the same thing only sped up

one paper left and i'll be done the semester more or less. one intersession course before heading off to the Desh. tomorrow, tickets, visas, itineraries.

i finished my taxation paper faster than i'd planned which left me plenty of time to take a walk and take more pictures. deadfall is brilliant. uprooted trees, stumps, forests, they're a masterpiece of nature. it's easy to walk fifty feet through the trees and completely forget that there are four million other people around. i never listened to any music taking pictures today. an oddity, but for the best i think.

i've gotten to know my camera pretty well, i know what it does and does not like. my camera likes trees. my camera likes things just the right distance away. sometimes it likes to go in for closeups, sometimes it likes to take in the whole scene. most of the time, it knows just what it wants.

here's an intriguing fact about today's tree session: it took me about two hours to realize I hadn't yet actually looked up. there was so much storyline going on ground level that it wasn't until I happened to catch a bald eagle flying by out of the corner of my eye and followed it did I look up.

there are things in life that just make you stop and look and think to yourself, wow, that's probably one of the most impressive things I've ever seen, and for the life of you, you just have to stop taking pictures and you're not sure why but you keep walking around in a marveled sort of daze with a goofy look on your face staring at the wide wonders.

I rarely take pictures with other people on these walks. if it's an organized photowalk, then yeah, but that's not the same. you don't have the same sort of freedom to just follow your feet in a group or if you have to wait for someone.

the one downside to this is a self timer. ten seconds is not enough time for this sort of stuff. when you have ten seconds to run like hell over thirty feet of dead branches, wood chips, rocks, dirt and whatever else there is and then turn around, get your bearings, position yourself and strike some kind of pose, ten seconds, cuts it close.

i can fly.

the same thing only sped up

under the cold street lights

under the cold street lights

cleaning out the folds

this has got to be the greatest infomercial in the world. actually, anything RonCo is the greatest infomercial in the world. for some reason, if i'm channel surfing and i run across a ronco infomercial, i have to stop and watch.
i have one and a half final papers left to go after spending 8 hours at school yesterday working through tax reformation. i was about ready to drop and just sleep in the lab but instead headed over to the cambie to watch the oilers beat the flamers with the human gas bomb and ryan and steve. i actually felt better after that. it was probably a good thing that i had a chance to chill out and have some laughs with people who arent in the same class as me every day.

im not working on anything today. i will print things out, but i will not work on anything. this week is going to be a paper blitz anyway.

cleaning out the folds

barley tax has an excess burden

barley tax has an excess burden

if you had to write 2500 words on the concerns of the personal income tax system using diagrams and discussions of tax incidence, excess burden, horizontal/vertical equity, savings, etc., what would you say?

feel free to be very very very specific and preferably have the accompanying charts and graphs as I have no clue what any of it means.

the Do's and Don't of zuppa

dont you love it when you're stricken with those nasty bugs that decide to go throw every possible symptom you can think of in the span of one or two days? i think this one has a propensity to move along with gravity. i offer proof. yesterday morning it started with my head, moved down to the throat, next to sneezing, next to cough, next to stomach and most recently has decided to settle in my GI tract. and this never results in anything other than discomfort and open windows.
were i to have some herbal remedy in my possession, then yes, I most likely would have injested it in one of many ways already, but unfortunately i don't, so i'm stuck with advil and gravol.
i dont really like to go beyond advil and gravol for most things. i dont really like going to the doctors, and im a firm believer that orange juice and vitamin C can cure most of what ails you.
i finished another final paper today. that leaves one 6 page econ assignment, and a ten page Poli paper left and that's the first year under my belt. one coop term and eight months to go and im out in the world with a Masters and i'll probably still be scratching my head wondering what to do.
mym mom asled me a few days ago what I wanted to do when I was done. i told her i didn't know, i'll worry about that when i have to. to which she replied "so, in 18 months." i couldn't really think of anything to say to that.
i dont like to use proper grammar or stuff on here a lot. i do enough of that already. i can get the point across without capitalization. or commas. or semi colons. you get the point. probably the most redundant sentence ever written on here.
im also a big fan of duct tape. just thought id throw that out there.
raul is planning a fotowalk apparently at some point. yes. i dont know when. when i find out i'll probably go and not work on a paper and take lots of pictures and meet some more new people because that's always fun.
when i woke up this morning the first thing i thought, after that first thought about why is there a vacuum running in my kitchen and then sort of falling back to sleep for an hour, was 'i thought i had A Clockwork Orange...where did my Clockwork Orange go?"

