Poisoned!

I did my laundry this morning so I got into work a little late. I grabbed a sandwich, sat at my desk and read the news while I ate. About half way through my sandwich I came to an article about the salmonella scare. My sandwich had a few slices of raw tomato. I had noticed that the guy behind me in line asking for no tomatoes but I just thought he was being an asshole. And Virginia is one of the states where poisonings have "cropped up" (though there are 9 states of primary concern and it's not one of those). So if I die of food poisoning any time soon, I want you to know it was from the Gallery Dream sandwich I got from the Gallery Cafe. Someone notify the FDA. That evil asian lady pretends to be so friendly while serving me poisoned tomatoes!

(An email from Dan after I told him he should purchase Tekken 5)
Bought it, goddam the last boss is a piece of shit, so far i hate the game and have forgotten all of my skills (not that they were the best to begin with). fucking god damn waste of $30. and online, i guess i was downloading something with caused serious lag and made my first online match a ass whooping. sons of bitches.

Cleaning and Curb Your Enthusiasm

Last night I was sitting at my computer playing a game when I felt something on my arm. I gave a startled jump and looked down at my arm but there was nothing there. Thinking maybe it was the hood lace from my hoodie draped on the back of the chair, I sat back down and resumed my game. A few minutes later I glanced down at my shirt and see a cockroach run up the shirt and over the top of my shoulder.

I don't think I screamed quite like a girl, but there was definitely a yelp. I jumped up and yanked my shirt off faster than I ever had before. After killing the cockroach I held an emergency cleaning session in my apartment. I collected and took out all the trash last night and tonight I'll vacuum everything. Hopefully I won't have a recurrence.

I've been watching season 6 of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Some of it is great, some of it is a return to the rediculousness that turned me off to it in season 1. Like the time when Larry was telling his date about overhearing a racist comment in the bathroom, and as soon as Larry quotes the use of the n-word a black doctor walks by and totally freaks out. He screams for a few minutes at Larry and then storms off in a fit of rage, and shaves Jeff's head while he's anesthetized and awaiting operation. Later he apologizes to Jeff by explaining that he was driven into a frenzy from having heard Larry's racism, and then Jeff and his wife proceed to scream at Larry for what the doctor did. The whole thing was retarded and extremely far fetched, and slightly, dare I say it, racist. There's not a black person on that whole show who isn't a ticking time bomb just waiting to misconstrue anything Larry says and get horribly angry and then loud about it. On the other hand, everyone on that show is kinda loud.

There are other episodes in the season that are pure gold though. When Funkhouser discovers Larry stole flowers from Funkhouser's mother's roadside memorial and shouts, just before walking away, "If we weren't best friends I'd knock your teeth in!" And Larry turns to his wife and laughingly says "We aren't best friends, I don't know where he got that from." The whole separation thing is kinda depressing, but it could have been made much more so. And the actress who plays Xena Warrior Princess is surprisingly pretty hot. I think she's pretty disgusting on her tv show with the dark hair and American accent. But blond with an Australian accent she's quite attractive. Usually I don't go for accents either.

me: i was just skimming your facebook profile
me: not much has changed there recently
kate: I haven't been on facebook much
me: yeah
me: you're not cool like that
me: but that's okay
kate: I could put a photo up of me and one of my guy friends

Another day, another dollar

Someone upstairs is sneezing every 30 seconds. While I can empathize because I get allergies myself and I know it sucks to have a constantly runny nose and watering eyes, I wish he'd shut the hell up already.

Asian people are weird. I've noticed from sharing a work bathroom with them that a large minority of the time, when an asian guy is in there, at some point in the process of washing his hands he'll bring his face down to the faucet and spend 30 seconds alternating between splashing water on his face and drinking it. It's a little disturbing when you're trying to wash your hands in the next sink over. I always want to mention that there's a drinking fountain right outside the bathroom door, but I don't want to be considered rude. You never know, with these older asian guys, what's going to set them off. And I don't want to have to cut off any of my fingers, I use these to type! Okay, that last part may be slightly racist.

(One doctor's response to the American College of Physician Executives survey)
"I find it necessary about once every month or two to stay in bed for 24 to 48 hours. I do this on short notice when I get the feeling I might punch somebody.”

Subway

I wish the lady at Subway wouldn't ask if I want cheese on my sandwich before she's even finished putting her gloves on. I walk up to the counter and say "I'd like a foot long turkey on Italian herb." She says "Okay, do you want cheese?" I always say yes, I want American cheese. And then, every time, she gets the bread, cuts it, puts on the turkey, and then asks me again "cheese?" EVERY TIME she does that. Why even ask the first time? Once, instead of pausing and saying "cheese?" she paused and said "Did you say provolone?" You know damn well I didn't say provolone. It doesn't make me super angry, just a little. And instead of yelling "Bitch, I just told you!" I bottle it all up inside and repeat my cheese selection. It'll be fuel for the fire on the day I blow a fuse and go crazy like the incredible hulk or Carrie from that movie Eric likes.

