More Than My Luggage

Tipping in a Foreign Country: The U.S.

2008-09-29T00:34:00.002-04:00

I ordered takeout from my favorite neighborhood restaurant tonight. As I stood next to cash register to receive and pay for my food, I noticed something going on before my eyes.

First, I noticed a family of four -- two kids and two adults -- get up and get ready to leave.

As the family started to leave (you know this sometimes takes some time), one of the waiters came to register with cash in his hand, presumably from someone having paid his bill. He kept counting through the bills (I counted maybe $70), as if somewhat distressed.

Eventually, another waiter says to the alpha male of the departing family, "Was everything okay? Did we do something wrong?"

Uh-oh, I thought.

"No, everything was fine," the guy responded.

"Well, I was just asking because you didn't leave any tip," the waiter continues.

Just for the record here, I don't really condone waiters doing this. Whether by oversight or by deliberate omission, sometimes people don't leave tips. I'm not a fan of waiters shaking down their patrons for their lack of tipping skills. It's rude and a bit tacky.

Anyway, the guy didn't understand what was meant by this. "Customarily," the waiter explained, "Diners add an extra 15% to for their waiters here."

"We're from New Zealand," the diner explained. But he didn't reach for his pocket, that's for sure.

"What's wrong?" his wife asked, coming back to the scene while the two kids lingered near the front of the restaurant.

"Nothing," the husband said, firmly.

I wasn't looking, but I'm reasonably confident that the waiter -- whose English skills weren't the best, by the way (I clarified his sentences for him in this entry) -- gave up explaining the concept and waved him off, probably dismissively, in a "whatever, just go already" kind of way.

Then they left.

I couldn't help thinking that any reasonable guide book published by any decent New Zealand company would have described the tipping etiquette in this country. And I couldn't help thinking that when Americans go abroad without bothering to learn the accepted social customs in the destination country, they get slammed with the "Ugly American" label pretty damn quick. Yet here it was, a Kiwi couple who apparently not only didn't bother to learn tipping etiquette for American restaurants, but they didn't even seem open to the thought of learning it when they were confronted with it.

It also led me to wonder how many other servicepeople they've stiffed so far, and how many they will stiff in the near future. I presume they're not cooking during their stay here, so each meal will likely entail a waitstaff who, it seems, are not getting tipped. If they're staying in a hotel, they probably won't leave a little something for the cleaning staff, whether it be on a daily basis or at the end of their entire stay. What if they catch a cab anywhere?

Of course, it's all just a part of the culture here. I couldn't help scripting out in my mind what kind of conversation I would have had with this couple had the opportunity for a civil discourse on the matter arisen. I suppose I would have explained to them the notion here in the States that, just as a matter of course, diners leave more money than covers their bill on the table. "It's a gratuity for the waitstaff and others who make your dining experience enjoyable," I'd say.

Then I can imagine them coming back: "But isn't that built into the price on the menu? They charge $12 for a meal when I could buy the ingredients for $5. That extra is what should be going towards the waitstaff and others 'who make the dining experience more enjoyable.'"

And to that, I suppose my only response would have to just be, "Well, that's what we do around here."

As it is, I know I already have one friend who doesn't tip cleaning people in hotels just on general principle. Like the theoretical Kiwi response above, his philosophy is that you don't pay over $100-200 per night to stay in a room then pay extra for something like cleaning service, which, ahem, is expected when you stay in a hotel. I just tip because it's customary anyway, but yes, sometimes I do wonder where all that money goes if they at those rates they still can't afford to pay their staff decent salaries or wages.

Anyway, it's a little refreshing -- though not in a good way, I guess -- to know that sometimes, the "Ugly American" myth is just as easily transportable to other foreigners visiting our soil.

Still alive....

2008-08-26T18:17:00.003-04:00

Is anyone even still reading this?

I'm still here, just horribly delinquent at posting anything. I suddenly developed a worldview which effectively asked "Who the hell cares what I think?" Mine is but a small voice crying out in the darkness.

But now that I've probably alienated the two people who used to come here most (I made that number up; I have no idea how many people there actually are who come here), I feel like coming back once in a while (read: maybe two or three times a week).

Maybe. We'll see if I live up to this pledge.

To the Death!

2008-06-01T23:15:00.002-04:00

Okay, I really just had to vent. This isn't going to be a well-written post, but a totally anger-inspired rant.

Here's a clip from this morning's Meet the Press, with special guest star Harold Ickes, representing Hillary Clinton's campaign.

It's amazing how he can really just close his eyes and ignore the plain facts being thrown at him.

Let me paraphrase:

[1]
Russert: "Clinton herself said Michigan 'doesn't count.' Why are you saying it counts now?"
Ickes: "It just does. La la la la!"

[2]
Russert: "You voted against seating Michigan back when they decided to move their primaries up."
Ickes: "Well [after today] they're in, so they're in."
... but you didn't want them in when it wasn't clear that their votes would help Hillary so much.

[3]
Ickes: "We think the popular vote is a very very strong measure."
... but you have made clear that electorals are the important number.

[4]
Russert: "If on Wednesday morning, Barack Obama has enough committed delegates and superdelegates to put him over the top, will Hilary Clinton congratulate him?"
Ickes: "We will win the nomination."
Russert: "That wasn't the question."
Ickes: "That's the answer. We will win."

Number 4 particularly bugs the CRAP out of me.

Excuse me, I'm sorry, but how can anyone vote for a person as the Leader of the Free World who cannot make contingency plans for things not panning out the way she expects it?

This kind of dig-your-heels-in-the-ground mentality is what makes her more electable? We want a President who doesn't understand that things sometimes don't go perfectly according to plan?

It's hurting party unity. And it's hurting her. If she actually does win the nomination, I'm not sure I could vote for her. I want a democrat in the White House, I really really really do. But if the democratic party, through its superdelegates (because obviously the state delegates won't the ones to make the final decision now) decides to put her on the ticket, it will be committing political suicide. And it will only have itself to blame when people like me sit at home rather than vote that egomaniac into the White House.

The Plus Side of Irrationality

2008-05-22T13:13:00.002-04:00

I think everyone is somewhat programmed to be "rational," or to at least want to be. It's absolutely clear that many people simply aren't "rational" in their thought processes, but usually when you point it out, they acknowledge it and have to admit that they're not. I don't think anyone goes out of their way to try to be irrational when making their day to day decisions. Heck, the law even bases a good chunk of its caselaw on the assumption that people operate rationally, and substantial deviations from that rationality cast questions on the value of the case.

But I've recently come to think there may be some instances when I kinda wish I were just a little bit less rational, and more completely off my rocker. I shall explain.

Just about a year ago, I was dating this guy. (Let's call him Jack.) [As a refresher for those of you (both of you!) who are reading this on a semi-regular basis (which means I've been horribly neglectful of you for not posting in ages), I pretty much stopped calling him as a chicken-shit way of calling an end to the relationship.) Anyway, point being, while not the best way of getting there, it was a pretty clean break -- I've probably only bumped into him twice since I weaseled out of it.

Jack had met most of my friends during the time we were together, and they all got along well. One of my best friends (let's call him Rick) still thinks Jack was great for me and why did I ever break up with him? I won't lay them out here, but I have my reasons, and trust me, they are very legitimate reasons.

So after I told all my friends I was no longer seeing Jack, the usual sympathies were exchanged, etc. But I do remember being of the resolve that I couldn't tell anyone not to call Jack anymore. I figured it just wouldn't be right to tell my friends who they could and could not talk to. So, I refused to make a blanket proclamation that Jack was now off limits to my friends. If they wanted to contact him, they could, and I would be fine with it.

And, honestly and truly, I am.

The other night, Rick went out with a few other friends; I was tired and broke so I stayed home. The night rolled along, and, apparently, Jack rolled into the bar. Our other friends having already well exceeded the point of non-sobriety, Rick ended up talking to Jack. According to Rick, they chatted for a good part of the night, and they even changed venue at one point ("I'm heading to this other bar; you want to come?" "Sure!").

And really, I'm okay with it.

But a part of me wishes that I wasn't.

A part of me wishes that I was angry at Rick. A part of me wishes that I felt that, if Rick were a true friend, he'd shun the company of an ex. A part of me wants to feel that combination of jealousy and anger, of betrayal and shame, that comes from having your best friend consorting with your ex.

But I don't feel anything like that at all.

I suppose it's healthy that I don't. But what does that say? All I can come up with is that my not feeling anything means I was never really in love. This is a fact that I will readily admit. I know I didn't really love the guy, and that for much of our time together I could barely tolerate him.

But the fact that I didn't love him only reminds me that I don't think I've ever loved anyone. I've never so freely given of myself that I even ran the risk of being hurt were it to end.

The guy I was seeing before Jack dumped me after six months. He looked like he was going to cry as he did it. I never cried once over the breakup.

So a part of me wishes that I did feel some irrationality. A part of me wishes that I did feel hurt that Rick would feel perfectly fine in hanging out with Jack. Because that would show me that I am, in fact, human, and that I am, in fact, capable of loving someone.

But maybe I'm not. And maybe that's why I should be mourning. Perhaps I should be mourning this as proof that I will never find love because I am completely incapable of it.

Even Cylons have love. I don't.

And dammit, now I have Rick Springfield stuck in my head:

You better love somebody
It's late
You better love somebody
Don't wait
You better love somebody
Don't tempt fate
You're gonna pull it just a little too far one night.

(Okay that last couplet makes no sense in this post, but the rhythm gets messed up if you don't quote the whole chorus.)

So I'm incapable of love.

Strangely... I think I'm okay with that.

Random TV Thoughts

2008-05-22T00:23:00.003-04:00

Possible spoiler alerts. Do not read on if you've got a backlog of Tivo'd shows you don't want to hear about. Though odds are, I'm not watching anything you are, because my taste in television shows is horrific.

-- The bachelor guy on "Farmer Wants a Wife" is really, really hot. And sweet. I didn't want to get into this show, but DAMN. Then again, I'm not really INTO this show because I fast forward past all the stupid bimbo scenes and concentrate on the guy, and his beautiful eyes, and his winning smile, and his hot bod.

-- I really do hope that Horatio Kaine really is actually dead. David Caruso can't act for squat to begin with, and his character was so far rogue that he really needed to be disposed of.

-- I just started getting into "Robin Hood" on BCCA too. Kinda neat.

-- I'm kinda over both "Two and a Half Men" and "Family Guy." I DVR them, but they're on soooo often, I'm tired of them. And the fact that they're on so often means I'm already into repeats.

-- As much as I love "Gilmore Girls," the fact that it's cycled back to the pilot episode reminds me of how much I hated the first few seasons. Why Rory ever became friends with Paris given what a frigging beyotch Paris was from the instant they met is beyond me; why they remained friends over the years boggles my mind.

-- As much as I love the CSI shows (including NCIS), I always wonder how it is that every single crime scene ever is immaculate before the time of the crime. These guys find one stray hair and it belongs to the killer. I can't imagine that anyone's house is so neat that it has absolutely no stray hairs or other DNA evidence that isn't easily explainable.

-- "Doctor Who" is awesome, but why is the SciFi channel actually ahead of BBCA? One would think that, of all channels to be current on "Doctor Who," it would be BBCA, not SciFi. Also, much as I love David Tennant, I'm getting kind of tired of his whole talking-through-gritted-teeth thing.

I need a life.

Justice Scalia Begs the Question

2008-05-19T16:24:00.004-04:00

Today, the Supreme Court upheld portions of the Child Pornography Protection Act.

I haven't read the case so I won't go into detail about it, nor do I have any opinions on it (yet). Basically, from what I can tell from the NY Times, the law prohibits people from offering photos of children in pornographic photos. Even if the photos are fake, or nonexistent. You could offer to send someone kiddie porn and not actually have kiddie porn. But you could be convicted for it.

Here's the rub for me: the following line from the article.

"Offers to engage in illegal transactions are categorically excluded from First Amendment protection," Justice Scalia wrote.

I find this logic circular. The First Amendment doesn't protect illegal speech, he says. So all Congress has to do to escape the reach of the First Amendment is to criminalize the speech.

Okay, that's a little simplistic. It's one level removed. Congress can criminalize any behavior it wants (within constitutional constraints), but talking about committing the crime is not protected by the First Amendment.

But what if, as here, the speech is intertwined with the purported crime? The crime, from what I can tell, includes offering to distribute or share child pornography. Doesn't that mean the speech is the crime? As so, how can you categorically remove that from First Amendment analysis?

Am I missing something here?

Weight Loss Issues

2008-05-19T01:07:00.003-04:00

I've had body image issues for as long as I can remember in my adult life. It's awful when I look at my pictures from junior high and realize how thin I look -- yet I can remember that, at the time, I fancied myself terribly fat.

I've only gotten bigger since.

Tonight I watched this BBCA show called "Super Skinny Me," which is a documentary type show where they took two female reporters and put them into the field of trying to lose weight. Mind you, these girls are not huge by any stretch to begin with, but they're both, for the sake of this show, trying various diets, routines, etc. to lose further weight.

One woman is truly going over the edge. She's trying way too hard: effectively starving herself, going on crazy diets, working out excessively, etc. And she's loving her results. She just asked a personal trainer down to absolutely no body fat. The trainer told her that he couldn't, because if she went down to zero body fat, she'd be dead. Her response: "Well then just this close to dead?"

The other woman, thankfully, has a decent head on her shoulders, and she's realizing that she's not enjoying losing all this weight. She misses her "womanly curves" and her boyfriend doesn't like snuggling with her and feeling her ribcage. She met an actual anorexic chick and realizes that she can't see herself thinking that Nicole Ritchie is actually healthy.

I watched this show because I thought it would be interesting to see these perspectives on these women's relationships with food. And I was hoping that it would present a picture of how awful body image issues are and how unhealthy it can be to monitor your food intake so zealously.

But then as I watch this show, it hasn't really done a good job in painting eating disorders as bad things. Hell, seeing this chick go through what she's doing, even though she is kinda miserable, I kinda find myself thinking that the watercress diet seems kinda doable for a week or so.

Because I'm fucking crazy. And I do want to lose weight.

Meantime, I baked a batch of chocolate chip cookies tonight to take with me to the office. They taste all right.

Because I'm fucking crazy. And I just love food. I mean, really.

A Panic! You Can't Scream Out

2008-05-01T19:18:00.003-04:00

I found myself at DAR Constitution Hall last night. To see Panic at the Disco on the Honda Civic Tour.

I confess, I like them. I like the sound of their first album and I find their antics innovative and creative. I didn't like their second album all that much when I first heard it, but it's been growing on me.

What I did not realize to save my life (and really, I should have researched this) was that Panic has a rather sizable fan base that consists of prepubescent little girls. And it didn't help that the opening acts -- Motion City Soundtrack and The Hush Sound -- also appear to be popular among the pre-teen set. Oh yeah, and Phantom Planet. In case you don't know (I didn't), they sing the theme song to "The OC." Yeah. Pre-teen. (Okay, okay, dammit, I admit it, I liked Phantom Planet and just added them to my myspace friends. Grrrr.)

Okay, my characterization of the girls just not fair. They're probably not prepubescent. But they are, I'd guess, around 15. I would hazard a guess that they probably could, in fact, get pregnant if they tried hard enough. Okay, to be fair, there were some boys too, but they we of the Y chromosomes were severely outnumbered. I mean really.

Some were their with their parents. Many, I'd hazard to guess, were not. My only comment on this is: when I was their age, no one was shelling out the cash to let me go to concerts. Let alone spend the hundreds of dollars it likely cost to get the t-shirts and other memorabilia. Let's not forget that pretty much each of these girls had cell phones (and not the cheap kind, we're talking phones with slide-out full keyboards and 5.2MP digicams in them). And digital cameras with which they were either photographing or video-recording large parts of the concert. I have a full-time job and I can barely afford that shit for myself.

Have you ever been in an auditorium filled with prepubescent girls while one of their favorite bands is on stage? I swear I could feel my ears tingling to the high-pitched screams these girls let out. To the extent that one can "feel" sound, I did. My ears were this close to bleeding. My right one still hurts today. I've spent an inordinate amount of time today saying "What? What??"

A few observations, if I may (and since this is my blog, I give myself license):

-- It must be really really weird to be a 13-year-old girl standing next to her dad (who was actually quite DILF-y) when the band sings the following lyrics: "I've got more wit, a better kiss, a hotter touch, a better fuck / Than any boy you'll ever meet, sweetie you had me." That song actually starts with lyrics involving slipping off your dress. I dunno, I guess that's a Family Talk moment in the making.

-- I think it may be a little irresponsible for a band, knowing mode age of its audience, to ask how many of them are single, and to follow that up with, "because I'm sure Brandon wants to take someone back to his hotel tonight." Because frankly, I'm sure a lot of those squealing pre-teens would jump at that opportunity, irresponsible though it is.

-- I also think it's a little irresponsible, when your lead singer comes out for an encore sans the rest of the band, to announce that the rest of the band is occupied in the back stage, "probably doing Jaeger bombs or something." Seriously, folks, can we at least try not to glamorize drinking totally-fuck-you-up drinks to kids who have almost a decade before they can legally drink it?

-- I find it humorous that the Honda Civic Tour touts its environmental consciousness and the fact that it donated a portion of its ticket sales to environmental causes... while all these little girls ran around carrying their souvenir paraphernalia in plastic bags.

Side note: When going to a musical event, do not take as your date someone with no rhythm whatsoever. Especially if he doesn't seem to notice this fact. When the band says to clap with them, it's not that hard... but for some, it is.

But anyway, I still should say that yes, I did enjoy the show immensely. Although I had reservations given how down-tempo their second album as a whole was, they amped it up for the show and it was a really great time. But all I can say is that if Fall Out Boy makes their way out here, I will go to their show armed with earplugs, accusations of geriatric state be damned!

How To Be Hetero.

2008-04-11T16:43:00.003-04:00

I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, How can this self-professed gay guy even think of trying to write a blog entry called "How To Be Hetero"?

Well, here it is.

Okay, I'll have to admit that really this isn't some sort of super-detailed primer on the subject or anything. It's really more of a story of what's been happening to me today.

So I've been at a work conference all day today. Except that I haven't actually been attending the conference. Instead, I've been outside at the registration desk for a good part of the day, watching people come and go ("speaking of Michaelangelo"), helping latecomers and stuff. No biggie.

We have vendors who paid us to let them occupy space at our conference. Decent, hardworking folk who are here to hawk their wares to us lawyers. I have to respect them for that.

This one guy is a little over-aggressive, in my humble opinion. While everyone else is inside, he has been accosting me with questions about the people: "Hey, do you know who this guy is? I've check out his site and want to talk to him." and "This guy had an appointment with me and kinda blew me off. Can you point him out when he comes back out?" I try to be pleasant but noncommittal.

But then, let's face it, the day gets boring sitting around doing nothing. So this guy has started talking to me about stuff that had nothing whatsoever to do with work. He started by discussing his personal life, and asking me about mine.

Hooooo boy.

It started off simply enough. He asked me where in the city I lived, what I thought of certain areas, where I like to go out...

And "where I like to go out" is probably where it all started tanking. Not knowing this guy, I was reluctant to identify any of the bars I tend to frequent, because most of them have big ol' gay flags hanging outside of them. "Around," I told him. Because I live close to the hotel where the conference, I pointed the alarming lack of places to hang out in my neighborhood. (That's actually not quite true, but oh well.) I told him that I walk to Dupont or to Gallery Place sometimes. He told me he likes to hang out at Bar Louie, in the Verizon Center. (Mental note: avoid that place.)

There's a pregnant woman working at the booth about 20 feet away from me. She's got a nice face and is, well, noticeably pregnant. What this means is that she also has a swelled bosom. Let's just say the size of this woman's breasts has not escaped this guy's attention. And let's just say, for the sake of politeness, that he jokingly suggested an illegal course of conduct involving her and some pharmaceuticals.

"Dude, that's not right," I tell him.

"Kidding, man, kidding," he tells me. Sadly, he has that smile that grants him a certain air, a certain charisma, that I'm sure has gotten him out of many a jam in past lives. I have to remind myself that he's being a total ass.

He has just shared with me one of his best secrets to picking up girls: he tells them he can speak some Vietnamese. "Chicks love that," he tells me. (He apparently finds "chicks" to be his mot juste for the opposite sex.)

"You do not speak Vietnamese," I challenge him.

"Sure I do," he tells me, and, to my surprise, he busts out with some actual phrases. Now I don't speak Vietnamese so I can't tell, but at least he has some syllables down adequately. I tell him I'm impressed.

"I guess since you're an Asian guy it wouldn't impress the chicks as much from you," he opines. "It sounds cooler when a white guy can speak an Asian language."

I have to give him some points for that. Just some. Not many.

"Big plans this weekend?" he asks me.

"Eh, I'm going to a movie tonight," I tell him. He asks me what movie, and I tell him: Prom Night. I have to explain to him that it's a slasher flick about a serial murderer as he doesn't seem to have seen any of the hype surrounding it.

"Are you going with your girlfriend?" he asks me.

"..." I say. Seriously, my mouth opened, and I started to speak, but I couldn't pick the words to come out of my mouth. Do I come out? Do I lie? Do I tell the truth (that I'm going with a gay male friend of mine)?

