Merry Christmas to Me

Once again I've fallen behind so much that it's pointless to try to catch up, so let's just say I have my own place now and a bed and life is better in that sense. I don't have any furniture yet, but my couch is in the warehouse, so I might by tomorrow!

So here's why it's Merry Christmas for me. The other night I came home and there were no parking spots (there is no parking at my apt.). I tried to squeeze into a spot and did a decent job. Until I realized the next day that I'd totally damaged the bumper of the guy in front of me. You see, here in California, license plates on the front of your car are mandatory. I'm not used to that and my car is somewhat ill-equipped for that. The set up right now makes it so that I basically have a bunch of sharp, puncture-y, scrapey stuff on my front bumper. Which I forget about.

There was a good amount of paint missing (a section larger than a candy bar) and some dents (almost-punctures). A good upbringing, guilt, and fear of karma all collided and I left a note, with my number. I was bummed because I'm very broke and that was pretty much the last thing I needed. But Kris Kringle must have felt my pain because that person never called me! It's been 4 days, so I'm feeling pretty safe, let's just hope I haven't jinxed myself.

Parents are coming into town tomorrow. A few hours later, I will be dining on a steak au poivre. MMMMMM...

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

*****Update! The owner of car just called me. I didn't get the call, but she left the nicest message (and she has a totally soothing British accent). Anyway, she said that the paint had already been chipping off for a while and then she thanked me for leaving the note. Yay!!

Beyoncé

So I just realized that Beyoncé spells her name with an accent on the last syllable.

But the accent is actually on the middle syllable.

Is this allowed?

Whoa.

Are misused apostrophes a grammar issue or a punctuation issue? I just thought about that and I have no idea. A friend has just suggested that punctuation is part of grammar, a chapter in the grammar book. Not knowing this is somewhat perplexing to me, but not enough so that I will actually look it up. Just enough to make me write about it.

Misused Apostrophes

Ah, the misused apostrophe, quite possible my biggest pet peeve (I have several, if I'm going to be honest). I don't know if they don't teach grammar any more or this is just something that people have forgotten since they were in grade school (because I think it's mostly adults who err in this way), but people put apostrophes where they shouldn't be or omit them entirely A LOT. I know, because I think I notice it every time. I feel sometimes as if I am plagued by misplaced apostrophes. I swear they're following me.

While it's possible that some of these are typos (I admit I just accidentally misused an apostrophe above [but FIXED it of course]), I see far too many of these for all these wandering apostrophes to exist in unintentional error.

A few months ago, I went to Canada for a wedding and had a four hour layover in Detroit on the way home. With nothing else to do, I planted myself at a bar with a book. I glanced up occasionally because the book wasn't that great and I noticed a sign advertising the following:

"JENNIFERS RECOMMENDED COCKTAIL'S"

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaat???!?!?!?!??!?!!? Never had I seen this before. TWO apostrophe errors in the same phrase!

People seem to make the mistake because of the same incorrect/unknown/apparently irrelevant simple rules. Here's a little grammar lesson:

* Apostrophes show ownership. If the noun that is doing the owning is singular, the word should end in ('s). If that noun is plural, since there's already an s there, it should end in (s'). If the noun is one of those plural words that doesn't happen to end in s (for example, women), it should end in ('s). In other words, if it already ends in s, just add the apostrophe at the end. If not, it's ('s).

* WORDS NEVER NEED AN APOSTROPHE TO MAKE THEM PLURAL. I can't say that enough.

* Apostrophes are used in contractions. I don't have enough time to list all the contractions here, but I've used several in this post (two in this sentence). Contractions are two words put together, the first word spelled out completely, the second word truncated. The apostrophe stands for the missing letters and it should go where those missing letters would be. When I was a TA, I was horrified to learn that many of my students had apparently never learned about contractions. You wouldn't believe how many "would of"s and "should of"s I got in papers. In case you're reading this and are confused, "would've" is a contraction for "would have" and has nothing to do with "of."

* And finally, we come to "it's/its." This one can be tricky and I readily admit to thinking about it every time I write it (and to using the wrong one when in a rush). It is actually simple if you just stop to think about it. It's means "it is." Its is the one that shows ownership.

And there you have them. I think those are all the rules for apostrophes. I may have forgotten something–I'm no English teacher after all. But I was once an English student and, call me crazy, I thought that grammar was one of the few things I learned in school that would be useful for the rest of my life.

*Disclaimer* I'm not saying I never make grammatical errors. Or that I don't purposely misuse grammar for things like blog posts. I'm not an all-around grammar Nazi. It's really only the apostrophes (actually, the apostrophe's) that gets to me.

****UPDATE**** Do you guys read the comments? I'm not sure, but if you don't, manunderstress directed me to a blog that is based on quotation mark misuse. This particular grammatical error doesn't personally bug me as much, but the blog is awesome. Check it out and thanks, manunderstress!
p.s. this has possibly inspired me to start photographing all the stray apostrophes I see and to start accepting your submissions of the same. I'm not saying/promising that this is what this blog is going to turn into, but I am sort of feeling the need to document the extent of this grammatical tragedy. (Ha, I know that's overly dramatic, but it's 5:43 a.m. and I'm up for the day since my roomies/providers of shelter have chosen this ungodly hour to wake up.)

Rank Your Servants

I am not a fan of cooking. While I'm not a shitty cook, I'm not great either and I enjoy eating great food. I also hate cooking for one because it's time consuming and I am a food-scarfer. I also get tired of the same food and leftovers frequently hibernate in the fridge for a few weeks until I admit to myself that I won't eat them and just throw them away.

So, if I could afford some sort of servant,* my first choice would be a cook. Not only would I not have to cook, but I think s/he would make me healthy stuff. And maybe buy my groceries (do they do that?). I mentioned this to my brother and he said he was going outside for a minute, but when he came back, we should have a conversation about our favorite servants. We didn't, so now I'm having it here with you, dear readers.

1. Cook
2. (tie) Driver, Massage Therapist

These are actually all I really need (need–ha!). The rest are more superfluous.

3. Personal shopper
4. Personal trainer
5. Housekeeper
6. Pool boy (or girl) At this point, I assume I would have a pool.
7. Aquarium specialist/consultant/tank cleaner (because I'd have crazy fish tanks at this point too)

Let's get back to #2 (the driver part). I have absolutely no idea why celebrities get DUIs. If I had that kind of money, I would have someone driving me around EVERYWHERE, DAY or NIGHT. I just don't get it. Imagine it–great night at the club, dancing on tables, drinking Cristal. How great would it be to just cuddle up and pass out in the backseat while your driver escorts you home?

So, if I can figure it out, I'm going to do a little poll (look to the right) and you can vote on your #1 servant.

*"Servant" seems like it's not the most PC word, but I can't think of an alternative.

Real Quick!

I have a bunch of post ideas written down, but for now I'm going to do some reading. I think it will improve my writing. You can be the judge.

A Quick Catch Up

So I'm in LA now. The road trip out was ok. Not fabulous, not terrible. C and I were both sick. The first day of driving (Atlanta-Memphis), C slept the whole time while I was tripping out on Day-Quil (I had to pull over for a little while so my eyes would stop doing crazy things). Went to Graceland, which was pretty cool. The 70s sure were colorful. And tacky.



