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June 30, 2003

Great start. Went in to work with the worst sore throat I've had in at least five years, drank a bunch of water (effectively no help whatsoever), and then had Gareth tell me to go home and come back once I'm well. Almost every time I swallow I wince involuntarily. I really hope this isn't strep (doesn't that lay you up for two weeks?). Sorry to dump on you, but I had to complain somewhere.

UPDATE: According to the doctor, there's an 80 percent chance this is strep, since I have every single symptom (sore throat, swollen glands, and fever, which I didn't realize I had until he took my temperature). The remaining 20 percent? MONO! That's right, mono. If this is mono, just stick a fork in my summer.

June 29, 2003

An entire winter (and a typically chilly spring) in Evanston with barely a sniffle - then I get to Washington and get a horrendous sore throat. This could only happen to me. I'm supposed to start work tomorrow, no less - you know there's nothing like a sore throat for radio.

June 27, 2003

   Went over to Talk Radio News today. This just in: apparently I look older than 20. Who knew? I'm starting there on Monday, so I'd say expect more updates as I finally have stuff that might be worth talking about. Alternately, I'll be so busy I won't have time to write anything. Until it reaches the point where I'm only updating on the weekends, expect the former.
    Some first impressions on Washington - bearing in mind that I went from Bethesda to, basically, Georgetown, and so did not exactly see all of the city:
    * My dad says the Metro is the best subway system in the U.S., and I'm inclined to agree. It doesn't have quite the coverage of New York, but it's at least as good as Chicago (and probably better) on that front. It's also quieter and cleaner than either of those, and is labeled as well or better than any subway system anywhere that I'm aware of (bearing in mind that of the well-known ones, I haven't seen Paris or Tokyo). The downside, because there had to be one: the steep, cavernous escalator entrances that have yet to make me feel like I'm not going to fall forward (or backward, when exiting). Also, why can't it run 24 hours?
    * My dad also says Washington is the best-looking city in the U.S., and with all due respect to Boston, I'm inclined to agree there as well. Again, let's not forget that I basically only saw Georgetown, but we've got to be talking about the least urban-looking urban area in the country, certainly compared to places like Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York (or at least Manhattan). There are trees everywhere. If you took all the trees in Central Park and distributed them evenly throughout the rest of Manhattan, you'd have some idea of what Washington looks like, except Washington has infinitely nicer architecture on average (not that New York doesn't have nice areas, but think about all the crappy jewelry or souvenir stores you see on every other corner in the city's busier sections).
    Washington is also, as I think should be expected from a southern city (and one that was built on swampland too, I guess), very low. The Washington Monument is, and allegedly (and let's hope this is true) always will be, the tallest building in Washington, but it's a mere 555 feet tall, more than 200 feet shorter than the tallest building in Boston, another low city. Frankly, I like low cities, because it's nice not be dwarfed everywhere you go.
    * Washington is also almost revoltingly clean. I tend to notice garbage rolling around everywhere, but it's just not here. The Metro doesn't allow eating or drinking, which I'd imagine contributes greatly to its cleanliness, and you'd think the same thing were true of public spaces. I counted only a handful of cigarette butts and a few scraps of paper, and the latter are things that could easily have blown out of a trash can somewhere. South Orange is about a mile square and it's not this clean.
    * You can tell the tourists from the residents by taking a look at their legs. Are they wearing shorts? Then they don't live here (or they're new in town). On the trip out I saw one person wearing shorts besides me, and he was a tourist. Everyone else was wearing pants, I guess because it was "only" 88 today. They might as well put up big signs that say, "Hey newbies - you think it's hot now, wait until August."
    I think that's it for now. I'll point out one more thing, though: there's a Chipotle at the corner of Old Georgetown and Wisconsin, which is like two blocks away. Life is good.

June 26, 2003

Well, here I am in Washington. Well, technically I'm in Maryland, but let's not split hairs. I'm going over to see what the internship looks like tomorrow, and then if all is well, I can probably start on Monday. Shannon's down here within the week, if I'm not mistaken. Things are good.

