Evil, selfishness, and short-sightedness have triumphed. The celtics have traded Al Jefferson for Kevin Garnett.
Why would someone trade a decade of wins and the rekindling of a legacy, starting in two years, for a year or two of above-average performance, starting right now? What kind of manager would make that type of decision?
Why, a manager who believed that he would be fired before his long-term investment matured, and is willing to sell a team's future down the river. The difference between the celtics and the knicks is no more. The difference between life and death is no more. The difference between Danny Ainge and Isaiah Thomas is only in the color and cut of their suits.
I no longer have anything to look forward to. I dread the fall, I dread finals, I dread beginning my new, unpaid, job, and I dread whatever horrid creature I'm becoming, in this worthless, valueless, hopeless world.
Monday, July 30, 2007
So, where have you been? Part Two: A day in the life.
5:20 AM. I wake up before my alarm goes off, or maybe I was already awake and just waiting to turn it off. I make my bed (this consists of folding it up, because right now I'm sleeping on a futon in my living room, and re-arranging the pillows and blankets until it resembles a couch.
5:30 AM. Breakfast. I slice a banana into some store-brand pink flavored yogurt, top it with slightly stale cereal, and eat it watching the morning news. A paper mill is on fire out on route 2; a girl was raped on the esplanade; and thunderstorms are predicted.
5:45 AM: Thunderstorms begin. I get dressed. I pack my lunch, brush my teeth, and consider fixing my eyebrows.
6:00 AM: I check my email, read the news, and look over my notes for corporations. My group is on today, so preparedness is key. After a bit, I pack up my backpack, put my lunch in a bag, and make sure I have my goddamned Charlie Card.
6:30 AM: Out the door.
6:45 AM: Back in the door. It's raining too hard, and my backpack isn't waterproof. I can't risk my laptop, so I get in the car and drive to the train station.
7:05 AM: Onto the train. Watching the lightning through the windows of the train is pretty cool. Random sudden stops and power outages slightly less cool.
7:45 AM: Arrive at school. I put my books away, get the keys and the cashbox from a locker, and open the CISP kitchen, which is a small room with linoleum floors and a very subtle rodent problem, where I work several hours a week.
8:00 AM-10:00 AM: Work. Mostly sitting. Some counting of money. A little bit of arranging things. Mostly I review my reading for the classes I'll have today, and start the reading for the classes I will have tomorrow.
10:10 AM- 10:25 AM: Run across the street on an errand for work. Run back, grab books, run up three flights of stares, and sit down for...
10:25 AM- 11:45AM: Basic Income Taxation. Fun times were had by all. About a third of my time was spent checking emails and reading CNN. This is considerably more productive than certain other members of the class, who are playing sudoku, doing crosswords, and internet gambling.
11:50 AM- 12:00PM: I am a jackass. I forgot to print out the assignment for corporations. I run up the stairs to the library, print out my document, grab my lunch from the fridge, and manage to get to my seat in corporations in time to get out my books, drop off the assignment, and start to eat my lunch (Yogurt, a granola bar, and half a banana). I like to cut up the banana and put it in the yogurt. It keeps me awake.
12:00PM - 12:40PM, Approx: Corporations, awake.
1:10PM - 1:30PM, Approx: Corporations, asleep.
1:30PM - 2:00PM: Corporations, Awake.
2:00PM - 2:05PM: I run to my locker, trade my corporations books for my Intellectual property books, buy a soda, and get back to I.P.
2:15PM - 3:45PM: Intellectual Property. My favorite class. I don't make a jackass out of myself today, I stay awake, and I'm prepared. A+
4:00PM - 5:00PM: Back to work. This time I'm tabling, sitting in a hallway begging other students to cast votes for...something. I pretend to read evidence for tomorrow, but mostly I zone out.
5:00PM - 6:55PM: My favorite spot in the library is taken. It's a nice little nook on the fourth floor, where there's no wireless reception and a lot of sunlight. I pick another spot, and settle in. I finish my reading for tomorrow, pack up my computer, and trade my books for my gym clothes.
7:00PM - 7:40PM: I arrive at the gym. It's full of undergrads. The girl at the front desk tells me they're closing at 7:45 tonight. I get a magazine and a sweat rag, change, and get upstairs, where I proceed to beat an elliptical trainer half to death.
7:55 PM: Back on the green line. Give up my seat to an old woman carrying a large child.
8:38 PM: Home. I consider dinner. I consider the prospect of doing dishes, and wonder what can be had without doing any before I actually get to eat anything. I microwave a pre-frozen sandwich I bought on sale last week, and cut up a cucumber on the side.
