Dance Baby!

My girlfriend gave me Dance Dance Revolution for Christmas. Once upon a time I thought this was a stupid game, and then I tried it, and it rocks. It's a blast. If she finds out I posted this picture she may very well kill me. Merry Christmas!!!

in other news...

my sister's got this boyfrind named Jim.

Ain't karma a bitch.

This just in...

I just heard the following on the news: "observers of the plane said they didn't see anything unusual until the wing fell off." They then were kind enough to point out that the plane crash was actually a result of the wing falling off.

Fucking brilliant. Gotta love the evening news.

What's up with ya'll?

Christmas Time

I'm finally done with this quarter from hell, and christmas is rolling up right around the corner. There's one thing that I keep thinking about today though. Tyrona is probably on his was to spend five months in Hawaii as we speak. With a bunch of undergrad coeds. I hate him so much.

BOO yah bitches

you are all pussies. remember that time I cut open my leg on a cinder block, and when i cut off the tip of my finger chopping parsely... and how i was always touching fire, when i had no business or reason to...

well turns out

"...redheads can withstand up to 25 percent more pain than their blond and brunet peers..."

Pizza Aroma

Today Liz and I have been studying since noon or so at the Tompkins County Public Library down on Green Street. I suggested Olin or Uris, but she said that I wouldn't be getting anything done because I'd be too distracted by undergraduate boobs. I said that I wouldn't be distracted if she just showed me hers occasionally while we were studying.

I think you know who won that little clash of logic and differing world-views. Alas, I am here at the TCPL, not a nubile nipple in sight. And the few illicit note passings over to the lovely Liz sitting across from me at this faux pine and formica table have gone over, shall we say, poorly. "Let's go do it in the reference section" just didn't get her as hot as it apparently did me. Neither did "Let's go do it by the Hardy Boys collection," although, I suppose that could be for a different reason. Come on, who doesn't like old world almanacs and exciting adventures to be had by teenage boys solving benign mysteries. More to the point, who doesn't like sex.

Anyway, after several failed attempts at the "Geez, babe, I'm just kidding...why, do you want to?...oh come on, don't get mad at me, i was really just kidding... I mean, making out wouldn't really be that weir--. come on, wait come back here, seriously, i'm just messing around" talk, I decided we should just go get some pizza at Pizza Aroma across the street.

Two things, well three really: One. Pizza Aroma now delivers. I'm pretty sure they used to not deliver, which was bull shit, but now they do, which is also bull shit because I don't live here. Two. Pizza Aroma continues to be, despite its recent promotion on my list of things that are bullshit (a competitive list mind you), god damn delicious. Three. There was a sign saying "Driver's wanted" in the window. I have come to the brilliant conclusion that this job is Mr. Atkins's calling.


well. i am done.

adieu. Dad.

Friendster Love

So I just used up my creative energy for the year updating my friendster profile. Part of the motivation was this gorgeous girl I'm trying to Friendster flirt with:
This is my first time Friendster flirting. She likes Classic rock and learning. I'm in love. Too bad she lives in Massachusetts. I'll let you all know how it goes.

Here's the new profile. Let me know what you think.

About Me:How am I not myself?

Being a consultant, I will use a bulleted list for this task due to the efficiency and raw effectiveness:
- I once killed a man with my bare hands…well, honestly, I just punched him, and rather than die he just got a small bruise, but I don’t think that diminishes the accomplishment one bit.
- I think "Live Free or Die" is an awesome thing to have written on a license plate; coming in a close second is "Taxation Without Representation." Both of these kick “Famous Potatoes” ass. Come on Idaho! That’s seriously all you’ve got?
- I’m a big fan of dogs. I think they’re pretty cool. I’d like to get one sometime soon. Maybe a mid-sized terrier or one of those scraggely mutts that looks as if it lives in an alley somewhere like the dog in Annie. I have a love-hate relationship with cats.
- Speaking of pets, all I have now is a 6’4” cactus named George. George started his life in a truck stop near Montreal, and has since had five owners and lived in three states and the District of Columbia. When I last moved George a bunch of his limbs fell off and I replanted them and named them: George Junior, George Junior, George Junior, George Junior and the twins. Once they rooted, I gave them away to friends and family. I’d be happy to cut a chunk off for you if you want.
- Growing up I really enjoyed sugaring (making maple syrup) with my father in New Hampshire. We had a small sugarhouse my father built when he was 18 for my grandfather. Besides collecting the sap, which is legitimately hard work, this mostly consists of watching sap boil and occasionally stoking the fire. I came to realize this, as well as many other manly pursuits, are just excuses to get out of the house and drink beer (a good example of this is ice fishing. Come on guys! Like you really just can’t wait until the spring!). Fortunately the payoff of this hard labor is oh so sweet.
- I could go on, but I only have 61 characters left. Crap! now it's down to just 1

THE WONDERS OF PHOTOSHOP

This is a rocking chair I built a 1/4 scale model of and placed in some random persons living room. Got to love modern technology!

the Job Offer

So I just got a new job offer and I'm not really sure what to do. It would basically involve me taking care of logistics for a geology class and driving a van around and keeping a bunch of college kids safe from themselves. Oh yeah, and part of the time I'd be taking care of a couple of little girls ages 6 and 3. I mean it sounds like it would be a lot of bull shit activities and grunt work and stuff but you know it would be something new. So what do you think should I take the job.


