Tolerable Insanity

CHINA

For the summer of 2008, I hold the post of visiting fellow at Peking University in Beijing, China. Consequently, the present focus of the blog is to share this experience in real time. In this regard I also point you to my friend [Eric Fogg’s Blog](http://thepeoplesdaily.blogspot.com)

TOLERABLE INSANITY

My goal is to share original content in the form of discrete vignettes. The style aims at communicating the revelation in asynchronous real time as to share the pleasure of first discovery, that elusive eureka orgasm.

SCIENCE

Science occupies most of my time. I want to share my fascination with science through explanatory entries, initially focused on what humans on the social plane can learn from biology of molecules.

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the concept concept is an elusive one and requires further qualifications. it’s a concept propped by a series of assumptions, delivered in a necesserally raw form, practical only partly, and even then in small yeild.

the cactus concept yeilds toothpicks. whatever the means and costs of the industrial production of toothpicks, it is of note that nature makes them as nature does — naturally. mexican omelletes contain prickly pear cactus nopalitos as an ingredient and you can purchase it in abundance at our local street grocers with the spikes removed. where labor is cheap, the labor of removing the spikes may be worth the product, but perhaps there is a machine for this task. if there is or isn’t, there should be one, with the following specifications:

– roll along the flat nopalitos surface stripping spikes
– sort spikes and select longer (adequate ones)
– discard short spikes and debris
– produce both despiked nepolitos and spikes

sell spikes as toothpicks.

this, in turn, yeilds the cactus martini concept:

– cactus liquor (or adequate substitute)
– gin or ouzo
– garnish with cactus flesh staked with aforementioned toothpick

in making it, which i will as i get the right ingredients in place, it will survive its concept concept tag, since it will maintain all of the qualifications.

when i hire a cocktail photographer to represent it resting on a sophisticated urban bar counter, document the mixture, and sell it as a book on concept coctails, it will cease to be.

in early retrospect, i’d claim as my objective: to communicate my cambridge experience, through a (my) fresh eye, avoiding the obvious, playing with the unanticipated, experimenting.

all vides are in (.avi) quicktime format. future videos are presently on hold due to condition of camera. email is pp258 at cam dot ac dot uk.