New Kicks

A few weeks ago I saw a pair of Nike Air Force 1s that I absolutely loved. Concurrently, I noticed that my 2 year old Reeboks were not nearly as white as they were when I got them, not to mention the holes that were left when the Reebok symbol fell off some time ago. On top of the aesthetic problems with my current shoes, there's almost no arch support which means if I stand, or walk, or even just wear them for longer than a hour, my feet begin to hurt. This pain quickly travels up my legs to my knees and my back which are already a bit messed up from youthful neglect.
So I decided to get a new pair. Now, I'm no shoe head, and I've never spent more than $60 on a pair of sneakers, but I decided it was time to put in some effort and buy a nice pair of sneaks that would be both stylish and comfortable.
My general style is rather simple, some might even call it transient. most of the shoes I stumbled upon online were either insanely chromatic or mostly white. Colorful shoes are neat. Crazy designs, crazy colors, crazy accessories all add up to some very interesting shoes. White shoes are just too hard to keep looking nice.
I basically wear 2 colors: red or blue, which means a shoe like this:

does me no good.

After a few hours of online research and some visits to various shoes stores in the mall, I decided what I wanted was a low, simple, comfortable shoe. I settled on this:

Simple, blue suede, Nike SB Dunks. These are the most comfortable shoes I've ever worn. The amount of padding rivals any decent arm chair. And, for only $55, I've got enough money left over to buy a Red pair too, but not yet.
Here are other choices in the running(no pun intended) and could possibly be an alternate shoe:


^if I found these with red in stead of blue I'd have bought them on the spot

If I had found these anywhere I'd have bought these too.

LOST Theme Songs

Over the past few months I have become quite the LOST-ie. It helps to have hours of time to waste but I've found it's quite a show. Action, adventure, mystery, it's got it all. the only thing LOST is missing is a good theme song. Thanks to the lovely people on the internet I've found a few good candidates. All of these have potential to be classics.

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

Button Pushing

I've found that at various hairy situations in my life that the solution can often be as simple as pushing a button. Buttons are everywhere. Without buttons, I feel humanity as we know it would not exist and a button-less existence would be a woeful one. From making the "go-up box," go up to buttons that can start cars with only a minute amount of finger pressure, buttons surely make the world go 'round. The button has had a profound effect on my life in three specific instances that come to mind.

The First button pushing experience wasn't actually my experience, but this push of a button by my friend B. had a ripple effect of 4 years. While pursuing my higher education there was a draw to explore every aspect of the University and its' campus. Others that felt this draw and myself would frequently find the empty football stadium particularly interesting for any number of reasons, but one being that the very top was so high up, one could see for miles around. Unfortunately, due to this draw effecting previous generations, there were a few security measures in place to try to make it very difficult for normal adventurers from pioneering all the way to the very top, including multiple 10ft high fences on the ramp leading up to the top. One faithful night our exploring leads up to try to summit the structure but the fences were doing their jobs and we were deterred. This is where B. comes in. There is an elevator that bypasses the fences and the ramp altogether but no one had ever thought to see if it was working. With what I assume was his left index finger, B. bushed the "up" button and low and behold, the doors parted and we had our path to the top. This single event allowed us to have many, many, MANY trips up to the top of Byrd Stadium and also allowed us to conduct a few physics experiments that otherwise would have been neigh impossible without the elevator.

The Second is a similar story about how I couldn't get into a building late one night on the same campus, but this time it was for a legitimate reason, I swear. All the doors were locked but with a quick brush of the handicapped button the door swung open and I got to where I was going. Button to the rescue again!

Today, the Third and most recent button pushing event transpired. I work at one of about a million tax preparation shops in the area and all of our work, as with many professions, is done primarily on the computer. This means of course that if catastrophe strikes and something like, I don't know, the power were to go out, the entire office becomes about as productive as an olive loaf. The apparently unforeseeable happened at about noon. Tax Professionals and their clients who had been entering data for hours were now S.O.L. This included myself. After about 20 minutes of making calls and taking down numbers, the office clears of clients and soon the Tax Professionals joined the rest of the office park on the porch area because, after all, it was a gorgeous day and we all just lucked into a few moments of sunlight. I hear a beeping coming from around the corner. I follow it only to discover a small security console with messages flashing. I can't understand the code but decide to push one of the three buttons. I push it once and the beeping stops. A second time and the power comes back on. We can all resume our normal, Saturday afternoon work schedule. Hooray.