Oh yeah, one last thing......the job is in Hawaii.

A Less than Modest Proposal

I propose a reunion in Columbus.

Winnebago style, from the east coast anyway.

i don't know when or how. but this seems like a fantastic idea to me.

Allegiances

Do you ever feel an allegiance to a certain brand for no apparent reason? Or conversely a deep seated dislike? For whatever reason, for a very long time I have been in love with UPS and hated FedEx. It's almost like I was brainwashed as a child. I'm sure there are other brand's out there that I feel like this towards as well, but I've always been acutely aware of this particular love/hate duo. Lately I feel like I've finally grown out of it. I love you FedEx...die UPS.

So there's this cat...

and it belongs to someone else in my neighborhood, but it travels all over my block. I see it pretty much every day, and it had been very nice. Every day this week though, I've caught it crapping by my front door. What's the deal cat!? What'd I ever do to you?

every quarter I must write a paragraph on each student

With quick discussions on the summer reading, we hit the ground running in English 1. We have covered the basics of the parts of speech and paragraph structure. Simon usually participates in the discussions on The Catcher in the Rye and earns sixties on his tests. His essays, however, leave something to be desired. They look like something a blind three year old would create by hitting the key board with its head. Without the ability to form a sentence, your son shall be doomed to work as a speed bump.

Maybe it's just me

Sometimes when I'm walking through the hallways at work and everything is real quiet like, I like to make faint helicopter noises:

Ticka ticka ticka ticka ticka ticka ticka ticka ticka...

As if I'm a helicopter flying through the halls instead of a consultant. You know, like Airwolf.

Apples and Oranges

Get out your reading glasses, pour yourself some Jack, and make yourself comfortable

http://www6.lexisnexis.com/publisher/EndUser?Action=UserDisplayFullDocument&orgId=1550&topicId=20164&docId=l:316189075

Word Verification

Is someone intentionally turning off the word verification for comments? Every few days it gets turned off, and we get spam, and then I go and turn it back on again.

... and then Julia Stiles walked in.

So, I was at a party last night with my friend Jon from HEV. I had previously told him about Chris's method of getting out of a bad story by saying "...and then I found five dollars." Jon thinks this is hilarious, and at one point said it to me, which of course resulted in me having to explain the joke to the others around. While explaining this quirky fix, I had an epiphany and decided instead of saying "...and then I found five dollars," I'm going to start name dropping celebraties. Possible combinations include:
- and then Jude Law walked by...
- and then Oprah came in the room and told me I should read "the Red Tent"
- and then my cell phone rang and it was Tom Cruise telling me I was late for the Scientology meeting
- and then I had to leave, because I was late for my lunch date with Jenna Bush

As you can see, the combinations are endless and also potentially hilarious.

Anyway, I quickly became the life of the party, because I made a couple references to Julia Stiles (probably because Matt and I saw her on Saturday) following bad stories and it was awesome. From then on all I had to do was say something about Julia Stiles and everyone would laugh. Then Will Ferrell came running in and was like, "who wants to go streaking in the quad!" And we did.

Those Crazy Eskimos

The expression "three dog night" is an eskimo expression meaning that it's so cold out that you have to huddle with three dogs to stay warm. According to Darby Conley at least. I just thought it was a band.

Happy Hour

Sometimes I try and continue the tradition and write happy hour emails for work. I thought you fellows might enjoy this one:

Subject: It's a date!

...so then I was like, “show me a crocodile that knows anything about accounting, and I’ll show you a giraffe that’s an expert on climate change!”

Yeah, that’s what I said. OK, catch you later.

Oh hi, didn’t see you there. How’s it going?

Coffee huh? I, uh, drink coffee too…

You can say that again!

Hey uh, I was wondering… I mean I don’t know… are you, uh… do you, um… you see me and the boys are…

Let me start over. I was thinking if you don’t have anything better to do, I mean don’t already have plans… well here’s the deal. I’m heading out with some other coworkers to hit up The Exchange tomorrow night on G street between 17^th and 18^th.

Yeah… pretty sweet. I figure we’ll drink some pints eat some burgers, maybe sit outside and heckle some lobbyists or watch some baseball… you know, whatever.

So, if you’re not doing anything you should come on by.

Oh, I see, well that could wait another day couldn’t it…

Yeah, I guess that’s pretty serious… did I mention Zeph is going to be there?

Oh, you can come. Great.

Well how about I pick you up… uhhhhh… at the elevators at 5:45 pm.

See you then! I gotta get back to work.

