hello, dear friends!

omg we haven't blogged in 2012 and it's already the end of july. lazy? preoccupied? unable to string together actual sentences and thoughts? all of the above, perhaps. and maybe because it's easy to post something quippy on facebook and receive immediate reactions. those "likes" sure soothe the ego. or something.

anyway, i am going to actively avoid talking about anything that may even touch upon my work. SO...let's talk about the olympics! first, it's so boring to talk about the passage of time, but seriously, didn't beijing happen like last week? how have four years passed? second, i won't be cheering for the US, don't worry. my many, many years living here have not convinced me that i should add to the nativist fervor. finally, does anyone still care about the olympics?

oh yes, this also allows me to talk about one of my favorite subjects in life: how old i feel/am. one of my college internships was for nbc olympics's FIRST website. i think i may have blogged about this before, but every four years, i'm reminded of how novel it was to move this content online. and apparently nbc is streaming the whole thing this year!

 so there you go, folks. opening ceremony in a few days.  relax.

 in the meanwhile, you may want to read this extremely long profile of bruce springsteen. bruuuuuuuuuuce!!!

an education

it's not exactly a state secret for me to reveal that i did not enjoy law school. i was very, VERY lucky to make the incredible friends i did, but the academic experience was, simply, bewildering. the socratic and case law methods made absolutely no sense to me and lacked any relevance, immediacy, or applicability.

now that i have this nerdy/wonky job that requires me to read dozens of law review articles every week (and which i sometimes do for...fun), i almost wish i could go back. the law makes so much more sense now, probably because i see so vividly how it permeates everything and that human beings can affect its course.

why am i bringing this up? not to bore you to tears, but i was listening to a podcast that discussed "music for 18 musicians" by steve reich.

i went to one of those colleges that thought you needed to study certain subjects to be a well-rounded person. i actually welcomed the opportunity to study in a structured environment, though my friends and i derisively told each other that we were learning merely "jeopardy" or "cocktail" knowledge through the core curriculum. as with most things smug 18-year-olds say, it's wildly overblown, but somewhat true.

so i am quite sure that i studied steve reich, except that i remember only his name, nothing more. but maybe i learned some critical listening skills, which may have come in handy, finally! listening to the above piece immediately reminded me of this:



or maybe this even more:


as the podcast said, reich seems almost quaint because that pattern and melody are used in virtually everything, including pharmaceutical commercials. so perhaps it's mere ubiquity, not my overpriced education, that helped me make this connection?

anyway, remember when sufjan stevens said he was going to make an album about each of the 50 states?

squeeeee!!!!

i'm not one for super-overtly cutesy stuff, but this is a relaxing way to ease into the week.

hello again...for now

like occupy wall street, the future of this blog remains somewhat unclear to me. this used to be a mishmash of random thoughts--generally speaking, things i wanted to bring to others' attention but seemed unfit to be shared elsewhere. maybe this forum lacks the instant gratification of a "like" button or an immediate audience that basically is also somewhat captive.

anyway, enjoy the above. deep thoughts by jack handey are my madeleines.

"ed is with the ayn rand institute"

i attended a federalist society panel discussion today. yeah, i know, why. let's just say these are the hazards of my new job. and i actually overheard the above, which, on some level, should not even cause me to raise my eyebrows. except that it is so exactly what you'd expect to hear in this forum that i couldn't believe my luck.

oh yeah, the panel was on whether we should be guarding against the infiltration of sharia law in america. i won't even bother with the arguments that were presented. that mess was predictable, too.

but that all ties into the actual theme of this post, since i know this blog is not your source for legal arguments / hard news (and if it is, you are awfully patient). i once heard (saw?) an interview with louis ck in which he said that people without any doubts are the funniest. he cited donald rumsfeld as an example of someone of unwavering certitude / guaranteed hilarity. i'd definitely add bankers/traders/whateverthehellyoucallthem on that list.

i will cite two examples:

1. jamie dimon. this guy. let's see if i understand this dispute correctly. in a meeting of international bankers, jamie deez tore into mark carney (chief of the bank of canada and widely expected to be the new head of the FSB, which wikipedia tells me is an international consortium of bank regulators that issues, uh, regulatory recommendations) because the latter supports higher capital reserves for banks. this presumably would prevent against the type of hyper-leveraging of our pre-september-2008 banking world.

what was dimon's defense? that these suggested standards were "un-american." now this made me laugh. because, in my view, trying to defeat an international agreement by arguing it is un-american is possibly the most american thing i've ever heard of.

