CK and I took a driving trip around Ireland a couple weeks ago. It was quite the adventure. Here's a shot of my introduction to Ireland.... more pics to come.

My trusty 1998 (purchased in 2000) Gary Fisher Hoo Koo E Koo. Repainted, rebuilt, reborn. Here's to 10 more years.

Props to Southwest Frameworks for the repaint.

This was my shrimp sandwich until a San Francisco Fisherman's Wharf seagull fell in love with it and swiped it from my hands. Look at him, grinning. Bastard.

It's obvious I'm no longer prolific enough to keep a blog. This site used to be a journal for me. I wrote daily, or sometimes more than once per day, but always at least a few times every week. Now, one blog in a month is standard. And that sucks. I've considered committing blog suicide and killing this thing off, but I've been at it too long to just close up shop. So, instead, I will change the format. From now on, this will be a photoblog. I will post photos. No text. I can't make guarantees as to how often I'll post photos, but I'm hoping I'll post more than I do now.

Here's to new beginnings, dusting off cobwebs, and changes of pace.

I don't know what any of those things really mean.

If you're a fan of In Utero, and you've wondered why some of the tracks sound a little different than the others, find yourself a copy of the original Steve Albini mix of this album. You will find your answers, and you will also notice that Krist's bass tracks are much higher in the mix while the vocals sound a little bit lower. The album as a whole sounds "bigger." If you felt like the album started out as an "I'm in the room with the band" kind of record, the Steven Albini mix will take the earplugs out of your ears.

I've been busy busy busy lately doing bicycle advocacy in Dallas. The advocacy group is called Bike Friendly Knox-Henderson and its goals are to improve cycling infrastructure in Uptown and parts of East Dallas, raise awareness of bicycling in the area, and get businesses and neighborhoods to support our endeavors. We've gotten some traction in the community and we're looking forward to improving cycling and transit options for people in our area.

I've also been hard at work building a commuter bike. It started life as an early 80's Raleigh road bike. It will complete its transformation as a one-speed road bike purpose-built to not break down, not be expensive, and be totally fun to ride. Details coming soon...

In other news, I learned how to ski (yay!) and I now wish we had skiing in Texas (boo).

The winter has forced me to take my cycling indoors. This nifty bike trainer has been providing what paltry amount of exercise I am able to wring out of myself in these lazy winter months.

Also amusing is my special concoction of bike trainer equipment. No, not the metal contraption attached to the rear wheel. I'm talking about the ancient and perfectly-sized textbook holding up the front wheel so that it is level with the raised rear wheel. That textbook is none other than my Constitutional Law textbook. I know, I know. Shame on me. It contains our Constitution. Not to mention it was one of my favorite classes in law school. But after many years of sitting unopened on a shelf in my study, it now sits unopened underneath my bicycle wheel. Is that so bad? At least it's serving a purpose now.

Apologies to my Con Law professor. And all Con Law professors out there. Maybe I should have used my Civil Procedure books. Man, that shit was boring.

Unless you've been living under a media rock the past month, you may have heard of the new uber-epic semi-sci-fi extravaganza movie called Avatar. It's from James Cameron, that guy who gave us all kinds of sci-fi and grand-scale saga type movies of the 90s.

I'm here to tell you it's worth your two and a half hours and $15 (if you spring for the IMAX). And spring for the IMAX you should. It's worth every penny. You get the true scale Cameron had in mind for the film and the 3D isn't the kind of 3D that makes you want to throw up, it's a 3D that adds the just enough depth to put you in the scene - not up close, but viewing from a safe distance.

For those who don't care for sci-fi and would rather get a root canal than sit through Star Trek, or even The Matrix, fear not. Avatar actually has a story, and a love plot, and socio-political commentary. It's a blockbuster with brains. An action film with a conscience. If I don't sound like a nerdy movie critic way into cliches to you yet, keep reading.

Even at two and a half hours, the movie does not drag. Pay even the slightest attention and the story will keep you moving. It has momentum. Several story threads progress concurrently, you know, just in case one of them bore you. You've got a love story. You've got a species survival story. You've got a war machine story. You've got an internal conflict story. And so on.

Case in point: my mom, a 59-year-old woman who goes to sci-fi flics with my dad only because he has no one else to take, genuinely liked Avatar. I think that speaks for itself.

Thinking back on 2009, it's hard to pick anything in particular that seemed like a stand-out event. The one thing I know that I should probably change in 2010 is my lack of news-following. Since I don't have cable or satellite or Uverse or whatever the hell other television channel package thing people buy these days, and I don't get the newspaper, and I don't normally like to read news websites (trying to cut down on computer time), I get no news intake. I get my news from people who say, "Did you hear about ________?"

Some notable things in the world of particleman for 2009:
- CK moved to Dallas
- I bought a house
- I turned 30
- I sold my sporty BMW and bought a sporty-ish Mazda hatchback
- I played a lot of shows with my Beatles band
- My Beatles band ended
- I met some awesome people
- I went skiing for the first time ever
- I went on some cool trips with CK
- I saw a lot of great concerts
- I parted ways with my Blackberry and returned to life with a non-email phone

I hope you all have a great 2010. Just for reference, and so you don't start putting too much importance into New Years and the new year, I like to give a little context about this thing called the "year." In America, and a lot of other parts of the world, the year is about to be 2010. Elsewhere, things are different. Time moves the same, but they count it differently. In Israel, it's already 5770. In much of Asia, the year for tracking traditional holidays is 4707. The Hindu Saka year in parts of India is 1931, though apparently the government and much of the population doesn't care. In Muslim nations in the Middle East, the current year is 1431.

So, if you're feeling anxious about this whole New Years thing, don't. A lot of people don't care that it's about to be 2010. They're still working through 1431, or they've already moved on to 4707.

Happy holidays, happy new year, happy December 24 on the Gregorian solar calendar.

The Black Joe Lewis "Tell 'Em What Your Name Is!" cd I got last week is really impressive. You gotta hear this cd. It's like James Brown on crack. If that's possible. They ran the singer's vocals through some kind filter, or engineered them somehow. The vocals sound simultaneously far away and in your face at the same time, and also somewhat distorted. It's a little hard to explain (clearly).

My favorite lyric on the cd is in the song Get Yo Shit. The gist is that the singer is consoling his special lady friend who thinks Joe Lewis doesn't love her. She says he never buys her any presents. His response:

"Yes I did, I bought you a box of chicken but I ate it on the way home." Then she asks if he even knows her name. He says, "Yeah, it's Melissa."

"Naw dumbass, it's Roxanne."

Bummer.

I leave for Argentina with The Evil I (remember him?) in two days. I sent my passport in for renewal with four weeks to spare, and they turned it around in about two and a half weeks, even though the website says it takes four to six weeks. So in case you were wondering, sending your passport in for renewal is a good idea after the summer travel rush but before the holiday travel rush.

Evil I and I plan to do the backpack thing - that is, no suitcases, just a big traveler's backpack. We're also staying in hostels to make sure we give ourselves plenty of opportunity to meet people our age who are traveling. I did the backpacking thing in Europe for a month many years ago and liked it.

I've been reading about the general dress code in Buenos Aires and, so far, I've gathered that BA is quite the fashion-conscious city. The blurbs I'm reading compare it to New York. My general rules when traveling abroad are:

1. No tennis shoes
2. No logo shirts
3. No backpacks
4. No caps
5. No cargo-style zip-off pants that travelers seem to like

Basically, dress the way I do at home. But I would like to have some kind of bag for carrying water, camera, guide book, sunglasses, etc. I'm thinking the best option is one of those shoulder bag things. I have a Timbuk2 messenger bag that has served me very well for 10 years, but it's rastafarian green, yellow, and red colors may attract too much attention, so I may end up getting a simpler day bag of some kind. Then again, wouldn't the rasta bag make me stylish, and therefore I'd fit in? Whatever. I'll figure something out.

Three quick show reviews for you.

Regina Spektor - Nokia Theater in Grand Prairie - 11/12/09

This is my third time seeing Regina, and the first time I heard her new songs in their entirety. I listened to clips on iTunes but hadn't yet heard the full versions. Of the three shows, this was my least favorite. Regina seemed to rush through the songs and hardly said anything more than "Hi" and "Thank you." She's normally much more talkative and engaging. My sister saw Regina in Austin the night before and said Regain did the same thing in Austin. As always, however, she sounded great and the band helped provide additional texture and dynamics to the songs. I'm not that crazy about her new songs, though. I don't exactly know why, but something is missing that was on the previous albums. I'll look forward to her next record. All in all, I can't complain about the show. Any Regina performance is a treat. Her talent and creativity are hard to match and always put a smile on my face. She played plenty of old songs, including many I wouldn't have expected, and some acapella songs as well, one of which I think was entirely about the color of boys' eyes. She also busted out with Ode To Divorce, which I've never seen her do live.

David Garza - Rock House Films - 11/13/09

I haven't seen David Garza in years. I don't remember when the last show was, but it was at least three years ago. Rock House Films is a "studio" in what amounts to a large-ish living room in someone's condo in Uptown Dallas. It's an intimate place for a performance - only about 70 people fit, all in folding chairs or couches - and the stage has hardly enough room for a drum set, a guitar player, and a bass player. Because we're on the verge of clocking over into the next decade, David made a point to work backwards chronologically through his albums. Since I've been out of the David Garza loop for quite a while, I didn't start recognizing the songs until about half-way through set, or circa 2000. He played many of my favorites from Overdub, This Euphoria, Culture Vulture, and Conmigo. Towards the end of the set, David realized he only had 15 minutes left until the music had to stop, so he raced through a bunch of dance-able songs and a small group of dancers, including CK and me, got up to shake it down in the small space in between the stage and the first row of folding chairs. Afterward, CK and I met David and took a picture, which we're hoping will be sent to us by the photographer girl we met.

Swell Season - Palladium - 11/14/09

CK and I saw Swell Season at this same venue about a year ago, so it was a treat to see them again at the same place and observe the changes in their sound and stage presence. The extra year or touring, recording, and fame fared well on the group. They looked like they were having as much fun as they were last year and they played with as much heart, if not more. I didn't know any of the new songs, but they were great. Glen and Marketa are now touring with Glen's prior band, The Frames, and the added rhythm section, electric guitarist, and violinist really complete their sound. Of course, Glen and Marketa played plenty of songs on their own, but the most rocking moments were definitely with the band. Though there was one exception - a song I was hoping Glen would play. Last year, Glen played a Van Morrison song by himself. It was just his voice and his guitar, and it was awesome. He ripped through chords at light speed - on his acoustic, which seems like it would ruin the guitar, hence the massive holes in his old beat up Takamine - and screamed out the lyrics to the song (not even sure what they are) at the top of his lungs. He sounds like he's exorcising demons. Ridding himself of years of pent-up aggression and emotional baggage. It's quite a sight. At the end of the song, he loops his chords and the end result is a tidal wave of acoustic guitar. Walls of sound run into each other and reverberate against the walls and floors of the venue, flooding the space and then disappearing when he turns off the loop. If you have the chance to see Swell Season on this tour, and you're into the singer-songwriter vibe, go see this show. Their new songs and old songs are all worth hearing - and seeing.

I'm really excited for this string of shows starting tonight:

1. Regina Spektor - lucked into some great seats for tonight's show at Nokia Theater. It's a larger venue than I've seen her at before, but I'm still excited. This will be my third Regina show.
2. Friday - David Garza - Rock House Films - I haven't seen David play a small show in years. I'm pumped to see him again in a small venue. I'm taking CK and this is her first time seeing David.
3. Saturday - Swell Season - Palladium - CK invited me to this show. We saw Swell Season at the same venue about a year ago, so it will be neat to see how they've changed.

If you have a record player and the stylus (needle thing) is bent, do not play your records. The bent needle could damage the record. Get a replacement stylus. I found out last night that the stylus on my turntable was bent, probably during my last move, and I've been calling all over town searching for a replacement. None of the stereo stores in town carried them. I didn't feel like ordering one online and waiting 5 days. Then I tried Guitar Center. Jackpot. They carry them.

So there you go. If you need a new stylus for your record player, find a Guitar Center, or other similar music store that carries DJ equipment. They should have one.

CK's mom was gracious enough to give me a gift certificate to local music store Good Records for my birthday. I used the opportunity to go on a long-waited shopping spree for some albums I've wanted for a while. The take:

- Rodrigo Y Gabriela - 11:11 (CD + DVD set)
- Black Joe Lewis - Tell 'Em What Your Name Is! (CD)
- Mudhoney - SuperfuzzBigmuff (LP + MP3 download voucher)
- The Jesus Lizard - Liar (LP + MP3 download voucher)

I think it's really cool that you can buy an LP and get LP sound quality and also get digital versions of the songs to dump to your ipod or burn to CD. Or, better yet, I can hook up the record player to my music recording equipment and record tracks from the LP as if I were recording live music tracks. The computer won't know the difference. Hooray for RCA inputs! And Garage Band. Assuming Garage Band will be able to interpret the tracks and make MP3 files out of them. I suppose any signal fed through my USB interface will end up on one track on Garage Band anyway, which means I'd just make each song on the LP a one-track song in GB and then convert the songs to MP3. This post just got really nerdy.

T-Mobile sent another white phone. This is the third white phone they sent. When I asked them to just cover the cost of the phone, since, you know, I've been waiting a month for the phone and I've had to make three trips to UPS to ship the phones back, they said all they could do was reimburse me for the shipping. Fantastic. All the lunch breaks I spent talking to them and driving to UPS are apparently meaningless.

My solution: I'm going to a physical T-Mobile store to get the phone. I figure if I can look at it and make sure it's the right phone, it will be the right phone.

Let it be known. T-Mobile customer service sucks. Their ordering process is awful. Expect nothing for your wasted time. Expect nothing from their "Customer Loyalty" department. Expect plenty of apologies, but nothing in the way of compensation for your time and effort. T-Mobile clearly does not care to hold on to long-time customers.

I'm not one to normally complain about customer service. I know that's how most of these stories start out, but this story is bad. Really, really bad.

I was on a family plan with my parents and decided to go solo. T-Mobile let me apply my two years of loyal patronage and upgrade to a new phone for $50 and keep my awesome rate plan of unlimited minutes, anytime, for $50/month. Not a bad deal.

I called T-mobile and ordered a black Nokia xpress music phone. T-Mobile sent it to my parents house in Houston instead of my house in Dallas. After a few phone calls with T-Mobile and UPS, we finally got the phone to my house in Dallas. Except that someone had to be home to sign for it, and after three attempts, they sent the phone to their warehouse. T-Mobile would not ship to my place of work, where I spend my days, like most people, because they had to send the phone to the billing address on the account. Fine. I go to the UPS warehouse, rip open the package, and instead of a black Nokia phone, I see a white Nokia phone. Wrong color. Great.

I call T-Mobile and explain the problem. They apologize and promise to send out the right phone immediately and that I should expect a text message with the UPS tracking number. The package with the new phone will have a shipping label to slap on the package so that I can send the other phone back.

Days pass. No text message. I call T-Mobile again and ask what the story is. Turns out they misinformed me how their "process" works. The process is that I have to send the phone back first, call them with the tracking number, and they will then send me the right phone. Ridiculous. Why I have to assume risk of a lost phone for their mistake is beyond me. They should send me the phone back and wait for me to send them their wrong phone, and should i keep the old phone, they should then have the right to charge my account for the extra phone. That's how it should work.

I follow their process. I take the white phone to a UPS store, ship it, call T-Mobile again, give them the tracking number and shipping charge which will be credited to my account, and they promise to send the black phone.

The new phone arrives, and this time, I don't need to sign for it. It's sitting on my porch. I rip open the package and see - another white phone.

I call T-mobile (6th or 7th call by now) and again explain the problem. The customer rep again apologizes, and promises to make it right. Except - you guessed it - I have to go to a UPS store to ship the old phone back, though I don't need to so before they ship the right phone.

Let's hope they finally get it right. I never had any problems with T-Mobile until this ordeal. And because of this ordeal, I have to tell you, if you have any plans of buying a phone from T-Mobile that you have not seen with your own eyes, do not bother. Buy your phone from someone else. T-Mobile is awful and this customer service experience has been a huge waste of time. I've heard good things about Verizon. Give them a shot.

I'll keep you posted on any new developments.

Today is my 30th birthday. This is kind of weird.

I bought a plane ticket to Argentina last night. I'm going in late November.

That is all.

CK and I saw Rodrigo y Gabriela last night. I think it was the best concert I've seen all year, aside from Paul McCartney which gets automatic 1st place due to historical and musical significance and whatnot. But taking into account musicality, originality, and audience participation, this was the best show all year, and maybe the best show in years that I've been to.

They absolutely owned the audience. It looked like it was their first concert, or their ten thousandth. They looked simultaneously comfortable and shocked to be on stage with everyone cheering for them.

The highlight for me was watching Gabriela beat the shit out of her guitar. It's amazing to see her play live. I don't know how they designed that thing or what kind of microphones and pickups they rig inside of it, but when she slams her wrist down on the bridge the guitar booms like a drum (a floor tom for the musician readers). When she flicks her knuckles against the edges of the guitar, it sounds like two-by-fours banging into each other. She does wonders with that guitar. It's quite a sight, and it sounds like nothing else I've ever heard on a guitar. She creates rhythms that are complex and groovy, and make white people dance. Rodrigo, of course, treats his classical guitar like a thrash metal guitar, and it doesn't sound too far off when he gets to tearing out the barred chords that hit every string. It sounds pretty awesome and I especially enjoyed his solo time on stage without Gabriela. I like his writing style.

Musicianship aside, the show was entertaining and engaging. They both consistently urged the audience to clap to the rhythm, and this was one of the few shows I've been to when the audience gladly obliged - every time. They took turns soloing when the other left the stage for a few minutes. They played a lot of new material, which fans will notice makes use of guitar effects like wah-wah pedals and maybe a phaser. Gabriela swapped her guitar for a small hand-held drum and Rodrigo took his turn on a box drum (the kind you sit on). I liked how they've mixed up the sound on the new songs. I don't think an entire album of bare guitar work would have been as cool as a record of guitar work filtered through some fun effects and accompanied by hand percussion.

It seems that a concert of two musicians playing acoustic guitars would get repetitive after a while. No drum set. No bass. No vocals. No keyboards or pianos. But the advantage for R y G is in their ability to experiment with song structure and dynamics by limiting the number of people and instruments in the group. By restricting the number of possible sounds, they force themselves to invent new and better ways to create drama and excitement with their music. And they've become better at it than many "traditional" bands.

There you have it. Go see R y G if you get the chance. Oh, and they told us they had to choose between playing Houston or Dallas, and since they "fucking hate" the Houston airport, they chose Dallas. Sucks to be you, Houston! Intercontinental, thank you for sending R y G to Dallas.

It's been a long time since I read a book. According to this blog, the last time I posted about a book was January 8, 2007. This would correspond directly with my last semester of law school, which was concluded with the following chain of events that probably explain why I haven't read a book since:

1. Studying for last semester exams
2. Studying for the Bar
3. Taking the bar
4. Moving to Dallas
5. Starting my job

Plenty of people read books during the above events. I didn't. At least I don't think I did, or at least I didn't blog about it, which means I probably didn't. Though I may have started two books that I did not finish (A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius and Guns, Germs, and Steel).

My manager lent me a book called The Book Thief, which I also started, and also did not finish. The introduction did not hold my attention and I got bored. So it sat next to my bed. For about two years. Last night, I decided to give it another try. I'm glad I did. It's really, really good. The structure was a little odd at first. I didn't know what to make of the occasional "FYI" comments from the narrator in bolded and centered text. But I pushed through the first few chapters and it all started to flow eventually. I think I'll finish this book. The first one in at least two years.

I don't know why i took such a long break between reading books recreationally. Maybe the Bar sapped away any interest I had in reading, maybe the task of transitioning from law student to lawyer took a lot out of me. Who knows. Either way, it feels good to read a story again. After reading contracts and agreements and licenses for two years, I think I'm ready for some reading that does not include the word "hereby."

I've been keeping track of every concert and show I've seen in my entire life for a long time. I previously kept the list in a .doc file linked on the right side of this page. I decided to finally make it a webpage instead.

I also added individual archive pages for the various authors that have authored on this blog.

See "Syllabus" for the new links.

The Paul concert was pretty amazing. He played a lot of songs from his solo and wings years I didn't know, but there all good. I was just anxious to hear all the Beatles I'd been waiting years to hear, and he did not leave us hanging. The set list is below, with some comments from me.

01. Drive My Car
02. Jet
03. Only Mama Knows
04. Flaming Pie
05. Got To Get You Into My Life
06. Let Me Roll It / Foxy Lady ending (Story about Jimi Hendrix asking Eric Clapton to come on stage and help him tune his guitar at a show after Jimi went crazy with the whammy bar, sending his guitar out of tune.)
07. Highway
08. All My Loving
09. The Long And Winding Road
10. My Love
11. Blackbird (story about civil rights movement, and how this song was about the events in Birmingham)
12. Here Today (John Lennon tribute. Paul said he wrote this for John after he died, and mentioned that sometimes you never tell your friends the things you want to tell them when they are around. This song is what Paul wanted to say to John).
13. Dance Tonight
14. Calico Skies
15. Mrs Vanderbilt
16 It's so Easy (Buddy Holly cover. Paul said that one of their favorite musicians while growing up was from Lubbock - Buddy Holly. So just for this show, the only time he’d played this song live, they did the song for us).
17. Eleanor Rigby
18. Sing The Changes
19. Band On The Run
20. Back In The USSR

21. I'm Down
22. Something (George Harrison tribute, first half was Paul playing solo with a ukulele George gave him. Second half was played with full band.)
23. I've Got A Feeling
24. Paperback Writer
25. A Day In The Life / Give Peace A Chance
26. Let It Be
27. Live And Let Die
28. Hey Jude

First Encore
29. Day Tripper
30. Lady Madonna
31. I Saw Her Standing There

Second Encore
32. Yesterday
33. Helter Skelter
34. Get Back
35. Sgt. Pepper Reprise/The End

Paul McCartney is here and CK and I have tickets to the show tonight. The hard part: getting to the show. There is a Rangers game going on at almost the same time not too far from the stadium and practically all of DFW will be converging on the area. I'm taking a train to CK's office's part of town and then we're driving to the stadium together. Hopefully, we'll make it on time.

I turned down an opportunity to see Depeche Mode with my work friends in order to go to Austin and help my sister celebrate her 35th birthday. Am I good brother or what?

Soundgarden recorded a song called Sub Pop Rock City for release on the record label Sub Pop's compilation Sub Pop 200. Jonathon and Bruce were the owners of the label. One verse of the song goes:

[Phone ringing]
Hello?
Actual phone call recording: "This is Jonathan."
Hey Jon
"I just want to know what the heck is going on."
Well, you know, I have this problem
"What the heck is going on?"
Yeah, ok, do you think you would have too much trouble if we got rid of our sideburns?
"At your earliest convenience."
Well, I know, you said that before, but do you think Bruce would mind?
"This is Bruce Pavitt."
Hey Bruce, I mean, ok, can we have our drummer back please?
"Bye!"

Our shredder wants to make sure you don't try to stick your hand, or tie, into it. Nice.

The list got longer:

Stan Getz and Joao Gilberto - Getz/Gilberto
Fugazi - Repeater + 3 Songs (still looking for Red Medicine and Argument)
Deathray Davies - The Day of the Ray and Midnight At the Black Nailpolish Factory
Elvis Presley - #1s
Letters to Cleo - Aurora Gory Alice
Muse - Showbiz
New Bomb Turks - The Night Before The Day The Earth Stood Still
REM - Green
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Mother's Milk

Today is the last day of the July Texas bar. Good luck to the bar takers! You're almost done. If you're anything like me, you will have made big plans to go get shit-faced right after the bar, but you'll actually go straight to bed.

I did some digging through boxes last night and discovered a ton of CDs I forgot I had, including three (not one, as previously thought) Sonic Youth CDs I didn't even know I owned. I'm working my way through Goo right now. It's all good. Every song. I know I'm only about 18 years late, but in classic Particleman fashion, I'm way behind the time curve but still totally hip. But not hipster hip. Just hip. The other Sonic Youth CDs I found were Experimental Jet Set and Dirty.

Other CDs I found were:
Sup Pop 200 (compilation)
Jesus Lizard - Shot
Babes in Toyland - Nemesisters
L7 - Bricks are Heavy
Bad Religion (two of the newish albums, which might suck)
Pulp - This is Hardcore
Mudhoney - My Brother The Cow

Get ready for some CD reviews of old CDs! I bought these CDs at some point in my life and forgot about them. I need to find out why I bought them, and why I forgot about them. And then if I still like them.

As you may or may not know, I maintain a list of every concert or music show I've ever seen (see link on right side of this page). I thought it would be cool to look at one day when I'm old cranky. You know, as opposed to 29 and cranky.

I decided to see who else keeps such lists. I found a few:

Sit. Stay. Good Blog.
Notthatanyonecares.com
Rock-revival.com

I'm thinking I should move my concert list from a Word document linked on the this page to this page itself. Or maybe create a separate page for it.

Yeah, it's a slow Monday morning.

I recently saw the documentary Hype!. I have a strange fascination with music "scenes" or "movements" that transformed a geographical area, music subculture, or entire music genres, and then disappeared. Hype! gave me the lowdown on everything I didn't already know about the goings-on of the bands that materialized in the Seattle area in the mid 80s to mid 90s. I've always known that "grunge" was a made up word, but now that I've seen Hype!, I have more of the facts of the so-called "grunge" movement.

If you in any way have an interest in learning exactly what happened in the "grunge movement," this documentary will more or less lay it all out for you.

The first big surprise I can tell you is that there really wasn't a movement at all. At least not an organized one. Any "movement" was the product of everyone outside of the "movement" deciding there should be a movement.

This makes my fourth Sonic Youth show. The sound at this show was probably the best among any of the other shows I've seen. I've somehow managed to never own any Sonic Youth albums, except when I think I might have had the Dirty cd for a while, though it managed to disappear at some point. Whenever I see Sonic Youth, I only vaguely remember any of the songs but I tend to like all or almost all of them.

I think knowing the Sonic Youth songs is kind of optional when seeing them live. In fact, I think the shows are more fun not knowing what will come next when they start a song. Their songs are so diverse and dynamic that most of the fun for me comes from watching them navigate their way through the song. On the other hand, one of the last songs of the set was an "old song," and I really like it, and now I have no idea what song it is or where I can find it. I suppose I may cave in and acquaint myself with some of their older albums so I can better track how they progressed from noise-punk outfit to their current schtick of avant-garde borderline experimental indie rock.

My only complaint at this show was the lack of inter-song banter. Kim hardly said a word. Thurston joked around a little, and Lee chimed in, but there was no other audience communication. I don't remember very many Thank Yous, either, which I think is pretty easy to do.

Otherwise, they seemed like they were in good form and it was a fun show. If you get a chance, you should try to catch one of their shows.

PS - if you're curious, the other SY shows were:

8/02/02 – Stubb’s, Austin, TX
8/30/02 – Crystal Ballroom, Portland, OR (happened to be at the right place at the right time)
7/04/08 – Battery Park - New York, NY (happened to be at the right place at the right time)

Hey Dallas readers-

If you have a Citibank credit card (or know someone who does), Sonic Youth tickets for tonight's show at House of Blues can be had for $5 plus an assortment of fees, for a total price of around $15 if you pay by credit card and choose to get your ticket by email. If you pay by credit card, you don't need to use the Citibank card to get the discount. You only need the last few numbers of the Citi card to activate the discount. After that, you can pay however you want.

Go here for Sonic Youth tickets.

You can also go here for other Live Nation tickets without paying any service fees, for today (July 15) only. If you want to see Aerosmith this Sunday, for example, you can get lawn seats for $30, with no service fees. I saw Aerosmith in high school and enjoyed the show.

CK and I are in Aspen for a few days visiting her parents, who come to Aspen every summer for one to two weeks. So far, we've walked around the town and looked at a lot of things and eaten a lot of food, which I've found is extremely taxing and has alerted me to the low oxygen levels at this altitude. CK and I found several cool pubs frequented by what appear to be locals and 20-somethings with nothing better to do than drink.

Today, our plan is to go white water rafting. Depending on how beat we are, CK and I may also rent cruisers and ride around town, or maybe go for a hike with her folks.

Other planned activities include: nothing at all, more cycling, more walking, more eating, and more drinking. It will prove to be a difficult and challenging few days. I'll keep you posted on our progress.

What, you've never lived in Oman? Never even been there? Would you want to know what happens when two charismatic and outdoorsy engineers (I know that's kind of an oxymoron) from Texas pull up their roots and move to Oman for six months for work? Of course you do. Go here:

Bree and Brian's Excellent Adventures

Remember my old friend Mr. Pinch Blogger? He blogged on this here blog for quite some time, and did a bang-up job of it too. Well, he's the one who ran off to Oman with his wife. See more of his witty writings at his new, Oman-centric blog.

I'm happy to admit I don't really know what this Twitter thing is all about. For someone who was supposedly once employed in and involved heavily with technology, I'm remarkably behind the times. I remember when Twitter came out. I thought it was the same thing as text messaging, except free. I also thought it was yet another way people can get around having to actually use a phone and call someone to tell them what they're up to. I also thought it was just more data to firehose at people who are likely already getting firehosed with too much data.

At either rate, I'm glad to see this Twitter thing has caught on and found a market niche for itself. Not that I'm using it. Oh, no. I'm much too lazy for that. I only know for sure that it's taken off because I've finally seen it show up in my legal work. One of my clients wants to use Twitter to advertise. And we all know, once a communication medium is considered by businesses as a viable advertising tool, it's officially hit the bigtime.

Congrats, Twitter. Business want to use you to hawk their wares. You've made it.

I also think the political use of Twitter with the Iran election situation is impressive. I'm glad a culture is able to circumvent their oppressive political systems and use technology to communicate with the world. If Twitter has ever had to demonstrate its usefulness to the world and prove its meaning in life, this was it.

Potter, Stars Trek and Wars, Matrix all the same movie

I've felt this way for a while. I think Lord of the Rings can be thrown in there too. Modified version:

Once upon a time, Luke | Kirk | Neo | Harry | Frodo was living a miserable/uneventful life. Feeling disconnected from his friends and family, he dreams about how his life could be different. One day, he is greeted by Obi Wan | Captain Pike | Trinity | Hagrid | Gandalf and told that his life is not what it seems, and that due to some circumstances surrounding his birth | birth | birth | infancy | birth* he was meant for something greater.

* Whether through his family connection to Bilbo or some other unexplained power that allows him to resist the ring.

Turns out I'm turning 30 this October. I know. It's as much a shock to me as it is to you. I really don't deserve having a 3 in the first spot in my age. I appear to possess all of the basic attributes of adulthood, but it's really a facade: house, car, job, bills, general late 20s disillusionment and the requisite pre-mid-life existential crisis. All meaningless. All hollow. My favorite lyrics are still the lyrics to Beck's Cyanide Breathmint and Bogusflow (those are two different songs). I still watch The Big Lebowski once per month. I still write bad songs on the guitar and attempt to cross Nirvana with The Dead Milkmen with Nick Drake. It doesn't work.

I need a birthday bash idea to blow away all other possible birthday bashes. I'll put down my first idea here. It's something I've wanted to do for a long time. I don't know how much it costs, but I'm pretty sure I'd have to take out another mortgage to afford it, and it just might be worth it. Here it is:

1. Hire the Foo Fighters to play at my party. I really just want to jam out on bass with the Foos and get stupid drunk with them afterwards. Or before. Both, probably. We'd have to play a bunch of covers, naturally. Goofy ones. Or at least make fun of some classics. I'm thinking Elton John. Fleetwood Mac. Maybe throw some Danzig in there for good measure.

2. ??? This is where you come in. Feel free to suggest other ideas.

WARNING: SPOILER (kind of)

CK and I watched The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Always the critical analysts, we discovered something of an inconsistency in the movie's theory about Benjamin's condition.

Given: Benjamin was born young in spirit but old in physical development, continuing to mature emotionally and mentally and "devolve" physically from an old man to a youth as time passed.

Extrapolated postulate of movie: Benjamin would have to die a "traditional" baby-like baby in physical development but an old man in spirit.

Actual end-game of movie: Benjamin dies a traditional baby-like baby in physical development but, rather than continuing to age mentally and emotionally with his life experiences and memories in tow, he loses his memory, suffers from dementia, and devolves into a baby in spirit.

Why the movie crew decided not to have a baby-looking baby talk and act like an old man must only be attributed to the difficulties in getting a baby to posses the speech skills of an adult. Could they really have given us a Benjamin that looked like an infant but talked like an old man? Maybe. Maybe not. They did give us a Benjamin that looked like an "old baby" but acted like a youth. Anything's possible in that context.

On the other hand, perhaps the dementia makes sense. As we age in the first few years of life, our brains make connections to hold more and more memories and make more and more thoughts. If memories and thoughts once existed in connections that Benjamin had, and he started losing connections as he physically devolved into an infant, he would lose the connections, and, with them, memories and thoughts, only to be replaced with confusion.

CK and I booked our beach vacation. We chose a hotel/resort/compound 30 minutes south of Cancun that seriously looks like another planet. I've been to Mexico before and I've seen the beaches, but this place just look ridiculous. They have their own jungle. I'm pretty excited.

Particleman.org now has a webmaster. Not just any webmaster - but my beautiful, intelligent, and charmingly geeky girlfriend, henceforth known as CK. She got the captcha password thing to work on the comments after I failed miserably ages ago and then gave up entirely on having comments. Thank you, CK, for fixing my broken comments.

So - comment away. I guess this means I should start blogging more now.

Um, I planted grass this weekend. My legs hurt like a sonofabitch. I also saw bits and pieces of The Chronicles of Narnia, which has to be one of the longest movies I've somewhat paid attention to.

CK and I are planning a beach vacation. Should we go to Cancun proper, Isla Mujeres, or one of the other towns down the Riviera Maya coast? We're not too crazy about the touristy parts of the area, so Cancun does not score high on our list. I've been to Isla Mujeres and Tulum and liked them both, and I'm inclined to go back.

I'm pretty sure I still spend more time there than I do at the house. At least I know I'm making progress on the house, that is, in between trips back here from home depot.

Something funny happened to me a couple weeks ago. I decided i wanted to turn this house into more than a never-ending project. I wanted to make it something that I liked looking at. Something that resembled a "home." So I started working on my lawn and my garden. I am proud to say that I now have "flowers" and "plants" in the flower beds in front of my house. Only time will tell if these things survive the harsh environment that is the place where I reside (I tend to kill plants) or if they become brown and crackly and dry excuses for something that was once alive and beautiful. I know that all I need to do is water them and make sure they get sun, but even that isn't always easy. I'm not sure they'll get the right amount of sun, or the right kind of sun.

Another thing I've noticed - I talk about my house way too much. And flowers. And sprinkler systems. And kitchen tile. And faucets. It's fucking lame. Thankfully though, I do have something else to talk about.

Music. My band has been very active lately. We've had several gigs this month and we've been working hard to build up our set and hone our sound. We've been choosing some lesser-known Beatles songs such as I Want You (She's So Heavy), If I Fell, and Fixing a Hole. It's great to see audience members react to our renditions of the Beatles classics - whether #1 hit or oddity. Who can't love a reggae version of I Want To Hold Your Hand or an instrumental version of Blackbird with flute instead of vocals? No one. No one, I tell you.

Oh yeah. I bought my first real leather sofa. Just had to get that in there. No more futon for me. I'm slowly whittling away at my college and post-college furniture. Which will then become guest room furniture...

But I moved into Home Depot. For anyone who has bought a house, I think you understand. And for those who have not bought a house, imagine buying a car, and then realizing you don't like the steering wheel, or the seats, or the door handles, or the A/C knobs, or the shocks, and so on. That's kind of what buying a house is like. At least, an older house.

If not, let me refresh your recollection. Turns out she responded to heather's post about her. Cool. And she's writing new songs. Cooler.

Here at particleman.org, we never make excuses for not posting regularly. Even when "not posting regularly" means not posting for three months. Oops.

Quite a few notable things have happened since we last spoke. My Beatles band finished a recording a demo, which was a lengthy and challenging experience, mostly because I was the one that did the recording. Let me tell you folks, recording a band is no simple feat, especially when recording with limited equipment and recording knowledge. We succeeded, however, and the demo is complete.

I decided to buy a house. I guess that makes me "responsible" and "adult" and "fucking broke." I had no idea buying a house was such massively costly ordeal. I'm not complaining, though, because the market is so favorable for buyers right now that my interest rate is ridiculously low, the gentlemen who owned the house sold it to me for less than market value because he was older and "wanted to help a young fella out," and Obama is going to give me $8,000, or so he says. I'll believe it when i see it.

Where is the house, you ask? In the cool part of town, of course. But not the cool part of town where everything is new and Europe-esque and completely overcrowded and overpriced (not that there's anything wrong with that - if that's what you like, hey, more power to you). My house is in the cool part of town where the houses were built in the 1950s, where someone's grandma and grandpa likely still live in their first house, where not three minutes away is a funky street lined with bars, cool restaurants, and a kick ass music venue, where literally across the street is a lake with a 10-mile bike path, and most importantly, where the land value will create a long-term investment for me.

Now, let's be realistic. A 1950s home? Wouldn't an older home be a slightly different owning experience than, say, a new home? Yes. Resoundingly yes. This house needs work. Quite a bit of work. But I'm determined to bring this house from 1955 to, at least, 1995. Maybe one day I can bring it to 2005. That shit gets expensive though, so I may hang out at 1995 for a while. Anyone have some nice used appliances they can sell me? I kid. Not really.

Consistent with that authentic particleman flavor of posting pictures of dishwashers, I will take a picture of the dishwasher in this house and post it for your amusement. It's a piece of American history. It should be in the Smithsonian. Or National Geographic. It will probably end up on Craigslist.

Other cool things that happened recently: As the previous post indicates, I went to Vegas, again, but this time with my special someone. We saw Billy Joel and the Beatles Love show and lost money at the craps table. Yay! I went to my girlfriend's parents' birthday party in San Antonio and spotted an older gentlemen reminiscing about the old days walking around with an oregano joint. I managed to not ride my bikes for two months (lame). I accidentally got really drunk last night at my friend's wedding rehearsal dinner after-party, and I woke up and wrote this blog post. My head still hurts. I'm going back to bed.

I went to Las Vegas for the first time. For a bachelor party. And I lost some money at a variety of establishments in and around the strip. I will not comment where I left my money and how I left it, but let it be known that Las Vegas is a money pit. A wild, crazy, and fun money pit. And it just so happens that I'm going back for Valentine's Day. The Girlfriend's birthday is February 13, so we're flying to Vegas to see Billy Joel and the Beatles Love show and to generally lose money together. Because losing money with your special someone is much better than losing money with a bunch of strangers.

Maybe this time the blackjack gods won't curse me hand after hand.

My Beatles band practices at a practice space called Universal Rehearsal. Down the hall from our little 11x11 room are two large padlocked double doors with a sign that reads, "Smile, you're on candid camera, stupid!" to deter would-be thieves from attempting any foolishness. I originally thought it was a storage room for the owners of the building.

Last week i went to practice and noticed that the doors were open. This was the first time in a year that I had ever seen the doors open. The room dwarfed my band's practice room. To my surprise, it was not a storage room. Well, it may very well be a storage room for the time being, but not for the building owners. In the room I saw stacks of speakers and music equipment cases with "TOADIES" spray painted on the cases. A large drum riser sat against one wall. The room is the practice space for the band The Toadies. I knew they practiced in the building, but I didn't exactly know they were down the hall. Cool.

I added an author post-sorting mechanism. Finally. You can now sort posts by the various and sundry authors that have appeared on this blog. Please direct your attention to the new heading "CONTRIBUTORS" underneath "PROPRIETOR" and marvel at the new links.

You're welcome. My Chrismukkah present to you. It only took me three years.

Winter showed up a while ago. I went into hiding. I've been working a lot. Working at work and working on my band. We played a show at a local Irish pub. Good times. I've also been doing a lot of traveling -all within Texas. Houston, Austin, and San Antonio. All of this is basically my attempt at making an excuse for not posting for two months. Oops. At either rate, I'm here, I'm back, and I'm ready to write. Run and hide.

I saw the Polyphonic Spree Holiday Extravaganza a couple weeks ago at the Granada Theater here in Dallas. In case you have no idea what any of that means, The Polyphonic Spree is an odd orchestral rock band with a varying lineup of musicians depending on the size of the venue. It's a little difficult to describe. The Polyphonic Spree creates positive music. It rocks. It's huge. It's complicated. It's a firehose of instrumentation. It's a wall of sound. Imagine a scaled-down orchestra complete with strings, horns, harp, flute, and percussion, combined with a six-piece choir, a rock band, a keyboard player, another keyboard player with sampling devices, and singer/conductor who sporadically jumps onto a podium to sing.

Some of the instruments get lost in the mix. The harp, flute, and strings were completely drowned out by the horns, choir, and rock band. There's a reason why orchestras don't have that many different types of instruments. Strings only work well when accompanied by other instruments when there are lots of strings to boost the sound. Horns, on the other hand, naturally push more air and need less amplification and can easily cut through the mix. The Polyphonic Spree ignores all of these usual constraints and throws together a patchwork quilt of instruments. I've been told that getting the sound mix right at live shows is a tricky task, and that if the sound is not mixed just right, the show is unlistenable.

The show itself was phenomenal. They played moving images on two gigantic movie projectors on either side of the venue hall throughout the entirety of the show. The first part of the show was the Christmas set. They covered Christmas songs of all types, some of which i knew, most of which i didn't. They also played a song from The Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack which prompted me to watch the move twice the following week. I hadn't seen it since its release in the 90s.

The second half of the show, which went till after 2 am, was the "normal," non-Christmas set. Interspersed throughout the evening were other side-acts that helped distract us from the length of the show (it started at 8 and ended at 2:something). I was late to the show so I only caught two of the side acts. One was a subset of musicians from the main band that donned baroque wigs and played original and cover songs, one of which was Because by The Beatles. The other side act I saw was Morgan Taylor, a guy who created an entire world of music, images, and other media about a character he created named Gustafer Yellowgold. It seemed to be geared towards kids, but i found it catchy and kind of refreshing and innocent.

The Polyphonic Spree also liberally blasted the space above the audience with confetti and dumped balloons on our heads. The guy next to me lost his glasses to a stray balloon, only to recover them thanks to someone 10 feet away who found them on the floor.

A photographer also took pictures of the band and audience. I made it into several of the pictures. Here's one of them.

Where's Particleman?

Blog posts to come: New Toadies album, new Breeders album, re-discovering old music, finding the funk, and trying to stay in shape.

I just turned 29. It's such a pointless age. It's like turning 20 in a state with a drinking age of 21. Rather than bitch and complain about my age, and claim I'm 21 plus some number, or 25 plus some number, I'm going to say I'm 30 minus some number. That way, I'll be establishing a pattern once I pass 30 and start adding years to my birthday in the form of, "I'm 30, for the third time" or something.

It's brilliant, I know.

I've been getting slammed with comment spam the past few days. I disabled comments until I find a suitable spam-prevention device. Apologies for the inconvenience.

I have a new obsession, and its name is someecards.com. They're witty one-liner e-cards for any and no occasion whatsoever. Here's an example from the "workplace" category:

Be careful, though. Those of the faint of heart should take caution before browsing the cards. Some are rather racy and/or make use of foul language. Kind of like the one I pasted above. Sorry.

Besides looking for fun cards to send to people, I also discovered the "Make your own e-cards" section of the site. And as one person told me after giving me a card-worthy topic about which to create a card, I turned into something of a card monster. I'll come up with a card topic and create four cards, and send them one after another. To the same lucky individual. You know, for feedback. Then I submit the best one to the someecard board of directors (or whatever the hell they are) for consideration on the main site. Chances of publication? Low. Thrill level I'll experience if they actually choose my card, or a derivative of my card, or something kinda similar to my card but clearly not my card for publishing on the main site? Ridiculously high.

