Talk of the weather will do.

On this, the last day of January, I counted five people on campus wearing shorts, three of them sans jacket or long-sleeves. For all of the talk about 'Oh how nice it is!', I'm cringing and bracing myself for the other shoe that must–must!–inevitably drop. Where last year it snowed briefly during spring break, I'm expecting this year nothing less than three inches of ice. Or perhaps a typhoon.

Power of the press.

So I had this cute little post all ready for the publication of my first column for the Kansan. The title was going to be Let the hate mail begin! and then the post would just be 'They're sooo gonna start hucking rocks at me on campus today' with a link to the column on Kansan.com. However they're not posting today's opinion stuff (and *just* the opinion stuff). So I can't.

But that doesn't mean there's not still the possibility that I'll be forced to run a gauntlet through Frasier Hall; the worst thing would be to get pricked by those 'This is what a feminist looks like' buttons. I hate shots.

Record breaking.

Forty pages in under three hours. I am a yearbook god.

"This run has the highest probability of producing a lawsuit."

Now this is how one does a scientific study: double-diamond ski runs, moguls, and alcohol. What could possibly the fuck go wrong?

Seven weeks out, or, Why I'll be dead by spring break.

For the first time since I took over the Jayhawker, I will miss a deadline. It upsets me and makes me feel like I've failed, which as my advisor David said today, "at least shows that [you're] not a sociopath." Including this deadline, I have 108 pages, including four full-color pages that are due within five days of the Jayhawks NCAA tournament end. At the way our team is currently standing, I'll probably go ahead and have those pages done with the rest of the book by 13 March.

Course this gets a little more involved due to the lack of interest shown by most of my photography staff. I have a couple of people who are still contributing, but for the most part, I haven't fulfilled my duties in really managing my staff. So I'm taking it upon myself to carry this book home; instead of planning things around my classes (which don't count anymore anyways), I'm planning around photo opportunities. Last night was an concert by our a capella group, tonight was a swim meet and Chinese New Year's dinner, tomorrow is a track meet and Mozart tribute concert. I also woke up at 5:15am this morning and decided that since the Rec was opening in 15min., I might as well go ahead and get a work out done. And now it's 6:40pm and I'm supposed to meet Jeff, Annie and Tim for dinner downtown and I'm exhausted.

At this rate, I'll be a wired, emaciated former yearbook editor by St. Patrick's Day. But dammit, I'll have a portfolio to send to Italy. Visions of pasta are the only thing getting me through this anymore.

The surly bonds of Earth.

I can't believe it's been twenty years since the Challenger exploded. I vaguely remember that day; we were living in Rifle, Colorado at the time, and I wasn't yet in school so I was home that day to watch the lift-off (being full-on in my astronaut phase, as all four year olds have to be). The only thing I really remember about the disaster, though, is my mom calling my dad at his radiator shop to tell him what happened. Eighteen years later, my mom would do the same to call me from New York when the Columbia disappeared off radar, to break apart in the skies over Texas.

Anyway, NASA has put up a tribute site on their Day of Remembrance. Take a look, and take a moment.

On not freezing my bollocks off in an Alaskan winter.

Via Deadspin, this is what temperatures of sixty below look like (video).

Extinction.

Because, obviously, one futuristic sci-fi action movie featuring a pretty girl as a trained assassin capable of taking on entire armies in a fight for mankind while canning the most crappy one-liners of dialogue ever ... wasn't enough. Anybody who thinks the traditional Hollywood studio/creative structure needs protection should be forced to watch those movies with their eyelids taped open.

Granted, however, this is not the worst punishment imaginable. That would be watching Michael Douglas or Tim Robbins trying to exude any notion that they might still be capable of having sex.

"I think we show up at his house two years from now naked with a box of cigars and go, 'You know what, stick them wherever you want, just come back.'"

Jon Stewart, in June 2001, on Bill Clinton. What I wouldn't give for us to go back to the days when getting one's winky wacked was the worst thing one could do in the Oval Office.

Finally, somebody at K-State is useful for something.

Course, the president will likely still get away with playing with truthiness, but good on ya' Tiffany Cooper.

As if curling didn't have enough problems already.

Continuing with our series on just what the hell is going on up in Scandinavia, the Swedish women's curling team joins up with a heavy-metal band for 'Hearts on Fire.'

