I’m not sure why I can’t sleep tonight. I’m feeling pretty good about stuff after a refreshing trip to Montreal. I mean, refreshing is a bit of a loose term to use in this situation. Generally, Montreal trips mean an excess of drinking, eating, partying, spending, combined with a very tiny amount of sleep. The main attraction of the weekend was the 80’s party on Saturday night. Of course, Tan didn’t tell me his party was going to be an 80’s party, so we spent all day Saturday scouring the city for 80’s costumes. I managed to scrape together a somewhat less-than-convincing punk rocker costume. Even though it probably looked more silly than punk, it was fun to wear. 🙂

This trip was a lot less wild than the last one. There was noticibly less police involvement. The long drives there and back gave me lots of opportunity to listen to Finnish music. Jen explained some of the lyrics to me. Finnish lyrics are really interesting. In one, a guy was singing “You are like a poem. I don’t understand you, but I want to try.” I know how that feels, so I could identify. It’s amazing to me how some things are so universal around the world.

I am reading a book about the neuroscience behind hatred. It’s kind of cool. I love these books that open your mind to completely foreign ideas. Basically, the book explains that hatred (particularly racial hatred) is a result of the workings of the primitive parts of the brain like the amygdala and the basal ganglia. The author gives strategies for engaging the more advanced reasoning skills of the neocortex to combat these us vs. them impulses that were useful in survival primitive times, but have become sources of conflict.

Anyway, yeah. I think I just made myself sleepy enough to go back to bed. Goodnight. 🙂