My Chits and Your Chats

Let's Focus on the Positive this Independence Day

2006-07-04T14:21:00.000-05:00

2006-06-29T12:00:00.000-05:00

We got a lot of rain, my final sucked ass and I am too mad at myself to write anything.

On the other hand, fellow blogger, Irina, has a great topic on her site, check it out.

Have A Great Weekend Everyone

2006-06-24T18:40:00.000-05:00

Irony

2006-06-23T13:00:00.000-05:00

I was going to write a light post today. It is Friday, I had a very late night and all I want to do is slip under my desk till 5:00 so I can go home and slip on my bed … but I saw this and I wanted to write something about it.

Police on Thursday, June 22, 2006, arrested Clint Brewer and charged him with trespassing. This guy, a complete moron, idiot and piece of dirt, was “discovered hiding in bushes outside a daycare center attended by Angelina Jolie's adopted son.”

Hiding in bushes! Outside a daycare center!

The jerkoff gets caught and HIDES HIS FACE as he leaves the police station.

What a dweeb.

All That Work For ... Ghana 2 - U.S. 1

2006-06-22T13:17:00.000-05:00

Prayer Time

2006-06-22T10:39:00.000-05:00

As a Muslim, I always run into problems when I have to pray, esp. during the daytime. Muslims have to pray five times a day and since our prayers involve movements, we need a little more space than, for example, the little cube where I spend most of my life.

While weekday prayers are important too, Friday afternoon prayers are the most important and Muslims, who like myself may not be the most pious, try to at least make their Friday prayers.

However, leaving work in the afternoons can be a little difficult, especially if the prayers aren’t being held anyplace close and you have to get on the metro to get to the mosque etc. My solution is the easy one, I don’t pray during the day. My reasoning is that God understands and that he’ll cut me a break.

However, not everyone feels that way. For example, the Washington Post reports that “the Howard County school board has agreed to consider continuing a policy that has allowed Muslim students to leave school 20 minutes early on Fridays to attend prayer services.”

I wanted to highlight this story for three reasons:

1. For those who think of America as the Devil’s Playground and an evil nation, I wanted to point that in many/most Muslim countries giving this kind of freedom to other religions is unheard of. This is just one of the reasons why I think that this is, bar none, the greatest country in the world.

2. For those that think that Muslims are a small minority, I wanted to point to this story and say that we are an active and vibrant part of this nation. We have to learn to live with each other, accept our cultures, as the Howard country school board is doing, and make this a stronger nation.

3. Finally, for the Muslims within the U.S. who don’t consider this country theirs, I wanted to point out to them the steps that the citizens of this country are taking to make them feel welcome. While there are some bad apples out there, no doubt, overall, this is a good, fair and welcoming nation. Be glad you are here and not in Egypt or, worse yet, Saudi Arabia.

Got a little serious there at the end. Sorry about that.

Now back to our regular programming.

The Movie To Beat

2006-06-21T14:39:00.000-05:00

Size Is Everything.

2006-06-21T12:05:00.000-05:00

I tried to write something up, uh not the thing that I am writing right now but something more meaningful, but because work is kicking my butt and I have a quiz tonight, I decided to focus on something easy.

Big glasses! What’s going on?

Shouldn’t you wear something that fits your face as opposed to something that takes over your face? We just got over the insanely loose fitting jeans thing and now these huge glasses have taken over our faces.

Any fashionistas out there care to explain this phenomenon?

The Appointment Has Been Cancelled!

2006-06-20T08:54:00.000-05:00

The NY Times had an interesting piece the other day on the joy of a cancelled appointment, linked here.

This article is particularly relevant for us DC dwellers. We lead amazingly busy lives and cannot seem to get away from work thanks to advances in Web mails, Blackberries and other such garbage.

So, when an appointment is cancelled, as it sometimes is, and there isn’t any other to take its place, the joy knows no bounds. I went through this joy recently, yesterday in fact. My class was cancelled and I found out about it when I got to the room. Reading the sign, Class Cancelled, brought tears to my eyes. Oh, the joy.

I am sure that we have all gone through similar feelings. What are yours?

Celebrities – Use Them At Your Own Peril?

2006-06-19T08:05:00.000-05:00

Everywhere I look these days I see celebrities talking about causes. Its not just Africa, e.g. Clooney, Pitt, Jolie, Bono, etc., its also things like Tibet (Gere), electric cars (Begley Jr.), AIDS (Stone, Taylor) and everything liberal (Robbins and Sarandon).

I thought about this topic when I read about the whole Daryl Hannah sitting in a tree thing (the link is to the LA Times article). I also saw everyone from Jon Stewart to Jay Leno make fun of her and not given an ounce to the actual cause, an important one as it turned out.

So, the questions that these endorsements raise are:
a). Does this actually help the cause?
b) Does this help the celebrity?

Living in Washington, DC I see this more than most people. Celebrities traipsing down the Mall, talking about their latest cause while everyone on the Hill goes gaga over a Jessica Simpson (Operation Smile) or a Cher (Better Army Helmets), to use the two latest examples.