Interesting story in the washington post today about Eliot Spitzer as a tragic fictional character.

Kate says these posts are boring when they don't mention her. So hello, Kate. Look, no misspellings of "ridiculous" in this post.

That's all for now, I have to get back to work.

Kate: And, if you quote me saying that, I'm going to punch you the next time I see you.

annoying coworkers

The guy next door is holding an attorney interview over his speaker phone. He's been talking loudly for the last 15 minutes. It really, really sucks for his officemate. At first I thought he was arguing with his officemate, and I was going to say "why is he yelling so much, nobody has an officemate so retarded that you need to lecture them for 10 minutes straight." But then I heard someone say something on the speaker phone. He's yacking with an attorney! Talk about inconsiderate. If my officemate tried holding a speakerphone interview I'd smack him over the head. I'm thinking about walking next door and kicking this guy's chair. Some people have no manners. And, no surprise, he's an Indian guy. jk.

I wish I didn't have to eat. I'm always just picking up steam with work or a project and I have to drop everything because I have to eat. I can't just idly skip meals either, I wish I could. After putting off lunch until like 3 or 4 I usually get kinda shaky. I should get an IV at my desk. That would be perfect.

Gah. A constant stream of noise from that office neighbor. Someone didn't get shaken enough as a child.

(Whitney is having a problem with getting to her money while she's in kenya. I recommend that she go back to the bank and have them exchange her a bunch of sheep instead of cash)
whitney: sheep. I'll do that.
me: i was going to say clam shells, but now i think that's native americans instead
whitney: well, i could always just steal
whitney: then I'd be culturally appropriate

catching up

Okay, I just down'd a cup of coffee so I'm all hyped up this afternoon. First some work stuff because I'm thinking about it: I think I'm gonna reject this case, but I know for a fact that the guy will appeal it if I do. So I have to balance how embarassing I'm willing to look infront of my supervisor against whether I'm technically correct for this case. My reference has a computer technican doing a bunch of the work and I'm not completely sure whether the reference works as a "diagnostic engine" without the technican helping it along. I know for a fact that the attorney is going to write into his appeal something snide to the effect of me trying to bring back slavery by including the person in this patented computer system. ("The examiner contends that the technician is part of the claimed computer system. Perhaps the examiner is expecting the technician to be black?" Hardy har har.)

Went to a party at Eric's on friday. It was a pretty good time. I was worried at first because it was just me, Eric and Jason. And Jason is the only one of Eric's friends who I absolutely dislike. But more people showed up and it was fun. Jamie gave me a nice lecture about how real men drive cars. (Unlike myself.) Other than that it was a quiet weekend of mostly playing videogames instead of doing the work I should be doing. Bad time management, but it was worth it! I got a sword of fire+3!!!! Haha, just kidding.

The weekend before last I went out to Colorado, and I meant to write about it but never got around to it last week. It was lots of fun though and the weather was very reasonable. Very reasonable in that it wasn't super freezing cold and snowing the entire time I was there. Kate and I saw the Spidewick Chronciles, which she thought was good but I was annoyed by the main kid actor. It's funny, I thought both the brother actors were about equally annoying, and then I read just now that it was one actor playing both brothers. Surprise. Annoying Brit kids... My second cousin's name is Brit, btw, and he is so much cooler than any of the real Brits. Nick Nolte was pretty good as the creepy, raggedy ogre-man.

Let's see, we also went to a hockey game. My first hockey game, and felt like I was about to fall down the bleachers anytime I stood up because we were so high up and the seating was so vertical. The local team (the avalanch?) got slaughtered, and all the local fans were kinda depressed, but I got a big plate of nachos and a pretty good hot dog. It was better than a baseball or basketball game, and about on par with a football game (there were more fights in the hockey game, but much more heckling at a Raiders game). As a side note: Kate's sister, who took us to the game, is really quite funny.

Finally, Kate helped me pick out a pair of jeans. I don't have any other jeans and haven't shopped for them in years because they never seem to fit correctly. Kate liked a pair that were tighter than any other pants I own, so I'm mostly only going to wear them around her I think. She's going to be upset when she reads that, but look I just said "mostly"! I might wear them around dc but, even if not, it was a purchase that will be very useful for Colorado. Last thing: airport security likes my shirts. I've gotten like 3 compliments now. Twice for Eeyore and now once for "I slept with Kirk". If only I was looking to pick up nerdy airport security girls.

Kate: Don't make fun of me.. I bought the exact same pair of shoes that I had before.
me: I did the exact same thing a little while ago!
Kate: Yeah, but my shoes are cute.

