I did it!!!! Today I ran 6 and 1/4 miles which for those who don't like SAE works out to 10 kilometers. And I did it in just under an hour, so that one of my criteria that I had set myself as part of the "get in shape before/when I turn 25" is made. The other two goals weren't quite as analytically defined as this one, but the goals have been (since January at least, prior to that I hadn't subdivided the "get in shape when i turn 25" goal)... Well anyway I've still got two weeks left. We'll have to see where I end up then. And I get to reward myself with a backpacking trip right after.

So yesterday I went mountain climbing for the first time outside of the gym. It was an absolute blast. 1200 vertical feet of rock face that Mike, Pat, and I scaled with just ropes, shoes and cams to keep us safe. The views were absolutely incredible, and since it was my first time to Yosemite I had never seen them before.
Of course what goes up, must come down, and we hiked back a "trail" to get back to the car. The trail was just inclined enough where we no longer needed climbing shoes, but I still would have called a great deal of what we did to get back climbing not that long ago.
Still it was a great trip, and mroe work than my legs have ever done in a single day before. I can't wait to go on another expedition.

I got a notice from my ISP yesterday that someone had been downloading copyrighted material through my IP address. They actually included the e-mail that the MPAA had sent to them. Basically they sent me a cease and desist with a pointer on how to secure a wireless router so that whoever had been downloading the copyrighted material (because I would never do that) could no longer continue. It was actually a pretty sound warning from them with some very sounds security warnings, and I'm glad for how they handled it.
The thing is that the letter from the MPAA included what the infringing material was and it turns out to be a TV show. Now I thought that most of what the MPAA cared about as far as internet downloading was movies (especially after acually putting some people in jail for camcording), but I guess I was mistaken. I guess even stuff that is broadcast free over the airwaves is still a big deal to have on the internet. Guess now that someone is zealously checking my IP address, I can't use bit torrent to download mozilla any more.
And of course all this happens the day that my suprnova.org t-shirt arrives in the mail. There are certainly moments of incredible co-incidence in life.
P.S. - Since I was reading this with my gmail account, I got some ads along with the message. It was impressive how accurate the ads were for the page. One was even an article written for people who run small ISP's about the legal implications of copyright violations by those they service.

Jogging in the morning has finally paid off. I was listening to NPR as I spent my time on the treadmill this morning, and heard about an upcoming interview with an Open Source proponent that would be on as I drove to work. So I listened to it, and there was one thing that was said that really impressed me. The interviewee was discussing Stallman's nazi-esque positions on closed source software, and saying how he (Stallman) viewed it as almost an ethical violation to which the interviewer then compared his views to that of downloading music off of the internet. It was a great juztaposition to think of corporate closed source software, and RIAA instigated lawsuits in the same light. I made the mistake today of leaving my portable radio on the rest area of the treadmill (I didn't have pockets this morning since those shorts were in the wash), and towards the end of my jog I turned from NPR to some classic rock to help push through the last mile, heard a couple of good Guns 'N Roses riffs and got so pumped that I slammed my hand down on the earphone cable and shot the portable radio right across the room behind me. Luckly nothing other than my pride was hurt.

This weekend was the annual 24 fest (wherein I have some friends over and we watch the entire season of 24 in a day, as this is what I think the creators intended). I'm noticing as we're on season 3 now that watching the show this way (as opposed to seeing it an episode at the week) has a consequence that I wasn't expecting. I don't have the same recall of the previous seasons that I do for other television I watch. It's like cramming for a test, and while I do process the information of the following days, it doesn't stay as long as if I had been processing and discussing the episodes for a week each.
Still, I don't think I would do this any other way. Also this weekend, being the unofficial start to summer, was prime BBQ time. I tried my hand at constructing a bacon burger dog. I had heard about this from the bacon forum on Orkut and had to try it. It's a sausage or hot dog wrapped in ground beef, and then wrapped in bacon. The cooking was straightforward, in that you just cook it slowly (i.e. at the edge of the grill) and rotate regularly (I so need to get a spit and someone to turn it). Apparently this is an homage to Cliff Huxtable (Bill Cosby's character on The Cosby Show) and it was a good to eat as it sounds. Especially since the bacon hardened just right a formed a crust suitable for holding the concoction and thus made it so I needed neither a bun (since I'm doing Atkins) nor silverware.
Next time I plan on getting fancy and gormet with the ground beef and make some good hamburger mix for the bacon burger dog, and I now know what the base flavor I'm working with will be.

