Articles from: 2011

I’ve been feeling particularly anxious about something so I went to the prayer room today and while talking to the man there he mistakenly called me Thor!  I thought I heard it all.  I also thought the only form of my name left that I haven’t used is my full name, Theodore.  I guess should I get bored with that one, there’s one more in reserve. Now if he called me Thor, God of Lightning, that would be odd.  Especially if he was praying to our Lord.  Awkward…

So my coworker recommended I pop a zit today and against all warnings from the internet against pimple popping I went to the local CVS, bought some q-tips, isopropyl alcohol, and went to work and after 14 or so q-tips (they do come in rather large packages so I figured I’d use them liberally) I did manage to wash the area, sanitize the pimple, finish the surgical procedure, and disinfect the wound. I’m not sure why I’m writing this down, but I have a much greater respect for q-tips now.  I attempted to graph the results:   OK maybe this is not that accurate as I don’t remember using q-tips before age 7 or 8sh and I’m not quite 35 yet.  Ah well, life’s too short to be fiddling with graphs.  Now if I only knew what to do with the rest of the box…

Someone at church mentioned that she prefers weddings in the smaller chapel more than the main sanctuary because it’s more homey. I asked her if by homey she meant ghetto. By the look on her face, she didn’t find that funny at all.

In the cafeteria today I was getting a salad and noticed someone pouring a healthy amount of olive oil on her slice of pizza. I thought that was a pretty odd topping. I guess if you think of it, pizza normally has olives and is oily in itsellf, so maybe the lady wanted to ramp things up a bit. Yesterday while hurrying in to church I overheard someone saying, “you don’t want to sit on those seats of shame,” which I assume he is referring to as the seats in the back of the church. Hey, I’ve sat on those seats before! Are we not human too? If you prick us do we not bleed? Of course we all know that when you’re little, the front seats are really the seats of shame. So close to teacher! So nerdy! What a dork! The cool kids sat in the back. Ah, how quickly life doth change. Later that day, I was talking with a friend and had one of those moments where the reality of one day seeing Jesus sunk in and I started crying. I hadn’t cried in quite sometime but I wouldn’t describe it as sadness or regret. I’m not sure if it was happiness either. It was, I guess, this overwhelming longing. What kind of Sunday will I have next week? Tune in next time when…

Well it’s Sunday night and I’m out of power, studying by a small flashlight hanging on a lanyard from the ceiling fan overhead.  I got the flashlight from Brookstone, not the usualy place I’d go to buy one but I ended up returning the electric massager I got at the white elephant gift exchange for a couple of these small flashlights which are proving to be quite handy since there’s not a whole lot to do when it’s dark.  Being without power is strangely peaceful.  Is this what it was like before the internet?  It seems like those times were ages ago. Anyway, I just finished Part 2 of 5 of my study manual, and cracking open Parametric models which is a fairly big section.  The first chapter, Method of Moments, is pretty basic but sounds like it could be the name of a cool indy rock bank or movie¹.  I’d go see it by the title alone! At church today there was this umbrella which was left drying by the door and everyone who passed by it would look because it had this interesting text written on it:

snow was general all call me Ishmael all we Karamazovs are such I have not slept here all night

It was a little strange so I wrote these phrases down to look up later. I thought it was a little neat puzzle for me to try to figure out before the sermon started. Well, not having power, I guess today has been a lazy peaceful Sunday.  I took a short nap.  I thumbed through a couple unread books on my shelf.  I ate an apple and a cookie.  I finished the section on Empircal models.  I guess there’s still a lot you can do without electricity (batteries not included).

I must be accustomed to taking out my calculator every time I take out my mechanical pencil because in sunday school class I found myself with a calculator open in hand while listening to the sermon for a brief moment before nonchalantly putting in back in my backpack.  I must have been dazed from losing an hour from daylight savings time and I tried to think of a reason for it to be out so I could look like I had known what I was doing but couldn’t come up with anything.  Letsee if you add up the number of prophecies of Balaam and divide by the chapters …. I’m sure I have no reason to be embarrassed.  I mean who really watches other people take notes in class anyway?!?!

  Well this is my best showing so far for a Tuesday puzzle.  Since I do these on a computer, I actually tried screen capture recording this attempt to try to make a Let’s Play video out of it, even coming up with a commentary but alas, when I clicked save, it didn’t.  Maybe I’ll try again next week but I’m going to have to try to find a different program to record.  Then again I question how entertaining a video of someone not solving a crossword puzzle really is. I did make one mistake.  I saw T_EATER and immediately thought “Theater!”  The clue was “Tab grabber.”  Movie stubs are kinda like tabs aren’t they and the theater ticket tearer kinda grabs them from you … right? It’s kinda strange doing these for me.  There usually comes a point halfway through where I want to give up (and usually do) but sometimes I keep going and things kinda fit into place.  Like 44 across’ clue was “One of a Disney septet” and I had _W_R_ to go with.  I was thinking, “Happy?  Grumpy?  I don’t know all the dwarves! Forget it” and then at work I had a “Doh!” moment and realized the solution was much simpler than I thought.  I get stuck a lot but it’s quite satisfying going on a roll and doing much better than you think you could do which is why I still try to whittle away at these. One of the things that made it easier was that all the words could be typed on the left side of the keyboard (one of the clues gave it away).  I thought that was neat!  Well I don’t normally look at the answers so I guess I’ll never know (although I did manage to get some after the fact):

• SERGE: Twilled fabric (thanks R2)
• CB__S: People with handles
• TATTER: Rip to shreds (figured it out but a word that starts with TB?  Clue: Way up a slope)
• EATAT: Trouble no end (TBAR?  Ohhhkaaay….)
• DRESS: Promgoer’s buy (I suddenly feel quite dumb and happy at the same time)

I had this strange dream Monday morning where there was this bubble bath liquid which came to life upon contact with water.  A dab of this liquid became this rounded off squarish smiley faces which talk and you had to toss theses things onto a target on the side of the tub otherwise they would grow monstrously.  And sometimes when you’d throw them they’d split and multiply.  The chaos in this tub was quite scary having all these creatures around you squealing, “toss me!” At the end of the dream I went all out and poured the whole bubble bath into the tub and went out the door.  I think the monster it created eventually exploded. The shower this morning was strangely less exciting.

On Saturdays, I’ve been meeting up with Nick to study.  He has premed classes to study for and I have a progress bar to increase and I think by our mere presences we’ve been helping each other being diligent in this.  He’s also fun to talk to:

ME (looking up from my study manual):  What if I was so into loss models and you were so into biology that we were doing this all for fun? NICK (laughs): Well it would be a different kind of fun.  Like it would be a deeper more fulfilling fun.  Like if it was, say, like gum it would be one of those long lasting gums with flavor crystals versus, say, regular chewing gum. Me:  What would the chewing gum be? NICK: Like something you’d have fun with for a little while but then put in a box only to find it years later when you trip over it in the garage.  Like Pogs.

I don’t really know what Pogs are but I can sort of tell that he’s having a fun time learning.  I, for one, might prefer a game of Pogs, but in the meantime I suppose watching my progress bar will have to do (I get the impression this is the real reason I’m studying).

A few days ago, after the manager astonishingly paid for the entire meal for 20 of us, we all got up and while heading out, not hearing anyone say thanks, I leaned over and thanked him for the meal.  He said politely that he was planning on splitting up the check back at work, but that there was going to be a free breakfast will be in a couple days.  That was … awkward.