Happy Anniversary, Let's Party

To celebrate the wondrous fact that this blog has been around for ONE whole year, I am not going to post an entry for ONE whole month. The mathematical reasoning for this shocking decision is as follows:

x = 1/a

where x is the # of months you must wait before posting again as to properly celebrate your blog's anniversary, and a is the current anniversary (a = 1, 2, 3, 4, ..., end of the Internet).

I bet you thought the relationship was directly proportional, eh? Well you were wrong. It's inversely proportional.

With a basic understanding of mathematical limits you would notice that as a goes to "end of Internet," x goes to zero. Logically this would mean you would have to post two posts simultaneously, the anniversary post and the following post. Without getting into relativity, spacetime planes, or hyperbolic-orthogonal points, let's just say this would be hard. So don't let your blog last this long. Seriously, only a really arrogant person would honestly think their blog was significant enough to last all the way to the end of the Internet. Don't be that person.

So anyway...see you in September or maybe the end of August.

Neutralizing The Toxicity of Coherent Thought

I pride myself on writing blog entries that are insightful, ingenious, imaginative, and other fancy words that begin with the letter "I". There is hardly a doubt in my mind that this overwhelming dedication to sophisticated literary exposition is the paramount reason for the, on average, four unique hits my blog gets a week. But like most weavers of linguistic masterpieces, I often feel that my sheer level of prose, my, shall we say, grace of tongue, may sometimes alienate a few hopeful readers or, perhaps stated more eloquently, the sea of Internet dimwits. My greatest fear is that one of these lowly critters should happen upon my blog and, with pure glee, dive into an entry only to be sodomized by the big, black, penis that is "intelligent thought." But even now I have begun to waver in my mission to bring forward an entry that can be enjoyed by the masses by way of this high-brow anal sex analogy. It might be best to pause here as to gather my thoughts and continue with some topics more suited for monkeys and pop culture obsessed teenagers.

Popular Music

I thoroughly enjoy the Britney Spears song "Toxic," and though I'm most often ashamed to admit it, it is undeniably true. But perhaps I should expand on this idea. I don't like the words or the instruments or any other sounds or anything like that about the song. What I like is the music video for the song. But again, I must explain. I've never seen the real music video for the song and don't even know if there is one. What I have seen is a very funny video of a boy dancing around and whatnot to the song. The video is called Weird Kid Does Britney (Edit: you can't access this video anymore. Too bad for you.) and, if you decide to click on the link, just ignore all the hardcore porn advertisements in the margins and just watch the video and leave. This thing used to be all over the Internet but now this is the only site at which I can find it so....oh well. Perhaps, though, this is fortunate for me. Now if someone searches on Google for the phrase "hardcore porn" they may come across this blog entry and I will have succeeded in increasing the traffic to my site. Let me say that my favorite part about this particular video is when the boy brushes his hair. It's fantastic.

A "Like, oh my god, did that really happen to you?" Type of Story (Translated For Teens)

So, like, I was sitting at my desk reading this killer article on, like, deep sea fish and junk and Chuck totally just walks right up to me and is all up in my face telling me to do some sort of thing for this guy in the corner and he was using all these, like, sciencey words and stuff and I was, like, completely clueless as to what he was talking about but he finally, like, showed me and it turns out he totally wanted me to ultrasound some old guy's butt cheek. It was mega grody.

Unabashed Nudity

I got home from work today and, here it comes ladies, took off my pants and shirt and changed into some shorts and a t-shirt. I was probably naked for about twenty-six seconds.

So there it is, ladies and gentleman. Perhaps now I'll diversify my reader base and open up my blog to the entire world.

Until next time, folks.

Driving Is Fun

On my way to work today I drove by a Korean bakery and there were cop cars and fire trucks outside. I looked a bit closer and it was easy to see what all the hubub was about. Apparently, one of the customers drove their car through the front window of the store.

Maybe they're right when they say stereotypes are funny because they're based on fact.

Talking To Children

I'll be the first to admit that a lot of things in life intimidate me. I know, I know, it's probably hard to believe considering how arrogant I am in my blog entries but whether you believe me or not, it's true. I am at heart a very anxious person and I often find myself feeling very uncomfortable when faced with certain situations. But I told myself that I'd stop this introduction before it went downhill so far as to become a suicide note so let's just leave it at this and I'll just move it along.

A few days ago it was my cousin's third birthday and before everyone else arrived, she asked me if I wanted to go on a walk. I eagerly agreed because everyone knows there's no other adjective that can be used to modify the word "agreed" when dealing with small children. But similar to the way college grads entering the real world with big dreams and a glimmering outlook on life get kneed in the crotch by reality, my "eagerness" for this little walk was quickly crushed like a pair of testicles when I realized how amazingly awkward a walk with a three year old really is.

Nobody really knows how to talk to a three year old but nobody admits it. I spent the entire walk desperately trying to keep up a conversation with little success. I tried every child conversation opener in the book.

(walking around in an awkward silence)
Me: ...Boy...those leaves sure are big. You could probably wear one as a hat.
3-Year Old: ... ... ...
Me: ...Look at all those birds. I guess they must really like flying because...they're...always...flying.
3-Year Old: ... ... ... ... ...
Me: What's your favorite kind of bird? I like ostriches.
3-Year Old: ... ...
Me: Are you sure you're three?
3-Year Old: ......Yes.
Me: Oh...good. Just checking. Haha...that would be pretty funny if everyone thought you were three but you really weren't...haha...you'd have tricked everyone...funny, huh?
3-Year Old: Let's go back.
Me: Oh...okay...yeah...this was fun don't you think?
3-Year Old: ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...

