Government taking our sunlight...

(Is there a rule as to how long political signs have to stay up on the side of the road after an election? I was sick of looking at pictures of Christine O’Donnell before; now that there is no legitimate reason for me to care about her I really don’t know why I have to see the signs. Though I will admit that her candidacy was the only way for the rest of the country to remember that Delaware is technically a state which, too be honest, is questionable at best.)

This is also the time of year where I make my typical remarks around how horrible Daylight Savings Time is. Actually, this weekend is the one I like as it a) gives me an extra hour of sleep and b) for a short period of time actually puts my body on the right schedule. See, my natural tendency is to sleep later than I should and stay up later than I should for my work schedule. Switching the clocks back an hour makes my body match up with the time for once. The fact that it was pitch black at 5:30 is not what one would call a nice thing but this time change doesn’t bother me nearly as much as the one in the spring. Still, just another sign that we are nearing the time of year where you wake up in the dark, go home in the dark and spend the rest of the time in a windowless box looking at a computer screen. Isn’t modern life wonderful?

In the “You know how lazy you are” story of the day, one of the Chilean miners completed the New York City marathon today in five hours and forty minutes. I, on the other hand, couldn’t be bothered to get up off the couch in order to run on the treadmill. The miner in question was the one who not only sang Elvis songs to keep everyone’s spirits up but also would run several miles every day inside the mine in order to keep himself together. All of which makes me wonder if they had that much space and free time why didn’t they do any actual mining? They were down there for two months so you would think that they could have dug up some gold while they were at it.

Last thought of the night as I know that this has been a completely random post. I’ve been watching Holmes on Homes on HGTV recently and I have realized that once I actually purchase a house that I am completely screwed. While Holmes is awesome as the only contractor on the planet who legitimately cares about his work the show basically puts the fear of God in the hearts of anyone who even thinks about owning a place. It is just one piece of bad construction after another that no homeowner would ever catch. Plus, you realize just how little you actually know about construction. If I was forced to maintain my own place alone I’d be living in a tent by the end of the week.

Best of 120 Minutes: Ever notice how certain bars have certain songs? As in that for some reason it is tradition that one song must be played on the jukebox every night even though it hasn’t been a hit in well over a decade. Well at Kelly’s in Kansas City it was James “Laid”. Of all the songs that one could choose this is actually a really good one. No one ever explained to me why this spoke to the people of Kansas City but hey, it was Kansas City. It will never make any sense.



The five random CDs for the week:
1) White Rabbits “Fort Nightly”
2) Mike Doughty “Sad Man Happy Man”
3) Keb’ Mo’ “Just Like You”
4) The Minus 5 “Down with Wilco”
5) The V-Roys “Are You Through Yet?”

Now a McRib I could understand...

I will start tonight with a Battling the Current Public Service Announcement. I would like to remind everyone in the United States (including those residents of Indiana who have finally decided to embrace the rest of society) that we are to spring forward this weekend and turn our clocks ahead one hour. Yes, despite the fact that there is still snow on the ground and I am still wearing a heavy winter coat every day we have officially declared it spring in order to get people to either a) use less electricity or b) do more shopping. The government will tell you that the reason is A but in reality it is B. The entire reason behind daily savings time is that it makes it easier to have evening barbecues.

Though do I have to lose an hour of sleep this weekend? I’m so sleep deprived at the moment it is not even funny. All I want to do is lie down and sleep for the next twenty hours except that now it will be nineteen hours because the man has an issue with the ways the clock works. And you know this extra hour of sunlight is just going to increase global warming.

Ok, I’m going to switch gears and talk about our constitutional right as Americans to have McNuggets. Or more accurately, I will discuss the woman who called 911 three (3) times to complain about the fact that they were a) out of McNuggets and b) they wouldn’t give her her money back. Let’s examine this in detail, shall we?

First of all, how the hell does a McDonald’s run out of McNuggets? We’re talking about an item that takes up little storage space and can be stored indefinitely. It’s not like they are making fresh batches of them in the back every day. There is probably a McNugget closet somewhere that contains numerous boxes of the chicken like items and the staff was just too lazy to go back there and get the next box.

Also, the “all sales are final” rule seems to be bizarre even for a fast food restaurant. Times are tough but I can’t imagine a franchise needing to hold onto the four dollars of revenue that they made from the purchase. If times are that tight why can’t they do what every other restaurant does: Add more ice to the soft drinks and cut back on how many fries you put in the bag.

But as much as the employees are in the wrong here (and given the crappy economy I would expect a better level of McDonald’s employee at the moment) we do have to face the fact that a woman called 911 three times to complain about her order of McNuggets. That can be worth one call at most. We’re not talking about a Shamrock Shake here. We’re talking McNuggets. They can barely be described as food. I’m not sure how a four dollar food item can be considered an emergency. Or that she felt the need to call repeatedly and is surprised by the fact that this resulted in her both being arrested and becoming a minor celebrity.

