the last ditch effort

my hair is getting annoying. it's to a point where there is nothing i can really do to it. i've basically turned into shaggy. why doesn't anyone else have hair like mine? i should probably get a clue. kim is dying for me to get it cut, but i still have a month. the only benefit is that my head stays warm at night when i run. yes, running again. spring begins here when the nights get above 30°. i'll do 30° for now, but the 60s is where it's at.

this week was bad. monday night i had five assignments due for one class, tuesday night was an exam that i think i bombed, wednesday morning was a group presentation, and last night a paper and a letter were due. as of monday morning i hadn't started on anything. let's take a guess why i was so behind. that's right, a concert. i'm so freaking nice. i am amazing. and he asks if it was me that opened up the cookies. yeah, i opened the cookies. and when i leave, you should thank me that i left one in the bag. luckily i was able to get everything done in time. my next hurdle in this final stretch is this coming monday when my group presentation in senior seminar collides with my final project and presentation in computerized. i'm waiting for my devil teach to get back to me on what i can do. life is busy. and the past few days have also included my last ditch efforts at dazzling the remaining law schools with my skills. i have many.

i've been thinking more about v for vendetta and i have a few more thoughts. this was actually like three days ago that i thought of new things and since then i have forgotten most of them. so here's the little i remember. i liked how they portray natalie as just some girl caught up in it all. she is not some random girl, somehow is skilled in martial arts and teams up with v to destroy all evil seen in so many other movies. here she is a regular girl whose feelings change throughout the movie and she does what she can, nothing more. it was refreshing. there were other things that i thought of; better things actually. but oh the tragedy, it seems as though they have escaped me.

so the mental girl in my group who was supposed to turn our project in was successful in that, but couldn’t do anything else i asked her to do. this chick named lindsey gale most likely didn't proof read it and turned it in without signing the last page, looking up a jurisdiction statute, and probably a few other little things that i told her to do to get us more points. plus, after seeing the work she did, it was next to nothing compared to my part. next is jaclyn who i have fewer issues with because she ended up doing more than lindsey. i still did a ton more than both put together. we only got like 88 percent on the assignment, although probably few got a higher score than that. i still would like to go through the assignment and see just exactly how much each contributed to it. not that it would matter or that i’d confront them, but i'd sure feel better.

i think all this stuff happening with the immigration reform is going work out okay for bush. i'm sure the push by specter and frist to get the bill moving along was pushed by bush. got that? all this crap going wrong with bush and predictions of how he will be remembered and his lame duck status and his poll numbers, might be overlooked a bit by this big ass reform of his somewhat doing. even though it's actually the good senior senator from massachusetts. i think years from now when iraq really is a democracy or whatever form it ends up being, we will look back and say that the war sucked like any war, but good things came from it because in the end this war will more or less end terrorism against the u.s. as we’ve known for the last 15 years or so. that will make a person a tad iffy with their opinion, however it will lean more for bush and his "ideals". then i think if this immigration stuff actually passes like it’s sounding, that will have an impact on a lot of people and might be some blurb in some u.s. history book someday. people will think that bush was primarily responsible for it, pushing their opinion of him as a president into a favorable light. controversial, but overall not a bad president. could just be that the dem’s are finally winning over their colleagues across the isle and the constituents. could be a lot of things. i have no clue. i was just a lowly intern.

last night's fear factor involved getting out of shackles, swimming into the ocean, using some keys to get a box, bringing the box back to shore, opening the box, and eating the seven live sand crabs inside.

stairwell resident of the crystal plaza apartments 

underneath the house side of the capitol exists a corridor of art. within that art is a man named matt. 

if i needed a lifeline, i'd call this guy. will hains everybody. 

the boring bay bridges in md 

http://www.ussjaguar.org/fun/wang/about.html 

the end of the world

watching a classic tale of two lebowskis. suncoast is currently having a little liquidation sale of 50 percent off everything. the flat irons mall gave me toy soldiers and animatrix while westminster gave me grand hotel and annie hall. very happy about these new additions. the concerts were great. the dirtbombs were super late so we decided to check out another show at the bluebird then head back over to the dirtbombs to hopefully catch them too. first up was nebula who sounded like a cross between megadeath and some psychedelic rock band. they were good though. then was the hellacopters who were an 80s hair band transplant. we headed back to the larimer lounge and were there in time to see the black lips who were actually my favorite band that played. these guys were great. picture some 60s hippie rock band with a scrawny guy with a mustache yelling incoherent lyrics. that's the black lips and they freaking rock damn it. and finally was the dirtbombs. they rocked pretty hard and i was impressed. sounded better live than on record. i'm not sure about them having two drummers, but the bass's were great. and mick collins was totally a freaking rocker if there ever was such a thing.

