I'm not making this up.

Gabby, who you can see if you look at the below pictures (Next to Jay. You know, Mike's Jay), is a Pharm student like Mike. Well, it seems as if she had some sort of lab accident. Here's how the story was related to me:

They had to mix some liquid, or some such, with a germ. (It's a science program, so I apologize if I get too technical). So, she was working with a lab partner, and asked him the best way of mixing the stuff, which was in a test tube. He suggested, since it had a topper on it, shaking it. (Don't trust lab partners who are encouraging you to shake germ test tubes is my new motto). Well, as you might have guessed, the cap came off and the germ/liquid mixture flew all over the desk.

Needless to say there was much ado in the lab over this, and the clean-up requirements were significant.

The germ? Syphilis. (We've all been keeping our distance from Gabby of late).

Yes, I knew I was going to hell. It's just, I wasn't sure how deep.....
(By the way, the Violence level is also the 'sodomite' level. I wasn't mean, just naughty).

The Dante's Inferno Test has banished you to the Seventh Level of Hell!
Here is how you matched up against all the levels:

Mike and I have a new roommate. He\rquote s black, a bit chubby, and stays in our bedroom. Oh, and Mike likes sleeping on him.

Well, okay. It\rquote s a chair. One of those over-stuffed, reclineable thingies. We bought it for mike to have a \lquote Study\rquote chair, and we re-arraigned the bedroom, so that the chair sits under the window that gets the morning light. Well, since we have only one window in the bedroom, this really wasn\rquote t a hard decision.

My main worry now is Mike\rquote s grades. I have a feeling that , more and more often, Mike is going to go \lquote study\rquote , and in 10 minutes I\rquote m going to find him all asleep and drooly on the new chair. Which just won\rquote t do, because the drool might stain the leather.

Okay, so I decided to seperate my political rants from here and give them thier own home. I call it LeftOfCenter. So, this place will be for just fun and general weirdness, life updates, and cookie recipes. If you're interested in reading about politics, you can wander to the other site.

Mike and I went to Tahoe a while back with some friends. The paparazziti was there!

This is the group of us. Notice my goofy hat. I'm not a hat person.

This is the view from the lifts. Or the Hotel. Or maybe just something we drove past.

This is Mike and Jay. Actually, they seem just a little too 'friendly'.

Like little angels. Uh-huh. (Hmmm...Mike and Jay. Together. Again.)

Okay - I'll go back to non-important things.

So, I'm at the gym the other night and one of the Televisions was tuned to Access Hollywood or whatever and they were talking about Mr. Personality with Monica and showed clips of Monica on 'The View'. Now, I have seen 'The View' maybe twice, and I know it's not 60 Minutes but still, all I have to say is, "poor Barbara". On the clips, as all the other hosts seemed to be enjoying all the 'dish' (I think that's the word), she looked about as comfortable as the Pope at Madi Gras with a handful of beads. You could just tell she was thinking, "I've interviewed heads of state and now I'm stuck interviewing about the state of head"....or something. The sound was off, so I don't know exactly what they were saying.

Speaking of women on TV, I have to admit that Mike and I went through a Golden Girls phase a couple of years ago. Back in Boston. It's a pretty funny show. I mention it because, randomly, one of the people I worked for asked me which Golden Girl I though I most represented. I thought that would be a cool 'Which personality are you' test. (Actually, the site has that exact quiz, but it's stupid).

By the way, since you asked, I think I most resemble Sophia, but mostly out of elimination of the others.

I know people don't like it when I get political here, so feel free to skip down one entry to where I talk about coming back to Boston.

My favorite anti-gay site is the ironically named 'Family Research Council' who, in addition to their monthly anti-gay culture watch newsletter, has daily Washington updates. Here's a section from the latest.

HRC is the leading proponent of the homosexual political agenda, an agenda that includes legalization of so-called same-sex marriage, taxpayer funded domestic partner benefits for unmarried gays, mainstreaming homosexuality in the public schools, passing "hate crime" legislation to criminalize politically incorrect thoughts, and adoption rights for homosexuals.