the Do's and Don't of zuppa

i got what was

stayed home today. this is why email is a student's best friend. emailing in papers is possibly the greatest thing you can do when you're popping gravols, wearing two sweaters and drinking large bottles of water.
that was last night. now im only wearing one sweater, and no gravol yet. water yes. im also making lunch. and finishing up my econometrics paper. slowly, bit by bit, one more page and then the table of contents and that should about do it. then one more econ assignment and one final paper and i are done.
last night while i was sweatered up and gravol'd up, i was craving swiss chalet. most satisfying chicken ever. i also felt compelled to watch Beauty and the Geek. you can tell im not feeling well when I actually sit down and watch shit like that and laugh at it.
i think this may be turning into a pretty annoying head cold, but tomorrow i think i'll be ok to go to class.

i got what was

bracing curtains

.
Originally uploaded by edmo

i dont feel good. i didn't get much sleep. the only few moments ive felt good today are those few moments where you're half awake and everything is warm and comfortable. and then you move and you fuck that up nicely.
i made it through the first half of econ this morning, and then through a hazy, headache ridden thought process decided that I couldn't leave without telling my prof that i do not feel well and i will be vacating. she was fine with that and even went so far as to say that yes i look terrible and kind of puffy have you been sleeping alright?
i came home and was out solid. short, strange dreams. i slept/dozed maybe three hours. i dont want to sleep all day because i need to do work on a paper and i'd like to be able to sleep tonight.
i have things dimmed because my eyes are not enjoying bright things right now.
on my way home the world was synced up with my ipod.

bracing curtains

heaving over barrens

Wasteland: pt. 5
Originally uploaded by musicmuse_ca

maybe you got away from it maybe you didn't all you can really tell yourself is one more page one more chapter one more look and you'll have to get along get going get moving get back to something that isn't as real as anything else you can see taste and touch. walking through the haze that isn't really there but sits just as heavy on the crown of your head pressing down with all the weight of a world you have just left behind sitting on the floor waiting waiting waiting for the clouds to open once again and the ink to flow and the soft wisps and whips of wind made by the flutters of a new line of living.
that's where it goes, that's what it does, no one really knows exactly. you can't say exactly. you can't tell yourself exactly. but you know because it's not something you can give up that easily it's a soft set of fingers cushioning your lungs cupping your heart inhalation exhalation mandated by a mindful figure.
can you still see out the window if you look away for just a moment knowing that you can't see anything but what's been trapped etched drawn burned into existence now. something you can reach up and touch something you can look down at and up at and around at and know that it's just as real as everything as is wrong.
which is saying a lot it's saying enough it's telling you fairy tales that ring true, they're true in some other frame of mind but maybe not this one and maybe not today.

heaving over barrens

it's the kind of fatigue that you know after reading to escape because leaving now is almost a betrayal. characters come and characters go but none so boldly as the ones you invest yourself in the most. read a page. read a line. read a mind. now you're him now you're her now you're them and you can't escape yourself even if you close the covers if only for a night. it seeps in it grows it flows it seems just right but to let it go now isn't. it's not/ you can't do that. they have faces and they haves spaces and they have dreams of their own. maybe in words maybe in pages maybe in a blank space. like a canvass that's empty but all the while full. did you read it did you think it did you live it did you want it did you know it did you dream it did you live it did you be it. and if the answer is no ten you haven't read deep enough you haven't read far enough you haven't read between the lines. you didn't do it you didn't dream it you didn't breathe it. but now you can see it feel it taste it know it show it now you want it.
turn the page.

their unsuspecting little eyes

today is a big day in GodSquad land. Dear Santa, for Easter this year, I want someone somewhere to do a sermon that goes something like this:

"Now children, today is the day where we all exercise our obsession with murder, death, and zombies by sending your parents to buy you candy that will slowly rot your insides and force them to hide little plastic eggs all over the house made with lead paint from china for you to find when you wake up in the morning.