i'm back home. there's a lot i have to say and most will be forgotten before it is put to print. it was good spending time with joe's fam. i don't remember ever meeting his dad or gramps, but apparently i have many moons ago. his grandpa is great to talk to, or to listen to i should say. he's an old timer who loves to talk and tell stories, but is probably sharper than any of us. his dad is a pretty funny man. i told this to someone, but it was crazy to think that had my mom and jim stayed together, her life would have turned out so differently. i think that as a person she would be completely someone else. of course you can say that i would never have been born or chris or emily, but someone else would have been born in our places, so who cares? we probably would have been born eventually i guess. and then there's joe. he's got a great new place, chicks leaving him messages left and right, and comcast cable. you should see the three of them in action when it comes to fixing crap up. seeing them makes me realize how inept i am when it comes to stuff like that. these guys are testing out electrical lines, drilling holes, putting together ice makers. you name it. i'm too lazy to fix the towel holder in the bathroom. today though i did feel like an adult living an adult life for about 30 minutes. i used my saturday to do chores and cleaning stuff. basically i had a saturday like the hundreds of saturdays i remember growing up with, minus voltron. saturdays that involved doing things, fixing things, cleaning things. felt good and the nice weather helped.

V for Vendetta (2006): not the best work to show off natalie's superior quality. although, she's good at crying and there is lots of that. there are hokie parts and parts where cases are solved based on "hunches." in what i assume are hundreds of kilometers of tunnels from london's underground, the detective happens to pick the right one based on nothing. crap like this happens a lot. don't expect this to be anything like the matrix movies just because they throw the wachowski brothers all over it. remember, they aren't directing it. they only wrote and produced it. this is the director's first movie. there is a ton of story to tell and they at least did a good job in finding ways to relay a ton of info to the audience without getting too old. it was a little hard to tell, but i think hugo weaving did alright. i don't know how to really describe the movie except that it's not very tight. the plot is good, but there is too much info in not enough time to keep everything clean. the more info-rich a movie is, the more susceptible it is to plot holes and such. don't get me wrong, it's worth it just to have a glimpse of the hottest jew in north america. see it.

so as i was driving through the great desert of eastern utah, i was looking around at the massive cliffs or whatever you'd like to call them, and noticed the usual lines left from what i believe was lake bonneville like thousands of years ago. i think i'm wrong about that, but it is obvious there was water there at some point in time. driving along i-70 you can look up and around and imagine that every space was filled with water. that's a lot of damn water. then i started thinking, what if all that water were to just appear? maybe it would just drop from the sky or just show up like old age. then i figured, this is how life on earth should end. it took millions of years to form, millions for humans to become what we are today. what if instead of aliens killing us one by one by infected paper cuts, can't they just blow us up like in hitchhiker's guide? in the end, without notice, water should appear. before everything dies, the last words uttered will be, "well that was fun," and the end credits will roll. then forever after, things are finally quiet. the end.

another movie 

old post with old ben 

the cap 

a church intended for national purposes 

the feds 

the tyranny

most of my time here has gone to writing my group project due in three hours. not sure if it's ready or what because my partners are not the best at communicating. part of me really feels like i totally got screwed in this whole project and they barely had to lift a finger, however i may never actually know for sure. but i did my part, possibly more, and that's another stupid assignment in the bank. it's getting down to the wire.

most of my whereabouts have been either at el grovers or tom's. a few hours from now i'll be dining with three generations of bryant. after a nice meal we will be wisked away to the show. tom's has been as good as usual. the nobles are in town so we don't have free reign to the land. i also found out that they don’t let him eat out of their fridge, forcing him to eat out all the time. he has a fridge at his parent’s house but the lords will not allow him to keep it in his village. we can't even use the up and down buttons on his remote because they want to restrict his cable usage. tom seems content though and is in good spirits. someday i hope to help strengthen our national policy to bring democracy to tom.

so you know how in denver you can carry like ounce of weed on you. well they have that one neighborhood called five points or something. i wonder if black people will pull out there little baggy and wave it to the police to intimidate them. could this happen? some black comedian needs to sketch this, stupid people need to test it, and we need to venture into the scary places and see if it's happening. of course the law might not really allow for it, but that doesn't mean we still can't try all those things above.

gotta go.

remember the kennedy/nixon debates? didn't think so. well these are the chairs they sat in. 

the smithsonian's most prized possession 

shoes from the wiz. judy garland, not diana ross. 

NW dc view from the old post office building 

hamilton's pad in the foreground, adams' digs in the back 

the quarter century

i’ve begun running again. it’s been a painful two days. throughout the past few years, i’ve been able to see my highs and lows when it comes to being fit. since dc it seems like i've hit rock bottom. luckily, running is fun.

kim and i were talking about why in 'n out has not expanded their operations to states other than the three they've been in for years. kim had heard the reason is because they want to stay within the region of cali in order to maintain the freshness of the food. if that's true then that's fine with me. but doesn't that mean that their earnings will eventually just level out (inflation aside) when they've maxed out how many restaurants they can fit in every inhabited square mile, within their "freshness zone?" most red-blooded capitalists wouldn't be down for that. they may be hoping that it won't be until they are dead and gone that they max out. and they could be thinking that new technology in terms of agriculture, transportation, etc., will allow them to expand their zone. or it could be that they just don't like the weather in other states. i don't know. and i can't believe i just took the time to write all this crap. who cares?

