Wednesday, March 31, 2004

Star Trek VI is such a good movie. It explains the importance of Kittimer in the eponymous masacres featured so prominently in Next Generation episodes and introduces Worf as a defendent of Kirk and Bones. Also, Kurtwood Smith (Red Foreman on That 70's Show) is the President of the Federation. It's got Kim Cattral as a sexy Vulcan. And Christian Slater plays a bit part. Spock's father, Ambassador Sarek, makes an appearance as do the Romulans, in a time before their schism with Star Fleet. Yes yes, I'm a nerd, I know, but Star Trek as a franchise is just such a well-conceived series of series. Gene Roddenberry was a genius. Also, nothing beats hearing "wessel" every now and then.

Apparently, Coach Hewitt is one miracle away from being Jesus. I believe this church to be the one on Howell Mill across from the pink crack-motel Budget Inn near I-75.

Tuesday, March 30, 2004

I have to preface this entry by saying that I've grown up the son of a diplomat. As such, my natural inclination is always to play peacemaker. I'm not trying to take sides, I just want everyone to be happy again.
So I've been thinking about this little "feud" that seems to be going on between Emily and Michelle and Kayre. It seems to be "about" basketball, but I think there's really something deeper there. But that's between them, and I'm staying out of it. As for the trigger, I'm afraid it might have been me. I talked to Emily walking back from class last Monday and she had just decided she wasn't going to St. Louis. She seemed so bummed out about it that I wanted to post something to cheer her up. And she hadn't told Michelle and Kayre yet because she went home and took a nap. So they read my blog and were concerned about why she wasn't going and why she hadn't told them yet. Tempers flared on both sides and now it's gotten all out of control and they're barely speaking to each other. I feel so bad because they used to have so much fun together. And of course if I say anything to Michelle or Kayre, I'm "taking Emily's side." And asking Emily to swallow her pride and just make up isn't going to fly. I swear it's like being 15 again.
Since my blog is somehow an official source of information now, my advice is this: forgive, forget, and move on with your lives. You're too good friends to let something like this screw it up. I can't make you talk to each other and I can't remove anyone's stubbornness, that's something you have to do yourselves.

I think the time may have finally come to dispose of my beloved Soundgarden hat. Exhibit A. Exhibit B. Sorry guys...

Since when did FCPS turn into a bunch of fascist, censoring idiots? As early as 1776 perhaps...

I fixed the previous post so the image shows up because the site that was hosting it originally has gone all to hell. Here's the link to the image's original location in case it ever starts working again. In the mean time I just mirrored the image on my site.

Monday, March 29, 2004

Jennifer Copeland still loves Georgia Tech athletics!

I'm not sure there's any more comfortable feeling in the world than sheets fresh out of the dryer. As soon as I was done making my bed I just wanted to curl up and take a nap in them. Then again, maybe sharing sheets fresh out of the dryer with someone special would be more comfortable...

I really need some sort of way to climb into bed and go to sleep on cue. I can't afford to be laying in bed with my body too exhausted to do anything useful (like read/study) but my mind still racing. I made the mistake of doing some more job hunting tonight. And so of course now I'm concerned about that and my mind is concocting all sorts of awful scenarios. But I can't have a panic attack about it right now. I've already used up my allotment for the month, so a full-blown crying-in-the-closet breakdown is just going to have to wait a few more days. Fortunately, I think my living situation either here in ATL or in Fairfax has at least temporarily resolved itself, so when I graduate and have no job, at least I'll have a place to live until I find a job and a new apartment. But there's a million other things rattling around in my brain and I just can't seem to silence all those thoughts so I can get some rest. Between all the schoolwork I still have to do and Coca-Cola losing another copy of my W2 so I'm probably going to have to file for an extension on my taxes (nothing but a bunch of idiots at that company...) and graduating and job hunting and my future with Emily and my potential plans for the summer regarding Warped Tour, I swear, most of my life I've felt so strong-minded, but recently there have been times that I feel like the world is caving in on me and the slightest thing could trigger a complete nervous breakdown. And all I want to do is put all of that out of my head for a few minutes, close my eyes, and wait for my alarm clock to lure me out of my slumber. Stupid brain...

Yay Tech! :) At #3, we're the highest seeded team in the Final Four this year. I'd love to have another shot at Duke for the championship, but since we beat UConn quite handily in the pre-season NIT, they'd be a fun competitor as well. But first we have to get past the Cowboys next Saturday.

