Black Vishnu

            On Monday morning I finished revising my translation of “Le régiment des mal-aimés” (The Regiment of Broken Hearts) by Boris Vian. But I’m still not sure about it, so I’ll do a little research to see if anyone has written about this song. I just did that and plenty of people have written the lyrics down but no one has really analyzed the song. I’ll just go ahead and memorize it then. Usually, I get a better understanding of the translation once I can sing the song in French. 

            I memorized the refrain and the second verse of “L’ethylique” (Ethanolaholic) by Serge Gainsbourg. There’s really only one refrain left and then I’ll look for the chords. 

            I weighed 86.5 kilos before breakfast. 

            I tried to work on my essay but I felt sleepy so I took an early siesta from noon to 13:30. 

            I weighed 85.8 kilos before lunch. I had a salad of avocados, tomatoes, scallions, and lemon juice with a glass of Garden Cocktail. 

            I took a bike ride and this time I had to pee so badly after I got to Yonge and Bloor that I knew I wouldn’t make it as far as the Horseshoe Tavern this time. I stopped instead at the McDonald's near Yonge and Wellesley. From the outside, I couldn’t tell if the fast-food joint had closed down. There were Royal Bank posters on the dark windows. But I looked closely through the window and saw that somebody was lying down in one of the seats and so I saw it must be McDonald's. I went in and saw a women’s washroom but what would logically be a men’s washroom next to it had no symbol. I tried the door but it was locked so I asked a counter person, who buzzed me into the blank washroom. There was no toilet paper and the air blowers didn’t work but I was able to relieve myself and make it home at the point when I had to pee badly again as I was entering my door. 

            I weighed 86 kilos at 17:30. 

            I worked on my essay, again researching the earliest evidence of the colour blue. In my studies of Hunduism since I was nineteen, the Hindu god Vishnu and his incarnations, as well as the god Siva have been depicted in paintings as having the colour blue. But they appeared in poetry long before they were visually represented and Vishnu and his incarnations were said to be black. They only started taking on a blue colour 500 years ago when Persian painting was introduced. 

            For dinner, I had a salad of avocado, tomato, cucumber, scallion, and lemon juice with a glass of Garden Cocktail. I ate while watching an episode of Astro Boy. 

            This story begins with a history of how the Spanish forced the Indigenous people of Mexico to work in the mines. A descendant of those people named Dante is still angry about it. He has built a very powerful robot called Ferno to help him get his revenge. Dante enters Ferno into competition in the robot fighting arena against a robot named Cassius Mud. Ferno puts a hole in Mud’s stomach with one punch and it collapses in defeat. But then Ferno lowers his head and shoots such powerful heat that it melts Mud into slag. The robot referee comes out to disqualify Ferno but he melts him as well. The entire audience is appalled, including Astro Boy and Dr. Elefun. 

            Astro Boy tells Ferno what he did was wrong and Ferno challenges him. They standoff and Ferno shoots a heat blast that Astro Boy dodges and flies above. Ferno flies after him but then Dante calls him away. 

            Dante has Ferno breach the defenses of the Institute of Science simply by turning his body white hot and walking through every obstacle. He then breaks into the main secret safe and destroys all of the robot plans. 

            They go to Dante’s hideout in the desert and Dante has Ferno complete Operation Mole, digging a tunnel to the volcano Mount Smokem and activating it. The volcano erupts, sending a river of lava towards the town of Taciturn. Astro Boy wants to change the course of the lava and save the town and an army officer suggests that a small atomic bomb could do it but it would need a fuse. Astro Boy says he can use his own power pack to set off the bomb. So he gets the bomb and sets it in the lava’s course but before he can power the fuse he is attacked by Ferno. While they are fighting Dante gets trapped on a shrinking island above the rising lava and calls to Ferno for help. Ferno however doesn’t care and wants to continue the fight. Ferno turns white hot and flies towards Astro Boy and they collide in the sky. Afterward Astro Boy shows some surface heat damage but Ferno falls apart. Astro Boy saves Dante and then Dante helps Astro Boy, telling him he can use Ferno’s power pack to set off the bomb. It works and the lave is diverted. But the volcano is still erupting. Dante suggests a freezing bomb and Astro Boy says he can get one from the institute. Dante warns that he might be frozen and so he installs a device in Astro Boy to prevent that. Astro Boy carries the freezing bomb to the heart of the volcano and detonates it. Then he is frozen but suddenly the device causes the ice to melt and saves him. Dante admits he was wrong to seek revenge. 

            I went to bed again at around 21:30 and slept until almost 22:30. Then I got up and finished writing in my journal.