AJ

130 Fraority

When I was initially setting up this blog I tried to get the address of 130linden.blogspot.com, but as at least matt has discovered, it was already taken by some greek folks that moved into our house after us. I just rechecked their blog and it hasn't been updated in over a year. I think that eminent domain should apply here and we, being able to make much better use of the name, should be able to claim the address. Lawyers, do I have a case?

Jimmy's Old

Sorry i forgot Jimmy.

you're old now. Isn't Timmy old sometime around now too?

Re: He drink the cacophony substance

i am dying to know what the algorithm that generates spam subject lines looks like.

1. Does this make me a nerd?
2. Is question number 1 rhetorical?

i=3;
Lbl A
i. Is question number i-1 rhetorical?
i=i+1;
Goto A

Milk and Cookies

So you all may already be aware that his place exists, but I never seem to be up on all of the cool things on the internet. Milkandcookies.com has some hilarious videos. Best Ping Pong match ever, although it doesn't look like they were really trying to beat each other after a while. I promise this is the last one I'll link to, unless there's something totally awesome.

Classic Muppet Show

I just bought the first season of the muppet show the other day, and the very first episode contains the classic mahna-mahna, which is awesome. Go watch it!

Through a Mongolian Yurt Door

You'd think he'd have more sense by now.
Be less immature.

Kristin shuffling

I think the Kristin from Laguna Beach needs to be a "Kristin".

those of you who don't know who she is type "Kristin Laguna Beach" in google. what is it with me and Kristins.

suggestions? fantasy kristin? tv kristin?

The Public Cries for Desecration

I hate to be redundant, but I do not think we have given this giant fuzzy soft rabbit on a mountain enough attention. It looks like a giant baby dropped it in the middle of no where and crawled away.
They say it shall be there for twenty years so how long until someone like me cuts its head off and shoves a powerful pumping machine into its neck that spews forth a geyser of thick blood like red fluid for five minutes on the hour between the hours of 8am and 5pm?
How long before someone steals a paw for luck?
How long before someone stitches a paw on the open neck to stop the powerful pumping machine?
How long before someone stitches horns, a third eye, a penis, a human head, Christ’s head onto the giant pink fuzzy bunny?
How long before someone uses a helicopter to launch the giant doll at the Pope mobile?
How long before someone rearranges the figure into a mocker of Christ’s cross?
How long did it take for someone to have sex on the bunny? Knowing artists, I presume one of them climbed the 20 foot sides and did the deed, but how long was the bunny within public reach before two strangers humped on the fucking huge cushy stuffed animal on the side of a mountain. If it is really there for twenty years I hope that I can take a girl there and do it.

Blessed are we

Maybe it's the liquor talking, but there's nothing quite as great as Black Pepper Jack Doritos. Oh, whole corn how I love thee. Oh one or more of the following corn, soybean and/or sunflower oil how I love thee. And to all other 37 ingrediants, you are also deserving of my love, every one of you - even you sodium diacetate, whatever you are.

God bless you Mr. Frito and Mr. Lay. I salute you. There's nothing like the taste of Freedom washed down with a nice cool tug of Oringina. Did I say Freedom? Sorry, I meant capatilism.

99 cents** can buy so much happiness.



** $1.07 including all applicable federal, state and local taxes

Hi Jim

Hey Jimmy.

what classes are you taking this semester? How are interviews going for next summer? Looking mostly in Ohio? You should come work at Simpson Thacher in NY. good times man, good times.

also, how's your girlfriend. that's really lame that you're not sleeping with undergraduates.

well, that's all. just thought i'd write you here instead of email.

What are we doing tonight?

Do you hangout?

The year of huge stuffed animals

Denver recently built this very large Blue Bear that I think is sweet. This Pink Rabbit on an italian mountain is a little weird though.

M to the izzatt

Hey boys, I thought it might be cool to see what life would have been like on Linden Boulevard instead of the Ave.

Arrr....

Shiver me timbers.

Shhh..... Go to bed

Don't worry about it, it's fine...

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/16/national/16fugitive.html?th&emc=th

Grand Canyon Walkway

How crazy is this. A giant clear walkway overhanging the grand canyon.

Concern

Recently as I enjoy and suffer the train of thoughts in my head I have found myself thinking, “I agree” after I come to some conclusion.

The implication of thinking this repeatedly over the last few months makes me slightly concerned.

Thoughts?

Child's Ride on Toy

Most of my designs this quarter haven't been very exciting since I've been working full time along with school, but I thought this one was fun at least. It's a toy for a 3-4 year old child to ride on. The nose on the front can connect to another toy's ring in back so that kids can form a train.

Here's the full size model I built. 

Ride on Toy Rendering 

She acts all cute, but go and try to pet her stomach and BAM! she'll bite right down on your hand. Devious. 

Steamboat Card

Well, it looks like if anyone wants to do some skiing in Steamboat this year it is not going to be cheap. I just looked into getting a card, and apparently they aren't issuing any new ones. The pricing for people that already have one is less than a $10 discount per day. At least we got one good year out of them.

