Remember remember November november

I haven’t written much recently, as I haven’t really had much to write about. I am, after all, a grad student, and my life is marked by the boring monotony of readings and seminars that seem to take up 95% of my waking hours. To be fair, I spend a fair amount of time trying to make myself work, which is more or less directly euivalent to the amount of time I spend reading webcomics and checking facebook (because, you know, something might have changed in the last 30 seconds). It’s a bit pathetic, really, but the lure of shiny pictures and contact to the outside world is a bit hard to resist.

I have to admit, I really hate the library. Coming from a (former) librarian, that’s a harsh statement, but I’m quite anti-library. Even when I worked (read: lived) in one I still couldn’t stand the place and was nevertheless constantly there—but only to work. I cannot study in a library; library, to me, speaks of dusty books, poor lighting, sterile environment, uncomfortable chairs and a dearth of electric sockets. Compared to my desk at home replete with surround sound speakers, coffee maker and the opportunity to take walks in the fresh air, I can’t imagine under what circumstances I could be induced to leave my little 8th floor sanctuary.

In addition, the library has a certain air of frantic desperation to it which I find offputting (mostly because it gives me a guilty conscience). Everyone is frantically doing something, buried in readings, meandering lost through the stacks (why do no two libraries use the same cataloguing system? Am I spoiled by the American 2-option system of a) Dewey or b) Library of Congress?) or taking constant coffee breaks. In fact, I am quite sure there are several people whose coffee breaks exceed the time they spend studying. Mostly, my life right now just makes me want to go AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!
It’s obvious I don’t get out much, and I like complaining.

Occasionally, however, I do manage to make it off my butt to go do something. Satuday we went to a concert at au Chat Noir, a bar in Carouge, which was featuring a brass/funk. It’s the kind of thing which is either amazing or ridiculous; you either love it and you dance, or you hate it and you leave because there’s no middle ground. Of course, the place was almost empty, and we joked it was a private party just for us (we were what, 10 people?) and as the crowd trickled in, it became a mix of us and people twice our age.

The band consisted of seven-odd frenchies in their mid 30s acting like they were in their early 20s, playing tuba, saxophone, drums, drums, trombone, turntables and banjo, playing stuff ranging from uptempo funk to big-band rap with jam riffs. The kid playing the turntables was slight and rather scrawny, and like anyone I’ve ever seen do ‘tables he bobbed back in forth almost hypnotically with the music, hunched to one side, one hand turning and one hand flicking switches. The frontman was as ridiculous as they come, a saxophone player who looked about ten years older after taking off his hat and hoody, dancing along to the music and eventually leading the band off of the stage and into the crowd where they played jam-style. It reminded me of the soccer games this summer; at one point everyone (including the band) would crouch down and the pressure would build and build and the music would crescendo and speed up and everyone would leap up and jump up and down. After all of that I just had to go home, but everyone else stayed out and the night apparently turned into a minorly epic odyssey, trying to find some bar that was open, rescuing a drunk guy trying to walk to Annecy in the snow with no shoes, etc.