Monday, July 31, 2006

gold star number one


love in an elevator
Originally uploaded by with an eye.

I've finally got some of my trip pictures online. All the Florence ones are up. Three hundred and ninety nine of them from the 4 days I was in Florence.
too. many. pictures.

But please go look at them...and leave some comments too - I ran out of steam with the titles and the captions!!

www.flickr.com/photos/with-an-eye

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

example

I registered with a website today and we all know how that goes now - with "internet security" a big issue whenever you register for something and have to give out your email address you then have to wait for the confirmation email. But then you have to go a step further and validate this by clicking on some button, going to some link, or replying in some manner. I understand the security measure here, to prevent people from signing up for things under someone else's email address, or being able to later claim that this was not what they wanted. However, the confirmation email I got today began with one sentence that seemed to be a very polite attempt at explaining why I had to go through all this crap:

We require this step to protect our relationship with you

It struck me - what a good idea this is. An initial step that is required in order to protect the relationship. I'm thinking of saving this email and using it in many other instances in my life. You want a ride from me, first you'll receive an email indicating that I require this step to protect my relationship with you. You want me to go to your party, first you'll get this email. You want to buy me a drink, have my phone number, take me to dinner, EMAIL. Then I will require you to go to a webpage, check of that you agree to the terms and conditions, and maybe make you enter a string of letters and numbers that are artfully disguised behind a mess of criss-crossed lines and stripes. Can't ever be too safe!

Sunday, July 23, 2006

cupcakes

I heard the best advertisement on the radio today - it was one of these anti-marijuana ones, but I think we're stretching it a little bit here. (I'm glad I get to type this because when I tried recounting it this afternoon to my friend Jess I messed it all up because I was laughing too much)

Here's how it went.

Girl (in a very serious voice):"A week ago my friend Amanda told me to smoke pot, and I did. Two minutes ago she told me to shoplift and now I'm here with a cupcake and frosting down my pants and it doesn't want to stay there. The store manager keeps looking at me, like he knows something."
Store Manager (sounding kinda gruff): "excuse me girls, can I help you"
Announcer: "Live above the influence..."

I'm sure the announcer said something else but I couldn't hear it because I was laughing to hard. SERIOUSLY - they said "and now I have a cupcake and frosting down my pants and it doesn't want to stay there". I'm sorry, forget the whole marijuana part, who shoplifts a CUPCAKE? by putting it DOWN THEIR PANTS? Where is this store with cupcakes laying around so that you can easily shove them down your pants? All the stores I know keep the cupcakes safely behind the counter. I never thought of it before, but this is obviously an attempt to keep the potheads from shoving them down their pants!

who is this girl? and as my friend Jess pointed out - why were her parents allowed to procreate?

Saturday, July 22, 2006

the greatest words in the world

On Wednesday I decided not to go in to work so that I could, instead, go to Fenway Park and try to buy tickets to the Red Sox game. My friend picked me up at 10am, and we drove into the city and began our quest for tickets. After a bit of looking, and some lunch, we then got the BEST TICKETS EVER. We were sitting right behind home plate - it was awesome. I've been to a few red sox games in my day, not nearly as many as the friend who was with me on Wednesday - but a lot. It always amazes me how I never cease to be excited to be there. And then when the announcer comes on and says "Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome to Fenway park - America's most beloved ballpark!" - oh I love it!!

They played the Kansas City Royals, the second worst team in baseball. We met one of their fans at Stub Hub and she was hoping to see them get win number 32. (for those non baseball fans out there - each team has played about 96 baseball games so far...And Kansas hadn't won 32 of them yet!) It was a good game, Josh Beckett was pitching and Gabe Kapler was playing, and Doug Meintkiewicz was in town. We saw Ortiz bunt, and it was pretty. Manny hit a homerun and there were about 5 amazing catches in the outfield.

One of the things I love about following a baseball team is getting to know the players tendencies. Most people remember Nomar's glove thing, and maybe people know Ichiro's samurai stance before batting, - but there are so many others!! Big Papi who spits in his glove and slaps his hands together before each at bat, Manny taps his bat twice behind home plate, Gabe Kapler (#44) stands perfectly straight before walking into the batters box. I caught that one on film - although I'll admit maybe I was just trying to take a picture of his bum because he's cute!! Coco Crisp does something that I don't quite understand - between each swing he bends down and picks up some dirt, then he spits into his hand, and then he grips his bat. So basically each time he is making mud on his hands and then rubbing it on the bat. YUCK. And he doesn't use batting gloves.

Lastly, we got to see Papelbon pitch - and he's just amazing. And such a cool guy too. When he comes into a game the whole place goes nuts, applause, cheers, chants. It's awesome. Everyone stays standing just a bit longer and claps just a bit louder when Papelbon is on the mound - and he deserves every bit of that!


Let's Go Red Sox!!

Friday, July 21, 2006

time flies...

