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August 31, 2004

Alimento Squisito

Last night I went out to Maggianos in Tyson's with Matt's family in honor of his younger brother leaving for his first year of college. The food was DELICIOUS, I ate way too much. After much "discussion" we decided to get the family style meal, which of course only led to more "discussion" about what to eat. With much poking and prodding we tried to get Nathan to choose one dish of each course (we were allowed 2) but poor Nathan was not prepared for the responsibility. He chose the fried cheese appetizer then left the rest up to us. My favorite were the Mussels, I unabashedly ate nearly half the dish, although I was slightly beat by Matt's dad.

I believe I only embarrassed myself once. When Matt's dad was grinding the pepper into the oil for the bread, I was utterly fascinated. I found the pepper falling into the oil mesmerizing. Half the pepper floats on top and then the other half falls to the bottom like tiny black snowflakes. Ok so it's not all that exciting but, Matt's dad must have thought I was sick or something because I was staring at it so intently. Embarrassment aside, it was a great and boisterous meal, and a big thanks to Matt's dad and uncle for footing the bill.

Here's another picture from the Alhambra in Granada, Spain, circa 1998.




The medal count

The olympics are over, sigh. I'll miss them, they were the only thing worth watching on our 5 channels of TV. I guess we're going to have to cough up the money for cable now, although maybe Super Monkey Ball 2 can fill the void for a little while.

Although it is completely against the whole spirit of the games, every Olympics, there's always someone keeping score. The US is almost always up on top somewhere, here is the official medal count. Looking at that list it seems like the other countries don't even stand a chance. But, here is another way of scoring that I think is a little more fair. Although I think that silvers and bronzes should also be taken into account with different weighted values. The idea of taking population into account is much more realistic. This list puts the Bahamas up at the top and the US down to number 34. Yay Bahamas!

August 30, 2004

Computer non-Savvy

So I'm thinking of buying an iBook. I'm thinking of getting one used off of craiglist, mostly because I'm cheap and I haven't heard a good argument not to, as long as I go see it first. I do know that I want a G4. But, I'm a little confused about a couple things.

Airport Extreme - how convenient/useful/necessary is this? is it something i'll be able to use everywhere?

512MB DDR266 SDRAM - is this enough? I plan on my major applications being Office, Adobe Photoshop and iMovies.

40GB Hard drive - also, is this enough?

What questions should I ask the owner? And how much should I pay?

Any suggestions are welcome, thanks all!

That Izzle, he's so hot right now

So another friday night and another terrible bowling score. I mean really could I be any worse of a bowler? Here are my scores: 74, 69, 71. I ardently believe that bowling is my anti-sport, the more I practice the worse I get. There really was a time when I could get over 100 but, I think I'll have to boycott bowling for another year to get back up to even that! I go bowling with Matt's entire extended surrogate family, who are really great and fun people; his nephew Evan is adorable. But really, I just suck at bowling. It just isn't all that fun for me to play a game that I seem to have no hope of ever being good at. Maybe if I didn't bowl for 10 years straight I'd be like a bowling god for one game. (side note: I rock at Super Monkey Ball 2 bowling, it's just the real bowling that baffles me.)

Satuday Naomi, Matt, and I drove down to C-ville. Did a bit of shopping on the corner, reading in the library, movie watching at the downtown mall, eating at Wild Wings and rocking out at Starr Hill.

Plan 9 still a fun store to browse at but they neglected to make sure that the CD was actually in Matt's Blues Traveler case which was quite annoying, but ah well.

Alderman Cafe wasn't open so no Greenberries, a bummer, but I really did miss the smell of those stacks.

I really liked the movie Hero. Since I was forewarned (thanks Jess) not to expect an amazing plot, I got to focus on enjoying the scenery and the visuals, which were fantastic. Everything had a magical feel to it, especially the fight scenes which were possibly more surreal and beautiful than the ones in Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, but I'd have to watch that movie again to be sure. Anyway, Matt and I both liked it but Naomi thought it was enhhh.

Wild Wings was just how I remembered it. Lemon Pepper wings are still my favorite, YUM!

Scott rocked his concert! We had a great time and I got to see a ton of people I wasn't expecting such as Dellis, Hunter, Tracy, Dan (who used to live above us in Lambeth) and the surprise Kara who I used to run Track with in High School. I must say Izzle, I liked your new t-shirt "Your girlfriend wants me", too funny. And I bet your parents liked it as well, :-). You are a braver person than I.

After the show we stopped by Franks and saw Catherine's Bro, Peter, who was drunk, I believe, and exhausted from ROTC orientation week but still able to inform me that fires are rather common on submarines, I had no idea.

Sunday Na and I went to see Catherine, Tom and Charles' new place in the city, under the pretense of helping them move. The apartment is great! High ceilings, new wood floors, skylights, a great deck... but i'm sure you'll hear all about it over at unrequited narcissism.

After that I went over to the Roosevelt Island parking lot for a picnic with friends from work. We had way more food than needed, the kids fed and watered the ducks. We tried to explain that as they are swimming in millions of gallons of water they most likely do not need the bottled water, but young Madelaine was not to be swayed.

Here is a picture of cute little Sophia:




August 27, 2004

Jon's Around the World Adventure!

A friend of mine from my high school cross country team is currently travelling around the world, something I really want to do someday. Anyway, he has some awesome pictures up on his website: Jon's Around the World Adventure! Check them out if you have time, just a warning there are quite a few. But he's got his pictures up through China. I think he might be in Australia now, actually.

