a disturbing future / music rec

[dolabellae]

Oh dear. Whilst messing around on the interwebs, as you do, I stumbled upon a website which professed to offer stichomantic readings - a cyber version of the old way of predicting the future/seeking guidance on what to do by randomly selecting a passage from a book. Traditionally this was often the Bible, or Virgil, but the website draws on a great

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[tree_and_leaf]

What shall I do with my life?
The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Symposium by Xenophon:

And there is another thing. So long as I was rich, they threw in my teeth as a reproach that I was friends with Socrates, but now that I am become a beggar no one troubles his head two straws about the matter. Once more, the while I rolled in plenty I had everything to lose, and, as a rule, I lost it; what the state did not exact, some mischance stole from me. But now that is over. I lose nothing, having nought to lose; but, on the contrary, I have everything to gain, and live in hope of some day getting something.[53]

Clearly this bodes ill for my financial solvency.....

[dolabellae]

I refuse to be addicted to that site... haven't seen such hilariously bad fortunes predicted since my friend and I used to use her Greek mythology playing cards to do tarot (the future always seemed to involve killing your husband in various unpleasant ways)

You could focus on the I lose nothing, have nought to lose; but, on the contrary, I have everything to gain angle, I suppose! Please to be telling me an optimistic way of looking at consumption of Irish babies?

[tree_and_leaf]

... OM NOM NOM....?

OK, you're right, there's no way to make that acceptable (though I can't work out who my Socrates is!)

[a_t_rain]

Will I get tenure?

The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Professor by Charlotte Bronte:

family, and you are not as fine a fellow as your plebeian brother by long chalk."

There was something in Mr. Hunsden's point-blank mode of speech which rather pleased me than otherwise because it set me at my ease. I continued the conversation with a degree of interest.

"How do you happen to know that I am Mr. Crimsworth's brother? I thought you and everybody else looked upon me only in the light of a poor clerk."

"Well, and so we do; and what are you but a poor clerk? You do Crimsworth's work, and he gives you wages--shabby wages they are, too."

That's ... actually rather strikingly appropriate, although it doesn't really answer the question.

[dolabellae]

The internet has peculiar powers - though it's a shame it couldn't go on to tell what happened to Mr Crimsworth's brother. Hope that your status as 'poor clerk' is not prolonged. When do you find out about tenure?

[a_t_rain]

In about six years. It's all one looooong job interview until then.

IIRC, Mr. Crimsworth's brother married one of his students, which is not necessarily the best plan as far as I'm concerned :)