Mike's Awkward Adventures #1

I started to drive to school today, and headed for the interstate because it's quicker than going the other way. Normally there's not very much traffic on the 805 at that time of day. This is partly because there's never a whole lot of traffic heading north, and partly because I leave for school at around noon. Anyway, today I am heading into the 805 onramp and the right-hand lane is pretty full... like so full that there wasn't a whole lot of room to merge. So I basically had to drive kind of aggressively and squeeze in front of someone. He was kind of a jerk about it too, not wanting to let me in and flashing his lights at me and everything. Once I finally get in the right lane, I notice the guy in front of me is flashing his lights too. That seemed kind of weird, but not so weird as the high concentration of motorcycle cops in front of us and behind us. This whole lane was acting strangely... everyone flashing their lights and none of them going the full speed limit, even though all the other lanes were zooming by us.

That's when I saw the hearse. Just behind the cavalcade of motorcycle cops was a lovely all-white hearse, followed by a lovely all-white limo, followed by several other cars, all flashing their lights. Then me. With a groan I looked into my rearview mirror, only to see several more cars flashing their lights, followed by another cavalcade of motorcycle cops.

I had aggressively merged my way into a funeral procession, and had split them right down the middle. As soon as I realized this, I looked for a way to jump out of that lane, but the traffic to my left had become too heavy. I thought about just getting off at the next random exit, but mine was only a little ways away. So we continued in this way: a police escort, the deceased, some mourners, me, additional mourners, additional police.... we continued in this way for about 3 miles. I briefly wondered if maybe I should start flashing my lights just to try to fit in with the crowd, but I decided against it for two reasons. First, if they knew I wasn't part of their group then they'd be even more pissed at me for being a poser. Second, if they DIDN'T know I wasn't part of their group, they'd get worried when I eventually took the wrong exit and got the hell out of there.

So finally I found a space in the lane to my left and got out of line, but my trouble was not over yet. I was still about even with the middle of the funeral procession, but now the speed of the traffic in front of me was not any faster than the speed of the procession. The procession was like 15 cars long, so I had to jump about 7 cars' lengths forward to get around them. This would have been fine had we not been only about half a mile away from my exit by then. So basically I had a moving screen on my right, I was pinned in by the traffic in front of me, and I had to exit in about 30 seconds. I calculated that if I gunned the engine then I might be able to zip left, go around the car in front of me, zip back right, race forward to pass the procession, zip right and just make the exit... assuming I was driving a Ferrari and not my old busted Corolla with the check engine light on.

So, I just bit my lip and did the only thing that I could think of. I turned on my signal and AGGRESSIVELY MERGED BACK INTO THE FUNERAL PROCESSION, then out onto the offramp. I take comfort in the knowledge that the spirit of the deceased was probably watching me go through all of this, and understood what was going on from my point of view. That way he'll only think I'm an idiot and not a jerk, and probably won't haunt me.

Six more weeks of winter

Well, it happened. I suppose it was only a matter of time. Given the past history I should've expected it, but I have this annoying habit of trying not to think ill of people. I just generally tend to believe that the people I know are basically good, and that they are trying their best and any mistakes they make are the result of bad circumstances. But sometimes you meet someone who is just sort of incorrigible and never quite fixes their own problems and never quite changes in the ways they need to. And then you have to see their balls.

I got back from my trip to Pasadena this morning, and dropped my crap off at home and went in to work. After a long day I came home at 11ish and saw my housemate and exchanged some smalltalk about my trip. She went to bed almost immediately because she has a fairly normal schedule now. I'm not sure if Boyfriend was already in her bedroom at that point, or if he somehow arrived later after she had gone to bed. Anyway, at about midnight I go downstairs and have a snack and watch an episode of the Simpsons (they'll have to respect me after I get that Harvard diploma!) I turn the lights off and head back upstairs and her bedroom door opens right as I reach the top. This leaves me face-to-face with a completely naked Brazilian man, who is too surprised to react for about 3 seconds.