So from assisting in mischief to cutting short a Saturday Siesta, button pushing, to me, is almost a motif of my life. I plan on continuing to push buttons as I come across them. And, although I may not always understand the affect a particular button will have on my life, I can confidently say that all buttons are meant to be pushed.

Meat is the new bread!

The Question has been asked: Should I cut down on meat and eat more fruits and vegetables? Well after much thought and deliberation i've come up with this answer:

You must grasp logical efficiencies. What does a cow eat? Hay and corn. And what are those? Vegetables. So a steak is nothing more than an efficient mechanism of delivering vegetables to your system. Need grain? Eat chicken. Beef is also a good source of feild grass, a green leafy vegetable. And a pork chop can give you 100% of your recommended daily allowance of vegetable slop

Writing about writing

I seem to remember when I had a xanga journal in high school I could post on a daily basis about absolutely nothing in particular. Now I am struggling to find material. Something about announcing to the world every little aspect of my life doesn't seem interesting anymore. Also, I rather not write about me. Who cares about me and the stupid stuff I do on a daily basis? Hopefully people have better things to do with their time.

I'm sure that every blogger who isn't good at blogging has at least one post about having nothing to write about or a reflection on why they're really blogging. Other than the paragraph above this will not be one of those posts. Here is a rant and rave about good blogs I enjoy reading and how pointless and stupid I feel twitter is.

First the good stuff. I subscribe to maybe 10 personal blogs through my google reader. I love spending my time reading well written posts about other peoples trials and tribulations and interesting musings. Only half of these people actually know that I may be reading their blog, but thanks to the anonymity of the internet, this is not only possible but in a way, encouraged. Sometimes the topics and the style of writing makes me feel like an inadequate blogger until I remind myself that it's the internet and it doesn't matter what or how anyone writes. My favorite posts are the ones about small events in peoples lives explained in great detail to help explain the bloggers thought processes. My least favorite posts: random updates about pointless things WITH NO EXPLANATION. And yes, I do understand the irony here, but it leads to my next paragraph: my loath for twitter.

If you don't know what twitter is and you use the internet on a regular basis then you've been using it under a rock. An internet rock. Whatever that is. Check out this TED.com video on twitter by one of it's creators, Evan Williams. It is actually interesting how these technological "advances" come about but I still don't understand the necessity for twitter. Basically, twitter is a way to update anyone who's subscribed to your "tweets" on what it is you are doing at any given moment. Recently there was a campaign to get members of congress on twitter, which in itself is a neat idea, I'd rather get updates from the leaders of our country that get paid by my tax dollars instead of some random people/friends. Unfortunately, during Obama's "state of the union" or whatever it was, a Congresswoman was caught tweeting DURING HIS SPEECH. I didn't even know they allowed blackberries/mobile phones into the chambers but apparently this woman got one in. Although this situation is rather funny, we have to ask ourselves if updating others of our situations has become more important than actually living our lives. In the near future I fully expect a twitter sequence to go like this:
TooMuchTimeGuy1: Driving home from work
TooMuchTimeGuy1: It's raining pretty hard
TooMuchTimeGuy1: There's a car coming right at me!
TooMuchTimeGuy1: On the side of the road waiting for paramedics
TooMuchTimeGuy1: Going to the hospital
With the internet now everyone has the opportunity for a "published" voice but soon enough those voices will become overwhelming and twitter is the first step in the wrong direction of mass communicating useless information. We have enough of that everywhere already.

