A Birthday Eve Ramble on the Nature of Maturity

Last night I had dinner/beverages and Hookah with a friend that I have known since she was a freshman. As a freshman she was like some kind of feral drunken freshman animal. Sober she made little sense and seemed prone to tantrums. When exposed to alcohol she was all screams and insanity.

While I have seen her mature over the last 3 years, seeing her now, as someone with interesting things to say, a career and a remarkable new sense of self respect, I was stunned. I guess looking back to my freshman year, I was not much (or any) better. It still blew me away though.

What it really made me wonder though, is how will I look back on me in 3 years? With envy? Embarrassment? Pride? Shame? The fact of the matter is that who I am in 3 years will be nothing more than the sum of what I do with regularity in the mean time. Short of being an astronaut, in theory pretty much every option is on the table.

Too bad it's harder to dream at 24 than it was at 18.

The Wild and Wooly Working World

Today marks one month on the dot as a full time employee of BSC, and right on cue at 11 this morning I got a call from a headhunter from a consulting firm asking what they could do to get me to leave. And it made me think, I am happy here. Pay aside, every day that I come into work I am challenged and I learn something. The people I work with are rational and professional, as well as being friendly. I get to the gym every day, and so far, I have not gotten assigned anything I would just call busy work. It's a pretty damn good feeling.

Last night was a bar night with Kroot and we went for some food and some darts at Brighton Beer Garden and then to Castle Bar. I was trying to get a hold of Kalah and she untypically did not call back. Turns out she put down her scooter coming back from work, in a skirt none the less. She seems like she is OK except for some lesions and contusions. That girl is a pint sized Canadian bad ass.

Kettlebell

Inspired by Jade's dedication to fitness (he is now thinking of opening his own gym after graduation) I went and got a kettlebell. If you have never seen it, it looks like a tea kettle and is made of iron. After about 15 minutes with it today my arms felt they way that they usually do after a 45 minute doing a weight circuit at the gym.

In other news, XKCD continues to make me extremely happy.

Up North

Spening time in vermont for a few days haspretty much been the shit. Friday I was in nh for a coworker's birthday, then saturday I went further north to burlington and was out on the boat within an hour of getting there. had an all nighter in town and saw a ton of friendly faces.

it is incredible how much seeing old friends, the lake, the stars and the sun rise have all brought me to a better place.

Wild Prognostication 1.

Cash for Clunkers and the Next Election.

Cash for Clunkers will replace about 1% of cars. By the next election gas will be $4 a gallon again. Here's the kicker. As people are making the choice of who they elect in three years, for the first time in American Politics, gas prices are going to have much less of an impact on the people they used to matter to most.

Will this win the election for Obama's second term? Maybe not. But if you think that the last 4 elections have been won or lost by less than 5%. If <1% of American voters got a new car from Obama and the evil demo congress, than maybe (Just fucking maybe) there will be less pouting about drilling in Alaska and more willingness to acknowledge that this somewhat stupid program has actually moved us away from our "oil addiction".

Additionally, this week saw the first gas powered, production ready car EVER get a preliminary EPA rating of 230/100 MPG, and it's being made in America.

The change we were promised is coming and in a sustainable way.

The Perks

On one hand I feel alone, and I will probably never find anyone ever again with the same appreciation I have for the world smallest dear.

On the other had:

My Netflix account has been emancipated from the tyranny of joint custody.

Hygiene standards after 7 on weeknights are lower.

I can enjoy stupid comedies without guilt or ridicule.

I can revel in my enjoyment of cars.

A bottle of kettle lasts me longer (sort of).

Hmm...

maybe other things.

Low.

After almost three years things are over with Meg. On the plus side, I do feel somewhat cut free. On the down side I have quickly realized that I am a 23 year old child. So far the road to recovery needs to involves spending more time with friends and (in this order) buying a breakfast sandwich, a suit and a pickup truck.

I'm halfway to a country song.