What the Chinese is a “Degenerate Pineapple?” Don’t worry, I had the same reaction when the term first popped into my head as well. I wouldn’t say it’s a particularly clever name, but hopefully this post sheds a bit of light on why I believe it to be a fitting title for my blog. I’ll also explain the site’s logo and its significance at the end.
Part 1 of 2: Degenerate
If you were friends with me in high school, this probably won’t come as a surprise. If you met me in college, however, this will be the first time you’re hearing this: my favorite word is degenerate. It’s just so versatile with so many different definitions and usages as an adjective, verb, or noun. I mean, just look at its Merriam-Webster dictionary page!
I originally fell in love with the word as sort of a joke - it was the catchall term my friends and I used to describe anyone who engaged in, well, impure behavior. For instance: getting drunk? Degenerate! Smoking the Devil’s Lettuce? Degenerate! The term eventually expanded to the point where we just threw it out to describe any goofy acts, but you get the idea. Near the end of senior year, my friends and I actually joked about designing label stickers that would say “Degenerate” to stick on people and/or various items. It was never realistic, considering we probably would have been expelled from school even if we only stuck them on each other as a joke. I just find it rather humorous to entertain the thought of there being a couple engaging in PDA under the school stairwell and the “Degenerate” police slapping the stickers onto them out of nowhere before running off.
I also find “degenerate” to be a rather accurate description of the state of this blog. You’ll see that I’m a very egotistical and judgmental person through my posts, so I guess you could call me a “degenerate.” Furthermore, the first two definitions that appear on Google for “degenerate” are “having lost the physical, mental, or moral qualities considered normal and desirable; showing evidence of decline” and “lacking some property, order, or distinctness of structure previously or usually present.” I find these descriptions to be extremely fitting, as my posts will document how my mind degenerates over time and display absolutely no order regarding a central theme.
Among other definitions, I am obliged to lavish my praises on “degenerate” as such a useful term in STEM. I’ve seen it used in math to describe conics, physics/chemistry to describe orbital energy levels, and biology to describe codons. This makes me so happy as a STEM nerd, and I honestly can’t think of another word that comes even close to rivaling the versatility of “degenerate.”
Part 2 of 2: Pineapples
This part should be obvious to everyone. I love pineapples. I actually can’t eat many fruits due to allergies or just how they make me feel afterward (I still don’t know whether that’s a mental or physical problem). As a result, I really only stuck to eating apples, grapes, and bananas growing up. But one day in high school, my mother bought some canned Dole pineapple chunks. I decided try them out, since I had eaten actual pineapples before and not felt sick from them, and let me tell you: the taste was divine. In fact, I dare say it slapped. My mind was absolutely blown, and I kept on eating the Dole cans for days until they ran out. Of course, my mother did not always have a fresh stock of pineapple cans, but when she did, I suppose my reaction would resemble this meme that kids nowadays use:
This behavior only continued for about a year, however. I don’t exactly know why - perhaps it was just that particular batch of cans - but I eventually found the taste of the pineapples to be quite repulsive. I recall being bothered by the extremely metallic flavor of the pineapples chunks, which lead me to abandon eating canned pineapples for a while. Nevertheless, God had a greater plan for me! A few months later, my mom purchased some cans again, and I didn’t want to waste food so I tried eating them once more. I’d liken my reaction to that of Anton Ego tasting ratatouille for the first time since his childhood: it was spectacular. I haven’t abandoned my love for pineapples since, and they accompany me wherever I go. People often give me odd looks when they see me just eating out of the can with a fork, but I don’t care. I’m just living my own life.
Quick side appreciation: my love for pineapples has given me answers to some annoying icebreaker questions, like “what’s your favorite fruit/food?” and “what’s fun fact about yourself?” I hate those types of questions.
As a final note, I found it rather ironic that the initials of this blog, DP, mirror those of the Daily Pennsylvanian. My site is clearly superior, however.
Logo
If you haven’t noticed already, this site has a URL icon. Here’s a close-up picture of what it actually looks like:
I commissioned the talented Vickie Hua to draw a logo for the phrase “Degenerate Pineapples,” because graphic design is her passion after all. After some sketch drafts and friendly text exchanges about what the logo should look like, I must commend Victoria for drawing such a fantastic design. I’ll do my best to replicate her explanations of modern art to me to explain my interpretations of the logo. That is, pretty much entirely BS.
The primary object of focus is the annular pineapple slice, which is reminiscent of the canned pineapples I sometimes consume. The left of the pineapple slice is a healthy yellow color, but it degenerates into a brownish decaying color as you move right. I suppose this is symbolic in a few ways. You could say that pineapples give me life, and I still have a good amount left in me as depicted by the yellow side of the pineapple slice. However, this blog serves as concrete evidence that my mind is slowly descending into madness, which is represented by the growing brown gradient.
As for the rest of the logo design, the pineapple slice serves a dual purpose as also one of two gears. In one sense, this depicts how my mental “gears” are turning as I detail my thoughts on this blog. It could also represent my love for the grind (you should check out my 25/8 grind Spotify playlist by the way). I suppose I could even combine this idea with the previous point by saying that I’ll gradually turn into a machine as I grow older. Of course, I’m already an emotionless bot. But perhaps society will slowly suck all of the remaining life out of me and turn me into a thoughtless slave, programmed to serve the corrupt practices of the higher authorities. Or humans reach a point during my lifetime where we can replace all our body parts with machinery. Both are scary.