The Best of Both Worlds

I talked with the folks at CCT, and they said that we could make it work so that I can do both SNOOPY!!! and Godspell, which was kind of the BEST AND MOST FREAKING AWESOME POSSIBLE OUTCOME I could have imagined.

It is unfortunate that I don't get to work with the other director, but I'm really excited about how possibilities have changed into realities.

Also, my mind and emotions have been ablaze since Thursday night trying to figure all this stuff out, so now that it is finalized, it's almost like my mind, body, and spirit just crashed. Seriously, I'm suddenly exhausted, and this is the only reason that I can see for explanation.

Thanks to all for the advice, and I could not be happier with how it turned out.

Wicked

So the gf and I were trying to get seats to Wicked this morning as this was the first day that tickets were available. It should also be noted that the ticketing office is right next door to a large hall that is the site for various events, including governmental ceremonies. It should also be noted that, luckily, our office building is right next to the ticketing office.

Because our office building is so close, the gf and I were tag-teaming the line-waiting. When it was my turn to go and wait for a while, I left the office and headed over there, and as I was walking out of the building, two people who work for my company in a different department were noticing the line of people waiting and were trying to figure out what it was.

As I passed, the suggestion that I heard was, "Are they having an immigration ceremony today?"

Right. A line that at least half caucasian people is obviously the line for an immigration ceremony, especially if it takes place in San Diego. We have a HUGE influx of people from Northern Europe who want to live here. HUGE.

An Update

I have been formally offered the parts of Max and John the Baptist, though not necessarily both.

Blah blah blah standing on a precipice blah blah blah big decisions to make blah blah blah uniquely marvelous position to be in blah blah blah.

Carry on with your days.

How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love my Life

Gentle readers (or even the more forceful ones), I have a pretty good idea what I'm going to do about the situation that I am in, but I would like to have your feedback as well.

I have auditioned for three theatre groups in the area for a combined total of seven shows.

The first theatre had the show that I was most hoping to get into, Urinetown, as well as two other shows. However, as it has been over a week, and I have received no word from them, I am not exactly feeling the most positive about my chances. In fact, were you to take your mouth, and put it on an exposed piece of skin and blow, and thereby make a "raspberry" sound, that sound would be kind of how I feel about my chances. This would have been a paying job with a semi-prestigious theatre.

The second theatre group called me back for the part of Max in The Sound of Music, John the Baptist or Judas or some other featured soloist for Godspell, and as a chorus member in one other show. I have played Max before, and the part kind of fits me, but I'm not overly excited about the prospect given my other opportunities. I have never been in Godspell, but either of the named parts plays an important and exciting role in the show, as well as having at least one really great song. This theatre group is fairly well recognized in the area and they usually do pretty good work, but they don't seem to be as well respected in the theatre community here. A plus to doing a show here is that the theatre is huge, and so it would be a great opportunity to shine in front of a lot of people; a minus is that it is not paying.

The last theatre group is doing a production of SNOOPY!!! (yes, it has three exclamation marks after it, don't ask me why. It should be noted, however, that one of the scores had it listed with only two exclamation marks. Come on, people! Are we really, really excited about the dog, or just really excited?). I saw this audition a month ago, and I was excited, because after a couple of years of not getting the roles that you want due to typecasting, you become enthralled when you could be typecast for something. As I am somewhat overweight and have a bald head, I believe Charlie Brown is one of the few characters in musical theatre that I really fit the bill for. This theatre is small, but it is gorgeously brand spanking new, and I would receive a stipend for the show. The stipend is not very large, but I think everyone can agree that it is wonderful to get paid for what you love to do.

Now, this is my dilemma. The directors of both Godspell and The Sound of Music apparently love me for the parts that I mentioned above. I have not heard any definite offers from them, but from what one of the directors told me, they would rather offer me both the parts over the phone on Friday and then make me decide than to decide themselves. I am pretty confident that they will offer me Max, and about seventy percent confident that they will offer me either John or Judas. The big problem that would keep me from getting cast in Godspell is my aforementioned lack of dancing skill and the fact that I have to go to a more advanced dance call back tonight for this show. In my favor is that word is that certain of the lead singers don't necessarily have to dance.

