Brown sucks

So I have a question for the CEO of UPS.

"Sir, when do you work?"

If the answer is from 9-5 or 8-6 like many of us slobs, then how the hell does anything get delivered to you. Everytime I order something and it ships UPS. I get one of these.


I hate these things. They taunt me and say, "Where the hell were you? You could have your video game/expensive consumer electronics product/birthday gift/life-saving medication if you were simply home at 1:15 PM like a normal American."

Now I have to go pick it up. And I don't care where you live...the UPS distribution center in your area is never convenient to get to. Usually in a heavily industrial area, close to nothing. So unless I want hookers with my package, it looks like I'm being sent far out of my way.

The Swedes know funny.

A friend from the NYPD sent this to me. Enjoy.....

Looking for a new job?

The nice folks over at the Bureau of Labor Statistics came out with the figures of the top ten highest projected job growth rates in the next ten years. Any guesses? And no, neither government or porn fluffer ( This is why I love Wikipedia) made the cut.

The top 3 are:

1. Home health aide: Sorry Mom, I'm not changing your bedpan. Thanks for looking out for me for 29 years though.
2. Post-secondary teacher: Good news to my friends who believe in being career students. You might actually pay off those loans before your estate inherits them
3. Registered Nurses: Nothing much to say here, except nurses can be hot and we hope they hire more hot ones.

That is all. Sleep well America.

A little trivia

During the Big Dig, two tunnel boring machines (TBM) helped to dig out the tunnel that would eventually become I-93. They started on each end with the goal to meet in the middle, much like this fine event. I learned tonight from a well-placed source that the machines dug to within 100 feet of each other. Hand tools were then used to finish the tunnel. But the machines then both made right turns into the sides of the tunnel and were buried there.

So I'm not sure what the cost of one of those machines is, but I'm guessing $20 million maybe? And all because they didn't have a reverse gear. Much like this expensive toy currently.

This apparently is a global problem

I'm glad to see that this happens to all men.

Anyone heard of this place?

So there's this store called Trader Joe's and I went there today after work. I'vd been before, but only once a looong time ago in California with Mikie. So I went there to stock the old pantry and they had some great stuff. I bought some salad, and some cool frozen entrees, like Chicken Satay and Mandarin Chicken and some Pad Thai...with Chicken.

Geez, that's a lot of chicken. They didn't take American Express however, which I have to get someone on. Perhaps Montu can speak to them for me.

Oh, and if you're interested in an update on the cell phone story, American Airlines called my boss's boss today and told her they had it in Newark. Someone turned it in. Thank God I reported it missing, otherwise that could have been awkward...

Boss lady: Graham, are you missing something?
Graham: Uh...no?
BL: Are you sure?
G: Uhhh, yeah?
BL: How about a phone?
G: Oh, that! Riiight...I was going to tell you about that.

I'm fried

So I just got back from the armpit of America. That's right, New Jersey. I was attending my friend Montu's sister's wedding. 600 indians and like 30 whiteys. The place was nice. But I had been on the road for three days before that also, so I'm fried. I lost a cell phone, left a tie at the hotel, and I'm exhausted. This was one of those weekends that needs a weekend right after it to recuperate.

I'm not sure if the idea of 600 indians dancing or fighting at the buffet line sounds relaxing, but it's not. I love Indians, however they have no concept of personal space. I'm not talking about your friend from Brown whose parents lived in Bombay. I'm talking about the FOBs (Fresh off the boat.) I had to box out at the buffet line. It was quite something.

I'm ready for a vacation. Is it really sad that I might go to sleep before 9?

This day is rated Yarrrr!

Guess what today is????

I've got class tonight

I've got class tonight, so this will be brief. It's my brother Ross's birthday today. He's 26, which means that I'm next in December with the big 3-0. Sweet. That's when I start my campaign of world domination.

I am going to put this up here, because I found it on the net and it makes me happy. My favorite parts are the eater profiles and the safety standards. Enjoy. Only in America could this be a sport.

Surprise!

So do you know what this week is?

If you guessed National USA Week, then you're right.

If now you're asking, "What the hell is that?" then you're in for a treat. It's National Unmarried and Single Americans week. They have a website, so it has to be legit.

And if you still doubt it, then feast your eyes on these luminaries who recognize it. Big ups to Haverhill, MA.

So congrats fellow singles. Now we have a whole 7 days to think about how alone we are. So alone.

Long weekend

This morning at 4AM, I was in hotel conference room working on a large terrorism exercise. This was a long day. Rest assured, the terrorists didn't win. Because this is America, and I'm on the front lines. And by front lines, I mean eating melon and drinking coffee while real men are carrying victims to ambulances. But I'm drinking that coffee like an American.

Hope everyone had a good weekend.

Today pretty much sucked.

So Today blew....donkey balls. Well really, only the part of my day between 8:00AM and 8:00:05AM. That would be the time when I rear ended a car driving to a meeting. There was a cop at the intersection who waved me through, so a truck could cross, and he waved me into the trunk of this Hyundai in front of me.

I'm fine. My car is okay, except the bumper is a little bent and the plastic is catching the right tire when I turn a certain way making an ungodly noise. His car, not so good. His trunk needs some work and his tail light. But he seemed okay. Getting into accidents suck. I know this is obvious, but it needs to be said just how miserable it is. That second before impact when you know you're going to hit no matter what you do. Blech.