Today is the day where all the Old People tell you that today is important because a long time ago an Arab man that we tell you is a White Man came back from the dead after being hung up on a big piece of wood for days and days with rusty nails. But don't worry, they didn't know about tetanus back then, so he couldn't possibly have had gotten that what with those iron spikes driven through him.

Today is the day when the Old People make you put on Sunday School plays about how the Zombie Man needed to rise from the dead while trapped in a cave by a multi tonne boulder, body wracked by starvation, rot and wrapped in mouldy rags to come back and tell his friends that he'd done it for the good of all Men.

You see kids, back then, no one did things for the good of Men and Women.

See kids, it's important to realize that the Zombie Man came back like a bad character from a George Romero movie because it let's us tell you now in the present that it's ok to only really act on what he told everyone in the Way Back Time on one weekend a year. Today we make you reassert your values in the Hope for All Mankind (and what are we missing there?). When today is over, and Tomorrow is over, and there won't be any more Easter days for a whole year, you will go back to living your lives not living up to the Zombie Man's expectations. You will go back to wanting your toys and candy and movies and when you hear your parents go 'Tsk Tsk' while they watch the news, they'll tell you it's nothing you need to worry about, just less civilized folk who don't appreciate Freedom and then ask you you if you want some peach cobbler.

Now kids, I know this next part might be hard to believe, but did you know that not everyone thinks Easter is about the Zombie Man? For a long time, even Way Back before the Zombie Man lived, they didn't know about it! All over the world were People who didn't believe in the Zombie Man and his Friend in the Sky. Then through a series of fear driven assaults, we killed all of those people who didn't want to believe in the Zombie Man, or we spread diseases that killed them because our Missionaries we sent alllllll over the world to tell people they were uncivilized and heathens, and could never share in our obsession about death if they didn't join us. Did you know that some of these People didn't even think the world was made by the Sky Friend just 6000 years ago because they'd been around far longer than that!

Now kids, I know your parents tell you that it's important to help your fellow human beings, and that being humble is important and that giving to the poor is important. But don't worry, they won't really give away your toys that you don't really play with anymore to a charity that will take them to kids in far off countries who haven't had a proper meal for days. After all, how are you supposed to play with your New Easter toys with as much smugness if you can't look at your whole collection and think about how much stuff you have and you're better than other kids because you have so much.

And that's why this weekend, every year, we remind you that you should be penitent for just a day or two so you don't have to feel guilty.

Now we get to watch a movie! And remember, Jesus died so people could make this for you!

How'd you kids like that? Now, if you really want a good example of someone who will uproot themselves from their lives with tv's and dvd's and ipods and takeout every night, then you should follow in the footsteps of Marnie the Nurse because she actually does what most of your parents and most likely you, will never do."



Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to chow down on a chocolate bunny, and work out more of the project I'll be working on in Dhaka to help directly improve access and efficiency of nursing services in the country. What are you doing today?

their unsuspecting little eyes

two cents for a day's walk

i listened to the Headstones all day. not these jackasses that stole the name and logo, the real headstones. there are few bands i regret not having seen live more than this one.

yesterday i never left the house. at all. never went outside. i sat in here and finished a paper. and then after i was done, i stayed in here some more.

so today, i did not stay in here and do a paper. i walked down streets i'd never been down and took pictures of things i'd never seen before. sometimes all you need to do to feel normal again is point yourself in a direction and just keep walking. and when you run out of road, turn left and keep going. when you do this, never look at the world like you would on any other day. on these days it's important to look at the world and realize that it's all the same but all different at the same time. if you take a step forward, it might be the same sight, but it's not the same perspective.

two papers to go, homeward bound for a week, back for two, then off i go into the wild blue.

two cents for a day's walk

they all have to have one of that kind

i finished one of my final papers today. it was the shortest of the three but whatever.