As far as Snoopy!!!, I talked with the director last night at call backs about the possibility of the other shows, and he thanked me for my forthrightness. He then proceeded to email me within three hours of the end of call backs (aka 12:30 a.m.) and offer me the part of Snoopy, which is, in fact, an even better part than Charlie Brown because it has three or four terrific and fun songs. I would also be receiving the largest of the monetary stipends for the show.

My dilemma is compounded by the fact that if I did get cast in Urinetown, I'd have a hard time even turning chorus down because I love the show so much. You may refer to this as the wild card option.

My number one choice is Urinetown, but I don't think that it's likely I'll get cast. My number two choice is John in Godspell, but that is followed very closely by Snoopy because it's such a good part. I also really want to work with the director for The Sound of Music because I am interested in seeing her directing style.

It will be very difficult to do both Godspell and Snoopy!!! because performances of the latter overlap with rehearsals for the former. It is possible to do both, but only if I could skip or only go to rehearsals for part of the time and then run off to a performance. It would be impossible to do Sound of Music with either of them. It will also be impossible to do Godspell and Urinetown, although I could do Snoopy!!! or The Sound of Music and Urinetown quite easily.

A disclaimer: I really hope all of this doesn't come off as arrogant, because that's not my intent.

So, with all of that in mind, does anybody have any suggestions?

Well,

After at least a month of waiting after submitting my little blog, I was finally reviewed over at italk2much.com.

You may click the link if you like, but rest assured, it's not favorable.

I expected to get knocked for the lime green template; I know that they hate those, but I expected my content to earn myself some points.

Instead, I am told that I have "an inability to reliably string thoughts together in a manner that is logical to the outside observer." This kinda makes me think that he didn't really read it, but more just hated the template and glanced at my blog for other reasons to hate it.

Although, for the record, this is the criticism that I receive most from my girlfriend. That is, I'll start a conversation, and then be two or three steps further down the conversation trail, and respond from that vantage point, as opposed to where any reasonable person would assume that we were. I will take this under consideration.

I believe that my only possible retort is put best by that scholar of our times, Ralph Wiggum: "Me fail English? That's unpossible!"

In News Only a Music Major Could Find Interesting...

Some scholars believe that Mrs. Bach wrote some of the music that J.S. Bach has gotten credit for. The article says that at least one person who thinks this said that some of Bach's pieces just seemed to lack the genius of most of his other pieces.

In response, the long dead Mrs. Bach said, "Hey! Get off my Bach!"

See, it's funny because it's like back...never mind.

But seriously, this is huge. This is like finding out that a baseball player who may overtake the all-time home run record did so with the aid of illegal substances, or that a scientist who worked to clone a dog in Korea didn't actually clone the dog. This will shake the world of music to its core; well, at least for the three of us that care about two hundred and fifty years dead composers.

This Guy

This man is my hero, in only the way a man who has majored or minored in women's studies can be my hero.

Seriously, he's been in college since 1994, and he is only planning on leaving now because he is out of money because of a new law that charges people who have thirty units more than they need to graduate a higher tuition.

I wanna go back to school. Sigh.

Fascinating

VP Dick Cheney is getting a tax refund. A big one.

This next bit is the part where I lose most of my readers.

I'm something of a closet liberal; there, I've said it. And by that I mean, that I've read and seen most of what Michael Moore has to say, and I think the man makes some good points. I don't agree with everything he says, but I'm glad that there's somebody saying it.

Now, in one of his books, he informed me that there was an actual form from the IRS that people fill out when their income tax refund was going to be larger than a million dollars. I scoffed at first, but then I realized his point: if the IRS has made a specific form for people getting that large of a refund, it must happen quite a bit. I had never heard of anyone in specific getting this, but now I have.

Now, in the VP's defense, the reason that he is getting such a large return is because he donated something like six and a half million dollars to various charities.

This next bit is the part of this post that I lose the rest of my readers.

I'm something of a closet conservative, and it is evidenced thusly: I would one day like to make so much money that I get a $1.9 million dollar income tax return.

