Reasons I love the internet in general

And youtube in particular.

Here's a reason.

Here's another.

I guess these also might be reasons why I love Russians as well?

BIG... CLOSE TO EVERYTHING...

I once had a set of roommates that had this annoying habit. If they found something funny or otherwise entertaining, they would laugh for a few moments and then declare that they "almost peed [their] pants! Really!"

I think this bothered me mostly because hello, we are adults now and it is unnecessary and undistinguished to talk about pee. It annoyed me in the same way the whole "I just threw up a little in my mouth" thing annoyed me for a few years there where Everyone was saying it All The Time.

That being said, this McSweeney's List caught me so offguard that, well, you know. The rapidfire hilarity of the seventh and eighth entries is what really got me. And you know, I read these lists for the exact reason that I expect them to be funny. Somehow that one just really hit the right spot for me. Thank you, Eric Feezell.

Thoughts on Hoboes

Discussion with my roommate: who has the moral upperhand? Hoboes or office drones? What is the American Dream, and is it different from the American Ideology? I contend that the American Dream is to get your money for nothing and your chicks for free, and that the American Ideology is that if the Dream doesn't come true, you will always be able to get the money if you just work hard enough. Being a hobo is the Dream, and the protestant work ethic is the backup. Eh?

On hoboes: My roommate couldn't be one for moral and also for hygienic reasons. She thinks she would not like to smell bad. I don't think I would mind, and that puts me in mind of the idea of pheromones. Are they real? Do they actually work, and if so, how? If you were in a room with a bunch of people, how would your Jacobsen's organ know which person was emitting the good pheromones? Is that the reason why people go on dates, is to cross-check in a number of situations and make sure that the pheromones remain constant? Could a person effectively mooch off a friend's irresistibility by never being separated from them? This seems a tricky business.

Also on hoboes: man, I'd like to be one. And barring that, I wish I could at least see one. I have always watched passing trains diligently when stopped at the crossing, hoping to see one of the majestic dying breed. Hoboes make me think of wheat fields and the Rootabaga Stories and why is there such a rich hobo tradition in our culture if hoboism is not the American Dream?

Bums vs. hoboes: what is the difference? I feel like there is something naturally inferior about bums, like maybe because they stay in the same place it's proven that they've simply got problems and can't afford or otherwise manage having a home. Hoboes, on the other hand, just have places to go, and keeping a home would be logistically a bad idea when they've constantly needing to be in different places. Hoboes are maybe bums with a purpose?

At one point, written on the wall of the music building on campus there was a message: no oboe can compare with the music of the soul, or something along those lines. Although it was happy and good-natured graffiti that made my day brighten every time I saw it, I also felt the urge to graffito the graffiti to read, no hoboe can compare with the music of the soul. I feel like defacement of state property can always be improved, and often without too much effort or added visual impact. One little letter could have changed a simpering hippie sentiment into a real good chuckle for the students, musicians and hoboes alike who used that building.

This Moment is Accounted For

I'm currently in the middle of what I will call, for lack of a better term, a time audit. At the suggestion of the Austenite, I've created an excel file that has a running tally of every hour (it's actually accurate to five minutes, sort of) of my day. During the past three days, I've spent around 25 hours at work, 21 hours asleep, and close to 9 hours have been marked as "social," which basically means sitting around talking to roommates and/or watching movies with folks. I've spent between 2 and 3 hours each on exercise, computer time, and bathing, with service taking the smallest chunk of time at an hour and a half. I'm kind of adding categories as they come up, and although I had kind of planned on needing a "sinning" category for the hours I couldn't figure out what I was doing during the day (and thus must obviously have been sinning) I have so far been pretty good about marking stuff often enough that my time is all accounted for at the end of each day.

I'm kind of looking forward to analyzing everything at the end of the week to see what I can improve on (prediction: sleep more, spend less time on the computer). I was recently listening to an old This American Life about a guy who makes lists and tallies of everything he does every day for the past like 40 years, and I thought, "gee. I could be that guy, except I'd have statistical data for how long I did stuff for!" Obviously I need more sleep.

Time for Lunchtime Musings!

Which is worse: the fact that the lady who used to sit at my current desk spilled coffee down the front of it SOMETIME IN THE PAST and never cleaned it up, or the fact that I noticed it last week and I still haven't cleaned it up?

Followup question: does it matter?

Maybe I'll sit on the couch all day and watch movies

Two nights ago I was happily sitting and watching an old movie with my roommate and a friend, and something in the movie made me laugh. Not because it was meant to be funny, but something dated the movie, maybe it was when the leading lady was supposed to be crying but instead it looked like she had snorted a handful of pepper?