We spent that night at a hotel that I think was a sex hotel. There was a sign at the check-in that said, "No X-Rated Movies." I thought they meant watching them; C thought they meant filming them. There was a BIG mirror on the wall next to the bed that could only be a sex mirror (right?). How can you have a mirror like that and prohibit filming? The place grossed me out a little and reminded me of a terrible stay at an Extended Stay America (which is a good story that I should tell here sometime), but was actually exponentially better. Nonetheless, I didn't shower. It would have required flip flops.

We drove 1000 miles the next day. And close to 1000 the next day. Here are some pix from that:

The Continental Divide (I think)

We went to an ostrich farm.


An amazing California sunset


And the low moon to the east


Got to California a day early after skipping the Grand Canyon.

C and I hung out for about a week. I was savoring my last bits of time with him. I cried a lot when he left and am weirded out and totally uncomfortable with the fact that I'm single now. I went to the dog park later that day and a straight guy started talking to me. He wasn't flirting, it was just idle dog park chatter but it freaked me out. I was short with him because I didn't want there to be any sort of misunderstanding, like I was flirting with him. Treating other people not nicely for this reason is lame, but I think a little unavoidable for now, until I get myself a little bit more under control.

I got a job! That's very exciting, but what's less than exciting is the fact that I have to wait 2-3 (or maybe 4) weeks until I can start it. It's with a highly bureaucratic place and paperwork, fingerprinting, and physicals are holding up the process. I'd like to get started as soon as possible because I'm curious about the job, but also because I need money. Without a paycheck, I can't get an apartment. Without an apartment, I can't use all of my stuff. You see, my stuff is all in boxes still, in my brother and his girlfriend's shed. They are extremely graciously hosting me during this homeless period. I am super thankful that they are so cool with my presence, but I need my own space and inflating and deflating my bed daily (not to mention not sleeping in a real bed) is getting to me.

I'm poor, so I can't do much. I would go to the beach, but that eats up a lot of gas. To pass the time and to possibly get the opportunity to make some cash, I tried out for a game show the other day. You haven't heard of it, trust me. It's advertised as "requiring no skill or trivia knowledge." It does involve deception, something I don't really have a lot of experience with. We'll see if I was cute and exciting enough to make the cut and play the game. I could win $10,000, which would be AMAZING, but I'm not banking on it.

That's pretty much all that's going on. I'm going to some shows (saw the Avengers, who still rock 25+ years after their prime), wasting a lot of time. Every now and then I think of little things/thoughts to blog about, but they are, um, little, so I haven't. But I've decided that brief is better than nothing, so I'll probably be doing some mini blog posts here and there. I've forgotten most of my ideas at the moment and I'm not feeling particularly creative anyway, so I'll leave them for later.

Amazing

I Really Couldn't Have Said it Better

When I tell people I'm moving to LA or that I love LA, more often than not (from people that have been there), I will get a response like, "Really??" These people–especially my mom–then ask me to tell them what I like about LA. You have all seen my list (which I would link if that option were functioning) already; responding with said list always ends up being a bit banal. It's like there's this essence that I'm incapable of putting into words. I just read this quote from David Lynch and I think he gets at part of it:

"I love Los Angeles. I know a lot of people go there and they see just a huge sprawl of sameness. But when you're there for awhile, you realize that each section has its own mood. The golden age of cinema is still alive there, in the smell of jasmine at night and the beautiful weather. And the light is inspiring and energizing. Even with smog, there's something about that light that's not harsh, but bright and smooth. It fills me with the feeling that all possibilities are available. I don't know why. It's different from the light in other places. It was the light that brought everybody to L.A. to make films in the early days. It's still a beautiful place.”

I particularly agree with the first two sentences. And there is something about the light, or maybe it's the sunsets. I just remember that I frequently found myself admiring the sky and very rarely did the thought ever come up that it looked that way because of the smog. I'm getting a little giddy about thinking of doing it again.

It's Just Funny To Hear Someone Say Orgasm So Much

Yay! LA!

Lest you think I sit around sobbing about my impending move all the time, here's a list of all the good LA stuff I've been thinking about (in no particular order):
1. The weather
2. The beach. Matador, specifically
3. In N Out Burger (protein style!)
4. Palm trees
5. My brother
6. Jack in the Box commercials
7. Being able to buy liquor (not just beer and wine) in the grocery store
8. Being able to buy any alcohol on Sunday
9. The preponderance of dive bars
10. My friends
11. The sausage platter at the Red Lion
12. Every movie I ever want to see is actually available for viewing in a theater somewhere
13. AMAZING MEXICAN FOOD
14. Much less segregation
15. Latin people
16. The possibility that I may be able to make some furniture at my friend Mel's carpentry studio
17. Downtown
18. A real job
19. LA Times Sunday crossword
20. The occasional celebrity sighting (not the ones you read about in the blogs)
21. Real news and good music on NPR
22. The sunsets

There are a lot more that I've thought about that aren't coming to me at the moment. I'll keep adding on.

How to Unpuff Your Eyes

Last night I cried (well, sobbed, to be honest) for a while about leaving. About leaving my boyfriend, specifically. I don't like how that sounds, but I can't think of another way of putting it. Anyway, my point is that I woke up today looking more terrible than I ever have in my life. And having most, if not all, of my crazy years behind me, I've woken up looking pretty rough before. This was much, much worse. I was going to take a picture, but it was too awful. Both of my upper eyelids were incredibly swollen, and my left lower lid was doing something crazy too. Honest to God, it looked like I had been punched.

I'd been planning on going to yoga, but that was now not an option, so I set about figuring out how to bring down the swelling. I started with cold spoons. This was a technique that my ex taught me; apparently he was a big cryer, though I rarely saw him cry. I've never been that jazzed about the cold spoon thing though, I guess because I grew up in Michigan and am well acquainted with the wet skin frozen to metal phenomenon. And eye skin is so delicate!

But, I started with that because that's all I knew.

The spoons don't stay cold for very long, so I googled away and learned a few more tricks.

Next step: wrap ice cubes in paper towels, hold them your eyes. That one seemed like it worked pretty well, but got a little too cold and I felt like I was freezing my eyeballs.

My final treatment was getting a bowl of ice water and dipping a washcloth in it and resting that on my eyes. That was the most comfortable and I felt it was the most effective, but it was also the last thing I did, so who knows.

Now you know.

By the way, the whole time I was doing this, I was watching the Today show which ran segments about Graceland and the PCH. I'm going to Graceland on my way out west and I've always wanted to do a PCH trip, so I kept cheating and taking the ice cubes off of my eyes to see the tv. I walked the dog and then went shopping and no one asked me what was wrong, so I think all the eye treatments did a passable job.

It is Insanely Hot

Hotlanta has really been living up to its name recently. The other night I came home from work at 11:30 p.m. and it was 89 degrees outside! No sun, but still 89! It's 5:30 p.m. now, but "feels like 104." Tomorrow's forecast says it's going to be 102. Went to a friend's pool to cool off yesterday to no avail because the pool was hot. Not warm, hot. Almost body temperature I would say. It's pretty overwhelming and entirely unpleasant.

The good news is that I am moving. I have mixed feelings about the move because I will miss a lot of people dearly and dear people a lot, but Atlanta will be dead to me climate-wise. Good riddance! I'm headed back to Los Angeles.

You know you live somewhere ridiculously hot when moving to the desert is a huge relief.

You Now Have a New Polling Place

Blogger has a new polling thingy (check it out on the right). Basically I can make up random polls and you can vote on them. Given that the large spike in my viewer/readership is attributed to a whopping 7 people looking at my blog in one day, I'm not sure how many votes these polls will generate, but I thought I'd try it out. So vote away! Also please leave comments of anything you'd like to see polled.