So, Mr. Cheney, I am appalled/envious of your achievements in the world of income tax returns. I would like to be just like/nothing like you.

Another Day in Paradise

I complain from time to time about my job; this should come as no surprise to anyone who reads this page. I don't think that this is the most upright thing that I can be doing concerning my current situation, but I think that, for right now, it's okay because it reminds me what my true dreams and aspirations are. In working here, I am fully taking advantage of the fact that everything is permissable, and I'll even go so far as to say that my working here is advisable given some unfortunate monetary decisions of the past couple of years.

However, this whole job would be worthless if I couldn't find some joy in it. I think that that's part of the reason why I started this blog; to seek out what my motivations are for being here, to try to make sense of what I'm doing here, and to make people smile at my arduous journey through it all. I believe that, with each post, I am accomplishing this with various degrees of success, and that, with each post, I am able to understand myself through the concrete form of written communication versus the abstract form of human thought, because despite the similarities between the two, by actually having written them instead of just thinking them, my thoughts become a physical part of me that I, and others, can then understand.

Writing also aids my perspective. Though I am certainly discontent with my current occupation, the fact that I will not let myself be here forever gives me happiness. When things are rough, I rest in the notion that, unlike those whose whole careers are encapsulated in what they accomplish today, the rest of my life has little bearing on what I do work-wise today. My accomplishments at home practicing are much more valuable to me than anything here.

So how then do I live? Do I do everything at work as poorly as I can? Logically, if I don't care about being here, why then do well?

The answer is that throughout the rest of my life, I will be presented with tasks that I could give a flying flip about. If I choose to do poorly now (as funny as I think it would be to be fired for gross incompetence), doing poorly will then be my first choice for how to act in similar circumstances for the rest of my life. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is not how I want my tiny smudge on the timeline of human events to look.

*Exhale* I apologize for this ideological tirade. We will resume regularly scheduled programming with the next post.

Thinking in Ohio

To be sure, most of the blogs that I check out regularly are pretty much fluff. I'm generally looking for somebody to make me laugh or smile on my breaks from work. It helps me get through the day.

But one day, I was sitting at home, and clicking that button up in the top right portion of the page that says, "Next Blog," and I happened upon a page with the title of "Thinking in Ohio." I thought to myself, "I like thinking, and while I do not live there, I am largely ambivalent towards the midwest. I shall have to give this one a read-through."

And I did. And what I saw there was a man who was grappling with some of the weightier concepts of trying to live as a Christian, as well as a man who was trying to honestly make sense of life. I was compelled to go back frequently, and I think that, no matter what you believe, if you like to read about a person trying to put it all together, you will find yourself going back frequently as well.

I will offer a disclaimer, though. When you go there, in one of his recent posts you will find him offering me very gracious praise. I just want everybody to know that yesterday, before he posted that, I was thinking to myself, "Man, I really like that site. I need to write something in my blog about him so that all three or four people who come to my blog will go and see the goodness over there." Sadly (or, I guess, happily), he, unbeknownst to me, beat me to the punch, and now it may just look less like I am offering him honest praise.

You'll just have to take my word for it that this is not the case; he produces quality work, and I'm looking forward to getting to know him little by little through his posts and our comments to each other.

That's all. Go there.

In Case Anyone Hasn't Heard...

Cruise to Eat Nutritious Placenta

Hollywood actor and Scientologist Tom Cruise is planning to eat Katie Holmes' placenta.

It is the latest in a series of strange revelations by the 43-year-old 'Mission: Impossible' star about the child he is expecting with fiancée Katie Holmes.

Cruise told GQ magazine: "I'm gonna eat the placenta. I thought that would be good. Very nutritious. I'm gonna eat the cord and the placenta right there."

Cruise has also claimed he knew that Katie Holmes was pregnant before she told him.

He has also defended the Scientology belief that women should give birth in silence.

"It's really about respecting the woman. It's not about her not screaming," he told GQ.

Cruise plans to marry 27-year-old Holmes in the summer. He said earlier this month that their baby was due "any day now".

Now, as we all know, eskimos used to, and, as far as I know, still eat the placenta of their young. This is because childbirth is a very difficult thing to go through, and the mothers need the protein that is in the placenta in order to survive.

