I'm off to witness a marriage.
Here's a fun fact: Saturday will mark the first time in about 3 years since my parents have been in the same room! And the time before that was about 6 years back, when the current bride's sister got married! Did I mention they haven't spoken to one another in approximately 12 years? It's always a good time when my folks are around.
Check back Sunday night for pictures of me: DanPretendsNotToBeUncomfortable.jpeg, TheLovelyBride.jpeg, GodWhenIsOneOfThemGoingToLeaveTheReception.jpeg
Thursday, April 27, 2006
How Not To Date A Black Woman
[A companion piece.]
Step 1. Live in Kansas.
Step 2. Be a passive white dude of German ancestry.
Step 3. Be terrified of dating a black woman.
Step 1. Live in Kansas.
Step 2. Be a passive white dude of German ancestry.
Step 3. Be terrified of dating a black woman.
Tuesday, April 25, 2006
The Forgettable Fire
I know we're all exhausted from talking about board games, but can we take a moment to discuss Crossfire?
No, it's not that gay CNN show that was cancelled (I think), it's slightly better.
As a kid, I was very, very excited when my brother and I received Crossfire for some reason. The commercials we'd seen for Crossfire looked super-awesome. No one we knew owned Crossfire. Crossfire was going to kick so much ass. How could we be so lucky?
The object of the game was to fire your gun, loaded with ball bearings, toward the two puck thingys, and to push both puck thingys all the way across the board. Your opponent also tried to shoot both thingys across the board.
Two players. Two puck thingys. Can you see why Crossfire turned out to be a bust?
It was terrible. One person would succeed in shooting puck 1 across the board, while the opponent would succeed in shooting puck 2 across the board. Ties are for soccer, not board games. Not board games that inflate your hopes with promises of gun-shooting.
Now I see that the goal of Crossfire was to "push your puck into your opponent's goal as often as you can", which sounds even lamer than the way my bro and I played. Amazon also features some customer reviews:
No, it's not that gay CNN show that was cancelled (I think), it's slightly better.
As a kid, I was very, very excited when my brother and I received Crossfire for some reason. The commercials we'd seen for Crossfire looked super-awesome. No one we knew owned Crossfire. Crossfire was going to kick so much ass. How could we be so lucky?
The object of the game was to fire your gun, loaded with ball bearings, toward the two puck thingys, and to push both puck thingys all the way across the board. Your opponent also tried to shoot both thingys across the board.
Two players. Two puck thingys. Can you see why Crossfire turned out to be a bust?
It was terrible. One person would succeed in shooting puck 1 across the board, while the opponent would succeed in shooting puck 2 across the board. Ties are for soccer, not board games. Not board games that inflate your hopes with promises of gun-shooting.
Now I see that the goal of Crossfire was to "push your puck into your opponent's goal as often as you can", which sounds even lamer than the way my bro and I played. Amazon also features some customer reviews:
My 7yo son cried the first (and therefore only) time he played it because it was too hard to fire the guns. He had to squeeze with both hands, which prevented him from being able to use one hand to reload. They often misfire and you have to jiggle them to get the balls to roll into place and that can mess up the whole playing surface. He also said it hurt his hand to pull the trigger. I tried to play the game to see how bad it was. I couldn't even finish the game because I developed a blister on my trigger finger. The next day, my whole hand was sore and the pain extended up my forearm.Nice work, Crossfire! You sucked and you always will suck. Get fucked.
Sunday, April 23, 2006
Beating Bush
Nathan and Julie had an argument about our President - was he above average intelligence, or was he below? I couldn't decide, so I tried to tackle the issue from another perspective. Could I match him in a game of wits? Like Trivial Pursuit?
People and Places
Unlike myself, W has visited every state in the Union (I assume), as well as many foreign countries. I have been to Cancun. This category also tends to favor the older player, who may know folks like Pol Pot from something other than a history book, and who may have actually known Elizabeth Taylor as a hot young actress.
