mom, give me back my fucking drumsticks

interesting news in the world of foreign policy: Condoleezza Rice enlists in Kiss Army

new old post 4: a meme from Amanda

1. YOUR ROCK STAR NAME (first pet, current car): Tarzan Cherokee

2. YOUR GANGSTA NAME (fave ice cream flavor, favorite type of shoe): Almond Joy Reef.

3. YOUR NATIVE AMERICAN NAME (favorite color, favorite animal): Green Puppy

4. YOUR SOAP OPERA NAME (middle name, city where you were born): Catherine Worcester.

5. YOUR STAR WARS NAME (the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 of your first name): Cha An

6. SUPERHERO NAME (2nd favorite color, favorite drink): Blue Sapphire and tonic

7. NASCAR NAME (the first names of your grandfathers): Laurence Norman

8. STRIPPER NAME (the name of your favorite perfume/cologne/scent, favorite candy): Acqua di Gio Cadbury Cream Egg

9. TV WEATHER ANCHOR NAME (your 5th grade teacher’s last name, a major city that starts with the same letter): Paine Philadelphia

10. SPY NAME: (your favorite season/holiday, flower): Fall Hyacinth

11. CARTOON NAME: (favorite fruit, article of clothing you’re wearing right now): Bing Cherry Sweater

12. HIPPIE NAME: (What you ate for breakfast, your favorite tree): Supreme Omelet Birch

13. NEW LJ ID: (One word from your street name, a nickname of a family member): Parker Cookie

UPDATE, 5/28/08: I can do better than this.

memorial day weekend

at long last, it's seersucker time.

seersucker is pretty awesome, but I get a little misty-eyed thinking about how much awesomer last Memorial Day weekend was. for example:















and of course:









On that note, happy birthday MRhé!

new old post 3: on how I'm getting old

In my random internetty wanderings, I found this letter written by Katra, a blogger on Vox. Her blog is called "Freudenschade," which is a reversal of Schadenfreude (finding joy in other people's misfortune). So Freudenschade is supposed to mean being unhappy at other people's good fortune (see this article about a guy who felt guilty pleasure when they discovered the truth about that girl who plagiarized a novel in her college application).

I think it's a pretty cool concept, and clearly, a feeling I have all the time. It's similar to jealously, but feels more justified. I guess it's because the Freudenschade-feeler is the unhappy one, and we have this idea that gloating at others' pain is bad but self-hatred is kind of noble. Or maybe it's just because of the cool German name.

Anyways, enough about the word, back to the letter. This girl is turning 30, something I am kind of preoccupied with. What if I turn 30 and still don't have a real job? What if I'm never done with school? So her terminal degree and "real adult job" make me feel a twinge of jealousy. But after all, I have almost four more years to sort that out... yay?

Dear Twenties,

As I am sure you know, the time has come for us to part company. It's been a long, lovely ride, but this is my stop and I am getting off. Goodbye to you, suckas!

Don't get me wrong, there were a lot of things about you that were truly good: I gave up vegetarianism, for one, and every piece of bacon I now eat tastes just that much more delicious for its long absence. I was For Real In Love for the first time, which was also a pretty amazing thing. In retrospect, however, I'd have to say that my relationship with bacon has worked out much better for everyone involved. Except the pigs, of course.

In my twenties I think I also got the friendship thing right: I managed to keep the really important friendships and ditch the toxic ones. Learning to recognize the toxic ones alone was a major accomplishment. For some reason, it took me a while to figure out that if someone's basic function in your life is to make you feel shitty about yourself, then that person is not a friend. An ingenious insight, I know.

On the other hand, a lot about you straight up blew, Twenties. The long-nourished infatuations with people who didn't love me back (so much wasted time!), the exchange of running for sitting at a desk or on a couch, the mounting student loan and credit card debt -- those are fun little mistakes I plan never to repeat.

I hate to tell you Twenties, but I think the Thirties are going to kick your ass up one side and down the other. I'm no longer a student now, for the first time since before kindergarten. I have a terminal degree and a real adult job and a dog. I am at the beginning of my real life now, looking forward to establishing myself professionally and starting to earn a Serious Adult Salary (soon, we hope, right?).

The friendships keep getting better and better and I'm sure the relationships will, too, now that I know what I want out of them. One lesson learned, relationship-wise, for example: It is not okay if your boyfriend thinks that sitting on his couch smoking pot while you watch him play Nintendo is a fun date activity. Not okay.

Twenties, I bid you a bittersweet adieu. I'd love to stay and chat some more, but I have a mission. I am off to meet the Thirties and together we are going to step out and kick some serious ass. Sorry, Twenties, but it's over.