I think he senses my hesitation, but he interprets it all wrong. "Well," he interrupts my floundering, "at least you're taking a chick, right?" I swear he's about to give me that sideways smile-wink-double-point triple threat of treacly charm.

"..." I continue, but he beats me to the punch: "Because going to those kinds of movies with chicks is the best, man. 'Oh, I'm scared, I don't want to go home now!,' she'll say. Or, 'That was so scary, can we go back to your place?' You know what I mean."

Indeed. I knew this theory back in high school. And I wasn't even sexually active then. With either sex.

"I'm just going with a friend of mine," I tell him.

A part of me would not be terribly surprised if he would just come out and ask me point blank if I'm planning on "nailing her." Thankfully, he doesn't do that.

"That's cool, that's cool," he says.

And I let the hallway lapse back into a tersely enforced silence.

The Unwitting Time Machine

2008-04-02T17:36:00.000-04:00

I was in the middle of a teensy bit of cleaning tonight when I stumbled across an old wallet that I had replaced ages ago. So old was it, in fact, that it contained a "HRC Member" card for the year 1999. Why this wallet has remained on my shelf for this long, I don't know. I chucked it (the wallet, and the HRC membership card).

Also found in the wallet: My old Social Security Card. I had thought I lost it years ago, and thus had it replaced already. Guess what's heading straight for the shredder. Back then I thought it was a good idea to carry the good ol' Social Security card around. Since then I've learned that it's not a great idea.

Also: A tip guide. (That is, how much is 10%? 15%? 20%? How much do you tip a hairdresser? etc.) Not that I need it anymore.

And: Several ATM receipts from Riggs Bank ATMs. This was back when I used to actually reconcile my bank statements with my withdrawal receipts and checks. And when I actually banked at Riggs. (I closed out my account when they were implicated in that big Middle East money laundering scheme. Then they got bought out by Provident or some such.)

And: An old fake ID from my college days. It's tucked away in a compartment that's not meant to hold anything -- it's behind the credit card slots (nice hiding place, don't you know). When I was 19, it reported that I was 25. It was a really really bad ID. Literally, it was taken with me standing right in front of a very large poster board made to resemble a Michigan license. If you look really closely you can see my shoulder extends past the photo area onto the other fields of the card.

(I decline to post a photo of the actual Michigan ID in all its horrificness.)

Funny story about the fake ID, involving my Asshole Uncle (whom I will refer to as "AU"). One summer on my way home from college, my AU insisted that I spend a few days with him in California. I don't know why he insisted, seeing as I had always hated him growing up anyway. But my mom thought it would be a good idea, so I caved and figured I'd endure it for a few days. Besides, I shuttled between him and his wife (on one hand) and another aunt-and-uncle pair whom I liked better.

So on the third morning I'm sitting there at breakfast and AU says to me, "When were you in Michigan?" (He attended the University of Michigan, so I suppose he had some degree of affinity for the state.) "Wha?" I say. He then tells me that he's seen my Michigan driver's license, and when was I in Michigan? Remember now, that license was not only in my wallet, but in a "secret" compartment in my wallet. The SOB was freaking nosing around my wallet!

I tried to call him on nosing around my stuff, but he kept brushing it all off as if he just "happened" to see it. I knew damn well that it wasn't possible to "accidentally" see my fake ID, but I couldn't very well call him on it since he didn't seem to notice that it listed me as being 25 years old. So I also hemmed and hawed about having taken a road trip to Michigan (where I got a driver's license? My uncle isn't the brightest bulb) and just let it go. But I fumed about it for weeks after.

The worst part about that story is that I couldn't then go complain to my parents about AU clearly and thoroughly invading my privacy, since that would involve admitting to the 'rents that I had a fake ID to begin with. So I got to experience the wonderful frustration of stewing in my anger with no outlet at all. And I swore never to talk to AU again.

Anyway, that was a huge digression.

Also in my old wallet: a 3x5 index card, with a locker combination stuck to it. I have no idea what lock that combination opens anymore.

On the other half of the 3x5 are taped 2 quarters and 2 old-school Metrobus tokens. It scares me to think that 2 quarters was part of my "emergency" money. I think they were meant for use on a pay phone in the event of an emergency. (I acquired my first cell phone in 1999.) The bus tokens were, of course, a way for me to get home if I needed to ... on public transport.

And finally: two twenty dollar bills. Score! One of them is a 1996 vintage. Do they even still accept that bill anymore? Damn, it's old. But it's forty more dollars than I had a day ago, so go me!

I'm using them to buy lottery tickets.

Another Swift Kick in the Back.

2008-03-28T17:25:00.003-04:00

A while back, I blogged about the single life. In a nutshell, I talked about how I had come to accept my status as a single guy, and that actually finding someone to date and settle down with had actually become low on my priority list. I enjoy my life, with or without someone "special" to share it with.

Later on, I blogged again about the topic, occasioned by a good friend's wedding. In that post, I scoffed at the notion that I -- or really anyone, for that matter -- needed a second person to complement us, to pick us up when we fall, to prop us up when we lack the strength to stand.

I recently had occasion to re-examine my thoughts on these.

And I've reached a slightly modified conclusion.

First, don't get me wrong: I am still single, I still enjoy being single, and I am by no means desperate to find someone to relieve me of my singledom. I still cling fast to the "if it happens, it happens" mantra and refuse to approach life as a one-track minded quest for personal partnership.

Nonetheless, my recent trip home, and my mother's exhortations (spoken truly from the heart) have managed to really pierce me hard-headed mindset.

I went back home for a week recently to be with my family because my mother had been experiencing significant pain in her back for the better part of a year. Finally, she went in for surgery to help her relieve the pain. Back surgery for a woman of my mother's age can be a big deal, and recovery an even bigger deal, so I returned home to spend some time with her. Not that I could really help much (I wasn't lifting her out of bed or anything), but I think my just being there made her happier and thus helped just a little bit in her recovery.

She was in the hospital for a few days after I arrived, first with a morphine drip, then with heavy doses of oxycontin and percoset. (I was tempted to steal a pill or two, but thought better of it.) Walking around was quite difficult for her, even with a walker. Her physical therapy treatments involved ensuring that she walked whenever she could, including the part about getting in and out of bed by herself. If you had to watch her do this, I assure you, it was no easy feat for her.

By the time she got home, she had markedly improved, but she still experienced some pain when moving around, and it's clear that she won't be running marathons anytime soon. But another part about my visit home was just to be at home during the day for those first few days in case she needed me.

One afternoon, as I was preparing some lunch for her while she sat on a stiff-backed chair in the living room, she said to me with all seriousness: "You really still don't have a girlfriend? Really, you need to find someone and settle down. If you should ever wind up like me, who's going to help you? You need to have someone around to help you in times like these."

(In case you're late to this blog, be advised that I have not come out to my parents, who still hold out the hope that one day I will meet a nice girl, get married, and have children. My poor, poor parents....)

Normally I pay little heed to what my mother says. But having seen her all week, struggling through such simple tasks as getting out of bed and walking to the bathroom, I realized she wasn't 100% wrong. What would happen to me if I were to suffer some kind of misfortune?

Spouses or other significant others kind of, by default, are expected to take care of you when you're sick, or when you're recovering from a major surgery. What happens when you don't have one? I'm not the kind of guy who feels comfortable burdening his friends. In fact, the last time I had any surgery at all, I felt bad begging friends to come over and just help me. An excerpt from a 2004 entry:

But the panic attack really started to hit me when I realized that I would be completely unable to feed myself if I got hungry and Tracy wasn't around. How would I be able to find something in the fridge? How would I prepare it? Suddenly, even something as mundane as a peanut butter sandwich, or a frozen pizza, or even a friggin' frozen tv dinner, would become a tremendous effort, involving lots of navigation that I would have taken for granted on any other occasion.

I think not being able to care for myself has quickly become my greatest phobia in life.

So what's a single guy to do? I have no answers, only generalized anxieties.

PS: Leave it to me to take a life event like my mother's back surgery and turn it into a "me" moment. In case you're interested, my mom was doing fine by the time I left; her pain had started to subside and she was able to scale back on her pain meds. She still needs a walker to move around, and probably will still need it for a few months, but she seems okay. And my sister-in-law took her to her follow-up appointment and reported that all seems decent.

Outta Here.

2008-03-18T01:08:00.003-04:00

I am taking an unscheduled break from my Washington life.

I'll be heading home this morning for about a week.

Nothing more need be said about the matter.

Back soon!

Family Programming

2008-03-17T00:33:00.002-04:00

One recent morning as I got ready for work I turned on the television and found it in the middle of the movie 300. Not having enough time to sit down and watch it, I hit the "record" button on my DVR and went about my way, anxious to watch it later. I certain didn't want to pass up what I'd heard was a movie laced with barely dressed men sporting six-pack abs in various homoerotic fight scenes.

This evening I finally got around to watching the film. So I fired up the DVR menu, scrolled over the "300" and asked it to "Play from beginning."

As sometimes happened, the machine caught the tail end of the show before.

As the closing credits of the movie before ran, my ears were accosted by the sound of "Somewhere Out There."

Yes, 300 -- rated "R" and carrying warnings of "graphic violence, nudity, adult content, and adult language" -- was being run immediately after An American Tail, starring this little guy:

Fivel's a good segue into blood and homoerotic violence, is he not? I note that 300 contained a scene wherein a good number of people were violently tossed into a deep chasm within 10 minutes of the beginning of the movie; an almost-naked woman dances around within 15 minutes from the start; and a rather steamy sex scene (with prominently featured female breasts) takes place within 25 minutes. (All times approximate; after all, my DVR recorded started early.)

Stalking

2008-03-14T16:51:00.007-04:00

I can't help thinking that CBS is going to have a major lawsuit on its hands stemming from this season's Big Brother.

Seriously, Natalie is a complete psycho-chick stalker, and eventually, she will hunt down and kill Matt, whether it's in the Big Brother house or not. Or at least she'll try to.

Matt's a total player -- hello, he even made out with one of the other chicks (I forget if it was Chelsia or Sharon) just to get a tactical advantage -- but usually that can be written off as part of the game. You can never be sure that anyone in that house is being genuine, whether it's emotions, or alliances or whatnot.

But Natalie, however, has convinced herself that Matty loves her. When he's not near her, she goes looking for him. He tries his hardest to push her away, and she keeps coming back like some puppy dog. He's rude to her and her best response is, "No, I know he still loves me and wants to be with me and wants to sleep in the bed with me."

"Matty why won't you get in the bath with me? Come o-o-o-o-on..."

The kicker for me: when she found out that Matt made out with another girl, it did not immediately shatter her "he loves me" image. It upset her, sure, but in the end, she was "torn." Seriously, she was "torn" the same way a new bride would be if she found out her husband had cheated on her during their three-year engagement. And Natalie's only known Matt for under two months.

I would think that a reasonable person would, after less than two months together and in the face of clear signs that he doesn't want to be with you, take the making out with someone else as firm evidence that he's not as infatuated with you as you thought.

Natalie is not a reasonable person.

Oh, and I cannot be the only one who thinks that, at any moment, she's going to break the tension in the house by calling out "You know what this room needs? THE PERFECT CHEER!" I mean, seriously. She's a spitting image. But then at least Cheri Oteri was funny.

Pushmi-Pullyu

2008-03-14T14:24:00.002-04:00

Dear Lady Who Just Left My Office Building As I Was Walking In:

I know you saw me through the glass door. That's not a huge challenge.

I know you could tell I was coming into the building. That's not a huge challenge either.

Perhaps you don't realize that I saw you, too. One of the principles of glass doors is that usually, if you can see me, I can see you.

So I saw you walking up to the door -- yes, the same door I was approaching, from the opposite side -- and I saw that your arm was half way up, getting ready to push the door open.

Then I saw you actually put your arm down when you saw me on the other side of the door.

Uh, hello?

Are you little miss primadonna princess that you can't push the freaking door open yourself? Just because I'm approaching the same door doesn't mean you can't also push the door open too.

If you ever do that to me again, I'm going to open the door, all right... and then I'm just going to walk on through it and let it close behind me.

Just giving you a heads-up.

Smooches,
Dennis!

No Longer Subtle

2008-03-12T14:53:00.001-04:00

I used to be really good at subtlety when it came to checking out random hot guys. I have mastered taking cell phone shots with the intended target wholly unawares. I have stared down fetching young fellows as they walk by me on the street, in the Metro, at bars. Usually they don't notice because, well, they probably don't want to, but hey, I have fun.

I seem to have lost that subtlety in recent days.

Never mind that, a few days ago, I was at a (straight) bar with some friends of mine and thought I could be all slick by taking photos of guys (with a freaking flash camera -- with red-eye reduction) without them knowing. (Shocker: they figured it out. I'm going to blame the Smithwick's.)

I offered to give away some items from my home recently and some internet stranger offered to come get it some of them. Great, I thought, I get to de-clutter.

The guy showed up at my office building as I asked and called me from downstairs, where I was to go meet him with a bag of my stuff. When I got to the front of my building, I saw him.

He was on a bicycle. Wearing a unitard bike outfit. You know the kind I'm talking about.

Okay, this guys was fully covered up, none of this spaghetti-strap stuff (though it might have been nice...). But when one thinks of bike shorts, really, one's mind can tend to drift toward other things, like wrestling singlets

and spandex

and even superheroes

but in the end, it all really just boils down to one thing: those outfits can leave very little to the imagination. One time I was sitting at a Starbucks, in the window seat, minding my business when a guy wearing a blue bike outfit walked down the street (where was his bike? I have no clue) and I swear not only I could I tell his religion, but I could get an appreciation for his manscape.

So back to this guy picking up some free stuff from me... try as I might, I was having a hard time struggling not to check out this guy's junk. I mean, really, it was just there, begging to be scrutinized. Not too shabby. I know it was horribly rude, but really now, when you wear that, you're kinda just asking for that kind of attention, aren't you? Especially if you're thin and fit, as this guy was.

Words cannot express how extremely happy I was that this guy was able to pick the stuff up from me during the work day, because if I had to arrange for him to come by my home to get it, there's no telling what I'd be tempted to do.

Meow.

2008-03-11T14:42:00.003-04:00

My avatar notwithstanding, I'm not a huge fan of cats. A woman in my office absolutely loves hers; whenever she mentions him, I provide a Maynard-G.-Krebs-like response* of "evil." I mean, they can be cute and all, but in terms of personality, I'm truly a dog guy.

But just to butter up you cat lovers who may happen to be reading this, I bring you this video just for you before I get to the meat of this post:

Okay, there.

Aight, so a trailer park community in Chantilly has decided that they're going to round up some 200 (feral, I gather) cats and euthanize them because, well, they're being general pests. Obviously at least one cat-hugger is "sick, sick" over the idea, but I don't care either way, really (which doesn't stop me from mocking the cat-hugger -- I mean, really, those things are evil and ungrateful and you feed them? Geez Louise).

Here's the WaPo article about this situation.

And here's the funny/stupid thing about the article:

By law, the trapped cats must be taken to the Fairfax County Animal Shelter, animal control officers said.

***

[Fairfax County Animal Shelter spokeswoman Michelle] Hankins said today that the shelter had not been notified of the management company's plans to begin trapping the cats. The shelter was already running near capacity and not equipped to handle 200 animals, she said.

"Our hope is that the cats aren't brought to us," she said.

I read those two propositions together and my first thought was, "Where else can they go, if by law they have to go to your shelter?" I was thinking just how retarded she was, and did she even know the law which the Post just referenced?

Then I realized what she probably meant was that she hopes the roundup efforts won't take place at all. (I would still call it a combination of unfortunate phrasing and poor juxtaposition of the two propositions, though.)

Then I couldn't help thinking, "How hard could it be to just throw the things into a chamber as you get them?" But that probably sounds even more nasty than necessary, and while I retract that question, I've decided not to actually back up and delete it.

Yeah, just not a cat guy.

* If you know what I'm talking about, two snaps, I'm impressed. If you don't, Maynard was played by Bob Denver (yes, Gilligan) who had a knee-jerk, autonomic reaction every time someone said the word "work" around him. He didn't like the idea.

Wow, Gilligan was kinda cute. In a Shaggy (sans Scooby Doo) sorta way.

Idiocracy, Continued

2008-03-10T19:48:00.002-04:00

Remember this post? Well apparently she's back for more.

She emailed me again today to ask me to please change her email address in the system. Never mind that you can do that yourself once you've logged in.

So rather than give a woman a fish, I decided to teach her how to fish, and told her to just log in herself and change the email herself. Guess what? No dice.

She asked me to send her her password again. Never mind that just a few days ago, she had asked me to retrieve it previously.

Now, to give just a tiny bit of credit, she was probably have a wee bit of trouble because the only way to retrieve your password is if you let the system email it to you, and she was changing her email address because it had been disconnected. But still: don't you write things down?

Eventually I gave up and changed her frigging email address for her. But I did tell her that if she was changing her address because she lost her freaking job, she should change the rest of the information in there accordingly.

Badass Moron

2008-03-04T22:50:00.003-05:00

There's usually no shortage of "interesting" people on the Metro. True, in DC, we have far more than our fair share of stuffed-shirt bureaucratic professional types, but we've also got a pretty persistent undercurrent of countercultural types. Kinda like Greenwich Village wannabe types. Not many, of course, but almost by definition those people don't give a damn what others think, so they can stand out.

Tonight a young man boarded the Metro with what appeared to be a wallet or business card type case dangling from his mouth. It's hard to describe. It looked kind of like this, but the kind with a key ring attached to it too:

Now as I said, this thing was dangling from his mouth. Upon first glance, I thought he had placed a key on the key ring portion of the wallet and simply put the key in his mouth. (Why would one do that? I have no idea... but then I suppose that's what made him him and not me.)

Watching him as we made our way along the tracks, though, I realized my initial conclusion was incorrect. He was not sucking on a key, or on anything that was attached to the end of that wallet thingee.

The wallet thingee was attached to his face as a eyebrow ring would be: he had pierced the lower part of his mouth and placed something through it; through that ring he hung a wallet.

Keep in mind, I'm not talking about a pierced lip. I'm talking about a portion of the skin just beneath the lip. Someplace where beards usually form.

And I thought how comically stupid he looked.

First, as I said, this thing was dangling on the edge of his face. Did he really think this looked cool?

Second, it was attached to his face. Attached. What the hell purpose does that serve? Is there an ID in there? Money? Business cards? He has to reach up to his face to retrieve any of those items. How bizarre is that?

Third, I presume the look is meant to project a badass attitude. "Yeah, I'm not, I've got a facial piercing that's not my ear and there's a big-ass thing hanging from it. I'm noncomformist and that makes me all badass." Thing is, I'm pretty certain that area of the skin isn't that tough. So if Mr. Badass with a Wallet Swinging From His Face were to actually get into anyone's face, I imagine it wouldn't be all that difficult to yank the damn wallet off. Then while he's howling in pain from a huge missing chunk of skin, you could do all kinds of things like kick him in the stomach and/or balls and/or shin, or maybe just run.

There's making a statement, and ... there's idiocy.

Lexicography

2008-03-04T17:46:00.005-05:00

I've decided to work some new phrases into semi-regular rotation during my many conversations with random people. Feel free to join the fun.

1. "I drink your milkshake! I drink it up!"

I'm not exactly sure in what context I'd actually use this phrase, but I intend to use it nonetheless. Apparently all kinds of other people are already doing it, which puts me behind the curve.

Also, in gay circles, it invites a segue into bringing the boys to the yard, which can into a wonderful pick-up line.

Or not.

2. "What the French, toast?" and "Who are you calling a Cootie Queen, you Lint Licker?" (accent required).

(Bonus two-fer!)

That's some funny stuff right there, yo.

The first one is ready-for-prime-time with immediate usage irrespective of precise context. I suppose someone would have to use the phrase "Cootie Queen" before pulling out the second phrase... or not. I think maybe it would be even more fun to just pull it out of nowhere.

3. Scully-rific.

I'm making this one up myself. To the extent that it's even possible, I used to have a mad crush on Scully from The X-Files, whom I found hot and sexy and smart all at the same time.

(Unfortunately, House of Mirth did not leave me with the same love for Gillian Anderson.)

4. Craptastic.

I don't know where I read this first, but it's the funniest word ever (for now) and I'm going to put it into heavy rotation. Kinda like "ghetto fabulous," it's inherently contradictory and yet everyone who hears it knows precisely what it describes.

And it doesn't even necessarily have to do with bowel movements, contrary to what the photo above would suggest.

5. Anything from Heathers.

I mean, really, the lines were just classic. (Though the cutesy language of Juno will likely provide a run for the money. But they talked a little too fast in that movie so the cool jargon gets kinda lost.)

Examples of my favorites:
- "Fuck me gently with a chain saw!"
- "Grow up Heather. Bulimia is sooo '87."
- "Corn Nuts!"
- "What's your damage, Heather?"
- "Lick it up, baby! Lick. It. Up."
- "Veronica, why are you pulling my dick?"
- "I don't patronize bunny rabbits."
- "I love my dead gay son!"
- "Save the speeches for Malcolm X... I just wanna get laid!"

There's plenty more, but you get my drift.

---

There's definitely more phrases I'm working into heavy rotation, but these are the fun ones I want to start getting other people to use too. Go to it, people!