Last week after all that had happened to me I had felt a period of calm. It reminded me greatly of the eerie calm that comes in the middle of a hurricane, and while I hoped that the peace would last (mostly. I do like some adventure) I knew in the back of my mind that more storm was yet to come.
So Jaime arrived on a one-way ticket on Monday. Shortly after we get home from the airport she asks to borrow my car so that she can get to and from the city that night to make it to a meeting she needed to attend that night. Hesitantly I said "yes".
The next morning I woke up (I had gone to sleep early to get up for work) and she wasn't home, and hadn't left me any voice mail to let me know what was going on. I was a little worried, but figured it was probably O.K. and told myself I'ld see her that night.
That night happened to be my going away dinner with the Winamp gang, so I came home at 11p.m. (drunk off my ass - all you can drink sake can be a very intoxicating time) and the car wasn't home (though evidence that Jaime had been in the house existed) so I left a voice mail for her of "Where the Fuck is my car?"
I hadn't heard from or seen Jaime at all on Wednesday in spite of several messages I left for her, and it wasn't until Thrusday that she finally contacted me (it took accusing her of ignoring me to get her to call) at which point she told me that she had left my car in front of my house on Tuesday (with the keys left on my table). I had my doubts, but I rushed home (I was in no condition to work at that point) to verify whatever I could.
When I got home I had a letter from the San Francisco police department in my mailbox telling me that my car had been impounded. Turns out that it was impounded Tuesday morning for blocking a driveway. Well a good friend gave me a ride to the police department (where the security was far more lax than I was expecting - I think I may need to start shaving my head again) and I retrieved my car with the spare set of keys I had left with Andrew and Lexi.
I hope Jaime comes home so we can talk (or at the very least so I can get the keys to my house back. It sucks having to get my neighbors to let me in)

So it finally happened. A lot of the people with whom I talked about coming to work by foot had expressed concern over what would happen in the event that it were to rain. Well this morning there was a thick mist (it's what passes for rain in California), and I have to say that I didn't melt on the way to the office. As a matter of fact it was kind of nice.

They say there is an ancient chinese curse: "May you live in interesting times." Well the last week sure has been interesting. And I haven't written anything yet because I was waiting for the 3rd thing to happen. They say bad things come in 3s. And that's not true. Especially in this situation. It's more that unlikely things come in 3s. (Given a poisson distribution of unlikely events like radioactive decay, short intervals are more likely than long and so forth). Anyway I digress...

First off, I quit AOL. April 30th will be my last day, and I hope that they return my soul along with the unused vacation time. I didn't read the fine print to carefully, but I'm hoping that they only have temporary possesion while they give me a paycheck. And now I'm off to Topix.net. I'm incredibly excited about the new opportunity, and the chance to get to work on some algorithmically interesting problems again. I really hope the brain rot is only on the surface.

Next I was dumped from a relationship I wasn't even sure existed. (That's probably a good indicator right there of why I was dumped -- whoops). I was sitting there trying to read the signs for what ladder I was on, and I guess I'm not too good at reading the signs. One way or the other.

And finally I found out that a close and dear friend of mine (with whom I don't maintain nearly the contact that I should) just got out of a 4 year relationship herself. Since she lived on the other side of the country it's a lot harder for me to know what was (and still is) going on. It does put my problems into place, and I hope she can make it through this trying time.

