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!