i had some fun with loops after that. and then i reorganized my comic books.

hey, at least no one can say i wasn't productive today.

there are several half empty cans of coke sitting around my desk.

if you look up Charlie Brown parody on youtube you get some fucked up results.

they all have to have one of that kind

long road down

went to watch the Oilers/Nucks game with a jerseyless friend of Nemo. it was good times even if we did lose.

refs need to learn what tripping is. reffing. ur doing it wrong.

easter weekend and i have no chocolate bunnies, easter eggs. i have papers to write. and whatever's in my fridge to cook. and the thought to cling to that in a few weeks time i'll be on a plane home for a break from everything that hoards away moments of my time and i can lie on a couch in front of a picture window and not worry about anything for a few minutes.

i've come to decide that a big reason i'm glad to be going to Dhaka this summer is that the internet isn't really good there. truth be told, i'm getting sick of spending so much time in front of a screen. papers, research, emails, surveys, whatever.

honestly, if you're reading this, take a second and try to think how much of your life is spent in front of a screen, or thinking about what exists as words you type into a computer. i bet it's a lot. i bet more than once you've thought the same thing.

long road down

i remember the way they smell

you can escape but never get away. you can run but never get far. you can think and never have a thought. but you can say a word and find everything.

when i graduated high school i hoisted a lite brite over my head walking down the rows and smiled because i never had to hold a peg. one name ahead or one name further on and i wouldn't have been holding it up over my head.

if you've never held one over your head and smiled, then you missed out on a good time.

i remember the way they smell

excellence has no bearing

now the words are lost, floating off in the ether of some none existent plane, once thought never to be said. only to be recognized with the nod of the head and a wave of the hand.
tree tops with spires casting their glare down upon us and the shadows deepen with the pull of the air.
they are lost upon us, always searching in the wrong places for the things we hope most to find, yet never wish to see.
reflections in a window, too close to know, too far to judge. is this wisdom, or just wise to ignore? and the shadows grow more. dinner is cold, it's been waiting too long. the door remains shut, still standing, still guarding, still empty.
not thinking about a care in the world, but the world is too loud and speaks all at once. a flitting thought, a spark of some far off glint in the eye that casts doubt on how far the shadows have really come. left thinking of you thinking of me and then off again, off to the top of some unknown, some unseen, some unthinkable part of everyday understanding.
the bus is late again. the traffic's stalled again. the world stops at every instance when we are dismayed at what leaps up out of the plain and dreary ground. it's never a place we thought we would be.
and the shadows deepen, welcomed by the nod of the head.

excellence has no bearing

and oh my god how the mountain came down

good god what a waste of a day it's been so far. i got shat for sleep, had to convince myself it was worth getting up to go to class, only to get there and have our prof take two hours to tell us she has nothing to really tell us today.

yeah, thanks.

still with the odd dreams, only this time they were almost in 3D it seemed and for a bit I was convinced I was an ant named Fred.

waking up in the morning after that...is strange. not generally helping the fact that i've been feeling off kilter lately.

it's green day. hurray? i'm sitting my ass down and forcing myself to do work instead.

everyone go say happy birthday to the leprechaun.

-----

let's add to the list shall we? the laundry machine has now ceased functioning while full of water and soap and all my clothes in it.

and oh my god how the mountain came down

Hobbits don't hate

believe me when i say that it's essential that you all immediate go out right now to see Horton Hears a Who. really. no joke.

Horton Who'd and awkward safeway cake was had for the Neon Tiger's birthday last night even though it's really tomorrow.

i had weird dreams last night about buildings and skytrains and tracks and sharks and tigers and it played out like a movie and was really very strange.

i have parts of sentences floating around in my head that i'd like to write down as lyrics but they aren't all there yet so i don't know how.

ive been feeling uninspired lately. there's not that much left to do in the semester. not much to read, not that much to write. i could probably have some final essays done this week, two weeks before they're due, but I just keep staring at the papers and not moving. maybe it's because i know i'll get them all done regardless which either way would just leave me with the same amount of time to sit around wondering what's left to be done.

when someone asks what super power i'd want if i could ever have one, usually i say the ability to not have to sleep ever and always feel rested because imagine how much you'd get done. i was thinking about that on my home last night and thought, no, you'd probably get pretty bored with life if that were the case.

im going to go fail at trying to be even a little bit productive now.

