Random News

So it's the start of the first "real" week of classes, and my schedule is set. It is how I previously stated after the slight change, and it looks to be a good schedule. There isn't much to report, I just feel like posting a blog, so here are some slightly insignificant developments.

1. I downloaded Death Cab For Cutie's latest album off itunes, Narrow Stairs, even though it is overdue. I enjoy it, it has all the aesthetic appeal you would expect from a Death Cab album, and it is good "study" music.

2. Two nights ago I was sleeping, and I woke up to someone knocking on my door. so I answer and two of the other non-miami students are outside as one says "Josh, we have reason to believe that a giant rat has ran into your room, because jaimee woke up to it perched on his neck, and we chased it out and it ran under your door." Naturally, I was shocked, so I responded with a typical "josh hamm is shocked" response and said...."hmmmm, okayyyyy". so put some pants on and the other guy gets a pole and we locate it under my bed, he prods it with the pole and we get it out of my room. They corner it in a bathroom stall, and I leave them to do the capturing and go back to bed. It was really big...hopefully I do not wake up to one perched on my body.

3. I talked to my independent study professor, Dr. Prasad, briefly about the direction I want to go with the Vedanta study, or what I am interested in or how I am interested in looking at it. 

-We could do some reading of the principle texts, the Brahma Sutras, and sort of retrospectively look at the issues involved in the three different schools of thought, 

-we could focus on issues raised in the philosophies and commentaries on the brahma sutras, which make up the different schools of thought and their approach to metaphysical/epistemological issues

-or we took take a comparative approach to the study. I expressed my interest in phenomenology and consciousness, and he brought up the idea of doing a comparative study of Edmund Husserl (thinker/founder of phenomenology) with Shankara, the sage responsible for the Advaita school of vedanta, who differ on how they see consciousness.

So I am not sure what will go down, we will see. I am not sure I want to do a very narrow comparison of these two thinkers at this point, or if I adequately can. I have not read Husserl's actual writings yet, so I would have his readings, as well as vedanta readings, it might be a bit much. We will see what happens.

4. I am also somewhat concerned about the voltage from these outlets to my computer, it might be on the verge of being too much, but not "too" much. Some people have reported their computer doing weird things, the only thing weird my computer has done is the speakers stopped working, so I have to use headphones, and the battery doesn't seem to last too long. hmmmmmmmm, I wonder if i need a converter that converts voltage as well, even though the girl at radio shack (who I think was quasi-flirting with me), said that I wouldn't need to convert voltage. Time will tell....?