charge much for their products (hence the term, VALUE meal), and they duplicate stores (as you would expect any restaurant chain to). I don't give in to the plain snobbery that some have towards McDonald's though. I think it's mostly because McDonald's makes cheap products for what tends-to-be poor consumers -- but heck, I grew up in Jersey City, I was raised to like fast food, and I'm not going to lie about their food tasting better than some of the stuff that comes out of high-end restaurants. (Many of them are great, don't get me wrong, but there tends to be a great deal of variability within restaurants). In a country where people count calories and cholesterol levels, it's obvious that McDonald's would be an easy target for the public, but if you eat there, you're making a concession to be eating primarily fried foods high in calories. You don't see fast food diners getting as bad a rap. It's your responsibility to watch your weight, not theirs. Furthermore, I think there's a great deal of exaggeration about the hazard of eating McDonaldland's foods. Yes, they have preservatives. Yes, they salt their foods -- but it's not like they're serving you rat poison in a burger. I think there's a great deal of exaggeration involved when people start talking about poisons, preservatives, free radicals, and carcinogens in McDonald's foods. There would be a huge liability risk for McDonald's if it was true, and if it was, I think the settlement package would more than make up for any grievances. People are so blind to the good that McDonald's does. When have they considered the Ronald McDonald House Charities the company sponsors, or how the restaurant offers healthy alternatives like milk and orange juice to its soda, not to mention the $1 side salad? I think the average McDonald's customer is satisfied with his or her order -- all of my friends from Jersey City certainly were. It wasn't until I moved to the suburbs that I started hearing bad raps about McDonald's, and all this while the company was making money and the stock was doing well. I also know something that many people tend to forget as they get older: kids love McDonald's. They love the burgers, the fries, and those colorful happy meal boxes. McDonald's also has great management and they know how to negotiate. Do you remember when McDonald's teamed up with Ty Beanie Babies or Neopets? What about Hasbro and Parker Brother's Monopoly? A look at their sheets will tell you that McDonald's has over $4.5 billion in operating cash flow, with about $1.5 billion in free cash flow. Management knows what it's doing and it's doing it right. MCD is a great stock to own. It's proved itself time and time again, they have a great international presence, the company will probably still be standing when I die, and they offer good dividends. With it's long history, MCD is no longer a value play, but it's still a damn good growth stock to own.

Citigroup (C): Have you seen all the Citibank and Citicard advertisements lately? There are a million of them! I see them all over NJ and PA when I'm on my way to New York City. It's part of Charles Prince's (CEO) aggressive advertisement campaign. Citigroup offers competitive rates and valuable service, and their CitiRewards credit card offers one of the best deals to consumers. Citigroup has also won Glendale Federal Bank vs. the United States, and recently acquired the First American Bank in Texas (FAB), to offer more than just a strong presence in the East Coast. To add to this, Citigroup has a diversified asset management base, has been growing steadily in revenues, is trying to command a stronger international presence, and is buying back common shares: a good sign! I'm hoping to use it to add some stability to my somewhat volatile-at-the-moment portfolio. It's just too bad I didn't get it earlier when I was already thinking about it at $44 a share.

I think these five stocks should give anyone an idea of what kind of companies I like and why I like them. I did also want to talk about Amazon (AMZN), Dell (DELL), eBay Inc. (EBAY), Dow Chemical (DOW), Deere and Co. (DE), 3M Co. (MMM), Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), Microsoft (MSFT), Conoco Philips (COP), and JP Morgan and Chase (JPM). Alas, I'm tired. That will have to wait for another day.

I did, however, come up with a list of business leaders I now officially admire.

My new business role models include:

Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Cofounders of GOOGLE
Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer and Pixar Studios
David Filo and Jerry Yang, Cofounders of Yahoo!
(by the way, did anyone know that YAHOO was originally an acronym for "Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle"?)
Bill Gates, you know… Chairman and Founder of Microsoft
Warren Buffett, Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, "revered investor," and second richest man in America, after Bill Gates
Pierre Omidyar, Founder and Chairman of eBay
Jeffrey P. Bezos, Founder and Chairman of Amazon

This basically makes my reading list for the month.

