Where does your name rank?

The Social Security Administration has come out with its list of the most popular baby names from last year.

Theodore is 295th with a tad over a thousand more of us born last year.

Some cool, interesting, or displeasurable (IMHO) names that I noticed on the list:

Maximilian - 300th for boys (There's actually a lot of baller names starting with Maxi-)
Junior (that's sad) - 637th
Remington - 721st (321 boys - I hope at least one of them is a Steele)
Augustus - 795th
Leonidas - 883rd
Jagger - 954th (also would go well with Steele)

Genesis (really?) - 95th for girls
Serenity (eww) - 111th
Harmony (again...) - 314th
Ximena - 332nd (never even heard it before, should I have?)
Liberty - 620th
Precious - 791st (My PRECIOUS!!!)
Charity - 793rd
Xiomara - 805th (never heard of this one either)
Chastity - 956th (a good idea, but we'll see how it works out in 16 years)

Why do people feel so compelled to name their little girls after concepts of which they are vaguely supportive?

Greece and Italy

I think all of you know that Liz and I went to Greece and Italy for a month. We spent more than just 2 weeks there. We spent a lot of money. It's not like we spoiled ourselves (though we did have lots of delicious gelato), it's more that you end up spending a lot of money on food when you vacation for one month and stay in places that don't have kitchens. Anyway, let's go over the trip:

We started out in Athens. What a strange city. I've been to most major cities in the US. I've also been to Sydney, Madrid, Barcelona, Florence, and Venice. I have never been in a city like Athens. It was nothing like what I expected. I was expecting, as I'm sure you all would, a city that contained lots of fascinating history around every corner. I was definitely expecting to see some evidence that Socrates, Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle, and Euclid had been there. What I didn't know until I got back was that Athens had only 100,000 people in 1900, and now it has over 3 million. Basically, my first impression of Athens was horrible. People were peeing everywhere, I couldn't understand Greek, and the whole city just felt rushed and cheap. However, the Acropolis and Ancient Agora were amazing. The pictures of the Parthenon really don't do it justice. It is magnificent. There are several nice museums in Athens too, but seeing more than 2 would just be redundant. If any of ya'll go to Athens, make sure you don't stay there too long. Seriously, see the acropolis, the surrounding ruins, a museum, and then leave.

Our next destination was Crete, which is where Zues was supposedly born and where the Minotaur is said to have lived. The only way to get there (besides flying) is to take an overnight 9-hour ferry ride. The ferry was nice and everything, but we were too cheap to get a private cabin ticket, so we slept on the floor once we realized that all the other passengers had started sleeping on all the couches. It was super uncomfortable and only Liz managed to fall asleep. It's a good thing I stole the blanket from the airline... In Crete, we stayed in the island capital, Iraklion. It was a wonderful city and I swear it must have the highest number of pastry shops per area. While we were there we visited the palace of Knossos, where the minotaur lived. It was cool to see, but there really isn't much there anymore. The frescos were pretty though! When we left Crete, we almost missed our ferry to Santorini! I have never ran so hard in my entire life. Liz was wearing flipflops, so she couldn't run and carry her suitcase at the same time. I basically ran about 800 meters straight carrying a backpack and our 2 suitcases. Liz was laughing at how tired I was...how hilarious.

Santorini was also great. It's the most stereotypical Greek island you can imagine. Its got the black sand beaches, the blue and white buildings, and the tiny churches. The first day we are there, we go to the beach. That picture is literally right where we were. An amazing view! Anyway, we get there and within 30 minutes these 3 Bri'ish girls that are probably about my age show up and sit right next to us. 2 of them are very very hot. These same 2 decided to take off their tops! Santorini was giving me a wonderful impression. I soon learned that nearly every woman was topless; however, I couldn't get Liz to "blend in." On one of the days there, Liz and I had a romantic dinner while the sun was setting. The only thing prettier than the sunset was Liz of course!

Then we went to an island called Naxos. It was a great place and we had some good food there. It was very relaxing. Each place we went to is very different from the others. Naxos was a bigger island than Santorini, and we went inside to a small, charming village that was totally old fashioned. The desserts in Naxos were especially good.

From Naxos we went back to Athens and caught a plane the next day to Florence. It's late though, so I'll tell you about Italy tomorrow.