EDGE: George W. Bush
History
Again, the older player usually has an advantage in this category. Now would be a good time to point out that I'm referring to the traditional Trivial Pursuit games, not the pop culture versions, which shouldn't be purchased or played.
EDGE: George W. Bush
Science and Nature
Unless he could use his position to skew the scientific information, as he does in real life, my two scientific degrees would prove too much for the President. "Working" on a ranch in Texas does not a nature expert make.
EDGE: Me
Sport & Leisure
W is a sports fan, and we all know that he enjoys his leisure. This is always a strong category for a male - I don't see either of us struggling to gain this piece of pie.
EDGE: None
Art & Literature
I imagine that George has read the same classics as I have, and perhaps even a few more. His wife is a librarian, so he's been at least subliminally exposed to hundreds of authors' names. For some reason, though, I think he'd be weak on Renaissance painting and sculpture. I, on the other hand, know that Rembrandt painted "The Night Watch".
EDGE: Me
Wild Card
Here's the thing about the Wild Card category - it's full of ridiculous questions like "How many paperclips does the average Croatian use per year?" And they often give you multiple choice: 20, 2000, or 20000000? You have to be savvy enough to know that it's always the huge number, or the tiny number. You have to be a veteran of the game. I'm guessing a college-aged W never stayed in on a Saturday night, playing very, very serious games of TP with his classmates until 3 or 4 in the morning. I have.
EDGE: Me
Taking three of the six categories outright, I would defeat our President. I could also dispatch him at Scrabble, Scattergories, Boggle, any fantasy sport, and Catchphrase.
I may be smarter, but that doesn't mean I'm invincible. I'll give W the nod in a game of Monopoly (he's the kind of guy that could convince you to trade him Pennsylvania Avenue for the Electric Company and a Get Out of Jail Free card), Stratego (irony rule in effect), and Quarters.
People and Places
Unlike myself, W has visited every state in the Union (I assume), as well as many foreign countries. I have been to Cancun. This category also tends to favor the older player, who may know folks like Pol Pot from something other than a history book, and who may have actually known Elizabeth Taylor as a hot young actress.
EDGE: George W. Bush
History
Again, the older player usually has an advantage in this category. Now would be a good time to point out that I'm referring to the traditional Trivial Pursuit games, not the pop culture versions, which shouldn't be purchased or played.
EDGE: George W. Bush
Science and Nature
Unless he could use his position to skew the scientific information, as he does in real life, my two scientific degrees would prove too much for the President. "Working" on a ranch in Texas does not a nature expert make.
EDGE: Me
Sport & Leisure
W is a sports fan, and we all know that he enjoys his leisure. This is always a strong category for a male - I don't see either of us struggling to gain this piece of pie.
EDGE: None
Art & Literature
I imagine that George has read the same classics as I have, and perhaps even a few more. His wife is a librarian, so he's been at least subliminally exposed to hundreds of authors' names. For some reason, though, I think he'd be weak on Renaissance painting and sculpture. I, on the other hand, know that Rembrandt painted "The Night Watch".
EDGE: Me
Wild Card
Here's the thing about the Wild Card category - it's full of ridiculous questions like "How many paperclips does the average Croatian use per year?" And they often give you multiple choice: 20, 2000, or 20000000? You have to be savvy enough to know that it's always the huge number, or the tiny number. You have to be a veteran of the game. I'm guessing a college-aged W never stayed in on a Saturday night, playing very, very serious games of TP with his classmates until 3 or 4 in the morning. I have.
EDGE: Me
Taking three of the six categories outright, I would defeat our President. I could also dispatch him at Scrabble, Scattergories, Boggle, any fantasy sport, and Catchphrase.
I may be smarter, but that doesn't mean I'm invincible. I'll give W the nod in a game of Monopoly (he's the kind of guy that could convince you to trade him Pennsylvania Avenue for the Electric Company and a Get Out of Jail Free card), Stratego (irony rule in effect), and Quarters.