Also, I don't think I mentioned this but, my cousin is from China. She's adopted. They adopted her from China. She is Chinese. It's pretty noticeable and stuff, but I'm thinking that over time she may forget where she came from. One of my favorite restaurants is Panda Express ("It's finger Ling-Ling good!) because they serve drive-thru Chinese food and eating orange chicken in a Volvo stuck in rush hour traffic on the Capitol Beltway even though it's 11pm is just heavenly. There is no panda on the menu but pandas must have something to do with China so I was determined to ask my cousin about it if I ever take her there.

Just think, if I had a real life Chinese person in the car they might give me some sort of communist discount.

Death By Looney Tunes

I have one of those jobs that you've heard about on TV or in newspapers. You know, the kind where you need a brain. Basically my duties require intense concentration because my job description basically involves two things:

1. Attaching electrodes to people's bodies and administering a sort of mild shock therapy.
2. Performing ultrasound procedures in high risk areas such as on or around the spinal cord or major arteries.

Anyways, today I had to do the ultrasound thing on this lady's neck and while I was doing it up she started talking to me and she had this really thick Australian accent like that Crocodile Hunter guy if he was a girl. I was trying my hardest to focus on the task at hand because I really wasn't in the mood to kill some old lady if I accidentally ultrasounded her carotid artery and messed up the pacing of her heart. Despite my steadfast effort to concentrate though, my focus wavered and her voice triggered a scene in my head from an old Looney Tunes episode. It was the episode where Sylvester gets the world's biggest and meanest mouse in order to teach his son to be tough but when it arrives it's not a mouse but a kangaroo with boxing gloves.

So here I was, fighting off laughter and trying to keep my hand from shaking which would undoubtedly alert the lady that my attention was not on trying to maintain her position among the living. I managed to fend off the shaking but the thoughts in my mind were building. My thoughts branched out from the single image of Sylvester getting his ass beat by a huge mouse to the thought of whether things like this happen a lot to people who live in The Outback.

I mean, we laugh at the prospect of somebody getting kicked in the face by a marsupial but that's because we've never met a marsupial. But things are different for Aussies and zookeepers. They're faced with situations like this on a daily basis and it's probably not nearly as funny.

Australian big-wigs stepping out of Parliament for lunch and getting ambushed...
Schoolchildren getting trampled at the bus stop...
Brides and grooms massacred when one jumps out of their wedding cake...

It sounds funny but I did a simple Internet search for the phrase "bloodthirsty marsupials" and came up with an article telling me this:

"Steven Shorten, 13, suffered massive facial wounds and cuts to his abdomen, back and legs when [a] 150-cm (five feet) tall kangaroo grabbed and repeatedly jumped on him when he was looking for his [golf]ball in [the] bushes in October 1996."

I'll just leave you with that.

Just A Nobody Blogger's Way Of Stickin' It To The Man

Ladies and gentleman, history has been made tonight. If you will kindly look to your right you will see a little Rent My Blog box. If you know anything about renting blogs you probably know that more often than not this whole charade involves shitty little blog owners attempting to latch onto popular blogs in a futile attempt to gain more traffic to their pitiful little sites.

But not here, my friends! Oh no, in this case, the opposite is true. I, the owner of said shitty little blog, am renting my space out to this fantastically popular site called The Fifth Column.

So if you've got even an ounce of brains you'll visit The Fifth Column and help take down the Blogger Establishment one digital brick at a time.

P.S.
If you're not into the whole "social upheaval" sort of thing, you should visit these guys anyway because, honestly, their blog is funny as shit.

All I Want For Christmas Is To Grow Up To Be A Grandma

Don't get me wrong, I have no interest in being a woman. No, not until I'm at least 70. Believe me, if I was blessed with a vagina I would hide it...oh boy would I hide it. I'd grow up and go through my 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, and 60s and I wouldn't tell a soul. As far as anyone would know, I'd be all man. But then one day some young whippersnapper will come up to me in a narrow hallway not big enough to pass slow walking old people and he'll say "move it along grandpa" and at that point I'll know that it's time. At that point I'll turn around and ask him to repeat himself and when he does, THEN I will reveal my true self. Oh yes, ladies and gentleman, I will turn on my heels and pull down my pants and show that guy my old wrinkly vagina and then cue the awe...oh yes, the awe my friends. Cue that awe and that soap opera music because as that dude cringes in fear of the sight before his eyes I will tell him...

"Not grandpa, my boy. I'm all grandma."

And I would go through all this because there is one, single, solitary right afforded to grandmas that is given to no one else. That one thing is the way grandmas can make outrageously flattering statements like "Oh Jimmy, I didn't recognize you because I thought you were a movie star."

And because they are grandmas...you believe it.

I need that.