Some things I didn't mention that are just generalities are:
1) The Greek food. Greeks serve pretty big portions. It wasn't unusual for Liz and I to each order our own dish and end up not finishing our food. We could even split just a simple Greek salad and be completely full. Greek food wasn't anything special, but maybe I'm just saying that because I've had it at family reunions. I got the impression that there isn't a difference between Greek food in Greece and in America like there is with Chinese food in China versus in America. But like I said, the food was delicious. The ingredients were always fresh too. Greek breakfasts are not good. I love a big breakfast, so being served just French bread, tomatos, and maybe deli meat is not my type of thing. I yearned for eggs, bacon, and pancakes the entire trip.
2) The Greek people. They are ridiculous! Every Greek needs to have the last word in an argument. And, boy do they argue. Two strangers on the street would find something to yell about and they'd continue yelling at each other as they walked away. Once, a bus driver didn't stop when a lady pushed the button, and they wents nuts on each other. It was strange.

Life Behind The Orange Curtain

Hey Everyone,

So like Elliot said, I figured posting to the blog would be a good way to update everyone on what has been going on in my life. (I will call all of you at some point with the exception of Mark who called me a whore)
Speaking of whore, that was one of the titles of a student film I watched tonight at my second night of orientation at my new school. For those of you who do not know what I am doing, about a month after I got home from school the last grad school I was waiting for finally accepted me. So for the next three years I will be getting my MFA in Film and Television Production with an emphasis in sound design.
As I type this post I am currently sitting at my desk in my new apt. For those of you who are not familiar with southern California culture, Orange County is a whole different way of life than the Santa Monica-Los Angeles Area. In fact this is the part of so cal that is a beacon of conservative hope in the state. Needless to say, Orange County is not home to the most progressive mindset. Fortunately for me I was able to find a roommate who is a Canadian Jew,or a Canew who I seem to get along with really well.
Well anyway, I figure this actually may be one of my last written blogs as I will probably be doing more video blogging than anything else. (I'm paying to use all this fancy equipment so why not)

My first blog post...but with few details

Hello cyberfolk!

Since I've graduated I've really been thinking hard about how useful it would be to post on the blog so that I don't have to call up each and everyone of you and tell you all about my life.

Obviously I should post about my trip to Europe, and I definitely will. But right now it is 1AM and I am tired. I'll give a quick list of things that I've done that don't involve Europe:

1) Last night Free ho and I traveled out to western Virginia. This is not the actual West Virginia, just not the part I'd consider "Northern" Virginia. Anyway, the reason we went there is because Jen and Barb live there! They live in a great house. We got crazy wasted out there. Jen's boyfriend was offering shots left and right. I have never had to much whiskey in my entire life. Of course, Jen works at a winery, so we also had a little wine. And I had a ying ling (I don't care how its spelled) black and tan. The point is, these do not mix well at all when they come back up. Now I understand why Jen's boyfriend was saying "Never mix a grain and a grape."
2) Tomorrow I will move into a house with 2 other guys that is about 5 miles south of the University of Maryland. Their names are Dave and Dan. Dave will be taking one class a week toward getting his masters. He works for the city of Hyattsville (the city I'm living in). Dave is my age. Dan graduated from college in 2007. He works for the NSA. I have hardly met him though. Both guys seem normal, so hopefully I won't be living with a crazy psycho.
3) My parents have been doing a lot of reorganizing. Especially with books and bookshelves... Anyway, my dad found a book called "the Human Sexual Response." It is a big thick book all about how humans respond to sexual stimulation. Here is a graph from the first chapter. The accompanying text notes that the pattern in the graph is roughly the same for all men, but there are many many many for women. Why the hell did they evolve in such a way? Anyway, there are chapters on so many things: Sexual Response in the Aging (click this link if you dare, its nasty) Male and Female, the CLITORIS, and of course the physiology of the everything. Did you know that the female breast grows 1/4 to 1/5 during sexual stimulation?


Anyway, I also picked up a great book in Europe. It's called "Stone Cold." Before you read it, you should read a book called "Camel Club." I haven't read it, but its about the same characters as Stone Cold. Then theres another book called "Divine Justice" that takes place immediately after "Stone Cold." The author is David Baldacci. It's not an intellectually engaging book with themes and motifs, but I recommend it.