Hobbits don't hate

no dogs orange

no dogs orange

a moment please

so i havent passed out yet. instead im watching reminders of my singing prowess when irish pubs and beer is involved...

a moment please

it's friday night. im so tired i might actually be in bed by 7.

post haste!

it it the postiversary of this video today.

post haste!

oddest search engine hit leading here so far: shaks anal sex.

i get the odd one from "dog peeing on a baby" but any true HIMYM fan will know that one.

***UPDATED***

this morning i woke to a hit from 'April O'Neil naked'.

someone's reeeeeeally serious about their ninja turtles...

a brain fueled by lemons

so, I just found proof that human beings are turning into automated voice messaging systems.

i got my Student Loan agreement thing in the mail today, and i had a question about it, so i phone the handy dandy 1-877 number (whatever happened to 1-800 numbers?) and, because of the handy dandy call timer on my phone, it took about 2:01 to get through the first bunch of "please visit our website, if you are this, please visit our website at, if you are that please visit our website at, if you are lonely please visit out website at, if you are calling about press 1, if you are calling about press 3."

i always press 0. because 0 always gets your right to the real people and not more menus. handy dandy.

anyway, my question took all of five seconds to ask, the response took all of ten seconds to give, I said "thanks have a good day" and was expecting the same.

but instead i got an earful of....

"thank you for calling the British Columbia Student Loan Service Bureau, if you have any questions please feel free to visit out website at www.bcslservicebureau.com or email any questions to customerservice@bcslservicebureau.com."

which added another fifteen seconds or so to the call.

and me sitting here dumbfounded and wondering what to say to that.

so i said "um...thanks? have a good day?"

and THEN i got "thank you, you too!"

really?

like....for serious?

you make me wait through two minutes of that message being droned on by a nasally sounding Barry Manilow voice and then you say it for reals?

that's....i don't know what that is. it's odd.

i mean, wouldn't the easiest way to have ended that conversation be along the lines of "thanks you too, and if you have any further questions just give us a call back or check out our website."?

yes i think so.

simple, to the point, not leaving the caller wondering if they've actually been talking to a computer the entire time.

a brain fueled by lemons

everything zen I don't think so

lately I've been having trouble deciding what music to listen to on the way to and from places. i'll listen to twenty seconds of something and switch to something else and repeat.
on my way home today i got off the skytrain and was walking to the stairs at the station and some girl marches right up in my way, stares at me for a second and starts belting out NO YOUE NOT MINE NO HIT ME BABY ONE MORE TIIIIIIIME and it took me a second to realize she had earphones in.
i get business cards made up when im in Dhaka.
i realized today how much i rely on 16:9 when i take pictures now. im slowly trying to work my way back to 3:2 but it's actually pretty hard. i'm so used to that extra width it just doesn't look right. this might prove difficult when I eventually upgrade to an SLR and even then, a wide angle lens just won't look the same on a display that's not meant for wide screen.
it keeps being noted that when im out with friends most of the time im the only single person there. not all the time, just most of the time. this probably would have bugged the shit out of me a few years ago. now it's a shrug worthy thing. one less person to yell at me if i do something dumb.
plus, i seem to move around a lot anyway so there's that.
im listening to Sixteen Stone right now.
i think children who never had the luck to live through the early and mid to late 90s missed out. try to name any band that's come out post 2000 that's better than any band you listened to in the 90s. there are maybe 4 post 2000 bands in my iTunes.

dont feel low you look amazing.
dont get sick thats no fun.
dont go in the basement there are ants.

