Purty

So very, very South Philly:



Via.

An Open Letter to the Dumbshit Who Stole My Bike Headlight While My Bike Was Parked in the Corner Parking Lot

Dear Dumbshit,

You are a dumbshit. May you, while biking home, illuminate, ever so briefly, an unnavigable obstacle with sufficient time to comprehend the coming—but, one hopes, reparable—injuries to your plunderous, pilfering hands.

mmkthxbye,
Stan

When I was wee

Over at unfogged, pdf23ds links to a cool website that lets you upload a picture of a face and distort it to look more feminine/masculine, older/younger, etc. It seems to have some trouble with facial hair (the feminine version of me had a weird beard-ponytail thing), but my "baby" pic had me laughing aloud:



P.S. I almost did one of co-blogger Ryan, too, but I thought he might quit the blog.

In a Word

Man Man?

Brilliant.

Westward Eastward Northward!

At noon, my mom boards a flight bound for China. She's going with a delegation that will look into the education system, with the hopes of fostering more exchanges of teachers between the two countries. Pretty cool.

And! They fly over the North Pole! She promised to report on the state of the polar ice cap, if she's awake.

My mom is soooo Nixon—but in a non-evil way.

No, Not Really

Said a co-worker the other day: "It's really a matter of deniable plausibility."

Deniable Plausibility?! That's wondrous:

Person 1: With utter certainty and without fear of contradiction I aver that this thesis is entirely plausible.
Person 2: No it's not!
Person 1: Dang, you're right.

Of course, I'm eminently professional, so I just offered a polite and muted correction.

Zap

Holy crap! This market isn't half-a-block from my house

Lightning brought part of a Belmont building to the ground and left four people trapped inside. The collapse happened around 6 p.m.
...
Firefighters say the cause of the collapse is apparently due to lightning. They think a lightning strike weakened the structure and brought the wall and a sign crashing to the ground.

I didn't know lightning could do that—and so close to my own humble abode!

I'm glad everyone's okay, and hey, statistically, this means that I'm that much less likely to get struck by lightning at my house. Right? Yeah. Um. Science. Or something.

Sibera is unbreakable

The game of RISK stared with Ryan pouring everybody sparkling wine while we doled out country ownership and LC explained to Jordan how it is, exactly, that one conquers the world with three dice and tons of plastic cannons. In the first round of turns Stanley's Team Gray made some underhanded deals with Red in order to take solid control of Africa, LC's Red Squad laid claim over South America (using the same anti-Interpol tactics), Team Jordan (Black) began a shaky and ill-advised run for all of Europe, and Ryan staked out the purple land of Australia, placing his headquarters neatly in Sydney, where like nobody was ever going to get, ever. The North American frontier was most likely going to Ryan's forces, but meanwhile Jordan continued to send troops into Greenland, just to be a bitch, and by no means was Eastern America a walk in the park, pillage-wise. Nary a world leader expressed any real interest in Asia's seven points per turn, although Ryan dared everybody to attempt to enter Siberia, which he deemed "unbreakable".

The first notable skirmish was more verbal than anything else. Prime Minister Jordan of Team Black showed notable frustration over Ryan and Stanley's constant argumentative presence at World Summits, telling the two Presidents to quite frankly, "Shut the fuck up and let Lauren decide for herself," to which Ryan and Stanley gave each other a look and passed the salsa dip and decided to make pizza. North American control soon went to Ryan. Stanley showed interest in stacking multiple horsies in the Middle East. Most battles now were nominal and only for the cards.

Just as all global politics seemed balanced and calm, with all forces agreeing to use Asia as a ground to beat each other around and get cards. Stanley broke his pact with Team LC and sent a serious wave waterborne manpower across the ocean into Brazil, where most top-level intelligence officers thought LC's headquarters to be located. Somebody went to get beer and now smoke breaks were constant.

Maybe in the time it took the pizza to cook all of South America was demolished, forcing LC to push her forces into Mexico, breaking up Ryan's hold on America and just like seriously pissing him off. Ryan then was forced to exit America through the back door (Alaska) and make a run for all of Asia, which he was successful in doing. At this point all armies were adding 30, 40, 50 new troops every turn, and casualties per round were at least in the lower hundreds w/r/t little men being dropped back into their rectangular plastic containers. LC took America. Stanley now had Africa and South America, but had lost the Middle East. Ryan was in Australia and Asia. Jordan had had Europe for some time, but was facing serious cannon power at all borders, most of which were pointed at the tippy-top of Big Ben.