Some of my cards:

Addendum: I've been notified by the originator of the first card I created above (please see below comment) that the idea for the card was not mine and should properly be credited to the originator of the idea. I hereby relinquish my claim to originating the "falling asleep while with one's partner in an intimate situation" card idea to the original creator, who was not me, who called me to complain. I will maintain ownership, however, of the unique implementation of the idea as embodied in the card above. The unique combination of picture, card color, and phrasing of the idea are properly attributable to me. Sorry for any confusion.

One of my friends called me with a strange legal question the other day. He's the sales rep for a new flip-flop company. As you know, flip-flops often contain rubber. The question went like this:

Do you know of any tort where someone can sue if a flip-flop melts and gets stuck to the bottom of your foot? You know, like if you're sitting by a fireplace or something and the rubber catches fire and melts? Can they sue for that?

Feel free to post your responses.

Am I the only person who wanted desperately for Sarah Palin to say "hockey mom" at the debate last night? That was all I wanted to hear. "I'm a hockey mom."

Unfortunately, I was too busy drinking at a happy to pay much attention to the TVs showing the debate. Oops.

I signed up for a bike tour in Glen Rose, TX called the Paluxy Pedal. Don't know where Glen Rose is? Yeah, neither did I. Turns out it's about 50 miles southwest of Ft. Worth in the Hill Country. Small towns all over Texas host bike tours throughout most of the year to attract tourists and support local businesses. This tour comes in four flavors: 30, 45, 60, and 80 miles. I opted for the 45-mile version since I'm out of shape and figure three to four hours on the bike is about all I'll feel like at 8:30 on a Saturday morning.

I signed up with my colleague and manager. When I sent the email to them asking if they were interested, the responses included:

Glen Rose is all about the hills. With me on a MTB (I'll get some more appropriate tires) and mostly out of shape, I hope you're ready for a slow ride.

45 miles? I've never even done 30.

Troopers they are, they both agreed to come along. The ride is Saturday, October 11, at 8:30 am. Show up hungover, out of shape, asleep, or on a tricycle. Whatever. I'll be at least three of those things.

If you're interested in other rides, check out TexBiker.net.

I heard about this acoustic rock duo from Mexico called Rodrigo y Gabriela last week and I have totally lost it for this band. What happens when you combine old school thrash metal with classical Spanish guitar? Some damn good music, and some damn good musicianship.

Rodrigo and Gabriela were apparently in a thrash metal band in Mexico and gave it up to start their own duo in Dublin. The result can be seen here.

I remember reading something about this group on V's website, but of course I can't find the link now. I wish I had checked them out then. Rodrigo y Gabriela's music blows me away. I love it. Gabriela's thumps, bangs, strums, plucks, and smacks her guitar to keep the beat and the melody while Rodrigo adds a layer of solos and occasional strumming and banging as well. In basic terms, she's the rhythm section, and he's lead guitar. It's a fantastic idea and they pull it off perfectly.

They also cover an old Metallica song. I was a Metallica fan in my junior high days, and Rodrigo y Gabriela's song Orion sounded vaguely like it was laced with Kirk Hammett guitar lines and classic metal riffing. Lo and behold, Orion is a 1986 Metallica song from Master of Puppets. The rest of Rodrigo y Gabriela's music borrows from metal guitar here and there in melody and sometimes style.

Mostly, what I like about Rodrigo y Gabriela's music is the rhythm. It feels like traditional Spanish guitar music, but with a beat that moves you. I can't wait for them to come to Texas. If they don't come to Dallas, I will do my best to get to wherever they are playing. And you should too.

The last update was 10/12/07, so a lot of new shows have been added.

My parents and friends are without power. I spent most of my life in Houston and I don't remember any hurricane causing this much damage, and Ike wasn't even that severe of a hurricane. If all goes according to plan, I will be in Houston this weekend helping my parents clean up and get things back in order. Thankfully, their house wasn't damaged.

In other news, um, I have no real other news. Except for that the summer is over and it's officially been one year since I started working full-time as a lawyer. It's been a great year. Challenging, but great, and I'm looking forward to the next year. A lot of interesting stuff is happening with copyright law and music law, stuff that no one except copyright law geeks like me care about, but here's one thing that you guys might appreciate: Lars Ulrich Fine with Metallica Album Leak.

A long, long time ago, I mentioned to my boss, a huge Nine Inch Nail fan, that we should make a work event of the upcoming Nine Inch Nails concert. You see, Nine Inch Nails have a special meaning for my boss and me. My very first day as an intern in the summer of 2006 involved Nine Inch Nails. I sat in her office, eager for my first day, and she told me that she spent the previous night rocking out at the Nine Inch Nails concert. I was jealous. Then she mentioned she was surprised that Nine Inch Nails played "Hurt, you know, that Johnny Cash song."

Huh? She must mean "Hurt, the Nine Inch Nails song that Johnny Cash covered, not the other way around." She was doubtful, so I insisted she ask Google and see what it said. Lo and behold, Google told her Hurt was indeed a NIN song. So, my working relationship with my boss started with Nine Inch Nails. Granted, she was rocking out to Nine Inch Nails before I knew they existed, and before I had finished Junior High, actually.

I mentioned to her that we should make a work event out of this summer's NIN show because both of us are fans, and the other lawyer in my department and our managing partner are also fans. She said it sounded like a good idea. And we went back to work and completely forgot about it.

Fast forward to this summer. Last month, I get an email with the following subject: "FW: Thank You for your purchase of four Nine Inch Nails tickets for Dallas, TX." The managing partner got us four seats.

The show was last Monday. It was awesome. Besides playing a great set of both old and new songs, the light show was fantastic. It was the best light show I've seen at any rock concert. Better than Muse and better than Massive Attack. This light show was something else. I can't even describe it because I don't really know what they did, but all I can say is they had three gigantic LCD screens, a translucent light screen, and hanging light sticks that hung down to stage level blinking in rhythm.

As for the music, I am not crazy about the new stuff, but the old stuff was great, of course. What I've noticed about the new stuff is that the music is more 'open.' That is, there seems to be less going on musically. It's been stripped down. There is more open air in the drum tracks, providing more space for other instruments and 'thicker' vocals. Or sometimes, the new open space is left open, so the tracks sound less busy, which I think is a good thing.

A lot of the older NIN songs sounded very busy - lots going on, and not much empty air to build with. I think learning to use open space effectively is something that comes to a songwriter with experience. Trent is probably at the point where he wants to leave the songs with more open space. I think it's a good dynamic. I still crave the crazy, seething energy of the older songs, but the new songs do break up the set. Instead of noise-fest after noise-fest, the new songs demonstrate a very different style of songwriting and give the listener some time to process all of the music. Not to say all older songs lacked open space entirely - Piggy, Hurt, and Closer all make use of open space - but the new songs are much more stripped-down. I just hope he doesn't lose that edge. It's hard to maintain the same high energy level in songwriting when you're not young and angry anymore, and you don't have as much to prove. The music has to change, but hopefully it doesn't lose its impact.

I went to Israel in July to see family and hang out with my cousin. My cousin, a 28-year old computer engineer, managed to get all 10 days of my trip off from work. We did a lot of random stuff, so I'll just list everything out in completely nonsensical and unchronological order, as usual.

1. Went to Haifa to see the Bahaii Gardens and ride a cablecar. The gardens are on the side of a hill and are the most lush gardens I have ever seen.
2. Ate a lot of shawarma. A lot as in every other day. The shawarma in Dallas just isn’t the same.
3. Went hiking somewhere outside Jerusalem after the trail closed but also after my cousin was able to convince the guard to let us in anyway.
4. Manage to not get blown up (it’s not really not as bad as the media makes it seem. Don’t believe the hype. The country isn’t self-destructing).
5. Went to a lot of bars and pubs. Drank and danced.
6. Went to Hertzliyah beach twice and Tel Aviv beach twice.
7. Got completely sunburned at Tel Aviv beach. But not the time I stripped down to my boxers and jumped in the sea without sunscreen. I got burned when I wore sunscreen.
8. Avoided Jerusalem.
9. Discovered that lawyers have a worse reputation in Israel than they do in the US.
10. Met a lot of amazing people.
11. BBQ'd hamburgers, hot dogs, and shishkabobs in a park.
12. Went to Yafo, one of the oldest port cities in the world.
13. Embarrassed myself with my broken Hebrew on a daily basis.
14. Was informed my glasses were out of style and that I ought to get some new ones (I did. Once back at home. They’re cool).
15. At my uncle’s home-made falafel.
16. Gorged on humus.
17. Did I mention that I ate a lot?

I bought Apple iWork a while ago out of spite for Microsoft and I'm starting to miss Excel. There is no equivalent of Excel's "Freeze Pane" in iWork's Numbers. This makes working in large spreadsheets much more difficult. I also don't see the use in moving the "Worksheets" bar to the side of the application, where it takes horizontal space away from the spreadsheet itself.

Apple, please give me Freeze Pane, and please nix the side-mounted Worksheet tab.

Thanks.

particleman

I went to New York for the July 4th weekend to hang out with one of my friends. It was a great time. I'm trying to recall everything we did but it's only coming back in pieces (as usual), so here is a jumbled list of what we did:

1. Saw Sonic Youth at a free outdoor concert at Battery Park
2. Waited in line to see Sonic Youth only to get turned away, but found a way to watch the show anyway with a bunch of people that were also turned away
3. Drank too much beer at a pub in Brooklyn, a bar in Brooklyn, and a Belgian bar in the West Village. The Belgian bar only served Belgian beer.
4. Ate street pizza in Brooklyn, and the West Village.
5. Convinced my friend's friend to propose to a girl in the subway with a quarter and a ring box I found attached to fake plastic Christmas tree branches wrapped around a light pole in Brooklyn. (she said no)
6. Went to the New Museum.
7. Went to Chelsea Pier and slept on the grass.
8. Went to Brooklyn Bridge.
9. Walked a lot.
10. Ate a lot of good food.
11. Watched a bartender spank a customer with a belt. He asked for it. So did a lot of other guys. They took pictures. She liked it too.

Thank you Jess for an awesome weekend.

I'm in Israel visiting my family in Hertzliah. My cousin and I are about to go out to a "dance bar" with his friends. Apparently it's a bar with different kinds of music in different rooms. I think these things exist in Dallas, but I wouldn't know, because I keep going to pubs.

I got here yesterday afternoon and we went straight to the beach after I landed. It was awesome.

The rest of the week will consist of more beach, more bars, and some traveling around the country to go hiking, kayaking, and maybe camping. I haven't been in Israel since 2002 (I think) so it's nice to be back and see everyone.

More to come...

Hey particlefans. Guess what. I moved. Again. In case you had forgotten, moving sucks. The owner of the duplex in which I lived sold the house and the owners have two sons who decided to occupy the duplex. After looking around for a suitable place to live, I finally signed a lease a whole five days before I had to be out of the duplex. Yes, I like to live on the edge. I spent Saturday and Sunday frantically packing and moving.

Because renting a moving truck would have been really expensive with that short of a notice, I ended up making 48 trips to and from the new place with my car filling it up as much as I could. Ok, maybe not 48 trips. But it was a lot. At least the new place was a whole two blocks away, so it wasn't so bad. And my friend with a pickup truck came to help too. And so did his fiance. Well, she mostly rode in the love seat in the truck bed talking on the phone, but, you know. That's how it goes. (She's from Oklahoma so she knows what she's doing) (Her words, not mine).

Oh, and did I tell you? I'm blogging from my new Macbook, which I got a while ago. It's sleek and black and awesome. And totally not Windows.

I didn't get to confirm that she was really Q T. Oh well.

If you don't play an instrument, or you don't care about key changes and music composition, you may want to skip this one...

The Yeah Yeah Yeahs released a song called Kiss Kiss that I immediately liked. I couldn't figure out exactly why, but the progression in the verse section sounded like something else I knew, but I couldn't place where it came from.

I had Nirvana's Nevermind playing in the car for a couple of days. I'll sometimes listen to a song four or five times in a row because I focus on different parts of the song. On the way home from a friend's house last night, I listened to Drain You for the entire duration of a 20 minute drive.

Then this morning, something occurred to me. The reason Kiss Kiss sounded familiar and the reason I couldn't figure out where it came from is because the verse progression is a carbon copy of the verse section of Drain You, but in a different key. I recognized the intervals, but because the key was different, I didn't immediately pick up that it was essentially the same riff.

I verified this by checking the Kiss Kiss tab. There it was. Drain You is in A. Kiss Kiss is in D. But the progression is the same.

The Drain You verse section isn't exactly the most unique or ingenuitive progression, but it's strange to see it show up again.

See? This post is really not that interesting for people who aren't music nerds.

One of my favorite movies growing up was Short Circuit. Imagine my surprise when I saw a preview for Pixar's new movie Wall-E.

Meet Wall-E.

Now, meet (not for the first time, I can only hope), Johnny #5.

I rest my case.

That said, I still want to see the movie, I still think it's a great idea for Pixar's next film, and I'm sure Wall-E's creator is tired of people asking if he's seen Short Circuit.

Addendum: Actually, it looks like Short Circuit got its inspiration from another non-human sentient being. Eventually, I will find the first movie to feature an alien or robot with a head shaped like binoculars on top of a long neck and squarish body.

June 4 - 8: NYC with my boss. We're meeting with clients on Thursday and Friday and then staying for the weekend. It's my first time to New York proper so I'm psyched.

June 21-22: toobing in San Marcos.

July 4-6: NYC again. This trip was planned months ago; the one above was planned well afterward. I'm going to hang out with my friend who is interning at a law firm in NY. July 4th in New York! Woo hoo!

July 17-27: Israel. I haven't gone to visit my cousin in five years, so I figured it was time to suck it up and make the flight. I'm gonna plop down on the Tel Aviv beach and take in the scenery...

This song has been stuck in my head for weeks. I wish I could write songs half as good as this one. With only four chords, she manages to create a catchy and powerful melody.

Not to mention PJ Harvey is totally hot.

I saw The Breeders last week. And they weren't drunk and/or high on something this time. I saw The Breeders in college (2000?) and I'm pretty sure Kim and/or Kelley had engaged in illicit substances prior to the show. But this time, the Deal sisters were sober and witty. They played some of my old favorites - Iris, I Just Wanna Get Along, Shocker In Gloomtown, Divine Hammer, and a song I did not expect to hear, Happiness Is A Warm Gun, which may have been the best song of the night.

The opening band, Colour Revolt, really wants to be an experimental indie band. They have a ways to go. "A" for effort. I'll reserve judgment on the rest.

Who knows how long the Deal sisters will keep touring. Go see them while you can. It's a nice taste of off-camber mid-90s indie-pop. Which, of course, will never go out of style.

I went biking after work on Wednesday in an effort to whip myself back into shape. It's been a while since I've ridden the ol' bikes on a consistent basis and I figure I am all out of excuses (rain, cold, work, band, lazy) so I was determined to get a lap or two in at the lake.

The first lap was great. I hauled ass and went faster than I normally do. Since the sun was still kind of up, I thought I could get one more lap in before it set entirely, so kept riding. About twenty minutes into the second lap, something strange happened. Well, it I wasn't so strange because I experienced the same thing a couple summers ago when I was an intern here, but I didn't expect the same thing to happen since it's not really summer yet.

What happened was this: swarms of tiny airborn bugs descended on the lake. It was like the Ten Plagues. Determined to drive me away from their feeding grounds, they bombarded me with their presence. They made noise as they hit my helmet and glasses and bike. They were too small to see with the fading light, but as soon as the sun was completely down and my bike light was the only thing illuminating the bike path, I could see them streaking past in the night. I had to duck my head as I rode to keep from eating or snorting them. It was hilarious. One of them got caught in my ear. That wasn't a pleasant feeling.

Today, I went for a ride in the beautiful 75 degree three o'clock air with The Evil I. After he complained of nausea and impending hurlage and headed home, I kept riding for another lap. Somewhere along the way I found myself in a strong head wind. While I was huffing and puffing up a hill, a bug much larger than the tiny insects from the other evening set itself on a direct crash course with my mouth and quickly got lodged in my throat.

It happened so fast I hardly had time to come to terms with the fact that I had just eaten a bug. Thankfully, he didn't go all the way down, but had just gotten caught in the back of my throat, so I hocked him right back out. Bastard. I'll show you. Then I vigorously rinsed my mouth with water, cursed at nature, admired the pretty trees, and rode on.

One of my friends had two extra tickets to a Jimmy Buffet concert last night so I called Evil I and drove out to Frisco, TX to meet up with her and her boyfriend. Just so you know, Frisco is the closest I have ever been to Oklahoma without flying over it. I found that rather fascinating for some reason.

She mentioned to me that they were hanging out in their friend's RV in a huge parking lot full of other RVs. I didn't know what to expect. It was a little bit like a Grateful Dead concert experience, or at least what I imagine what one would have been like. And it was also a little bit like your average concert experience, except the fans were a lot older and wearing goofy Hawaiian shirts. Such is apparently the dress code at a Jimmy Buffet concert.

Evil I and I made the trek from our parking space to the stadium and along the way passed through a grassy field temporarily modified into a RV/SUV/whatever you're driving party extravaganza. We passed one guy who said, with a very thick Texas accent, "I pulled that sucker right off and painted it myself," referring to the silver Chevy emblem on the grill of his Chevy truck. At that moment, I could have gone home happy and content. Mission accomplished. I had experienced something unique and entertaining. Regardless, we pressed on for the stadium, which was actually a soccer field for Dallas' soccer team.

Once in line, Evil I and I were treated with more walking comedy: a roaming bachelor party. Who knows where these guys had started their weekend, but as for now, they were all wearing custom-made yellow shirts with various lewd and quirky proclamations. Each guy apparently had his nickname emblazoned on the back of his shirt. One guy called himself "The Canadian Schlonghorn." Again, I could have gone home happy at that point. But we pressed on.

We finally met up with my friend and her boyfriend and entered the stadium. We were greeted with a massive throng of aging hippies and bored executives trying to let loose. It was quite a sight. While walking to our seats, a mid-40s woman and her friend (both drunk) offered Evil I and I a piece of their pink cotton candy. This is not a euphemism. They asserted that pink cotton candy was the better kind. I'm sure.

Once in our seats, we were able to enjoy the Jimmy Buffet concert experience. Basically, imagine sitting on a beach and listening to lazy songs about drinking, sitting, and screwing. Except that we were sitting in plastic seats with 20,000 other people, and there was no beach, which really made me want to take a vacation to a beach. So at that moment, my friend said we should pick a weekend in June and all go to Cancun or something. Sounds good to me. I need a vacation.

My favorite part of the show is that Jimmy Buffet has managed to find what may be the perfect career. He flies around the world filming himself having a good time in various far-off places. He spends a few months out of the year touring and showing videos of these vacations on massive screens at concerts while he stands around and sings a few songs to a bunch of drunk and/or stoned suburbanites. I obviously need to reevaluate my career choice.

After the concert, the four of us went to my friend's friend's RV and hung out and walked around the parking lot. People have apparently driven from all over the Southern US to Frisco for this concert. We saw a Tennessee license plate. People set up party pads next to their RV complete with imported sand to simulate a beach, beach chairs, kiddie pool, PA system playing laid-back tunes, a makeshift bar, mannequin pirate things, so on and so forth. One person built an actual pirate ship on a full length trailer. I'll wait for Evil I to upload the picture. It was impressive.

All in all, it was an unforgettable experience. And fun. I can check off that line item now. I've seen Jimmy Buffet and experienced the Jimmy Buffet concert experience. Even if you don't want to go to a Jimmy Buffet concert, you should take a trip the nearest parking lot or four adjacent to the stadium where Jimmy is platying. It's a free show of drunken hilarity. And you might see a pirate ship on wheels.

I have three options where I could go on my next vacation:

1. Sevilla, Spain, to hang out with my friend and her boyfriend.
2. London, with the singer in my band, to hang out with our friend and all the fun random people she's met by the time we get there.
3. Akumal, Mexico, just south of Cancun, to hang out with some college buddies and their friends and go snorkeling and sit on the beach for a week and drink.

What do you think? I went to Mexico last summer. I was in London for three days in 2001. I was in Sevilla for one day in 2003. Cast your vote.

My sister and her family moved into a new house this past weekend. Being the dutiful brother, I drove to Austin to help with the move. Thankfully, they hired movers to do most of the heavy lifting, allowing me to avoid permanently injuring myself trying to move things that require actual strength. The cool part is that one of the movers' names was Devo. As in, the band. How cool is that? Way cool.

Less cool is having to be asked, "Like, the band?" for your entire life.

All the necessary food groups in one convenient, tasty package. Cheese: protein. Crackers: carbs. Wine: alcohol.

I've been on an 80's music binge lately. Tears For Fears, The Smithereens, and XTC. I've decided that Mad World, Blood and Roses, and Making Plans For Nigel are each pop perfections in their own way. One spooky, one rocking, one goofy. Blood and Roses seems like three and a half minutes of songwriting perfection. The pieces of that song fit together so well.

Since I don't like Microsoft, and I don't want to pay stupid sums of money for Office, I downloaded OpenOffice, free of charge, from their webite and have been running it for about six months. I'm happy to report it doesn't suck. It's actually pretty good, especially considering how much I paid for it. No, it's not a flashy as Office 2007, or even Office 2003, but it gets the job done. Its version of Excel handles formulas just the same as Microsoft's version, and the documents are all cross-compatible. Just be sure you save your "Word" doc as .doc so Microsoft can open it on someone else's computer.

In other news, I'm buying a plane ticket to NYC to my friend over the July 4th weekend. I'm psyched. I'm also pondering a trip to London or Israel, depending entirely on scheduling and flight prices. What was once an $1100 ticket to Israel is now $1700. Bummer. Even England is over a grand now. I remember when flights to London could be had for under $500, and I'm not talking about the "Go to London for Three Days, Starting Tomorrow" deals.

Happy St. Patrick's day. My blog automatically qualifies as St. Paddy's day-friendly because it has green on it. All of the time. Every day. This was not planned.

I spent yesterday at the Greenville (no pun intended) Parade. Greenville is a street that runs north-south through Dallas. The city closes off a mile or so of Greenville every St. Patrick's day Saturday and holds a parade. There is also a concert. This year, Ghostland Observatory was the main act. I bought two tickets a few weeks but thereafter decided not to go. I just didn't feel like it. But my band's guitar player had also bought a ticket, and I really needed the fresh air, so I invited my singer and the three of us had band-bonding-day out in the sun.

Off we went traipsing through a sea of drunk green-clad partiers. The three of us were completely sober the whole time, so we got to laugh at all the drunkies falling all over the place. For some reason, there is something about me that compels strangers to ask me for directions, or advice, or guidance, on what the hell they should do and where they should be going. I'm certainly happy to oblige, but I get the feeling I'm always the guy people ask, "Hey, is this the right way to __________?"

The concert was good and we were all sufficiently sunburned. Especially me. It's mostly my face. When I wrinkle my forehead, it hurts. When I smile, it hurts. It's not pleasant.

I ended the night drinking Guinness with Evil I. I couldn't go through St. Paddy's day without having at least one pint of Guinness, so I figured three was a nice round number. Evil I and I talked about tables, music, engineering, lawyering, paint, traveling, sinks, and home-ownership. You shoulda been there.

Now that St. Paddy's is over, I don't want to see another green shirt for the rest of my life. Please. No more green. Anything that is green kind of annoys me now. The little Skype icon in my computer's tray is green. It annoys me. The forward and back buttons in Firefox are green. They annoy me. My website is kinda green. It annoys me. I think I just OD'd on green. Give me some time. I'll get over it.

I'm back home from Austin. It was a good trip. Max and Maya are the cutest and funniest kids I've ever seen. Maya likes to dance to radio stations on cable TV - especially KISS and Tears For Fears. Max likes to repeat whatever the adults say. My brother-in-law was feeding Max some macaroni when Max spontaneously announced: "No More Attitude." I guess it's something my sister and brother-in-law tell his older sister when she gets saucy.

Otherwise, I hung out and chilled with the fam. On Saturday afternoon, I did a fun thing I like to call "hill repeats." Find yourself one hill, or a set of hills, and ride your bike up and down until your lungs seize up and your legs fall off. Going 37 miles per hour down a hill is pretty thrilling, and kind of scary. Cranking back up the hill at four miles per hour, with no end in sight - not so thrilling. Regardless, it's a form of self-torture I find cleansing.

On Saturday night, my friend and his fiance made dinner for the three of us at their house and we drank wine and caught up. After his fiance went to bed, my friend and I watched a Bugatti race a fighter jet on You Tube. It was a nice and relaxing evening. Not to mention they gave me a bottle of wine - that they made and bottled themselves.

I'm off to Austin this weekend to see the kiddos, aka M&M aka Max and Maya aka my niece and nephew. It will be a good trip. I need a break. Work has been rough the past couple weeks. I inherited a monstrous case and it was my turn for it to overwhelm me, and overwhelmed I was. I might take my bike to ride around the beautiful hills around my sister's house. Outside is calling me. Clarity is calling me. I need to clear my head. There's a lot of crud in there and I'm hoping a change of scenery will help. I feel kind of broken. Maybe Austin can fix me.

Oh yeah, it snowed here in Dallas yesterday. I woke up and found an inch or two of snow on my car. Fun.

Happy weekend.

I've been told to stop posting about so-called "pocket lint," ie, things that one finds in one's pockets. I posted about the slip of paper I picked up in Cancun with a warning against swimming with dolphins. I posted about the receipt from The Flying Saucer (which, mind you, helped Mark from Atlanta find a cool pub to visit).

But just so that the person accusing me of blog misuse understands the person with whom he's dealing, I should mention that this blog has seen posts about dishwashers, thin walls, shower curtains, and broken power transformers. I think I have the right to post about pocket lint. When reading this blog, I think my readers have come to expect a sufficiently minimal amount of intellectual content to consider posts about pocket lint standard fare.

If I wasn't so comfortably sitting in my bed with my laptop, I'd get up and take an actual picture of pocket lint. But that would take too much work, so please imagine some pocket lint. Or stick your hands in your pockets and take a look at your own. We all have it. Pocket lint is the universal clothing accessory.

Now that I think about it, I may add a new post category: pocket lint.

My grandfather died on Valentine's Day. He was 83. He had lived through several heart surgeries and astounded every single doctor along the way. He was a miracle of science and determination. That's what you get when you deal with a former 25-year Marine that retired as a Major.

I'd like relate one story to you about my grandfather. This is probably what I will remember the most about him, so it's fitting for you to have as your one story about him. It conveys his character, his quirkiness, his values, and his sense of humor.

My grandfather had a system for giving his grandchildren birthday presents. Multiply your age by 7. That way, everyone was given proportionally equal gifts, and everyone knew what to expect. However, what Grandpa didn't mention was that the system would change once we reached a certain age. Somewhere in our late teens, he started giving us a single, crisp two-dollar bill for our birthdays. He suggested we leave the bills in our wallets at all times just in case we ever ran out of money and we needed a couple bucks.

Thanks to the wonderful technology of electronic payment devices (credit cards) I had no need to use my two-dollar bills. So they remained in my wallet, for years and years and years.

My aunt called on Valentine's Day and told me Grandpa had died. I was on a plane to Tampa four days later. We said goodbye to our grandfather with the Marines by his side. They shot the rifles. They gave my grandmother and my aunt each an American flag. They played Taps. We all cried.

I flew home the following morning at 6:50. Back in Dallas, bleary-eyed and numb, I hailed a taxi at the airport to take me home before heading straight to work. I looked in my wallet and noticed I probably had just enough to cover the ride and a tip. But we got stuck in traffic, and I looked in horror as I saw the fare go up and up.

By the time we got to my car, the fare was too high. I didn't have enough cash, and I didn't have time to drive around with the cabbie and find an ATM. Then I remembered the two-dollar bills Grandpa gave me. I pulled them out, gave them to the cabbie to make the fare, and got out of the car.

Grandpa, I used the two-dollar bills to get me home after I said goodbye to you for the last time. Did you know that's when I would use them? I carried them in my wallet for years, and pulled them out when I needed them. Thank you.

Once upon a time, I lived in San Antonio. I lived across the street from a great little pub called The Flying Saucer. I went to The Flying Saucer a few times per week. The waitresses at The Flying Saucer were generally kind of cute. As such, my friends and I made sure to hit on as many of these waitresses as we could. I even went out with one of them. Good times. Long story, that. Anyway, moving on.

Last week, I went digging in the pockets of a jacket I don't wear very often and I pulled out this receipt, almost exactly four years after I received it. After looking at the name, I realized that I have no recollection of Jillian-Marie, which means she may be the only Saucer waitress my friends and I didn't hit on. She was a lucky girl.

I therefore present you with this fossil, this ancient record, this snapshot into the life of a 24-year-old Particleman. On Monday, February 16, 2004, Particleman was likely recovering from a weekend of drunken nothingness and decided to go to the Saucer with his fellow apathetic workmates. He dined on chips and queso, Franzniskaner, and Young's Double Chocolate stout. Particleman then likely returned to his abode, having stumbled across the "street" separating his apartment complex from the pub, located his bed, and fell on it, waking up the next day in the same business casual attire he wore the day before. After a shower, and maybe a shave if he could bring himself to it, he dragged himself back to his cubicle, where he diligently worked on documenting the software documents and running the document website at the Massive Insurance Company.

This concludes our exploration of Particleman's social life, circa early 2004.

Dirty Maggie Mae played its first show at The Improv in Addison (north of Dallas) on January 22, 2008. We opened for a comedy show. It was a lot of fun and we did pretty well. More shows and open mics are on the way. I posted pictures on flickr.

In case you were curious, G and i got a hold of the setlist from the Flogging Molly concert last Sunday. If you want to check it out, here is the pdf.

In comparison to the last time I saw Flogging Molly, this show wasn't quite as good. The band seemed unnecessarily loud and their new songs sounded more mainstream then the old songs. There was more a pop vibe - a more friendly sound. I'm not surprised. Mainstream songs will allow them to appeal to wider audience. Hopefully, though, they won't lose sight of what made them unique.

You know you’ve reached a new level in your career when you receive an invitation to a training course that exclaims: “Walk the Red Carpet with the Stars of Criminal Defense!”

The scary thing is that part of me wants to go.

You know, it's funny. You come home from a long day at work and find that your shower looks kind of different, and then you remember that your landlord finally agreed to remove the nasty, rusty, grout-falling-out shower doors while you were away at work hunched over a desk in an office building. And you suddenly get too lazy to drive to Target to buy a shower rod and shower curtain.

Ford says it owns the copyrights to all pictures of its cars - even pictures owners take of their own cars. Link from Slashdot.

I played an acoustic set with my singer on Saturday at a venue in Dallas called The Hub Theater. We were the first act in a variety show featuring poetry readings, skits, and comedians. It was a lot of fun and I'm looking forward to gigs with the whole band. Our first show is on January 22nd at a comedy club in Dallas. We're the opening act.

Our set on Saturday consisted of:

Help
Norwegian Wood
Mother Nature's Son
Yesterday
Real Love
Don't Let Me Down

In case you forgot, yes, we are a Beatles cover band. Our set on the 22nd will consist of:

Come Together
Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds
While My Guitar Gently Weeps
Norwegian Wood
Mother Nature's Son
Yesterday
Julia
Don't Let Me Down
Eight Days A Week
Help (maybe)
Real Love (maybe)

I had a crazy weekend. Maybe not crazy according to Evil I's standards though, because he brushes his teeth with Mexican tap water and goes out with 22 year old girls. That's what I call crazy!

I hauled ass to Houston right after work on Friday and got in around 10 and went to straight to a bar, where I met up with some law school friends and John (he gets special mention becasue he's not "law school"). I then proceeded to get drunk. It's amazing what four pints of Harp will do when you have an empty stomach and you just sat in a car for four hours. Good times. After the hangover wore off Saturday morning, I realized I was completely congested and couldn't breathe. It seems I'm allergic to Houston.

After stopping by my parents' house to pick up a few things, my friend Megan and I went to a Jewish dining staple in Houston - the New York Hot Bagels Coffee Shop. I had bagels and lox (what else could I order?) and she had some kind of tuna salad thing. Megan is Catholic and loves learning about my Jewish-ness, so I had to show her a little bit of Jewish Houston. After that, we ran some thrilling errands - Bed, Bath, & Beyond and Target. I bought a new shower head and new towels. They rock. I had no idea towel-buying was so intense. Racks and racks of towels with varying degrees of softness. I'm happy with my purchase. My towels are amply soft, yet stylish.

I had dinner with a couple law school buddies at Barnaby's, which was fun. Then I went to another law school friend's party and schmoozed till 1 am - a truly late night indeed. I woke up this morning with that funny feeling you get when you're getting sick. I think I may be coming down with a sinus infection. Lucky me! Just in time for New Years Eve! With any luck I'll be hacking up gobs of gooeyiness in no time. Sorry for the unnecessary detail. I guess it's too late now though.

Getting back to the title of this post, I am about to leave town and head back to Dallas so i can catch the Ghostland Observatory show tonight with one of my workmates. I'm totally psyched. I saw this band at ACL and they were awesome. Totally unexpectedly good.

However, if I find any 22-year olds at the show, I may ask them out so I can live on the edge like Evil I. Details to come.

This space used to have a You Tube video of Regina Spektor playing John Lennon's "Real Love." It has somehow disappeared. So here's what we're going to have to do. Click this link to reach a Google list of You Tube videos and please watch one.

I played a prank on one of the women in the Accounting department last summer when I was an intern at the law firm. It was harmless and fun. I replaced her chair with an identical-looking reject I found at the office that happened to have a broken hydraulic lift resulting in the chair's sinking to the bottom of its height adjustment as soon as it was sat on. I also switched everything around on her desk so that anything that was on the right side was in its corresponding place on the left side. As a result of this move, I gained a reputation as something of a prankster in the office. This was not my intention, though I am not necessarily surprised.

For Christmas, one of the gifts my managing attorney gave me was rather peculiar. She gave me a prank kit of 12 pranks. I can't decide if she's condoning my prankish behavior or challenging me to apply it, perhaps on her. At either rate, she already blew my cover by giving me a box of pranks in front of the entire firm. Of course our firm's gift exchange was done with the entire firm present (there are only about 15 of us) so everyone knows that I am now in possession of a prank kit.

At either rate, I might use the boxed pranks as diversions for more sinister pranks. No one is safe.

I went to Austin this weekend for my Dad's birthday. My folks drove in to Austin and we all met up at my sister's house. We went to The Cheesecake Factory for lunch on Sunday and we brought the kids with us. Maya (4) and Max (2) were in full effect in the restaurant. Max busted out with a toy fuel-tanker truck that looked awfully familiar. It was emblazoned with the brand "HESS" which no longer makes gasoline, so I was wondering how my sister managed to get him a Hess truck. At that moment, my dad said, "You know where that truck comes from, right?" I answered no. He responded, "That was your truck. And those were your dinosaurs. We kept all of your toys, and they're Max's."

That was the coolest feeling. To know that my toys had survived all these years in some box in my parent's attic and were now passed on to my nephew really gave me the warm fuzzies.

At the exact moment this thought occurred to me, Max became possessed by a spontaneous and apparently uncontrollable urge to release the truck from his grip and send it on a direct crash course with the marble floor, thus permanently freeing the rear axles from the body of the truck.

Eh, it was just a plastic toy. Oh well. My dad thinks he can glue it back together. He can usually fix anything.

I was checking email on my blackberry this week while walking and I saw an open elevator door. I went for it, expecting the guy in the elevator to hold the doors for me. He didn't. I smacked my shoulder straight into the door and it almost knocked me to the ground (I guess I walk fast?) You know how sometimes door frames jump out and hit you in the shoulder? It was a little like that, except the door frame was moving. And the best part was that I hit my right shoulder, which nicely complimented the strain on the right side of my neck. Pretty soon I'll need to wrap myself in bubble wrap. I'll become the bubble boy. As long as my blackberry gets service in the bubble, that's ok with me.

I almost forgot to wish you all a Happy Happy Chanukkah. Tonight is the sixth night, so don't forget to light your candles (if you are so inclined).

In other news, I have been the sad victim of yet another one of my infamous neck strains. I seem to have a habit of pulling the muscles that connect my neck, shoulders, and back together all at once. It normally happens when I get stressed out over something and crane my neck in the shower because the shower head is too low. It happened during finals last semester. It happened while I was studying for the bar too. Just ask my classmates. I walked around like I was wearing an imaginary neck brace. The strain makes it painful for my to tilt my head upwards. Most of the pain is in my right shoulder and the right side of my neck. Just lifting up a drink with my right hand causes pain. Thankfully, I also have a left hand, so I can still drink.

Tonight I am very excited to lie down on my heating pad. My parents have had it since the 70s (and you can tell). It's awesome. I lay it on the pillow and rest the sore part of my neck on the heating pad. It's almost as good as a massage.

That I am posting about neck pains and heating pads is testament to how lame my life has become. For those of you wondering how Particleman is fairing in his newly adopted city, you now have the scoop. Neck pain, heating pads, and drinking. And Chanukkah.

Oh wait - one more thing. Remember that Beatles band I talked about a few months ago? We finally recruited a lead guitarist and drummer. Our first show is January 14th at a comedy club. We're an opening act. We're playing some old stuff and newer stuff.

We're three, we're three were three in the dark tonight
And baby my snake is a shark tonight

-Kiss Kiss by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs

The best part is how she says "shark." It's part sung, part whispered.

While we're on the topic of Mexico, and fake cities, I was fishing around in my wallet the other day and found the following slip of paper I picked up at one of the hotels Pajama Grrl, Evil I, and I stayed at while in Cancun. It said (yes, in caps):

SI UD NADA CON DELFINES, CONTRIBUYE A QUE MUCHOS MUER DURANTE SU CAPTURA

The English translation said:

IF YOU SWIM WITH DOLPHINS, YOU CONTRIBUTE TO MANY OF THEM DIE DURING THE CAPTURE

I'd like to reiterate that this message came in a handy, portable medium, capable of being folded up, placed in a pocket or wallet, and retrieved later additional consultation. You know, in case you forgot what it said.

It's always fun when you have a party and people bring over alcohol and leave it in your fridge/freezer/bathroom. Take, for instance, the bottle of Becherovka liqour from the Czech Republic I found in my freezer. I had no idea what it was when I found it. It looked like vodka, but I wasn't brave enough to take a swig of a bottle with writing I couldn't read. Turns out it's a general mixer and herbal recipe with an alcohol content of 38%. I have no idea who brought it or what they drank it with (if anything). All I know is that there is a green bottle of this stuff in my freezer and I'm going to give it a try tonight. Hooray for party favors.

In other news, it seems The Evil I will be leaving us. Well, not really. He'll be working in Mexico for his same company for two months. He'll still have an internet connection so I hope he will grace us with his presence and tell us about his new life. I'm sure it will involve a lot of the same things it does now, except without the BMW, the condo, or the having to sit in an office. I think it's a good trade-off.

Thank you, Evil I. Yes, I did pass my silly lawyer test. And thank goodness. It was kind of important, and yes, I was drunk most of the weekend.

In other news, I turned 28 last week. Almost forgot to tell you. The past couple weeks have been a little nuts whatwith my birthday and the whole silly lawyer test results things.

And guess who's going to see Regina Spektor on Thursday? Me and Girl, who we will call G, because her name happens to start with G, which is convenient. I wanted to propose to Regina at the concert, but that might not be the best idea since G will be there and all. She would probably put the kaibosh* on that. Either way, I'm really excited. I'm hoping Regina plays Dusseldorf. It's become my favorite song of hers. I also managed to hook some people at work on Regina and they are going to the show as well. I think Regina should move to Dallas so we can start a band. A punk band. Can you see it? I can. I bet she'd be all about a punk band.

* More info here.

I saw Interpol with a coworker the other week and it was everything I expected. They were good, really good. Maybe too good? They didn't miss a note and the sound was fantastic. Those guys can write some interesting songs. I notice that as they move through their career, their songs take on a more dynamic quality - more stops/starts, breakdowns, melodic layerings, vocal solos, and drum riffs that depart from the usual rock beats.

The only weird thing was that they hardly moved during the show, and neither did the people in the audience. I realize an Interpol show isn't exactly a punk show, but it does qualify as rock, and rock music generally makes people move. I suppose Interpol fans are too cool for school to rock out at a live show. But when Interpol played their harder songs and the only "rocking out" I saw consisted of some head-bobbing, I starter to wonder if Interpol fans might need to loosen up a little. Regardless, it was a good show.

Oh, and as for their opener, The Liars, I hesitate to call them an "opener." I also hesitate to call them a "band." Bloc Party once sarcastically described their band in the third-person by saying, "They do everything that's required to conform to the currently received ideas of what a band is: ostensibly to play instruments at the same time, but also have a title for the work created." While this is funny for Bloc Party, it is not funny for The Liars, because The Liars did not really play their instruments at the same time. At least the melodies did not seem to go together at the same time. Maybe they did in some alternate universe. I'm actually not sure there were melodies. I do know that air molecules were moving in wave formation, because I heard their terrible noise and felt it in my chest. Other than that, I was not able to discern any patterns, ideas, or musical structures.

In other news, I downloaded the new Radiohead album. I gave them $10, or $1 per song. I think that's fair. It's what iTunes would have charged. Did anyone else out there buy it?

Ever seen a 6'2" mustachioed guy in tight, rolled up jeans and no shirt don a red wig and red heels? Well, then you need to go see Gogol Bordello. I can say with confidence that you will never see anything else like it. The music, the show, the energy, the atmosphere. Every bit of that show was unique and special and completely insane.

I had some stomach issues this weekend but I went out anyway on Sunday to see the show with my old friend and fellow bike geek El Raymundo. My stomach felt a little queasy but it held up for the duration of the show. Thankfully The Granada has an upstairs balcony area that was significantly less crowded and free from the mass of pogoing hipsters. I would have gladly joined those bouncing masses, but my stomach would not allow it. It looked like a party down there.

Consistent with my new role as bass player in a Beatles band, I ordered this bass. It should be coming in the mail today. It's a replica of 1962 Fender Jazz Bass, and even though it's neither a 1962 nor a Fender, it looks the part and was way cheaper than a Fender!

But i finally added a new post category: geek. See the previous three posts. I probably should have done this when I started the blog way back when. Call it laziness. All geeks are lazy by nature.

In other news, happy weekend! I have to go outside now. It's 76 degrees outside. I think Fall just got here.

I installed OpenOffice. Hooray for free software! It's not as slick as MS Office 2007 (or 2003), but it gets the job done.

If you have no idea what I'm talking, go here.

Coolest shirt, ever.

It's been a long time since I've been to San Antonio. I promised my friends there many times I would come visit, but alas, law school and work continually got in the way. Well, last weekend, I finally made good on my promise. I caught a flight down to San Antonio (aka SA aka Saytown) on Friday and hung out with all my old friends.

Friday found us at Blue Star Brewery for First Friday, which is a monthly art, music, and food extravaganza held in South Town, an area of San Antonio south of Downtown. After beer and dinner at Blue Star, we stumbled over to Beethoven's for Oktoberfest, where my friend consumed yet more beer and I got to play DD, which was fine by me because I wanted to see her have a good time (read: get drunk... friends are always funnier when drunk). Her friends also met us at Blue Star and were thoroughly entertaining. They tried to use my lawyering skills to sue each other. I got to explain the difference between assault and battery. I hope I got it right.

On Saturday, we had lunch with the infamous Skorloff and his Girl at Liberty Bar, which is really half-bar, half-restaurant. We got to learn about British toast soldiers and humpty dumpty, and Skorloff and I had Guinness for lunch. Good times. After that, we visited the Skorloff-Girl residence and I marveled at all the progress he's made on the house in the last three years. I think it mostly has to do with the addition of Girl, and the contractor Skorloff hired.

Then we went to a football party to watch the Texas Longhorns lose a great football game. Good job guys! I forgot that the object of football is turn the ball over to the other team as many times as possible. I'm glad you cleared that up for us.