everything zen I don't think so

that's what peels are for

today dan and sonu and i watched some random dude get fucked up by building security in the food court for god knows why. the guy was yelling and screaming at them about them hurting him cause there were three of them on him while another dude stood there and periodically yelled at him or something. and everyone in the food court was watching this happen as they were totally roughing him up.
so of course dan and i were like, let's go sit closer and get a better look.
and we're watching this go down and I said "I wonder how long it'll take for this to be on youtube?"
and about thirty seconds later some guy walks up with his camera and starts filming what's going on and the biggest security guy gets up grabs the guy's phone while it's still in his hand, and also the guys collar and shove him back and tells him to turn the fucking thing off and get the fuck out of there, to which there were several fuck yous exchanged and the guy with the phone didnt leave and waited a few seconds and started filming again after the security guy walked away to go some napkins or something.
and then dan was like "NOW it's something you'd see on youtube."
I have yet to find it on youtube.

and then they hussled the guy off to some back room before the cops showed up and were walking around all high and mighty with their radios.

yeah.

wow, you really have some good security ability there. a radio. that must be why it takes four of you to beat up one guy who's screaming in pain.

seriously, fucking security guards come in two types and both are pretty much useless. there's the not specifically building security guys who are hired out off site and they dont even have radios and all they do is walk around with their thumbs up their ass and who are generally not big fat white guys.
and then there's the building specific security like these douche bags who are often big fat white guys with a radio and spiked hair who never ever run into trouble and as soon as the tiniest bit of anything happens BOOM they're all over it like stink on shit in the most unnecessary way imaginable. and then after they walk around with their shoulders up and their radios held up to their ears like they're the fucking bees knees.

no dude, you're a fucking douche bag because suddenly you think it's ok to beat on people and threaten the general public when they point out how violent you're being when you could just as easily have sat the guy in a chair instead of pound his face into the floor.

sorry your life if pathetic and meaningless and all you do is pace up and down halls in a government/university building all day but that's probably your own fucking fault.

that's what peels are for

they aren't fangs, fangs are hollow

this is what my room at home looked like when i was in high school. at one point i had the Che and the Union Jack flags hanging off the ceiling in the middle of the room so you really couldn't move anywhere in there without something in your way. the trend of completely covered walls continued well into university. seriously, you try living in a rez room and not putting stuff on the walls to make it less depressing.

they aren't fangs, fangs are hollow

doors with more

Laborers with axes in Dhaka, Bangladesh
Originally uploaded by AdamCohn

in spite of it being cloudy and grey out, it's a pretty nice day today.
it's easy to disassociate from mountains of snow and roads of ice when you can walk around in a tshirt here now.
compared to the furor of our reading break, lately things have seemed relatively calm.
I wonder how long that's going to last given that there's a month left in the semester.
It's weird to think how fast a year of study goes.
like BAM! hah! emeril'd!

i had a meeting with one of the guys i'll be working with in Dhaka this summer. It made me realize how big a project I'm undertaking, but it also made me realize how much I want to take it on.

i also joined a March Madness NCAA pool. no clue what im doing.

doors with more

explosions in the underground, while rain falls from above, the sweet, musty scent of it bathing buildings, bathing ruins, breathing in the footfalls of the city as it climbs up and up and up until the clouds sit at its head, and the people wander around in a daze thinking how far away they should be.
overhead the curtains call, and close upon the glinting windows of glass cages and towers, capsules to be swallowed and eaten, traps for the most freely bound, and when the water falls, it caresses them, lines like lovers skin, waterfalls on sheets of ice, mired in a mist that never goes away.
Stand up, the marchers are calling you. Stand up, in the clouds circling round so that one day you can wake up,
And tell yourself that you're forever blind if you don't reach a hand above them.

im tired, i managed to get some work done, for some reason this particular scene seems to sum up my mood pretty well.

and now it's time for...

Good Idea, Bad Idea.

Good Idea: Drinking healthy carrot juice.