Lawsuits and Death

2008-02-28T15:30:00.002-05:00

I may be getting old and crotchety, but this rubs me the wrong way. Apparently, the families of the District girls who died under their mother's care are planning on suing the District.

I will admit that I don't know many of the facts of this case other than what I've seen in the paper. The facts so far seem to indicate that the mother, Banita Jacks, had custody of four girls (fathered by, it appears, at least two different men), and that she, well, wasn't all that fit to raise them. From what I've seen, she withdrew all four of the girls from the schools they were attending, going so far as to tell school officials that she was home-schooling them. She then promptly locked the girls in the house, such that no one ever saw them again.

And then they turned up dead.

Look, I don't doubt that the District could have done a better job in policing this family. They purported to conduct home visits of the house, but never actually saw the kids. And then they appear to have accepted without question someone's assertion that the family had moved.

But what's notably missing from all the news accounts about this case -- including this most recent one -- is what contact the girls had with any of the following people: Mamie Jacks (the girls' grandmother and Benita Jacks' mother); Jessie Fogle (grandmother of the two younger girls); Kevin Stoddard (father of second oldest girl); and the father of oldest girl.

Both of the grandmothers appear to have served notice upon the Mayor that they are planning a lawsuit over the deaths of these children. The father of the second oldest girl (reported to be Mr. Stoddard) also commented, through his attorney, that he plans to sue. But on what basis?

From all that is apparent, none of these people had or attempted to make any contact with Ms. Jacks or the children during the troubling period of time. None of them went by the house demanding to spend some quality time with their kin. Did any of them offer to babysit or take the kids away from Ms. Jacks for any period of time? Had any one of them stopped by or otherwise questioned the strange circumstances brewing in Ms. Jacks's house, perhaps someone could have done something sooner.

Now, apparently not having given much of a second thought to their kin for some period of time, are they seriously suggesting that they should somehow be compensated for their deaths? Just how much pain and suffering could they have experienced from their deaths if they weren't seeking to experience joy and love from them when they were alive?

But apparently, headline-grabbing deaths must, as a matter of necessity, result in a lawsuit. There's gold in them thar deaths.

Idiocracy

2008-02-28T10:24:00.002-05:00

In my spare time I serve as a web guru for a professional association I belong to. It's not a huge deal, because mostly all it means is I get behind-the-scenes access to a website that makes publishing content, etc. a matter of typing and clicking rather that coding and posting.

Most of my duties on the site involve troubleshooting for people who are having problems, and that usually focuses almost exclusively on people who are confused about our website structure (and it is a little retarded), and on login issues.

Today I received an email from a member, telling me that it had been a while since she logged in to the password-protected site, and could I please remind her of her password? Or was there someone else she should be contacting for this info?

Answer: Lady, do you see that link labeled "Forgot your password?" RIGHT NEXT TO the password field of the login screen? What do you think it's there for, decoration? It's not terribly cryptic, is it? How is that you managed to root around to find my contact information to ask me this question, but weren't able to see a blindingly obvious link that would answer your question?

Norm!

2008-02-27T18:10:00.002-05:00

I returned to my usual poker night last night after a five-week hiatus punctuated by illness, work restraints, and bad weather. I had actually missed my time there; the guys there are fun to play with and they're generally cool. I pretty much suck, and they're okay with that and we all laugh at me together.

I got there just before the game started and didn't even look around to find my friends. Instead, I retrieved my chips and, upon turning around, found a table with a good number of empty seats. "Sit down," one of the guys on the table said. "Sure, why not," I said, a tad disoriented and excited to be back in the game.

Across the room, at a different table closer to the door, I heard my name called out rather loudly, and repeatedly. I truly felt like Norm from Cheers. Turns out there were empty seats at the table where my regular group of friends sat, so I went off and joined them instead. It was too bad, because I wouldn't have minded playing with some new people, but hey, there's comfort in familiarity. Besides, several of the guys on my regular table were kinda hot.

Story of the night:

So I get pocket aces (diamonds and clubs), and the guy before me raises. Because he did my job for me, I just called. One other player called after me.

The flop contained a queen, the 10 of diamonds, and the 4 of diamonds. One player limped in, but the second better put in a humongous raise. It hurt just watching it, because I didn't want to have to lay down my pocket aces. In the end, however, his actions screamed that he had flopped trips, so I tearfully let them go.

I was right, he had a pair of queens in his hand.

But that's not the end of the story.

The second player called his huge raise, and the turn was produced: King of diamonds. That's three diamonds on the board, for those of you keeping track.

Bets ensued. Keep in mind, I'm relatively certain one guy had trips at the time that I folded. We got to the river.

I hadn't even finished saying "If it's a diamond I'm going to cream," when the 8 of diamonds showed up on the river. I had folded the nut flush.

I give myself props for finally having the strength to let go of pocket aces. I only wish that it happened on a hand that I wouldn't have eventually won.

CNN/AP Loses Its Sense of Humor.

2008-02-24T13:17:00.002-05:00

Okay, check it.

I was on CNN.com and saw this headline: "Huckabee overstays welcome on SNL."*

Part of the text of the article:

Even though Mike Huckabee is still battling for the Republican presidential nomination despite long odds, he said Saturday he won't "overstay his welcome."

Then he did precisely that, lingering on the "Weekend Update" set of "Saturday Night Live" despite repeated cues to leave the stage.

* * *

However, he said: "Mike Huckabee does not overstay his welcome. When it's time for me to go, I'll know. And I'll exit out with class and grace."

Then he remained seated at the "Update" desk even though Meyers made it clear it was time for him to leave.

I found this fascinating, just because I thought it would be funny to see how Seth Green handled a big-time politician accidentally missing his "we're done with you now" cues. Maybe they'd just pan away from him. Or do a close-up of Amy and Seth, deliberately pulling him out of camera range.

So naturally I found the clip on youtube. Here it is:

Aight people, who really believes that Huckabee accidentally missed his cues like a moron? I, for one, think it's pretty damn clear that the entire "oops? Am I supposed to leave?" thing was totally planned. I mean, come on, he had just been to try to explain why he wasn't conceding an election he is certain to lose now -- "overstaying his welcome," as it were.

CNN and AP, you are doofs.

PS: Was it just me, or was Amy Poehler unusually far away from Gov. Huckabee? I think she thinks he has cooties.

* I know what you're thinking. You've clicked on the link and found that the headline is not what I say it is. I swear, this is what the link said. It's what the headline said when I got there. Within the past few minutes, they've changed it.

Live!

2008-02-23T15:44:00.008-05:00

One of the things about being stuck at home for as long as I have been is that I get to watch television which I normally never would. One morning (I forget which one), I woke up and turned on the television, which happened to catch Live with Regis and Kelly.

Normally I would not watch this show. I think both Regis and Kelly are rather lame and their banter boring and nothing I couldn't do. But today was a bit different. Regis wasn't there.

In his place was a hot sexy Latin man who goes by Mark Consuelos.

Mark is apparently Kelly's real life husband (the fact that he's married disappoints me; that he's married to Kelly Ripa even more so) because they spent the first 10 minutes of the show bickering about whether she was given adequate warning about some fancy dinner that Mark had planned. Blah blah blah, the man was whipped.

But he was sooooo gorgeous. He has that smile that radiates and is infectious and heart-melting. And he was wearing a very nice shirt (I couldn't tell the fabric) but let's just say it hugged his very nice chest very very nicely.

Mark previously was in All My Children, where he met Kelly, which appears to be the pinnacle of his career, since he later went on to host that god-awful reality dating show Age of Love.

Some random photos I dug upon the internets (sorry, some just had to come with Kelly):

Honest to Blog!

2008-02-23T00:13:00.002-05:00

I finally saw Juno last weekend (before I got sick). It's a cute film despite its rather serious underlying subject matter. Do kids nowadays really talk like that as a general matter of day to day speech? It was cute and off the cuff, but still.

Oh, and I still think Jason Bateman is incredibly cute. And that Jennifer Garner has a smokin' bod, but her mouth is like fifty times larger than Julia Roberts's.

Of course, I was enchanted, as always, by Michael Cera, who pulls off the adorkable thing so well. I love how movies nowadays are willing to put characters who aren't traditionally "cool" in protagonist roles. Cera's character is one of those people who would usually get beaten up without a second thought in some of the movies I grew up with. But here, we're actually expected to like him and cheer for him despite his social ineptitude.

And finally:

I had seen this video on Logo like a million times before. I had never bothered to read the credits to it (if there were any) so I had no idea that the singers Michael Cera and Ellen Page. And I always wondered what the hell was up with those runners at the end. It made just a bit more sense after having seen the movie.

My Latest Food Network Crush

2008-02-22T01:40:00.003-05:00

A while ago I blogged about my crush on Alton Brown of Food Network's Iron Chef and Good Eats.

I've since developed a new food geek crush.

That's Geof Manthorne, the executive sous chef of Charm City Cakes as featured on Food Network's Ace of Cakes. I love his singing in this clip -- so mellow and soft -- but I really truly admire his immense talent and handiwork in creating those damn cakes he makes on the show. They're huge and look fantastic. I can't imagine actually eating any of it, though, but I think he's totally cute. And he's in Baltimore, which is less than an hour from here. I sense a stalking run is in order.

Of course, while I am now crushing hard for Geof, and now a little less so for Alton, my biggest Food Network crush will always be Dave Leiberman. I mean, come on. He's just too adorable for words.

Being Sick Sucks.

2008-02-22T00:38:00.002-05:00

I hate being sick.

This week has been pretty awful in so many ways. After having such a good time with Lorelai on Friday night, I thought I was in for a good week.

I was kinda wrong.

My friends and I went out on Saturday night to BeBar, which was surprisingly straight. After my straight Friday night, it kinda wasn't what I was looking for, but oh well. I didn't drink much but I did hang with my boys for most of the night before we all bailed at around 1:00.

Monday was President's Day. Usually we don't get most federal holidays off, so in the absence of being told anything, I went in to work on Monday. It turns out we did in fact have Monday off -- which I found at around 11:30 a.m. -- so I bailed by 1:00.

I showed up for work again on Tuesday and put in my full day, but I noticed that I had a cough thrown in there that I hadn't had before. I had taken a sick day already in early February, so getting sick again would absolutely suck. But it's gone worse since. I've now taken two days off this week. I've coughed so hard in the few days I've seen stars. My chest is tight. I'm sucking down orange juice and chicken noodle soup like there is no tomorrow.

I'm going to try to get back to the office tomorrow, but my colleagues are kinda paranoid about catching things when one of us isn't feeling well, so I think they'd be just as happy if I didn't show up again.

I don't enjoy taking sick days. I actually get bored at home all day.

I have, however, seen a gazillion movies, some more memorable than others.

Taxi Driver: DeNiro as a young man was hot.
Reefer Madness: The Musical: Christian Campbell is hot. And it's a fun show.
Because I Said So: Except for the fact that almost all the credited men are quite easy on the eyes, the movie has no redeeming qualities whatsoever.
My Super Ex-Girlfriend: Cute premise, but horribly executed. I just felt nothing for Uma's character or for Luke Wilson's.

Meanwhile, I am also working on a work of short fiction which I plan to submit for publication in a gay magazine this summer. Wish me luck!

Weekend Escapades

2008-02-17T00:26:00.004-05:00

I was supposed to go to the Black Cat on Friday for some 80s party. Some of my friends were going to be there and I wanted to check it out because I'm an 80s dork. Then again, though, because it was the Black Cat, I figured we wouldn't be hearing Debbie Gibson and Roxette.

But in the end, of course, the best laid plans often fail. I had invited my friend Lorelai to go, but she had to stay late at work and didn't feel like making the trek out to the Cat. So I abandoned those plans completely in favor of just meeting up with her at a bar in Cleveland Park.

The place was the straightest bar I've been to in a long time. That really just speaks to me, not so much the bar, which I'm sure was standard hetero-fare. There was a time when I eschewed gay bars in general because all my friends seemed to be straight girlfriends so I ended up just hanging out with them at the straight bars. Then recently I made a new crop of gay friends so I found myself back at the gay bars surrounded by The Boys a lot.

But even when I was hanging with my straight girlfriends at straight bars, I don't think I've ever felt as out of place as I did at this bar. The male-female ratio was pretty even, but it felt ... different. I can't place it, but it did. But I was fine with it, 'cause I'm cool like that.

Lorelai and I met a cute guy at the bar. I don't think he's gay, but he seemed cool enough. We swapped business cards. I've emailed him, but he has yet to respond.

There are sooooo many reasons I want Alek to email me back at some point. I need the contact. (I'll leave that vague.)

Now that I have longer hair... I gotta let it down more often.

Birthday Brunch

2008-02-04T21:29:00.000-05:00

I made brunch for some friends a few weekends ago. (This is a delayed post because it took my lazy ass this long to pull the photos off my camera.)

That's eggs benedict, asparagus, potatoes, and bacon. By way of explanation (the eggs look funny), they're not on traditional English muffins, but spelt muffins with raisins. Oh, and that's prosciutto tucked under that.

Originally my plan called for stuffed French toast as well, but the Safeway ran out of Texas toast when I went to look for it. That sucked. Thankfully, there was so much food already that no one missed the French toast.

It took much longer than I thought it would. Here's a helpful hint: just watching cooking shows doesn't make you a speedy gourmet chef. And just because Sandra Lee can create an entire meal in half an hour, here's one word: editing.

In any event, the food did come out pretty well. It didn't hurt that we treated ourselves to mimosas too:

For dessert, a pudding parfait with bananas and raspberries:

Despite the fact that the rest of the meal took about an hour and a half to assemble, the pudding parfaits were the biggest hit. There was also a cinnamon crumb cake involved too.

It was also a slightly belated birthday gift to my friend L.:

See, if you make friends with me, you too could have a homemade breakfast on your birthday! (Provided you have a decent kitchen for me to work in.)

Way to Hit Your Target Audience.

2008-02-01T00:20:00.000-05:00

This guy's hawking Bowflex weight machines.

I hate him.

And that means I sure as hell don't want to buy a Bowflex because of him.

What's the worst part of him? Check him out at 1:44.

"I gave all my fat clothes to my fat friends."

Okay, you know what? It's great you lost that weight. But you're an asshole. If losing weight means you get an automatic entitlement to look down on your friends who aren't so hot and thin, then I don't want to be hot-like-you. Fuck you.

And then there's that other commercial (which I can't find on youtube) where the guy thinks he's hot shit because he's an older guy and he's finally in a rock band. No, really, that's his big thing. I just have to say, when you're 40 and your life's ambition is still to have girls throwing their panties at you because you're in a rock band and you have a rock band body, then you've got issues that giving yourself rock hard abs won't cure.

All I'm saying is, the spokespeople these guys pick really don't make me want to buy the product. At all.

Oh Yeah, Baby, Just Like That.

2008-01-10T18:48:00.000-05:00

Okay, a friend of mine posted this on my Facebook page recently.

I'll let you watch it before I dissect it.

Okay, you with me? Seriously, if the guy thought she was a girl, did he seriously think it would turn her on to lick his popsicle like that? Is that really a turn-on for women? "Oh yeah, man, you're so hot simulating oral sex on a guy. Now come have sex with me." Really, unless you're into guys who suck dick (as I am), I don't think that particular tack works very well.

And just for fun.

Still hot. And finally:

I need a towel now.

DVR Was Ruining My Life, Then the Writers Went on Strike

2008-01-09T16:16:00.000-05:00

In a way, I'm glad the Hollywood writers have gone on strike.

DVR was ruining my life. I was recording everything I was remotely interested in. And because many of those things were reruns that I couldn't filter out, I was recording a lot. For example, I've become addicted to Food Network, but most of their shows are old. They're new to me, but they're old. I can't tell the filter to not record stuff I've seen (the only options are "First run only" or "First run and repeats"), so I end up scheduling hours upon hours upon hours of shows.

With the DVR on as my constant standby, television programming was no longer a reason not to go out. Even though I had no "can't miss" shows in the pre-DVR days, there was always, in the back of my mind, the knowledge that if I attended a particular happy hour, it would be to the sacrifice of watching a particular show. No longer.

Indeed, I stopped watching live television altogether even when I was at home for it. Why watch live TV when you can watch the recording later and skip through the commercials? So now even if I'm home during a good television show, I'll delay watching it, instead watching something from my recorded list (43 minutes instead of an hour), and returning to the "live" show later.

It seriously got to the point where my Netflix queue was stagnant for about two months. I used to have a system where I'd watch all three of my Netflix DVDs every weekend, because they'd get replenished by the time the next weekend came around. Now, though, the sheer number of DVR'd shows I have to catch up on makes it difficult to make time to watch three DVDs on top of that. (Worse, these three DVDs are of television shows (Veronica Mars and Gilmore Girls to be exact), so each of those DVDs has run times of about 3 hours (4 episodes), as opposed to the usual 90 to 120 minutes.

So in a way, the writer's strike is kind of good. For me. It means fewer new shows are being recorded, which means substantially less for me to have to catch up on every week. (Unlike Paula Deen shows, for example, I had safely set my DVR to record only first-runs of Bionic Woman and Pushing Daisies.)

A part of me wonders, however, whether the strike is a bit self-defeating.

It's already been noted that the networks are turning to reality shows to fill the void of scripted shows. American Gladiators is returning, and an impromptu new season of Big Brother is starting, to name a few examples. And let's face it, a lot of the American public eats up all that crap with a silver spoon. (I'll readily admit that I was hooked on BB as well -- until it was clear that the Donatos would do really well, at which point my hatred for them both caused me to stop watching.) Game shows like Deal or No Deal and Power of 10 are also stepping up to fill the void, along with some new ones.

Because the American public seems more than content to watch "reality" shows, are the writers really making much of an impact by keeping new scripted television off the air? Or will America eventually become so content to watch "reality" shows that they won't care about the death of some of their favorite scripted shows? And when all the dust has cleared, might networks decide that the reality-to-scripted ratio is better when the scripted shows are limited, thus resulting in fewer opportunities for writers?

Just some thoughts that fleetingly pass through my mind. Just to prove that the Idiot Box hasn't completely dumbed me down yet.

... Or has it?

I am Officially Changing My Name to Rodney. Dangerfield.

2008-01-09T14:34:00.000-05:00

So last night was the first night of free bar poker in 2008. I anticipated going with a small mix of anticipation and dread, since (1) I had not been to a free poker night in weeks and I was starting feel some withdrawal; and (2) I did play poker at the Harrah's in New Orleans (did I ever blog about that?) and, well, that was disastrous.

Here's where I start getting technical. If you don't know Texas Hold 'Em, this may mean less to you than it would otherwise, but I'll try to keep it accessible.

I had managed to amass a decent amount of chips by getting a King-high flush within the first few hands that I played. Not a whole lot, but more than usual, and I was happy. But I had to make sure I was still being cautious, because I have this terrible tendency to think that because I have a lot of chips, I can do stupid things and get away with it.

No. Last night my bigger concern was with really bad cards, and a fucktard at my table who, while being perfectly amiable the entire time, seemed to have it out for me.

I got into another hand with decent pocket cards. I think they pocket 9's or something. I raised into the pot, hoping to drive my fellow players out. Instead, Fucktard, who had amassed a large number of chips already as well, called me.

The flop was pretty much crap: 2-5-7 or something. Nothing to help much, but I had the top pair, and basically I figured that this flop wouldn't help anything except really crappy pockets that no one would really care to keep. So I bet heavily into the pot, pretty much thinking that it would scare away anyone with a really crappy hand.

Fucktard was the only one who called me.

Here's something you need to realize in Texas Hold 'Em: when someone calls your sizable raise, they're trying to signal to you that they think they have a better hand than you do. At least informally at the games I've been playing at (I don't know if it's a poker-wide term), it's called respecting the bet when you beg off of a hand by folding to another player without having to run through the entire deal.

At the end of the hand, Fucktard won, showing his hole cards to be... 5-7 off suit.

Who the hell calls a raise when all you have is a 5-7 off suit?

In this case, the guy got extremely lucky to have hit two pair. I even called him on why he would stay in with a 5-7 off suit. His response: "I figured I had the chips, so why not?"

At that point I was still laughing it off, because hey, I can kind of see the logic to that. Still, I was wounded from the hand, but I was still doing decently enough to shrug that off.

A few deals later, the short stack at the table goes all in. In a round where the big blind is some $200, he bet $850. Given the play we'd already seen earlier, this is not a hugely substantial raise. Fucktard had already previously called the $200, now his choice was whether nor not to call the $650 it would take to play through this hand.

Fucktard folded. And this where I went ballistic.

"Woah woah, you'll call my raises with a 5-7 off suit, but you'll fold to this guy? What could you possibly have that was worse than that, and what happened to 'Why not, I have the chips?'"

Clearly, it was personal. Then I even called him a motherfucker. While laughing, of course, but still, the joke was, basically, "oh, so clearly you're just calling me, mothafucka." He laughed; I was less than 100% amused.

By this point I'm on tilt, but I don't care, because (a) it's free poker, and (b) I'd kinda rather play with people who are playing the game than with people who are treating it as, well, free poker. So the next chance I get, I'm determined to go for broke.