Thursday, April 20, 2006
More Than One Way
We were given a pale, dead rat. It came with instructions. After moving the scalpel around the torso and making a few other precision cuts, remove its skin "like you're taking off a T-shirt".
Since my sophomore year of college, I've peeled tees from my body thousands of times. In my luckier days, I've been allowed to remove T-shirts from the bodies of women; although usually, I wait for them to handle that themselves. I'm shy.
But whenever I get crossed up, I look back to my training, and I think, "Remember, it's just like peeling the skin from a bisected rat."
Since my sophomore year of college, I've peeled tees from my body thousands of times. In my luckier days, I've been allowed to remove T-shirts from the bodies of women; although usually, I wait for them to handle that themselves. I'm shy.
But whenever I get crossed up, I look back to my training, and I think, "Remember, it's just like peeling the skin from a bisected rat."
Wednesday, April 19, 2006
Pamoja
[Hi. I found the following text over the weekend, when I was searching for the letters I wrote to former Minnesota Twins players. (I asked several of them to put me up in their mansions while I went to graduate school. I did not receive any correspondence in return.) The text is an email I sent on behalf of the student senate - we were hosting a get-together for all the grad students. It was called "Pamjoa", for reasons I'm still not quite comprehending. Regardless of its name, we needed to get the asses in the seats, as they say. I thought this email would do the trick. It's ridiculous, ridiculously long, and of little interest to anyone.]
I hope you are all considering to attend Pamoja: An Evening of Community. Wednesday evening will surely prove to be a good time.
I'm sure more than a few of you have thought, or even wondered aloud, "Pamoja? Why is it called Pamoja? Well, I'll tell you why.
There's a reason for everything, and--
No, stop. Wait. I'm sorry. I'm off to a bad start already. That's a lie, the thing about a reason for everything. Reassuring as it may sound, it's simply not true; I don't want to start off with a lie like that. What message would I be sending? A message of untruth, or, at the very least, a misleading memorandum -- and that's, like, the Best Case Scenario.
There is not a reason for everything, and that fact is a difficult thing to wrap one's head around. Still, for some things a reason exists, and one of these reasoned entities is the naming of Pamoja. After an extensive survey of young professionals, the name for the back-to-school Student Senate-sponsored event was shortlisted to three. They were, in order of popularity:
1. Twilight Enchantment
2. Banquet Under the Sea
(and)
3. Pinnacle: A Remembrance of Heart
Clearly, Student Senate had its work cut out for itself. After separately voting on the best event name at four separate meetings, the deadlock was broken. "Banquet Under the Sea" won out by the narrowest of margins, and planning began in earnest. Things hit a snag rather quickly, however, when it brought to our attention that seawater caused unfortunate aftertastes in the dishes we planned to serve. This detail -- in combination with the grim realization that humans cannot dine or survive for extended periods underwater -- was great enough to abort the underwater buffet idea. I thank heavens to this day for the rehearsal that brought these points to our attention; I fear the loss of life may have been far greater if we had proceeded as planned.
So, there we were, a mere two months away from the event date, without a name for our gathering. Down on my luck, I turned to my usual therapy -- a steamy helping of alphabet soup. As I sipped the broth from a plastic spoon -- irregularly shaped due to unfortunate, improper placement in the automatic dishwasher -- I happened to glance down at my bowl's literary content. Clearly spelled out between a bit of celery and a chunk of chicken (the manufacturers claim it's 100% All White Meat!, but I have my doubts) was the word that inspired it all: "PARTOFME".
Granted, it was hardly a word at all, more like 3 words in one magical grouping, but it did the trick. A switch in my noggin flipped, and I rushed to the file cabinet in the next room. Inside was the answer we had been searching for: 3,000 pieces of correspondence, the result of an intensive, nationwide letter-writing campaign to Student Senate the previous semester. All across America, both youths and adolescents alike sent their voices soaring past the walls of their middle schools. They urged us to, should we sponsor a gathering of public health students and faculty, name the event "Pamoja".