After loafing around for a while, we got off our collective asses and went bowling with some other folks I hadn't seen since I left SA in 2004. They reassured me nothing had changed since I left. That was good to know. So, when are you moving???

I discovered two important and profound things while bowling that night. First: bowling with a beer in one hand will improve your performance. Second: bowling with your non-dominant hand will also improve your performance. Net result? If you're right-handed, hold a beer in your right hand and bowl with your left. I promise your score will go up.

Everyone slept in Sunday morning and we ate lunch at Twin Sister's, which is kind of like Liberty Bar, except with less alcohol and more breakfast. I caught a three o'clock flight and was sped off back to Dallas just in time to chill out at home for a little while and head to band practice at six.

It was a fun and crazy weekend and I had a great time. Thanks again to the coolest girls in San Antonio for driving me around and playing host for a weekend. You are both welcome in Dallas any time.

Apologies for the dearth of posts lately. I have been a busy particle. But before I write my post on the Interpol and Bad Religion shows (yes, I saw Bad Religion. I can die happy now), I need to tell you about this: Radiohead is giving away their new album. They are letting the buyer decide how much to pay. I think all you have to pay is the credit card processing fee of 90 cents.

Yes, other bands have done this kind of thing before, but never a band as popular as Radiohead. And that part is important. Their popularity means they have a lot to lose. A band that is not so popular has less to lose since the fan base is smaller and fewer people would be buying the album and the forgone revenue would not exist. For Radiohead, they stand to lose, or gain, a lot. If it works, they will have proved a point that has been a long time in the making: music does not need record labels. The record label is no longer a necessary part of the music distribution and marketing process. They weren't necessary to begin with. After all, they didn't always exist. The only purpose I see labels serving now is as more of a "music club." Bands can join together and help fans find new bands, thus helping to give smaller bands more exposure by associating with similar bands.

Bands can rent their own studio time, hire their own engineers, pay for their own mixing and disc pressing, do their own marketing via a website, and open an online shop. No need for the label. All you need is money and some organizational skills. If a band has those two things, there is no need for a record contract. The label is an unnecessary middle man.

What's also interesting about the Radiohead deal is the lack of an iTunes affiliation. None of the articles I've read mention iTunes. Did Radiohead ignore iTunes altogether? If so, it could be proof that even iTunes should examine its role in music distribution, or perhaps lower its prices.

Either way, I'm very happy Radiohead took this risk. It's one step towards taking music out of the hands of record labels and putting it back into the hands of artists. Record contracts and record company desires are not conducive to the creation of good music. Good music is what we want. Musicians who own the rights to their art is what we want. Contractual obligations and creative restrictions do not help either of those goals. The issue is that record companies, unlike bands, are not artistic endeavors. They are business enterprises. Art and business, by their nature, do not always mix well. Free one from the other and both would probably prosper more.

For reference, you can check out this guide to recording contracts. It makes me want to buy an Entertainment Law textbook and read up on music industry contract basics.

It's pretty good. I thought and thought and thought about the best way to describe it. Instead of writing some long, drawn-out album review like I usually do, I will say only this:

The new Interpol album sounds like Joy Division, The Cure, and Radiohead packed into one band, and then doused with a bucket of music comprised of The Doors’ The End and The Crystal Ship.

Whether that does anything for you is beyond me, but that's how I felt. I could say more from a technical standpoint (like "these guys are still addicted to reverb" and "all of the songs are in minor keys"), but I won't. And lucky me, I get to see Interpol tomorrow night. Report to follow...

If you remember way back to when The Evil I was Dallas Guy, I posted an entry of an instant messenger chat I had with Evil I about his issues with Dallas, work, women, and life in general. It sounded to me like he really needed to move out of Dallas. So we threw around the usual ideas. Sell all your shit and move to Europe. Or hell, even Canada. It's not that far, yet is completely different than Dallas (or America, for that matter). Or you could always head for Central America, South America, or Asia. Maybe Australia? The options are endless. Evil I is an engineer and is fluent in two languages (besides English). He could probably get a job anywhere.

So where does he decide to go? Israel. Well, not quite decide, but he's been talking about it. His rationale is that he already speaks the language, he won't have any issues with finding Jewish women, the job market for someone in his field and his education is pretty welcoming, and it's generally a fun place. If you ask me, I think it's a bad idea. Of all the places he chooses, he chooses a country fraught with turmoil? A place where people blow themselves up? A place that Syria and Iran like pointing their missiles at? No thanks. I'd rather go to Canada. It's closer, safer, there are Jews (and thus Jewish women) there, and they probably have those cool accents too.

But another thing we should all keep in mind is that Evil I likes to talk. He gets lots of half-brained ideas, starts working on them, and then gets distracted with something else. I'm not putting too much stock in this Israel thing. Maybe it will pan out. Maybe it won't. Either way (if you ever meet him, his favorite thing to say is "Either way"), he'll get my full support with whatever he decides.

And hey man, if you do go to Israel and find a woman, can you make sure she has friends? Friends that like tall nerdy Americans? With blogs? That would be great. Thanks.

Ah, ACL. Three days of music, sun, and walking. My story of ACL will sound kind of like Pajama Grrl's, but different, and longer, and more guy-oriented. Would you expect anything less?

First of all, I have to thank all of the beautiful women prancing around in minimal clothing. Thank you. You totally made the weekend. The music was great and all, but the scenery was what kept me going when I thought I just couldn't stand in a hot, sweaty crowd for one more minute. Because at that exact moment, some bikini-top wearing hottie would show up next to me and make everything ok.

Second of all, I must disagree with what Pajama Grrl said about Regina. She was very entertaining and certainly not boring. Though PG is entitled to her opinion (as misinformed as it may be), I think PG is forgetting that Regina is a solo pianist. There is no band. And she's not Ben Folds - ie, she will not pound on the piano (too much) and scream. I'm not sure if PG has seen performances like those of Tori Amos, but a solo-piano performance isn't necessarily designed to be exciting in the same way as a rock band. I thought Regina was great. Granted, I like her anyway. But I was excited to see her reproducing the songs, the vocal inflections, the emotion, and the vibe that she transmits on her records. She drew the audience into her world, and that is what makes a good performance. She also played some lesser-known songs, so I was glad to see her avoiding a set that consisted of only her pop singles.

One last thing about Regina. She held a one-hour autograph session that I got to 45 minutes early just to make sure I didn't have to wait in line forever. It was a good plan. The line was HUGE. It had to have been two hundred people. All I wanted was a picture with her, but since there were too many people, we were only allowed to give her one item to sign and then we had to move along. No posing for pictures with her, no conversations, no holding up the line. Because all i wanted was a picture, I did not have my album covers with me, and thus had nothing for her to sign. So I did what any self-respecting male would do. I took my clothes off. Before I got to the signing table, I took my shirt off for Regina to sign. It was my favorite shirt, and now it is now my extra-favorite shirt. You can check out the pic below. Thank you, Regina, for signing my sweaty Batman shirt. I guess I can't wash it ever again. And since I will be seeing Regina in Dallas in November, maybe I can get her to sign my chest too. But I'd have to shave a spot for her first. (Sorry, TMI).

The other highlights of the weekend included Muse, Ghostland Observatory, and Common. Muse, as usual, was jaw-droppingly awesome. They are so awesome that any effort at describing their awesomeness is utterly useless. I thought they were good ACL last year, but since the White Stripes canceled, Muse took over the top spot on Saturday night. Their show was intense and flawless. They gave it everything. I can't believe that the singer, who is not a big guy at all, can produce a voice like that. I don't know where it comes from.

The singer also switched between guitar and piano mid-song, showing us his mad piano skills. Their set spanned all of their records and each song was performed as if they had just written it and it was fresh on their minds. I really can't recall the last band that performed with such fury. Muse rocks. Comparisons to Radiohead are totally inaccurate. If any comparisons must be made, make one to Nirvana. This band rocks like no other band I've seen in a long time, and it's not a punk-rock rock or metal rock - there is no punk-rock frustration or metal negativity. It's the perfect kind of rock.

Ghostland Observatory was a total surprise. I didn't know what to expect. I still don't know what to expect. I'm speechless. It's a crazy mix of dance, electronica, disco, and hip hop. You have to hear to believe it. Better yet, you have to SEE it to believe. Their light show was ridiculous. Check out the vids below.

Common was a last minute sub for Rodrigo y Gabriela. They owned their time slot. The crowd went wild for them. They took a volunteer woman from the audience and basically serenaded her. She melted on stage. Literally, we saw her quiver in her sandals when the singer held her and sang to her. It was great.

On the not-so-cool side, The Killers were a total let down. I opted to see them instead of Bjork, and what a mistake that was. The Killers were all flash and no substance. The songs sounded mechanical and the musicians stood around and didn't move. I think the bass player might have been sleeping. Only the drummer showed signs of life, but that comes with the territory. And I reconfirmed my dislike of the new album. Verdict: if you're thinking of shelling out $30-40 for a Killers show, go see Muse instead. The Muse show (lighting, video screen, etc) was just as cool, and they rock so much more and the music is so much more intricate.

The National were also not impressive. The songs sounded the same, and the singer didn't sing so much as moan. But I can see where they found their niche, and I'm happy they found it. It's just not my niche.

And no, I did not see Bob Dylan. I know he changed the face of music and that skipping his show might be seen as sacrilegious by many musicians and music fans. But I don't like him. Never have, even though he influenced almost all of the bands I like from that era. I was tired, my feet hurt, my legs hurt, my head hurt. I had just come from an awesome Ghostland Observatory show, and I still had to make the three-hour drive back to Dallas. I decided to end the weekend on high note and skip out a little early. So off I drove, still shirtless from my Regina encounter, and covered in a lawyer of dirt and sweat. But happy. Very, very happy.

Pics are here. I only took my camera on the last day because I'm too lazy to take pictures, which means the only pics I got are of Regina Spektor and Ghostland Observatory.

Ghostland Observatory - video 1 (3.8 MB)
Ghostland Observatory - video 2 (5.4 MB)
Ghostland Observatory - video 3 (3.0 MB)

I'm still working on my official ACL recap. Until I'm done with it, here is something to hold you over. Can you guess what it is, besides a worn out Batman symbol?

These are texts i've saved or have gotten in the past. I've been compiling this list for a while. NOTE: this post is kind of dirty... relatively speaking. I put an asterisk here and there to avoid getting too much of the wrong kind of traffic (and spam comments).

Idea stolen from Sara B.

Oh no too much cyber s*x?

Do you need it today or will tonight work?

Boot camp bitch.

You are awesome even in your jewish ness.

Am i google?

You bad boy.

I am on the plane stuck between some old lady that wont shut up and dumb jocks that wont stop giggling and my ipod broke last night. God hates me.

P*ssy.

You don't want your Israeli princess slutting out.

I dont want another gay friend. i have reached capacity. go team *** job!

Survived my first prick encounter.

I will pay you back in snobby beer.

What is the difference between a jewish woman and a christian woman? Christian women have real orgasms and fake jewelery.

It is madness here.

Thank you captain obvious.

Christ compels you!

I have a confession. I joined a band. It may or may not be a cover band, that may or may not be a Beatles cover band, that may or may not be fronted by a female vocalist who plays the flute and has a wonderful voice, and we may or may not be twisting the songs into our own interpretations of rock, jazz, funk, blues-rock, and folk numbers. We also may or may not have a name yet, and we may or may not still be in the formative stages of our existence.

However, no other details are available.

You know, I thought living without internet is bad. Living without a microwave, well, that's a whole nother story. It really sucks when you make a huge batch of spaghetti with meat sauce planning to eat it over the next two days, and on day two, you realize you cannot reheat any of your spaghetti. It's kind of a bummer. Hot spaghetti is a lot better than cold spaghetti. I guess I'll just have to warm the spaghetti on the stove. Lame ancient technology.

In other news, I test drove three cars today, for the hell of it. I drove an Infinity G37 (the coupe). It had plenty of power and was very luxurious. But it also had so much techno-wizardry that it felt like a space ship. And the salesmen told me that the aluminum trim in the interior wasn't just any old aluminum, it was special aluminum from Japan made from rice. Wow. I give a shit why?

Then I drove the new Volvo C30 which I have been lusting over forever. I was totally let down. It did not feel Volvo-ish at all. It felt very plasticky. It is being marketed as a sporty car and the handling was not sporty at all. Cornering in the C30 did not inspire confidence. Maybe getting the "sport" package would help. But by the time you add that package and some other col options, you're looking at a $30,000 car, and that's asking a bit much for a two-door "intro-level" car.

Then, for grins, I drove a Dodge Charger, with a V8 HEMI!!! If it's power you want, the Charger will not leave you wanting more. I barely tapped the pedal and the car growled at me and flew. It is big and heavy and fast as hell. Ironically, it is also very usable. The V8 cuts itself in half and runs on four cylinders when cruising over 60 to save gas. Very handy. The trunk was also huge, which is useful for people like me with bulky musical equipment. If you want a simple sedan that will blow anyone else away, yet still get good gas mileage, check out this car. Don't expect it to be nimble, though.

Despite all this, I was still reminiscing about Evil I's BMW, and I am sadly still jonesing for one myself. They are so typical and yuppie and costly to maintain, but the drive is worth it. I'll take the stigma.

I was happy to discover that my newly-adopted city has a Jersey Mike's Subs. I ate at Jersey Mike's three times per week while studying for the Bar and never got sick of it. They slice the deli meat right there in front of you! None of that sitting in a plastic tray business. I think they are the best subs I've ever had.

Oh yeah, and what also makes me happy is that US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales resigned. It pains me because he is a native Texan and the first Hispanic AG, but he was one shady mofo. I'm sure that once all the dust settles, he will have a comfortable life of giving speeches and teaching law school courses. Not bad if you ask me.

I'm back from my trip. Turns out we didn't go to Boston. We went to Cambridge, which is close enough if you ask me. It was essentially a trade show combined with seminars given by experts in the field. And by trade show, I mean that I sat at a booth with a marketing person from my firm and met all kinds of intelligent and interesting people, some of whom are on the cutting edge of the industry. The industry I'm talking about is the information security and privacy industry, i.e., the protection of your personal information as it is held by financial institutions and other companies that might get access to your personal info.

I met computer security professors from George Washington University, law professors from the John Marshall School Of Law, VPs from AIG, directors from Shell, attorneys from USAA, security people from Microsoft, so on and so forth. It was incredible. I had a really good time.

Now for the weird stuff. I went to a pub with my colleague and bought us beer at the counter. I made a motion to sit at a table, and the bartender said, "You can't sit at a table if you buy beer at the counter." What? What kind of stupid-ass rule is that? Aren't I spending money regardless? I offer to buy food at the table, and the bartender acquiesces. My colleague and I pick a table which could seat four or five people. There are only two of us, however. Right after we sit down, a waitress approaches us and says, "If it's just the two of you, you can't sit there, you have to sit at a smaller table." What the &#%@!!! Can we please drink our beers in peace! Fine. We go to a smaller table for two.

After a while, I get word from my boss that she's coming by to have a drink with us. Her client meeting had ended. I drag an empty table over to ours to make room for her, at which point our new waitress says, "Why did you do that, do you have more people coming?" No, I just like having extra space for my imaginary friends. Can't you see them? YES, more people are coming. She asks how many. Ugh! "Two," I tell her. Turns out it was only one, but screw it, I don't give a damn by this point. Oh yeah, and I didn't think much of their quesadillas either, but that was to be expected. Hell, we were in Massachusetts. I will not name this particular pub to save it from any embarrassment. If you want to know, post a comment and leave your email address.

That was the not-so-great service experience. The good service experience came from a burger joint called Charlies Kitchen (no, it doesn't have an apostrophe before the 's'). Our waitress was 78 years old and had worked there for 45 years. She was a sweetheart and totally entertaining, but unfortunately their iced tea was not that sweet. In fact, it tasted a little like cough syrup. But my colleague and I bought T-shirts nonetheless. For the record, we got the signature double cheeseburger. Get it. The fries are good too.

Overall, I found the trip a success. We met some great people, possibly got some new clients, learned a lot about the industry, and gained more exposure for our firm. Mission accomplished.

To pre-empt some questions: no, I did not have any chowder. No, I did not pick up a Boston accent. Yes, I did visit Harvard but was not that impressed (sorry, the grounds were kind of lame). Yes, I did go to the Harvard Co-op, which they strangely call The Coop. Those crazy New Englanders.

I'm going to Boston for work for a couple days. It's only my second time in Boston and I'm really excited. I had a great time last time I was there.

In other news, I went to an 80's party on Saturday night and I have great pictures of my outfit. Or rather, Evil I has pictures. I think. Someone took pictures of me in that sweet turquoise blazer...

I did. Just to remind you of why you need to buy some too:

I'm taking a vacation from my vacation. I forgot how totally exhausting vacations can be. Well, this was one wasn't that exhausting. I did log a good 30 hours of beach time, which basically equates to sitting under an umbrella sipping on mojitos. It was good. Much needed. I also turned into something of a tri-color version of myself. Some was my usual pasty white, some was burned, some was tan. I'm not telling you which part was which.

As for retelling the story of the vacation, so much happened during the course of those seven days that I can't really remember it all and I'm having a hard time figuring out how to recount the trip.

Ok, the real reason I can't remember it all is that the sun or the alcohol beat all memory capability out of me. We all got kind of loopy after a while. I do remember a few things though.

- The seafood was excellent. I spent the whole week eating fish and shrimp.
- Mexicans like their mojitos really sweet. There was a cache of sugar at the bottom of every one (more so than usual).
- My tolerance for alcohol has sadly gone up.
- Mexican women are gorgeous. I think I want one.
- Aussies, Israelis, Brits, Italians, and Germans love Mexico. They were everywhere.
- Restaurant owners assumed my friends and I were Israeli, and first spoke to us in Hebrew instead of English. Evil I does look kind of Israeli (he's brown). Thankfully, Evil I and I do speak Hebrew, so we were able to correct the mistaken restauranteurs.
- When I spoke to members of the public, a mix of English, Spanish, and Hebrew came out.
- In case you forgot, "C" on the shower knob stands for "calor," not cold.
- If you get a Mexican cabbie on coke, hold on tight. Try closing your eyes for extra fun.
- Seat belts are kind of pointless because you'd probably rather die in the accident than get sent to a hospital.
- Bus drivers drive like they're in a small compact car.
- Taking a bus is always more fun than taking a cab.
- It helps to know the CEO of a nightclub on the Cancun strip.
- White sand and turquoise water are intoxicating.

More memories may trickle in over the coming days. Who knows what's rolling around up there.

I start the job on Monday. I'm excited. My boss will apparently be out of town for my whole first week, so that should make things interesting. Oh yeah, and some fun facts about my apartment (a duplex): When we arrived, there were no numbers on the house, so I wandered around for 20 minutes before I found the place. The dishwasher did not work. The previous occupant felt a minimal need to clean before moving out. The back door did not lock. My shower drain did not drain. The smoke detectors were simply decoration. But everything is slowly getting fixed and our landlord is great, and the apartment itself is spacious and nice. Pajama Grrl and I are happy. No, PJ and I are not dating. Get those dirty ideas out of your head.

I'm in Isla Mujeres off the coast of Cancun with Pajama Grrl and Evil I and we're having a blast. the water really is as blue as the pictures. We rented mo-peds to ride around the island yesterday and it resulted in a spectacular crash by yours truly. I clearly have no concept of how to regulate speed on a motorized two wheeled vehicle. I'm not even that great at regulating speed on a non-motorized two wheeled vehicle, to be honest.

The first problem was that my scooter kept stalling on me, so they gave me a new one. By the time the new one was fueled up and ready to go, my friends had already ridden off, so i hauled ass to catch up with them, found myself on a sandy road and accidentally gunned the throttle instead of pulling the brakes. You see, i have a habit of twisting the grips on my bike when riding, so when i twisted the grips on the scooter, it did exactly the opposite of what i wanted it to do. When i realized i had speed up and thay i was heading right for a parked go-kart, i turned the wheel and slammed on the brakes, thus causing the rear wheel to depart from its normal course and slide away from beneath me, sending me right-shoulder first to the ground.

It was glorious. Yes, i was wearing a helmet. But I was also wearing shorts and sandals, so my leg and toes are pretty torn up. Thankfully, i didn't lose a toenail.

But now that i have gotten the hang of riding motorized two wheeled vehicles, i kind of want a motorcycle...

Next on the agenda: more beer, more beach, more Mexican food, and more Neosporin to help my cuts heal.

I don't live in Houston anymore. It feels a little wierd saying that. I live in Dallas now. I still feel like I'm just visiting, or I'm only here for the summer, or that I'm just here for the week. It's odd. Dallas isn't new to me, but it isn't completely familiar either. But it's good. I needed a change. I'm excited. I don't start work till the 20th, so between now and then, I will be hanging out, getting settled, and drinking on a beach in Mexico. I really need to decompress. I also plan on making a trip down to San Antonio to see some friends, so if you're in SA, plan to see me in mid-August. Mark your calendar or PDA or whatever.

I'm at the Apple Store checking email right now. My roomie and I don't have internet yet and it feels kind of cool. I like it. For now. But I'm sure I'll start going crazy soon enough. We'll probably sign up when we get back from Mexico. I'm sure Pajama Grrl, Evil I, and I will have some good stories for you when we get back. Till then.

Last night was my last "night out" in Houston. I invited pretty much everyone I know in Houston, and if I missed anyone, I was hoping the ones I got would spread the word. It was a good time. I got really drunk, but not stupid-sloppy three-sheets to the wind drunk. I even shot tequila - something I reserve for special occasions (like waking up in the morning). (Just kidding).

Last night was one of those nights when your various pockets friends finally meet. You know what I mean. You have friends that have never met, but whom you talk about with your other friends. So you end up talking about people you know with other people you know, who don't know those first people (get all that?) Basically, my worlds were colliding.

In other news, packing sucks. I have way too many books. And I'll be giving away like six pairs of shoes I haven't worn in a year. I have no idea why I have these shoes. They were probably on sale and I felt compelled to buy them. Damn sales. Damn effective marketing strategies.

I move to Dallas Wednesday. I'll be moving in with my new roomie Pajama Grrl. No, PJ and I are not dating. Anyone getting ideas can just kill those ideas. However, she might catch a glimpse or two of my manly hairiness. I like walking around in my boxers. I bet I just created a wonderful image in all of your respective minds.

Some of the dreams I've had lately, likely resulting from the stress and insanity of the Bar (more on that Bar thing later):

Dream 1

I'm in a physics class taught by none other than an aged Samuel L. Jackson. He has long gray hair and he's wearing a lab coat. We had a homework assignment. One of the problems (#30) was particularly difficult. It asked: "Is there any way to be in two places at the same time?" Dr. Jackson asked, "Did that question drive you guys crazy or WHAT! Who has an answer for me?" A tall-ish girl stood up and said, "I have an answer. You can be in more than one place at the same time as long as your presence is only known by one all-powerful being at a time." Meaning, I suppose, you can be in more than one place at a time as long as for each place that you are, only one all-powerful being (God?) knows that you are there. Maybe this is possible because you could be in separate universes, each of which has its own all-powerful being? Who knows.

Dream 2

I arrived at my apartment after being gone all week and everything is gone. The structure has been mostly dismantled. All that remains is the frame of my little garage apartment. I walk around the remnants wondering what the hell went wrong and where my stuff is. I find that most of my belongings are in a gigantic hole next to my apartment. At that moment, I find a strange middle-aged woman giving me dirty looks. I ask what happened. She looked at me incredulously as if I should know. She didn't speak English (or perhaps couldn't talk), so she directed me towards a small piece of wall that remained on my apartment where she had apparently scribbled her response to my same question asked by someone else. I guess someone else had asked where the hell my apartment had gone.

She scratched out a few things and modified the previous response (which was in English) to help answer my question, and I gathered that my landlord was no longer the landlord, that I had a new landlord, that she (this woman) was a tenant of the new landlord, and that I had not paid my rent. I argued that I had paid my rent to my old landlord and she looked surprised. She shrugged and walked off to her apartment, which appeared to be underground down a flight of dingy carpeted stairs whose white walls were covered with various markings.

Those are just two of my dreams. There have been other strange ones, but those are the only ones i can remember clearly.

As for the Bar, the new rule I'm following with myself and my friends is that I will not talk about the Bar. It was too stressful, too difficult, and too long. I'm glad it's over and I hope I never have to do it again. If you plan on taking it any time soon, let me know, and I will tell you everything you need to know.

Your job between the hours of 8 and 4 on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday of this week is to pray as hard as you can to whatever deity or force that strikes your fancy that I do not f*ck up on the Bar exam. Your other job is to send any positive brain activity going on in your head to the Palmer Events Center in Austin, TX.

If you happen to be in Austin on Thursday night and you want to get a drink, find the nearest drinking establishment to Palmer and there I shall be.

I have never felt like i knew so much about the law than i do now, and yet i have never felt so unprepared for a test. For anyone considering law school, please reconsider. I haven't slept in three? four? weeks. I don't even remember graduating. I don't know what day of the week it is when i wake up most mornings. Eating is the highlight of my day. Well, eating has always been the highlight of my day, but now it's, like, my sole purpose. I was put here to eat and study law. Or maybe it's eat law.

My classmate today really summarized it well. I said that my brain was like a shelf: for every piece of information i put on the shelf, another piece falls off. He said, "Shelf? SHELF? I only have a ledge. Screw shelf." You heard it here first. Screw shelf.

I'M PG BITCHES!!! Those fucking fucks down at the blog rating agency have their heads too far up their asses to know what the fuck is going on. Fuckers.

Anyway, for July 4th, I celebrated by NOT studying. I drank beer with friends, watched Pirates 2 (mediocre) and Boondock Saints (excellent), and watched the fireworks. It was a good day.

And I also said FUCK a lot.

I've been studying at Rice University's Fondren Library the past few weeks and finally got around to walking around the giant courtyard in front of the library. While on a stroll (study notes in hand) the other day, I stumbled upon this inscription on the side of the Physics and Astronomy lecture hall.

I asked my mom what it means because I can't read Hebrew without vowels. It says: "He who respects knowledge is respected." So to all my fellow bar-studiers out there - RESPECT KNOWLEDGE AND THOU SHALT BE RESPECTED.

Hey, if you had to study a book called "The Texas Procedure/Evidence Workshop," you'd need a beer too. Especially one with an alcohol content of 7.2%, which technically makes it "Malt Liquor."

all the kiddies sing for you.

I've been studying at Rice University on and off since I started law school three years ago. But never did I know that they were hiding not one, but TWO pubs on campus. One is easy to find. It's in the basement of the student center and is intended to be the "undergrad" hangout.

The other pub, however, took more work to find. I had only heard rumors of it from a friend, who only heard rumors of it from a friend on his Ultimate Frisbee league. This other pub was named Valhalla, which brought to mind Norse mythology, Vikings, horns, swords, plunder, blond women, gigantic ships, and beer. When one of my study-mates mentioned that we should grab a beer after studying at Rice one day, I remembered that infamous "other" pub. We set out to find this mysterious Valhalla.

Guided only by instructions from a Rice student and our keen second-sense of alcohol, the three of us searched for the pub. We were told to look for a building that looks like a lecture hall (um, this is a university campus) by a bus stop with stairs leading up to the entrance. Except that we're not supposed to take the stairs. We're supposed to proceed around to the side of the building and locate a door leading down into the basement of the lecture hall. There, so said the Rice student, is where we will find Valhalla - the "grad student" pub. I liked it already. Grad students. People who were as jaded about education as were are.

We expected to need a password, maybe a special saying, like at a speak-easy, to gain admittance to the pub. You know - knock twice, scratch three times, pound with your fist. Maybe we'd have to bring booty from our last voyage.

Valhalla was exactly where it was supposed to be, and it looked exactly how I had imagined. It was kind of dark, it smelled of old building, beer, and maybe some BO. It was small, there were pictures on the wall of various Valhalla partiers and Rice events dating back to the 19-teens, including photos of JFK's famous moon speech at Rice Stadium and the G7 Summit. And there was, of course, a Viking helmet displayed in a glass case at one end of the room. The curved ceiling and old piano in the corner buried beneath various board games and knick-knacks completed the experience. We had found it - Valhalla was ours.

Not really. But it was fun. The beer selection was excellent, as were the prices. $1.25 for St. Arnold draft? Done. $2 for Blue Moon? Deal. I handed the proprietress a credit card. She looked at it, looked at me, and said, "Oh, this is Valhalla. Cash only." Of course. Let me go find some gold coins I picked up in Newfoundland.

While there, my friend struck up a conversation with an older couple sitting at the end of the bar by themselves. We got to talking, and turns out they had been Valhalla patrons for 25 years, and had owned Shakespeare's Pub in Houston for 16, having recently sold it.

Go on - check out Valhalla for yourself. If you can find it.

Dallas Guy has decided to join us and he brings with him his signature form of cynicism and wit. He has chosen the moniker "The Evil I" (his name starts with I). For details, see what wiki has to say. I don't think there will be any national geographic jungle chics in these posts, but I can't guarantee it either.

This is the ninth edition of the "things that happen to you while" series.

Things that happen to you while on route to, at, and on route back from a wedding in Abilene, TX:

1. You drive through a bunch of small towns inhabited by people that probably consider a "home" to consist of no less than 100 acres.

2. You decide you should give up city life and get yourself some la-yand out in the country. It really does look like a nice lifestyle. Sure beats the hell out of sitting on 59 every day.

3. You meet (or re-meet) the groom's childhood friends who were an excellent group of people who you had a great time with.

4. With the groom present, you trade stories about the groom with said group of friends about his various and sundry exploits with women over the years. The groom turns red and buries his face in his hands. Only then do the really good stories come out. Almost every story starts with, "HEY, oh yeah, remember that time he..."

5. You watch one of said friends attach a ball and chain to the groom's ankle and give the key to the bride.

6. You drink a lot of beer. A lot. A really really lot. But somehow you don't get drunk, which could be a good or bad sign depending on your point of view.

7. One of the friends bought the bride and groom a Sony Playstation with a game called Guitar Hero. You try it out, and marvel at how much more difficult it is pretending to play guitar than actually playing guitar. You also marvel at the zen-like state of concentration exhibited by two of the groom's and bride's friends who are Guitar Hero experts.

8. You run into one of the groom's friends who you met when you lived in San Antonio and worked at "that company." You discuss all the crazy and stupid things the company did, and he updates you on all the crazy and stupid things the company is still doing. You're glad there is consistency in the universe.

9. You get to see your friend who you convinced to go to law school when you lived in San Antonio get married to a girl who went to law school with him, and you wonder what would have happened if he had gone to the school you advised him to go to instead of the school he actually went to. He probably wouldn't have met that girl, and he probably wouldn't have gotten married this weekend, and he probably wouldn't have looked like he was about to pass out for the thirty-six hours before the ceremony. "Dude, you're sweatin' like a mofo. Stand under this vent and have this beer. You need it."

10. As your friend is standing at the altar saying his vows, you silently pray and hope that he and his wife enjoy a lifetime of happiness and success. L'Chaim!!

10.5. You also pray and hope that he doesn't start using the excuse, "I'm married and boring now" to get out of trips to the bar and whatnot. It's not gonna fly. Like any good relationship, ours was founded while drinking, and it's important that we adhere to that standard.

I went to Khan's Deli, a sandwich shop in Rice Village, on Monday to give them a try, and it was not a good experience. This is what happened.

I order a turkey sandwich and move to the register to pay with a credit card, when I see a "cash or check only" sign. It would have been nice if they put the sign at the "Order" counter to put people on notice of what the payment situation is, but whatever. I ask if they take check cards (I know it was a long-shot), and the guy, who appeared to be the owner, said no, but that i could walk to the Walgreen's down the street and use the ATM. I figure that since the sandwich guy hadn't really finished the sandwich, that i'd just come back another time when i had cash. At which point the owner called out to the sandwich guy, "Hey, this kid doesn't want his sandwich, he doesn't want to walk half a block to the Walgreen's to get some cash. He's one of those yuppies."

By this point I'm already at the door when I hear him call me a yuppie. We exchange some words across the restaurant and it doesn't end well. It was not what I'd call a pleasant customer experience.

I sent this story to one of my friends who took (and passed) the bar last year, and she had this to say:

You just had what we call a "bar encounter". This is something that you would normally let slip off your back and walk away; however, since you are studying for the bar, you take offense and eventually tell the guy to f@#k off. "Bar encounters" occur frequently during bar preparation. It is recommended that any "bar studier" refrain from contact with the general public and venture out only when absolutely necessary. Contact with "other bar studiers" is permitted, but the length of such contact should be kept to a minimum.

While that may be true, the owner had no reason to get all smarmy with me. The ironic thing is that his sandwich shop is located in Rice Village, which is about as yuppie as you can get in Houston, and his entire client base could be labeled "yuppie," so if it's yuppies he doesn't want to serve, he's going to have an empty restaurant.

I have this friend in Dallas. He's 26. He has two BMWs, a motorcycle, his own condo, and a bunch of random toys and gadgets to add "fun" and/or complexity to his life. He also has three degrees and is one of the smartest people I know. The other night, we had one of those conversations about life that makes you sit back and say, "I need a drink." Here are a couple excerpts cleaned up for your viewing pleasure. Words in [brackets] have been replaced for something less lewd. He gave me permission to post it. Names have been changed. Keep in mind Dallas Guy is more jaded than the average 26-year-old. He's a little on the bitter side for living in the same city his entire life.

(9:04:35 PM) Dallas Guy: so now where do I go?
(9:04:44 PM) Particleman: whereever your heart desires
(9:04:44 PM) Dallas Guy: if I had a plan I'd go do it already
(9:04:51 PM) Dallas Guy: or hell, if I had a goal
(9:04:56 PM) Dallas Guy: I can make plans
(9:05:08 PM) Particleman: tell me about your ideal week
(9:05:13 PM) Dallas Guy: I was always goal driven for everything my whole life
(9:05:19 PM) Particleman: regardless of location or cost of living
(9:05:24 PM) Dallas Guy: and now Ive met all my goals
(9:05:46 PM) Dallas Guy: my ideal week is one where I go solving
problems all day long and I never do anything repetitive
(9:06:09 PM) Dallas Guy: and then I go home and [sleep with] some hot chick that argues with me about politics and tries to put me in my place
(9:06:27 PM) Particleman: you want marriage
(9:06:47 PM) Particleman: and a cool job
(9:06:54 PM) Dallas Guy: but not to some dumb jewish chick that was raised to be a trophy
(9:07:14 PM) Dallas Guy: I want a smart ambitious girl that's out to prove her d*ck is bigger than mine
(9:07:45 PM) Particleman: but you didn't dispute the original statement
(9:07:48 PM) Dallas Guy: and the cool job, I think I know the route on
that, its just timing now
(9:07:49 PM) Particleman: you want marriage
(9:07:52 PM) Dallas Guy: I do
(9:07:56 PM) Particleman: you want it now?
(9:08:10 PM) Dallas Guy: not necessarily
(9:08:17 PM) Dallas Guy: in the next 3 years though
(9:08:35 PM) Particleman: thats what you think. you are totally in your quarter life crisis
(9:08:55 PM) Particleman: you are sick of the daily grind and are just waiting for the next cool thing
(9:09:55 PM) Dallas Guy: It's totally a quarter life crisis
(9:09:59 PM) Dallas Guy: in a bad bad way
(9:10:20 PM) Particleman: you bought the cars, the motorcycle, the toys, the crazy trips to far off places
(9:10:37 PM) Dallas Guy: that sounds more like a midlife crisis
(9:10:48 PM) Dallas Guy: thats what makes mine unique
(9:11:06 PM) Dallas Guy: most quarter life people are busy trying to find something stable to call home
(9:11:25 PM) Dallas Guy: I'm tired of the stable and craving anything else which is the midlife crisis
(9:12:26 PM) Dallas Guy: its like a desperate attempt to convert the fruits of my previous labor (salary, savings, freedom, etc...) into excitement for my otherwise uneventful life
(9:12:40 PM) Dallas Guy: only to be left with an uneventful life and lots of toys
(9:13:09 PM) Dallas Guy: I should probably talk to some 50 year olds about their midlife crisis
(9:13:17 PM) Dallas Guy: and their personal resolution to it
(9:14:05 PM) Particleman: i disagree. you have the new young-professional quarter life crisis
(9:14:36 PM) Particleman: your life turned into that of a 40 year old and it freaks you out. 9-5 job. house note. car note. traffic. monotony. boring job. you miss the excitement of being young(er) and without obligations and responsibilities
(9:14:59 PM) Dallas Guy: I guess thats it
(9:15:04 PM) Dallas Guy: so how do u fix it
(9:15:39 PM) Particleman: leave dallas. find a better job and/or move to a new place. just don't carry your problems around with you. and realize there will always be obligations and sh*t

...

(9:18:24 PM) Dallas Guy: right after I bought my place i realized that this was the beginning of the end of my life
(9:18:35 PM) Particleman: nothing is that permanent
(9:18:54 PM) Dallas Guy: it's like the people at work. they all have the same life as me
(9:19:15 PM) Dallas Guy: they have a job, some random hobbies, some loans, and whatever
(9:19:22 PM) Dallas Guy: some are married, some have kids
(9:19:31 PM) Dallas Guy: but in the end it's slavery to a system
(9:19:48 PM) Dallas Guy: and we do it so we can buy bigger houses and fancier cars
(9:19:53 PM) Particleman: give me a break. slavery my ass.
(9:20:09 PM) Dallas Guy: indentured servitude sound better?
(9:20:21 PM) Particleman: you're useless man
(9:20:30 PM) Dallas Guy: I really think I would be happy living in a jungle
(9:20:36 PM) Dallas Guy: or the side of a mountain
(9:20:44 PM) Dallas Guy: killing sh*t to eat when I got hungry
(9:20:57 PM) Dallas Guy: and otherwise banging some [sexy] jungle chick
(9:21:16 PM) Particleman: can i put that on my website?
(9:21:22 PM) Dallas Guy: put what
(9:21:30 PM) Particleman: your jungle thing
(9:21:32 PM) Particleman: that's funny
(9:21:33 PM) Dallas Guy: sure
(9:21:53 PM) Particleman: lol
(9:22:00 PM) Particleman: my site is too clean for that
(9:22:06 PM) Dallas Guy: u gonna keep the [sexy] jungle chick
(9:22:20 PM) Dallas Guy: you can use nicer words

And so I did.

Maybe. Maybe not. Bear with me.

I saw Blood Diamond last night. Leo the Sleazebag was actually cool. I'm not that big of a Leo fan, mostly because he plays a pretty boy most of the time, but I was impressed with his performance as a sleazebag in this movie (reminded me of his neurotic OCD Howard Hughes portrayal). But of course he couldn't remain the sleazebag throughout the entire movie, so without giving anything away, let's just say Leo redeems himself. Kind of. Inadvertently. By no fault of his own.

As for Leo's accent, I though he was trying to cop a South African accent, in which case it would have kind of sucked, because my brother-in-law's family is South African and I know what South Africans sound like (Hello love! Oh deah, that does sound o-ful. You must be famished, yeh?). Turns out Leo was not supposed to be from SA, he was supposed to be from Rhodesia, which according to the World Atlas of Particleman did not exist until last night. Here it is.

Rhodesia is present-day Zimbabwe, which happens to be the place used to denote things that are prohibitively far away. For example, if one of our friends goes on a world-wide tour of far-off places, they are "probably in freaking Zimbabwe by now." Zimbabwe is basically a term interchangeable with "BFE." You might not know what BFE means if you're not from Texas, in which case I will have to explain it in a separate post.

Also, Jennifer Connelly is hot. Leo should have totally made out with her.

I rode my bike to class the other morning (in the 90 degree heat) and walked into the lecture hall to find it warmer than usual. Since my internal body temperature was already at 175 degrees due to the bike ride, I was especially disappointed to hear the administrator announce, "Sorry, some transformers blew and half of the power is out. There isn't enough power to run the A/C or the projector, so class is canceled for now. Please check the website for updates."

Screw you guys. I'm hot and sweaty. I need A/C, and I just rode here to learn about Criminal Law, or something. It was right about then when I heard some classmates chant: "RE-FUND... RE-FUND... RE-FUND...." Gotta love it when a bunch of to-be lawyers start bitching about getting ripped off.

I saw Pirates 3 and Spiderman 3. They were both lame. I know, I know. You're saying, "We could have told you that before you spend $9 each on them." Thankfully: 1) Dad spent the $9 for me and 2) I knew they would suck. The problem with these movies is the same problem every other 3rd edition of a movie has - too much of what you don't want, and not enough of what you do - namely, fresh ideas. These guys are running on empty. Can't think of a good plot? Add more bad guys. Can't think of any more cool twists? Make the story more confusing and hope it looks like a twist. Ugh. At least Kirsten Dunst and Keira Knightley are hot.

I also saw 28 Weeks Later, which scared the shit out of me. I don't see scary movies. I don't like them. I don't like gore. It's not the violence that bothers me, it's the cutting-off-of-body-parts and heart-stopping screams and general twisted story-lines that make me squirm. Case in point: the last "scary" move I saw was Stephen King's "It" when I was 14. I didn't sleep for weeks and I have a permanent dislike of clowns.

For 28 Weeks Later, I sat in the back row and drank the beer that my friend and I snuck into the theater, and I still couldn't handle the movie. I basically buried my face in her shoulder. She called me all kinds of names. I deserved it. Whatever. That movie was messed up. I'm never going to think of London in the same way.

As if you really needed it, here you go. I've been riding my bike to the bar-prep class I go to every morning from 9-12:30 and I normally stop for lunch on the way home. While leaving Brown Bag Deli (BBD), one of my favorite lunch spots, I noticed a strange contraption parked against a bench. It was a Segway.

Have you ever seen one of these things? I mean, like, in person? They are awesome. Sure, I've seen them in magazines and on TV shows but i had never seen one in person. And just my luck, the owner was walking out of BBD, so I had to talk to him about it. I couldn't resist. There we were, a geek on a bike and a geek on a Segway outside of a sandwich shop, talking about how the Segway works, how it senses your body position and decides whether to go forwards or backwards, how it locks itself, how it runs on batteries and requires a nightly charge, how it has a running distance of 250 miles, how it saves gasoline for short trips to the sandwich shop...

And there is your proof. If you needed it.

Firstly, big thanks go to MPB and Pajama Grrl for taking over while studying for the Bar exam has me chained to my desk. Ya'll are rocking.

Secondly, I really wanted to sum up my three years in law school in a descriptive and complete post because so much has happened during this time, but it's not gonna happen. This is a slightly abbreviated version.

Thirdly, i had the week from hell last week. Not only was I in class for about eight hours per day, but my car decided to stop working on Monday night. I got out of class at 9:30 and it wouldn't start. I called my friend for a jump but no dice. The engine wouldn't even turn over. Turns out my battery was completely dead so I had a new one put in and all is well now. The Honda keeps on ticking.

In other news, I graduated from law school. I have a Juris Doctor, or Doctor of Jurisprudence, or JD, or whatever you feel like calling it.* I basically paid $95,000 over three years to be able to tell people, in response to their legal questions, "it depends." When I look back at all the things I've learned, all the amazing people I've met, and all the friendships I've made, I am infinitely thankful for the opportunity to have gone to law school, and I'm thankful I have such supportive parents and understanding friends who didn't get pissed off when I wished them happy birthday three months after the fact.

People ask why I went to law school. There are so many answers to that question. In the end, if I really think about it and put aside all the baloney about making a difference and doing something interesting with my life (which is actually true), the real reason I went to law school was to meet people.**

When I went to law school, my goal was to meet smart and interesting people who were fun. Law school gave me that. So thanks everyone, it was cool. I may be moving to Dallas, but this site will (hopefully) always be here, and you all know how to find me anyway, website or not.

Ok, end sappiness.

From here on out, my life will be dominated by the Bar. I will be the Bar's bitch for the next two months. And then come July 24-26, i will make the Bar my bitch. Such is the plan. I will try to drop in every now and then to tell you all about how exciting studying is. I could tell you now, but I'd rather save it up.

*With one big caveat: as long as i passed all my classes. Grades aren't in yet. Keep your fingers crossed.