2. alessio rastani.

i've never heard of this trader and i'm not sure how he is qualified to opine on the state of the international financial system. but hey, i suppose talking heads are a dime a dozen nowadays. for whatever reason, i expected the bbc to have some standards. his basic theory is that you can't depend on governments for shit and the eurozone is going to implode.

ok, whatever, that's fine. i even overlooked his statement that "governments don't rule the world; goldman sachs rules the world" because, let's face it, it's kind of true. those dudes own everything.

however, his worldview did make me sit up and take notice. for example, "we [traders] don't really care how [governments are] going to fix the economy . . . our job is to make money from it." then he notes that even though history remembers the great depression as a time of turmoil and grief, some were able to make money from it. indeed, and that is an example of how "anybody" can make money from the current worldwide economic debacle.

wow, anybody? "not just the elites?" sign me up. of course, his definition of "anybody" is a clever take on the english language: "those with a plan," e. g., "hedging strategies." then he tells everyone to "learn how to make money from a downward market," and that we all should "protect our assets".

anyway, i often am accused of being kind of a downer or too pessimistic. well, i dunno. my newest retort is that i must believe in some form of human progress to have the job i have. if i were truly nihilistic, i'd brush up on my hedging strategies and join . . . a hedge fund. those guys have it made.

bonus links:

do you think some lady accosted michelle bachmann to tell her that vinegar caused mental retardation in her daughter?

chris christie and i have more in common than i'd thought.

2pac, d. 9/13/96

Damn. 15 years goes by fast.

Harrison Ford's Earring

I AM PLANNING MY COMEBACK POST, NERDS. IT'S GOING TO BE FUCKING EPIC. BOLD-AND-ITALICIZED-AND-IN-FUCKING-ALL-CAPS EPIC...

Meanwhile, here's why we can never have original thoughts anymore. A tour of my mindgrapes recently:

Step 1 -- See picture of Harrison Ford (above) with his dumb earring; Catch him on some late night chat show with his dumb earring, chatting about how he's a rich fuck who decided he liked the horse he was riding in whatever dumb movie he oldmanned his way through recently, whereupon, I shit you not, the audience applauds. The audience applauds his decision to buy the Hollywood horse in some movie about cow dungs and aliases like Harrison Ford is some kind of great protector of animals. The fuck is wrong with people?

Step 2 -- Wonder why Ally McBeal lets Harrison Ford leave the house with that stupid earring. It's so stupid. I don't care how much Kabballah you do or Ciroc you drink. That shit is so dumb. Everybody knows it's dumb. Fucking George Lucas, who has a bulbous challah bread for a neck and a facebeard and made the worst movies ever made, probably thinks that shit is dumb.

Step 3 -- Decide to create a fake Tumblr for Harrison Ford's earring.

Step 4 -- Sinking feeling sets in; Decide to check that no one else has made a fake Tumblr of Harrison Ford's earring.

Step 5 -- Confirm that someone has. Here it is. Fuck. 

Step 6 -- Fake Cormac McCarthy Twitter Account?

elegy

so, if you're a regular reader of this blog, you know that i started a new job. so far, so good! but today was my first day and i think i'm predisposed to not sleep the day before the first day of anything, so, y'know, unreliable narrator and whatnot.

i'm going to get so emotional, baby.

i feel an enormous sense of loss. i suppose that is a cliche, and i probably should explain in greater detail. despite all of the problems at my old job, i wholeheartedly feel it was the first time pretty much ever i enjoyed being a lawyer. and that includes all three years of law school. i worked 12, 14, 17 hour days (consecutively!) completely voluntarily. sure, i was tired, but it was nothing in comparison to how empty i felt whilst working at the firm. i always thought people who told you to do what you love were privileged assholes spewing their trust-funded bullshit. but you know what? those people, whatever their station in life, are 100millionpercent right. if you are ever so lucky to find something you enjoy doing AND it pays a living wage?! by god, i hope you can hold onto it.

this does not mean that i'm not excited about what's ahead. emotions aren't mutually exclusive. it's perfectly logical for me to simultaneously feel bereft over the past and hopeful about the future. if you don't think so, perhaps that's a limitation of your emotional range. and the american obsession with everything sunny all the time always. nonetheless, i would say the lowest depth of misery is to have something you love taken away from you through no fault of your own.

i was feeling rather self-conscious about just how deep this shit was, then someone pointed out that if you're supposed to be passionate about what you're doing, then it's impossible for you to not feel equally passionate upon its sudden departure.

so there you go--i have no answers. i'm tremendously grateful that i got to experience that period of belonging. and here is to hoping that i can regain that, and that you can experience it, too.

separated at birth--hot but confusing edition

that new zoe saldana movie--columbiana or whatever it's called--this entire time i thought it was starring thandie newton. c'mon! they look a LOT alike.

what do i do if a hurricane strikes?

why not engage in some aughts nostalgia trifecta?

