Libba rides again

I’ve just discovered that there’s at least one charitable soul in my building who doesn’t have a password block on his wireless internet. To him, and all the others of his kind, I salute you!

Of course I am in the process of getting my own connection, but that requires two things: money, which I don’t have; and the ability to overcome my laziness and finally call Roadrunner or whoever is the supplier around here, which I also don’t have.

Little has changed since my last entry. I’m still studying archaeology, but I’ve put myself on a temporary hiatus for sanity’s sake. As a result, my Star Trek novel and numerous other profitless endeavors are coming along swimmingly.

I did have a slight disagreement with my best friend, Big V, about whom you will be hearing more shortly. Big V lives a few blocks away from me and for this reason, and also because we get along just so gosh-darned well, we spend a lot of time together. So it thoroughly ticks him off when he calls me and I, occasionally, don’t answer. When I put it to him that he sometimes does the same to me and I don’t get pissy about it, his explanation for his pissyness was that he knows me and my habits so well and knows when to expect me to be sitting at home doing nothing (“nothing” includes watching/reading/writing Star Trek and other various timewaste). My answer to him is that sometimes when I’m doing “nothing”, I don’t want to be disturbed.

I should also explain that Big V is extremely industrious, at least by my reckoning. The guy works I don’t know how many hours a week, and still manages to do reading, keep up with his friends/family, and plan his future. In none of these areas do I myself excel, not the least of which would be employment status. Sometimes he gets onto me about not doing all the things I should be doing. I always mean to do these things, but somehow I always find “nothing” to do.

To add to this trend of non-productivity, I recently discovered a program called Garage Band on my computer, which I use to make a cappella recordings of myself singing country, Greek, blues, and folk songs. This discovery has singlehandedly doubled the current timewaste factor, which was formidable to start with.

I did take a trip upstate with Big V this weekend. V is known for his attention to detail, but his driving skills definitely have room for improvement. Once we arrived at our destination, I had some trouble walking at first, and I realized that it was because I had been clenching my butt-cheeks almost continuously for 4 hours.

That’s not to say the trip wasn’t fun. I love trips. Even a trip to the grocery store is its own special adventure. And driving skills aside, V is a great travel companion. He’s probably somewhat more well-traveled than I am, in terms of the sheer number of places he’s been, and I hope we get to do more traveling together in the future. Maybe sans car.

First things first

I should introduce myself.

How to do this...

I could start by saying I'm an archaeology student. That would certainly be true, but it's also sort of a copout. I'm a lot of other things too. Not just me I guess. No one is just one thing, neither to himself or to others.

And what happens if I drop archaeology, what would I be then? A *former* archaeology student?


I guess it's better to say what it is I do and how I spend my time. If you could then find an appropriate title for me, I'd appreciate it.

I study archaeology. Specifically Late Bronze Age Aegean archaeology, with some Near Eastern thrown in. People think archaeology is just digging stuff up and doing Discovery Channel specials. Not exactly. A career in archaeology also requires writing, a lot. And a lot of reading, much of it in other languages (German, French, Italian, Greek). I'm not going to tell you I'm fluent in any of these languages because that would be a lie. I can pretty much stumble through them with a translating dictionary. People say it gets easier as the years go by, and I guess it must. I can't imagine people would stick with it as long as they do otherwise.


You'll remember me mentioning that there's a lot of writing in archaeology. That's a gross understatement. Archaeology requires a *shitload* of writing. And not completely imaginitive writing either. Most of it's pretty dry stuff, as is most academic writing. And necessarily so, I'm told. Someone, I don't know who, has famously described archaeology as "an exercise in extreme bookkeeping." That about sums it up.

Which leads me to another pasttime of mine. All that dry, research intensive writing has given rise to a rather productive streak of sci-fi writing. Almost like afterbirth. Or perhaps more accurately described as a coping mechanism, an outlet for my rather fertile imagination, which I must ruthlessly suppress to turn out the academic stuff. If I just go full bore on the academic stuff without giving my creative side a little playground where it can run and frolick and try to see pictures in the clouds, I go nuts. That's not speculation, that's a fact.

So I'm working on a Star Trek novel. Are you done laughing? Good. I'm working on a Star Trek novel, and a few other non-sci-fi short stories which may turn into novels. Some of the short stories are based on my personal experiences, but sadly I'm not yet ready to be truly honest with myself about the most interesting things that have happened to me. Comes with time I guess.


As you probably surmised for yourself, I'm a Star Trek fan. I like all of it pretty much (except for "Enterprise" I draw the line there) but I'm pretty fanatically devoted to the Classic series, around which my novel centers. I'm also into reading the (K/S) slash-fiction stuff, but I've yet to generate any myself. My novel is decidedly un-slashy.

I love to travel. That doesn't make me special, but I do love it. And when I don't get to do it for a while, I miss it terribly. I always go alone. I do think that that makes me different from most people. Most people like to travel with friends. I love my friends, but when it comes to travelling, I find a solo journey most rewarding. It gives me the freedom to make a lot of bad decisions and go off on some really ill-considered adventures, either on my own, or with strangers. And that's when I learn the most about myself and about my surroundings. If you want to read about my first time in Greece, you can check out www.mytb.org/libba.

As I'm writing to you, I'm listening to Pandora, just as you yourself may be doing. I started out on there about a month ago with a Johnny Cash channel, determined I wasn't going to get hooked on country music. Well guess what. I'm hooked on old-school country music. Dumbfounding, how I can grow up in the South and be repulsed by country music and suddenly, after being out of the South for 5 years, I suddenly discover that I've been a nascent country music fan all along. Damnedest thing.

But country is not my only musical fascination, by any means. I also love Classical, Jazz, Blues, Rock (Classic and more recent Metal). I happen to be absolutely enthralled with Amy Winehouse. Say what you want, the girl can belt. And there's always Leonard Nimoy. Don't knock it until you've heard him do "Ruby, Don't Take Your Love to Town." Seriously, youtube it. Also, Shatner's album "Has Been"- talk about honest. And just damn good.



The music I like usually has one or a combination of the following qualities: earthy, honest, aesthetic, frivolous, quirky. And none of these qualities have I found to exclude any of the others. Some of my favorites fit into an honest/frivolous category. I just want to take this opportunity to say that I think "Convoy" by C W McCall make a cute novelty rap song. Someone needs to get on that.

I'm also pretty taken with Greek music, mostly old laika and rembetika, but I've recently discovered some contemporary Cretan artists that are phenomenal (Stellios Petrakis, Vasillis and Mitsos Stavrakakis, Ross Daly, Nikos Xylouris, Paris Perysinakis etc etc). I don't understand everything they say, but I've made a pretty intense, private study of modern Greek, and I hope one day I can call myself fluent. But that day is very remote indeed.

Well I think that's quite enough for now. I'll try to be more regular about updating this blog than I have been in my previous attempts at keeping one. I once allowed a cactus to die. My negligence sometimes takes on quasi-mythical proportions.