Eventually I would get tired of talking about Nazis

Today I sat behind a bunch of chicks on the metro who were babbling on in German or Dutch or something. They weren't abnormally tall or putting on totally weird foreign facial expressions or anything (as foreigners often do), they just seemed like normal college girls who just happened to be speaking German. Had they not been talking, I would have said they were very borderline hot or not-hot girls. The "I could go either way" type. So I spent the whole train ride leering at them and considering whether the foreign language pushed any of them over the edge into being definitely attractive or unattractive. I decided it was closer to unattractive. Sorry German-speaking chick readers.

(from a viewer's review of "In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Seige Tale")
"It was all right, if you're in an undemanding mood. The dialogue was awful. Scenes where a mother was told her child and parents had just been killed and the death of the King in particular produced howls of laughter, which I don't believe was the intended effect."

Joe gets lectured

I got lectured recently about Knocked Up. I made the mistake of comparing it to Superbad. "Superbad had some hilarious dialogue and Knocked Up really didn't. Also Knocked Up had too much pregnancy and birth stuff. " That last line was a mistake. Apparently the scenes of giving birth are not disturbing, nor overly graphic, as I mistakenly thought at first. Instead it's such a beautiful, natural event that men need to learn to appreciate and be in awe of it.

First: bullshit. I don't eat dinner while watching the surgery channel for the same reason. The insides of the human body are pretty disgusting. And birth scenes are even worse because people are always yelling and the lady is usually grunting and screaming in the most disturbing way. It's like a mixture the surgery channel and a war movie, where people are screaming and bombs are going off. Also, new born babies are too gooey.

Second, I hate getting lectured. And it doesn't happen very often, because from most people I wouldn't take it. If most anyone had told me the same thing I'd have responded, "I completely disagree with everything you just said, and I think you're a lesser person for having said it. You've confused your personal opinions with global facts." Or if it was Eric, I'd just say "You're full of shit." Becsause we disagree about this sort of thing regularly. Instead, I was actively trying to get along with this girl (something that I do very, very rarely) and I had to really try to see her point.

"Hmm, that's a good point. I'll think on it." That, my friends, is what a Joe-lie sounds like.

(from an IEEE analysis of the recent international space station computer failure. They concluded it was caused by a power short caused by condensation on a power transformer that was depended on by all 3 of the triply-redundant systems)
"It is dismaying that after decades of experience with manned space stations, Russian space engineers still couldn't keep unwanted condensation at bay. But what's worse is that they designed circuitry that would allow one spot of corrosion to fell a supposedly triply redundant control computer complex. Another cause for dismay is that when trouble did develop, the Russians' first instinct was to blame their American partners."

Laundromats build character

Walking back from the laundromat this morning when someone driving by tried to ask me directions. I couldn't help him, but I'm surprised he even thought I would be able to. I was 10:30AM on a Wednesday, I'm walking down the street with a bag of laundry, unshaved and wearing an undershirt and shorts. Clearly I'm unemployed, don't own a car, and probably don't speak English.

On the other hand, it was a moderately pleasant experience at the laundromat. I was the only person there so I turned off the unbelievably annoying cartoons they put on the television. Kids' television has to be the most difficult thing to ignore. The characters have squeeky voices, are always asking the kids to jump up and down or shake or somehow participate, and occasionally break into non-rhyming songs! A wise investment for any parent hoping to avoid abusing kids would be a set of headphones for each child.

Today I'm working late. Tomorrow I have two 2-hour presentations, one on multi-threaded processor design and one on error correction in quantum computing. Should be interesting. Then I'm flying out to CA in the afternoon for a long weekend.

Shane: Don't see me yawning and yawn at the same time as me. That's gay.

I want quarters! Obvi!

Today I bought a sandwich for lunch and the total came to $6.84. I handed over a $20, a dime, and 4 pennies from my pocket. Then the cashier-lady tried to give me back two quarters, two dimes and a nickel! I said "wait a minute, I just gave you 9 cents." Maybe that wasn't the right way to explain it because she said "I know... Here." And she tried to give me the change again. Then I said "Do you not have enough quarters?" She understood and gave me 3 quarters instead. Then she gave an irritated grunt as I collected my stuff and left. I guess I'm a touchy customer, making a lot of trouble over nothing. But I think I was justified. I had just given her a bunch of random change (including the dime she tried to return to me), I don't want even more change back! The whole point of putting some change in with the $20 is to receive less change in return! Unfortunately the counter between us was a little too wide to effectively reach across and smack her.

That's the only eventful thing about today so far. Though at least I'm done looking at stupid fax machine systems. That was a painful few days.

(At the mini-mart downstairs, when the checkout line gets long, they open up a cash register near the back of the line and start helping the last customers in that line. This happened to Amelia, and she got to pay before me despite me standing in line longer)
me: It's so unfair the way they do that! The last person in line suddenly gets to checkout first.
Amelia: Yeah.. It's like a first in last out.
me: Haha, yeah it is. That's a pretty nerdy reference.
Amelia: Well I figured you'd get it.