June 25, 2003

   Holy shit. Eight days? When's the last time I went this long without updating? (Well, I just looked it up, so I'll tell you: February 2-10, 2002.) Yesterday's trip into the city was Shan-tastic (I wonder if she'll laugh at that or think I'm an idiot); details below.
    So we go to the Brooklyn Bridge because you can walk across it and it's a landmark and all that. Aside from the annoyance of having the middle lane divided between walkers and bikers, necessitating herding techniques, it's really quite cool. The cables and the towers are picturesque, and there are cool views - you can see Governor's Island, Liberty Island and (barely) Ellis Island, along with the Verrazano Narrows Bridge to the south and the Manhattan and Williamsburg Bridges to the north, plus various Manhattan and Brooklyn buildings and such. And you're in the middle of the bridge so I didn't have to freak out about being that close to falling over the edge. It was hot, of course, but at least we got sporadic shade underneath the towers.
    The rest of the day also involved it being hot. We walked down to South Street Seaport (better name: South Street Open Air Mall; there's a goddamn Abercrombie and Fitch, for crying out loud, though I shouldn't complain too much because when we sat in front of it the open door enabled us to bathe in chilled air) and from there down Water Street to Battery Park. The line was pretty long for the Staten Island Ferry and there's nothing to do in Staten Island, so instead we walked along the esplanade. It costs ten dollars just to go to Liberty or Ellis Island - you can't even go to both - and you can't go inside the Statue of Liberty because you might be a terrorist. I can see the statue from Manhattan, boys; if I can't go in it, I'm not shelling out ten bucks for a 20-minute boat ride. So instead I had a bomb pop and we sat in the shade. Then we walked all the way around the tip of the island and saw Shannon's high school. Then we went home.
    Gotta run, dinnertime.

June 17, 2003

Just when you thought - in fact, hoped - it was over, Blair Hornstine's back. I can't believe how much she annoys me. Two weeks ago it was reported that an article she wrote for her local newspaper was actually largely taken from sources written by Bill Clinton and two former Supreme Court justices. Her excuse? "Thinking that news articles didn’t require as strict citation scrutiny as most school assignments because there was no place for footnotes or endnotes." (Source: Article on MSNBC.com... there, that wasn't so hard, was it?) Excuse me? Here's someone who is so petty she demands to be officially declared the smartest person in her school, despite the fact that it will have no bearing on her admission to any university, has a 4.whatever GPA, accepted an admission to Harvard - and she didn't know plagiarism was wrong? What?
There's speculation that Harvard will rescind her admission - it probably should. Maybe this is schadenfreude, but I'm sorry: if, by some miraculous happenstance, she wins her $2.7 million from the school district, she's taking away nearly 5% of the school's operating budget for next year. (Source: http://www.tow.com/photogallery/20030607_blair/.) So much for being a grateful alumna... but then she clearly never was. She doesn't deserve money; she may "deserve" sole valedictorian, but as far as I'm concerned, her unceasing pettiness removes that. And if the supposedly smartest person in her school doesn't know what plagiarism is, she doesn't deserve Harvard admission either.

June 16, 2003

Defying conventional wisdom, there's a new poll of the week. I know, I was surprised too.

June 14, 2003

Well, I'm back in New Jersey. The car ride was, as usual, pretty much uneventful, except for the fact that every place we stopped was warmer than Evanston when we left, even when we stopped in Pennsylvania at 9:45 pm. (Here in New Jersey, of course, it's in the sixties and raining tomorrow, because Mother Nature thinks I ran over her dog or something.)

June 12, 2003

After my last final, trip to Shedd Aquarium with Shannon today. The beluga whales are awesome (I got sprayed twice), as are the Pacific white-sided dolphins. In fact, the Oceanarium in general rocks. The rest of the aquarium was more or less standard issue aquarium, though there were certainly plenty of cool fish and similar to look at. More of a letdown was the new "Wild Reef" exhibit, which Drew professed to have passed on enduring a three-hour wait for. I can't imagine anything in there was worth a three-hour wait; not to say it sucked, but it was just a few sharks (and not in an all-over tank like I was expecting based on the promotional material; there's tanks on the walls, floor, and ceiling all right, but not in one place at the same time), basically. The garden eels were cooler (I want a tank full of them at my house). At any rate, aquariums are bitchin'.

June 9, 2003

It's nice having nothing to do. I can't even believe how gorgeous it is outside right now (10:45 am). After handing in my paper, I went to Norris and bought "breakfast" (new favorite Pop Tarts: S'Mores), and then went out to the lakefill. I faced south while I ate and drank, and then walked up to near the top of the lagoon and found this pier-like outcropping to sit on and faced east (a nice semi-secluded spot, if a bit tough to get to, particularly if you're not an expert rock scrambler like I am). After 10 or 15 minutes I walked to the top of the lakefill and faced north briefly (an underrated view in my opinion, as you can see the top of the Baha'i temple from many spots up there), before finally coming back. It's rather disappointing that I was outside for only about 60 minutes all told (including the walk down to Kresge), but that's 60 more minutes than I've been outside on a lot of days this year. Besides, any more time out there and I would have resembled some sort of boiled crustacean, as we learned when I managed to get burned in two and a half hours at a Cubs game where the sun was actually out for less than an hour total.
Let me just explain the niceness briefly. It's 72 under largely clear skies (just a few cumulus here and there), and the sun is bright. This means you can feel warm but there's this cool breeze that cuts things and means you can still wear pants and be okay. It's delightful. Tomorrow's supposed to hit 80, but with thunderstorms. Fat lot of good that does me.