** There was another reason which you should be able to figure out for yourself. It's actually included in the first reason.

Much has happened recently. I went to my last law school class of all time. I've taken three final exams. I went to Austin for a wedding and got very drunk and danced up a storm. I rode my bike a few times. And I have enlisted the help of another pinch-blogger. Or rather, she volunteered. Her name is Pajama Grrl and she likes pajamas.

Tonight is my very last final exam of law school, EVAR. I am very excited. I graduate on Saturday and I plan on having a drink in my hand for the entire period in between.

Sorry for the dearth of posts lately. I'm in finals mode and that means I'm cranky and I don't have much to say. I did enlist the help of two (2) pinch-bloggers, but both (both) are apparently slacking. Maybe they have less to say than I do? Not likely, knowing what I know about them.

Neither had I until last week. So here you go. This is a medley of songs performed at a record store. It just cuts from song to song.

addendum: i just ordered two of her albums from amazon and i bought one more from iTunes. it's official - i am smitten with Regina Spektor.

Today was my last day of school, forever. Of course I still have finals and the bar to look forward to, so I'm no where near "done." And to make things more fun, my school decides to start the spring semester later than other Texas schools, thus making the semester end later. Pretty much everyone takes a course to prepare us for the bar. While students from other schools have a week off between graduation and the prep course which I shall not name, we get a whopping 36 hours to relax before we're plunged right back into class. A day and a half. Did we really need a five-week winter break? Four would have been plenty.

But wait - there's more!! There's a supplemental prep course that focuses on a certain area of the bar that some people - including me - opt to take. That course is one week and runs concurrently with the first week of the normal prep course. So the week after finals and graduation, I will be in class for seven hours a day.

I know you're thinking. It's one of two things:

1. Dude, that sucks.
2. Stop your bitching. You did it to yourself, remember? You're the one that went to law school.

I respond:

1. No kidding. Tell me about it.
2. Go to hell. When I'm defending your sorry ass for copyright infringement you'll change your tune.*

*note: i spent all afternoon studying for finals. i'm feeling a little punchy. i need a beer.

Two neighbor stories for you.

1. I live in a garage apartment behind a duplex, which means my apartment is right next to someone else's backyard. They have fence, but it's not wooden, so you can see through it. They also have a patio where they tend to hang out. My washing machine and dryer are outside my apartment, which means I have to walk outside to do laundry (I share the washer and dryer with the tenants in the duplex). See Exhibit A below.

Exhibit A

There is normally no one in the backyard when I am doing laundry, so I tend to walk outside without a shirt. I figure hey, it's my place, it's not very far, and I'm basically in the privacy of my own backyard.

Well, I was doing laundry yesterday afternoon. On the way back from starting a new load, I notice that my neighbors are in their backyard, that their parents are there, and that their granddaughter (maybe 5 years old) is also there. I also noticed I'm not wearing a shirt. Oops.

2. I play bass a little loud every now and then. How loud? Loud enough to shake my walls, and probably let the neighbors know how much soul I have (I'm like James Brown - I got soul to spare). Around the same time I was doing laundry, I was also jamming out to some older Lenny Kravitz, a song called "Come On And Love Me." It has a really great drum beat and a simple, funky bass line. It's perfect jam-out fodder. So there I was, jamming away in my apartment, when I get a Gmail chat message from one of the guys in the duplex:

"play that funky music white boy"

I figured I was too loud. He heard me. Then he said:

"Just got back from some GREAT margaritas (very surprised for Pittsburgh)"

HE WAS IN PITTSBURGH. How did he know I was playing that funky music?

I don’t feel good about giving a negative review, but every Vedera song sounded the same. I was expecting a little more variety. And when a band uses lyrics that include “I see that sparkle in your eye,” (or anything close to it) I know it’s time for me to bail. Vedera are a great pop-rock band… if you’re in high school. The vocalist did steal the show as I excepted, and she was phenomenal, but the rest of the band did not impress me enough to get passed the general boringness of it all. I felt bad for them since only 40 or 50 people showed up and many of them were sitting at the bar. I figure that if I’m going to watch a band, I will show them enough respect to at least stand up. I guess I needed more rock and less pop. Twenty-five minutes of their set was all I could handle.

The other surprise Vedera’s opener. They were better than I expected. Though the singer looked about 16, This Is Me Smiling put on a solid show of piano-laced rock. Imagine a younger Ben Folds Five with electric guitar, but not quite that good yet. Give them a few more years (at least until they stop claiming “dependent” on their tax returns).

Vedera didn’t cure my music funk. I think what I really need is a Flogging Molly show.

Contents of my fridge:

• salsa
• milk
• juice
• shredded cheese
• tortillas
• ketchup
• old root beer
• one bottle of sam adams
• strawberry jam
• eggs
• mayo
• butter
• parmesan cheese
• old phili cream cheese, possibly now rock-solid

And that's more than it usually has. I wonder what I can make using only those items.

The coolest thing happened today. I plugged my ipod in, loaded iTunes, and iTunes said:

So I said: "Huh. That's funny." I unplugged the iPod and performed a 'reset.' Then just to be on the safe side, I made sure all my music was still there. Lo an behold - it was all gone! Every last song! No where to be found! After spending weeks - no, months - honing the perfect playlist so that it had just the songs I wanted and none of the ones I didn't, it all went bye-bye. Now I get to compile the list for a second time.

*grumble*. apple, i shake my fists at you.

I've been in a little bit of a funk lately. It's a combination of stress from finals, worries about the upcoming bar exam, and a lack of good shows. I haven't seen a good show in a while. But this Thursday a band called Vedera is playing and I'm really excited. I randomly found this band on myspace and I liked what I heard. Imagine a slightly harder and new-for-2000s-era-hipsters version of The Sundays.

Most of what I like about this band is the vocalist. So many vocalists in young bands pretend to sing but are unable to control what talent they may have. The vocalist for Vedera really knows what she's doing. Her voice is pure and clear, and it doesn't sound like it's been tweaked by studio equipment. She does seem to rely on some common emo-vocalist gimmicks, but hey, they're a young band. I'm willing to cut them some slack. The music is a little mediocre, so I'm expecting her to carry the show.

If you wanna go, it's $9 in advance/$11 at the door at Walter's on Washington. Show starts at 9. Get tickets here.

You can (legally) download two cd-quality songs here. Their old name was Veda, so I think Veda shows up in the file name.

Via onotob. Sorry, but you kind of have to be a nerd to know what this means. Non-nerds will have to do the best they can.

var particleman = everyone.getPerson['Particleman'];
var myPerspective = {evil:'Having to take the Bar exam',good:'Riding bikes, drinking beer, reading books, and traveling'};
for (var personId in everyone)
{
var p = everyone[personId];
p.desiresNoBarExam = true;
p.proactive = true;
p.perspective = myPerspective;
p.send (particleman,p.assets.getAssetType('cash').getAmount(1,'dollar'));
}

Thanks Lee.

I had a free ticket to see Kofi Annan speak last night. I gave it up so I could see a ska show instead. I think it was the right choice.

I am cursed to have bad laptop luck. The laptop my dad fixed a couple months ago done broke again, and this time, the breakage was permanent. Fed up with buying laptops that consistently fail right when I need them, I resolved to never again spend a lot of money on a new laptop, which is convenient because I don't really have any.

I hopped on Craigslist while I was in Dallas over Spring Break and found an IBM X30 for $450. It's a tad low on RAM (256 MB) and it doesn't have a CD-ROM drive, but it's well-built and very, very light. At least i thought it was well-built until i cracked the edge of the case. I put it in my backpack after one class, walked to my next class, and there was a crack in the case waiting for me when I pulled out the laptop.

No matter. It still works. As for the RAM, I sucked it up and bought 512 more MB. It's a little quicker now.

I know it kind of makes me seem like an alchie to be posting about a "new favorite drink," but this is too good to keep to myself. I'm not much of a liqour guy - I like me some beer. But one of my friends in Dallas introduced me to a wonderful concoction called a French Connection. It's cognac (Hennessey, in my case) mixed with amaretto (Grand Marnier), with a couple ice cubes to cool it off. It's kind of a fru-fru drink, I know. But it's really good, and a couple of them will give you a nice buzz for the rest of the night.

Mexico won the contest. It's close, it's cheap, and I've never been. I am going to Riviera Maya with two of my Dallas friends for seven days. The itinerary will go something like this:

1. Locate beach with white sand and crystal blue water
2. Secure alcoholic beverage
3. Claim easy chair or hammock
4. Decompress

Repeat repeatedly. Other activities may include:

1. Snorkeling, sailing, etc.
2. Visiting ancient ruins
3. Hopping to nearby islands for day-trips
4. Renting a moped and riding around
5. See four items above

Thanks everyone for playing. One day, I will visit all of the other places. One day...

I should have decided to move EAST.

WTF.

[ click for larger version ]

Bike geek socks. Thank You Google Checkout.

You pervs. Get your minds out of the gutter.

The massage was nice but it didn't relieve the pain. It did give me some more mobility though. I guess it will just take a few days for my muscles to heal. I can tell you one thing - at one hour and three minutes, Massive Attack's album Mezzanine makes for a great soundtrack to a one-hour massage appointment.

I messed up my neck pretty good this morning in the shower. It's happened to me before. I think I pinched or pulled something and its preventing me from moving my head up, and most any other way i turn it hurts. I end up having to turn my entire body to talk to people and I have to keep my head pointed sort of down, which, as you can imagine, kind of puts me in an awkward position when talking to women. Yeah, I've become "that guy."

I made my first ever appointment with a massage therapist for tomorrow morning and I can't wait. It's an hour. I hope she can knead this pinch or knot or whatever it is out of my neck so I can walk around like a normal person again. Chances are I'll be really sore when she's done. I'll probably need more sessions. Don't people get hooked on this stuff? And just so you know, I've already gotten one joke about happy endings. Don't think you're all clever and witty, someone beat you to the punch.

I don’t post about recent cases I find interesting because most of you probably won’t find them any more interesting than a plate of okra. But this case is interesting. I promise.

Some high school kids (the nerds) are suing a company called Turnitin that archives student papers in a database and compares them against recently submitted papers to check for plagiarism. The idea is to keep kids from cheating off of other kids’ work. While this is a worthy cause, Turnitin apparently archived some papers without the authors’ consent. Viola – copyright infringement. They are profiting off of the nerds and the nerds are suing for $150,000 per infringed paper for a total of $900,000.

It pays to be a nerd.

Story via Patry.

addendum: in response to a comment i got in the hall today, if this happens to get the nerds laid, more power to them.

Remember that ethics test I took last semester? Well, I flunked it. You need to get a "scaled" score of at least 85 (out of 150) to pass, and I only got a 75. Pretty bad, I know. I retook the test last month and my score came back today. I got a 120. I kicked the crap out of that test. I am truly an ethical person. So what am I gonna do now? Drink. There's a happy hour down the street with my name on it.

The eighth installment of the series.

1. You are forced to steal your own car because the alarm has malfunctioned and locked the ignition
2. Your alarm goes off while driving, so you rip out the lead wire to the siren
3. Once in Dallas, the alarm drains your battery while you’re out partying at bars
4. You wake up at 6:30 on Saturday morning to attend a 5K run your law firm is sponsoring
5. It’s 35 degrees. You don’t run . Instead, you get the best 20-minute massage of your life.
6. It snows.
7. Later that day, you and your boss’ brother manage to jump your car and bypass the alarm by ripping apart the rest of the alarm assembly. Wires dangle from under your steering wheel.
8. You play your friend’s Nintendo Wii. You want a Wii too.
9. You almost bust a lung laughing at all the rabbits you’re shooting with plungers. Rabbits don’t like plungers and you have a plunger gun. Life is good.
10. You eat Mediterranean food with friends on Saturday night. One of the guests just happens to be the law student from whom you sublet an apartment last summer.
11. You can’t remember how well you cleaned the apartment when you moved out but you hope it was good enough, because she’s sitting right there.
12. Hennessey mixed with Grand Marnier becomes your new favorite drink when your friend insists you try it later that night.
13. You nickname one of your friends "Roshanda Bangkok Nigeria Horowitz."
14. You and your friends eat lunch the next morning in the part of town affectionately termed “The Gayborhood.” You might have been checked out, but you’re not sure. Your waiter is wearing bunny ears and a bunny tail (hello, it’s Easter).
15. You play more Nintendo and take the record for fastest rabbit runner, but running in Nintendo has nothing to do with feet.

It's the holiday when Jews typically spend a week remembering how the Jews were freed from slavery in Egypt and escaped Pharaoh's grasp by the hand of God. Part of that remembering involves giving up all foods resembling bread, which includes anything with yeast. Passover is also the holiday when Particleman drinks a lot of beer, eats a lot of pasta, and enjoys many sandwiches. With bread. Thankfully, Judaism contains no concept of Hell, and neither does Particlemanism.

It's called the "Where Should Particleman Go After The Bar" game. I encourage your suggestion to be different and daring. Do not take cost into account, since I will most likely be borrowing (yet more!) money to pay for the trip. Do, however, take safety and digestive issues into account. With exception to Israel, I do not want to go any country I have already visited:

Canada
Costa Rica
Ecuador
England
Holland
Belgium
Germany
Austria
Italy
France
Czech Republic
Israel
Russia
Lithuania

I can't go to a concert with a ticket that costs $250. It's just not right. It's counter to everything I stand for about music. Here at particleman.org, we stand for things, and one of those things is not price-gouging music fans. I saw Fugazi for $5. I can't possibly see a show with a $250 ticket.

So instead, I think the My Chemical Romance/Muse show in two weeks is more reasonable. It's $30. I think I can handle that. The only thing that bothers me is that Muse isn't the headliner, they're the opener, so their set will be short.

Particleman.org therefore says, "F**k The Police." They charge too much.

This is the bass I finally settled on. I traded my old one in and I'm pretty happy with the new one. I'm so excited about it that I played till my fingers were raw. They kind of hurt now.

As you can see, the "stripes" on the back extend along the length of the bass. These stripes are actually strips of wood fused together to create one solid length of wood. Then, a piece of wood is fused to each side of the center piece, and presto, you have a bass. Using one solid piece of wood for the neck and body (called "neck-thru" construction) as opposed to a neck that is bolted onto the body results in a more solid feel and notes that sustain longer. This bass rings like a piano.

It has also has a longer-than-usual two octave neck so I can hit those high notes. Not that I'm one to be messing around that high on the neck very often, but it's good to know those notes are there if i want them.

It sucks when you're at the grocery store and go on a cereal binge, and you can't wait to get home and have yourself a delicious bowl of Frosted Mini Wheats, except for that the soy milk in your fridge expired on March 11th. But you figure "what the hell, it's soy milk, not real milk, it can't be all that bad," and even though it tastes kind of funny, you satisfied your cereal urge. Cereal is, quite possibly, the perfect after-school snack. This is something I learned in grade school and I just wanted to pass the knowledge on to you.

My friend bought four floor tickets to the last-chance-ever Police tour for $250 each. The show is on Friday, June 29th. I want to go. I don't have $250. Help particleman fulfill his dream of seeing Sting take his shirt off. Just kidding. But I would really like to see The Police. This isn't a Rolling Stones-type tour where they say, "Ok, THIS is the last tour. We mean it this time." This will really be the only time The Police tour together again. I'm pretty sure they hate each other and that's why they have never done a reunion tour. Until now.

I know there are a bunch of you out there who read this blog. If each of you donates a buck or two, that would probably be enough. For those of you requiring a guilt trip to encourage donation, consider the donation a small token of thanks for the many years of enlightening and humorous blogging. I did it all for you. Plus, it would be a great graduation gift, provided I pass my classes this semester...

Those of you that are still reading, I would really, really, really appreciate it if you could send a buck or two or five to my paypal account, registered under the email address mtnbiker7901 -at- yahoo -dot- com. Or, if you see me at school, I will happily take cash. Thank you thank you thank you.

I will be keeping track of who donates what (in an Excel spreadsheet, of course). If I don't get close enough to the $250 to actually go, I will return all of the money. You can consider this an enforceable contract.

No more after this, I promise.

The woman I shared an office with last week is a huge fan of The Police. I like The Police just as much as the next guy, maybe more. I have some LPs (you know, those black vinyl things) and a double live album on CD. But i was not prepared for her cell phone ring of "Don't Stand So Close To Me." After only a couple rings, the song got stuck in my head and I'd spontaneously start singing it at any given moment. And you can bet that I have a pretty bad singing voice. It must have not been pleasant for her, but the way I see it, it was her fault.

Strong words in the staff room
The accusations fly...

You didn't think I was done, did you?

My office is on the 53rd floor of a downtown office building. We can't see out of the windows on foggy days. Airplanes appear to be heading right for us. Cars look like Hot Wheels. We can only imagine how windy it is up there. So when we see a bug (spider, fly, whatever) stuck to the outside of one of our windows, we can't help but say to the bug, "DUDE, do you know how HIGH you are?? How did you get up there?? Why aren't you getting blown away?? Go home!!"

I get a kick out of playing what I see as harmless pranks on people at the office. Back at my old IT job in San Antonio, I removed the mouse ball from my team-member's mouse. One morning, i got to my desk and everything except my computer was gone. All papers and office supplies were missing. I thought I had gotten fired. Turns out that same teammate hid everything in a file cabinet down the hall. Such shenanigans make office life a little more fun.

Last week, I spent spring break in Dallas working at the firm and was presented with an opportunity I could not pass up. One of the lawyers there is really attached to her stapler. It's heavy duty and works well. One of the other lawyers likes to "borrow" it and she freaks out when her stapler goes missing. She had gone on a vacation in Hawaii so the other lawyer naturally "borrowed" it while she was gone. When she got back, she went through his office looking for it while he was out to lunch and couldn't find it.

So my office-mate, the other lawyer, and I resolved to pool our creative abilities to come up with some kind of prank focusing on the stapler, and I had an idea. The firm was auctioning off basketball and hockey tickets to raise money for a charity, and they put silent auction forms on the fridge in the kitchen so we could could bid for the tickets. I suggested we put the stapler up for auction and see what happens. If the attorney really wanted her stapler back, she'd have to bid for it. If she didn't bid, she'd demand we hand it over, and we could at least have a little fun in telling her where it was hidden.

After the silent bidding ran its course, I was the highest bidder for the stapler at $40, and the firm got together for a verbal auction to finalize everything and see if anyone who did not bid silently might speak up and claim one of the items. The basketball tickets went for $220 in a lively bidding war. The hockey tickets went for $150, and the stapler went for ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS. And since one of the named partners offered to match the auction prices, the charity got $200. For a stapler.

Moral of the story? Pull more pranks. You might end up benefiting a charity.

A guy who sits in front me in one of my classes has extremely short hair - almost military short - but he's far from military material (sorry man). The quality of his mettle is not at issue here, however. The issue is a rather amusing arrangement of dot-like scars on the back of his head. The scars are visible because of his short hair, so my friend and I joke with our short-haired classmate that we like playing connect the dots with the back of his head. Classmate is good-humored about our little game and in fact has been known to encourage it.

Today, Connect-The-Dots Man (I'll keep coming up with new nicknames as I see fit) was making chit-chat with me and my neighbor and, in classic Particleman fasion, I sarcastically blurted out that Baldy needed to stop talking and turn around so I could continue drawing imaginary lines on the back of his head. Scar-man was noticably flabbergasted at the comment and took offense, noting that he spent all day thinking of me in nothing but a positive light, and, yet, I mistreat him so. I could not argue. Peach Fuzz had made a point.

He then suggested I consider our humorous exchange for a blog-post. So, Scalp Man, please consider this an informal apology for my rude remarks. Also bear in mind most of what I say is in some degree a distortion of what I'm actually thinking, and that this trait is amplified on this blog.

Maybe next time I'll show up to class with a Sharpie. The non-eraseable kind.

Note: any inconsistencies or exaggerations in this story are the result of either my bad memory or great story-telling ability, or both.

I think i'm going to get one of these. Aw yeah.

Out with the old, in with something else, maybe older.

I’ve been playing a Fender Precision Bass* since 2001 even though I swore I would never buy one. They’re very plain and simple and ubiquitous. You’ve seen them everywhere. It’s the classic look that’s been around since the 50’s. Thing is, because there are so plain and simple, they always sound good, never break down, and are easy to fix.

I always wanted a Gibson Bass – either a Ripper, RD Artist, or Victory – so I could sound like Krist Novoselic from Nirvana.** Yes, it was a teenage dream. He’s basically the reason I started playing bass. I was 14. Give me a break. These Gibson basses look and sound completely different from Fenders but are hard to come by (and are expensive) because Gibson only made them for a few years, circa 1974-1983. Prices have steadily risen in the last few years because of increased exposure by other well-known Gibson users – Mike Dirnt of Green Day for one.

The time has come to sell my old Fender and get something else. Something completely different. My options are to get one of the Gibsons, a Fender Jaguar Bass (something new Fender concocted that combines 60s retro with modern technology), or what I like to call a geek bass.

A geek bass is a ‘high-end’ bass that normally comes in a natural or translucent finish that lets the wood grain show through. These basses abandon the classic Fender and Gibson shapes in favor of a more modern design that in some cases makes the bass easier to play. They may also come stock from the factory with complex electronics and an onboard pre-amp. If you don’t know what an onboard pre-amp is, suffice to say it’s like slapping a mini stereo amplifier inside the bass and wiring it up to the pickups.

I call these basses geek basses because of their new-fangled electronics – 5-band EQs, active circuitry, compression, expansion, pan, treble/bass boost/cut, blah blah blah – and exotic sounding woods – zebrawood, pau ferro, bubinga, purple heart, tiger eye, etc etc. It’s like listening to tech geeks talk about tech stuff. (Not that I’m one to talk…) These basses also don’t really exemplify the “rock” look. They say, “I sit around my apartment and practice jazz riffs” instead of, “I live a life of no rules, plenty of alcohol, I regularly trash hotel rooms, I engage in news-worthy shenanigans, and I generally live a rebellious lifestyle.” Cause, you know, that’s totally me.

Don’t get me wrong, these basses are excellent instruments that sound great. They are usually more expensive than “standard” basses because of the construction process, choice of wood, and electronics. Sometimes they are hilariously expensive. But hey, to each their own…

The point is – I promise there is one – is that I’m really thinking of replacing my old rock and roll classic with a geek bass. I wanted something completely different, and a geek bass would fit the bill. After 13 years of playing bass, I’ve resigned myself to the fact that I will never need to look like a rock star on stage, because I will neither be on a stage nor will I be a star. This is the bass I’m ogling. But don’t worry, I’d find a used one. A’int no way I’m paying full price.

* Mine is a mid-80’s model made in Japan that looks just like this one.
** Krist never played a Victory, but they look cool.

addendum: i'm playing with the comments settings. i've been getting a lot of comment spam and i'm trying to make it so that only approved commenters can comment.

Max, my 18-month-old nephew, calls my dad Aba, which is actually the Hebrew word for dad. He’s unable to pronounce the ‘s’ in Saba, Hebrew for Grandfather. I was visiting my sister and her family in Austin this weekend, and when Max saw me, he said “Abba.” Which is funny because I’m neither his Abba nor his Saba, but when he saw the tall, funny looking guy with glasses, he thought I was his Saba.

Maya, the three-and-a-half year old, has her own ideas about me. She stubbed her toe and my sister was trying to get her to eat some soup, but Maya was too concerned about crying over the stubbed toe. So I told her that I’d eat the soup if she didn’t hurry up, and then I made a funny face, and she said, “HEY! You’re thilly! Hee hee hee.” She laughed, the tears vanished, and started she eating the soup.

I’ve been living life like a first-year law student lately, except for the whole reading thing. My friends have instituted a mandatory happy hour every Friday at 4, and I usually last till about 8 or 9 before giving up and going home. There’s only so much partying I can handle. My late twenties feel different than my early twenties. That difference in feeling is what you might call “hangover.”

One of my friends, a girl who has thus far managed to hide her true party-girl ways, found herself dancing on top of a pool table at one of these happy hours a couple weeks ago. I was so proud. As for me, well, I did my part. I’m not much of a tequila guy but I had my share of margaritas. I got one girl to show me her yoga skills (wow) and then a guy decided to the same (ugh). What amazes me is that this weeks’ happy hour was already planned on Tuesday. TUESDAY. We really are back in first year.

I saw Little Miss Sunshine. Yeah, I don’t wanna hear it. This movie came out a long time ago, I know.

Anyway, as I was watching, I rename the movie, “Can They Pile Any More Terrible Shit Onto the Stack of Horrible Things That Happen To These People.” It was like watching a train wreck, a really funny train wreck that I’m glad didn’t happen to me and my family. Not that having the grandfather die was funny, but come on, you know what I mean. You laughed at that movie, admit it.

The best scene, without a doubt, was when the grandfather lectured Dwayne about women, and particularly, how many of them he should sleep with.

It’s cool when you get called on in class and your surly answer to a question makes the teacher say, “Ah, clever evasion.”

I had dinner with a buddy last night and we decided to see Breach, the spy movie that just came out. Without checking on movie times, we go to the theater and hope one is starting soon after we get there. Just our luck, we are 30 minutes late for one and two hours away from the next one. So we buy tickets for the late one and figure we’ll hop into another movie in the meantime. You might call it theater-hopping. I call it making my $8 stretch as far as possible. Hey, I’m broke. Eight dollars for one movie is too much, but eight dollars for two is doable.

We catch Factory Girl, the Andy Warhol movie, just as it’s starting. My friend has no idea who Andy Warhol is. I give him the quick rundown: 60’s-era artist, eccentric, quirky, famous. It’s not a bad movie. Not great though, either. It drags in places, but I guess some bio-pics do that. And it turns out that the movie is less about Andy Warhol than it is about Edie Sedgwick, his short-term project. And, judging from the Wiki, I’m not even sure it’s that accurate. The ‘look’ of the film was interesting, though – filters and camera angles and whatnot.

Then we see Breach. Wow. What a trippy movie. And to think the basic facts of the story are true. A 27-year old rookie at the FBI gets assigned to take down the worst spy in American history. The government isn’t even sure how much damage he did by leaking information to Russia. His treason work supposedly led to the deaths of 50 Americans. Go see this movie. You'll leave with a "damn, that's f-ed up" feeling.

I finally saw Donnie Darko. Yes, I know it came out in 2001. I never got around to it. Now that I have, I must say it’s one hell of a movie. The version I saw was the extended director’s cut with deleted scenes. The extra material helped clarify what was going on, sort of. It was still confusing. And I still had to do some research on the web to figure out what everything meant. If you haven’t seen this movie, see it. And try to find a version with the extra scenes. I borrowed the DVD from a friend and the more I watch it, the more I notice that helps things make sense.

The soundtrack was also good. Plenty of 80s. One of my favorite scenes played Head over Heels by Tears for Fears while Donnie and his friends cruised down their high school hallway in slo-mo.

Addendum

[Seth is holding a knife to Donnie's throat as a car approaches along the road]
Seth Devlin: Did you call the fucking cops?
Donnie: Deus ex machina...
Seth Devlin: What did you say? What the fuck did you just say?
Donnie: Our saviour.

I never knew what Donnie said there because he was whispering. Now that I know, it makes more sense. Read about "deus ex machina" here.

Welcome to the new and improved particleman.org. Yes, it looks basically the same. Yes, all the old stuff is still here. But what you don’t see is what makes all that work worth the brief hiatus. Many thanks to John for helping me with the importation process. He found a way to import my old tables into the standard Moveable Type tables while retaining all the fields, the time stamps, the categories, and of course the comments. For those of you who don’t know what that means, just keep reading.

I’ve been busy the past few weeks. Busy doing – you guessed it – not much of anything. I did have a fun father-and-son day last Saturday. My dad managed to fix my laptop and then we went to the car show. Did I tell you about the broken laptop? Oh, it’s an awesome story.

I get home one night and turn on my laptop. Nothing happens. No false start, no blue screen, no nothing. I take out the power cord and notice it looks different. It seems part of the inside of the power jack broke off in the computer. I plug it in again and notice little sparks fly out of the jack. Interesting. I press the power button. Still nothing. I unplug the jack and plug it in again. More sparks. I call the manufacturer and they want $550 to fix it. I say Thanks But No Thanks. I take it the store where I bought it and they say the laptop is worth less than it would cost to fix it because the motherboard is toast. Turns out the power receptacle broke, and the power receptacle is attached to the motherboard, and they’re not about to go hunting around Houston for that power receptacle. I say Thanks Anyway (jackass).

I take the laptop to my dad. He decides to do exactly what the store would not do – he hunts around Houston for the power receptacle. He goes to his favorite parts outlet and, lo and behold, finds the power receptacle. For two dollars. He spends three hours carefully dismantling the laptop, soldering the new power receptacle on to the motherboard, and putting it all back together. He presses the button. It works. I love my dad. God bless dads who are engineers.

After that, we went to the car show and ogled all the cool new cars. Did you know that Hondas, some of the most efficient cars out there, produce more smog than many other cars out there? More than Volvos, which are probably less efficient on the average. Did you know BMW’s M6, a $102,000 behemoth of a coupe, has 400 horsepower V10? It looks like a rocket ship with 20” rims. Chevy has a new Camaro coming out that does what the Mustang, the Charger, and the PT Cruiser do – that is, relies on nostalgia to bring buyers back to American cars. I think it’s kind of lame.

That’s more or less what’s been happening. Oh yeah, and I completely embarrassed myself in class last week. So nothing has really changed.

To all my friends who have been asking me whether they should buy Windows Vista when it comes out, I wanted to make a public announcement: No. Don’t buy it. Stick with XP. Rule #1: never buy the first edition of any Microsoft software. Wait till they patch the hell out of it or release updates to fix all the holes and bugs. Rule #2: do your research. Read reviews. Don’t fall prey to the hype.

For 99% of you, XP is good enough, and you already own it. You won’t need to overhaul your computer to install anything and you already know how to use it. You will probably have to buy more memory to run Vista. For the law students among you, upgrading to Vista could cause problems if you plan on taking exams on your laptop. There’s no telling if ExamSoft will work. Also, there’s no telling if you’ll be able to take the Bar on your laptop. And if there’s one thing you don’t want to mess with, it’s your chances of passing the Bar. If you’re strictly a “type exams” kind of person like me, you don’t want to risk having to write all those essays by hand.

The other strange thing about Vista is its licensing. If you don’t activate the software, it will stop working. I don’t think Microsoft has ever done this. Activation is usually an option. Read the use terms yourself and see what I mean. The other issue is that you can only install Vista on one “device.” What’s a device? What happens if you get a new motherboard? A new processor? A new hard drive? That might be a new device, and you’d have to buy Vista again. This problem is not unique to Vista, but I was hoping they’d clarify the question for Vista. I guess not.

If you’re curious, you can find the use terms to most Microsoft products here.

Seventh installment of the “things that happen to you while” series.

For those not wise to Texas talk, The Valley refers to the Rio Grande Valley, or more generally, the area around the border. My friend Ricardo is from Edinburg, a smallish town in The Valley with about 50,000 people. I’ve known this guy for almost 10 years and I have yet to visit him in The Valley, so I figured it was about time I made the trip. So I hopped on a plane to McAllen (the closest airport) to spend four days exploring the bosom of the Rio Grande Valley.

I’m hoping you picked up on the bosom reference above. I’ll give you one hint: a coffee can and the pacific ocean.

Large quantities of beer were consumed and some excellent Tex-Mex was had. Note, however, that not all the tex-mex was good. Proximity to Mexico does not automatically result in higher quality levels of tex-mex. There is no correlation. Case in point: the first restaurant we went to served some pretty lame tex-mex. My mom makes better tex-mex, and she’s basically Polish. No matter. The rest of the tex-mex we had was good.

We managed to make a trip to Mexico, or rather the tourist area for buying souvenirs and whatnot called Nuevo Progreso just across the river. I have never seen so much useless shit for sale. I have also never seen such amazing prices on alcohol. Bottles and bottles of liquor at ridiculous prices. Otherwise, it reminded me of my time in Russia: children hawking all kinds of knick-knacks, low air quality, overcrowding, etc. It was not a pleasant sight. Kind of depressing actually. Keep in mind we only saw the shops on the tourist strip. I can’t imagine what it was like off the main road.

After Mexico, we stopped by South Padre Island. It was my first time there. Yeah, I know. What took me so long. I don’t know. I just never made it down there. It was kind of deserted since we were there in the off-season. It was kind of a ghost town. We did have some good seafood though. Or, actually, my fish po-boy was good. Ric’s shrimp platter was not that great. He wasn’t too keen on eating “shrimp poo.” The shrimp were not de-veined. Sorry bud.

To my surprise, minor league hockey is huge in The Valley. We saw the Rio Grande Valley Killer Bees battle the Amarillo Gorillas and beat them in overtime. It was pretty cool. I haven’t seen a hockey game since I was a kid and this game reminded me how much fun hockey is to watch. It’s like football on ice, but the players are allowed to fight until one guy falls down. And the overtime shootouts are awesome.

Ric also has a small radio-controlled helicopter that totally mesmerized us every minute that we were at home. This thing is incredible. I have to get one. You can only use it indoors because it’s made of Styrofoam and any wind will blow it clear across your yard into someone else’s yard, or a tree, or a street, or who knows what.

We also watched a lot of movies, one of which was Nacho Libre with Jack Black. You have to be a Jack Black fan to like this movie. It is absurd and over-the-top in a way only Jack Black can pull off. He plays a Luchador, a Mexican wrestler. I took to calling him Luchador Grande because, well, Jack’s a tubby guy. Ric happens to have a little dog named Chato who liked to bark at me at every opportunity. He was a sprite little guy who could have been a wrestler if he were a person. So I started calling him Chato Grande in honor of his wrestling potential.

And that’s my Valley story. Hope you enjoyed it. Actually, I don’t care. I’m a Luchador and I’ll do an eagle jump off the ropes and take you out.

I was at a bar and someone in my group said, “that tastes like fermented curry!”

In other news, my three-week stint at the firm is over and I head back to Houston on Monday, but not before causing a little more damage this weekend. I’ve also rediscovered the awesomeness of Fish and Chips. If you’re ever at a pub and feel like something other than standard tex-mex or chicken strips, try the Fish and Chips. It’s really good and will give you horrible breath. You’ll be a favorite at the table.

I’ll miss zipping around in my friend’s BMW. Yes, I have gotten better at driving manual, but I’m still no expert. I either over-rev the engine or kill it when getting into first, and shifting to second will give you whiplash. After that, I’m golden, but most driving takes place in gears one through three (though this car is a six-speed, so I spend most of my time in fourth).

The cool part is that my friend is thinking of moving to Europe for a while after he gets back from his vacation there. He’s thinking Munich. That sounds good to me, because I can continue to “watch over” his car while he’s gone. I can’t wait to call my insurance company and say, “Hi, I’d like add a monstrosity of a BMW with a V8 to my plan. And oh yeah, I’m male, single, and have no kids. How much will that run me?”

My friend gets back sometime tomorrow so I better start cleaning this place up. Ironically, it was messier before I got here; I vacuumed and cleaned the kitchen floor as soon as I arrived, which are things I don’t think he’s ever done. But in the meantime, stuff has managed to pile up everywhere. So I might spend today in cleaning mode. Cross your fingers.

Do you ever get that feeling that you’ll be out drinking for the unforeseeable future? This always happens when you’re about to move out of one place and into another, or when friends are moving out of one place and into another. For me, all of those things are happening, which means I’ll be getting ‘see you soon’ drinks, ‘welcome back’ drinks, and ‘it was fun’ drinks for someone who is leaving Houston. Not that I’m complaining. I just feel like the bartenders at some of these bars are starting to recognize me. And that is a scary thought.

I resolve to make no more new years resolutions. I always either forget about them or break them by the end of January. I resolve to make resolutions “on the fly” as needed. Perhaps that’s what some people call “making good life choices.” I obviously don’t know too much about that.

So here are a few of the new and improved “on the fly” resolutions:
1. I am not a crammer. Cramming does not work well for me. I will actually have to act like a 1L and stay caught up with the material . It kind of sucks. But my grades this semester have sent me a clear signal: my short-term memory is not what it used to be.
2. Ok so that’s it. If I keep listing the other things I have in my head, they will really start to sound like actual new years resolutions, and I already resolved to not do that.

One of my girlfriends from college got married last year (not to me) and she left a message on my phone that she had some interesting news for me. I automatically assumed she was pregnant. So I called back and left a message. We tend to play phone-tag a lot. I said that I had a pretty good idea of what the news was, but I’d just wait for her to tell me. Since her resulting email was so funny, and I don’t think she’d care if I posted this, this is what she said:

"I am guessing you think my news (based off your voicemail message) is something a lot more serious then what my actual news is. I was just going to tell you I got hit in the face with a volleyball and got sent to the emergency room because my jaw locked shut."

This book is rocking. Really entertaining. I haven’t gotten very far yet, but there was one passage I wanted to share.

Background: a teenage boy in India discovers Christianity, and adopts it. He then discovers Islam, and adopts it too. The imam, priest, and pandit find out about the boy’s religious whoring and confront the parents. His older brother finds out too, and says to his younger brother:

“So, Swami Jesus, will you go on the hajj this year . . . Or does Mecca beckon . . . Or will it be to Rome for your coronation as the next Pope Pius. Have you found time to get your pecker cut off and become a Jew? At the rate you're going, if you go to temple on Thursday, mosque on Friday, synagogue on Saturday and church on Sunday, you only need to convert to three more religions to be on holiday for the rest of your life.”

Is it me, or are whales talking to each other in the background of Little People by The White Stripes?

My TV is lame and old and I don’t have cable. I don’t watch TV. I just watch DVDs. Or I go to friends’ places and watch there. Have you heard of this HBO series called Rome? I’m already a sucker for historical fiction as it is. When they put it on a screen with cool battles and hot women I’m sold. Or bought. Whatever. It rules. I watched about five hours of Rome with a friend yesterday and I want more. Thank goodness he borrowed the entire first season on DVD. There goes my studying for the week. As if I were actually going to read.

Oh yeah, and 24 is back on too. Jack Bauer is my hero.

In other news, I’ve had a sorry excuse of a flu for a few days now. It’s not even a full-blown flu. I might have had a fever for one night. But I’m congested and generally lethargic. I know that’s not exactly a new thing with me, but it’s normally not this bad. I think it might have something to do with the mono I had last year. Doesn’t mono never go away? I don’t know. I think it just makes whatever illness you have that much worse. Or long-lasting. Oh well. Bring on the Rome episodes!

I’ve never been an obsessive grade-checker. I usually wait till my friends tell me that our grades are posted to log on and finally check. Call it apathy, call it laziness, call not giving a damn. Yes, I know that last one means the same thing as the first one. I only bring this up because when I finally decide to get off my ass and check grades, the system is overloaded. All I need to do is make sure I passed my classes so I don’t have to worry about not graduating this semester. I’m thinking the system is overloaded because all the 1Ls are frantically checking to make sure they at least made a B or something. Some of them might be checking to make sure they passed so as not to jeopardize their GPA and possibly get kicked out of school. While I sympathize with their plight, there is more riding on my not passing than their not passing, so I therefore have no patience for the overloading of the online grade web site.

1Ls, get off. I want to graduate this semester.

You might like a band called Dropping Daylight. The name is cheesy, and the music is more groomed for mainstream radio, but it still rocks and there is still plenty of banging pianos and wailing vocals. Instead of buying the cd and wading through some radio-friendly watered-down tracks, go to iTunes and download these songs:

Tell Me
Take A Photograph (my personal favorite)
Brace Yourself
Soliloquy
Till You Feel Something

The album is called “Brace Yourself.”

It seems I forgot to post the requisite and obligatory well-wishes holiday post. Oops. Consider this your retroactive happy/merry whatever you feel like celebrating post. I forget what I was doing at the time I should have made these posts. I may have been finishing up finals. I may have been contending with the tantrums of a three- and one-year old. I may have been (ahem) hungover. Who knows. Either way, I hope you had a good time.

I wore a yellow shirt to work today. At 6:30 I pulled my jacket off of the back of my chair, put it on, and walked out to the train station. I sat in front of a young couple seated together. When my stop came, I got up and walked out. I got home, took off my jacket, and hung it on the back of a chair. Stuck to the back of my jacket was a Post-It note that read:

BIG BIRD

Did I mention that I did 110 miles per hour on the highway in my friend’s BMW? Shiiiit, and I didn’t even get to 6th gear. Yes, it’s a six-speed. Ninety in that car felt like forty in my Honda. I’m not so good at first gear though. I stalled at more stop signs than I’d like to admit. I’m still working on that whole clutch thing.

it's been a wild year. lots happened but i;m too drunk to talk about it. so instead:

album of the year: arctic monkeys
song of the year: way out by yeah yeah yeahs. if that link does not work, go here.
movie of the year: the departed

Hey particlefans. I’m back. Didja miss me? I hope you enjoyed the ravings of MPB. He’s quite the kidder, he is.

After partying till the wee hours of the morning last night (4 am by my recollection), I was on my bike six hours later cranking out the miles in the beautiful December air. It was a brisk 70 degrees, and windy as hell. I might as well have been riding up hill most of the time. I started getting this weird pain on either side of my lower back and I think it was my kidneys screaming at me. My liver probably put a few words in there too.

Where was I riding? No, not in Houston. I’m in Dallas. I got a phone call from my boss last Saturday and she said, "Hey, wanna come up to Dallas for three weeks?" I said Yes, of course, and relayed the news to one of my Dallas friends who I had previously told I would only be in town for a few days. He was planning on going to Europe for three weeks so he said, "Wanna house-sit?"

So here I am. Apartment-sitting in Dallas. Oh, and this friend? He has a 2000 BMW 540i with a V8. Watch out, Dallas. I like fast cars and I’m not very good at driving manual transmission.

Since finals have taken over my life and I’ll be traveling around the state after they end, I’ve enlisted the help of yet another pinch-blogger. This gentleman has had the misfortune of knowing me since our freshman year in college, so he knows things about me many others don’t. He might even know things about me that I don’t remember happening.

With that, I hand over the reins.

I saw Borat last night. It was a well-deserved study break. I will not give anything away or ruin anything for you, but I wanted to point something out that may actually increase the humor level for you, or at least it will put things in a new perspective after you see the movie and have time to reflect on it. Most of the time when Borat and his producer are not speaking in English, the producer is speaking what I’m assuming is Kazakh or some form of it. Borat, on the other hand, is not speaking that language. He is in fact speaking Hebrew.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled pinch-blogger.

The term is thrown around all too much but refers to a distinct style of culinary practice. Different people have their own takes, but one thing’s for sure: when it shows up at my law firm’s catered holiday party at tomorrow 11:30, no work will get done between the hours of 11:30 and 5:00 pm. It’s not that we’ll be eating until 5, but soul food tends to convert any potential energy contained within the body into, well, nothing. The laws of thermodynamics break down. Energy will be completely lost, never to be found again.

Also, your pores will ooze gravy.

Addendum: i know you're thinking. i must have eaten so much that i was stuffed for the rest of the day. yes, i did eat so much that i was stuffed for the rest of the day, until 9 o'clock rolled around and i ate an entire pizza. where does it all go? my legs, people. i store brisket and cornbread in my legs.

Tomorrow I register for classes for my last semester of law school. LAST SEMESTER OF LAW SCHOOL. I can’t believe I just said that. I never thought I’d actually make it this far.

Remember when I started? Remember before that, when I quit my job? Holy shit, that seems like years ago. Wait, it was. It seems like decades ago. It seems like the guy that walked into that building on the first day of orientation is a completely different guy than the guy writing this. Completely different and exactly the same. Maybe just more focused. My strengths are more refined and my faults are more pronounced. They took everything good and bad inside me and amplified it. Concentrated it. I am a phenomenally efficient reader, writer, editor, and slacker. No one can slack like me. Give me ten minutes of your free time and I will make it disappear into a wormhole of procrastination. Then again, give me a red pen and an essay and say goodbye to everything you wrote. Give me any story, any conversation, any exchange of human thought, and I will over-analyze it and interpret it in so many ways you will ache for me to shut up.