A Monster-truck announcer breaks up with his girlfriend

K-K-K-K-K-KARENNNNNNNNN,

This SUNDAY SUNDAY SUNDAY, I'd like you to have all your stuff moved OUT OUT OUT of MY MY MY APARTMENT APARTMENT APARTMENT, because I'm b-b-b-b-b-breaking up with YOU YOU YOU!!! I don't know what to say, really. I feel b-b-b-b-bad about all this, but it's like we're just not c-c-c-c-c-c-communicating like we used to.

Let's just be m-m-m-m-mature about this and try to remain friends. We should get coffee sometime, in case one of us needs some CLOSURE CLOSURE CLOSURE. I know no one PLANS PLANS PLANS for things to turn out this WAY WAY WAY.

Call me if you think this is a MISTAKE MISTAKE MISTAKE MISTAKE.

Sorry,
Keith

*Found on McSweeny's Internet Tendency page, alas I cannot take credit.

Confessions of a Tax Associate

Sitting in an empty H&R Block office night after night leads me to ask one question: Why aren't people doing their taxes?
I constantly am coming into work fully expecting no business. Maybe it's our demographics. The families and business in this particular area are bit "well off" so chances are they have their own CPAs and accountants.
Maybe people are waiting unitl the last minute to complete their returns because they know they'll owe money and want to hold onto it for as long as possible. If this is the case, we'll be swamped in a few weeks.
It is rather disheartening that my first "professional" job post college is already what many would consider a dead-end. I've been attending career fairs and calling up some conects, but I have that 7.6% national unemployment in the back of my mind. Who would hire me of all the people looking for jobs? I guess this is just another situation where I keep my head down and power through, something is bound to come up.

Air Strike on a Motorcycle

I swear I just heard that Israel retaliated for post cease fire bombings by having an air strike target a motorcycle. Air strike on a motorcycle...wow.

I never thought I'd see the day...

...when Dave Neal would get an ovation of sorts for coming in off the bench. I never thought I'd see him start either but that's neither here nor there, since the terps really have no one else to put in. It is a sad state of affairs when there's no inside presence with the obvious lack of a big man, our potential 3-point sharp shooter can't hit a bucket under any pressure and our most passionate player is a big ball hog. Tonight I went to the UVA v. Maryland basketball game and observed one of the worst games ever played at the comcast center. Our zone defense was working only because the UVA players can't pass worth shit, the refs couldn't seem to get any calls right and the Maryland players couldn't get a rebound to save their lives. I'm disappointed in the team, the fans(an ACC game, versus UVA, and the stands were half full), and the coach. Gary's got one more year before I start chanting for the hook. I shouldn't really complain I guess because the Terps did win, even though through some very stupid mistakes, UVA never seemed out of it.

In other news, the Inauguration went off without a hitch. I arrived early enough to stand and wait in the streets of D.C. with 2 million of my now closest friends. I ended up getting pushed about 200 ft. closer than I ever expected to get, due mainly to some very brave souls crossing the frozen reflecting pool to try to get an even better view. After the ceremony I went to a lunch thing that Sen. Barbra Boxer was holding which was part "yaaay Obama!" and part "yaaay I'm running for re-election in 2 years, I better start campagining now." But hey a free lunch is a free lunch, plus I got to meet members of her staff as well as the Senator to whom I remarked, "I loved your scene in Curb," to which I recieved a "haha, nice to meet you" as she moved on down the line. Overall, I'd say it was a rather successful day which started off with some regret as I prepared to freeze my tail off. One note though: being forced to stand ass to elbows with completely random people allows for maximum random schmooze time as well as a way to keep warm on a bitterly cold January day.

Inauguration Ticket

So my mom came home today with a surprise. A ticket to Obama's Inauguration. Don't believe me? Here's proof(also, I dunno how many of you will get a chance to see an Inauguration ticket):


Pretty sweet huh? When I first found out about this I was like, "Hells no, It's gonna damn cold." But then I thought, I'm a trooper and there are a ton of people that would love this opportunity, so why should I waste it? To give you an idea of where I'll be here's the map that came with the ticket:

I'll be in the silver section. I get the idea that the orange, blue, purple and yellow ticket holders will be really close to(if not on) the steps of the capitol while I'll be with the rest of the ticket holders in the front part of the mall. At least I won't be stuck in the middle of the mall somewhere, though chances are I'll see more of the ceremony via a Big Screen T.V. than with my own eyes. Gates open at 8am, so I guess I'll have to be there round 7. I plan on wearing 2 possibly 3 layers under my coat. God damn it's gonna be cold.