Now I understand that these causes need these celebrities to get some publicity and get on the docket but does this really help their cause? I find myself tuning the cause whenever I see a celebrity, any celebrity, talking about. Hell, I almost voted against Kerry after seeing Springsteen et al. give those election year concerts. Are there others like me i.e. those that don’t want the incessant coverage of a cause just because the person talking looks like Jessica Simpson? Would you take any advice from the woman in this picture? Okay, forget I asked that.

The other question is whether this publicity hurts the celebrity? Obviously it hasn’t hurt Bono (Africa) but it destroyed Cruise (Something). It will be interesting to see how it affects the Africa Actor Gang or AAG as I like to call it. Members include Clooney, Pitt, Jolie, etc.

Oh and Happy Monday everyone.

U.S.-Italy: 1-1

2006-06-17T19:14:00.000-05:00

The U.S. played Italy today and they played great to draw the match 1-1. However, before we get to that, we should focus on something a little more important i.e. what you see on your right.

Is there anything hotter than soccer fans? Hell, I'd switch to calling it football if they wanted me to.

Anyway, back to the game.

It was a hot day in D.C. today and so it was a perfect day to run off to a bar and watch the U.S.-Italy match.

The U.S., overall, played great. While technically they did not score against Italy, Italian defender Cristian Zaccardo knocked the ball into his own goal, but at the end of the match, they did draw the match.

It was a violent match. I haven't seen many soccer matches so I don't know how it usually goes but this was a damn tough match. Another thing that I did not realize, even though it is very obvious, is that these guys don't get a break between halves. There are no timeouts, nothing like football where the game stops every three minutes. This thing keeps going and going and going.

So, where does the U.S. stand. They are at the bottom of the half but they are not out of it. Ghana's shocking defeat of the Czech Republic gives the U.S. a break and if the U.S. beats Ghana and Italy beats the Czechs or something wierd like that, the U.S. could, could, go to the second round.

Overall, this is fun and I hope others in the D.C. are enjoying it as well.

Happy Saturday everyone.

Forbes Celebrity 100

2006-06-16T08:49:00.000-05:00

This list has to be, quite possibly, the biggest kiss of death for any major actor. The reason is that this list does not just measure how much you actually earned, if it did that then one could understand Forbes printing it, but it also measures how much publicity you got.

What the hell has that got to do with anything related to the creative field?

Some would, could and probably do argue that:
1. This is a Celebrity list and that requires nothing more than earning money from exposure.
2. Everyone in the entertainment field is into it for exposure.

I will not argue with the former point but will never agree with the latter. The problem is that people, now more than ever, confuse a Paris Hilton with a Jennifer Aniston. A Paris Hilton is a celebrity who hasn’t done anything other than pose, I obviously am discounting her doing that idiot in her porno. A Jennifer Aniston is a celebrity who makes movies and probably doesn’t want people capturing her every move.

To mix these two groups is supremely idiotic and all evidence shows that this world is supremely idiotic, which brings me to the reason for this post.

Tom Cruise (TC) is my boy. He is also a serious actor. Yes he has gone off the rails in the last two years but that doesn’t discount the fact that he is a serious actor, check out Collateral for evidence. So, his being on top of a list that measures mostly exposure and not skill is not sitting too well with me. Of course the fact that Forbes made this stupid list ain’t sitting too well with me either. Nor is that nacho I ate last night … but that is another post.

Discipline

2006-06-16T08:15:00.000-05:00

Man, that was a long movie. I went in to see King King in Dec. and just finished it. That Peter Jackson, he sure earns his money.

King Kong

2005-12-12T16:03:00.000-05:00

Does anyone else have an iffy iffy feeling about this movie? Every review I have read says that this is an amazing movie, the effects rock and the story is very well done. However, I cannot shake the feeling that this movie is all been there, done that. It looks rehashed, it is long and it looks uninteresting. Anyone else feel that way?

Considering that Universal spent over $200 million on this, I hope, for their sake, that I am the minority.

By the way, for those that saw the Kong movie that came out in the 80's, has Jessica Lange ever looked more sexier? I know the movie sucked, but that woman was all sex.

Miss World

2005-12-12T15:59:00.000-05:00

Mostly gentlemen and some ladies, meet the new Miss World, Unnur Birna Vilhjalmsdottir. I did not see the Miss World pageant so I don't know how the host/announcer pronounced her name.

Here she is, Miss World, Unnur Birna Vilhjalmsdottir. Although, her face and body make up for that name.

Increasing Productivity

2005-12-06T16:21:00.000-05:00

One of the many ways that people, who are a hell of a lot smarter than me, keep track of the economic conditions in a nation is through productivity reports. Efficiency, that’s the name of the game people. The thinking, if I understand it correctly, is:

Higher Productivity -> Higher Efficiency -> Lower Cost of Production -> Higher Profits -> More Investment -> Better Economy.

The above is obviously a very simplified approach to the whole thing but you get my gist, the higher the productivity, the better off a nation. We all would agree that laziness and dawdling are not good and no one wants lazy and dawdling people around.

The Labor Department released “said the productivity of American workers, the biggest factor determining future living standards, raced up at an annual rate of 4.7 percent in the July-September quarter, the best showing in two years.” The quote is from today’s Washington Post.

This got me thinking: Can you ever be too productive? Technological advances, a better trained workforce, Internet filters, these are some of the things that increase our productivities and ….