I was going to do a posting on my mere-minutes-at-a-time of fame on the internet (a collection of various websites that have posted my picture or thoughts) but the one that I scored today has my name in it, and I'm trying to remain anonymous on here for those people who don't already know it's me. Since I can't include any links, I'll be vague:
1) Two (2) whole photographs in Creative Loafing, the "alternative weekly" (due totally to the fact that I have some friends that work there)
2) A question I wrote in answered in one of my favorite blogs

This is nowhere near as exciting as it would be if I could actually put the links in. Sorry.

About Those New Seven Wonders...

Who gets to decide that it's time to revamp the seven wonders of the world? I'm not sure I'm in agreement with this move. When were the first seven first chosen? Which set is better? I'm doing a little research on this, just for you, dear reader. Then we can decide.

The Classic Wonders:

1. The Great Pyramid at Giza
2. The Hanging Gardens of Babylon
3. Temple of Artemis at Ephesus
4. Statue of Zeus at Olympia
5. Mausoleum of Maussollos at Halicarnassus
6. Colossus of Rhodes
7. Lighthouse of Alexandria

Okay, well Herodotus was one of the people who named them, so I'm going to say that gives the Classic Wonders a huge advantage. The list was compiled mostly by the ancient Greeks as sort of a tourists' guide. They didn't call them "wonders," they called them "must-sees." It's unfortunate wording for those of us living in the present day because they've all been destroyed.

During my "research" I discovered that there are several Seven Wonders lists. Some are pretty dumb. One man is responsible for all of them. He too is a travel writer, but he's no Herodotus.

On to the new set:

The Seven Wonders 2.0

1. The Great Wall of China
2. Petra Haha, just kidding.
3. Machu Picchu
4. Christ the Redeemer Statue
5. Chichen Itza
6. The Colosseum
7. The Taj Mahal

8. Whoa, the Great Pyramid only made it to "Honorary Candidate" on this list. Ouch.

I have been to a few of these wonders and I think they're pretty amazing (especially Machu Picchu), but I'm not so sure about the Christ the Redeemer thing. A statue? That's wonderous?!?!

So who wins?
It's hard to judge since I can't see the original wonders. I was going to say that the Christ the Redeemer statue knocked 2.0 out of the running, but there's a statue in the first set too. I think I might call it a draw. The Original Wonders win because of originality and authenticity. The New Wonders win because they have a broader geographical scope, I can go visit them, and most of them are pretty stunning.

P.S. If you're really into categorization of Seven Wonders, check this out.

How Does This Happen?

Every time I make ice, I get one cube like this. Only one (though I make two trays), every time. Over time, the stalagmite shrinks. How/why does this happen? No, there isn't anything dripping from the ceiling of the freezer.

I Heart Scanner

I am a regular reader of Nerve.com, particularly the Scanner section. I feel like I'm friends with the writers at Scanner, particularly Sarah because she's responded to every email I've ever sent (which is only two or three, don't think I'm some crazy fan!) and because she's from Michigan, which makes me feel like I know her. I particularly love her for a line in today's Scanner:

"American beer is shite. Sorry, hipsters, your Pabst Blue Ribbon is little but a punishment for that stupid haircut."

I don't really agree with the American beer is shite comment–a cold Budweiser can be very delicious at times–but I am SO with her on the stupid haircuts. And she's even more obsessed with the dramatic chipmunk than I am.

That's all for today (baby steps). Happy Fourth of July!

Dramatic Chipmunk

Ok, it's all over the web, and it's not even a chipmunk, but I can't stop watching this over and over again (giggling quietly to myself).

Hunh. Who Knew?

It's been ages since I've last posted, so I have some catching up to do, but first let me regale you with this little tidbit of information. Ladies, did you know you have a vestibule? I don't mean in your house (you may or may not; I personally do not), but on you. Kind of in you, actually (but not totally).

I went in today for my annual exam (men: that means I was at the gynecologist) and found myself sitting around the exam room/second waiting room, staring at the posters of cartoonish STDs and diagrams of the female anatomy when I spotted it smack dab in the middle of the vulva: the vestibule. It seems so welcoming, having a vestibule.

Instead of posting a picture of a vagina on my blog for everyone to look at when they visit (if you really want to see it), I've decided to post the definition (this was also brought on by my curiosity about whether this particular meaning of vestibule made it into my pre-installed Mac dictionary, which I'm proud to say it did. Go Mac!). Lo and behold, everyone has a vestibule! Men have three and women have four!

Here's the defintion:
vestibule |ˈvestəˌbyoōl| noun
1 an antechamber, hall, or lobby next to the outer door of a building.
• an enclosed entrance compartment in a railroad car.

2 Anatomy a chamber or channel communicating with or opening into another, in particular
• the central cavity of the labyrinth of the inner ear.
• the part of the mouth outside the teeth.
• the space in the vulva into which both the urethra and vagina open.

So there you have today's great discovery.

I still don't have a job. My dad sent me a link to an article talking about how some people get offered jobs because of their blogs (and some people get turned down because of them). This made me wonder:
a) Does my dad know about and read my blog and was this a not-so-subtle hint to be a little bit more intelligent on it (clearly failing miserably with today's post)? and
b) Do potential employers read my blog?

I think I've managed to remain fairly anonymous on here, so hopefully the answer to both questions is no. Part of me doesn't really care though. This blog is for fun and it doesn't affect my ability to work, so judging me on anything that I've written here is kind of silly (unless it's a positive judgment). Really nothing I do in my free time affects my work and if anything, this blog gives me some writing practice. So there. Hire me. Please. If you're reading this. I'm smart, organized, efficient, and super reliable. I swear.

My New (Old) Place

The gods are smiling upon me, at least on my living situation (not so much on the job situation). A few days after finding out that I didn't get the Google job, my old landlord called me. I'd been harassing him quite a bit, asking if anything was available in my old building.

I kept fantasizing about my old place–it was exactly what I was looking for: sizable, hardwoods (no gross carpet!), decent sized kitchen, upstairs (windows open when not home!), dogs allowed, lots of closet/storage space, central heating and air, and within walking distance of the bar, the grocery store, the movie theater, the 24-hour diner, and the best porch in Atlanta. My fantasizing, as it turns out, was not in vain (for the first time).

As I was saying, my landlord called me. He called me to tell me that the girl that had been living in my EXACT SAME APARTMENT had just given him notice that she was moving out in one week! I panicked a little, thinking about my total lack of income. He assured me that I could think about it for a few days and that he had no problem renting to an unemployed me. During those days, I asked people what they thought about me moving into a place that would eat my savings up more quickly than crashing with friends. The funny thing was, I was only asking people who I was pretty sure would tell me to take it. I thought for a while about whether to ask my parents about it. I've been getting a lot of advice from my parents lately–most of it requested, with some unsolicited nuggets of wisdom mixed in. My parents are awesome. Let me repeat that, my parents are awesome. Above all, they want me to be happy. That said, they are both extremely frugal, which has been a great example for me (no credit card debt!). I couldn't decide whether their desire to see me happy by being in my own place would outweigh their good pecuniary sense. It was too risky, so I kept the news to myself until I made the decision.

And of course I elected to take it (the folks thought it was a great idea. Again, they're awesome). I move in on Friday. I am SOOOOOOOOO excited! At last! Organization! Projects! Walking around in my underwear! Sleeping in my super-duper bed! Being messy when I want to! It will be a strange orgy of freedom and organization. I can't wait.