Redefining Prosperity

I went to Springfield for Thanksgiving, and soon as I came in, he was busy chopping up vegetables, preparing the cranberry sauce, mashing the sweet potatoes and making the signature sweet potato bread rolls. Bored and left to my devices, I went online to check the performances of certain stocks, something I haven't been able to do since I last visited him from UPenn. He pried my fingers off from the keyboard as soon as he realized what I was doing, and went back on ten minutes later to check the most recent news about the Noreaster hitting our coast and pending forecasts of rain and snow.

This Thanksgiving may be bordering on a bit strange, but this year, I have several things to be thankful for:

The first one would have to be the Puppy and his own brand of lovableness. He likes making things, giving them to you, and making you feel special. He's interested in just about everything you can find around the house, and looks especially adorable when he's planting fall bulbs, buying pet fish, or making apple pie. I don't feel like I'm at home in my own apartment, which I pretty much only use for sleep; but I feel like I'm home wherever he is.

The second thing I have to be thankful for is the lab and the new changes I've made in studying the mouse model. Drosophila is an excellent model organism for genetics, but I can only go so far in it if I want to study topics of a medically-relevant basis. The mouse is infinitely closer to the human than flies are, but they present challenges that geneticists must concede if they want to focus their energies on this model. Working at the Labosky lab has taught me much about mammalian development and has allowed me to get my foot-in-the-door on stem cell research. Currently, I work on liver bud development, but I'm expecting to have an increase in responsibilities soon. Yesterday, Dr. Tremblay told me about CRE-mediated diptheria toxin production and the new genetically-controlled ablation technique in developmental biology research. This makes it possible to perform ablation techniques on mammals in vivo.

Working in close proximity to Wharton and many business-minded people is changing the way I think about science and the world. I've recently made the academic switch from genetics and a developmental biology focus to pharmacology, and soon, nanotechnology. Genetics and stem cells are interesting, have only marginally been tapped as a medical resource, and have great potential for therapeutics; but for the moment, advances in these fields are too speculative for me and unattractive to investors.

I'm thankful that I've found something that calls to me and is rewarding on a material, physical basis as well. I used to think that genes, poetry, literature, and the human genome were the only things worthy of my time, but I've come to add the stock market to that hodge-podge assortment as well. Now here is a dynamic system that changes, challenges me, uses my skills, is inexhaustible (like Shakespeare, or Merrill...), and is understandably important as well. It makes me feel like I have a personal stake in the economy, and motivates me to learn more and more about it...

There is a world outside of academia. There are companies that would pay me to be mad and neurotic, and find new molecules for them; places where I can be myself, and be with other smart people that will challenge and stimulate me. Initially, I wanted to be an academic because I thought it was the only place where I could learn forever and escape being given some rote task that would bore me to the grave. I'm the sort of person that requires a high degree of stimulation. When I first entered the marble halls of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I gazed around and around and was dumbstruck with awe. I want to emulate that feeling; and make it happen in my life. I like finance. I like investing. I want to be a business-scientist, and I feel, intrinsically, that I'll always be a poet as well. Academies are so quick to encourage polymaths, Renaissance men, and people with varied interests. Why can't they be enthusiastic about business as well? If students are taught Einstein, Shakespeare, and Virgil, shouldn't they be taught how to do a little more than balance a checkbook as well?

It's Thanksgiving, and I have a couple of other things to be thankful for as well before this night comes to a close:

Parents and family: as annoying and misunderstanding as they can be at times, they're there when you need them, they've known you growing up, and they intrinsically mean well. You can't fault them for everything.

My education: it's made me who I am, it's shaped my ego, and it's exposed me to a myriad assortment of people and philosophies I would have otherwise never known. Here's to you: McNair Academic, Penn, and Drew

Jersey City: you're not so bad. You're dirty, poor, mismanaged, overpopulated, and uncared for, but you played a part in shaping who I am, if only to make me aware of what I had to escape from, and you made me want to try every bit of the world I could. You're not so bad.