I love the pains they go to, to make everything look suspicious. Not just domestic partnership benefits, but TAXPAYER FUNDED benefits for UNMARRIED gays.

It kills me.

They want benefits and THEY'RE NOT EVEN MARRIED! HOW DARE THEM!
Ummm, we're not allowed to get married...
Why should you be allowed to be married? I certainly wouldn't expect people who want unmarried benefits to be allowed to be married. The thought!

Ever since Bush took office, it has been open season on gay rights. And another shot was taken recently by Senator Rick Santorum from PA. (CNN covered the story here). Here's what he thinks about the Supreme Court Anti-sodomy law (If you're not up on the case, 2 gay guys in Texas were in their own home engaging in what-not, when their next door neighbors called the police and made up a story of a "weapons disturbance". The police broke into the apartment, saw them having sex, and arrested and prosecuted them):

"If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual (gay) sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything"

Anything. Allow consensual gay sex and you allow everything. EVERYTHING!
Oh well, At least he didn't mention animals. (By the way, the FRC offered an amicus brief on the supreme court case which says that it's important to up hold sodomy laws to protect the sanctity of marriage!)

Well, I booked Mike and I's (Mike and I's?) tickets to Boston today. 325 pp round trip SFO to Boston - couldn't beat it. So, we'll leave SFO Saturday the 28th and return Saturday the 5th. (I was hoping to return the 6th, but it was all booked up).

My palms were sweaty the whole time I was reserving them, but I couldn't talk Mike into taking the train with me (3 days each way). (My family better appreciate the horror I put myself through to see them. I HATE flying. HATEHATEHATEHATEHATE Flying.)

So - I need to make arrangements to see people now. Like Greg. And his wife and kidling. And some other people. And our favorite restaurant (if it's still open). And 1 trip to Legal Seafoods.

I'm not sure what else - this is my first trip back being a 'tourist'. I kind of want to do some touristy things. Maybe see the Whites of their Eyes and Climb Bunker hill. See Haymarket. Try out the new I-98 tunnel.

Assuming I survive the flight.

Well, Mike and I are nearing the end of Season II of Q.A.F. and so I have begun the quest for the next TV Series on DVD. I enjoy the DVD Series thing, because it allows me to watch the whole season, in order, at the time of my choosing. I don\rquote t have to be home at the exact time or set up the VCR. Yes, the sets are sometimes a little pricey, but it\rquote s worth it.

So I\rquote ve moved on to Six Feet Under Season I. I\rquote ve only watched the first episode, but it is odd \endash though admittedly engaging. The story is about a dysfunctional family that runs a funeral home \endash The controlling mom, the son who ran away and became the \lquote favorite\rquote , the dependable son who has spent his time trying to do what his parents want, and the druggy daughter. The first episode begins with the father getting killed while driving the brand new hearse to pick up the favorite son at the airport, and the family dealing with the grief, while at the same time \lquote processing\rquote their dad like any other client. The \lquote spirit\rquote of the dead father hangs around and each of the family sees him in a different light (During the scene at the graveyard, the father sits on top of the hears in a Hawaiian shirt and Bermuda shorts, smoking and drinking a cocktail from a coconut.

It\rquote s a dark drama, though it has odd moments of humor, such as the commercials for funeral home products which make dead skin look live, and what is basically spackle for dead bodies (to fill in wounds). The commercials though, are like you would expect a soda commercial to look like. Lots of pretty faces and slick advertisements.

Anyway \endash it\rquote s worth a look if you have HBO and don\rquote t mind the dark.

So, my continuous efforts to design my website into something which uses the state of the art flash technology has hit a wall of reality - namely, that I have no artistic ability. None. But, in the spirit of those pioneers who pressed ahead even though they had no idea where they were going, or that they wouldn't be able to drink when they reached Utah, I have used my weakness as a strength. My website theme will be a poorly drawn cartoon world!

I stuck upon the idea last week, and have \endash in beaver like fashion \endash been busily writing a ton (well, a couple of pounds anyway) of code to support my poorly drawn world. So, if you want to take a peek it\rquote s sitting on my site.

