between the rock and the cold, cold sea

To ward off brain death and boredom, and because I have completed as much Apology as is necessary for class, I'm going to try to hit up some Euthyphro and see how far I get. Practice, etc.

And besides, I'm not coherent enough to work on my paper. Papers. I lose track of my overall train of thought too quickly.

[2α]

Εὐθύφρων
τί νεώτερον, ὦ Σώκρατες, γέγονεν, ὅτι σὺ τὰς ἐν Λυκείῳ καταλιπὼν διατριβὰς ἐνθάδε νῦν διατρίβεις περὶ τὴν τοῦ βασιλέως στοάν; οὐ γάρ που καὶ σοί γε δίκη τις οὖσα τυγχάνει πρὸς τὸν βασιλέα ὥσπερ ἐμοί.

Σωκράτης
οὔτοι δὴ Ἀθηναῖοί γε, ὦ Εὐθύφρων, δίκην αὐτὴν καλοῦσιν ἀλλὰ γραφήν.

Euthyphro:
What newer thing, O Socrakes, has happened, that you, leaving the amusements in the Lykeio, now here pass all your time around the Stoa Basileos? For surely you don't also have some lawsuit for the basileus like me?

Socrates:
These Athenians, O Euthyphro, call this [not a] lawsuit but an indictment.

[2β]

Εὐθύφρων
τί φῄς; γραφὴν σέ τις, ὡς ἔοικε, γέγραπται: οὐ γὰρ ἐκεῖνό γε καταγνώσομαι, ὡς σὺ ἕτερον.

Σωκράτης
οὐ γὰρ οὖν.

Εὐθύφρων
ἀλλὰ σὲ ἄλλος;

Σωκράτης
πάνυ γε.

Εὐθύφρων
τίς οὗτος;

Σωκράτης
οὐδ᾽ αὐτὸς πάνυ τι γιγνώσκω, ὦ Εὐθύφρων, τὸν ἄνδρα, νέος γάρ τίς μοι φαίνεται καὶ ἀγνώς: ὀνομάζουσι μέντοι αὐτόν, ὡς ἐγᾦμαι, Μέλητον. ἔστι δὲ τῶν δήμων Πιτθεύς, εἴ τινα νῷ ἔχεις Πιτθέα Μέλητον οἷον τετανότριχα καὶ οὐ πάνυ εὐγένειον, ἐπίγρυπον δέ.

Εὐθύφρων
οὐκ ἐννοῶ, ὦ Σώκρατες: ἀλλὰ δὴ τίνα γραφήν σε γέγραπται;

Euthyphro:
What are you saying? Someone has, it seems, written a graphe against you? For I am not about to discover that thing, that you [have written a graphe against] another?

Socrates:
No, indeed.

Euthyphro:
But another [against] you?

Socrates:
Very much so.

Euthyphro:
Who is he?

Socrates:
Myself, I do not know him well, O Euthyphro, the man, for he seems to me [to be] someone young and obscure. However,they call him, I think, Meletos. He is of the deme of Pittheus, if you hold in mind some Pitthean Meletos, with long straight hair and not very much beard, and a hook nose.

Euthyphro:
I wouldn't think so, O Socrates. But he has brought some graphe against you?

[24α] ὥστε, ὅπερ ἀρχόμενος ἐγὼ ἔλεγον, θαυμάζοιμ᾽ ἂν εἰ οἷός τ᾽ εἴην ἐγὼ ὑμῶν ταύτην τὴν διαβολὴν ἐξελέσθαι ἐν οὕτως ὀλίγῳ χρόνῳ οὕτω πολλὴν γεγονυῖαν. ταῦτ᾽ ἔστιν ὑμῖν, ὦ ἄνδρες Ἀθηναῖοι, τἀληθῆ, καὶ ὑμᾶς οὔτε μέγα οὔτε μικρὸν ἀποκρυψάμενος ἐγὼ λέγω οὐδ᾽ ὑποστειλάμενος. καίτοι οἶδα σχεδὸν ὅτι αὐτοῖς τούτοις ἀπεχθάνομαι, ὃ καὶ τεκμήριον ὅτι ἀληθῆ λέγω καὶ ὅτι αὕτη ἐστὶν ἡ διαβολὴ ἡ ἐμὴ καὶ τὰ αἴτια

