recently observed away message:
“i’m out studying at the library! if you care to goin, call the cell!”
well i hope you’re going to check out a book on spelling. at first i thought you were talking about “groins.” and calm down with the exclamation points, it’s the LIBRARY.
i took this picture last night while “out on the town” because it’s awesome. i mean, i don’t even really have to say anything, it’s too easy.
“please use stairs, but don’t be a person capable of movement.”
just when i thought my day couldn’t get any worse, i got an email from my friend “sdcjlcdmvz,” and all of a sudden things started looking up. the “Z-man” - as we used to call him back in college - had sent along some inside stock tip info which is about to make me lots of cash. he was quite excited about PIFR (premier information management) which is expected to gain over 300% short term. he’s really a nice guy and has a lot of connections to the world of trading. i’ve gotten to be good friends with “mlvpdue” and his broker “g8dleqp” whom have also showered me with wealth tips and recently offered to enhance some of my physical attributes. i’m having trouble thanking them via email; i don’t know if they are going through or not, but no response yet. however, i’m sure they’re quite busy.
SOMEONE must have been PISSED. i saw the remains of a telephone book on the parking lot pavement today. it seemed like such a random item to lose/throw out a window of a car(?) and if it was disposed of due to its dilapidated state, how did that happen? i can’t imagine someone using the phonebook SO MUCH that it gets all crappy, unless you’re really short, and sit on it a lot at the dinner table. but even so, why throw it out…you need that.
i’m sure it was just a grad student relationship gone bad as the guy angrily stomps out of the apartment with his girlfriend yelling after him “AND TAKE YOUR STUPID PHONEBOOK, TOO!” of course, he gets the last laugh. he left it to decay.
today while i was walking, engulfed in the ipod-hipster-fad of the 21st century, i still had what little remains of my auditory sense to recognize a slight vibrational noise behind me. that coupled with a minor wind current circling my feet finally caused me to turn around in time to realize that i just barely got ran over by a street sweeper. A STREET SWEEPER?
do these things even work? i know they’re kind of big, make lots of noise and have the look and feel of a zamboni machine (which of course is a PRICELESS piece of equipment), but seriously, this has to be the most inefficient use of energy/parts ever. it’s essentially a broom with a huge motor attached to a car that maxes out at walking pace. i followed one of these things for about a block and noted NO improvement in the appearance of the pavement. sure i saw leaves flying around and stuff, and the driver looking intently at the ground like he’s trying to be all precise, but really, there was no order or cleanliness to the scene. and it took me like a block out of my way. i’m pretty sure the driver was just using the sweeper as transportation - to get “back to the shop” to hang out with his boys and talk about some “hot babe” he saw walking through the quad while he was “sweepin’ the streets.” yep, yep, the guy pretty much runs the place.
a street is pretty dirty - do people actually care if there are a few leaves floating around? will campus tourism decline? honestly - if folks are willing to swim in the fountains (which they are), then i’m pretty sure a twig on the corner of north-south mall and serra isn’t going to be a cause for complaint. unless it starts grading chemistry midterms. then we have a problem.
i guess before i kick off the first of probably a few more installments of “weekend in review,” i need to mention my disdain for a particular phrase which we all hear everyday, but after the 13,254th time one of us has got to say something: “it’s amazing how quickly it adds up” among other variants such as “it all adds up,” etc.
commonly heard in checkout lines or reviewing bills of some sort, i beg to ask - what does that even mean? “how quickly it adds up.”
1) no shit it adds up. do the math, genius. that’s how the world works. it’s not like you can offset a box of cap’n crunch with a gallon of milk at the grocery store, and thereby, with a little strategy, end up paying $0, or, better yet, having the store pay you.
2) since when is there a time domain to adding things? this makes the least amount of sense. “it’s amazing how fast the cash register lady is scanning your items, and the rapidness of the calculator should really give you cause for concern.” it adds up. to a number. it doesn’t matter how fast, it matters how much. so really, if you have some sloth reading your bill or someone not good at math checking out your items, it really doesn’t add up that fast…so i wouldn’t worry about it yet.
that being said, here’s what’s in store for this installment, ie. why this weekend was, well awesome (the posts are broken up to retain reader interest):
(I) THE OLYMPICS
(II) NBA ALL-STAR WEEKEND
(III) DRUNK TREE
(I) THE OLYMPICS - the world’s newest reality tv show. it must have sucked back in the 1900’s when you had to settle for waiting a day or two before finding out who won a particular event. when there were no sweet designer steroids, no awesome photography/video special effects, no sappy-ass montages of triumph, and no watchful eye of the media, looking to dig up any dirt for a story.
welcome to the 21st century, baby! nothing has changed except everything that happens we know about. and a lot happens. and it’s great.
the LEON LETT PREMATURE HIGH-STEPPING AWARD goes to u.s. snowboarder LINDSEY JACOBELLIS. did you see this? she had a commanding lead in “the cross course,” essentially snowboarding’s equivalent to a downhill ski run with a motocross mentality (ie. all the racers compete simultaneously, and there are sweet jumps). then, on the last jump before the finishline (and a gold medal), she showboats in mid-air (grabs her board - somehow this is difficult to to do?) and totally wipes out. amazingly, she was still able to get the silver medal.
i swear i would have done the same thing, but probably with a slightly cooler looking jump. and you can bet if this was an NBA league equivalent event, she would have landed the trick-jump and taken the gold. but for some unfortunate reason, the karma of the olympics is pure and looks favorable upon hard workers and good sportsmanship…LAME.