To be fair, I was too surprised to react either. I was pretty sure that this was not a situation that you can get through by pretending everything's cool and making smalltalk. This would have been especially awkward since he's a chronic hand-shaker... every conversation we've had started with a handshake. I'm no homophobe, but that still doesn't stop me from having a strict "don't touch any naked dudes" rule. Besides, there were no lights on and I'm not gonna risk reaching towards him in the dark...

So, smalltalk is clearly out... maybe I could break the ice with a joke? "How's it hanging?" No, too obvious... and the double meaning might not work for a non-native English speaker. "Cold out tonight, eh?" Nah, he'd probably kick my ass, and I really don't wanna be beaten up by a naked dude. "Oh JP it's you! I didn't recognize your penis without Barbara's mouth on it." Ok ok, too far. Maybe a joke is not the right way to go either.

Luckily I was spared from having to think of an appropriate response because the spell of shock and em-bare-ass-ment broke and he quickly shut the door. In times like this, I call upon my superhuman ability to be good-natured about things. This skill was passed down to me from my parents and from their parents before them. It must be some sort of mid-western thing, but my folks have the ability to put a positive spin on anything if they are sufficiently motivated. This generally occurs when a family member does something shameful and they have to explain the situation to someone else. If, for example, my uncle was arrested for trying to kill himself by auto-erotic asphyxiation, they'd just chuckle and say something like "Well, boys will be boys. We all have our flaws, and I'm sure he learned a valuable lesson." It's like one part denial, one part relentless optimism. Anyway, I too have this power. After Naked Boyfriend covered his shame, I tried my best to think of the whole thing as a funny goof-up and chuckled about it just loud enough that they could probably hear me through the door (but not so loud that he would think I was mocking his junk... that would be a terrible breach of Dude Etiquette).

So, tomorrow will be delightfully awkward, and then I'm sure things will be back to normal. I pray to holy jesus that tonight does not represent the new "normal".

And she's off...

Lately I am reminded of something I heard Jerry Seinfeld say when I went to see him perform live in Tucson. After his standup, he allowed some questions from the audience. One guy asked him what his favorite thing was about having children. His reply was "just chasing them."

My niece is nearly 2 years old now, and she can walk. This means that watching the baby is no longer the responsibility of her parents, but the responsibility of everyone in the building. A kid that young you can't just leave alone, unless she's sleeping. And any time she's not sleeping she's zooming around, often in circles through the whole house. That means the job of watching her continually passes to the nearest person who has line-of-sight, often as many as 10 times per minute. If you're not actively playing with her, you are usually witness to seeing her run around and around some part of the house, possibly the chair you are sitting in. If you are actively playing with her, you'd better have a short attention span because you might be doing the same jump-out-from-behind-the-couch-and-scare-her routine for a good long while. Settle in, grab a drink.

On my latest visit to my parents' house, my brother and his wife and baby were there as well. Everyone was staying in the same house and there's not enough bedrooms, so I was set up on an air mattress in the dining room. One of baby's favorite games is to fall down face-first onto the air mattress. Then I jump onto the part next to her and it bounces her way up in the air and she laughs and screams. Again, if I'm not careful, this could go on for days. Well as it turns out, baby loves this game way too much to actually wait for me to get up in the morning before she starts playing. This would not be a problem except that she figured out how to open the folding doors that lead into the dining room. Sunday morning for me began when something small and giggly landed on my feet. It went from sleepytime to playtime pretty quickly after that.

My mom has gone completely baby-crazy. Well, she went baby-crazy about 2 years ago, but it's been escalating ever since. This is the first baby girl in the family since... her, I guess. My mom is doing everything she can to encourage my brother/sister/niece to visit, as often as possible. Her latest scheme is to allow them to leave some of the baby's stuff at her house even when the baby is not there. So there is a full-size crib, changing table, and assload of toys that live at my mom's house now. I'm sure my brother and sister appreciate this, but I think maybe they're also using it as a clever way to dump off unwanted baby crap. I'll give you an example. My mom bought the baby this little toy dog that you can pull by the leash and it has wheels and rolls along, and the rolling activates the voice chip inside and it makes doggie noises at you. Baby dragged it around for about 30 seconds before it capsized, at which point she immediately and finally got bored with it and didn't touch it again. There were many attempts to get her to play with it some more, but they were all for naught. After a few minutes of this, mommy exercised her newly-gained toy-dumping powers and said "Oh boy, doggie is fun isn't he? We'll have so much fun playing with him next time we visit Grandma, won't we?" Ba-da-bing, ba-da-boom, one less piece of baby crap! A surreptitious parental high-five followed.