Well that got depressing...Maybe I should have put them in the other order, but that's the chronology, and I try not to re-order history to tell a good story unless I'm working up to a punch line. Anyway working for a start-up news aggregator, I'll either be spending a lot more or a lot less time updating this. Time to decide "You karate do: O.K. You karate no do: O.K. You karate so-so: Squish, just like grape." Hey look at that I leave it on another depressing note.

Well there's a few things I forgot to write down last night as I was passing out from mosh exhaustion (and perhaps a little CO2 poisoning/heat exhaustion. I was feeling pretty light headed at times in the croud). I hadn't thought of the concert as a family event, but there was a dad showing his 10 year old son the ropes of Rock 'n Roll by making sure his son got a good view when the flashing started. That's a special kind of dad, though the "strong moral fiber" voice in me is saying that I'm going to be paying for 10x10 housing for that kid some day.
And there's something else, that I still can't remember...ah well, too much second hand "smoke" at the concert.

So AOL Music comp'ed me a ticket to the Godsmack/Metallica show tonight. It was absolutely incredible. I stayed on the floor, where from what I gather the objective is to push your way as close to the band as possible. Unless of course you're about to pass out or are under too much pressure (in a physics sense, not a psychological one), in which case you are pushing the other way about as hard as you can.
It was absolutly incredible to see the bands in person. I wish I had started going to concerts earlier, as I imagine I will continue to do this in the future. And one of the remarkable things, is that I had only one ticket, so I went by myself. Contrary to my expectations, I actually still had a blast. And I don't know if I could have stayed with anyone, if I hadn't gone alone, but that's an experiment I'ld like to try some day.
As for going alone, there's something about a Rock concert that puts chicks in heat. It was absolutly incredible the response I got from being in the croud. It's been a while since random women came up and grided on me, and just grabbed my hand, and, well, something other than my hand.
All in all a good time. I must find a way to thank the person responsible for my ticket appropriately.

I finally got a chance to watch the Red vs. Blue Season 1 DVDs. It's so hillarious, and everyone should go pick up a copy of it. It's basically a film of Halo scenes in Blood Gulch, and the writing on it is incredible. Also what they get out of in game play is very impressive.
The one thing that I do wonder about it though is that there is a scene with a robot who can only speak spanish, and "Madre de dios" is translated as "Son of a Bitch". What are they saying about Mary?

Today was another required attendance all hands in Mountain View. Now, maybe I'm a bit disgruntled by having to go to Mountain View, and don't really get a chance to go work in San Francisco today, but the meeting felt completely useless. I've been going to these things for the last 4 years, and they are still saying exactly the same thing as they have every time. I find it incredibly dissapointing that no progress on the larger issues have been made in the last few years, but not terrible surprising. I suppose that the larger issues are mountains that need to be moved one pebble at a time. But I can't see the new pile of pebbles anywhere.

Do you know where the term g-string comes from? You're in good copmany. Apparently there is no authorotative source for this. The Merriam Webster and the American Heritage dictionaries just leave the origin as unknown. Ask Yahoo has a few interesting selections that all seem reasonable. And a few other sources (here and here) seem to agree with the Native American explanation.
It crossed my mind that I didn't know where the term comes from last night and tried to do some research. Apparently there's actually enough mystery that you could probably write a history thesis on it. Either that or leaving the adult filter on when doing google searches like this eliminates the useful results - nah.

Since I've seen the way the candles light your face...
It's been a while
But I can still remember just the way you taste

Seriously though, it's been a while, so there's a bunch of updates

I've been paying attention to the f***edcompany.com personals, and one of the questions they ask is "what was your most humbling moment?" I always felt weird because I couldn't come up with a humbling moment. I mean I went to Caltech explicitly for a humbling experience, and it certainly took down my ego several notches. The problem is that it was a slow 4 year effect, and there was no single moment I could point to that took the lion's share of my ego.
Then today I came up with my most humbling moment. It will be the moment when I give up on a fairy-tale romance. The day I give up on the theory of love at first sight and happily ever after.
I noticed today that I still firmly believe in all of the disney-esque childlike romanticism, and that if I continue to actually try to expose myself to people to try and date I'm probably going to give that up. It seems likely that there will be a point where I give up, and just start looking for the best that I can get as opposed to waiting and hoping for perfection.