I know what you're thinking, and no, it's a different 'Hearts on Fire.'

Mmm, beer.

Those Aussies sure get right to the point, don't they?

Visionary.

The brightest mind in the entertainment business today? My vote goes to Mark Cuban.

On bumming around in sweats and not leaving the apartment all day.

Not like I don't have a good reason. Canada, sorry but I'm gonna have say 'no.'

Housekeeping.

When I came back from a week in Humboldt, I actually weighed in at 148 lbs, which is a bit over my prediction. However, thanks to my new resolution and figuring out a good schedule for going to the Rec, I was able to shave a good four pounds off that in the three weeks since coming back. Plus, as pertains to Resolution #1, I ran 5K on the treadmill Wednesday with a (rather unnecessary) quarter mile walk break at the halfway point; I may be able to run 10K by the end of February, and spring break at the latest. My new resolution is now to break my personal best of 48'50" at 10K by June.

For R#2, I have decided to set aside my grad school plans and pursue some alternatives, namely the Columbia Publishing Course at the famed Journalism School in New York City. It is a summer program, and being as I won't know my status for sure until March or April, I have had to decline working for Duke TIP again this summer (which sucks, because I was very much looking forward to being around Mischa and Lee and Julie and any other returning staffers again). In addition to that Course, I am also hoping to get accepted into Fabrica, Benetton's communication studies institute about 40km outside of Venice, Italy. If I get through the trial period (which in itself would be two weeks in Italy; score!), then I sign a contract for a year-long internship to work on publishing projects and such.

On R#3, last night was indeed 80's Night, or Neon as they prefer to call it, at the Granada. I went with Mischa and Michelle; being a little rusty from months of no dancing, I was pleased with my groove by the end of the night. However, if I were to get on a treadmill and force myself to run 10K while wearing kevlar body armor, I would not have been as sore as I was while walking out of the Granada. I forgot how much twisting one tends to do when one listens to classic Madonna.

This being my last semester at KU then, I'm excited. I only have two classes, on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons from 1-4pm, and I'm way excited about them (if for no other reason than because it's the lowest amount of money I've ever spent on textbooks). The first is from my dear mentor, Prof. Bob Antonio, on Sociology and the Economy; this will be my third class with him, the two others being the two best classes I've ever taken in college. I'm sure he can handle the expectations. The other course is History of Photography, my first ever art history course; I really don't have anything else to say about it, but I hope that changes.

The yearbook is, um, well, hm, going. We have a deadline of 40 pages that I have to send off a week from today, and at this moment in time I only have about a dozen pictures of the campus buried in snow. Which is cool, but there's not even any sledding, and I am *all* about sledding photos. Nevertheless, I'm sure Joah and I will pull it off; we're like Harvey Birdman and Peanut. I'll leave you to determine which one is which. (Hint: I'd be the one more likely to say 'Oooh, sprechen sie sexy...')

On that note, I watched two and a half hours of Harvey Birdman DVDs this week. Best written show on television AND it has Stephen Colbert.

In addition to the yearbook, I am also serving as a regular columnist for the University Daily Kansan this semester. My column starts on Tuesday, 31 Jan., and will run every two weeks after that (meaning that I get the Valentine's Day column. Ha ha! Chocolate fueled depression). My parameters are roughly anything within the realm of politics and economics, so I'll be writing on, among other things, the politics of Roe v. Wade (hmm, I wonder where I'll go with that...) and the economics of organic farming. And if I get more hate mail from the Young Democrats than from the College Republicans, well that's just icing on the cake.

I've also applied for the position of Commissioner of Elections for this spring. The elections for Student Body president/VP and for the Student Senate are held every April, and they need a non-partisan student who is interested in politics and the law to administer the elections and investigate campaign code violations. It should work with my schedule well (I'll be done with the yearbook by spring break), and I looove the title of Commissioner Scarrow. *chills*

And finally, this is really something that only I could pull off: I managed, over the course of the past seven months, to forget my mom's, my dad's, and my sister's birthdays. In case you're new to the show, that's my entire family. I've already invoked the 'freebie' rule to cover this past year, and have sworn a blood oath that it will never happen again. Until I forget my blood oath. Because it has happened before.

Nothing more useless than a bulletproof vest that can't, you know, stop a bullet.

And they say that bloggers aren't 'true' journalists. My ass.