Therefore,


=



It is important to note that this has been my working hypothesis all along, namely that Tom Cruise is actually an eskimo woman. It was nice of him to let us in on the secret. Don't worry, Tom, your secret is safe with us.

P.s.: Tom, if you ever really do read this, it's not that I dislike you, it's just that I am a fair-weather friend. You are probably a pretty reasonable guy, what with having been in all of the cool movies that you've been in, and despite some of your questionable movie choices. What I mean is, when I am held up to media scrutiny, and a friend of yours insists that you post about me on your blog in a comical fashion, I would expect nothing less.

Love, your pal,

Analyst Catalyst

A Hypothetical

Let's say that you have had a project hanging over your head for a customer since December. Let's also say that there was something wrong with the way things were set up on your side of things since December, so you haven't been able to complete this project for the customer as of yet.

Let's say this customer sells apples.

Now let's say that you are so close to finishing this project for the customer that sells apples, that you can almost taste it, but there are a couple of variables for the project that you are unsure of.

Now, let's say that you email a coworker who has worked with this customer who sells apples before to try to figure it out. Because he has helped you before, you assume that he will again help explain to you what the issue is. Now let's say that he calls you back, after receiving your email, to say, "I don't mean to offend you, but I don't want to look at anything that has to do with the customer that sells f#$%ing apples any more today."

Let's say you take that under advisement, and you wish him a good day.

Now let's say that you speak with the person who trained you for your position servicing the customer who sells apples, and you ask her to clarify. You even send her a spreadsheet that she had already received in the hopes that she would be able to help you. You are sure to mark in the subject line that this spreadsheet is about the customer who sells apples.

Now, let's say that she writes you back and says that the spreadsheet does look funny for the customer who sells ORANGES, and that you should talk with your boss for clarification.

Now, hypothetically, with a maximum of 18, from how many stories up do you throw yourself from the window of your office building?

Ah, Thursday

For my money, Thursday is one of the best days of the work-week.

Monday and Tuesday I find myself wallowing in the depression of the "This is really what I do?" attitude. These two days are the hardest grind of the week, because Friday seems so far away.

Wednesday is the apex of the week, or the hump if you will. You know once you get past today, it'll all be down-hill, but getting past Wednesday is the tricky part because you are equidistant from the weekend: it's three days back and three days ahead. This is the day, more than any other day that you can't remember what your life was like before you were, er, encouraged by society to go out and make a living.

Friday is a good day, because you are on the last step before freedom. However, I often find that Friday becomes overshadowed by having to consider which "restful" things I will be doing on the weekend with all of your hard earned cash. You also can't really get a whole lot of work done because you can taste the liberty sandwich that you are about to consume.

But Thursday, the world is alive. You know that you're close to the end, and so you can take a deep breathe, relax, and know that all is closer to being right with the world.

Sigh.

Gas

I have heard reports that gasoline will be up to $5.00 come summer. I thought that that was a ridiculous number, even though gas is back up a $3.00 a gallon down here in San Diego.

However, the above prophecy may come to pass. Consider this gas station in New York; gas is up to $4.50. So at least we in California have something to be thankful for, in addition to the terrific weather, proximity to anything we could want, and the many other perks of living here.

I wonder if I can convince my boss into setting up a cot in my cubicle so that I can save on gas during the work week. Maybe I'll make him an offer he can't refuse...

Hmm...but that's assuming he likes parfait. According to a popular cartoon, even ogres like parfait, but what if my boss doesn't?

I know! I'll offer him gold dubloons! Now, all I need to do is find sunken treasure from a pirate ship. Who doesn't like sixteenth century Spanish gold?

Genius.

Two Things

First, a comic from a wonderfully funny website: explosm.net.


Secondly, I am amazed at how well Netflix works. My roommate subscribes to this service, and he gets three or four new movies a week.

Let me just say that I, at first, thought that Netflix was a dumb concept. That is, why would I want to wait two or three days to get the movies I want, when I could go down to Blockbuster and get whatever I wanted the same day? However, in my analysis, I had forgotten a deeply engrained truth in American culture: people like to get mail.