I've had to talk with the police. While I've always heard the curse "may you live in interesting times," I'm still out on whether it's a blessing or curse.

• The first time I had to talk with the police involved some banking fraud, and due to the people involved I won't go into it any further
• The second time was when Ishy broke out of the house. I had to leave him home one day, and there was a thunderstorm which freaked him out a lot. He actually was so scared that he broke through one of my living room windows and was wandering the street and the police where called to collect him. I was able to get him back with a minimum of problems, but it did change how I treat him alone. I think his training with separation anxiety is going well.
• And the third time I had to talk to the police involved an accident that came close to taking my and Ishy's lives (pictures). We were out for our morning walk and where just turning the corner with no stop signs (that really I've been thinking needed signs, or at least a clear right of way, since I got here), when I heard the two vans collide behind me. I turn and jump out of the way (as does Ishy thankfully) and watch the two van mess crash through the fence where I had been standing. I told the police after they arrived what I had seen. I really hope that they put some stop signs in place.
  Opening your heart
  Today I went to see the Lion King musical in the theater in San Francisco. It was absolutly marvelous. The animals where beautiful, and creativly constructed. And the talent was marvelous.
  It reminded me of something I had been meaning to put down for some time. I've been out to a few things in the last few months that hadn't really done before. Cirque du Solei and the Transsiberian Orchestra. All of these performances have stirred some long dead parts of me that I think are called emotions :). It might just be that since Jaime moved out, I've been rekindling the part of me that actually cares about life. And the thing is that even the pain, even the hurt and the hard times seem better the the emotional void that had been there before.
  I had for too long been of the opinion that it was better to maintain an emotional equilibrium than to ride a roller coaster. (Since, after all, every moment of pleasure is purchased with an equal moment of pain). But I'm not so sure of that anymore. I'm starting to think that maybe I need to go out and get my heart broken a few times so that I can enjoy the highs.
  Then again, it's possible that the emotions run like any other drug, and it would take more and more for me to get my fix if I start to indulge. Well I think it's time for some empirical evidence one way or the other.

It's still amazes me the way memory, and human recognition work (and I haven't event spent that much time with a child learning those skills). A few weeks ago the nice lady who took my coffee orders at Peet's had mentioned that she couldn't remember my name because I wasn't in more often than once every few weeks. After that though she remembered my name every time (which, of course is due to the fact that mentioning it caused her to put the little bit of extra effort in to remember it). What really gets me, is that today when I walked in without the mohawk, she didn't have any problems recognizing me. That's impressive.

He caught his second mouse yesterday. It's nice to have a pet that can help with some household chores. He still doesn't go for the killing blow, and this time the blood is on my hands (not literally. I gave it a human death). It's not as hard as I thought it would be. Maybe I could have made it through the rat lab after all.

Now I don't want to overgeneralize, so let me describe how I got that metric. I know that California houses somedamn fine drivers. Anyone who can take Laguna Seca gets props. But California has a lower percent that grossly biases the state average.
Case in point: On the way to work this morning, there was a driver who had been tailgaiting me. After hitting some traffic, the car in front of me put on his brakes, so I put on mine. I had to adjust and brake harder as he did the same in front of me. After I got the stop in full control, I looked in my rear view mirror and the guy who had been tailgaiting me was in the process of swerving into the guy in the next lane because he hadn't left enough space behind me and figured it was better to go into the next lane blindly. He did manage to stop, and the car next to him managed to avoid him, and he did give me plenty of space after that, but that's my california drivers suck story for today.