Really, finally over,

Katra

new old post 2: on politics

I stole this delightful quiz from Mike's blog. I'm totally on board with my results for the most part, although I'm a little surprised to hear that 11% of my opinions coincide with stupid f-ing Mitt f-ing stupid Romney's platform. Hugest douche in the universe.

I'd also like to point out that of the Democrats here, my best match (Gravel) got the least votes in New Hampshire while stupid f-ing Hilary f-ing stupid Clinton, who I like least both in the real world and in this quiz world, got the most votes. I may have to quit my frequent trips to the tax-free Nashua retail district in protest. I probably should anyways, for both moral and financial reasons.

95% Mike Gravel
94% Dennis Kucinich
79% John Edwards
75% Chris Dodd
74% Barack Obama
72% Bill Richardson
71% Joe Biden
70% Hillary Clinton
27% Rudy Giuliani
26% Ron Paul
18% John McCain
14% Mike Huckabee
14% Tom Tancredo
11% Mitt Romney
5% Fred Thompson

2008 Presidential Candidate Matching Quiz

Anyways, all this makes me think about what I'll do when I go to vote in the primaries. I'm not gonna lie, I don't know this Gravel dude well enough to vote for him. And I think he might have dropped out? Since I got a TV I've been doing a lot less NPR listening than I should.

Kucinich, on the other hand, makes me feel warm and fuzzy. The thought of voting for such a long-shot candidate is kind of a dilemma in my mind though. I'm thinking back to the fateful presidential election of 2000, which happened during my sophomore year of college. It the first election where I was old enough to vote, and it was a pretty exciting one.

There were a few of us who weren't registered to vote yet, and we 'heard' that one could register and vote on election day simply by going down to City Hall. It sounded easy enough at the time. What we didn't know is that City Hall in Hartford is similar to a three-ring circus, except without the fun. Yes, there were midgets and peanuts and sideshows, but also a lot of sitting on the cold marble floor in mile-long lines of a thousand people who had the exact same idea as we did.

Add to that the general surliness of civil servants, the unnavigable sea of red tape involved in registering to vote, and the unusually high number of district court cases going on that day... IT SUUUUCKED. But at the same time, it was kind of exciting. We knew the election was a big deal, and it felt pretty cool to be doing out civic duty. Plus we were there for like six hours and ended up missing all of our classes, but for such an honorable reason that no professor could punish us with a clear conscience.

So anyways, when we finally got registered, it occurred to me that I was now a registered voter of Connecticut. This was a whole different ball of wax than being a Massachusetts voter. Namely, I wanted to vote for Ralph Nader. I f-ing love Ralph Nader. In Massachusetts, I could have voted for Nader and felt really good about it (at least that's what I thought at the time). But thinking about it strategically, I decided that it was too risky to 'waste' my one vote on Nader in a state where it wasn't a given that the Democratic candidate would win.

I guess the point is, I love Massachusetts, but I know my vote doesn't really "count" much here. It's kind of like that whole "free-rider" problem our professors always talked about. In Mass I could have written in Mugabe, and gotten all of my friends to do the same, and Gore would have probably still captured the electoral vote. So i could go with my heart, and my principles, and whatever, and vote for Nader without feeling like I might be 'spoiling' anything. At the time I remember some Gore supporters saying that a vote for Nader was equivalent to a vote for Bush. It makes some sense, because 99.9% of Nader supporters [probably] would have otherwise supported a Democrat rather than Republican.

In the grand scheme of things my vote in CT didn't matter much either, but for some reason I felt it was more important for me to vote for Gore there, because it wasn't quite as certain that he'd be able to win without my vote. In the end, of course, it didn't matter that ANYONE voted for Gore, but who saw that whole thing coming?

UPDATE, 5/22/08:
Wow, how irrelevant is THIS now? I voted for Obama in the primary, although I was surprised to see John Edwards still on the ticket and almost voted for him, then when I left I almost made a call to William F. Galvin himself to ask why he would tempt me so. This post, which I wrote back in January, represents the period when I cared about this presidential election. I am so sick of it at this point, I barely listen to the news anymore...

new old post 1: on irony

remember when Alanis Morissette's "Ironic" came out, and people would constantly bitch about her misuse of the word "ironic"? Like, "Oh my god, rain on your wedding day is NOT irony! It's like, bad luck or something! God!" Or, "A black fly in your chardonnay? Is that supposed to be irony because, like, the wine is white and the fly is black? If so, OH MY GOD - that's so DUMB! God!" Seriously, people used to get really worked up about it.

And that's why to this day I'm always a little nervous about using the word "ironic." I'm an admittedly huge grammar dork, but this seems to be such a sore spot with the general public that I usually opt for safer, more precise phrases like "unfortunate coincidence" or "seriously, God hates me."