first: revel in the new cheney memoir, which includes gobbledigook like, “Economic policy was being run out of the White House, and meetings to make big decisions often did not include the Treasury secretary. O’Neill should have demanded — as Hank Paulson would later demand — to be included in any White House meeting about economic policy. On the other hand, either the president or I could have said: ‘Where’s O’Neill? We should not be having this meeting without the treasury secretary.’ ”

chase it with this gem.

then, tada! the piece de resistance.

final countdown

so...last day! seriously, i cannot believe it's here. i almost don't want to say anything because i fear i am going to jinx myself. but hey, why not go out on a limb--i'm done! this is the first time i've ever really had a transition between jobs. i've held limited-term jobs (internships); i've been summarily dismissed from a job (layoff); and i've been allowed to leave some jobs on virtually no notice (working for my parents). otherwise, i quit my first post-college job on a friday and started work at a new job the following monday.

all that is to say, i've never looked forward to a vacation more than this. i'm going to shore up my liberal bona fides by finally watching the wire. i'll let you know whether it blows my mind.

things i will miss about dc

- affordable rent
- public transit that does not resemble a trashcan on wheels
- feeling ok about not going to the gym because i'm feeling thin, on a relative scale
- feeling stylish because i brushed my hair even though it's still wet
- living two blocks from a target
- being surrounded by people who are possibly more nerdy than i am (NB: didn't think it was possible)
- concerts that don't sell out before they even officially go on sale
- streets that don't smell like urine and/or festering garbage

TBcontinued...

duh news of the week: korean edition

actual research was needed for these conclusions??

Korea’s typical CEO is in his 50s, is surnamed Kim, lives in Gangnam – Seoul’s most expensive neighborhood – and graduated from Seoul National, the country’s top-notch university, according to a report published on Tuesday by Korea Listed Companies Association.

He is also a Seoul native, majored in business management, and is likely to have founded the company he runs or is a member of a founding family. He goes to church on Sundays, and is most likely to be enjoying a round of golf in his spare time.

hipster or...ajumma?

did you read this article in the times about how everyone is now foraging for edible plants in new york city parks? when they say everyone, they mean it: But foragers today are an eclectic bunch, including downtown hipsters, recent immigrants, vegans and people who do not believe in paying for food.

y'know, this has been weighing on my mind for quite some time. there is SO much in common between hipsters and ajummas. who are ajummas, you, white person, may ask? well, in the blandest sense, it is a korean word that technically refers to a middle-age woman. it usually carries a pejorative connotation. you wouldn't call a sprightly, beautiful woman an "ajumma." because she will kill you. but to me, an ajumma is more of a state of mind than anything: she doesn't give a shit, she asserts her own needs, and she will have her say. she will negotiate for a discount without speaking a word of english, and put you in your place with just a look. here is a good definition, too.

but for purposes of this post, i'm going to examine some of the common traits between hipsters and ajummas:

- pasty skin (whether natural or hard-won)
- love of pickling
- saving and reusing jars, plastic bags, and take-out containers
- love of purchasing second-hand goods- unique sense of style

anyway, in my thegoogling of ajummas, i found this article about a 66-year old (!) korean woman who stood up to two armed robbers. hot damn, girl! two amazing quotes:

Somehow, Kim managed to push the man, grab on to the edge of the counter and brace herself, blocking his path. Kim recalled what she had learned from watching the television show "Cops."

Hadley, who probably won't be readily telling anyone he was chased down by a 4-foot-10, 100-pound Korean woman, was charged with armed robbery and is being held on $250,000 bond. My favorite part, after all that, is Ms. Kim's advice for her would-be robber: "He [should] study. Get out [of jail], he find a job. Don't go to school, no job."

and as the blogger notes: That's gangsta.

Baby Gosling

Here is what you get when you Google image search "baby Gosling." First of all, why are you searching for that? That's redundant. All goslings are babies, dummy. Second of all, what the fuck is up with these images? None of these fucking goslings are cute. Why are their abs so undefined? Who knows. Fuck those goslings. What you're I'm really looking for of course is this. Look at that tinysexy! His shirt is so big! Timberlake towers over him! Is that Britney at the end? She towers over him too. (Btw, I never had Disney Channel as a kid, so even though 95% of this blog is pure pop culture nostalgia, this isn't an example of that.)

I've been on hiatus from the blog for a while, I know. And after a while, I got to thinking, when I make it back, it has to be big. Some kind of magnum opus. Will I finally sit down and write that careful reflection on John Edwards -- whom I lionized in this blog? That fuck-you column about how I was right -- 100% right -- about Barack Obama, you fucking fake-ass, horse-race liberals? (I was right. Seriously. Shut the fuck up. I was right.) No, I am going to write about my questioning my sexual orientation. I think I love Ryan Gosling. Putting aside the fact that he's white and kind of blonde-ish....he's...he's....he's....Canadian. I am a mapleleafsexual. Kill me now.