Bringing the Drama

On Sunday I took advantage of the final day of Gap’s Denim Exchange. It had been months since I had bought any new clothes, so this exchange thing where I could get rid of old jeans was able to draw me out. I also hit up the sale rack while I was there and bought two new pair of pants and a dress shirt. One pair of pants was $6. The other pair was a style called Cadet, and they’re khakis. I looked at the label and they were described just like a pair of jeans I had tried on that I really liked, so I bought them. I put them on this morning to wear to work and found out they were button fly. BUTTON FLY! Who wears button flies anymore? Incidentally, when discussing this at work today, I told my cubicle neighbor Kenny about the $5 shirt I tried on that had two buttoned down breast pockets (that I noticed after I tried it on). That jackass designer probably was the one that thought putting a button fly on khakis was a good idea. Anyway, after a couple of minutes this morning I decided to cut off the tags and keep the pants. I like the feel and the fit and the color. I can deal with a button fly, even though I think it’s completely stupid.

Also this afternoon, I got Lady Gaga stuck in my head. I blame the article on CNN about some new video of her’s and how music videos are changing. I don’t really listen to the radio, so I’m behind the curve when it comes to pop music, much to the chagrin of my sister. I heard Poker Face in the gym a few weeks ago, and it was the first time I had heard a LG song knowing it was her. They have video screens now sometimes showing videos, but always telling you what song is playing. Anyway, I liked it, and then later I was able to ID her as the person who sings that song “blah blah blah blah blah, blah blah blah blah blah” or whatever. Today at work those two songs kept getting stuck in my head. I can’t help but like them. I hope that doesn’t lose me any music elitist cred. (I won’t tell you how I now have a couple of Katy Perry songs on my iPod)

I did write this yesterday, but didn’t post it. So really I did write yesterday, but technically it probably doesn’t count. I’ll post something else later on Saturday. The title of today’s post comes from the Paramore song I heard yesterday morning, and also fits with the subject.

Dear People who control the thermostat at my office,
When I first moved to my new desk, it was cold. It was August, and yet it was TOO cold. People would call, and yet you would do nothing. Then more people from my group finally moved over here, and felt the same cold that we’ve been feeling for months. They called and complained, and these people are the kind that won’t let things go, much to their own detriment I think. Anyway, now the past couple of days you have turned the heat up, but now it’s too hot. Can you just do your job? How hard is your job? All you have to do is adjust the temperature for people to feel comfortable. I don’t understand your inability to make this happen.

Searching for comfort in my cube

Dear interstate drivers,
The left lane is for passing only. It is most certainly not for going below the speed limit, talking on your phone, or texting someone. Is there something you fail to understand about the rules of the road, or are you just that inconsiderate? Last night on my way home from the Hornets game, I had to deal with at least 4 people who thought the far left lane was their cruise lane. Also, to the lady in the Toyota, I know you slowed down on purpose, after you had cut me off, so I flipped you off as I passed you IN THE CENTER LANE. I know it was dark, but I hope you saw it.

Frustrated driver who wishes people would just practice courtesy on the road

Dear Congress,
Do you think we are all stupid? Please figure out laws that actually work and don’t cost almost 1 TRILLION dollars so you can check off a box before Christmas. I don’t care if the president has a goal. Don’t be peer pressured into voting for ANYTHING. I know this concept may be very difficult for you to understand. How about granting people responsibility for their actions instead of getting involved? I understand not everyone can take control of their lives, but a lot of people in this country can. If they don’t want to do it on their own, then MAKE THEM.

Anxious to vote out all current senators and representatives

I get along with pretty much all of my neighbors. We’re not BFF or anything, but when I see them outside, we exchange pleasantries. This holds true for everyone but the older lady who lives behind me. I have never talked to her, and only see her when she’s out riding her lawnmower or letting her dog outside to do his business. She has lived behind me the entire time I’ve lived in my house. A while back in the early spring when I’d start to cut my grass, I noticed her dog was crapping in my yard. This is something she had to have done on purpose, because when I’m outside grilling or something, she keeps the dog close to the back door. Where my yard starts is pretty far from the back door. I flung everything back into her yard. This would go on the whole summer, and then each spring. She used to have a pine tree and an oak tree in her backyard. After Katrina, half of my oak tree (it was like a big V) kept the bedroom side of my house from suffering the same damage my kitchen side did. A pine tree in her yard fell towards my house, but my oak tree saved my house. I picked up everything from her trees that fell into my yard and hauled it out to the curb. She took care of everything that was in her yard. Her oak tree over the years has since died. It had one measly branch on it that had leaves, but the rest of it was dead. My neighbor and I were outside one day talking about how her family was going to get a fence, and we commented on the old lady’s tree and how it looked horrible and she should get it cut down. I told my neighbor about how the old lady lets her dog crap in my yard, and while we were out there, the old lady came out with her dog. Seeing us outside, she kept the dog close to the back door. She knew we knew. The tree thing though bothered me a lot, because I was always afraid it would fall onto my house.

