"Those things are secret for a very important reason: they're super depressing."

Ladies and gentlemen, I present the largest cojones on the planet. All the more striking compared to the shriveled ones of our media. Except for the Boston Globe; but even so, they're still following in the wake of a fake newsman.

Don't let the door hit you, Pt. 2.

To follow-up on yesterday's polling data, it turns out that of the 31 red states in November 2004, there are now four. I can't imagine that allowing for even more pollutants into the summer heat will help. But then again, I'm sure that Exxon's $36 billion in profits will be used to help restore the atmosphere of our cities, ease the health effects on children, and help working people with their daily commutes.*

*Hahahahahahhahahahahhahahahahhahahahaha!

2960 Broadway.

My address this summer while in NYC. *unintelligible mumbling*

I may faint.

Changes in a minor key.

Slight shift in font, but since I use a Mac with untold number of typefaces on it, I don't know if you will see it. If you have it, you'll see Optima; otherwise it may Georgia or that blasted Times. Anyway, I was getting tired of the Futura (which is what it was supposed to be since the last template change) and wanted something a bit more restrained. Also, more linkie down at the bottom with some of my favorite sites. Do enjoy.

Don't let the door hit you.

Goodness, the president set a new record today: lowest approval rating ever in the CNN poll. Beating, of course, the record he set last month. And the month before that. Hmm, there's a pattern here.

It's worth mentioning that his disapproval rating is at 60%. Clinton had numbers that high...oh I'm sorry, those were his approval ratings when it turned out that he got his winkie wacked and Congress didn't think that was proper, no sir not proper at all. Unlike refusing to fire your incompetant secretary of defense, leaking sensitive information about a CIA operative for political retribution, and playing 'Hey guess what red button I have my finger on?' with the Iranians. Asswipe.

Mr. Scarrow.

Yesterday while at the house in Humboldt, on the phone:

NRA Lackey: Mr. Scarrow?
Me: Um, yes?
NRA: I'd like to thank you for your past support of the National Rifle Association!
Me: ...
NRA: Now sir, how would you feel if the UN came into your home and took your guns away?
Me: Um, that would never happen.
NRA: Cause you wouldn't let it happen!
Me: No, because I study politics six hours a day and it's impossible.
NRA: Now, England and Australia strengthened their gun laws and their crime rates skyrocketed.
Me: Yeah, that's not true and you know it. Besides, the UN thing is a ridiculous assertion.
NRA: You don't think an amendment could get passed that would take away our gun rights?
Me: Well it takes 2/3rds of the states and 3/4th of Congress to amend, so, no I don't. Besides, organizations like the NRA routinely ignore the first part of the 2nd Amendment about the 'well-regulated militia.'
NRA: You don't think gun rights is an important point?
Me: Not when you're making ridiculous assertions just to raise money and send extremists to Congress. How about gun safety? Where is the NRA in pushing gun manufacturers to research DNA palm readers that would allow only those who own the gun to shoot the gun? Where are the trigger locks?
NRA: Now sir, I don't fully agree with all of the positions of the NRA either. But my gun rights are important to me.
Me: And I understand that. I'm just saying that the UN can't do the things they're supposed to do, let alone take away the guns of American citizens, so it's patently absurd to suggest otherwise.
NRA: Well sir, thank you for your time and you have a good day.
Me: Good day!

A cause I believe we can all get behind.

Get it? 'Behind'? Heee.

Just this morning I was thinking about how we should combine sit-ins with make-outs. This is on the right track.

Air Force, representin'.

Where be the glow sticks and the half-naked tequila-soaked girls? (Takes a while to load, but so worth it.) Via the cartoonist behind the best serial comic on the web, Questionable Content.

Res publica.

This essay from Michael Tomasky is really really good, but it is worth noting that I wrote a strikingly similar term paper about two and a half years ago called 'On the Death, and Rebirth, of Liberalism.' I'm just sayin'.

And while we're on the subject of a new American politics, these are some great articles from New York magazine (on the shortlist of publications I'd looove to work for in a few months, hint hint) about the prospects of a third party. While I am totally and completely in favor of a Purple Party (despite my devout hatred for that color), I think the only way it happens is for a third party to capture people's attention but still lose because of the first-past-the-post and electoral college structures; then maybe we can get some honest to God discussion about proportional representation in this country.

'I can’t believe it every day, that I can get up and people will pay me to write.'

As an addendum of sorts to my column of this morning, this interview courtesy of the Morning News.

Grafs.

I was taught, way back when, that a paragraph was to consist of at least two sentences. When I sent my latest column into the Kansan, it was four carefully constructed paragraphs, not every sentence for itself. Unless they were trying to fill space in the actual paper, I just don't get it. And I've been doing this for oh the better part of a decade.