One of the only funny parts of my day came at this meeting that I was consequently late for thanks to the accident. The guy was talking about the Trunk Monkey ads, which are very funny, as shown here.




However he kept saying, "Man, nothing is as funny as that porch monkey. I love that porch monkey." My ears perked up at that and I said, "John, I think you mean Trunk Monkey. Porch Monkey is something else." If you don't know what this is....ask around. But wear a helmet when you ask.

Gotta love Boston.

So I bought some shoes today...

Do we like them? They're from Target. So this is the first time I've bought shoes from Tar-jay. They look much like the photo. They're slightly hipster, so I guess I can wear them with jeans and the what not. That's about all that's happening really right now. Kinda boring. Anyone else have a cooler day?

A little scattered today

So work was fine. Did the moment of silence at 8:46AM, or tried to as my co-worker wanted to ask me something. All today I guess I felt scattered. It was like I had ADHD and I was 3. So I left a little early, as I saved most of the heavy lifting for tomorrow.

So now I'm home and I have to finish my first paper, and I feel alone. Let me preface this by saying that I know I'm not alone and I'm not looking for a million phone calls. I have the world's best friends and I know this. I sort of wish that I had someone here, right now, who I could see and talk to. Perhaps this is one of the negatives of being single. Apparently DateGraham.com isn't pulling in the hits. Sometimes you feel alone even though you're surrounded by wonderful people.

Does this make sense? I have no idea. I'm off to write about these 111 poor bastards who died in a coal mine explosion in Centralia, IL. Thanks for stopping by today.

Fidelis Ad Mortem

So, this is the 5th anniversary of 9/11/01. An event that has a lot of emotion for many people, of which I am one. My old employer has a nice tribute page up for these 23 brave men and women shown here.

I also have the e-mail that I wrote on the morning on 9/12 when I finally got home. Some of you have seen it, some probably haven't. It was important for me to get it off my chest.

It's not that I don't want people to forget. I want people to remember. I can't forget. It's locked inside my head and I can't get some of those images out if I tried. Especially Moira Smith on the radio that morning. I pray to God that I could get rid of that memory, but I can't. I also remember her beautiful daughter running up and down the aisle of the poshumous medal ceremony in the prettiest red dress.

God bless them.

I have a paper to write

But I'm not really doing that. It's due by Tuesday evening, but I'm going to try and knock it out tonight. However, I was surfing around and I found this. If you're old enough to remember this, I hope you enjoy.

Bort Bort Bort Bort

Movie Night

Just finished watching Blow. Meh... I liked Traffic better. It was a neat movie. The guy who directed apparently died about a year after the film of a heart attack during a basketball game. There was cocaine in his system, so he really saw the project through. The pace somewhat reminded me of Goodfellas, or maybe that was because Ray Liotta was in it also.

Oh, and even though my blog readership is flung far and wide, I wanted to point you all to this site. Room 8, is a New York City political blog started by my high school friend Ben and another guy. Ben's legit, being that his day job is blogging for the Daily News. But, my other high school friend, Adam "Waka" Green has a daily video on this site spoofing the current themes in politics. While most of it is New York based, Waks is really funny. So I command my 10s of readers to go check it out. See one of them below....

Some thoughts as a grad student

So I just got back from my first night of grad school, and asides from my pen running out of ink it went pretty well. As far as Pedro's suggestions, I have made the following decisions...

• I'm not going to take notes on my Mac, for a few reasons. I would be one of like 2 people in the classes of 25-30 doing it, so I don't want to stick out. Also, when writing papers off the notes in class, I'd rather type while looking at a notebook, than shifting back and forth between word documents. Also, that typing noise is kind of annoying.
• As far as the ladies go, they are present. However they are either much younger, or much older. So no worries there.
  
• I've already started some of the readings. I'm a geek, but I find this stuff interesting. There's a Boston City Councilor and the Boston Transportation Commissioner in one of my classes, which is pretty cool.
  

That's about it. It's gone well so far. I've got mandatory orientation this Sunday from 9AM - 3PM, which I will guaranteed be hung over for. Yee ha!

I'm a little nervous

So tomorrow, I begin my pursuit of my Masters in Public Administration at Suffolk University. And yes, you jokers, I have my new backpack and my pencil case and my name is written into the back of all my gym shorts.

So I'm returning to school after a 7 year hiatus and I'm a little scared. But hopefully we start slow. I'm also entering the 21st Century by deciding to take notes on my laptop. We'll see how that works out as well.

I'll keep you all posted.

1 pound of meat....no worries

So apologies for the rapid-fire blogging but last week was really busy and I was away this weekend. However on Wednesday evening last week, my brother Ross and I took on the Godzilla burger at Eagle's Deli. The Godzilla is 2 half-pound patties and a pound of fries. You need to finish the whole thing in order to get your picture on the wall.

We came, we saw, we got very full. It was actually the fries that were the hardest, but we adopted the strategy of eating them at the same time as the burger, and not saving them for the end. Now, once they take the polaroid of this major life event, you get to make your own caption. This is a lot of pressure as there are hundreds of other photos with clever captions, and you want to be original. So I settled on this:
And let me tell you.....truer words never written. Sorry for the crappy photo. My brother's phone is not going to be used by the AP anytime soon I'm afraid.

Crikey

RIP Steve Irwin, you mad crazy bastard.