And what? So we produce more goods. Does that mean that people consume more goods? What if they have enough goods and don’t want any more? Does that mean that all the productivity was for naught and that the same productive workforce that we aspired too must now be decreased because the profits are high enough? Did their high productivity lead them to losing their jobs?

In another article today, in Time I believe, I was reading about how American car manufacturers are cutting their workforces like crazy while Japanese car makers, with domestic plants, are adding workers. The article gave a number of reasons for this, chief among them lower pension loads, higher productivity in the workforce and better sales.

Better sales. More people are buying their cars than those from American car companies. Let’s ignore the pension load and the productivity, especially since American car companies are catching up to the Japanese productivity levels. Let’s focus on demand. Demand will end. I mean, there are only so many people and only so many need so many cars to drive on so many roads.

Isn’t this a system, the constant growth of an industry, doomed to end one day? Should I just not worry about that and just enjoy the ride?

DC Winters

2005-12-05T13:43:00.000-05:00

Winter in Washington, DC is a truly unique time. Other cities may have colder temps and they may get more snow but no one has as many kooks as us when it comes to the white stuff, snow not cocaine.

When I first moved to DC, in my younger days, I was amazed at people’s reactions to a little snow. In my naiveté I thought these were people who had just moved to the area and had never seen any snow before. Of course, now I can’t believe how dumb I was but hey, we were all dumb once.

As the years passed I saw this craziness repeat itself over and over again. I came to realize that the people who lived in this area are truly crazy and panicky, when it comes to the white stuff, snow not cocaine. The weird thing is that DC’zens don’t panic when it comes to things like wars but when there is the slightest hint of snow everyone loses their minds.

Is it because so many of us are not from the DC area? Because we don’t know how to react to the white stuff, snow not cocaine? Because we are idiots? I don’t know the reason, all I know is that the same people seem to panic over the same miniscule amount of snow every year. Its either that or I observe a very small circle of people.

Of course, as is true with everything else, there are people who blame the media for this attitude. They say the media hypes the storm and the people have no choice but to panic. They cannot explain why, after having gone through this thing multiple times, the people still continue to panic. Are we that dumb? Don’t we have a higher number of graduates than any other U.S. city? Are people with graduate degrees that dumb?

I remember last year when the weathermen, meteorologists, cuckoos, whatever you call them, called for multiple storms and nothing happened. The cuckoos blamed the anchors, I think Topper Schutt (love that name) did that. The anchors blamed the weather people. Everyone blamed each other and they all said they had learned their lesson.

Of course, it’s 2006 now and, this being DC, we are back to THE UPCOMING STORM.

The GAP Destruction

2005-12-03T18:27:00.000-05:00

There is a new and very cool GAP ad, directed by Spike Jonze that shows people destroying their local GAP store.

It advertises the renovations that the company is making to all its stores.

See if you can find it. The pic is a screenshot from the ad.

Cricket

2005-12-03T17:57:00.000-05:00

Today's post will not appeal to everyone, unless you are from a cricket playing nation.

England just, actually yesterday, lost the test series to Pakistan, 2-0. Since I am from Pakistan, I am obviously very happy about this. Especially since cricket is a sport that every Pakistani was born to play/follow.

By the way, the only reason why I am not bashing the England team is because Michael Vaughn, their captain, took their defeat like a man and did not whine about it, in spite of some baiting by journalists.

Now, onto the One Day Internationals.

Alright, have a good weekend everyone and have a beer for Pakistan, yeah I get the alcohol contradiction.

Gone Too Soon

2005-12-01T08:07:00.000-05:00

Today’s post is inspired by the death of Wendie Jo Sperber. Ms. Sperber, an actress seen in numerous TV shows and movies, died after battling breast cancer for eight years. If interested, you can read more about her here.

The idea for today’s post, which could be construed as a little insensitive, sparked from the headline “Wendy Jo Sperber, A Zemeckis Veteran, Passes Away All Too Early.”

All of us, have either read or written things that have used similar words saying things like so and so passed away all too early, before their time, etc. My thinking is that this is not the right way to write about someone’s death.

How do we know that the individuals who died passed away before their time? I mean, it was their time and that is why they died. To say that they passed away too soon implies that there is something wrong with the timing of their death. There may be many things wrong with the circumstances of their death but the time was correct, that is why they died. If the timing had been wrong, the individual would have lived.

My second problem with this kind of emotional larceny is that it gives a false sense of security to the grieving parents, relatives, etc. It implies that the individual had more time to accomplish many wonderful things and that this time was untimely taken away from them. That is a lie. They did not have more time and they wouldn’t have accomplished anything more because they had no more time left.

Of course, we are all saddened by the passing of people who we know and love, of that there is no doubt What is wrong is our implying that the people passed before their time. That is either a contradiction or it implies that God is sitting up there making a boatload of mistakes. Neither is very comforting.

Shakira

2005-11-30T09:53:00.000-05:00

After the politically tinted posts of yesterday, I am focusing on more lighthearted ones for today. Well, lighthearted and hot.

Exhibit 1: More hot than lighthearted, ladies and gentlemen, may I present Shakira.

Her new album, Oral Fixation Vol. 2 – love the title, dropped yesterday and MTV showed her taped concert last night. If you didn’t get a chance to see it, you should. Knowing MTV, I’m sure they’ll re-broadcast it a million more times.

