Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain...and most fools do.
- Benjamin Franklin

i'm in gryffindor!

Wednesday, October 29, 2003

Drunken Bastards

I just saw something which epitomizes the college students at U-Albany: a giant empty bottle of Canadian Molson sitting on the wet pavement under one of the concrete benches between Humanities and Education. I laughed and wished I had my camera with me so I could take a picture. Maybe when I come back to campus later today I can bring my camera, take a picture, and post it on my blog. I'll have to put something next to it so you can understand the scale. It's huge. Huge-ass big. And sitting on campus between two of the buildings.

This is a party school. I'd heard that when I initally applied, but my dad, who was working here at the time, vehemently denied it. He was a goddamned liar.

The kids here drink like `80's frat movie characters. They drink until they get alcohol poisoning and die. They come into afternoon classes on a Wednesday with hangovers. It's amusing at a certain level, like the huge-ass, green Canadian Molson bottle. It also sucks as the professors have to be much harsher than at other universities as the students generally don't give a rat-fuck and need to have even the faintest work ethic beaten into their alcohol-damaged minds in order to make the teaching of the course worthwhile. It amazes me large numbers of people graduate. It amazes me professors don't just throw their hands in the air and give up, reciting from the same yellowed notes they used fifteen years ago (like the professors at NYU). They still care, even though the student body is too fucking drunk to care back.

But, damn, that empty bottle made me laugh.

Sunday, October 26, 2003

Trust me, the Donger knows

Yet another example of life being vastly improved by television: "I Love the 80s Strikes Back". All the weird pop culture shit of my childhood, summarized in hour-long years. God, how fabulous. I laughed 'til I cried when they covered Jolt Cola (1985).

Saturday, October 25, 2003

Death and Destruction, with lots of swear words

This has audio, so's if you're watching with a bitchy boss looking over your shoulder, you may get into trouble. Or you may have no sound and therefore miss half the fun. Anyway, go watch the end of the world.

Thursday, October 23, 2003

kawaiiiiiiiiiiiiii

"Cowboy Bebop: Ed & Ein Plush"

Must! Have! Ed & Ein doll!

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!

If only she came with her hacker equipment, too.

AUUUUUUUUGH!!!

Jeff Weaver?

Jeff Fucking Weaver?

Jeff "I blow every game I pitch" Weaver?

Oh, for fuck's sake, Joe! Why? Why, why, why, why, why?

"We need long relief."

Weaver is not relief. He's what you need relief from. He's the reason for antiacids in Yankees fans homes across the nation. He sucks. He sucks so much I have a chant whenever I see him: "Try not to suck, Jeff!" He never listens. He always sucks.

Oh, the pain. The agony. I hate second-guessing you like this, Mr. Torre, but what the bloody hell were you thinking, bringing Weaver back in in the bottom of the 12th? Why? Why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, whyyyyyyyyyy?!

sob

Wednesday, October 22, 2003

Neige, yuki, Schnee, la neve, la nieve, white stuff

It snowed today. Today, October 22. We haven't even ended daylight savings time yet. People still haven't bought their Halloween pumpkins yet. Snow.

Okay, so mostly it was rain and then some snain (rain and snow at the same time; not to be confused with sleet, which is slush falling from the sky; or with frozen rain, which is super-cold rain which is ice when it hits anything). But I looked out the classroom window, and there was the snow. I went to get the mail, and it was snowing.

Don't get me wrong. I love snow. It's purty.

Still, this just brings home the Farmers' Almanac prediction for this winter: it will be super-harsh. Yeah, even more harsh than last winter. Time to get mentally prepared for fifty foot blizzards, I guess.

Tuesday, October 21, 2003





HAPPY BIRTHDAY, HALIFAX!




belated, that is.

i still don't know exactly when your birthday is. i've heard it was around the time you moved but....

anyway, belated happy birthday.

i need your new address so's i can send you a birthday/housewarming present.
or an address so's i can send you a birthday-type present.
hey, if you don't like it, i'm never around, so you can regift it with ease.
regifting: fun, easy, free!
just try not to let on you did it, or i might cry.

cheers.
-l.t.s.k.