My cat's breath smells like cat food...

Fun Video

Chemicals Brothers Featuring the Flaming Lips "The Golden Path"

It's video number 7, and had me laughing out loud and feeling happy.

Reversal of Personality Test

So after writing the post below I got to thinking. What if I were to start a blog and write about a bunch of political news, but instead of writing my opinions, I would take the exact opposite stance and write what some neo nazi ultra conservative hate lover (hah! hate lover) would write. First off, would I get ridiculous responses from both right and left wingers?
ex. I think gays should be forced to take therapy to straighten themselves out.
Right response: You're so totally right! Fucking homos. I love your blog.
Left response: What the hell is wrong with you? Die you fucking nazi!
And second, would I start to believe, or at least empathize with those views? It seems like it might be an interesting social experiment. Anybody know if somehting like this has been attempted with a journal, or some other outdated writing medium.
Totally unrelated except for that last bit, I weep thinking about the day when we only have e-books. I love paper books. I love bookshops. I can spend hours looking at nothing in particular.
Also, I have finally regressed into a fantastic procrastinator.

Wikipedia Terrorism

Seeing as the Wikipedia is an extremely popular thing, and is editable by anyone, I think it begs the question, "Are we vulnerable to a terrorist attack via the Wikipedia?" Think about it. Someone begins slowly creating a trail of barely false information that people over time start to take as fact. As the months progress the information gradually gets more radical and pretty soon we're all doing exactly what the terrorists want. Seeing as how we're all mindless drones prone to believing anything and everything it's bound to happen. The government should obviously begin to monitor all posters and begin arresting people who might be 'troublemakers'. Heck, they might as well monitor the entire world population. I won't sleep soundly till I know it's happening.

Ghost of Law Firm Future

So, today i'm sitting at a different desk in my office cause i needed to spread out. When i use the phone at this desk, people who i call don't know its me. Apparently this phone says "FUTURE" on their phones when i call them. This has become endlessly entertaining for me this morning. I've been calling everyone at work and telling them all the bad things that are going to happen to them today in a spooky ghost like voice. Also, I'm not sober yet and its 11:42, i don't know what to do.

booze cruise followed by karoke. i think i smoked some cigarettes.

i sound like a drag queen today.

Holy Shit!

The big one.

They found him!

Apparently it's a slow news week

Walpole

According to Wikipedia, Walpole, NH has a population of 3,594 people spread out over 36.6 square miles (giving a population density of 101 people per square mile, or one person for every 500 ft x 500 ft square). The population's also 98.3% white. I think Walpole needs an affirmative action plan, because that's kind of sad. Probably could use some sky scrapers too, in order to up the population density a bit.

Our Girl Tyrona

Tyson, what gives? You haven't said a peep about how your triathlon went? Did you survive? Also, what's the job hunt/school thing looking like? Shed some light on my dark and boring life.

Sit back and enjoy the ride

I was reading an article recently about China. Apparently they have been slowly but surely scaling up their military recently, although they still lack the ability to project their military much beyond their own borders. No one knows why they're doing this, but some think that one day they will threaten the U.S. as a world super power - others fear for the independence of Taiwan. Of course, no one in China would admit that they're thinking of taking Taiwan back, but recently a Chinese general was quoted as threatening nuclear war if the US attempted to protect Taiwan in such a situation saying, "The Americans will have to be prepared that hundreds of their cities will be destroyed by the Chinese." Think of that next time you shop at Walmart.

Does anyone else feel like we're totally screwed - spiraling uncontrollably toward disaster? It's just a question of from which direction the deadly blow will come. I used to think this was a unique point in history, and then I realized I think it's always like this, it's just that I only recently started paying attention.

The Iceman Cometh

"If? Man when I don't want a drink, you call de morgue"(O'Neill 22)

The Crestone Needle

The Crestone Needle is a 14,197 thousand peek with a technical rout that goes directly up a 2000 foot rock face. It begins with a 5.7 for 200 feet and then a 5.5-5.7 for maybe 100 feet, then there is 1000 feet of 4 class(not much more difficult than a ladder at about 80 degrees), then 4 pitches of 5.5-5.7. So besides the length and the elevation I thought it would not be very difficult.

Hands, legs trembling, breathing quickly and lifting my foot up to my shoulder hight on a fucking 4th class. What the fuck?