Thank you, law school, for showing me how ‘me’ I can be.

Since I still have one semester left, I’m leaving the actual “end of law school” post till next year. That one will be longer and sappier. Maybe with some confessions.

I’m at the point where I’m chaining myself to my desk for hours at a time. The studying vibes worked. Whatever you sent my way did the trick. That, or I realized that two weeks of goofing off has really bitten me in the ass and I have a lot to learn. Four months of slacking (including seven days of skipping class) can really add up.

I did take my bass in to the guitar shop today for some routine maintenance. The humidity changes really mess with the alignment (we call that neck bow and string action in guitar-speak). I also went to a bike shop and used a coupon that was about to expire. I bought a helmet that fits a lot better than the one I bought in 2000-ish.

I clearly have nothing to say. I eat securities for breakfast. The SEC is the bane of my existence. Marital property laws are my bible. My relationship advice to everyone is never get divorced. In fact, you might as well never get married. Bad idea. I have to get back to studying now. Time to learn how to appeal a lower court’s decision on the division of your marital estate.

I COMMAND ALL OF YOU TO SEND ANY VIBES, FEELINGS, AND GENERAL THOUGHTS OF STUDYING AND OTHER SCHOLARLY ACTIVITY MY WAY, BECAUSE I AM ALL OUT OF MOTIVATION TO STUDY FOR FINALS. DO NOT SEND ANY SUCH FEELINGS TO ANYONE ELSE. CONCENTRATE THEM ON ME. THIS MUST BE DONE TO MAINTAIN EQUILIBRIUM IN THE UNIVERSE. DO YOU WANT TO DISRUPT OUR EQUILIBRIUM? I DIDN’T THINK SO. WHOAAA CAPS LOCK.

YOU ARE THUS COMMANDED.

Contrary to popular belief, I am not the Verizon Guy. If I were, I’d hate myself, because I’d be fucking annoying.

I am also not Rivers Cuomo, singer for Weezer. If I were, I’d transport myself back to 1994 (or 1996) and remind myself how to write songs that don’t suck.

I am also not Ben Folds. But if I were, I’d marry a model, because I can rock the piano like none other, and everyone knows models marry goofy looking guys with ridiculous musical talent.

No, I am none of the above. This is who I really am.

I picked up my friend’s diploma from school last week and she hasn’t come to get it yet. I think I'll cross her name out and write mine in.

This is where I’m going after I finish taking the bar next summer, or during the week preceding the release of the scores. Or both. I forbid anyone else from going there during that time. If I find you there, I’m chasing you down with my guitar and you’re gonna have to swim to the next island.

Saw The Departed this weekend. Go see it. If you can, imagine Alec Baldwin, in a Boston accent, saying the following at a million miles an hour, and you should probably end up laughing:

I'm gonna go have a smoke right now. You want a smoke? You don't smoke, do ya, right? What are ya, one of those fitness freaks, huh? Go fuck yourself.

Context: conversation with a friend about studying habits. I intend to say that it’s hard for me to get started studying for finals, but once I get started, I’m ok.

Particleman: You see, I have a problem –
Friend: “A” problem?? “A” problem”?! Honey, if only we all had “a” problem. I have more than I can count.
P: Good point. I probably have more than one problem.

How to celebrate Thanksgiving in 10 steps, Particleman-style:

1. Get together with a small group of friends and order food from Boston Market.
2. Rent a few movies.
3. Stock the apartment with a wide array of wines and beers.
4. Start drinking at 3 pm.
5. Start eating at 4 pm.
6. Keep drinking.
7. Keep drinking.
8. Keep drinking.
9. Keep drinking.
10. Throw up in the bushes and pass out at 10:30.

At dinner last night with my dad, who has a habit of firing off question after question:

Dad: Hey, I have a law school question for you.
Particleman: Ok.
D: What if you sign a will on the last page of the will -
P: You can sign it on any page, it doesn’t matter -
D: No, that’s not my question. What if you sign it on only the last page. What’s preventing me or someone else from swapping one of the earlier pages out for a new one that’s different?
P: Uhhhhh. Ask a lawyer. I haven’t started studying for that class yet. Ask me again in three weeks.

I am slowly growing more ethical. But not yet so ethical that I could practice in Texas, which actually has the highest required minimum score* in the nation. Texas is one of several states that requires a score of 85% while many other states are satisfied with 75-80%. So when you hear people complain that lawyers are sleazebags, you can proudly state that in Texas, lawyers are 5% less sleazy than in most other states.

*I should clarify that the only state with a score higher than 85% is Utah, which for some reason requires 86%. But they just did that because they wanted to be different. Which, of course, they are. Dooce can tell you all about that.

The water that comes out of my bathroom faucet smells funny. Is water supposed to smell funny?

I have a weird teacher this semester. Well, I actually have two weird teachers, but let’s just focus on one for now. One of these teachers assigned us a text book and a statute book. Both of these books are rather large and heavy and annoying to lug around the building.

One day, I was just too lazy to bring my statute book to class. I was hoping he wouldn’t call on me for anything, or that if he did, that I could answer the question without my statute book.

He called on me, and I needed the statute book to answer his question. Great.

Particleman: Um, I don’t have my statute book today.
Teacher: What! You came to class without your clothes on?
P: [pause] Huh?
T: Jeez, I’m turning red over here!
P: thinks: are we really having this conversation?

I’m going to Dallas this weekend to hang out with my Dallas crew and the law firm. I was supposed to go up there in September but never found a free weekend. My school is having a softball tournament this weekend that I wanted to see, but this is probably my last chance to goof off before I have to start studying, or at least pretend like I’m studying.

But before I can split town for Dallas, I have to sit through two hours of class. Senioritis has totally kicked in.

I’m taking my road bike up there but the weather doesn’t look good for outdoor activities (and it doesn’t here either… good luck softball people). Saturday might stay dry so everyone please do a rain dance or something. Or I guess the anti-rain dance. Whatever it takes.

it's 74 degrees. SEVENTY-FOUR!! humidity is only 60%!! that's, like, almost tolerable! time to take the road bike for a spin around Memorial Park.

1. Whenever I get into a relationship – which is not that often – I use the six month anniversary as the point when I “take stock.” Am I happy in this relationship? Happier than when I was alone? Is she happy? Does she seem happy? Should I stay here or move on? I recently had a conversation with someone that convinced me that maybe six months was too short. You’re still in the honeymoon. Nine months might be better. Either way, does anyone else do this? When is your threshold?

2. When the landlord knocks on your door and you’re in your boxers and say “Who is it?” and she announces herself and you say “Just a minute” and proceed to look for clothes and she walks in anyway, it’s pretty fucking annoying.

I love it when you’re out dancing with a group of friends and the dance floor is so crowded that you bump into a couple dancing and turn around to find them mugging down while his hands are exploring various intimate areas of her person. No problemo, I think we’ve all been there, right? But when their bodies coated in love-sweat keep bumping into you, it’s about that time when one of your friends says, "Yeah, looks like we’re caught in the middle of a porn."

Dallas was fun. I think I scored on the dance floor.

I spent yesterday enjoying the cool breeze and warm sun. Today, my allergies are kicking the shit out of me. Why oh why was I blessed with my mom’s allergies. Notice there is no question mark there. It’s more of a lament than a question. Oh, OH, did I mention that I have tickets to see the Yeah Yeah Yeahs tonight? I do. And I’m going, even though my nose is a sorry excuse for a leaky faucet and I’m so medicate I can hardly complete a coherent sentence.

I just took twenty practice questions for an ethics exam that every lawyer must pass. The test is on Saturday. Out of the twenty questions I took, I ONLY GOT ELEVEN RIGHT. Either I’m stupid or completely unethical.

I just realized that the contact form at the bottom of this page and on the about page doesn’t work. You can enter your name, email, and message, and press the button, but I never get your message. I tested it out twice last night and, while it’s supposed to send me an email, I didn’t get anything. No email. No message. Apologies to those of you who tried to use it in the past and never got a response from me. I promise I’m not an asshole. I didn’t ignore you. The form (along with my comments) broke when I changed servers in May. Let’s see if can’t fix it.

In other news, I took one of the Danish exchange students out to get sushi with Heather last night, and then we got beers with my old roomie. She had a great time. I’m so glad my friends came out. I think the best part was when Heather and I asked her how she and the rest of Denmark feel about W. She was a little hesitant at first but came clean when Heather and I told her she was probably with the two best people with which to discuss W’s shortcomings. Good times.

And then at the pub, former roomie and I got the true story of how one Danish motorcycle gang fired a rocket at a rival motorcycle gang. Not a pistol. Not some semi-automatic thing. Not even a grenade. (Do gangs use grenades?) And how many years did the guy who fired the rocket get? Sixteen. Sixteen years for firing a rocket at people!!!

addendum: i found a news clipping. the end of this article says:

In Denmark, Sweden and Norway, the two sides deployed rocket-propelled anti-tank grenades and AK-47 assault rifles in their battles.

Twenty-seven years ago today this world was first graced with the glory that is me. Congrats World and Happy Birthday me!

Ashley and JR concocted what is probably the coolest two-person costume. They created a -

HUGE CAMERA

And you can see the pictures it (they?) took here.

I need to be a Non-Expert as featured on The Morning News:

“Experts answer what they know. The Non-Expert answers anything.”

A group of Israeli college students are traveling the country speaking at schools about what has been going on in Israel and the Jewish Law Students Association at school invited them to speak. One of them immigrated to Israel from Ethiopia with his family when he was seven months old. His story was amazing. I knew about the Ethiopian Jews but I never heard first-hand about an Ethiopian Jew’s experience.

He is the youngest in a 12-child family, which is considered small by Ethiopian standards. Twenty kids is not uncommon. His father is 90-something years old and his mom is 60-something. He is 27. One day in 1980, his father decided they should move to Israel to escape the dictatorship in Ethiopia. So they left everything behind – all possessions, their home, their livestock, their land – and walked to a town in Sudan where they could find transport to Israel. The walk was 300 miles. For perspective, that’s 60 miles longer than walking from Houston to Dallas, in African (maybe like Texan?) heat. It took them three months with a family of 14.

Once there, they stayed in a small apartment with three other families of like size and could not leave very often because Sudan is a Muslim country, and his family ate only Kosher food. They could not risk being seen looking for Kosher foods (if it could be found at all). They got word from the Mossad, the Israeli version of the CIA, that transport could be arranged for them to Israel via Greece.

He was obviously too young to remember any of this, but his father had never before seen a White Jew, let alone a White man, so he expected all of the Jews in Israel – including the Mossad agents helping them – to be Black, or at least dark-skinned. He did not know that Jews were living in all parts of the world and look like, well, all parts of the world. So when he saw the Mossad agents and all the White people in Israel, he though they had been taken to the wrong country.

This story must have repeated itself for thousands upon thousands of Ethiopian families. The students also described the racism in Israel as less color-based, as it is here, and more cultural-based. If people with dark skin are discriminated against, it is less for their color than for their heritage or nationality. One of the students described her surprise at the kind of racism we have in America. She couldn’t understand how color could be the basis for discrimination.

All three students served in the Israeli Army and one was called from reserves to serve in the recent war with Hezbollah. All of their stories were amazing. One, born in England, made the decision to move to Israel when he was 18 and never looked back. His accent was most perplexing – English, Israeli, or both? Both. In America, we say “um” when we’re thinking of what to say. In Israel, they say “em.” He said “em,” but with an English accent. Awesome.

As for where the Ethiopian Jews (aka Beta Israel) come from, there are four theories:

1. The Beta Israel may be the lost Israelite tribe of Dan.
2. They may be descendants of Menelik I, son of King Solomon and Queen Sheba.
3. They may be descendants of Ethiopian Christians and pagans who converted to Judaism centuries ago.
4. They may be descendants of Jews who fled Israel for Egypt after the destruction of the First Temple in 586 BCE and eventually settled in Ethiopia.

Like bikes? Like staying up late? Some friends and I are doing the Moonlight Ramble on Sunday, October 29th, at 2 am. Some people wear costumes. Some mount radios to their bikes. Some pull kids (or pets) in bike carriers. BikeHouston puts the event together and has the streets closed off for the cyclists. The approximate route, from what I remember, takes the riders from The George R. Brown to Midtown, past The Summit (or whatever it’s called these days), up Westpark, through the Galleria area, down Allen Parkway, and back to the GRB. There is an eight mile route and a 20-miler. The 20 miles goes by quickly though and I think anyone can do it. It’s not a race – it’s just a ride. The idea is to get out in the cool October air and pedal.

Last year I wore my usual bike get-up but this year I think I’m going to have get a little more creative.

If you’re interested, register before October 15th and pay the $20. It goes up to $25 after the 15th.

Every now and then, we at particleman.org like to strip things down. It was time to simplify and we were tired of looking at the tried and true old page. We used the basic elements contributed by our friend Chris Sandoval in his original design from 2003. Was it that long ago? Yes, it was. Hence all the more reason for a facelift.

The new theme here is “less is more,” “simpler is better,” “we’re lazy and less code equates to less work.” Nothing else should have changed. We still take bad jokes too far and ignore the laws of tact. You’ll hopefully like the new page as much as the old one. And if you didn’t like the old one, too bad, we never cared. And if you don’t like this one, also too bad, because it’s on the cutting edge of technology. I mean, check it out, that’s HTML back there. There might even be a style sheet.

Keep in mind the site is still in a transitory state and some pages might retain the old look for a little while. No no, let’s not call it the “old” look. “Legacy” sounds so much better.

There’s always one table at a restaurant occupied by a group of annoying adults celebrating someone’s birthday. Last night, I was one of three guys at a birthday party that gave our table the “annoying” status. It was awesome. The three of us ordered round of sake after round of sake and every time we had a glass, we’d announce as loud as possible, “HAPPY BIRTHDAY SARAH!!!!!!” and take the shot of sake. We drew a lot of smiles from our table of 16.

How many shots of sake did we take? I don’t remember. All I know is that between the three of us, we went through five jars of sake.

Some time ago, Skorloff was pinch-blogging for me while I was sick with mono or cramming for finals or lord knows what. He posted a most entertaining post about his off-the-charts cholesterol levels and his switch to a vegetarian diet. I’d like to find out how that vegetarian thing is going, and if he's lost more cholesterol points than the equivalent of one slice of bacon.

Saw the Yeah Yeah Yeahs Sunday night. Since I wasn’t feeling all that well and John wanted to watch the Cardinals game, we decided to skip the opening acts and only see YYYs. We guessed that 10 pm was a safe bet, and we got there at a few minutes after 10, and they had just taken the stage and started the first song. The timing couldn’t have been better, though we did have to stand at the back of the crowd. (This is where being tall comes in handy).

Karen O. is a nutcase. Lots and lots of energy. She was theatrical and dramatic. She had masks and costume hats and Stevie Nicks-esque capes and other flowy fabrics. The other members did the music dude thing and kind of hung around. The music did sound a little muddled at times. They could have done a better job refining their live sound. My main complaint is with the vocals – she was entirely too hard to hear above the drums and guitars.

Also, to my surprise, they didn’t play Way Out off the new album, which is the song I wanted to hear above all others. It reminded me of when I saw Radiohead on their OK Computer tour and they didn’t play Electioneering, which was of course the only “rock” song on that record. I guess they were too cool to play any rock songs amidst a set of spacey quasi-electronic numbers.

Here are some pictures I lifted off flickr. Yes, I realize they’re all of the singer. The guys in the band weren’t that exciting.

Last year at about this time I did a bike ride called the Moonlight Ramble with my friend Kevin. We decided to make an annual event and did it again this year, though I had to forego a big law school party that all of my friends hassled me about skipping. Sorry guys, I’m a cyclist first and drunk second!

The night actually did start out with some partying. It is Halloween, of course, and there’s nothing better than riding your bike on a few beers (don’t tell the State Bar I said that). I live in a garage apartment and the people that live in the duplex in front of me threw a Halloween party. They’re a young, recently married couple and we get along well, so I was happy to represent. I got suited up in a Hebrew Hammer outfit and John went the “Jiffy Lube Mechanic” route. Somehow there are no pictures of us which is a shame. Someone thought I was Matisyahu…

Kevin showed up at 1:00 and we left for the bike ride, after which I heard John took control of the stereo at the party and rocked everyone’s world.

The bike ride was a lot more crowded than I remember. A staffer told me there were 2,000 people. That’s quite a few crazies on their bikes at two o’clock in the morning. And again, there were some people in costumes. Pirates, clowns, knights, and a husband-wife “The Incredibles” duo. The weather was perfect – 54 and clear.

I’ll be in Dallas this time next year, but I’m definitely driving down to do this ride again. Good times.

Flickr photos here.

My dad is borderline color-blind. Red stoplights took yellow. Yellow looks orange. Purple looks green. And greens, unfortunately, look blue. So when I called my dad yesterday to ask about loctite to use on the threads of my bike’s self-loosening chainring bolts, I should have known what to ask. The conversation went:

Particleman: Do you know what loctite is?
Dad: Of course.
P: Do you have any?
Dad: Yeah, in the garage. Above the workbench on a shelf in a red bottle.
P: Red? Ok. But what color is the loctite? It comes in different colors with different bonding strengths, green, red, and blue. I need blue.
Dad: Yeah, the bottle is red but the fluid is blue.
P: Thanks. I’m borrowing it. Some bolts on my bike are coming loose.
Dad: Ok.

It’s been a couple weeks since I’ve ridden the road bike. I know I’m not at the level I was when I was in Dallas, but I didn’t know exactly how bad it had gotten. There I was at the loop at Memorial Park today, cruising at 18-19 miles per hour, when some douche bag on a full suspension mountain sails past me. Me, on super-duper titanium lighter than your left shoe road bike with bladed-spoked wheels designed to cut through wind better than normal wheels. He was on a completely inefficient trail bike designed to soak up bumps and waste as much energy as possible.

My ego was bruised. So what do I do? What any male would have done. I sped up. I tried to catch him. I dropped a few gears and cranked as hard as I could. But since my breathing was all out of whack and my muscles aren’t used to that kind of stress, I lost him. He rode off leaving me gasping for air. To make matters worse, he lapped me a while later. Who’s the douche bag now?

Is anyone listening to the new(ish) nine inch nails album? I know they’re not underground or indie or the synth-dance-rock that the kids* love so much these days (The Killers, The Bravery, etc), but shit, it’s Trent Reznor. He knows what he’s doing.

Anyway, I’ve been listening to the new NIN album, and while it’s certainly different than the other albums, I like it. Yeah, it might be more commercial, and it definitely has a less “industrial” vibe, but I still feel like a lot of thought was put into it.

I especially like the drum work. You can’t go wrong when you get Dave Grohl to hit things for you. And since there are a lot of grungy bass lines, it gets automatic points. Put a bass through a distortion filter and I’m basically sold. Hey, I’m easy.

* I admit it. I like those bands too. Even though they dress like Robert Smith in a suit.

I saw:

• Gomez
  
• Thievery Corporation (only a few minutes)
  
• Gnarls Barkley (only a few minutes)
  
• Wolf Parade (only a few minutes)
  
• John Mayer (only a few minutes) (ugh)
  
• Ben Kweller (only a few minutes)
  
• Nada Surf (only a few minutes)
  
• The Shins
  
• The Raconteurs
  
• Massive Attack
  
• Ween
  
• The New Pornographers (only a few minutes)
  
• The Greencards
  
• Muse
  
• Tom Petty (only a few minutes)

My top picks were Muse, Massive Attack, The Raconteurs, and Gomez. Three of those bands happen to be from the UK and they happen to be bands I’ve been waiting to see for three years, so this ACL was kind of a big deal to me. These bands don’t come to the US often.

Muse was phenomenal.* Everything was there – musical accuracy, stage antics, variety of song choice, and sound quality. They must have a great sound guy. I was concerned they’d have a hard time translating the complexity of their studio recordings into a live performance but they seem to have a good handle on it. In fact, the same goes for Massive Attack. I didn’t know what to expect with them. I wasn’t even sure they’d have a full band, but they did. They had two drummers. I pegged them as more of an electronic outfit with various keyboards and synths doing all the work. I was also happy to see they toured with the two extra vocalists featured on their studio tracks. Massive Attack are experts at gradual builds and they pulled it off well in the live performance. The light show was also impressive. The main vocalist made a few comments about our buddy W, and on the next song, the light display behind the band scrolled factoids about the Iraq war: the number of Americans killed, the number of Iraqis killed, the cost of the war to American taxpayers, the number of displaced Iraqi civilians, so on and so forth. It was sobering.

The Raconteurs, Jack White’s new band, were insane. That guy is possessed. I saw The White Stripes a long time ago at Emo’s in Austin and I thought he was nuts then. He’s only more crazy now. If you get the chance, definitely check this band out. They will not disappoint.

Gomez was a little more reserved than I had hoped for. They didn’t really let loose and kept to the more mellow tracks. There was one song in particular I wanted to hear with a (surprise) distorted bass part, but they didn’t do it. What really bugged me was that the bass player hung back the whole show and stood by his amp. If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s a bass player who hides behind the band, musically or physically. Otherwise, they played some good songs and had a good time on stage.

What about Tom Petty? Yeah, there were about 50 million people standing between me and Tom Petty. Tom had already started by the time the Muse show ended. I walked for a while towards his stage and there was still at least a half-mile of people in front of me. There was no way I was going to get closer to see or hear anything. No amount of wattage could have moved the sound to where I and thousands of other people were. So I heard traces of a few songs and left with a couple friends. We ate at Magnolia, they went back to the hotel, and I hit the road to get home in time to sleep a few hours and be at work at 9.

Just my luck, I ran into a torrential downpour on I-71 that brought me down to 30 miles per hour. My sight was limited to 10 feet in front of me. Thankfully I finally got away from the rainstorm and cruised the rest of the way, getting home at 2 am. Seven hours later, I was at my desk, ears ringing and head groggy.

Pictures i lifted from flickr:

Muse:

Massive Attack:

The light towers:

The Raconteurs:

Jack White screaming his head off:

Gomez:

*Addendum: My only complaint about Muse was that ACL pulled the plug on them too early. They were supposed to have a forty-five minute set (which was already too short), but since Tom Petty had started playing, the singer said, "We'd love to keep playing but the people running show are going to pull the power on us because Tom Petty has started." Hence, some of my ambivalence towards seeing Tom Petty.

The Austin City Limits music festival has gotten cocky in its old age. They let you bring your camelback, but it has to be empty. WTF? No water allowed. Oh, but you can bring “two factory sealed water bottles up to 1 liter each.” I sweat two liters of water in five minutes. Two liters is a joke. Meanwhile, I’m betting a half-liter bottle of water costs $7. Someone out there in ACL-land is making way too much money, or getting a really good laugh out of this. Fuckers.

I just felt like channeling a little bit of the stuff that bugs me vibe.

The fun part is that I’ll be skipping class all of Friday and probably Monday since I won’t have read anything all weekend. Wait – I never read anymore. Looks like I’ll be in class Monday.

Cherz made the grave mistake of inviting me to be a guest-blogger on his site. He has two other guest-bloggers and I am the lynch pin that will bring the whole thing down. Just wait and see. Case in point: my first post.

there's a new ipod nano out. it's thinner, has an aluminum case, has a 24-hour battery life, and a brigher screen. damn you steve jobs, i can't afford all of your ingenuity.

Before i get into describing the staggering awesomeness and total exhaustion of the weekend, which will take me a couple days to get to, i have this to say: it felt good to be in a place where people have tatoos of Texas on various body parts. You don't see that so often in Houston. But in Austin it's standard issue. Gotta love it.

Hell no. Not gonna do it. Why should I? I love my nano but I’m an iPod minimalist. I upload songs to the nano and that’s it. No pictures. No calendar. No notes. When I charge the nano I don’t open iTunes – it charges whether or not iTunes is open. I have no need for the jukebox-style album covers. When I hear of features like "jukebox-style album covers," I think, "slow my computer to a screeching halt." No thanks.

So to all the Apple junkies who downloaded iTunes 7... suckers!!! (insert winky smiley face thing here). I hope you had a good reason to install it, cuz I can hear your hard drive grinding from here.

If you read my post on cherz’s blog, you would have seen that I had big plans to see the Reverend Horton Heat on Thursday night and skip class on Friday. Did I see the Reverend? No. It sold out. Did I skip class? Of course. I couldn’t possibly go to class when I had gotten it into my head to skip. Instead, I went mountain biking and the equipment gods sent their wrath upon me.

I’ve broken all kinds of bike parts on bike rides. If I haven’t broken it, I saw someone else break it. I’ve also seen people lose all kinds of parts while riding, including a crank bolt a few months go. But I could not have been prepared for what happened yesterday.

There I was, just riding along, and I notice that the drivetrain on my single-speed feels wobbly. Now this is especially odd because the whole point of a single-speed bike is that there are fewer parts to go wobbly and thus less headaches on the trail. There’s a crank, a chain, a chain tensioner, and a cog. That’s it.

So imagine my surprise when I stop and look down at my bike and see nothing wrong. What? Something was wobbling. I get off the bike and take a closer look and see that there is indeed a big problem. What’s wrong with this picture?

There should be four bolts around the perimeter of the chainring. Those bolts hold the chainring to the crankarm. One of the bolts managed to work itself loose and take a walk on the trail.

I tightened the three remaining chainring bolts, cursed, and headed back to the car. My epic three hour ride was cut short to one hour. But that’s ok because I don’t think I would have lasted for three hours.

1) One of your professors has a sub come in to discuss a narrow area of law. This sub is the leading state expert on this subject. He’s an older man, maybe 60, and rather large. He stands up, shakes his left leg, and adjusts himself without trying to hide his movements behind the lectern. Horrified, you look at the girl beside you and claim, “I feel violated. Did he just do what I think he did.” “Yeah, ew.” Then, the professor does it again, this time turning to the side to face half of the class.

2) You arrive at your Securities Regulation class a little early as the previous class’ professor is packing up. He says, “Is this Securities? How do you like it? I also teach it some semesters.” You give him a blank stare and think to yourself: “This class is freaking impossible. It’s like tax, but worse.” Just as you’re about to give a perfectly civil response, he adds, “You know, because this stuff is basically impossible.”

Today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day. Yarrrrrr. Shiver me timbers. Rebecca remembered, but I didn't.

You must. I’m not a huge tv-watcher but this show is gold. Pure brilliance. I still haven’t watched last week’s episode – gonna get to it tonight – but I’ve heard it’s one of those episodes that is so good it’s hard to watch. Just makes you feel all awkward and sympathetic for the people you’re watching. Like when Ben Stiller used to be really good at making you feel absolutely horrible for him. If you like that kind of humor, you’ll like The Office. Before it came to America, The Office was a UK show very similar to the new American version, but with a British sensibility that can’t be recreated or described. It’s just – British humor. Highly recommended.

The Wall Street Journal recently ran an article covering the fashion industry’s request that congress pass a bill giving copyright protection to its designs. You may remember that I took a copyright class last year, spent the summer working for a copyright firm, and that I’m going into copyright law after graduation. I have a thing or two to say about the fashion industry’s request.

At first I was completely against this maneuver. I thought it was a horrible idea. The last thing we need is federal regulation in yet another artistic field. The nature of art involves a certain degree of borrowing, and, yes, even ripping-off. Every artist in existence has ripped off other artists and co-opted other artists’ ideas. It’s how creativity works. Inspiration and what have you. No one has any new ideas anymore. It’s a matter of taking someone else’s idea and twisting it into something quasi-original.

But then I thought about all the counterfeit clothing and accessories that cut into fashion designers’ sales. Sure, maybe counterfeit products function as free advertising, and maybe those buyers wouldn’t and couldn’t afford some of those items and would never buy them anyway, but there’s something to be said for preventing others from making a blatant copy of a work and passing it off as their own. Case in point – music copyright law. Software copyright law. Any copyright law. The creator is entitled to protection of the unique expression of an idea (though not the idea itself).

There are more arguments, of course, but I won’t go into too much detail. OK, maybe a little. How would we enforce fashion copyright law? Will judges have to decide if one blouse rips off another one? Do we get experts to testify? Can you copyright simple classic designs, like the vertical blue-striped shirt I’m wearing right now that every guy owns? The WSJ article also brings up another issue – that the counterfeit market forces the fashion industry to adapt quickly and come up with new designs after last year’s designs saturate the market, and that this is good for fashion.

So what do you think? Should a dress’s cut be copyrightable? The look of a purse? The design of shoes?

I leave town for Houston on Saturday and this has been and continues to be a crazy week, but the commentary will have to wait. Rest assured I’ve been drinking every night this week... I need to eventually get my thoughts together. Perhaps after I detox. And then retox.

Pluto is no longer a planet. Sucks to be Pluto.

props to nerdygirl.

I finished Fathers and Sons by Ivan Turgenev a couple days ago. It had been sitting on my shelf for months and I completely forgot about it. It’s a smallish book of about 230 pages so I figured it would be a good read before school started.

It follows two newly minted college graduates in Russia as they travel to spend time with their respective parents in the country after finishing school. One is a nihilist, or a person that believes in nothing, and the other is his protégé.

The story is simple. The graduates wander the countryside, meet girls, go to dances, discuss the nonsensical philosophies of nihilism, and bitch about their parents. The sadness of death and happiness of marriage impress upon them new emotions.

But it’s not the story that makes the book worth reading. It’s the writing. It’s very descriptive and – for lack of a better word – lush. You really feel like you’re out there in the Russian countryside. If you’ve got a few hours on a Saturday and Sunday, pick this book up. It set me back all of ninety-eight cents from Half Price Books. I’m sure you can find one at your local bookstore.

Or, you can read the whole thing here.

It sucks when you thought one of your electives was only a two-hour class and then you find out it’s three hours. And then you feel really stupid because if it were only two hours, you’d be short one hour and you wouldn’t graduate on time. So even though the schedule you made for yourself weeks ago is what you need, owning up to it and going to class still sucks.

What is cool, however, is the teacher that says, “Here’s my home phone number in case you need it, but keep in mind I’m a single guy and my idea of dinner means going out, so don’t call before 8. And if I don’t call back by 10, that means I got lucky.”

N.B.: i forgot to add that this professor is circa 60 years old... thought you'd like to know.

I currently own four and a half bikes (you will recall the Schwinn my old roomie and I bought last year). I think four and a half bikes is entirely too much. And I think my credit card bill from the summer in Dallas is starting to scare me. It’s time to clear some of these bikes out. If you want any of these or know anyone who might be interested, post your email address in the comments and let me know which bike you want info for. The goods are as follows:

Schwinn Sting-Ray, coppertone, 2003-ish
Bridgestone RB-2, 61 cm, blue, 1994
Gary Fisher Paragon 29er, large, yellow, 2006

I am also happy to offer for sale my legal services which come with no guarantee of quality or legality. I am good at proofreading though.

Thou shalt see Talladega Nights.

i hate parking tickets. that is all. you may continue about your business.

I was buying groceries yesterday and the check-out guy feels the inclination to tell me a story. I oblige. He says:

"I know I can be a little flaming sometimes, but this Hispanic couple is checking out earlier today and the husband called me a derogatory name in Spanish to his wife. Little did he know I’m fluent, so I kept on checking his items and then gave him the total in Spanish, and he turned completely red. On the way out his wife smacked him across the head and chewed him out."

In a first-time event for this blog, the author was prevented from seeing a show because it sold out. I had big plans to see Bloc Party, a great band from the UK, but my big plans to buy a ticket at the door the night of the show didn’t pan out too well. I’ve seen bands at this same venue on weekday nights and bought tickets at the door with no problem. I mean, come on, it’s a Wednesday night. Who sees concerts on a Wednesday? Lots of people, apparently. So many that they couldn’t fit me and my two friends. How lame.

So what did we do instead? Why, drink, of course.

On today’s agenda: clean old apartment, go to dentist for routine cleaning, sulk about Bloc Party. They better come back.

I was chatting it up with my neighbor the other day and I mentioned that Time Warner was giving me grief about cable modem service. So he offered me the password for his wireless network. Talk about awesome. I offered to put in some cash every month but he wouldn’t hear of it. What this all means is that this post is coming to you live, from my couch, at 8:15 CST.

The other cool thing about my neighbor: he’s a CPA. How is it that I always end up living around accountant-types?

I still don’t have internet at my new apartment. Time Warner is being obnoxious and I’m almost at my wits end calling them every week. Whatever. I’m managing. I actually kind of like not having internet so far. I’m more productive at home and it forces me to get out of the house and find a place to chill to get wireless. It also saves money, but of course that money gets earmarked for beer, so it’s a wash.

Unfortunately, it also means I’m behind in the news and I have no idea what’s going on in the world right now. I think Israel and Hezbollah finally have a cease fire and the UN has shoehorned itself into the middle, and I think England is making progress on finding the wankers who tried to bomb all those planes, and I’m pretty sure Dubya is still president, but I can’t guarantee any of this.

Classes this semester are shaping up to as exciting as ever. I look forward to each and every day. Not so much.

I did get a part-time job working for the 1st Court of Appeals, but if you ask me about anything work-related, I’m required to artfully dodge the question and comment on the weather, or the news, or what have you. Since I don’t know squat about the news, and the weather sucks anyway, I’ll probably just give you a blank stare. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

No, I didn't go. But the one known as Carrico who from time to time posts comments was in attendance and sent me a most effusive email chronicling his experience:

Dude,

I saw Muse last week at a small venue in Denver. My reaction: "Holy fucking shit".

They rocked, and hard. There was a heavy dose of synthesizer to cover elements of songs they couldn't produce on stage with just 3 people, and there was a healthy dose of cheesey glam rock showmanship, but it all actually added to the overall impression. Case in point; the lead singer had a big fan set up in front of his mic that blew his hair back while he leaned forward playing guitar in dramatic fashion. But bearing in mind that their new album has a bunch of songs that sound like cowboy space rock, it seemed only natural.

Overall, they totally destroyed the place and ripped through every song. The lead singer would sling his guitar around on his back to play the piano parts, then sling it back around to play a riff, then back to the piano, etc. it was awesome. also, i don't think the albums do him justice as a guitar player.

My only gripe was that most of the crowd seemed like a bunch of emo-rockers that were too worried about whether or not they wore the perfect thrift store t-shirt that was two sizes too small to fully rock out to the extent appropriate. The crowd barely moved during Plug In Baby, which is practically a crime. However, John and I made our way to the front though and were going nuts the whole time, as everyone should have been. Rant over.

The set included (as i remember it):
Take a Bow
Hysteria
New Born
Exo-politics
Assasin
City of Delusion
Map of the problematique
Bliss
Plug In Baby
Stockholm Syndrome
Time is running out
Supermassive Black Hole

The finale was appropriately Knights of Cydonia, which succeeded in sending the crowd into a frenzy.

Verdict: Go see them.

I moved to a new apartment down the street from the old one this weekend and I’m still waiting on internet service. I get the shakes every now and then from the lack of connectivity. I’m the first person to live in this apartment and there’s no cable jack, and the cable people are not sure they can even provide cable service to the unit, so I might have to go the DSL route, which I don’t want to do because that means I have to get a phone line. So for now, I’m writing to you from my old apartment where my roommate still lives.

My reasons for moving are three-fold: 1) Crazy lady upstairs. Enough said. 2) Living directly on a busy street makes for constant traffic noise in the apartment. 3) I need to live alone if I’m going to study for and pass the Bar next year, so I had to move out now. The apartment is actually a garage apartment that was completely gutted and redone from the inside out. It’s basically a studio – just a big room. It’s cozy and simple. And it’s quiet because it’s behind a house and the driveway has a gate with a big steel covering on it to keep out even the slightest road noise from people driving down the street.

School starts Monday and I’m getting really excited.

I hope you didn’t believe that. This last year is going to be a drag. Everyone tells me, “But dude, isn’t the last year a joke?” Yes, it’s a joke if you make it a joke and take joke classes. But if you’re me, and you want to make sure you pass the Bar, you don’t take joke classes. You take Bar classes. Classes like Marital Property, Pretrial Procedure, Criminal Procedure, and Secured Transactions. Some of these are this semester, some will come next semester, but they all have one thing in common: they’re going to be a pain in the ass. They might be interesting, but definitely not for four months, and definitely not during my last year.

Now that I’ve gotten that out of my system, it really is good to be back. I’m happy to see my friends again and have many a happy hour on Friday afternoon. But there’s one thing I can’t get used to, even after 26 years. This damn Houston humidity. Can we ever get a break? It’s raining even when it’s not raining.

no, it's not inga the 5'10" Swede (i just decided she's 5'10"), it's the guy that posts here as john. he moved from his old place in Clear Lake about 45 minutes south of Houston to just down the street from me. we can bet beers after work much more easily now. welcome to the neighborhood, john. your liver just took a turn for the worse.

addendum: not only can we bet beers, we can also get beers. spellcheck be damned.

There’s a small town north of Dallas called Addison that had fireworks last night. Well, they had a limited version of their usual fireworks show because of a sudden rain that, strangely, pretty much everyone figured would hit. And just our luck, the rain directly coincided with the fireworks. After the fireworks, the rain stopped. Perfect. Since I had come straight from work and was still wearing my dress shirt (with undershirt) I took off the dress shirt to try to shield the rain for a couple friends and myself. It worked well enough but also meant I was left wearing slacks and a v-neck undershirt. For any of you that know me well enough, or those of you who have for some reason had the misfortune of seeing me without a shirt on, me in a v-neck is not a pretty sight. Chest hair abounds. I might as well have hung a bling Star of David around my neck and started swaggering around to the ladies saying, “Hey baby, you lookin’ sexy tonight, what you say we go hit club down street, eh?” This is what we call an “arse” in Israel.

After the rain we ended up in a crowded bar. I didn’t do much dancing because I wasn’t digging the music and most people were just hanging out. But when a couple good songs came on I had to break it down on the dance floor. Watch out people – wet, almost shirtless Jew gyrating to the beats.

Then, in total high school fashion, we went to IHOP at 1:30 am. I was in bed at 3. So have a happy fourth, be safe, and keep a spare shirt in the car.

and i quote:

"There's carnage everywhere. Some riders are sitting in the melted snow runoff that comes cascading down the mountain. Others have their heads between their legs. One is puking."

News broke today that Floyd Landis, the comeback king in the 2006 Tour de France, tested positive for levels of testosterone above the officially acceptable limit. I personally just think it means he has bigger balls than the average Tour de France rider, but the people in charge think otherwise. It’s important not to jump to conclusions here. He failed one test. There is a second test, called the B-sample, that can either prove that the first test was false or that the higher levels of testosterone occurred naturally. This can come about because, as reported, Landis takes cortisone shots for his hip injury and he drank a beer before the day he was tested. Both the cortisone and the beer can raise testosterone, as can just being an athlete performing at the limits of his or her endurance.

Before we throw our hands up and declare the sport of cycling totally corrupt and strip Landis of his yellow jersey, let’s wait for the B-sample results to come back. Think of it this way: after every stage, two riders automatically are tested for drugs – the stage winner and the overall Tour leader. Why would Landis, planning a comeback in stage 17, take drugs to help him win only to face a drug test after winning and risk throwing away his career? It doesn’t add up.

I’d also like to call attention to a total faithless whiner who happens to be the first great American cyclist. Of all people, Greg Lemond, two-time Tour winner and comeback kid himself, should give Landis his say and wait for the B-sample to come back. Instead, Lemond denounces Landis and laments the state of cycling. It’s also worth noting that Lemond recently slammed Lance Armstrong and is known for not being much of an Armstrong fan. I just think Lemond wishes he could have won six Tours. I have much respect for the guy that opened the doors of professional road racing to the US and who came back to win the Tour after a freak hunting accident, but seriously, that’s some lame shit.

One of the few remaining historic commercial areas in Houston is on the verge of being razed and replaced by a Barnes and Noble. This is morally unacceptable. And probably just as fiscally risky as leaving the older shopping strip as-is considering the glut of similarly obnoxious bookstores in the area.

So do us all a favor – Houston is already tough enough to live in. The heat. The humidity. The traffic. The no hills. Help us hold on to a few shreds of history and eclecticness (word?). Please go here and sign a petition asking the people holding the keys to the bulldozer to change their minds.

One of the girls at work is dating a guy who plays bass in a few bands, two of which played in a Battle of the Bands last night. I went along for the fun of it, and to feel old, and boring. Everyone at the venue had an “X” on their hand. I was also still in work clothes, which, on that day, meant dark slacks, a blue button-down, and black shoes. ‘No, I promise I’m not an accountant, though I might as well be one.’ She was also in her work clothes so I didn’t feel that bad. There we were – two shiny and clean-cut law clerks - surrounded by high-schoolers in hip-huggers and too-tight shirts and hairstyles blocking most of their vision. The best part? The guy from the record label was wearing khaki shorts, white socks, and Birks. Socks and sandals!! But he was also dancing with three girls so mad props. But dude, enough of the dancing. It’s scary.

We had an end-of-quarter party at work last Friday and I have to tell you about this drink one of the attorneys concocted. Since part of what this law firm does is software piracy defense, we had to make Pirate’s Punch (it’s funny, you know it). It was green. It was good. And it was spiked with a BOTTLE of Captain Morgan’s Parrot Bay Rum. Hoo boy.

I went to a house-warming party/BBQ yesterday from 3 pm till 11 pm. Which means I drank for eight hours with plans to wake up early and ride my bike at 8 am the next day. I was responsible and made sure to be in bed by 11:30. I woke up at 7:30, made it to the lake at 7:45, stretched, and set out to ride a 10-mile lap in 30 minutes.

For the first fifteen minutes I was on a pace to finish the lap in less than my projected 30-minute estimation. My average was just above 20 miles per hour.

And then… and then. I hit the wall. Call it a bonk. Call it dehydration. Call it freaking stupid. I came up on a very gradual incline and my heart felt like it was about to bust out of my chest, and I started getting the dreaded cramp in my side. Instead of trying to be the badass and ride through the pain, I pulled over and stopped to catch my breath.

I felt like I might throw up. Woozy, light-headed, generally not good. The high-point of this experience was when an older woman on a cruiser rolled by and said “Hey, you ok?” Um, yeah, thanks. Just trying to sweat out the beer over here. I nodded yes and smiled a painful smile.

But it gets better. A cop pulled up, rolled down his window, and, head tilted, said “You ok son?” This time I managed to verbalize a response: “Yeah, thanks, just a little winded.” He smiled and drove off. Seems the punk on the second-hand $4000 bike isn’t quite up to his bike’s potential.

Moral? You can’t act like your 19 when you’re 26. Your body will make sure you suffer.

Are you watching the tour? Can you believe this shit? It’s insane. Every stage is a battle to the finish. Now that Lance retired it’s open season. Guys like Floyd Landis are racing with a crumbling hip and the few racers with any link to drug use were booted, so that makes things all the more interesting. The wrecks have been gnarly too – broken collar bones abound.

During the stages, packs of guys break away and get reeled in, and some brave soul will strike out again. That kind of behavior didn’t happen as often when Lance was around. I totally geek out every morning on letour.com and tab over to the status updates to see who’s doing what in the peleton and which new guy thinks he has the cajones to win a sprint to the line.

Coincidentally, I’ve been riding the road bike a lot more lately. Of course I don’t average 35 miles per hour over three hours and I don’t climb hills in the hardest gear, but I’m really enjoying White Rock Lake. I’ve been riding with a Sunday morning group every week and it’s been great. My tan lines are ridiculous. I bet you’d love to see them. This 184-degree heat business is no good though. I rode a few miles at 12:30 on Sunday and almost passed out.

No matter how much I ride, though, I refuse to shave these legs. Hell no. Not gonna happen.

I played my first game of chess recently. We’re having a chess tournament at work and, as luck would have it, I happened to get paired up with the other intern. She plays chess. She’s good at chess. I’m doomed. How is it that by drawing numbers I end up playing the other intern? I demand a recount.