Otters holding hands

This video is way too long, but I love otters. They are my favorite non-pet animals. So otters holding hands, well, it's almost too easy. When you get tired thinking about how cute the otters are, listen to the people's commentary. I've noticed this at zoos–people make kind of dumb commentary (I am not exempting myself from this). Like that time at the San Diego Zoo when several of us simultaneously noted the tapir's HUGE (bigger than his leg) penis. Or at the Barcelona zoo, looking at the monkey's blue balls (they're kind of a Tiffany blue). Or at just about every zoo I've been to when chimps do something very "human." I love otters. And zoos. But I'm pretty sure these otters are "holding hands" so they can float en masse, not because they're dating. I guess it does say something that they want to float together though.

A Transitional Period

I've been pretty lax on posting lately, kind of because I was just lazy and uninspired, but also largely because I was applying for a job at Google. They own Blogger and I was paranoid that this blog was somehow going to affect my getting the job potential. I didn't get the job, so now I'm free to post again. I think probably they did read my blog. I mean, I told them I had one and I had a total of 8–yes, EIGHT–interviews/assessments with them. They're pretty thorough, so I imagine someone read my blog at some point.

They couldn't/wouldn't tell me why they didn't hire me, aside from saying that they were sure I was capable of the job, but thought someone else they were considering was a better fit. It's weird (to me) that they can't give you any constructive criticism because of legal reasons. Do people sue companies for being mean?!?! I don't really get it and no one's really been able to explain it to me, so if you can enlighten me, I would appreciate it.

During the course of the interviews, I started having working-at-Google fantasies. These mostly revolved around all of the free food they provide (I got to the point of thinking that maybe I didn't need an apartment with a kitchen) and their you-can-bring-your-dog-to-work policy. So I'm a bit sad about that loss (of something I never really had). I freaked out for about 15 minutes after I got the bad news. Okay, I was sobbing. It was terrifying. It is terrifying. I dropped out of school and am now homeless and jobless, with no opportunities for remedying either clearly visible at the moment. I still don't regret leaving school and C did an excellent job of calming me down, so I'm relatively good now.

But I'm back to square one. Maybe square zero.

Shortly after the Google rejection, I thought, "Hmmm... maybe this is a sign that I should try to pursue that career in carpentry (kind of my secret dream job)." I [sigh] googled "how to be a carpenter" and learned that you're supposed to start in high school, so, uh, oops. I have to admit that the prospect of having unsightly hands does sort of dissuade me from carpentry (but the creation of neat furniture!).

I've been looking at marketing, advertising (I have to admit that I don't totally know the difference between the two), project management, production, market research, etc. Oh, and volunteering at the dog shelter. And I briefly (very briefly) considered selling my toenail clippings to perverts, inspired by this article. I'm kind of all over the place, but I like to refer to it as "keeping my options open."

After lots of phone tag, I finally got the chance to talk to an old college buddy (L) last night. He's in a major transitional period now as well. He, in fact, coined this time period as "transitional," while I was calling it "floundering." His term is more positive, so I'm sticking to that. My best friend (M) is also on the verge of transitioning I think. Maybe it's because we've all recently turned 30. Well, L's job was basically uprooted for him, so I guess that's his reason. We all have our own reasons, but we all want change. And we're all a little unsure of what we really want and how to go about that.

I've reached that end of the post area where I start to ramble. If you have any words of wisdom, let me know and I'll pass them on to L and M for karmic purposes. And because they're great friends and I would do whatever I could to help.

As L suggested when we were trying to figure out if we'd be in the same city any time soon, "We can grab beers and cry into them. By which I mean be positive and determined, happening to life instead of letting it happen to us." Cheers to that.

This is Cool

It's a little over the top, but sometimes you have to be like that to get the message across. Pretty good public health promotion in a sea of crappy ones.
http://www.scaryideas.com/print/2011/

Still Working on It

Ok. Have changed the background to white, but I'm still not thrilled with how it looks. I'll be fiddling around with it...
Thanks for your comments!

What Do You Think About the New Look?

I like it, but it might be a little dark. It doesn't correspond to my "Yay! It's spring!" mood.

And Now It's Time for an Unoriginal Anti-Hummer Rant

I hate Hummers. Actually, all SUVs. As a small car driver, they frequently block the view ahead of me, which is annoying and dangerous. And then of course there's the gas-guzzlingness. It's beyond me why people spend so much money on a car only to then pay even more money on gas. I guess it's the conspicuous consumption stuff that Veblen talked about (in a nutshell, consuming a lot of expensive stuff in a public manner so people know you're rich, and therefore awesome). I think anyone who knows me would know that I think that conspicuous consumption is totally ridiculous (the concept makes total sense; the people who do it are the ridiculous ones).*

Comedian Patton Oswalt has a little Hummer rant in one of his bits. He makes a good suggestion though: You can have a Hummer, you're just responsible for going to the Middle East yourself and getting your own oil.

And now to segue to my new favorite band, The Thermals. They were semi-recently offered $50,000 by Hummer to use one of their songs in a commercial. They turned them down, even though they're a little band that could probably use (or at least enjoy) the cash. They're from Portland, which kind of makes me wonder what Hummer was thinking in the first place. I've never been to Portland, but I've heard some nice things about it. Like how it's very green (both senses of the word) and designed to maximize the use of public transportation and walking. I imagine if you grow up in a place like that, Hummers seem pretty evil. Most of my friends in Spain (where there are narrow streets and lots of walking) view SUVs as unnecessary and just another example of American over-the-topness. I'm getting back into my anti-SUV rant, so let me just say, "Yay!" to the Thermals and "Boo!" and "Duh!?!" to Hummer.

I saw the Thermals the other night thanks to a recommendation and it was great! awesome! stupendous! My friend likened them to early Green Day, which I think is a pretty good comparison sound-wise, though they're a fraction slower and their lyrics are far more intelligent. The singer reminds me of my high school friends and he does these little David Byrne-esque dance-move-things that make it entertaining to watch them. They sounded excellent and had a lot of energy and instead of me telling you about them, you should just go see them whenever they come to your town. Or check out their MySpace for some songs and video clips (I have surmised from this that they have good senses of humor).

Here's a little bit of them on YouTube. I couldn't find anything that demonstrated what a good show they are that had good sound. So this clip is them in their home town, with the crowd appropriately rocking and here's a link to a clip where you can hear them a bit better, but they're in a little record store.

*I realized while writing this that I perhaps conspicuously consume my computer. I mean, it's definitely fancier than what I need, but I love it and it's not bad for the environment (not worse than other computers anyway). Plus, I'm hardly ever out in public with it.

Amazing French Beat Boxer

I've seen this posted around and it's worth a re-post because this guy is amazing. Also he seems very shy, which is endearing. And I have no idea what he's saying, but it's fun to watch and listen to a "husky" guy speaking French.

Worst. Dream. Ever.

I'll spare you all the details, but it entails me crapping a foot-long earthworm.

I know, it's horrifying.

It's a Good Thing I Don't Have a Job Yet

Because if I did, I might feel more paranoid about this seemingly normal looking spam I've gotten THREE times now:

"Hi, I hate to be the one
to mention this, but people
continue to talk about your
weight issue and it just
disgusts me. Whether you
know it by now, people are
always chattering about each
other at work but you come up
more than enough. I wasn't the
happiest or best-fit up until
a year ago or so but that did
change. Thanks to my dam
brother-in-law(of all people).
Anyhow, it was for the best.