Sunday, March 28, 2004

Georgia Tech is going to San Antonio for the Final Four!!!!! Oklahoma State, here we come!!!

Saturday, March 27, 2004

Yay Tech!!!! Yay Xavier! Yay Kansas! Boo Duke! Tomorrow - rooting for St. Joe's over OSU and UConn over Bama. Then on Sunday, GT over Kansas and Xavier over Duke.

Friday, March 26, 2004

Teams to root for tonight: Georgia Tech over Nevada, Xavier over Texas, Kansas over UAB (I guess... if we win tonight, I'd rather risk losing to a respectable team like Kansas than an upstart like UAB), and, even though Duke losing means UConn is the only Elite 8 team I'd still have in my bracket, I'm pulling for Illinois over Duke.

Ugh... Leaving the house this morning I felt like I was breathing through a thick gauze pad until my Claritin kicked in. Even after that I felt pretty awful. I don't think it's meant to handle this level of pollen infestation, but it certainly helps. Something about 1,950 pollen particles in a cubic meter of air is incredibly sickening, both literally and figuratively. Maybe I should start wearing one of those medical/dust masks and draw scary faces on it like people did when SARS was on the loose.

I have to stop looking at speakers on Parts Express before I buy $500 worth of speaker components so I can build custom speakers using what I've learned so far in my Audio class. I really want to do it, but I think I had better wait until I have a job and can afford that sort of thing. Hopefully my knowledge that earned me a 49/50 on my last test will stay in my brain long enough after I've graduated, and of course I'll always have Leech's Audio Engineering book.

According to Star Trek: The Next Generation, television as a form of entertainment won't last past 2040.

Next time Darby starts chewing on something you own:
image removed from original site, mirrored at 250free.com

Question of the Day: If you know someone is coming over, shouldn't you be awake when they do? Or at the very least conscious enough to hear them knocking, quite loudly, on the front door 4 times in two minutes?

Let me explain: I was awoken this morning at 8:45 am by the sound of someone gently rapping, rapping at my apartment door. "Tis the UPS man," I thought, "and nothing more." I wasn't expecting any packages, so I rolled over and went back to sleep. For about 15 seconds when he knocked again. And then he knocked louder about a minute later. And even louder shortly thereafter. I dragged my sleepy self to the front door to see what the hell was so important. "Hi, is Waqar home?" I'm thinking, it's 8:45 am, why aren't you home? Instead I went to see if Waqar was home. He was, in fact, home, curled up in bed fast asleep, like I deserve to still be. So I let the guy in and told him Waqar was still in bed but he was welcome to go wake him up. I'm curious what Charlie is doing here, but it's really none of my business. At least, it would be none of my business if his arrival hadn't necessitated my getting out of bed at 8:45 this morning. And I know Waqar was expecting him, because his bedroom door was halfway open, presumably to hear him knocking. This almost never happens, even in the middle of the day when he's wide awake. Grrrr... Well, I think I'm angry enough to go back to bed now...

Today was a good day. It started off with me waking up besides Emily. So automatically, that's a plus. The pollen count today was the highest yet this season, and I could feel it before I even got outside. I had a mild headache in the afternoon despite taking my Claritin, but I shudder to think what would have happened if I hadn't taken it. Anyway, my psych class was fine, and we did a review in my INTA class for our test on Tuesday. I need to get caught up on my reading for the test, but it's only 4 chapters this time instead of 6 like the last test. Then I came home and had a nice nap for a little bit until Emily called and woke me up to tell me she was done with her meeting and ready to go to the show.
The lineup has changed repeatedly over the last couple months since I found out about the show. First Darkest Hour cancelled and they added Moments in Grace (boo!) then My Chemical Romance cancelled and they added Vaux (yay!). Moments in Grace opened. They're okay I guess. I just can't get into them. They just sound too produced, even live. Very radio friendly, very smooth, kind of mellow. Vaux was up next and I was stoked for them because I haven't seen them since Warped 2002 and they always were such an energetic live act. Tonight was no exception and they rocked hard. I even like their CD more now than I've seen them live again. They're so talented and I'm proud (and a little wary) of the fact that they got picked up by Universal. But they'll go far I think. Poison the Well is always kind of disappointing to me live. I loved Opposite of December, but each record afterwards has gotten less hardcore and more rock. Their musical talent has increased and their songs are definitely more polished. But that's what happened with the Deftones, and I've never really liked anything after Adrenaline. Even the songs off PTW's old records tonight were kind of sluggish. *sigh* Oh well. Thrice, as always, was just awesome though. I have never seen them do a bad show. Their albums are great, but it's as a live act that they really shine (like Sick of it All). The breakdowns are heavier, the singing, though a little off-key sometimes, just sounds so human and full of life, the guitar solos are crazier, and they just play so tightly as a group. I'm excited that they didn't suck after signing to Island-Def Jam like emo-core counterparts Thursday (maybe Geoff needs another year-long bout of insomnia to write a good record?).
All in all a good show. Thrice was by far the highlight of the night, though Vaux was a close second. And the sound at the Masquerade wasn't even awful tonight like usual. In fact, the drums were especially crisp. Hooray! And now I'm eating my tasty Bagel Bites and drinking some Diet Coke with Lime (I know, I know, but it's actually good, and until Kroger makes it, I'm buying *shudder* the brand name product). I reek of cigarettes, but that's nothing a shower can't fix. Tomorrow's going to fly by and before I know it'll be time for our Sweet 16 game against Nevada! Go Jackets! Tim wants to go to a sports bar or something to watch the game (apparently Bobby Dodd is too social, but a sports bar isn't...), so maybe we'll hit up Jock & Jill's.

