My horoscope for this week:

"Virgo: (Aug. 23—Sept. 22)
It's important to keep yourself looking and feeling good, but your relentless reapplication of home permanents is beginning to seem disturbing.

Where’s my head

My suit pants tent

I wore a suit today, anxious about my "position update" at nine in the

morning. Turned out it wasn't really about any position I was getting, but a message about how someone else would be receiving it and I would remain as a temp for nearly another year. Heather told me that I didn't do as well in my interview; which is interesting as I didn't have an interview with her that I'm aware of. I didn't have the guts to tell her that I deserved a raise after she basically told me that I wasn't doing anything right; which is also interesting, seeing as how she has this knack not telling anyone when something is incorrect. Regardless, the guy who accepted the position is a fool who works in the internet management team. The man has difficulty figuring out why our system doesn’t work properly when the answer is that it’s out of date and flawed in nearly every aspect.

Tonight a group of people and I will be going out to a bar to celebrate Yoshee

and Stephanie’s birthday. My presentation as joking David will not be the truth at all. Never did I believe that I deserved the position. I did, however, believe that I deserved a chance to defend myself before I was strung up and used as a welcome mat for an idiot who told me that the content system was perfect and didn’t need any adjusting whatsoever.

Temp til June?

I fought a bear today before the jury, and it didn't sway them much.

Bro can rock the guitar, bro.

Problem is, he looks too much like a giant douche bag to be a rocker.

P.S. - "You're breaking it!"

Not to be a jerk here, but the spam comments and comments about the spam comments...they're just fantastic. Thus far my favorites regard "ebony sex" and "UK sex shops".

BRING IT ON!

My thoughts and prayers go out to those who were affected by the hurricane and its aftermath.

Sushi for Yoshee and Stephanie's birthday.

My mom's flight was on time as I sat in the parking lot with the air on

Not sure I know where I'm going with this

While I was in college my parents came to visit me, excluding move in days,

once. They just never saw it as economically sound as they would have to coax my little sister into coming along in her eleven-year old rambunciousness for the ride, and would probably have to stay somewhere in the Decatur area for the night as four hours each way isn't easy. It never bothered me, this independence that was created by they never coming down, as it would other kids. They required their mother to come down and tend to the cleaning and cooking of a weeks worth of meals. My junior year roommate was one of those types. His mother came to visit from Bloomington twice a month to clean his bathroom, pester him about the condition of his bedroom and standing in front of the stove, hair still perfect, cooking chili for a weeks worth of eating, which would be stretched as long as possible. And the chili was just for my roommate, as she would tell us. Sometimes she would make a bit extra for one of my other roommates, but most of the time it was a pot for one.

It's not as if she didn't offer, to the disgust of my roommate, it was more that

she realized that the rest of us were fine without a “mommy” tending to our unmentionables and the slow bubbling of chili. We lived in the apartment as independent machines.

Reading it again.

I've decided that the most painful part of your body to get sunburned is your knees. It's killing me, and aloe doesn't help as much as people claim.

P.S. - Also, my mother called me a "honky" for the first time in my life, after hearing that I had sunburn. At least I'm honoring one side of the coin, right? ...Right? Damn.

The Important Things

For as long as I can remember people have been telling me that they know me.

They either know who I am or what I'm all about, but I'm beginning to question if many actually do. After all, what make up a person are experiences and memories of the "important things,” not always the overt. The things that we keep with us forever, the shreds of a day that meant something, one way or another. This is what makes us. These are the “important things.”

Conversations have ended with me surrendering to someone as they inform

me that they have a grip on what made me tick and boom and operate the way that I do. Presentation apparently gave way to someone thinking that they’ve completely mined me out and gathered up enough of a stockpile to decidingly proclaim understanding. Is presentation it though? Are the actions performed by a person always real and orderly enough for someone to have a construct or structure created? I think not.