Friends: without naming any specific person in particular, all of you are different and represent some different aspect or stage in my life. Not all of you could stay with me through the years, but it was mutual while it lasted, we shared some joys, you taught me something about the world I never knew, and even if it ended on a bad note, I don't think I'd take back ever meeting you.

As Mark Twain once said, "Grief can take care of itself, but to get the full value of joy you must have somebody to divide it with."

Have a Happy Thanksgiving.

Now is the winter of our discontent....

How did it get so cold so quickly in the Northeast? I can hardly type...
Let’s huddle together for warmth!

I can’t wait for December, not that I particularly like winter above all seasons, but I want school to end. I want to have finals behind me. I want to breathe, and to be able to hear myself think for once. I couldn’t care less about the Urea Cycle in Biochemistry. We’re going to have a third exam in Pharmacology on Pharmacokinetics. The Segel text is like James Joyce in numbers. Darwin, help me now!

The Living

It occurred to me that I don't have a single example of my poetry on this journal. What a pity that would be, and to think: what better than a poem to bespeak one formerly known as Poet! This is one of my non-rhyming ones, as most of my poems are written in rhyme. I wrote this while I was still studying at Drew.


The Living

Hunger of the flesh eats like a maggot in the rind.
Hunger of the mind beats like steam in the kettle.
Hunger limb for limb tearing at the old balustrades,
And the granite obelisk erected for the dawn
Are nothing more but a rack of ruins by night.
Somewhere a million stars are exploding,
Extinguished – the supernovas, blasting through the cosmos
Blazing the lonely panegyric of the sky.
We are all dying. It is programmed in our cells.
Six million of me succumbing to senescence.
I am a city, encomium of the world,
And this foot, this finger, hanging on a tendon
Are my sole tributes to mortality.
Like a studded glove it hits. Here is a knucklebone.
Here is a ruptured jaw. Take the old mandible
And boil it in water. Ferment it with onions.
Make bone soup. It is better this way.
From whence it came, salt and sulfur,
Blood and brine. We are all elements primordial,
And this boiling acid soup, ballast water,
And seminal fluid, tiny old homunculus of the world
Are a pot thickened with people. To live is to hunger.
Drive me desire. Take this umbilicus,
Dip your spoon, and dig in.

--N.D. Pura, 2005

New Yorkers think they live in the center of the universe. Then you visit for the weekend and realize that they're right.

I went to New Jersey and New York this weekend to visit Mike and Kevin. Mike was big, blue-eyed and happy to see to me and it made my entire week to see him after what seemed like an eternity (five days). The next day the two of us went to visit Kevin in Manhattan, who was urbane, well-shaven, blunt, and insulting in the endearing sort of way. Then, we had dinner at a Thai restaurant where he and Mike pointed out nearly every little Asian nuance the restaurant could pull off to give the customer a unique "Asian" experience (including me for that matter). We wandered for a bit until Mike got bored and started pointing out tourists. I love New York. I miss its flashy window displays, its boutique shops, the traffic, the people, Washington Square, and that sense of speed and energy that must come from constantly being in the middle of things. I claim to have "New York blood" in my veins (as an extension of my Hudson-county upbringing), but I have my own reasons for living in Philadelphia (cost of living, parents, city taxes, school...). I know I’ll return to live there one day. I just don’t know when.


I'm feeling lucky

The Founders Speak

I’m not really the type of person to extol high-profile CEO’s I’ve never met before, but Larry Page and Sergey Brin are different. They’re the founders of GOOGLE. We touched upon the Google story briefly today in Entrepreneurship class when discussing IPOs. The conversation piqued my curiosity enough to look into it a little more (click on the title link above).