As for other updates, I got back from my family vacation in the Bahamas with a bit more money than I originally had, thanks to the fish at the poker table. The weather was awful so the best thing to do was sit inside in the casino. After a quick turn-around I was in Israel for 10 days which was completely amazing. The people I met were awesome, the country is beautiful, I want to go back again and again and again and again. If anyone has a few hours on their hands and wants to hear about my trip I will be much obliged.
I've started working at H&R Block in cloverly. Taxes are boring as hell but it's a good stepping stone job and I'll know some ins and outs for when I need to do my own taxes. If anyone needs their taxes done, let me know by January 23rd so I can get you on a special friends and family list, it'll be a ton cheaper. Even if you don't make it onto that list and want your taxes done, swing by cloverly and I'll see what I can do for you.

Showdown at the Golden Corral

This is both an appreciation and story post, so it runs a tad long.
I love the Golden Corral. For those of you who may not know or have experienced a Golden Corral in all its food-acious glory, a Golden Corral is a buffet style restaurant that specializes in fried foods, steaks, and desserts. It's relatively cheap compared to most buffets and many restaurants. Many think Golden Corrals have low quality food due to the massive amounts they prepare, but I swear the quality is Grade A. Tonight, I ventured out to my "local" corral and had a small confrontation, hence the "showdown" in the title. Henceforth is the telling of that confrontation:

I'm at the salad bar and I had just started putting lettuce into my bowl when this guy comes up to the salad station and yells at the lady behind the counter, "Hey! Hey you! we need more lettuce! can I get more lettuce!" I'm very confused because I just used the lettuce and there was tons of lettuce. So I say to the gentleman, "hey man, the lettuce is right there, and there's plenty." He looks at me, looks at the lettuce, yells something, i think, "nevermind" to the woman behind the counter. Ooooo.K. I go on, enjoy my salad, and my first plate of delicious starches, meats, and veggies. After completing the task of vanquishing all of my edibles collected on the first trek, I go up for my second plate, which as we all know, is the most important plate. Let me side-track here to explain the second plate:

The second plate theorem:
-The second plate requires a lot of thought, management, and personal integrity to complete. Chances are you've had 2, or maybe all 3, of these; Salad, soup and a single first plate which was most likely rather full with bits and pieces of the entire spread. You went up for appetizers and came back with pizza, mac and cheese and a slice of meatloaf.* Eh, it happens to the best of us.
-Now, with the second plate you get to try the things that caught your eye on the first trip but didn't grab for any number of various reasons(space, wait, freshness, ect.). But watch out! You don't have as much room and you need to save some for dessert. thus the balance.
-The balance is when you "balance" the contents of the plate with new things, old things that you want more of, and the idea that you will want to make one more trip for 2 or 3 desserts. So some sacrifice size of the portion for flavor, just to get a taste; others may only get what they know is good, thus leaving more room for it, but keep in mind: room for dessert.

Back to the story. I go up for my second plate and I'm waiting in line when I look up and it's that same guy from the salad bar. I noted it but didn't care until we get up to the steaks. I wanted this rare steak that had been taken off the grill maybe 5 minutes before. No one wanted it, everyone wanted well done. I go to ask for the rare one and the guy in front of me snags it with his fork. His own fork! You don't use your own utensils at the buffet line! So I had to wait for another steak. But just note this, the wonder of the Golden Corral, they will grill as much steak at any degree of cooked, right in front of you! AMAZING!!!
So I finish my second plate and go up for dessert. I'm pickin' through some pie, some cake, a cookie thats covered in frosting and has cake and whipped cream on top. Yeah, I domolished that. And just as I'm leaving I hear this guy, that same guy from the salad bar and at the grill, yelling at the lady behind the counter cause, guess what the were out of: a cookie thats covered in frosting and has cake and whipped cream on top! So, yeah, I owned him. Looking back I feel bad for the person working there, but if he's going to take my steak I'm going to take his cookie cake. Booya.