9:10PM - 9:30PM: Eat dinner, blog, make an attempt to call my boyfriend.
And what are my plans for the rest of the night? I'll spend at least an hour, probably two, studying evidence. Then a shower which covers at least the three major areas, followed by collapsing into bed, setting my alarm, putting on a DVD and, before the titles finish, passing out.
Tomorrow will be very similar, and the day after that. The only expected variations will be a decline in the number of hours I can devote to sleep...because, you have to understand, this was me slacking off.
5:30 AM. Breakfast. I slice a banana into some store-brand pink flavored yogurt, top it with slightly stale cereal, and eat it watching the morning news. A paper mill is on fire out on route 2; a girl was raped on the esplanade; and thunderstorms are predicted.
5:45 AM: Thunderstorms begin. I get dressed. I pack my lunch, brush my teeth, and consider fixing my eyebrows.
6:00 AM: I check my email, read the news, and look over my notes for corporations. My group is on today, so preparedness is key. After a bit, I pack up my backpack, put my lunch in a bag, and make sure I have my goddamned Charlie Card.
6:30 AM: Out the door.
6:45 AM: Back in the door. It's raining too hard, and my backpack isn't waterproof. I can't risk my laptop, so I get in the car and drive to the train station.
7:05 AM: Onto the train. Watching the lightning through the windows of the train is pretty cool. Random sudden stops and power outages slightly less cool.
7:45 AM: Arrive at school. I put my books away, get the keys and the cashbox from a locker, and open the CISP kitchen, which is a small room with linoleum floors and a very subtle rodent problem, where I work several hours a week.
8:00 AM-10:00 AM: Work. Mostly sitting. Some counting of money. A little bit of arranging things. Mostly I review my reading for the classes I'll have today, and start the reading for the classes I will have tomorrow.
10:10 AM- 10:25 AM: Run across the street on an errand for work. Run back, grab books, run up three flights of stares, and sit down for...
10:25 AM- 11:45AM: Basic Income Taxation. Fun times were had by all. About a third of my time was spent checking emails and reading CNN. This is considerably more productive than certain other members of the class, who are playing sudoku, doing crosswords, and internet gambling.
11:50 AM- 12:00PM: I am a jackass. I forgot to print out the assignment for corporations. I run up the stairs to the library, print out my document, grab my lunch from the fridge, and manage to get to my seat in corporations in time to get out my books, drop off the assignment, and start to eat my lunch (Yogurt, a granola bar, and half a banana). I like to cut up the banana and put it in the yogurt. It keeps me awake.
12:00PM - 12:40PM, Approx: Corporations, awake.
1:10PM - 1:30PM, Approx: Corporations, asleep.
1:30PM - 2:00PM: Corporations, Awake.
2:00PM - 2:05PM: I run to my locker, trade my corporations books for my Intellectual property books, buy a soda, and get back to I.P.
2:15PM - 3:45PM: Intellectual Property. My favorite class. I don't make a jackass out of myself today, I stay awake, and I'm prepared. A+
4:00PM - 5:00PM: Back to work. This time I'm tabling, sitting in a hallway begging other students to cast votes for...something. I pretend to read evidence for tomorrow, but mostly I zone out.
5:00PM - 6:55PM: My favorite spot in the library is taken. It's a nice little nook on the fourth floor, where there's no wireless reception and a lot of sunlight. I pick another spot, and settle in. I finish my reading for tomorrow, pack up my computer, and trade my books for my gym clothes.
7:00PM - 7:40PM: I arrive at the gym. It's full of undergrads. The girl at the front desk tells me they're closing at 7:45 tonight. I get a magazine and a sweat rag, change, and get upstairs, where I proceed to beat an elliptical trainer half to death.
7:55 PM: Back on the green line. Give up my seat to an old woman carrying a large child.
8:38 PM: Home. I consider dinner. I consider the prospect of doing dishes, and wonder what can be had without doing any before I actually get to eat anything. I microwave a pre-frozen sandwich I bought on sale last week, and cut up a cucumber on the side.
9:10PM - 9:30PM: Eat dinner, blog, make an attempt to call my boyfriend.
And what are my plans for the rest of the night? I'll spend at least an hour, probably two, studying evidence. Then a shower which covers at least the three major areas, followed by collapsing into bed, setting my alarm, putting on a DVD and, before the titles finish, passing out.
Tomorrow will be very similar, and the day after that. The only expected variations will be a decline in the number of hours I can devote to sleep...because, you have to understand, this was me slacking off.
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Kill it! Kill it!
I was walking home from the train station today when something...terrible...happened.