What I am saying is that you
need to do something different
and maybe you can make the same
difference I did. Try this stuff
I used. I took it on the idea it's
just more junk but it worked great.
I see more positive reviews on it
nowadays and makes me feel even
better. So, I am encouraging a change,
not only in the chatter around here
but in you personally.

-Anonymous for now
Using an anonymous email website to send this btw;)"


I have to say that that's some creative advertising. Hell, I re-posted it!

I Had No Idea So Many of My Friends Were Into Cutting

There are checklists?
I thought they wore their hair like that too look cool–who knew they were purposely blocking out half the world?!

Another Reason to Learn Lots of Languages

This is taken from BoingBoing, where it was likely taken from a reputable news source. It's about a foiled hijacking attempt.


"Speaking to the gunman during the hijacking, the pilot realized the man did not speak French. So he used the plane’s public address system to warn the passengers in French of the ploy he was going to try: brake hard upon landing, then speed up abruptly. The idea was to catch the hijacker off balance, and have crew members and men sitting in the front rows of the plane jump on him, the Spanish official said.

The pilot also warned women and children to move to the back of the plane in preparation for the subterfuge, the official said.

It worked. The man was standing in the middle aisle when the pilot carried out his maneuver, and he fell to the floor, dropping one of his two 7mm pistols. Flight attendants then threw boiling water from a coffee machine in his face and at his chest, and some 10 people jumped on the man and beat him, the Spanish official said."

When I was writing that title, I was thinking about the hijacker and his fatal flaw, his lack of francophonic ability (yeah, I made that word up), but looking at it again, the same applies to the passengers.

Anyway, this little blurb caught my eye and my brain, leading me to think about post-911 airline passenger courage. It's kind of cool: people banding together to take down the bad guy, but, I don't know... Were hijackings never fatal pre-911? Or just not fatal on a large scale? Are there pre-911 stories about passengers outwitting and outgutsing hijackers? I suppose that there was always a chance that you would "just" be a hostage in the past; now people assume the whole plane's dying. It must be interesting and terrifying, experiencing that moment where you have to contemplate whether or not you are going to risk your life to attack the guy swinging around large guns. To be a little hokey, it makes me feel a little proud (or something) that everyday people face that decision and take the risk. Maybe it's just the terror talking, but I like to think that it's altruism.

You Know You're Back in Georgia When You Hear Stories Like This

Last night I was hanging out with my new friend K. She told me that her mom, who lives in Woodstock, GA (I don't know where that is, I'm told it's north of here), recently experienced the following while at a Chinese restaurant in a food court.

Mom K was getting her General Tso's when the woman serving her wished her a happy New Year, telling her it was the year of the pig. The man behind her in line (who was shortly to reveal his true redneck status) got all worked up and said, "We don't celebrate that shit here. This year is the year of the eagle and the flag. Go back to China." His wife laughed a little nervously, "oh, Ted!", K's mom berated him for being an idiot, and then he went right on and ordered his food, totally unaware of the irony.

I guess it is the year of the pig. Unfortunately, it's not this kind:



It's this kind:



This is the kind of person all my friends in Spain think that this entire country is composed of.

I Have a Lot of Catching Up to Do

Okay, so I've been home for a little over two weeks now and I've only written one blog post. I've felt very disorganized lately–being homeless will do that to you.

The three main themes of what I've been doing are: 1) social 2) car and 3) job.

Social: Catching up with old friends and my once again BF. It's been quite nice. I have such good people in my circle!





Car: One morning I was walking my favorite dog and I noticed all these birds in the trees. At first I noticed them because they were kind of weird looking. Unlike a regular ol' swallow, these birds had fancy haircuts. Then I noticed that there were HUNDREDS of them. This I noticed when the dog's presence scared them and the flew out of the tiny tree they were sitting in. Fast forward about 20 minutes, when I am leaving, weighted down by my backpack, purse, and a basketful of freshly laundered clothing. I am walking towards my car when I notice what looks like a bunch of blueberries all over the ground by my car. Then I notice all those birds in the tree above and realize that the "blueberries" are actually dark birdshit (I guess they were eating some kind of berries or something). I'm trying to get my keys out of my pocket while juggling all my stuff when I realize that the birds above me are actively shitting all around me! I could hear the little drops of crap falling dangerously near. I panicked as I realized I was in the middle of a poop gauntlet carrying newly cleaned clothes. Of course the panicking made it worse. I finally put the basket down and made a human shield over it as I tried to get my keys. I managed to get the basket safely in the car and was shutting the rear door when the inevitable happened–I was hit. On the arm. It was a good thing that the bird feces happened to be dark blue because my coat is black and you can hardly tell.

At some point during this episode I noticed that the birds had been at it for a while and my car was COVERED in bird shit. I had to go directly to a gas station because I could barely see out of my windshield. I got a lot of looks at the gas station. Why not? I was driving around in a poopmobile. It was totally embarrassing, but I drove around like that for a day because the line at the car wash was too long. When I finally did go to the car wash, the attendant took one look and said, "Birds really don't like you." They had to give it a chemical bath prior to the wash, but it came out good as new (or used). I took a picture before I went through the car wash. It doesn't totally do it justice because the windows had already been cleaned and because it's only part of the car (I felt weird taking a picture of my crap-infested car at the car wash).



Oh, also on Monday I got rear-ended. I'm fine, she's fine, and she's paying for it, so it's all good. I will have to empty everything out of my car when it gets fixed, but things could have been a lot worse considering she was in an SUV (of course!).

And finally: In my first 14 days back here in Atlanta, I saw an astonishing FOUR people purposely run red lights. As in they were stopped and then started again before it turned green. I'd NEVER seen this before, so four times in the past two weeks is kind of freaking me out.

Job: I still don't have one but I'm starting that whole process. It's exciting and daunting and it's what I spend a fair amount of time on, so I don't really feel like talking about it here. But, if you know of any project manager or producer jobs in Atlanta, feel free to let me know. Or if you know me and can think of something else I might enjoy doing... thanks.

Here's a shot I took from the plane as I was leaving Spain.


Thanks for being so patient! I'm going to make a concerted effort to write on here on a more regular basis.
♥☠
p.s. rereading this, I wonder if something's wrong with me that I put a picture of a bunch of Macs under the "social" category.

I'm Still Here!

By "here" I mean in the blogosphere, not in Spain. Because I'm in Atlanta now. Sorry I've been crappy about keeping this up for the past week... I am getting back into the swing of things, working on finding a job, hanging out with my friends, and I'm staying somewhere that doesn't have internet. Oh yeah, I also haven't really thought of much to write about.

Here's something moderately interesting (kind of, maybe not really): I was driving today and looked over at the car next to me and the lady in there was smoking. That's not really the weird part–the weirdness is that I thought it was weird. Which makes that the first time in over five months that I've seen someone smoking and thought it was strange. If you've been to Spain, you know that A LOT of people there smoke. It's not as bad as it was in the past, but it's definitely noticeable. Another thing about smoking in Spain is that it crosses gender, race, and class lines that it doesn't cross here so much. The result is that pretty much no one in Spain looks weird smoking (ok, probably if I saw a baby lighting up, that would be weird), but an older woman puffing away in her car in the U.S. made me do a double take.