I myself like to get mail so much, that even when I fail to get advertisements that I don't want, I leave my mail box feeling disappointed. If it's been a rough day, it's even worse. It's like, "Not even people that want my money want to communicate with me today." However, when you get movies via mail, you get a sense of self-worth (ridiculous as that may be) and, well, movies.

However, on the flip side of the coin, Blockbuster online is supposed to be pretty sweet too, in that they give you a free coupon every so often to go in and get a movie.

What say you, the reading populace? Have you tried either of these services? What are your opinions?

Also, this is officially my hundredth post. Huzzah!

An Update

Yesterday I wrote and said that I was not looking forward to the diversity training.

Let me just say how calloused and unenlightened I was in my young age! It wasn't until I got there, and the presenter started talking about how we all just need to be respected that the scales fell from my eyes, and I was no longer blinded by my own prejudices.

In reality, though, it wasn't all that bad. Although most of it was common sense (don't tell a pregnant woman that she needs something that beeps when she's walking in reverse and don't make comparisons about your coworker to Willy, the whale who needed to be freed, if he's overweight [apparently it's okay if he's a regular weight]), it was actually a kind of enjoyable time.

The presenter had me at her joke about how this sexual harassment course was not a course to learn how to sexually harass better. What can I say? Curse this bleeding heart!

Training Day

Today is the day that the new hires get to go to meetings all day to learn about the benefits of working for the company that we work for. We learned about the intranet and our insurance options and so forth. The day will culminate with a riveting discussion about celebrating diversity.

Now, while I don't have any problem with diversity, let's just say that I am about as diverse as a white guy in a cracker factory...oops, what I meant to say was that I am about as diverse as a cracker in a white guy factory.

Hmm...Probably neither of those above statement are kosher. I'll have to keep those to myself until next kwanzaa when I pull out my four leaf clover, eat some borscht and sauerkraut, and pray to my elephant-looking, many-armed deity to save the whales and emasculate the men.

But seriously, I'm not looking forward to the hour between two and three this afternoon; from what I've heard from those who have gone through this orientation before me, this is the most boring part of the day.

Oh well. At least I've got another call-back to go to tonight, and after that I'll be able to stop wondering if "call-back" should be hyphenated. Well, I guess that I can still wonder; I just won't have to type it as often.

Call Backs Last Night

This last evening, I had the priviledge, nay, the honor of going to call-backs for Jesus Christ Superstar. It's pretty exciting because I enjoy the show and the music, although pieces of it are difficult to swallow theologically.

Anyhow, I was called back for one of the priests. They herded us all onto the stage, and made us sing twelve measures of one of the priest's songs. I think I did pretty well, and the director made some mention about the part Annas with me in the same sentence, so we'll see how that works out.

Life is alive with possibilities.

In other news, I was walking downtown the other day, and a fire trunk went made a screaming turn down the street I needed to walk to to get back to work. I kept my same route, and came upon the fire truck stopped, with no fire in sight, and I couldn't help but think, "Hey buddy, where's the fire?"

...because I'm a horrible, horrible person.

The Opposite of Serendipity

When I came to work this morning, it was very warm; some might even say that it was hot. It was so hot, in fact, that I didn't take my coat with me from the car.

How does the weather turn from that to rain in the space of two hours?

A Sign

I was walking by where our mail boxes are at the apartment complex, and I noticed that someone had put a sign up advertising what things that he would do for money. I should have taken a picture, but I didn't, and so I'll just retype the sign.

"HI! I clean houses and babysitter. My name is XXXX and you can reach me at XXX-XXX-XXXX if you are interested."

The cleaning houses thing I could see him making money at, but who even hires a babysitter that is dirty? And who would want to pay for the cleaning of said babysitter if it showed up dirty? This just seems like an aptitude entirely too specific to make any money at. Now if he said that he cleaned babysitters, that would be a different story, in that oftentimes I see flocks of filthy babysitters walking down the street, and I just wish that there were some way to clean them.

But one...it just doesn't seem cost-effective.

Because I Am a Moron

I believe that I mentioned it here before, but in case I didn't (and in case you didn't know), I shave my head. This becomes a bit tedious at times, but overall, I like the look and I feel like people respond better to me with a shaved head than they do with me just balding.