Wednesday, March 24, 2004

Think Hillary wants a crack at the White House as the first lady to be President instead of the First Lady? Blasting Dubya is a good place to start.

Happy B-Day to Fatty Arbuckle! My Simpsons calendar rocks.

Tuesday, March 23, 2004

So I was watching the Congressional 9/11 Commission hearings today when they were blasting Sgt. Rummy. Basically congress is blaming the Bush administration for terrorism and the Bush administration's officials are blaming inter-agency issues and the Clinton administration for terrorism. And yeah, this about sums it up...
The point is, no one could have prevented a couple planes from being hijacked and crashed into things without grounding EVERY airplane preemptively. And that's assuming that anyone knew for sure what day there was going to be a strike. The whole notion of preventing something like that is ridiculous in the manner they are examining it. To prevent terror, you have to stop it before it starts. Whether that's your liberal notion of not being such assholes to other countries and not arming/training people who are just going to turn around and blow us up. Or whether you take the more conservative approach of just blowing up every suspected terrorist training camp you can get your sights on and killing (or imprisoning indefinitely without a trial) anyone you suspect of being a terrorist.
Either way, you're not going to stop terrorism with a ballooning new bureaucratic department. And realistically, it's not going to be stopped with bullets. It's got to be stopped in the mind so that it never comes to bullets, bombs, and planes. Am I the only one who sees that? I know it's idealistic, but if people don't hate you, they have no reason to blow you up. And I promise you, just because we caught Saddam (who we trained and armed to help us fight Iran in the 80s, thank you very much Col. Ollie North...) and "liberated" Iraq, and are working hard to scrub the stain of the Taliban (who we trained and armed to help us fight that dastardly Communist threat from the Soviets) from Afghanistan, there are plenty of people out there who still hate Americans, and the more we intervene militarily, the worse it's going to get.

Monday, March 22, 2004

And speaking of months, um, there are 12 months in a year. Okay, so I'm running out of things to segue into...

And speaking of Michelle and Kayre, I've swapped out Michelle's diary for Kayre's diary on the Linko!™ bar because Kayre updates regularly, and Michelle hasn't posted in almost 2 months.

And speaking of basketball, apparently Robert Brooks offered to get Emily, Michelle, and Kayre tickets to our Sweet 16 (and our possible Elite 8) game(s) in St. Louis. I know how much Emily wants to go, but she's got as much (if not more) work as I do, and I think she's a little concerned about driving all the way to St. Louis and then the tickets falling through. It would also mean skipping all her classes on Friday this week and probably all her classes on Monday. If March Madness was in January (and named therefore January, um, Jubilation?), I think she'd go in a heartbeat, especially since she passed on the ACC Tournament. Anyway, I know she's bummed about not being able to take advantage of such an exciting opportunity and about all the work she's got ahead of her, so Emily, this is for you (and if it cheers anyone else up in the process, hooray!):

Cause, really, what's funnier than hairy monkeys? ;)

