the microscope

there is basically a 94 percent chance that kim and i will be moving out of the beehive state this year (actually, because university of utah is in the top five choices, the percentage is actually a little lower, but i'm no statistician yet). i've lived here for over four years now so i'd like to devote some space on here to list a few things that i won't miss by leaving happy valley. each day i will try and make new mention of things that i've noticed and would normally complain about to kim. now it's your turn to hear it all. and don't get me wrong, there are plenty of great things utah has to offer, although that list will be much smaller. so in no particular order, i give you my reasons why i will never move back to utah and will try and persuade my children to attend schools elsewhere. today's complaint is provo/orem's and probably all of utah county's pick of restaurants. we have all the major chains, but only one of each in a twenty mile radius. there are so few shopping/retail/restaurant districts that there is probably only room for one of each. plus we have a school with 30,000 students and another with 25,000 in the two cities, who love nothing more than to date. meaning, at the one applebees each weekend, you can always expect a 45 minute wait. same with all the rest. during the weekday it's very similar. it's certainly not like colorado with the zillions of pods of retail. and that of course has consequences of its own, but i'm not criticizing colorado today am i? basically, orem/provo has very little options in terms of food. and i'm not about to drive to sandy or salt lake to get a bite to eat. it sucks and makes for crappy weekends when we have to find something.

back when i was wee lad, oh say, fifth grade, i so badly wanted a microscope set. they had a pretty cool one at kb toys, back when kb toys was a respectable store. i used to ask for it all the time thinking about all the cool crap i could look at under the lens. it was no electron microscope, but it was no cheap plastic set either. it was fully functional with lots of sample stuff and was basically the freaking shit when it comes to kid microscopes. it even came with a damn scalpel to slice up your samples of onions or skins cells. how much? oh i don't remember, maybe $100 or less. so i ask for it for christmas but of course don't get it (could have been because of the scalpel). instead i got the chemistry set. granted it was pretty extensive. included lots of powders and liquids and tools and lots of formulas that made some weird plant growth thing and crystallizes liquids and bubbles up this and that. i don't remember actually doing all the experiments because some were really lame. my biggest complaint was that eventually this crap would run out, whereas a microscope could be put to use for years to come. there is only so many times i will want to change a blue liquid to a red liquid using the "power of chemistry." think of all the random stuff you can view under a scope. just off the top of my head i can think of dead bugs, live bugs, skin, blood, hair, food crap, snot. the list goes on and on. it would have been a fifth grader's dream. but no, i got the shaft. that chem set is long gone. and now i have anthrax spores growing on my closet floor and would just love to have that microscope right about now. this is the point of all this. is this stuff spilt flour? a secret stash of cocaine? i'll never know now. thanks a lot santa.

a few days ago i thought i'd start giving my reports about fox news and their horrible bias. after a few days of thinking about it i realized it's too much work and i'm just not that motivated. so without any empirical evidence, my conclusion is that if you are a close minded person with no hope for change, and you loathe progress, then fox news is the right choice for you. if you are open minded, right, left, or moderate, and want a balanced news source, then go for cnn. stay away from lou dobbs though. he is cnn's conservative basher.

and finally in anticipation of sunday night's oscar ceremony, tomorrow will be my top ten list you've all been patiently been waiting for. if you read only one post this year off of this blog, tomorrow should be it. i have become an authority when it comes to film (not really) and my top ten list will be scrutinized by every major film critic in the industry (t & r probably) and finally has historically been an indicator of how the nominees will fair on oscar night. i know you are getting chills so i'll wrap it up. my loyal fans, until tomorrow.