The interesting fact is that this is not that unusual of a story. These stories cross the news wires at pretty regular intervals and it tells you something about our society. We immediately seek retribution from a third party. We can’t solve our own problems, we must always ask for help from someone else who should know what to do. We feel as though the universe owes us so that even a few dollar dispute at a restaurant becomes a capital issue. If we don’t get what we want we will go to war because it is our right to get everything we want. I just don’t think that is a healthy attitude for a society. At some point we must take some responsibility and be at least a little bit zen about the fact that not everything goes as planned. Especially not a food order.

Lost an hour a sleep and half an hour fixing clocks

Is it alright if I find it a sign of moral weakness that we now institute Daylight Savings Time while there is still snow on the ground? Maybe we are working on a misguided impression that an extra hour of daylight will help melt the snow quicker. It just seems bizarre to me that we start this so early now. I remember as a kid that daylight savings time meant that you could be outside well into the evening but we didn’t need to be wearing mittens at the time.

(Yes, I occasionally wore mittens. When you’re already labeled a geek things like keeping your hands warm takes precedence over any attempts at style.)

I say this every year but I find it useful to reiterate it. The reason we have daylight savings time has nothing to do with energy conservation or schoolkids taking the bus in the dark or any of those reasons. It is simply so that we have an extra hour of light in the evening for barbecues, golf and other economically viable activities. You move the hour of sunlight wasted by sleep to when you are most likely to spend money. It’s tricks like this that keep the economy moving in its own lumbering way.

That said, the hour of lost sleep gave me an excuse to stay in last night as opposed to making a late night even later. In all honesty I was just dead tired last night and had to wake myself up to even be bothered to turn on the Duke-Carolina game. Probably could have just slept given the end result. Duke looks like a team that is going to lose in the Sweet Sixteen. They’ve got talent but they also lose to teams like Miami. Not a very good sign.

Switching gears, I have a bit of a bummer to report on. I got a call on Friday about the job I was interviewing for and was told that they wouldn’t be needing my services at this time. It wasn’t a complete door slam as they were passing my resume on to another manager who might be interested in me but still it wasn’t exactly what I wanted to hear. Not sure exactly why I didn’t get the position (I asked the recruiter for reasons but wasn’t told anything specific) but I felt that I interviewed well. That said, I didn’t think that I would get a job this quickly or this easily so I’m not stunned by the result. I’m just bummed as I really felt qualified for the position and could have done a bang up job in it.

The good news is that I still really haven’t even started my job search. I’ve reached out to a few people and dropped a resume off here and there but I haven’t even come close to going full bore. I’m confident that I will find something out there for me. Given what I’ve accomplished I think I could make someone take a chance on me. Otherwise I’ll just enjoy my paid sabbatical. I’ve always wanted one of those.

Best of 120 Minutes: Thought that I’d have a rocking start to the week. Given that we are all going to have a collective case of jet lag in the morning there is nothing better than some musical adrenaline to start the day. Let’s all enjoy the Smashing Pumpkins, the best band ever out of Chicago, with the song that broke them into the mainstream. This will make a day of spreadsheets and powerpoints much more palatable.



The five random CDs for the week:
1) Coldplay “Live 2003”
2) The Autumn Defense “Circles”
3) Josh Ritter “Live at the Record Exchange”
4) Alain Vinet Mouvement “Day by Day Volume 1”
5) U2 “Live at Notre Dame”

Out of the darkness and into the light

Best of 120 Minutes: I’ve occasionally been called a sexist pig. Ok, more than occasionally. I’m not sure why that is the case, just because I’ve stated that girls are bad at math doesn’t make me sexist. It means that engineering is an all male endeavor. Well, that and it probably makes me a sexist pig.

Anyway, the reason I bring this up is that one of my statements that people use to prove my sexism is “Women are unable to play a guitar solo. Except for Bonnie Raitt and she doesn’t count because she was taught guitar by blues legends.” That quote is from tonight’s featured artist, Juliana Hatfield. I still don’t know why women can’t play a proper solo, you could probably write a thesis based on the imagery of a guitar being slung low across the waist and all, but Juliana sure had great songs. She still does, but like most members of alternative nation, she’s a lot harder to find today.

Random High School Note: I have to congratulate my high school for making the final eight of the football playoffs for the first time ever. It’s a great day to be a Nazareth Roadrunner as we were able to showcase the awesome power of the roadrunner. Yeah, that nickname never really worked for the football team. Having a mascot that is best known for running away is always odd.