Damn it to hell.

Just when I was about to swear a blood oath to curb my Facebook addiction, they have to add a feature where you can update your status and see the status of your friends as well. This may well be the end of me.

Where I make gross stereotypes of faiths in different parts of the country.

I didn't expect so much religosity in North Dakota, until I remembered the summer of '97 and that if you were stuck in such barren wasteland, you'd probably be praying too. See also, Utah and the Panhandle.

Further down below, I like the fact that there is a county in Utah in which no Catholics were reported. Methodists are also not that popular out there; just because we like our church services to end before the noon football games isn't cause for hostility, thank you. Kentucky apparently has no Jews. When did Idaho become Quaker country? Wyoming has waaaay more Muslims then I would have ever imagined. Watch out guys; Dick Cheney comes locked and loaded.

Song geekdom.

This new album I just downloaded off of iTunes from a band I never heard of an hour ago has the best, and longest song titles I have ever seen. Check out some of these from Panic! At the Disco's A Fever You Can't Sweat Out:

"The Only Difference Between Martyrdom and Suicide is Press Coverage"
"London Beckoned Songs About Money Written by Machines"
"Lying Is the Most Fun a Girl Can Have Without Taking Her Clothes Off"
"There's a Good Reason These Tables Are Numbered Honey, You Just Haven't Thought of It Yet"

This goes along with my long-stated case that the best bands are the ones who don't use song titles as the album title too. I didn't say it was a substantial case, but it does exist.

This is not the way it should be happening.

When I finished the yearbook, I thought that was it. No more font angst. No more 'what ifs'. No more thinking up catchy titles.

Except that apparently my brain didn't get the memo this weekend, and I couldn't help but think about what I would do if I had the book for yet another year. This is primarily because:

'What if' I had gone against everybody's advice and pushed my idea for the greatest yearbook ever: an Annie Leibovitz style monograph of student portraits done in black & white, with all of the names saved for the back of the book?

And also because: this may be my most favorite typeface since I started studying them.

And then there's this quote that goes so great as a title for the portrait idea: "That we walked past each other every day, and never knew it until now," from Colson Whitehead's book The Colossus of New York.

Of course this truly is all for naught. There is no way in hell I can do another yearbook, so it will instead be the unfulfilled dream. Wow, I'm really feeling the deja vú right now.

On making spaghetti for Easter.

Much more reasonable than $22 for brunch downtown; for that price I'll go fish and poach my own salmon. Although the endless rack of lamb is rather tempting.

Karma.

So after the dancing and jumping around upon hearing my big news, I celebrated New York City the way that I think anybody should: with Chinese takeout. The next day, though, I realized just what I have ahead of me the next two months:

Making arrangements for subleasing my apartment.
Moving out of said apartment.
Packing my books so that they don't disintegrate in our home attic.
Managing to still stay in Lawrence through mid-June.
Possibly going on a road trip after finals week.
Determining what to take to NYC that I may live for six weeks.
Finding luggage suitable for carrying all of it.
Figuring out how to get it there.
Waiting for Apple to come out with their black MacBooks.
Buying one of them while I still have the student discount.
Getting a new suit for the (hopeful) job interviews.
Getting dress clothes for the (guaranteed) cocktail parties.
Paying tuition for the course.
Obtaining a student loan to cover it all.

There is no question that this is indeed karma for having only one class this semester. But if given the choice between planning for six weeks in New York City or a slate of finals, then karma ain't got nothin' on me.

Now I'm not a math major...

But somebody wanna explain how three presidential candidates can combine for 104% of the vote?

Oh Delta Force, I again thought this was your year, but alas, Ignite, even though I know of at least three people who thought that meant they were pyromaniacs, swept through thanks to the Greeks. "We're not KUnited with a different name" my ass.

And please be sure to read Mischa's letter to the editor from today's Kansan; she blows the doors off of the J-School, and we're all the better for it.

Immigration.

Anybody who thinks that reason will prevail clearly hasn't met the current crop of Congressmen.

Turn on the Bright Lights.

I GOT IN!!!!!

Interpol, clear out your summer schedule cause you and I got a date in New York City. In a purely heterosexual yet lyrical sort of way, of course.

Sleepless in Lawrence.

Okay maybe it's not quite that dramatic, but my sleep patterns have been in chaos lately. My body is waking me up at 7:30am on the weekends no matter what time I went to bed the night before (2am this past Friday and Sat.), and yet on weekdays I struggle to get out of bed before 9am even when I set my alarm for a generous 7am. It's to the point that it's actually easier for me to spring out of bed at 5:20am to go to the Rec a couple mornings a week.

