Offending the system, one drone at a time.

I'm not too big on corporate buzz words/terms/ways of thinking/well, corporate anything more or less. Especially the whole interview ritual. Because let's be serious for a second, it really is just a ritual. If the anthropologist aliens are studying it, they probably look at it the way we look at baboons fanning their asses at one another. In a way I'd prefer it to be so simple. Here's the thing, I'm charming, good looking, humble, and completely qualified for any job you can think of. So such trivalities as actually working, or being bothered to interview for a position is a bit below me. Perhaps it wouldn't be, if it were actually what its supposed to be. I.e. Go in, present your abilities, get selected on the basis of how good a job they think you can do.

But noooooo it has to be a whole fashion/etiquette howdy dow. My Carreer Development or Job Management or Some Shit Related To Working (I hate that class and refuse to memorize the exact name) teacher makes it all worse. She has us stand up and critiques us based on what we wear to class. Publically. As a result, I dress as poorly as I possibly can on those days. It pisses her off. I recently turned in an 'informational interview' we were supposed to (and this was assigned directly out of the book) go out and interview a person in a job we want. As this is work, I didn't do it. Instead I took the opportunity to fabricate a person and have them say the things I wanted to. Here's a sample of that work:

ME: What is the typical entry-level position in this field?
Made up person: The typical entry-level position is doing bitch work for someone like me. After a few years you move up to delegating bitch work to others.

ME: What skills do you use the most? Least?
MUP: Most: Technical, troubleshooting, working on the problem at hand. Least: I don’t know, I guess using that fruity corporate speak they teach you in college.

I was understandably eager to see what kind of feedback I would get on such an assignment. I mean, I can't censor my interviewee can I? What kind of fair and impartial reporter would I be if I did that? I expected something about language. I expected some kind of loss of points because I blatantly made up a person and had them say outrageous things (which only seem interesting if you're in the class, or I would have included them). What I didn't expect from her was a letter about her 'feelings'. I must have missed the class where I married this woman.

Continued in comments:

As I promised...

Being a man of my word I felt I had to come through on the pictures. Why are you laughing?! I'm serious! I'm totally a man of my word. It just has to be a serious word. Most of the time I don't mean what I say. In fact, I've come to the conclusion that in general I don't mean what I say. I say it, then later on decide if I want to mean what I just said. It's a bit of a retroactive decision. Unless I'm giving my word. In that case it's premeditated. Like I said, doesn't happen all that often. So be glad. And enjoy the pictures.

In the larger picture you can clearly see the impact point in the upper right hand side of the window. In the inset you can see that the cracking inexplicably spread to EVERY PORTION OF THE GLASS. Science is still boggling over it.

I've got another post lined up, but I haven't finished the visual aids, so this is all you get for today. Hope you like it.

- Scott

It turns out, people outside glass houses shouldn't throw rocks either.

I was going to name this post 'F*ck it'. But I refuse to use that word on my blog. You can still call it that if you want. It's the general message. Currently I'm quasi-drowning in loads and loads of crap and I don't really care. In fact, I find it pretty funny. Here's a quick rundown of what's going down. I went to J & A's place to set up their Tivo and in the process broke the internet. The entire internet. Luckily I fixed it (with a minor assist from Nick) the next day. Whatev. That same day I decided, being on such a roll, I would go set up my brother's home network. That's where the bulk of this story takes place.

You see, my brother wasn't home. And his apartment complex locks the exterior doors. So if you don't live there you can't even get into the hallway. A good precaution but maybe they should make sure the FUCKING INTERCOM SYSTEM WORKS if you plan to do that. Did they? No. It doesn't work. Not even a little. My favorite part: they designate which button goes to which apartment by taking a sharpie and writing on the wall. It's a textured wall too, so it looks like the ghetto. But not quite as ghetto as it would look when I was done.

Think for a second, what would a guy who is at times the personification of a sitcom do in this situation? If you said "fall back to the grade schooler in love schtick of taking pebbles and throwing them at the window of the one person who's home" you're right! So I scooped up some of those tiny purple landscaping rocks and started flicking them at Webb's (second story) window. Sadly web was both looking at porn AND listening to music. So no joy on that one. (Pure speculation on the porn, but that's my backstory on him.) On a whim I decided that he may be in the living room, so I was flicking rocks over the balcony and against the siding when one missed the narrow strip of siding I was aiming at. Despite hitting the door with the least amount of force you can imagine, defying all logic, rewriting whole sections of Einstien's theoretical physics, it chipped the glass. "No way" I said looking at the tiny chip. Half a second later the entire window makes a completely fake sound and spiderwebs into amazingly tiny cells of glass.

So in the span of two days, I twice went to a house to fix something and broke it. I'm currently searching for a dead bird to throw against the door to support my "I think a bird flew into it" cover story. If you see one let me know.