So yeah, Golden Corral is the shit, let it be known!


*known as the first plate theorem.

Fun With Snapshots

So the new VLC Media Player fixed the snapshot bug. This is what I made just now.

Oh, the places I've gone

Today my 1991 Acura Integra achieved a feat that most cars only dream about; 250,000 miles. To put things in perspective that's over 10 times the circumference of the Earth, 2,640,000,000 dollar bills laid end to end, 10,000 more miles than the distance from the center of the Earth to the Moon, and, with an average MPG of 28, 8929 gallons of gas. In case you need proof, and the fact that I could have been killed while taking these, here are pictures of my odometer:


If you are wondering about anything else in my life, no nothing is new, this is my achievement of the week so stop asking "what i'm doing" or "what's new" because the answer other than my car surviving much longer than the factory expected is nothing. If you are curious on the condition of the car, it shakes, a lot. And it smokes, a lot. For some reason my engine likes to shoot oil on itself causing billowing smoke to come out from the hood. But don't worry, other than an impending car fire, a terrible burning oil smell, and my 1 of 4 speakers being blown out the car is in grand condition.

Batman Returns

I was watching Batman Returns today and one quote seemed to really pop out at me and I would like to share. Maximillian 'Max' Shreck is played by none other than Christopher Walken and Catwomen is portrayed by Michelle Pfeiffer. I feel like this dialogue belongs in a comedy routine.

Maximillian 'Max' Shreck: I don't know what you want, but I know I can get it for you, with a minimum of fuss! Money, jewels, a *very* big ball of string.

Catwoman: Your blood, Max.

Maximillian 'Max' Shreck: My blood? I gave, at the office.

Cops and other thoughts

So today, as I was driving from one place to another, I noticed something odd. I saw three cops, on three separate occasions, cut people off without signaling; twice at rather high speeds(45mph+). What the hell? I'm usually one to defend the police in arguments about how people don't like cops, saying things like "they're a necessary part of society," and "you're just mad you got caught," type of things but how can they expect anyone to follow traffic laws when they provide such a poor example. Oh, and get this, one time, after cutting one person off the cop flipped on his lights for about 10 seconds just to get through traffic. He turned them off immediately after he was past. Why should cops be allowed to do such things? I should have gotten plate numbers and reported it but i was driving, not taking notes. So that's one thing.
I decided to go up to my old apartment for a little while today to a)get out of the house and b)pick up a few things I had left in my roommates room. Just as a background, my roommate has been in Boston for over a month is isn't coming back until the 31st, and I have his keys and my swipe still works. Every once in a while I like to stop in and check on things, especially since we had some drama with facilities management about replacing the carpet. At about 6pm, which is an hour after their offices close, three people come into the apartment for inspections, two wih facilities, one claiming to be some sort of resident director. She's worried about how the carpet needs to be replaced and the walls need to be painted before new people move in this weekend because she doesn't want to get complaints form parents. After explaining that my roommate is not there they start looking around and discussing what needs to be fixed. I mention that my roommate won't be able to move his stuff. They seem to get mad at this. This RD tells me that not only will my roommate get charged for not complying with hat they want but there's a possibility that I will get charged for the carpet. I go into a tirade about how I already got my bill, and paid it and I thought the whole thing was put to rest. I strike a deal with her; I'll move my roommates stuff if she won't charge me for ANYTHING. She agrees. So I feel as though I dodged a bullet by the pure coincidence that I was there and willing to do a favor for my roommate. But there's still an obvious flaw. Why, almost a month after I moved out(and days before new people move in), do they decide to take care of things? I already got my bill for $22.50. The RD said it didn't matter and that I could still get charged for the carpet. What the hell. People need to get their acts together.