This is a hot, hot woman and I am being completely superficial, which is the perfect way to judge someone.

The Reason Men Don’t Let Women Drive in Saudi Arabia

2005-11-29T15:11:00.000-05:00

The title may be long but the story is short. I read in a newspaper today that four women in Saudi Arabia teachers married their driver so that they could live closer to work. What the …

Is this why women aren’t allowed to drive in Saudi Arabia (SA), so that multiple women are forced to marry one man for the most stupid of reasons? According to the newspaper, the women “were impressed with the man’s good morals and decided to marry him and live together in the village where they teach — avoiding a tiring daily commute.”

Ignoring the fact the women are obviously insane, what the hell is wrong with the man that would make him marry women like these.

---------------------------------------------------------------------
After I wrote the above thing I found out from another site that a “Saudi man married four women in one night only to prove to his estranged first wife that he was attractive.” Apparently, the man’s first marriage lasted only a few months, why I have no idea, and as the woman left him, no easy thing to do in SA, she told him that “no woman would ever marry him.”

“So he swore to marry four women just to prove her wrong.”

---------------------------------------------------------------------

Regardless of whichever is true, both are very interesting.

Iraq and the Withdrawal

2005-11-29T14:25:00.000-05:00

If there is one topic that is on every sane mind these days, it’s Iraq. Currently, the big conversation regarding this topic is whether U.S. troops should withdraw from Iraq and leave the country in the hands of the Iraqis.

I should note here that I was in strong opposition to the U.S. going into Iraq. I believed that the amount of money that would be spent on this war would be better used on homeland security especially since Saddam didn’t have anything to do with 9/11, was boxed in and that the war would take years to end. I had an advantage over some other because I did not buy the whole “they will welcome us as liberators” spiel and knew more about the region than the people planning the invasion/liberation.

That is in the past though. We are in Iraq now and the question to be answered is what we should do now. Should we stay the course or should we leave? Everyone has heard the arguments and chosen one side or the other.

I come out on a third side. I say that we cannot afford to leave Iraq nor can we afford to stay the course. Huh? What I mean is that the U.S. should continue to stay in Iraq but also force, yes force, other Muslim nations to send their troops, countries such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, India (not technically a Muslim country but with more Muslims than most Muslim nations), etc. These troops, including a large contingent of U.S. forces, should be commanded by the UN. While this will reduce our sovereignty in Iraq it will also reduce the number of U.S. casualties.

This new contingent should continue to focus on training Iraqi troops and securing the country. This mixture of multiple nations, and not just “white” nations, will greatly lessen the power of the insurgency. This step will also decrease, immediately, the number of U.S. troops in the country since the multi-national troops will pick up the load left by the vacated U.S. troops, decreasing the load on the U.S. finances, involving other nations and improving the U.S. image.

The big question of course is, why should other nations go to Iraq. Simple, Iraqi oil money and a stable Middle East nation. I am, I admit, saying that Iraq should buy the foreign troops using its oil revenues, that will start to flow when the pipelines are protected, with these additional troops, and the insurgency dies, when the U.S. presence is reduced.

Regardless of whether you agree with this or not, the one thing that is unavoidable is that the U.S. cannot leave Iraq without replacing its presence with something. A unilateral departure is foolish and will exacerbate a situation that we created.

If we do leave then we have learned nothing from 9/11.

That Cheney, Such a Kidder

2005-11-29T11:10:00.000-05:00

Since we live in the DC area we are all addicted to everything political. In that vein here is something interesting that the Washington Post reported this morning.

Mr. Dick “Oh My Ticker” Cheney has refused to release the travel information for his office. The rule is that any travel that is funded by outside, federal government, groups costing more than $250.00 has to be reported.

For example, W has, since 2003, reported all such travel but Mr. Cheney’s office refuses to do so because, according to them, the rule applies to the “head of each agency of the executive branch” and since “the Office of the Vice President is not an agency of the executive branch” the rule does not apply to them.

I think Cheney has the right idea, I mean who are we to ask such questions of the people that we vote. Its not like they work for us or anything.

Move To Maine

2005-11-28T09:25:00.000-05:00

There aren’t many reasons for people to move to Maine. Before today, if you had asked me to give you one reason, off the top of my head, why someone should move from DC to Maine, I wouldn’t have been able to come up with anything.

That was before today because today I found out, through the Washington Post, that a lingerie store called Spellbound, in Augusta, Maine, has real life lingerie models in its window. Genius! Sheer Genius!

Unless, something like this happens in DC, I may seriously consider moving to Maine.

What Insanity Looks Like

2005-11-25T14:20:00.000-05:00

The Day After

2005-11-25T08:42:00.000-05:00

It’s the day after Thanksgiving and I hope that everyone had a good time on Thursday. The weather was great, it got a little cold at the end, but during the day it wasn’t too bad. I went running in the morning and near the end I was sweating like Whitney Houston.

While the Falcons kicked some serious Lions butt, the Cowboys lost a thriller to the Broncos in OT. So, we had food, some nice weather, good football and, keeping with tradition, a bad movie.

This year’s movie was “Sunset” starring Bruce Willis, in his second lead role, and James Garner. It’s a bad bad flick but if you’re going to see something between football games on a full stomach, this would be it.