June 7, 2003

Some changes to the Top 50 movies. Welcome Seven Samurai, Rear Window, 25th Hour, and Rushmore to the list; bye bye (for now at any rate) to Die Hard with a Vengeance, As Good As It Gets, Good Will Hunting, and a fourth movie I've already forgotten, so it must have been fairly inconsequential in the grand scheme. That about extinguishes the last remnants of "Movies I Liked When I Saw Them Once on TV Five Years Ago" which had for the longest time been filling out the last several spots in my Top 50 solely because I couldn't think of anything else to put there. This means that in the future I may simply expand instead of booting movies off (like when I add That Thing You Do!, which I just realized was not on the list, though I'm not adding it tonight).

June 5, 2003

   Uh, could it ever get warm? Please? Today it said it was a high of 78, but it wasn't too warm when I went out (low humidity, I guess), and right now it's in the fifties. I mean, this just isn't funny anymore. It's in the eighties in DC... of course, just like usual, I'm complaining that it's too cold now, but this summer I'm going to be grousing about the heat and humidity. Why can't I live somewhere where it's 83 with mild humidity every day? (Answers of "Such places don't exist, loser" are not appreciated.)
    One week from the last thing I have to do here this year. Thursday finals... boo. Although since this'll be the last time I'll see a lot of people (in a school setting at any rate), I suppose for once I'm in no hurry to leave. Which of course means time is flying (how is Reading Week almost over already?).
    Anyway. New quotes are up in both the regular and quiz bowl sections. Not much compensation for the overall dearth of updates, I know, but it's Reading Week, which means nothing's been happening.

June 3, 2003

   How is it June? We're so close to the end of school, it's just weird. Last night I was up writing a paper and I looked at the sun at 5:30. It was pretty cool; it was so low in the sky and red I could look right at it. It looked like a grapefruit half. Anyway, some new mini-reviews:
    * White Chocolate Kit Kat: Tastes fine, but what's the point? There wasn't enough of a difference between regular Kit Kat and this to make it seem worthwhile. It basically tasted like "Kit Kat for Wussies." I like white chocolate, unlike some (like my mom, who calls it an oxymoron), but this just seemed pointless. (On the other hand, there also seems to be a "Dark Chocolate" option, which I'm sure my parents will love. I don't care for dark chocolate, personally.)
    * Poodle Hat: Weird Al Yankovic's latest album. I've got a lot of Weird Al and I love nearly all of it, but he seems to be slipping. Maybe it's a symptom of the crappiness of the music he has to parody nowadays - but then pop music's been little better than mediocre (in my own opinion, that is) for most of his run. Basically, the album is up and down.
    Parodies: Eminem's "Lose Yourself," Nelly's "Hot in Herre," Avril Lavigne's "Complicated," Billy Joel's "Piano Man," and the Backstreet Boys' "I Want It That Way" become "Couch Potato," "Trash Day," "A Complicated Song," "Ode to a Superhero," and "eBay." The last two are by far the best (Al lucks out that his eBay number remains fairly topical, since the Backstreet Boys have been out of vogue for years now). The rap numbers smack of a lack of creativity, and both "Trash Day" and "A Complicated Song" are kind of gross (the latter, for example, replaces "complicated" with "constipated" in the first verse and goes on to describe moving bowels at rather unfortunate lengths). The requisite polka medley is probably the most listenable of the crop, which about says it all. The days where the sense was that Al was known for parodies because he was so good seem to be passing; few of the songs give me the sense that I couldn't have written them, or for that matter something better.
    Originals: Equally up and down. "Hardware Store" and "Why Does This Always Happen to Me?" (with Ben Folds on piano) are pretty listenable, but the rest ("Party at the Leper Colony," "Wanna B Ur Lover," "Bob," and "Genius in France") are at best tolerable. "Bob" is, rather annoyingly, composed entirely of palindromes. "Genius in France" wants to be a repeat of last album's "Albuquerque" but it can't compare. Folds' guest appearance is probably the best part of this half of the album.

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This page last updated: Monday, June 30, 2003 11:51:09 PM