Happy birthday to me

Today was my birthday. (This means I am much older and wiser than you, Mynamyn.) Let me tell you why it was a nice day:

First, there were no disasters. This is unusual for my birthday. On past birthdays I have gotten grounded, been publicly humiliated, almost gotten arrested, been mugged, been hit on by gay men, missed exams, and other unpleasant experiences. Most of these events make great stories later on (especially the one about almost getting arrested and the run in with the flamers), but they were no fun at the time. (If anyone really wants to hear more about those stories, I can tell them at a later date.) So this time I had a pleasant day without problems. That alone made it a wonderful day.

Second, the weather was gorgeous. The Redhead and I took a stroll around town, enjoying the sights. I took some pictures, and as soon as I figure how to get them posted on this page I’ll do it. I’ll have to find some Web space somewhere. It was a beautiful day, the leaves were turning colors and we sat on a bench by the Tidal Basin and enjoyed the day. What more could you ask for on your birthday? (Besides a BMW or something like that.)

Another reason it was a good day is because I got STUFF. I actually don’t demand expensive things all the time (although if I had more money than brains I could get myself a pretty impressive wardrobe in an afternoon spent in Georgetown). But I got some fun presents: some nice books, a jacket, some DVD’s, etc. The nice kinds of things that make me happy. Oh, and a berry smoothie at Costco. For my birthday. (Thanks to Myn for introducing me to that particular delight.)

Finally, at risk of sounding rather cheesy, it was a good birthday because I got to spend it with The Redhead. Nice days should be experienced with your favorite people, and The Redhead is indeed my favorite person. I would have really liked to have had some other people around, but I’ll take a rain check on everyone else. As long I can see them when we go back to Provo. Preferably when we’re moving into our apartment. Anyone want to help us move? C’mon, it’s my birthday.

Funny email

One of the enjoyable things about working in an office are the fun emails people send around. In my office they don't forward them unless they are actually funny, so I am spared the lame or sappy ones. This one made me chuckle:

Rules of the Road in the Washington D.C. Metro Area

• First, you must learn to call it by its rightful name. It is D.C., or the "District." Only tourists call it Washington.
• Next, if your road map of Montgomery County is more than a few weeks old, throw it out and buy a new one. It's obsolete. If you're in Loudoun or Fairfax County and your map is one day old,it's already obsolete.
• There is no such thing as a dangerous high speed chase in D.C. It's just another chase, usually on the BW Parkway.
• All directions start with "The Beltway"...which has no beginning and no end, just one continuous loop that locals believe is somehow clarified by an "inner" and "outer" loop designation. This makes no sense to ANYONE outside the Beltway.
• The morning rush hour is from 5 to 11 AM. The evening rush hour is from 1 to 8 PM. Friday's rush hour starts Thursday morning, especially during the summer on Route 50 eastbound.
• If there is a ball game at the Redskins' stadium, there is no point in driving anywhere near PG County. Tip: Never say PG County to anyone from Mitchellville, Upper Marlboro or Fort Washington. They'll blow a vessel in their neck and go into a seizure.
• If you actually stop at a yellow light, you will be rear-ended and shot at. If you run the red light, be sure to smile for the $100 "picture" you will receive courtesy of DMV. (However, if you don't go as soon as the light turns green, you will get cussed out in 382 languages, none of them English.)
• Rain causes an immediate 50 point drop of IQ in drivers. Snow causes an immediate 100 point drop in IQ and a rush to the Giant for toilet paper and milk.
• Construction on I-270 is a way of life and a permanent source of scorn and cynical entertainment. It's ironic that it's called an "Interstate," but runs only from Bethesda to Frederick. (Unless you consider Montgomery County another state, which some do).
• Opened in the 60's, it has been torn up and under reconstruction ever since. Also, it has a "Spur" section which is even more confusing.
• All unexplained sights are explained by the phrase, "Oh, we're in TacomaPark."
• If someone actually has their turn signal on, they are, by definition, a tourist.
• Car horns are actually "Road Rage" indicators. Heed the warning. All old ladies in Buicks have the right of way in the area of Leisure World.
• Many roads mysteriously change their names as you cross intersections. Don't ask why, no one knows.
• A taxi ride across town will cost you $12.50. A taxi ride two blocks will cost you 16.75. (It's a zone thing, you wouldn't understand).
• Traveling south out of DC on Interstate 395/95 is the most dangerous, scariest thing you will ever do. There is nothing more frightening than seven lanes of traffic cruising along at 85 mph, BUMPER TO BUMPER!!!
• The minimum acceptable speed on the Beltway is 85. Anything less is considered downright sissy.
• The Beltway is our daily version of a NASCAR reality show. Strap up and collect points as you go.
• The open lane for passing on all Maryland interstates is the far right lane because no self-respecting Marylander would ever be caught driving in the "slow" lane. Unofficially, both shoulders are fair game also.
• The far left lanes on all Maryland interstates are official "chat" lanes reserved for drivers who wish to talk on their cell phones. Note: All mini-vans have priority clearance to use the far left at whatever speed the driver feels most comfortable multi-tasking in.
• If it's 10 degrees, it's Orioles' opening day. If it's 110 degrees, it's the Skins opening day. If the humidity is 90+ and the temperature is 90+, then it's May, June, July, August and sometimes September.
• If you go to a Skins football game, pay the $75.00 to park in the stadium lot. It's cheaper then getting towed or a citation. By law, you're not allowed to walk on the "public" roads around the stadium during game days.

Random thoughts

After a flurry of last minute editing and revision, I finally finished my personal statement and got my early acceptance application off last night. I’m applying to Vanderbilt with the hopes that I’ll get accepted early and I won’t even have to apply to other law schools. It really isn’t that hard to apply, it’s just annoying and time consuming. Like I mentioned in my earlier post, every time I sat down to work on the personal statement I would find something more entertaining to do. Like watching paint dry. Or write on my blog! Actually, I’m writing on my blog now because I have an oral presentation and a final project due tomorrow, and I’ve barely started both of them. So the blog seems a much more attractive option.