since it was the very thing which I was speaking about from the beginning, I would be amazed if it would be possible for me to remove from you this slander in this little time which has existed for so long. This is the truth for you, O Athenian men, and I speak, neither concealing from you a lot or a little, nor dissembling. And indeed I know well that I am hated by these men themselves, which is a sure sign that I speak truth and that this is my slander and the causes

[24β] ταῦτά ἐστιν. καὶ ἐάντε νῦν ἐάντε αὖθις ζητήσητε ταῦτα, οὕτως εὑρήσετε.

περὶ μὲν οὖν ὧν οἱ πρῶτοί μου κατήγοροι κατηγόρουν αὕτη ἔστω ἱκανὴ ἀπολογία πρὸς ὑμᾶς: πρὸς δὲ Μέλητον τὸν ἀγαθὸν καὶ φιλόπολιν, ὥς φησι, καὶ τοὺς ὑστέρους μετὰ ταῦτα πειράσομαι ἀπολογήσασθαι. αὖθις γὰρ δή, ὥσπερ ἑτέρων τούτων ὄντων κατηγόρων, λάβωμεν αὖ τὴν τούτων ἀντωμοσίαν. ἔχει δέ πως ὧδε: Σωκράτη φησὶν ἀδικεῖν τούς τε νέους διαφθείροντα καὶ θεοὺς οὓς ἡ πόλις

are these. And if now, if once more you will investigate these things, you will find in this way.

So, concerning the things which the first prosecutors alleged against me, let this be sufficient defence against you: and against Meletos the good and patriotic, as they say, and against the latter ones, next after these I will try to make defense. For indeed once more, as if these were different accusers, let us take up afresh their sworn statement. And how does it go: Socrates, they say, does wrong both by ruining the young men and by


[24ξ] νομίζει οὐ νομίζοντα, ἕτερα δὲ δαιμόνια καινά. τὸ μὲν δὴ ἔγκλημα τοιοῦτόν ἐστιν: τούτου δὲ τοῦ ἐγκλήματος ἓν ἕκαστον ἐξετάσωμεν.

not acknowledging the gods, the ones the city acknowledges, but other, different divine things. Indeed the charge is of this kind: let us examine this accusation in each point.

---

There are maybe eight lines left in my assigned translations for this weekend. I'm not going to scrape them out tonight, though. I think I've reached my limit.

I spent the afternoon and most of the evening marathoning the first four Resident Evil films. I'd never seen them before. They're impressive B-movies, despite progressing through increasingly demented levels of WTFery on behalf of Corporation Evil Stupid (and some worldbuilding WTF, and Mad!Science WTFery): the first two are well-constructed and bring the BOOM; the third is sloppier but has a delightful Wagon Train Of The Zombpocalypse West vibe going on (and fucking aces the Bechdel test with its eyes closed) although the WTFery mounts to new levels; while the fourth one doesn't really balance its BOOM vs DOOM ratio quite right, and loses points in addition for structuring its climax a little too obviously like a videogame boss fight.

Boss fights are boring, on a structural level. Even drugged to the eyeballs, you can call the beats.

These aren't films to be watched for logic, but I'm legitimately impressed at how well they manage characterisation within the limitations of the genre - and how they all bloody well pass the fucking Bechdel test without looking like they're even trying, BLOODY HELL PEOPLE. For that alone, they get mad props - sad but true, so very few action films actually bother, and here is Resident Evil with its zombies and its fleshmonsters and its TENTACLE ZOMBIES WTF, and it passes the Bechdel in the first ten to twenty minutes.