Fast forward to three weeks ago, and there was a heavy thunderstorm that came through. I looked outside the next morning and the top half of the oak tree had toppled over and most of it landed in my yard. I went outside and threw every bit of it back into her yard. There was no way I was picking up a rotted tree that’s been in her yard for 4 years, esp since she’s never shown me respect on anything. A few days later the rest of the tree fell cross ways across her yard. I wasn’t going to have to worry about the tree falling onto my house anymore. The tree was laying across her backyard. After a week or so, grass started growing up around the tree. She never even went out to pick up the little pieces. This morning I looked out and it appears she rolled the log closer to my yard so she could cut her grass. If she needs help picking up the tree, I would go help her if she asked. Maybe she’s waiting to see how long it’ll take me to get to a point where I just call up one of my friends with a truck and haul the tree off myself. It may get to that point, but I’m going to wait her out to see if she can take care of it herself. It isn’t really helping anyone with this standoff, but she knows I know and I’m sure it’s part of her plan.

A few months ago my small group friends and I were at the Abita Brew Pub and discussed Twitter since it had been in the news. We all laughed about it as something that was beneath us, and we didn’t really see the point of it. My friend Sam said that he’d just have a constant update of “I’m twittering”. I had gotten emails from a couple of people for me to join Twitter because they wanted to follow me. Follow me? It just seemed a little too creepy. Then a week or so later I read an article about Shaq’s twitter, and how he tweets all the time, and people have actually met up with him because of Twitter. So I softened a bit on the “Twitter is stupid” stance. Then someone on the Ryan Adams board I read posted his new Twitter page, so I read that. I found John Mayer’s too and thought maybe it wasn’t so bad after all. Then I started keeping track of the upcoming Voodoo Fest lineup, and the way they put out information was Twitter. The stupid way they would post bands is irrelevant really, but I thought it was very lame and frustrating to jumble up band names for some game. Anyway, then I was checking information on the upcoming new album from Mute Math, and again, they used Twitter to get out information. I was also trying to find out if the album release show in NOLA would be open to the public (it is). Basically I was keeping track of Twitters without being on Twitter.

I had told my friend Whitney about Twitter because she had never heard of it, then she joined. So when we were at that Brandi Carlile show a while back, she was keeping track of tweets on her Blackberry. Then I started to find out that my friends who were not really hard core tech people had twitter. So then I thought, when weird stuff would happen at work with BO Guy, I would think “I would so twitter that.” Sometimes ridiculous things happen to me, and I don’t always remember to blog about it, so I think twitter could be a good thing. I could twitter from concerts to share things like pictures, or at sporting events where crazy things are happening (like the Hornets being blown out). The possibilities seem to be endless.

In April when I went up to North Carolina, I noticed my friend Mike had gotten a Blackberry. I used to HATE Blackberrys, because they were the symbol that work would always have their hook in your mouth and could email you at any time. Managers at my job are assigned them just for this purpose. I never really liked the idea of being connected all the time. My phone does the job it needs to do and I’ve had the same model phone for 4 years. I liked it so much that I bought a replacement off of ebay when it died instead of going to get a new phone. As I started to get more and more interested in Twitter, I thought I should get a Blackberry. I didn’t really want to pay the data plan fee though. I still don’t know if that’d be a good thing. Of course it would be nice to have all that ability, but for $30 extra a month? I realized it was a WANT more than a NEED. I emailed friends with Blackberrys though and asked if they were worth it. All of them pretty much confirmed that they were.

Then last week Carla told me she twitters just fine with a regular phone like I have. Of course, her’s is more fancy with a keyboard and all, but it’s still a basic phone. Now I’m still resisting because it’s technology. My friend Trey didn’t have a cell phone for the longest time and I thought that was so cool. He was like a backwards pioneer! Then he got one a year or two ago, so he was no longer the backwards pioneer he once was. I was slow to succumb to myspace, facebook, and iPods, so this should not come as a surprise to anyone.

