A weekend away

Blogger, you so crazy! I didn't notice until today that Friday's post duplicated itself. Moving on...

I had a great weekend at the house of my parents-in-law. They were out of town, so I stayed with J. and we took care of their dog, Cody. We brought in some Applebee's to go spinach & artichoke dip, which we both love, and drank a couple of glasses of wine each and watched a half hour of Big Daddy before we started to fall asleep on the couch.

J. had a baby shower on Saturday, so I had the house to myself basically all day. I finished reading The Time-Traveler's Wife and made myself a grilled cheese sandwich, although I couldn't find any peppers or tomatoes to make it gourmet. After cleaning up the kitchen, I took Cody out for a walk and looked at all the green buds and sprouts popping up all over the place. All sorts of birds were hanging out in their backyard and singing. I drank some wine and took a nap on the couch and Cody slept on the floor next to me. Then I woke up and started reading Snow Crash. J. got back around 8:30 and brought some food from the party.

On Sunday, we drove out to Wisconsin for her grandma's 80th birthday. The highlight for me was we got to visit her uncle down the road and see his garage/motorcycle restoration shop. My father-in-law hopped on the Honda Scrambler that they're working on and took it for a spin. We saw a couple of the bikes he had restored (two other Hondas) but we did not see the Triumph that he kept in another garage.

We got back to our place and just collapsed. It was so nice to stay in a place where there weren't people shouting on the other sides of every wall and running around on the floor above us. Living in your own house all the time must be really nice.

Congratulations to my wife!

This morning, J. interviwed and was hired for an entry-level graphic design job! We are both very excited as this is what she got a degree for and wants to do for a career. We will be celebrating tonight!

Congratulations to my wife!

This morning, J. interviwed and was hired for an entry-level graphic design job! We are both very excited as this is what she got a degree for and wants to do for a career. We will be celebrating tonight!

Too Cool

Stag satellited her current home with Google's new service, so I found my apartment building for everyone to admire. This is pretty much how Minnesota looks this time of year: everything is brown and the lakes are frozen over.

Stag reports having some trouble locating her place on the satellite image, but I was able to track down our neighborhood without much trouble by switching back & forth between the satellite and street maps.

Bonus info for SG stalkers!! Here is where I work. Boring.
This is the general location of my undergrad school. Much prettier photos, but I can't zoom in much further without taking a big hit in resolution.

I could play with this thing all day. My dad is a private pilot, so I've actually seen some of these things from the air, which is much cooler than looking at static satellite photos. But this is the greatest thing I can get from my desk at work.

Media I have consumed recently

Have you ever seen Shaun of the Dead? This movie is awesome. It was funny, suspenseful, and even sometimes touching. Plus there were several LOL moments, much to the surprise of my wife who was fast asleep in my lap and then jolted awake by my uncontrollable burst of mirth.

I also watched Bourne Supremacy last weekend and was very impressed. Lots of handheld camerawork and real stunts gave it a very imminent feeling. So check that out if you haven't already.

Sorry this post is so lame. I got nothin' today.

Life, Qwantz, Gender

Shout out to Denise:
T-Rex and Utahraptor deconstruct gender issues today on Dinosaur Comics! [Comic moved to here]
Is gender a social or biological construct? Read the strip to find out!

Let's Review

How did I become the Master of Patience? Not only has it been, as of today, exactly five months of waiting since my applications went out, with no solid good news since then; but also some big gaps in between the times I got any news at all. My application adventure up till now:

11/5/04: All applications submitted via LSAC
...then an initial wait of 42 days before the bad news...

12/17/04: Deferred at Minnesota

...and another wait of 45 days until...

2/1/05: Waitlisted at UConn
2/2/05: Waitlisted at Wisconsin

...then a couple of weeks later:
2/17/05: Rejected at Washington

...nice short wait of 21 days...

3/11/05: Rejected at Colorado
3/18/05: Rejected at Texas

...a glimmer of hope...
3/25/05: Waitlisted at William & Mary

...but then...
4/1/05: Rejected at Washington & Lee

...but I still haven't heard a thing from Georgia! That's all right though, since according to law school numbers there are many people still pending at that school. So I've still got a chance there, I would say, plus my deferral & three waitlists might pan out. Who knows. I'd be happy if Blogger would just work like it's supposed to for a change.

One wait ends...

Just found out that I didn't get the job I applied for way back when. They were looking for someone with experience in hectic, stressful, mandatory overtime positions. And I wanted to argue, "no, I can do that..." but I wondered why I would want to. I enjoy having a job that doesn't suck me dry and break me down every day. It's nice to work with enough free time to blog a little and talk to my coworkers now and then.

