@CaptainGiraffe Wait, so they accused your parents of child abuse (what does that even mean? such a stupid term) merely because you were good at mathematics?

@CaptainGiraffe My god, how horrifying. A 5 year old that can read and count?

Hi @Cerberus. How are your three heads this evening?

@rumtscho A characteristic rave -> sarahtales.livejournal.com/197538.html

Hi!

I had gin and tonics at a friend's.

I get the impression that most of the fantasy writers in English were DWJ fans. The female ones seem particularly prominent.

@Cerberus Was it good?

I have come to realise that I prefer Hendricks over Bombay, I'm sorry.

@Cerberus I've no idea what that means.

Sure, it was all right, for gin and tonics (I 'm not a huge fan of sweet drinks and consider the current trend a fad).

@FaheemMitha Brands of gin.

@Cerberus Oh. I don't think I've drunk gin in my life.

That that interesting.

@Cerberus Hmm?

You haven't missed that much.

@rumtscho WP page of the Sarah in question - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Rees_Brennan

Now I am consoling a friend who got sort of dumped.

@Cerberus Not really much of an alchohol consumer in general. I had some red wine in 2009, I think. And some beer in 2011. Two. I only wanted one, but some ass ordered me another.

Through Whatsapp.

The consolation was through Whatsapp, or the dumping was?

The consolation is.

The dumping was live.

@FaheemMitha Sounds hilarious.

Ah.

@Cerberus How so? Hilarious beer drinking?

I had a friend once. He made beer drinking seem fun. So I used to drink with him. But not otherwise.

Never really got the taste for it. And it dehydrates my mouth and leaves an aftertaste.

And hard liquor burns my mouth.

@FaheemMitha Hilarious that your last drink was years ago, and that you remember the exact year and quantity.

No more friend, eh?

@Cerberus Well, I don't drink that often. As you may have gathered.

@Cerberus Well, he lives on another continent. We talked in January. He's English.

We're sporadically in touch over the net, but beer drinking isn't really something you can do virtually.

Oh, my.

You consort with Englishmen?

The British is big on beer drinking. As are the Germans. And no doubt other Europeans.

@Cerberus I've had a couple of English friends, yes. Why? Is that surprising?

Yes, the northerner, the drunker.

I was mocking your criticism of British colonialism.

@Cerberus I don't follow.

Oh, you mean because the British trashed by country, I wouldn't be friends with English people?

Yes.

Hey, I have just drunk Bombay gin. Don't be too hard on me.

@Cerberus Ah, well, that's what they call a non sequitur. As Tom would be the first to point out, he didn't trash anyone's country.

@Cerberus As long as it was good gin.

@FaheemMitha Thank you.

@FaheemMitha It was fine.

Having said that, the few English people I knew well were notably irrational about discussions of their country's ugly history. We're talking Deep Denial here.

@Cerberus Thank you?

Strangely, Americans seem on average a bit saner about discussions of their country's ugly history.

Maybe that's more a reflection of the British and Americans I know than anything else.

Though the British always struck me as much more invested in the whole imperialism thing than the Americans did.

@FaheemMitha Really? That's odd.

@FaheemMitha Not in my experience.

@Cerberus What's odd?

@FaheemMitha Thank you is almost always ironic in my case.

@Cerberus Maybe it's just my particular sample.

@FaheemMitha That they should be in denial.

@Cerberus So I gathered, but what are you ironically thanking me about in this instance?

For calling my remark a non sequitur.

@Cerberus It doesn't seem odd to me at all. Given that they identify with their country's history and politics. Granted, the latter seems strange to an Indian. I certainly don't identify with my country's history and politics.

@Cerberus Well, I thought it was. No offense intended. If I didn't talk to citizens of a country that had done something bad, I'd have few people to talk to. If any.

@FaheemMitha No, for an educated person I find that odd.

Anyway, Tom is a nice guy and has been a good friend, but not the sharpest tool in the shed.

@FaheemMitha Probably none. But I do not take offence, you have nothing to worry about.

@Cerberus What, identifying with a country's history and politics?

I am playing songs by the Red Army Choir as loud as I can at the moment.

@FaheemMitha To the point of irrationality.

And I'm not sure what education has to do with it. Educated people can be as brainwashed as anyone. In some ways, maybe more. It's called being socialized, I think.

@Cerberus Lots of people are irrational.

@FaheemMitha I disagree.

If you are privileged, you're actually more likely to identify with dominant institutions, because they are working for you.

In a good education, you are taught of great misdeeds too.

I disagree completely.

@Cerberus With which particular part?

@Cerberus Define good.

Everything.

Good by any criterion.

Chomsky has some good stuff about Intellectuals who support crimes of the state.

A fictional example is Syme in 1984.

Nobody in Holland who went to a gymnasium would deny or defend the Politionele Acties in Indonesia, where many Indonesians were killed.

@Cerberus Maybe Holland is a more enlightened place. I have no idea.

I am drunk; now is not a good time to wave the red flag of America.

foolishly attacks flag

I do know the British identify a lot with their past history. Often in an extremely myopic fashion. They seem be under the delusion (some of them anyway) that it was a positive thing for the people whose countries they destroyed. It wasn't.

A clue is the word "destroyed" above.

@Cerberus Ah. Is it fun being drunk?

Depends.

What is the red flag of America?

One just has slightly fewer inhibitions. But not that many fewer.

"gymnasium" means school, right?

@FaheemMitha When I get emotional, I hate it and want to attack it. Which is of course an overreaction and partly irrational.

@FaheemMitha The highest school type.

@Cerberus I don't know what flag you mean. Are you talking about the Stars and Stripes?

@Cerberus ok

No, I am talking about mentioning the country, which might make me go berzerk.

Still listening to the Red Army Choir.

If anyone has committed heinous crimes, it is the Red Army.

To my Slavic brothers, mostly.

But their choir is just so good.

@Cerberus it must be late there. You should go to sleep.

Nah, it's not even 2AM yet.

Far from my bed time.

And you?

@Cerberus lol

@Cerberus Me what?

What time is it? 7 AM?

What is your bed time anyway?

@Cerberus Coming up to 5.30 am here. I was asleep earlier. I think I accidentally fell asleep around 9 pm and woke up 1 am ish. I'll try going back to sleep in a bit.

Hmm.

You're not much of a sleeper either, are you?

@Cerberus Well, I have difficulty sleeping for long periods.

Even if you go to bed late?

When I go to bed early, I sleep for about 3–4 hours.

But late is usually OK.

@Cerberus I sleep more when I go to bed late, that is true. Maybe 6 hours.

Still not a lot.

And if you go even later?

@Cerberus Yes, something like that is true of me as well. I'm always waking up in the middle of the night.

@Cerberus True.

@Cerberus Hmm. Doesn't make much different. 6 hours is probably around my limit. In India, anyway.

In the US I used to sleep quite soundly. Even when horrible things were happening to me.

And elsewhere?

Ah.

I think it's possibly some psychological thing. My subconscious probably isn't happy about being in India. Nor is my conscious, come to that.