I feel joining Twitter is inevitable. I have decided when that day comes, that I’ll be even more snobby than I am about Facebook. I am very picky when it comes to facebook friends, and right now I have 6 people who have requested alliances (that’s what the pirate translation calls FRs) who I’m letting sit there. it’s not that I want to be a jerk about it, but I guess I like to have FB friends count. If I wasn’t friends with you in HS, then why should I be your FB friend? Same with people I’m on a message board with, who I’m not really friends with, that doesn’t count either. So maybe Twitter just lets anyone follow you, but I’m not going to be following all of them. I kind of want to be like a celebrity and have way more people following me than I follow. Isn’t that the sign that you’re cool now? (Btw, I think the only cool white person was Fonzie)

Now I just need to come up with a username.

(this actually happened 3 weeks ago, so pardon the tense it was written in, i just never got around to publishing it)

so last night i stayed up way too late playing around on the internet. nothing special, but i got caught up watching videos on youtube and reading about soccer. about 1 am, i turned off the computer and was turning off all the lights to go to bed. i decided to have a look at the hibiscus along the sidewalk in front of my house. it is one of the remaining plants from the flower bed renovation of 2006, and i’ve noticed the past couple of days since the more recent renovation, that it is starting to look like it’ll bloom for the first time since the summer of 2006. it was late, and i thought i’d turn on the front light and have a look. so i turn on the light and look out the window by my front door and look at the hibiscus, then i looked up and noticed a car parked across the street with people just hanging out. i turned off the light and the rest of the lights, but i found ways to keep an eye on these people. they were parked across the street along the windowless side of the house directly across the street from my house.

my street’s relatively quiet at night, because it’s not along the main road in the neighborhood. it’s really nice actually, unless there’s a mysterious car parked on it. i went into the front bedroom of my house and peered out the holes in the blinds, because obviously they knew i was awake, or had been, and besides, i didn’t want them to KNOW i was watching them. i didn’t call the cops for the same reason, they’d know who called the cops because i turned on the freaking front light to look at my hibiscus. i was just making sure they weren’t doing anything illegal. it just seemed really really odd. after about 10 minutes, i got tired of watching and went and brushed my teeth. i heard the car drive off right before i went to bed. i have no idea what those 3 (who i could see) people were doing, but next time that happens i’m calling the cops….unless i turn on the front light to look at the hibiscus again.

So last week I finally got around to getting the defensive driving class scheduled that had to be taken because of the ticket I had gotten in February. I was going to take the class more locally, but the added bonus of the class being $20 cheaper and 2 hours shorter, plus hopefully being able to see my uncle and grandfather made it an easy decision. Once I had figured all of this out, I called the BR Courthouse to get signed up for the class. The lady on the phone told me the next Saturday class was in July, so I told her that wouldn’t be good because I needed to have the class taken by the end of June. Then she said she’d be able to fit me in the class the next day (this past Saturday). Why didn’t she just do that the first time? I was finally signed up and the lady told me I had to be on time, because if I was late, they’d not let me in the room. I was fine with this rule, because you’re taking a class so the ticket doesn’t get reported to your insurance, so I’ll be there on time. She also told me I could not wear shorts, which I thought was strange.

I woke up early on Saturday morning and set off for BR at 6:15. I made it down to the courthouse and found a parking spot. There was a crowd outside the courthouse waiting for the doors to open about 7:45. I could tell a lot of the people in the crowd were courtroom regulars. I had to go back to my car to leave my cell phone since they weren’t even letting people bring them in the building. I found the courtroom where the class was going to be held through the help of a fellow classmate. The teacher called everyone’s name and we had to go up to the front to sign in. There were probably 40-60 people in the courtroom, and it wasn’t even full! The teacher basically read out of a binder and played videos, so he started reading out of the binder after everyone signed in. About 8:20 or so, two people came in late. One lady wasn’t in the right room, she was apparently wandering around looking for a certain class. The other lady was late, but the teacher let her sign in and join the class. What about the rule about being on time??? This kind of bothered me. Also bothering me was the lady who came in from a break late (the breaks were 15 minutes, and there was NOWHERE TO GO!) with a water bottle (the teacher said at the beginning don’t bring food or drinks into the courtroom). The teacher said “Ma’am, you can’t bring that water into the courtroom.” Her response was “Huh?” So then he said “You’re going to have to go outside and throw it away.” She did it begrudgingly, but really, is it that hard to follow a couple of rules for a few hours?