I have numerous projects to work on at work, and although none of them really keep me busy full-time, they are usually fun to do and I like them. Except for this one assignment. It really isn’t hard; it just requires me to call around to a bunch of places and try to drum up support for an online information-sharing forum. I simply have no desire to do it. I didn’t like the project from the beginning, when one of my supervisors suggested that I work on it. He is usually a fairly good communicator, but this time he sat down and explained what he wanted, and after 15 minutes of talking I still didn’t have a clue what he was trying to achieve. So I continue to ignore it while I work on more entertaining projects, like working an office in Puerto Rico. My contact down there has the last name of Babilonia (Babylon). I think that’s hilarious. I wonder if he’s extremely wicked.

This entry is turning out to be a mishmash of random items, so I might as well throw in a few I find funny. Tuesday evening up in DuPont Circle they had the Annual High-Heel Race. DuPont Circle is known for its gay entertainment and homosexual population. I was very disappointed that I wasn’t able to see fifty drag queens running a quarter mile in high heels, but I’m probably better off not seeing it. Still, it would have been funny. Anything absurd like that is funny. One time my old Boy Scout troop had a wacky boat race that had six different groups making boats out of things they found at home. One was made out of 50-gallon drums and a bicycle. One was made out of a tarp, duct tape, and balsa wood. One sank immediately. The bicycle one broke within ten seconds. It was hilarious. But I really would have liked to see the drag queens trucking it around the Circle. That’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

House Members and Hobos

Per my casual comment and Trueblat’s encouragement, I’ve decided to catalog my experiences with members of Congress and other high-ranking officials, contrasting those to my run-ins with the local homeless crowd around where I live and work. Now that I think about it, there are some interesting similarities. Ted Kennedy, for example, drinks about as much as the guy down at the corner. I saw him leaving the Phoenix Park Hotel and he looked about has haggard as any of the bums on the streets, although he was dressed a lot nicer. I can see why they wouldn’t let him on a plane, though. That is one scary dude.

On the same day I saw all of the justices of the Supreme Court, I had a nice run-in with the protesters in front of the Supreme Court building. They don’t quite count as hobos, but they’re close enough to merit mention. There were two groups of protesters there that day. One was a left-wing group with signs with the logo of NOW and pro-choice slogans. (Isn’t it interesting they don’t call it “anti-life?” I wonder why?) They sat there until the video cameras for the news agencies got set up and then they waved the signs and chanted for a few minutes while the cameras rolled, and then they left.

The other group was more entertaining. They brought a bunch of musical instruments, like guitars, harps, etc., and played music and sang about peace and stuff. The one guy leading them all was actually quite a good singer; I enjoyed that part of the protest. I was waiting for two hours to get in to hear the oral arguments, so I didn’t mind a little background music. But then they stopped playing music and all lined up and were bobbing their heads and shaking and praying or something. I dunno if it was really praying; some of them looked more like they were having a seizure or something. This one chick with red hair kept screaming unintelligible things. I never quite found out what they were protesting. They need to work on their message, I guess. But they were much more faithful than the NOW people. The singers stayed for several hours. I really did like the singing. If they had sung something like “Kumbaya” I would have gone over to join them.

I ran into a few Representatives from the House a couple times in hearings and conferences and stuff. They are all pleasant, patronizing, and like to talk about things they know nothing about. Kind of like the homeless people I pass on a daily basis. Most of them try to be pleasant, they patronize you in an attempt to appeal to your pity, and they love to talk about any ol’ thing. Some of them probably know more about politics than the House members, actually. My least favorite guy sits by the bus stop at Washington Circle. He chain-smokes and mutters angrily at people and scribbles things on a paper cup. Even The Redhead doesn’t have much trouble not giving anything to him. After spending two years in Latin America I have developed a well-hardened conscience that is not very susceptible to the pleas of panhandlers. The Redhead, on the other hand, cannot help but feel bad for them. According to my way of thinking, they really don’t need spare change; they need food or help finding gainful employment or help treating substance abuse. We’ve volunteered at the Capital Area Food Bank and we don’t feel completely heartless. But The Redhead is very empathetic, and it’s much harder for her to dismiss them. One day she told me she had a confession to make. She said it in such a way that I was expecting something like, “I broke your Clié” or “I lost your wallet” or “My name is actually LaFawnda and I’ve been leading a double life.” But she just confessed to giving a panhandler a few bucks in the Metro. I laughed and hugged her and said that it wasn’t illegal and isn’t an unpardonable sin, either.

I’m not sure which group I like better, the important people up on Capitol Hill or the homeless people. The Senators sure smell better, but you get to know the hobos. There’s the guy that sits under the tree. The guy with the dreads and all the magazines sits by the hospital. The big jolly guy with few teeth sits by St. Stephan’s. I think I’ll actually miss them when I move back to Provo. Except the smoking guy. He’s almost as scary as Ted Kennedy.

Suffrage

This weekend I decided to change the template of my blog. It’s not that I didn’t like the old one; in fact, I think I like it a little more than this one. I liked the dark blue and beige, and although teal isn’t really my style, I thought it was a decent color scheme. But I felt like a copycat or someone who follows the crowd when I found out that everyone and their mother was using the same template. Perhaps it’s a tribute to our collective good taste, but Toasteroven, CGNU Grad, and Trueblat all have the same template I used, and I’m pretty sure at least one of them had it first. So I went searching for a new template. The ones Blogger provides are really pretty decent, to be honest. With the possible exception of the very pink template, I would be fine with any of them. Except now that I’ve spit out a dozen or so random thoughts in paragraph form, I feel somehow motivated to make my blog unique. Never mind that I followed the crowd in getting a blog; now that I have one it’s gotta be mine and mine alone. So I started looking for templates with all the pickiness that I use when purchasing ties and shoes.

