Just what the world needs right now

Whenever I don't want to do work, I watch movie trailers. Boy oh boy did I find a movie trailer this time. The movie is called Bitch Slap. After watching the trailer I have no idea what the movie is about. All I know is, I want to watch it.

I would like to point out a few parts of Apple's summary.
a) one of them might not be human
b) the movie runs backwards, like Memento
c) "the fate of the world hangs in the balance"

What kind of movie is this!? It comes out January 8 and I insist that the Men's team sees this.

A Dowist Perspective

So the term is over and for a few of us (sorry non-Carleton folks), winter break has started.

First, a few updates:

I think where I left off last was when the men’s team Tasted the Rainbow on Halloween. I said I was gonna write a whole post on it. But now I feel as if too late. I could probably write a whole novel on the night, although not from my perspective, which is missing completely… I’ll just say this: We started at 8 and I don’t remember anything after 9:45pm. 12 shots in an hour and a half is NOT a good idea, but hell I knew what I was getting into. We went through the rainbow, then did primary colors, then did our favorites. Allegedly, people were trying to make me drink water as early as 10:30 and I was two people I don’t know tried to take me home and put me to bed. I also know that I woke up at 5am in Davis 304 (Sjoberg’s current room) not knowing where I was, how I got there, or what was going on. I also felt great. But that is because of the massive purging that occurred around midnight…

So clearly the rainbow was a success.

On the last day of classes we had a flippy cup swim party at Dow. It started out with just the swim team, and then a jewgressive when through my house because of one of my housemates (the swimmers challenged them to a few rounds of flippy cup), and then all hell broke loose. The place blew up. It reminded me of that one party we had in the winter of last year in Stadium when the hall director came. Not only was it packed to the brink insider, there were probably about 100 people outside. The RAs kept wandering outside asking people, “Does anyone know who lives here?!” And supposedly the hall director came and was ignored by everyone she talked to. Security eventually came at 12:47 exactly and shut it all down. If you want to hear really funny stories, talk to Alfredo about this evening - you won't be disappointed.

Finals came and went. They sucked. Much of my time was spent on papers. But to give myself a pick me up in the middle of writing them, I would watch the video that Nonberg acted in for his friend’s project. Nonberg, your zombie walk made me laugh out loud so hard that some girl in the library asked me to keep it down or move to the 4^th floor. I recommend everyone watches it. It was so good that Mia and I thought we’d send it to btin.

Overall, I’d say this was my worst term at Carleton. But I won’t bore you about that. It mostly was because of my classes - very hard they were. But I think the fact that I had the best term of my life in the spring made this one seem worse than it really was. I do think that the living situation played a part as well. Living with swimmers is just so much easier. I think its the fact that everyone is on the same page and all. I’m very much looking forward to the break though, which is going to be much different than winter breaks past, mostly because of the difference in the training trip.

For those of you that don’t know, the team is doing something different in terms of winter break training this year.

Starting Monday of next week, the whole team (I think except for one or two people) is meeting back at Carleton to train. We are going to train twice a day for a week. Practices are 8-10 or 10-12 and 2-4 or 4-6. Morning practices are lift/swim (four days a week for sprinter and 2 days a week for distance) or all swim, and the swim is mostly technique based (filming, experimental stuff, etc). Afternoons are, as Andy put it to me one day when we were teaching SwimFit, “We are really gonna hammer you guys.”

OH! And practices are all gendered, which will be a fairly new experience for the team. It should be fun, since we don’t get that opportunity much during the normal season. But it also will be weird because we probably won’t see the women’s team during meals either, because we are cooking our own meals in the floor kitchens (because Bone Ape Tit isn’t open during the break).

So yeah, we are cooking our own meals. And because our room/board over the Northfield part of the training trip is covered by some fund from the Athletic Dept, we don’t have to pay for our food. The original plan was to have us buy all of our food and then give the business office receipts. Turns out, they are just gonna put the money ($22 a day!!!) directly in our checking accounts. And if we don’t spend it all, we get to keep it… Obviously, this part is awesome because I’m a thrifty/stingy asshole. We had a good chuckle about how if Jared was here, he’d be eating PB sandwhiches for the whole trip.