To give you a sense of my high school and the nature of my hometown, the national anthem at the game was sung by Jim Petarik, possibly the most famous native of Berwyn in history. Who is he? He’s the lead guy in Survivor. Yes, the guy behind Eye of the Tiger is from my hometown. That my friends, is the pinnacle of art where I’m from. Well, it is kind of cool…

Switching gears, it’s dawned on me that I can only write when it is dark out and that means that now I can start writing at 5:30. Yep, it’s time for my annual time change rant as I am currently lighting a candle and cursing the darkness. The time change in the fall doesn’t bother me as much and I really wish they had changed the time last week like they always used to. Did anyone seem a little out of sorts last week because we were still on daylight time? I just felt off, like it was just a little too dark in the morning and a little too light at night.

It’s strange just how much this will affect everyone this week. The entire country will have jet lag for a day and things will just not look right. I know that the official explanation is that this makes it light in the morning for schoolkids but really this is all about money. You want it light when people are awake and can do something and spend money. Personally I’d just appreciate a couple more hours in the day. Then maybe I could get everything accomplished.

What? You want me to talk about a football game this weekend? Wasn’t that Illini game great? We were able to finally defeat the Gophers in Minnesota for the first time since I was a senior. Oh, you mean that other game. Yeah. I’m pretty sure it didn’t happen. I’ve been watching football my entire life and Notre Dame always wins that game. Someone must have just keyed the score in wrong or something.

The five random CDs for the week:
1) Mindy Smith “Long Island Shores”
2) Pieta Brown “In The Cool”
3) Cowboy Junkies “Studio”
4) Arcade Fire “Neon Bible”
5) Wayne Toups and Zydecajun “Fish Out of Water”

Time...thought I made friends with time

Good news in that things improved today and my life is no longer in the state of epic disaster that it had been teetering on for the past couple of days. Everything should now be under control and I expect that my anxiety levels will return to normal in a few days. Of course, normal anxiety for me is “freaked out beyond all belief” for everyone else. This weekend my anxiety level was at the “afraid to leave the house because the second I get past the doorway I might die” stage, which is about as much fun as it sounds. Yeah, that sound you just heard was my therapist celebrating the fact that she’ll get to buy a new car this year.

But, since things have gotten under control I was able to turn tonight into a celebration night as I did conquer most of my anxieties. That means dinner of gumbo and crawfish etoufee, which always makes the world a nicer place. And then an evening spent playing Playstation and switching between wrestling and Australia’s Next Top Model, typically staying with the latter. They got rid of the model with the eating disorder this week. I’m pulling for Sam even though her runway walk was described as “looking like a pole dancer’s.” Like I’ve said before, I think reality television exists solely to destroy the self-esteem of nineteen year old girls.

Since I’m kind of short on topics I figure that I might as well do my time change rant now. They moved the time change up three weeks this year, which meant that I was driving to work in the dark. The time change is always a rather bizarre event because the entire country suffers from jet lag for a few days. There is a legitimate reason for daylight savings time and then there is the one politician’s claim. The claim is that we do this for energy savings. That by shifting the clocks ahead an hour people will use less light bulbs and less electricity and the world becomes a nicer place. That is, in fact, complete and utter bullshit.

The real reason is pure economics. Give people an extra hour of sunlight in the evening and they are much more likely to have a weekday barbecue. Or try to fit in nine holes of golf after work. Or go to Home Depot and get cracking on that home repair project. Or even do what I did today, take advantage of the warm weather and see if I can hit a restaurant while it’s light out. The idea isn’t that we’ll spend less money on electricity. It’s that we’ll spend much more money on everything else in our lives.

I also have to tell the story as to why, up until last year, Indiana did not follow Daylight Savings Time. This is the true story of the logic behind the Indiana State Legislature, a body that at one point was one vote away from legislating the value of pi to be equal to three in order to make things easier to calculate. (And yes, remember that Wednesday is Pi Day and an official Battling the Current holiday. Ask your boss to let you out of work on religious grounds.) Anyway, the reason they didn’t move the clocks forward is that it confuses the cows.

It’s not as silly as it sounds. Assume you’re a cow. Not something you do every day but stay with me here. You have no idea of a clock but you understand cycles and you know that at a specific point every day you will be milked. Now suddenly have that switched by an hour because the farmer has to make sure everything is on the same train as before and has to operate on the train’s schedule. Obviously, this is very disconcerting to your little cow universe to have the man in overalls and a funny hat showing up an hour earlier while you were pleasantly asleep. Hence, very upset cows. And in Indiana, upset cows have great pull amongst the legislature.

To be honest, having spent a few years living in Indiana, I’m pretty sure cows are allowed to vote.