The idea is that the way in which we react and act, the stories we tell paint a

very vivid picture as to assemble who we are for others. The problem with that mentality is that we’re missing out on all the things that we haven’t talked about. There are limitless stories to be told, millions of instances where something affected us enough to warrant a conversation with another person and countless times where we have presented ourselves in a false enough light to shadow a part of ourselves. With these factors involved, who’s to say that we ever will know anything about a person? Married couples learn more about each other with every moment. When he was a child he eat paste to when she was in middle school she feel from the climbing rope in gym class and broke her arm. Is there any way to collect all of these situations? I doubt it.

What about those hidden things that we wish no one to know about happy or

sad? The memory that most often comes to mind when I discuss happiness is not one that I have shared with anyone save the people who were there to experience it with me. It is one of these moments where we ourselves. It’s here where someone might be able to say that they know more having heard this story then they had accrued before. Then we can begin to suggest that we know anything about another person.

The weekend is over...or

Two Rangers games, Criteria show, big grill out, Sunday school registration and no sleep

My mom comes into town tonight at 7 and I'm showing her around. Looks like it'll have to be a few days until I can think straight and my body isn't drooping. (snore)

The weekend just got more complicated

Layla received another four tickets to the Rangers/Twins game tomorrow, and is looking for anyone interested in going; no dice from co-workers, waiting on responses from friends. This game, of course, will take place right before the Criteria show and Yoshee's big surprise party, so Saturday's hellish landscape is looking far more time consuming. I then wake up early on Sunday to help with registration for the new Bahai school opening up at the Arlington Ceter. I'm pretty sure that I'm going to die several times over this weekend. Hooray! (snore)

Blogertising

Please refrain from using my blog as a source of free ad space. Especially if your advertisement includes gender biased and/or bigoted statements.

Give Google a hug if they next create an OS for PCs to rival Windows. Why? Because it would work with very few problems and probably be free. Hey, it worked for Linux and Unix.

In other news, AOL still sucks and is ripping people off! Thing is, this time they had to pay $1.25 million in damages.

Lastly, Playmates Toys has created a toy that will be sure to make your children scream and cry uncontrolably.

"Name that panda"

That's right. The China Wildlife Conservation Association has decided to hold a contest to chose a name for a newborn panda bear. The choices are "Hua Sheng, which means 'China Washington' and 'magnificent,' Sheng Hua, which means 'Washington China' and 'magnificent,' Tai Shan, which means 'peaceful mountain,' Long Shan, which means 'dragon mountain,' Qiang Qiang, which means 'strong, powerful,'"

Is it just me or do the Chinese think very highly of this panda, and also, what's with the obsession with 'Washington'? With a tie in to the U.S. I would think they would use 'Freedom,' 'Patriot' or simply 'Idiot George.'

Where did my mind go?

Lately, I've been looking at various blogs of different aims and means, and I've concluded that the majority of bloggers tend to follow some kind of implicated structure or with some specific goal in mind.

Fancy Robot is a bastion of political leanings and aimed personal stories. As

she is entrenched at The Nation, it makes perfect sense why this would be the case. Working specifically as a fact-checker and journalist for a newspaper or magazine allows for the writer to draw from stories they read or have interacted with each and every day. This creates easy links and even humorous barbs to the news stories and with each personal happenings.

Maryam's journal falls squarely within her specially and current field of

study, photography. The images she posts create a likeness of exactly what happens on a day-to-day basis; painting a personal and business oriented page. Specially, she and I hung out and she used me as a “model” for a shoot she did at the UTA studio. After concluding in the studio we moved out to the graveyard on campus to take some pictures through her Polaroid lense and created the photo “Gone Home.” It’s a mixture of story, whether created by the patron or the artist and the image on the page.