Is it something in the water?

I don't know what goes on in Iceland, but if I can have kids as gorgeous as these, I might just move there. And you know, their music scene doesn't seem to be all that bad either.

Shot in the arm.

The times when I read an essay that floors me in both its analysis and foresight with regards to current geopolitical realities seem to be fewer and farther between anymore. Prepare to be floored.

Heart.

I was explaing to my mom the other night what it meant to *heart* something. For example, I *heart* this keyboard.

No no, you don't understand. I *heart* it. Badly. With a devotion so strong and solid that it is unknown to but a few other people on this planet.

Wait, what?

That was word for word my literal reaction upon seeing this.

Jason Statham is the greatest badass in the history of badassery.

I was a little disappointed with the special effects in Transporter 2 until I realized: Hey, Jason Statham is putting on some of the best fight scenes I've ever watched. What the hell do I care?

Besides, I'm all for positive representations of men with high hairlines. Although I'm sure the suit and the Audi A8 also help.

White paper.

Facebook deserves many things from us. Scorn. Ridicule. Dismissive smirks. Whether or not it deserves statistical analysis, though, is something I'm not prepared to deal with yet.

That being said, earlier this morning I surpassed 10K people that I'm connected to through friends. I could post a screengrab to prove this, but I don't want to make things any worse than they already are.

I am frightened by whoever photoshopped this.

But I'm more frightened at the thought that it actually isn't photoshopped. My whole 'fleeing to Europe' thing makes more sense with each passing day, it seems like.

Can you feel it?

I sure can. It's starting to feel very Olympic, not least of all because NBC finally released their broadcast schedule. Reading through it becomes crystal clear that I will have to go back to the cable company and have my TV service reconnected (sadly, the attempts to get an attenae to work were blocked by the fact that I live on the side of a hill). On the upside, though, I will only need the limited cable, and not the expanded cable, as NBC proper will be showing a good enough cross-section of the events; USA will be showing some biathlon and curling, but the bulk of the cable service is dedicated to every single hockey game of the Olympics, and that is really not worth the extra money. I haven't missed an Olympics since I realized they existed halfway during the Albertville '92 games, and I seriously wouldn't be able to live with myself if I skipped out now.

Snark.

I never knew the New York Times could be so campy and sarcastic, yet I never really expected to see them do this long of an article about the porn industry awards.

[The best feature award] went to "Pirates," a relatively high-budget story of a group of ragtag sailors who go searching for a crew of evil pirates who have a plan for world domination. Also, many of the characters in the movie have sex with one another.

..."There's nothing worse then when the pizza boy rings the doorbell, the girl says she doesn't have a tip, and then they get it on," she said. Ms. Daniels also won an award for best screenplay for a parody, "Camp Cuddly Pines Power Tool Massacre," which presumably had a storyline more in keeping with her tastes.

#*&@!

There are lines that must be drawn in a civilized, law-abiding society. I believe the Bush Administration and its bastard child, the Dept. of Homeland Security, may want to look behind it and find that line again. Far, far behind.

Cause the FCC can suck it, that's why.

Howard Stern's first day at Sirius, by the numbers. (Mom, you might not want to look at this. Trust me.)

Host with the most.

Just when I couldn't possibly care less, now I gotta watch the damn thing.

Fight On.

Here we go folks: let's hope for a glorious evening in Pasadena.

Resolved.

1] To be able to again run 10K on the treadmill by June. (I still have plenty of homemade treats to finish off, so this is as much for pragmatism as it is for pride.)

2] To have a grad school, internship, or job for the fall lined up by June. (They have internships in Europe right? They have bars and bartenders over there, that's for damn sure.)

3] To go dancing at a club at least every other week; techno, 80s, salsa, whatever. (I've been told I have great rhythm; it's a shame to deny it to the people.)

4] To try and get a second date with a young lady whom I fancy. (Course, there's always the obstacle of getting that first date. Damn.)

5] To get and I mean the hell out of this state.

Chart topper.

Yes it's an arbitrary list from a site that many people don't read, but I take much solace in knowing just how many albums from this 2005 top ten list I already had on my iTunes: #10 Bloc Party, #7 ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of the Dead, #6 British Sea Power, #3 M83, #2 The Decemberists, and #1 Wolf Parade. Seriously people, listen to these bands as soon as possible; they're why I still have hope in music today.