I was just past the fire station when I passed a man pushing a stroller. In the stroller was a baby. It was a classic baby, I suppose, nothing exotic or imported. It was a young baby; I'm not good at the ages of young people; I have to go by size. It was small for a baby, large for a liquor bottle. It was about 1.5 gallon baby. Redheaded, squinty, with that wierd accusatory old man face that the small type of baby generally has. It was drooling and just a little bit crusty.
And it wasn't wearing a hat.
I remember that, because as I passed them, some voice said in my head "Oh, don't you want to put a hat on his little head?".
Don't. You. Want. To. Put. A. Hat. On. His. Little. Head.
Not: For the good of society, will you please wipe that little fucker down or consider a rear-facing stroller? He's gone past sticky to greasy, and it's unpleasant to have that thing wheeled at you on a hill, like that.
But: Don't you want to put a hat on his little head?
Remember, I'm the person who is ready to advocate for a thirty day, no questions asked return policy on those things. I'm the person who seriously considered writing a paper for my animal behavior class that suggested that the delayed appearance of features triggering the "aw" response in human infants is a result of the evolutionary advantage to abandoning infants below a certain age.
Not only am I suspicious of, and hostile to, infants - I don't know a thing about them. I've taken, and passed, child development, but the only thing I got from it is that Russian learning theorists tend to die as young, and of similar (hepatic) causes as other Russian intellectuals. And yet, apparently, I know one thing about babies: They should wear hats. On their little heads. When it's sunny out.
I'm trying to reassure myself that my reaction was not some bastard emergence of then nurturing instinct I have thus far only hoped to extend to large, wealthy african-american men who are strangers to me
.
It's probably nothing to do with babies, and a lot to do with my mom. "Don't you think that baby should wear a hat?" is the only female conversational game* that my mother will consent to play. The rules are simple: Is it sunny out? Can that thing be identified as a baby? Then it should be wearing a hat. So you get to say "Don't you want to put a hat on his little head?" I still haven't figured out whether this game works without accompanying weather conditions. Can hats be suggested on babies for one's own amusement? To go with the general tenor of the moment? If I see a baby at a funeral, can I say "Don't you want to put a comically small hat with a black tulle veil on his widdle head?," or, in the North End "Shouldn't that baby be wearing a fedora?"
*Other famous female conversational games include "Other people's medical problems" "Lets enumerate our imaginary flaws" "Things I would like to buy or own but haven't yet." and "Who would you let put it in your butt?**"
**This is not actually a female conversational game +.
+But if it were, I've got my answer: Prince William, and Prince William only.++
++ Not out of some ridiculous anglo-royo-philia, but because the dollar's down. And if I'm going to have somebody stick something in my pooper, I want to be able to sell the story to the tabloids. And nobody's got a more thriving tabloid culture than the UK. And damn, the Brits would pay a lot for the story of the night the Prince got his brown wings. With exchange rates being what they are, it's likely that royal weiner + my bum could be the smartest investment I'd ever get to make.
I was just past the fire station when I passed a man pushing a stroller. In the stroller was a baby. It was a classic baby, I suppose, nothing exotic or imported. It was a young baby; I'm not good at the ages of young people; I have to go by size. It was small for a baby, large for a liquor bottle. It was about 1.5 gallon baby. Redheaded, squinty, with that wierd accusatory old man face that the small type of baby generally has. It was drooling and just a little bit crusty.
And it wasn't wearing a hat.
I remember that, because as I passed them, some voice said in my head "Oh, don't you want to put a hat on his little head?".
Don't. You. Want. To. Put. A. Hat. On. His. Little. Head.
Not: For the good of society, will you please wipe that little fucker down or consider a rear-facing stroller? He's gone past sticky to greasy, and it's unpleasant to have that thing wheeled at you on a hill, like that.
But: Don't you want to put a hat on his little head?
Remember, I'm the person who is ready to advocate for a thirty day, no questions asked return policy on those things. I'm the person who seriously considered writing a paper for my animal behavior class that suggested that the delayed appearance of features triggering the "aw" response in human infants is a result of the evolutionary advantage to abandoning infants below a certain age.
Not only am I suspicious of, and hostile to, infants - I don't know a thing about them. I've taken, and passed, child development, but the only thing I got from it is that Russian learning theorists tend to die as young, and of similar (hepatic) causes as other Russian intellectuals. And yet, apparently, I know one thing about babies: They should wear hats. On their little heads. When it's sunny out.
I'm trying to reassure myself that my reaction was not some bastard emergence of then nurturing instinct I have thus far only hoped to extend to large, wealthy african-american men who are strangers to me
.