Here's one of his pictures from Thailand (I believe) just to wet your appetite:



Update on the spider bite: Day 1 of Steroids, the red streak going up my arm is mostly faded, whew! and the swelling is beginning to go down.


August 26, 2004

I'm on Steroids! ARRR.

On Tuesday I got bit by the most horribly savage wickedly evil spider the world has ever seen! Well actually it will remain unseen since I didn't even see it myself, but it has possibly scarred me for life (not really). When it happened I was in our back yard innocently picking tomatoes for my coworkers and roomates, I felt something bite me but assumed it was one of the umteen million mosquitoes that infest our back yard, aside from the possiblity of West Nile I was unperturbed. It looked a little worse than a mosquito bite for the rest of the day but nothing major. Then on wednesday as I went to work and throughout the day it got increasingly worse. The skin got really red and began to really swell up. I've never had a severe allergic reaction for spiders before so I mistakenly assumed that after a good nights sleep the swelling would stop and then start to go down. I was horrified when I awoke this morning and found that instead the swelling had atleast doubled in size and there was now a red streak running from the biten area up my arm and heading for my heart. I thought well if it gets any worse I'll go see a doctor, and then went to work.

I showed my coworkers who then promptly freaked out, and told me that I really should go see a doctor today. So I switched PCP's, since my old one who I had never even seen was out in Leesburg, and called up my new doctor in Reston. The secretary told me to come in immediately. Now I began to get a little freaked out. I mean usually don't doctors secretary's try to play down what ever ailment you have? When she told me to get right over there, I obeyed. The doctors visit itself was rather routine although I did find out that I have shrunk an entire inch! That's right, I am no longer an average and glorious 5'4" but only a meager and somewhat sad 5'3".

I recieved two prescriptions. One is a steriod for the allergic reaction, I believe, and the second is antibiotics for the line running up my arm, which is apparently a rather scary infection. Here are some interesting facts that I turned up after an internet seach of my new steriods:

Use alcohol cautiously. Together, alcohol and oral methylprednisolone can be damaging to the stomach.

Serious side effects may include:
sudden weight gain (more than 5 pounds in a day or two)

Less serious side effects may include:
insomnia

Rare side effects:
increased hair growth
cataracts
roundness of the face
changes in behavior

So I'm going to be an overweight, squinty, unpredictable and sober insomniac, but atleast I'll get rid of the spider bite.

Anthropology: the study of sex?

Ok the Anthro geek in me found this interesting:

There are two accepted ways of coming up with a time to the most recent common ancestor (TMRCA). One is to compare the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) which is passed exclusively from mother to child (no contribution from your dad here). The second is to compare the non-recombining portion of the Y chromosome (NRY) which is passed exclusively from Father to Son (no female influence). According to this study there is a trend for the TMRCA using the NRY to be half as long as that using mtDNA within the same populations.

What does all this mean you ask? Wilder JA et al. believes that it means polygyny (many woman to one man) is prevalent in humanity's past. This would make some sense as there are many cultures in anthropological record with a tradition of practiced polygyny and relatively few with a tradition of polyandry (many men to one women). However, I once read a book titled The Moral Animal by Robert Wright which made a convincing case for the evolutionary advantages of monogamy so, no boys, it's no more in your genes than it is in ours.

Ok sorry for the boring post I don't promise I'll be better in the future.



August 25, 2004

Breathing the fresh air

Alcohol without the hangover? Sign me up!

Shout outs:

To the reviewer who has been telling me for over a week that she is going to get me her reveiw by the end of the day. You're review was due 2 weeks ago! Either shit or get off the pot!

To the the man who said that Naomi and I had a bad attitude for ignoring him on the street outside Fado's on monday night. It's not like we didn't see you talking to those two guys right before us, they couldn't wait to get away from you, we weren't about to stop and let you torment us as well, we had a trivia night to get to.

To the two girls in front of me in the bathroom line at Mousetrap on Sat. night. Like, oh my god, you're so right, turquoise is the new IN color. I mean if you saw it at Burberry it must be true, right? Also, I think you're hot too. And that Australian that you hooked up with last weekend totally wants you. Oh yeah and can I hold your hand under the bathroom stall like your friend?

To the guy dressed like Rod Stewart (also at Mousetrap). You're awesome, dude! Keep on truckin'.

To all the Bunnies, mice and rats at the Reptile show on saturday. You're all going to be fed to snakes. RUN AWAY! GET OUT! HEAD FOR THE HIGH GRASS!

To my bowling ball on friday night. The gutters are not your friends quit rolling over to the side, don't you know its time to kick some pin ass?


On the wagon, off the wagon


Houston Sunset
Originally uploaded by Julie_Sargeant.

Alright Catherine you are going to have to chill, some of us actually have to do work sometimes, and we don't have computers outside of work!

Anyway, here's the part where I go through old picts on my computer and post one that I like. This picture was taken from my hotel room while on a work trip in Houston.

And now for a few disclaimers.

I don't spell check.

I often don't have time to surf the web at work and therefore often don't have anything interesting to say.

I like bad poetry and Irish music.


August 20, 2004

What's in a name?

Vistablind and Aspectblind sat down for a cup of tea,
Vistablind asked Aspectblind why he could not see,
Aspectblind told Vistablind, “I see as well as thee.”
Vistablind told Aspectblind, “but miss a single tree.”

Aspectblind met Vistablind while out for an evening drink,
Aspectblind asked Vistablind why he could not think,
Vistablind told Aspectblind, “I shall make any link.”
Aspectblind told Vistablind, “but shant go past the brink.”

~Anonymous




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