“Our opponent is an alien starship packed with atomic bombs,” I said. “We have a protractor.” – Erasmas, Anathem So, I’ve done a little light reading lately, and finished up Neal Stephenson’s Anathem–in my opinion, his best book thus far. It’s not nearly as slow as the [Baroque Cycle](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Baroque_Cycle_(novel)), nor as “conventional” as Cryptonomicon, yet remains as cripplingly cerebral. It’s just so engrossing, I couldn’t help but voraciously consume the adventures of Erasmas and the very concept of a “Math” in general.

So, I’ve started reading a highly amusing pseudo-manga titled Scott Pilgrim, and damn… how could I not like this? Seriously, this comic is some of the most innocent fun I’ve experienced excepting Excel Saga. But where Excel Saga was crack-induced insanity, the Scott Pilgrim series apparently derives its entertainment value from light-hearted hijinks gone awry–what Megatokyo started before it was fully engulfed by over-ambitious zeal. Read it, you won’t be disappointed!

To a six-year-old boy, hospitals are more confusing than frightening. But Shaun liked this place, even knowing on some level he may never leave. There were the play-closets, for one: child-size doors scattered around the waiting-room where kids who never met could hide and seek each other while parents completed paperwork. Further into the labyrinth was a sprawling wooden house sized just for little ones, always echoing with the giggles of all but the few confined to wheelchairs, too weak to stand but smiling at the sight nonetheless.

Some time during Friday, I noticed I wasn’t feeling very well. By 9pm Friday night, I had a fever of 99.8 and an intensely sore throat and slowly aching muscles. By 5am Saturday morning, I had a temperature over 102 and felt like I’d just been accosted by angry bat-wielding thugs. What I thought was the flue–but went to the doctor for confirmation–turned out to be strep. The nurse told Jen I “smelled like strep” and after a test confirmation, I was sent home with a regimen that would have me feeling better “within 48 hours.

It’s interesting what happens when perspective is adjusted. I see conflict now as pointless, anger as a loss of self, a weakness of infinite depth. But Why? A push was all I really needed, maybe even for years. Scientifically, I know the brain is nearly endlessly malleable, and barring significant cases of genuine chemical or physiological distress, it can be guided to fit a specific end. In this case, I’ve long considered myself helpless to disrupt the cycles of anger that have plagued me since some of my earliest memories.