December 2005 Archives

The Nutshell (Cracker)
Christmas

We blue highwayed it to NM from KS
If you've never taken US 54 from Wichita to Tucumcari, NM- Do it. It kicks ass.
Did the trip down in two shots
Did the trip home in one shot
Lobo is a rockstar, was beloved by all the hatas down south
Presents are cool
My in-laws rule (pillows for xmas? BRILLIANT!)
KittyValium is amazing
Da Bears are going to the NFC Title Game and dare I say it? Dare I say it? Yes, I say it.

Da Bears D will make Matt Hasselbeck their own personal biatch
Da Bears are goin' to Da Superbowl
Da Bears will beat Da Pats 20 years after they did it the first time
This time, the WILL shut them out

I am asking Rex Grossman to go to prom with me.

Think he'll say yes?

Wow, I can't tell how scared I am by this.

Let's run down the checklist of reasons to be afraid

1- Fourth film in a series where I loved the first two and never saw the third.
2- Direct to DVD release.
3- Unrated
4- Centers around a minor, though funny as hell, character from the first three.
5- Centers around the younger sibling of a supporting character from the first three who saw his role grow as other more prominent actors realized that this series was career suicide.
6- Should have been called "Eugene Levy Needs the Money."
7- Does Eugene Levy really need the money that badly? Cuz if he does, we can take up a collection.
8- Entire film is premised on a memorable line from the first film.
9- They ran a sneak preview of it on USA Network after RAW this week and before a showing of film two.
10- Did I mention it's titled "Original Film Title Presents: New Film Title." This is never a good sign for a movie franchise. Never.

Yeah, I'm scared. Maybe we should all get together and watch it.

The other day my boss came by and said

"Nenie, you're getting a raise."

Only he didn't tell me when it started. So I assumed it was Jan 1.

So I called HR today to straighten some things out and while I was talking to the nice HR lady she said,

"So you're excited for your big raise in March?"

WHAT?!?

Yup, my raise is effective at the end of March.

But here's the silver lining. They're going to retroactively pay me for all the money I SHOULD have made if my raise had kicked in sooner.

"Nice, so in March I'll get a check for $XX/day for the three months between January 1 and March 15. That's some nice money." I say to the HR lady after I do the math.

"No, Nenie. The check will be for $XX/day for the FIVE months beteen March 15 and October 31 (my first day in my new department...did I mention that I was transferred? I was.)

Yup, so if I can make it to March, I'll have a phatty, phatty check coming in. It's awesome.

The HR lady is currently trying to make it so my raise is effective Jan 1, though. So the retroactive check will be smaller. She figures they'll be paying me the money anyway, why not give it to me up front?

FOUR JOBS YOU'VE HAD IN YOUR LIFE:
1. Cinnabon Gnome
2. Copy Boy
3. Residential Counselor
4. High School Teacher

FOUR MOVIES YOU COULD WATCH OVER AND OVER:
1. Star Wars Epsisodes 4-6
2. Love Actually
3. Varsity Blues
4. Dune

FOUR CITIES YOU'VE LIVED IN:
1. Hoffman Estates, IL
2. Northfield, MN
3. Maryville, MO
4. Lawrence, KS

FOUR TV SHOWS YOU LOVE TO WATCH:
1. CSI
2. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
3. The West Wing
4. Good Eats

FOUR PLACES YOU'VE BEEN ON VACATION:
1. Miami, FL
2. Elkhart Lake, WI
3. Cali, Colombia
4. Seattle, WA

FOUR WEBSITES YOU VISIT DAILY:
1. livejournal.com
2. espn.com
3. cnn.com
4. wrestlinging.com

FOUR COSTUMES YOU'VE WORN ON HALLOWEEN:
1. Luke Skywalker
2. Jake Blues
3. Rey Mysterio
4. Garfield as Handsome Roy Gato

FOUR SCHOOLS YOU ATTENDED:
1. St. Hubert's School
2. Hoffman Estates High School
3. Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy
4. Northwest Missouri State University

FOUR OF YOUR FAVORITE FOODS:
1. Colombian Empanadas
2. Chilean Empanadas
3. Italian Beef Sandwiches
4. Deep Dish Pizza

It takes a special person to talk about a sub .500 D3 football team.
And I am just such a person.

From an alumni mailing...

"Football was 4-6 (2-6 in the MIAC), the most wins since 1996. Unfortunately the rumors are true; they received the only NCAA sanction in Carleton's history for violating the NCAA's off-season practice policy."

Wow.