My Audio test went okay today. I was up until roughly 5:30 last night finishing my homework and studying and making my notesheet. Also, in case you didn't already know this, you shouldn't leaves knives laying on the floor where you can step on them. Skipping French Revolution on Friday turned out to be a bad idea since he told us we had to turn in our bibliography for our research paper today, which Emily and I were unaware of. I'll just have to throw something together and hand it in Wednesday along with my lame (but truthful) excuse. And speaking of research paper, it's due April 16th. That's so soon. And I've basically done nothing yet. I'm going to have a lot of reading to do in the next 2 weeks so I can start writing. Not to mention all the reading to do for the class itself. *sigh* And then this week is shot with reading to do for my INTA test on Thursday, then basketball and Thrice on Thursday night, followed by our game on Friday night (and some other games as well). Maybe this weekend? Oh wait, I have another section of our Audio project due next Wednesday. And then if we win Friday, we'll have another game Sunday, so block out my whole weekend that isn't Audio to basketball. When did this semester stop being fun?? Oh wait, I know when. It stopped being fun as soon as spring break was over and suddenly my work load tripled somehow. Stupid school. I'd just say "to hell with it" and do a half-ass job on everything, except that I still have a chance of getting an A or two before I graduate.

Sunday, March 21, 2004

Also, yay for Xavier!

Not to be all NCAA Tourney fanatic or anything, but hooray for Tech winning again (barely)! And Kentucky losing to UAB makes us the highest seeded team in our bracket. We need to beat a very scary Nevada team (they're also the Wolf Pack, yikes!) and then we'll face either Kansas or UAB to get into the Final 4. It's going to be an exciting end of the week with Thrice coming up on Thursday (no pun intended) and our game on Friday.

Good lord... Fox has hit a new low.

Saturday, March 20, 2004

Fun things to try if you're tired of your apartment being clean #117: drop half a tub of hummus on the floor of the living room. It's just liquid enough to splatter, and just solid enough to fly pretty far in every direction. I think there was a ring of delicious roasted garlic hummus about 10 feet in diameter that I just finished cleaning up. Oh well. At least I was finshed with it and putting it back in the kitchen when I dropped it all over the place.

Happy sun, angry sun.
Harris Engnr: happy sun, pissed off sun, happy sun, pissed off sun
Harris Engnr: *sigh* doesn't take much anymore

So my psych test went better than I anticipated. I got a 72 on it, so I'm still on track to pass. Speaking of passing, we finally got our French Revolution midterms back on Wednesday. I got a 26/30, which percentage-wise isn't that great, but he said that 25+ is probably an A, so yay me! I felt justified in skipping class on Friday then to go watch our first round basketball game against UNI (not to be confused with the Spanish television network). We won, but it was a little hairy there for a while. I think Northern Iowa really threw overtaking they had at us, and it was almost too much for us, but we prevailed. Our next game is against Boston College on Sunday, and I think we can handle them without too much difficulty. But the way Nevada is trouncing the Zags right now, I'm terrified of playing either team next week. Hopefully the game tomorrow won't interfere too much with my studying for me Audio test on Monday.
In other news, after the game we went out to dinner at Chili's and ran into Dr. Edmonds, a microbiology professor from Tech who was there after work to have a margarita. I mean a couple margaritas. I mean a few margaritas. He was a little tipsy, and quite talkative. He talked our collective ear off for about 45 minutes about how great Tech is and how much he loves his job and how much we should consider being professors and blah blah blah. He was very friendly, but he just would not shut up. But it was nice for a professor to just come talk to a group of students that he didn't know when he saw us at a restaurant. I don't know that many of my professors would do that. After dinner we watched some more basketball at Emily's and had a little party of card games and such. Slept in late today and am now going to spend the rest of my day watching basketball and trying to do my audio homework.

Thursday, March 18, 2004

I knew that sooner or later this semester I'd hit a point where I just didn't care about school. It hasn't happened in a broad sense yet. But motivation to study for this psych test (on personality theory) tomorrow is really hard to come by. I'm taking the class pass/fail, we get to drop our lowest test grade (as I just remembered/found out), I don't even need to pass the class to graduate, and failing the class has no impact on my (admittedly poor enough) GPA. "So I ask you Bob, where's the motivation?" I'm too poor a student to really try to do well on something I don't need to do well at, but I'm too conscientious a student to just completely blow it off and not study at all, or worse yet, not even take the test. But I figure if I'm going to take the test at all, I might as well attempt to pass... Here's to my educational mediocrity!