I first went to all the Web sites Blogger mentions as other sources for blog templates. If any of you have taken a look at those sites, they are largely unhelpful. They’re all too cluttered or focused around a theme that I don’t want. If I wanted a blog about Hello Kitty, I would have been set. But since Hello Kitty isn’t my thing and I cover more topics than one, I just wanted something simple, clean, and good-looking. Which was apparently too much to ask. I expanded to a Web search that ended up taking way too much time and still left me with nothing better than what I already had. And the ones I did find had complicated instructions to use them, and I wasn’t sure if I could get them to work. So I went back and picked from one of the Blogger templates, and although it wasn’t my ideal choice, it is good enough for now.

This weekend I also voted. I got my absentee ballot in the mail a few weeks ago, but I waited to actually vote so I could make more of an informed decision. I asked my mom about some of the candidates, particularly the local ones, to see if she knew anything about them or their history of service. I also got a flood of campaign ads from various candidates and the two main political parties. Some of these were rather uninformative, but many had platform issues and helped me decide whom I wanted to vote for. So Saturday I sat down and cleared off the “kitchen” table (the one in between my bed and the oven) and spread out the campaign mailings and got out my voting packet. First of all, I must comment the instructions on how to fill out the absentee voting card were about as confusing as the instructions of how to use a template for my blog. And my great and enlightened state still uses punch card voting. In fact, it uses more punch cards than any other state except Utah. (Smart people with too much time on their hands may deduce from that statement what state I’m from, but it really doesn’t matter for my narrative.) If the vote is close (which it inevitably will be) I predict an army of lawyers will descend upon my state and replicate the Great Florida Fiasco of 2000, which I missed because I was out of the country. I will probably be glad that I’m out of the state this time, which is why I voted by absentee ballot. Which brings me back to my story.

It’s no secret that I’m more of a Republican than a Democrat. My views on states’ rights, the federal government, moral issues, and fiscal policy are all more similar to the Republican Party than the Democratic Party. However, I do vote Democrat in lots of local elections because I vote on the candidate. So I started punching out the chads from the punch cards and I immediately felt just like when I was looking for a new template for my blog. In some ways I didn’t like any of the choices. This holds true for everything from the presidential elections down to county sheriff. I found myself looking at things along party lines, which made me feel like a sheep. There’s a ton of choices out there, and none of them is exactly what I want. I even looked into a few of the independent candidates, but nothing was what I wanted.

So I did the same thing I did with the blog templates. I went back to the beginning and picked the one I liked best, even if it wasn’t ideal. I ended up leaving a lot of them blank because I didn’t feel informed enough to vote one way or the other. Just like my blog, I had to be a little different: I actually voted for the independent guy for county sheriff. But for the most part I just picked from the limited set of choices. That’s what voting is all about, right? You’ll rarely get a perfect fit, but almost half of the voting population isn’t going to agree at all, so you take what you can get. Even in my closely contested state, I suffer no illusions that my vote will actually matter. I did it more as a matter of principle and because I wanted to vote. As I carefully inspected my voting card for the perilous “hanging chads,” I felt good for having put my two cents in on the big voting mess. And when it really comes down to it, that’s what my blog is all about: putting in my two cents.

At least my blog doesn’t have chads.

Pennant pessimism

The day after the Boston Red Sox won the American League Championship, I walked into work expecting to see my coworkers in whistling, cheerful moods. They had anxiously watched their team come back from a three-game deficit to win the American League over their nemeses, the New York Yankees. What wasn’t there to celebrate? I was surprised to see all the die-hard fans with serious faces, quietly talking amongst themselves as if someone had recently passed away. I asked one of the senior analysts, perhaps the most avid Sox fan among them, the reason for the somber mood.

He shook his head and said, “Did you see all those people celebrating in the street last night?” I had, they showed it on the news and had pictures of it online. “Well,” he said, “those aren’t the real Red Sox fans. The real fans are even more nervous than ever.” I didn’t get it. This man was a true Sox fan. Being a Red Sox fan was the primary defining element of his personality. Before being a husband, lawyer, or Jewish, he was a Red Sox fan. And yet he sat there at the boardroom table before one of our meetings looking like he just lost everything the stock market. He, like thousands of other Boston fans, are more sure than ever that their team will choke. And he is convinced that as long as he doesn’t get his hopes up and as long as he expects them to lose, there might still be a chance of them winning.

Red Sox fans must be the most superstitious, fatalistic, and contradictory bunch of sports fanatics in the world. My colleague explained to me that Boston had done well thus far because he had been able to go to his favorite sports bar and watch the whole game uninterrupted. Every time he had been interrupted or unable to watch the game at that specific sports bar, they had choked. He woefully explained to me (in all seriousness) how the last time Boston went to the World Series he had been watching the game at a friend’s house instead of his sports bar. But the real reason, he said, why they lost the game was because in the 9^th inning with the Sox ahead his friend went into the kitchen and popped the champagne early. My colleague screamed, “No, you can’t do that! You can’t celebrate early! They’ll lose!” Sure enough, within a few minutes they choked and lost the game. (My colleague had to flee the house because his friend got so angry he was throwing objects and swearing a blue streak.)

So the collective anxiousness of Red Sox fans around the country cranked up another notch as Boston won the first game of the World Series last night. They shake their heads and speculate how it could all go down the tubes, while they wear their lucky socks or go to their lucky sports bars and plan their schedules around the games. I’m routing for the Sox too, actually. But I’m not a true fan, so I can celebrate and enjoy the games. I only care because a) they beat the Yankees, and the Yanks deserved to be whupped sometime, and b) my grandpa would be happy if they won. He watched the Sox games for decades without seeing them take the pennant, and I’m not sure if he’ll get a chance to see another season at this point. When there is a game on, I know he’s wheeled his chair down to the TV to watch it. He’s probably asleep half the time, but he’s watching the game. He doesn’t follow much these days, but he follows the Red Sox when they play. I know it’d make him happy if they won.

Geez, I hope I’m not being to optimistic. They could still choke. Maybe I’ll go down to the sports bar on Pennsylvania Ave. and watch the game. This one’s important. This one’s for Grandpa.

Bad user, bad!

