In response to Vanilla Ice’s performance of "Ninja Rap" in the film Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze, hip-hop artist Tim Dog said: "[Rap] is not something you can put into a movie with a bunch of turtles".
Month: January 2009
words
Look at the 100 most beautiful words in the English language. I like riparian (perhaps because I’m potamophilous), loquacious, penumbra, diaphanous.
AT&T Rage
In my ongoing struggle to get my AT&T DSL working again, I talked to some supervisor in the customer service department. Her name was Joy, but she brought me none. When I said: "Nobody there seems to have any accountability" she said "Yes, sir. That is correct". So at least she was honest. This was after the first person put me on hold for an hour to contact a department, which turned out to be closed for the evening. Joy also said "I’ll do my best to call that department in the morning, but I can’t give a guarantee". Joy thought she might not have the mental capacity to operate a telephone, and it turns out that she was right.
So to conclude, AT&T blows chunks.
wooooooofffff
We went to the Golden Gate Kennel Club Dog Show on Saturday. I liked the GIANT dogs – the St. Bernards and the Mastiffs. Then we went to San Bruno Mtn State Park which was surprisingly great, particularly the 5k summit loop. I thought my sourdough starter was dead but it has risen like Jesus or Darth Vader and now it’s almost ready to make some delicious bread.
Good photo from the inauguration
food
When the roommate departs, I eat a lot more ranch dressing. I just had a bowl of spinach and ranch dressing – it was so delicious I ate two more bowls. What’s more is that I have an orange addiction. It’s been dormant since the days of Sierra Madre, when I would buy a 25lb. bag at the farmers’ market and eat them all in 3-4 days. I bought 12 pounds of your standard navel oranges, seven pounds of fancy Cara Cara and five pounds of bloods. So far I think the Cara Cara oranges are the best.
wrinkly
I saw a tremendous trio of Neapolitan Mastiffs outside the Conservatory of Flowers this morning. There were so big and gray, it was like a herd of elephants escaped from the zoo. Their heads are gigantic wrinkly beach balls, and the one I got to meet was so friendly I wanted to take her home but she wouldn’t fit in my car.
UPDATE: My roommate described these dogs as a cross between a manatee and a bear.
Then I saw the rainforest exhibit at the Cal Academy of Sciences. It was really spectacular – one of the best parts was that the animals seemed so at home. I saw a bird looking for sticks to build its nest, then another bird landed on a large vine that was used to display (impressively) a swarm of leafcutter ants parading with their leaf cuttings. But the bird apparently didn’t know it was an exhibit and began eating the ants, leaves and all.
Sadly the albino alligator was on medical leave. Maybe he got a sunburn.
Style
Andrew Wyeth died. I don’t really like his paintings – all substance no style. The LA times obit, though, is very interesting. Also, I saw Synecdoche, New York on a couch at the Speakeasy. There was about 25 min. that was tedious towards the end but the rest of the movie was good. Lots of style.
Big in Europe
A Brit and a Swede have purchased iPace so we’re a big deal in Europe.
UC Berkeley has granted two hours of leave so employees can watch the inauguration on Tuesday. That’s cool and all and I’ll go to the campus event, but did they grant two hours of leave when Bush was elected? No. That’s kind of sketchy.
Noctambulator 