Tomorrow when I'm all alone in my new house I will post about Europe. And then on Thursday when I register for classes, I'll let ya'll know what I'm taking. Laterrrr

The Hurt Locker

I haven't written a film review in a while, but I recently saw a film that exceeded my expectations so greatly that I've decided to review it and tell everyone I know to see it. This film is "The Hurt Locker."
"The Hurt Locker" follows a bomb defusing squad in Baghdad in 2004, exposing the psychology behind the "rush of war." The film reveals its intentions with an epigraph before the first scene that focuses on the words: "War is a drug."
James, the new bomb specialist in Bravo Company, has defused 873 bombs in his life and lives for the rush of adrenaline that putting his life on the line delivers. Sanborn, the CO of the group, is an ex-Army Ranger who is cool and calm on the surface but war has destroyed his psyche and grip on life. Eldridge has one goal in Iraq: not to die. The film divides itself by counting down the days left in Bravo Company's rotation, putting the viewer within the mentality of a soldier counting down the days to safety.
Each performance is delivered well by the actors, but the key credit for this film must go to Kathryn Bigelow, the director of the film. Each scene is shot handheld and edited extraordinarily well. "The Hurt Locker" is not only an excellent analysis of the human psyche during war, but is also one of the tensest action thrillers I've ever seen. From the first scene of the film, Bigelow puts the viewer on the edge of the seat. And allow me to rave about the first scene: this is one of the most amazing openings to a film I've ever seen and amazingly the film only gets better as it continues.
This is a war film that has a profound respect for the soldiers it portrays without feeling like an Army recruitment video. "The Hurt Locker" may be the defining war film of our generation, if it generates more attention.

On Beer and the Manner of Things, or: My Two Trips to Rochester

This was promised a long time ago, so it is vastly overdue and will probably disappoint.

I just arrived at my apartment in Rochester (for the second time) about 45 minutes ago. I'm sure I was unclear in my last post; I came out here earlier this summer to move in a back-of-a-minivan-and-U-Haul-trailer-full amount of my stuff into my apartment. This was part of a longer road trip with my parents. Now I am here for the beginning of the semester next week.

On our road trip we visited: my aunt and uncle at their cabin in northern Wisconsin (on a lake named “Papoose” to be more specific) and my sister, her boyfriend and family in Lansing. This trip took about a week (I think we left on a Wednesday morning in July and returned on a Tuesday evening in August). It seemed like we spent an at least equal amount of time in the car as we did out of it—discounting the time spent sleeping (mercifully not in the car) of course.

Despite the long hours of driving, the trip was overall good. I will recount one experience now as I don't have time to recount most all of the trip (you wouldn't want to hear about sitting in a car anyway) and it is relevant to my situation at the moment. While in Michigan I got to go to Bell's Brewery (or brewpub as it were) in Kalamazoo. Those of you familiar with Bell's know that it is a microbrewery that makes great beer; those who aren't will have to take my word for it. Anyway, besides the beer, the actual premises of the brewpub were excellent. It didn't seem great from the outside—or even from the inside initially—but after we got our beers we headed out to the patio. This was a large mostly grassy area that looked almost as though it could have been someone's backyard. This backyard feel was amplified by the fact that the burgers and other delicacies that could be ordered there were cooked right outside the back door on a regular, back-yard, propane (or at least I think it was) grill. My family and I sat at a picnic table underneath an arbor with hops vining their way all over it. Around the corner from us was another large grassy area with a small amphitheater at it's end. It appeared that on many summer nights a band would most likely play on the stage, drawing a sizable crowd of young concertgoers on the grassy area before the stage. As it was a saturday afternoon when we were there, the grassy area was instead occupied by a few tables, one at which a group of half a dozen aging yuppies (first Google hit) from Chicago appeared to be enjoying their sojourn in Michigan tremendously.

After sampling half the menu of beers I had chosen a smoked rye ale to enjoy. It was an interesting beer. At first the smoky flavor overwhelmed the rest of the beer, but after I became accustomed to it, I could taste rather mellow pale ale flavors underneath. It would have been delicious with a barbeque pork sandwich.