The first thing I did was research basic strategy. Take control of the middle of the board early on. Protect the king. Don’t be afraid to use the Queen. I held my own for a couple of hours and even took more of her pieces than she got from me. But in the end, I made a huge blunder and left my King wide open. Stuck in a corner behind a couple pawns, a rook swooped in and locked me down. Bye bye particleking. My dreams of being a world-class mainframe-computer-beating chess champion are dashed. Bollocks.

In other news, I’m learning more about software licensing than you could possibly imagine. In fact, you probably don’t want to imagine it. Just be sure that whatever company or business you work for has legit copies of software installed on its computers. Or else… the boogey man will come running after your CEO.

Went to Six Flags with the firm last night after work. We only had a couple of hours to run around and be crazy but it was still fun. One ride called the Titan has a sick drop at the beginning that was absolutely thrilling. The not-so-cool part was the corkscrew. I’m not talking about a corkscrew that propels you parallel to the ground like the old Ultra Twister at Astroworld; this one went down perpendicularly towards the ground, and was the followed by another corkscrew that took you up. The Gs force you down into your seat and your arms, formerly up, are pushed down into your lap. This is not a good feeling.

The one ride I refused to do had a similar effect. The Superman Tower of Power is essentially a vertical drop ride that fires you up on a huge tower and plunges you straight back down, and then back up, and then back down, and then back up, and then back down. Your feet hang as you’re propelled up an down along a tower. Ain’t no way I was riding that thing. My stomach would have kept moving while the rest of me went the other way. I don’t mind heights. The way I see it, if I’m going to risk my life by falling to the ground, I’d rather it be a uni-directional thing. Just down. You’re not getting me to go back up again. Case in point: throw me out of a plane and I’m ok. But try to yank me back up and I’m not so happy.

No, she's not the future Mrs. Particleman. She made my lunch today. Or rather, I went to her restaurant in south Dallas with work people and ate more than I thought I could fit in my stomach. You should have seen this lunch. It could have fed a family. I had a quarter of a baked chicken, about a pound of sweet potatoes, about a pound of broccoli and rice casserole, and corn. Sweet Jesus. I couldn’t even come close to finishing my plate. Within thirty seconds of walking outside into the heat I started sweating broccoli casserole. And our waitress was so nice. She called me, “baby.” Well, she called everyone baby.

One of my coworkers grew up in the part of town where the restaurant was and I’m all for trying new restaurants that aren’t part of a chain. I’m definitely taking everyone I know to this restaurant.

Back at the office, I was so full I couldn’t see. The hours of 2 pm to 4 pm are a blur. The best part of the experience was the television show they had the TVs tuned to – church gospel performances. I’m ready to convert.

driving to weatherford, tx to ride in the peach pedal bike ride. it's about an hour and a half away - thus the extra-early departure time of 5:30 am. i'm going with five friends and wouldn't you know it, we made team shirts with iron-on letters. pictures to come...

Mightygirl, one of my favorite bloggers, just published a book called No One Cares What You Had For Lunch: 100 Ideas for Your Blog. Funnily enough, please see my last post. Fate, or coincidence? Consequently, thousands of bloggers worldwide are saying to themselves, “This woman just negated my entire blog.”

In other news, crotch-grabbing computer-programmer badass and blogger sings karaoke in patented and one-of-a-kind Particleman shirt, Girlfriend totally smitten. I’ve never been more proud.

the rest of the pics are here.

ps: comments are working again. notice though that you can't preview your comments before you post them. working the bug out took me a while and fixing the preview feature will have to come later. i'm adding comments back to all the posts without them.

American With Degenerative Hip Condition Kicks Everyone Else’s Ass And Wins Tour de France

God bless Floyd Landis.

if this post looks familiar, that's because it is. translation courtesy of gizoogle.
boilerplate disclaimer: i don't actually talk like this, i don't condone the use of some of the terms used, and no one calls me the black folks' president.

Wizzle out Tuesday night ta celebrate mah friend's last week in Dallas. He's going ta gangsta law fizzy fo` tha riznest of tha summa back in his home ghetto of Baird, Texas (izzy Bizzy n' shit). His olda pusha came along n she basically knows everyone. Snoop heffner mixed with a little bit of doggy flint. We started out at a sushi restaurant n she knew tha bartenda. I had three (or four?) long island ice teas. I was feel'n quite happy. The sushi was bootylicious as was tha people-watch'n cuz I'm fresh out the pen. Playa tizzy we wizzy ta anotha chi-chi bar that specialized in tequila. Before I can say "in over mah heezee" mah friend's killa sista is rapping ta a homey in a blaza who turns out ta be one of tha owna. They call me tha black folks president. They're friends n' shit. So I git anotha long island, this one on tha house. I'm crazy, you can't phase me. Tizzle we see Don Nelson, forma Mavericks coach. Tru niggaz do niggaz. He's totally sloshed. Wussup to all my niggaz in the house. The next hit is some bar I ciznan't rememba by now. I tried ta drizzink a 7 n 7 but it wasn't happen'n, so killa became tha beverage of choice ta help you tap dat ass. Then we run into Tim Cowlishaw, who mah nigga claims is a brotha fo` tha Dallas Steppin' News n sometimizzles on ESPN mah nizzle. My nigga ogles Tim. I ogle tha flashy-look'n bitchez walk'n around thats off tha hook yo.

Wizzle out again last night but kizzle mackin' in check spittin' that real shit. Two baller no celebrizzle jiznust a safe Jewish stoked hizzle ridin' in mah double R. I was home by 11.

The firm is throw'n a stoked hour tonight n ANOTHER tomorrow night. So thizzat will makes it four nights in a row of going out. Motherfucka this run I may have ta go on a dry spizzell ta makes sure mah killa n I is S-T-to-tha-izzill on good terms.

And now it's 8:00 am n I gots`ta run ta wizzy.

Landis on Larry King

Medical expert says Landis's sample results are a wee bit off adding up

Landis on NPR

Amatuer cyclist educated in how performance-enhancing drugs work starts blog - lots of technical commentary on the process

the cabbie asked me how old i was. i said, "guess." he responds with, "i don't know, maybe 28? you look like you been around the block a couple times." AROUND THE BLOCK?

Working till 6:30-ish and then going out means you get home at 11 and crash. Saw the Arctic Monkeys and We Are Scientists last night. AM were a lot better than I imagined and WAS were not as good as the last time I saw them. I think it was mainly the sound guy. All I heard was mud. No notes. AM are talented song craftsmen and the execution was tight and organized. I was very impressed considering they’re all 19 or 20 years old.

At one point, the AM singer was jabbering at us about something and I thought to myself, “I can’t understand a word this guy is saying. Those crazy Brits.” Then he says, “You know, I’m speaking very clearly for you guys.” If he was, I couldn’t tell.

Also, i bought new shaving cream.

I thought my car had done broke, but it was only this thing called a Speed Sensor and not that expensive to fix, so all is ok with the Honda. On the other hand, my brother-in-law brought home his 2004 BMW 330i today and i took it for a spin around the neighborhood, and now I want a BMW 330i. Man, that thing could corner. I was doing 80 in the rain down a winding street and the tires only broke once.

In other news, the radio station 101.5 in Austin has a "Lunchtime Flashback" where listeners can call in requests for flashback songs - ie, songs from the previous era, or what have you. Usually they play songs from the 70s and 80s that really are from before my era. But today, some dude asked for Aneurysm by Nirvana. WTF? I still listen to that. It's not a flashback. I have three versions of that song on my iPod: the original studio version, a B-side version, and a live version. So what if the song is basically 15 years old. Does that make it a flashback? Obviously, the correct answer here is No.

I went for a ride around White Rock Lake last night and watched the sun set on the water. It was beautiful. Sailboats docked at shore, couples walking hand in hand, kids on rollerblades. I brought my lights so the few cars that drive on the lakeside drive would see me. After the sun set, I noticed that the road became deserted. I figured at least a few die hard cyclists would ride past sunset, but I was all alone on the road. I found out pretty soon why.

Bugs. It was like the 11th plague.

"And the Lord said: I will send down swarms of obnoxious foul-tasting bugs upon any straggling cyclist left circling my pure waters after sunset. The bugs will hit him head-on like hail falling on the earth. He will have to cast his face down and away from the headwind to avoid eating the creatures. The cyclist will gaze around him and behold that he is alone in his soulless endeavor. Staying in shape is futile and unholy. But since I pity him, I will place protein in the creatures, so that when the bugs are forced down the cyclist’s throat, he will get some nourishment, which the skinny bastard needs anyway."

I woke up this morning, my first day or work, and took a quick shower. Then I got ready to shave. I shook the shaving cream canister a little and pressed the button. Nothing. No shaving gel. Nada. There I stood, wet and ready to shave, holding an empty can of shaving cream. I tried to keep myself from freaking out. Showing up to work with two days’ worth of stubble is no good even at my beard’s teenage growth rate.

Then I think: “Hey, the girl who lives here must shave.”

Ladies and gentleman, I shaved this morning with Skintimate Moisturizing Shave Gel, Citrus Sun Tea scented.

It wasn’t even that good of a shave. I highly suggest the ladies out there switch to a men’s shave gel. Get yourselves a can of Gillette Complete Skincare Multigel. It even comes in a fragrance-free variety so you don’t have to worry about smelling like a dude. Trust me on this one. If my face likes it, your legs and whatnot will like it too.

Otherwise, work today was good. Lots of the usual first-day here’s the copy room, there’s the kitchen, that’s your desk. They took us out to lunch and it was good. I can’t talk about work because, you know, rules and stuff. But my view rocks. Fifty-third floor! Oh yeah, and there was a jumper on the parking garage next door. That was kinda weird. Some lady that apparently wasn’t too happy with her state of affairs perched herself at the top of a parking garage for a few hours, and we could see her and the cops that surrounded her. They eventually talked her down.

Tomorrow I have lunch with my old San Antonio buddy who I suckered into going to law school. I mean, who I suggested take the LSAT just for the hell of it and eventually went to Baylor, which he hates, but which also allowed him to meet his fiancé. Life is funny like that.

The Dallas Mavericks lost the NBA Championship. Of course the finals were kind of a big deal here being that the locals are crazy for their Mavs. I would have liked them to win since they are a Texas team, and even despite the fact that their owner tends to be a spoiled brat. It was apparent by game five that there was a pattern. I watched the first two games, and the Mavs won those first two games. I did not watch the next three games, and the Mavs lost those three games. Thus, when I watch, the Mavs win. I’m clearly the deciding factor.

I informed my colleagues about this theory and they all agreed that I had better watch game six. I acquiesced.

Not only did I watch the game, I watched the whole thing. There was no slacking going on. No channel flipping. No phone calls. No nothing. I sat on my tuchus and watched. Things started out just fine as the Mavs took an early lead. Good, it’s working. Now they just have to hang in there with me and all will be well. But no, they had to go and get careless. Bad shots. Bad passes. Bad decisions. And they totally had it too. Gary Payton was useless to the Heat. He basically gave the Mavs the ball on several occasions. Shaq, as usual, was no more than a moving wall. What happened?

I don’t know, but I did my part. It was a good run and there’s always next year. Congrats to the Mavs for getting as far as they did.

My friend (let’s call her O) and I skipped the Mavs game and opted for sushi and then beer with the Jew Crew. One of the girls was celebrating her last weekend in Dallas and the result was a Jewtastic party at a local bar. I had my introduction to the Dallas Jew scene, and I must say, there are lots of them and they travel in packs.

The bike ride this morning was awesome. It’s 9-mile loop around a beautiful lake complete with sailboats. It’s pretty flat but sufficiently twisty to keep things interesting. After one lap with O and her friends, I rode one more lap alone when they left to play softball. I then went to Richardson Bike Mart to scope the bikes they carry. I asked if they carry Lemond, and the salesman guy smiled. Apparently, Greg Lemond talked smack about Lance Armstrong using drugs to stay competitive. Since Richardson Bike Mart is where Lance got his start in cycling, Richardson isn’t crazy about selling Lemond bikes anymore. The Richardson owner called Trek (parent company of Lemond) and bitched. Hence, the salesmen said he could probably get me a Lemond, but there sure are lots of other bikes to look at…

Then I spent the whole afternoon catching up on season one of 24 (the tv show).

Sorry if these posts are starting to read like play-by-plays of my life.

Oh yeah, and then I made spaghetti with ground turkey for dinner. Now you have a complete play-by-play of my weekend. Come back tomorrow for details about my first day of work.

It’s not just the work. Or the new city I get to explore. Or all the cool people I’m meeting. There have been many moments when I knew that I found the right bunch of people, but there is one that stands out.

The other intern and I were hanging out in our corner of the office and the main attorney we work for came over to chat. The movie Napoleon Dynamite came up in conversation and before you can say ughhhh the attorney and I are exchanging one-liners from the movie. We basically reproduced the entire script right there on the spot. I even busted out my butterfly move.

If they get me drunk enough I might even have to break dance.

My ipod has been playing a lot of Billy Joel lately. I only have 14 Billy Joel songs (out of more than 600 total songs) but they somehow keep coming up in the mix. I leave it on shuffle and listen to whatever it chooses. Lately, it’s been a lot of Billy Joel. I think ipod is trying to tell me to get in touch with my Bronx self.

Fuggedaboutit.

The floor below ours is undergoing remodeling and we think the workers flipped the wrong switch today. The lights went out in half of the office and the internet went down. So what happens then? Everyone congregates at the receptionist's desk, shrugs, and someone inevitably says, "Since we can’t work, we might as well make ourselves drinks."

Unfortunately, the lights came on a couple of minutes later and the internet followed soon thereafter. Impromptu happy hour at work averted. Damn.

I went to a BBQ with another portion of the Dallas Jew Crew and found that none of them were actually from Dallas. Maybe one was, but mostly I remember places of origin ranging from Russia to Mexico to Houston to Atlanta. Being a fan of accents (I don’t have one*), I had a particularly good time talking to the woman whose family fled Russia for Israel in 1990 and is in Dallas for school. She and her fiancé are now angling to get back to Israel. There’s nothing quite like the accent of a Russian who spent over half of her life in Israel. Listening to her talk brought back a lot of old memories.

I sat the last Mavs game out so I’m off to a pub to check out tonight’s match. We’re meeting at The Gingerman. I couldn’t be happier.

*You know, except for the whole “y’all” thing, and the git er done thing.

i changed the charity for my particleman and particlegirl stores. while the red cross is good, i don't think it was motivating people. i've chosen a charity that means more to me. the Mr. Holland's Opus Foundation raises money for music education programs throughout the country, including 15 schools right here in Tejas. let's get those kids playing a new double bass, trumpet, sax, or some other instrument that might get them cool points. the links are at the top-right of this page. thanks.

Went out Tuesday night to celebrate my friend’s last week in Dallas. He’s going to another law firm for the rest of the summer back in his home town of Baird, Texas (aka BFE). His older sister came along and she basically knows everyone. We started out at a sushi restaurant and she knew the bartender. I had three (or four?) long island ice teas. I was feeling quite happy. The sushi was great as was the people-watching. After that we went to another chi-chi bar that specialized in tequila. Before I can say “in over my head” my friend’s older sister is talking to a guy in a blazer who turns out to be one of the owners. They’re friends. So I get another long island, this one on the house. Then we see Don Nelson, former Mavericks coach. He’s totally sloshed. The next hit is some bar I can’t remember by now. I tried to drink a 7 and 7 but it wasn’t happening, so water became the beverage of choice. Then we run into Tim Cowlishaw, who my friend claims is a sportswriter for the Dallas Morning News and sometimes-guest on ESPN. My friend ogles Tim. I ogle the flashy-looking girls walking around.

Went out again last night but kept things in check. Two beers, no celebrities, just a safe Jewish happy hour. I was home by 11.

The firm is throwing a happy hour tonight and ANOTHER tomorrow night. So that will make it four nights in a row of going out. After this run I may have to go on a dry spell to make sure my liver and I are still on good terms.

And now it's 8:00 am and I gotta run to work.

I went mountain biking today and introduced myself to a friendly couple I saw in the parking lot. This was fortuitous because I would have had no idea where I was going once on the trail. I also managed to make two new friends – friends that like mountain biking.

The first trail was at Cedar Hill State Park. It was twelve miles of tight switchbacks and narrow passes; not the ideal environment for my extra-huge 29”-wheeled bike. This bike likes wide open spaces. Navigating through the switchbacks was a chore; the trail took a sharp turn just as soon as a straight-away presented itself. I missed my smaller 26” bike. Score Dallas trails: 1.

Then I ran over a prickly pear and got a flat tire. Score Dallas trails: 2.

Then, angling for revenge, I suggest to my new friends that we ride another trail they mentioned. This one – Boulder Park – was a few exits down the highway and much more fun. There was more space to maneuver, more downhills to speed through, and more climbs to grind up. Good times.

But the Dallas trails were not through with my first day of mountain biking here. While attempting to negotiate a particularly gnarly rooty section of trail, my front wheel got stuck and I nearly endo’d. I thankfully managed to avoid the endo but the bike did come down and hit something, maybe a tree stump. Either way, when I came to and looked at the bike, I noticed that my brakes looked funny. Keep in mind this was only minutes after we started riding and I was anxious to see the rest of the trail.

Before I go further, I have to explain something about this bike. You know how cars and motorcycles have disc brakes? A metal rotor attaches to the center of the wheel and hydraulic fluid forces pads in a caliper to squeeze on the rotor, thus slowing the wheel. Some mountain biking yahoos several years ago decided mountain bikes needed disc brakes too. In my opinion they only add cost, complexity, and weight to the bike. The original brakes that squeeze pads against the outer rim of the wheel work just fine for my taste. But as it turns out, more and more mountain bikes are coming stock from the factory with disc brakes. Mine is one such bike. I don’t like the disc brakes, but I’ll live with them since they’re already there. Or maybe I won’t…

So, I looked at my brakes and noticed that the rotor on the rear brake looked bent to hell. I spun the wheel and – lo and behold – the rotor was so bent that it wouldn’t spin through the caliper. I now had a non-functional rear brake.

Option A: call off the ride and walk back to the car. Option B: render the rear brake superfluous and ride with only a front brake. Which did I choose?

Option B. I removed the disc rotor and stuck it my Camelbak. Viola. No more bent rotor getting stuck in the caliper. This also means I rode the rest of the trail with only a front brake. So I guess it’s Dallas: 3, me, 0. But I did manage to keep the bike in running condition. I think Dallas: 3, me: 1 is fair.

I’d really like to get rid of the disc brakes now. I'm going to try to bend it back into shape, but if i can't, a new one will run $40. I can’t use older style brakes because the bike frame doesn’t have the proper mounts. I could buy a new frame with the proper mounts... But that would cost a lot more than $40.

I must admit though – riding with one brake does add a new level of challenge (insanity?) to this mountain biking thing. Imagine driving a jeep down a rocky downhill section of off-road trail with only front brakes. You do the physics.

Dallas proper is actually smaller than Houston. I’ve spent one day here and I already feel like I have a solid feel of how to get around. I live down the street from every business establishment I could possibly need. Central Market. Bike shop. Haircut place. CVS. A plethora of restaurants. I could and probably will ride my bike or walk to these places whenever possible. A rail station is also down the street so I can take the train to work and save money on gas.

I met up with some old UT friends that I haven’t seen in ages last night and saw the Al Gore movie. My conclusion is that I would have rather read an academic paper or seen the actual lecture instead of sitting through two hours of what was essentially bits of the Al Gore slideshow interspersed with Al Gore autobiographical background. His message was meaningful and heartfelt though, and backed by solid data, so it gets my overall approval. See it. Be prepared for lots of charts and graphs. Al likes charts and graphs.

Today I also hung out with another UT friend that’s been in Dallas a few years. We’re going to watch the Mavericks game at a pub with some of her friends. I don’t know a damn thing about the Mavs or the basketball season in general, so I’m mainly going to hang out and meet people. And drink lots of beer of course. Tomorrow morning we’re going for a bike ride around White Rock Lake with a couple of her biker friends. Ride time is set at 9 am. Cross your fingers and pray I actually make it.

Oh yeah, and the apartment. I’m subletting from a law student who is spending the summer in DC. She cleaned the place up and left all of her furniture here. It’s a nice place. And did I mention clean? I feel obligated to keep it tidy while she’s gone.

Work starts Monday and I’m psyched. Happy Saturday night!

there is now an archives page. check out the "archives" link under mumbo jumbo (top right of this page).

I reckon it’s about that time. This born and bred Houstonian is off to Dallas tomorrow morning. Tall buildings and whatnot. Houston has it’s share of skyscrapers, but Dallas just has this vibe. The finance industry. The Federal Reserve. Those crazy highways. Hopefully big city life won’t corrupt me.

Who am I kidding.

p 20:

"Appear irrational where it seems helpful. This is a successful but often dangerous tactic... Primier Nikita Kruschev significantly increased deterrent power of the relatively small Soviet nuclear force by banging his shoe on the table at the United Nations in 1960; he gave the impression of being somewhat imbalanced – a man who might unleash nuclear weapons upon even a slight provocation." Dispute Resolution: Negotiation, Mediation, and Other Processes, Goldberg, et al., 2003.

THE KRUSCHEV KONTEST

It’s 12:06 am and I’m sitting at my desk, studying. My roommate went to sleep hours ago, right after we ate take-out fajitas.

All of a sudden, he busts out of his room, squints at the light, and stares at me.

“What are you doing up?”
“Can’t sleep. Indigestion by Lupe Tortilla.”

True.

The Flametrick Subs are playing with Satan’s Cheerleaders tomorrow night at Walter’s. If you’re in Houston, GO. It’s $10 and it will change your life. Where else can you experience rock n roll and hot girls in fishnet stockings and “666” on their tank tops dancing with pompoms?

I used to go see Flametrick with the Cheerleaders in Austin at the Black Cat before it burned down. RIP Black Cat Lounge.

My sister and her fam are moving to Austin this weekend, and no one except for me can actually be at the house tomorrow, so I drive there tonight in time for the gas company to turn on the gas. They’re supposed to show up between 8 am and 5 pm, which probably means 5:30 pm. Someone over 18 needs to be there. That someone is me.

I then fly to Little Rock that night at 7:30 – or earlier if the gas people show up earlier – to help my brother-in-law load the moving van. Then, on Saturday, we make the 10-hour drive to Austin. Meanwhile, my sister and mom will drive down with the kids that morning and arrive before my brother-in-law and I do.

Still with me?

I help unload and unpack until Sunday at 7, when I go to my college band’s drummer’s wedding. I haven’t seen him in about two years so I’m really excited to see him and everyone else.

Then, Monday, if I’m lucky, I hope to ride my bike. I’ll have the new 29er with me and it would be nice to throw it around the Austin trails. I christened it Tuesday at – where else – Memorial Park, the first place I ever went mountain biking (sans the mountain). After a few minor tweaks here and there I think I’ve got everything dialed in just right.

Oh, and before I leave for Austin tonight, I need to drive my mom to their airport so she can get to Little Rock in time to drive down with my sister on Saturday. My ETA for Austin is 9 pm at which point I plan to eat and crash. I wanted to see my friend’s husband’s brother-in-law’s band (huh?), but alas, it will have to be another time.

You are now fully apprised of my life in all of it’s mind-numbing glory and I instruct you to proceed here (SFW). I think I have a new “thing” to say now.

I guess I should preface this by saying that I’m writing this on Monday night, the move is not yet complete, and I’m still in Austin, which was not the way things were supposed to happen. More on that later.

Crazy shit that happens to you while helping your sister and her family move from Little Rock to Austin. Let us commence:

The cabbie that takes you from the Little Rock airport to your sister’s house only has one good arm. His cell phone rings. You think, “no way he’s going to reach into his pocket and pull out that phone to answer it, his only good arm is driving the car.” The cabbie proceeds to let go of the wheel – mind you, at highway speed – fish the phone from his pocket, answer it, and hold a conversation with a prospective client. He drives a little with his elbow to humor you, then returns navigation of the cab to pure chance or Acts of God.

You get to your sister’s house which currently does not contain your sister, your niece, or your nephew. They have since left to Dallas to stay with the in-laws before driving down to Austin. That leaves you with the T, your brother in law. That also you leaves you with the moving guys, a ragtag bunch of tattooed toothless dudes. One of them likes talking to your more than moving anything. You find that odd. He later finds a patch of grass to lie on while the other moves continue to move stuff.

One of the moving guys catches wind you’re going to be a lawyer. Towards the end of the evening, he furtively calls you aside while the other guys are busy loading stuff onto the truck, and asks, “Hey man, I heard you a lawyer, I got a question. I got this felony on my record that I can’t get rid of man. How can I get it off?” A flurry of legally proper and appropriate responses come to mind, but all you can think is, “What did you do?” Thankfully, you weasel out of the question but coming up with some mumbo jumbo that you aren’t a criminal attorney. Some awkward silence follows and you say, “Yeah, um, I’m gonna go over here and help load that thing onto the truck.”

The big truck leaves and you and T are left with a smaller van containing the bare essentials. (The big truck is scheduled to arrive Tuesday).

You spend eight hours in the small van with your brother in law talking his head off about anything you can think of to keep him awake. You offer to take the wheel but he kindly refuses. You talk to him about girls, cars, jobs, your parents, your sister, his kids, Dallas (where he’s from) and whatever else comes to mind. Sometime towards the end of the ride he says, “Man, I didn’t know you could talk that much.”

The best part is that his every response to any female-related comment you make is: “You need to date around more.” This coming from a guy that married the first woman he seriously dated.

The next day you take your bike to a local Austin trial that you haven’t ridden in about three years. It’s a difficult trail, but you’ve got your new bike and you think you’ve got the cajones to make it through. After slamming your shin against a log once, crashing into the rocks twice, and getting racked by your bike seat, you slowly pedal out of the trail battered and bleeding. It was a brutal and humbling experience. When you get home, your family points at your shin as if you don’t know it has a bloody welt the size of a quarter.

Later that afternoon you visit your newlywed friends and hope to iron your dress shirt for a wedding you have that evening. You hang out, go to Target, veg out, and leave. Only when you’re five minutes from your sister’s house on the other side of town do you realize that you didn’t iron your shirt and you left it at your friends’ place. You have a wedding in an hour, a suit, and no shirt. And no wedding card. You haul ass to the nearest Target and buy a white dress shirt and an iron. You race home, iron the shirt on the kitchen countertop, change into the suit, and remember you forgot to buy a card. The wedding is now in fifteen minutes, you have a suit and a shirt, but no card and only a vague idea of where the wedding is. You race back to Target (this is now your third time in a Target in three hours), buy a card, and tear off down 620 passing four (4) sheriffs. None of them pull you over. God must have his finger on your car.

You get to the wedding in the nick of time to watch the bride give her vows. The wedding is a good time and you catch up with old friends.

The next morning, you hang out some more with your newlywed friends and then an old college friend, after which you plan to head home to Houston. But on the way back to your sister’s house something fun and exciting happens. The “D4” light on your ’95 Honda starts flashing and the speedometer goes wild. One second you’re going zero, the next you’re going 60, the next 50, and then zero again. No rhyme or reason. A few days earlier, the ABS light came on. Your car is, how shall we say it, fucked.

You get home and show your dad this new fun and exciting development. His solution: get it towed to the nearest Honda shop, wait till tomorrow for the quote, and if it’s more than the value of the car, buy a new one. Dads always have the best solutions. You figure the towing idea is probably a good first step, so you make it happen.

The tow truck shows up and loads your car. Just before he’s about to go, his engine cuts. No explanation. Just stops. He looks at the truck. “That’s not good.” You inquire if maybe he ran out of gas? No, he just filled up.

While you and the tow truck guy wait for his other tow truck buddies to give him a jump, and the irony slowly kills you, you and tow truck guy talk about the various cars that he most often is called to tow Hondas? Not so much. Toyotas? Nope. How about Saabs? Not really. Surely Jaguar. Of course. Mercedes? Not usually. BMW? Mostly the post-2003 models. And what car did your brother-in-law just leave the house to buy? A 2004 BMW 330i. Oy. At least it has a warranty.

Your parents are kind enough to help you buy a new car if it comes to that. You hope it doesn’t only because they want to get another Accord. Meanwhile, you’re still trying to avoid that “conservative suburban family man” thing because, well, you’re not. You’re young and you’re wild and you’re an animal. At least that’s the vibe you’re going for. The Mazda 3 hatchback is looking pretty sweet and you test drive one and fall in love. It has a peppy engine, sporty looks, and an auto tranny that has a manual option a-la the Porsche Tiptronic. Lots of fun in the twisties, and the car has plenty of space in the back for your music and biking gear. The only other contender is the Subaru WRX, but again, mom and pops are urging for a simple and no-personality Accord. This will only lead to argument.

(I know I know, life sucks so much to have parents want to help you buy a car, but when you’ve been driving an Accord with -40 horsepower and less personality for five years, you kind of want something more exciting to wake up to. Humor me here.)

Tomorrow, the movers show up with an 18-wheeler containing the contents of your sister’s house. You can’t wait to haul beds and dressers up the staircase and build assorted pieces of furniture. That Texas heat will be your nemesis.

Oh yeah, and you’ll be missing a day of work. For shame.

If you leased a patch of land hoping to strike it rich with oil, and the lease contract says that you need to read another contract external and separate to this contract that more accurately describes the land in this contract to make sure you’re contractually screwing yourself over or allowing the contracting lessor to unwittingly screw himself over, what is the legal term for this?

1. Huh?
2. Objection, leading.
3. Bullshit.
4. Black gold, Texas tea, yee haw!
5. There is no more oil here anyway so what’s the point.

Assume you are the plaintiff’s attorney, and you have tried to settle with the Defendant several times but your offers have been rejected. You run into the Defendant himself at a party. He approaches you and asks, “Hey, why don’t we just settle this case, this thing is getting annoying.” A proper response from you would be:

1. "Sorry, I’m prohibited from talking to you according to the ABA Rules on Legal Ethics."
2. Scream, throw your drink in his face, and yell for help.
3. "Hey, do you mind? I’m trying to have a drink here."
4. "You idiot, we tried to settle. Why don’t you find yourself a real attorney who knows what he’s doing."
5. 3 and 4, but definitely not 1, and maybe 2 if you’ve had a bad day and a few too many drinks.

the 29" bike came while i was gone. i assembled it last night. dear lord, this thing is enormous. the wheelbase is three and a half feet. overall length including tires approaches six feet. maneuvering this thing in tight trails could be a chore, but i think the benefits of the bigger wheels will outweigh the drawbacks. we'll see.

i've named it "The School Bus," naturally.

300kb

Normally, I can understand Stephen Colbert’s sense of humor - drier than Jon Stewart’s and a shade away from the completely nonsensical. But did you see Colbert’s speech at the White House Correspondent’s Dinner? I don’t know why these people let Colbert speak at their event. He absolutely killed. Or totally sucked. (Depending on your political leanings, of course). It’s obvious to me that he was freaking hilarious for 90% of the time and completely inscrutable for the rest. I couldn’t get some of his jokes. They were too dry for me to process, or I’m just too dim-witted to figure them out.

He clearly and blatantly mocked W with a straight face, to his face, in front of 2,700 people, including his wife. It was a show of phenomenal gumption and insanity. Kudos to Colbert for taking the plunge.

So you haven’t seen the speech yet? You can watch it here.

Finished my last final last night, and it took me THIRTY-FIVE MINUTES. And i wasn't even the first to finish. Then i partied. Now i have a plane to catch in two and a half hours to Midland, TX for a wedding. As far as i can tell, there's not much to do in Midland except drink and wed, so it's gonna be a party. Be good and i'll see you in three days.

I’ve been though three sets of law school finals so far, so you may wondering why I keep whining about this Payment Systems business.

Payment Systems is governed by this thing called the UCC. Think of the UCC like IRS Tax Code, but even more nonsensical and convoluted. The Texas UCC Code book we use was compiled and annotated by three guys: Roy Anderson, Roger Bartlett, and W. David East.

Who has been teaching me Payment Systems all semester? Professor W. David East, THE GUY THAT WROTE THE CODE. This, my friends, is why I’m nervous.

using only stats based on the several days i've been on this new server, 54% of you use Firefox, 34% use IE, and the rest use Safari and others. good job. i applaud your strong use of Firefox. those of you still on IE need to make the switch. it's worth the 30 seconds it takes to download and install.

what's odd is that "metronome" is still the #1 search query used to find this site. i don't get it. metronome?? and now i'm only making it worse. maybe i can be the #1 metronome site on the internet.

guaranteed, this guy is crazier. and funny.

props to cherz.

ok, everything isn't working. the rss feed and the calendar aren't working. you can be sure i'm working around the clock to to fix them.

i hope you don't actually believe that.

so - about that Frametric Subs show. It was exactly what i expected, but i don't think my two guests were properly prepared. The red light, the creepy lyrics, the creepier "vh1 storytellers" stories, the full-throttle rockabilly. The show also started later than most shows at Walter's and it was really smoky, so we checked out at 1:45 while the band was still going. The audience was also pretty thin for a Flametrick show, but i guess this isn't Austin we're talking about.

addendum: yeah, comments aren't working. i actually am working on this. thanks heather for the heads up.

There is a subculture of cyclists out there going back in time to when bikes had one speed. These people are rigging their bikes to have only one chainring up front and one cog in the back – a singlespeed bike. Why would one want to sacrifice the convenience of 24 or 27 speeds for the pain of one lonely gear? … Easy. Why the hell not.

And since there are fewer moving parts on your bike, there are fewer breakable parts, less maintenance, and less weight. So it works out well for the lazy and the slow (me). I stripped the geared parts off of my bike and slapped on a single cog and a single chainring crank. Simplify.

Unfortunately, I’m also a sucker for the creative and the different, so I’m joining another subculture of cyclists – the 29er world. Mountain bikes traditionally have 26” wheels. These wheels don’t work out that well for tall people; they make mountain bikes feel like glorified BMX bikes. Thus, the 29” mountain bike. Really good for tall people, maybe good for mid-height people, probably not good for people under 5’5”.

So I have a 29” mountain bike on the way. It will now come to three. Complify.

The real question is: will I take the singlespeed, the 29er, or the road bike to Dallas? Yes.

In 1990 I was not yet a teenager. The internet age was about to start. The Wall had just come down. And a band called The Breeders released an album called Pod. On Pod was a cover of Happiness Is A Warm Gun.

Sixteen years later, I discovered this song. Can life get any better? The Breeders covering The Beatles. The cover song to end all cover songs.

i've regained my composure after finding that pleasant "Particleman.org is coming soon!" message. A quick heart attack and freak-out session later, i managed to drop my old server, find a new one, upload all my stuff, cross all my t's and dot all my i's, and get everything working. all the old posts and comments should be there.

sorry for the abrupt break in service. this was a long time coming, anyway.

in other news, i went mountain biking yesterday and got stung by a huge bee. or a hornet. or a yellowjacket. it was black and yellow and enormous. scared the hell out of me.

wow, what a weekend. a beautiful couple, a beautiful wedding, amazing people, and of course... a bounty of delicious cuisine.

i don't know where to start. it was 52 bours of sensory bombardment. watching two close friends get married put me in a state beyond happiness. i love these two people so much, it made me happy to be present as they solidified their relationship. the world is a better place for it and we should all rejoice that these two crossed paths. ok, so i'm gushing. weddings do that.

there were over 300 attendees on saturday night, and throughout the weekend i met people i had only heard of second-hand who turned out to be everything i had imagined - and more. i seem to have a knack for making new friends. it's saying goodbye that i'm not so good at.

when the alcohol began to flow at an after-party, there was a little bit of a "particleman roast" of sorts, except that it wasn't on comedy central and it wasn't about my career. i'll say no more. i'm glad the comments aren't working right now.

what else... the groom, decked out in traditional Bengali groom's garb, rode in on a horse with the requisite cowboy hat. the bride's father, a devout and knowledgable muslim, greeted me and said "shalom! do you have any hebrew music with you?" the power went out on friday night leaving the guests at their outdoor tables with nothing but candlelight to illuminate their conversations. i thought it lent the occasion an intimate feel. cops showed up friday night. old ladies next door complained of noise saturday night. wedding partiers wandered downtown in search of bars that would stay open past 12:30. afternoons were spent compensating for the previous night's debauchery. cake was eaten. the really spicy foods were avoided. arabic was sung. henna was applied to hands and feet (not mine).

all in all, a weekend to remember. my sincerest thanks to the bride's parents, the groom's parents (ahem), and of course the bride and the groom. mazal tov!

they should be at the top of the list, but you mighht have to sift through some others.

the ipod is here... already? i only ordered it on monday. i offer yet another valuable lesson: apple products (or ipods at least) ship from Tennessee, so if you live anywhere close to that state, don't bother with the upgraded shipping. i'm in TX and it got here in 2 days flat. this does assume, however, that the TN location is the only distrubutor - they might have others.

i really wanted pictures of the trail itself, but Google Satellite hasn't gotten that good. yet. so this one's a little easier.

Even if you’ve followed another car into the parking lot without getting caught by the arm, don’t assume it will always work that way. Be more patient and swipe your card. It only takes a second. And you can rest assured you won’t get your antenna jacked like I did this morning.

finals are quickly approaching and my annoyance fuse is short this time of year, but thankfully i don't have the energy to get annoyed with anything in the news, so it's a wash. i don't have time to read news anyway. i'm trying to spend every minute away from my desk on one of the three bikes. this morning i rode the hog around the neighborhood and got some smiles from various children and adults hanging out in the front yards. yesterday morning i did a few laps around Rice before it got to 148 degrees.

in other less brain-numbing news, i saw Thank You For Smoking, and it was good. perfect weekend material to sit back and laugh. witty, good camera work, enjoyable dialogue, katie holmes can't act, cheese-fest ending, and the MARLBORO MAN. how cool is that? the marlboro man. sorry if i just ruined the movie for you. i didn't tell you anything you couldn't have figured out anyway. it was totally predictable.

and i quote:

"I haven't yet tried to validate, following a long tradition of seat of the pants live recoding."

Sixth installment of the “things that happen to you while” series.

Day 1

Your trouble with the law begins before you even get on the plane. The small folding allen wrench you packed into your Camelbak that you packed into your larger bag has piqued the security peoples’ interest. Piquing their interest is not something you want to do. A security person tears apart your bag, fishes out the Camelbak, and runs it through the x-ray machine again. She then pulls out the offending allen wrench and asks the supervisor, “Is this ok?” Yes, my friendly security-obsessed airport employee, it’s a freaking allen wrench. You might want to watch out for the guy with golf clubs, though. Those look painful.

You arrive in sunny Denver and it’s a glorious 50 degrees. You couldn’t be happier. Mr. Carrico (let’s call him C) picks you up and you speed off immediately to what you’re told is an Engineer Party. You see, C is an engineer of sorts – an engineer that designs poo treatment plants. As such, it figures that these people need to party quite a bit to maintain their level of sanity (sounds like lawyers). Hence, the engineer party you’re going to in Golden, about a half-hour drive from Denver, is first on the list of attractions.

The party is held at the house of one of the engineers (let’s call him J). It turns out that no one is home when you and C get to the house. You have beer on the mind and are feeling impatient, so C does the sensible thing and calls J to see how to get into the house. And now your troubles with the law escalate to what we in law school call “breaking and entering” or “trespass.” That is, C reached his arm up through the cat flap in the back door and manages to unlock the deadbolt (he has long arms) thus gaining entry. Mission accomplished. One tort and perhaps one crime are committed on your vacation. And you’ve only been in the state forty-five minutes.

After you help ourselves to some beer (thanks, J) more of the engineer crew and their significant others show up and the party grows to nine strong. You meet Mrs. Carrico (MC) for the second time and hope you might finally get to know her. You only met her at the wedding and didn’t get much of a chance to talk.

Now would be a good time to mention the fireworks display that you’ll later get to see at the Colorado School of Mines. Yes. A bunch of miners are going to blow shit up and it’s going to be awesome.

Before the fireworks, however, there’s something you have to see. You kick off the fireworks party in the college’s ‘lab’ as it were – a place where they store all their mining devices and whatnot. J asks you, “You wanna see a big drill?” Do I? He walks you over to what looks like something out of Star Wars. Or Robocop. Or Wyle E. Cayote’s stash of tools that catch the Roadrunner. This drill is as big as a moving truck. The ‘bit’ is the size of a Honda. You stand under the drill and wonder to yourself that your old jobs playing with computers all day were really pointless.

The fireworks are held in the college’s football field. You and the engineer crew get the best seats – on top of the announcer’s box high above the field. The fireworks are phenomenally loud and close. You can smell the chemicals. The crowd of chants “BLOW THE FUCKER UP… BLOW THE FUCKER UP… BLOW THE FUCKER UP…” Your jaw drops, and you join in. For the grand finale, a man – assumedly crazy – runs out to a string a fireworks mounted across the field and attempts to ignite them by hand. It rained the night before and the fireworks are not lighting in succession as planned. He has no choice but to keep going back to light the fireworks when the fuse runs out. He appears to be wearing protective ear-coverings but you see no other signs of protection. He injures his leg the last time he goes back to light the fireworks – perhaps some shrapnel got him. Firemen and EMS show up.

You’re more than satisfied with the day’s events, but the party hasn’t even started.

The festivities end up back at J’s, the scene of the original crime. J proposes a neat trick to the group. A drunken stupid human trick, if you will. Fold a dollar so that it can stand on the floor by itself. Supporting yourself on only one foot, find a way to pick the dollar up with your mouth. Your hands cannot touch the ground. It quickly became clear that this was a great way to get people to do stupid things for a dollar – or just to do them. To up the ante, someone put a $20 bill on the floor. To up it further, you put your wallet on the floor, which was in fact not an “up the ante” because you’re broke. Though many had gotten close and you managed to fall and hurt your knee in an effort to retrieve the dollar, J was the first and last to successfully perform the trick. Bravo J.

Your hosts’ cat apparently discovered the air mattress, and well, that was that. You and C try to find the holes in the air mattress and find one. C seals it with a bicycle tube patch kit and it works like magic. For several hours. By morning, your back is on the ground and your legs are in the air. You end up on the couch cursing your long legs.

Day 2

You and C start the day at Green Mountain. Your lungs are still stuck at sea level so you have a hard time getting up the mountain, or as natives call them, foothills. Anyone from Houston calls them mountains, though. You have to walk half of the final climb and on the way got passed by a runner going up, who then passed you going down, who then passes you going up again, all before you reach the top. When you do finally reach the top, you see him again, and he turns around again. That’s called meshuggah where you come from. You hit Red Rocks after grabbing some power bars and ride another two or three hours there.

For dinner, you and your generous hosts planned on going out but somehow the party ended up at home. You head to Whole Foods, score some chicken, and start a BBQ. Others show up with more goodies to throw on the grill and Heathfeather and her friend also join the party.

It’s not long before the stupid human trick from last night emerges. Except this time, instead of setting doing the trick on a wood floor in a house, it’s on a brick patio in a back yard. Brick hurts a lot more than wood when succumbing to gravity. Needless to say, you abstain, having sufficiently embarrassed yourself the night before. Other stupid human tricks emerge as well. MC introduces the group to a trick wherein you cross your arms in front of you and twist them around so that you end up with your fingers on your nose. Note that says on your nose, not in, but that might be interesting too.

The last stupid human trick is proposed by J (the stupid human trick expert?). This trick calls for two people. One person stands, legs apart, preferably on a soft substance like grass. Person 2, preferably limber, jumps on Person 1’s back, crawls over their shoulders, down their torso, through their legs, and back up to Person 1’s back. J volunteers to be Person 2. Heatherfeather volunteers to be the standing Person 1, claiming to have served a stint in a circus. Que pasa? Circus? Then she reminds you that she knows how to ride a unicycle, but not a bicycle. Oh, right. Unicycle. You realize your hosts have like six bikes, none of which are unicycles. Too bad. Heatherfeather is unfortunately too short or not strong enough to support J. C, as it turns out, is about 6'4" and strong enough to support the weight of another grown man (man that sounds weird). J hops on C’s back, crawls over his shoulders, down his torso, through his legs, and scrambles up his back. You really had to see it. Oh wait, YOU CAN*.

You round out the night at a bar called The Funky Buddha.