On the other hand, I would like a job with more responsibility.

On the third hand, this would be a crappy time to try job hunting on top of everything else on my plate. I'm happy staying with the company while I wait (plus the benefits are excellent and at least we're insured). The only question is, do I transfer to this position in Collections they have available, or just lie low and ride it out in a job I'm familiar with?

I'll be relieved when this stupid law school applications thing is done. I almost don't care any more whether I'm in or out; I will be celebrating when it's all over. I just hate the feeling that my life is on hold.

Let's do this like Brutus

Well, all right... it's time to get off my butt and try to make something happen. Stag's interview inspired me to set up a meeting with the Director of Admissions at the U of M. I just hope it's not too late in the process to make a difference.

I'll admit something to y'all: I may be the Master of Patience, but I have only kept a cool head thus far by giving up little bits of hope, one at a time. I am very dispirited by the whole process. By now I've basically given up on getting into law school. It doesn't look good. Hard as it is to believe, tomorrow marks the five month point after sending out my applications. And less than three months from now, I need to make a decision about my lease and my future and time is running out, and I still haven't been accepted anywhere.

So now I'm finally going to break free from the inertia that I've built up over the past five months and see if I can make a difference after all. My appointment is for next Wednesday. It's do or die time.

Weirdy weekend

So yesterday my grandma took me and J. out to Panera for lunch, and we ended up sitting next to a total whacko, which always seems to happen to us when we go out to eat. He was talking (loudly) about how Moslems are all anti-American and want to kill us infidels. He kept repeating the phrase "marked for destruction" or something to that effect, and he told stories about how there are secret temple meetings about how to destroy America, but we can't get in to find out about their plans because of the separation of church and state. He was very angry, he said, to find out about this. There was a younger girl sitting next to him, nodding and agreeing with every crazy thing he said. Very bizarre.

Then on the drive home, we saw not one but two vehicles bouncing around, showing off their hydraulics. Now up here in Minnesota that is quite a rare sight outside of car shows and the like, so I was pretty surprised. The second car was a Saturn.

Check out all that yummy sediment. Decanting is fun!

Rejected by Washington & Lee

Previous April 1st fooling aside, I trust you will believe the title of this post. It's true.

Understand that, once again, this is not bad news. Nothing has changed except that a bothersome unknown has become a non-factor. I'd like for this process to come to an end, and being placed on another waitlist just extends it. I've been dreading additional waitlists since being placed on William & Mary's, which is why I was similarly unfazed by the UT rejection two weeks ago. At this point, I just want to reduce the number of variables. Sure, acceptance would be great. But rejection is the next best thing. No more waiting, thanks.

Sui Generis book club #18

Eastern Standard Tribe by Cory Doctorow

For real folks, no foolin', this is another winner. I can't get enough. Doctorow had better come out with a new novel soon, because now I'm seriously hooked.

I used to read a ton of science fiction, but I gave it up for a while. Before D&OitMK, it had been a long time since I'd read any sf. When I finished that book, I couldn't remember why I stayed away. After reading this one, I realized the answer: I was sick of gloomy, dark, sad sf, and reading Doctorow was the antidote.

His stories are primarily hopeful, fun, and bristling with cool ideas: a futuristic utopia. Doctorow's futures are happy futures. Sometimes bad things happen to the people who live in them, but that's life, and that's conflict that makes the story go. They bounce back up after getting knocked down and life is good again.

Overall, I get the impression that it's a future I'd want to live in, and that's why I love reading about it so much. This is good stuff!

Categories: books

Sui Generis book club #17

Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov

I feel dumb writing about this book for two reasons:

1. It's too good for me to attempt any kind of critique or say much of anything about it, since what else is there to add--it's a classic, and;
2. I didn't actually read it. I listened to it... on audio tape. But!--

It's narrated by Jeremy Irons, and it's the best book-on-tape I've ever heard. I'm sure you recognize Mr. Irons from his role as "Profion" in the movie Dungeons & Dragons. No? Okay, how about as Simon Gruber in Die Hard: With a Vengeance? But check out his voice work experience: he was Scar in The Lion King! He also played Humbert Humbert in the 1997 version of Lolita, natch. He reads Lolita as if it really were his own life he's talking about, with all the emotional energy you could hope for.

Anyway all I'm saying is that if you need something to listen to in your car during your commute, give this a shot. I'll have to read the book some day to pick up on everything I missed, but this audio presentation is a true performance in its own right.