I'm not gonna gush about how cute the baby is, but I will say one thing. They got her some shoes that have little squeakers in them. I challenge anyone not to smile when a baby toddles up to you for a hug, huge smile on her face, making squeaky noises with every awkward step.

Shmesearch

I'm almost there. After only 3 grueling years, I'm just one week away from not earning a Master's Degree. It's so close that I can practically not taste it.

You see, on the path to get a PhD, you have to pass a couple of milestones. One of them is called the "Research Exam". It's a giant paper survey in which you read a million billion gazillion pavillion cotillion research papers and then write them up succinctly in 9000 words or less. I've spent most of the summer doing mine. Last summer I worked at Google and made ridiculous money. Just thought I'd mention.

Anyway, the Research Exam is somewhat special. Though it's tons of work, after you finish it you have the option of getting a Master's Degree on the way to your PhD*.
(* Offer not valid for losers who decided to get a Master's Degree first before going to get their PhD because they couldn't get in anywhere good and didn't wanna go get a real job instead)

So even though I don't get a Master's Degree, I still have to do the freaking Research Exam. A pessimist would say I get no reward for all my hard work. An optimist would say that I got my reward 3 years ago, and have been able to enjoy it this whole time (I asked an optimist and he assured me this is what he would say). I prefer to think of it in another way: after I complete my Research Exam, the university will travel backward in time and award it to me 3 years ago. This way I still get something for my effort, and it only violates causality a little bit.

Most students you talk to about the Research Exam are very casual about it. "Oh yeah, it's just a giant book report. It's a lot of work, but it's easy." But of course, Professors like to "motivate you to do your best," which is secret code for "spur you into action through fear and intimidation." So my advisor is making my exam sound much more important than anyone else seems to think it is. From hearing him talk, the exam will foreshadow my entire future research career, and that of all my descendants. Its impact will echo throughout time and space, and a couple other dimensions we haven't discovered yet. It will cause the creation or destruction of countless alien worlds, and single-handedly determine who wins the final battle between good and evil. So my slides need to be really REALLY good.

The biggest beef I have with it is just that I've done nothing else this whole summer. I wake up in the morning and spend all day working on my exam, then I go home and sleep and wake up the next day and work on my exam. I constantly worry that the result I turn in is garbage, and that my advisor will tell me that I'm not cut out to be a researcher. More and more I have daydreams where I'm in my Research Exam presentation and at the end they tell me that everything I've done is worthless and just start laughing at my complete ineptitude, and then I start cussing everyone out and run out of the room and leave the state and start my life over as a potato farmer. I've never seen a potato in the wild before, but I bet I could take it.

Your reward for reading through this far is that I will now pelt you with a plethora of potato puns:

I'm going to try to grow the world's smallest potatoes, one millionth the normal size...
I'll call them mu-taters.

Or I could arrange them all in a grid and only sell them line by line...
Then they'd be row-taters.

Or maybe I could just put little pairs of glasses on them...
Then they'd be spec-taters.

Then I could start them on the path to becoming doctors...
And I'd have a bunch of pre-med-itaters.

At their interviews they'd need nice clothes, so I'd buy them expensive jeans...
So they'd be levi-taters.

Some I would treat as royalty, but the rest would just be common-taters.

If I got lonely some nights then the unlucky ones would become dick-taters (They'll get it right in the eyes!)

But don't worry, I'd treat those ones especially well. I'd take them all on a cruise...
On my dick-tater-ship.