Metrosexual Dogs

It is my assumption that when a Buddhist meets the lifeform they are destined to be reborn as while biking through the woods on a Saturday, that there is some sort of spiritual connection that links their beings together for some magical instant wherein their souls may blend together in a creamsicle like twist of orange and...cream. Oddly enough, the same thing happened to me today when I rode my bike past the exact breed of dog the Internet quiz "What Breed of Dog Are You?" predicted me to be. There was no spiritual link, no metaphysical bond that merged that Bernese Mountain Dog and I, but nonetheless, as I sped by and our eyes met and his tongue had this big dollop of drool on it and his owner yanked on his choke collar to stop the dog from being hit by me which caused the dollop to cascade onto the asphalt, we became one. I instantly saw in my mind a scene from Lassie when little Timmy was stuck in a well and I thought to myself that, if I were a Bernese Mountain Dog, I too would spend my days saving young boys. The scene faded but just as quickly another one popped into my mind, this time of a female Bernese Mountain Dog with a Milkbone and she was beckoning to me and she had another Milkbone and somehow I knew that that Milkbone was for me. But as a slight smile graced my face, the link was severed by the screams of my sister saying something like "my helmet is so ITCHY!" and that was it.

On a topic not even remotely related to canines, I have decided to grow my hair out so as to obtain some sort of long, characteristically dog-like mane of shimmering dark brown, wavy hair that I can toss side to side in a carefree almost sensual yet still masculine manner. If all goes well, I may attract some homogametes in the process and that, ladies and gentlemen, is not a bad thing at all. In a way though, it's sort of sad because, as you probably know, hair length is inversely proportional to a person's likelihood of joining the Marine Corps. The beauty of the situation though, is that I've never had an interest in joining the Marine Corps! The Navy, maybe, but that's just because one time I toured a decommissioned submarine and the tour guide said that sailors got free refills regardless of rank and that got me thinking, what other armed service allows the lowest of the enlisted men and the highest of the officers to be unquestionable equals in terms of opportunity for massive soft drink consumption? Alas though, the perks of military life is a subject left for some other blog entry on some other day.

I will leave you with one last thing that's been weighing on my mind all day. The shirt I'm wearing today says "My favorite class at Allegheny College is Nap-101" and it's not even true.

What's a guy to do?

Boy Scouts 4Eva

I've been wandering in a state of utter confusion this entire day and even now, as I sit at my desk and type these words, my mind is twisted in knots knotted by the best Boy Scout knotter who ever lived. The reason? My watch says it's April 31 but everyone else thinks it's May 1.

I used to be a Boy Scout but I quit because I enjoyed indoor plumbing far too much. Over the years I simply became less and less thrilled with how wonderful it was to have a breakfast of oatmeal mixed with hot chocolate in a cup that was the same cup I used to dig a hole in the ground to shit in as well as used to hold the creek water I brushed my teeth with. But honestly, I had some good times as a Boy Scout. I learned how to light my hand on fire without it hurting and I learned that the crazy kid whose dad made him join even though he didn't want to must always win at late-night poker because he's got the biggest knife and you and the baby fox from the previous day know he's not afraid to use it to kill baby foxes. But despite what I learned, I quit all the same. And the fox, well, if he knew what he was getting into, he would have done the same.

But it's funny to think about the things that boys do when their parents aren't around. I mean, there are a thousand million things to do when you're in the woods with civilization hundreds of miles away and all you have is a picnic table and a spider infested outdoor bathroom where the toilet is just a hole cut in some plywood. But even in this rich environment filled with possibilities, the activity of the day always comes back to lighting your body on fire.

This in turn makes me wonder why there are no more freak shows. I honestly believe that Boy Scouts and more specifically, Boy Scout camping trips/summer camps, are the breeding grounds for freaks. It's not as much that boys become freaks from attending these events (though little Sammy Willis would beg to differ, what with the fact that he's missing the middle finger on both of his hands) but that they discover their own personal freak-itudes as they're desperately trying to find things to do. For example, on one of my first camping trips I learned that I was really good at not being able to get my towel when somebody threw it into a tree. On a second trip I found out that I had the innate ability to smell feces on the bottom of a shoe anywhere from 0-67 feet away. I could go on, but I'm sure you get the picture.

I guess the whole point of this rambling ramble is that I want to go to a circus where they invite me out into the ring to hold a hula-hoop or something while a dog or elephant or clown or something jumps through it.

give it a title

I've been going through this period of introspection, retrospection and reflection on this here blog's direction. I think the difficulty I'm having in finding things to write about is due to the fact that I don't really know what a blog is and what it entails. I switched to my current blog when I realized that my previous one was becoming just a storehouse for stories I made up while sitting on the couch in high school before classes, at lunch, or after classes were done. People liked them, and I had the most popular blog in school for a while. But then things changed and I found that I wanted my blog to reflect my daily life more so than it did because that's what I thought a blog was all about.

It's this impossible idea of using this blog to highlight my daily life that keeps coming back into my mind. Sometimes I find a blog that is basically a list/outline/excruciatingly detailed account of the horribly boring day some person had which is expertly hidden and embedded on the page in what, at first glance, appears to be something that might resemble prose. This is what I once wanted. I wanted the same shitty blog that everyone else had. I wanted some annoying background that clashed with the font I was using and I didn't want to capitalize the words I used or make paragraphs or check spelling or anything. I wanted my own little plot of land in the Internet world where I could sit down with a sign that, when you got down to it, was just a big fuck you to originality.

