maze of death!

what a GREAT game.

read this.

it's interesting, but long. i don't agree with all of it, but it was a fun read. worth the effort.

what's the matter with liberals?

not dead. yet.

i guess it's been a bit of a while... a whole four days with no blogging. i blame two things: 1. work; and 2. henlopen. even now i have tons of stuff to do. but procrastination is like dessert. there's always room for one more bite.

i realized today that one reason i love slate's today's papers is their pun-loving titles. today's is "hand sheik." hand sheik! that's wonderful. the world needs more punning.

henlopen was fun. i got to play a hell of a lot, which will be atypical for the season (i'm sure). i played like shit at first and really well towards the end. i think i was overall positive for the weekend, despite one point where i had two drops (ew). i got some Ds and usually if i touched the disc during a point we scored. at least, that's how it felt. something something eupeptic rating... that was funny.

this post is of terrible quality. i do sincerely apologize to my sizeable readership. and by sizeable, i obviously mean 4. who reads this, anyway?

mara's coming back today. she wants a big creepy cookie. mara, creepy cookies are not your friend. they're the kind of sweet food that will bite off your toes while you sleep. creeeeepy. creeeeeeeeeeeeeeepy. mwahahahaha.

ahem. yes. okay.

i'm going to go back to work before my brain completely shuts down. *waves maniacally* bye!!! see you soon!!!!!!!

-what a weirdo.

rainy days ahead

today i'm headed to lewes, delaware, to play at henlopen. i'm going in theory with ambush, but we were crazy short-handed so we picked up a couple of women and now have i think 10. so, who knows. i'm driving down tonight from newark airport (ugh). it's supposed to rain all weekend. that'll be 2 for 2 in cold, wet, muddy tournaments. maybe my season is cursed. i bet it's the red laces.

last night, after a nice (and super-filling!) dinner with corey, i talked to natalie for over an hour. she agreed to write my peace corps "close friend" recommendation, which made me very happy. i miss her tons, since she's one of maybe two or three women i maintained close relationships with from college. but, as always, we hatched a hairbrained plot to end up in DC - she at gw, i at georgetown - and live together. even though it's 4 years down the road, it's still nice to hope.

there's some blogger glitch that keeps the columbia-hosted folks' blogs from updating on my work computer. so goose and stoops, i can't read your blogs at work. sad. i don't know how to fix it. i check them all the same, though...

blogs are such strange things. like superpowers, they can be used for good or evil. the idea of using a blog as a personal journal still weirds me out--a public private journal? it's an inherent contradiction, and those are the worst kind. of contradictions, i mean. not necessarily blogs.

moving along in that train of thought, i have to analyze this blog. why do i write here? some of my posts are (as you might have noticed) political or social commentary that is (a) venting, (b) information for my less-aware friends, and (c) practice writing. others are just posting links for the entertainment of others. some are chronicles of my trips, also mostly for the benefit of others who i know what to read about them, but also again as writing practice. then there's the occasional brainfart, where i just ramble on about something that's important, or annoying, or trivial, or fun, and those i guess i write for myself.

i kept a journal on my computer for most of my senior year (maybe earlier too, i haven't looked at it in a while). it was the longest i'd been able to maintain a personal writing mechanism. obviously, based on the experience of this blog, i get tired of things quickly and let them go. but, just like i came back here, i'll probably end up back in that journal too. it's where i write things that i don't want to talk to anyone about. if it goes in there, it doesn't go anywhere else. when i don't write in it, it's because i don't have anything to say.

i love my friends. i love them. i love them. i love them. mara. mike. corey. mikeliu. natalie. dave. austin. abhay. iloveyouiloveyouiloveyou. don't ever go away, okay?

stolen goods

because i know you fools don't read the morning news, even though it's one of the best catch-all websites in the internet universe, i'm going to steal a brainteasing slice of it and provide it here.

haha. slice. oooh whew. oh man i'm good. ha. ahem. anyway.

this: the 12 man/13 man problem.
wait for the movement, and count the men.

and this: the solution to the 12 man/13 man problem.
for when you are sufficiently stumped.

what kind of american do YOU speak?

go here. be amused. it's pretty accurate.

ramblings...

it took me the entire day to realize that i knew marla ruzicka. she was killed on saturday in iraq, an unforseen casualty of a suicide bomber.

the organization i work for gave her ngo, CIVIC, most of its funding. she was based in our NY office for a time this year, and we ran into each other at a couple of happy hours. she struck me as a bubbly, possibly bipolar, but genuinely nice person. i spent a chunk of time today reading about her, and the things she did with her life are really incredible. i mean, really really incredible. i'm at a loss for words at her dedication.