Was, from the small bits I remember, a blazing success. I'm still trying to work out exactly what to do about image web space, so I don't have pictures up yet (and boy where they helpful in figuring out what happened on friday). We had a large crowd, and about 20 different scotches to sample. And, if we had a lampshade, I believe I would have been "lampshade drunk". Damn Jaime for pouring her scotches into my glass, though I suppose I probably should have eaten before a heavy night of drinking. At least we didn't actually hotwire the forklift across the street, though apparently I promised Lexi sexual favors from Jon to do so. That was a surprise to learn on Monday. Jaime was ill Monday night, and spent the night on a friends couch in the city. She had asked me to bring her car back from the Millbrae BART station, so I knocked on the door upstairs, and asked Lexi to come with and drive one of the cars back. She said "OK. Just let me put pants on first," and the door was closed before I fully processed the sentence. I think I may need to start paying closer attention to what's going on around me in the future.

...everything can change. And the Yankees defeated the Red Sox last night in one of the most exciting games of baseball I've seen in a while. Clemens leaves after 3 to a standing ovation. Wells comes in as the 3rd reliever from the bullpen (that was a sight) and gives up a homer on his first pitch. And Pedro pitches a great game until the 8th where he loses his steam and the Yankees pick him apart to tie it up, and it goes until the 11th. Rivera pitched the last three innings (the first time since 2000 he's done that), and Boone wins the game.

But with all the hoopla over Boone, and the decision to keep Pedro in the game during the 8th, I think theres a small bit falling through the cracks. That's that throughout the game (until the 8th) the Yankees couldn't do squat against Pedro. Except for Giambi. His two solo homers were crucial to keeping New York in the game, and Torre had put him 7th in the line-up that night. So while everyone congratulates or vilifies the later inning players, I want to give props to Giambi for keeping hope alive.

So the first teikonaut took off yesterday. With Russia not able to afford their current space program, and the United States fleet of space fairing vessels land bound after Columbia, it may well be time to have another player in space. My hopes are that this leads to future exploration, and scientific knowledge, and that the cost is something the Chinese people can bear.
It is disappointing however that we won't give funding for science and research in it's own right, but we will give funding for the sole purpose of beating the other person. And I'm not sure whether the "we" I just mentioned there applies to just people in the United States or if it's a part of the human condition... Elvis Lives! In a retirement home in Mud Creek Missouri. And there is an egyptian mummy stealing souls there. Bruce Campell did a compiling portrayal of The King and got to deliver some of his classic attitude as a geriatric Elvis. The character was well thought out, and certainly made me think about the lives of the elderly. And the current mythology around Elvis provided a wonderful gateway of discarded disbelief to the soul-sucking mummy.
Very good movie. I highly recommend it.

I was driving to work this morning when traffic began to get heavy so I had more of a chance to look at the debris on the left shoulder next to the freeway divider. What should I see but the triangular prism of an "Allied Driving School" roof attachment laying serenly and visibly in the shoulder. Now should I think "what was the school doing taking a student driver on a freeway" or should I think "the poor student who recieved that introduction to the freeway system"? I think I'll just hope that it was an off-duty instructor, though I don't think that bodes well for the future of drivers in this state...

So it's been a while since I've written here, so I figure the best place to start is with some thoughts on apathy. And though I have always prided myself on my apathy (it was too much work to think about how it didn't deserve pride), I must admit, I've actually had a slight decrease in the last month.
And while I haven't left to soul-sucking environment of AOL (sorry just Time Warner now), I did register to vote, and have actually been getting out of my house to spend time under that ball of fire 93 million miles away. I guess I can attribute that to me new roommate, so lets move on to... Jaime moved out to the Bay Area at the end of last month, and is currently living with me. She, dad and I drove out from New York and had a hell of a time on the drive. I was very glad that I could enjoy a cross-country road trip again after the New Orleans fiasco.
It's been really good for me to have Jaime out so far. She's been getting me to go outside and spend time away from the T.V. And she's also been making me watch more football. I've been meaning to pick up some of the subtleties of the sport (yes, go ahead and insert some joke about oxymorons if you need to) for a while, so it's good to have someone to learn from about it.
And it's just nice to have some family within 1000 miles, and to have it within 100 feet is wonderful. And it gives me someone to go see new movies with... Was actually a very enjoyable movie. It didn't fully remove the taste of the summer crapfest, but I did enjoy watching it. Granted you have to want to see vampires biting werewolves to enjoy the movie, but it delivered on it's promise of cross-supernatural-evil fighting. I was slightly disappointed that they took the time to develop special bullets to defeat each (silver nitrate to kill the werewolves, and ultraviolet ones to kill the vampires) and yet didn't fully flush out some of the armed violence scenes. But it did mean that the few bits of supernatural violence that occurred were special and hit you all the harder.
Naturally the plot was not the selling point of the movie, but there was a little mythology thrown in during the talking scenes which helped them out some, but not nearly as much as the corny lines that were delivered by the sacraficial stupid male scheming for control.
And I had forgotten how much I love to look at skin-tight black plastic clothing, and corsets. And together, they are simply amazing.