Things I could be doing right now, in the order I would prefer to do them:
-go to sleep
-read my new Dark Tower book (thanks Emily!)
-play Soul Calibur II
-aimlessly surf the internet
-stare blankly into space
-drive to Mexico (yes, even through my arch-nemesis Texas)
-set myself on fire
-continue studying for my psych test
-watch an Old Navy commercial

Wednesday, March 17, 2004

Two things from watching TV this evening:
Number 1 - Old Navy TV ads make me want to throw a brick through my TV every time I see them. I don't have a huge problem with the store itself because they sell decent quality, inexpensive clothes. But their TV ads just hit a nerve with me, big time. If I ever need to get off the hook in a murder trial, I'll plead temporary insanity on the grounds that I witnessed an Old Navy commercial before I butchered 37 people.
Number 2 - The truck I was behind on 75 today that was loaded up with all sorts of crap like dryers and various spare pieces of sheet metal was just mentioned as an upcoming story for the 10:00 news. Apparently, a dryer fell off and killed someone. Which is precisely why I got into a different lane and passed the guy.

Congratulations are in order for Mike Krahulik, better known as Gabe, and his wife Kara on the impending arrival of their son/daughter (see the item titled "Woo!").


Happy St. Patrick's Day to all! May the drunken luck of deranged Irish leprechauns bring you good fortune! Or something. Also, today would have been my dog's 24th birthday. :( I miss having a pet.

Tuesday, March 16, 2004

Today is Freedom of Information Day according to my Simpsons calendar.

Dear American Infidel Government:
     Please send me the plans for building an atomic bomb, in the spirit of Freedom of Information Day. Thank you.
Sincerely,
A Potential Terrorist
(suspects, aren't we all?)

It is also Jerry Lewis and Flavor Flav's birthday. "Turn it up! Bring tha noize! Ooooh lady, ooooooh lady, oooooh lady, nice laaaaady!" Happy b-day kids.

You rock Toshiba!

Monday, March 15, 2004

New Zuma high score: 133,320
I was on my last life, but I could have kept going, except that the game ends after level 4-4 and tells you to buy it. I doubt I could have made it to the 150,000 necessary for a SuperStar skill level, but I did make enough points for my full complement of 5 stars.

I picked up my cap and gown today and registered to fall asleep during, er, I mean participate in, commencement. I think that's the last $38 I have to give Tech before they'll let me out of here.

Spring break pics from DC are here.

Picking up where we left off:
After our game ended on Friday (we won!!), we headed over to Tommy and Steph's for a ravioli dinner that was mighty tasty and some lemon meringue pie. Mmmm... We watched SLC Punk! again and Emily got to see what happens when you put me and Tommy together. After seeing the sparks of me and Chris being in the same room, having Steph relate stories of me and Tommy coming up with things like brick-launchers or how to mount an anti-aircraft gun in the back of a Dodge Ram could have been a little frightening. But I think she handled the geekiness admirably. We also enjoyed the latest additions to the menagerie, a cute little ferret named Murphy, and a new cat who's name I have forgotten. Then we went home to an empty house and enjoyed just having some time to ourselves to unwind a little bit.
Saturday began with our refusal to get out of bed despite the alarm clock's insistence to the contrary. But we finally got up and went down to the National Zoo. It was a little windier than we'd anticipated and so it was accordingly colder. Some of the animals weren't outside because of the weather, but we still were treated to a number of fun animals and I got some good pictures. Those (along with my DC pictures) will be posted after school tomorrow. My brother arrived home on Saturday evening around the same time we got back form the zoo. After GT's loss to Duke, we were excited to find out that Maryland had beaten NC State in their game. So we went to Outback, found a 1.5 hour wait ahead of us, and went to Brion's Grille instead.
This morning we got up, had some sticky buns from the Amish country that made the return trip with my brother and then packed some sandwiches and hit the road around 12:30 after getting gas. Much to our astonishment and absolute glee, Maryland upset Duke in the ACC Championship game while we were driving down I-85 past Durham. So take that Dookies!! And hooray for Maryland! They are on some sort of hot streak right now that I think could propel them easily into the Sweet 16 if not the Elite 8. Anyway, we made great time coming home, despite some mild construction, a little congestion around Charlotte, trucks in the left lanes, and elderly Asian women swerving all over the road. We rolled to a stop at Tech at 8:57 pm, which I think sets a new record for me on the drive from Fairfax to Atlanta. I need to take Emily in the car whenever I go on road trips. Not only is she a talented "CD bitch," but she's also great company and some sort of good luck charm for making the miles just melt away.
So now I'm back home, having accomplished none of the school work I "intended" to do this week. But I had such a great time with Emily doing all the touristy DC stuff that I don't even care about school right now. I am sad however that I didn't get to see Caryn and Kristin while I was home. I really wanted them to meet Emily and vice versa. Maybe next time around.
NCAA brackets are available and GT has earned a #3 seed in the St. Louis bracket, which is very exciting. We're easily a Sweet 16 team as well, and I think we've got what it takes to bump off the Zags to make the Elite 8 and I'd love to see a matchup against Kentucky. Beating them wins our division and puts us in the Final 4, playing against (in my own bracket picks) Pittsburgh for a chance to take on either Duke or UConn for the championship. UConn is the most subject to change; they could easily be replaced by either NC State or Maryland the way Maryland is playing right now. Anyway, enough (is there such a thing?) sports for now. I'm off to bed. Pictures will be posted tomorrow.

