Nudity is Only Skin-Deep

Hora aderat briligi. Nunc et Slythæia Tova
Plurima gyrabant gymbolitare vabo;
Et Borogovorum mimzebant undique formae,
Momiferique omnes exgrabuêre Rathi.

“Cave, Gaberbocchum moneo tibi, nate cavendum
(Unguibus ille rapit. Dentibus ille necat.)
Et fuge Jubbubbum, quo non infestior ales,
Et Bandersnatcham, quae fremit usque, cave.”

Ille autem gladium vorpalem cepit, et hostem
Manxonium longâ sedulitate petit;
Tum sub tumtummi requiescens arboris umbrâ
Stabat tranquillus, multa animo meditans.

Dum requiescebat meditans uffishia, monstrum
Praesens ecce! oculis cui fera flamma micat,
Ipse Gaberbocchus dumeta per horrida sifflans
Ibat, et horrendum burbuliabat iens!

Ter, quater, atque iterum cito vorpalissimus ensis
Snicsnaccans penitus viscera dissecuit.
Exanimum corpus linquens caput abstulit heros
Quocum galumphat multa, domumque redit.

“Tune Gaberbocchum potuisti, nate, necare?
Bemiscens, puer! ad brachia nostra veni.
Oh! frabiusce dies! iterumque caloque calâque
Laetus eo!” ut chortlet chortla superba senex.

Hora aderat briligi. Nunc et Slythæia Tova
Plurima gyrabant gymbolitare vabo;
Et Borogovorum mimzebant undique formae,
Momiferique omnes exgrabuêre Rathi.

- by Hassard Dodgson (and Lewis Carroll, of course)

Est praedulcis esu Mars-Bar.
Nil est cibo tuo, Mars, par.
Tune vis beatum larem?
Habe promptum Martem-Barem.
Captus dono Martis-Baris
Helenam liquisset Paris.
Dum natabunt ponto scari,
Dentur laudes Marti-Bari!

- by Herbert H. Huxley

Today is a two-for-one special:

ad Caluum poetam (XIV)
ad Aurelium (XV)

I'm afraid I stammered a little bit on the first one. Some of those words are serious tongue-twisters. Oy.

Today's reading is ad Furium et Aurelium by Catullus. It's been a while since I've done one of these. I'm feeling rusty, already.

Here's the text and translation, if you care to read along.

XI. ad Furium et Aurelium

FVRI et Aureli comites Catulli,
siue in extremos penetrabit Indos,
litus ut longe resonante Eoa
tunditur unda,
siue in Hyrcanos Arabesue molles,
seu Sagas sagittiferosue Parthos,
siue quae septemgeminus colorat
aequora Nilus,
siue trans altas gradietur Alpes,
Caesaris uisens monimenta magni,
Gallicum Rhenum horribile aequor ulti-
mosque Britannos,
omnia haec, quaecumque feret uoluntas
caelitum, temptare simul parati,
pauca nuntiate meae puellae
non bona dicta.
cum suis uiuat ualeatque moechis,
quos simul complexa tenet trecentos,
nullum amans uere, sed identidem omnium
ilia rumpens;
nec meum respectet, ut ante, amorem,
qui illius culpa cecidit uelut prati
ultimi flos, praetereunte postquam
tactus aratro est.

----------------

Furius and Aurelius, companions of Catullus,
whether he penetrates the furthest of the Indies,
or the shore where the beating of the eastern
waves resonates far and wide,

whether he penetrates into the Hyrcanos or the gentle Arabs,
or the arrow-carrying Parthians,
or the seven fold Nile which
which colors the plains,

whether he will go across the great Alps,
intending to see the great monument to Caesar,
or the Gallic Rhine or the horribly dis-
tant Britain,

you who are prepared to try all these things,
and whatever else the will of the gods will bring,
announce to my girl a few
nasty words.

Let her live and let her flourish with her adulterers,
whom having embraced 300 of them at the same time, she owns and keeps them,
truly loving none of them, but repeatedly breaking the groins of
all of them;

nor, let her no longer look back for my love as before,
which by her fault, has fallen,
just like the farthest flower of the field
has been killed by a passing plow.