I get a A-Q unsuited. I raise into the pot, and Fucktard, explicitly announcing that since I've called it personal, he's calling.

The flop, again, has crap in it -- 4-7-9 or something, and I pushed all-in with my last $4,000. (That's a huge move at this point, but again, I no longer care.) Normally, a show of strength here would be sufficient to drive an opponent out, and my friends who have played with me before would probably have caved because I have a reputation for not doing that lightly.

Fucktard, of course, calls. No respect, I tell ya. None. He's AGS (I just made that up (I think); it stands for "ain't got shit"), but he'll call me just because he can, even if that reasoning is inapplicable to the other guys on the table.

What does he have? A 5-6.

Like, what the hell.

And, of course, he hits his 8 on the river, giving him a straight.

And I take my leave.

No respect, I tell ya. I don't know why I keep playing this damned game. I love it, but holy canoli, it treats me like a beaten mistress.

I'll be back there again next week. And odds are very, very good that I will avoid as much as humanly possible being on the same table with Fucktard again.

Pee.

2008-01-08T17:05:00.000-05:00

My office bathrooms are a shared set on the floor. At least three different offices are on my floor, each of which, apparently, has its fair share of men.

Men who have never learned to urinate properly.

Our lone urinal (in addition to the two stalls) is a manual flusher. Both stalls, as well as the sinks, are automatic. The urinal used to be automatic too, but for some reason they replaced that with a manual over a year ago. I guess it was either flushing too much, or not enough. I forget which.

Not that it helped, because apparently people simply aren't flushing the urinal as often as they should.

The other day I walked in there and found the a nicely laser-printed sign over the urinal:

"If you flush at home, please flush here too. THANK YOU"

The sign was gone the next day, which is sad, because I really wanted to write in an addendum after it that would have read: "Also, if you could work a little harder on your aim, that would be really cool too." Because, really, it was kinda gross that day I went.

***

So in composing this entry I googled "urinal." Here are some of the cooler shots that come up on the first page.

I would never have thought of urinals as a way to express such creativity....

Apathy

2008-01-07T21:56:00.000-05:00

I can't seem to get myself even remotely roused about the primaries. I can't be the only one.

It's been all over the news lately, and I can't seem to get myself to read the articles and listen to the pundits. Obama won the Iowa caucuses? Eh. Huckabee? Well, a little worrisome, but not something I feel like investing a huge amount of stress over.

In terms of Democrats, I'm inclined to just let other people pick the nominee. I've mentioned before that I don't think Senator Clinton would be a smart choice -- and I haven't changed my mind that that effect -- but she does seem to be someone whom enough Democrats love that perhaps they'll make it to the polls in enough numbers to overcome far-right opposition. And another part of me is ready to just believe that eight years of idiocracy has left a large portion of the electorate very, very ready to change vote for a Democratic White House.

Likewise, I can't bring myself to consider the Republican field to figure out who's more/most scary. With the exception of Ron Paul, they all seem to doing a pretty poor job of walking the delicate line between appealing to the mainstream and satisfying their base. I guess with the tide of gay marriage having ebbed a bit, there's less red meat to feed to the rabid right.

But then in the end, I kinda no longer care.

Could it be W. fatigue? That de-sensitization that comes from eight years of complete ineptitude such that one really thinks it's just impossible to get worse? I'm thinking I might just want any new White House occupant now, Republican or Democrat -- when even Republicans start distancing themselves from the positions espoused by the incumbent, well, there's no way to go but up. Right?

Or maybe I'm just in a prolonged bad mood.

Deja Vu: Deductibles

2008-01-02T15:34:00.000-05:00

The worst thing about a new year is the fact that prescription medication deductibles get reset. I could almost verbatim repost this entry from this time last year here today, because almost the exact same thing happened to me just now.

Some minor changes to the script:

-- GBTC became Lady Behind the Counter, and she's not all that attractive.

-- I picked up three prescriptions, instead of two.

-- The cost was $130, rather than $120.

-- LBTC pointed out that I had $3 in ExtraCare Bucks, rather than $2.50.

Why is it that when I spend over $100 at the CVS, the checkout person seems compelled to point out that I have received a rebate of about 3%? Really, is that supposed to make me feel better? If I'm going to spend that kind of money, I'd really much prefer to spend it on, say, a WII, or a nice spa treatment, or perhaps anyone one of the wonderful toys in the amazon.com wishlist, posted in my right-side sidebar here (which readers are encouraged to peruse and, well, use for its intended purpose).

I kinda miss the cute GBTC. Strange, no?

I suppose I should take some solace in the fact that three medicines only cost me $10 more than the two I got last year. I think it's because I quite possibly paid the entire deductible off just now within the first 48 hours of the new year.

But I think not.

Welcome to my new year.

Sugar Bowl: Ouch.

2008-01-01T23:25:00.001-05:00

I am not a sports fan.

I like live sporting events pretty much only when someone can score me free tickets, or cheap ones (usually in nosebleed seats). I watch games on television when I'm with friends who know better, so they can explain to me not only what's going on, but the history of the team(s). I watch March Madness, but usually only after it gets to the Round of 16.

The weekend before Christmas, I took a last-minute trip to New Orleans, just for fun. It turns out we were there during the New Orleans Bowl. My friend and I were wondering about all these people wearing their Memphis clothes everywhere. We soon found out why. Of course, they lost to Florida Atlantic.

More importantly, though, I noticed a few flags for the University of Hawai'i flying on Bourbon Street. Why?, I wondered, since you don't usually seem much of good ol' UH down in New Orleans.

I soon found out. Hawai'i faced the Georgia Bulldogs in the Sugar Bowl this year.

Had I known, I might have considered staying in the city for the holiday just to check out the game.

My cousin (at school in New Orleans) texted me to tell me that there were tons of Hawai'i fans who had made the trek to New Orleans just to see their team in action. Hawai'i sports fans are an enthusiastic bunch, that's for sure. I kinda miss the whole "aloha spirit" thing; immersing myself in a sea of people with Hawaiian accents might have been fun.

I texted my cousin back: "Go Bows!" Of course I had forgotten that the team name changed from the Rainbow Warriors to just the Warriors back in 2001. I seem to recall that I had visited Hawai'i at around that time, and part of the controversy was that the "rainbow" in "Rainbow Warriors" was a little too gay for the coach. This, of course, strikes me as completely retarded. But oh well.

Anyway, it's unfortunate that the game isn't anywhere near as competitive as it could be. I always like to see my home state do well. I wish they had managed to pull it together better for this game.

But it's cool that they made it there at all. And I'm glad so many Hawai'i residents made the trek to support their team.

Oh, and I have to do it. Colt Brennan is a cutie.

Happy New Year!

2008-01-01T00:01:00.000-05:00

Controlled Spontaneity, and This is Why My Family Hates Me.

2007-12-21T01:56:00.000-05:00

Two, two, two posts in one!

<><><>

Picture it, Christmas party, December 9. December 9, people. That's like 12 days ago.

Random conversations abound, and I'm flitting back and forth between a few of them. Eventually, I approach my friends Ann and some other friends. Without having to say a word, Ann turns to me and says, "So, want to go to Mexico for Christmas?"

I stop for second.

"Sure," I tell her.

Turns out the conversation before I arrived was along the lines of Ann saying "I want to get away for a little bit for the holiday. Just a quick trip." And then I showed up.

For my part, I haven't left this city since my Provincetown vacation last July. I'm itching for a vaca. And given the season, well, I had the time. And my credit cards will hurt, but oh well.

We did about three days of research before we ruled out any destination in Mexico. No to Acapulco, Cancun, and any of those other cool (warm) touristy cities. We opted instead for either New Orleans or Miami.

Almost without trying, we settled on New Orleans. Cajun food, casinos, non-stop drinking... in the bag. We found hotels rooms for under $100 and airfare for a reasoanble price.

I swear this is the first time I've ever booked a flight less than 14 days before the departure date.

The feeling of spontaneity was exhilirating. I've always said I wanted to wake up one day and say, "I'm doing something big," but this is so far the closest I've come. Let's just call it a controlled spontaneity. Not quite 24-hour spur-of-the-moment, but definitely less advanced notice than one is used to having to plan for.

I leave this morning. I'm horribly excited.

<><><>

I'm also unacceptably bad with my own familial relations. I'm an awful person and I hate myself for that.

Quick background: My mother is one of a dozen children, which means my generation of cousins is tremendous. We range in age from 45 to something like 9. It takes me about 5 minutes to go through each aunt/uncle to count up the number of children each of them has. It's crazy.

Of course, this also means it's a little difficult to keep track of all of them. Many of them were born well after I reached adulthood, meaning I've really never met them. When I went to college I moved quite far from home -- and thus pretty far from all of my family -- which somewhat further disconnects me from my family.

So how does this relate to this post? I had this trip to New Orleans planned for about nine days... and had completely forgotten that my cousin Jay lives in New Orleans now. He's finishing up medical school at Tualne. He's freaking 25 years old. He makes me feel totally old.

Of course I love my family. But it's so hard for me to keep up with them. And I feel like a total tool for being excited about this New Orleans trip for over a week without it ever even crossing my mind that I have kin down there and that it would be criminal for me to go there without having drinks or dinner with him.

Thankfully, I found his number and texted him my travel plans and asked him if he'd be available. He said he would, and I now totally look forward to catching up with him.

New Orleans here I come!

Why Not?

2007-12-16T21:49:00.000-05:00

I walked by a homeless person on my way to the grocery store tonight. She asked me for some change. As I usually do, I politely refused by shaking my head and holding open an empty palm.

I passed by her again on the way home.

She: Spare some change?
Me: No, sorry. [Shaking head and holding out open palm]
She: Why not?

Huh? Did she really say "Why not?" I hate to break it to you, lady, but I owe you positively no excuses for my decision not to do something that's wholly my choice to make. There are probably millions of reasons I could have chosen not to give you any of my money. Let's list some of them, just for fun:

- I don't have much money of my own
- I don't like panhandlers
- I give "at the office"
- I don't give to street panhandlers
- I don't like you
- I prefer to give directly to charities
- I think you're probably some lazy ass who should get a real job
- I just spent my money
- I am a Scrooge, and proud of it
- What the hell have you done for me to deserve any of money at all?
- I don't give money to people wearing blue hats
- The little green martians told me not to, and I obey their every suggestion
- A homeless person once bit my leg, so now I avoid them at all costs

What do all of the items on that list have in common? No, not "it's the truth," because I don't actually subscribe to all of the reasons listed there. The one characteristic shared by every single item on that list is that each one is perfectly valid reason for me to have chosen not to give you any money, lady.

"Why not?" I have my reasons.

My Language, or I Just Had a Margaret Cho Moment

2007-12-16T21:29:00.000-05:00

This conversation actually occurred at my local Whole Foods earlier tonight. Really, I don't make these things up.

I approached the cashier with my purchases and loaded them onto her platform. She started ringing up my purchases, and then:

She: How are you?
Me: Fine, thanks. You?
She: Fine.

[Wait for it.]

She: Paper or plastic? Hey, how do you say 'paper or plastic' in your language?

[And there it is. I momentarily lost the power of speech.]

Me (internal): Did she...?
Me (external): Wha...?
She: How do you say 'paper or plastic' in your language?

[Oh no she di'n't! Except that, well, yes, she did. She actually repeated it.]

Me (internal): Are people actually still like this?
Me (external): Uh, you mean, in English?

[I didn't see the need to go through a long explanation that, despite my facial features, "my language" is English. Shamefully, my Chinese skills have deteriorated dramatically in the past ten years. Sadly, I'm better at French and Spanish -- hell, even Italian -- than I am in Chinese.]

She: Oh. I thought... no, I really thought you were from...
Me (internal): Please don't. You'll only hang yourself.
She: I don't even know where.
Me (internal): That's a pretty good dial-back. I'm glad you didn't actually try to guess what Asian country I'm from.
Me (external): [nervous laughter]

I was immediately taken back to Margaret Cho's routine I'm The One That I Want. Part of her routine talked about an exchange during the run of her (short-lived) show All-American Girl. A local television station (I forget where) had just switched over to an ABC affiliate, and she was talking to a reporter.

Reporter: Why don't you tell our viewers, in your native language, that we're switching over to an ABC affiliate?
Margaret Cho: [looks into camera] They're switching to an ABC affiliate.

That's me. Know how I say "paper or plastic" in my native language? "Paper or plastic."

Zzzz....

2007-12-16T19:20:00.000-05:00

Am I the only one who is seriously disturbed by this little caveat calmly thrown into a commercial for Lunesta, a sleep aid drug?

"Call your doctor right away if after taking Lunesta you walk, drive, eat, or engage in other activities while asleep."

Seriously, what the hell? Sleep-driving? That scares the crap out of me.

Virtual Networking

2007-12-13T17:40:00.001-05:00

It seems like only yesterday that my friends insisted that I get a myspace page. "It's so much fun!" they told me.

"I'm not 16 and in high school!" I protested.

"No, seriously," my 25-and-over friends repeated. "It's fun, you should join."

So join I did. And I quickly linked up with the friends whom I knew were there. Then I branched out and found more friends of my own, people who I didn't even know had myspace accounts.

At first I vowed only to have "friends" as myspace friends and not clutter up my page with all kinds of random, stupid friends. That resolution quickly got tossed, and I started linking up with random bands, just to keep up with their tour dates. Then other more indie people would find me by noticing who I was friends with, and they'd ask me to friend them (it's a verb, you see) too. That's kind of how I got turned on to Ryan Huston (great voice, doesn't hurt that he's very easy on the eyes) and Royal American. Then I just started friending my favorite bands just to be able to keep track of their tour dates, in case I was ever actually able to go.

Then slowly, my closest friends started getting too busy to log on to myspace with any frequency. So where posting random silly comments was one of the most fun things you do on myspace, such frivolity rapidly curtailed itself. I started to bore of myspace.

Then some people (not myspace people) told me I'd have to sign on to Facebook.

"Uh, I'm not some 20 year old college student," I protested.

"No, seriously," my 25-and-over friends repeated. "It's fun, you should join."

And the cycle begins anew.

Most of my myspace friends are not on facebook. But facebook has all these mini-feeds and stuff on them that makes it so much more dynamic. You can see all kinds of things that other people doing. Most of them goofy, but some of them pretty fun. I happened to find a high school classmate on there -- who knows two of my close friends. What a small world.

Oh, and you can play a Scrabble-ish game on there, as well as poker. And some stupid cute little game called Diverman.

Strangely, given that these are "social networking sites," I haven't actually met anyone off of these sites that I didn't know already.

Me to Gift Horse: Say Aaah.

2007-12-10T23:11:00.001-05:00

I got an early holiday gift from a girlfriend of mine recently. (I say "holiday" gift because she's Jewish. This means that technically I was late in giving her a holiday gift. But then she went out of town, so it's all good.)

Anyway, so I got this gift. I don't have a tree, so I really have no place to store unopened gifts, so... well, I just open my gifts as I receive them. It's much simpler that way.

So anyway, what she got me was awesome! Great gift, perfect, timely, definitely something I'll read and use. I was totally excited when I tore open the wrapping.

Inside the front cover: a receipt. At first, I figured it was a gift receipt. But it wasn't. It was an actual receipt.

And the book was $4.99.

I'm torn. On one hand, it really is a pretty cool book and I like it. On the other, it cost five frigging dollars! I know it's the thought that counts, but wow.

Worse yet, I have no idea what I'm going to get for her now knowing that she didn't spend all that much on my gift.

"Bad Financial Choices," They Say

2007-12-06T13:52:00.001-05:00

WaPo today reports that the government has brokered an agreement to freeze interest rates for those homeowners who risk foreclosure under the whole sub-prime mortgage crisis.

Proponents argue that this is a great idea, and would stave off tons of foreclosures. Critics -- labeled "conservative" by WaPo -- say the plan "amounts to a bailout of people who made bad financial decisions."

On some level, I can understand the criticism: people bought their houses knowing their payments would balloon after a certain amount of time; they took that risk; it's tough cookies that they can't now afford it. It's not much different from getting a fixed-rate mortgage knowing that your income stream was going to severely plummet a few years down the road.

But where I hit a philosophical problem is this: these people are in trouble, and these conservative critics would just as soon toss these people out on their butts than do anything to help them. Where are these people supposed to live? Do you really think apartments will be willing to rent to them if their credit history reflects a foreclosure?

More importantly, the critics here cite "bad financial decisions" on the part of the owners and would just as soon leave them to their own devices. But then I end up asking the same question I'd ask of conservatives who advocate for privatizing Social Security: what happens to those among us who make bad decisions?

Social Security was meant to be a safety net, allowing people at least some amount of money upon retirement (admittedly, not a whole lot). Privatizing Social Security -- under this whole "it's my money, dammit!" rubric -- means that instead of people putting into the system and getting back something come retirement time, people would keep their money and "invest" it.

But what of people who "invest" the money unwisely? Sounds like we'd find conservatives saying to their 68-year-old grandparents, "hey, you stopped contributing to SS taxes long ago. That money didn't grow for you? Too damn bad."

You know we as a society would never do that. We'd have to provide them with assistance. So again, really, we'd be "bailing out people who made bad financial choices."

And if the solution to this apparent conflict is pointing to the fact that even privatizing Social Security provides a floor so that seniors can't squander all their money, then... well, why is that any different from Social Security in the first place?

Rav-i-no-li

2007-12-06T01:06:00.000-05:00

I tried to make some ravioli tonight. It was a dry run of something I was planning to take to a party this weekend. I thought I was becoming some master cook or something, adept at the ways of food.

I was wrong.

And just because I am a glutton for idiocy, I will tell you just how stupid I was, so that real master chefs out there can tell me just how big of an idiot I am.

I had some egg pasta sheets in my fridge and I needed to make an appetizer for this party. So I had this thought that I would cut the sheets up into the right shapes and fill them with fruit flavors like raspberry jam or something. Then I thought that instead of boiling the ravioli (like one normally would), I would fry them. Breaded.

Does that sound good? It sounded good in my head. The execution was a whole different matter.

First failed attempt: I cut the sheets into square for purposes of folding them into triangles with filling. It didn't even make it to the breading stations. The pasta was so brittle that it kept cracking whenever I tried to fold it.

Second failed attempt: Perhaps if I boiled the pasta first before filling it then frying it, it would come out better. That failed because (1) the pasta started breaking before I even removed it from the water, or (2) if I got it out of the water intact, it broke as I tried to stuff it -- this time because it was just too soft.

Third failed attempt: In a stroke of genius, I broke out the little round cookie cutters I had just purchased from the Whole Foods a few weeks ago on a whim. I would cut the pasta sheets into little rounds, I figured, then layer one on top of the other. This would prevent anything from breaking prematurely. Finally, I managed to assemble the ravioli and get them through the egg-wash-and-breading process. I heated some canola oil in a frying pan and started tossing the breaded ravioli in.

That was strike number three. Oh, and by the way, I used a cookie shape that was just too large. I couldn't taste the fruit filling at all. The ravioli was terrible. (Perhaps some confectioner's sugar sprinkled on top would have helped, but I seriously doubt it.)

In short, it tasted like crap. I will not be making this for this party this weekend.

Thankfully, I formulated a backup plan while I was grocery shopping, and picked up a few tins of Pillsbury Crescent Rolls. Now instead of little mini-ravioli filled with a fruit flavor of some sort, I will be bringing crescent rolls dressed with fruit filling (and raisins).

Well, I'm taking that, and some lemon bars and creamy onion canapes. I love Paula Deen.

I need a better kitchen. And some actual skills.

Geek Love

2007-12-04T01:41:00.001-05:00

I have a whole new wonderful celebrity crush.

I'd been avoiding Iron Chef America for a while now. It never really interested me, frankly, because speed-cooking is not something I cared about. As of a few months ago, cooking was something I barely cared about, let alone speed cooking.

Then I got addicted to Giada de Laurentiis and Paula Deen, and, well, Food Network in general. The fact that I can even speak competently about some of these television personalities, comparing and contrasting their cooking styles and kitchen demeanor, speaks volumes about that particular change with me.

So how could I resist when I found out that Giada de Laurentiis was going to be on Iron Chef (working against Rachel Ray, whom I'm far less excited about). On top of that, on another episode, Paula Deen competed as well. I love those two women -- how could I not watch those episodes.

You know how they say you show up for one thing and fall in love with another.

My new celebrity food crush is Alton Brown.

Alton is not what I could generally call "hot." Sometimes he's kinda cute on his show, but in general, I'm not at all sure he'd turn my head if I walked past him on the street. At least in terms of physical appearance.

But listening to him serve as the primary host/commentator on Iron Chef truly takes the cake (no food pun intended). What makes him sexy is not the way he looks, though it doesn't hurt. What makes him super-sexy is the fact that he's so freaking smart. The fact that he's able to pull from such a vast array of food knowledge from nowhere so he can provide such rapid-fire -- and if you haven't seen the show, I really do mean rapid-fire -- during the show is incredible. Without saying a word, the chefs just launch into their work. They start cutting and chopping and frying and mixing almost without a word, and all it takes is Alton watching them, observing what they're putting into their pots, and coming up with precisely what these chefs are doing. Being able to pull from the top of his head the "classic" elements of certain dishes just from the very beginning of the chef's work.