Friday, March 12, 2004

Time for an update:
We had a great time in Columbia visiting Emily's cousin Laura who's engaged to be married in September. So now that I've met he I'm excited about the wedding. Then we had a great homecooked dinner at Laura's sister's house. After going to bed at 10:30 pm, we slept in and headed out to the highway around noon. A surprisingly short 7 hours later we arrived in DC.
On Tuesday we slept in late again and then went for a driving tour of some important locations in Fairfax such as my high school and my old house and the Tavenner's old house and my old apartment off West Ox and our church and where Joe died. Then we spent the rest of the day planning out what we wanted to see in DC the next couple days and just lounging around the house. A great salmon dinner topped it all off before we went to go see The Last Samurai with Chris and Matt and then went back to Chris's to see some footage from our ill-fated movie. It's been so long since I'd seen any of it that it had me in hysterics. We got home around 2:30 and went straight to bed so we could get a good start on our activities for Wednesday.
We awoke to snow flurries with some nice big pretty flakes which gradually shrunk and then dissipated entirely. We took the Metro downtown to go to the Holocaust Memorial and the Botanical Gardens near the Capitol. The Holocaust Museum was sobering, but I think it was an important thing to do, especially knowing how close my grandmother came to being a victim. She's never been and will never go, although I think she should. The entire museum is very tasteful, but some of the atrocities are just really hard to take. Especially the children's dolls and drawings near the end of the exhibit. They look like they could have been from 5 years ago, and yet these poor children were sent to death camps like Auschwitz. The Botanical Gardens was a nice uplifting activity after the somber Holocaust Memorial and the orchid exhibits were fantastic. Being a man, I can't really claim much knowledge about flowers, but I know what things are pretty and interesting to me and most of the flowers on display there were quite fascinating.
Thursday started off with my alarm clock going off at 7 AM to head downtown with my mom for a very very long day. After dropping off a change of clothes at her office, we went down the the Jefferson Memorial and walked all around the Tidal Basin through the FDR Memorial. We saw the new WWII Memorial which looks absolutely amazing and I can't wait to see what it looks like when it's complete. Then we walked up to the Corcoran to see the American Impressionist exhibit and saw a fabulous senior thesis art exhibit as well featuring some really fantastic photography. By then our stomachs were grumbling so we headed over past the White House to the the Ellipse and ate our lunch at the Boy Scouts of American Monument with a great view of the Washington Monument in the background. Then we walked down the mall to see the National Gallery's sculpture garden in front of the Archives and took some fun pictures (they'll be posted eventually, maybe). Then we took a deep breath and just sat on a bench on the Mall for a while and rested before heading back to my mom's office to change clothes. We then went to the Spy Museum which was fascinating but was information overload for me by that point. There was just so much to see and interact with that I felt like I just couldn't take it all in. We spent about 2 hours there, but we probably could have spent 4 instead. Then we went down to the Reagan Building for the opening of USAID's photographic exhibit of the women of Afghanistan. It was a great exhibit, but it was put in way too small an area for the number of people that showed up for the opening. I mean it's great that so many people were interested, but for that much interest, it should have been in the main atrium of the building, instead of hidden in the back room of USAID's press office. Then we went out to the brewhouse across the street for dinner and then came home and collapsed.
Today we slept somewhat late and then got up to have lunch with my grandmother. Now we're "watching" the GT/UNC game. We're refreshing ESPN and fighting with OCSN's Gametracker because Cox cable are a bunch of fuckers who aren't showing our game on ESPN2 here, because, like I said, they're a bunch of fuckers. Instead an ESPN+ game was on and now it's ESPNews. Grrrr.... I know I'm not the first to say it, but FUCK COX. Tonight, after the game, we're going over to Tommy and Steph's for dinner followed by a relaxing night here at home alone. Then my brother gets home tomorrow evening and we're planning to go to the zoo in the afternoon. And then we'll be heading home on Sunday. :( It's been a great vacation so far and it's been great to have Emily here to spend it with. :)

