Vermiform

Vermiform: adjective. Having the shape and/or physical characteristics of a worm. Also: 'Vermiform Appendix' is another term for the appendix.

Side note: "Wyrm", in old english (pronounced "Verm") means dragon. Not sure where the modern english for "worm" and "dragon" intersect, but I'd be interested to see if "vermiform" can be traced back that far, and if its original meaning was mythological.

An important announcement

Attn: Men of the world,

From this day onward, I will no longer be accepting unsolicited applications for the position of Having Sex With Me. All of my recent proposals have been from applicants lacking tact, respect, charm, bachelorhood, and/or basic hygiene. Future applications for Having Sex With Me must be filed through my agent, and must be accompanied by a reasonable resume and a list of excellent references. And wear a tie, for God's sake.

Sincerely,

Lucy

Mad Girl's Love Song

I know this is supposed to be a blog of original poetry, but I loved this poem so much I thought I'd share it.

Mad Girl's Love Song

By Sylvia Plath

I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead;
I lift my lids and all is born again.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

The stars go waltzing out in blue and red,
And arbitrary blackness gallops in:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.

I dreamed that you bewitched me into bed
And sung me moon-struck, kissed me quite insane.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

God topples from the sky, hell's fires fade:
Exit seraphim and Satan's men:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.

I fancied you'd return the way you said,
But I grow old and I forget your name.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

I should have loved a thunderbird instead;
At least when spring comes they roar back again.
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

Love, Sex, and Death in the Digital Age

I've recently been roaming the internet on StumbleUpon, my newest web favorite. I always assumed that, as per internet standards, StumbleUpon would yield ten boring, disgusting, or childish pages for every interesting one, and so never bothered to check it out. I recently did, and was surprised to find that like an experienced and sensitive lover, StumbleUpon seems to always know just what I like.

(What's this? A joke about sex and the internet that doesn't involve porn?)

Anyway, I found this website: blog.okcupid.com/index.php/2010/01/20/the-4-big-myths-of-profile-pictures/

It's basically a statistical analysis of the activities of participants on dating websites in relation to elements of their profile pictures (self-taken pictures/smiling or unsmiling/eye contact / 'flirty face' / etc) Most of it was pretty dull, to be honest, but one part piqued my interest:

When analyzing position/ eye contact in pictures, women's results were about what you'd expect - they were far more likely to be contacted if they were smiling, and also if they were making eye contact with the camera. Their results dropped, however, when looking unsmilingly into the camera

women_smiling.png

What's curious to me is that the results were exactly the opposite with men - men's results were far less successful if they smiled, and their chances were actually damaged by making eye contact with the camera - whether they were smiling or not.

men_smiling2.png

The results were by far the worst from both genders when the picture was both unsmiling and making eye contact, which is understandable - a serious face staring you down, to me, comes off as either pretentious, humourless, or vaguely threatening.

So why might it be that women so strongly prefer a man frowning in another direction, while men prefer a warm, adoring gaze? In gender studies you're always hearing about woman as the "seen" object - woman is "to be looked at", whereas men are "looking", but then why would men more strongly respond to a woman looking into the camera? The only thing this seems to indicate is that men enjoy being the subject of cheerful and adoring attention from the opposite sex, but then, who doesn't?

Well, women, apparently. Why we would prefer a sullen, preoccupied photo over a positive, open one is completely beyond me.

I think it's indicative of the "Edward Cullen" syndrome that seems to be sweeping the nation. I don't know much about Twilight, but I know that old Edward is apparently the new standard for all that is hot and desirable about men to young women. Edward is:

1: Serious

2: Aloof

3: "deep"

4: pretty

5: sparkly

And since so many girls are so hot for his sparkly self, he must be the next big thing in attractive males. If Edward took a "mycupid" profile picture, he wouldn't be smiling, he wouldn't make eye contact, and I very much doubt he would be making the "flirty face". So despite all this Gender Studies talk about men being the subject and women the object, it seems that women too have a tendency to want a man who is seen and not heard - a man not looking at the camera is unthreatening, but he is also mysterious - it takes some work to figure him out. He's also separate and inhuman (like Eddie Cullen) free to be attractive and looked at without revealing any of those pesky flaws and imperfections that happen in real life.

It seems a kind of alarming trend for young girls, if you ask me.

Fridge poetry 2

Someone took letters from my poem and made their own. I checked back. It's slightly influenced by mine. It's so cool to think I was part of this changing constellation of words and ideas, and that each poem flows into the next.

Give no man your story,

to take you as they grew apart, longing

Draw Grow Read Study

----

Mass media geek out!

fridge magnet poetry

I. LOVE. FRIDGE. POETRY.

Randomness is good for creativity.

I found stumbleupon today, which was phenomenal in it's own right, through which I found this, an interactive, real-time, shared poetry fridge: www.isnoop.net/toys/magwords.php

Strangers on the interwebs keep messing with my words, but here is what I came up with:

May no man's eye read yours,

his longing pressing in, as cities do,

here in this gingerbread country.

Verb.

To peregrinate. Verb. To travel or wander from place to place.