It’s really quite interesting. What I’m posting is a link to a SEC filing that came out in 2004, but it’s also a Letter from the Founders to investors. It’s essentially their “Letter to the World” (I’m reminded of that marvelous scene in ATLAS SHRUGGED when the protagonist steps up to the microphone and brazenly says, “This is John Galt Speaking.” This isn’t exactly the same thing, but it comes pretty damn close). Google is a remarkable, relatively young company that I’ve grown to have tremendous respect for. They have a young, ingenious, new product that continues to do more and more. They’re not motivated simply by short-term gains, but love of innovation and technology. They have a sense of social responsibility and an awareness of what their technology means to the world. The last time mankind attempted to the harness the knowledge of the world in one spot was with the Library of Alexandria. Now we have Google, and at several billion webpages of net searching, they’re still growing.

Read the Letter if you can. SEC filings are usually dry, dusty, and filled with the financial and legal jargon only an MBA would understand, but this one is different. It’s bold, brazen, funny, and has that wonderful dash of humanism. Yes, there are companies out there that do have a soul. Google is one of them. The statement is long, but there are some notable passages:

Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. When we started Google in 1998 out of Stanford University, we searched about 30 million web pages. And at the time that was pretty competitive. That was about as big as most search engines, not quite as big as the biggest, but we soon overcame those. Now we’re searching many billions of web pages, so over a hundred times bigger, and Google works well...

Our employees, who have named themselves Googlers, are everything. Google is organized around the ability to attract and leverage the talent of exceptional technologists and business people. We have been lucky to recruit many creative, principled and hard working stars. We hope to recruit many more in the future. We will reward and treat them well...

The significant employee ownership of Google has made us what we are today. Because of our employee talent, Google is doing exciting work in nearly every area of computer science. We are in a very competitive industry where the quality of our product is paramount. Talented people are attracted to Google because we empower them to change the world; Google has large computational resources and distribution that enables individuals to make a difference. Our main benefit is a workplace with important projects, where employees can contribute and grow. We are focused on providing an environment where talented, hard working people are rewarded for their contributions to Google and for making the world a better place...

Don’t be evil. We believe strongly that in the long term, we will be better served--as shareholders and in all other ways--by a company that does good things for the world even if we forgo some short term gains. This is an important aspect of our culture and is broadly shared within the company...

Google users trust our systems to help them with important decisions: medical, financial and many others. Our search results are the best we know how to produce. They are unbiased and objective, and we do not accept payment for them or for inclusion or more frequent updating. We also display advertising, which we work hard to make relevant, and we label it clearly. This is similar to a well-run newspaper, where the advertisements are clear and the articles are not influenced by the advertisers’ payments. We believe it is important for everyone to have access to the best information and research, not only to the information people pay for you to see...

We aspire to make Google an institution that makes the world a better place. In pursuing this goal, we will always be mindful of our responsibilities to our shareholders, employees, customers and business partners. With our products, Google connects people and information all around the world for free. We are adding other powerful services such as Gmail, which provides an efficient one gigabyte Gmail account for free. ... AdWords connects users and advertisers efficiently, helping both. AdSense helps fund a huge variety of online web sites and enables authors who could not otherwise publish. Last year we created Google Grants—a growing program in which hundreds of non-profits addressing issues, including the environment, poverty and human rights, receive free advertising. And now, we are in the process of establishing the Google Foundation...

Google is not a conventional company. Eric, Sergey and I intend to operate Google differently, applying the values it has developed as a private company to its future as a public company. ... We will live up to our “don’t be evil” principle by keeping user trust and not accepting payment for search results. We have a dual class structure that is biased toward stability and independence and that requires investors to bet on the team...