We also are going to go a Macalester Invite on the 5^th of Dec, which I’m glad about, because I have not been doing so well at meets this year and I want another opportunity before January.

Then we head to Puerto Rico! Group flight, which should be awesomely chaotic. In PR, we are practicing from 6-8 and then 3-5 and we gotta drive to the pool. The hotel we are staying at is a different one from when the team went before. This one doesn’t have kitchenetts – only a microwave and a minifridge (which should be interesting). But we do get like an amazing continental breakfast (with like omelets and stuff).

Then we all head back to campus and train like hell for 3 or 4 days until the 18^th, when we all go home for the rest of the break. Andy said those three days are gonna be the hardest of the whole time.

Should be a pretty cool time!

We’ll that’s all I really gotta say. I’ll leave ya with this.

Fall Term: A Reflection

Holy shit, I haven't posted in forever. I've sat down to start to write several times, but most of those times I was a little closer to Pluto than I should have been and ended up just listening to music and playing Mario Kart.
This is the laziest term I've ever had, and quite frankly I can't repeat it. I've set a new standard of laziness for myself, but at the same time I very much enjoyed Fall 2009. The defining factor of this term was Hill House. Although my Hill House triple cannot compare to the size and epicness of Stadium 110, Hill House as a whole has proven to be as historical and adventure-worthy as Stadium. Filled with winding staircases, hidden closets, ping pong tables, abandoned drum sets, and the ghetto Cave of Wonders (the room that controls who gets cable tv and internet), we took full advantage of every aspect of Hill House. Beer pong in the basement is perhaps my fondest memory, even though one night we were shut down at 11 and I cussed out the RA (oops). However, said RA was not the Hill House RA, who is by far the coolest RA I have ever had ("You guys shouldn't smoke on the porch. But if you do smoke on the porch, smoke on the right side"). The 3rd floor fire escape was also an oft-visited location, typically by Granger and I. Hill House has one of the best groups of people anywhere at Carleton. While Andrew, Ken, and I are the people you probably know, the presence of Granger, Aaron, Darian, and Sam made "quiet" nights in Hill House fairly raucous.
In Stadium, much of our time was dominated by COD4, Little Big Planet, and TA. This year, our room has a Wii, and we play Mario Kart nearly constantly (I'm the best). We also play lots of Laser Hockey (which some of you experienced during Alumni Weekend). I beat Metroid Prime 3 in the first 2 weeks, and I've been working on beating Resident Evil 4 for the last few weeks.
In terms of music, I've been listening to a lot of new stuff that I'm pretty confident you guys will enjoy. On the electronic scene, I've been listening to Crystal Castles, The Knife, Digitalism, Nosaj Thing, and of course, lots of Aphex Twin. I've found a lot of good hip hop in the past months, and would suggest that you all check out Buck 65, a Canadian artist who has been called the Tom Waits of hip hop (intrigued yet?). Get his album, "This Right Here is Buck 65" first because it's a good intro, mostly because his early albums sound like they were recorded in a basement... which they were. Also, check out the new Tech N9ne album, K.O.D., because it's awesome (Tech featuring Three 6 Mafia and rapping backwards=awesome). I've really gotten into Brother Ali recently as well, plus Cunninlynguists and Sage Francis. I saw Atmosphere live in Wichita over the summer, which was disappointingly uncrowded but one of the best shows I've ever been to. Minneapolis has the best hip hop scene of any city in the US. Period.
The main sad news from this term is the passing of Beelzebub, aka Mephistopheles. He was an excellent companion, be it morning, afternoon, or night, Monday or Sunday, and it didn't matter if it was just him and me or if there was a big group of people. Beelzebub was loved by all who knew him, and will be sorely missed. One day a new companion will be found, and it is my hope that you will all meet him someday.
So now I'm living in Davis 104 with Mering, KEG, and 2 international students over break. We dragged the TV and Wii with us, so Andrew is playing Mario Kart while I'm writing. We cooked brats outside and had some brews, so all in all this "Thanksgiving at Carleton" thing is going pretty well.
Nonberg, Elliot, Ted, Tim, and Toto: I miss you guys a lot. This place just isn't the same without you, and I've enjoyed reading your post-grad posts. I haven't been doing my job to keep the blog alive, but I'm going to try harder.