Ever have one of those days where nothing interests you? Yeah, that’s me today. I wonder what in the world has gotten into me; I don’t want to do anything. I have been possessed by an evil spirit, except it’s not really evil, it’s just extremely lazy and lethargic. It could be a product of the weather—the sun hasn’t shone for days here in the district—but I doubt it. If I was that sensitive to the weather, I’d be suicidal every winter by the time February rolled around. But my mood is as gray as the forecast, so I’ve decided to play with my negativity for this entry. I may be exposing my own psychosis, but it’s at least somewhat amusing. I now speak out against a force that threatens to tear the very social fabric apart. It’s not gay marriage; it’s bad cell phone users.

I spent of much of the morning listening to the girl in the cubicle next to me talk loudly on her phone to various people. Phrases like “Oh no you di’in’t!” and “Girl, whawazzyoo thinkan’?” punctuated the conversation. This wasn’t even a conversation that I would want other people to here if I were her, but the whole set of adjacent cubicles were privileged to hear her side of the discussion in its entirety. I actually don’t own a cell phone, although I certainly would like one once I figure out where I’m going to live for any decent period of time. But plenty of people here have one. I think 90% of the people in DC own cell phones; the other 10% use Blackberries. Every time I hear somebody blab at high volume in the Metro I tell myself I will be a good cell phone user when I finally get one. One of my favorite Dilbert strips was a few weeks ago that showed “Heck” being overcrowded by people who use cell phones in bathrooms. (Yes, it’s called “Heck” in the comic. The ruler of this domain carries a big spoon instead of a pitchfork.) And don’t even get me started on cell phones going off in church or the theater. I went off on that subject a few months ago in one of my postings on the Board. In fact, actor Kevin Spacey was recently reported to have stopped his performance at the Old Vic Theatre in South London because a member of the audience ignored the repeated ringing of their cell phone. In strong words the actor told the member of the audience to shut it off or get out of his theater. (Being the owner and artistic director of the theater, he’s pretty serious: it is his theater.) He later went on record saying that people unwilling to obey simple rules of etiquette were unwelcome in his theater and should not disrupt other people’s lives elsewhere either.

I’m not so cranky that I don’t recognize the polite people in the world who calmly use their convenient devices in responsible ways. It’s not as if cell phone ownership caused this behavior. Bad cell phone users are usually the same people who don’t use the turning signal and stand in the middle of the sidewalk or block the left side of the escalators in the Metro. And more often then not, they’re talking on their phone while they do all three of those things.
This is probably the most unfunny and uninteresting post I’ve ever written, but like I said at the beginning, it’s a blah day.

Virtual parody

It was the Redhead’s birthday last week. Not only did I remember, I took her out to dinner and we went shopping for her birthday and got some clothes on sale. This wise and careful action on my part ensured that I would not be sleeping on the couch for the rest of the week. And I assure you, sleeping on our couch is not something I want to be doing: it’s a love seat with room for 1.5 people and is made of hard wood and cushions that have all the comfort of concrete slabs. Suffice it to say that if I had to “sleep” on the couch I wouldn’t get any sleep at all.

Anyway, the birthday was a success. Cake, streamers, balloons, and the most important part of all birthdays: presents. Let’s be honest, we all like presents. Admittedly, presents don’t represent nearly the allure they did when I was 10 and wanted Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figures. But no one can deny that gifts aren’t important. (Just ask all the guys who forgot and did end up sleeping on the couch. They know.) So the Redhead got the perfect present for her this year: a video game. Yes, she likes video games more than me. (Except for Halo—she doesn’t dig first person shooters.) So she found herself the proud new owner of The Sims 2. Let me first tell you that this game is “ridiculously huge,” to quote a popular red-gloved icon. The game itself is more than 3.5 gigs. Yes, that’s right, I said gigs. More than 10% of her hard drive is now tied up in a virtual reality world that is simultaneously identical and completely different from real life.

Each character has wants and fears, and you try to satisfy their desires by guiding them through every day life. You can use existing characters or set up your own. The Redhead set up a boy and girl that look like us to see if she could get them to hook up. She then proceeded to spend several “days” with each character hanging around the other’s house or in public places, hoping for the chance that the other would happen to pass by so they could meet. I thought this was funny, but I guess lots of people do that in real life too. The guy would then come over to the girls house and they would play video games together, which is genuine real life as far as I’m concerned. (The game is so complex that it has a game within a game—the characters can play SSX 3, and after having watched my roommates play that game for hours on end, I can assure you that the music, graphics, and multiplayer options on the simulated game were true to life.) The game got even more amusing as the two characters started a family. The girl proposed and the guy took her last name, which shows what an enlightened and flexible society the video game people live in. They had a baby through a process described as “Woo hoo,” in which the two characters get bed and perform what looks like WWF wrestling under the blankets. The entire pregnancy lasted about three or four Sim days, culminating when she woke up in the middle of the night screaming and then a baby boy appeared in her arms.

There were plenty of realistic touches to the game, however. If you flush the toilet while someone is in the shower they get blasted with hot water and yell at you. The beginning of the new mother’s 4-day gestation period was when she ran to the bathroom and proceeded to be violently ill. I have yet to find out if the guy has to sleep on the couch if he forgets her birthday, but I’m sure the game creators thought of that too.

Mondays

Usually when I sit down to write a blog entry I have some entertaining or whimsical idea in my head that I bat around on the screen and tease out a few paragraphs that I find interesting. In that respect, my blog is entirely selfish: I write what I like and what I find interesting, not what other people want to read. (I do, however, make some concessions. I changed the URL so I could have actual “readers.”) But today is Monday morning, which leaves me completely and utterly devoid of any reason or intelligence. Monday is a truly terrible phenomenon.

