Motif

It's almost comical how many people emailed me about the Harry Potter theme park. The problem I have is this: It won't be open until 2010 and by then I'll be 27 and 3 years removed from when the last book was released. I don't think my excitement will last that long, nay, in a few short months, with the story resolved, I will be done with Harry Potter. It's sad, but true.

Stop Saying Blood to Strangers

As a youngster I was, much to my fathers chagrin, a pussy. I was afraid of roller coasters, blood, spiders and a slew of less common things. For instance I had a soul-chilling fear that the bathtub would overflow to such and extent that the house would fill up and we would all drown. The phobia was so paralyzing that I would shake with sobs of fear when my the my bath would rise to a depth beyond 2 inches. Why 2 inches? I don't know, but there it is. My parents were worried about me for a very long time. I would never try new things.

I know the exact day that it all changed. It was in the 2nd grade after my first schoolyard fist-fight. See I was, as I previously mentioned, a pussy and so a perfect target for the bullies of the area. I had come home a couple of times, perhaps in tears perhaps not, and told my mother about my problems. She was loving and caring and made me feel better. At some point Papi caught wind of the problem. He was also loving and caring but did not make me feel better. Instead he taught me to fight and told me that the next time they come to harass me to just swing hard and they would leave me alone forever.

He neglected to mention that they would savagely beat me first. Still, I did it, and after that day I was never harassed by bullies again (actually, i was, twice. Both times I won the fight, puberty hit me like a ton of bricks) and more importantly I realized I wasn't made of glass.

Thing is, most of those weird fears still exist somewhere in my psyche but a healthy male ego has deemed them unworthy pursuits. Much love to dear Father for that.

Still whenever I go for my bi-annual (thats 2 per year) blood donation I have to face two of those fears: Blood and Needles. Blood is easy by this point because many of my hobbies involve bleeding because of my incompetence. My mountain biking partners can attest. Nonetheless watching two pints of blood flow from your body is jarring.

"Needle" mightn't be grandiose enough a term. Because rather than take out a needle to draw blood the lab tech unsheaths and wields a noble blade she has lovingly named "Dawn's Sorrow" or some such nonsense. Cheerfully she gores me with her cavernous harpoon and leaves me to bleed until she believes I have bled enough to repay whatever debt she construes I owe her. It's all very Merchant of Venice.

In the end, though, I feel great. I like being light-headed and I love cookies and apple juice. Also, even though by this age they are very small battles with very old phobias I enjoy winning them. Also, who knows, maybe I saved a life by now.

Sidebar: The Puget Sound Blood Bank does not give T-shirts to donors, and their cookies are sub-par. I miss MD Anderson. Great Cookies. And one time I got a peanut butter cracker pack. Which was great even though I didn't get to enjoy it fully.



10 points to whoever can guess the quote in the title.

Yes, you are too

I'm suiting up to get back into the game. After a catastrophe that left my life in the worst shambles I've experienced so far (much thanks to the family for picking me up, dusting me off and chocking me on my chin) "suiting up" involves hardening my heart, dying inside and wallowing in a misogynistic pool whose calm surface belies a turbid downward current.

I got that part done. I hate women so much by this point that I'm almost guaranteed they'll fall for me left and right, remember, women are stupid and self-destructive. I still love my mom though, and my sister.

The other part of suiting up involves getting into some facsimile of 'shape'. Because even their stupidity and self-destructiveness can't overcome their shallowness. Thats not really a commentary on women, everyone is shallow, even the fugly.

Also, now that I shave my head I have an even more vested interest in being thin.

So I endeavor to drop a lot of weight. It's actually really easy because as it turns out my life is plenty active and to maintain my ideal weight I should be eating over 3000 calories a day, 2000 of which merely keeps me alive and warm. So really all I had to do was start the calorie counting (which is math, and thats fun). I already play a lot of basketball and bike fairly often, but just for kicks I threw in a daily lunchtime run.