Today I am back at work and there is no one around. Everyone is doing what this picture shows, this from the NY Times but I am sure they’re doing the same thing in DC and everywhere else.

The weather is damn cold, it’s going to be a slow day and we get to wear jeans. A perfect way to relax after Turkey day.

Have a good weekend everyone and keep an eye out for Syriana. It comes out in limited release today and should come to the DC area soon. I will write more on this movie, which I am really looking forward to, this weekend.

Tis The Season ...

2005-11-23T14:39:00.000-05:00

I would like to formally announce my thoughts on the holiday season: It sucks. Sure we get days off and that is never a bad thing but the fact is that is a horrible season. The year truly does end on a sucking note.

However, since moving to the DC area I have found myself handling this season in a more rational way. The reason is diversity. Yes, folks, diversity.

There are people from everywhere in the world in this area and not all of them follow this season as insanely as we do and hanging out with these folks makes this season a little bearable. I know, I know, it’s a run-on sentence.

I realize that there are many people out there who love this season and everything that goes along with it and I fine with that, to each their own, but for me nothing says “horror” like the holiday season … which officially starts tomorrow.

Now that that’s off my chest, let’s talk about turkey day. If you live in, or near, the DC area then you know that the drumbeat for bad weekend weather has already begun. What this means is that we will get a half an inch of snow sometime before Monday.

The Washington Post is saying that we will have cold weather tonight, good weather tomorrow, cold weather on Friday and nice weather over the weekend. God knows what’ll happen; all I want is nice weather on Thursday, Saturday and Sunday. Those are the days I go running and I hate running in bad weather.

Now if only they would never show “It’s a Wonderful Life” ever again.

Hope you all have some nice weather, good food, pleasant company and lots of gravy.

Nothing. Nothing at all.

2005-11-22T10:56:00.000-05:00

The most depressing thing about my life right now is how boring it is. There is nothing going on at work, there is nothing going on outside work.

Let’s face it, even if there was something going on outside work, my life would still be boring. We spend a majority of our time working and if that is boring then so is everything else.

I applied for a graduate program and was accepted, so I start school in January, again. It’s a part time program which means that I will work during the day and go to school on evenings and weekends. I am so looking forward to that.

Of course, work will pick up. Like everything it comes in spurts and after busting the hump for a couple of months, we are in a downtime. Everyone else is enjoying it because they know what’s around the corner.

I, on the other hand, like doing 500 things so I hate this time. I enjoy not having any free time, working till 9:00 pm every night, not having a moment free, this is killing me. It’s so bad that I have started looking for another position. Nothing can be this boring, can it?

I have an interview today, its not for a position I want, but it will get me out of the office and there is nothing wrong with that.

The only good thing going on right now is what I posted yesterday. Lindsay Lohan has gained some weight and I am very happy that she got her boobs back. Of course, I had no hand in that and that is even more depressing.

She's Back!

2005-11-21T19:58:00.000-05:00

About time skinny Lohan disappeared and the real Lohan came back.

What The ...

2005-11-21T15:14:00.000-05:00

Cheney: Some Iraq Critics Are 'Dishonest'

They're Dishonest!!!!

Inspirational

2005-11-21T09:38:00.000-05:00

"If I can work, I should work …it’s better to work with my own hands, to perform my livelihood, than wait in line and accept aid."

Even without knowing anything about the context of this statement, I would have to admit that the above quote is pretty inspirational. All of us admire those who take initiative and not aid, who do what’s right instead of what’s easy, who use their skills instead of aid.

Of course, this is not to denigrate those that do accept aid. There are circumstances when aid is, and should be, accepted and people should not be harbored any ill will for that.

However, there are individuals that, even if they have been the victims of horrible events, should not be given any aid because of their situations or their behavior. Individuals, such as the Katrina victim who got a government supported charge card and immediately went and bought a $200 handbag, are scum and not deserving of our good will.

Then there are those, such as the person quoted above, who should be admired. By the way, the above quote comes from a barber in northern Pakistan, the area that was devastated from an earthquake that killed at least 86,000 people, who instead of accepting government aid re-opened his barbershop “between the broken boulders and chunks of concrete.”

The ‘Skins Are Tearing Me Apart

2005-11-21T09:17:00.000-05:00

The image says it all.

Too supposedly easy games and two losses.

These guys are just playing with my emotions now.

I am too tired and angry to even think about them.

When To Move On

2005-11-17T16:52:00.000-05:00

A little more than a year ago I switched jobs. I went from a position where I made a good amount of money but wasn’t very happy to one where I did not make as much money but was much happier. Of course, this is professional happiness and has nothing to do with personal happiness, which is never a problem for me.

So, I take the new position and it is everything that I had thought it would be. Its fun, the people are cool, etc. Only the money is just a little too little. Alright, so a year goes by and I have my evaluation, today as a matter of fact. The evaluation goes great and I am told that I am being given a promotion. Which means that I will have slightly more work to do, I volunteered for everything this past year so my work couldn’t possibly go much higher, but will have a big bump in salary. Yay!!!

Here’s the problem: Since I volunteered for everything under the sun, in addition to my regular duties, I now find myself thinking how I could continue to be excited about doing the same thing for another year.