Now on Tuesday, my sick day, I played a fair amount of PS2, because I'm a nerd like that, and I, at one point, was so disappointed with how I was playing that I took the PS2 controller and hit the edge of the controller up against my forehead. It was a dumb thing to do, and I should have known better, but I didn't hit myself especially hard and so I didn't figure anything bad would come of it. Unfortunately, there is a small divet around the edge of the controller, and this sort of caught my skin, and I am now left with the monument to my stupidity in the form of a crescent shaped scab in the center of my forehead.

I've been telling everybody the truth if they ask about it, but I wanted to ask you, the readers, your opinion. I'm not saying that I would necessarily change my story, but I am curious to see how you would hypothetically respond. Would it save more face if, instead of telling the truth, I claimed that I had cut myself shaving? This would seem a pretty silly blunder, but it would certainly be somewhat less embarrassing than admitting that I had been so upset by a VIDEO GAME that I had mashed the controller against my head.

Also, would it help if I explained that I was playing Madden '06, and I had just thrown an interception that had been run back for a touchdown?

Early for Easter

My mom and my grandma are the best people on earth. After kind of a bummer of a day yesterday, I come home to find that I have a package. I assume at first that it is just something that I ordered off of ebay, but closer inspection shows me that it is an Easter basket in package form complete with a handful of fake grass and all the chocolate I can eat.I also got a new shirt in the mix.

I just wanted to say thanks to my mother and grandmother for brightening my day.

After a Day Being Ill,

I returned to work today, victorious over the forces that sought to keep me from feeling minty fresh, but I was feeling a bit down on myself due to the fact that there was now a mountain of things to do at work. I couldn't help but feel a little behind.

After I got slapped for the aforementioned action, I got back to what I actually meant by that statement, which is to say that I had not accomplished all of the things that I had to do.

However, I remembered something that I had heard yesterday, namely that an italian mafia boss had just been arrested after evading police for forty-three years.

I'm just saying, that number makes our three years of looking for WMDs in Iraq seem a lot more reasonable, and it certainly makes my work being one day later than anticipated seem like a lot less drastic of a situation.

p.s.: I know that was a cheap shot about the WMDs. What can I say? I pander to the masses.

p.p.s.: Doesn't the mob boss look like the devil in the photograph in the link?

p.p.p.s.: Don't the Italian police look like terrorists? If that's what they look like all the time, I can only imagine what humorous situations they must find themselves in.

Because I Didn't Post It Yesterday,

Go here and read this. I would offer analysis, but she found and posted it, so I will leave that to her.

Dance Callbacks

Let me just say that the seven years of dance classes that I took as a kid were apparently completely and totally wasted on me. I drew a cartoon a while back that was making fun of Brent from this season's Apprentice that I believe works just as well for me, and so I will now repost it.

With that image in your minds, I will now proceed to describe dance auditions.

First off, I made sure to get a terrible night's sleep the night before so that I would be sure to be able to give my very best for the call backs, which were at noon on a Sunday. Also, in addition to sleeping poorly, I had to get up early to practice for singing and playing with the band at church of Sunday morning.

All practice and no sleep make A.C. a dull boy.

After church, I drove over to call-backs thinking that I can't imagine the thing would go on for any longer than an hour. I feel so confident in my assumption, that I, even though I am a half hour early, sit and wait in my car with my eyes shut in order to get a bit of rest for what I assumed would be a very difficult hour.

When I finally walk in, I get into what I think is the line, which is four or five people back from the table where they were signing people in, only to realize that the line started in a different room than the one I was in, and it was more likely that I was at least a hundred people back from the table. It turned out that the whole experience took about three hours.

But all of that was fine. I waited. No biggie.

We eventually got called into the theatre from the waiting area, and they asked us if we considered ourselves singers/movers or dancers. Because I really don't consider myself either, I went with the first because it sounded easier.