With the threat of afternoon thunderstorms that always threaten 14ers in the Colorado summer, we had to begin at day break and simultaneously climb the 4 class 1000 feet. One must do this to make the summit quickly and descend before the afternoon in order to avoid lightening even more than the rain. I have never really done high elevation exposed (that means open air beneath you and if you slip without a rope you could bounce a very very long way) climbing. We had a rope, but we did not have the time to place anchors, so if one of us slipped or if a part of the rock broke the other would have to arrest his fall without any aid. So I'm in the lead and there is this hump of rock. I feel like my chest is up against the front of a school buss, not the flat faced grayhounds but the old yellow ones with hoods. I put my hands on the hood and see no holds betweeen my hands and feet. Alex says "hurry up man, it's only 4th class." So I look down and see a the ground 600 feet bellow. Only small ledges and no anchors between Alex and my harness. I put both hands on the hood and push and hump and slide up on it like a beached whale. I am breathing thin air hard with my feet in mid air and my chest laid out on the hood of a buss and saying "fuck, fuck, fuck this fucking sport."
After that I insisted we drop an anchor at least during difficult pulls; but there weren't many cracks to use with the anchors. Two or three times we simply put a sling around a little rock horn as we simul climbed an exposed wave of rock.
A few times I thought he or I was going to slip and we would drag the other to our demise. needless to say, once we got to the last four pitches (the last 500 feet) where we placed anchors I felt much more at ease. By then we were at about 13600 feet and we could very easily discern rain heading our way. So the last few pitches I pulled through the thin air to the summit. Luckily the rain kept to the East of us and we descended without too much difficulty (the book's description of the descent begins with "The descent is complicated". True enough we began in the wrong rock gully for the the first 500 feet and we had some difficulty finding a way to traverse to the trail). It was wild and thank that fucking old son of a bitch in the clouds that the rain and lightening stayed to the East of us.

One Hundred Years of Solitude

“Jose Arcadio Buendia was not as crazy as the family said, but that he was the only one who had enough lucidity to sense the truth that time also stumbled and had accidents and could therefore splinter and leave an eternalized fragment in a room"(Marquez 375).

Certainly the magical realism of Marquez may be scoffed by the scientific minds of 130 Linden, but on a psychological plain this quote beautifully portrays our nostalgia. In the text the quotation explains how a room does not decay, it remains the same temperature and atmosphere for a hundred years. Matt and AJ would laugh at such fantasy, but when applied to our mind’s tendency to dwell on a certain event, a certain afternoon, or certain game of chess these two logical minds must concede to the axiomatic power of the quotation.

Hey AJ, remember when I beat you in chess three times in a row! You suck. We are always in the dark kitchen of Dan’s old apartment on Buff. ave.

Dan, remember that giant canvass we painted in Jaden; it’s still on my wall. I love booze and paint.

Next line of thought:

So I finished Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude last night. Have any of you read this brilliant dragging epic? I recommend you read it. I know you all would enjoy parts of the novel, if for nothing but an enchanting escape to an old world Columbia. The book beautifully flows through time slightly like Faulkner but in a much less cryptic and cynical fashion. Marquez dashes in small amounts of fantasy (a trail of blood flowing a very specific path through a house to someone’s door) as if he were simply describing the flow of a creek. He handles everything with a very dead pan voice. The characters pass the same name to their kids again and again and the cycles of repetition all mesh together like a slow roasted stew. Is this Buendia the great grandfather or the uncle or the grandson?

With fresh beautiful descriptions of sex, war, and fucking god damn pride the book enchants.

If any of you pick up the book, I warn you that it drags a bit, but is certainly worth the effort. I found it best to just keep reading and try to feel each experience and not worry which character is which.

First line:

“Many years later as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendia was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.”

Colonel Aureliano is the motherfucker with the pride to inspire any space monkey to fucking go into space even if almost all space monkeys die during, if not immediately after the flight. Damn Matt, I went to the “monkeys in space” web site and was physched when I saw how many of my kindred were martyrs.

Sweet, sweet summer lovin'

Okay, I'm making the official proposal that we plan a little get together for sometime in August. I know that Ryan will be out east at some point then, and I can get away for a long weekend without much trouble. What say you!?

The Fool on the Hill

"No doubt," the tall man ( E.C.) agrees. "By 'every study,' I do not, of course, mean to include the study of how to act like a pompous ass, which is the only study to which your offspring are likely to be inclined."
- Matt Ruff

So what did Ryan learn their?

Article

http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0616/p13s02-stct.html

This is an article about what I do. Andrew Fanara is our EPA client and basically tells us what to do for ENERGY STAR product development. A few people from my office are going to the meeting in San Francisco they mention. I should get to go to these type of meetings as I get more involved in projects.

JIMMMMYYYYY

Jimmy emerges from the depths of Ohio.
I think Jim should be required to write a 500 word essay on what he's been doing for the last year. To ease the task, I'll even suggest some potential topics to hit:

1. Meg
2. Mrs. Robenalt
3. Pictures of Jim's main squeeze (I imagine she looks something like Meg or the Mrs.)
4. How Jim plans on "contributing" to society as a lawyer
5. The social injustice forced upon us by the Ohio republicans.
6. When Jim's coming out east to "Hangout".
7. Current height, weight, girth and IQ.

What ya'll think? Maybe we should all just write essays about what Jim's been up to and make it a contest. Winner will get 55 cents and a tin of popcorn.

westward ho!