His comments are truly amazing.

(If someone comments that he's really being fed this information from Google during the show, I will never speak to you again.)

And they're intoxicatingly sexy. He's like the Tim Gunn of food. They're both smart and articulate and able to command such a vast degree of specialized knowledge off the tops of their heads.

Knowledge is power, y'all. I'd carry their children.

Karma-22

2007-12-03T19:08:00.000-05:00

I often find myself wishing and hoping that someone, somewhere, of whatever deific persuasion, is keeping tabs on me for the many times I find myself generously resisting my baser impulses.

I casually mentioned (over GoogleTalk, 'natch) to a friend of mine just now the fact that GoogleTalk now offer GroupTalk -- kinda like a conference call on IM. His response: "Yeah. So what. Who actually uses that anyway?" I refrained from telling him that he dragged me into several group IM conversations several years ago, albeit back on MSN messenger.

Similarly, remember my friend who chastized me for not sending timely thank you notes three hours after I received a birthday gift? I totally bit my tongue with him too.

This past weekend I had dinner with a friend Lisa. She tends to blab a lot, monopolizing conversation, even to the point of interrupting my thoughts as they come out of my mouth. (I don't think she means to, but she does.) She's done this for years. I have never called her on it.

My brother is annoyed at the fact that I have Answer Call on my cell phone (the caller hears a song rather than the sound of my line ringing). The last message he left me was "Dude, you really need to change that feature. It's annoying." I want to tell him to suck it. I know that I won't.

These are relatively petty things, and things I know one really shouldn't score karmic points for, but I kinda hope they're building up somewhere. I hope they're sitting there alongside holding the elevator door open for bitches who don't even acknowledge the effort and telling the hot-dog guy that he gave me too much change. Small stuff that adds up, you know?

The problem, of course, is that once you sit there and hope that your good acts are going to pay you back somehow, you've removed yourself from the realm of pure altruism and relegated yourself to the selfish standard: doing good because you hope it comes back to you. Booma-booma-boomarang.

But I can't help it: I do still hope that those times I've volunteered at a soup kitchen help make up for the fact that I never give panhandlers money. I hope that my being the designated driver at a party helps make up for the times I've been an obnoxious boor to random strangers at a bar. And I hope that for all the times I overlook over people's faults because I want to give them the benefit of my good graces, I hope others are willingly granting me that same leeway.

They tell me the energy you send out to the universe is what you get back, in spades.

Here's hoping only the positive vibes I send are susceptible to magnification.

Lawyering on Demand

2007-11-29T09:23:00.000-05:00

I've decided that I want to shoot the guy who first came up with whole "If you have a phone, you have a lawyer" tagline.* Because it's stupid shit like that that makes my life just that much more annoying.

I work in a very small law office. There are not many lawyers here and therefore we can't justify a huge support staff. And that means that, from time to time, we lawyers have to answer the phone, like when the receptionist is busy on another call.

Trust me, when I'm busy doing other work -- billable work -- talking to a random person who thinks they "might" have a claim is the last thing I want to do.

First of all, far too often there's an expectation that I'll dispense free legal advice over the phone. Once they spill out the facts of their situation -- usually a long a drawn out process -- they'll demand that I immediately tell them that they have a case. Guess what: that's not my call. And even if it were, why would I tell you? If I tell you that you've got a case, nothing prevents you from then running to another firm and hiring them. And seeing as you haven't paid me for the time I spent listening to you and telling you that you have a case... well that pretty screws me and my firm.

I simply do not understand how it is that people feel like they have the right to pick up a phone and get immediate access to free legal advice from private firms like mine. I have to earn my keep here; that means working on client projects that actually generate money. The time I spend listening to you blather on, as well as the time I spend thinking about your case to come to a reasoned conclusion about the merits of your situation, is time I could spend doing other paid work. It's a simple function of economics: the time I spend listening to you is likely to generate no return whatsoever. That's why I usually refer you to an assistant who will listen patiently to you, take down notes about your situation, then bring them back to the attorneys for later evaluation.

Now, just because this is a small firm ("Law Offices of Joe Schmo"), why do you think you can pick up the phone and say "I'd like to talk to Mr. Schmo, please."? Really, do you think Mr. Schmo does nothing with his time but sit around and wait to dump free advice onto random callers? He's busy. The lawyers are busy. That's why they have support staff to answer the phones. It would be pretty silly to have them there answering phones if they then really only had to push them over to the Big Guy, now wouldn't it? Think of it this way: Sullivan and Cromwell is a rather large firm in DC. I'm pretty sure that no one ever picks up phone and demands to speak with Mr. Sullivan or Mr. Cromwell unless and until they've established a prior working relationship with them (or unless they're personal acquaintances).

Plus, let's face it, more often than not your case isn't anywhere near as strong as you think it is. I once had someone call and tell me she knew "for a fact" that she had a case. Not knowing anything about her matter, I was ready to lay odds that she was full of shit. Another person called this morning demanding to speak to a lawyer because she had an urgent need for one. Sorry, but I can't drop everything for you right now -- kinda busy. Talk to the hand.

So stop with this whole "entitlement to a lawyer" thing. You don't have one (at least not in a civil case). Just because you have a phone does NOT mean you have a lawyer. This society is too damn over-litigious anyway.

* DISCLAIMER: I do not literally want to shoot him. I just want to inflict serious bodily harm upon him.**

** FURTHER DISCLAIMER: This, too, is not true. But I think you get my point by now.***

*** STILL FURTHER DISCLAIMER: Just in case any lawyers out there get any stupid ideas, no, I am not encouraging or forecasting unlawful or illegal action against this person. I'm just writing a damn blog post expressing some frustration. Seriously, get over it.

If I Had a Million Dollars....

2007-11-27T22:20:00.000-05:00

I have a special rapport with the guy who sells me lottery tickets. Not that we tried to develop one. I was just being goofy. I keep giving him shit for never selling me winning tickets. (If I win at all, it's something like $3. Which is stupid when I've spent something like $10.)

With the Powerball up to $155 million for tomorrow's drawing, I popped in to purchase $5 worth of tickets. Another customer was in there at the time. The following exchanges occurred after I finished my transaction:

Other Guy [to Lottery Guy]: How much is the Powerball up to for tomorrow?
Lottery Guy: 155 million.
Other Guy: Hm, maybe it's worth it for me to get some then...
Me: Don't you dare buy tickets if it means that I'll have that much more competition to win!*
Other Guy: [laughs]
Me [to Lottery Guy]: Seriously though, dude, if you sell this guy the winning ticket and I get squat, I will cut you!
Other Guy: Yeah man, sell me the winning ticket.
Me: Dude, if he wins, I will cut you.
Lottery Guy: I don't really care which one of you wins it, if one of you does, I still get $100,000.**
Me: Dude, if he wins, you could have $100,000, but then you'd still be cut.

Then we laughed and I left the place.

But if someone else wins the jackpot with a winning ticket from that store, I will never ever go there again. At least not without a switchblade.

* I realize this does not make sense, because there's no guaranteed winner for any drawing, but I just wanted to make a stink.

** Apparently lottery vendors get little prizes for having sold large winning lottery tickets.

Check Me Out!

2007-11-27T13:43:00.001-05:00

Dear Random Lady at the CVS:

Hi.

I wanted to write an open letter to you briefly after I observed you this afternoon at my local CVS. I had gone in near around lunch time to make a quick purchase a roll of aluminum foil and a birthday card.

I noticed you were in the process of using the self checkout kiosk. Those things are cool, aren't they? Kinda sorta fun to use, until they get all HAL 9000 on your ass. And yet sometimes they're great, and they allow you to avoid having to interact with an actual human being (which I'll admit, at that CVS is sometimes a dicey proposition).

See, here's the thing though: usually self checkouts are supposed to allow you to finish your transaction faster than if you had to deal with a real person.

You didn't have the same problems I did with the machine. In fact, from what I can tell, you had finished scanning your items before I even stood in line. Thankfully for me, I noticed that the line in front of this one checkout lady was only one person deep, so I stood there instead of behind you.

Lady, was it really that difficult for you to finish your transaction? Good gravy, I literally was halfway done with my transaction (slow checkout lady and everything!) while you were still at that machine! I noticed you fumbling around to try to sign the little pad (obviously you used a credit card -- I'm going to venture to guess that you didn't have the card anywhere near out and ready when you approached the kiosk in the first place, just to speed things up), then you spend something like two minutes tucking things away in your purse and gathering up your things. How many things did you manage to accumulate that you had to gather them up? Did you even notice that there was a guy behind you in line -- who only wanted a freaking Coke, for Pete's sake -- who was waiting on you while you just stood there like an idiot?

The self checkout kiosk has a functional purpose. It's meant to be used. And it cannot be used by more than one person at a time. Get in, finish your business, and promptly leave. It's not like you're in the aisle pondering your decision about which shampoo to purchase -- people can walk around you in that instance. But in this one, you are actually a colossal waste of space.

In and out, people. It's not that hard. If you're going to waste that much time in front of the kiosk anyway, you may as well interact with a human cashier.

Happy (Belated) Thanksgiving

2007-11-25T18:49:00.000-05:00

Hope everyone reading this had a great Thanksgiving. Really, both of you.

I was given Wednesday and Friday off from work, so really it's been the shortest week ever. This is good and bad for me, because when I get into a goof-off mindset, it's harder for me to snap out of it. Going back to work tomorrow is going to suck. Hard.

(PS: Random pet peeve: I hate it when people refer to Thanksgiving as "Turkey Day." I guess I'm a sap in that I do still enjoy looking back on Thanksgiving and thinking just a little bit about my blessings and things to be, well, thankful for. I feel like calling it "Turkey Day" devalues that sentiment and turns the holiday into nothing but its material tradition. It's the same as if we had collectively changed the name of Christmas to "Presents Day.")

Thanksgiving dinner went okay. I helped make the bird, and the stuffing, and some pie. All in all, it came out pretty well. My friends continue to annoy me, but oh well. In the words of Ouiser Boudreaux -- "I've been in a very bad mood for the past forty years." Okay, not forty years, but hey. I've been in a bad mood for a while, and I feel bad, but I'm trying to snap out of it.

So, what to be thankful for this year. Basically, the same things I've been thankful for for years now: a great set of friends, a decent apartment, a decent job. Just this year I emerged from long-term credit card debt (yay!) and picked up a lead on a new job. Even if I don't get that new job, I have exciting new plans and prospects. I've got more than a lot of other people and I need to focus on that silver lining that says there's a lot I should be happy for.

Life is pretty good.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

I am Turning Into Martha Stewart

2007-11-21T18:22:00.000-05:00

I am so addicted to the Food Network it's not even funny. For a guy whose kitchen sucks, and whose culinary skills are marginal at best, I am making a huge go at trying to my hand whenever I get a chance.

For time to time, I volunteer to go over and make dinner for my friends Jason and Jessica. They have a nicer kitchen and more supplies. I provide some of the labor and try to come up with a decent, and decent-looking, meal. It's all about presentation.

I feel so gay when I do that.

Tomorrow promises to be the ultimate challenge, though. I have somehow managed to volunteer to make the turkey for Thanksgiving dinner with some friends. I got the turkey recipe off of Food Network. I am also planning on making a green bean casserole and homemade stuffing.

What the hell have I gotten myself into?

If I don't post tomorrow, Happy Thanksgiving all.

Why Do I Do These Things to Myself?!

2007-11-20T00:58:00.000-05:00

Okay, so two posts ago I blogged about what I thought was the grossest video I have ever seen. I enjoy the reaction videos because, well, it was fun to watch everyone else get all grossed out. And it doesn't get old -- if I were to watch it again I would puke all over again.

Then I watched this reaction video, starring Michael Buckley on his YouTube video blog What the Buck:

(He does two video blogs. He's hilarious and fun and totally gay. You should totally subscribe.)

If you haven't seen the "2 Girls" video yet, he describes the video pretty well, so don't listen too long if you don't want to know what's in that nasty video.

Why am I blogging about this again?

Because I am an idiot.

I read through a very brief portion of the comments posted to Buckley's post, and found reference to another site.

Another site, which I stupidly enough had to check out.

You thought "2 Girls 1 Cup" was bad. "2 Girls 1 Finger" is pretty gut-wrenching too, and definitely not in a Terms of Endearment sort of way.

Words

2007-11-18T23:42:00.000-05:00

Okay, just a quick gripe.

It's JEW-EL-RY, people, not "jew-le-ry".

It's REAL-TOR, people, not "re-lah-tor".

And Mr. President (and everyone else who uses the word), it's NEW-CLEAR, not "nu-cue-ler".

I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For... The Grossness of It All.

2007-11-17T00:45:00.001-05:00

Where the hell have I been? I just watched Best Week Ever and heard about this viral video that's so nasty that most public-access file-sharing platforms have yanked it. So of course I went to look for it.

BWE was quite vague about what this video was and, in fact, would even provide a clip name so I could do a google search to find the video. My curiosity having spiked to huge levels, I knew I had to find it.

I started on the mother of all video websites, YouTube (natch) and did a quick search. BWE had indicated that it was disgusting (which is why, thankfully, VH1 declined to air it), and that it involved two girls, so that's the search I did. BWE also indicated that it was so viral that now the reaction videos -- videos of people reacting to watching the video -- were as popular as the video itself.

And they were right.

My search on YouTube was for "disgusting two girls" and immediately turned up pages and pages of reaction videos but no actual video. (This is when I first realized that YouTube would not be hosting this video.) Anxious to find it still, I google searched it.

Naturally, the one reliable link I could find for it was on Perez Hilton. I won't link to it here just because it's so... but I will do you the honor of telling you what the name of the clip is: "Two Girls One Cup." There. Have at it.

Have a vomit bag ready because I really was ready to hurl at several points in the video. No, I did not watch the whole thing all the way through. I spent most of the thirty-second video with my eyes squeezed shut.

I will say this, though: The reaction vids really are pretty funny. (If you do watch these videos, some of them will pretty much give away what happens in the video itself.)

Some guy who "turns gay" as a result:

Some random person's mom -- I think she threw up in the kitchen sink after:

Another person's mom:

Blonde dude cracks me up more than anything:

(First guy has a kinda cute smile but mediocre bod.)

I can't tell if this guy really puked or just half dry-heaved:

I love this one. And the boys are pretty hot:

I don't think this guy made it:

Two poor innocent unsuspecting women:

("Just watch the whole video," he says. "It's not that long," he says. What he doesn't say is that it's the nastiest 30 seconds ever.)

These guys are kinda cute... even if one of them does toss his cookies:

(The sadism of the cameraman is hilarious too.)

Even goth/stoner/skater dudes are grossed out (or maybe it's just that they're German):

I think it turned this chick on:

(I think it gave them an idea and they had to turn off the camera to go try it.)

Bandana boy is kinda cute:

I don't know why I'm still so amused by these reactions:

I love that this video is letterboxed. Letterboxed, people!:

Dude says he's throwing up in his mouth. Little does he know what's coming up:

Okay, I'll admit it, now I'm just looking for cute boys reacting to the vid:

I love the boy in the hoodie -- and his accent is adorable:

Kinda grainy, but still funny:

These guys don't actually start watching it until over a minute into the video:

Okay, this has to be the last one or I will seriously be up all night watching this shit:

(Literally.)

New Dinosaur

2007-11-15T17:34:00.000-05:00

A paleontologist at the University of Chicago, Paul Sereno, has unveiled his discovery of a new dinosaur, one that was more bovine in character and goes against the archetypical view that dinosaurs were tall, majestic carnivores. This one appears to have spent its life with its head hunched down, enabling to eat vegetation from a few feet off the ground. Apparently its teeth were formed in such a way as to make this kind of chomping easy too.

It's being called the Nigerasurus taqueti, or just Nigerasuraus.

I'm just waiting for the for the hue and cry that will surely burst forth that this name is racist.

Suspicious Minds

2007-11-15T15:16:00.000-05:00

I know in this day and age there's this heightened awareness with respect to both national security and personal security and all. I know I bought a personal shredder at home just to get rid of credit card offers, for example. But is there a point where one's cynicism just goes too far?

The other day DC Blogs highlighted a site that I thought was kinda fun: Free Rice. It appeals to so many parts of me: wanting to help other people, not being to get up off my fat ass to do so, and dorking out over vocab words.

If you didn't bother to click over to Free Rice, let me give you a quick summary of its content. Really, all it is is an elaborate vocabulary quiz. The twist: for each word that one can correctly define, "they" will donate 10 grains of rice to the United Nations World Food Program. Seems to me like a win-win: test your knowledge of 50-cent words (or learn some: "picaroon" = "pirate". Did not know that) and help stack up some rice for starving people. According to the stats they post, people are helping to raise almost 2 BILLION grains of rice so far.

(Okay, I know in the grand scheme of things that may not be many bowls of rice, since rice by definition is small and is generally eaten more-than-one at a time. But still, it's not bad.)

So I told my a good friend of mine about the site. Check out this exchange:

Dennis!: hey, check out this website: www.freerice.com
Dennis!: the more vocab words you get right, the more they donate rice to some anti-hunger fund
Dennis!: and the words are kinda cool.
Friend: 1 word = 10 grains of rice?
Friend: what's the angle?
Friend: 10 grains of rice is less than a penny's worth of rice
Dennis!: then you kind of keep going until you get to a decent amount of rice...
which is kinda win-win, because you'll also test your vocab at the same time.
Friend: what does this site get though?
Dennis!: ?
Friend: people don't spend money for nothing.
Friend: someone has an angle
Friend: not sure what
Dennis!: http://www.freerice.com/faq.html
Friend: i read it

The FAQ I linked to, by the way, explains the goals of the site and how they donation process works, and how the vocab twist on it is educational. Apparently not enough for my friend.

Personally, I think it's kind of sad that we've reached a state in this country where an effort like Free Rice -- which doesn't cost anything at all -- is met with such skepticism. Instead of saying "Hm, looks like fun, why not give it a shot?", my friend instead immediately responds with "This is clearly too good to be true, it must be nefarious, and I distrust it inherently."

Let me reiterate: it's free. You can learn some vocab words out of it. Who cares if it's really some huge sham and really no rice is going anywhere ever? You can still pick up some words from it. Unless you have some legitimate fear that somehow that site is either broadcasting brainwashing zombie images at you, or is busy snatching your password information while you blithely guess at vocab words, then really, what's your damage?

Live a little.

Surprisingly, this post is quite unrelated to the one immediately below this one. Perhaps I've just got incredibly stupid friends.

Gaaaah!

2007-11-15T10:10:00.000-05:00

I hate my current work situation (in particular, certain projects I'm working on, and asshole opposing counsel), and as a result, it's putting me in a bad mood. I hate that.

(Okay, to make sure that last paragraph is complete, I should add that my boss was also a source of my immense frustration last week too.)

I won't go into details here of how annoying my opposing counsel is -- let's just say that I've worked with many opposing lawyers over the years, and many times our exchanges have been cordial, friendly, and professional. The kind that make you think that maybe you wouldn't mind hanging out and having a beer at some point. Not so this guy.

But what's really upsetting me is that I'm letting it take over my life in such a way that I'm in a very bad mood lately, and this means that I take it all out on people who don't deserve it. Those people would be my friends. (Oddly, I still make sure I'm polite to strangers, like the people from whom I buy things.)

Thankfully, my friends are text-addicted and therefore communicate with me mainly through thumb-relays. What this means is that I am at liberty to ignore things rather than unfairly blow up.

Here's a non-exhaustive list of things that my friends have done that bug me lately:

1. Responded to one of my texts with a lame joke.

One friend has this tendency to make the same stupid joke over and over. It's pretty stupid even when he does it in real life. Basically, when he doesn't hear what you've said (or when he claims not to have heard), he'll make something up completely (usually something crass and sex-related). Example I'm just making up now:

Me: I think I'll get the salad.
Him: You tossed that guy's salad? What?

Yeah, told you it was lame. It's not terribly funny in real life. But imagine that exact same conversation, in text. It makes even less sense, no? For some reason, I was ready to blow up at him for how lame that joke was when I got that text. Thankfully, I didn't.

2. Turned all Sybil on me about Thanksgiving.

We're planning on having Thanksgiving dinner at one friend's house. He's notoriously flaky, but given that it's Thanksgiving and he's inviting a bunch of people, he can't possibly totally flake out on it. So every so often, for about a month, he'll say something like, "We should go grocery shopping." And I'll say, "Sure. I have a menu in mind, so we can go get stuff." Then later I'll say, "So are you free to go shopping this weekend?" and he'll say, "Eh, we should wait until the weekend before Thanksgiving. There's really no need to go early." Then two days later he'll send out another email: "We should be getting ready for Thanksgiving." Gaaah!

3. Sent me inappropriate an text message.

I think just because of my mood I'm hitting (artificially depressed) tolerance levels with respect to how completely retarded my friends can be. I got a text the other day from one that was a picture of a guy in a gym shower. It was captioned "A guy at my gym."

How completely stupid is that? I mean really, who does that? That is just NOT cool.

When I finally told him never to send do that again, or at least never to send me shots of naked people who don't know that they're posing, is when he finally told me that he actually just snapped the shot off of a gay porn site.

