Five Questions May 2023

Posted on 2023-05-02

How would you describe sleep to an alien?

"You close your eyes, nothing happens for a while, and then you're in this alternate universe where none of the laws of time or physics apply. Then you 'wake up' back in your previous universe, confused about what you just experienced."

What in your opinion is a fascinating cultural tradition or practice?

I sometimes enjoy watching the Gaelic games, hurling and Gaelic football, which were developed in Ireland in antiquity and promoted in modern times as an assertion of Irish identity, as opposed to British or English and the games they invented, such as soccer. To this day, the Gaelic games are almost exclusively played either on the island of Ireland, or by Irish people abroad. They used to be on local public TV here, but that stopped years ago.

What's a beverage you loved, but was discontinued?

When I lived in Washington, DC, I was two blocks from a microbrewery that made a great ale with a lot of rye (this part of the US has a long history of making rye whiskey, so it checks out.) Sadly, it was discontinued sometime in the depths of the pandemic, although it returned for a brief time last year.

Have you ever experienced a "healing crisis" or withdrawal symptoms while recovering your health?

Not really. I did once experience withdrawal from a medication that wasn't administered to me when I was hospitalized after a reckless driver hit me on the Beltway, but I don't think that's quite what you're getting at here.

Have you recently had a rediscovery?

Much like I came to appreciate jazz more after I left music school, the same is now true of 20th century classical music. I'm enjoying the works of Reich, Riley, Glass, et al much more now that I don't have an overbearing music prof telling me about them with disdain.


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