Some hyperbole may occur during typing

Thu, 25 Feb 2010 21:07:54 GMT

Somewhen in the process of getting my new cell phone (the old one broke), I lost a bunch of phone numbers. So if you think I should have yours, please let me know. It seems that the lj people were disproportionally omitted somehow.

It's not all bad; I can now post this from my phone! :)

comments screened

Because linguistics is fun

Mon, 22 Feb 2010 04:00:54 GMT

A haiku:
it's shorter
than you thi-

Tue, 09 Feb 2010 00:22:30 GMT

We sure are getting a lot of snow. Our 3.5-day weekend may well become a 5.5 day weekend, depending on what is decided in the next few hours. I'm hoping that if we get any more snow, we get enough that we can build snow roofs over the sidewalks, thus obviating the need for any more sidewalk clearing. That, and I've always wanted to walk through a snow tunnel.

There is no milk in the DC area for sale, as far as I can tell, except for weird kinds. I'm sticking with canned condensed milk and kefir.

It occurred to me today that if Purim falls on a Saturday, observant Jews should make sure that a young girl does the reading; after all, on Sabbath, they're supposed to be paed-Esther-ians.

Tue, 26 Jan 2010 21:51:55 GMT

Apparently, the university has just realized that I'm not a student anymore. It only took a year and a half. So next month, they'll be disabling my email address.

This will have been seven and a half years with one address; I've never had that long a run with any of them before. Back in high school, I think I wound up getting a new webmail account every year or two, since a lot of them fizzled out quickly, but in college, it got whittled down to two: the university account, and an account on my roommate's server. Both of those will be gone, now. I have six active emails right now; I don't think anyone knows all six (muhuhahaha!), a .edu, a .gov, a .mil (I never expected one of those), a .net, and two .com's. I may get a .org shortly, too; hopefully before I lose the .edu. For a while, I've wanted to have the whole set.

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 03:14:39 GMT

I don't remember ever having seen so many cars on the side of the road as I have today (with the exception of snowstorm aftermath or whatever). Not only were there lots who appeared to have pulled over for some sort of internal problem, but also lots pulled over with flashing lights behind them; sometimes multiple flashing lights.

Is there something going on that I don't know about?

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 06:32:53 GMT

After going all weekend without any soft drinks, a bottle of Dr. Pepper has now got me up all night from caffeine, and the sour taste of soda water is still in my mouth, after 12 hours.

I think I'm going to give up soda altogether*.

(I feel a little shameful calling it "soda" and not "coke", but I've been on the East Coast a long time already.)

*Except Root Beer, since it is the Sacred Elixir of Happiness. Also, it's the only palatable liquid they have at the Taco Bell next to church, even though that's the Pepsi brand, which is mediocre at best. (Somehow, even the water is nasty at that Taco Bell. It's hard to mess up beans on a tortilla, though, and even mediocre root beer is drinkable.) I wouldn't be able to get through Lent without that Taco Bell.

Tue, 19 Jan 2010 22:35:06 GMT

I think "That Which Survives" is my current favorite Original Series Star Trek episode.

Mon, 04 Jan 2010 03:24:24 GMT

I wonder if the soul and mind are connected quantum mechanically.

Wed, 23 Dec 2009 02:25:54 GMT

I have now seen the great holiday classic, "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians".

It was everything I expected.

(: (: (: (:

Mon, 21 Dec 2009 02:20:10 GMT

I love having a wimpy government!

"
Federal Government Operating Status in the Washington, DC, Area

the following message applies only to Monday, December 21, 2009

Federal agencies in the Washington, DC, area are CLOSED.

This Means . . .

Federal agencies in the Washington, DC, area are closed. Nonemergency employees (including employees on pre-approved leave) will be granted excused absence for the number of hours they were scheduled to work. This does not apply to employees on leave without pay, leave without pay for military duty, workers' compensation, suspension, or in another nonpay status.
Telework employees may be expected to work from their telework sites, as specified in their telework agreements.
Emergency employees are expected to report for work on time.
Employees on alternative work schedules are not entitled to another AWS day off in lieu of the workday on which the agency is closed.
Posted on December 20, 2009 at 4:35 PM

U.S. Office of Personnel Management
"

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 11:35:05 GMT

Is it too much to ask that the foot of snow NOT fall on a Saturday? How about Sunday, late afternoon?

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 02:46:04 GMT

Having been at the grocery store today, I think I can say that our society owes a big apology to St. Nicholas of Myra.

New Recipe

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 01:56:05 GMT

Peter's 30-second Cranberry Tuna Salad:

Ingredients:
Tuna
Cranberry Sauce

Instructions:
Mix the tuna with the cranberry sauce.

This tasted a lot better than I expected.

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 23:17:06 GMT

Having just gotten back from the grocery store, I'm happy to report that I am, in fact, old enough to legally buy vinegar.

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 23:52:04 GMT

I have acquired a copy of The Joy of Cooking, the delightful older edition which includes illustrated directions on skinning a squirrel. Also included are recipes for such animals as muskrat, beaver, raccoon, wild boar...

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 00:58:28 GMT

I just watched this movie. I liked it.

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 03:47:08 GMT

To unpack your library after a year of separation is a joyful experience.