Two weeks and a bit of willpower later I dropped 10lbs. I always read that 1-2 lbs a week was how much you could healthfully lose and so I decided I must have been doing something wrong. I went to talk to one of those trainers at my gym and ask him about it. He said that, and George said this too, healthy weight loss is really defined as a percentage of your size and that maybe that was a little fast but I should be ok.

So I'm sticking to my plan. I'm feeling pretty good right now because i have an old pair of pants back in rotation. The crux of my 'plan' is this bathroom scale I got. It gives my weight to the nearest tenth of a pound. That way I can always see what progress (generally after bball) or regress (Sasqatch music festival...fried /everything/) I am making on a daily basis, even if it's minute. So at any point you can ask me how much I weigh and I'll be able to tell you to a tenth of a pound. I usually check when I wake up and before I go to bed and whenever I stub my toe on the damn thing.

Sidebar: Diet Coke is a miracle of modern science. I refuse to drink it because it must be a carcinogen or radioactive or laced with mind control drugs, but still, making a calorieless beverage is amazing. Really it's an abomination upon the Lord our God. Whatever made scientist figured this one out is surely going to hell. When I discovered that it had exactly 0 calories I almost shit a brick.

For The Record

I'm liking this Ron Paul. EOM

It means mustache in German

I made the mistake of going to a bona fide pet store. Up to that point I had visited humane societies and city adoption centers. In those places you'll find many a good dog, and I did though none of had that je ne sais qua I hold so paramount. Those dogs range from angsty tween to salty curmudgeon in age so they are still precious but lack that newborn puppy spark. I managed to maintain self control.

Then I go to this retail pet store where the pups are young. Generally around 2-3 months old. Pups who could bring a nation to ruins with the sheer magnitude of their cuteness. I don't mean a nation would ruin itself in some internecine race to 'acquire' their cuteness. I mean that if their cuteness were released in full the nation would merely be razed and it's citizens wiped out by some unseen cuteness force.

I played with a schauzer puppy.

I wanted to take him home so I ask the lady how much. She tells me "830$". At first I just stared at her waiting for the absurdity of her 'little joke' to crack through in the form of laughter and "just kidding"'s. When that proved fruitless I looked to her cronies behind her, figuring that perhaps one of them might prove less able to master the internal giddy that surely rocked their cores when they heard their friends jest. I got squat. They were serious, and whats worse, they were completely unapologetic. Apparently they often ask for close to a grand for a puppy and thought nothing of it. To wit, I think I saw a flash of condescension when she realized I was shocked, SHOCKED at her outlandish asking price.

It was like watching the Sopranos, when Tony 'offs' someone. I walked away wondering where their moral compass was set, how they slept at night, who they thought they were.

Anyway, I called back today and the schauzer is down to 780. I'll keep checking. If he makes it to a reasonable price I'll snag him up, though I doubt he will.

Trends

Google saves all your queries. We've always known that, but now you can sift through your history dating back as far as your google account. They do interesting little stats for you:

Top queries For All Time

1.	521 S Weller St, Seattle, WA 98104
2.	stl
3.	harmonica basic
4.	1ZX580110309902134
5.	tobacco
6.	weather 98104
7.	subversion
8.	seattle bus
9.
10.	pirates bay

9 was omitted because of it's personal nature. It's not porn, just so you know.

All the Seattle related queries are there because in the few months immediately before I moved up here I really couldn't think of anything that didn't involve no longer being in school. So when it was stupid hot in Austin I checked Seattle weather or I would longingly look at my current apartment on google maps etc etc.

STL makes a lot of sense. Whenever I need to look something up in the STL I search for it. It happens a lot.

Harmonica basic is funny. When I was teaching myself harmonica I found a nice tablature site that popped up when I searched for Harmonica basic. Who needs bookmarks?

I have no idea what package that is. It arrived in Austin on May 03 2006 and was signed for by Dylan. Best guess I can come up with is a textbook for that oh so epic summer session.


Also, for some reason I search more during january and february. Fun stuff, give it a go.

Amazing!

The caliber of the Starbucks marketing think tank boggles the mind!