Wednesday, October 15, 2003

Words, Words, Words

I take special joy in some words. Sometimes because of the sound (eeeee-bola!), sometimes because of the specific meaning, sometimes just because. I can't say today's Word of the Day will be listed among my favorites, but I do like it lots.

• • •

vitiate • \VIH-shee-ayt\ • verb
1 : to make faulty or defective : impair
2 : to debase in moral or aesthetic status
3 : to make ineffective

Friday, October 10, 2003

Diana

Tonight will be the Hunter's Moon, which is one of the cooler names for a moon. I suspect, however, that many men are looking forward to November 8th.

Thursday, October 09, 2003





HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DAVID!




i'm still older than you are.

as with SheepBoy (see below),
i'm sending you something but it make take a while as sending something requires i go to the post office.
also, i don't have your new address. you jerk.

anyway, happy birthday.

-l.l.b.s.

Tuesday, October 07, 2003

Still There

As of the 6th of October, Dresselmeyer is still in his cage at the vet's office, waiting for someone to give him a home. This breaks my heart as I really, really like Dresselmeyer and would take him home myself if I didn't have two of the world's greatest felines already here. Oscar would never forgive me.

Dresselmeyer's fully recovered from donating blood to a cat in need of emergency care (what a good samaritan!) and is back to being his friendly, cuddly self. I could really see myself getting attached to that cat. He very much deserves a home.

I'm not going to start on Monkey, the scared, sweet little skinny black kitten, or Isis, the gray and white long-hair with the sleepy eyes.

If all were right with the world, Dresselmeyer would be my cat and my nephews would take care of Monkey and my mom would take Isis to play with the even-longer-furred Floof and Oscar would still love me unconditionally.

Poor Dresselmeyer. I think he's starting to recognize me now, too, and wondering why I'm leaving him in there.

Hey, they gave me a form to apply for a job there, at the vet's. Maybe I could take care of him then. If they give me a job.

Lucky

Did I ever mention I like all of my classes, meaning I like what we're studying and the texts we're reading and the professors teaching?

The students, well, I could do without a lot of them, but a couple of cool ones have surfaced in a couple of the classes.

For the most part, though, I'm lucky in my class selection this semester. This makes not doing so hot so far rather upsetting to me. I want to do well in these good courses and do well for my professors.

I'm such a dork.

(At least I'm doing okay on my Japanese quizzes so far.)

Monday, October 06, 2003

On Not Posting

The computer has been more or less on the fritz.

I have been very busy trying to keep up with classes (and generally failing to do so, mostly because of the state of the computer).

I have been having too much fun being distracted by my (our, our) new toy, the DVR. I am now watching Alias and many anime programs shown on this unknown TechTV channel (or whatever it's called) and so on. Shows I didn't get to watch before because of the dominance of HBO's Sunday 9:00 shows in my life (The Sopranos, Six Feet Under, Carnivale). I could watch both West Wing and Angel if the writing on the former hadn't obviously taken a turn for the lame and lazy (it's bad. not super-bad, but definitely not good in a packed-with-bad-television-cliches kind of way). Yay, Angel! I would be more upset about missing the season opener, except I know it'll be shown this winter during the break and the many, many, many weeks of repeats. The DVR will do its duty and the episode shall be there. Huzzah for the DVR!

Now if only Mom would let me set up the VCR properly so it's hooked up to cable.

non sequitur: Halifax, isn't your birthday in October, too?





HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SHEEPBOY!




you're still older than i am.

i'm sending you something, but it make take a while as sending something requires i go to the post office. also, i'm not sure i have your address. again. tra la.

anyway, happy birthday SpeedRacerG.

-l.t.s.k.

Thursday, September 25, 2003





HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SAM!




big hug, a.k.

Wednesday, September 24, 2003





HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JACKIE!




xo, l.l.s.

Whoops, I forgot to mention...