The class itself wasn’t that bad. The teacher was funny enough to keep boring driving rules interesting. The videos he showed were pretty good. Of course there were videos with people pretending to be horrible drivers not caring about seat belts, or easily driven to road rage. Stupid quotes about not having to wear seatbelts or whatever that were obviously supposed to be actors made you sad that there are actually people like that. The road rage video had some funny parts. The mention of a drivers’ ed teacher in NC who was with a student, ordered the student to chase down some guy that cut them off. And then the video where one guy driving a white Caravan got pulled out in front of by a Taurus. Instead of just dealing, he follows the guy and pulls up behind him in his driveway. He just happens to have an aluminum bat with him between the seats, so he pulls that out and approaches the Taurus. Unfortunately he didn’t see the guy in the Taurus was pulling out a gun. Oops! Also, the teacher told us when going over RR Crossing info that some lady in Louisiana had recently crashed into the 42nd car of a train. FORTY SECOND! The train was basically passing and she didn’t even stop. She survived though and told the officers at the scene “It just came out of nowhere.” (shakes head)

We all had to take a 20 question test at the end which was really easy. I told the guy next to me before we graded our neighbor’s that if anyone failed, they should have their license taken. You could miss 6 questions and still pass! Everyone passed and we got our certificates and I was out of there around 11:30. Unfortunately I didn’t get to see my uncle or my grandfather. I had called my uncle twice during the week and left VMs, but didn’t hear anything back. I called my grandfather as I was leaving the class in hopes I could talk to him, but had to leave a VM. I hope the non returned calls were just oversights, and I’m not on the “Never talk to again” list. I ended up driving home way earlier than I thought with a heavy heart.

you know how lately bands from the late 90s and early 00s have been going “hey, we’re tired of working at the Gap, let’s go out on tour! i don’t hate you anymore!”? No Doubt and blink-182 (WTF?) are the latest bands to have this happen. i think it mostly started with Rage Against The Machine’s ‘reunion’. oh what, no new record? they got back together so they could be needed? what a bunch of BS. ANYWAY…..today i was perusing any available concerts coming to NOLA. i did see The Donnas are coming, a few years late for me, but still. the show that obviously is going to be the concert of the year is Sugar Ray being supported by Fastball! OMG! is it the One or Two Hit Wonders United tour? it must be. i laughed when i thought they’re going to be up on stage with people yelling for the 3 songs they know total and the bands are going to be wanting to play the songs they’ve written on their hiatuses from civilization the past 10 years.

random dude: “PLAY I WANNA FLY! I WANNA FLY!”
lead singer of SR: “no see, we all got together over the holidays and wrote a bunch of new songs for you guys!”
entire crowd: “BOOOOOOOOOO!”

it could possibly be a glorious moment, but one i’m not willing to shell out $30 to go see.

also strange today in addition to the usual shenanigans from BO Guy, i got a very nice compliment about how i should quit engineering and become a model, because i’m so handsome. sounds great right? well, this lady has been sitting near me for a couple of weeks. i knew her from a while back, and she was always so nice. like i think she probably makes cookies on the weekends for neighborhood kids. anyway, since she’s been sitting near me, i’ve noticed how much she hates NOLA. i don’t know exactly where she’s from, but she’s not from here, and she’s quick to point that out if she can. last week she brought in a blueberry pie she had made and offered me a piece. i turned her down because i don’t like blueberries, but when i told her she said “that’s okay, i don’t like crawfish”. what? i know maybe people don’t like NOLA, i get that. i think it’s stupid how the mayor of NOLA is quarantined in China for the swine flu. (what the hell is he doing in China?) i don’t like people openly criticizing it over and over again, especially when they are not from here. if she hates it so bad, then why doesn’t she leave? anyway, all that kind of stuff made me kind of not like her, and today the model comment threw everything off. i don’t know how to feel about her now….but at least she thinks i’m really really really ridiculously good looking. let’s go grab some orange mocha frappacinos!

so lately i’ve been tracking my calorie intake over on Livestrong’s website on this section called The Daily Plate. it’s pretty cool. Chad had told me about it a while back and i started using it last week. it lets you put physical activity on there which subtracts from your calorie total. i’ve been steady around 1600-2000 calories before subtracting physical activity. when i added last night’s run, it subtracted 922 calories. nice.

i’ve been a lot more conscious the past few months about the things that i eat, esp eating out. there’s a Sonic that i pass twice a day and the past couple of weeks they’ve had the following up on their board: “Try our new Chicken Bacon Ranch on Wheat Bread”. back when Subway started offering their Chicken Bacon Ranch sub, i ate it a few times. it was great. it was Subway, so it had to be healthy right? nope. i found the nutritional info on the CBR sub and it had 30 grams of fat per 6 inch. whoa. a Big Mac has 29 grams. (on average your daily fat intake should be ~50-70 grams) i stopped eating the CBR from Subway. which brings me back to the Sonic. lately when i pass the Sonic’s sign, i got “oh, so the wheat bread saves you from the bad other stuff!”