All across America people wake up and smack their alarm clocks across the room as they realize with horror they have a whole week ahead of them. I suppose my current Monday’s aren’t too bad. They were ugly when the clock read 4:45 AM in high school, especially since I rarely got to bed before 10:30 PM. Last year I got up at 5:00 AM to be at work by 6:00 for my early morning shift at the warehouse. If it is medically unadvisable to operate heavy machinery while taking medication that can make you drowsy, it is doubly dangerous to operate a 4-ton forklift at 6:00 AM while trying to rub the sleep out of your eyes. The summer before that I worked a 9-5:30 shift at the same warehouse. Those Mondays were okay for me, but with 40 hung-over coworkers the general experience was still unpleasant. They would rush out the door on Friday afternoons to catch happy hour and drag themselves in on Monday mornings, looking like they had gotten run over by a Mack truck.

Now my Mondays consist of me waking up and wondering what that unholy noise is and why is it ringing so loud. Once I come to my senses I turn the alarm off and roll out of bed by sheer habit, because no combination of willpower or effort could get me out of bed feeling like I do. I stumble to the bathroom and turn the light on and instantly regret it. As the florescent lights stab my pupils I wonder why I didn’t remember to cover my eyes first before I turned the lights on, but I wonder this every morning and I still don’t remember the next day. It’s usually about this point that some of my higher thought functions start coughing and starting like a cold engine. I remind myself never to start drinking, because if I’m this bad without the alcohol I’d die with a hangover. Fortunately, habit takes over once again and I continue through my routine. I get in the shower and wonder why the water takes so long to get to a decent temperature. Then, just about the time that the water gets really good and warm, I get out and wonder who’s idea it was to put an air conditioning vent right above the shower. Midway through shaving I have resigned myself to another day of being conscious, even if I don’t like it.

I sat down to ramble through a worthless Monday morning blog entry, but I’m actually rather entertained by what I just spit out. Perhaps the utter despair of Monday mornings has some potentially productive power to it. Maybe some great masterpieces were painted on Monday mornings. Like Edvard Munch’s The Scream.

Democrats and Vegans

The weather is turning colder and my morning walk to the Metro is quite brisk. I like this time of year very much, actually, and I had spent so many autumns in Utah or elsewhere that I forgot how nice the trees look in the fall. After a stifling summer, the cooler weather has really been a welcome break. On the campaign front, however, things are still heating up, and you can’t walk a block in this city without being reminded of it.

For some reason people seem to think that if they stage demonstrations they will change the outcome of the elections. So they plaster posters on street signs and protest in the streets. The group I am most amused/annoyed by has recently taken residence at the entrance to the Foggy Bottom Metro station. I assume by their ages that they are students from George Washington University, and they do very odd things. They try to hand out homemade flyers about the evils of the current administration, which isn’t that odd. But the other day they had a choir singing slow hymns or something. For some reason that didn’t make me want to run home and register myself with the Democratic Party. But it did make me want to stare and wonder what they were thinking, which was probably what they wanted so they could give me more homemade flyers. This group also has a particularly creative set of posters and banners (which happen to always be in the way when I try to walk by). Most of the posters involve funny caricatures or altered photographs of the current president and various slogans, most of which are extremely creative but unprintable.
Actually, that part of town seems to be a veritable hotbed of activism of all sorts. One night the Redhead and I were approached by a guy handing out a “vegetarian guide to restaurants in DC”. Now, I am not a huge vegetarian eater—I tried tofu once and thought it was rather tasteless—but I’m always looking for presents. So we took it, thinking it might be useful. It turned out to be 95% PETA propaganda that had small bios on animals like “Ashley” the pig and “Julie” the chicken. Although I respect people’s decisions to eat or act a certain way, I couldn’t help finding humor in the article that claimed even goldfish have thoughts and feelings. That little magazine actually provided us with an entire evening of entertainment, especially after we found a similar Web site entitled “PETA: People Eating Tasty Animals.”

In "Convenience"

My apartment is what is known as a “convenience apartment.” In this convenience is a drastic euphemism for “really really really ridiculously small.” Another common name for such apartments is a “studio apartment,” which is also a misnomer, since no studio is this small. The small size has its advantages, of course. I can sit at my little table and get something from my tiny fridge without getting up. And cleaning house takes about 20 minutes, max. One of the coolest things is that I have a Murphy bed. You don’t see those much anymore—those are the ones that you pull down from the wall. Unfortunately, the novelty wore off quickly when I discovered that you couldn’t really shut people up in the bed like they do in the movies. Mostly it just stays down and unmade.

The big upside of this apartment is that it is cheap. I really wouldn’t be able to afford any other apartment in West End. But it has plenty of down sides. The bathroom is very cramped; it is hard to squeeze in and out because the room is only about as wide as the door. I’ve seen handicapped restroom stalls that were bigger. The toilet is smashed between the shower and the sink, so you feel a little claustrophobic while sitting on the throne. Everything is proportioned a little differently, which tells me why most bathrooms are proportioned the way they are: they just fit better. The sink is at a funny height so I drip all over the small counter when I’m shaving. The toilet doesn’t even have a lid, which makes it seem even more like a tiny public restroom stall. I almost expect to see a big institutional roll of toilet paper hanging next to the john, but then again, that would be too big to be “convenient.”

The worst incident so far that has happened as a result of this “convenience” involved the bathroom. I had some orthodontic work done last year and I still wear a retainer at night. I reached up in the medicine cabinet to take the retainer out of its case and I dropped it. It fell onto the sink, bounced, and did a swan dive directly into the toilet bowl. The sounds from my shriek of horror were only drowned out when the Redhead realized what I had done and began to laugh hysterically. No wonder I love her, eh? She continued to roll around on the floor, emitting gales of laughter in a very unsympathetic manner. So then I was left there miserably staring at my retainer in the toilet, wondering what in the world I would do. And I’m supposed to put that thing in my MOUTH? Aaaaaaaah!

So I have a new retainer now that has never been defiled by porcelain. And I am very careful when handling this new retainer so it doesn’t meet the untimely demise of the old one.

Convenience my eye.

Links and more links

I really liked the set of political links I put up last week, but I think it a waste to only focus on the political stuff out on the Web. I consider the primary purpose of the Internet to be a tool of information and communication. This is closely followed by the secondary purpose of providing entertainment. A few of my links last time around were cartoons, so I'll put up a few more of those. But there are some high-larious Web sites out there just waiting for you to find. I'm not just talking about the Homestarrunner stuff, either. So here are a few of my favorite spots of entertainment.