I just got back from L.A. and on the way up, I was thinking about how I would write something nice here about how most of the drivers on the 5 treated the left lane as a passing lane (so when they weren't actually passing anyone, they were in the right lane). Unfortunatly, it appears likely I will receive a ticket in the mail shortly.

I had heard some people talk about a program California had tried several years ago involving unmarked police cars that would "pace" a suspect, take a picture of his license plate, and then send him a ticket in the mail. I had also heard that this program had been stopped since it violated the civil rights of the speeders by not being able to see their pursuer. Unfortunatly for me, it appears as though they didn't cease the procedure.

I was driving along the 580 just after the 5 and was doing a reasonable <80mph when I was passed by another car. It passed a car in front of me, which then moved into the left lane, and a bright light then filled the night (Which I think may actually be more dangerous to other drivers than someone going a little fast). I had no idea about what this was, or what was going on, so I sped up to see if I could see what was going on. I pass the car that had been in front of both of us to start, and notice that it's a red mustang, and nothing else out of the ordinary, but it's night, and I'm trying to not spend too much time looking out the side of the car. After I am fully in front of him, he whips behind me, and this pisses me off. Why would he be sitting in that lane, wait for me to drive past, and then try to pass the other guy who had moved into the right lane in front of him. But anyway, I yield and start to pull to the right when the same flash goes off, and this time it's behind me. Then as I slow in the right lane to let him pass, he takes another picture of me behind the wheel. This is the point where I finally remember about what my Californian friends had told me, and realize that I will probably have a ticket in my mailbox in 6 to 8 weeks. I wonder if the fact that he had to break at least 3 traffic ordinances to do this will help me get out of paying the fine.

At least I know where the karma went...

Living in San Francisco (well at least the Bay Area) I feel lucky that I am not constantly party to the injustices that exist in the world. But even in somewhere as enlightened as San Francisco, I still find people who behave differently to you based on your skin color (I almost said appearance, but in all fairness I like that people treat me differently because I have a mohawk, and really since that was a choice on my part, it probably does reflect my personality in some way).

So anyway, I went to Peets to get a latte this morning (I feel so yuppie now that that no longer seems odd) and when I got there, there was a hispanic man and black woman standing far enough away from the counter that I assumed they had already ordered. This belief was further enforced by the fact that there was no one by the cash register taking orders. So naturally I walk up to the counter and wait for someone to take my order. When one of the staff comes up, I get halfway through my order when the black woman states that she was already on line. I felt terrible, recognize that the two of them must have been waiting before me to order, and I give my appologies, and walk behind them. She orders a coffee and merrily goes on her way, and he orders a medium latte. I then order a medium latte, and give my name so that they can call me when it's done. As it turns out, my latte is done before his.

Now the part of me that grew up with happily ever after, and still thinks life can and should be fair really hopes that this is just because I had given my order before I had walked to the end of the line, and the part of me that isn't so optomistic fears it isn't.

Though it does make me wonder what it would take to achieve equality for all when the social norms of what to do when waiting on line with no one to take your order are different enough to cause this sort of problem in the first place.