I am helping out at an Almuni event for my college next week. It's for the incoming freshman and their parents - to meet the alums and listen to how much we loved the school and to see how cool we are now and to give them hope for their own futures! I'm very excited about it, because I did love my school and I am cool now, and I'd like to give people hope for their futures. But, these kids, that will be starting in colleges around the country at the end of next month...

they are the class of 2010. that's right. two thousand and ten. '10.

twenty-ten.

(clearly I can't get over this!)

Wednesday, July 19, 2006

nostaglia

I don't know why I thought of this story the other day - perhaps it's because I've made friends with a few of the janitors at work, but I remembered a story from college about the cleaning guy, Effrain. And I thought I would share.

It was my sophomore year, and I was living on the second floor of Sanford Hall (ahhh - Sanford, the old apartment!) and we had the nicest cleaning guy. It turned out I had a 8 or 9am class everyday - so I was always up and showering early. Our room was conveniently positioned right across from the bathroom and the kitchen. It took a few weeks for Effrain to realize that I was always up early, but he caught on. He also noticed that I would let him clean the bathroom first so that I could be the first one to use the sparkling bathroom!! It started slowly, but eventually we fell into a little system. I would wake up and crack open the door. Then I would sit and check my email or whatever and wait. When Effrain was done with my bathroom he'd knock lightly on the door (so he didn't wake up my roommate) and I'd run in to get ready! He was so sweet. Some days if he was running late he would come up and start on the second floor bathroom just for me. All year it went like this - and I was the first one to use the newly cleaned bathroom!

I can't believe I forgot about this, it seemed so important at the time!! Thanks Effrain!

Sunday, July 16, 2006

did we try to fight it?

I had the opportunity to be in the car for a while today, and Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire" came on. Great song! And it allowed me some time to think. One of my favorite teachers in high school, Mr. Meyer, had us analyze this song once. It was 'history' class - but really it was more 'life' class, since he really taught us more about where we were going than where we had been. He gave us the lyrics to this song one day and we went through and discussed each event and how it was important in the development of the 20th century. We had to write a paper about it, not cataloging the events, but explaining why they were grouped together the way they were in the song and how things as different as British Beatlemania and the Bay of Pigs Invasion were pivotal in shaping that point in time. It was a cool project. Today, when I heard the song, I wondered what would make it into a current version of the song. At the heart of it, I bet we'd find they are all the same. Are we making the same mistakes over and over? Or are we really trying to fight it?

Harry Truman, Doris Day, Red China, Johnnie Ray
South Pacific Walter Winchell, Joe DiMaggio

Joe McCarthy, Richard Nixon, Studebaker, television
North Korea, South Korea, Marilyn Monroe

Rosenbergs, H-Bomb, Sugar Ray, Panmunjom
Brando, "The King and I" and "The Catcher in the Rye"

Eisenhower, vaccine, England's got a new queen
Marciano, Liberace, Santayana goodbye.

Josef Stalin, Malenkov, Nasser and Prokofiev
Rockerfeller, Campanella, Communist Bloc

Roy Chon, Juan Peron, Toscanini, dacron
Dien Bien Phu, and "Rock Around the Clock"

Einstein, James Dean, Brooklyn's got a winning team
Davy Crockett, "Peter Pan", Elvis Presley, Disneyland

Bardot, Budapest, Alabama, Khrushchev
Princess Grace, "Peyton Place", trouble in the Suez

Little Rock, Pasternak, Mickey Mantle, Kerouac
Sputnik, Chou En-Lai, "Bridge on the River Kwai"

Lebanon, Charles de Gaulle, California baseball
Starkweather, homicide, children of thalidomide

Buddy Holly, "Ben-Hur", space monkey, Mafia
hula hoops, Castro, Edsel is a no go

U2, Syngman Rhee, payola, and Kennedy
Chubby Checker, "Psycho", Belgians in the Congo

Hemingway, Eichmann, "Stranger in a Strange Land"
Dylan, Berlin, Bay of Pigs Invasion

"Lawrence of Arabia", British Bealtemania
Ole Miss, John Glenn, Liston beat Patterson

Pope Paul, Malcom X, British politician sex
JFK, blown away, what else do I have to say?

Birth control, Ho Chi Minh, Richard Nixon, back again
Moonshot, Woodstock, Watergate, punk rock
Begin, Reagan, Palestine, terror on the airline
Ayatollolah's in Iran, Russians in Afghanistan

"Wheel of Fortune", Sally Ride, heavy metal, suicide
Foreign debts, homeless vets, AIDS, Crack, Bernie Goetz
Hypodermics on the shores, China's under martial law
Rock and Roller Cola Wars, I can't take it anymore

We didn't start the fire
It was always burning
Since the world's been turning
We didn't start the fire
No we didn't light it
But we tried to fight it

We didn't start the fire
But when we are gone
Will it still burn on, and on, and on, and on....


this site has references to all these major events - and even some papers similar to the one I was asked to write once.
http://www.teacheroz.com/fire.htm

If anyone has the desire to try and write a new version of we didn't start the fire I'd love to hear it - hell, I'll even help if you want....