It's probably nothing to do with babies, and a lot to do with my mom. "Don't you think that baby should wear a hat?" is the only female conversational game* that my mother will consent to play. The rules are simple: Is it sunny out? Can that thing be identified as a baby? Then it should be wearing a hat. So you get to say "Don't you want to put a hat on his little head?" I still haven't figured out whether this game works without accompanying weather conditions. Can hats be suggested on babies for one's own amusement? To go with the general tenor of the moment? If I see a baby at a funeral, can I say "Don't you want to put a comically small hat with a black tulle veil on his widdle head?," or, in the North End "Shouldn't that baby be wearing a fedora?"
*Other famous female conversational games include "Other people's medical problems" "Lets enumerate our imaginary flaws" "Things I would like to buy or own but haven't yet." and "Who would you let put it in your butt?**"
**This is not actually a female conversational game +.
+But if it were, I've got my answer: Prince William, and Prince William only.++
++ Not out of some ridiculous anglo-royo-philia, but because the dollar's down. And if I'm going to have somebody stick something in my pooper, I want to be able to sell the story to the tabloids. And nobody's got a more thriving tabloid culture than the UK. And damn, the Brits would pay a lot for the story of the night the Prince got his brown wings. With exchange rates being what they are, it's likely that royal weiner + my bum could be the smartest investment I'd ever get to make.
Monday, July 23, 2007
Thursday, July 19, 2007
From my walk today.
For some reason, this picture put this mini-movie in my head: Crucified Jesus, on a hill. Red skies. Bible epic costumes and sound. For some reason, Yul Brynner is there. And hanging around Jesus' neck, just like on the door of a small barber shop at lunch time, is one of those signs with the plastic clock face on it, one of those : Back at - signs. Some roman soldier runs up, sniggering, and takes the hands off the plastic clock. The apostles titter among themselves, dissappointed that no one wrote it down. Then somebody goes up there with a sharpie and writes "Soon."Jesus will be right back, people. As soon as he drops his netflix in the mail and buys a grape slurpie - there's gonna be redemption and there's gonna be half-priced french pedis.
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Blogging Backup.
I haven't blogged seriously for most of this term; I've let so many important events go by: being solicited as a caterer for a friend's wedding; a trip down south; the whole employment thang.
Why haven't I blogged? Well. Here's the thing:
1. I have much more time now than I had as a 1L.
2. I have much less time now that I am a 2L.
If those two statements seem contradictory, it's because they are. They're also both true. I have much more time now. I've grown my interests back; I've been baking bread and making bagels. I've been getting to the gym more; I've been seeing my family. Unfortunately, the amount of time required to do these thi
ngs is actually greater than the free time I've acquired by virtue of being a 2L.
It all comes down to poor time management.
So, a month's worth of blogs, in a few sentences, in simplified English, with accompanying illustrations.
June 29 : I had job interviews. Basic Summary, as an east german lolcat: "Yes. I is qualified law thing. Pleaz to hire me for law. Pleaz? K Thx."
June 30 - July 1 : Donuts are good. They are far away. Maryland is pretty. I drank beer. Many barbeque sauces. Oh! So many! Did not see Lincoln. Another time. Happy Birthday to me.
July 3- July 5 : Went to the beach. Nice beach. Wine. Fireworks, yay! I drank beer. Had burger. my friends were there! Yay! Hi Joe! Later.
July 6-July 12 : Holy Shit! Everything is broken! My car goes click click click. My phone won't beep. And sprint smells suspiciously like vinegar and morning dew to me.
Why haven't I blogged? Well. Here's the thing:
1. I have much more time now than I had as a 1L.
2. I have much less time now that I am a 2L.
If those two statements seem contradictory, it's because they are. They're also both true. I have much more time now. I've grown my interests back; I've been baking bread and making bagels. I've been getting to the gym more; I've been seeing my family. Unfortunately, the amount of time required to do these thi
ngs is actually greater than the free time I've acquired by virtue of being a 2L.It all comes down to poor time management.
So, a month's worth of blogs, in a few sentences, in simplified English, with accompanying illustrations.
June 29 : I had job interviews. Basic Summary, as an east german lolcat: "Yes. I is qualified law thing. Pleaz to hire me for law. Pleaz? K Thx."
June 30 - July 1 : Donuts are good. They are far away. Maryland is pretty. I drank beer. Many barbeque sauces. Oh! So many! Did not see Lincoln. Another time. Happy Birthday to me.
July 3- July 5 : Went to the beach. Nice beach. Wine. Fireworks, yay! I drank beer. Had burger. my friends were there! Yay! Hi Joe! Later.
July 6-July 12 : Holy Shit! Everything is broken! My car goes click click click. My phone won't beep. And sprint smells suspiciously like vinegar and morning dew to me.
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