Friday, March 05, 2004

Well, I'm all packed for spring break. Yay! Tomorrow is GT Basketball's last regular reason game before the ACC Tournament. We play FSU at the McTit, so I'll be at that game masquerading as a swarm member since all my other friends will be long gone. It's also senior night for all the players, so hopefully Dave Nelson and Robert Brooks will get to start (I don't think there's much doubt of Marvin Lewis starting, and although Clarence Moore hasn't started recently, I don't think Hewitt would have any qualms about it), even if only for a minute of play. FSU isn't much of a threat this season outside of Tallahassee, but no sense in losing now after such a commanding win over Duke on Wednesday night. Anyway, I'll be on the floor for the game, so look for me on TV alongside Emily, Michelle, and Kayre, in that order.
Then Saturday night is the Duke/UNC game which should be a great matchup. At this point, as much as it pains me, I want Duke to win, because it would push us up a notch instead of leaving us tied with UNC at the end of the season. I just hate Duke so much. It's like rooting for UGA or FSU.
Then on Sunday, Emily and I are headed to Columbia to visit her cousin Laura and her fiancee who are getting married in September. We're spending the night there and then on Monday we'll be on our way up to Fairfax. So if anyone wants to hang out next week, I'll be at my parents' house, I'm sure you know the number by now, since cell phones are so flaky there.
I'm looking forward to a week vacation from the physical confines of school, but I have a lot of reading to do over break. Yuck. Fortunately, the weather looks like it should be nice, not the 60s and 70s of this past week, but not bitter cold either, so hopefully we can get downtown a couple days and do some touristy things. It's always more fun when you go with someone who hasn't grown up 30 minutes from the Mall because DC is exciting again instead of just "that poorly laid out city to the northeast that's a pain in the butt to drive in and whose mayor smoked crack and then got re-elected." Mayor Barry jokes never get old. ;)

New Zuma high score: 112,650. Take that Emily's 110,XXX!!

Thursday, March 04, 2004

Yes, my excitement over the Duke win and about spring break has kept me up way past my bedtime (well, I've been in bed, but unable to sleep). Good thing I don't have much to accomplish tomorrow.

To quote ESPN's Basketball Power 16, "Nobody wins 'em all at home (well, except maybe Duke), but scoring just 46 points against Big East's ninth-best defense is a red flag." [ed - In reference to Pitt's loss to Syracuse last week.] And in reference to Duke's seeding in the Power 16: "Blue Devils back among No. 1s after a week away. Will Tobacco Road neighbors send 'em back to land of No. 2s on Saturday?" Huh, last time I checked, Atlanta wasn't on Tobacco Road. Oh, you were referring to UNC. Gosh that's funny, seems that we were the ones who stomped Duke at Cameron... Although Carolina will have their shot on Saturday, but Duke losing two in a row at home would be cause for mass hysteria as hell most certainly would be freezing over.
Okay, who's going to have some statement retracting to do in the next edition of the Power 16? Can you say, Andy Katz (didn't rank us at all), Dicky V. (ranks us 18), and Fran Frashilla (also 18)? I'm excusing Joe Lunardi, not only because he ranks us 15 (actually inside the Power 16), but because he's had faith in the Jackets through our highs and lows all season in his NCAA Tournament Bracketology, where we're currently a rising #4 seed. So take that Duke's home win streak and ESPN writers who don't give us any credit (not to mention who love Duke and worship the ground Coach K walks on. *cough* Dick Vitale *cough cough*)!

Wednesday, March 03, 2004

Take that Duke!!! 41 game home win streak what? What's your home win streak now? 0 games? Ha ha! Suck it Coach K! The Jackets owned you on your home court!!

That unnamed guy on the left, with Afghan President Karzai, one of Karzai's ministers, and U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Khalilzad, is my dad. :)

The good news is that I'm not sick. At least, I don't think so. My sore throat has subsided, it's still a little tender, but it doesn't hurt much anymore. My heady is still a little stuffy, but I know that's from the yellow dusting of pollen on everything. Fortunately, the rain yesterday cleaned the air up, so breathing today was a joy instead of challenge. At this point, I'm just going to blame the yuckiness I was feeling earlier this week on the sudden rise in temperature and the corresponding rise in pollen in the air that my system was unprepared for. Time to break out the Claritin!