Now, I earlier said that this experience related to my current situation, and you are doubtlessly wondering how. While at Bell's I also picked up a sampler six pack of beers. I brought them along to Rochester and stashed them in my refrigerator once here, with the intention of enjoying them at an unspecified future date. Upon arriving once agin at my apartment tonight (now nearly an hour and a half ago) these beers remained (and still do) the only form of caloric substance in my apartment—besides that which under even the most dire of situations would not be considered edible. And so, as I began to scribe this post I decided to sample one of the beers stowed in my fridge. I chose a cherry stout. I had very high hopes for this beer, and I was a bit disappointed (I have just minutes ago finished it). The cherry flavor was, unfortunately, a bit syrupy, and overshadowed the more hearty roasted grain flavors. Alas.

I now realize that this beer had a rather healthy 7% alcohol by volume which, as I ramble on, may be affecting my post a bit. As it is now rather late and this post is teetering on the edge of bombast (and that seals it), I must retire.

If nothing else, I can now truthfully claim that there was a time that the only thing in my Frigidaire (I just checked, unfortunately it's not actually one) was a six pack of beers.

Let me get a new bib...

I like to think of my summers in terms of my favorite pastime: eating.

First, my drink: Well, they started classy and have only gotten worse… Started with Champagne and six packs of various brewskies at school, transitioned to Seven and Sevens as well as Gin and Tonics during the few times I drank during the hunk of the summer, and then settled for (prepare yourself) Natty Ice near the end.

The appetizer: Senior Week - what a riot that was. Remember those meatballs at prom? Me either.

The Main Course: This wasn’t an Italian wedding meal with 5 courses. One big entrée. So it had to be good. This summer it was Camp Pendalouan. Friggin loved it. Got paid for teaching self defense, canoeing, archery, and swim lessons to 7 year olds, making inappropriate jokes that go over the kids heads but make my co-counselors laugh, going kayaking or sailing around for a whole afternoon, going on hikes, mountain bike rides or making the biggest bondfire I have EVER seen.

But that’s over now. It was a LONG summer camp season and it always ends at the perfect time. Don’t know how good I would have been at my job if another group of teens had come in this week. So now I’m home, decompressing and preparing for what lies ahead…

DESERT! Chillaxing time. Watching movies, seeing my friends off to college, hanging out in beautiful summertime Chicago. Also, my grandma’s 90^th birthday is during labor day so I’ll be up at a relatives’ lakeside cabin for a few days before school starts. And somewhere in between all that, I’m hoping to make a few hundred bucks working a week at a raspberry farm in ND, and I’m hoping to go on a camping trip with my some of my OP buddies… So we’ll see.

And then on Sept. 14^th, the restaurant known as Summer closes for the season. And then my junior year of college.

To All You Physics Guys

So my mom drew my attention to this article about a strange Russian High Voltage Cascade Transformers. They are apparently the only outdoor installations of this type in the world. They're in some random city outside Moscow. Russia is so awesome.

It burns!!

Glenn Beck apparently feels he and his fragile white culture is being oppressed by Obama and his cohorts (I don't know, Mona Sutphen?)

I know I shouldn't take notice of anything that Beck says, but I just can't help feeling like...



I can't imagine why any member of a racial minority could hate a white guy like Beck...

summer update

Ok, I haven't posted in a while again. I guess it's mostly because my summer has been fairly uneventful. I didn't bother trying to find a job for two months between reunion and my first semester at Rochester and I thought I could have a summer like we used to when we were around 12 years old. It's been only moderately successful since of course all my friends are working so the days are fairly lonely. My parents put me to work doing some landscaping stuff around the house, but otherwise I have enjoyed my last summer of freedom.

A couple weeks back I participated in something called a Tri-Loppet. It's like a triathlon, but begins with a paddle in a canoe or kayak on the lakes in Mineapolis from Calhoun to Brownie, then has a run and a bike (which is largely on mountain bike trails) in Wirth park. I did the paddle with my dad, then we split up for the rest of the loppet. The paddle started out in a downpour, so the trails were nice and muddy for the run and bike. I got incredibly wet and muddy, but the race was a lot more fun, in my opinion, than a regular triathlon--especially the mountain biking rather than road biking. If anyone is living in Minneapolis in the next few years I would recommend checking it out.

Tomorrow I'll be heading out to Wisconsin, my first stop on my way out to rochester to move my things into my apartment in Rochester. I'll try to keep you all posted.