Day 3

Your back is a little sore from the previous night spent on the couch. Thankfully, one of your hosts’ friends who we’ll call G graciously swung by with his full suspension mountain bike for you to borrow, so any back pain should be rendered moot once on the trail. Otherwise, this morning starts out quite the same as the previous, meaning that a bike ride is in order.

You and C hop in the car and drive to Boulder for a ride at Walker Ranch, deep in the foothills just west of the city. The trail is breathtaking and you wonder why people live anywhere else. Things like law school come to mind. Bummer. After the ride you head to a local brewpub, Southern Sun Pub & Brewery, for nourishment of the liquid and solid variety.

You take it easy for dinner and order Thai food. The free movie channel is playing Donnie Brasco and you watch Johnny Depp turn into a Wise Guy.

Before crashing you and C resolve to find the other holes in the air mattress. Or rather, MC issues a directive that it needs to be fixed. You locate two more holes and seal them. It does the trick. You sleep soundly on a bed of air.

Day 4

Your hosts go off to their respective office lives designing poop treatment plants and whatnot. With five final exams rearing their ugly heads in a matter of weeks, you set your sights on the nearest hipster café and ride a ridiculously small BMX bike to Devil’s Food Bakery. It’s closed. In fact, everything is closed. It seems Denver sleeps in on Mondays. You hang your head in shame and head to Starbucks. A city of full of nifty cafes and all you have at your disposal is a national chain... For shame.

Several hours later, Heatherfeather rescues your vacation from becoming a corporate-coffee-shop-law-school-study-fest and takes you to the Crazy Asian Café for lunch. You chat about the UN, Connie Rice, and They Might Be Giants (naturally). Agreeing you should at least make an effort at studying, you head to Stella’s, a café that is actually open. After an hour of conversation interrupted by occasional bouts of studying you face the facts and call off the charade. The Denver Folklore Center down the street sells all kinds of cool instruments and the allure is just too much.

You noodle with guitars, banjos, mandolins, mandolinas, basses, and other stringed devices. Heatherfeather gives you a sample of her sublime voice and guitar skills. You wish you could put a digital soundboard in front of her and record what you’re hearing.

Heatherfeather drops you off at your (er, C’s BMX) bike at Starbucks and you ride home. Your hosts arrive soon after and you head to Sushi Boat with C, MC, and their friend, who we’ll also call G (different than the earlier G). After stuffing your faces full of sushi, seaweed salad, and miso soup, you decide on the perfect follow-up for desert: Bonnie Brae Ice Cream. It hits the spot.

Day 5

Has it really been five days? Feels like two. Your hosts probably think it feels like 10.

Your flight is at noon. But before your hosts can unload you, you get to accompany them to a very special occasion: the inspection of their newly bought home. It was built in 1906 but is somehow in better shape than most newer homes. You follow the inspector around and carefully watch (from a distance) what he does. One day you’ll have to buy a house. Or at least you hope to buy a house, maybe in Denver.

OK I can’t write in passive present tense or whatever it’s called anymore, it kind of hurts my brain. Much, much thanks to Mr. and Mrs. C for having me, to J and G (the first one) for lending me their bikes, to Heatherfeather for wasting her afternoon with me, and to the house cat for not accosting me too much.

All of you are welcome in Houston any time. Except the cat. Sorry.

* it’s a little dark, so if anyone has video editing software and is willing to help, contact me via the link at the bottom of this page.

Hung out with Mr. and Mrs. Carrico and the one and only Heatherfeather.

Stories to come. And believe you me, these are some whack stories.

1. It’s cool when a company like American Express sends you a check to compensate you for the money you gave them to pay a bill, until you realized it had several hundred dollars in fraudulent charges. What’s not cool is signing up for American Express Blue and dealing with the fraudulent charges.

2. I saw the Deathray Davies for the third time last night. And there were only about 50 people in the whole club. I guess that’s what happens when you play a show on the same night as Dinosaur Jr.

3. I really need to study today. A lot.

4. I really need to ride my bike today. More than a lot.

5. There’s a jewtastic happy hour tonight that I’m going to. Yee-ha.

6. There’s a law school prom tonight that I’m not going to, but I’m going to the drunken after-party. Ohhh yeah.

7. I’m volunteering for a benefit run tomorrow and I have to be there at 6:45. Ohhh crap.

8. I need to get new lenses for my glasses because the old ones are so scratched and smudged I can hardly see through them.

9. Remember how I lost my ipod a couple weeks ago? I heard that the 99 Cent Store was celebrating 999 days in Texas on March 31st, and each store would sell nine iPod Nano 2 GBs for 99 cents. They open at 8 am. I vowed to wake up at four am on Friday morning (a day I had to be at work at nine) and see if I could score an iPod. I woke up at four and arrived at the store at 4:15. There were already nine people there, some sleeping on the concrete. I guess they wanted an iPod more than I did.

10. Did anyone see the slashdot page today?

i'm finding that a whole of stuff happened in my three and a half days in denver and there's a lot to write about. this could take a couple more days. in the meantime, i'll present you with Google Satellite images of key locations that were visited. they will make more sense when the final trip summary is posted.

here is the first:

i'm having a hard time studying this semester. motivation levels are at an all-time low. i don't think they can get any lower, but third-year students tell me, "if you think you're jaded now, you aint seen nothing yet."

case in point - i've spent more time researching 29" mountain bikes than i have researching my class notes. but only because i'm studying for professional responsibility, which isn't really a class. when i start studying for payment systems, that will be real, actual studying. and only because i'm terrified of that final.

I was at Macy’s today looking for some flat-front pants (you ladies should be proud of me for that) and I overheard a familiar voice. It was a voice that sounded like someone I heard on TV. I turn around and see Craig Kilborn. Average looking guy, blond, mid-30s, sorta tall. Yeah, that’s Kilborn. What the hell is Craig Kilborn doing in Houson? Who cares. I called a couple friends and relayed the news. It’s not everyday you see a talk show host in the menswear section of Macy’s.

After I got home, I did some Google reconnaissance on Kilborn because something told me the guy I saw wasn’t really Kilborn. It was, in fact, the local weather guy, Frank Billingsley. Looking at the two pictures side by side, it’s clear these guys look nothing alike aside from the blond hair. I know, I must be on crack. So why did I think I saw Kilborn? Did I want to see Kilborn?

Ironically, Billingsley fits in well with another talk show host – Conan O’Brien. Billingsley has the same trademark O’Brien humongous hair wave.

I went to an AIPAC Conference on Monday night and got to see Charles Krauthammer speak.

To summarize, he applauded the election of Hamas (somewhat tongue in cheek); declared the Oslo accords hollow; stressed his opinion that Arafat never really wanted peace, as evidenced by Arafat’s rejection of Barak’s offer in 2000; and said that building the fence was the right thing to do. He also commended Bush for his handling of the Middle-East conflict, adding that he’s ‘not sure why – and not sure if Bush knows why’ Bush did what he did (paraphrasing there).

>Click here to read his articles on the Washington Post.

And I don’t know about you, but I had no idea Krauthammer was disabled. He lost the use of his legs when he was a 22-year-old medical student. Oh yeah, and he’s also a strong supporter of stem cell research.

With that, I leave you. I take off for Denver tomorrow to commence my last hurrah before finals.

c clued me in to several key bands while i was in denver and i finally got around to checking them out.

1. eagles of death metal - peace love death metal*
2. lcd soundsystem (heard some stuff before, but not the whole album)
3. morcheeba - big calm
4. kaiser chiefs
5. the new pornographers (heard some stuff before, but not the whole album)
6. dogs die in hot cars
7. the bravery (heard some stuff before, but not the whole album)

and some others i recently discovered...
8. beck - guero. have you heard this album? i didn't know it existed. freaking rocks.

other bands i still need to check out from carrico: drive by truckers, son volt, wilco, and uncle tupelo (my education in alt-country-whatever).

*did he just say shit goddamn i'm a man, i'm a man? yes, he did.

My 4GB iPod Nano disappeared from my life a few weeks ago and never turned up. My dad, in his infinite wisdom, reminded me that i have a renter's insurance policy. Oh yeah. I completely forgot that i pay $11 per month to insure personal property over $100. My insurance company covered the cost of the iPod over the $100 deductible, so i got a nice chunk of change back.

In an effort to keep the total cost of the new ipod within the reimbursement, i decided to order a 2GB nano instead of the 4GB, and i opted to order it online because Apple gives free shipping. I also assumed that, as is usually the case with online purhases, there would be no tax.

After pressing next a few times I completed the order. It was only then that i realized that Apple still charged me tax. Dammit! That's what i get for pressing Next like a robot.

If i have to pay tax, i might as well just drive to the Apple store and buy the iPod in person - that way, i don't have to worry about not having the iPod for my trip to Denver on Friday afternoon. I tried calling Apple and canceling the order, but lo and behold, it was already out the door. Apple must have some really efficient order processing.

So, once again, my idiocy translates into your gain. I'm getting good at this.

i'm moving to Dallas for the summer. june 5 - august 4, to be exact. i got a summer gig at a law firm that i didn't think existed in texas, but thankfully does exist and is doing just fine. they do software copyright and licensing defense work. translation: if you work for a business accused of exceeding its license quota on software installations, or of installing pirated software, or of selling software that infringes another software mfr's copyright, this law firm would defend your business against such lawsuits.

the way i see it, it's the equivalent of defending the little guy against the software industry's version of the RIAA, even if the "little guy" is a fortune 100 company.

also cool is the fact that i'll have access to a slew of new mountain bike trails.

the last time i was this excited for a job was when i was a DJ at UT. i can't wait to get done with finals and head up to Dallas. it's making it really, really hard to study... as if it weren't already hard enough.

i'm going to a wedding in may, and to help save some $$$ i'll be sharing a room with a friend - a female friend. upon discovery of this arrangement, the bride-to-be, our mutual friend, caught me on gmail chat. this is what happened:

bride-to-be: naughty boy
me: i do what i can
bride-to-be: or who you can

going to see the Dropkick Murphys tonight with John. i'm bringing earplugs this time because i like what little hearing i have left. next week is KT Tunstall at Fitz.* i'm hoping i can get her number. total hottie. Salma might not like that though.

in other music news, i rediscovered my old B-52's cd. Rock Lobster is pure genius.

* turns out KT dissed Houston for SXSW in Austin. her loss.

Living a 10-minute walk from Rice Village has its perks. John and I walked to Hungry’s, ate dinner, had two Guinnesses, walk to Kelvin Arms where I switched to Stella and John stuck with Guinness, walked to Gingerman where we met up with Heather and had more beer, walked to Two Rows where we recovered from the beer with water and appetizers, walked back to Kelvin Arms to get scared away by the insane crowd, and walked home. There was no driving involved, and even better, no parking. The Village was a zoo. There was no where to park.

Grand totals for the night:
John: 10 Guinnesses (he started at 2 pm).
Particleman: 2 Guinesses and 4 Stellas.
Cameras brought with: 1.
Pictures taken: 0.
Vomits: 2.5.
Waitresses shamelessly and perhaps drunkenly hit-on: 1.
You can guess who was responsible for that.

I took the roommate mountain biking yesterday at Memorial Park. I think he’s hooked. He already bought a new set of tires, a sweet jersey, and a pair of baggy bike shorts (basically, standard lycra bike shorts housed in a baggy exterior).

The funny thing is that this same thing happens every now and then. It happened to me when I was a high school senior. My friend took me mountain biking at the same trails and I went out and bought all kinds of bike stuff to fuel my new hobby. When I was a college freshman in Austin, I took an old friend mountain biking and he went and dropped a grand on a new bike and accessories. He then proceeded to become a better rider than I ever was or will ever be, though his bikes are now excellent dust-collectors.

So you see, this is a repetitive process. It just so happens the roomie was in need of a hobby - tech-geek only does so much - and this one happened to be an outdoors hobby, so I think it was a winner. It also helps that female cyclists are in great shape and, uh, wear the standard lycra bike shorts.

go here. listen to the first song, "she hates love songs." note the panning of the guitars, and the keyboard in the middle. good stuff. she also happens to have a great voice.

brought to you by heatherf.

addendum: for those of you currently stuck in an office environment resembling the novel 1984, you can also find the songs on her website.

I’ve seen a lot of things on mountain bike trails. Cows. Chickens. Donkeys. Health-nut jogger-people. Today I got to add something to that list: middle-aged couple dressed in business attire making out. I was JRA (just riding along) minding my own business, and I run into these two going at it. Something tells me it wasn’t exactly a date, or a married couple. I mean, what couple (married or dating) walk around a muggy bike trail on a drizzly Thursday morning? And in business attire, no less? Something aint right.

Whatwith all the kiddies blogging every minute of SXSW as it happens, one guy is Liveblogging not being at SXSW. First entry:

"8:30 am: Woke up, made coffee and a birdfeeder."

you know that riddle about "thinking outside the box?" (even typing it makes me cringe). draw three rows of three equally-spaced dots so that you end up with a square. without lifting your pencil off of the paper, connect every dot using only four lines.

when i first heard this riddle in college, i couldn't figure it out. it was posed to my friend in an interview with Shell or Microsoft or another some such conglomeration.

so when i got to Mediation class last week and saw the trademark nine dots on the board, i knew what we were in for. when he finally got to the dots and explained the riddle to us, everyone went to work. heads bent, pencils gripped, fingertips white. i sat there and stared at the desk, the wall, the dots on the board.

after five minutes, the teacher called time and looked right at me and said, "sir, can you solve it?"

nod.
"come up and show us."

i hate having to do this kind of stuff. i begrudgingly got out of my chair and waltzed over to the board. i quickly scribbled the lines on the board and i heard a collective "ohhhh" from the class.

no, people, i'm not that talented. i didn't figure it out either. i practically live in the box.

as i walked to my chair i had to smile to myself because of the class' reaction. if they only knew... now they do! at least some of them do.

also, thanks to john, the calendar works again. muchas garcias. in the process of fixing the calendar i also had to force myself to fix other things that have been broken for a long time, so it was all good.

The number of bikes in the house recently climbed to five. It climbed one more this weekend. Roommate finally caved in and bought a mountain bike. It’s starting to look like a bike shop in here. As you can see, we’re big fans of self-propelled transportation.

We went for a ride at the Ant Hills. He came back with a small case of poison ivy and I was lucky enough to escape with only a scraped arm. The coolest part was the throng of 12-year-olds jumping ramps towards the back of the park. These kids are fearless. They plummet down steep natural ramps and fly off man-made jumps. Some of the jumps are ‘doubles’ - two jumps placed closely together with a gap in between so that you jump off the first and land down the second. Some of the ramps are twice the height of these kids. They might catch 10 feet of air. And they do it over and over again. I certainly don’t have the cajones to do that.

1. the calendar is broken. don't bother using it.
2. i can't find my ipod. this sucks.

The tours just keep on coming. Last night was We Are Scientists supported by a slew of poor to mediocre indie rock bands who need to learn how to sing and stop saying hi to their parents.

We Are Scientists were pretty good – kind of an indie-punk-dance-pop sound. The bass player was definitely the star of the show. Witty inter-song comments, nerdy Kareem Abdul-Jabbar glasses, and porn-stache. And he really did play that bass with scientific precision.

Musically, the sound can be described as: guitar, heavily doused with reverb and medium distortion, noodles high up on the fretboard creating a spacey background; bass with kind of a hollow sound plays jittery dance-pop beats (think futuristic My Sharona bass line); and drums thwacking everything in sight propelling the whole mess forward. Not all songs were like this, of course, but that sums up the basics of what to expect. The singer is definitely trying to showcase two distinct voices – an emo croon and a more angry yell. Remember how Billy Corgan could swap between a serenade and a nasal screech? That’s where I’m going with this.

happy weekend.

and i quote:

"Until we understand quantum gravity, we're not going to be running Linux on a black hole."

Letterman last night was a great double header, and not even because of the Jew factor (though that was a strange coincidence). First, Dave hosted Natalie Portman, who happens to be the future Mrs. Particleman, or Mrs. Particlewoman if she prefers (Salma and KT and Charlize may not like that, though). David asked Natalie about her recent travels, to which she responded that she spent six months in Israel last year. And she’s also fluent in Hebrew – not surprising considering she was born in Jerusalem. Then she turned over to Paul – also Jewish – and asked if he spoke Hebrew: “No.” Bummer. Maybe Natalie can give you lessons! Maybe she can give me lessons.

After that, as if two talented Jews weren’t enough, Al Franken, one of my favorite funny-men, talked with Dave. Actually, as is often the case with them Jewish folk, Al did most of the talking, and pretty much all of it was funny. That guy cracks me up. He’s apparently going to run for Senator of Minnesota. Do it, dude. Or as Ben Stiller would say: Do it, Do it.

I figure you may be wondering about the wave of bike posts the past few weeks. During my first year of law school, I maybe rode my bike a grand total of two times. Things got a little better the following summer. Things returned to their status quo of non-riding in my third semester. So what’s the deal with this semester? Well, first of all, I’m taking two less hours than I usually do and the classes aren’t quite as intensive. Call it a much needed “break” from law school, though I’m somehow still in school…

There is another reason, though. I was going to wait till the very last minute to spill the beans, but what the hell, I have zero willpower.

I’m going to visit my friend (posts here as ‘carrico’) and his wife in Denver in two weeks. I’ve known this joker known as Carrico since I was a college freshman. He rides mountain bikes and all sorts of other wheeled things – and he is much better at it than I am. He taught me a thing or two about how to not crash and burn on mountain bike trails.

Denver is basically located in the stratosphere compared to Houston, so there will be less air for me to breathe, and since I’ve been a slacker for almost two years, I need to get my ass into shape. Thus, the recent spate of mountain bike rides and cycling-related posts.

I’m flying up on a Friday and coming back on Tuesday. While I’m there, I’ll stop by and harass Heatherfeather. How could I come to Denver and not raise hell with Heather? Carrico, Mrs. Carrico, Heatherfeather, and the rest of Denver are totally unprepared for what is about to hit them in two weeks. The last time I visited a blogger I had never met in person it resulted in copious beer-consumption, wild music fests, late nights in strange places, barefoot kickball with punk-rock people with various piercings and colorful tattoos, sushi happy hours complete with funny hats, and an orange mustang convertible, among other things.

I just finished The Odyssey. Yes, I am referring to Homer’s Odyssey. The one most people read in high school (or were supposed to read). Well, my high school never told me to read it. After rummaging through a stack of books I pilfered from my older sister, I found this book and decided I had to read it. In the back cover were the doodles of a 15-year old girl madly in love with some boy with the first initial of G. My sister, daydreaming in freshman English. She’s now a lawyer. Go figure.

The books was pretty damn good. It’s got something for everyone. Fantasy, romance, psychology, adventure, battles, heroism. The writing is straightforward and descriptive. No flowery language – just the right words in the right places.

If you’re looking for an entertaining and quick read, try this one out. They give it to high school students for a reason. You could analyze the bejesus out of it but it’s not so complex that you need extreme patience to get through it. I thought there was some gratuitous mythological backstory, though, so I did some skimming here and there.

they wrapped up 3.3 gigs of music into two bit torrent files. 3.3 gigs. that's over 900 mp3s. my trusty 80 GB external hard drive swallowed it whole. a lot of the music is not to my liking, but there are some gems in there.

if the term "bit torrent" means nothing to you, all hope is not lost.

…because I know someone at this internet company, and you know her vicariously though me.

This person is ASHLEY and she landed a sweet job as a USER INTERFACE DESIGNER at GOOGLE in SAN FRANFUCKINGCISCO!

More of these !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It’s a dream come true. Please help me congratulate Ashley. She rocks.

Last night was a doozy. I drank. I laughed. I took my shirt off and wandered around Midtown at midnight.

It all started when a friend, let’s call her L, scored six free passes to the Laff Stop. We arrived at the club after a quick pre-party at her place and proceeded to laugh and drink our hearts away. I drank a couple Crowns – my liquor of choice. The headlining comic was Darren Carter (the party starter), a very confused redheaded Irishman with no accent. “I like my women like I like my socks – in pairs…??? You kinda had to be there.

Our next stop was a pub to celebrate a friend’s 30th birthday. Let’s call him M (or MostStupidHaterAlive, his sometimes online persona). Before the birthday stop we had to stop at L’s place to pick up my car so I could drive myself home at a respectable hour and get some sleep before my 8:40 class. Upon pulling out onto Montrose I spotted something rectangular and hard-looking in the middle of the road and tried to avoid it. I didn’t. It caught both of my left side wheels. It didn’t sound good.

I had a sinking feeling that I flatted both of the tires, and when we got to the pub, I confirmed that my left rear tire was indeed toast. This is when the shirt came off. If I’m gonna change a tire, I sure as hell aint gonna ruin a nice shirt (don’t freak, I was wearing an undershirt). L, the sweetheart she is, volunteered to call AAA to get them to change the tire. Alas, I was a stubborn male. I’d rather get it over with and change it myself.

But wait – why is my spare tire flat? A flat spare is no spare at all. This is not good.

L asked AAA to also bring an air pump. Problem solved.

But wait – where is my jack? I can’t get this car off the ground without a jack. Shit.

Enter another friend, B, who extricated himself from the birthday festivities to borrow the jack of another friend, S. S’s jack worked like a charm. After some more digging, B found my jack in a side-compartment of the trunk. Oh well. I am an imbecile.

We then try to borrow S’s spare tire because she also drives a Honda, albeit a Civic. The spare is too small. No dice. We return the spare to its rightful home.

The plan then hatched by myself and B was to mount the spare, slowly drive to a gas station, and fill it with air. Then get back to partying with M, the birthday boy. In the process of changing the tires we were approached by a strange guy - let’s call him Crackhead #1 – who insisted he help us even though he didn’t want any money.

After hanging around a few minutes, trying to change my tire for me, and dispensing lots of advice, Crackhead #1 asked for a dollar to buy a 40. At least he was honest.

We drive to the gas station. The spare will not take any air for some reason. Enter Crackhead #2. He removes his full-ear headphones and says he can solve our tire problem. He then reaches for his belt and starts to remove it. Before I see any more, I recoil in shock and look away, focusing on getting air into my tire. B, standing behind the crackhead, suspects we’re about to get carjacked and prepares to throw down. Crackhead #2 then asks for my belt because he says the tire isn’t seated on the rim, and if we use the two belts to squeeze the tire more tightly around the rim, it will fill with air.

I concede – almost at my wits end by this point – and hand over the belt. He ties the belts around the wheel and… nothing. My belt breaks. The tire takes no air. We leave Crackhead #2 with his headphones and his belt and slowly roll off in my semi-driveable vehicle.

Enter another friend, J, who has bailed me out in the past. J lives two blocks from the gas station in question. He also drives a Honda Accord, though newer than mine. I call J and ask if I can borrow his spare. He’s naturally confused as to why someone would want to borrow a spare, so I explain about the flat and the crackheads and the belt. He obliges. We meet in his parking garage to pick up the spare and I notice his Honda wheels are five-bolt. Mine are four-bolt. Can you say worst luck ever?

J has to reach through the rolling gates of his parking garage and wave his magnetic card in front of the card-reading doohickey to let us out. The gate begins to roll - taking Js arm with it – as it heads for a concrete pillar. J deftly removes his arm from the gates of pain just before the concrete pillar causes any damage.

By this time, B and I are fed up with the whole situation and he wisely suggests I leave the car parked on the street and return the following morning with my roommate to take care of the flat, and he points out that there is an NTB down the street. I note the NTB and agree with his idea. We head back to the pub.

After another hour or so of retelling our story to everyone I call a cab and head home. I have no cash, so I plan on telling the cabbie to stop at a nearby drive-through bank so I can pulse some cash to pay the fare. We stop at one bank. The ATM says “THANK YOU” but does absolutely nothing for me. Bastard. We go to a gas station but the guy inside won’t open the doors – it’s passed midnight. Then I ask the cabbie, “You don’t take credit cards, do you?”

“Yeah.”

Internal dialogue: “Well thanks for fucking telling me that before we drove around looking for a fucking ATM, fucker. Since when do cabbies take credit cards?”

I get home at 1:30, leave a note for my roommate telling him the story and how I need a ride at 6:30 am before he goes to work. And then I crash.

And all that on a Wednesday night.

Thank you, thank you, thank you to L, B, S, J, and roommate for everything. I owe you all a drink. Or two. Lesson learned? Make sure your spare has air. And avoid crackheads at all costs.

n.b.: turns out Crackhead #2 was right. the tire filled with air once the guy at NTB seated it properly.

I ordered a 20” flatpanel monitor from Dell. Why 20”? The max resolution my laptop can handle is 1600x1200, and that’s what I aimed to meet, and the Dell matches that max resolution for the best price. And it has four USB ports and other useful inputs.

I might as well spill my guts about the next bit of technogeekery on the horizon. This one may take a bit longer to save up for, though. I’ve always longed to invest in some kind of device to record music whether it be a stand-alone system or one that connects to a computer. After doing some research, I settled on something of a cross between both. It’s a standalone digital recorder that can dump the songs to a computer, which then burns to cd. I’ll also need a decent mic to record acoustic guitar. I’ll run the bass in directly to the recorder without an amp because the bass sounds good on its own.

For those that I haven’t lost yet, here’s how I plan to record. I’ll record acoustic guitar in the middle of the mix so that it is balanced between either side. Then, I’ll record a clean bass track 80% in one side and 20% in the other (“pan” it mainly to one side). Then, I’ll record a distorted bass track 80% / 20% in the same way, just flipped, so that the two bass tracks balance each other.* I’ve been curious for a long time as to how such a mix would sound. Since I can’t sing, there will be no vocals. Since I can’t play drums and don’t own any, there will be no drums (unless I find a drummer – not likely).

I have a bunch of musical ideas I’ve been racking up over the years, but nothing too organized. I really have no idea how it’s going to come out, but I’m excited to find out. Whatever comes of this experimentation will surely get posted here so you can all point and laugh at the guy with the recording device who doesn’t know how to write songs.

*anyone who copies this idea totally sucks. that is, unless i have unwittingly copied it from someone else, in which case i apologize and it's not like you can copyright ideas anyway. jeez.

My ADR teacher is an adjunct, meaning the teaching he does at my school is only a part-time gig. This guy happens to be a professor at UT Law, so he comes to Houston once a week to teach us. He told us a story about what happened at a recent dinner party he hosted.

He mentioned at a meeting or class that he had never seen Driving Miss Daisy. Later that week a VHS copy of the film showed up in his inbox at school.

Guests arrived at his house for the dinner party and he popped the tape in for them while he got things ready in the kitchen. Soon after, he heard screams, and then laughter.

Had he really looked at the tape, he would have seen that the complete title of the movie was “Driving Miss Daisy… Crazy.”

It’s a rarity, but every now and then, we at particleman.org have to bitch and moan about certain things that require bitching and moaning. This is one of those things.

If you’ve ever lived in Austin, you almost automatically groan when SXSW rolls around. The city explodes with people cramming into downtown trying to figure out who the cool new band is going to be, to see the hip new films, and to sit in on panels where people talk about the sociological impact of blogs on our day-to-day interactions. Fascinating stuff.

I’m a little bitter about SXSW. I lived in Austin for four and a half years and had to deal with four SXSWs. SXSW clogs the streets and highways (which are already choked) with lost tourists. You can’t get a seat at restaurants. You can’t get into bars or pubs. You can’t park your car anywhere near downtown, which during SXSW, extends to all of central Austin. You can’t see any shows because everyone knows someone who got them a band, and you can’t afford a band because you’re a broke student and can’t muster the $300+ fee.

If you know where to go, there are lots of anti-sxsw shows outside of downtown. If you know where to go, there are tons of great restaurants and pubs to go to outside of downtown. But meanwhile, all the bands you ever wanted to see are in one place for one week, and you can’t get in…

Granted, I know SXSW is a tradition. It might even be a necessity. And it can be a great way to meet like-minded people. It’s a cultural orgy.

But for people on the outside looking in, SXSW is fucking annoying.

after much stalling and slacking, i finally got an rss feed up. ok, it wasn't me, but really rebecca who sent me the initial code and then john who helped me tweak it. in firefox, click on the little orange box at the far right side of the address bar above. voila. rss. in IE, i have no idea what to do. does IE recognize rss? friggin microsuck.

I was stopped at a stop sign in front of a major one-way street waiting for a clear chance to turn. I spot one of the swanky (and pricey) new Mercedes coupes and admire its attractive shape. Then I notice the driver digging for treasure in his nose. Classy.

Ok, I’ll admit it. Tax isn’t the sexiest legal field to go into, but please keep in mind who you’re dealing with here. The only legal fields i would want to practice are copyright and tax, and there are apparently no copyright gigs outside LA and NY, so looks like tax may be it.

Which is why I have this to say. If you’re a programmer, you should go to law school. After that, you should be a tax attorney. Why? Because you already know how to do it. Don’t agree? Here you go:

there i was, happily snoozing away wednesday night, until 12:15 am arrived and the lady upstairs decided to sing like a canary. again.

it took me two more hours to fall asleep after that earful.

but this guy can PLAY. and it's an 11-string bass! and he's playing mario brothers!

Waco, TX is essentially BFE with a Wal-Mart. And a highway. According to my tour guides, there are a couple bars. There is a university. And there is crime. Not just any crime, but really stupid crime. My friend’s girlfriend had her car stolen from her old apartment complex. The car was later recovered with various drugs and drug paraphernalia strewn about the interior. An extra special bonus party favor with the items recovered was a picture of the thieves posing with the car. The full extent of the thieves’ stupidity became apparent upon arrest. The story goes that the car was stolen and sold to a drug dealer for $20 in cocaine. TWENTY DOLLARS. IN COCAINE. A CAR. SOLD. $20.

Kee-riste.

Otherwise, the place is not all-together offensive or anything. Yeah, every other car has a Bush or “W” sticker on the bumper. But they still have NPR radio (to which my friend’s girlfriend is an avid listener). And apparently Baylor is crawling with hot Baptist blond girls with rich dads. I oughtta move to Baylor and set up a net to catch all the hotties. Hey mom and dad, look what I found in Waco! Her name is Whitney! Or Britney. I mean Tiffany. Shit.

My buddy and I made fajitas and watched the superbowl while his girlfriend went to a prep class to learn how to kick the crap out of the GRE. She came home and schooled us on fractions. Did you know that to divide fractions, you flip them and multiply? It’s the damndest thing.

I saw the Baylor law school and realized how lame my school is. Our classroom chairs are hard plastic contraptions bolted to long desks on a swiveling hinge. At Baylor, each seat has its own independent office chair. You know, like the kind you get at Office Max or something. On the other hand, Baylor makes their students stand up for recitation… for every teacher. I’ve only had three teachers do that in four semesters. I think the Baylor administration has issues.

Buddy’s girlfriend and I spent a couple hours studying in the library (which was beautiful) while buddy went to class and slept through his Business Organizations course. Yeah, I know he slept because that’s what I did in my Biz Org class last semester.

One thing I envy about my buddy and his girlfriend living in Waco is that they can see stars. The night sky is full of them. Here in Houston, our glorious pollution (chemical, light, and otherwise) drains out all starlight.

When it comes down to it though, Waco is still BFE with a Wal-Mart. And an HEB.

Thanks again to buddy and his girlfriend for hosting me. Next time I come visit, we gotta see about setting up that net.

I am fortunate enough to have many different pockets of friends from the various lives I live or have lived. They are all amazing people. But when I get some of them together, I find it hard to play the host – especially when they’re meeting for the first time. I worry (a trait I got from my mom) that they aren’t having fun or the conversation bores them. I worry that I’m neglecting some while talking to others.

This is all made more complex because I tend to thrive in smaller social settings with two or three people. Any more than that and I feel overwhelmed. But I like getting lots of them together because I think they will get along, find things they have in common, and perhaps become friends themselves. So what I do in larger social setting is make my own mini-parties of two or three people. Usually it works. Occasionally it doesn’t.

This is also made more complex because I over-analyze everything (see every post on this website).

In the end, though, I think people have a good time whether or not I try to be the perfect host, and they don’t expect me to be everywhere at once. But sometimes, I do.

And that’s when I say to myself: “fuggit.”

I got some new headphones. I decided I’ve had enough of the inner-ear type headphones for now. Most of what I listen to is bathed in distortion anyway or housed in a less-than-stellar mp3 file so I can’t really justify hi-dollar earphones. These Sennheisers were rated as very good for the price (cheap!) so I got a set. Performance is consistent with the review. Highs aren’t as good as they could be, but the sound is full and the over-ear design blocks out most other stuff around you so you don’t need to turn up the volume as much. As long as you don't max out the bass on your music player, I don't think they'll distort.

I missed class last week and emailed my buddy for notes. This was his response.

Umm, I don't take notes in payment systems, I wrote some stuff down so [the professor] thinks I was listening, but I was actually writing my grocery list.

Sorry for being worthless,
[buddy]

is an amazing movie. so amazing, that i can't figure out how he took the other painting at the end of the movie. i can see how he dropped the pencils in the steel rails - probably earlier that day or week when no one was paying attention. but i can't figure out how he stole that painting for Rene Russo. the entire exhibit was closed off with metal grates.

also, the iPod is a blessing in airports.

There was a time in my life when I did not know of Slashdot’s existence. I now divide my life into two periods: pre-Slashdot and post-Slashdot.

There are handful of websites out there that every self-respecting nerd/geek/whatever has to know about. Slashdot is one of them. Digg is another.

The point of this nerdy link-o-rama is that Roommate read about this thing called Pandora on Digg. Pandora is a user-customized radio. Yes, I know Yahoo has a user-customizable radio, but if you’re a real nerd, you’ll always do everything you can to try new technologies. Pandora works by asking you for one band you like, and then it builds off of that one band. For example, to keep things easy, I started with Nirvana. But then it started playing all sorts of crappy, sludge rock bands I don’t like, so I had to temper the Nirvana with Bloc Party, and then Self, and then The Skatalites, and then NoFX. And then the radio started playing music more to my actual tastes.

Moral of the story? Be a nerd. Go to Digg. Listen to Pandora. Find out about new bands.

You might remember that I took a copyright class last semester and really liked it – so much so that I wanted to practice it after graduation. Well, after talking to someone who’s been practicing copyright for 20 years, I decided it’s not the best idea. Turns out most of the work in copyright is in NY and LA, two places I have no desire to live in. Also, the brother to copyright, patent law, is apparently where the business is. Copyright is a much more narrow field. So looks like I might have to be a tax attorney, which probably means another year of school after law school to specialize in tax. On the bright side, i can help you guys out when the Taxman comes a-knockin.

Particleman is currently in Little Rock visiting Particlesister and her fam.

The weather is supposed to get really bad tomorrow and stay that way till at least Monday, so for all I know, I may be here till Tuesday or Wednesday though my flight is Monday afternoon. I might miss class. What a shame.

i'm meeting up with some Danish exchange students for some beer tonight. i've found that people from northern europe tend to be skilled drinkers, so i will probably be hungover tomorrow. just some fair warning for you.

the other bit of international fun will come from my trip to College Station. let's just say that College Station is in Texas, but the people there aren't from around here. at least not the here that i call here. i'm meeting up with my buddy and his girlfriend at College Station because girlfriend wants to look at grad school programs there. after we have lunch, we're heading back up to their place in Waco, where my buddy goes to law school. Waco, as it turns out, could also be considered "international." you might remember Waco for this reason.

Not that there's anything wrong with College Station. Or Waco (We Ain't Comin' Out).

addendum: change of plans. there will be no trip to college station. instead, i'm going up to waco tomorrow and staying till monday (i don't have class monday).

and i'm tired of looking at that confession post. you'll occasionally find some drama here at particleman.org, but it doesn't last long.

waco was interesting. different. and a tad frightening. more details to come. for right now, i must read all about Payment Systems and Professional Responsibility. joy.

Dear Steve,

You seem to be the man when it comes to good ideas lately. Case in point - the nano. The mac mini. That airport thingie. If I may, I’d like to make a suggestion for your next iPod, and it has nothing to do with capacity or features.

The iPod needs an endless power source. It needs to draw its energy from the hydrogen in the air. I think you can do it. I mean, you oversaw the nano, which is pretty freaking amazing. With all that brain power at Apple, I’m sure you guys could whip something up. If necessary, maybe you could team up with someone else for some help. Maybe the kids at MIT might have some ideas. Or NASA.

Sincerely,
Particleman

Yoni died on Friday, February 17. My dad took him to the vet for a teeth-cleaning and they put him under. Yoni had a heart condition and his heart failed while he was anesthetized. The poor little guy never woke up. At least he went painlessly and no longer has to suffer.

Yoni was a world traveler. He went with us to Moscow. He’s flown through many of the world’s largest airports and has taken many a road trip. Yoni was a good dog. He was a compulsive sleeper and lounger. He excelled at making your problems disappear with a smile and a wag of the tail. We miss him and hope he’s in a better place.

Linux will become the new Mac (as far as operating systems are concerned). Allow me to analogize. You know that feeling you get when you discover a new band that has yet to make it big? You’re all excited about them and try to get your friends to listen to them? Consider what happens when they show up on MTV and your local obnoxious radio station. Their luster is gone. Sure, you’re a fan, and you eagerly await their next release, but you’re already on the look out for the next underground act that you can ‘discover.’

Even if you don’t feel that way, that’s basically how the music industry works. No artist is really expected to last anymore. Macs may face the same fate. They’ve been built up on the strength of the iPod but I don’t think their golden era will last much longer. The iPod doesn’t seem to be stimulating sales of Apple computers the way they were expected to.

Linux and Mac are both known for their stability and immunity to viruses. Or rather, no viruses for them existed. Now things are changing. Three Mac viruses have come out in recent weeks. I foresee more of this happening as Apple increases in popularity as the computer of choice for the hip and trendy. Granted, Macs are basically Linux machines, but Mac is owned by someone. Linux is not, so the software is open and can be fixed by anyone. Mac will eventually outgrow its iPod-carrying market and a new ‘indie’ computer system will occupy the fascination of these buyers.

I’ll go out on a limb and claim that most Mac buyers don’t really need a Mac. A Windows machine would do everything they do on the Mac for a fraction of the price. They’re attracted to the chic of the Mac and are willing to pay premium for it.

The new Apple marketing campaign for the Intel Mac is that the Intel chip is finally being set free in a Mac. No more dull tasks in a grey box. The flaw here, of course, is that PCs and Macs can do the same things. Macs may be more well-known for graphical work and whatnot, but you can do the same work on a PC. Now that Macs are facing viruses as well, Apple’s only other claims to fame are stability and style.

But what if Microsoft finally makes a stable operating system? What if you could get it in a pretty silver case with a single-button mouse? What if PC manufacturers sell computers that come equipped with Linux and every piece of software that would have come on a Windows machine? Mac, the classic Windows alternative, suddenly seems less justifiable.

Instead of seeing apple bumper stickers, you’ll start seeing penguins. Linux will replace Mac as the stable and user-friendly operating system. Windows will continue to be used by accountants and CEOs who obviously have no style. And probably lawyers too.

I know. Most of you are saying, “Cry me a river.” But it really is sad. I liked my long weekends. I had big plans to take 4-day trips to see friends. Now they will be 2-day trips. Phooey.

The job is with a tax attorney who works solo. He’s also a CPA, so he’s basically a tax badass. Since tax seems interesting hopefully this will tell me if I’m really cut out for tax law. The best part is that his office is one exit from my house, so the commute is basically nonexistent. Tomorrow is my first day. Wish me luck...

I went to see Flogging Molly last night with some friends and had a blast. We had to wade through an hour and a half of lame opening acts, but there was a light at the end of the tunnel.

I haven’t had that much fun at a show since I was in college and I saw The Donnas and broke my glasses. We started out near the back of the crowd but John weaseled his way up front for one song and came back grinning from ear to ear. There was a throng of not-quite-moshers up front bouncing around and generally having a jolly old time. So when the right song came up, John and I went up front and took part in the festivities. It’s probably the friendliest moshing there is. No real sensation of violence or angst in the air, just running around, singing along, pumping your fist. It was a good time. I also know that I’m really out of shape because I was gasping for air after only one song.

They played two of their most intense songs back to back so that was a little more than I could handle, and I found myself with – lo and behold – a crooked pair of glasses after getting shoved into someone. No worries though, I got them straightened out today.

What most impressed me was the instrumentation and the musicianship. That is, they had a bassist, accordion player, violinist / some kind of flute thing, acoustic guitar, banjo / mandolin, electric guitar, and drums. That is a lot of people to have on stage at one time and getting them to all sound good in a large-scale sound system is no easy task. Somehow, the band sounded tight and unified even when they were at full throttle. A lot of practicing must go into sounding that good.

Many songs found some of the members hanging back while other members took the spotlight. I though that was a good idea because it allowed specific instruments to shine that would normally get buried beneath bass, drums, and guitar. For example, some songs called for only acoustic guitar, mandolin, and violin, and the other musicians literally stood back away from their mics, out of the light, and either played nothing or played minimally. In a band of that size, I think this is a necessity because it underscores the band’s variety and gives the audience something besides a guitar-bass-drums rock show.

Be sure to go if they come by your town. Even if it’s on a school night. I did. And I only went to one (of four) classes today. I know. Shame on me.

I only have one of their albums so I’ll use John’s approximation of the setlist:

album: swagger
-Salty Dog
-Selfish Man
-The Likes of You Again
-Devil's Dance Floor
-Sentimental Johnny

album: drunken lullabies
-Drunken Lullabies
-What's Left of the Flag
-If I Ever Leave this World Alive
-The Kilburn High Road
-Rebels of the Sacred Heart
-The Rare Ould Times
-The Son Never Shines (on Closed Doors)

album: within a mile of home
-Screaming at the Wailing Wall
-Seven Deadly Sins
-Factory Girls
-Whistles The Wind
-Light of a Fading Star
-Queen Anne's Revenge
-The Wanderlust
-Within a Mile of Home

One last note – the show was at a new venue, Warehouse Live. It’s much better than The Meridian (which a support beam in the middle of the stage). The sound was pretty good and there was a big, open bar, but they really could have used an ATM in that place.

I did it. I gave in to the iPower of Apple and bought an iPod Nano. I even sprung for the four gig model. Yeah, I’m am iLoser now like the rest of Americans between the ages of zero and 35. So it was only a few weeks ago that I was lambasting Apple for all the iThis and iThat. What can I say. I’m fickle. The nano has a lot more space than my old iRiver 256 MB mp3 player (strange, notice they also adopt the “i,” and they’re not even Apple…)

The nano also has other cool features that I’ll probably never use. But I tell you what. It’s packed full of questionably-obtained at antitrust-violating-prices memory! Four gigs is a lot for this small a device. I remember when four MBs (not GBs) of memory took up a whole room. Just kidding, I’m not that old. But some readers out there are. I am old enough, however, to remember when a 500 MB hard drive was the bomb, if that makes you age-advanced folks feel any better.

So, off I go to install iTunes and let Apple finally take hold of my life, like Google did a few years ago. They’ll just have to share.
addendum: though i may have bought the iPod, i will not be using the cheesy white earphones, which coincidentally do not satisfy my music-snob ears. i didn't completely sell out, only partially.

addendum to the addendum: damn, these earphones are actually pretty good. they sound much fuller then my old ones. freaking steve jobs with his black turtleneck and excellent R&D department.

idea graciously lifted from nerdygirl and hereby imposed upon heather, who must impose it upon someone else, ad infinitum.

A Schwinn Stingray. Roommate and I split the cost.

Before my roommate and I moved in last August, the only TV shows I watched were The Simpsons, Seinfeld, and Family Guy, none with any regularity. Now, however, things are different. First came The Office. Then Lost. And the newest addition is 24. These TV shows are like crack. The more you get, the more you want.

What I’d like to point out is this: the main characters on Lost and 24 are named Jack. Why is that? Why Jack? Is Jack a name of authority? Does it connote honor? Humility? Strength? Leadership? All of the things that make a hero?

To me, no. When I think Jack, I think “jackass.” Or Jack from Jack In The Box, the guy with a big white ball for a head. When I think Jack, I think “jack squat,” as in “nothing, nada, zilch.” When I think Jack, I think “jackalope,” that deer-like creature I learned about on the Discovery Channel. And, of course, there is “jackolantern.”