Like, I know they broke the rules, but they WON! Not just a game, 4 games! That's like 4 times as many victories as they had in my four years there. (I know this is an exageration, but not by a whole lot.)

Plus, how Carleton is that? Getting busted for studying too much...

Is it wrong of me that I kinda wish our first infraction had been for something a bit sexier?

But, looks like the coach packed up and left for Beloit College. Making him the first person in recorded history to leave NFLD for Beloit. Even Strick had the good sense to go the other way.

iTunes meme from alphasarah

Open iTunes/iPod or Windows Media Player to answer the following. Go to your library. Answer, no matter how embarrasing it is.

How many songs: 8915

Sort by song:
First Song: "!!!!!!!!" - The Roots
Last Song: "Я СОШЛА С УМА" - tATu

Sort by time:
shortest song: (Blank Track) from "Fly"- Dixie Chicks
Longest Song: NPR: Music for Saturday, 26 November 2005

Sort by artist:
First Artist: 2Pac
Last Artist: ZZ Top

Sort by album:
First Album: ... Oooh On the TLC Tip
Last Album: Zooropa

Top Five Most Played Songs:
"Dime Bag of Funk"- Funky with Two Es
"Extraordinary"- Liz Phair
"Te Mando Flores"- Fonseca
"She Thinks My Tractor's Sexy"- Kenny Chesney
"I'm Bad, I'm Nationwide"- ZZ Top

First song that comes up on Shuffle:
"If I Ever Feel Better"- Phoenix

Search ....
"sex", how many songs come up? 69...no, really, seriously. I can't make that up
"death", how many songs come up? 75
"love", how many songs come up? 400
"you", how many songs come up? 785
"final", how many songs come up? 8

I had the most bizarre dream last night. Far as I can tell it was right before I woke up and was interrupted by my alarm going of at 5:30a.

Right, so I'm back at Carleton and it's like the middle of winter term if the snow on the ground was any indication. I'm the me I am now, my age, that is and I don't know what year I am ... but since I'm 26 in the dream ... I'm totally older. The plot of the dream was that I was killing time before I had to leave for the airport to go to China for the remainder of the term/year.

I was living in Nourse at the time when my phone rang telling me it was time to go to China, pack up and be at Sayles in a few hours. I was happy to be going to China but sad that I was going to miss broomball season, since I figured the Drama Queens finally had all the pieces to go all the way. Sad, but not detered I grabbed Billie, my broomball stick and headed over to Minervacat's to hand her the stick and hand over the captaincy of the Queens to her. Only, I never quite made it over to her place because I was distracted with the thought of heading over to Evans to see Mrs. Gunder and say goodbye to her.

Oh, did I mention that Nourse had been completely refurnished with stuff from IKEA?

Well it had.

At this point, I didn't see a single other Carl. From here on out Carleton was populated by people I know from life in Lawrence. Friends from school, coworkers and so on. When I got to Evans I couldn't remember what collumn Jo lived in so I called her from my cell phone that couldn't get reception at all, so I headed out to the balcony to make the call. On my way there, I saw a line leading up a stairwell (that doesn't exist in reality) leading up from the Evans Dining Hall. In line were a few coworkers who were complaining about the long line.

Eventually I ended up in the basement of Boliou talking to The Bobo and TongueRingCoworker talking about his photos.

Yeah, a strange dream that seems to be an amalgam of things that have been going on in my life.

The IKEA thing comes from Jonathan Coulton song about how IKEA is powered by a bunch of Norsemen. While listening to this song last night I started to wonder what it would be like if the furniture in Nourse were made by a bunch of Norsemen ... The Gunders show up because I really owe them a call ... I did hand over the captaincy of the Queens to Minervacat when I graduated and even gave her (and the other co-captain) one of my broomball sticks (Ella, if I remember. Because I kept Billie and Stevie for myself.) I never lived in Nourse after frosh year and I never went off campus, either. So that part of the dream is odd as is all the non-Carls showing up.

And the Boliou thing is weird. I really wish I could remember how I got there. The transporting isn't strange in dreamland, I know. But in this dream I remember walking from place to place and looking at the landscape between Nourse and Evans and all the pretty snow and stuff. Really odd, yo. And I was talking to someone the whole time ... but I can't remember who.

HOLY MOTHER OF SHIT IS THIS GUY FUN.
credit caucus (moorem? konzems? someone of that vintage) with hooking me up with this guy's cover of "baby got back"

thing is
the rest of his stuff is pretty entertaining as well
if you're the type who fantasizes about being an evil overlord
or writes romantic poems about fractals ... yeah
carls and imsageeks

check him out