- Scott

P.S. I'm heading over now to get some pictures.

Have you heard?

Quick post admidst all the things I'm doing today (which gets a post of its own later tonight or tomorrow). At the state fair I got my hearing screened. That should give you a rough idea of exactly how boring it was. Anyway I've always thought (since a few early concerts) that my right ear is a bit deaf. Just a little more than my left ear. So I got them tested.

Turns out I have perfect hearing. A slight loss on the right side. But still above average by far. So I've been asking people "You know what I just heard?" then after the inevitable pause: "EVERYTHING."

"Fair" and Balanced

I just got back from the State Fair. Let me tell you, that was some of the edgiest entertainment I have ever seen. It makes Rent look like The Music Man... Ok, I'm lying. It was quite possibly the corniest thing you can imagine. Except for one small facet of it: my MC-ing the Robert Morris College Jeopardy. It was actually the RMC Computer Jeopardy, another person did the Business Jeopardy, she drew a crowd of 5 or 6. When it was my turn, we're talking like 20-30. The first time went great, everything worked. I had good contestants, good rapport with them, they played along with my ridiculousness. It was perfect. The crowd enjoyed it.

Then came the second round. Contestants... not as good. Apparently my mistake was choosing two adolescent brothers who would rather punch each other over missing questions than play the game. And because when we get to double Jeopardy I call up "the Nerds" TM, to help them with hard questions, they were just mashing the buzz in button and turning to their nerds for the answer. So they got faster and faster at the buzz in. Eventually they would buzz in before anyone selected a category and I forced them to pre-emptively answer the question a la Carnac the Magnificent. Once again, completely lost on them.

Eventually, in the midst of this anarchy (that was actually quite funny) a well placed comment from a Nerd caused a minor problem. I kind of... dropped an f-bomb. It's just my reflexive reaction to any comment from that particular nerd. However this time, I was on the mic (rophone like a Boss DJ). And most of the audience heard it. And laughed! It didn't matter, I just made some joke about how sensitive the mic was and moved on. Even people from my school cut me slack over it. In fact one of my professors said that "the show was just so damn good other than that I don't think anyone will care". And even though I didn't talk to the dean after that, I don't think she's going to expell me for it. Good times were had by all.

I'd like to cap this post with a few bulleted things I thought were funny at the fair:

• How far they put Germany from France in the international food section.
• The country of BEER in the international food village.
  
• The fact that Jamacians will jerk anything.
  
• Old woman completely not hip, not with it, not even seemingly sure of where she is, wearing a shirt that said "Math is Hard" Hilarious.
  
• I was blown away at how far we've come in shake-up technology. We've now advanced as a civilization to the point where we aren't just limited to the lemon shakeup. No! There are now Strawberry shake-ups, Peachshake-ups, Orange shake-ups, Rasberry shake-ups, and any combination there of. God bless America.
  

Ungrateful Skanks!

I don't care that Rob mentioned it. I'm blogging it myself. I went out of my way (and my daily amount of exercise) to maybe flirt with some girls moving into my apartment complex. First, how it went down: I was opening windows to let in some of the temperate pre-fall air, and I noticed two passably fine women struggling to get a heavy sofa out of the back of a truck that was also too big for them. Being the charming man I am, I decided to go get something out of my car and then offer to help them. Suave no?

Well before I got the chance Skank #1, we'll call her Sara, shouts "Hey you! Come help us move this couch." I kind of laughed, and said something to the effect of "Well since you asked so nicely..." while thinking Well since it's the reason I'm out here... I quickly recruited the help of Rob, it was pretty heavy. So Rob and I try to make conversation with these MTV-fed moron girls, who it turns out were nary as hot as I thought from my breif glimpse. They didn't even try to support their end of the conversation. All the while we're pushing/pulling this brown turd of a couch up three flights of stairs. When we got it up we barely got a thanks of any sort. Not even a trite, meaningless obligation thanks. Just kind of a mumbled 'yeah.. thanks.'

Our pleasure, thanks for being ungrateful skanks! Next time you need some help from me you can expect me to show up with a tool belt on, out of which I'll gladly pull a ball peen hammer and smash your teeth in. Oh and welcome to the neighborhood.


P.S. If anyone out there is curious, their names are Sara and Jessica (and Parker) they live at

DELETED!
(they were nice to me in the hallway, I decided I didn't want to chance them getting killed)

Feel free to visit if you're unbalanced. Or just send them junk mail. That's my tact.

An inspiring 'Summer of Junior Year' effort

Tim, quit blogging so much. I'm going to start calling you Rob. Rob, blog more I'm going to start calling you Scott. Scott, blog just the right amount. I'm going to keep calling you my sexy self. And finally, SPAMMERS, prepare for underhanded WAR! Failing that, just stay the hell out of my comments.