I don't know if any of you went, or if you even like Dave Matthews Band, which I do a lot, but there's a live broadcast of their free concert in Central Park right now through AOL at this site which I'm not even sure you can access, anyway. But I thought I'd post this, in case there's someone with broadband or DSL who's reading my blog now and likes the band. It's pretty good. These live broadcasts have a hell of a lot better in just a couple of years, like, scary much better.

Ah, well. Tra la.

Phoning in the blog posts

Late Night TV Political Humor

e-mailed to me by my elder sister
"Finally, a candidate who can explain the Bush administration's positions on civil liberties in the original German."
- Bill Maher, on Schwarzenegger running for Governor.

"President Bush is supporting Arnold. But a lot of Republicans are not, because he is actually quite liberal. Karl Rove said if his father hadn't been a Nazi, he wouldn't have any credibility with conservatives at all."
- Bill Maher

"President Bush is on a 35-day vacation, and before he left he had his annual physical, and it turns out his cholesterol now is lower than his approval rating."
- David Letterman

"Yesterday, Arnold Schwarzenegger announced he would run for governor of California. The announcement was good news for Florida residents who now live in the second flakiest state in the country."
- Conan O'Brien

"Apparently Arnold was inspired by President Bush, who proved you can be a successful politician in this country even if English is your second language."
- Conan O'Brien

"They're saying Arnold will get 95% of the vote. At least according to his brother, Jeb Schwarzenegger."
- Craig Kilborn

"President Bush has been silent on Schwarzenegger. Of course -- he can't pronounce 'Schwarzenegger'."
- David Letterman

"Here's how bad California looks to the rest of the country. People in Florida are laughing at us."
- Jay Leno

"Well, we're all excited because President Bush has started his 35-day vacation. He's down there in Crawford, Texas, and on the first day of his vacation he went fishing. He didn't find any fish, but he believes they're there and that his intelligence is accurate."
- David Letterman

"The White House released a videotape of President Bush meeting with his cabinet, and today Iraqi officials say they believe the tape is authentic."
- Jay Leno

"The United States is putting together a Constitution now for Iraq. Why don't we just give them ours? It's served us well for 200> years, and we don't appear to be using it anymore. So what the hell?"
- Jay Leno

"President Bush held his first full press conference in over five months this week. He announced that the war on terrorism is continuing, much, much more work needs to be done on the economy, and Saddam Hussein has not yet been captured. Then he said, 'I'm going on vacation for a month.' "
- Jay Leno

"The White House says that the vacation in Texas will give President Bush the chance to unwind. My question is, when does the guy wind?"
- David Letterman

"If you add up all the time he's spent on the ranch, he's spent more time in hiding than bin Laden and Hussein put together."
- Bill Maher

"[President Bush] used his press conference to come out very strongly against gay marriage. And then he said, on a personal note, that he apologized if he had done anything to lead Tony Blair on."
- Bill Maher

"President Bush's economic team is now on their Jobs and Growth bus tour all across America. I think the only job they created so far is for the guy driving the bus."
- Jay Leno

"President Bush has refused to declassify portions of the congressional 9/11 reports about the Saudis, because he says it will help the enemy. Not Al Qaeda, the Democrats."
- Jay Leno

Bumpersticker Ideas For The Republicans For 2004

also e-mailed to me by my sister
  • Bush/Cheney '04: Leave no billionaire behind
  • Bush/Cheney '04: Less CIA -- More CYA
  • Bush/Cheney '04: Lies and videotapes, but no sex!
  • Bush/Cheney '04: Making the world a better place, one country at a time.
  • Bush/Cheney '04: Putting the "con" in conservatism
  • Bush/Cheney '04: Thanks for not paying attention.
  • Bush/Cheney '04: Four More Wars!
  • Bush/Cheney '04: Don't Change Whores in the middle of a screw.
  • Bush/Cheney '04: Assimilate. Resistance is Futile.
  • Bush/Cheney '04: Apocalypse Now!
  • Bush/Cheney '04: Compassionate Colonialism
  • Bush/Cheney '04: The economy's stupid!
  • Bush/Cheney '04: This time, elect us!
  • Bush/Cheney '04: We're Gooder!
  • Bush/Cheney '04: Asses of Evil

  • George W. Bush: A brainwave away from the presidency
  • George W. Bush: It takes a village idiot
  • George W. Bush: He's Not as Dumb as Arnold.