Natalie Dee, on the other hand, has decided on a far more gallery approach

for her page; a showing of her day to day work and mental tangents. This seems to be the most common path for artists, especially stick-figure artists, who wish to present their art to the masses without having to deal with the direct problems created by a newspaper or magazine source printing their work or an actual gallery that requires a grandiose fee for the display of her work. Instead, you have a very public gallery that costs nothing or very little, when it comes to domains that have been paid for by the artists, and allows as many people as possible to view your work. Nearly free upkeep, free viewing. It's hands on and alleviates oneself of the burden of dealing with dealers in person and critics noses and pompous, pseudo smiles. Some of these pages even include a branched page dedicated to the sell of the artists work as either collections in a book or singular pieces (if this is possible). It reflects the new direction of art. The masses wish they could view real art but don’t want to deal with the atmosphere of the gallery, and now they don’t have to.

This begs the question, ‘what does my page offer, then?” None of these

things. Instead, my blog represents fragments of my life and shards of what is actually going on in my head as it is impossible for me to glean all the “important things” to others without becoming incredibly uncomfortable and running away. This page acts as a way for me to trick myself into letting whomever may read the page without becoming immediately uncomfortable and nearly self-destructive. This blog is a relatively private representation of what the scatter is in my head. Subtract the idea of it being private and you’re left with nearly the same aims as the other authors and artists who make up the blogosphere. We’re all divulging our personalities to the world in different public spheres. Mine’s just slightly more private than others…or so I would hope.

Indiana is close enough to Chicago

Greg and Cara are doing really well out in Indiana. Greg's been teaching K through 6 since the 15th, and he's liking it a lot. I don't envy the drive, an hour each way, but the ability to teach band and orchestra seems to really please him. As it should. Cara starts grad school soon. Then they start the planning process for the wedding.

Congratulations and good-lucks to the both of them.

Disrupted movement lunch

10:59 - Our contact for the manuscript we are working on has finally sent me

a response to my email. It seems as though he's made some mistakes, and he's confused. After all, this guy, who was supposed to collect forms, hadn't done much of anything until after an author went on maternity leave and three others had gone on vacations. We protect the asses of those who make mistakes, and our own like plastic wrap.

11:07 - An email from Andrea suggesting that I escape quickly downstairs to

the lunchroom and viewing area where we will all sit and have a film's light reflect off our eyes like in middle school; eating as we gaze. She’ll meet me downstairs at 11:30 or so.

11:15 - Problems persist with this Statement; which, needs to go in for peer

review. Turns out we're missing even more authors’ forms than we thought, and I'm told that we may just drop some authors’ names from the manuscript. It makes sense in some ways, but not in others. Conflicted as a former author, understanding as a former editor, ignorant as my current understanding is that a person authors several statements and papers a year. I can't escape downstairs.

11:16 - I got an email from Heather telling me that I incorrectly filled out a

Author Disclosure Table, despite her telling me to do it the exact opposite way yesterday. It looks like its going to be lunch at my desk again.

11:57 – After waiting for this guy to get back to us he finally does, only he has

complicated things further by ignoring what both Heather and my emails said and explaining that he’ll go ask for one doctor’s form and have it faxed to us post haste. Problem is, not more than half hour ago I told this guy that we had the author’s form… Missed my chance to talk some more. Our conversations are fascinating even if they’re injected with random tangents by others and ourselves. I wouldn’t mind sitting down outside of working and “getting to know.” That sounds weird and dodgy.

12:25 – I’m still here at my desk, and I should probably apologize for my

absence at lunch. I don’t want her to get the wrong impression. My nerves are moving like an African tribal dance…or my urge to call this form collector a jackass.

12:27 – Back to dealing with manuscripts of statements…and my apprehension

at saying anything at all. This is why it’s been eight months since my last encounter. Hooray for dinner for one, baseball, my computer and Sarah Vowell novels.

My horoscope for this week:

"Virgo: (Aug. 23—Sept. 22)
You're still young, but eventually, you will learn that wearing sandals is no way for a man to go through his life on this earth..

