I think I just found another point for the Geek Test: "I have made playable musical instruments out of edible and perishable materials, like broccoli."
Seriously, I’m in awe of this guy’s enthusiasm and vegetamusicability in a mad, mad way.
Happy Anniversary, Ben. Here’s to four years of never fighting, always saying the right thing, buying the perfect home, and simply having the perfect life. It’s all turned out exactly the way we expected it to!
Oh, not quite. In fact, that’s a load of horseshit. But I wouldn’t want to have had any of the good, bad, horrible, amazing, sweet, gruesome, stupid, incredible or character-building experiences in these last 4 years (officially speaking, and many more years unofficially speaking) without you.
I love you, you big handsome turd.
(Remember, don’t ever change unless it’s exactly the way I want you to. And I’ll try to do the same. Also, let’s try to follow our dreams and not get caught up too much in life’s little tragedies. That sounds cheesy, but dammit, I mean it!)
Photos taken by eatch other at a Starbucks near Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco last month. We were seriously enjoying our experience away from Utah and the fact that lots of people were drinking coffee and walking and recycling all around us. Not all at the same time, of course.
When I was growing up, I had a friend who was born around Christmas but always had a half-birthday party in June. The concept of a half birthday fascinated me, mostly because it had never occurred to me that there was a point in every year when I could officially start including the "half" in my age.
My parents didn’t think my half-birthday was anything worth celebrating, but still. It was exhilarating to say "I’m nine and a half" and know for certain that the extra half year could be mathematically proven.
Well, today is my half-birthday. It’s been a long time since I included the "half" in my age when asked. I’m not having a party and I’m not extraordinarily excited about the day, but I can’t let April 9th pass without remembering that it’s the halfway mark to my next birthday.
Which today means that I have 547 days left in my twenties.
(I started counting days to milestones on my thirteenth birthday. "Only 1,095 days until I turn sixteen, Mom and Dad! Aren’t you excited?!")
Many of my friends are around my age and are dealing with turning thirty in their own ways. Some are more affected than others, which I suppose is to be expected. Ben took it pretty hard last October, but I think he’s easing into it a little more now.
My life now is much different than I imagined it would be ten years ago, but not really in a bad way. I wonder how I’ll feel in six months with I hit T minus 365 days.
May 3, 2008 is less than a month away.
It’s a day that falls between my wedding anniversary and our started-dating anniversary (not that we’ve celebrated that since we got married). The date combination is the same as the Cincinnati-based banking institution 5/3 Bank. The date’s translation into 1337 is May e, zoob (which sounds Latin).
For me, numbers 1, 6, 7 and 10 sound like attractive ideas. What about you? Am I missing any events or plausible choices here? I don’t know why, but it seems like now is a good time to start planning what you’re going to be doing on May 3rd.
I originally wrote this post on Friday morning, but lost it in another retarded instance of Movable Type software being an asshole. So I had to rewrite it and get the links again and post it late. But I left the original "publish" date because dammit, that’s when I wanted to post it!
Leap Day is the day I remember specific people’s birthdays: my little cousin Sophie is 12 (it’s her third birthday) and my friend Jon from college must be 28 (ooo, lucky number seven). I thought that Mozart was also a Leap Year Baby (learned somewhere during my early public school education) but I can’t find any evidence of that.
In other Numbers Notes, I find it interesting that I will be turning 29 in this Leap Year. And my fourth wedding anniversary is sneaking upon me. I hadn’t realized that being married in a Leap Year was considered bad luck in Greece. Oh well. I also walked under a ladder that year and spilled a ton of salt. Plus, a black cat has crossed in front of me almost every day for seven years.
February 29 is also the one day of the year that it is traditionally okay for a woman to propose marriage to a man. There are some interesting vintage postcards from the late 19th and early 20th centuries that really encourage women to put on their scarlet bloomers and grab a guy by the balls, which of course was totally inappropriate back then. (It’s much more common nowadays.) Way to embrace women’s suffrage… give them one "free" day year!
However, I’m amused by the fact that if a man declines a proposa under that tradition, he has to "soften the blow" by giving her a kiss or buying her gloves, a silk dress, etc. I’d be proposing like mad during that time period just to get a bunch of lovin’ and cool swag. If a guy accidentally took me seriously, I would have said j/k because there doesn’t seem to be a traditional penalty for that. Other than breaking a guy’s heart… oh, cry me a river. Payback’s a bitch!
Wow, I suddenly feel very cynical. I assure you that everything’s just fine with me. *twitch*
Have you ever poked around on Craigslist? You can buy, sell, or solicit anything. So it’s not surprising that my college friend Steev found a want ad for a Chinese Baseball Announcer. Or that he responded.
What surprised me is how long it took the interviewer to hang up on Steev during their (videotaped*) phone interview.
This is the same guy who used to torture telemarketers when they called by speaking gibberish (or saying "poopie") to them for as long as he has free time. The nature of their job made it h difficult for them to hang up on him, and he got the biggest kick out of that. Maybe he’s stopped by now?
Nowadays, if you’re in the Chicago area, you should go to see his live Saturday night game show called "Don’t Spit the Water" or one of his other Blewt! productions. Puppets by Noah Ginex, whom I revere as an even greater fan of The Muppets.
*Is is still okay to say videotaped if the thing was recorded on a DVD or hard drive camcorder? What else can I call it?
This has been around for a few months, but was just introduced to The One Semester of Spanish Spanish Love Song.
I especially enjoy the farmer tan and the shirt, plus these great lyrics:
Working until 8pm on Friday evening sucked. Working again for another couple hours on Saturday sucked even more, even though I was working remotely from home. The hour that I worked on Sunday sucked the worst. Overall, suckage in conjuction with recent working hours. I will be taking a break to get my damn hair cut (and colorized? who knows?) sometime this week.
In the meantime, Neil Gaiman has this to say about what I should do about writing my damn Sundance stories on this blog, as well as how to proceed with my writing career:
So I guess I better get on that or risk being eaten by flowers (that kind of make me want to sneeze just looking at them… that would be a double whammy to be eaten by flowers while silmutaneously having an allergic reaction to them. Sounds like stuff from a B-movie horror flick to me.
In case you were wondering, American Gods: A Novel
If I ever went back to school for a Master’s degree in something literary, it would most likely be folklore and fairy tales. I think I’m most fascinated with their ability to survive and thrive across so many centuries and how one idea can transcend so many different cultures and yet still be the same basic story. And all that without the Internet! OMG how fab!
Okay, the literary geek-out is over (for now), and I should be leaving for work.
My friend Carole sent my a neat video of an even neater social experiement… 207 people simultaneously freezing in place at Grand Central Station in NYC.