Bad Idea: Drinking a litre of carrot juice and trying to make it taste better by adding any of the following:

- milk
- powdered iced tea mix
- powdered grape juice mix
- powdered Tang mix
- liquid Nesquik mix
- powdered After Eight hot chocolate mix
- refined white sugar
- Grower's raspberry cider

Final Verdict: Gross. Healthy, but gross. Also, loss of some of the healthy aspect considering the additives.

now ask me if i had something better to do on a friday night.

and now it's time for...

i want to make a movie and the soundtrack is only going to be Tragically Hip songs. The opening song is going to be Boots or Hearts and the closing song is Vaccination Scar.

your task: come up with the rest. also to realize how awesome the Hip are for all the naysayers. you know who you are.

there they are alive on the moon

i got an email the other day saying that this picture has been shortlisted for some contest i didnt even know i was in. it's for Schmap. i had no idea there even existed a thing called Schmap until i got this email. actually, that's the first email i read on my birthday. i thought it was neat.

i think i bruised my ribs last week playing football when i caught the other team's QB with his knee coming up as he threw the ball.

do you ever look at something really mundane and then wonder why is it that people essentially allow that thing so much control over their lives? like today in class, i was looking at a can of coke i had and all of a sudden i got all weirded out by the fact that so much of the world is determined by a little red aluminum can with scrolling letters on it. i'd say this is the first time i've stared at something like this, but it's really not. it's almost like looking at some foreign object that you are aware has some importance but for the life of you, you have no idea why people would put so much value in it. and then there's the name. Coke. Coca Cola. the all American drink. who needs to worry about supplying food and medicine to developing countries, if they know what a Coke is, their lives can't be that bad...

see what I mean?

i got a new pair of nikes yesterday. i can't even remember if i've EVER owned a pair of nikes. i bought them because I'm going to be spending the rainy season in Dhaka and they're built for getting wet and drying fast. the fact that they had a swoosh on them that seems to be a major determinant in a lot of people's lives never really registered in my brain until i got them home. when i pick them up off the display shelf i was initially drawn to them because of their description, not because there's a great big check mark on them. and then later i thought about it, and wondered how many people i've seen on the skytrain or the bus with $200 nikes on because they seem to need them to live their little lives full of swooshes and red cans and little green alligators and whatever. humans are weird. we put so much value and importance on the strangest things.

i have homemade cookies.

there they are alive on the moon

that's what the hell is happening here

the parentals and the aunt and uncle and i went for my twofour dinner at Chill Winston yesterday. twas tasty. today we hit up MEC so I could get some stuff to take with me to Dhaka...i.e....new shoes...new bag...water purifying stuff...board shorts....you know, those kind of things...

tomorrow i am taking them to meet the Rossi parentals.

right now im sitting here trying to get through my next econometrics assignment which thankfully isnt due for another five days. it's a pain in the ass...this time i have to read the damn book. you know what's annoying? subquestions. you're handed out the assignment sheet and look at it and say "sweet only four questions" and then you go look at the questions and each one has like, four separate questions so now your four questions turns into like a dozen. why the hell cant you just give us the dozen and not get our hopes up?

im going to get this stupid assignment done by friday so i can let it lie.

that's what the hell is happening here

stone cold stober

Me - you know what i just realized

Them - what is this?

Me - 24 is 42 backwards

Them - that is a truly earth shattering epiphany.

Me - alright, now consider that in the context of Douglas Adams

Them - hooooo. does that mean that you are the opposite of the Answer? or the reverse of the Answer?

Me - maybe I'm the question

Them - maaaybe.

Me - that'd be pretty rad I think

Them - so you are the question. huh.

Me - I should be coveted

Them - wait- does that mean that in 33 days, I am going to be the question? do you get to be the question just today? or does it last all year?

Me - that's the question, isn't it?

Them - I thought you were the question. is this a question within a question? can I answer in point form?

Me - as long they are bulleted with dots and not numbers

Them - who would bullet with numbers? unless you are indicating some kind of sequential order, which even then, if written properly, should be implied

Me - all good points, however, when dealing with questions questioning the answer, which in itself is a number, perhaps, numerical bullets are in order

Them - wouldn't that only further confuse the reader? because what if, say, you had fourty-one points to argue? wouldn't numbering them indicate a subtext?

Me - what if numbering them is key to the Question? we're aware that the answer is 42 which implies that there are 41 of something else

Them - well, that is a good point. but the 41 of something else could be an implied negative- there could be not 41 of something else

Me - yes, but in terms of numeric value, in that case the absolute value would only matter

Them - is that in terms of the numeric value of the numbering system of the bullet points or the answer?