4. Can't bother to get simple facts down.

I've mentioned on here that I had a job interview recently. It's for a counsel position at a federal agency. I have repeatedly told my friends what Agency (let's say, for the sake of this post, that it's the USDA).

This friend -- and I'm sure he's only trying to express an interest in my life -- keeps asking me "So have you heard back from DOJ yet?" No. No, I haven't heard from DOJ. Ever. Because I didn't apply for a job with them, as so I did not interview with them. I interviewed with USDA. Is it really so hard?

Just to turn all sexist for a brief moment here, I feel like I'm more irritable right now than Naomi Campbell during her monthly visit from Aunt Flo. I hate this, and I'm blaming work-related stress for it. Hopefully this stress patch will soon pass, and I shall be back to my normal, happy self again.

Wish me luck.

Milo

2007-11-12T22:35:00.000-05:00

I've had a crush on Milo Ventimiglia since The Gilmore Girls.

So, of course, I was terribly excited when I saw that he had a pretty prominent role in Heroes.

Now I'm just thrilled that this season -- finally -- he's being given a good deal of skin time.

One word: Schwing!

Deep Breaths

2007-11-12T16:45:00.001-05:00

My office mates are bugging me. Not the ones I actually work with (they're a different story), but the ones we share office space with. They're the older Chinese married couple I mentioned earlier.

As I mentioned last time, whether he realizes it or not, The Husband's remarkably dependent on His Wife. When she's here, she cooks his meals for him daily (I sometimes wonder if she ever actually gets any work done for him in the office, because all she ever really does is show up, stock the fridge, and start making lunch -- sometimes it takes up to an hour), she also does his dishes when they're done eating. Don't even get me started on the smell when she decides she's going to make some sort of fish dish for lunch.

Well, notice in my last paragraph I said "when she's here"? That's the point: for about a week and a half she hasn't been here. (More on that later -- foreshadowing!) And when she's not here, he doesn't seem to realize that his indentured servant isn't there to wipe his ass for him. Translation: he acts as if there's still someone around to clean up his crap.

The other day he came up with a lunch of some sort. (Don't ask me how.) It must have been a decent lunch, because he used some 4 dishes/bowls in the process. When he was done eating, where do you think it all ended up? In the sink.

For hours.

He clearly had no intention of washing it. His Wife usually does the dishes. I really think he had completely forgotten that with the Wife gone, it really necessarily had to be up to him wash his own damn dirty dishes. He pays to sublet space, not for maid service.

(Eventually, out of sheer frustration, my office manager washed his crap.)

But what really took the cake was today. As I was walking into the kitchen, Husband was in there getting ready to do something or another. We all heard something fall -- it was so loud my colleagues in their offices down the hall heard it. I was touching nothing at the time and was probably some three feet away from the nearest surface.

He looked at me, and gestured/pointed at what just happened. "Uh, yeah, I guess something fell." And then he went about his business.

I was so dumbstruck I couldn't even speak, although the first thought I had was along the lines of "Uh, yeah, we heard that." My second thought was, "Yes, well, fucking pick it up then, motherfucker!"

Seriously, though, how does one actually survive into relatively old age not knowing such basic rules as "if you drop it, pick it up"? This is particularly bizarre when you have learned the rule that if it falls, it should be picked up. Clearly the "who should do that" part was totally missing from the lesson.

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Meanwhile, The Wife is gone without a trace. I honestly can't even remember when she was last in the office.

It should be noted that Husband and Wife are not Ward and June Cleaver. Husband (it is alleged) cheats on Wife rather flagrantly. Wife can't divorce him because, well (according to her), it's just not something Chinese people do. (Never mind that she is actually Husband's second wife.) If Husband had his druthers, she would be out on her ass and he'd be with Hot Mistress. Don't ask me why, but that's not happened, and instead they all maintain some strange detente.

Wife left the office one evening and, I'm told, hasn't returned home since. I don't know where she's staying, nor do I know what she's up to. But the rumor continues: she hasn't heard from Husband at all since her unexplained departure.

So now she's trying to use my workmates to play mindgames. Apparently she has called the office now to recruit my colleagues into this bullshit: "Hi, it's me. Don't tell him I'm calling. I haven't seen or talked to him in over a week, and he hasn't made any attempt to call me. If you get a chance, you should ask him, 'Hey, where's Wife?'"

I, for one, know that no one in my office is so overflowing with spare time that they're willing to inject themselves into this stupid domestic cat and mouse game.

<><><>

Seriously, some of these people need to grow spines and shut the fuck up. If I had my druthers (that's twice in one post!), I think I'd boot both of them from our suite already.

A Beginning, and an End

2007-11-04T22:32:00.000-05:00

A very dear and close friend of mine got married this weekend. The ceremony was charming and wonderful, and I couldn't be happier for her and her new husband and family.

And yet somehow I'm feeling a profound sense of sadness. My brain tells me I'm being totally stupid in that regard. But we all know brains don't always have the last say on these things.

She'd been seeing this guy for almost two years now anyway, so it's not like he just swooped in and swept her off of her feet. Indeed, truth be told, she's been exceptionally good at keeping her pre- and post-boyfriend lives pretty consistent, so it's not like she suddenly spent all her time with her new man and stopped ever calling me (as I understand happens frequently).

And I know that the truth of the matter is things probably won't change now that she's married either. I am confident that she will make every effort to continue to get together with me and our other friends -- with or without her husband -- on a somewhat regular basis, and that we will remain very, very close friends even after the marriage.

But another part of me still can't help making a huge deal of what a significant change this is. I mean, it's huge. It doesn't have to be, but it just is. She's got a whole new family now, and from what I can tell they're a pretty cool bunch of folks, most of whom live around the area. Will she start having to divide her time up between Her Friends and The Husband's Friends? (I realize they'll be "Their Friends," but truly it's somewhat inevitable to remember which people were in which spouse's life before The Marriage.

It's the stuff of advice columns and at least one real life friend: people get married, then suddenly their social lives suffer a substantial hit. One other woman we know moved from the city to a 'burb after she got married, so our invitations to join us in the city for anything are usually met with polite regrets. Her social schedule is frequently spent with her husband's friends and family, and her time with the friends she had before the wedding have been curtailed dramatically.

I hope this won't happen with us. I'm confident that it won't happen with us.

But those tiny shreds of doubt are still there.

I suppose all that's left now is that I have to deal with it, and take whatever happens as it comes. It's been a good long run... and there will still be good times to be had.

And Here I Thought I Was Being All Slick.

2007-11-02T11:21:00.000-04:00

I love my job. I do. (I had to get that out of the way early.)

That being said, I did have a job interview this week for a position that sounds fun, challenging (substantively) and, most importantly, could represent a HUGE pay increase for me. Let's face it, the day to day litigation schedule I get at my current job can be a strain; I'm not generally happy in wholly adversarial relationship, either professionally or personally.

So I had an interview last week.

Of course, I didn't tell my current boss about this interview. I figure I'll wait until it becomes somewhere closer to concrete. No sense stirring up the hornet's nest until it becomes closer to becoming a reality.

What I did do, though, was basically just sua sponte* took a half day off from work on Tuesday. Just plopped it on the calendar: "Dennis! is out of the office from 2:00 on." Didn't explain it to anyone. Figured no one would ask.

And usually no one does. Because usually it's for things like doctor's appointments, etc., and I'm glad my colleagues are generally rather cognizant of being too nosy about specifics of doctor's appointments. "What's wrong with you? Why are you seeing a doctor for three hours?" is not something I'll ever imagine them asking. (This is a good thing because the one time I decided to seek talk therapy for an issue I was having -- thankfully it only lasted something like 4 sessions -- it looked strange that I kept booking doctor's appointments on a regular basis at lunch.)

On the day of my interview, my boss and one assistant went out for lunch. I reminded them that they wouldn't see me when they got back, and that I'd see them tomorrow. Then, as I made my way out (thankfully I live close to work, so I went home to change into a suit then hitched a cab), I told my other colleague that I was gone for the day and that I "had something to do."

I thought I had handled it well, and I was being effectively evasive without raising too many eyebrows.

I may have been wrong.

I had asked my office assistant to order more business cards for me recently, as I was down to the last few in my box. The day after my interview, she came to my office. "So, I have a weird question," she started. "Do I still need to order business cards for you?"

"What?" I asked.

"Well, you ran out of here all secretive yesterday, I figured maybe you went on a job interview or something."

Damn! Busted.

"Ha!" I laughed. Without explicitly denying that I had been on an interview, I just said, "Just go ahead and order me the cards." (Internally, I'm thinking that if I do get this new job, I can just reimburse them for these cards.)

I really hope my other colleagues didn't get this thought in their heads too. I feel like I'm lying to them by not telling them about the opportunity, but then again I also don't want to get my hopes to high. I've been down this road before: literally three years ago I told my boss I was getting sick of litigation and that I was going to start looking for a new job -- and yet I'm still here. Strange how hard it's been.

Anyway. All I have left to say is: Wish me luck. Second round callbacks are sometime in the next few weeks.

* I know you're impressed by my random injection of a Latin phrase in here. You are, you know it, admit it.

What a Drag

2007-10-30T23:47:00.000-04:00

Tonight was a blast. Hit up the Annual High Heel Race on 17th Street with a few friends. What a fun night! Not too much to say other than that, so here are a random spattering of photos from the evening.

Most of the photos from before the race started are really bad because there was pretty much no light on the street and the flash wasn't remotely powerful enough to help me out.

I just like the composition on this one.

Nice ass.

The Washington Monument guy.

Ugly Betty.

You can't see it, but this salt bottle has legs. Of all my friends (and the people around me), I was the first one to figure out just what this costume meant. 'Cause I'm smart like that.

This is a very elaborate headdress. I was trying to get a shot of the guy along with the headdress, but he moved.

?

Gorgeous.

Not sure what this was.

Judy Jetson (we think).

Good times, good times. My friend Laura wants me to be in the race next year. I might actually consider it.

It's a Small World After All

2007-10-29T11:38:00.000-04:00

I am often amazed at how small the world can be sometimes. Sometimes this is a good thing; more often, it's a somewhat awkward thing; from time to unfortunate time, it's a metaphorical herpes outbreak that just won't go away.

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Picture this, Washington, 1999. I'm in my mid-20s and in what I now realize to be the prime of my life. I have long come out of the closet and am comfortable with having gay friends and frequenting gay venues.

Meeting gay people is difficult for me, mostly because meeting people in general is difficult for me. I'm not naturally outgoing, and making lifelong friends with guys who just happen to be standing next to me in a bar just never seems to click for me. So in whatever diverse ways I meet people (usually on line or through friends), I end up developing several small networks for friends, none of whom I have ever introduced to the other.

And for (relatively) good reason: in the context that I meet these people, I am a different person at different times. Sometimes I feel like a social chameleon: I can be a party animal with one set of friends, and the quiet, brunch-and-International Coffee kinda guy with another group of friends. I can be pretty comfortable in both worlds. I think that as a result I developed several sets of friends, each one catering to one of my moods. Call me Sybil. "I ain't no slut!"

One night, I and some of my friends decided we were going to hit Nation, the warehouse dance club which was such a hit among The Gays in the '90s. I was looking forward to dancing, hanging out, staying up to all hours with this crew of friends...

... and as we were in the bar area waiting for the main dance hall to open, I bumped into another, complete distinct, set of friends. "Hi!" we greeted each other happily. I felt so popular, knowing so many people without even planning it that way.

Being the polite guy that I am, I (however grudgingly) introduced my one set of friends to the other): "Blah Blah, this is Blah Blah."

And, of course, they already knew each other. In fact, they were pretty good friends.

Here I was, thinking that I had given myself so many different options for my own personal gay posse, only to realize that really I was just cherry-picking from the same large group of friends.

<><><>

On Thanksgiving Weekend of 2004, I visited some friends from high school who have now moved to Seattle. Joining us was C.W.T., another high school friend. Sometime during the course of that weekend, C.W.T. -- who until then I had considered a friend, if only one who made cameo appearances in the screenplay of my life -- referred to me as "the most superficial person [he] know[s]," in absolute seriousness. In fact, when I made clear how taken aback I was at the characterization, he took pains to defend it.

I reflected on the situation for a long time after it happened, and I decided that I didn't want to remain friends with C.W.T. any longer. I was, and am, perfectly comfortable with the decision to voluntarily remove myself from the life of someone who thinks so little of me. I generally don't think of him much anymore. Were I to visit the metropolis that he lives in, I would not really be inclined to look him up.

We take you now to Provincetown, July 2007. I am standing outside of the Paramount Video bar with my friends trying to figure out our plans for evening when I feel a tap on my shoulder. Turning around, I find that the finger belongs to none other than C.W.T.

How, oh how, is it that of all the times and places for us to end up vacationing, we end up vacationing in the same place at the same time? Oh strange Fate!

We exchanged various pleasantries -- oh everything's good, I'm having a great vacation, there are my friends, we're going to go find more drinks now, bye! -- and I departed the scene. C.W.T. suggested that we catch up, but I definitely knew we would be doing no such thing, not if I could help it.

I flash you ahead now again to the events of these past two weeks. I had been itching to go see a play, so I contacted my friend David, with whom I have developed a theater-buddy relationship. It had been a while, so I just sent him an email rather than bug him on the phone.

He was too busy to respond to my email promptly (my bad anyway), but when he did, he included this P.S.:

P.S. I met two friends and former classmates of yours in New York
recently. One was Blah Blah,* who has been a friend of mine for years; the other was another gay Asian guy who was a classmate of yours (but I'm blanking on his name right now).

* It's shocking how many friends I have named Blah Blah. It's quite a common name. Sometimes I'm surprised I can tell them apart.

Knowing this Blah Blah as I do, there is no doubt in my mind that David is referring to C.W.T.

I feel like my world is becoming smaller and smaller. My worlds are colliding, and it scares me.

<><><>

It is, indeed, a small world after all. And now that damn song is going to be stuck in your head for the next 12 hours. Ha ha!

Wherein I Turn Strangely Catty About a Topic on Which I Know Nothing

2007-10-25T17:38:00.000-04:00

Dear Fellow Metro Traveller Who Happens to be Waiting Next to Me the Platform This Evening:

OH HONEY. Those pants are atrocious. I mean, really. Is that flannel? Whatever the material is, it most certainly doesn't look comfortable. More importantly, though -- the stripes. What. The. Hell. Multicolor thin vertical stripes all the down the leg? Did I blink and miss my trip back to the 70s? Because if I have, it's terribly unfair that I somehow missed my opportunity to drop acid to see that. If I'm going to be subjected to those colors, I kinda want to be on a mind trip when it happens.

But wait... are those SNEAKERS? RED sneakers? Woah, those pants don't look good to begin with, and you pair them with THAT? They're not even remotely stylish! Ugh. Oh Lord I wish I could take a picture, but my phone has horrible resolution and the lighting in here sucks. It would be horribly rude of me to try to use an actual camera camera.

But... well, wow.

At least, I suppose, your pants (and shoes) aren't half as bad as this guy I snapped a shot of in Amsterdam last May.

Horrific. You lose a sense for it from the back, but take my word for it; they looked HIDEOUS from the front.

A&F Got Pwned!

2007-10-19T22:41:00.001-04:00

Okay, I'm not a huge fan of Abercrombie and Fitch to begin with -- it's pretty body fascist, in my opinion.

But apparently in the old-school style of Flash Mobbing, a group called Improv Everywhere put together a little prank on the A&F store in NYC.

Sorry about all the random video posts lately. But come on, it's some funny stuff.

Oh, and hat tip to QueerClick [NSFW!].

Uh... No.

2007-10-16T17:34:00.000-04:00

My office rents out part of our office space to a solo practitioner and his assistant (who's also his wife). They're this older Chinese couple, and the woman has basically taken to treating me like a surrogate son because she feels bad that I'm so far removed from my own Chinese family. From time to time she brings me some leftover food, either stuff she's made or stuff they had at some restaurant. She's very traditional Chinese.

One afternoon, my office was having lunch in the conference room when she wandered by. I had made a rather large recipe of pasta and vegetables the night before, so we were all eating my food which I had shared with the others.

"So what are you eating?" Chinese Lady asked.

"It's pasta with vegetables. Dennis! made it," one of my colleagues told her. We have a makeshift kitchen in the office (consisting of a rather large toaster oven and a microwave) so oftentimes there are rather impressive cooking projects going on for lunch. Even salads are a big production sometimes. I usually buy my food, but sometimes I bring leftovers.

"You should cook more often!" Chinese Lady tells me. "See, that looks good!"

"I know, but it's hard when you're single," I tell her.

Chinese Lady stopped for a while... then piped up again: "You know what you need? You need a girlfriend to cook for you." Have I mentioned that she makes her husband his lunch every day?

My colleagues and I each looked up and kinda chortled. Really, how does one respond to something like that tactfully?

Have I mentioned how traditional this woman is? On top of that, she's very religious; her church creates a large part of her social life. Once I remember a number of us sitting around at lunch chatting and the subject veered to same-sex marriage. "What's your opinion?" my boss asked her. I think she was caught off guard, because the first things out of her mouth were words to the effect of how "those people" are "sick." (She then slightly changed her wording but it was clear what her position was on the subject.)

The conversation just got more bizarre after that: You could almost see the light bulb go "ding!" over her head as she suddenly said, "Oh! I know! You should meet my niece! She's in New York now, but I think she's coming down to visit!"

I couldn't hold it back. Almost immediately after she finished, I responded: "Uh, NO."

She persisted though. I'll give her her perseverance. "No pressure, really. Just a relaxed evening. We'll all go to dinner. Really it's just you guys meeting each other."

My boss tried valiantly to extricate me. "I think Dennis! is really quite the happy free-wheeling bachelor...."

And yet she insisted that it would just be dinner, no big deal, no pressure, just a fun night out. She insisted that I give her my cell phone number so that she could set it up.

That was about two weeks ago. I thought it had all blown over, but apparently he niece is coming into town this weekend and she wants me to join them for dinner.

Short of telling her that I'd rather stick an iodine-dipped dinner fork in my eye, I can't imagine politely declining for no reason.

So I'm going to tell her I already have weekend plans. Maybe I'll be going out of town.

To New York.

Color Me Skeptical.

2007-10-15T14:03:00.000-04:00

Today's WaPo proclaims:

The U.S. military believes it has dealt devastating and perhaps irreversible blows to al-Qaeda in Iraq in recent months, leading some generals to advocate a declaration of victory over the group, which the Bush administration has long described as the most lethal U.S. adversary in Iraq.

"Devastating" and "irreversible" blows? How convenient, given that public support for our occupation of Iraq has steadily declined for months now. Someone somewhere seems to have decided that the American public needs to be fed some good news out of Iraq as the casualties mount and the stagnation of any progress continues. So they decided to tell us that Al-Qaeda is "crippled."

This strikes me as a demure version of "Mission Accomplished." Instead of a press conference with a huge banner, they'll just let the headlines do the work.

I, for one, am skeptical. With more and more of our citizens coming home in flag-draped coffins, I really don't think the resilient terrorist network has really been "irreversibly" "crippled."

Hand Job

2007-10-12T11:27:00.000-04:00

Oh my.

SNL on Craig

2007-10-11T16:34:00.000-04:00

I'm stealing this from Scott-O-Rama.

My fave lines:

- "You opposed gay marriage. What, do you think marriage takes the sizzle out of it? Really. Or are you just afraid that if gay marriage is legalized there will be fewer single gay guys trying to have sex in airport bathrooms? Really!"

- "So, in conclusion: You're gay, but a married Republican, you're going to vote for anti-gay legislation but you'll solicit sex in an airport bathroom. Wow, you really do have a wide stance."

Gallon Challenge

2007-10-11T11:59:00.000-04:00

While doing an image search for this post, I came across this site which somehow I just had to share. (I decline to share, however, the links for puke sex-fetish sites.)

The Gallon Challenge is apparently some ritual that involves drinking an entire gallon of milk in one hour (2% or greater, it says, and no chocolate milk allowed), and then trying to keep it down for another hour. They say the "keeping it down" part is well-nigh impossible. Hence, the photos. Lots and lots of photos. Of puke. Lots and lots of puke. Very, very white puke.

I have no idea how long that site's been around, so those poor kids in the photos might be professionals in their late 20s by now, but still.

I can't imagine that much regurgitation is good for your body in any way, but I have to admit, I think I'd laugh my ass off if I were around to watch this.

Sloppy

2007-10-10T11:42:00.000-04:00

I submit to you that anyone who actually has a strongly negative opinion of this GWU policy is a serious lush in need of some intervention. "It's just a little puke" is just... not a sentence that should ever be uttered.

**Aside: I did a google search on "puking" to find that picture. Never, ever, ever again.

Wish Me Luck

2007-10-08T11:12:00.000-04:00

Hopefully my Tuesday night training will get me somewhere this time!

I have registered to play in the PokerStars World Blogger Championship of Online Poker!

This Online Poker Tournament is a No Limit Texas Holdem event exclusive to Bloggers.

Registration code: 7861445

My Dorkiness is Limitless

2007-09-27T15:35:00.000-04:00

Last Monday night, I was walking along 14th Street when I bumped into some friends on the street on their way in to dinner at a nearby restaurant. I was carrying a small Whole Foods bag.