The things \endash which you uninformed people might miss, which are cool \endash well kind of- are these:

The sky in the window is dynamic. It should, theoretically, change to reflect the current time. IE dark at night, bright during the day. The thing I\rquote m not sure about, however, is if it uses my server time or your system time (I think it\rquote s the latter) \endash so if you check it and it seems dark when it should be light or vise-versa \endash let me know. I eventually plan to add a sun/moon both if which will rise and set. I also thought it might be cool to reflect the current weather in the window How? Let\rquote s move to cool thing number 2:

If you click the TV (it moves when you pass over it), you\rquote ll see a remote appear. Click on, and you\rquote ll see a list of movies you can watch. This too is dynamically generated \endash and is one of the more powerful Flash AS thingies. The flash program talks to a perl program I have on my system and the perl program checks a file and tells Flash all the movies I have there \endash allowing you to watch them. I\rquote ll eventually add some text files, which describe the movies and what-not. That\rquote s pretty easy to do, now that I have the movielist program working. (No, the movies aren\rquote t new. I don\rquote t have THAT much free time. Though, I should eventually get the next round of Vietnam Videos up \endash from Hue and Hoi An). Anyway \endash I could also use perl to talk to a weather service site, get the current weather, and tell flash what to display. Maybe.

Finally, that\rquote s a simple drawing of me that walks by the window. Honest. If it doesn\rquote t look like me, well, that\rquote s because I drew it. :)

Things I plan to add \endash pictures of Mike and me that, when clicked, will bring up cartoon stories of our lives, some games, maybe a recipe section (I have a great low-fat string bean recipe that\rquote s simple and tasty). Something to represent Mike\rquote s plants, and maybe a guest book. I still plan to Flashercise my blogger \endash but that\rquote s much later down the road.

What else should I add?

I\rquote ve been a UFO buff since long before Agent Mulder first stepped onto the small screen (and certainly long before the show got dumb). I believe, strongly, that in a universe as vast as ours, it doesn\rquote t make sense that this is the only place life has sprung up and developed intelligence. I think SETI is the best bet in this direction, as I\rquote m not 100% convinced that we\rquote ve been visited. The new news is that, after four years of Seti-At-Home which basically uses a network of millions of home-user computer to analyze data from space looking for signals, has just finished re-listening to the areas that seemed to be the most promising. Will they find something?

Probably not. Looking for intelligent signals from space is a lot like looking for god \endash finding nothing doesn\rquote t necessarily mean that there\rquote s nothing to find. We have no concept of what technology they may use to communicate, and we assume we\rquote d be able to hear it. Yet, as we delve more and more into the quantum realities of out universe, we realize how much physics is like magic. While we\rquote re in no place to do it, Bell\rquote s Theorem suggests faster than light communication is at least theoretically possible. How could we, using our technology today, detect it? And what bizarre twist of our understanding of the universe lies around the corner?

You can\rquote t talk about SETI without touching on UFOs, which I am skeptical about. 95-99% of UFO reports, in my opinion, are not UFOs but either terrestrial craft or natural phenomenon. That does leave 1-5% though. There are, of course, places you can report UFOs you see, though the cynic which resides in me thinks a lot of people who report these things are a little bit kooky or are looking for a small sense of celebrity-ness (though not all, by any means. There seems to be quite a few honest reports). I get all of my UFO news (and ghosts, life on mars, YETI, and biblical code news, as well) from Coast to Coast AM which is a wonderfully paranoid conspiracy talk-show which goes from amusingly obvious to sometimes creepy in the news they cover. (Sometimes, in the open mike segments, you can tell that some of the callers calling in their experiences have had a few and is making things up as they go along).

The thing about UFOs, which keeps me wondering though, is contrary to popular belief, they pre-date Roswell. By a lot. Take a look UFOs in History. I don\rquote t know how much of this stuff, if any, are hoaxes, but it gives you pause.

Until next time \endash Keep looking up!