If you don't care to rtfa I'll sum up: Starbucks put quotes on their cups that they gathered from various sources like news media or typical customers. A couple quotes were slipped in that are clearly meant to enrage Christians. Nothing too blasphemous, just humorous quips or different takes on things.

The Christian right obligingly becomes outraged and some mid-westerners are calling for a boycott.

Here is the brilliant part. First and foremost the 'boycott' will put no dent into Starbucks' bottom line. Any self-respecting right-wing will not go to one of your tree-hugging, patchouli-wearing, poetry-reading, hookah-smelling local cafe. No, they will go to some other corporate entity, the largest of which will be Tully's and Seattle's best. Both owned by Starbucks.

More importantly, suddenly the popular escape from Starbuck's evil corporateness will put you in rank with right-wing Christians. Suddenly Starbucks is right in the trenches in the war on Republicans and rich people. They, who so recently were evil and rich themselves, are making a stand against the Christian Right! They, are now good.

It won't push anyone into a Starbucks explicitly, but the change in image they just bought is invaluable!

FUCKING BRILLIANT!

And I'm ok with it, because they were a good company long before this little trick of theirs. If only I drank coffee.

I learned the word "Maw" from News Radio =-D

I just got back from a meeting. It was a quick meeting. A meeting to discuss a recent re-org, or really an initial-org, of our wiki pages. There was a powerpoint presentation, as often there will be.

Before this meeting I went to lunch alone. Not because I am a loser with out friends but because sometimes I really dislike people and would rather knock off a few chapters in lieu of their company. The book du jour was "Freeware" by Rudy Rucker. The last in a series I suggest you try. (if you're addled enough to enjoy cyber-punk)

Whoever prepared my sandwich felt it was unnecessary to remove the wax lining from my deli meat. I probably downed two-thirds of the sandwich before I realized something was different. I didn't ask for my money back or even complain, I did what any red-blooded man would do, I pulled at the wax like a errant sweater thread, threw it on the plate and moved on with my life. Still, I felt more nauseated than usual when I walked into the conference room and I figure that has something to do with it.

The conference room had that unmistakable clinical smell that comes so close to ruining so many dalliances. It smelled like a condom. More subtle was that general smell of sex, so hot when you're horny and sooooo disgusting when you are not.

I didn't have time to point this out to my colleagues before one of them walked in with some very pungent indian food. Throughout the meeting she, next to me, quietly ate her lunch. Still, I was full and nauseated twice over so her polite mastication sounded, to me, like a cow with nasal congestion chewing her cud slowly and loudly.

So bad wax in my belly and knowledge of recent rendezvous on the very desk I was staring at to drown out the grinning, smacking maw next to me, I started to feel really sick.

No climax. I didn't vomit or anything, but I still feel awful and felt I should somehow record all that.

Poochie

Part of me really wants to get a dog. And what with having kept my plant alive for over 3 weeks that part is feeling more bold. There exists another part of me, what can only imagine is a new part, that is playing the role of the chiding parent: "Dogs are a /lot/ of responsibility. And you are not responsible, clean your damn room and get me a beer." I'm not sure whose parent it is, but there he/she is.

There is a wholly other part of me that reels from the thought of such a commitment. I can barely sign a year long lease with an apartment with out breaking in flop-sweat, who knows what will happen when I consider having the same dog for 7 years or so. Whatever it is, it won't be pretty.

But, the part that wants the dog ripostes, you have money and will never again have so much free time to care for a dog, and you need some exercise donut boy. And it's true. Also, I have no one to go biking with. A dog can't bike (yet) but can run along side.

Also, there is my penchant for naming things, luke my banjo, sh'naynay my bike, joyce my car, Lord Thomas Pheferton III my roomba, and, of course, big confucious and far and away. I could probably have fun naming a dog.

And hell, maybe taking the plunge will help me with the fear of commitment thing and i can finally sign that 2 year cell phone contract.

Anyway, I'm working from home today so I figure I'll go checkout the animal shelter, maybe some dog will strike my fancy.

WikipediaFS

If you're anything like me, you aren't even reading this anymore. ^_^