Without bothering to alert the others, I immediately began researching the etymology of Pamoja. What I found was alarming. Not only was its aesthetic value off the charts, Pamoja's literal and figurative meanings were perfectly suited for its designation. Clearly, the letter-writing youth of America were on to something…something BIG.
It turns out that Pamoja is a Swahili word for "together". Can you believe it? What a happy coincidence! Here we are, planning an event to bring together two groups of people, and we get a name that MEANS WHAT WE'RE DOING!! Amazing. And it didn't stop there -- as my research continued, I found that "together" is actually an English word for "pamoja"!
Furthermore, "together" is taken from the essential derivative "ghedh", which in turn becomes words like "gadrian" (meaning "gather", Old English) and "gaduri" (meaning "in a body", Germanic). Just fascinating. Didn't I tell you it was fascinating? Here we are, "gathering" people (or, "bodies") into a place that originally was going to be a "body" of water…I mean, does it get any better than Pamoja?
Pamoja, were it to appear in a common English language dictionary, would be placed adjacent to "pampero", a strong, cold southwest wind that blows across the Pampas. It's cold here in Minnesota -- where wind sometimes blows -- where we're having Pamoja! And it's being held at the Weisman Museum, a museum that just HAPPENS to face the southwest!
Books of learning scattered across the floor, my hands shook as I sat there, trying to light a cigarette. My anxiety was so great that I failed to accomplish that task; indeed, my anxiety was so momentous that I had forgotten that I do not smoke -- in fact, my anxiety was so very, very big that I had no recollection of stopping my research briefly, walking outside, punching a passerby in the stomach, taking his wallet and cigarettes, then calmly moving back inside my abode and attempting to enter Flavor Country.
And you should be excited, too. Pamoja could very well be the last event we ever attend. Not the last function we go to at Gehry's Wacky Shack, not the last gathering at the University of Minnesota -- the last event, like, ever. The world could end immediately after the interactive entertainment we have planned for Pamoja comes to a close. Don't believe me? What if I told you that "Pampas" was a vast plain of south-central South America from the lower Parana R. to south-central Argentina? Am I the only one that sees the significance? Pamoja? Pampero? Pampas? Parana R.? Vast plain? A vast plain is, like, only the most OBVIOUS reference to the all-encompassing void of space known as the ever-expanding universe, where our souls will drift for all eternity after the planet we know as Earth implodes upon itself.
Please, I urge you to come to Pamoja before life as we know it comes to an end. Also, there will be food and drinks.
Bye,
Student Senate
I hope you are all considering to attend Pamoja: An Evening of Community. Wednesday evening will surely prove to be a good time.
I'm sure more than a few of you have thought, or even wondered aloud, "Pamoja? Why is it called Pamoja? Well, I'll tell you why.
There's a reason for everything, and--
No, stop. Wait. I'm sorry. I'm off to a bad start already. That's a lie, the thing about a reason for everything. Reassuring as it may sound, it's simply not true; I don't want to start off with a lie like that. What message would I be sending? A message of untruth, or, at the very least, a misleading memorandum -- and that's, like, the Best Case Scenario.
There is not a reason for everything, and that fact is a difficult thing to wrap one's head around. Still, for some things a reason exists, and one of these reasoned entities is the naming of Pamoja. After an extensive survey of young professionals, the name for the back-to-school Student Senate-sponsored event was shortlisted to three. They were, in order of popularity:
1. Twilight Enchantment
2. Banquet Under the Sea
(and)
3. Pinnacle: A Remembrance of Heart
Clearly, Student Senate had its work cut out for itself. After separately voting on the best event name at four separate meetings, the deadlock was broken. "Banquet Under the Sea" won out by the narrowest of margins, and planning began in earnest. Things hit a snag rather quickly, however, when it brought to our attention that seawater caused unfortunate aftertastes in the dishes we planned to serve. This detail -- in combination with the grim realization that humans cannot dine or survive for extended periods underwater -- was great enough to abort the underwater buffet idea. I thank heavens to this day for the rehearsal that brought these points to our attention; I fear the loss of life may have been far greater if we had proceeded as planned.