I'll admit that the only blogs I personally visit are the one's that have a new naked teenager pictured every day and a concise little blurb underneath about how young the girl looks and how perfect her breasts are. Though I would kill for the sheer number of hits these blogs get daily, I don't want my blog to be like this. I want substance and I want meaning and I want something that people want to read and learn from and laugh at because it's good stuff. But I've never gotten there and so my blog isn't like that.

And thus I'm left with what I have. This...thing...this...amalgamation of mashed up chunks of garbage that I spew across the Internet that means nothing and which relates to nothing that can even remotely be considered my life. I find little nothings in my day and I exploit them. I take them and stuff them full of exaggerated filler and things get so deformed that the part that was my life is gone--wiped away and covered under some fold in the literary material. I stretch and stretch until I can't even remember what was real. And people laugh at what comes out of it. People laugh because it's stupid. Everything I write is stupid and pointless and unimportant and meaningless and fucked up and I don't even want to finish this entry.

San Francisco: If You Were A Robot You'd Be Home

Dim Sum. It's Chinese and translates literally to "pushy waiters bringing you food you don't want to eat because it's a chicken foot." I partook in this "Dim Sum" today while in San Francisco and I must say it was traumatic to say the least. I refuse to think about what I may have unknowingly consumed.

There is this street in the city that is ridiculously crooked. It is probably the worst tourist attraction ever because it was created to be a tourist attraction and the only point of the road is to be a tourist attraction. I can imagine the thought process that led to the creation of this crooked street. Some guy in the San Francisco Bureau of Tourism thought one day, "Hmm, the Golden Gate Bridge is not enough of a reason for people to come to see our city. Perhaps we should create an exaggeratedly crooked street that has absolutely no purpose and is completely impractical and useless." I just don't understand why San Francisco didn't just do what any other self-respecting city would do if they wanted more visitors--bake the world's largest pizza.

In other news, I rode a cable car for the first time ever. I have come to realize that San Francisco is the closest thing this world has to a mechanical city because of the cables that constantly run beneath the streets. This of course, leads to the question of why there aren't that many robots in the city.

And what is the deal with the San Francisco homeless population? First off, I saw maybe three homeless dudes and that's pretty sad. You can't call yourself a real-deal city without an overflowing street-dweller population. And the hobos themselves, Jesus, it's almost as if the city puts actors on the streets who pretend to be homeless people and who make sure to appear happy as not to depress the people driving by. Honest to god, ALL the people on the street had signs that had some variation on the phrase:

Any little bit helps, even a great big smile.

They even drew a smiley face at the bottom. If that doesn't just make you throw up, then there's something seriously wrong with you. Where's the guy with the sign that says:

I'm tricking you into thinking I'll use the money you give me for food and clothing but I really just need to replenish my illicit drug supply and hire a prostitute.

Honesty is important...even when you sleep in a box.

Anamorphic Politicians Wear Holographic Sunglasses

Oakland International Airport smells like a mix between an old-folks home and an indoor swimming pool and I haven't the slightest idea why. Stranger even, is the fact that nobody notices it but me. I asked the man at the Sunglass Hut as I was browsing their selection of shades, none of which I would ever buy because sunglasses are a waste of time. It's common knowledge that the only good sunglasses are the ones I had as a kid that had a skull hologram on each lens. My friend had the same type of thing but instead of skulls he had fish. I asked the man working there if he had any of these and he said he didn't know what I was talking about but I suspect it's because he is a Pakistan man and everyone knows that Pakistan has yet to discover the power of the hologram. India has. But for some reason these two nations fight relentlessly which I suspect is quite a sight because I assume both countries fight while riding on elephants.

There are no elephants in North America. I can honestly say that this has many implications into all sorts of different areas of society. For example, if we had elephants, George Bush would not be president. You might think the opposite would be true since the symbol of the Republicans is an elephant, but think of it this way. I don't know why Republicans have the elephant and Democrats have that ass thing, but I assume it's because these are the animals that each political party can morph into in emergencies such as if the other political party gets too powerful and then use them to cleanse the world and start anew. Since this is undoubtedly the case, the presence of elephants would cause the Democrats to think that the Republicans had already morphed which would lead them to morph in response and the result would be the end of the world. Case closed.

What's important though, is how awesome it would be to live in an underwater retirement community. I would never have to bathe and my grandchildren would actually want to come visit me because they could swim.

They would want to bring their friends.

S-T-U-M-P-E-D

"The Man of the Stump" is what I call him.

He is Asian.

He is one with nature.

He does his homework while sitting on all that remains of a colossal tree that once grew near my dorm.

I don't know what Zen is but if I did then this guy would totally be Zen.

Today I saw him sitting while reading a calculus textbook. He was completely covered in squirrels. They were singing.

I hope that tomorrow he returns.

A Bear Does Not Care

Your mommy says that
you should share your toys fully,
with girls and some boys
though not so with a bully.

But that's 'cause you're human
and must be sophis',
but such is not true
in the dark wilderness.

If you were a cub
deep and snug in the woods,
and had the desire
to selfish your goods,
your momma would only
look down and be smiley,
there'd be no disgraced look
she'd be happy highly.

On no there'd be nothing
resembling a glare,
because simply speaking
a bear does not care.

A bear does not care?
A bear does not care.
Because simply speaking
a bear does not care.