Anyways, I'm going somewhere with this. The abbreviated back story is that I love my job but the pay sucks, they won't hire me full time, and I've been actively seeking a new job that involves such perks as "employer contribution to my health insurance," "not having to drag my laptop to work everyday," and "not being asked to MAKE COPIES at 4:30 on a Friday. Or at all, for that matter, because I'm basically three f-ing pages away from a master's degree." So I've hinted at this to my boss - an awesome awesome boss, and not the person who asked me to make copies, I might add. He's pretty sympathetic to my financial woes - a little less sympathetic to the fact that staying at my job is crushing my ego and will to live, but whatever. Anyways, the point is, although I've kind of told him I need to find a full-time job at some point, I don't think he really truly believes me...

UPDATE, 5/22/08:
The punchline of this story is: I was in Staples shopping for resume paper while simultaneously talking loudly on the phone to Amanda, my own personal HR specialist, about various job-searching-related things (like should I fold the resume and put it in a regular sized envelope, or leave it unfolded in a big envelope? I worry about these things.) Then my boss walked into the store and I had to pretend I was doing something else. Good story, right? Ironic, even?

At the time this was a big deal, but now my boss forwards me job postings. Things just get curiouser and curiouser.

um, hello

if anyone still checks this blog, you'll be happy to know I'm not dead. I have actually started writing quite a few blog posts over the past few months, but never finished them. I've just had a lot of crap to do, and blogging never rose to the top of my list.

but then I was having lunch with one of my professors the other day, discussing how I might one day finish my thesis. He reminded me that one possible reason for my writer's block is that I haven't been writing enough. He's completely right - in school I used to write something every day - sometimes schoolwork, sometimes work work, sometimes blog posts, sometimes blog posts when I should have been writing schoolwork or work work. But my current projects at work require no writing whatsoever, and I'm a little out of practice. So now I'm trying to write a little something every day (ideally my thesis, but this works too).

My other strategy for finishing my thesis was to come to the department (instead of my office) on Thursdays. A few other unfinished thesis sufferers also agreed to meet here on Thursdays for the same reasons - to be around other thesis writers and to be in a "school" environment.

So here I am in the department, not writing my thesis, but I'm here, and I'm writing. It's not a bad start, as long as I use the blogging as a jumping-off point for more studious endeavors. Anyways, my first writing project is to finish all those posts I began over the past few months. As we say in Moldova, enjoy.

shrink, I want to kill

I mean, I wanna, I wanna kill. Kill.














Bono meets Pentagon chief to discuss poverty

the state of my blog

a few weeks back I was surprised to find that industrious little high school math students came to my blog seeking information on how to use a TI-86. well, things have gotten weirder. here are a few of the more interesting searches that have brought people to my illustrious blog this week:

1. "stansfield tires" (I guess that's not too surprising, but why would someone actually seeking tires check out my blog?)
2. "wooden nickels"
3. "henry miller FEMA trailers" (at first I thought, what in the good green earth does henry Miller have to do with FEMA trailers? But then I googled it and discovered that the famous writer shares his name with a FEMA lawyer - who I can't ever recall blogging about, but whatever...)

and my personal favorite:

4. "how to write a apologize letter for drinking beer in school"

well, my friend, I hope reading my humble blog somehow helped you write a well-received apologize letter. my advice: perfect grammar will get you nowhere, so don't worry about that, but stay in school anyways. well at least high school. just don't go to grad school - it sucks, and even drinking beer during class doesn't make it more fun.

eduardo kingman

I saw this picture on a Bolivian blog (yeah, I'm all about working hard today) and it reminded me of Guayasamin (see below). I looked it up, and lo and behold, the painter is also Ecuadorian.















makes me feel like a huge jerk, but still, it's pretty cool.

Martin Luther King III's letter to John Edwards

From the Below Boston blog...

January 20, 2008

The Honorable John R. Edwards
410 Market Street
Suite 400
Chapel Hill, NC 27516

Dear Senator Edwards:

It was good meeting with you yesterday and discussing my father's legacy. On the day when the nation will honor my father, I wanted to follow up with a personal note.

There has been, and will continue to be, a lot of back and forth in the political arena over my father's legacy. It is a commentary on the breadth and depth of his impact that so many people want to claim his legacy. I am concerned that we do not blur the lines and obscure the truth about what he stood for: speaking up for justice for those who have no voice.

I appreciate that on the major issues of health care, the environment, and the economy, you have framed the issues for what they are - a struggle for justice. And, you have almost single-handedly made poverty an issue in this election.

You know as well as anyone that the 37 million people living in poverty have no voice in our system. They don't have lobbyists in Washington and they don't get to go to lunch with members of Congress. Speaking up for them is not politically convenient. But, it is the right thing to do.

