When I'm home alone and just want to relax, I like to instant watch old episodes of Law and Order. Netflix streams right to the TV, so even though they only offer the 'Criminal Intent' and 'Special Victims Unit' versions of the program, it's nice to just press play and instantly have something to ignore. It is precisely because these series are retarded, truly retarded iterations of the original series, yet the same, insofar as they ape the form of the original Law and Order, that they are so goddamn easy to ignore. I play a couple of episodes and pretty soon I've answered emails, done the dishes, watered the plants...It's brilliant!

The head of the Philosophy department at Stanislaus was a Deadhead like few others. While this may seem laughable to some, he is a truly original thinker of the Grateful Dead phenomenon, and one hell of an administrator, having brought together a serious group of Continental thinkers in a fucking cowtown in Central California. Well, anyways, we were talking about the Dead, and I said something about the richness of the lyrics, and the rewards of focusing on the lyrical element in the music. Jim agreed with the point, but pointed out, with a smile, that he often found himself ignoring the music altogether. It was what he put on when he needed to work, which is to say that he had reached a level of familiarity with the music to the point where he no longer needed to pay attention to it. He could just be with it, without that being a thing. Is that what love is, the blissful ignorance of the beloved's existence, objectless and indifferent? Am I in love with Law and Order, SVU?