Yesterday was the coldest day of the year and today I sat outside in a short-sleeved sweater. And if you know me, you know I can't stand even one little smidgin of coldness, so trust me when I say it was unusually warm today.

Last Post from Spain!

It’s been a fairly introspective day, but I’m writing this after eating a big steak and drinking red wine (room service). I’m currently sitting in my hotel room bed and knowing that I’m way too lazy and relaxed to do a proper blog entry. So, a quick summary:
• Got all teary saying goodbye to my roommates. They’re all really good people and I’m lucky to have gotten to know them. I will miss them A LOT. It's weird saying goodbye to people that you've come to love in a way while wondering whether or not you'll ever see them again.
• Thought about how one’s life can totally change in one day.
• Listened to some music on the bus to Barcelona that made me think a lot about the fact that I’m starting completely over, from a blank slate. Had my first very brief moment of terror. Started listening to Lady Sovereign to get out of that mood (was getting teary eyed again on the bus).
• Bus was full of Danish high school students. They are SO blonde! All of them!
• Got to hotel, room was tiny, no bathtub, poor internet connection. Complained, got new, MUCH huger room with tub and better internet connection.
• Took first bath in five months (I’ve been showering). Realized that I kind of like baths better in theory than in practice.
• Had a steak for room service and about to go to bed. It’s only 9:40, but I have to get up at 4 a.m., travel all day, and then party with my friends.

Tomorrow is the first day of the rest of my life. Holy shit!

I Can't Stop Cruising Websites

For dogs to adopt, that is.

Here is today's obsessision:



Isn't he the cutest little snugglebutt you've ever seen?

Unfortunately, I'm homeless and by the time I have a job and then a home, I'm sure he'll be taken. I can only hope that an equally adorable specimen will appear by that point.

In other news, talked to my best friend today and I am contemplating taking a little trip to Miami to see her before I get a job. On the one hand I feel like it's a bit irresponsible to go on vacation while you're supposed to be looking for a job. On the other hand, I GoogleEarthed her address and she has a pool, is really close to the beach, it's in the mid- to high 70s there, who knows when I'll next have time for a vacation, and she might move away for grad school. Oh, and once I have a job, home, and dog, well, I'll need a dog sitter!

Who Are You??

Ok, I just found out that people (or person) from my soon-to-be/kind-of-already ex-department read this blog, which is kind of weird (but I don't mind). I guess I didn't think that that blog post about me dropping out of school would actually be any sort of announcement. Anyway, I also have various tracking devices on this blog (don't worry, it doesn't tell me which individuals look at it, but it does give me your IP address [which is kind of useless because you can't track IP addresses with much specificity]) and I see that people in Java and Australia and Quito read my blog (Quito, you read it regularly!)! Some blogs I read on a regular basis mentioned that a few weeks ago was National Delurking Week. I have no idea if this is something they just made up and they're blog friends, so they all said it or what, but this is MY Delurking Week. Add a comment, fess up to who you are, I promise I won't change the content of this blog. Unless maybe you're my parents. But give me an idea of my audience please. And if you have a website, make sure to include that. Thanks!

p.s. I just woke up, so I'm not holding myself responsible for how well (or poorly) this post is written.
p.p.s. For those of you who look at this blog by clicking the link on my myspace: I'm setting the myspace to private as soon as I start looking for a job, so if you like this blog and you're not one of my myspace friends, copy down the link for future reference.

The Funniest Two Sentences I've Read on the Internet in Months

Taken totally out of context:

"Men can get a general idea of a girl's endowments before unveiling them, but penises are the Kinder Egg element of the human body. As you'll remember, cracking open one of those yellow capsules could yield something fun and useful, or shitty and pathetic."

(written by a man, by the way)

Source

Addition: It's been brought to my attention that not everyone knows what a Kinder Egg is, thereby stripping this post of all its humor. So, for those of you who've never seen one:

Another update: Got the picture up and found this blog entry on Kinder Eggs (includes pix). By the way, I'm pretty sure the "Kinder" is "children" in German and has nothing do with the egg being nicer than others.

Haunted Apartment?

I almost forgot to tell you all that I possibly stayed in a haunted apartment in Barcelona. Or maybe just a haunted room. Anyway, the first night I noticed that the overhead light would flicker on occasionally. Just a sort of soft glow. I attributed it to the crazy weather outside (strange magnetic fields?? I have no idea). Anyway, thinking this way made me feel better about the maybe ghost in my room. The next night, there was no crazy weather and the light still glowed occasionally. Surprisingly, I was fine with it. Usually the thought of ghosts scares the bejeezus out of me, but I was ok.

When I was in ninth grade, my parents were out of town for the weekend and my brother was living in Germany. I was home alone and went over to my best friend's to watch the ghost scene in Three Men and a Baby. I returned home after having seen the ghost. At some point I realized that there was no way I was going to be getting any sleep in my big empty house, so I rode my bike over to my friend's. She probably thought I was overreacting a little, but let me sleep on her floor. That wasn't good enough because I still kept imagining/dreaming that that little ghost boy was going to get me. So I got into her bed with her, but even that wasn't good enough. I had nightmares until she let me sleep between her and the wall. Finally I was safe now that I had my Lindsay protective shield. (Thanks, Lindsay!)

So, I'm pretty proud of myself for being able to mind over matter myself into staying in that room all that time.

Identity Theft?

I am in the process of getting my USA life back to order. That involves setting up my cell phone so that I will be able to call everyone the second I get into the country. Having ordered the new plan, I called today to see if I could get my old phone number back. It's not a particularly neat number, and it doesn't spell out anything cool, but I think people still have it programmed into their phones, so it's just easier. But maybe not.

I was on the phone with someone who was a legitimate operator and she put me on hold to check on something. All of the sudden I hear someone say, "Hello?" and I tell her I was just on hold waiting for the other operator. This new woman, by the way, sounded kind of drunk (or if you've seen those clips of Paula Abdul's intoxicated interview, like that). She told me that she didn't know why I was calling, that the call just got put through to her, so I needed to explain the whole story to her again. I did, the whole time thinking about how weird and unprofessional she sounded. Then she asked for my social security number. I gave it to her, even though I felt a little uneasy. She then wanted my name. I gave her the first name and she said ok and then asked for the last name. At this point the whole thing just seemed weird, so I told that I felt uncomfortable giving her that information because of the way the call had been put through to her and the fact that she herself sounded so weird. She said she was just asking that information for verification purposes and I told her I would just hang up and call back. She tried to keep me on the phone, saying that she could explain the whole process to me, but I said, "No thanks," and hung up.

Now I am all paranoid that there's going to be another me out there, but this new me will be one with really bad credit and that she'll mess up my perfect credit. argh! The one thing I keep telling myself to make myself feel better is that she did ask me how I was doing today in exactly the same way that the legitimate operator did. Let's just hope that she was drunk at work.

Going Away Again

I'm off tomorrow morning for my last stint as a Barcelona tour guide. Back Friday!

Coupling is Freaking Hilarious

In my spare time, I've been watching Coupling, another BBC masterpiece. I have no idea if it's stil on the air. If it's not, you should rent it. This clip is pretty good, but only showcases one character and really all of them are hilarious. Don't just take my word for it.

It's Been a Long Time Coming

I am dropping out of school. The less "quitter-ish" way of saying this is to say I'm withdrawing, but really, yes, I am quitting. Just in the way that you would quit a job that you knew you didn't like and had no future in. Just in the way that you would quit a job that you knew you were not excelling in because you didn't really care about it.