P.S. - Damn.

Stems cells from skin cells? That's what Harvard's saying. And, I mean seriously, they're Harvard.

Very little to report. The position here at the AHA is still very much in the air at this junction, and I'm hoping that some news regarding it will be forthcoming. In the mean time...enjoy Criteria.

Birthday's are forthcoming

Greg on the 28th, Yoshee on the 30th, and some crap-job on the 9th of September. The gifts will flow like the grape juice. Hey, I'm a non-alcoholic here.

OBEY MY DOG!

Does this make anyone else scared of a Christian theocracy "suddenly" sprouting up in this country?

P.S. - "Bush administration officials Tuesday disavowed Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson's call for the assassination of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez." Sure, but they wouldn't really mind if someone shot and killed the guy. This is sounding more and more like the Middle Ages. Where, if the Pope requested that someone be killed for looking at him the wrong way people would jump at the chance. That's where we are again. Great advances in medicine, technology and the like but we still can't divorce ourselves from the extremes of religion.

P.P.S. - Hooray! Now Roberson is denying that he suggested assassination. He was just recommending that we go in their and "take him out." That's what he said, right? And that could mean any number of things...including but not limited to assassinating the guy. Of course!
Even Fox News is saying he's wrong on this one.

R.I.P. Bob Moog

Your keyboards are your memory.

Rain nights are needed. Maybe on Saturday as well.

Say hello to my dopleganger.

Second guy from the left. Yeah. That's creepy.

If we were to touch the world would come to an end.

Art Talk

Maryam sent me some art that I really liked, thought I would share it.

Lost my badge again, felt like a fool, looked all over, couldn't find it, got a phone call from downstairs, they had it. I still feel like a fool.

Today is a very ghostly day. Quiet.

My horoscope for this week:

"Virgo: (Aug. 23—Sept. 22)
The bear's probably going to be pretty hung over when it wakes up, so it would be best to go somewhere else to wonder how your bank robbery went wrong.

P.S. - Well, I do fight bears...and lose.

There are rumors abound that Peter Angelos might sell the Orioles to Cal Ripkin Jr. To this I say, thank you, and Bring Back the Oriole Way.

"Harvard to explore origins of life"

Oh man, they'll figure it out in, like, two minutes. Sweet! Harvard knows everything!

Kind of like a wind

As it stands, I’m a ghost in the office today. In my own department only Linda

has said anything directly to me. Emails and curt phone calls have been the extent of everything. It’s not a great thing to be dealing with, but something I’ll grow to get used to, I suppose.

If you don't like the Highway Watch ads on the radio and television then you're a communist and support terrorism...and you also probably don't obsessively wave an American flag and put a decal with said flag on everything you own. You Un-American garbage.

P.S. - My favorite line is, "He's out there looking out for terrorist threats; there out there you know." YES! THEY'RE EVERYWHERE! And the best thing to do is to get our truckers invovled. You know, truckers, the uneducated, unkept of us will save the day!

P.P.S. - I'm not suggesting that all truckers are stupid...just the one's who believe this kind of trite crap.

Comes in like the wind

I was pulled aside today to have a conversation with one of my co-workers.

They told me that they were part of the meeting regarding the future of my department and my employment with the AHA. Turns out, I’m just a schmuck. Again. It should seem obvious by now though. I should have been able to tell that I wouldn’t get the position I thought I deserved and wanted. Quite honestly, I’m not sure that I really deserved it. More like, I was told that I would get it, but it turns out they didn’t mean it when they said it. I’m expected to remain where I am, on an island amidst the company. Watching responsibility and any kind of stability move past me like a lobster cage lined with barnacles, rusted shut. It should seem obviously by now. Naïve and nubile are looked over or stepped on instead of applauded and built up. Sharks work, calm heads don’t.