Also, Milla Jovovich has real muscles. They flex. And great shoulders. So used to seeing lady actors with stringy muscles play fighter-types, it's nice to have some muscle definition in there for change.

Okay, I'm going to go lie down and read about the Thirty Years War and hope that I survive a night of primordial ooze. You guys have fun out there.

I have a plague again.

But guess what? I'm here, in college, because I have an evening lecture tonight, and a seminar and an evening social outing tomorrow, and I can't miss either of them.

I can rest when I'm dead. Or just sit here quietly reading the internet and wishing I was well, instead of doing the work I can't concentrate on.

Ah, well. Such is life.

The doctor, a nice man by name of Chan with a semi-Scottish accent, made a house call. This was just as well, because neither the parent nor I were in fit state to leave the house. I, apparently, have a flu with the added benefit of pus in my throat. Pus! For which I have been prescribed antibiotics - which I view dubiously, but the man says the swollen throat thing is probably the result of a bacterial infection, so.

(Pus! No wonder it hurts and itches like fuck, and I can't stop the dry cough. Bugger all fucking opportunistic infections anyway.)

As it turns out, the supermarket takes customer orders by phone and does delivery, free. Alas, the ability to command the absolute necessities of life - bread, milk, water, cough sweets, yoghurt - does nothing to alleviate the crushing boredom of waiting-to-be-well.

Oh, how absurd is life, hey?

Still, it could be worse. I could have far fewer Stargate and Farscape DVDs to rewatch, and I might have had no Sean Bean in Sharpe (Sharpe's Rifles through Sharpe's Mission has probably been the one thing encouraging me to hold on to my sanity these last few days). For that matter, it could be snowing.

O, plague, O most vile and terrible plague, that has rendered me unable to speak above a whisper, convinced there is broken glass in my throat; O most inconvenient and annoying plague, which has struck just as my break has begun and while the libraries are still open; O plague, which is ruining my chances to get more essay done sooner, O plague, which is giving me aches I should have had to do exercise to acquire, O plague, go away.

I overdosed on cough medicine just to be able to get a couple of hours sleep last night. You would not believe how drunkenly wobbly I am right now.

The parent also has a plague. A different plague. Joy is in the house.

(Can't speak. Plague is eating me.)

Finally, I appear to be utterly deplagued.

Finally.

Went for a very short run this afternoon, dropping back dvds before I got stuck with library fines - 30 Days of Night is actually a pretty decent film - and did not die of it. So that's good.

I have a medical note for my plague-induced absences, which is also good, and means I can probably wrangle an extension for the essay due this Friday if necessary, which is better than good, because damn, I have a lot of catching up to do.

One more week of classes. Five more weeks to exams. Seven more weeks to freedom.

To do this week:

a)write ~2000 words of essay
b)catch up on missed lecture notes
c)organise TT lecture notes
d)resume normal studentish operations
e)reshelve books to take advantage of new shelves
f)commit banking errands
g)commit purchase of necessary clothes.

So much to do, so little time.

I think I'm sufficiently emplagued that it would probably be counterproductive to go to college tomorrow. Commuting, ick.

Gods, I hate being sick. It is annoying; I have things to do, and the stupid emplagued body says, Do this and you fall over, fool!

(It is actually today that I should go to college. But. I do not want to lie down because of plague. So Monday is still tomorrow.)

...but I've been dizzy since I woke up on Sunday. And feeling kind of queasy. I don't feel sick, not sick sick, if you know what I mean. Just as though my head is no longer properly connected to the rest of me.

Typing this is actually an exercise in concentration, which might tell you something.

It doesn't help that I've three assignments due between this week and next. Ones I haven't done yet, even. If I was properly sick, I could get an extension. But I don't feel properly sick. Just weird. Damn weird.

So, obligatory whinging is over for now. Anything fun on teh interwebs about now?