unlimited

I've just finished 3 hours of math work. Woohoo! Semi-productive weekend, I suppose. I didn't study much, but doing homework is a start, considering my track record last year =)

Beyond that, I've been mostly sleeping. Had a long, tiring week of staying up late reading... It's disappointing that I've taken more than a week to finish the book, Atlas Shrugged (I take Hui Ying's mention of it on her blog as a recommendation =b ). Heck, I finished Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in one day (and don't remember a thing). And that was thick. This is dense... Makes me realise why I don't read so much anymore. I get ObSeSseD =).

The book is somewhat interesting, except when it comes down to the long, long philosphical speechs... The author's previous work, The Fountainhead, is better IMHO. And thinner too, unlike this 3mb monstrosity (1000+ real pages, I think). I'm at the climax now, where there's the really long, tangled statement of the Rand's ideology.

I wrote quite a lot yesterday in the lost entry (bah, I'm writing in notepad from now on) and I don't really feeling like retracing my mental steps... lazy =). The summary of what I wrote is, I don't completely agree with the philosophy of Ayn Rand. It's like one extreme fighting against the other, where one side exalts human ability and only that, and the other side need. In other words, one side says, no free lunch, everything you have must be worked for and earned; likewise you are not expected to sacrifice your life, your mind for others. The other side says (indirectly, through their actions), need is king. The man who tries and succeeds is the slave; the man who tries and fails is the master - because he is needy, therefore the successful one must sacrifice to help him.

I lean towards the camp which says human ability is important, though of course I hardly practice such. I'm lazy lazy lazy =b. Trying to change, but changing oneself takes a very, very long time. Years, sort of thing. Anyway, I appreciate it because, well, it's just. But I don't practice it much because I like free lunches =b (it's when you feel free lunches are a right, are something you deserve, then you're in trouble, I think). That's very common this day and age, it exists in everyone, only to different degrees. Example: pirated CDs. Bill Gates has the right to charge what he will for Windows, because it was his ability that produced it. You pay for his ability, his effort. If you demand he charge less, you violate his ability. What then becomes of yours? If you cannot afford it, then you have no right to it. You trade, in a sense, your ability for his, in the medium of money...

...Bah, so much for summary =b. But that's only as far as I grasp the ideology, which is not very well. And I haven't finished it. I'm thinking of just skipping the tortuous speech that I'm in the middle of... don't understand it either way. Besides, I've got the newest Discworld novel just itching to be read. That, will be fun =). Though it means another few days of late nights and backlog... *sigh* Obsessive reading is a pain. I hardly understand/remember stories because I barrel through them so fast, too. But I like to think of it as cycling (so sue me, I just made the connection; I've always said my mouth (or fingers in this case) is smarter than my brain, because through nonstop talking or typing, sensible things I didn't know I knew pop out). Cycling is one of my pleasures in life, and cycling fast feels great, even if I miss the scenery (lots of it in TTDI =D ). Reading fast, I feel a sense of exhiliration. The story unfolds naturally in my mind. In the end I forget most of it, but it was an amazing ride all the same. Whee... =) Though it means I hardly learn much from reading (novels, I mean), because I do it for pleasure and not for self-improvement.

And I think that's about it for now... Nice, long rambling post to make up for the week of silence, hehe. Time to get back to my book, I suppose. Oh yes, I guess I should mention: had an enjoyable night yesterday, watched Constatine with Phoebe and Shea Kang, then had dinner with them at Vietnamese Kitchen (weird food! augh! but there was fried rice, *phew*). While watching I wondered about reality, wondered, 'What if all this were true??' I wish I didn't have such a mind as bothers me about these things and the nature of reality.