I skipped ahead with my Latin. I guess I was tired of reading the lovey-dovey love poetry. It's time to talk dirty:

Ad Aurelium et Furium.

Hey. What else should I be doing at this time of night?

My voice sounds like shit today, so I whispered some poetry of Catullus into the microphone: Ad Lesbiam.

I'm whispering Latin love poetry to you. The poetry of thousands of kisses. It isn't even the naughty stuff. Not yet.

Lord Byron: "I love the language, that soft bastard Latin, Which melts like kisses from a female mouth."

I want to narrate the entire works of Catullus. I think it will be good speaking practice, as I find the words to be very tricky to say. After that? I dunno. Maybe Ovid.

Today's Catullus excerpt is Fletus Passeris Lesbiae. That's what I sound like with a chest cold and asthma. Kinda hot. Ha.

I'm still sick, but I'm not dead yet.

Here are some links for your enjoyment.

Giger Wedding Cake: I wish this had been my wedding cake (thanks, Kutulu).

Miley Cyrus' little sister the new face of kiddie 'lingerie' line: Yeah.

Man hurt after homemade rocket explodes during party stunt: This looks so much like something one of my friends might do.

Axe Cop: Epic comic strip written by a five-year-old and illustrated by a grown-up (thanks, chernobylred).

I'm getting to the point where I can compose simple Latin sentences, written or spoken, without needing to look anything up. It's a small victory, but one I'm proud of. I continue to practice reading Latin aloud pretty much every day. I still can't read it as quickly as I can English, but it's coming along. I just have to keep practicing, so my comprehension continues to improve. I'm just so darned scattered. Where the heck did my self-discipline go? Maybe it disappeared when my muscles did.

I taught myself poi. I will teach myself Latin. My determination says so.

BACK TO THE GYM! Yes. I miss the structure of my martial arts training and my academic years. Gotta get myself motivated again, especially now that my lungs are mostly recovered from my battle with the cold.

The past week or so has been pretty stressful, and I went for a lengthy power walk with Steph. It calmed her killing rage, and settled my jangled nerves. We marched until we were wobbly and in pain. And then we went out for hot chocolate with Matt at Coffee Culture. It's great to have a coffee place close by that's open late. We chatted for a while, and then, even though my hips were killing me from the walk, I managed to piggy-back Steph for half a block. It was a lot harder to carry her than it should have been. I've become weak, I say. WEAK!

Gotta get back into doing squats and lunges. My badonkadonk is gone, and my big ol' muscle legs have been replaced with skinny little pipe cleaner thingermabobs. I miss my big muscles. Now I'm just a scrawny chick. Boo!

I will use this photo of myself as motivation. I looked like this not too long ago. Check out those biceps! I had some serious guns, a couple of years ago. And I can again. Fuck the bad foot. Fuck the bad lungs. I miss my mightiness. Pole class and weight training, here I come.



Link time.

Miniature Moss Garden: Maybe I'll try this out this summer. Might be nice to have a little moss garden beside my computer.

I Breastfeed My Dog: So very odd, really.

Experts stunned by swan 'divorce' at Slimbridge wetland: So they don't always mate for life. I'm intrigued by how the ex-lovers do not acknowledge one another despite living in close proximity.

Mom forces son to kill hamster for bad grade: Tough love.

Young Christopher Walken: Made my jaw drop, and then I said "oh" in a little voice. Niiiiiiice.

The Venezuelan ice-cream parlour with 860 different flavours: I think I'd pass on the sardines-in-brandy flavour.

I've been practicing spoken Latin for a while. I'm finally getting to the point where I no longer sound like I'm using a bad Italian accent. Whee!

I also tried my hand at some calligraphy today. I only had a ballpoint pen handy. I must get a good pen set, at some point. I wish there was a stationery shop in downtown Kitchener. Ah well! Although I need to practice my uniformity and spacing, I'm not too displeased at this first attempt, which is based off the Ludovicos font/hand. I do not like the "q" as I find it looks too much like a "g", so I'll probably change it up a bit on my next pass.

The writing is my own composition. I hope it's grammatically sound.



Any calligraphers in the house? Critiques? Criticisms?