having spent the past few years of her life pushing for compensation for civilian casualties of the war in iraq, i'm not sure how she'd feel about all this attention. four other people, including her iraqi coworker, were also killed today. but her name is the only name you see in the headlines. because she was pretty. and American. and great.

this has left me very confused. why did the headlines not matter to me until i realized that i'd met her? why does her death mean more to me than the deaths of the thousands of civilians in iraq? is it because i know her name? is it because i know her face? because i heard her laugh? does this make me a bad person? am i going to forget about this tomorrow? would that make me a bad person? why are all these questions about me? i'm still alive, remember.

death is so final. i think i'm starting to understand why people need to believe in a god.

fucking republicans

most people who know me would - i hope - stop short of calling me a "liberal activist." i try to avoid knee-jerk reactions, and i like to believe that there's always at least a semi-reasonable argument to support the other side. i'd like to think i'm a pretty moderate liberal, and i'm unsure of a lot of issues, from taxes to law interpretations and other things. i'm still figuring a lot of this stuff out, and i acknowledge it.

but the senate is really hitting below the belt. fucking fuck.

read this very good article by the LA times. you'll have to google for background articles if you need more information; i'm too angry to spend the time finding them now.

basically, judicial nominees are confirmed by a simple majority vote in the senate, 51-49 takes the cake. however, debate is allowed during confirmation votes, and filibusters, which are basically time-grabbers, are often used by the minority to delay and block votes. it takes 60 votes to end debate (and a filibuster). currently the senate has 55 republicans and 45 democrats.

the senate republicans - i'm lumping them all together - have recently begun openly attacking the filibuster, campaigning to remove filibusters from federal judge confirmation hearings. if this succeeds, and votes go by party lines, every single judge nominated by president bush will be confirmed. so far this year, democrats have only used filibusters to block 12 of the president's nominees, which (as i've read) is about the same rate at which republicans blocked clinton's nominees. but they're putting up a big stink about it because of the light at the end of the tunnel: supreme court nominations.

republicans are greedy fuckers--they want to be able to completely suspend debate if the president ends up nominating an ultra-right-wing conservative judge to the supreme court, should rehnquist/o'connor/kennedy retire. given the number of critical decisions that have been handed down by 5-4 votes from the justices, with moderate conservatives (nominated through compromise between parties by republican presidents) taking the "liberal" side. abortion. affirmative action. these are key issues, and asking for forced compromise between parties - through a filibuster - doesn't seem like that much to ask.

as i said to mara, they are acting like bullies in the schoolyard, picking on the kid with the glasses. i don't know if they anticipate a reversal of majorities in the next election and want to get in whatever punches they can now, or if they're overly confident in their success in years to come, but obstructing the democratic process isn't the way to work.

i can only hope that, if they succeed in banning the filibuster in judicial nominations, it'll come back to bite them in the ass tenfold when they lose their grip on the country's psyche.

i just ate soap.

it was sitting on my fingernail from my shower. gross.

today was my first day of spring league. we played two games and went 1-1 (with the help of some ringers--thanks erica!). i love the guys on my team. they are solid players and really FUN guys. we were almost playing savage, even with our ringers, and during our last game we were really tired and just not into it. but none of us felt like we had to win; we all recognized that we were exhausted and let the pressure go so we could have fun. and i had a great time. i'd been turned off from co-ed after my last summer league experience, and it was nice to remember that it can be really fun. i'm still not going to play WSL this year. between ambush and LSAT class, i won't have the time or the energy to play for another (probably) losing team.

i have a couple more touch-up things to do before i'll feel quite settled in my room. i have a plastic drawer-thing that i'm not using--anyone want it? otherwise i might throw it away. i also have to re-adjust to not having laundry in the building. apparently there's a laundromat en route to the 2/3 that will wash, dry, and fold for you. seems like a convenience worth paying for more often than not. i remember how my dad used to justify it when our washing machine broke and we had to use the laundromat: my time, per hour, is worth more than the cost of paying someone else to do it for me. however, i've never quite gotten over the weirdness of having someone else wash my undies. that just seems like an odd position to put someone in.

i love - LOVE - my new house. it actually feels like a house. althought it'll take some time before i'm fully comfortable living here, until i know what's in all the kitchen cabinets and when it's my turn to take out the trash, i'm totally confident that i made the right decision to move here. i cooked last night for the first time in ages, and had people over for the first time in at least seven months. it was wonderful. i hope i can do it a lot more now, especially with so many of my closer friends nearby.

yesterday i did my taxes. i can't mail them yet, but once i get this one form they're going out. and then, the irs is going to owe me some dough! as i said at starbucks: yay ipod! yay dvd player! yay savings account!