Well boys, Anna and I are heading to points west for our triathlon this coming weekend. I'm feeling pretty good about the whole thing, as long as I don't get too overheated with my mop top. I'm hoping to bring back some pictures so I'll let you know how everything turns out next week.

Space Playground

This is a virtual model of a Space themed playground I built. About 20 damn hours of work for a 5 minute presentation. There's a good effort to result ratio for you. Below the virtual model pics is a scale model we built of the main tower. I finished my quarter up a few days ago and am now just being extremely lazy and doing nothing for a few days. On Wednesday I head up to chill with Ryan for a bit, and then next week I'm heading to help the folks pack up. They're moving down to St. Louis in a month.

Space Playground CAD model 2 

Space Playground CAD model 1 

Scale Space Playground model 

Blogging

So I've been meaning to blog but can never think of anything to blog about. So then I thought: "what if I blogged about nothing". Perfect. Remember in High School when people would write papers about nothing, or better yet turn in a blank sheet of paper? I know a girl who did it twice, to different teachers, on two differnet topics and got a B+ and a C. Ridiculous! (and this was a world class institution, not some camp for rich ski brats, whose english department head will give anyone an A just for giving praise to the devil.) This really is pretty good, when you consider the reward/effort ratio, but also comes at high risk. I tried to think of ways to submit a blank blog, but then you'd just scroll down to where there was actually writing and wonder about all the empty space above it. You'd probably say something like "stupid internet, must be broken again." This clearly lacks the effectiveness of the stark blank piece of 20# printer paper with your name in the upper right hand corner. So instead of taking this approach, I decided to write about nothing... but of course this turned into writing about something - namely writing about nothing - and so this is how I have failed. At least I managed to enetertain you for a couple minutes, or at least given you yet another reason to kill me.

some good Auden

from part III of "In Memory of W.B. Yeats," which, as i understand it was actually written before Yeats died. Auden just put it in a desk and waited. (i think i'll do that for you AJ.)

Follow, poet, follow right
To the bottom of the night,
With your unconstraining voice
Still persuade us to rejoice;
With the farming of a verse
Make a vinyeard of the curse,
Sing of human unsuccess
In a rapture of distress;
In the deserts of the heart
Let teh healing fountain start,
In the prison of his days
Teach the free man how to praise.

I don't buy it... not even for a dollar

Ghost Reflections ...
Question: On a long vacation drive, as it gets dark and people are putting on their headlights, you flip the rear-view mirror up into the "night-driving" position. Your daughter notices and asks, "Dad, what did you just do?" You reply, "I flipped the mirror to night-view to reduce the glare from the headlights behind us." She's quiet for a minute and then asks, "Well, how does that work?" What do you tell her?

Answer: Most mirrors are glass with a back reflective coating. This protects the reflective coating from scratches and tarnish. There are front-reflective mirrors but they are rather rare, expensive and usually used in optical systems where you don't want "ghost" reflections from the partially reflecting front glass surface. However, in the case of rear view mirrors, this is exactly what you want to exploit. The trick here is that the two glass surfaces of the mirror are not parallel — the glass is actually a shallow wedge when viewed from the side. When you use the mirror during the day, you have it adjusted so the back silvered surface provides the reflection to your eyes. At night you pivot the mirror, using the factory installed adjuster, by the wedge angle so that the front surface of the glass now directs the reflections to you. Regular clear glass reflects approximately 4% of incident light (in air) from the front surface, so in this position about 4% of the light coming from the headlights behind you makes it to your eyes. The rest of the light (minus losses) is directed up to the headliner of the car (assuming you flip the mirror up to make the adjustment). Pretty simple and beautifully effective.

Murderball

Have any of you heard anything about this movie? It's a documentary about guys playing rugby in wheelchairs, could be cool.

Watch the trailer

Fish Air Freshener, Back Seat of Some Girl's Car Named Valerie, Portland, ME - Saturday night 

WWII Memorial - last night 

WWII Memorial - last night 

Dryer Fills Fast Shoes

In my dazed state this morning I sat looking at this headline in the Denver Post. My thoughts went like this, "Dryer fills fast shoes? What the hell? Are kindergardeners writing for this paper now? Shouldn't it be Dryer filled with fast shoes? It rained yesterday so maybe that's it. No. That doesn't make any sense either. What are they talking about. Maybe I read it wrong. Nope, got it right. Maybe it's some new technology." Then I finally caved in and read the article to discover that Dryer is a person. Stupid headline.

Long, tall, old, and sweet

Mongolia

Mascot

I think Homer should be the mascot for the next beer olympics. He's got the perfect slogan, "Son, when you participate in sporting events, it's not whether you win or lose: it's how drunk you get."

Our Traveling Space Monkey

Anyone heard from Ryan lately? Or was he eaten by a yeti in Mongolia? More likely all those kids drove him insane, I suppose.

Elephant Larry = Sellouts

I heard a group of Canadians bought out Elephant Larry's show this Saturday and Chris doesn't love Matt enough to get him in on his Birthday. What's this world coming to?