Lileks
Wow. This site is random. I mean random. It's slightly more subtle humor than your average sitcom, which for me makes it more worthwhile. I recommend clicking on the "Institute of Official Cheer" and scrolling down to see the Dorcus Collection. I actually had a professor introduce this site to me in class, and it was so off the wall I've gone back occasionally to see what other odd-ball stuff James Lileks has up next.

Things My Girlfriend and I Have Argued About
Mil Millington's live-in girlfriend is crazy. No, really, she is. His stories about Margret's irrational actions have been published in a book (now translated into several languages) and he has a Web site dedicated to the subject. Mr. Millington no longer updates this Web page, instead sending out monthly emails that detail the further exploits of Margaret and their arguments, but there is still plenty of old stuff on this site. It's the kind of quick British humor that makes me laugh out loud.

The Oracle of Bacon
The Oracle of Bacon at Virginia is a project at the University of Virginia that builds on the Kevin Bacon game. Using imdb.com (which merits its own link) it tells you how many steps away from Kevin Bacon any actor is. In fact, you can link any two actors with its search engine. You'd be surprised how close any given actor is to Kevin Bacon, or anyone else for that matter. Me, I'm three steps away from him. Really! My only complaint about the oracle is that it cheats sometimes because it uses movies that haven't come out yet to connect people.

Nation States
I had a friend who had posted the link to her simulated country on her instant messanging profile. I thought it would be fun to make my own country and start a war with her or something, but I soon found you can't do that with Nation States. It was enough to keep me entertained for a little while though. The options are really limited, but I had fun running a country according to Libertarian ideals to see what happened.

Adventure Game Studios
This place is retro cool. Not only does it have tons of old adventure games, it has software you can download for free that will let you make your own video game. Who hasn't wanted to do that at one point or another? I never really got into the old adventure games when they were new, but now that they're old (and free) I find them pretty entertaining. There are enough walkthroughs online that I can just play and enjoy and not get stuck on some stupid puzzle.

International Movie Database
IMDb is a great site for all those random questions about movies. It has information about the actors, directors, cinematographers, the musical score, etc. Anything you want to know about a movie is on this site.

Comics
I included a few cartoon strips in my previous links post, but comics deserve more attention than that. Among my favorite cartoons on the Web are Frazz, Zits, Dilbert, Foxtrot, and Bizarro. I have been surviving on a combination of these comics ever since Gary Larsen and Bill Watterson stopped writing. Fortunately, the immortal Calvin and Hobbes is still available online in reruns.

Law and Disorder

So I am applying to law school right now. To those of you unfamiliar with the process, I encourage you to thank your lucky stars that you never have to endure such humiliation and abject suffering. Applying to law school is just about the most miserable academic undertaking, with the notable exception of applying to medical school. I fully confess that medical school trumps anything difficulty law school application may profess, and that everyone who ever tries to get into medical school must either have a burning passion to pursue that profession or be stark raving mad. But I’m not talking about medical school; I’m talking about law school because that’s where I’m applying. The process really started a year ago when I started studying for the LSAT. I took a class, I did about 30 practice tests, and after six months of preparation I took the real McCoy and got one point better than I did on my very first test. Great, there was six months of my life and a couple hundred dollars practically wasted. But it wasn’t too bad a score, so I’m keeping it and going forward with the application process. Except I got my score back in June and I have done almost ZERO work towards applying since then. I was burned out from the LSAT and I decided to take a week or two off, and then start working on my personal statement and my application so I could have it all done by November. Well, I did take some time off, but I never took some time on again until a week or two ago when I realized that November is in a couple of weeks. It basically all boils down to the simple fact that I am the King of the Procrastinators.

Now I know lots of people can make that claim, but I feel I have good and legitimate reasons as to why I am the best. I’m so good at procrastinating that I can even convince myself I’m not procrastinating at all. I should have been working on my personal statement for months now, but every time I sat down to do it I found something infinitely more pressing that needed to get done. It’s called “active procrastination,” and it’s even sneakier than the lazy kind. It’s like during finals, when you know you should be studying, but suddenly everything else is so much more interesting. I have watched soap operas during finals instead of studying because it seemed more interesting than reading Machiavelli. Despite the fact that I hardly ever play basketball, I played a three-on-three game a few hours before my last exam my sophomore year just to do something other than studying. My active procrastination isn’t even limited to schoolwork. Last year when I had to move out of my apartment I was watching a show about bounty hunters at one in the morning because I didn’t want to finish packing. So during the last few months I have been extremely productive in almost everything BUT applying to law school. I have successfully rationalized away three months of my life.

As with all procrastinators, even the King must face the music. It is now crunch time, so I am frantically sending forms across the country and trying to get things done on time. I think I’ll make it, I usually do, but not without a few ulcers along the way. But hey, that’s what law school is all about.

Office Space

I’ve had a few jobs before this one. I was a lifeguard during high school. I worked in an office. I worked in a warehouse twice, once on conveyor belts and once driving forklifts. I’ve done event planning and project editing. But it wasn’t until this job that I got completely enveloped in working culture. I guess working for the government will do that to you. Suddenly Dilbert is a lot funnier to me. The cubicles stretch as far as the eye can see, and I have to share mine with another low guy on the totem pole. (Actually, our workspace is quite ample, but we still feel like prison inmates in our cell.) I thought I would lay out the office hierarchy since it is the prototypical government office, and in many ways is just as funny as Dilbert’s world.