Which brings up the question of the day: When Do You Know Its Time To Move On?

One part of me thinks that I should start looking for another position while another part tells me that I should wait one more year, get two years of experience here and then start looking. I think the two year argument makes more sense because of my having changed fields … and this is a drastic change i.e. going from technology to finance.

The dilemma, if I pick the two year argument, is how the hell am I going to keep myself interested in this position for one more year doing the same things that I have been doing this past year.

Anyone go through similar things? Ideas, thoughts, advice?

Prime

2005-11-16T18:42:00.000-05:00

The last three days have been busy like crazy. Unfortunately, the weather was great and I couldn’t take advantage of it. Now that I will have some free time, it’s raining and the temp is supposed to go south, not Brazil-south but Mexico-south, starting tonight.

Okay, let’s not focus on the negative and let’s look on the positive. This weekend I went out, with a person of the female gender, and in order to impress her I asked her to select the movie we hoped to see. I wanted to go see “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang”, she selected “Prime.”

I was dreading on going to see this thing, it is a romantic comedy and looked like a total chick flick. Well, it wasn’t that bad. It could have been the company or it could have been the independent nature of the movie, but I enjoyed the piece.

Uma Thurman looks better than she has ever looked. Meryl Streep was hysterical. The guy was hot, the women behind me shrieked every time he had his shirt off. The movie is very funny and it was a New York movie, which I like. Having lived there I tend to like anything NY-centric.

Alright, so what is a NY movie? It’s a movie that cannot take place in any other city. It’s a movie that is filmed in NY and does not focus on the city’s landmarks but on its every day sights. Its major characters include at least one Jewish person. It is not an action movie but romantic, dramatic or funny. It’s a “Keeping The Faith.” It’s a “Prime.”

The Pain of Workouts

2005-11-11T17:10:00.000-05:00

“No pain, no gain.” Isn’t that what they say? Well, I am going through the pain and there had better be some gain.

The thing is that I am starting to work out after a while, a month a half to be exact. The reasons for this are multiple. I hurt my knee and that took about two weeks to get better. Then Ramadan started and I had to start fasting.

For those that do not know, Ramadan is a month in the Islamic calendar when Muslims fast from sunrise to sunset for 29 or 30 days. That means no eating or drinking during the day. During this month I could not workout, weights and cardio, and before I knew it, it had been a month and I had not worked out.

Ramadan ended a week ago and after doing some cardio for three days I went back to the gym to check out the weights. After getting over the shock of not lifting as much as I used to, not surprising since I did lose 10 pounds in 29 days, I got on with.

I did weights on Wednesday and Thursday and cardio today. The result is that I cannot walk today. My chest and legs hurt like … well something serious. Tomorrow and Sunday I get back on the weights and hopefully this old ass body will get back in tune pretty soon.

I know that people say that this pain is a good pain. Well, I am here to say that there is no good pain. Pain is not good. It doesn’t matter how it comes by. However, the good thing is the result of all this pain. Well, the probable result, a person in better shape and a hotter physique.

Okay, forget the better shape, just a hotter physique.

Here’s to the pain and the benefits from it.

Oscar Movies - Munich

2005-11-10T14:45:00.000-05:00

Oscar season is almost upon us and while I am not a big fan of most Oscar-caliber movies, there are some that pass muster.

For example, I hate “Titanic.” I think it’s one the worst movies ever made and yet it won every Oscar under the sun and made more money than any other movie in history.

I though that “Return of the King” was the worst of the three “Lord of the Rings” movies, I favored “The Two Towers” and yet, while Towers didn’t win anything, King swept the Oscars.

So, given my history with these movies I am always a little suspicious when people say that I should see this or that because it has been nominated for a gazillion Oscars. By the way, this is not meant as a criticism of those that follow the Oscar choices, especially since plenty of people do follows the Oscars.

Apparently, having read a number of prognosticators about their Oscar predictions, this year is looking a little weak in the Oscar caliber movies category. There are some front runners but many of the favorites are falling by the wayside. Having not seen any of these favorites I cannot comment on their quality but what I can talk about, and am in this long winded blog, are the movies that I want to see.

One of these movies is “Munich.” Its directed by Steven Spielberg, his second after “War of the Worlds”, and stars Eric Bana, Daniel Craig (the new James Bond) and Geoffrey Rush. It’s about the team of Mossad agents that tracked and killed the terrorists who assassinated the Israeli Olympic team at the 1972 Munich Olympics. The original title of the film was “Vengeance”, which tells you something. The trailer can be found here.

The reason why I am looking forward to this movie is because it’s a procedural. While I am sure that it will have many layers, its serious Spielberg and is written by Tony Kushner, it essentially looks like the 70’s movies that John Frankenheimer or William Friedkin made.

Some People.

2005-11-09T16:11:00.000-05:00

I don’t know how it is in other cities, its probably very similar since this is a universal truth, but there are two things that get me upset in DC. The first are cab drivers and the second are people who take elevators to go up, or down, one floor.

The former is a subject for another post. The latter is the subject for this post because it happened to me today.

I was standing on the 2nd floor of my building, waiting for the elevator to come and take me up to the 8th floor. As I was waiting, an especially long time by the way, this other woman comes by and also waits for the elevator. We just stand there, for around a minute, waiting for our chariot.