it was a good weekend. i needed it.

oil and water

what the fuck.

what the fuck.

anyway, here's something fun.

two great links

one.

two.

fantastic.

lord jesus.

this. this is disgusting.

i wrote a terrible thing before, about what i wanted to happen to this complete waste of molecules. but i erased it. because those kinds of thoughts are not worth sharing.

these people are like ellen jamesians, without an ellen james to tell them to go fuck themselves. fighting for the possible life of the unborn while sacrificing life that's already living, is the work of a coward. the self-righteousness involved in this kind of thinking, in this kind of action, makes me more angry than almost anything else i have ever encountered. this isn't ignorance. this is way, way worse.

it's a sad day.

oh the wonderful sound of it

manu chao is a genius.

if you have never heard manu chao, and you have even the slightest respect and admiration for musical talent and creativity, go download proxima estacion: esperanza, right now. right. now. do it. do it.

for the first time, i thought to look up the lyrics to this album--i guess i just assumed that they wouldn't be available for some reason. he sings in english, french, spanish, portuguese, and arabic. the site i looked at (here) has both the original lyrics and the translations into english. denia has always been a personal favorite, and i love it even more now that i know (a) that it's in arabic, and (b) what it means.

the album is really a work of art. when i ripped it onto my work computer, i actually considered merging all the tracks into one on itunes so that there wouldn't be the silly little breaks between songs that are meant to flow together. it's like a painting. it flows from start to finish, it has themes and substance, and little audio images pop up over and over. he purposely uses bad french (his native language) to imitate an american tourist in a song! he sings in five languages! FIVE! i know like seven people who can even speak five languages, and this guy writes and sings... oh man. i could go on and on and on. i have had this album for a couple of years now and i wouldn't be surprised if i've listened to it over 200 times, start to finish. it's as close to a perfect musical work as i've ever heard.

incredible.

*swoon*

manu chao, marry me.

movement

almost every weekday morning, i do the same thing. i get up around 830. i leave for work late. i get to work late. i hang my coat in the closet, drop my bag at my desk, and go to the kitchenette. i fill a plastic bowl with my cereal-o-the-week (multigrain cheerios, currently). i use 1% or 2% milk, whichever smells fresher. i sit down at my desk, log in, and read my new email (usually about 10). and so begins the day.

i do two main sets of internet reading/browsing each day, unless there's something really pressing or an all day meeting. in the morning, it's about the world. i start with today's papers (from slate), and read whatever stories they link that look interesting. then i go to the morning news (.org), which often links to the same stuff but can have real gems occasionally. today, for instance, they link to a live journal entry (and its comments) that have written pop songs in outline form. after that, i usually read the NY times and the washington post online - i browse the headlines, look at the health section, and read the editorials. most of the time i read the drudge report. and i check arts and letters daily, but they only post 3 or so articles a day, and i'm not usually that interested.

then work.

in the afternoons, like now, i usually need a break. that's when i read the blogs. i go onto eric's first, and then go down his links. i skip some, i read others. i get to the ones that aren't linked there, too, through other people's blogs. our little webring is pretty convenient. i wish people would post more. but that kind of makes me a hypocrit, since i'm not very good at it. the afternoon (like now) is when i would probably blog the most. i don't really use my home computer anymore, except on the weekends. good thing, too, since it's on its last legs.

work has been pretty boring recently. i've been surfing the web and reading unrelated materials more often than i think is appropriate. i kind of feel bad about it, because other people around me are really quite busy. but i work faster than most of them, so that kind of makes up for it. or, at least, that's what i tell myself. i'm trying to be better.

on that note, going to be productive.

five minutes

...til lunch.

i'm back at work, but as usual, i'm not quite in my routine yet. since last may, with only a couple of exceptions, i've been living from one big event to the next. it makes it way easier to put things off. i'll get better at seeing my friends after ultimate season ends; i'm way too busy now. i'll write this application essay after my trip; i'm way too busy now. i'll start working out after i move; i'm way too busy now. no. no more. i could live my life like this, never quite comfortable and always with a ready excuse to avoid this or that. but i'm tired of putting off the things that can make me really happy just 'cause they're slightly more inconvenient now than they might be next week, or the week after that, or the week after that.

so, the special this week is that i'm moving out of my east village shithole and into fancy shmancy new digs by central park north. what is that neighborhood called? i'll call it central park north until someone gives me a better idea. even though i have to move, i'm going to (a) run in central park today after work; (b) go to the women's practice on thursday; (c) convince stoops to hang out with me sometime soon (stoops! hang out with me sometime soon!); and (d) SKIP spring league on sunday. even with the best intentions, sometimes we still have to make sacrifices.

lunchtime! later.