Have you ever wanted
to eat someone's face?
To bite off a leg
just to place in a race?

I bet you your teacher said
that would be dreadful,
she scolded you, yeah man,
she gave you a head full.

But guess what my son?
See that beast by the lake?
If you were her son
you could eat legs like steak.

And why, you may ask
wouldn't that be unfair?
The answer is NO
'cause a bear does not care.

A bear does not care?
A bear does not care.
Because simply speaking
a bear does not care.

Heaven In A Tuba Box

Oh man, I don't usually write in here more than once a day but this is what intelligent people with large, flowing vocabularies call an "extenuating circumstance." However, my vocabulary is not quite as immense so I'm just going to call it "weird."

Anyway, when last we spoke I was going to go get some nachos from the food place and as it turns out, I did. On the way, though, I took a detour through heaven on earth. Now usually people see heaven as a place full of shiny-ness and cloud things and people with little wings and white pantsuits. While that is close to the truth, it's not quite right. It just so happens that heaven is a giant box in which a tuba was shipped but which has had the tuba removed and now all that remains is an ocean of packing peanuts.

Needless to say, I swam in these packing peanuts. The box must have been five to six feet long and two to three feet deep. It was incredible. The box was filled to the brim with packing peanuts and I swam and swam and swam. Eventually, someone came by and told me to stop. I think it was a music professor.

I just thought I'd let you guys know.

Figgle-Eyed Crow

Today was a good day in that I did not forget to wear pants to class. In fact, there has never been an occasion where I have done otherwise so I think that it is safe to say that my entire life has been quite good.

I also made my hair look awesome today. I don't know how I did it but I did it. Unfortunately I messed it up shortly after I styled it because I went in for a closer look in order to bask in its textured goodness and accidentally hit my head on the wall and squished my hair against the mirror. I hadn't the time to fix it so I left the dorm with it as it was and have neglected to attend to it all day.

I also became suddenly very itchy as I left the food court at lunch and I don't know why. This sometimes happens very often.

In genetics today I answered a question regarding regulators and repressor proteins. It wasn't a very difficult questions but the rest of the people in my class are dumbasses and did not know the answer. I'm like the dark horse of the class in that I am a physics major in a crowd of biology majors and I score better than them on exams.

Oh yeah, on the way to class today I saw an old man curse out a crow because he was "figgle-eyed." I don't know what this means exactly, but in my opinion the man was quite figgle-eyed himself. Perhaps he and the crow are brothers. And what about those shirts you used to wear in elementary school that computer nerds in college still wear with the giant picture of an animal like a wolf or a tiger on the front? Supposedly the proceeds from the sale of them goes to helping keep the animal on the shirt from being endangered, or if it already is, keep it from becoming extinct. The trouble with these shirts (and the reason I never got one as a child or as a computer nerd) is that the animals aren't grateful for you donation. No. They are just as likely to eat you if you have one of their shirts on or not. A bear does not care.

Hmm, "A Bear Does Not Care," that's a pretty good title for a poem. I will write it out in it's entirety tomorrow and post it here on my bloggidy blog.

Anyway, tonight I get to go over to the freshman dorm and take part in a membership review board meeting. It's exciting because we get to kick people out of our club. It's sort of like in that Berenstain Bears book "No Girls Allowed" when Brother Bear had that drawbridge he used to keep Sister Bear out of his secret clubhouse. The only difference is that our club doesn't have a drawbridge. And we let girls in. In fact, the president is a girl and so are 90% of the club's members.

Damn. I need to get me a moat.

Hey, I Can Dream

Dear Green Lantern Kyle Rayner,

You are probably my most favorite superhero ever. If you ever get mortally wounded would you please pass your ring of power on to me so that I may become the next Green Lantern?

Thank you in advance for the powers,
Rob

P.S.
I promise not to fuck things up and kill everyone like Hal Jordan.

Flashback Friday: Dick Cheney Stole My Internet (10/15/04)

Haven't done one of these flashbacks in a while, so here goes:

On Wednesday Dick Cheney was here at Allegheny College. He was here to talk about how awesome he is or something. Supposedly Pennsylvania is something called a "swing state" and that means that people here like to hear lies more than people in other states. Wow, that last sentence was actually kind of politically charged--I don't think I've ever said, written, or mumbled under my breath anything politically charged before. Better log this day in my JOURNAL! WOW! That's what I'm doing right now! Holy crap! This is awesome! I'm recording events to be reexamined at a later date! Sweet! So anyway, I thought that the event would be worthy of one of my poems so here it goes. I've been toiling over this one for about three minutes now and I think it's turning out a-okay. Enjoy it or leave:

Dick Cheney came to my school,
Dick Cheney came today,
He brought his thirteen buses,
And then Dick went away.

But nigh before he sped off,
Into the sunset there,
He gave a heartfelt speech here,
and then his pants did tear.

Alright I faked that last one,
But hey it sort of fit,
I couldn't help it sorry,
I'll get on with this shit.

So Dick was here on Wednesday,
The cops were by his side,
This guy had some cool trailer,
Kerry givin' Bush a ride.

The day was not all fun though,
It was no cup of tea,
I had to walk 'round Edwards,
'Round Edwards just to pee.

They closed all of the roads here,
Not one not three but two,
I could not get to class then,
Nigh God could not get through.