I am disturbed by how little attention the topic of economic justice has received during this campaign. I want to challenge all candidates to follow your lead, and speak up loudly and forcefully on the issue of economic justice in America.

From our conversation yesterday, I know this is personal for you. I know you know what it means to come from nothing. I know you know what it means to get the opportunities you need to build a better life. And, I know you know that injustice is alive and well in America, because millions of people will never get the same opportunities you had.

I believe that now, more than ever, we need a leader who wakes up every morning with the knowledge of that injustice in the forefront of their minds, and who knows that when we commit ourselves to a cause as a nation, we can make major strides in our own lifetimes. My father was not driven by an illusory vision of a perfect society. He was driven by the certain knowledge that when people of good faith and strong principles commit to making things better, we can change hearts, we can change minds, and we can change lives.

So, I urge you: keep going. Ignore the pundits, who think this is a horserace, not a fight for justice. My dad was a fighter. As a friend and a believer in my father's words that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere, I say to you: keep going. Keep fighting. My father would be proud.

Sincerely,

Martin Luther King III

allow me to correct myself:

contrary to what I was saying the other night, the UMass Lowell men's ice hockey team is Division I. In addition to being Division I, they are apparently really really awesome and currently ranked 4th in Hockey East. So my apologies to anyone who was actually listening to me when I was making shit up about hockey. Remember, I'm the one who didn't know what the C in AFC stood for. So when it comes to sports, don't listen to me unless I'm talking about the infield fly rule.

ode to stansfield tire

It's not every day I'm happy about customer service - just thinking about my experiences with Verizon and Bank of America gives me tiny little heart attacks. It's even less often I'm satisfied with the experience of getting my car fixed. But the dudes at Stansfield Tire have made my heart grow three sizes today.

I happened upon Stansfield Tire about two years ago when I moved into the neighborhood. I had previously been having my car serviced at the Source of All Worldly Evil, so I was pretty psyched the first time I went to Stansfield Tire and discovered that I don't have to pay $600 to find out that nothing's wrong with my car (or that every single solitary thing that has ever been wrong with me car is in fact, my own fault/"due to wear and tear"/not covered by my warranty. EFF YOU, IRA!)

So, back to the story here... Today I had driven to work in four-wheel drive, and on the ride home I put the car back into two-wheel drive. When I took my first left-hand turn of the trip, I heard a really loud, really disturbing pop/thud coming from my back driver's side wheel. I drove out of my way to make sure I had to take both a sharp right and a sharp left, and the noise happened only when I made a left. Plus the car had started to make a sinister groaning sound when I was going straight. I've always had some issues getting my car to switch between four- and two-wheel drive, but this time, none of my old standby tricks were working.

So I pulled into a gas station and called my friends at Stansfield Tire to see if they could take a quick look at my car before the end of the day. The guy who answered the phone proceeded to ask me a series of questions, analyze my problem over the phone and talk me through fixing it. In the time it took him to do this (quite a while), he could have told me to come in and made me pay an hour's labor. I also have to mention that he had no idea who I was, that I was a regular customer, or any of that. He was just being nice. Un. be. lievable.

In the end, what he told me to do (put it in reverse and back up 30 feet, some other crap I don't remember) worked like a charm and I didn't have to take the car in. On its own, this episode probably isn't that exciting or groundbreaking. But I've been this satisfied every single time I've dealt with these guys, with the exception of one kind of fatherly lecture ("It's an oil change every THREE thousand miles, young lady. Not eight thousand miles, not nine thousand miles.") Their nice service and lack of desire to rob me blind are just so refreshing I feel like shouting it from the rooftops. And whatnot.

So in the immortal words of Ice Cube, go to Stansfield Tire for all your tire and car repair needs.

i'm not an engineer

but I do spend 20 hours a week having my intelligence insulted by engineers, so when I found Cooking for Engineers, I was expecting a useless collection of gross recipes written in a condescending, unintelligible manner. I should rephrase that - I was hoping it would be like that, so I'd have an excuse to call engineers useless, gross, condescending, and unintelligible.

Oh look, I just did it anyways!

But I digress. Cooking for Engineers is actually a super awesome and incredibly super website. Some of the recipes are weird chemical experiments, mock apple pie and the like. But most of the recipes are good, plus there are lots of pictures, plenty of step by step information for the more difficult stuff, and interesting explanations of the science behind cooking and baking phenomena. Check it out next time you're at work - especially if you work with engineers, who may walk by, spot a chart like this, and think you're actually working:

:

Material	Thermal diffusivity
Copper	120 * 10-6 m2/s
Aluminum	100 * 10-6 m2/s
Cast Iron	22 * 10-6 m2/s
Carbon Steel	14 * 10-6 m2/s
Stainless Steel	4.3 * 10-6 m2/s

who knew?