Lordy Lordy, class was boring today. We are now deeply immersed in the legal positivists, and all their in fighting. Moreover, Bo (the professor. They always cal professors by their first name in Sweden) is not so good at stimulating discussion. Next is legal feminism. We'll see how that goes.

I have a problem which I will explain. I was online listing to past broadcasts of "This American Life" when I came upon a Star Wars rant by John Hodgeman. Heaven! Star Wars and John Hodgeman, together at last. But things were so good that they were in fact bad. John was telling how big a Star Wars fan he was and how much the atrocious prequels were to one with such reverence to the original trilogy. He then went on to say how he was rewriting Episodes I-III to better fit the tone of the original. He listed many specific ideas he had, all of which sounded quite cool.
What's the problem? I myself have embarked upon the exact same task. Not only this, but many of his specific and good ideas I also came up with, and thought myself so clever for. What’s worse is the belated realization that most likely a good quarter of hard core star wars fans have put more mental effort than they would admit into the same project, and probably a quarter of those had ideas that largely overlapped with mine. Oh, mediocrity.

It’s not a big deal, but kinda gets you down. It’s happened before, too, that I realized one of my ideas was also thought up by another (and they capitalized on it to such a degree that I found out about it). When in a truck stop in Wisconsin I chanced upon a book titled “The Plot to Rescue Socrates” which is about time travelers going back in time to save Socrates at the point of death. The brilliant thing about it is he would be pretty easy to save without altering history. He drinks hemlock, falls asleep and dies, and they burn him in a pyre. It would be very simple to switch the drink to one that makes the drinker appear to die, and then switch the bodies before it is burned. Of course my idea wasn’t for a book, but for what I might actually do given the ability to travel through time.

Worked at the Kalmar Pub last night again. I have now worked enough shifts to be invited to the staff party at the end of the term. There were many Swedes around so I tried hard to practice and learn more. A good portion of my Swedish knowledge revolves around the kitchen. For example, I know how to say such words and phrases as “washing the dishes”, “cucumber”, “make a salad”, and “hamburger, hold the cheese”. Today in Swedish class we shall learn the past and future tense. This will increase what I can say by at least 3 times. Solid.

-TWN-