May 2004 Archives

May 03, 2004 — I've posted some new pictures from the weekend in southern California and the Coachella music festival.

In other picture news, I've put more of my pictures out of Shutterly as per several requests I've gotten. You can find a link to the Shutterfly galleries by going to my Gallery Index. The links are in the gallery descriptions.

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May 04, 2004 — The punctuation on that last subject doesn't seem to really convey how that song sounds. Writing out song lyrics is pretty tough because punctuation can only go so far. I'm always tempted to use extra letters to get my point across. Like there's the one part that's like "California, here we come... right back where we started from." Then there's that other part that's like "Californiaaaaaaaaaa... Here we cooooOOOOOOOOOme..."

I thought about this while watching the captions on my Billy Joel Live in Yankee Stadium DVD recently. It was weird. Punctuation was used inconsistently, and in my opinion, a little too sparsely. If it were up to me, I would be real descriptive with my captions. If this is the best deaf people are going to get from a concert, we should really help them feel it. Even deaf people should be able to rock out.

Here are some examples. First, there should be exclamation marks during Pressure. At least at the one at the end where he screams "Pressure!" In fact, all caps, a space, and his accent would be better -- "PRES SHA!"

The New York accent really should be better developed. I would have written "Ant'ny works at the grocery staw," "don't aks me why," and "whateva kinda mood yawwwww in tanite."

Also, why not convey the music too. Here's the beginning of "Big Shot" -- "Dun na_na na_na na_na. Dun. Dun. Shhh... Dun na_na na_na na_na. Dunnn. Dunnn. Dun na_na na_na na_na (ch) merner (ch) ner (ch) meh meh meh meH meh. Weeehhll... you went uptown ridin' in yaw limousine wit' yaw fine pak avenue cloOOOOOHthes." OK, someone has to listen along to that song now. I spent way too much time trying to get that right. Now I know why they don't bother.

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May 06, 2004 — I'm sick of my breakfast always being all yellow. Seriously. Everything I ever eat for breakfast is yellow. Eggs -- yellow. American cheese -- yellow. Corn pops -- yellow. Canned peaches -- yellow. Bananas -- yellow. Orange juice -- orange. Oh wait, nope -- that's yellow too. I need some more color in the morning.

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May 07, 2004 — I really like Goldfish -- the crackers. They're the only snack we stock in the office so I eat them every so often. One of my favorite things to do with them is stand them vertically in my mouth and gently separate them at their vertical seam. When I do it right, it separates into two exactly identical and equal halves (as the word half would typically imply). It's like separating an oreo, except there's no cream inside. And with Goldfish, that's a good thing.

Here's my question. They make pizza flavored Goldfish, right? In the past several years I've only had original cheddar. I seem to remember eating lots of pizza Goldfish as a kid. I can't really focus in on my memory of them. One part of me remembers them as being delicious. Another part of me remembers them as being kinda nasty. Does anyone know if they are good or not?

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May 18, 2004 — Man, I really hate when people combine the words "congratulations" and "graduation," thiking that they're all clever. It's not clever. It's just stupid. I do, however, enjoy being proud of people when they accomplish major achievements and it's a big time of year for that stuff. So here are some congratulations that are due:

Congrats to Kristen for earning her BS in Statistics from CMU.

Congrats to John for earning his Master's in IS from George Washington University.

Congrats to Samantha for earning her M.D. from George Washington University. And if that's not enough, she'll be finishing up her Masters in public health this summer.

Speaking of not being enough, congrats to my dad for earning his Certificate in Advanced Study for education administration, which is on top of his PsyD doctorate. And also congrats to my smart dad for graduating number one in his class!

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May 20, 2004 — Creepy moment #576: You're sitting in your office and all of a sudden you hear this loud bang on your window. You see a pair of legs dangling outside your window. A second later some dude suspended by a wire jolts down and is outside your window, face to face with you, holding a straight metal object in his hand. After realizing it's not Spiderman, thoughts race through your head. Someone's after me. Did I break the law? Maybe they found out I forgot to sign myself in today on the "log in board." Maybe the RIAA found out about my mp3s. Maybe they got me mixed up with someone else! Then, of course, you relax as you look through your crystal clear window to see that the dangling man has moved on to the floor below you. He was just there to clean your windows. You know, like what they told you about in that email yesterday. Whew!

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May 21, 2004 — There are some pretty bad storms in Madison this morning. As I was getting ready, the power was going on and off, the winds were howling, and the rain was pouring down. It looked treacherous, but the walk from the apartment to the office is only about 30 seconds. Equipped with my umbrella, I could surely handle that.

As it turns out, not so much. An umbrella doesn't shield your legs and when it's coming down this hard, your legs need shielding. I'm now standing up in my office, bent over my laptop, deciding what to do. Clearly, I can't sit down. I might as well have taken my pants out of the washer and put them on. They're that wet. I'm walking around carefully trying to avoid wet pants from touching dry skin, as one might walk if the crapped their pants. I desperately want to dry off but we have exclusively paper towel-based bathrooms in the office. There's no hope of finding a dryer stand in front of with my legs in the air, hoping to dry them off without catching on fire.

If you need me, I'll be standing in my office until I dry.

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May 26, 2004 — I don't know about you, but it always takes me some time to get the perfect water temperature in the shower. Maybe I'm just picky, but adjusting the temperature is kinda like doing the Electric Slide... a little to the left, a little to the right, down, and clap (the last two steps are just for fun).

Just once I would like to turn the knob and immediately find the perfect water temperature. Flick it and find it. I would think, with all the showers I've taken over the years, that this should have happened at least once. But it hasn't.

Someone should invent a digital shower water thermostat. Maybe it already exists. This may sound excessive but it's like that theory about buying a good mattress. You spend about 1/3 of your life sleeping -- a good mattress is important. While less time is spent showering, it's a pretty important time of the day. I do some of my best thinking and rocking out in there, not to mention some of my best hair and body washing. I'd definitely pay some cash to spend less time fidgeting with knobs and more time scrubbing, singing, and coming up with great ideas like this one.

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