So the full lineup for the ACL Fest came out today and I actually looked into taking a train, because looking on a map the Amtrak station was near where the festival is. Austin is one state over, I figured, it might take half a day or something, right? WRONG! This is the actual route the Amtrak webpage spit out: Slidell to DC to Chicago to Austin. THIS TRIP WOULD TAKE THREE DAYS! I think settlers in the 1800s could make this trip in a shorter amount of time! The US needs a better passenger rail system.

Three of the main headliners were huge to me in 1998, while KOL was not even a glint in my eye. Would I love to go relive 1998 in October? Yes please. The rest of the lineup is just packed with bands I’ve either seen before and loved (Decemberists, Felice Bros.) and bands I have not seen but really want to (Andrew Bird). The lineups at ACL have always looked good to me, but I’ve never been able to go for one reason or another. Hopefully this year will be different.

There are some sports stories you love being a part of. When your really terrible basketball team upsets the #1 team and you get to rush the court, that’s something you cherish being a part of. When your football team finally knocks off their archenemy at home when that team is #3, that’s something you love being a part of. When your football team returns to their home stadium a year after natural disaster that effected everyone in the metro area, that’s something you will never ever forget. When your basketball team completely quits on a home game in the playoffs, and goes on to lose by the biggest margin in NBA playoff history, that’s something you are embarrassed to be a part of.

Before the Hornets game yesterday, I told people I wouldn’t mind them losing, because they’ve been banged up and just haven’t shown much effort in the playoffs. Plus, if they lose the series in 5, I wouldn’t be spending more than $100 on playoff tickets. I thought going into last night that the Hornets would stay close or lead for the first 3 quarters, then just run out of gas in the 4th. I had no idea the plan was to take a 2-0 lead then just give up. I got to the arena about 6:40 and had to wait in a ridiculous long line for the free beer in the season ticket area. Jacob was meeting me at the game but was coming later, so I left his ticket at will call. I finally got my beer, but the tap was running out, so I had more foam than normal. I walked into the arena and the program had David West on the cover. Combined with the foamy beer, I thought the DW cover was a bad sign. I ate my turkey sandwich and headed upstairs to my seat. I bought a $9 beer (Abita Amber at least) because I thought I’d rather not have the foamy beers be the last beer memory of the season. I went up to my seat and settled in for what I hoped would be a hard fought game.

After the 2-0 lead, everything fell apart. I haven’t been a fan of David West since I started going to games and watching him play. He plays lazy defense and jogs a lot. I think he may also be allergic to offensive rebounds. I saw him give up at least 10 points in the first half, but I’m sure there was a lot more. He wasn’t rotating over when people would drive to the basket and he would fuss at teammates when they gave up a basket. Hello pot, this is kettle! I had called my mom earlier in the night to tell her the game wasn’t on TV and offer an alternative, but she said she was planning on watching 24 and would see about catching the game after seeing the score. After the first quarter, the Hornets were down 21. I texted her this and her response was “Damn”. My mom doesn’t curse very often. Jacob got there sometime in the 2nd quarter and by the end of the 2nd quarter the score was 61-39.

I was texting with a friend about the game and how in the 3rd quarter they should just start jacking up 3s. Unfortunately, the Hornets chose to run their same offense with passing the ball to David West in the post and hoping he doesn’t turn it over. Bad plan. The defense was awful again, and the 3rd quarter resulted in the Hornets being down 38 points by the end of it. I had fun yelling “SHOOT IT!” when Chris Paul would cross half court. Why not? It wasn’t like anything else was working! Also at the end of the 3rd quarter the majority of the crowd started leaving. Jacob and I left with 9 minutes or so left in the game, so pretty early in the 4th. I usually stay until the end of a game no matter what, but I could not stomach a team giving up. On the way out walking past the Dome, I tore the front cover off my program and said “he’s supposed to be an All Star? What a bunch of garbage!” Then I threw it away.

On my way home I stopped at Walmart to pick up a few things, and almost was hoping no one would ask me if I went to the game. I was embarrassed to have paid money to see such a terrible display. I know some people want to blame the coach, but at some point, as a person you have to be motivated not to embarrass yourself, your family, your school, and your fans. If you hate the coach, don’t take it out on the fans. If you hate management, don’t take it out on the fans. The fans are paying their hard earned money to come watch you play, at least have the decency to give effort to show them you’re trying.

My favorite NBA writer on ESPN is John Hollinger, and he was the one that wrote the article about the game this morning for the daily NBA info page. I completely agree with him. It was the most sorry performance by a professional team I’ve ever seen. Losing by double digits is one thing, losing by FIFTY EIGHT at home in a playoff game is nothing less than shameful.