Friday, July 14, 2006

analyze this

I'm prone to having some weird dreams - very vivid and often very bizarre. There was this recurring dream I had when I was younger where my grandmother and I were staying in someone's house and then the house caught on fire. While we were trying to escape from the house we were shrunken down to about 2 inches tall. We were able to slip under the closed doors, but the stairs became a big obstacle. Once we finally made it out of the house we were in the middle of the desert and still two inches tall. And I distinctly remember having this dream about half a dozen times between the ages of 7 and 9.

Then there was the time where I had a continuing dream. I had a dream one night that involved me trying to run from these scary things - they really resembled the flying monkeys from the Wizard of Oz, but they were on wheels and wheeling around after me. I woke up just as I was trying to barricade the door of my grandmothers house and keep the monkeys out. phew! But, the next night when I went to sleep...we start right back up at me barricading the door in my grandmothers house and the monkeys trying to get in. They did. And I kept running. I'm fairly certain the monkeys left my grandmother alone.

Last night was the first time in a while that I have had a really bizarre dream. I needed a haircut, so I called a salon to make an appointment. I spoke to the woman who would cut my hair and she didn't have an appointment at a good time for me, so she agreed to stay open later so I could make it. The hair place was in this freakishly large empty building, so it took me about 20 minutes to walk from where I parked my car, through this mall-like building that had nothing in it. Finally I arrived at the salon. Out comes my hairdresser who was in a wheelchair, paralyzed from the hips down, and had these mis-shapen hands. She was extremely nice and we sat down with some books. She asked what I wanted to have done with my hair and I said I didn't know. Then she said "well, let me ask you this. Are you happy with the way your hair looks on a daily basis? Do you like the way it looks when you visit your grandmother?" After this consultation they told me that my haircut would cost $150. (In reality I normally pay $20 for a haircut, so this was crazy to me!) But I felt like since she had stayed open late, given me this consultation, and was paralyzed and with mis-shapen hands, I owed it to her to say yes. Then all these people came to the salon and they had a birthday party and then I woke up.

What I'm noticing is - all of these very strange dreams involve my grandmother. why is that? I'm not asking for an explanation of the shrunken 2 inch people, or the presence of the desert, or the monkeys on wheels, or even the paralyzed hairdresser with mis-shapen hands. I'm sure those are all very interesting and proof of some neurotic tendencies that I am already aware of. But, my grandmother? Why is she in all these weird dreams? That's my question.

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

and of course...

i would have just finished writing that last entry when I decided to check my email.

and all i have to say now is:

blech.

someone loves me


I came home tonight, from a fabulous night of nacho eating, beer drinking, and Rachel Rey watching, and as I was walking from my car I felt as if someone was watching me. I looked up and saw Mia starring down at me from the living room window. She watched me the whole way down the driveway and over to the front door. When I got up to the apartment door she was there with her paws under the door trying to get me. I wish everyone had a Mia sitting in their window waiting for them to come home, it's so nice!

Monday, July 10, 2006

is this thing on?

wow - it's like i have nothing to say since i've returned to the country. I guess nothing seems quite as exciting anymore! And that right there is the downfall of this thing, you can all tell when I'm really boring and have no stories to tell.

Todays topic - I'm old. I mean, I'm not old. really. But I just had a birthday and today I am falling apart. My whole body hurts, but in places where OLD people hurt. It's not like I pulled a muscle, or have a bruise, or got a really cool field hockey injury - no. my BACK hurts. my HIP JOINT hurts. my SHOULDERS hurt. Aren't these things that start to hurt when you start slipping downhill?? I mean, it's been a week - how did my body pick up on the fact that I've moved out of the first quarter of my life already!

Soon I'm going to be writing about the smell of bengay, using too much powder, and stringing bars of soap up all over the place!! (those last two are for my parents, and I can hear them laughing from here!!)

Friday, July 07, 2006

one point twenty-one jigawatts

I have a folder on the desktop of my computer with slightly under 3 gigabytes of pictures and movies from my trip!! As soon as I can go through them I will post all the pictures...

but it may take me several light years.

Saturday, July 01, 2006

i'm home

it's 11:30 pm on Saturday, and I'm showered and in bed. But, to put it all in terms of Boston hours:

the last time I was in a bed it was 7pm on Thursday night.
the last shower I had was at 4am on Friday morning.
I've been wearing this outfit since 5am Friday morning. (not entirely true - since my parents brought a new outfit to the airport, so I was able to change around 730pm.)
since 7am on Thursday I've slept about 6 combined hours, all on a plane, and have been on three different continents.

bonne anniversaire a moi