And it was. They taught us the first routine, which was mostly walking around and box-stepping, which was easy enough because I walk around every day, and the box-step is one of the handful of dance moves in my vast choreographic library. The routine was so easy in fact, that it lulled me into a false sense of security. I thought, "Man, I'm a dancer!", because I think in short excited thoughts like that that have no real substance. They then announced that there was going to be a second routine, and any hopes and dreams that I may have had of a dance career came crashing to the ground like the chandelier does at every performance of Phantom of the Opera: jerkily and not at all believable, which was how I danced the second routine.

Let's just say that when you are asked to perform the dance routine, and the choreographer is not smiling but laughing, it makes you think that maybe, just maybe, you're not the twinkle-toes that you thought that you were.

However, it was still an enjoyable experience. Yes, even though the second dance routine was less a dance routine and more my personal interpretation of the Hindenburg disaster, it was a lot of fun to be dancing and moving and being considered for a part in what I consider to be a pretty good theater company down here in San Diego.

And, even with it going as it went yesterday, I still have call-backs for specific roles in the shows, and so all is not lost. In fact, things are looking up.

SAT Scores

Would you expect anything less from a lawyer named Snodgrass?

This lawyer is suing the company that administers and scores SAT tests because they incorrectly scored several hundred tests.

I don't really have anything of merit to write about this, I just thought it was hilarious that the lawyer's name was Snodgrass, and I'm immature like that.

Nouns into Verbs?

The following is an excerpt from this si.com article.

"After all, it's not like I can claim last Monday didn't work out for me, seeing as how 35 minutes after leaving downtown I was chowing an avocado burrito at Campo's on Pico and 20th in Santa Monica..." (Italics mine)

Are we really going to accept this? I mean, however disgusting a purely avocado burrito would be, that is merely drawing attention away from the fact that the noun chow is being used as a verb. This is ridiculous, and poor English to boot!

However, having said that, I guess I actually empathize with the man in that just this morning I was carring along to work when I was struck with a hunger pang, so I decided that I needed to food. When I was finished fooding, I completed carring to work, where, upon my arrival, I speeched with my boss about some issues related to my work. Upon finalization of speeching, I movemented to my cubicle, and chaired myself up to my desk, where I occupationed until the lunch bell belled, at which point I fooded some more. After lunch, I employmented up until five o-clock, at which point I legworked back to the parking garage and vehicled my way home. All in all, I vocationed well today. Thank goodness that I have workweeked to completion. Luckily I shall be reposing and relaxationing this weekend, otherwise I could never job again on Monday.

Seriously, is that really the language that we want?

Scrabble Calendar Update

"Which name on the list at the right is not an acceptable SCRABBLE word?"

Henry,
Holden,
Helen,
Harry.

Can anyone tell me what the answer is and why? Well, especially the why part since I looked and saw the answer already, so I'm a step ahead of you in that department.

For Those Who Were Waiting with Anticipation

I went to my audition last night that I wrote about a couple of days ago. It was an open audition for the entire summer season, which consists of four shows. I was only interested in three, however, because the fourth show is, I believe, primarily a dance show, and I am not exactly nimble on my feet. In fact, even the thought of me dancing drives grown men to tears, and not in a good way.

In any case, I was called back for the three shows I was interested in: Jesus Christ Superstar, The Wizard of Oz, and Urinetown. I was not called back for huge roles, but the roles I was called back for are decent roles that will be fun to play, assuming I'm cast.

I am giddy with the possibility that life has more to it than this cubicle again. That's all I needed.

An Open Letter to Washington Mutual

Dear Sirs,

When does free checking cease to become free checking? Apparently when your company arbitrarily decides to start charging fees for using ATM machines not at your locations. Now while it would be quite handy for me to use your ATM machines if I, say, lived at your location, this is, unfortunately, not the case. In fact, when I tried to do so, you ran me off with a hose.

When do I lose faith in my banking establishment? When I call about the fees that I have recently started to get, and I get a reply that says that I will be charged three dollars for every time I use a non-Washington Mutual ATM during the month in question, and the fees that I have been charged are in the amounts of four dollars for the month of February and ten dollars for the month of March.

The last time I checked, four and ten were not divisible by three without a remainder, which leads me to believe that I must have used an ATM for only a third of a transaction, with I guess the other two thirds of the transaction being my money being dropped to me by bird and speaking with a teller who was under the impression that her head was a rectal thermometer.