An exchange of pleasantries ensued, and a friend commented on my bag, suggesting that I had my dinner with me.

"No," I sheepishly replied, "this bag has a travel Scrabble board and dictionary. I'm on my way to meet some people to play Scrabble."

And with this, I once again emerged from my Scrabble closet.

A small group gathers at my local coffee shop on a regular basis to play Scrabble. We're pretty hardcore geeks about it; we have the little cheat sheets listing all the two- and three-letter words and we are genuinely excited about bingos and other cool plays (like being able to play a "Z" on a triple letter score that counts twice).

Wow, I am a geek.

***

The very next day, I was at my weekly poker tournament in the 'burbs. As I've mentioned before (I'm too lazy to look up the link), it's generally a very straight affair with a group of people that I've seen around enough that I consider them (and me) to be regulars. And I've never had occasion to discuss my sexuality with them. (Well, I kinda have, but chose not to -- it would have felt forced.) (Again, too lazy to look up that link.)

So after the cheap beer specials ended, I asked our server (female) for my check. She provided it in the obligatory leather sleeve, and I pulled a $10 bill out of my wallet and slipped it in, with an edge of the bill protruding through the top. In due course, she took the sleeve and returned with my change.

Meanwhile, one of my fellow players (who had already been eliminated from the tournament and was watching away from the table) decided to announce, rather loudly, that I had clearly given my number to our server. "Did you see that?" he practically yelled. "This guy gave his number to the waitress? There was writing on that bill! Seriously!"

I just kinda smiled to myself, because I knew what writing he was referring to.

On the edge of the bill I had left was a handwritten notation: "www.wheresgeorge.com".

Where's George? is a site where you can log in your currency, then spend it normally. When other people find the bills, they re-enter the number into the system. This way, one can track particular bills as they venture around the country. It's kinda fascinating.

In a geeky sort of way.

I've started making it a point to enter all my bills into the system. And I try not to spend bills I get back as change until I've had a chance to enter them in. And if I see bills that have the mark on them, I'll try to acquire them so I can re-enter the bill myself.

Because I'm a big geek.

Now That I Think of It...

2007-09-13T22:31:00.000-04:00

Dear Sen. Craig:

I understand you're trying to withdraw the guilty plea that you entered in Minneapolis. You know, the one wherein you admitted that you had inappropriately moved your foot under the partition of the guy sitting next to you (more than once, I might add). I understand that you think you should be able to take your case to trial, because, hey, the guilty plea was somehow legally defective.

Okay, I'm no lawyer, but --

Oh wait, I am a lawyer.

First things first: Withdrawing a guilty plea is very very difficult. If the trial judge is worth anything at all, he walked you through a big long colloquy in open court wherein he asked you a very very long series of questions designed to elicit whether you were absolutely, positively, super-de-duper sure that you were okay with waiving the large numbers of constitutional guarantees our criminal justice system offers. You were probably asked, possibly more than once, whether you knew you had a right to a trial by jury, that you had a right to confront witnesses against you, to have counsel appointed for you, etc. etc. You were then asked whether you were ready to waive all those rights. You were asked whether you knowingly and voluntarily and of your own free will waived those rights. And you affirmed each and every time that you knew you had those rights, and that you were willing to waive them.

Dude, judges usually have a script in front of them for when they accept guilty pleas. Judges don't frequently mess up guilty pleas for this very reason.

So, uh, good luck with that.

But I'm more curious about the next step after that. You want to withdraw your guilty plea. If -- if -- you succeed, what do you think will be the next step for you? I'm sure you've thought this through, or if not, your lawyer has told you this: the next step would be that you get to go to trial before a jury of your peers.

It's unlikely that you can get the charges reinstated for the purpose of legally challenging the sting in the first instance, or that you were read your Miranda rights.

The sting was clean: even if you think it wasn't, it's unlikely that the judge will be able to conclude on his own that it was dirty. It would be a swearing contest between you and the cop; that means sitting in front of a jury who will decide just what the facts surrounding your arrest were.

And the Miranda issue? First of all, there's a tape recording of the arresting officer reading you your Miranda rights. But even if you wanted to try to claim you were not told your rights again later, what harm would that entail? It would mean any statements you made during the non-Miranda interview session would be inadmissible. But don't look now, your first post-arrest interview contains some pretty damaging admissions standing all on its own.

So, where does that get us: you'll end up in front of a jury of your peers. You're going to ask a jury of your peers to decide whether or not you were engaged in inappropriate conduct. When you ran your hand under the partition. When you scooted your foot over toward that of your stall-neighbor.

Let me tell you this: no man who has ever used a public restroom will ever buy that you just have a "wide stance." We all know that's not appropriate. We all know it's kind of icky. And once the officer testifies that tapping your foot is what people who want stall sex do... well, you're toast.

So seriously, dude... what are you thinking?

Uh, good luck.

Sincerely,
Dennis!

Overthinking HSM

2007-09-06T21:21:00.000-04:00

I just wanted a reason to post this pic. HOT!

Okay, so I saw High School Musical this weekend. Entertaining, to be sure. Who doesn't love a good song-and-dance routine (though the very first number, "Get Your Head in the Game," was a little lame). Even better when there are cute boys involved.

But of course, as I am wont to do, I have some stupid issues about this movie. I overthink things, and here's what I came up with after watching this movie.

Quick synopsis if you haven't seen the movie: Troy is a basketball star, and his friends laugh at him because he found out that he can sing. The same is true for Gabriella, except that she's not an athlete, she's academically talented. (Who would have thought the nerds could be mean to each other like that?) Troy and Gabriella together endure ribbing and taunts to try out for the high school musical. Along the way, they have to beat out brother-and-sister team Sharpay and Ryan Evans (by the way, how much crack do you have to be smoking to name your child Sharpei?), who have dominated (and, somehow, terrorized) the drama club for a long time.

The movie is, of course, set up to make Troy and Gabriella the heroes. You're supposed to want them to try out despite their other commitments and be the musical leads. Sharpay (tee hee!) and Ryan are talented, but their personalities are awful and you're supposed to want terribly to dislike them.

But although I don't like them, I still kinda feel sorry for them. Truly.

Here's my thought: Sharpay and Ryan had nothing going for them besides their stage talents. True, they let it go to their heads in an awful way, but at least they had something to be proud of. It's what they're good at. I suppose, up to that point, they had no reason to expect that anyone else would ever challenge them for the position of on-stage talent.

But then here Troy and Gabriella. Both already have their superstar talents. Troy is universally loved anyway, just because he's the basketball king. Gabriella is clearly academically talented and will probably graduate at the top of her class. (And, inexplicably, this is actually something to be proud of at the school they attend.) They don't need the extra attention and love.

But Sharpay and Ryan kind of do. As I said, that was destined to be the pinnacle of their high school career, the point when everyone watches them and thinks just how great they are. But this moment of glory was taken away from them. Worse yet, it was taken away from them by two people who already had the world on their oyster shells. Troy and Gabriella get to walk away from this not just stars, but now they're well-rounded super-duper-uber stars. Meanwhile, Sharpay and Ryan no longer have anything. Troy gets basketball and dramatic lead on his college applications (an admissions officer's wet dream, I tell ya); Gabriella gets to boast of top academics and dramatic lead; Sharpay and Ryan no longer have that "dramatic lead" line to brag about.

Really, if I were Sharpay and Ryan, I'd hate them too.

... And Zac Efron is hot.

My Quick (or Not-So-Quick) Take on Larry Craig

2007-09-04T11:29:00.000-04:00

Larry Craig is a fool and a hypocrite.

Wow, that was fast.

Not so fast. I've got more to share.

***

I'm reading a fascinating exchange on a legal ethics listserve to which I belong. Various experts in the legal field (and I do mean experts -- big names in legal ethics circles) are debating whether there's such a thing as a public-private dichotomy when it comes to legal ethics. Question: does how one acts in private life necessarily mean they are unfit for their (more public) job? If Larry Craig engages in sexual liaisons in bathrooms, does that make him per se unfit as a legislator?

Some say no; that a whole constellation of reasons could exist for the foot bumping and the finger-reaching. (Oh, and the guilty plea.) These are reasons we don't know, the argument goes, and as such, we can't necessarily judge the whole of the person based upon this once incident that may very well be a huge (HUGE!) misunderstanding.

I can't buy it. Not because I necessarily disagree with the principle that one act does not necessarily condemn the entire person, but because I have given some though to what constellation of events may have caused Senator Craig to "accidentally" bump his foot against the foot of the guy next to him (twice!, I think) and to reach under the stall, and I come up empty.

According to the cop, there was no paper on the floor for him to pick up, and if there were, who picks that shit up? Unless it was a piece of legislation that you were reviewing while on the can, or even a newspaper, most people just leave it. (Early reports were that he claimed there was a piece of toilet paper on the floor. Really now, who makes the effort to reach down a pick up a piece of errant toilet tissue in a public bathroom?)

He doesn't deny tapping the cop's foot, he just claims a takes a "wide stance" when taking a crap. Uh, please. Every American male who has ever used a public restroom knows the rules of public toilets: unless absolutely necessary, never stand at a urinal that's right next an occupied one; never talk to anyone; and always look straight ahead while urinating. And never, ever, invade another man's space, for any reason. Memo to Sen. Craig: This generally includes not letting your leg drift into the next guy's stall, no matter how "wide" your "stance." It just doesn't happen. Unless you want to initiate some chicka chicka bow bow. And let's face it, Sen. Craig knew those rules. And he knew the rules on who to solicit sex in a public restroom.

Oh, when you're in a stall an realize there's no toilet tissue there? I would vote for a stage whisper to the guy next to you along the lines of "Hey dude, I seem to be out of paper here. Could you pass me some?" Oh, and doing that before running your hand under the bottom of the stall.

***

In the aftermath (though I suppose it's still continuing, WaPo ran an article about Mike Rogers entitled "The Most Feared Man on the Hill?". Mr. Rogers is the gay activist who spends a good chunk of his time identifying and outing anti-gay lawmakers (those whose legislative activities are homophobic -- including not just voting records, but also campaign-related issues). Sen. Craig was on his list.

I mention this article because there's a wonderful quote in there which needs to be called out. It's on the third web page of the article.

Context: Rogers outed Dan Gurley, a national field director at the Republican National Committee, whom Rogers believed signed off on a flier sent to conservative voting districts which played upon those voters' base fears about gay marriage. Gurley eventually lost his job and moved to North Carolina. But here's his money quote:

[Gurley] adds: "Who does Rogers think he is? God? What gives him the right to bully people around and tell us what to think or how to conduct our lives?"

The hypocrisy is rank. Does he not notice that if you substitute "the Republican Party" where "Rogers" shows up in that quote you come up with the exact reason gay people should reject GOP social conservatism??

***

And, just for fun, Keith Olbermann:

Recent Giveaways

2007-08-26T23:18:00.000-04:00

In an ongoing (painfully slow) process of trying to de-clutter my life and thereby get my apartment a little cleaner, I advertised on freecycle.org recently to give away a hair dryer.

My ad was very honest: I gave the model number for the dryer, and described it as being from my college days (though I didn't mention specifically just how many years I've been out of college). Also, immediately afterward I posted an ad giving away law books, which also could conceivably tip my hand as to my age and, thus, the age of the hair dryer.

I got a response very quickly and handed it off that night. Very handy.

One woman who responded asked: "Does this hair dryer have hair comb attachments?"

Lady, do you really think a 19-year-old male really cared about comb attachments?

***

It's wonderful the kind of things you can give away on the internet nowadays. I had to get rid of my old desktop computer (same ongoing painfully slow effort) and, again, was incredibly blunt about it. I described it as:

- old
- running a slow processor
- possessing an old memory card

I also mentioned that it's slow. As a final straw, I told my audience that because I don't have shredding software, I was simply going to remove the hard drive too, so really the machine was going to come without a hard drive or operating system either. Who wants it?

I managed to give it away the next day to a woman whose son's PC had recently blew up. She intended to use the shell and transfer necessary components to my machine. It was quite a fortuitous matchup.

***

Somehow I have failed to give small random assortment of shot glasses that I have on one of my shelves. I just don't want them anymore. Not that no one showed any interest; at least seven people emailed to say they wanted to pick them up. But none of them followed through, and now I still have the damn glasses. Grrrr. I'll report that ad soon.

***

I'm looking around my apartment, trying desperately to decide what else I could give away or sell. At some point I'll also need to place a bunch of old clothes in a bag and give those away too. I have far too many.

Spamity Spam

2007-08-25T00:55:00.000-04:00

My spam filter at work sucks.

My gmail filter is remarkably good. It captures spam wonderfully, and lets through all kinds of non-spam. On this account in particular, I get tons of spam. And I know I don't expect much mail here. Even on my other gmail account, I rarely get spam, and when I do, it's in the Spam filter.

At work, however, my spam filter sucks.

At the beginning of each day, I open Outlook, which then downloads all the mail that's accumulated through the night. Not usually a big event, except that usually there are at least 50 items of junk email in there along with the legitimate stuff. Heck, I'm even being generous by defining email from vendors who legitimately have my address as "not spam."

Then my spam filter kicks in, and tells me it's "working." It tells me it's scanning new mail for spam. And at the end, it brags to me that it's quarantined 5 spam messages!

Except that there are like 45 more spam messages still in my inbox.

How many unnamed persons have to send me e-postcards before this damn filter system will recognize that to be spam? I've had friends, and family members, and neighbours [sic], and school mates, and acquaintances, and business associates, and even worshippers send me e-postcards. Poor dears will never get in touch with me at this rate.

The stupidest thing is, when I click on those emails and then hit "Is Spam," the software is supposed to, somehow, learn what spam looks like and start blocking these things on their own for a while. Indeed, the damn software will hold up my computer for a while with a damn window that says "Learning... Please wait." as if it could figure out cues about what is spam. As these postcards show, though, clearly it isn't working. The word "postcard", by the way, has never shown up in a legitimate email of mine yet. At least not in my work email.

Technology. Gotta love it.

Crap. (No, Literally.)

2007-08-21T12:50:00.000-04:00

I am notorious among my friends for overpopulating the "Missed Connections" section of Craigslist. My friends all know this, and one, in particular, now takes delight in trying to spot which ones are mine.

Recently, he sent me this one, which I am reproducing here because CL posts can expire:

mens bathroom kramers - m4m
Reply to: pers-402262572@craigslist.org
Date: 2007-08-21, 10:51AM EDT

I saw you popping a squat. You stole my heart with the sounds you were making, I know that you could never clog a toilet. Lets meet for some lunch!!!

I have no idea what it means, really.

Here's the IM conversation we had about it:

Him: OMG is this you?!? [link]
Me: Uh, yes.
Him: Shut up.
Me: What?!? He was hot.
Me: Don't judge.
Him: OMG, I was just kidding. Please tell me that's not really you.
Me: Uh, checking, checking... nope, you're still judging.

I wonder how long I can string him along like this.

A Million Little Pieces, Only Without the Illegal Drugs

2007-08-10T00:21:00.000-04:00

So I bought a new shredder the other day. Just for my personal home use. Cute little model, comes with a basket, does a diamond shred of up to eight pages at a time. Good enough for what I need it for.

I brought it home and plugged it in, anxious to start using it. I had managed to accumulate a huge stack of bills and other documents that needed to be shredded before discard so I wanted to go ahead and get started.

Okay, so before I go on, here's a snapshot of the top of the shredder:

You see there's a slot for the paper. Under it is a special slot for credit cards. Look closely and you can see where you can feed CDs too, in the event you should want to shred a CD.

I call special attention to the part of the shredder beneath the feed slots. Here's a closer view:

That little red button is marked "Emergency Stop." Notice the light next to it; you can tell it's green, but it's not lit up.

And there are indicators above the red button.

I plugged my machine in, ready to get started with my shredding, when I noticed the little green light was not on. So I thought perhaps it's one of those machines that starts working automatically upon the introduction of paper, but putting paper into the slot didn't start it either.

Repeatedly pushing the red button -- the only thing I could think of to do -- didn't get the machine to start either.

Great, I thought, I bought a defective machine.

There's a toll free number on the machine you can call for tech support, so I did. After holding for a bit, I finally got an operator on the phone.

"Hi, I bought this shredder, model number XXXXX, and, well, it just doesn't seem to work."

Her response made me feel like the biggest idiot of all time: "See that red button? Okay, yeah, why don't you push it all the way over to the right and see what happens...."

The freaking red button is the power switch. The green light turned on once I pushed it over and my paper then came out in a gazillion little diamond-shaped pieces.

I burst out laughing with the tech support lady. "Oh my goodness, I feel so completely retarded now!"

"Well," she very politely reassured me, "from what I can tell the instructions aren't that well written."

"I'll say," I told her, "the damn instructions don't even tell me how to turn the damn machine on!" (Really. They don't. They talk about shredder maintenance and shredder safety, but not how to operate your shredder.)

We laughed together for a while -- I really was laughing so hysterically at how stupid I felt that I suppose it was a little contagious -- and I thanked her and hung up.

Then I filled up two large kitchen bags with shredded paper and discarded a large part of my past.

I Need Uglier Friends - Redux

2007-07-31T21:28:00.000-04:00

Okay, so the more I reminisce about my wonderful trip to Provincetown, the more I think I just need to shut up about it. I mean, really, I had a great time while I was there, but the more I analyze it, the more I realize things may not have been as great as I presently remember.

Remember this post? I'll give you a chance to go back and read it if you need to.

You back?

Some of my friends are exceedingly good-looking. I didn't choose them because they're good-looking. It's just the way they are. And only "some" of them are very attractive. Others are pretty average, kinda like me (I guess).

I'm getting sick of having good-looking friends.

I'm getting sick of having friends who get hit on at the drop of a hat.

I'm getting sick of being invisible when I'm standing next to my friends. I'm sick of having random guys walk right past me to hit on my friends.

I want someone to notice me once in a while, dammit!

I'm realizing that my Provincetown trip last week just highlights this fact for me. My friend Brian got hit on left and right. I am not exaggerating. All he had to do was look at one guy on the boat and suddenly he showed up near us and randomly introduced himself. (This guy later on hung out with at the clubs.) I hit on guys left and right, and got nothing. (I secretly think these guys excused themselves and ran off to the bathroom to puke after I hit on them.) Didn't even get any numbers or anything out of the deal. No one wants a piece of this. I think the guys I did hang out with stayed with me because it was a way of getting closer to Brian.

All of us who went up there hung out a lot and met a bunch of people. And all that was fun. But now that I'm back, I'm realizing this: I haven't managed to keep in touch with many of them since we split up. Everyone else seems to have exchanged numbers and emails and are corresponding with people. No one seems to care to return my emails.

Am I really that completely forgettable?

One night during our trip, we invited a couple over to our place for a cookout dinner. The couple is from DC too, so we figured we'd see them again back in town. Keith suggested that he and his friends put together a happy hour once a month and that he'd invite us. True to his word, he did that, by sending an email to one of the seven of us in the house. And his email -- I am not exaggerating -- said, "Here's the info. Please pass it along to (names five other people in our house) -- did I miss anyone?" The one person in the house he missed was me! I thought I was pretty friendly, at that dinner and when we hung out at the bars... but apparently when naming off the seven people who shared my house last week, I was the one who was forgettable.

It kind of hurts in a stupid way to be so completely and totally overlooked.

So... how the hell do I find uglier friends?

Return from Paradise

2007-07-29T21:21:00.000-04:00

Never in my life have I been this depressed upon returning from vacation. This trip to Provincetown has been probably the most relaxing vacation I've ever experienced.

In that way, this trip was substantially different from any other trip I've taken just because it was so relaxing. Usually I'm running off to places where you have to see things: Paris, Madrid, Amsterdam, Rome. When you shell out the bucks to go to places like that, it's absolutely stupid to sleep in, relax, read, and not occupy as much of your waking time as possible to seeing the sights and, well, being a tourist.

But in Provincetown, it really truly was all about letting the world go by without you for a while. Sleeping in is a perfectly acceptable way to spend your day. Doing absolutely nothing productive while lying on the beach (perpetratin' a tan) is not only acceptable, it's encouraged. Shopping for hours on end -- even if you don't spend anything -- is great. Unabashedly people-watching. Drinking. Eating nasty pizza. Drinking still more. It's all good.

I spent the entire week drifting in and out of sobriety. I don't think I've spent that many consecutive nights out drinking and dancing since I was 25. I don't think I've awakened to that many hangovers in one week before either.

But it was all worth it.

We met some fun people, many of whom I will probably never see again.

One thing I do know for sure, though: We are definitely going back next year. Maybe even for two weeks!

I Had a Dream....

2007-07-24T11:00:00.001-04:00

I'm still alive.

It's so beautiful here it's easy to let shit roll off your back, and that's the most important part of any vacation. Well, it's easy to let a lot of stuff roll off your back -- I won't say everything.

One of my housemates is posing something of a challenge; it's somewhat annoying me. I'm trying not to let it bug me too much, but for God's sake. Details later.

I've met several fun and interesting people here. Of course, one meets people here at bars and fast food places. There's not too much room for substantive conversation sometimes. I'm trying to get phone numbers and, well, some action, but so far I haven't sealed any deals. This disappoints me, but then again it shouldn't seeing as I really shouldn't have expected myself to magically become more attractive just because I'm five hours away.