LC, not happy with the glory of her new headquarters both in California and Quebec, ran mass troops through Alaska and just fucked Ryan's world up in big ways. Ryan lost most of Asia and all of Australia. Jordan was more or less done. Stanley was a dick. LC now had troops on all colored continents except Africa, which Stanley no longer had because of a deal made between Asmith (newly elected president of Team Black (Jordan had to go bartend)) and Ryan wherein they both stormed Egypt with like totally insane paratroopers and ended up taking all of Northern Africa.

Stanley turned in some cards and prepared for a mass takeover, maybe aiming his guns at the complete destruction of both Team Ryan and Team Asmith/Jordan, but then some other non-world leader peoples showed up and somebody pointed out that this whole world domination thing had been going on for seven-and-a-half hours, so it was ended.

But probably Ryan was going to win.

Local Fertility

I noticed that someone had tilled two sections of field in Friendship Court (née Garrett Square), and I thought, "That looks like someone's starting a community garden, which would be cool."

Well, how 'bout that:

The Quality Community Council, a local nonprofit organization, has been developing plans for an urban farm near downtown Charlottesville, and has secured land for the project. Such a farm would serve as an educational vehicle for city students, while also providing a source of fresh produce for the community.

The name is a bit hokey ("Friendship Farm"), but otherwise it's a great idea. Maybe I can get roped into weeding or something.

Dr. Dolittle

I know I didn't run over a cute little bunny yesterday. I know, because (a) I didn't hear the telling KA-THUMP (my condolences, catherine) and because (b) I was not a block away before I saw another cute little bunny posturing as if to say, "Did you see that?! My friend just went under your car. But—whoa! He survived."

Yep. It's a good thing I hear the bunnies when they speak.

Ahoy

I just had someone add me as a friend on facebook, someone whom I met in Spain seven years ago and who's from Egypt. I found out she searched on last name, and mine is admittedly quirky, but wow. Score one for the internet. Happy to hear she's doing well and pursuing a degree in linguistics.

Pop-up Audio!

We're all sad. It's Monday.

The Sopranos ending was brilliant/disappointing. Either way, it's over.

Shit, Lebron James threw an air ball on a dang free throw.

And you probably have a deadline coming up.

Times are trying, but no worries—we have pop music: some new Tegan and Sara (click "listen" on the first song; many more songs come with it).

Shh. It's fine. You don't have to tell anyone you like it. Not even me.

[Album via, like two weeks ago.]

Self-effacing

Beard envy. It's a menace. I know. I encountered it today at work.

Not that my beard is great or anything. It's not. I'm at perhaps my most unkempt ever. But the envy is there, and it's breaking America's—nay, the world's—heart.

See, one of my favorite co-workers (we shall call him "Bart") told me of the days long ago when his own facial shrubbery eclipsed even the current abomination that resides among my chops and jowls. Verily, his beard, it turns out has aged more years than even I: 'twill celebrate its thirtieth year in this 2007th year since, uh, something happened. And he is saddened by its close-shorn nature of late, longing for the days of a freer thicket upon his countenance.

So, haters of the beard, friends and enemies alike who would sooner take a straight razor to my cheeks than learn a bit of history: know that I suffer for a greater cause. I suffer for the beards of yesteryear. And also, I'm lazy and shaving takes effort.

Out with it

I had a wisdom tooth extracted this morning. Nothing exciting. The whole thing took less than an hour. At the end, the dentist said, "Yep. You can probably go to work today. In a few hours."

What?! Certainly he meant to say, "Here, you better go home and do as little as possible, oh, and here's a little something to help with the pain."

Sheesh. What's a dentist good for, if not excuses to be the shiftless layabout that I aspire to be?

Oh well. Off to work...

(Dis?)heartening thing I heard today

Eekbeat: I remember when my hamster died. His name was Lucky. He lasted only six months.

Wherein I Dribble

I like sports. No, really, I do.

I don't often watch sports. Or talk about them. Or think about them. Or play them (anymore). But I understand quite well the rules of many sports (basketball, baseball, football, soccer, for example), so I can easily keep up, and I enjoy watching sports with sane people who want to talk about strategy and drink beer.

But sometimes, especially when it's playoffs, or some other Big Game™, or a Chicago team, I'll tune in and care for awhile. Hence, me watching the NBA playoffs last night. See, I get all the fouling and picking and rolling and shot-clocking. But then I go and ask, in a crowded bar, "Wait, who's that guy?"

"Uh, that's Lebron James."

And I'm reminded, as ever, that I'm a poseur.