  • Vote Bush in '04: "I Has Incumbentory Advantitude"
  • Vote Bush in '04: Because dictatorship is easier
  • Vote Bush in '04: It's a no-brainer!

  • Vote for Bush & You Get Dick!
  • Who would Jesus Bomb?
  • With a Bush and a Dick, everyone gets screwed
  • One Small Vote for Bush. One Big Vote for Halliburton.

Tuesday, September 23, 2003

Okay, so I'll blog about this

The photos on Eric Conveys an Emotion range from make-me-smirk to crack-me-the-hell-up. Eric's latest Adventure, The New Pad, made me laugh very, very hard. Go see! (And check out the tee-shirt.)

On Being and Nothingness

I will probably not be posting much else to my blog for a while.

I'm not dating anyone. I'm not wishing I were dating anyone. I'm not being stalked. I'm not getting eyes from anyone.

I'm busy with much reading and much writing. I'm behind in reading and writing. I've research to do. I've hiragana to memorize. I've vocabulary to memorize. I've "action verbs" to memorize. I've index cards to write up to aid in memorization.

I'm not reading anything outside of class (except for Alan Moore's From Hell, which I got on sale from Powell's along with my Japanese-English dictionary, but I'm only reading it before bed and thereby guaranteeing eventual scary-gross-bloody-freaky nightmares). I'm not going to movies. You can see what I'm watching on T.V. from the list, and nothing I have to say about any of the shows would add to what has been posted on friends' blogs or printed up in newspapers or magazines.

I'm not travelling. I won't be going travelling any time soon. (Except for maybe to a Yankees game this weekend, but that's to use up rain cancellation tickets from my birthday.)

I do not have a job. I have no anecdotes about coworkers because I don't have a job. I have no anecdotes about classmates as they are a good portion drunken frat boys and sorostitutes, and drunken frat boys and sorostitutes are boring in their annoying habits of stupidity. (I do have one super-annoying Chinese girl in my Japanese class who has the worst fucking penmanship in the world and won't take correction because she is always, always right, even though she is usually wrong--and usually late to class. My only comfort in dealing with her is thinking how much ET would hate her fat ugly ass if she ever met her. She won't, though. ET should be very, very happy indeed in knowing she will, in all likelihood, never, ever, ever have to deal with this stupid, stupid bitch. The majority of the female non-round-eyes in that class are really pretty and smart and at least quadlingual.

I'm sure every white boy reading this is now drooling and trying to figure out a way to sneak into my class, mostly because I ended the description with a word that had "lingual" in it. You are gross. These girls--they're super-young in my eyes, so "girls"--are smart, have beautiful penmanship and make me feel old, slow, and super-stupid. But you're still gross, you pervy, pervy gaijin.) The rest of my classmates are mild and leave no mental aftertaste. They are all still about twelve years younger than I am, except on the occasion when they are twenty years older than I am. The ones who are older than I am are, without exception, deeply troubled people, as is shown by their distorted fashion sense (oh gawd the hair!) and their dumb commentary in class. They are not as dumb as the sorostitutes or the annoying ugly chick in my Japanese class, but they are dumb and it must be stated somewhere that they are so and that their stupidity reflects badly upon me, 'cause, for pete's sake, I am categorized as an "Adult Learner" too, so they are my equals in the eyes of UoA Admissions. Oh, lord, this means I am like them: I am an old, ugly, fashion-challenged, mentally-disturbed 'tard. I weep bitter tears at this revelation.

So, that's it. Nothing's doing.

Except I have a cell phone with a lot of unused minutes on it but have no one to call.

And I should have spent the time I just wasted on typing up this post on catching up on my reading for Medieval Lit. so I can get the journal up-to-date so I and turn it in tomorrow morning and not get a lousy grade.

I'm pathetic.