Anyway, I'm on someone else's computer so I'm going to bounce off now. (He just sat down next to me.) Later, gators.

Provincetown

2007-07-22T13:06:00.000-04:00

I'm taking a week in Provincetown, Cape Cod. This is the gayest vacation I have ever taken.

I and five gay friends have taken a house in the city. This trip is a welcome and refreshing change from the many times I've been to "Rehoboth" in the past. I put "Rehoboth" in quotes because the last many times I've been to Rehoboth, it's been with straight girlfriends and we end up in Dewey Beach amongst the frat boys and their bustily gifted counterparts. For once I am at a "gay beach" area where I can happily go out to gay bars and meet gay boys and even, if everything goes well, exchange numbers or something. I have not been given any opportunity to meet a gay person in Rehoboth in years.

It's beautiful up here. More posting later.

Straight People Live in Filth Too.

2007-07-17T13:53:00.000-04:00

I ordered DVR service recently. Yay! It's on some kind of promotion, so paradoxically, this upgrade is actually going to cost me less for the next year than the service I previously had.

After an aborted attempt to meet with the technician on Friday, I rescheduled her to meet me in my apartment today. Just now, in fact. She just left.

She was a trip. And my apartment is, as I have said before, absolutely inexcusable.

"Come in," I told her, holding the door open for her. "Pardon the mess."

"No problem," she says as she makes her way to the living room. She was an affable, polite woman, friendly and just the right amount of gregarious.

Eventually, it apparently got to her. "What happened here?" She glanced around at the random piles of dust and crap scattered variously across the floor. Thankfully she noticed neither the rat traps laid out by the central air grate (that's a whole separate blog post right there) nor the gay porn lying around near my television.

"Uh... you know what, I can't even explain it."

"What, your girlfriend move out or something?" She smiled.

I laughed, the same way I always do when someone mistakens me for being straight. Then I started stammering. "Moved... it's... let's just say things in the apartment have not been going well for a little while now."

"Men, I tell ya," she throws out. I laugh again.

After having set up my DVR, she tells me she's also taking my cable modem and replacing it with a wireless cable modem. (I hadn't even realized that this was part of the upgrade plan I purchased. I really just wanted the DVR.) I am typing this from a wireless connection now -- yay for me, because somehow I could never get a wireless to work when I had the actual cable modem. That woman performed miracles. Now I can surf from my bedroom!

"So," I ask her, "it's secure, right?"

"Yes," she tells me. "Your password is XXXXXXXXX."

"But I don't need to type in that password every time I log in, right? I just have to turn on the machine and it'll find the connection, right?"

"Yep," she says again. "Now if you're girlfriend were to come over though..."

"No girlfriend is going to come over..." I start.

"If your girlfriend is coming over," she repeats with a sly smile on her face, "she'll need your password to connect to the wireless."

I let it slide again. "Thanks."

I debated the thought of coming out to her ("No girlfriend will ever come over, but maybe a boyfriend or two") but didn't think it was really going to worth the effort. So I just let it go, and let her believe that at some point a girlfriend may come over and try to connect to my wireless internet.

On her way out, she asked just how I slept (the bedroom's a mess too). "Very badly," I told her. I presume she thinks it's because I'm lonely without my girlfriend next to me anymore.

Would It Be Rude of Me?...

2007-07-15T15:56:00.000-04:00

So my birthday was a few weeks ago. Usually I don't make a big deal of it, as I don't really care for being the center of attention, and I feel this strange sense of modesty from receiving gifts. So usually I just let it subtly slip by, people don't give me anything or usually remember my birthday, then I silently sulk in my personal self-created prison that no one remembered. Usually small sets of friends do remember, though, and that's sweet and kind of good enough for me.

This morning, some friends took me out for brunch as a belated birthday treat, seeing as we were all quite busy around the time of my real birthday. They also presented me with quite a handsome gift, too -- a rather nice leather briefcase from Kenneth Cole Reaction. (Retail price, $200, though I'm certain they got it on some kind of sale.) I thanked everyone for the gift once I opened it, then we proceeded to dine, then eventually got back (gift in tow) and relaxed for the afternoon.

Just now, I got the following text message:

"Uh, thanks for the thank you email for your birthday gift."

Wow. I think I was kind of floored. I've never actually been called out for failing to send out a thank-you email before. Especially less than TWO HOURS after receiving the gift itself.

So I tried to feign stupidity, by responding:

"Huh?"

I really don't know what I expected to result from that particular response, but here's what I actually did get:

"Send Joe and Bob a thank you email for gift."

At least, I suppose, the sender didn't demand a thank-you note for himself. (The three of them chipped in for the item.) But I was still flabbergasted. I truthfully responded:

"Uh, does it have to be an email? Because I was planning on writing out a note-note tomorrow."

Okay, see what I intended? Pretty much I intended to convey the message that I know enough to thank people when they give me a gift, and (hopefully) that the subtext of the message would have included that it's fucking rude to call someone out for not sending out a thank-you.

He responded:

"Perfect."

Uh, what a bitch.

I'm tempted to respond with the following which references a factually accurate circumstance:

"So, uh, when can I expect a thank-you note for the gift I got you for your birthday three weeks ago?"

Would that be bitchy? Unfortunately, I suppose Miss Manners would frown on that particular response.

Pearl

2007-07-11T19:34:00.000-04:00

Oh my God, this little girl is just too freaking adorable for words. I know I posted "The Landlord" before, but she's back!

The Landlord

Good Cop, Baby Cop

If I Had a Camera I'd've Taken a Pic of You

2007-07-11T00:46:00.002-04:00

An open letter.

Dear Random Tourist Guy:

I know you're visiting our fair city, and I'm glad for it. Really, I'm trying really hard to like tourists, because I recognize how much you non-residents contribute to the economy in this city. And it's necessary that way. And, well, this is the nation's capital, so it does attract a fair number of people for nice little visits.

I do, however, only have one question for you. You look pretty young, so I don't think you even know what it used to feel like when the only option you had for photography on vacations was large and clunky. My parents had this really big Nikon when I was growing up. It had 35 mm film. It was huge. The only way to carry it around if you wanted to sightsee and take photographs was to pop a strap on it (hehehe -- I said "strap on") and wear it around you neck.

This is not the guy I'm referring to. At least he has a big... camera.

You, however, are young. You're (comparatively) hip (I suppose). You have a digital camera. And your digital camera is something like 4" x 3" x 1.5" or something like that. It's tiny.

So why the hell would you wear something that small around your neck?

Dude, it's that small so you can shove the damn thing in your pocket. You look like a fucking moron.

Thank you.

Resign.

2007-07-09T17:47:00.000-04:00

[Via]

It's a shame his last few words got cut off. And it's a damn shame it took this long for us to get this fed up. But I do love this video.

Power Up

2007-07-05T01:08:00.001-04:00

I thought I'd share the following funny conversation I had with a friend of mine tonight.

Backdrop: I was visiting my friend and wanted to hop on to his computer, a laptop, for a bit. I kept hitting the power button, but it would only do a half-boot before sputtering and dying on me.

Me: Dude, I think your computer needs to be plugged in. Like, it needs a charge.
Him: Just hit the space bar. It'll start up.
Me: [hits the space bar, knowing full well it won't start up] Uh, no.
Him: Then press the power button. It's probably off.
Me: Uh, I've hit the power button twice now. It starts the startup process but then goes poof halfway through.
Him: Oh. Then I guess it needs to be plugged in.
Me: Uh, just where did this conversation begin again?

Yeah, some of my friends are complete idiots.

Another Year

2007-07-02T12:32:00.000-04:00

It's my birthday today.

I should have taken the day off from work. It's a dreary day in the office already. Couple that with the fact that it's quite pretty outside, and my thoughts are not with me here in the office. On my birthday.

My birthday kind of stinks because it always falls two days before a major national holiday -- a major national holiday on which most of the rest of the country (or at least my friends nearby) usually decides to take off and hit the beach. So either no one remembers, or no one is around to hang out with me. Over the years, I've really come to not really care about my birthday that way anyway.

So instead, I spent a bit of time reflecting on the past 365 days. Unfortunately, my memory isn't that good, so really only the huge highlights pop up. I realize that I have an amazing corps of friends now, possibly better than any set of friends I've had before in my life, even though I've only known some of these people for less than a year. I know my older group of friends is still a great bunch, even if they have their substantial annoying quirks about them. And I've come to a still greater self-realization me in the context of a dating life.

I'm proud to say that I've passed my "early 30s" and have hit my "mid 30s" and I am in no way ashamed of the number. Every single year that passes grants me more wisdom and life experience which I would trade for no other.

I'm living a great life. I'm embracing it. I'm embracing me.

I'm getting ridiculously self-helpy so I'll stop now.

Happy birthday to me!

Success!

2007-06-30T20:12:00.000-04:00

The party was a smashing success. Either everyone lied to me, and did a great job of it, or the food was a huge hit.

The salad course was a standard mixed salad (boxed from Costco), topped with Granny Smith Green Apple wedges and drizzled with a red wine vinaigrette (made with red wine vinegar and olive oil). I failed to take a picture of this.

While the salad was being consumed, I prepared two courses of salmon. One was a Maple Salmon, created by marinating the salmon fillets in a maple syrup/soy sauce/garlic confection then baking them. The second was a simple Magic Salmon, made by rubbing a store-bought mixture of spices and herbs and baking them at the same time as the Maple Salmon.

I then served the salmon with a side of roaster garlic rice, accented with chopped asparagus (I tossed it into the pot while it was cooking to help infuse the flavor) and sprinkled with the juice of one lemon. Also served on the side were some asparagus spears. And, just for effect, I garnished with a lemon slice.

Cooking for nine people is NOT easy. I have to say, though, in the end it was rather worth it. My friends were duly impressed. And I do have to say, I do make a mean salmon.

All in all, I'm quite proud of my efforts.

"It Does Not Say RSVP on the Statue of Liberty!"

2007-06-28T10:14:00.000-04:00

So, like right now, for example. The Haiti-ans need to come to America. But some people are all, "What about the strain on our resources?" Well it's like when I had this garden party for my father's birthday, right? I put R.S.V.P. 'cause it was a sit-down dinner. But some people came that like did not R.S.V.P. I was like totally buggin'. I had to haul ass to the kitchen, redistribute the food, and squish in extra place settings. But by the end of the day it was, like, the more the merrier. And so if the government could just get to the kitchen, rearrange some things, we could certainly party with the Haiti-ans. And in conclusion may I please remind you it does not say R.S.V.P. on the Statue of Liberty. Thank you very much.

-- Cher Horowitz (Alicia Silverstone), Clueless

James (the boyfriend of my friend Roger) has a wonderful talent for cooking some great meals. Okay, wait, maybe he just has a talent for cooking better than I can cook, which isn't saying a hell of a lot, so I just think his stuff is fabulous when it's really just normal, but I digress. The point is, he's been really generous with sharing the fruits of his kitchen, inviting me over to their place for dinners quite frequently. Usually, he'll invite a slew of other people (and make a night out of it -- we'll all sit around (there's like 8 of us), eat, and watch stupid television shows like So You Think You Can Dance or American Idol. Some nights he'll just randomly make an extra helping of food for me when he's cooking dinner for the two of them, then call me to let me know I can pick up some "leftovers" at my leisure. (They're not really "leftovers" since they never intended to eat them in the first place!)

Me being me, of course, after a while I feel bad that I'm mooching all these free meals off these guys so I feel the need to reciprocate. Miss Manners would be proud; I'm pretty sure that's her rule: when you attend a social occasion, it's polite to extend a reciprocal invitation.

I got my chance this weekend when, while out to dinner one night (lots of food involved in this post), James mentioned that he didn't feel like cooking this week, and he and Roger would probably be having dinners out all week. I leapt at the opportunity to suggest that I cook them dinner one night to make up for him having cooked for me so many times. Small wrinkle: my place is tiny, so I'd have to do the actual cooking at their place, probably using their cookware. But never mind that, the point was, I offered to supply the edibles and put in the kitchen time.

They happily accepted by invitation, and I was underway to making my friends a nice dinner. I had previously purchased a nice set of individually vacuum-wrapped salmon fillets at Costco, so I figured that's what I'd do: make a nice salmon dinner for the three of us, plus maybe one other guest.

You know what they say about the best laid plans.

Because James is used to having many people over for these dinner nights, what started off small escalated quickly. "Should we also invite A? and B and his boyfriend C? What about D?" Before I knew it, a dinner that I had envisioned for four ballooned to nine.

Cher, however, was lucky that all she had to do was re-arrange some food on a plate. The Costco salmon that I bought comes in a package of seven fillets. This is, of course, not enough to serve nine people without splitting a nice single-serving of fish. On top of that, I now had to get more of the rice side dish I was planning on making, as well as the salad and the appetizers.

Paula Deen I am not, people!

I made an emergency run to Costco last night. Picked up extra salmon. A large box of salad. Some grape tomatoes for the salad. Plus some green apples for the salad. Couldn't find asparagus for the side, so I got green beans instead. (Then ended up at Safeway later, where voila! they had asparagrus. Got some of that there.) Got home only to realize that I do not have enough of the rice dish (Near East brand rice pilaf -- love that stuff) in my cabinet -- will shop for that at lunch today.

I never thought I'd be the type to obsess so much over food, but I guess when it comes to impressing other people, it kind of is a big deal. You want to make a decent food that people will like. And when it's a full-on spread, well, it could win you quite the accolade among your friends.

And maybe this will actually lead me to cook just a little bit more.

Anyway, the dinner is tonight. Maybe I'll try to take some pictures and post them here later. Wish me luck!

Among Other Unfortunate Results, Bong Hits Also Have the Power to Erode the First Amendment.

2007-06-27T10:13:00.000-04:00

This week, the United States Supreme Court ruled that suspending a high school senior for holding up a "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" sign at a school-sponsored function was not a violation of the kid's First Amendment rights. The case was Morse v. Frederick.

In 1969, students wore black armbands to school protesting the Vietnam War. In Tinker v. Des Moines Indep. Comm. Sch. Dist., the Supreme Court held that punishing these students based on some generalized fear that school disruption would occur was simply not enough of a reason to deny the kids their First Amendment rights.

The difference between that case and the Frederick case makes the outcome of the Frederick case that much more astounding. The black armbands actually were intended to convey a message; they made a statement by those who wore them. As Justice Abe Fortas noted in Tinker, the armbands were banned "based upon an urgent wish to avoid the controversy which might result from the expression, even by the silent symbol of armbands, of opposition to this Nation's part in the conflagration in Vietnam." Translation: The school board wanted to avoid the awkwardness and discomfort from having people openly debate whether the Vietnam War was a Good Idea.

The sign in Frederick is more vague: "Bong Hits 4 Jesus." True, it doesn't really stimulate a hell of a lot of discussion about the "hot topic" of drugs and drug laws.

Really, the school in Alaska just wildly overreacted to a stupid gag. Kids do that. And under Tinker, the school's generalized fear that its event would be disrupted by the sign is not enough for the school to ban the sign altogether.

But now, the Supreme Court has changed that landscape, and in a markedly broad way. The sweeping language of the decision suggests that a school may discipline students for speech which "they reasonably regard as promoting illegal drug use." The problem: On its face, the sign doesn't "promote" using illegal drugs. It's meant to be funny. Lots of people make reference to bong hits even if they don't use drugs. Should a kid be punished for saying in school "Are you on crack?" to a friend who just said something remarkably stupid?

Worse yet, the standard vests that determination purely in the hands of the school board. If they just say "I reasonably believed it promoted drug use," that's the end of the analysis, and they have a right to censor the kid. Where's the checks-and-balances on this? Shouldn't someone else -- i.e., an objective reasonable person -- have to agree with this assessment?

This case turns First Amendment jurisprudence on its head. Really serious speech -- like expressions meant to protest the Vietnam War -- are protected. But silly, frivolous speech -- like a sign linking marijuana use to Jesus -- is not protected. One would have thought that Tinker set a floor for First Amendment protection: everything up to an including the really serious stuff is protected. Not so, this Court says. The super-serious stuff is protected, but if it's not so serious (maybe semi-serious?) watch out. You could get nabbed.

This ruling is a huge setback to the free speech rights of students and represents just why this country messed up big time when it "elected" W. to the White House. Twice, no less.

Oh, and one last bit of food for thought: What would the conservative justices who voted in the majority in this case have done if a kid had been disciplined for holding up a sign that said "Abortion is Murder"? I submit to you that, strangely, that kid would have had the full backing of the First Amendment behind him.

Have a Sandwich!

2007-06-26T14:04:00.000-04:00

Okay, I really don't want to blog too much about Paris Hilton, but this blurb from WaPo caught my eye:

According to jailhouse phone interviews, Hilton is looking forward to sleeping with her own pillows and having a good meal.

And my first thought was: "Wow, the bitch actually eats?"

Double-U. T. Hotel.

2007-06-20T00:23:00.000-04:00

If my travels abroad have taught me nothing at all, it's taught me to love my fellow man, including those tourists whom I used to loathe. They're everywhere in DC, especially during the summer months when people bring their summer break-ing kids with them. And growing up in Hawai'i, tourists were a part of the landscape. Hated 'em.

But now having been a tourist several times now -- a few times in cities where I don't speak the language well -- I have come to appreciate the kindness of strangers and feel the need to reciprocate if and when at all possible.

Every so often I'll see a random hapless person on a street corner in DC poring over a map. I try nowadays to take the time to stop and ask them if they need help finding something. God knows I've been lost before.

Tonight, as I walked back from the Metro, I was approached by a random man. At first I was a little wary -- was he going to ask for money? Or worse yet, was he just going to rob me? -- but then this conversation ensued:

Guy: Ex-cyooze.
Me: Yes? You need something? [I am still poised to bolt if necessary.]
Guy: Where is 15th Street? [He has an accent.]
Me: This is 15th Street. What are you looking for?
Guy: 1515.
Me: 1515 15th Street? [I seriously don't know where that would be.]
Guy: 15.
Me: Huh?

Clearly, English is not his first language, and he's not doing too well. And I take it he's lost. So I engage my good Samaritan nature and continue the conversation:

Guy: 15.
Me: Uh, what are you looking for? Maybe I can help you. Do you know a cross street? [This phrase is totally lost on him, of course.]
Guy: W hotel. 1515.
Me: The W?
Guy: Double-U. T.

I gotta tell you, I don't even know if a W hotel even exists in DC. And I know most of downtown DC like the back of my hand, so I would know if there was a W somewhere.

"You know what? Let me see what I can do." I pull out my cell phone and dial 411, looking to ask for the number to the W hotel for purposes of finding directions for him. Then suddenly the last thing he said hit me.

Me: Wait, what did you say?
Guy: Double-U. T.

I hung up the phone and instead opened up a text editor. I typed in a word and showed it to him. "Is this what you're talking about?"

"Yes!" the guy responds. I had typed the word "Doubletree." Which is located at 1515 Rhode Island Avenue, NW.

"Oh, good. You're heading in the wrong direction. Just come with me."

At which point, because it's well on my way, I walk him to within a block of the hotel. Along the way, I tried to engage him in conversation, but his English was so severely limited that it simply wasn't working. I even asked him if he spoke Spanish or French, but that didn't take either. We ended up walking about three blocks in complete silence.

At my corner, one can see the hotel. I stop at my corner and point it out to him. "It's right there," I tell him. "Cross the street here, then cross the street to there. Then turn that way, and the hotel is right there."

He thanked me (if there's only so many words you know in a foreign tongue, I would suggest that "thank you" must be at the top of your list for words to know), we shook hands, and he went off on his merry way. I presume he found what he was looking for.

And now I hope I'm getting karma points off of this effort.

Random Update

2007-06-19T21:15:00.000-04:00

Okay, so...

No blogging about Amsterdam. Which is unfortunate, because it was a great trip. But stuff like that has to be timely, I think, and writing about it now would, unfortunately, bore me. (And I'm all that matters. Ha!) As with the other times I've ever been to Europe, I come back thinking how much I'd love to return there sometime -- and that conflicts with my desire to see as much of the world (or at least Europe) as possible. Of course, the euro is way too strong right now (and I's po') so I'm thinking that the next time I hop an international flight, it'll be to Mexico.

My erstwhile boyfriend is no more, and I am still a complete pussy. I haven't called him since I got back from Amsterdam. On the flip side, he never called me. We effectively "drifted apart." Unfortunately, he made friends with my friends and has their numbers. Now I've gone and put my friends in a strange position, since he called one of them the other day just to see what he was up to. I'd feel weird if they hung out together.

Work is kicking my ass. I've come to the conclusion that my boss, whom I had been admiring and looking up to for the better part of five years, is a technically competent litigator, but not a very good one. He talks funny, has strange mannerisms, and sometimes goes into strange lines of questions with witnesses. In the "silver lining" file, I feel a little bit better because I now find myself thinking things like "Damn, dude, I can do a better job than you at this."

It's hot as balls here. Mostly because it's about to rain, I think.

Okay, I think that's it for now. Thanks again to you readers out there for bearing with me during this lull in posting.

PS: I've also noticed that during this lull in my posting schedule, the spam that tends to accumulate in my email box rapidly dropped. Guess spammers know where their spam is useless.