It's a big decision and one that various advisors at school have urged me to "think about a little more." I've been considering it for four and a half years, so I really think that's enough. Plus, ever since having made the decision, I've known in my heart and my brain that it's the right one (these two organs rarely align, so I have to pay attention to that!).

So here's what happened. For those of you who don't know, I am in graduate school for anthropology. I pretty much went to graduate school because I thought anthropology was interesting and isn't that what you're supposed to do if you have an undergrad degree in it? I immediately realized that I was nowhere near as passionate about it as my fellow students. In fact, despite liking them as people quite a bit, I purposely distanced myself from them because I couldn't handle talking about anthropology as much as they did. [Note to self: Don't try to get a PhD in something you don't like talking about.] I tried to drop out my first year, but let myself be talked into staying because I didn't really know why I wanted to drop out (I knew I was not enjoying myself, but due to other things going on my life at that time, I wasn't able to tease apart the reasons for not being happy with school). Also, I hadn't been in grad school that long, so I didn't really know if I was making an informed decision, and I'm one of those people that prefers that sort of thing, especially when it's life-altering.

I kept going to school and stopped hating life so much once I made all my rad friends and was dating. I didn't realize at the time that my successful social life was pretty much masking/dulling my dislike of school. I was consciously aware that I didn't enjoy school, that I never read journal articles unless assigned them, that I was never driven to go above and beyond, but I thought, "Well, ok, I don't really like class and I obviously don't like writing grant proposals, but fieldwork's my bread and butter–that's why I like anthropology, that's why it's worth it for me to hang in there."

But now I'm in the field and I, in fact, don't like it. I do like talking to and observing people, trying to get their point of view of things. I don't like the hours and hours of transcribing or the structured system of analysis that you have to do. And so, the last thing I was banking on has turned out to be a dud.

I've waited a while in writing this post because this blog is linked to my myspace and some of my myspace friends are school buddies. School is like work and gossip travels fast, so I wanted to make sure all the higher ups knew first. Now they know, now I can talk about it. I also was worried about their being offended because I was rejecting something that they feel strongly about. But this is not a rejection of anthropology, it's the realization that it's not the right fit for me. I like anthropology, but I don't want to be an anthropologist. I have no idea if that makes sense. Perhaps my interest and belief in anthropology is just too superficial? I'm not sure. I just know that I want to be happy in both the personal/social and work/career parts of my life. Some people I've talked to disagree with this or don't think it's necessary, but I do think it's necessary and I do think it's possible. Maybe I'm being a naive optimist, but I at least have to try.

I obviously have to find a job now (btw, I'm moving back to Atlanta). I have no idea what I want to be, which could be terrifying, but I'm actually finding it exciting and an adventure. I've been working on a book that helps you identify your skills and interests and at this point I've got it narrowed down to this: I want to be the organized person who gets stuff done in a company/group of artistic people. I don't actually have any idea of what sort of job this might be because I need an Atlanta yellow pages to fully complete the exercises (long story). But so far, with that little to go on, it feels right. I feel like I'm headed in the right direction, something that I have not felt in the work/career side of my life for a very long time.

I was worried about what people would say when I told them this news because worrying about disappointing people is something I do. Pretty much everyone, however, has been marvelous, offering support, reminding me how they remembered my lack of passion from the beginning, and offering me places to crash while I'm job hunting. As I have mentioned several times in this blog, my friends are fantastic. To that group of wonderful people I add my committee–my advisors who have invested a lot of time in me and are yet supportive of my decision to leave. Lastly, my parents and brother, who pretty much encourage me in anything I do and make sure that I know that they've got my back, always and unconditionally, and have thereby given me the confidence to completely change my life. I am so grateful and lucky to be surrounded by such people.

For Old Times' Sake

It's been quite a while since I've been physically capable of consuming large amounts of alcohol, but back when I could, this bar sign language from the Modern Drunkard was very entertaining. It still is entertaining, I just don't put it to use anymore. Who am I kidding?–none of us were ever really able to put it to use because this sign language is hard to remember when you're drunk. Give it a shot (ha ha).

I am 30 Today

I don't feel much different. A little tired since my parents woke me up with a 5 a.m. birthday phone call, but otherwise the same. Not that I was expecting any big changes–the 30=old thing is definitely a myth!
I think people get bummed out about their lives on big bdays because they reflect on their lives and are disappointed with their currents places. I don't use more or less arbitrary markers/days to do that (I do that all the time!) and besides, I'm pretty thrilled with life at the moment. Thirty will definitely be an interesting year and I'm totally up to the challenge! (More on that in about two weeks.)

Got back from another Barcelona trip yesterday. Just kind of chilled. We went to the zoo (pix below), walked around, shopped, and saw the naked old man with the tattooed butt and the pierced penis (again). Had an apartment near (in?) the Born area, so got to check that out–very cool, would stay there again (arty, fewer tourists).

Have a friend visiting and she's still sleeping, so I'm going to wrap up because I'm worried my typing might wake her.

Here are some zoo pictures.

This one's out of focus, but I like it because the male tortoise is clearly putting a lot of effort into his mating.




These chimps would clap and raise their hands so people would throw them food (prohibited). It was amazinng to see that they'd picked this skill up, but it was also totally depressing.




This is some cute deer/antelope thing.



And here's some really ridiculous hair we saw.



These aren't from the zoo, just a funny butcher's display.

Nature Still Cool.

I might alternate between neat nature clips and bad date stories.
This may or may not work. If it doesn't, check it out here.

Bad Dates (#2)

It was my first date with "Michael." We'd hung out before, but this was the first official dinner together, just the two of us thing. Michael is (was?) fond of the drugs, but one of those people that you couldn't always tell if he was on something because he was slightly weird anyway. So we are at a sushi place, and I am chatting away. It's possible that my story was getting long-winded, but I'm pretty sure he was super wasted. Why? Because when I noticed that he was staring at me instead of listening to what I was saying, I asked, "Michael, what's up?" and he responded, "I just was totally focusing on the shape of your skull."

I actually did go out with him for a little while after that. I guess I'm not (or wasn't) dissuaded by that type of thing. I probably should be.

I'm going out of town for a few days. A good friend is coming in to celebrate my rapidly approaching 30th bday. Perhaps I will have some debaucherous pictures to post when I get back.

Well done!

Acid-head extraordinaire, Albert Hofmann, turns 101 today (and he's still lucid!*).

*At least he was when he gave a 20-minute speech with no notes sometime in the past year

**Please excuse all the comments on here today that are pretty much directly taken from Boing Boing. It's an interesting day over there, what can I say?

Bad Dates (#1)

It's been a long time since I've been on date. That's usually how things go... I don't date anyone and then I decide I better get back in the game and I do. (Again, I repeat to any of you nosey folks who know me, I haven't been on a date in a long time, over two years.) Anyway, in the past, when I did decide to date, it was usually a no-holds-barred kind of thing, meaning that I would date pretty much anyone who asked me out. None of the dates during these periods had any sort of happy ending, but pretty much all of them make for great stories. Which I will now share with you (not all at once though).