Anyway. So I started laughing too hard and choked on a little blob of misplaced spit, and suddenly I was coughing and couldn't stop, and then when I did stop, I still had to cough every couple of minutes for the rest of the evening. Weird, huh?

Then the next day I *still* had to cough every couple of minutes, all through the day at work, and on top of that my neck and back were really achey and sore, and then as I rode my bike home my throat hurt so bad from the breathing and the coughing and the achiness that I almost gave up halfway through my commute to live in the park for the rest of my life. And then I realized that I was sick, that I caught whatever it is that my roommate was home with.

While I was at work still, I went in the bathroom and looked down my throat in the mirror to see what I could see. Which is really silly, because I've never been one of those people who can look into a throat and see that the tonsils are too big, or whatever. I have some friends who can do that, but to be honest, when I look into my throat all I see is a bunch of flesh. I could have an alien life form nestled in there and I would never know.

So I went home at the end of the day and made myself and my roommate some chicken noodle soup which was pretty amazing, considering the fact that I could barely roll out the dough for the noodles without sitting down for a rest in the middle.



I'm finally starting to be congested today, but the achiness is starting to go away. It's like having a cold... in reverse! Starting with the weak, lingering cough, then the achey muscles, now the snot. In a few hours I'll probably start sneezing, and by tomorrow morning I'll be better!

Favorite passage from a lunchtime read

This is out of David Sedaris' When You are Engulfed in Flames, and I think that if you stop at just the right point in this section it's a beautifully poignant look at human nature. Fortunately for us, Sedaris goes beyond that point and gives us something to snort with laughter at in our offices.

"I remember once riding in the car with my dad. I was twelve, and it was just the two of us, coming home from the bank. We'd been silent for blocks, when out of nowhere he turned to me, saying, 'I want you to know that I've never once cheated on your mother.'

'Um. OK,' I said. And then he turned on the radio and listened to a football game.

Years later, I mentioned this incident to a friend, who speculated that my father had said this specifically because he had been unfaithful. 'That was a guilty conscience talking,' she said, but I knew that she was wrong. More likely my father was having some problem at work and needed to remind himself that he was not completely worthless. It sounds like something you'd read on a movie poster: sometimes the sins you haven't committed are all you have to hold on to. If you're really desperate, you might need to grope, saying, for example, 'I've never killed anyone with a hammer' or 'I've never stolen from anyone who didn't deserve it.' But whatever his faults, my dad did not have to stoop quite that low."

Not counting my chickens yet, but...

Dang, that's some fine cheese. I know because I made it and pressed it and dried it myself. I lovingly (perhaps a little paranoidly) turned it over and over as it dried, so one end wouldn't be any moister than the other. I smelled it sometimes.

Ok, I smelled it a lot. I smelled it every time I turned it over, perhaps 50 times in four days. Sometimes I smelled it twice when turning it over. Sometimes I smelled it in between turnings. It just smells good, ok? I'm not sure I can stand to wait a whole four weeks before eating it. More than once I nearly took a big chomp out of it while smelling. There might even have been drool.

I think I covet my cheese.

What I do not covet, however, is the crappy waxing job I did on it. Yes, that is a big ol' thumbprint in the top of the wax, and no, I don't own a pastry brush. Turns out that putting a few layers of wax onto a cheese without using a pastry brush and without burning your fingers is pretty difficult to do. But it's done! Now I have to wait. Probably the most difficult stage of all the cheesemaking stages. You should check back with me in a month. I'll let you know how it went.

Also? I've got two more gallons of milk in the fridge (it was on sale, I promise!) that will begin the process on Saturday. I'm stoked.

A promise I have no problem with

Alright, so yesterday I found an amazing book on a free books pile. A free books pile in itself is a beautiful thing, and when there's a book in there that looks interesting, it's just an added bonus. I've come across a couple of these books; sometimes I just take it because I like the cover (see: five paperbacks of, like, academic journal bibliographies swiped from a geography department in Canada, and an issue of American Quarterly with a picture of a woman wearing a gas mask while pushing her child in a stroller, also be-gas masked), while other times it's an actual book that I read and enjoy (like the memoirs of some blind guy on how being blind doesn't preclude you from being a normal guy).

The book I got yesterday was an encyclopedia of religion. Yes, you can open the book and find entries on faith, necromancy, and every kind of protestantism there was in 1945. I was standing there next to the book pile, gloating over my good fortune in finding this gem, when our Jane Austen-loving male friend came up and asked what I was reading. I showed him the book with glee, and he totally confirmed my good taste. Thank goodness, because on other occasions when I have been excited about things I have been shut down by people who do not understand the coolness! of the things! He got excited about the book and asked me to look up a few things, and expressed his jealousy that I got to it first.