What makes me sad, nay, angry sirs, is that your bank is still probably the best choice in banking, even with your new policy changes leaving me feeling as taken advantage of as a District Attorney would be wherever this sticker is stuck.

In conclusion, thank you for teaching me the value of a dollar again. This is a lesson that I will remember.

Love,

Analyst Catalyst

Fantasy Sports

I signed up for a fantasy baseball team with yahoo through a group of people I've met online at a theatre website. This has got me to thinking, however, that why is it that sports are the only fantasy style game available to us? Why doesn't somebody make up a fantasy media/celebrity game? And by that, I mean, people would get points for how well or how poorly some celebrity does in the media spotlight on any given day.

For example, Tom Cruise is going to be a father: plus twelve points. However, he's unmarried, and his opinions on child birth are kinda scary: negative fifteen points.

Hmm. I suspect that it would just be too difficult to say what were positive points and what were negative points. Dang pluralistic world.

I would just be interested to see how a Pitt/Jolie combo would match up against a Spears/Federline one. I think smart money would be on the Pitts; they have a veritable army of children on their side.

I Don't Intend on Making This All About Sports,

But there were a couple of items in sports news today that I thought were noteworthy here.

One: Steve McNair, the quarterback for the Titans, tried to go to the Titans' building to work out, and he was asked to leave. Now while he may not be the greatest QB anymore, there was a time when this man was one of the best in the game, and to not even let the man into your building after he has been such a great force on your team just seems mean on the part of the team. That's like not letting Mrs. Butterworth and Aunt Jemima back into the syrup factory to share their delicious sweetness because they were getting too old. However, even this is more classy than

Two: San Diego fans try to get the juice to Barry Bonds more quickly than he could have gotten it to himself. The fans at the game last night threw a syringe, minus the actual needle, onto the field near Bonds as he was walking by. Now Bonds may be the most hated man in baseball since Ty Cobb, but is that any reason for us to encourage his alleged steroid habit? If you are going to be mean, at least be helpful. Why not throw some literature for Drug Addicts Anonymous? At least then it would be more likely that he would get clean. This brings me to

Three: San Diego won. This means that they are undefeated so far this year. Now, you may argue that they have also only played one game, but at that point I would poke you in the throat with my index and middle fingers and tell you that you had only played one game, and that you had just lost, because I'm violent like that.

Let the jubilation commence.

A sign of the Apocalypse

As has been pointed out elsewhere, at two minutes and three seconds after one in the morning on Wednesday, the complete date and time will be 01:02:03 04/05/06.

You've been warned.

Also, I have an audition with a theatre group down here in San Diego on Wednesday night for a show that is one of my very favorites: Urinetown. Now while just about everybody (including a character in the show itself) may concede that this is a terrible title for a show, it's probably the funniest musical that I've ever seen in my life, and that includes Oliver (because being mean to kids is funny).

So come Wednesday night, assuming the Apocalypse has not yet happened (which would be just my luck), wish me well as I give this the old college try, which I assume means getting blindingly drunk while wearing a sweater with a monogrammed letter on it.

Spotlight

So I got conned into running spotlight at the college that I went to for their spring musical. They are doing a production of Little Women, though not the one that was on Broadway last year.

Anyways, I was checking my fantasy baseball on the computer here (because I'm a nerd like that), and all of a sudden I receive an instant message from somebody I don't know because some other person I don't know was signed in on the computer. I was presented with an ethical dilemma: admit that I was not the person that they meant to write to, or else converse with them incognito.

I think we all know which option I went with. I nearly got caught when I assumed that the other person was a student at the school and asked if they were planning on coming to the show, and they responded with, "what? i don't know what your (sic) talking about." To this I responded out loud, "UH," and tried to exit the program, but was unsuccessful in doing so, because I'm a moron and I think that X-ing out of the instant messenger box will sign me out, only to be horrified when a new window opened up with the continued conversation.

In any case, the other person said that they would probably go, and I told him to talk to me the next time he saw me about it. Now that is a conversation that I would love to hear.