Matt, I told you he was lying when he whispered those sweet nothings into your ear. Chris is a rotten bastard. That's right, you heard it right - CHRISTOPHER PRINCIPE IS A ROTTEN BASTARD!!! Luckily he's too busy becoming famous to read our quaint little blog with 4 webhits a month so he'll never know how I really feel about him.

Wegman's

So I stopped by Wegman's today, but some thing just wasn't right about it. Sure they had the fresh baked bread, the sushi bar and the cheese people with funny accents, but something was still amiss. I just didn't feel like I was in Ithaca, Utica or even Rochester. Maybe that's because instead of being among abandoned factories, ford dealerships and mud filled canals I was in the middle of an old farm surrounded by thousands of brand new condominiums, which I'm sure fetch a pretty penny. Suburban Virginia is about the most depressing place in the whole world, but at least they have a bright shiny new Wegman's. It was a bitter sweet experience. Instead of hippies and yuppie college students pretending to be hippies I was surrounded by suburban house wives fighting for the ripe avocado. Luckily my check out lady had only a handful of teeth left so it made me feel a little more at home. Sure it felt good to be back in old Danny's arms, but it just wasn't the same. Speaking of things that aren't the same, I spent over $200 on shoes today! Click.

Random Blogging

Do you ever hit that little 'next Blog' button up in the corner to see what random place it will take you? Every once in a while I get the urge, and usually it's a big waste of time. But occasionally something interesting will come up. Today was odd as I went to maybe 20 different blogs, and hit two different ones twice. Not so random.
There seem to be a lot of religious blogs. Seeing as how I used to be extremely religious i'll read bits of them to see what these people are thinking. Usually, it just affirms my belief that organized religion is a bad idea. I'm all for faith and such, but religious people generally seem so judgemental, and at least within the churches I've belonged to they are extremely hypocritical.

A Cute Girl named Jessica

Just so that dan doesn't taint you with what he is about to post, Chris and I think that its an 8 or a 0. Dan thinks its a nine, but he's obviously wrong.

Oh Jimmy

I love Jimmy.

Tyrona, you and me, head to head poker throwdown.

It was a crazy game of poker....

Well boys now that I've finally remembered what my log in is, I'm venturing back into the world of wasting time that our friends AJ and Dan seem to have perfected. Anyway, I just thought that you should know that I won my first ever poker tournament. Okay, so it was for charity and there were only 16 people playing but still I took all their money with a cold hard stare that would make a baby cry...well maybe just Principe. Anyway, my winnings for the night were $170. Of course, after my buy-in and Anna's buy-in (stupid girls) I made $90, which is going directly into our triathlon fundraising. So no I'm not much richer but my confidence is through the roof, so to bring my super-sized ego back down from the stratosphere I suggest that we all hang out and play some cards so that you guys can take all my money and put me back in my place. Any takers?

Oh yeah, I think I'm going to try out for Jeopardy!

I love making money without doing work.

Interesting? 

Mmmm......... Yuengling. I'm going for it! 

Aaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrraaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!! 

Happy Birthday AJ! 

Best Trash Can Ever!

This baby will make me rich.

I was pulling my trash out of the can last week, and as always it was a pain in the ass because of the suction that builds up. So I say, "Dammit, why doesn't someone design a trash can that doesn't suck!" And then I stop, and berate myself for being an idiot, seeing as I am a designer. So I pull out the old drill, poke some quarter inch holes around the base just high enough so no liquids will spill out, and wallah! (how do you spell that?) Anyway, Tim Roth Designs first product will be the suctionless trash can. You should get one because it doesn't suck! Anyway, it actually works, I just pulled out my first bag of trash 10 times easier.

Mr. Atkins goes to Washington

So Ty's here and he's petting dancer's cooter. Oh yeah, go Ty. Get some.

Ty says, "I have nothing to say."

Ty

So....

Dan and I are headed to D.C. this weekend. Just thought you should all know.

Another thing you should all know: Dan and I are about to eat a fried egg. I've been sitting at the living room table, waiting to have an actual meal, and now Dan shows up with an Alphabet City Burrito (read: any food wrapped in a tortilla). You should all be jealous, and assuage your guilt by hanging out more.

Seriously,

Dad

What part of "But I don't have $300 Million dollars, and I'm not that convinced you really need it in the first place" do you not understand? Thanks for the free beer though, maybe next year.

we have the technology

Communication

Hey Dan, how's it going? I think this blog is a great way for you and I to communicate. I wonder if any of those other guys we used to live with are still alive. Remember them? I don't. Well, gotta go shave the poodle. Can't wait to see you this weekend.

AJ

Tyson

Ty is sooooo cute! Listen to this:

"Currently, we are living in Philadelphia, PA with Dancer, Linda, and Bunches, our dog, cat and rabbit." How adorable! They really love that rabbit!