So, there we were, a mere two months away from the event date, without a name for our gathering. Down on my luck, I turned to my usual therapy -- a steamy helping of alphabet soup. As I sipped the broth from a plastic spoon -- irregularly shaped due to unfortunate, improper placement in the automatic dishwasher -- I happened to glance down at my bowl's literary content. Clearly spelled out between a bit of celery and a chunk of chicken (the manufacturers claim it's 100% All White Meat!, but I have my doubts) was the word that inspired it all: "PARTOFME".
Granted, it was hardly a word at all, more like 3 words in one magical grouping, but it did the trick. A switch in my noggin flipped, and I rushed to the file cabinet in the next room. Inside was the answer we had been searching for: 3,000 pieces of correspondence, the result of an intensive, nationwide letter-writing campaign to Student Senate the previous semester. All across America, both youths and adolescents alike sent their voices soaring past the walls of their middle schools. They urged us to, should we sponsor a gathering of public health students and faculty, name the event "Pamoja".
Without bothering to alert the others, I immediately began researching the etymology of Pamoja. What I found was alarming. Not only was its aesthetic value off the charts, Pamoja's literal and figurative meanings were perfectly suited for its designation. Clearly, the letter-writing youth of America were on to something…something BIG.
It turns out that Pamoja is a Swahili word for "together". Can you believe it? What a happy coincidence! Here we are, planning an event to bring together two groups of people, and we get a name that MEANS WHAT WE'RE DOING!! Amazing. And it didn't stop there -- as my research continued, I found that "together" is actually an English word for "pamoja"!
Furthermore, "together" is taken from the essential derivative "ghedh", which in turn becomes words like "gadrian" (meaning "gather", Old English) and "gaduri" (meaning "in a body", Germanic). Just fascinating. Didn't I tell you it was fascinating? Here we are, "gathering" people (or, "bodies") into a place that originally was going to be a "body" of water…I mean, does it get any better than Pamoja?
Pamoja, were it to appear in a common English language dictionary, would be placed adjacent to "pampero", a strong, cold southwest wind that blows across the Pampas. It's cold here in Minnesota -- where wind sometimes blows -- where we're having Pamoja! And it's being held at the Weisman Museum, a museum that just HAPPENS to face the southwest!
Books of learning scattered across the floor, my hands shook as I sat there, trying to light a cigarette. My anxiety was so great that I failed to accomplish that task; indeed, my anxiety was so momentous that I had forgotten that I do not smoke -- in fact, my anxiety was so very, very big that I had no recollection of stopping my research briefly, walking outside, punching a passerby in the stomach, taking his wallet and cigarettes, then calmly moving back inside my abode and attempting to enter Flavor Country.
And you should be excited, too. Pamoja could very well be the last event we ever attend. Not the last function we go to at Gehry's Wacky Shack, not the last gathering at the University of Minnesota -- the last event, like, ever. The world could end immediately after the interactive entertainment we have planned for Pamoja comes to a close. Don't believe me? What if I told you that "Pampas" was a vast plain of south-central South America from the lower Parana R. to south-central Argentina? Am I the only one that sees the significance? Pamoja? Pampero? Pampas? Parana R.? Vast plain? A vast plain is, like, only the most OBVIOUS reference to the all-encompassing void of space known as the ever-expanding universe, where our souls will drift for all eternity after the planet we know as Earth implodes upon itself.
Please, I urge you to come to Pamoja before life as we know it comes to an end. Also, there will be food and drinks.
Bye,
Student Senate
Tuesday, April 18, 2006
Looking West
You can climb to the top of the Topeka Capitol on a clear and eyeblue day, but you'll still be in Topeka. You'll take some pictures out of obligation, and mill about to acknowledge the effort it took to get there, and wonder exactly how long a good acknowledgement should last. Then you'll leave, back down 296 stairsteps.
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