And there's no telling what's causing this, whether it's my body rebelling against me after all of the stress and work I did with yearbooks and unnecessary classes, or whether I'm truly becoming a nervous wreck because I don't know what my future holds (this is the week I found out about Columbia; as if it would kill them to send the letter a few days early), or because I'm laying awake thinking about certain friends who I wish would talk to me about things going on their lives. Damn my empathy!

On-deck.

I'm sure each of us has wondered at some point what song we would choose if there was a massive, omnipresent stereo that played said song when we walked into a room. It's the same thought you have while at a baseball game listening to the players choices while they're stepping up to bat. In the last few weeks I've been intrigued by this as I've discovered that on Myspace, you can upload a song to play when somebody clicks on your profile (which can be annoying if you're like me and already listening to something while browsing). So I got to thinking about what song I would choose if, in fact, I had a Myspace account.

I spent (literally) several hours of meticulously plowing through my iTunes and making an shortlist that exceeds the limit of being an actual shortlist during the last day and night. Bear in mind that I considered a number of objective factors such as lyrical eloquence, genre of music that most people would identify with me, political messages, and strength of electric guitars. I also had to decide whether I want my song to have a strong hook at the beginning (ie: 'The Mexican' by Babe Ruth), be a 'fun' song ('Coin Operated Boy' by the Dresden Dolls), or be nice listening while reading my probably lengthy profile ('Glósóli' by Sigur Rós). With all of this at stake, I think I've settled on it:

'White Rabbit' by Jefferson Airplane.

In the end I rejected those three options and went with a classic late-60s San Francisco Sound, a song that builds and builds to an irreversable climax with lyrical brilliance and unmistakable drug influence. That it was a favorite of Mr. Hunter S. Thompson may have also played a subconscious role in this decision.

Others on my "shortlist" were 'Not an Addict' by K's Choice; 'Lorca's Novena' by the Pogues; 'In the Sun' by Joseph Arthur; 'Hallelujah' by Jeff Buckley; 'French Disko' and 'Bullets' by the Editors; 'Obstacle 1', 'Obstacle 2', and 'C'mere' by Interpol; 'Thunder Road' by Bruce Springsteen; 'Positively 4th Street' by Mr. Bob Dylan ('Like a Rolling Stone' shall never be debased by gratuitous Internet playing); 'Diamonds on the Face of Evil' by Ugly Casanova; 'Abilene' and 'Crazy and Losin' It' by Abileen; 'Contact' by Citizen Cope; 'Pass the Ammo' by Mac Lethal; 'I'm a Playa' by Tech N9ne; 'Going the Distance' by Cake; 'Golden Age of Radio' by Josh Ritter; 'Just Like Honey' by the Jesus & Mary Chain; 'The Last Great Punk Rock Song' by Say Anything; 'It Ended On an Oily Stage' by British Sea Power; 'The Seed (2.0)' by The Roots and Cody Chestnutt; 'Hell + High Water' by Rainer Maria; 'Set You Free' by the Black Keys; and 'Lebanese Blonde' by Thievery Corporation. That's about 1/3 of the list, but I think you got the point of the exercise.

Mischa, something else for the bulletin board.

As a straight, white guy, I say ditto.

My God.

Because it worked so fucking well the first fucking time. The entire article makes your head spin; Sy Hersh is a national treasure.

If Congress doesn't stand up to the president's insatiable lust for war, then the Republic is over. I'll take my books and head for South America, or New Zealand, or my handcrafted hammock shop thank you very much.

Not like a Rolling Stone.

And just like that, the dream died. In order to make the deadline I would've had to send my application packet out tomorrow, so this afternoon I set about making the 5-10min. introductory video with Joah, and with her invaluable help and support, we had the makings of a damn good video. However, iVideo would have none of it, or at least none of the audio, as the video format was the only one that is unable to import sound along with the footage. So with no ability to reshoot with a proper camera and figure out iVideo in time to make a DVD, all the while finishing up the rest of the packet, my hopes of appearing on MTV with a shot at my ideal job at my ideal magazine have been dashed. And even though I knew I was probably a longshot, I still feel amazingly bummed tonight.

Oh, and congratulations Keith. But it doesn't reduce the fact that your state still has bugs, Bush (Jeb), and Bobby Bowden.

The greatest Lawrence day ever since ever began.

Great Harvest Bread Co.
Au Marche
Urban Outfitters
Cocoa nibs
Great Danes
Love Garden
Feminist postcards
Vanilla & raspberry gelato
Wood wind chimes
An hour and a half trying on vintage dresses, shirts, and jackets (I just did the last one, thank you.)
Seventy-eight degrees

Thanks Mischa!