First, you have the director. She’s the boss. I have never seen her, although I have been in her office suite and I occasionally use her nice conference room. Along with the director comes her secretary, who has chocolate at her desk for all to partake at any given moment. My place of work is not conducive to losing weight. You definitely want to be on the secretary’s good side, so you smile and chat when you see her.
Then you have the division head. I’ve actually met him. He does a very good job at seeming friendly and personable, whether or not that is the reality. He consistently dresses a little nicer than most people here. (Actually, he’s probably the best-dressed man in the office. Other than myself, of course.)
After the division head come the group leaders. I work with two groups. One of them has a leader that vaguely reminds me of my 10th grade math teacher. I think it’s the slightly crooked teeth and the shifty eyes. *shivers* His leadership style involves opening lots of Pandora’s boxes without any means of solving the problems. Every group meeting I go to I try to include a certain time that I need to leave. It’s usually half an hour after the meeting is supposed to have ended, but every time they are still going strong when that time rolls around. This group leader is by no means the worst leader I have ever worked under, but he does possess an amazing ability to say the exact wrong thing at the exact wrong time. The other group leader I work with telecommutes from Pittsburgh, so he isn’t in the office very often. He shares the same name and religious persuasion as Fagan from Oliver Twist, and even slightly resembles the actor from the musical movie. Most people don’t mind the fact that he’s gone all the time. He shows up for a few days every week and owns a small apartment here in town for those days. It’s always a surprise to see him in the office, so I try to have his projects ready at a moment’s notice.
There are a host of other funny characters that I work with on a more regular basis. My main supervisor has a beard and a ponytail. He is as laid-back as I am type-A, but we get along great. He teaches law, and I would love to have him as a professor. Another woman I work with is a feisty one and fears no one in the office. I somehow got on her good side when I came here, which is a good thing because I work with her a lot. Another woman has platinum blonde hair and a breathy voice that makes her seem like a character straight out of a movie. It’s an interesting group.
The person I see most frequently is my cubicle-mate. He is probably the only person here whom I out-rank. Through some twist of fate I always end up with the juicy projects. I work on news broadcasts and fun research and get taken out to lunch, while he usually is stuck doing data entry or filing or nothing. Normally I would be interested in equality, but this isn’t a normal job, it’s just until the end of the year, so who cares. So I’ll enjoy being not quite the lowest of the low. It’s like the two kids at the end of middle-school track meets that race each other down because neither of them wants to be last.

A Visit to the Supreme Court

Yesterday I had the great privilege of hearing oral arguments before the Supreme Court. The case was a boring one to most people, but it is actually a landmark case in an area in which I currently work. The Supreme Court heard two separate cases together to decide the legality of the federal sentencing guidelines. Sounds kinda boring, right? Well, it’s actually important. If you want to hear some basic details on the case, read the next paragraph. If not, just skip past it and continue reading.

Before the creation of the Federal Sentencing Commission and the federal sentencing guidelines in 1987, two people with exactly the same criminal history that committed the exact same crime could receive drastically different sentences, depending on the personal style or opinion of the federal judge. So the Federal Sentencing Commission was created as a quasi-legal body to help create guidelines to try to make the system uniform, fair, and consistent. And while almost all people consider this goal to be worthy, many people (most notably Justice Antonin Scalia) believe this commission to be unconstitutional. So last June, out of the blue comes a case called Blakely v. Washington that challenged the Washington state sentencing guidelines. The court ruled them unconstitutional because under Washington state guidelines (which are suspiciously similar to the federal ones) a convicted defendant could receive more than the maximum jury-recommended sentence, depending on other elements present such as the presence of drugs, use of firearms, etc. So suddenly the whole federal sentencing guideline system is called into question, so two cases were fast tracked up to the Supreme Court out of Maine and Illinois to determine the constitutionality of said guidelines. Boring or not, the case will affect thousands of people each year.

The experience was amazing. My coworker and I waited outside for two hours to get into the courtroom because we were afraid that it would fill up fast. But despite the fact that it was the first day of the session and the cases of Fanfan and Booker were pretty high profile, everyone got in easily. We didn’t mind the wait; it was a nice day and we ate lunch in the plaza in front of the Supreme Court Building. That beats sitting in my cubicle any day. After going through several metal detectors and checking all items except a pad of paper and a pen, we were seated in the rear of the courtroom just in front of the huge marble columns. We got in just in time: just as I sat down I had to rise again as the Marshall of the Supreme Court banged her gavel and announced the Justices. So in walked Chief Justice William Rehnquist and the other Justices and they got down to business. It was impressive enough to be in the Supreme Court—marble columns, maroon velvet curtains, pacing security guards, etc.—but to be across the room from the Justices was the coolest part. It’s weird seeing people in person at such a short distance that you usually see in textbooks or newspapers.

Because there were two cases combined, the Acting Solicitor General Paul Clement had a full hour to argue his case. Because he is essentially the government’s lawyer before the Supreme Court, the Justices paid him a certain amount of deference. But they still shot a rapid-fire series of questions at him most of the hour. To his credit, Clement was amazing, snapping out code and going head to head with Justice Scalia on several occasions. (They do not see eye to eye on several topics, but Clement was not cowed.) The current Acting Solicitor General was surprisingly young, almost certainly in his thirties, and he argued eloquently with Supreme Court Justices without any notes in front of him.

The attorneys representing Mr. Booker and Mr. Fanfan (J. Christopher Kelly and Rosemary Scapicchio, respectively) were not quite at ease in the courtroom, although Ms. Scapicchio certainly did not lack in attitude. In her thick Chicago accent she basically accused the Solicitor General of changing his story. Both Mr. Kelly and Ms Scapicchio underwent aggressive questioning by the Justices, especially from Justices Scalia, Ginsberg, and Breyer. Every Justice had a comment or question except for Justice Clarence Thomas, who maintained his customary silence. I was glad I was seated in the back of the courtroom and not subject to the 9-way crossfire up front.

It was a cool experience, I got several hours of work off, and I got to see a landmark Supreme Court case argued by the best. I doubt this will be a case schoolchildren will have to memorize. It wasn’t a Marbury v. Madison or Brown v. Board of Education, but it will matter to a lot of people and I was glad I got to see it.