Thu, 01 Oct 2009 05:08:33 GMT

I just got internet access again; I moved last week. I'm now living in Alexandria. This is the first time in my life I have not lived in a county, interestingly enough.

An honorary niece!

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 01:09:45 GMT

My friend Daina just had a baby. I'm happy.

Wed, 02 Sep 2009 02:05:46 GMT

I just went through and deleted every reference to where I work from my lj. It's not secret, exactly, but it's also not something that I'm really supposed to broadcast. But then, there's a reasonable chance that I'll switch agencies in a few years, so people can properly lose track of me then. (: Since LJ is partially Russian-owned, I wouldn't be surprised if the FSB filed the information away, but there's far worse things that can happen. So if one of your comments is missing, it's because it said where I work. Nothing personal. Given that friends locking is not secure at all, from the government's perspective, my policy of all posts being public remains.

I have decided to start a consortium of space nerds who have mostly-unrelated-to-space day jobs, who design Martian colony ships in their spare time (we're talking the sort that could transport a colony from Earth to Mars in the 2050 time frame.) I've been missing design, you see. Anyone want in?

Though I did design an interesting space launch vehicle during a meeting at work about the new performance review system: The manned portion is a disk, saucer-shaped, about five meters thick at the center, with a circular living space inside. Attached to it is a secondary hull, a cylinder, with a rocket engine on the back, with two pylons coming off the side, each with a cylindrical booster rocket on the end. Those who are good with visualization might catch the reference here. (:

Mon, 24 Aug 2009 23:15:44 GMT

Now I can't get rid of the old insurance.

I really loathe voice-recognition systems on phone trees. If I want to talk, I would find a human. I don't talk to machines. If you want feedback, especially on a limited selection of items, tell me which button to push.

And sending me through five minutes of this crap only to reveal that the office is closed is very irritating. So now, I'll have to call from work tomorrow to terminate* this insurance.

*with extreme prejudice, mind you.

Sat, 01 Aug 2009 00:03:51 GMT

Well, I have seven more days of being broke and a fortnight and a day of being underinsured. But the fun part has been setting up my retirement account. I recommend working for the government, by the way; it's a pretty good deal. Also, I wound up working in an interesting agency in a surprisingly non-conformist division in a delightfully curmudgeonly group, in which every woman is named Jennifer.

It's weird dealing with expensive things -- like retirement -- while having ALMOST NO MONEY AT ALL right now.

The lovely unclassified computer system at work requires a magic card to function, and this magic card is available only by appointment. As far as I can tell, there is precisely one person in DC who can get this card for me, and she won't be able to see me until 11:00 on Monday (last Monday, I'd set up an appointment for 10:00, but she called today to say she wouldn't be at work yet at 10, so we changed it to 11). Meanwhile, until I get on this system, I can't get them to pay the mass transit subsidy for me to and from work. (Which, given the state of traffic on the Potomac river bridges, is almost a necessity. Though the state of traffic on the Metro is none too great either.) I think I have enough money left to do so for the next week, and I have enough gas in the car to make it to church and back this weekend, and we have peanut butter and bread, so I can probably make it through next Friday, which is payday, but it will be about as close to zero as my funds have been since high school.

Also my two walking loan agencies -- I mean, parents -- get home from their vacation tomorrow, so I can probably add to the $4000 I owe them, if necessary. So I guess I'll be ok.

Drool

Tue, 21 Jul 2009 22:34:54 GMT

Now that I have a job where I'll have to wear a suit every day (I think; I can get away without a jacket for this week (training), though):

http://www.performancebike.com/bikes/ProductDisplay?storeId=10052&langId=-1&catalogId=10551&productId=1023692&cm_mmc=$(referrer)$-_-Accessories-_-TRANSIT-_-20-4826-BLK-NON&mr:trackingCode=2E1C23D6-CF4E-DE11-BF23-0019B9C043EB&mr:referralID=NA

Tue, 21 Jul 2009 00:44:08 GMT

Secrecy gets annoying. But, amusing story from orientation:

We were being sworn in to our clearance level. We were told to read this paragraph, and if we agreed, good, but if we disagreed, that would be fine, but they'd call security to escort us from the building. We asked, and apparently this has happened before.

How does someone go through the whole months-long security clearance process, and then turn back upon finding out we have to keep state secrets secret?

There will likely be no further posts about work.

Fri, 17 Jul 2009 04:35:49 GMT

Other news that is good to have at last about work: it's going to be in DC. I'm quite pleased; it's right off the Green Line, which also goes relatively close to church. I'm thinking of looking for a place to live in Columbia Heights, in Washington, or somewhere like that (which would be in easy biking distance of at least four Orthodox parishes that I know of, two of which I visit every now and then anyway.) I could try to live in Greenbelt/Beltsville/College Park again, which would be bikeable to church and trainable to work, but I'm not sure that it's worth it, since I doubt I'll still be in DC in a year and a half -- everything is being moved down to Northern Virginia. The DC -> Ft. Belvoir commute isn't awful, I think, though it's not spectacular either. Probably the easiest thing to do would be to live in Alexandria and stay there, but I'm hoping my father's mother's sister's daughter's son (some degree of cousin with some level of removal), who is starting the University of Maryland, might be able to room with me or something, which would make Columbia Heights optimal.