I got back to my room then,
My room all warm and snug,
I tried to get my email,
But Dick had pulled the plug.

That's right he took our access,
He took our Internet,
Of course that's just conjecture,
But I'm willing to bet.

Who does he think he is, huh?
Is he so great first rate?
I wish I had a name-gun,
"Dick Cheney" meet your fate.

You might not get that last one,
That stanza's pretty vague,
Unless you're Seth or me my,
Or if you have the plague.

There was this sweet ass protest,
Outside the gym doors lined,
The liberals had these big signs,
And chants that blew my mind.

How could a human think these,
These chants that rocked my world,
"Drop Bush, not bombs" they shouted,
My hair it almost curled.

That's it that's all they've got here?
That's all that they can say?
At least shout out some curse words,
"Hey Bush F*** you, bay-bay."

Of course I am no liberal,
I ain't no Commi none,
Conservative no nothing,
I'm Rob just Rob my son.

But all and all that day was,
Sweet sweeter than sweet sweet,
My poem's almost done now,
Can't b'lieve I kept a beat.

So you know what they say there,
They say just what they say,
The walrus and the carpenter,
In all had one fine day.

Well, that's my poem and I hope you liked it. I have to say that I don't actually know what the word "nigh" means but I like to use it as some kind of negation or a one syllable "nada" or "nothing" or something. When you get down to it though, it doesn't really matter because it's poetry and honestly, how can you criticize something that is defined as "a pile of day old puke not fit for a dung beetle to die in"? That's right--you can't. That's poetry for you. Vomit. Brown, chunky vomit. Take that poetry.

The Spirit of Valentine's Day

Once upon a time there was a boy named Rob. On Valentine's Day he ate so much chocolate that he died. Nobody cared because they were having too much fun eating chocolate.

The day after Valentine's Day the medical examiner performed an autopsy on Rob to see how he had died. She made the first incision, and from the fleshy crevice oozed a thick river of delicious chocolate. She took some on her finger and licked it up and it reminded her of how much she loved Valentine's Day. She then went home.

The morgue night staff continued to use Rob's carcass as a giant chocolate fondue pot, and dipped strawberries in him all night long and into the morning.

As the sun rose over the horizon the next morning, the city dumped Rob's body into a ditch off the highway. After a few hours, a family of raccoons found his body and dragged it into the woods. The mother raccoon birthed her babies in his remains and they fed on the sweet chocolate nectar that dripped from his innards until spring when they left.

Over the months, Rob's body decomposed and returned to the soil. A few weeks later a cocoa plant sprouted from his final resting place and once it had matured, a bear cub strolled by and ate it up.

The bear cub smiled as it chewed. "Mmm...chocolate," he thought.

The End

Happy Valentine's Day!

Fuck Flu!

All the students on campus received this email today from the college health center. I've excluded some of the boring stuff (read: practically all of it), and just left in the meat of the message:

"There is confirmed influenza on campus...It is important to note that influenza in the United States is not the same as the "avian flu" that you have read so much about in the news."

Yeah, that's good stuff.

New Nickname Needed

There's a question that's been bugging me for a few hours now:

How far do you have to be able to throw a pie for your friends to start calling you "Pie Cannon"?

Missiles By Metro

Before I start writing this entry, I just want to make it clear that I am a huge proponent of surface-to-air missiles. Honestly. I believe that there are many tasks where these babies are without a doubt the best suited for the job. Tasks like:

• Blowing up things in the air from the surface.

• Blowing up things in the sky from the ground.

• Blowing up things in the firmament from the earth.

• Blowing up things not on the ground from not in the air.

• The opposite of blowing up things on the surface from the sky.

• Blowing up things in the air from the air and when I say "from the air" I mean "from the ground."

Yeah, surface-to-air missiles = important, especially in this day and age when it's just way too easy for terrorists to yoink airplanes from pilots. Oh, and off subject for a moment, did you know that the word "yoink" actually has a formal definition? Yeah.

Yoink: An exclamation that, when uttered in conjunction with taking an object, immediately transfers ownership from the original owner to the person using the word regardless of previous property rights.

Pretty sweet, huh?

But anyway, the meat of the entry. Regardless of how awesome surface-to-air missiles are, don't we all agree that they should remain in the hands of people we can trust? Yeah, I think so too. So wasn't I surprised when I was riding home from work on the Metro this summer and saw Stinger missiles located at every above-ground Metro station. Does this seem odd to anyone? Does it seem strange that the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority is in possession of surface-to-air missiles with a firing range of 5 miles, a sophisticated tracking ability using infrared radiation sensors, and the ability to hit almost any target with a heat signature with an altitude under 11,000 feet all from a man's shoulder?

Sure, I guess I don't know for sure if these large metal cases with the word "Stinger" written on them in big red block letters actually contain missiles. I suppose they could just be housing giant first aid kits for bee stinger removal in case the entire solar system got stung by bees at the same time. And did you know that killer bees are no deadlier than regular bees!?

But seriously, let's assume that the cases do have Stinger surface-to-air missiles in them. I have to admit that I don't like the idea that our nation's last line of defense against terrorists who want to blow me up are Metrorail drivers. I guess this is in large part due to the fact that Metro drivers do not actually drive the trains. They're kind of like the Queen of England or the King of Spain. Sure, they have fancy names, large, elaborate hats and a seemingly important and influential position, but they don't. They just sit there, smile at people, and walk around a little bit. Sometimes they throw a medal at you if you did something special but when you get down to it, they are the most useless, lazy, good-for-nothing, people in their entire country. I mean, think about it, nobody in their "royal bloodline" has had a real job in hundreds of years.