Can anyone tell me why the brilliant writers who have written some of the most intelligent and creative TV in the history of TV have chosen Jack as the names of their heroes? I need answers. And I need answers as to where Walt is and who framed Jack Bauer.

if you're curious, she'll be in houston on march 16th. i will be there.

thanks to aaron, and by proxy, jon.

First was San Diego. Now it’s Austin. The girl and I showed up at her sister’s place in south Austin on Thursday afternoon and plan to stay till Friday. We already went to Amy’s Ice Cream, Whole Foods, Malaga, Thai Passion, and Sullivan’s. Please note that each of these sites involves food. Food is really all we care about. We also went to Esther’s Follies and watched what is perhaps the most democratic comedy routine I’ve ever seen (well, we are in Austin).

I also had to introduce the girl to my old mountain biking stomping grounds – the Barton Creek Greenbelt. We hiked for about two hours. There was just enough water in the creek to skip rocks. Girl also happened to get dehydrated because I didn’t bring enough water, and the water in the creek was not suitable for drinking, aka, nonpotable (whatever that means). Girl and her sister are into scrapbooking, so while they do that on Monday, I’ll go for a ride at the Greenbelt.

We’re having a BBQ this evening. What else is there to do on a Sunday evening in January when it’s 75 outside?

after umpteen months of not working out, i went to the gym last night. the first thing i noticed was that the guys started eye-balling me. they looked me up and down and then looked away. granted, i don't think these guys were the types that dig guys, so that couldn't have been the reason for the glaring looks. i think it had more of a territorial feel. as if i were invading on their space, looking at their women. i half expected them to beat there chests and urinate on the closest stack of weights.

the next thing i noticed happened this morning. when i woke up, i couldn't fully straighten my arms. when i stood up, the elbows stuck out. i walk like an ape now. when i try to straighten out my arm, i get grimacing pain in the inner-elbow area. this is what i get for being a slacker for so long - stiff muscles. and an ape-man gait. i guess i fit in with the chest-beating yahoos at the gym. sweet. excuse me while i pee on the bench press.

Once upon a time, a fellow by the name Particleman lived in San Antonio. The year was 2003. His friend, Skorloff, informed him of a most interesting sale taking place at the Central Market, a purveyor of fine foods and libations. Central Market had made the business decision to rid itself of all forms of liquor with an alcohol content above a certain amount. Such a move would allow Central Market to legally serve samples of other wines to customers.

Particleman took heed of Skorloff’s words and visited a Central Market when he was in Austin for the weekend. Particleman roamed and roamed the store until he came upon the rack of liquors to be liquidated.

“Hark,” Particleman exclaimed, “I have found the booty, and it is good.”

Particleman aimed to buy the whole lot. Alas, his willpower held him in check and he resolved to choose one – just one – bottle of port wine. He browsed, he compared, he analyzed, and finally settled on one bottle.

Vowing to save the bottle for a special occasion, he returned to San Antonio and to his hum-drum existence at the massive EnormoCo at which he labored.

Months passed, and still no worthy occasion rose to motivate Particleman to open the bottle. Particleman’s sister had a daughter, and still, he was not moved to open the bottle. He was accepted to law school, but still, he left the bottle to collect dust.

The years went by, and the existence of the bottle passed into distant memory.

Then, something surprising and not at all expected happened. Just last night, Particleman was out to dinner with a friend, and he suggested he and the friend return to Particleman’s abode to relax, drink wine, and converse with the roommate. The roommate was not present upon their arrival, but presently entered grasping his own bottle of newly-purchased wine.

Soon the three were drinking from the roommate’s wine and having grand old time. It was then, at this very juncture, that Particleman sought out the long-forgotten bottle of port wine and presented it to the group. They were awed by its age and mystery.

“Open it,” they implored. Particleman obliged. They drank from the wine, and were happy.

By the end of the night, the roommate’s bottle was nearly empty, and the bottle of port – the bottle that had waited all these years – had finally tasted fresh air. It now lies in wait for the next such occasion.

Fifth installment of the "things that happen to you while" series.

You wake up the morning of the flight with the beginnings of a sinus infection. You are thankful it’s not anything serious that could make flying difficult, like stuffed sinuses or ear issues. Oh, yeah, it’s a sinus infection, so you have stuffed sinuses and ear issues. You call GF at 5:50 am and explain the situation. She says, “Talk to my dad.” Dad is a doctor. Doctor Dad says I’m sending daughter over to your house with drugs. Take the drugs.

Drugs given to you by GF’s dad work. You fly on the big airplane and eat the breakfast of cereal and a banana. You are happy and sleep on GF’s shoulder.

Instead of having to pay money to stay at a hotel, GF’s cousins are kind enough to open their home to you and GF. They also open their fridge, which is a blessing. They also lend you a car, which is blessing upon blessing. You are very thankful for GF’s cousins. Thank you thank you thank you GF’s cousins.

You spend the night and following day recovering from the sinus infection and pop Advil Cold & Sinus like Reese’s Pieces. You are a useless lump of boy during this time. You drink so much water your bladder effectively becomes the size of a pea.

After the worst of the infection passes, you gather your strength to meet the GF’s family for Chinese food. Only part of the family of is present, which equates to about 10 people. You are particularly impressed by an 80-year-old member of the family named Bob who eats more than you, and takes longer doing it. He, like you, is thin as a rail. He, like you, stores the food in his hollow legs. The table marvels at the amount of food this man can put away.

You and GF decide it is your duty to find an In-N-Out Burger and purchase hamburgers for lunch. You do so. The burgers are good and you are happy. Mission accomplished.

GF goes with dad to Tijuana, Mexico to have a look around. You rest at the house and pray they come back safe. They come back and you expect wild and crazy stories of ligers and four-toed sloths. They say, “People tried to sell us stuff. It was kind of crowded. Sort of boring, actually.” Your heart sinks.

You and GF make an attempt at visiting the famous San Diego Zoo to no avail. By the time you get there, you only have an hour because you have to be somewhere else very soon to get ready for another Important Family Event. Instead of spending one hour at the zoo (and paying lots of money to get in) you opt to look at the seals on the beaches of La Jolla. They are fun and cute and smelly. You wish you were a seal so you could hang around all day and bask in the sun on the beach and be protected by national gaming laws.

You head to GF’s Parents’ hotel room to shower and get ready for the next Important Family Event, which happens to be the most important Important Family Event of the trip. One of GF’s cousins is getting married.

The wedding ceremony is beautiful and goes off without a hitch. GF even has a part in it, reading an English translation of some meaningful Hebrew passages whose meaning you have since forgotten. Thankfully, you got pictures of it, so it’s all good.

After the ceremony, it’s time to dance the Hora, the traditional Jewish dance originating in Europe. The Hora normally consists of a circle of people dancing around other people in the middle of the circle. Those other people in the middle could have their own circle or could simply be dancing with one or two partners arm-in-arm. Since only five people at the wedding actually know who you are, you feel compelled to make yourself known by throwing yourself in the throng of Hora-dancers. You work up a sweat and, satisfied you sufficiently contributed to the dancing, seek out the food.

The food must wait. First come the toasts.

The Bride’s parents and sisters toast the newlyweds as do the Groom’s father and sister. The final speaker, the Bride’s grandfather, gives a moving and witty speech on how the Bride and Groom met. The grandfather forms the speech in Biblical language – that is, for example, “Sam met Amy, and Amy was a comely young woman, and Sam was smitten, and Sam wed Amy, and it was good.” Etc etc. His speech steals the show and there is a flood of applause.

Afterward comes the food. You feast on salmon and mahi-mahi and pasta and salad and potato, and it is good. You and GF score margaritas, and they are good. Your bellies are happy.

You once again find yourself on the dance floor. The Deejay is playing music to which everyone can dance. Namely: disco, R&B, and Motown. You manage to avoid stepping on GF’s toes and, to you, this constitutes a successful dancing evening. You close the place down and are in bed by midnight.

You and GF and hop in the car and make another attempt at the zoo, this time allotting about two hours for yourselves. You take the guided bus tour to see as much as possible in the short time you have. Your favorites include the polar bears, the elephants, the Alaskan brown bear, and, of course, the Pandas.

You then head to the Bride’s parents’ house for a quick brunch before you leave for the airport and the flight back home.

The sinus infection is all but a memory and you reflect on all the amazing people you met and the fun you had.

if this blog had a post category for "geek," this post would go into that category. i am posting this from the new linux partition on my computer. i'm running a version of linux called knoppix, which is basically beginner's linux. i've got linux and win xp dual-booting from lilo.

for those of you have no idea what i just said, don't worry. before a couple years ago i didn't know what i just said either, but it just so happens that the roommate is a former linux hacker and helped me get this set up. it's just a way to play around with customizing an operating system like windows to make it do what i want, and make it not do what i don't want it to do. it's also safer in terms of viruses and other bad stuff on the internet.

now i've got to figure out this console thing so i can install firefox. i'm using an old version of mozilla and the fonts look all whack.

can someone tell me why apple has to name all of its products "i-something"? i know it helps with marketing and brand recognition*. i just don't get the i. and i also don't think it's that cool, but if you do, i suppose you're entitled to your own opinion.

* see also: Ford "Ex-whatever" SUVs and other nauseating branding schemes.

First class starts at 8:40. Last class ends at 7:30. Tuesdays are going to suck this semester. Thankfully, Thursdays end a little earlier. I'm not complaining though. I only have school Tuesday and Thursday, which means i only have to go that 'place' twice a week. Halleluya. Hopefully i can get a job to fill the other days.

In geek news, i upgraded to a newer version of Knoppix and am acquainting myself with basic Linux commands. Did you know that the way to install a new application in linux, you don't have to find a website, download a setup file, find the .exe file, and go through a series of inane windows? You just type “apt-get install 'application name'” and you're done. Linux goes out to the web and finds the application for you and installs it. Sweet.

In politics news, i'm going to a Law Students for Choice Roe v. Wade luncheon next week with Red Hot Mamma. I have no idea what to expect. I'm hoping for some good food. Yes, i have a one-track mind.

I finished Jane Eyre. And I think my appetite for Brit lit has been quenched for a while. The introduction quotes a review from a June, 1855 publication of Sharpe’s London Magazine saying, “Imagine a novel with a little swarthy governess for a heroine, and a middle-aged ruffian for hero.” That just about sums it up. I thought ‘swarthy’ meant something along the lines of saucy, surly, or smart-alecky. Turns out it means having a dark complexion. But from my reading, Jane was a pasty lass. Hmm.

Anyway, it’s a nice little book, if you can stand having to turn to the back for the occasional definition. I still think if you’re after a wild story and graceful writing, you’d do better with Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, et al.

I also finished the Lance Armstrong book. This was his first book, the one in which he describes his beginnings with competitive cycling, his fight with cancer, and the marriage to his x-wife. It’s an inspirational story to say the least. That guy is not human. He did nonhuman things. If you’re looking for a quick read and a touching story, this is it.

Up next, I plan to slog through the rest of the Stephen Hawking book and then head to Half Price to see what I can’t find. I’ve heard this book and this book are good. Any other recommendations?

I was good last semester. On my two off-days (Tuesday and Thursday) I read and did all my homework. Sure, there were breaks, but the work got done. This semester seems to be different. I didn’t have class today. I went to a coffee shop for three hours and read for maybe two of those hours. That is all the work I have done today.

The rest of the time has been spent by:
1. riding The G Ride around the neighborhood
2. channel-flipping
3. coming up with a tracklisting for heatherfeather’s and erik’s mix cds
4. waiting for Lost to come on
5. looking for jobs
6. see #1
7. reading Jane Eyre

You see, one of my teachers goes too slowly, so I’m already where I need to be for tomorrow’s class. Another teacher assigns cases for each student, and my case isn’t for another couple weeks. Another teacher asked us to read the “introductory” chapter, and after about ten (of 25) pages of that junk, I had had enough. So I occupy myself with the above seven activities.

Oh yeah, I also did a load of laundry. And charged my cell phone.

He lives in Austin somewhere towards the end of the Barton Creek Greenbelt. He caught me hauling ass down the trail and stuck his blades out from the bush and dug them into my forearm. Though the cuts are fairly close together, implying the blades are close together, implying they came from a smaller hand, implying they came from Wolverine’s son. Yes, I found Wolverine’s son. Sonofabitch let me have it.

Now I remember why I never went to Highland Mall when I lived in Austin. It’s fucking impossible to find. Girl and I spent a good 50 minutes total in the car last night getting to the Indian restaurant where we met some friends (the restaurant is across the street from the mall). The food was great, the company was great, the drive sucked. Someone needs to mount a big flashing sign with an arrow that says “HIGHLAND MALL HERE” at the main entrance. That would be great. Thanks.

Also, "Girls On Film" by Duran Duran has been stuck in my head since Thursday.

taking a list of book titles with me, i set off for Half Price books on my trusty Schwinn and returned with one lonely book. All of the cool and hip books heather and skorloff reccommended were not in stock. turns out they sell as soon as they arrive. they didn't even have harry potter 2! they did have #3 in paperback, so i'll probably go back for that one tomorrow.

the one book i did find was The Coffee Trader, a suggestion on nerdygirl's list. and since i like historical fiction, it was a gimme.

there's a book on my shelf that i've somehow managed not to read for many years - Great Expectations - that i've added to the stack. so those two, plus the Hawking book, will comprise my extracirricular reading for now.

part of me really wants to read books like The World is Flat and Freakonomics, but part of me doesn't really give a shit about what some guy thinks about global or domestic economics. i'd rather just read a good story, especially one set in the past.

but i really enjoyed Fast Food Nation, which was partially an economics/marketing book, so who knows. i'll probably cave in and read The World Is Flat.

maybe the root of the issue is that i don't want to get caught in a book that sounds like one of the many law school textbooks i've read and have to read. i get enough lecturing from scholars as it is.

Exhibit A: Five-Year Old Grip Tape

Exhibit B: New Grip Tape

See how much brighter and prettier? Too bad it only took me 30 minutes and four re-wraps to get the first side wrapped right. After I learned from my mistakes, the other side went much more quickly.

And remember my old, gnawed cleats?

Exhibit C: New Cleat, Old Cleat.

Hopefully these will keep me attached to the bike. I offer no guarantees that I’ll actually ride the bike any more than I usually do, though.

i called the landlady. she called a plumber-guy. sixty-five of her dollars later, this is the culprit. oops. (we kinda feel bad).

i don't even need to wait for all the other redesigns to come in. i already found the winner. cherz drew from deep down and created what is perhaps the most advanced, modern, and tech-savvy blog in existence.

while some bloggers are all about complimentary colors, sans-serif fonts, and trendy logos and banners, cherz rejects such indicia of the "in" blogs and forges his own path. i challenge all of you to match the wit and daring that is cherz.com.

Consequently, they’re flying out of my butt.

Seriously though. This is bad news. Since when are terrorists allowed to run a nation? Oh, who am i kidding.

You mix old school jazz with modern electronic music? Cool shit. It’s called Verve Remixed. Some of my more musically up-to-date readers may chide me for once again lagging so far behind the trendy music curve, but hey, I mean well. I’m listening to Volume 3 right now and it’s rockin’. Highly recommended.

Caution: legal mumbo jumbo ahead.

What’s also interesting are the legal ramifications of this music. The Verve has a copyright on the original jazz recordings and, from what I understand, could not or would not release the rights to other musicians wanting to use the Verve’s music. DJs were of course using the tracks anyway, but probably without permission. What’s more, the question of whether sampling of this nature amounts to fair use or a derivative work is a whole nother issue. If you want to know the answer to that one, you’ll need to borrow a copy of my notes from Copyright class, or take the class yourself.

the "preview" button on the comments now works again. not that any of you noticed it broke. the server went and got case-sensitive on me and i had to root out the offending capitalization snafu. i return you to your regularly scheduled whatever.

quoting:

"Our conclusion today is that it is unconstitutional to teach [intelligent design] as an alternative to evolution in a public school science classroom."

Damn this thing. It won’t let go of my files. I’m trying to transfer my precious files over to my roommate’s server before I give the hard drive a clean sweep but it won’t loosen its grip. I swear it’s pissed off at me for neglecting it for so long. I was able to get about 3 gigs worth of Word files, Aeon Flux episodes, and The Office episodes over to his computer before it wigged out and refused to reconnect. It won’t even recognize his computer’s existence. Just an hour ago it was merrily transferring files over; but now, noooooooo, it has no freaking clue a humongous server with lots of free disk space is sitting right here waiting to store all my mp3s and whatnot. Damn technology. Finicky and unpredictable. Sounds like women.

Ok that last one came out of pure frustration. Sorry for the jibe. Computers still piss me off. Especially mine.

I started reading the Lance Armstrong book. Good story so far. I’m glad he got a co-writer. Homeboy Lance can ride a bike, but he ain’t no Tolstoy.

Well, looks like computer won this fight. But it hasn’t won the battle. Once I got all my files off of the hard drive and onto my dad’s computer, I realized that not only is the “resource” cd the computer came with lacking a copy of XP, but my backup image of the factory setup is also gone. So I have nothing to install even if I can swipe the drive. What I will do, though, is buy a legit copy of XP (groan) at a reduced price thanks to my friend who is a student at an unnamed university here in town.

Also, that road trip I talked about? Yeah, not gonna happen. The weather in central Texas is going to turn hellish this weekend. Cold, I can handle. Rain and cold I cannot handle. I’m not that manly (and neither is 56-year-old dad). So looks like pops and I are just gonna kick it here in town. He needs a new light jacket, so we went to to REI and got him a cool fleece top. Then we saw Aeon Flux, which has gotten terrible reviews, but at matinee price, I don’t mind watching Charlize Theron frolic around the screen in that smokin’ hot outfit. Yes, I’m easy to please. The movie was pretty good if you're looking for a sci-fi action flic to kill some time. It was definitely a guy movie: sci-fi plot with some social commentary stirred in, topped with enough action sequences to keep most any male happy. Damn the reviewers, we liked it.

Tonight was Heather’s birthday party, so I got to hang with her and Andrew at Rudyard’s, a new (to me) dive. Her landlord’s band was an opening act and they were pretty good, so I’m looking forward to seeing them again.

I’ve blogged about my landlady before. She’s older, probably somewhere in her 70s, and most definitely from the South. She does a great job keeping the apartment in tip-top shape. The weird thing is that she has a habit of parking her car in the driveway when no one is here and sitting in the car. Waiting. Either she’s waiting for the A/C guy to show up, or the heater guy, or the plumber, or some other repairman-person. It’s so freaking weird. I invite her in for a drink but she smiles and politely refuses. I don’t get it. It might be 100 degrees outside, but she refuses to leave that car.

What happened today really freaked me out. I had been running errands all morning and stopped home for some lunch before heading out again. I had to go out to my car for something and didn’t bother to look up at anything else around me. After I found what I needed, I closed the car door and then, to my surprise, heard a familiar female voice calling my name. I was in such a rush to get back in and eat lunch that I almost screamed like schoolgirl when I heard my name and realized Landlady had been sitting in her car next to mine the whole time. What the hell? It’s like 40 degrees outside, and she’s sitting in her car. She said she was waiting for a washing machine guy for the Lady Upstairs (whom I have also blogged about). I asked her if she would like to come in for a drink, perhaps some tea. Again, the polite, “Oh, No Thank You.”

Landlady, you’re weird. You shouldn’t sit outside in your car when it’s 100 degrees or 40 degrees. It’s not healthy, and just a little bit abnormal. Maybe even stalker-ish.

i'm going to a wedding in san diego with E, her parents, and her grandfather. E's cousin is getting hitched. now that i've already met the fam, i get to meet some of the extended fam. wish me luck.

happy holidays, be safe, et al.

Specifically, the La Jolla* neighborhood. La Jolla is basically a peninsula, so beach is everywhere and land is kind of expensive – or at least I imagine it is. So here’s my solution. I’m building my pad right on the beach. On the sand. I’ll set up shop next door to the seals. It’s probably illegal and the authorities will probably try to tear my house down, but if I take a few seals hostage – I mean, as guests – they’ll think twice about bulldozing my bachelor pad. They’ll resort to legal measures that obviously won’t work, since everyone knows “legal measures” is really code for “what the hell do we do now.”

The trip was great and the wedding was beautiful. I danced a lot and, as planned, everyone quickly and uniformly vacated the premises, some covering their children’s eyes to shield them from the abomination that is my dance moves.

I might subject you to one of these posts later on.

*pronounced La Hoya, for reasons i refuse to believe or accept. I still want to call it La Jolla.

It’s called Chanukkah, or Hanukkah, if you don’t like the ‘ch’ sound (which many of you probably don’t, and I won’t hold it against you). Yes yes, I know there happens to be some other holiday with trees and lights and the “sucking up [of] energy into a void of tackiness” also on the 25th. But this is the first time I can remember Chanukkah’s first night coinciding with Christmas.

Christians have it easy. Their holiday always falls on the same day. December 25th. No muss, no fuss. But for Jews in America, Chanukkah is an elusive bastard, shifting around from early-December to mid-December to late-December at will. Actually, it’s not so much Chanukkah’s fault as the difference between the Christian (Gregorian) solar calendar and the Jewish solar-lunar calendar. While the Gregorians add an extra day every four years, the Jews add an extra month every now and then. The exact calculations of when to add the extra month are too complex for me to explain here. I also don’t understand them, so that’s another excuse.

What all this hullabaloo means is that Jews are faced with the same question every year from their non-Jewish (or Jewish and absent-minded) friends: So when is Chanukkah this year? My usual answer: damifiknow. The Gregorian and Jewish calendars are in a constant state of flux, so it’s hard to tell when things will happen.

OK, I just really wanted to use the word “flux.” Great word.

So, whatever your holiday fancy, whether it be hanging tacky lights on your rain gutters, lighting 36 candles, or doing something else that’s vaguely religious or cultural in nature, remember this: there were times when doing these things was forbidden. And there are people in the world who want no other gift than to be with the ones they care about, and for some reason, will not have their wish fulfilled. Those of us who can have that should be thankful.

And since we’re already being sappy, why not top it off with this: in light of Skorloff’s astute observation a few weeks ago, we at particleman.org hope you enjoy your tradition - however lame it might be. And trust us, it probably is lame.

Links to particleman.org’s Chanukkah past:

I found the missing cd my computer came with that did exactly what I needed it to do: erase everything and start over. So I write to you from a freshly set-up laptop complete with external hard drive that doesn’t crash the computer. Hooray for technology.

My dad and I went to REI and got him a cool North Face jacket/fleece thing. It’s all part of my plan to help dad develop his wardrobe into something cool (for a mid-50s guy). It’s an ongoing project of mine. My dad could care less about what he wears so long as it doesn’t embarrass those around him and it doesn’t have holes. That’s all well and good, but unless someone else steps in, he’ll wear the same shirt to every occasion. Case in point: for each of the three of four times E and I have had dinner with my parents, my dad has worn the same shirt. It was time for some variety. Thus, the trip to REI.

Mom, though, had other ideas. She insisted on taking him to MACY’S, which I adamantly protested, to get him a jacket. They went without me and came home with two faux-suede jackets, one brown and one tan. They are hideous. They are not in conformance with my plan. They look like something a wife would buy her husband because they get the job done. Shameful. We’re not just trying to get the job done – we’re trying to do it with some style. Dad chose the North Face jacket. He liked it. Mom didn’t. I say let the man keep the jacket.

Believe it or not (believe it) Mom and I got in an argument over this. I know that probably sounds a little weird to a lot of you, but please consider 1) my mom and I argue about pretty much everything and 2) the arguments are always good-natured. There’s no real animosity there. Just complete obstinance.

Rather than take the hard line and require her to return both of the Macy’s jackets, I opted for a compromise. Take the more abominable jacket back and leave the North Face jacket status quo. At least then he has a choice between the two, and one of the jackets is clearly heavier than the other and therefore in a different category of jacket. I think that strategy was a winner. There was no protest and I haven’t a word about it since yesterday.

Up next: no more wearing white tennis shoes with everything. Instead, these, in mahogany. I have something similar and they’re great. No laces to futz with and they go with most everything.

Thankfully the kissing disease didn’t get me this time. Neither did any other ailment. Instead, I had five law school finals to contend with, and Skorloff was brave (and kind) enough to take on the blogging responsibilities of this here vessel. For that I am very thankful. We all learned a lot from Skoroloff. For instance, I didn’t know that “no self-respecting list of post-modern soundtracks would be complete without a quentin tarantino movie.” I also didn’t know that “we feed them every day which keeps them from starving and has cut down on the number of dead bird parts we find in the yard.” Neither did I know that “then i got old.” I’ll be damned.

What I do know is that I’m getting the hell out of dodge. My dad and I plan to take a road trip of sorts this weekend to somewhere in central Texas. Probably a state park. Someplace where we can canoe, hike, smell clean air, look at stars, and otherwise act like the rugged guys we really aren’t. Then E comes back on Tuesday and the wait will be over.

But before that, I’ve got a list of things to do:

My third set of law school finals start the 30th and the last day of class is tomorrow, so I must leave you for a few weeks as I duke it out with studying. But fear not. Your favorite pinch-blogger Skorloff will make an appearance once again. The last time you heard from him, I was battling it out with the infamous ‘kissing disease.’ I’m sure he’s traveled far and wide and amassed a great amount of stories to regale you with since he was last here. For all I know, however, he might just talk about dishwashers and the odd bottle of wine.

With that, I leave you to Skorloff’s devices (vices?). Enjoy. I shall return circa December 13th.

Before I go, I must say Thanks to Tarfia and JB for swinging by and saving me from more studying. They drove in from Austin for a belated birthday visit and we went out for sushi, beer, wine, and more beer. Much Belhaven was had by all. Belhaven is now the official beer of the Fall 2005 Semester. Hooray! Tarfia also brought her laptop and we performed a massive musical exchange, which sounds a little dirty but was totally kosher. I promise. Just don't tell the RIAA (bastards). Later!

Remember flashcards? The ones with an animal on one side and the name on the other? Yeah, I don’t much remember them either, but this is a website and most things here are fictional anyway, so what the hell.

I’ve had the luck to write out these flashcards of my Evidence course.

That’s right. An entire law school Evidence course jam packed into 30-something flashcards. They contain fun factoids like, “Where a witness from a former trial is unavailable for the second trial we admit the transcript from the first trial.” If you like that and want more, let me know, there’s lots more where that came from. In fact, I could even make it harder by translating it into a foreign language like Latin or Pig Latin, both of which are still widely used among lawyers and judges (which is why only Catholics and pubescent pre-teens know what they’re saying).

The best part is that I get to write four more sets of these wonderful flashcards! Four times the fun! Four times the eyeball-poking! My ass has created a permanent indention in my desk chair and they have begun to fuse, which really wouldn’t be all that bad because then I could roll around everywhere and this chair has nice padded armrests too.

So all in all, my hand may cramp up into a mangled mess, but I’ll have these sweet flashcards to show for it.

"[A]s long as he gets one more vote than the other side, he seems happy."

what was i just saying the other day about government jobs?

From one of my study guides:

"After all, much of transactional lawyering consists of building a paper record so that a dubious position later can be defended with a straight face."

NB: a transactional lawyer is basically one who never (or rarely) sees a courtroom, which, as it turns out, is most lawyers.

I needed a break from the onslaught of studying I’ve been putting myself through, so I went to a local pub last night with the roommate and his buddy. Five pints of Paulaner and Belhaven later, we struck up a conversation with a gaggle of girls - one of whom started bragging about her two-year-old nephew. I chimed in that I have a two-year-old niece. Within seconds, we were claiming that our respective sibling’s child could beat up the other’s respective sibling’s child.

Score 1 for the maturity squad. My niece can kick the crap out of anyone’s nephew. Hey, and I’ll have one more pint of Belhaven please.

I guess I forgot to write about the Social Distortion show. It was good. It was loud. The guys are getting’ old though. There’s just something weird about a 40-year-old guy with tattoos wearing black eyeliner.

They played some songs I recognized and some I didn’t. Of course they played Mommy’s Little Monster, The Creeps, and closed with Story Of My Life. But thrown in there were a couple surprises. Near the beginning of the show, they eased into a song with a very familiar melody. I swore I hear it just the other day, but Social Distortion’s only radio song is Story Of My Life, so something was up. After a few more bars, I realized I was listening to a Rolling Stones cover. It was Under My Thumb. I thought they did a good job giving it their own special Social D touch.

The other major crowd-pleaser was the first song in the encore: Ring of Fire. Man that place lit up. Rocking out a Johnny Cash song is a guaranteed way to get an audience going. It really, really suited them, more so than Under My Thumb. When a band bent on maintaining its teen angst with brooding lyrics, sneering vocals, and a twinge of blues gets its hands on a song like Ring Of Fire, success is the only result. I know it’s blasphemous to say so, but they could have pulled it off as one of their own songs.

we all know the drill. the faculty page at every school has a picture of the professor and his or her chosen quote. most choose some wise quote from a famous person, likely an author, politician, great leader, so on and so forth.

but one professor at my school chose an unlikely quote. he quoted a song lyric by Gibby Hanes of The Butthole Surfers. he gets mad props.

Yeah, I’m losing it. I was thinking how cool it would be to have a telescope and to take it out into the country and look at stars. Then I remembered something I learned in Astronomy that looking at stars is looking into the past – the light takes hundreds, thousands, millions of years to get here. The light takes time to travel, so what you see up there is not happening right now. Which made me wonder about looking at things that are closer, like the moon and the sun. When we look at the moon and the sun, we’re not seeing them right now. Extrapolated further, when you look at anything, you’re not seeing it now. Everything you see is the past, not the present, so we’re constantly looking into the past.

So yeah, four weeks till finals and I’m already losing it.

Here at particleman.org, we don’t keep up with the news much nor do we give a damn (unless the news is a swirling mass of storm headed our way). But we feel a comment or three are in order about the recent brouhaha over supreme court justices.

#1: judges, like presidents, are too busy wondering how the hell they got the job to spend much time on the job itself. Government work is pretty cool. Arrive at 9, leave at 4:30, take a one-hour lunch. Sure, you’re paid less than in the private sector, but look at those hours!

#2: most supreme court decisions are decided, and written, by law clerks. Law clerks are law students looking for a posh summer gig that looks good on the resume. Which means all supreme court decisions are written by equally unqualified and unlicensed law geeks at the top of their class who decide cases based on what they ate for breakfast. Thus, chances are equal the decision will be “conservative” or “liberal,” whatever those words mean.

And most importantly…
#3: if a judge (law clerk) writes an opinion we don’t like, WE EGG THEIR HOUSE. Justice is served.

It seems RSS is the new HTML table. At least back when HTML tables were cool (1993?). RSS, if you aren’t geek enough to know, allows you to read blogs without actually having to go to the blog and deal with all their graphics and links and stuff. It’s the ultimate lazy blog-reader’s heaven. Read multiple blogs, in one place, in like thirty seconds flat. No having to click around the internet.

Several of my favorite blogs are available in RSS or some similar device. Does that mean I’ll make mine available in RSS? Not so fast there, spanky. That takes work, and we here at particleman.org are notoriously lazy – and swamped with school work. We also don’t know if a blog needs to be hosted by blogger, typepad, moveable type, or some other purveyor of blogging software to work with RSS. If you had a chance to look at the code that runs this page, you’d scream, cover your eyes, and run away. Far, far away.

In conclusion (we love concluding paragraphs), it remains to be seen whether particleman.org will ever see the light of RSS. Maybe this winter. Maybe this summer. Maybe when I get a legal job in Austin.

Maybe not.

Wow. Wow wow wow. Ben folds was AMAZING. The set was over an hour and a half long. He played old ones. He played new ones. He played new ones that haven’t been recorded that were written in sound check two weeks ago. He even played Brick, which is one of those songs you figure an artist would never play again. After playing Jesusland, he told us that they should have “dumbed-down” the production of the new album and that this was how it should have been recorded, and they then played a version of Jesusland you might hear, oh, on church TV? They were poking fun at large-scale televised church music and it was a riot.

For anyone that’s heard The Gourds’ version of Snoop’s Gin and Juice, you’ll appreciate this. Ben and the band played a Dr. Dre song called Bitches Aint Shit. Oh my god, it was so freaking hilarious. Hearing those lyrics come out of his mouth, with that loungy music, was so funny I was laughing out loud. But of course it was executed flawlessly without any hint of sarcasm, and after the song ended, he got up from the piano and started talking shit to it (the piano). If you can imagine a scrawny guy with glasses raising his arms and balking at a piano, yeah, that’s pretty much what it was.

Somewhere towards the middle of the set, the drummer and bassist left, leaving Ben to serenade us solo. This was when Brick showed up, and also Army, which had Ben doing some of the best audience participation I’ve ever seen. There’s a portion of the song that includes horns, and since he didn't have any horn players, he used us. I’ve seen bands try to pull this off before, and most of the time no one really gives a shit. A select few will participate, but most of the crowd (me too) just stands there. Ben got up from the piano and waved his arm at half of the crowd and told us to do this [insert bah-bah-bah type singing] and then told the other half to do more such singing, so that the two parts layered on top of each other. He essentially became a choir director so that we sang the stuff that the horns play on the recorded track. So when it came time to sing, all he had to do was look at us and every single person sang. I couldn’t believe it. He really got everyone to sing, and it sounded good, and it made my night. I was really hoping he’d play Army, but I didn’t expect he’d try something like that. Mad props to Ben.

He also did something similar on Not The Same, teasing both sides of the audience by having them start and stop in the middle of their part. Other highlights of the night included Don’t Change Your Plans, The Ascent of Stan, Annie Waits, Gone, Still Fighting It, Zak and Sara, Landed, Gracie, You To Thank, Trusted, Prison Food, and a version of Narcolepsy that absolutely rocked. The place lit up and the sound system could hardly handle it. They closed (the encore) with a high-powered version of One Angry Dwarf that taxed the sound system again. Rock.

But the music snob in me made a couple observations. 1) The intro to Landed sounds a hell of a lot like the intro to James Taylor’s Fire and Rain. 2) The main riff to Prison Food sounds like Brick, but speed up; the key even sounds the same. Anyway, those are small complaints. The show was great, Ben was great, the band was great, and I’d do it again even if I had a final the next day. Ok maybe not the next day, but they day before the day before the final.

Warning, if you don’t like blood, stop reading now.

I took a break from studying this afternoon to get a haircut. Lame break, I know, but believe it or not, this right here is a break. So there I am, getting a haircut, chatting it up with the haircutting-person and I feel a slight knick on my left ear. She was using one of those machine clippers and I guess she goofed. It didn’t hurt and she dabbed it with some powder to “stop the bleeding,” so I figured all was ok.

Later in the day, I take of my classes and notice the earpiece is encrusted with dried blood. Hmm. I head off to the bathroom and bend my ear back and crane my head to try to get a look at my ear. HOLY CRAP SHE CUT THE SHIT OUT OF MY EAR. What, was she trying to maim me? I tipped her $3 for this!!! The entire back of my ear was all red.

Since I can’t see much of what’s behind my ear in the mirror, I do the next best thing. Take pictures of it with my digital camera, which is no easier than looking at the back of your ear in a mirror. After a few fouled attempts, I saw a cut about two inches long back there. That harmless ‘nick’ I felt was one hell of a cut. So much for that haircutting person. If I ever go back there, I’m not letting her come anywhere near with anything designed to cut hair.

if you live in houston, and you have an urge to see a skinny white Jewish guy bang on a piano, you need to go see ben folds this friday night at numbers. it's an early show that starts at 6:30 and will be over by 10 or 10:30. i know finals are rolling around and all, but c'mon, it's BEN FOLDS.

The Supreme Court decision came down in June, but it looks like action is only being taken now.

From a legal standpoint, the Supreme Court’s analysis is a little wacky, but the result is right. Grokster was actively promoting its product as a way to help people infringe. They circulated internal documents that basically said, “Let’s ride on all this copyrighted material to sell advertising and make lots of money. We’ll be the next Napster.” That was pretty dumb. They deserve to be shut down. The worst of it is that they actually said the goal was to get taken to court and sued. They got their wish.

While I’m all for nixing the current structure of the music industry in place of a more DIY approach, I’m not for blatantly ripping off music and laughing in artist’s faces. Though the lower courts in the Grokster case sided with Grokster, the Supreme Court swiftly and thoroughly vacated their logic in favor of something that made more, though not complete, sense.

Part of why the Grokster case was so big is because everyone was hoping the Supreme Court would explain an old case it decided in 1984 about VCRs (then called VTRs). In Universal City Studios v. Sony, the plaintiff said Sony was secondarily liable for people recording their movies because Sony provided the tool to infringe. The Supreme Court disagreed, concluding there were “commercially significant noninfringing uses.” In terms of establishing a workable test that can be applied to other situations, that sucks. It doesn’t mean anything. What’s a commercially significant noninfringing use? Who decides? Do we need market experts? Technology experts? Since the Grokster case is similar to Sony, copyright geeks everywhere were hoping the Court would expound a little bit on what it was talking about when it wrote Sony in 1984.

Alas, it said Hell No. There is no reason to go into Sony. Since in this case there is direct inducement to infringe, we don’t even need to look at what a substantial (significant, whatever) noninfringing use is. They’re guilty simply because they so strongly advocated an infringing use.

On the bright side, I did detect a little skepticism on the Court’s part that this process – make new technology, help people infringe, get sued – will result in a never ending cycle. Technology will always find a way. It always has. Coders love a challenge. I also found it funny when Justice Souter made references to both Wilco and Modest Mouse in the decision.

With that, Grokster leaves with its tail between its legs and a posting on its website that looks like something they were instructed to say: “There are legal services for downloading music and movies. This service is not one of them.” Ouch. But, they do plan on creating a legal iTunes-ish service. As soon as they figure out how to pay that fifty million dollar settlement.

I thought I’d write about all the homophobic morons in my state who showed up in droves to insert a clearly religion-based law into my state constitution. I thought I’d write about the nausea I felt in reading that the Kansas Board of Education now officially supports intelligent design, thus making sure they get a shot at turning students in their state into the good God-fearing citizens they need to one day become.

Instead, I’ll just mention that you need to check out a band from the UK called Bloc Party. The closest I can come to a description is (and don’t quote me on this) a pop-rock band making liberal use of electronic instruments and devices for effect. And their drummer is ridiculously creative.

Since that really doesn’t help, this is what they say about themselves:

Bloc Party is an autonomous unit of un-extraordinary kids reared on pop culture between the years of 1976 and the present day. Like many such kids, between them they eventually concluded that their own attempts to imitate what had informed them could be construed as a worthy variation on the many forms that preceded. They do everything that's required to conform to the currently received ideas of what a band is: ostensibly to play instruments at the same time, but also have a title for the work created.

I went to a classmate’s costume party last night and had a great time. My liver, on the other hand, did not. It had a horrible time. It’s still bitching, actually, and it’s taking the rest of my major organs and bodily systems with it. They’re all on strike. Picketing. Lobbying. Staging sit-ins. Rallies. Having union meetings. The muscles (what few remain after a year of non-use) are particularly stubborn and achy. Things from the neck up are also not functioning properly. In short, drinking large quantities of cheap rum with coke will make you hurt. Ow.

On the bright side, there were some cool costumes: sumo wrestler guy, Wonder Woman, Superman, female cop with handcuffs, pirate, Strawberry Shortcake, 70s Dude, goth people, fighter pilot, box of tissues (Blow Me), angel, nun and priest, belly dancer, firewoman (with ax), and more I’m sure I’m forgetting. My friend wore a hella cute Hawaiian dress complete with lei around her neck and flower in her hair.

Me? I rolled 70s style. Blue and white pinstripe pants, shirt unbuttoned half-way down, with a bling-bling Star of David resting in the natural rug that lives on my chest. I bet you’re wishing you hadn’t read that last sentence right now.

I went on that crazy bike ride with an old buddy of mine and we had a blast. I’d say about 1,000 people showed up at the wee hours of Sunday morning to ride their bike in the moonlight. There were all kinds of people on all kinds of bikes. Kids on BMX bikes. Racer types on swanky $4,000 bikes. Moms and dads with basic hybrid bikes, towing one of their kids. And one guy towing not a kid, but his dog.

Then there was the guy in the recumbent bike who rigged a couple 2x4’s to the seat-back and mounted small speakers on the ends to play music. There were also morons who didn’t pay the $25 ride fee and didn’t wear a helmet. Even though they didn’t pay the fee, the helped themselves to all the ride organizers’ hard work in getting this event together.

There were two possible routes – one eight miles and one nineteen. My buddy and I planned to take the short route so as to get home at a reasonable hour, but when we got to the turn-off to take the short route, we said “aw, fuck it, let’s go the long way,” and kept going straight with everyone else. We didn’t see anyone taking the turn-off and didn’t much feel like riding alone. All the action was on the long route.

I’ve ridden early in the morning before, so I know what it feels like to ride through empty streets illuminated only by streetlight. But 2:15 isn’t exactly early in the morning. 5:00 is early. 2:15 is night. The people we saw weren’t trying to make an early flight to the airport. They had just gotten done partying, so we got lots of attention: some hoots, some hollers, and some, “What the hell is this?!” Every now and then cars would make their way through or around us, but for the most part, we had the roads to ourselves. It was really cool to ride through streets I’ve driven through countless times before. It was about 50 degrees and clear outside, so we lucked out with the weather. Traveling by bike (or foot) makes it easier to notice all the little things that usually slip by. That café I never saw. The bookstore that never existed. And the complete disrepair of some of our streets. Damn. They gotta fix that.

For those of you from Houston, this is the route we took: George R. Brown – Fannin – W Alabama – Edloe – Westpark – Rice/Sage – W Alabama again – Post Oak – Memorial – Allen Parkway – Dallas – George R. Brown. My buddy and I hauled ass down Westpark, Memorial, and Allan Parkway, which was really cool.

Overall, it was a fun time. Some people wore costumes or other weird stuff. Pretty much everyone was there to have a good time and take a leisurely ride, so if you don’t fancy yourself a hardcore cyclist, you’ll fit right in.

One conclusion I came to was that I need to get back on the bike. I had forgotten why I started riding to begin with. It’s so calming and peaceful.

I’ve gotten hooked on this awesome show called Mythbusters. Two former special effects guys blow up, electrocute, bury, sink, and generally maim everything in sight to test the myths we live by. For instance, I’ve learned the following things:

but not wiser. i turn 26 today. crikey.

I went to synagogue and repented for my sins, just for all you lazy internet people sitting on your tucheses. No, I didn’t do it for me, I couldn’t care less about my sins. I did it for you. What’s more, I also asked forgiveness on behalf of you, so you get a clean slate too. Pretty cool, eh?

Ok, so maybe I spent half the time spacing out. Big deal. If it makes a difference, I grant you a clean slate. Done and done. Welcome to 5766.

You need to go on the BikeHouston Moonlight Ramble this Saturday night / Sunday morning at 2:15 am. What more fun can you think of than riding your bike in the inky black of night with a bunch of other loony cyclists, some in costumes? There are two routes, one eight miles and the other twenty. The ride starts at the GRB Convention Center and the entry fee is $25, which covers race costs, a T-Shirt, and other goodies.

Sound fun? Go here.

WE’RE GOING TO THE WORLD SERIES!!!

Just read this opinion for my Copyright class:

“Duke Nukem routinely vanquishes Octabrain and the Protozoid Slimer. But what about the dreaded Micro Star?

FormGen [and their counterparts] made, distributed and own the rights to Duke Nukem 3D (D/N-3D), an immensely popular (and very cool) computer game.”

“If another game could use the [infringed material] to tell the story of a mousy fellow who travels through a beige maze, killing vicious saltshakers with paper-clips, then the [infringed material] would not incorporate the protected expression of D/N-3D because they would not be telling a D/N-3D story.”

This judge must have a 15-year-old kid who will one day get a degree in something computer-related, start a website named after a goofy song, and then go to law school. Or, as my textbook points out, this judge reviews new games for Microsoft’s e-zine Slate and writes similar articles for other periodicals as well. Go figure.