Presidential Picture

So I typed into Google "presidents of the united states of america" and went to images and found this pic. The first thing that came to mind was that carter was the only democrat. I decided to MS Paint the picture and now I think it is rather hilarious.
I'm curious to know what it is like to be in a room with supposed "equals"(they were all president) and have the possibility that you hate their guts. Now, i'm not saying carter hates the other past presidents, nor am I saying that all the republicans get along, but one thing that does not make sense about politics is that everything is done with a smile. It's hard to get an honest opinion out of politicians most likely because they know that someone is watching or caring about every little word they say. Who cares?! I want to see what Obama and McCain really think of eachother, cagematch style.

Candy

Here's my acoustic version of "candy" by Mandy Moore circa 1999. I hope you enjoy, please bear with the audio and let's just blame the lack of vocal talent on...well my lack of vocal talent.

You Win Again, AC

Just got back from a day trip to Atlantic City with the one and only Tim Miller. I won't bore you with gambling details but lets just say I lost. It's really no fun losing. I do try to get something out of it like I learned when I feel like the worst player at the table it most likely means I am, AND I learned that Borgata is mondo stingy with the comps. I've never paid for a meal in AC until today. However, the buffet spread was rather amazing and would have been downright perfect if it wasn't for an obvious lack of crabs legs. How can you charge that much for a buffet and not include crabs legs?
Without any further ado, I would like to congratulate Brendan and (the oh so recent) Jenn O'Leary on their joining in holy matramony. I spent some amount of time in Annapolis every day for 3 days in a row(Thursday, Friday, Saturday) and loved every second of it. The O'Learys(or I guess the Sammuels in some cases) really know how to throw a party. Annapolis is a funny town. With my wonderful navagating skills I had the pleasure of exploring some unexpected parts of the town.
Speaking of said wedding, the rumors are true; I did wear a Yarmulke in one of the oldest CATHOLIC churches in the country. My reasoning: a)It was Saturday morning, I was in a place of worship, I should be wearing one, b)It went well with the tux. Although the tuxes looked ever so snazy, I really feel like they needed a bit less...grey? So a white Yarmulke was the perfect addition, and c) Mark this one in our column God, I'm not sure why but this feels like a win.

Pointless Goals

So, twice this past weekend conversations having to do with "things I want to do before i die" have come up. I've decided instead of creating a "bucket list," if you will, I'll make a list of things that if money and sensibility are thrown to the wind, would be really cool to do. This ongoing list of potential awesomeness will be referred to as my "Magic Lamp List" or MLL. Today on the MLL we have two items that are oddly intertwined.
MLL:
-Have a theme song written for myself. I'm thinking something like Shaft or Sanford and Son. Horns will be involved. I'll consider all suggestions.
-I would like to own my own airplane. There is a second part to this wish though. The price of admission, other than my discretion, would be to help with a ritual that I will institute for how I leave my plane. I wish to be carried down the steps of a stair car on the tarmac by all who were riding in the plane. I'll need four people to carry me and something like four other people to play an instrumental version of my selected theme song as well as fan me, feed me grapes, and do other assorted royal parade type stuff. This will last until we get down the stairs then its back to normal. Jonas Wilson has a permanent seat on my airplane as long as he agrees to be one of the people whom carries me.

More Class

First, in response to the comment from my last post, it's a pet peeve. I'm not going to hate someone for saying "America." And as for "americans" it's rather arrogant to refer to ourselves as "americans" in reference to the US. Mexicans and Canadians are just as much "americans" as we are. But ultimately, this is trivial.
Moving on.
Again, I am in class not paying attention and messin' around online. The Orioles are losing to the Red Sox through pure stupidity and lack of good pitching. I was playing poker but after getting hosed over and over I've decided to take a break from online poker. So much so that I've uninstalled Bodog poker. I am keeping my account though purely for sports betting. Unfortunately, it is unlikely that will continue for too much longer, especially if i bet the house on the celtics.