Many moons ago, when I lived in Boston (most of the stories you'll hear occurred in Boston), I decided to finally give in to a co-worker that had asked me out several times. Sometimes persistance pays off I guess. Because I was only 22 and was capable of such things at the time, I had spent the previous night drinking excessively with some other co-workers. Maybe I actually wasn't so capable, at least not that day, because I woke up terribly hungover and I remember that I was still vomiting about an hour before the date. I was going to cancel, but I realized this would result in further pestering, so I pulled it together, made myself up, and met up with "Seamus." When he first saw me, he was pleasantly shocked by my appearance (I tended to look like shit at work and I waited tables, so he'd never seen me out of my uniform). He said, "Wow! You look like a movie star!" Despite still feeling wrecked, I thought, "Hmm... this date is beginning surprisingly well."

Of course, it went totally downhill from there. We went to see Fight Club at a theater where his friend worked, so we got in free. I like Fight Club, it's a good movie. It's kind of annoying to watch with someone who's already seen it six times and says everyone's lines while they're saying them though. After the movie I announced that I had to eat something since I hadn't been able to keep anything down all day and was now starving. There was a pizza place nearby, so I got a slice while "Seamus" was outside the whole time (I think he was on his phone or smoking or something). Anyway, it was weird and I felt rushed. I scarfed down my slice and then we went back to his place; he drank, I watched. We talked and that's when he started trying to convince me of his immortality.

Immortality.

I was worn out and didn't have much fight in me, but I gave it a go: "Uh, you're not immortal."
S: Yes I am
Me: No, you're not
S: Yes, I am, I'm thousands of years old.
Me: No, you're not
S: How do you know?
Me: Because it's impossible!

It went on like this for far too long. Eventually I excused myself and went home.

He didn't ask me out anymore after that. Mission accomplished, I guess.

By the way, if people reading this are reminded of strange dates they've had, please share in the comments section.

YES, PLEASE!

Apple does it again. God, I wish I had some stock! To paraphrase some guy's comments I was reading online (don't know where), "I think I need some new pants now."

*Addendum: I won't be getting this phone any time soon because: a) it's not out til June (June!) anyway, b) it's only available with Cingular, which has horrible plans, and c) I could never justify (especially when unemployed) spending $500 on a phone (the iPod and video player features are irrelevant to me).

"Authentic Happiness"

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I read an NYT article recently about positive psychology. It referred me to authentichappiness.org, the website of Martin Seligman, head of the American Psychological Association. I've read some of Seligman's stuff. I did a directed reading on Adolescence and found that most articles (particularly in psychology) focused on depression and other negative things. My professor directed me to the small subset of psychologists that choose to focus on the good stuff (and they catch some flack for it). To be honest, the positive stuff is more boring to read than the negative stuff, but I do in general believe in positive psychology and that thinking good thoughts and enjoying what you do has a profound effect not only on your psychological health, but also on your physical health.

So onto the Authentic Happiness website... It's basically a bunch of quizzes (or that's the part I skipped to anyway). I did the 240-question VIA Signature Strengths quiz and these were my results:

Your Top Strength

Capacity to love and be loved You value close relations with others, in particular those in which sharing and caring are reciprocated. The people to whom you feel most close are the same people who feel most close to you.

Your Second Strength

Honesty, authenticity, and genuineness You are an honest person, not only by speaking the truth but by living your life in a genuine and authentic way. You are down to earth and without pretense; you are a "real" person.

Your Third Strength

Bravery and valor You are a courageous person who does not shrink from threat, challenge, difficulty, or pain. You speak up for what is right even if there is opposition. You act on your convictions.

Your Fourth Strength

Humor and playfulness You like to laugh and tease. Bringing smiles to other people is important to you. You try to see the light side of all situations.

Your Fifth Strength

Industry, diligence, and perseverance You work hard to finish what you start. No matter the project, you "get it out the door" in timely fashion. You do not get distracted when you work, and you take satisfaction in completing tasks. I found these results extremely interesting, mostly because in about 20 minutes, they told me things that it's taken me years to figure out. I don't know that it's spot-on, but the fact that #1 is about love kind of threw me. Recently someone asked me what I wanted from life and I said, "to be happy, to be with someone that I love and loves me." And that was it. Nothing about any other aspect of my life. That was the only thing I was totally sure about. I would never think of myself as a particularly loving person, but perhaps that's the me that's always been there, hidden under my #5 strength, industry and perseverance (also interesting is that this made the list, but as #5). So maybe on the outside I'm #5 and on the inside I'm #1. I'm trying to figure out what my point is here with this post. I guess mainly that I was really (pleasantly) surprised to get these results and that this appears to be one of the more "accurate" online tests I've taken lately (and I've taken a lot). This one seems to get at your gut, whereas the others are more superficial.* So take some of these quizzes: they're free, eye-opening, and the site saves your results. *Test results vary a lot depending on your mindset when you're taking them. My previous mindset may have skewed results of other online personality quizzes I've taken lately.

Nature is totally nuts!

And totally cool.

Sometimes I Feel Like This

But most of the time I feel pretty good (well). I just read an interesting article on Positive Psychology in the New York Times and linked to another website, authentichappiness.org. Interesting stuff that I want to write about later. Well, I want to write about it now, but I have other stuff I need to do. More later!

Some Pictures from the Market

It took me a minute to figure out what the below picture was. Then I realized that it's the head of a goat or sheep or something, sawed in half. You can see the cerebellum. And the tongue. Crazy!

Clearly I've Been Reading Too Many Gossip Blogs

I just woke up from a celebrity-filled dream. First, I was hanging out with Kate Moss and some other "civilians." We decided to go somewhere and for some reason, Kate drove. I don't remember the outside of the car, but the inside was similar to an ex's shitty Honda. Anyway, Kate thought it would be funny to drive while sitting in the driver's seat facing the back, legs up the back of the seat and touching the ceiling and sort of steering with her back/twisting around a little bit to steer. I remember thinking, "that doesn't look too safe anyway AND she's probably totally wasted."

Then I don't remember what happend, but all the sudden I was on a university campus hanging out with about 2-3 non-famous people and Kirsten Dunst and Jessica Biel. For a while we were in the library studying and then for some reason I decided that I needed to take a shower (I think I was homeless or something). I borrowed Jessica's student ID (you know, because we look so much alike) to get into the girls' locker room. Sorry, no crazy shower scene: next thing I know, we were walking around campus and I was thinking to myself, "Kirsten is really cuter than she appears on Perez's website. She should really not wear those wayfarers." Then we hung out some more and Jessica and I were totally BFF. It was only after I woke up that I realized I could have asked her for some workout tips (she was fully clothed during the whole dream, so I guess it didn't cross my mind then).

So I guess that is officially my most superficial dream ever!

This is why snail mail will never be completely taken over by email

I just saw this on BoingBoing (yes, this is a screen shot straight from their page). It's pretty amazing. I wonder if this kind of thing is a welcome change in the postal worker's daily routine? I know if I was doing the same thing every day and then suddently someone threw what is essentially a treasure map into the mix, I'd be into it. It's a pretty damn good map though (at least to someone who's totally unfamiliar with the UK)–I'm not sure everyone has those cartography skills. Here's the link to the article.


I was rereading some old posts and noticed that I had promised to relay some stories about family trauma over the holidays. Yes, there was the usual family fracas, making its spectacular appearance on New Year's Eve, but no, I'm not going to tell about it. It's kind of disrespectful I think. Suffice it to say, there was nothing unusual about this fight or about the fact that it occurred, since we are four independent people generally unused to seeing (and cohabitating with) each other. If I've ever told you about any other family fights, this one was the same, just in Barcelona. "Resolved" half an hour after it started. Other than that, the vacation was great and filled with lots of delicious food!