Now for the topic of this post. You may have noticed if you pay attention to reviews of new albums that after a group gets big, the next album they put out is called their 'Sophomore Effort'. Naturally, I think this would be a wicked awesome band name. And just after the band got famous, they intentionally put out a terrible record so that they can laugh at reviewers predictably making fun of their name.

But as awesome as my Glam Folk band: Sophomore Effort would be, it got me thinking about the whole naming convention. Their next album isn't called their Junior Effort, and after that it isn't their Senior release. What's the deal? Why can't we stick with this high school metaphore, and even extend it. Shouldn't the tracks themselves represent various stages of the high school year? Like if the reviewer was talking about the third track on the album shouldn't he call it the Homecomming track? Or if it was the second to last, maybe the After Prom Deflowering track?

And it can definately extend beyond highschool, for instance, there could be a 'Going to State College' release, and then a 'Changing my Major to Art History to Piss off my Dad' album, capped by a 'Got Drunk Listening to Dave Matthews and Knocked Up That Butter Face' effort. But I think I've just scratched the surface of what could be a whole new categorization of music.

Feel free - nay- feel obligated to leave your own album release euphemisms.

Advocate Anonymity? Perhaps. Just not right now.

I fully expect that in one way or another, I'll eventually be famous. Or infamous. That's more likely the word for it. But when that happens I'll really miss the fun things I could only do as a member of a large, faceless crowd. Like Tuesday, I went for a nice long roller blade. I hadn't done it in a while and by the end of it I felt like a rickshaw driver pulling Rosie O'Donnell. So I took a break on a bus stop bench. The bench in question was about 8 inches off the road. I could literally touch passing cars. It was a good position to enjoy the breeze that comes off the cars as they speed down Chatham.

Eventually they hit a red light, and who should I see but a girl named Sarah. You might remember my interview with her. If not, too bad. I'm hardcore and being hardcore, I refuse to repeat myself. Anyway she was a few cars back in the lane closest to me. And she somehow hadn't recogonized me. But to be fair I was wearing a Chicago Sanitation shirt and sunglasses, so I looked pretty working-class hot. Normally I'm white collar hot, the poor girljust couldn't reconcile the two. Anyway the light turned green and she was passing slowly by (5-10 mph-ish) I practically stuck my head in her car and yelled "HI SARAH!" Then was treated to my first ever driving-away-from-me scream of terror. It was great. I even fell over laughing, mostly because of the rollerblades and the hill but I was laughing at the time.

But these are small shenanigans, I've got some bigger stuff lined up for the next few months. Like next week, I'm MC'ing an event at the State Fair. That should be fun. Except that it's related to my school, so not only am I flirting with tar and feathering (we're talking Springfield people, it's basically 1850 here) but also expulsion. After that, I've got my largest MorrisCode assignment yet: on location in New Orleans. I'm down there for the National College Media Convention, from October 27th to the 30th. If you're going to be in town look me up, I'll be the really attractive guy.

- Scott

Nobility, Wise Ruler

The name for those ideas is the reason for this post. And that name is Avery. And Tim is currently about to open a vein on me for thinking thoughts reguarding any of it. I find this very limiting. On the one hand, Tim is a good friend. I like him, he's funny, and he's tall. So he can see things comming a long way off. Like stampedes, or a posse. Or other things you might encounter in the Old West. He's great for that. But on the other hand, Avery, she's hot. Plus she's kind of exotic. And only slightly underaged!

Compairing alcoholic activities I found that she makes her own Absinthe, which almost trumps even those people who have at some point in their lives made moonshine. How cool is that? In fact, I think I'll sing: (it helps if you play my background track, which happens to be Across the Sea, by Weezer)

Avery is a 17 year old girl who live in small city of Denver
She saw me at the hitchin
About four days ago and you’re itchin to know
All about me
And my hobbies
My favorite booze and my birthplace.

Why are so far away from me?
I'm good for you, and why can't Tim just see?
I could never touch you, Tim thinks it would be wrong
I’ve got your first name,
You’ve got my blog.

They don’t make women like this where I’m from – so fragile, so refined
So I flirt
And I drool
When I see you and fall to little pieces everytime
I wonder what things you do at home
I hope you don't drink absinthe alone
I wonder how you dress yourself
And curse myself for not living in the D

Ok, I'm done. That's it for the Avery schtick. That is until I see her again. At which point all bets are off. But until then, I lay it down. Just like I'm going to... Damn it, NO! That's it I swear. Until someone else brings her up, I'm done. I hope you're happy.

- Scott

Silence is Golden

But rocking out is platinum. And once again it screwed me over. You might remember the last incident involving my car, a couple of fine chicas, and a John Hughes style payoff. If not, you should read up, it was quite the post.