Finally, the chariot arrives and we both get on. I press 8, she presses 3. 3! By the way, this was a healthy woman, albeit overweight with a huge ass, I wonder why. I later ran into her at the cafeteria, twice in one day, I must have done something wrong, and she was loading up on soda and sweets.

What the hell dude. I am sure all of us have seen lazy ass people like these. Take the fraggin’ stairs jackasses!

The French Riots

2005-11-07T18:48:00.000-05:00

As you know there are massive riots going on throughout France and today’s post is about my trying to understand the reasoning behind them.

The riots started when two youths who were being chased by police jumped over an electric fence and electrocuted themselves. This happened 12 days ago and since then the country has been in the grips of nightly riots. The big fear in Europe is that the riots may spread to other countries and so all of Europe is now girding itself for something to happen.

So what is the reason behind these riots? We all know that the death of those two teenagers was the spark but what was the fuel? I think that there are a number of reasons behind these riots. There is the general European attitude towards immigrants where Europeans, with their declining birthrates, need immigrants but they don’t incorporate them into their country’s social fabric. The general attitude there is that the immigrants are needed to do labor but not to be a part of the continent.

On the other hand, the immigrants are also to blame. While the unemployment rates in these communities are exponentially higher than other communities, their lives are still much better than it would be in their native countries. Here is the kicker though. The kids rioting are French citizens. They were born and grew up in that country. So they are, for all purposes, French citizens. Yet, they don’t feel French, they see the jobs that other get and that they don’t get and they resent the country and the other communities for it.

So, what’s the solution? No idea. Maybe integrate them better?

France, by the way, has now imposed martial law across the land, hoping to stop these nightly lootings and burnings.

There Is No "I" In Team.

2005-11-07T05:56:00.000-05:00

Washington - 17
Philadelphia- 10

It was a tough game and the Eagles were without T.O., which made them a weaker team, but the bottom line is that we still won.

The whole team contributed and that is how it should be. There is no I in team and that was the difference between the Skins and the Eagles.

If T.O. had been in the game, it would have been a much closer game, they might have even won it, but T.O. is an idiot and only he is to blame for his suspension.

Regardless, let's not sell the Skins short. They made mistakes but they made up for them and came through. Considering what happened last week, this is a really good sign and shows that the Skins have picked themselves up.

5-3 Baby. The playoffs are looking mighty close.

TCM Movie Of The Week

2005-11-06T09:27:00.000-05:00

I am a huge fan of old movies and for people like me there is no channel as good as Turner Classics Movies (TCM). They have the best old movies with the best prints. So last night I found out that they were showing Gaslight, as part of their Essentials series. More on this series later, let’s talk about Gaslight.

Gaslight was produced in 1944 and starred Ingrid Bergman, Charles Boyer and Joseph Cotton. It’s the story of a man trying to make his wife go insane and another man who is trying to prevent that. Of course there are boatloads of other things going on but this is the story in essence.

This is a great movie and one of the reasons is how Bergman’s character acts. In most old movies the woman that is playing the victim just gives in until the hero comes to save the day. In this piece Bergman fights her villainous husband all the way. She stands up to him and at the end when she plays with him shows that this is not your average thriller.

Bergman is amazing, Boyer is excellent and Cotton is okay. He’s the weak link here. Oh and George Cukor’s direction is amazing as well. You should check out some of his other movies e.g. The Philadelphia Story, The Women, etc.

The Right Decision?

2005-11-04T08:38:00.000-05:00

Let me just come out say it, I have Cinemax. I like the channel and have enjoyed it for years, from the days when it used to show foreign made soft core porn to today, when the quality of soft core is so bad, I don’t even watch it anymore.

Regardless, the channel does show the best variety of movies anywhere and, while it does not telecast the HBO shows, is the best buy for your money.

One of the things that I have found is that it will sometimes show movies, that haven’t officially premiered on the channel, in the early mornings or at late night. I ran into one such movie this morning, Spanglish.

I’ve linked the title to its IMDB site so you can find out, in detail, what the movie’s about. I had never seen the movie, still haven’t seen it completely, but I know the story and the ending and it is the ending that got me thinking about today’s post.

In the movie Adam Sandler is married to Tea Leoni, who’s a bitch, and has a maid played by Paz Vega, who’s an angel. Now, while he is attracted to the maid and she is an angel, at the end of the movie, he stays with the wife because of their kids.

This got me thinking, was that the right thing to do? Should we stay in relationships that are bad for us for the sake of other people? Kids, parents, family, neighbors, friends, therapists, etc.?

Has anyone out there gone through this? What was the result? Would you go through it again?

I don’t believe in staying in a relationship for any reason other than for your happiness. It’s a selfish POV but then I don’t have any kids or such and so there is nothing really holding me in the relationship.

By the way, as you might have guessed, if it was me making the movie instead of James L. Brooks, who is a genius by the way, Sandler would have left Leoni for Vega in a heartbeat. I mean, just look at her.

The Man From Georgia

2005-11-03T13:51:00.000-05:00

Last night I was sitting at home looking for something to see on the ol’ boob tube. Not finding anything, I gave up and tuned to Larry King Live, a show by the way that has really hit the skids, and found that former President Jimmy Carter was on.