The Management Team


Congratulations to our winners!
http://www.drew.edu/english/prizes-and-awards

Noel’s List Of The Top Ten Drugs No Civilization On Earth Should Be Without

After successfully completing two back-breaking exams, I thought I’d celebrate by posting something FUN about science. Here it is:


NOEL’S LIST OF THE TOP TEN DRUGS NO CIVILIZATION ON EARTH SHOULD BE WITHOUT

1. Anti-Inflammatory and Pain Relief Drugs

Commonly known as: Aspirin, Acetaminophen, Ibuprofen, Codeine; Common Prescription Brand Names: Endocet, Roxicet, Tylox, Tylenol with Codeine nos. 1-4, Allay, Anexia, Bancap, Ceta-Plus, Dolacet, Hydrocet, Lorcet, Lortab, Margesic, Norco, Panacet, Percocet, Stagesic, Vicodin, Zydone, Talacen, OxyContin

This is without a doubt, the most widely-used class of drugs, if not for aspirin alone. There are so many combinations available, from simple generic aspirin, to prescription Tylenol with codeine. Most people are fine with over-the-counter retail drugs, but there several prescription ones out there that are much more potent, regulated, and fun to learn about. The narcotics in particular are popular among the underground, if not downright illegal. I find the opiods vastly interesting, but they work on the CNS and really deserve their own category. Some professors would have my neck for classifying them with the NSAIDS (non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs). Anyway, pain relief seems to be the most prominent concern in the drug world, and more of these drugs are consumed than any other.

2. Drugs for Bacterial Infections

Common Brand Names: Amoxil, Trimox, Larotid, Wymox, Augmentin, Marcillin, Omnipen, Probampacin, Spectrobid, Geocillin, Cloxapen, Dycill, Pathocil, Unipen, Bactocill, Pfizerpen, Beepen, Veetids

As with the first category, there are way too many drugs here for me to list. You all get the big idea: bacteria are bad and common and when they infect us (which is usually pretty often), we need to get rid of them quickly. I’ve only listed the beta-lactam inhibitors. They work by inhibiting cell wall synthesis in bacteria. There are some other more obscure and creative drugs out there, but I’m not a big fan of bacteriology and I’d rather move on.

3. Cholesterol-Inhibiting Drugs

Common Brand Names: Lipitor, Zocor, Lescol, Altocor, Mevacor, Advicor, Pravachol, Pravigard PAC, Crestor, Zetia

This is a big one. Most people don’t realize it, but this is actually THE biggest one, at least in terms of prescription drug sales. Pfizer’s Lipitor and Merck’s Zocor are the two most prescribed, used and lucrative drugs. Aside from the economic concerns, cholesterol-inhibiting drugs are really medically important. Obesity is a big issue in America and there is a push towards research in obesity-related drugs. Cholesterol synthesis isn’t exactly the same thing as being “fat,” but it’s a common medical concern, especially with age. I know so many adults that are taking these drugs nowadays it’s obscene. Many of them aren’t even “fat,” (in my humble opinion). Next time you go home, check your parent’s drug cabinet. Chances are, at least one of them will be taking these drugs.

4. Antidepressants and Antipsychotic Drugs

Common Brand Names: Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, Wellbutrin, Effexor, Zyprexa, Dyprexa, Celexa, Lexapro, Sarafem, Luvox, Moclebemide, Harmala, Nardil, Parnate, Marplan

Aldous Huxley once wrote:
"Two thousand pharmacologists and bio-chemists were subsidized. Six years later it was being produced commercially. The perfect drug. Euphoric, narcotic, pleasantly hallucinant. All the advantages of Christianity and alcohol; none of their defects. Take a holiday from reality whenever you like, and come back without so much as a headache or a mythology. Stability was practically assured." (Brave New World)

These drugs have received so much coverage and controversy in recent years I just had to touch on it for my sake. Huxley paints a rather grim and sterile portrait of psychoactive drugs, but if you’ve ever taken any one of these antidepressants, you’ll know that they don’t really make you instantly happy and complacent but just “color” your mood, maybe sedate you a little, and potentially give you some motivation. The human mind is far more complicated than any molecule, and it’s a bit simplistic, in my opinion, to relegate so much responsibility on a drug. You are who you are and that’s not going to change by swallowing a pill. Depression and mental health concerns are a major life issue and it’s a pity these drugs aren’t given the respect they ought to have. I don’t think people really start appreciating the power of drugs until they start taking one of these drugs. Everyone takes drugs to cure some ailment in at least at some part of his or her life, but most people just swallow the pill and forget that it’s even working. Not so with the psychoactive drugs. These drugs have the potential to make a big difference -- and not one you’re likely to forget. I don’t give into many of the hogwash theories out there about antidepressants and antipsychotic drugs changing your personality and who you are. I firmly believe that these drugs help people and save lives. They have great potential, and they definitely deserve to be on top of this list.