Today, as I do every friday, I put on my green visor, fake mustache, suspenders, and partially smoked cigar that never seems to ash. You see, I'm the editor for my school rag, the MorrisCode. Like that name? It's just so clever it makes me want to punch somebody. Anyway, as it is a silly and thankless job except for the whole having-free-reign-to-print-and-title-articles-as-I-so-choose thing, I always bring my iPod to keep things rolling along nicely. Or at least just nicely enough that I don't develop editorial coprolalia and just start printing four letter words all over the paper. So this morning, I put on the headphones, hopped in the Yorker, and drove to school.

I looked pretty badass if I do say so myself, and the CAKE serving itself up in the form of driving bass and quirky lyrics in my ears was really helping the illusion. So I didn't pay close attention to things. Like my lights being on... all morning. Don't worry I found out... the instant I tried to start my car. Make that the second instant. The first time around I just though "Wow, when I can't hear my car doesn't even feel like it's on." When putting it into gear didn't work I became suspicious.

So now my car is taking a breather in a parking lot at my college and I had the joy of walking back. Two good things came out of this: 1.) I perfected my pimp walk while listening to "Like this and like that" by the capital S, oh yes, the fresh N-double O-P, D-O-double G-Y D-O-double G, ya see and 2.) I was still listening to my iPod and sitting at the computer when Rob got home. I had no idea. He talked to me for about 15 minutes and thought I was ignoring him. He says he said so many times. Then I turned around, saw him and said "Oh when did you get back." He was so angry. It was wonderful.

For now though, off to Josh's wedding. It's on the other side of town so I'd better get to walking.

- Scott

The Taco Gods Smile Warmly On Me

Four wise men called 311 once quipped "One million people come and go, through a person's ebb and flow and faces keep on changing, yeah they're changing." How true. But it would be even true-er if they had sung it about Taco Bell's menu. Because one of my dear, dear friends was stolen from me a few months ago. All of a sudden ripped out of my life like so much idiom.

But then, just as I had recovered from my terrible loss, the Taco Fates smiled down on me, and heralded the return of my friend with a grand banner: "The Cheesy Gordita Crunch is back!!!" I went to Taco Bell immeadiately. Apparently a lot of people loved the CGC, because the place was packed. And even if they weren't there for it... they sort of were. Taco Bell really only has 11 ingredients combined about 30 different ways. 60 if you count the addition or subtraction of sour cream and tomatoes. They call that "supreme" and with all the Supreme Court stuff in the news lately, Taco Bell is all I can think about. Damn subliminal marketing to hell!

- Scott

Silver Tongue, Poker Face

Damn. I'm exhausted. What a friggin' weekend I've had. It featured what is quite possibly the most exercise I've gotten since I was training to run with bulls. But I've learned some important lessons along the way. Such as, when Rob says he's going to bring over "maybe four or so" girls, that means that they'll be a party featuring 24 girls and 4 or 5 guys along as well. Also a complete furniture re-arrangement. It went over nicely, so nicely infact... well let's just say there were two girls in my bed by the end of the night. The next day I drove home in hopes of getting my brother's nice paintball gun.

On the way down I managed what is quite possibly the best roadway "what's up" to Josh Ryder on the highway ever. It was really quite perfect. Perhaps from the excitement of that perfect 'what up' to Josh I didn't pay too much attention to anything else on the way home. Including tell-tale alerts all good drivers look out for. For instance, the car ahead of me suddenly and for no clear reason slowed down to 55 mph from a healthy 60-63ish. Not only that they got in the submissive "pass me, just don't take my money" far right lane position. Ok I says to myself, I'll pass the slow fool. I saw I had enough room to pass them, got out in the lane next to them, gave them a glance... then saw why they slowed down: State Trooper dead ahead.

Crap. I none too subtly slammed on the breaks and got behind the 'slow' person again. I knew I was screwed, he had already crept forward just a bit. So, I beat him to the punch: I pulled myself over. From where he was camped out he probably had to drive about 12 feet. He didn't even get to turn his lights on, nor did he get to ask for my license and insurance. I handed him both as I muttered "I'm an idiot...". He cracked a partial smile, then spoke for the first time to ask me why I got back in the lane behind the car ahead of me. So I told him, exactly what I told you in the last paragraph. There was a slight pause and he said in a hearteningly genial voice "Well, that's an honest answer". He asked me about prior tickets and I told him I had rolled a stop sign and said "Ok I'll have you out of here in just a minute." After he got back from his crusier he gave me a written warning and told me to watch out for his colleagues down the road and I was on my way. Total stopped time: 3 minutes.

Later that day I went skiing, then the next day it was paintballing and poker (I was in the final four of our tourney of 12). Yesterday I was in and out of sleep all day long from the rigors of being dragged behind a boat, dodging paintballs, and bluffing. And now? Back to the grind.

- Scott