movie alert! (that was the gayest thing ever written) i read that spielberg is in the works to make a biopic of lincoln. that would be freaking amazing. and who could you possibly chose to pull off the role of lincoln? i will tell you who. liam effin neeson is who. you know who's gonna win that best actor award that year. liam effin neeson is who. first though, we'll have wait for harrison ford to be ridiculed when spielberg directs indiana jones. there was more i wanted to say about lucas's ego, ford's oldness and an upcoming role, but i have to start a paper like three weeks ago.

on the last fear factor it was couples. one person would put as much of a certain, concoction, into their mouth from this giant vat of the ooz. they then had to spit it down a tube, into their partner's mouth. that partner then had to transfer the stuff from their mouth to a cup and fill it the fastest. and today’s concoction was fish parts, live beetles, and cockroaches, all blended together in a soup of greatness. all i can say was that it was terrible to watch. i'm sure the producers tell the contestants to not eat anything prior to those events in case they throw up. almost every person gagged enough where puke should have been everywhere. it was good times though.

my school finally got funding to build a new library, which is pretty big news cuz this library is sounding pretty sweet. i won’t be here of course to reap the benefits of the facilites, however i’m still excited. they said it would be completed spring of 2009. the problem is that according to the school paper, they are building this thing north of the liberal arts building. now my school is in the basic layout of this cool letter Ѓ, which happens to be cryllic capital letter gje. the liberal arts building would be the on the very top right of Ѓ (not the apostrophe) and the direction of north is to the right of Ѓ. all meaning the addition to the library would now transform the school to look like Ѓ`. the problem is look how far the majority of Ѓ is from `. our current library is in the middle of the I part of Ѓ, which is much more centrally located than these new plans. there probably aren’t a lot of other options because of the way the school is situated, but this sucks. they are building it on a parking lot so that will take up more precious spots of their horrible parking problems. and it will take an hour to walk there from other parts of campus. i guess i’m just being picky because most other schools’ libraries are the size of our entire campus.

wow, if a comment can turn a man on, mikel just succeeded. sexiest thing since nat in closer. also, today i received my decision from university of pittsburgh. going to denver tomorrow so this lucid dream may be on a temporary hiatus. happy st. patrick's day.

desk for fireside chats of our 32nd 

last hat worn by our 16th president 

file cabinet from the watergate hotel 

robe of the first woman associate justice 

stripes of our 15th chief justice 

the "blog"

I am a Liberal. There, I Said It!
from interviews with the guardian and larry king.


I am a liberal. And I make no apologies for it. Hell, I'm proud of it.

Too many people run away from the label. They whisper it like you'd whisper "I'm a Nazi." Like it's a dirty word. But turn away from saying "I'm a liberal" and it's like you're turning away from saying that blacks should be allowed to sit in the front of the bus, that women should be able to vote and get paid the same as a man, that McCarthy was wrong, that Vietnam was a mistake. And that Saddam Hussein had no ties to al-Qaeda and had nothing to do with 9/11.

This is an incredibly polarized time (wonder how that happened?). But I find that, more and more, people are trying to find things we can agree on. And, for me, one of the things we absolutely need to agree on is the idea that we're all allowed to question authority. We have to agree that it's not unpatriotic to hold our leaders accountable and to speak out.

That's one of the things that drew me to making a film about Murrow. When you hear Murrow say, "We mustn't confuse dissent with disloyalty" and "We can't defend freedom abroad by deserting it at home," it's like he's commenting on today's headlines.

The fear of being criticized can be paralyzing. Just look at the way so many Democrats caved in the run up to the war. In 2003, a lot of us were saying, where is the link between Saddam and bin Laden? What does Iraq have to do with 9/11? We knew it was bullshit. Which is why it drives me crazy to hear all these Democrats saying, "We were misled." It makes me want to shout, "Fuck you, you weren't misled. You were afraid of being called unpatriotic."

Bottom line: it's not merely our right to question our government, it's our duty. Whatever the consequences. We can't demand freedom of speech then turn around and say, But please don't say bad things about us. You gotta be a grown up and take your hits.

I am a liberal. Fire away.


in other news and shit that really doesn’t matter after reading something like that, since i've been going here they've had senator bennett, larry king, and steve young as speakers at graduation. this year we have the privilege of hearing jon m. huntsman sr. i’m sure no one has heard of him unless you come from utah. and even then, he’s nowhere near the top my list of utah people i’d like to hear. he’s got a nice resume though, but it’s nothing worth looking forward to.

also, can anyone answer me this? do we need progress (e.g. technology, medical) in order to survive as a race, or do we just want it?

i like the arab ninja style better 

which replaced pieces of the berlin wall, which replaced moon rocks 

oldest surviving u.s. gunboat, battled in the revolutionary war, sunk during battle, and put in a building for me 

our 34th president's uniform as general of the army 

saxophone of our 42nd president