Just as we were about to part, me going back to work and he going back to work on his comps, he asked in passing the name of the compiler. The best part! This man's name was Vergilius Ferm. If we ever had any doubt as to the legitimacy or accuracy of the book, or even the sheer wonder of the book, the name on the spine would be an instant reassurance. Vergilius Ferm. The stamp of authority. Vergilius Ferm! Before we parted, the Austenite made me promise that my firstborn son (or even my firstborn daughter) would be named Vergilius Ferm.

Things that Make the World a Sadder Place

Little Women (the Winona Ryder version)

War

Police chase video TV shows

Arm Fat (stomach fat and leg fat as well)

That scene in Animal Farm where the starving, cold animals smell barley wafting from the house and think the pigs are making them a warm mash, when they're really making beer for themselves. *Sob*.

Capitalism (sort of)

Things the World would be Sadder Without

Pyrex bowls

James Thurber

Dr Mario

Bacon

Deodorant

Ice water

Smells

Scrabble

Hershey's fake white chocolate with minty sprinkles in it

Bicycles

The Beatles in general, and George Harrison in particular (also John Lennon [Ringo Starr as well {I guess Paul is ok, although, as Mimi Smartypants pointed out, he does look a little too much like Angela Lansbury now that he's old}])

The whole concept of dinner and a movie

Pamper-y bathroom things like lotion and nice soaps

Psssst

This guy is "inspired by lotteries, lying and elderly people." Just thought you ought to know.

To a Mouse

I ran over a mouse today in the parking garage. I didn't even see it, but I definitely heard my wheel going over it when I pulled into my spot, late for church. I was curious as to what could have made that scary popping/crunching sound, so I briefly glanced under the car as I got out and locked my doors. I didn't see anything, and scurried off to sit in the back of the chapel on one of the hard, overflow chairs next to some guy I don't know.

After church I came back to my car and had the time to make a full inspection. There it was, the broken remains of the mouse. At first the damage didn't look too bad and I wondered if I could maybe revive and keep it at my house. Then I reached under and picked it up to examine it in better light, and saw that yes, the end of its life had come. The casing was cracked and in some places gone altogether, the batteries crushed and viewable through the gaping hole in the top, and the buttons would not push. Oh well.

I set it aside next to the wall in front of my car before driving away. I just wonder, though, who leaves a perfecly good mouse just sitting on the floor of a parking garage? A nice, wireless one, for that matter? Seems kind of careless, if you ask me. Was it one of those situations where they got it without knowing what they were getting into, just because their child asked for one, and now they realize they don't want to deal with it, and so let it loose in the wild? That's so irresponsible, especially when other people would have been willing to adopt it and give it a good home.

Aaaaaaauuuuugggghhhhh!

Can I take a moment to tell the entire world how mad I am at my sister right now? Yeah? Ok. Here it goes.

I am so mad at my sister right now! She's made my life pretty miserable the past couple of days by keeping me up far later than I should be up last night and again tonight, during a time at work when I really should be getting a lot of sleep, and not only that, but now my little heart is broken, and it's all because of her! She must've known all along that if she introduced me to Wonderfalls I would become addicted and obsess about the characters and be forced to watch episode after episode until I'd gone through everything on youtube (when I SHOULD have been sleeping), and THEN I would find out that not only will it not work out between Jaye and Eric, but that there won't even be a chance for it NOT to work out, because the freaking show only had one season! How can I live knowing all of that? It's almost too much to bear.

I could kill her. If I fall asleep at work tomorrow and get fired, I hope she knows it's all her fault. I feel like I am maybe in emotional distress right now.

Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket

Please tell me it's ok to go to a party, spend three minutes inside the house saying hi to the hosts, and then going out to the front yard to watch a meteor shower alone in the dark, ok?

If it helps, I saw thirty-five shooting stars in the space of an hour and a half, just staring at one section of sky. Can I just say I had a lot of important wishes to make? Because man, that house had way too many people in it.

Maybe the stars were defective, though, because my very first wish, while I was on my way there, was that I would have a good time at the party. Except, maybe, my wish actually came true.

Lunch break of awkwardness

So I've already eaten around the outside of my not-cooked-too-well tamale, and decided to brave the outside world to pick up a manual that I should have picked up days ago, and I'm wearing my ill-fitting university t-shirt because it's casual friday, so of course who should I meet but my friend whom I haven't seen in months, who's been out living it up in Sweden and being a fancy PhD student in speech and hearing sciences. So of course he waves me over to say hi and as I'm maneuvering around chairs outside the student union I put my hand down onto the back of a chair, except it wasn't so much putting it down on the back of a chair as it was putting it down into a fresh glob of bird friendliness, and right as it starts to ooze between my fingers he outstreches his arms for a hug. Not to make things more awkward, I pause, wipe my fingers off as best I can onto a different chair, then turn back to him for the hug, being sure I don't actually touch him with that hand. I'm not sure if he realized what was going on, or if he just thought I was insane and maybe a little OCD.