It's a Small World (After All)

It’s funny how we live in a world with about 6 billion inhabitants, and yet we still run into people we know. Last Tuesday I ran into a girl from my freshman ward at Institute. I didn’t even know she had graduated, and now she’s here in Alexandria going to some Institute for International Politics up by DuPont Circle. A very pleasant surprise, though. Friday we ran into a classmate at the Orioles game up in Baltimore. Saturday I caught the Metro over to Eastern Market with my neighbor to see the Priesthood session. On the way we were talking about professors and we found out we were both in 310 together and we never realized it. (That was a lame class. The professor had an online syllabus so he could change it at will. So depending on when you got online to look at the assignment, it could be one of several reading selections. Several times we all showed up to class having read different assignments.) Then at Priesthood session my neighbor looks over and says, ‘Is that Mike Leavitt?” It was indeed none other than the former governor of Utah and current head of the EPA. Okay, I really don’t know him, but it’s not every day that I run into him in town.

I like the small world phenomenon, although it also comes in not-so pleasant varieties. One time I ran into my ex in the supermarket in Provo. (Ex #2, to be exact. That’s right. The bitter one.) We were both pushing our carts down the aisle looking for cream cheese at the same time. I didn’t even know she was living in the state, much less nearby, but there she was in the dairy section. She looked up, looked right at me, and then looked away and furiously ran her cart on down the aisle. Unfortunately for her, that was the direction I was going, so I followed her down the aisle. She hastily grabbed her cream cheese and hurried to the check out. Too bad I was about to check out too and we ended up in adjacent lines. She nonetheless avoided eye contact and rushed out of the store as soon as the bagger had placed the last bag in her cart. I found the encounter extremely entertaining, but I have no doubt she’ll go home and tell her roommates, “Aaaah, I just ran into one of my old boyfriends and he was following me around the store!” It’ll be very dramatic. As for me, I’m content with running into old friends. In fact, I wish it happened more often. I’ll have to intentionally run into a few of them when I move out of the District.

Night on the Town

Last night the Redhead and I decided to actually get out and about and have a “night on the town”. We ate in an interesting little French restaurant called “La Madeleine” (which, for those of you who do not parlez français, means in French, “The Madeleine”). It was kind of cafeteria style, and no one there spoke English as a first language. (In the case of when we went there, the three people working there spoke French, Spanish, and something akin to Ebonics. It was most definitely NOT English, however. I understood the French guy better.) I felt a little dumb not knowing how the restaurant worked, but the soup and sandwiches were very nice.

Afterwards we piled in a bunch of cars with a bunch of friends and went off to see an Orioles game up in Baltimore. Unfortunately, leaving DC at 5:00 on a Friday evening is no easy task. We spent more than two and a half hours traveling the 45 miles from West End to Baltimore. In fact, two hours into the drive we were only about 15 miles from home. This is why I use the Metro.

I enjoyed the evening at Camden Yards. Baltimore isn’t the city I think of when someone mentions big east coast cities with pretty skylines, but it nonetheless fits the description. Orioles Stadium is nice and new and I liked the view of the city as we drove in. We got there in the top of the third inning, and the first pitch I saw resulted in a homer for the Red Sox. The game was actually close until the 7th when the Sox put a run in and then smacked a three-run homer. We left during the bottom of the 9th with the score at 8-2. I didn’t really expect the O’s to win anyway, and I had little emotional attachment to either team. I was more entertained by the shirtless drunk guy that tried to get the wave going around the upper deck the whole night.

This whole weekend has been pretty noisy. There’s supposedly a huge IMF conference going down a few blocks from my apartment, and most of the dignitaries are staying at swanky hotels nearby. They get shuttled back and forth in shuttle busses escorted by two squad cars with lights and sirens blazing. So every 15-30 minutes a little convoy comes right by and stops traffic and makes a big hubbub. And in the case of this morning, one of these convoys also woke me up repeatedly. That’s what I get for sleeping in until 10:30, I guess, but I was tired. We didn’t get home until around 1:00 this morning. Oh, how I love the weekends.

Put it together

I saw about 20 minutes of the Presidential Debates last night, but most of that time was spent furiously trying to finish my report that I handed in this morning. I actually kept fairly good tabs on the debate by keeping The Shape of Days, Instapundit, and the NY Times open in other tabs on my browser (to Firebird, Firefox, and all other tab-enabled browsers, I salute you). But the bulk of my time and mental capacity was spent trying to take the portion of the report that I wrote and the portion of the report that my partner wrote and make them one coherent paper. Let me tell you, it was no small task.

It’s amazing how different the products can be when you give two people the same directions. The paper dealt with historical analysis of several states (which were assigned to us) and we had to identify any trends in the national elections. My partner (who was also assigned to me) then picked two of our four states and I took the other two. I have inherent misgivings about working with other people on assignments—I hate to have my grade depend on someone else—but I thought this project was easy to divide and put together. So last night I sat down to combine the two sections and write an introduction and a conclusion, only to find that my esteemed partner had written the complete opposite of what I had written. He had done no research, he had no sources, his conclusions were completely different from mine, and he left out major trends and influential issues or characters. Perhaps the part that made me cringe the most (and yes, I did cringe) was his style of writing. Phrases like, “Now, if I was a poor man from Montana. . .” peppered his rambling paragraphs that held no structure or main ideas. My left-brain, type-A personality just couldn’t handle it. So I spent three hours doing the extra research on his states and rearranging his paragraphs. In some cases I had to erase several sentences completely. There were a few moments where I had to just get up and walk away from the computer because I got too frustrated. The finished product wasn’t as good as it could have been, but I think it will be sufficient for the expectations of the class.

Perhaps it was because I was checking on the debate the whole time, but the idea occurred to me that putting our two sections together was probably like what would happen if you made George W. Bush and John Kerry work together on a project. Bush’s folksy ramblings would clash with Kerry’s style, and they would probably fight over conclusions too (bilateral, multilateral, etc.). The more I thought about it, the more entertaining the idea became to me. They could do a report together instead of one of the debates, and the American public could watch them get frustrated at each other about a myriad of issues. But then I realized how much I dislike working on projects with people and I decided it would probably be cruel and unusual punishment. This is a free country. We only inflict such torture on students.