Do you realize that all Metro trains are controlled by a computer down at Metro headquarters and that the only reason they even need a human being "driving" the train is to open and close the doors and announce what the stops are? That's right. And if you've ever been on the Metro you'd know that these guys can't even do that. I ride the Metro home every day and every day there are at least five people that get crushed by the doors because the driver closes them on them. And what about the other 50% of the driver's job description? They must have that portion mastered, right? Wrong. Have you ever been able to hear what the Metro driver is saying? You know he's supposed to be saying Farragut West so why is it that you could have sworn he just said "Orange Town"? And since when does Smithsonian start with a K? I mean, I can understand screwing up L'Enfant Plaza because that's French. And who really knows how to speak French? Nobody.

The point is, if the government is going to hand out free missiles why did they decide to give them to the WMATA? Getting back to royalty for a moment, isn't it obvious that giving missiles to Metrorail drivers is as stupid as giving them to the Queen of England? I mean, they don't know what to do with them. Queen Elizabeth would probably sit down and have tea with it, put it in a parade, and then give it a medal.

A Little Out Of Our League

This is a conversation I had with a friend the other night. I decided to color code everything. Pretty.

JOHN- rob
JOHN- rob
JOHN- rob
JOHN- rob
JOHN- rob
ROB- what?
JOHN- you need to hook up with this girl (long link #1)
ROB- that's nadine njeim
JOHN- sweet name. how'd you know it?
ROB- john, that's miss lebanon 2004
JOHN- really? i had no idea
ROB- yeah, that's who that is
JOHN- well you're from lebanon
ROB- no i'm not
JOHN- well your family is
ROB- so?
JOHN- that means you've got a pretty good chance
ROB- do you know the population of lebanon?
JOHN- yes
ROB- well?
JOHN- about four million
ROB- lucky guess
JOHN- thank you cia world factbook
ROB- john you need to hook up with this girl (long link #2)
JOHN- that's the chancellor of germany
ROB- you're german
JOHN- i'm going to bed
ROB- goodnight

I'd Like To Thank The Academy

A few days ago the fighters returned (See The Eighth Plague Grandmaster). This time though, I was ready. I had my camera with me and was able to film a short clip of their savage battle squad. The film I made of the whole thing was so great, in fact, that Google Video decided they wanted it up on their site. As such, you can now view it anytime you wish. It's called Ravine Fighters, and it seriously is the breakout film of the year. It features the roommate, yours truly as the narrator, and Mighty Joe Young just to name a few.

Edit: This video is on YouTube too. You might as well just watch it below:

Now Serving Number 4703

The Chinese have just reached the year 4703, but frankly, I'm not impressed. If the Chinese are over 2000 years ahead of the rest of the world, tell me why they have yet to invent rocket boots? Is it because they're lazy? I'm embarrassed for the Chinese. I don't understand how a civilization can claim such supreme oldness and not have the technological advancements to back it up. For God's sake, it's the year 4703! Where's the goddamn DEATHSTAR!?

I ordered some Chinese food the other day and they brought it in those little white foldy buckets with the metal handle. Remember in Back to the Future 2 when Marty goes to his future house and they have that little pizza thing they put in the microwave and after they hit a button they open up the microwave and the little pizza had turned into a regular pizza? Why don't the Chinese have that? Plus, I looked out the window as the delivery dude was driving away and he was in a Toyota Tercel. You'd think that by the year 4703 the Chinese would have stopped buying Japanese cars and have their own Chinese brand jet-cars that fly on pure, unfiltered Communism.

If I were General Tso, I'd be turning in my delicious brown sauce filled grave.

#1 CHINA BUFFET!

Happy Chinese New Year

Garbage Man, M.D.

I've always wanted to pitch an idea to a major television network. I've been rolling an idea for one in my mind for a while now (since sophomore year of high school, I think) and I believe it's turned out well. In my opinion, there are two things that make a great primetime drama. 1) A catchy theme song. 2) An amazing pilot episode.

Luckily, I just happen to have both. Now before I release these to the Internet I would like you to promise to not steal my ideas. Of course, I don't trust you so I am hereby invoking a REAL DEAL COPYRIGHT. Well let's get this thing going.

TITLE: Garbage Man, M.D.
THEME SONG:

He's a Garbage Man...
Who's also a Doctor Man.
He'll sew you up with used dental floss,
And fill your veins with used tomato sauce.

He's the Garbage Man...
Who's also a Doctor Man.
He'll ease your pain
With 10 CC's of cocaine,
He'll beat off the hobos eating your brain,
You'll become his biggest fan...
He's Garbage MAN!!!
M...D...

PILOT EPISODE (Runtime: Approx. 5 minutes):

[Garbage Man M.D. walks into the Mayor's office wearing the skin of a prostitute]

Mayor: What in god's name do you think you're doing, Garbage Man M.D.!?

GM: What does it look like I'm doing? I'm out on the streets saving goddamn lives!

Mayor: You're a garbage man!

GM: I'm a doctor first and I always will be!