5. Cancer-Inhibiting Drugs

Amifostine, Aminoglutethimide, Bicalutamide, Bleomycin, Cisplatin, Cladribine, Clodronate, Filgrastim, Goserelin, Hydroxyurea, Idarubicin, Letrozole, Leucovorin, Leuprolide, Medroxyprogesterone, Megestrol, Melphalan, Mitomycin, Pentostatin, Plicamycin, Porfimer, Tamoxifen, Testosterone, Thalidomide, Thioguanine, Tretinoin, Vindesine

I list the generic instead of the brand names here, because they seem to be more relevant in this field. There’s a real push in the biotechnology world to discover these drugs. Most of the chemotherapeutic drugs for cancer now are broad-acting and have a number of undesirable side effects. They target the rapidly-dividing cells in your body, which means cancer cells, but unfortunately hair cells, skin cells, endothelial (gut lining) cells, and a numerous host of other cells as well. This is why people in chemotherapy lose their hair and have such bad nausea all the time. Much more research needs to be done in this arena. There really hasn’t been a ground-breaking drug here that’s been both safe and effective.

6. Drugs for Viral Infections

Common Brand Names: Agenerase, Combivir, Retrovir, Epivir, Crixivan, Emtriva, Epivir, Epzicom, Fortovase, Fuzeon, Hivid, Invirase, Kaletra, Lexiva, Norvir, Rescriptor, Reyataz, Sustiva, Trizivir, Videx, Viracept, Viramune, Viread, Zerit, Ziagen

You’ll hear it time and time again: there is no cure for the common cold. There still isn’t. Yet, there is a push to discover new anti-viral drugs, and it’s mostly from one high-profile and controversial disease: AIDS. This virus has decimated certain minority populations and South Africa. No one drug has really risen above all others, but treatments often involve drug cocktails that prolong life by a certain percentage. The problems with viruses are that they live inside cells and can incorporate themselves unto our own DNA. The biology behind these drugs is truly fascinating, in part because there are so many hurdles to cross. Many of these drugs are protease inhibitors or nucleoside analog reverse transcriptase inhibitors. Their modes of action are very complex.

7. Heart and Antihypertensive Drugs

way more than I care to mention, but the ones I know are: Atenolol, Metoprolol, Nadolol, Propranolol, Timolol, Norvasc, Plavix, Catapres (Clonidine), Digitoxin, Digoxin

This is a large, large category, and it hurts me as biologist to just clump them all under #7. Some of these work on receptors, some are antiplatelet, and others have complex mechanisms that would just let me ramble on and on and bore you to death. To give you an idea of their complexity, these drugs are further classified into some of the following major categories: Angiotensin-converting Enzyme Inhibitors (ACE inhibitors), Angiotensin II Receptor Antagonists, Beta blockers, Blood Vessel Dilators (Vasodilators), Calcium Channel Blockers, Diuretics, and Nerve Blockers. It really takes a cardiopharmacologist to explain them all! The bottom line is: many people have heart and cardiovascular problems and these drugs are very important. With that said, let me move on and finish this list!