NBC’s website devoted to olympic coverage has a photo slideshow of all the figure skating WIPEOUTS from the weekend which occurred in the ice dancing competition. awesome. thanks to ESPN and that, i feel i don’t need to watch anymore. i swear the winter olympics are like nascar. you have them on in the background and don’t really care that much, but you’re just waiting for someone to crash so the announcer can chime in “ooh, that’s going to cost her” or “you hate to see that, bob.” p.s. - some of those women ice dancers…HOTT.
a skiing event supposedly to happen on sunday was postponed because IT WAS SNOWING. heaven forbid people would have to ski in the snow. it’s like expecting to take a shower without getting wet.
(II) NBA ALL-STAR WEEKEND - NBA’s most creative way of throwing a party for “all the cool people” in the league by using talent and PPG as a discriminating factor. the EAST won, 122-120 in typical all-star game fashion, which goes like this: watching an all-star game is like watching yourself shoot hoops with your friends outside when everyone has their own basketball. people are getting pegged in the face, basketballs are everywhere, and you’re doing whatever kind of shot you feel like because you know the ball’s coming back to you anyway. hmmm. they should allow an extra basketball into the all-star game just to spice things up a bit.
what else is great about the all-star weekend, besides the fact that it is studded with wasted celebrities and bling, is the DUNK CONTEST. the pure concept have having people compete to see who can be score 2pts in the most ridiculous way is genius. it brings out this playground mentality in the entire arena, and nothing is cooler than seeing an A-list celebrity like Ashton Kutcher humbling himself with his own ARSENIO HALL impression after a monstrous jam. in fact, i am trying to think what the equivalent is in any other sport, and there isn’t one. sure, baseball has the homerun derby, but that’s no different than watching a baseball game - every home run looks the same. now, if they had a home run derby where the partipants called their own shots like “a right angle off the foul post, bounce into row 4 of the left field bleachers and into that bald guy’s big gulp,” then we have a contender. but until now, the only thing that comes remotely close is watching those trick shots in pool.
all in all, i am willing to bet one couldn’t tell the difference between the NBA All-Star game/weekend and a party at the playboy mansion…with basketballs.
(III) DRUNK TREE - the stanford university “mascot,” “the tree” (pardon the OD on quotes), was recently kicked out of the band for being WASTED at a stanford-cal basketball game. while the incident at the game was not the only offense leading up to the decision, it is the one that has garnered the most publicity, with mention on the radio, news stations, and espn.
WHY is this such a big deal? isn’t the point of going to sporting events for the college crowd to get drunk, rowdy, and make a lot of noise? you think there would be such thing as “homecourt advantage” if all the fans were sober? no, there would not.
have you seen the mascot? it’s a tree. it is going up against bears, trojans, sundevils, wildcats, huskies, bruins, etc. i mean all of these mascots’ real life equivalents urinate on stanford’s mascot everyday in the wild. probably even the duck. you’d HAVE to get me wasted in order to get into that costume. how else would you expect someone to have the intensity mascots are supposed to have…especially as a tree?
i’m sure ALL the other mascots at schools even more athletically hardcore than stanford are COMPLETELY sober. just look the other way - the school needs us. i mean, hell, if they let OSU basketball coach eddie sutton coach his team drunk on the sidelines for the past decade, the least they could do is let a mascot, much alone a tree mascot, have some fun.
i am a dork. i like science. i am probably not that cool, but every time i think that maybe i’m not as cool as i think i am, i just need to overhear someone else talking while i am walking home or open my eyes a bit…and thank god that i’m not THAT guy. it’s great when you get selective hearing for about 2 seconds, just enough time to hear THAT guy say something to the girl he’s walking with like “i’m sorry kickboxing practice went late” or “most people are unfamiliar with the difference between blue cheese and feta cheese.” at this point, there is no need to keep listening, in case the context reveals he is actually cool. it is better to laugh and move on, for he is not.
so, now that i think about it, i am pretty cool, and there are pretty good odds that you are cool, too. see, if we assume the world population to be about 6.4 billion, there is only a 1 in 6.4 billion chance that you are THAT guy i passed while walking the other day. that’s quite a small probability. and since THAT guy is clearly not cool, you and me probably are, too.
however, there has been a surge recently in the ever growing contingent of faction “THAT guy.” they have acquired this one guy i heard talking about how he knows where to get the best bagels; this coming right on the heels of recruitment of this one dude walking out of his dorm while telling this girl he was walking with “why, i’m a pretty cool guy” after she told him to stop being so annoying.
you should also be on the lookout for this one guy i saw telling this group of girls about his law firm outside a local bar, and his friend, whom earlier that day went tanning.
so i guess the probability goes up (albeit very slightly) that you are THAT guy, but it’s still very small. so just remember, if you ever are having one of those days where you’re not feeling cool, or you’re at a party and people are looking at you awkwardly, just look around or have a listen. there’s always that ONE guy who redeems your life’s existence and reason for living…and it’s to not be him.