I wish I had my overstuffed red armchair right about now. What’s most

interesting is that the person who divulged this information is the most like me. Probably moved out of the way a few times, looked over because of kindness. The idea that a jaded worker is far more valuable than one with hope kind of sickens me.

Is it weird that I miss The Tick as much as I do? I mean, the Midnight Bomber What Bombs at Midnight might be the greatest television character ever thought up.

$2.46 for gas is too expensive. I might as well purchase a horse to ride to work every day.

Interupted by sounds of the future

I'm tired of being a temp. "I'm thinking about graduate school. You know, to become a barber."

The massage therapist told me to lay down on a tennis or super ball to relieve the pain in my shoulder, but all I had was a baseball. It feels 80% better. Softball Saturday is sounding much better.

The hidden ball trick is the most amazing thing ever.

Also, Bobby Kielty looks like a wolf. It's creepy.

Racial Profiling is wrong, and this guy is a jerk.

Five a.m. is a good time to wake up in the morning, but not when its because of extreme pains in the left shoulder. That, that's no good. In fact, it might even hurt a bit.

"Falling Victim Proves that Yankee Fans are Retarded"

How am I getting spamed through the comments on my blog?

P.S. - Deleted!

The Indomitable Actions of…

Gary Sheffield was on Quite Frankly yesterday talking about steroids and

fights between athletes and fans. When asked about the Ron Artest brawl, he said that the decision to kick him out for the year was unfair. He went on to say that having Artest out of the game hurts his family more than anyone, suggesting that without being paid for the year Artest's family would be in financial duress. Yes, that's what will happen. After he squanders the millions of dollars he made playing basketball over the past few years and the profit from the CD that he helped release he'll be left with nothing.

What were his kids to do last year? They're already in rags. Artest should

have been kicked out of the game forever. His family doesn't need millions of dollars to survive, and Gary Sheffield is a jerk.

What's worse the that? The fact that he suggested that he never did

steroids. Really? Did he lie to a court room full of people? Did he lie to reporters before the season began when he told that outright that he had used a clear cream, but he didn't know what it was. It was steroids, you dumb jerk! You used them! Admit it!

This said, I feel obligated to discuss the matter of Jason Giambi. Giambi was

indicted in the same steroid case as Sheffield. He admitted to doing steroids in front of a court, and was to be booed by fans and the media alike for what he did. Not soon after this information was leaked, Giambi "allowed" the media to interview him on camera and held a press conference. At the press conference he apologized for what he did, and that he was sorry, felt bad for the fans who he disrespected. The media sat there and gushed. They thought he was abused and wronged. Everyone suddenly respected him all of a sudden after he admitted to doing "something." The problem is, he never admitted to doing steroids to the public. Some say that it was obvious what he was talking about. They say that the reason they forgive him is because his elusiveness wasn't as bad as it could be.

As it stands right now, Giambi has gained a whole lot of weight, and is bigger

right now than he was earlier in the season, by a lot. Yet, the fans and the media outlets are standing about applauding him. "He's the comeback story of the year." HE CHEATED! What the hell is this? I had no idea that people would be so completely retarded about this whole situation. He did something wrong, never admitted to it publically and now he's beloved by all. It's stupid, and wrong.

Giambi is nothing more than a jackass who took a good long piss on the game

of baseball, and should have his MVP honors taken away from him. He's not the come back player of the year, he's a crook and a fraud.

My horoscope for this week:

"Virgo: (Aug. 23—Sept. 22)
Officials will say that, although your death was indeed a tragedy, it could have been prevented simply by paying closer attention to either the warning signs on the time machine or your senior-year history unit on the Crimean War.

Girded

Well, there begins a point when you realize just how much sleep you need to get, as opposed to where you are currently. That point is called the 'droop period.' Your body begins to dip, slump over while you walk and eyelids look like curtains at the old lady’s house across the streets. But these drawn spots don't really help things, especially when you realize there's plenty of work that needs to be completed and an overwhelming urge to hide under your desk.