While I had heard Mr. Carter speak and obviously knew about all his post-Presidency career and achievements, I had never heard him talk for an hour before. It was quite a revelation. This is an amazing man and anyone who thinks any different is, let’s just say it, unpatriotic.

This morning I started looking for the man’s bio. I knew that he had a tumultuous presidency but what I did not know was that he studied nuclear physics, received a B.S. degree from the United States Naval Academy, served on submarines in the Atlantic and Pacific fleets and was in the U.S. Navy's nuclear submarine program, where he became a qualified nuclear engineer. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Carter)

Considering all that he did before and after his presidency, I think it safe to say that being President of the United States wasn’t a highlight of his life. How many of us would be able to say that.

Women's Rights

2005-11-02T08:01:00.000-05:00

This post shows that I can be sensitive to the plight of women in Afghanistan while checking out hot chicks in bikinis.

While the Taliban ruled Afghanistan, women in the country were treated horribly. Not that with the Taliban out of power they are being treated much better, but at least they can now enter beauty pageants.

I present, for your viewing pleasure, Ms. Sutara Bahrami, Afghanistan’s second beauty contestant for Miss Earth 2005. From burkhas to bikinis, you’ve come a long way baby.

Cleanliness and Productivity

2005-11-02T07:35:00.000-05:00

Everyone knows the old adage, cleanliness is next to godliness, and many people believe it to be true. I, however, was not one of those people. I, being the perpetual college student, liked how my place was always messed up, you know, it had character.

These days though I find myself looking at my place and thinking that if it was cleaner I would be more productive. I don’t know if there is a connection there. I think there is and I think this because as I get older I am becoming increasingly focused on being more productive.

If my day is not filled with things to do then I don’t feel good. While there may be some psychological reasons for this, I am an old school guy and not really into the whole introspection thing so my plan is to set aside an hour every evening for the old cooking/cleaning combo.

Hopefully that will increase my energy level, increase my productivity and keep my energy level high.

Now, for those out there … if any, has anyone gone through the same thing and what do you feel about it.

Mother and Child: What It's All About

2005-11-01T07:23:00.000-05:00

Halloween

2005-11-01T06:53:00.000-05:00

It’s a nice night and I am sitting at home, surfing the web, watching some old West Wing episode and the bell rings. Ahh, I think to myself, it’s Halloween. The kids are out with their parents in tow, dressed up in their favorite costume and looking for candy.

I get up, walk to the door, grab the pumpkin full of candy, open the door and … no kids, just teenagers. When did this happen? When did it become okay for teenagers to go from door to door looking for candy?

I asked the “kid” at my door if he was too old to go trick or treating? No, he said and then held out his bucket.

Of course, I gave him candy, why the hell not. He was bigger than me but it did get me thinking. Till what age is it okay to go trick or treating?

I did have some cute kids come by and I gave them sweets, chatted with their parents and it was all very good. Still, this thing is stuck in my head.

I mean if this came up to my door and wanted trick or treats, I’d give her a trick, a treat, a bag of chips and whatever else was in my house. However, she didn’t and I didn’t so I am stuck thinking about the older kids wanting free sweets when, maybe, they should be the ones giving them out.

Sir Mix-A-Lot ...

2005-10-31T07:20:00.000-05:00

… in his classic song “Baby Got Back” Sir Mix-A-Lot rapped about the positive aspects of the big butt. I will go out on a strong limb and admit that I do not like big butts. I am more of an athletic butt kinda guy and not afraid to admit it.

I was reading my fellow DC blogger, Kathryn On … the other day and I noticed that she had written a post warning her fellow females on the dangers of VPL, Visible Panty Lines. This is a particular female issue so I am not going to go there but her post did remind me of a topic that I will discuss, big butts and tight pants.

Ladies and gents, please, if it don’t fit easily, don’t force it on. Women, with the focus on tighter clothes these days, are worse off than men but both genders are guilty of this. The bottom line is that there a whole lotta men and women walking around in clothes that they don’t have any business wearing. This is because, I think, people have become more comfortable with their bodies.

As a former fattie I will come right and say it: You should never be comfortable with your body. Comfort with your body is a recipe for a high fat, high sugar, high calorie disaster that no one should go through. A little insecurity about your body image never hurt anyone, no matter what anyone says.

What Happened!

2005-10-30T19:28:00.000-05:00

I hate to start my blog off on this note but this is the biggest thing of the day and that’s the way it has to be.

The Redskins were doing so well this season and that’s why tonight’s loss to the Giants is so frustrating. We all, well all us rational people, knew that the Giants were a better team. They have a better QB and a better offensive line and I thought that we had a better defense.

Our offense has been coming along and that combined with our defense was something that I thought would keep the game close. Well, I was WRONG!

Damn we got killed today. 36-0! Tiki Barber had a career game. NY’s first shutout in almost 7 years. First time a Gibbs team has lost so bad.

Nothing good for the ‘Skins. Nothing bad for the Giants. You don’t need my analysis, you can get that anywhere but the only think left to say is DAMN!

The true test comes next week. How do we pick ourselves up and move on.

By the way, the Eagles are getting killed too, not as bad as the ‘Skins but still Denver is kicking their ass. Another surprising one this. Not the defeat perhaps, but definitely the margin.