I played hookey yesterday afternoon from work (it was too nice a day to spend boiling in my non-air-conditioned cube), and wandered off to the Metrione to finally see 28 Days Later. I must admit that the positive feed back I heard on it was quite accurate. It was a really good zombie movie. I was especially impressed with how it was a zombie movie without resorting to actual zombies. It might be the scientific training, but I really like the believable, overcome with rage infected that are killable like normal humans as opposed to the zombies that take two shots to the head and get up for more. It had good pacing, and some nice pyrotechnics. And the Lord of the Flies esque lack of civilization brings out the inhuman in us development, while it has been done before, is still nice to see and provided an interesting contrast with the "infected" who were inhumanly raged, but without a control switch.

As for the alternate ending, well I'm not sure which I prefer. The part of me that grew up on Disney likes the happily-ever-after of the original ending, and the part of me that knows life isn't a Disney movie likes the loss in the second ending (though the part of me that looks at movies as an artform is disgusted at using a second ending as a way of selling more tickets). I propose a compromise therefore: Save Jim, just to Napalm all of them when the Jet flies by. Why would you risk global contamination by saving them anyway?

And I'm even more confused now about the recall in California. On the one hand, what the fuck did Gray Davis do wrong? And is it worth the time and money of a recall? Certainly not. But it is in the state consitution, so I hope this means it's time for a refferendum to change that, though whether or not that would succeed depends greatly on how the recall goes.

And as for my friends pushing me to run, while that's fun and all, I really don't want to actively take part in such a ridiculous process. I'm ok, with the lazy, let-them-do-everything approach, but now that it comes down to filling out paperwork on my own, and waiting in line at some county seat, I can't do it.

And finally Arianna Huffington announced her intentions to run in the recall. I'm happy that there will be a strong Democrat in the running, and I would absolutely love to have someone that smart and well spoken as governor, I really hate that if she wins, the victory will be tarnished by the process.

Watching A Queer Eye for the Straigt Guy is really having a toll on me. I've been keeping my place neater and cleaner, and what's more, I've been shaving on a daily basis. The grooming expert had mentioned how shaving was the simplest way to show that you care about your appearance. I'm not entirely sure if this is still the simplest way when you're shaving 80% of your head, but let's assume it's up on there on the list.

Not only have I actually started shaving regularly, I've also been using (gasp!) shaving cream and aftershave. And I spent some time researching the whole with/against the grain thing. What it looks like (from my studies and my experience) is that you should shave with the grain first. Take care of most of the hair, neatly. Then work (carefully) against the grain for the tough spots. This seems to give me a really close shave, though I don't have long term studies. Also I've found that using a towel to dry off also gives me an idea of how close the shave is. If the towel catches anywhere during the drying process, there's still some stubble there.

So I almost ran a cop off the road today

I had gone out for a morning drive, and was coming back home along the 92 and was stuck in the left lane behind an SUV doing 70. I had been watching the right lane for a while, and since I had seen no one there, I changed lanes in frustration with the slow SUV and accelerated to pass.

Before I had completed the pass (and while I was still going under 80) I saw blue and red lights in my rear view mirror. Fuck! And I wasn't going all that fast. I pull over at the first chance I get (I was right next to an exit so had to go about a 1/4 mile further) then another cop pulls in behind him. Double Fuck! What the hell did I do?
When the officer walks to my window, this is the conversation as best I can remember it:

Officer: So, do you know why I pulled you over?
Me: To be honest, I'm not really sure.
Officer:  Well you almost ran me off the road back there when you changed lanes.
Me: What?!? I'm so sorry. I didn't realize.
Officer: License and registration please

[At this point I pull them out, and he goes back to his car. He comes back a 
few minutes later]

Officer: Thank you. Please go on your way.

Whoo-hoo! I almost run a cop off the road, and there's no long-term legal consequences. I just wonder what I was going to get with the Karma I spent there.

Finally got out to go to drink club. DNA Lounge is a good venue for it, and the girls dancing to the booty-shaking music was quite a sight.

Also, Red Bull and Vodka does have a great effect on the body. Wakes you up for the evening and still gets you loose.