Zuma high schore update: 106,200

Monday, March 01, 2004

I hope this isn't the flu I feel coming on, but just a sore throat from my pollen allergies. *sigh* Emily thinks she might have the flu, and if that's the case, there's a 95% chance I will too. Time for bed and lots of fluids.

I've decided that the best commencement speaker ever would either be Mr. T (Laurence Tureaud) or Triple T ("Terrible" Terry Tate). Seriously. Which of these men would you pay more attention to?
Georgia Governor Sonny PurdueA-Team Intimidator BA Baracas

Despite my previous predictions, Devastin' Dave is still alive (at least as of the time he recorded his 2000 release Havin' a Dream).

On the commencement speaker at my upcoming graduation:

XchaosdawningX: apparently, [Georgia's] governor, Sonny Purdue is the keynote speaker for the ceremony. I'm not sure how much I care about what he has to say... I'd rather have someone like Buzz Aldrin or MC Hammer or something.
ManThing83: or Devastatin' Dave
XchaosdawningX: i'm pretty sure he's dead by now. cocaine overdose or asphyxiation from too tight leather clothes, or more likely electrocution from his wild zip zap raps
ManThing83: well, that would just make it even cooler, now wouldn't it? "I'm Zombie Dave, and I'm here to say..."
XchaosdawningX: "...that school is cool in a devastatin' way"
XchaosdawningX: "do do do bat, do do do do bat"
ManThing83: "... BRAINS! EAT BRAINS!!!"
XchaosdawningX: "fresh well-educated brains!!!"
ManThing83: "before they're destroyed by the drudgery of the work world. Brains!"
ManThing83: *dave attacks the valedictorian, gnawing on his/her head*
XchaosdawningX: now that would be a graduation ceremony worth staying awake for
ManThing83: indeed. I can see the headlines now: OBSCURE DEAD RAPPER GIVES GRADUATION SPEECH, MAULS 30

I would just like to say that the job search process blows. I know there's a Georgia Employer's Career Fair tomorrow at school. I'm sure it will be at least as worthless as the one I went to in September because there will be less companies there and no one there is in a position to hire anyone, they'll just say, "submit your resume online," which I can do in my boxers from the comfort of my recliner instead of the discomfort of my suit at the McTit. But I've decided to go anyway and try to be optimistic. So I spent 45 minutes today trying to find a list of employers (I had to resort to using Google before I turned up anything useful, albeit crappy) who would be there (and hopefully, haha, a list of majors they were interested in) tomorrow so I could figure out how to budget my time and who to talk to. [Tangent Warning: GT has, without a doubt, the worst-organized collection of websites on earth. It's so hard to find any useful information about anything on any official GT site, and half the time, that information is out of date. But that's a whole separate beef that I have with Tech. As Brian puts it, "since when has this school done anything right?"] Anyway, back to the job searching thing, which blows, in case you missed it the first time. There are a million websites out there with job listings, but they all have different formats in their postings and want your resume uploaded in different ways and some of them make you create a new resume from scratch using their forms, which is just stupid. *sigh* Can't I just stay in school until I'm eligible for social security benefits? Basically, what all this job searching comes down to is that you have to know someone in order to get a job. All these websites and all this data floating around will never get me a job. Real human contact is the only way to score gainful employment, which is why I'm trying to convince myself to go to this career fair tomorrow. But I suspect nothing will pan out from that anyway. Whatever. I'm going to call Best Buy tomorrow and check on the status of the application I filled out to work there. That's just so much easier than all this bullshit.

So much for March coming in like a lion... Unless maybe that lion wears shorts and sunglasses, because today was bright and sunny with a temperature that I think topped out above 70.

Well, this should make those non-BCS conferences shut their pie holes. But it won't. My guess is that the Cotton Bowl gets first dibs on being the 5th BCS game because you've already got games in Florida, Louisiana, Arizona and California. Texas (as much as a I hate it) is a good middle ground. So although I suspect the nice people in Chik-Fil-A's marketing department are soiling themselves over the possibility of the Peach Bowl becoming a BCS game, I don't really see that happening. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out though and how angry a new ranking system will make everyone. Assuming all this nonsense gets approved anyway...

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  • I'm Rev. Adam
  • From Oakton, Virginia, United States
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