There's a well-known saying, passed through the centuries, by Confucius I believe. It goes something like this:

"Whenever TV comes up with a new idea, it will inevitably be beaten over the heads of the viewers until they feel they have no option but to gouge out their eyes and watch nothing but Monty Python on DVD"

This goes to show how smart Confucius was, he not only foresaw television, but that Monty Python would be a welcome relief from all of this \lquote reality television\rquote nonsense. It also goes to explain why Anna Nicole Smith has a show where people basically watch her get plastered and say annoying things. Kind of like Thanksgiving, when that uncle no one likes comes by with a small carton of KFC potatoes and 5 cases of beer, which he drinks all himself and then proceeds to loudly explain why the democrats are evil and the reason that the Red Sox don\rquote t win is because they teach sex education in the schools.

Anyway. I, for one, am fed up with reality but that doesn\rquote t seem to stop TV from trying to give me more of it. American Idol, the \lquote new\rquote Star Search, yet another Bachelor, people who don\rquote t know each other marrying one another, CNN, and people becoming superheroes. Did you miss that last one? Well, Yahoo is reporting that Stan Lee has worked out an agreement with the WB (Motto: We\rquote ll put anything on. We\rquote re basically just trying not to be bought out by the Home Shopping Network) to create a superhero based reality show. NOT, mind you, people going out and preventing crime or flying or what-not. Not, this reality show will feature contestants PITCHING IDEAS FOR NEW SUPERHEROES! I can see it now, everyday folks on TV resembling Comic Book Guy from the Simpsons saying things like:

\ldblquote He should wear a cape. Or maybe a shawl.\rdblquote

Then, as they pitch their ideas, they have to \lquote become\rquote the hero. Dress up in the costume and do hero-type things, like eat a bucketful of maggots. Oh wait, that\rquote s Fear Factor.

If that\rquote s not enough reality for you, the same article mentions that Donald \lquote name an airline after me\rquote trump has signed on to do a reality show called \lquote The Apprentice\rquote which apparently will pit 2 corporate lackeys against one another to see who can kiss the most butt.

Still not enough reality for you? How about (I swear I am not making this up), American Idol \endash The Computer Game!. Yes, you pick a singer, train him/her and compete against computer singers (and, one must assume, other people on the internet) to be the best computer singer. My understanding is that the winner gets to have a guest shot on the SIMs .

To quote an even smarter guy than Confucius: \ldblquote Worst idea ever!\rdblquote

So much to say, so little time. We (Mike and I) went to his parent\rquote s this weekend. I managed to nab a new-to-me juicer out of the deal. See, we were doing yard work (Built a trellis?) and on a break I noticed that they had a couple of juicy looking lemons. I naturally thought lemonade! So I asked if they had a juicer (expecting one of those plastic juicer thingies). Well, Mike\rquote s dad produced this little electric juicer thingy. Well, that\rquote s all I needed \endash it was JUICE FOR ALL! I\rquote m not sure if it was the sheer amount of lemonade I drank of the maniacal look in my eye every time I used the juicer, but Mike\rquote s mom suggested that we take the juicer home with us. Oh, and she bought us like a million lemons. Next time I think I may get closely attached to their large TV.

Speaking of yard work (Yes, I mentioned yard work. Read the 4th line). Mike said the \lquote S\rquote word this weekend. For all of you who think he\rquote s so sweet and innocent. I forget why, but basically something didn\rquote t go quite right and he uttered the word. Reminded me of my mom :)

CA has an interesting effect on people. I used to hate the 1 hour drive from Bridgewater to Boston. Now I take the 6 hour SF to LA drive in stride. It\rquote s like a trip to the store \endash except you have to pass 'Smelly-Cow' central. I\rquote m not making this up. On Highway 5, maybe 2/3 rds of the trip (The 5 is mostly farms and plains \endash middle of nowhere), anyway 2/3rds of the way to LA there is a huge cattle place. Like millions of cows all standing together. And do they smell! You can smell the area about 5 minutes before you see it (at 80 MPH) and the smell lingers with you like 10 minutes after you pass it. That\rquote s with the windows closed and the AC off and duct tape over all the vents. With all the Methane floating in the area, I\rquote m surprised the whole area isn\rquote t a \lquote no-smoking\rquote zone.

Anyway, it was worth the cow-smell to get some fresh lemonade.