Me - both. the fact that there are 41 something's. whether positive or negative is inconsequential at that juncture. you could be presenting 41 bulleted points, positive or negative, or 41 Something Else leading up to the Answer

Them - but what if there aren't 41 points to be presented?

Me - then there's a gap between them and the Answer. we know that the answer is 42, but we don't know the left side of the equation

Them - what if it's just two points? what if it's really simple? like 42 plus/minus 0? then the answer and the question are one and the same

Me - but in that case there leaves no room for an equation or question

Them - no, there's an equation, zero has no value, but it's more than a placeholder

Me - yes, but you're still lacking a solution side

Them - 42 is the solution

Me - if that were the case the equation would be 42 +/- 0 = ?

Them - that is the question, but we know the answer, being 42

Me - but that would mean that the Answer is itself the question, which cannot be the case given that Deep Thought provided the answer, but not the question, and then proceeded to design another computer to compute the question, leaving the argument that the solution itself is the question null and void

Them - But was Deep Thought not originally provided with the question, but as it took seven and a half million years, the question was forgotten. If A, then B does not state that if B, then not A

Me - transitivity had no place in that, as Deep Thought cannot have been provided the question if it had to build another computer to discover it. Deep Thought was asked "what is the answer to life, the universe, everything" which we know not to be the actual Question to which the answer is 42

Them- yes, 42 being the simplest answer. so then could 42 not be the simplest question?

Me - how would you ask that

Them - Well, damnit. that's the rub. unless you asked using the actual answer to "what is the answer to life, the universe, everything?"

Me - "I checked it very thoroughly," said the computer, "and that quite definitely is the answer. I think the problem, to be quite honest with you, is that you've never actually known what the question is."

Them - so you are the Question, and now we know

Me - I am the opposite of the Question

Them - I thought you were the opposite of the Answer

Me - oh right I am the Question

Them - well, that's one mystery solved

Me - indeed.

stone cold stober

feathers on a rope

feathers on a rope

Soft Blue Cardigans

you watch now.

Soft Blue Cardigans

i mixed the water

the new nin album is out. i have tried twice to buy and download it only to, twice, have the file been corrupted. lameness. thx to shaz i now get to listen to awesome music.

im a big fan of this new way of getting albums that radiohead seems to have pioneered about being able to get them directly from the artists themselves for varying prices. Reznor picked up on this which is pretty cool. Except for the fact that they may have grossly underestimated the demand for the new album(s), which I find a bit odd. anyway....

i got back the first part of my econometrics paper today after my initial proposal was torn to pieces and wouldnt work and blah blah blah it was shit, i reworked it into an A+ paper now. hells yes good stuff.

my parents are supposed to get into town later today, leaving me with nothing to really do but wait. i have no idea what time they're getting here, so i dont know if i should stick around downtown or go home or what.

maybe i'll go have some lunch or something. it's raining, and i brought my camera but i dont want to get it wet.

also, today is the borderline last day to procure me a toque or boots or anything else Bob & Doug related for tomorrow. so, you know, get on that.

i mixed the water

wasting time like it was free

wasting time like it was free

It leaves today no conversation

for whatever reason, my landlord's son can't keep a wireless network running properly a lot of the time.
thus, instead of chilling out at home, which is what I had planned to do today, I dragged my ass out the door and downtown to school because no one is here and there's plenty of working wireless to go around.
i did, however, take the opportunity of mumbling about a lack of connectivity this morning to clean the place. shower, bathroom, floors.

yeah that's right.

I can cook and clean and woo with music.

if only i had some semblance of a life in which to apply these instead of living at school...

as is plainly noted, there was an ugly sweater party last night.

there were many ugly sweaters.

i havent decided what to do today, beyond coming here to check my email and news and whatnot.

i should probably get some lunch or something.

by the way, that's me showing Jill how to paint like Bob Ross. At some point she was like "Patrick! I need to talk to that painter guy!" to which i responded "he's kind of dead. But ask any question you want and I will tell you what he would say."

It leaves today no conversation