8. Estradiols and Birth-control Drugs

Common Brand Names: Alesse, Lessina, Aviane, Levlite, Cryselle, Loestrin, Levlen, Levora, Microgestin, Nordette, Lo/Ovral, Low-Orgestrel, Yasmin, Portia, Loestrin, Microgestin, Zovia, Ortho-Cyclen, Sprintec, Necon, Norinyl, Ortho-Novum, Nortrel, Demulen, Ortho-Cept, Zovia, OrthoEvra, Ovral, Brevicon, NuvaRing, Norplant II, Progestrasert, Mirena, Plan B, Preven

It’s a common fact of life: people have babies that they don’t necessarily want right away or can care for. It’s only been in the past several years that women have started widely using drugs to take control of their sex lives. Just think about how horrible a world would be if people couldn’t separate the recreational and affirmative values of sex from its reproductive ones. It would be just plain MEDIEVAL. I don’t think we can maintain a healthy society that way. There would be too much concealment, detachment, desolation, and repression for me. There’s no reason for a society to regress back to the Dark Ages if the technology exists. Birth-control drugs should be legal and implemented in all countries, especially in undeveloped ones where people need it most.

9. Impotence Drugs

Common Brand Names: Viagra, Levitra, Cialis

Not as many names here as the contraceptive drugs, but the ones listed are major. For years this was the problem that many older people had but couldn’t do anything or even talk about. Now, that’s changed. The discovery of Viagra and the other cGMP inhibitors for erectile dysfunction launched a new market that has been publicized widely. People are quick to criticize and make fun of these “sex drugs” but I think they do alot of serious good in the world. People have enough problems as it is and sexual frustrations with the person you love shouldn’t have to be one of them. These problems can accumulate and seriously do harm to a person’s psychology …so, if there’s a drug for it, why not? Viagra, Levitra, and Cialis go under #9 on my list.

10. Gastrointestinal Drugs

Common Brand Names: Aciphex, Cytotec, Zegerid, Carafate, Pepcid, Axid, Tagamet, Zantac, Imodium, Opium, Meridia, Nexium, Ogastro/Prevacid, Prevpac, Prilosec, Protonix, Xenical, Adipex, Lipram, Pancrease, Ultrase, Antivert, Zofram, Emend, MiraLax, Cephulac, Reglan, Bentyl, Anaspaz, Librax, Levsin, Asacol

Most of these drugs treat ulcers, which is a common medical concern. Some of them treat heartburn. The others are proton-pump inhibitors, antacids, stomach coatings, H2 blockers, or antibiotics. As you can see, this is really a general category that includes certain drug classes, and I could even throw some of them in with anti-inflammatory and pain-relief drugs if I wanted to. I don’t really have much to say about the gastrointestinal drugs, which I personally find to be rather dull, but gastrointestinal issues seem to be the number 2 general concern after pain relief and it would be a crime not to include them in “Noel’s List of the Top Ten Drugs no Civilization on Earth should be without.”


Other drugs that didn’t make it to my list:

If I could include more than 10, I would have definitely included allergy drugs, asthma drugs, osteoporosis drugs, heartburn drugs, drugs for anemia, and anti-diabetic drugs. So many people have allergies, an equally large percentage have asthma, nearly all of the women in my life will probably be taking osteoporosis drugs after 50; and heartburn, anemia, and diabetes are just HUGE concerns. However, I must restrain myself with just 10 drugs. It wouldn’t be right to remove gastrointestinal drugs when people suffer from stomach problems all the time. I conceptually include heartburn drugs with the larger category of gastrointestinal-related-concerns drugs. I’m also certainly not about to remove birth-control and impotence drugs from the list when I know how HUGELY important they are to society and personal psychology in general. From sales, asthma and allergy drugs are probably more important than birth-control and impotence drugs, but asthma is so common nobody really thinks about it these days, and they certainly don’t receive as much public coverage or controversy as those drugs linked to reproduction. Some of these drugs can make or break companies. There have been huge corporate battles over these drugs, such as when Pfizer tried to protect Viagra by claiming that Bayer’s Levitra and Eli Lilly’s Cialis infringed on its patent rights. This is big business, and it’s just plain common sense that medicine is tied to everyone.

So, there you go: my list. Some of the drugs are given more interesting overviews than the others, but in general, I think I give a good “Pharmacologist’s Eye-view of the World’s Concerns” here. Send me a comment if you disagree.