Remember the last time I worked with boxes and how much I hated it? Yeah...remember that?

I'm inventorying boxes of journals again all this week. Limited time to post. Fire burning hot, bad.

News for today, a woman, Cindy Sheehan, whose son was killed in Iraq wants to talk to the president again. She spoke with him in June and he made light of the situation, nearly mocking the fact that her son passed away. So, she wasn't too happy with that, so last week she went down to Crawford, Texas to confront the president. The only problem is, he will have no part in this conversation. He ignored her persistence at camping out in front of the ranch by never sending any kind of word to her at all, so he's gong to have her jailed. Man of the people, in deed.

I have this mental image of Bush sitting his ranch counting huge piles of oil money like Mr. Burns or Scrudge McDuck. You like that Duck Tales reference. Yeah, I watched that when I was a kid, I was lame.

P.S. - Like an ex-boyfriend who's looking for some, Bush slightly gives a damn...slightly...if at all.

Someone gimmie a beat...a beat

Today seems to stand on one leg, wobbling. I've been sitting here checking on the news and postings on blogs for the past couple of hours, trying to divert as much of my attention away from the lack of work I have to complete. If there were a baseball game going on right now, even a Yankees game, I would be watching it from the computer, but, alas, I am without activity.

…I’m going to go find something to do…possibly involving an attack on Yoshee’s work space. That’s just how I roll, I’m a jerk…TO THE EXTREME! God, I’m bored.

Yesterday's Page 2 article raised some poignant issues regarding the calling of baseball games and sponsors strangle hold on the game.
Also, some penis jokes:

"Baltimore Orioles first basemen Rafael Palmeiro has been suspended for 10 games by Major League Baseball after testing positive for steroids. He was also a spokesperson for Viagra. So he's on steroids and Viagra. You know what that means? He doesn't need a bat anymore."
-- Jay Leno

WEE!

Lee Mazzilli has been fired as head coach of the Baltimore Orioles, and Sam Perlozzo has been named the interm manager. The reason Perlozzo is a great interm manager is simple, the double 'z' factor.

Not a great day in Orioles baseball.

I have still heard nothing regarding the position that I applied for here at the

AHA. As the first interview concluded the interviewer told me that my current boss, Heather, would be administering the next stage in the interview process the following week. Well, it’s been three and I haven’t heard anything about it. Funny thing is that neither has Heather. She just informed me that she hasn’t heard word one about the process, whether she can continue or not. Complicated and annoying this ship is.

Pick the best line (or submit your own)

1. The President demonstrating how Iraqis hid weapons of mass destruction
2. If I put my hand up here, that's how Dick Chaney stays in charge
3. Hey, let's see how far I can throw this thing
4. Who wants candy?
5. If Barney craps on me can I bomb him?

Also, he's going to take a 5 week vacation. 5 weeks. Yes, that's the longest vacation taken by a president for over 36 years. Hooray for meaningless records of sloth!

"Carl Rove"? What's a "Carl Rove"?

My horoscope for this week:

"Virgo: (Aug. 23—Sept. 22)
The stars, in their infinite cosmic wisdom, indicate that you should check out this radiation cloud on the far side of the Horsehead Nebula. It totally looks like Jesus.

Yes, that's right, Apple has created and released a multi-button mouse called the "Mighty Mouse." Think that's cool? Yeah, it is. What's cooler is that each of the bottons can be customizable to do whatever you want. So, lets say I want to launch iChat. All I could have to do is tap the right mouse botton and there you are, the program opens right in front of you. If that's not amazing, then I'm a hobo living under I-30.
I might be that anyway.

P.S. - A review of the new Mighty Mouse.

They sure do.

Hey, Mr. Bush...No...on everything you just said.

A Bush drunk in public? I don't believe it.

HA HA! Progress in automaking! Since 1980, we've gotten worse! We don't need no stinking energy bill.