Categories: books

Quinta do Noval Raven "Very Superior" Porto

This is how we roll! Thick, tasty, and intoxitastic. Weighty alcohol content aside, this ruby port tastes the way I imagined wine should taste back before I had my first sip all those years ago. It's a bit hot on the tongue for my liking, but all good on its way down. Fun was had by all, as this was also my first wine that I had to decant!

Wa-hoo! Like a party in a 500 ml bottle. I'll be buying one of these again.

Three hours of IOWA!

So my wife and I left our apartment at 0800h. on Saturday morning and returned thirteen hours later, 2100h. Out of that time we spent around ten hours driving down to Iowa City and back up to Minneapolis with something on the order of three hours actually in the city itself. I drove the entire way. I was exhausted and totally spent by the time we got home. And it was all worth it.

The first thing we did when we got to Iowa City was to find Devotay (picture posted yesterday) and have lunch. We forgot to bring any cash, but scrounged up twenty-five cents to plug the parking meter on the street. After we got settled in and our food had arrived, I asked the waitress if she could give us a $1 advance on our bill so we could stay long enough to eat. She laughed and gave me some quarters.

I ran out and dropped in more change, then hurried back to enjoy my portabello sandwich and onion bisque, accompanied with a glass of 2002 Castillo Rioja (featured wine). It was all excellent. Devotay has won all kinds of awards for best restaurant in Iowa City, and they are well-deserved. Highly recommended.

After lunch, we reached the goal of our trip: the University of Iowa Museum of Art. Now I was expecting something on-par with my alma mater's art gallery: small, uninspiring, filled with student art and the occasional visitng exhibit. So when we walked into this place, I was totally blown away. Beautiful architecture, big space, fantastic artwork. They had original paintings by Miro, Rothko, Picasso, Gauguin, and Pollock (x2!). Holy crap. Also a special "collage" exhibit with Situationist and Dada art, and a TV playing the hijacked G.I. Joe PSAs.*

On to the main event. The manuscript was completed unrolled for display for the first time at this museum, and the whole thing was rolled out from end to end in a long glass case. It stretched through two gallery rooms, where tangentially related video and audio were being played. There were more people there than I expected for the second-to-last day of the exhibit; it must have been packed in the first few days.

The scroll itself was a bit overwhelming; too long to take in all the details in an hour or two, and probably too long to read even if we'd had all day, which we didn't. I walked along the length of it and just enjoyed being so close to the thing, looking at xxx'd out text and pencilled corrections and big ink Xs across paragraphs and pages. The paper was all taped together and repaired in rips and yellowed with age. The end of the scroll was supposedly chewed off by a dog. It looks the part. I went back to the beginning and read the first few sentences and I was ready to go.

We decided to skip dinner in Iowa City, which was planned to take place at the Red Avocado, an organic vegetarian restaurant. I was bummed to miss that. But we stopped at Steak & Shake on the way out and managed to get home at 2100h, just as I was reaching the limits of my driving endurance. I top off at around 11 hours a day. After that, forget about it. Anyway, it was a great trip and a really fun day overall. Iowa City, thanks for everything.

*Specifically, these:
Your ass got sacked.
Body massage.
I'm a computer.
Porkchop sandwiches.


Categories: travel, books, wine

University of Iowa Museum of Art

Kerouac weekend

Today, I am excited that our new digital camera has arrived in the mail. New photos may be coming soon to this blog. I'm even more excited about my impending trip to Iowa City to see the On The Road manuscript this weekend. It's on display at the University of Iowa through this weekend. This is as close as it's coming to us in Minnesota, so now is our best chance to see it. This is the first stop on its tour when it has been fully rolled out for display. If J. were willing, I'd read the whole thing right there in the museum.

So we're on the road to Iowa City, an exotic, assuredly scenic place that I have never visited. If anyone has a recommendation for a good vegetarian eatery or wine bar, by all means share with the rest of the class. I always like to search out good restaurants when I go out of town. The eating out, it is something I avoid while at home, but usually a very pleasurable part of my vacations.

Speaking of terrible segues, I totally forgot that The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is coming out this summer! I think I blocked it from my memory, actually, because I was so afraid they would flub it. But I just saw the trailer (albeit without sound, here at work) and visually, at least, it looks very promising. Certainly prettier than the BBC version. And after reading interviews with some of the people involved, and realizing that the project is based on a screenplay by Douglas Adams himself, I'm allowing my hopes to be got up.