Mayor: I don't give a flying fuck if you're a doctor or not! Your methods and tools are dangerous and I won't stand for it! You are a menace and you're endangering countless lives!

GM: I'm SAVING lives you fool! Why do you think I spend so much time in the sewers? It's not so I can bathe in feces, you know. I do it in order to collect the feces and inject it into my patients' bloodstream. Then, maybe, if there's any left I'll bathe in it, but that rarely ever happens!

Mayor: Are you listening to yourself? You're a psycho!

GM: Would a psycho have these? [pulls out a handful of pigeons coated in motor oil and lashed together with dental floss]

Mayor: I think it's safe to say yes. Plus, if you haven't noticed, your assistant is a mangy old dog.

GM: Watch what you say about my wife, asshole!

Mayor: I've had just about enough of this, Garbage Man M.D.. I want you to stop practicing street medicine and get back to your real job---picking up garbage.
[Garbage Man M.D. scowls and turns to leave. The Mayor takes a bite out of his ribblet sandwich and then quickly clutches his chest]
My God! I'm having a heart attack!
[Garbage Man M.D. looks back but just shakes his head and continues to walk]
Garbage Man M.D., please save me! I'm dying.
[Garbage Man M.D. stops but doesn't turn around]

GM: Save you like you saved my daughter?

Mayor: [gasping for breath] No, Garbage Man M.D., that was an accident! I tried to help her with that harpoon gun. I wanted her to grab onto it and have me pull her back to the boat, not have it rip through her face!

GM: Perhaps. But I guess we'll never know. Now please...just die. I have hobo abortions to perform. [straightening his prostitute skin jacket he steps from the room and out of view]

THE END, MOTHERFUCKERS!

Sorry! I've Been Promoted!

My reign as the Ultimate Sorry! Champion lives on after a grueling five game series last night. The evening began with Jon coming out to a 2-0 start, but I skillfully rebounded to pull off the overall win by sweeping the last three games.

I must say that Sorry! is quite the amazing board game. It combines the mystique of Parcheesi but succeeds in liberating it from it's Yahtzee-like dice rolling, while integrating the colorful magnificence and superficial apologies of say, Pop-o-matic Trouble, and the space-age translucent playing pieces reminiscent of, well, space.

Anyways, I am now a teaching assistant (TA) for the Physics Department for the second semester in a row and I must say I am quite excited. Last semester was spectacular but the mechanics labs that I led were a little dull. Professor KB was a good guy and I'm somewhat sad to see him go, but I realize I'm now going on to bigger and better things.

Yes, and so it is with great pride that I say goodbye to Introductory Physics I, and give a hearty hello to Introductory Physics II. So long mechanics, pleased to meet you electromagnetism and optics. Nice knowing you Professor KB, and let me introduce to you now, the greatest of all the physics professors at Allegheny College, and the man who will supervise the labs I run.....

Ph.D. from Dartmouth...
Enjoys nuclear physics and sprinkled doughnuts...
Walks with a limp...
Fan of homestarrunner.com...
Thinks I'm awesome...

You guessed it, it's DR. DAN WILLEY!!!

Well I'm too excited to write anything else so...

Rob out.

Fast Times in Claim Area G

Most of yesterday was spent hiding in the corner of an abandoned baggage claim at Pittsburgh International Airport while watching episodes of The Simpsons on my laptop. I stopped briefly to pick up a $10 wrap from the refrigerated shelving unit at the Pennsylvania version of Au Bon Pan, which distinguishes itself from other Au Bon Pans because of the fact that the Pennsylvania version decided not to upgrade to the fully functional, working model of a restaurant. The actual sandwich making service was unavailable because of understaffing as well as because the ovens, breads, cheeses, and other essentials were all cardboard replicas of real items. Not unlike what you find in Ikea, where they furnish their office settings with plastic televisions and computers that are merely painted to look like their functional counterparts and which can be lifted easily without effort and tossed back and forth between good friends on a Saturday plagued by unexpected rainfall, boredom, and a lack of individuals who can come up with good activity ideas. These situations are usually free of mishaps but on the off chance you pick up a real computer used by employees and drop it due to the unexpected weight things can get a little messy, in which case (when it happened to me) I fled and skipped my usual $1 vanilla ice cream cone from the snack bar.

Nevertheless, the wrap was tasty enough and it was accompanied by a large blueberry yogurt made crunchy by the complimentary granola presented to me at time of payment. Uneventful, though, my lengthy stay at the Pitt'n'Port was not. My mysteriousness coupled with the fact that people often mistake me for an A-rab, which, when occurring, I kindly explain that their racial slur was perfectly valid because my family does in fact hail from Lebanon, caused me unwanted attention in the form of a security guard stationed in my vicinity and a strange "old woman" who asked me where the baggage claim to "retrieve lost sweaters" was located.

I had my bag searched again. I really think I should have been given a "Frequent Searchee" card by now but perhaps it was lost in the mail. They say that the searches are random but I've taken my fair share of logic and probability courses at both the high school and undergraduate level and I think that being searched 16 times out of 16 (that's in the past two years) is just slightly unheard of considering the vast number of people who travel by air in any given time period and the fact that none of my friends or family of friends have ever been searched.

Well, I have nothing more to say at this point in time. Perhaps at a later date I will return.

Ushapti