Of course, the awkwardness went both ways, because he had something stuck between his teeth that he was trying to get out throughout the entire conversation that ensued. Aren't we classy.

Perhaps we shouldn't look too close at my unconcious self

Two bits of information that were very important that I spread to the world when I woke up from a dream of watching the turbulent ocean at dusk just now:

1. The correct spelling of the word churl and its near cousin, cheauxrl.

2. Although this has no bearing on the righteousness or evilness of hairy people, naturally hairless people will all end up in heaven because hairlessness is an indication of innate perfection. The destination of the hirsute is up in the air.

What's my name again?

Do you think it's possible that something that's an inherent part of my personality could lead me to do some action on a daily basis that could be the reason why I have a terrible short term memory? No, I'm not doing drugs or spending my afternoons hitting myself in the head with a mallet. At least, not that I remember.

I only ask because during the past year (almost!) of working at my current job, I've noticed that my short term memory isn't up to snuff. I'll be standing in my boss's office, and he'll tell me something I need to do in the next hour, I'll say ok, and go off to my office to do that thing. But somewhere in the six feet between his office and mine, I forget what I'm doing and then I'll remember two weeks later (sometimes earlier, like when my boss asks me why didn't I do that thing).

So I was thinking about this tonight, while I was sitting on the ground listening to the same song over and over, wondering why I have a bad memory. Then I thought, maybe it's because I've trained myself only to remember stuff when it's repeated six or seven times in a row! Maybe my compulsive/addictive personality is to blame for my woes at work! Of course, I'm not a scientist, and have not thoroughly thought through this idea of mine. Perhaps a controlled experiment with mice and a cardboard maze is in order?

Maybe I should remove my blue shower gel from the bathroom, while I'm thinking about it

My roommate has this big bottle of "Frozen Daiquiri Shower Gel" that's been sitting in the shower for a long time, maybe even as long as my neverending bottle of shampoo.

I have problems with this!

Where do these things come from, anyway? No one would go to the store and buy "shower gel" for themselves. They would buy soap. This stuff is masquerading as liquid soap, when it's just some pink viscous material. It must have been given as a gift, but again, WHY? Why would you give someone you love a bottle of fake soap?

Frozen Daiquiri? If I "washed" myself with a daquiri, I'm pretty sure I'd come out of the experience sticky and smelling like oversweetened syrup, like my apartment after my roommates' famous margarita parties. Gross.

FROZEN Daiquiri? Aren't those types of drinks, by definition, frozen? Unnecessary adjectives! (see also: flame-broiled Whopper, sinful chocolate cake, and young children).

I'm pretty sure that technically, the flavor of a daiquiri can best be described as "pink." Can't we just call it Pink Shower Gel and get it over with?

Why is it in the shower still? This type of product is best dealt with in one of three ways: immediate disposal (either by garbage can or by re-gifting), storage under the bathroom sink to assuage guilt until spring cleaning, when it can be thrown out, or usage for one week or one application (whichever comes first) followed by disposal or storage under the sink. There is no need for this bottle to be sitting in the shower for more than a few days, really.

I Blogged Every Day in November and All I Got was My Roommate Winning Some Scented Oil

I think I just found the perfect Christmas gift for someone to get me. For someone that loves me exactly $17 + shipping, and not a penny more.

In other news, holy cow tonight we did something fun! Ok, it was pretty dorky and cliche, but we did a photo scavenger hunt, and we ran around the university, sneaking pictures of dudes playing DDR (man, they were good. They must have no lives), and walking up to older couples to ask if we could take a picture of them hugging (they were suspicious of our intentions: "so, where exactly are these pictures going to end up?" They hugged in the end, and it was way cute. Go old people!)

The most awesome part? Our group won! We got pictures of everything except the bursar's office (because it was so far away) and... a class schedule? I think that running around for an hour once a week, taking pictures of anything and everything might be a good idea in general, especially if you get to walk up to two mean-lookin' toughs to ask if you could take a picture of their bald heads for a scavenger hunt. The one guy actually looked a little freaked out and didn't want to be in the picture, but his friend was pretty cool.

UPDATE: Holy smoking bananas, not only did I find the best shirt ever, but I just saw the most hilariously sweet song on youtube! Who in the world comes up with this stuff? It's so bad, but also so so good!