"I'm planning on taking a few classes this spring in preperation for heading back into the acedemic world, and I'm still working out the details of my next employment." Who are you trying to fool? I heard Anna got Ty a new apron and vacuum cleaner for his birthday. Ty's so wonderful, don't you just want to marry him? I can just hear him now: "Don't worry Dr. Lundeen, we don't need money, all we need is love (and bunches). I'm going paddling again, can I have $100."

Speaking of marraige - "And now for our big news! No, we're not getting married (we know that's what you all were thinking!). We're training for a triathlon!!" Seriously Ty, you're screwed. So screwed it's adorably cute! That caught me totally by surprise. I thought maybe you found that kidney donor you've been waiting for.

Slope Day

I was just reading the Daily Sun online, and did you know that they've got Snoop Dogg coming to Slope Day this year?! What the hell? Can you imagine the kind of unbridled chaos that is going to create? I would love to see it. Ahhhh, chaos.

Dad said that Harvey said I need to Blog, so here I go...
#1. This is a picture I took Half way up Mt. Warner three weeks ago. It reminds me that god loves us.

#2. I verbally accepted a job yesterday afternoon. I'll be working on specification development for the Energy Star program. This means I get to figure out how things work, and how they can work more efficiently, and then set guidelines for the requirements they need to meet to get the energy star rating. Then saavy consumers who care about the fate of our world and our dependence on foreign oil, will look for an energy star rated vacuum cleaner when their old one eats the cat.

#3. I think we all suck and we should write more on this blog. What's everyone upto?

#4. I will be soon be contacting you all about our new 130 Linden Website. The plan is this - I register 130linden.org and setup a simple website. You then each send me $10 and you get a POP3 email address of your choosing (spacemonkey@130linden.org for example) and your own subdomain for your own webpage (www.spacemonkey.130linden.org for example). If I'm really clever I will find a way to integrate our blog into the website, but I don't know how to do that. All those in favor say Aye, all those opposed say Nay.

Lovely Denver

Got to love the weather here in Denver. It's been so nice all week I've been walking around in shorts. Now I've got 15 inches of snow in my front yard. Go figure.

Tsunamis and the Pope

Okay,

I'm a dork. I know that. But so is Ty. And Jim.... definitely Chris. Dan and Ryan might have hope, (i think they are both savants, which is different) but i don't even have to argue that Tim and AJ are dorks.

My point is this. I was watching Nova.... the Tsunami in Southeast Asia shortened the day. Albeit only by a mere 3 millionths of a second. But that is awesome. AWESOME!!!! Ty? Awesome right? the huge plate that subducted under the other brought the mass of the earth closer to its center. Holy shit.

In About 28 Billion Years the Pope might have to make another one of those declarations that we're off by a couple weeks. "Today is not April 5th, It is March 26th" And just like that Ty will have to suffer through UNC's road to the championship again.

The Four Best Words to Hear When You Wake Up

"What Happened Last Night?"

or

"Don't Worry About It"

I am Mischievous. I am Loki... Hear me roar! 

Hey Jim, Dan and Chris - You suck! 

So get this: It turns out that there are solar systems moving away from ours faster than the speed of light."How can this be?!" you might ask. "According to Einstein's (whom I have heard was fairly smart) 'relativity' NOTHING can move faster than the speed of light!" It turns out either you are right, or scientists are idiots.

Here's the deal: It turns out that there is a misconception about the expansion of the universe and things aren't actually moving away from us. Instead of other solar systems moving away from us (and getting bigger themselves), what's actually happening is the actual space between us and the other galaxies is what's expanding.Since this isn't "conventional" motion, so nothing's actually moving, galaxies can move away from us faster than the speed of light and not break relativity. The analogy used is of two ants standing on the surface of a balloon. As you inflate the balloon the ants get farther apart, but aren't actually "moving", and don't get bigger themselves.

Here's where it gets weird. The big bang is often thought of as a small infinitely dense piece of matter in a whole lot of empty space. It then blows up and expands through the space. This isn't true, what actually happened is all of space was incorporated in this tiny piece of matter, and then the distance between the objects increases as the space itself expands. Getting back to the ant/balloon analogy: As the balloon gets bigger, the ants world (the surface of the baloon) gets bigger even though they cannot conceive of there being any space for their world to expand into. This is because they live in two dimensions and the baloon is expanding in three dimensions. Our situation can be thought of in the same way except we live in three dimensions and our universe is expanding in four dimensions (thanks to the convenient curvature of space time). This is why our universe's expansion happens with no edge, no center and no space to expand into, just like the ants 2d world of the balloon.

Awesome!

The only complication is that Einstein said the universe can expand without the presence of a fourth dimension...doh! Although he did believe in the curvature of space time...You can't have your cake and eat it too Einstein!

Speaking of building legions of robot soldiers and selling your soul, I bet they're hiring!

Well, that's about it for us.

It's like they haven't seen ANY movie about robots in the future that's been made. We're all doomed.

Happy V-Day y'all.