The “Venus de Milo” of Coats

I rarely notice trends in fashion before they are yesterday’s news.  So when I do see a trend forming in fashion, I’ve got to tell everyone.  Although, as pleased as I am that I notice this trend, I am equally puzzled by it.  I am talking about the

trend of the vest–the sleeveless jacket.  I can’t help but notice the growing popularity of this winter/fall accessory.  I never really got the point of a vest.  Though it is fashionable, to me it seems virtually useless.  Sleeves are one of the best qualities in any jacket or coat.  Any top I have covers the chest and back and tops of my shoulders, and most even go as far as covering the sides of my shoulders down to about mid-bicep.  Any shirt will cover those areas.  And a jacket vest will, at best, just add reinforcement to those already covered areas.  The vest will make those areas warmer–I’ll give it that–but what about the arms?  If you are going be out in temperatures that call for a need of warmth to your chest and back, then your arms are going to need the same protection from the cold.  You could wear a sweatshirt underneath, but the arms of a sweatshirt are not enough to protect you from the harsh whips that cold weather brings.  If you need to stay warm, why wear a vest when that is only a solution to part of the problem?  So if you’re going to be in cold temperatures, skip the middle man and just go straight for a coat or jacket with sleeves.

Another trend of vest-wearing that I noticed is that a lot of people tend to wear their vests unzipped and open in front. Here are a few examples of what I mean:

Like father…

…like son.

Ok, I have to admit, the latter picture actually works for that hunk of a man.  But is this really even doing anything?  The vest has very few duties assigned to it: keep chest warm; keep back warm.  An open jacket vest loses 50% of what it is supposed to do.  Having a vest unzipped or unbuttoned leaves it with only one purpose–keep the back warm.  Let me ask you something.  Has your back ever been cold?  I can’t think of one time when my back was even cool for more than a split second of a cold chill.  The back–the core of the body–is arguably the warmest part of the body.  So really, the vest isn’t doing anything at all.

But like I said before, no one has ever accused me of being fashionable.  Maybe there is something about vests that I’m not taking into account.  Maybe they do serve some purpose that I don’t see.  Or maybe they are just plain stupid and useless accessories.

Starting My Winter Break

Yesterday I woke up at 8 am only to find that my back, driver’s-side tire was rim-to-the-ground flat. My boss had called the day before asking if I could come in early, and I had said I could.  Needless to say, I hadn’t expected waking up to a flat.  After giving it the cliche toe kick (yeah, I cracked a toe nail), I prepared and began to change the tire.  The lugnuts were all  stubborn, to be generous, but I got all of them loose; all except one.  I could not get that lugnut to budge.  Pretty soon, my Buick-issued wrench for the lugnuts had cracked and the immovable lugnut’s head was almost a perfectly round circle.  I was beaten.  A lone lugnut was the only thing standing between me having a mobile vehicle and me not having a mobile vehicle.  I finally caved in and called a repair shop and they said they’d come out.

Meanwhile, I needed to get to work.  My brother was kind enough to let me use his truck.  I drive a fairly small Buick Century; my brother drives a Chevy truck with an extended cab and extended bed.  The point I’m trying to make is it is fucking long!  A longer vehicle than I am used to driving by at least 12 feet (which reminds me, I have to get my poetic license renewed).  Anywho, I drive the truck to work.  Oh, and did I mention, my workplace’s parking lot is very small (Food Fantasies on Wabash across from Little Saigon; go check it out if you don’t believe me).  While squeezing into a parking spot, I had to switch it from Drive to Reverse and back again so much that I got dizzy.  But long story short, I made it to work more or less on time.

I get home from work to find that I have a $35 bill waiting for me from the repair shop for coming out and changing my tire.  That one lugnut cost me $35.  But regardless of this whole ordeal, I am not upset.  I am on winter break.  I am home with my family.  I am not at school.  I didn’t have to walk a half a mile to my car before I discovered the flat (although the 15 steps from the front door to my car were pretty exhausting).  I have Christmas Eve, Christmas, New Year’s Eve, and New Year’s to look forward to.  As far as I’m concerned, this was the perfect start to my winter break.

i am the part of the artist that is scared of his masterpiece

Happy 24th Anniversary Mom and Dad

It’s a funny thing, love.  About a month ago, my mom and I were having a conversation about my dad.  This was back when we were in the process of moving, and were only living in our new house part-time.  She and I were staying there while my father was staying back in the old Winchester house.  The conversation ended with my mother saying, “It’s so weird — when he’s around I can’t stand him, but it feels so wrong to be here without him.”

To get a fuller effect of this statement, I’ll specify what we were talking about before it.  We were talking about my dad’s past gift-giving record.  My mom was telling me about their first Christmas together after they got married, and how she’d put so much thought into what would make the perfect present for her new husband.  And after much deliberation, she couldn’t decide what gift would be best, so she got him a plethora of perfect gifts, making each present special in its own way.  And what did he get his newly-wed wife for their first Christmas as a married couple?

Nothing.

Not one single gift.  She said that he tried to make up for it by saying that he couldn’t find anything that was good enough to give her.  But my mom didn’t buy it, nor did she talk to him for several days afterward.

“But you have to realize,” she said to me, “as I had to realize back then that we were raised differently.  I was from a family that treated Christmas as this magical time where anything could happen and everyone was cheery.  And he was from a family that didn’t even celebrate his own birthday.”

Only knowing that makes this next part of the story make any sense:  A few months after the whole “first Christmas” incident, my dad went away on a business trip or something for a day or two.  When he returned, he brought back gifts — not to make up for last Christmas, not for her birthday… just for her.  His magical and extremely thoughtful gifts to her were as follows: a pillowcase (no pillow to go with it, mind you; not to mention my mom already had pillowcases for her pillow) and a couple of decorative scouring pads, not meant for actual usage.  In any normal marriage, this might have exacerbated things a bit (let’s just say that “You just got served!” wouldn’t just be a line from some dance movie).  But, as every white basketball player who has ever barely nicked the ball when attempting to block a shot would say: not it my house!! “I was just so happy to get anything from him,” my mother told me with tears welled in her eyes, “that I cried and forgave him.”

Over the years, my father’s gift-giving abilities improved substantially.  He has since learned, and past on to my brother and me, that Bath & Body Works is a gold mine.  And, just a couple of years ago, my dad, who knows nothing of computers (he doesn’t even know how to use a cell phone), got my mom a top-of-the-line laptop computer for her birthday.  (The whole “top-of-the-line” part was really just lucky guess work on the part of my dad, who decided that the most expensive computer had to be the best.)

This story helps explain why my parents, who seem to be passive-aggressively at each other’s throats constantly, cannot stand to be apart for even one night.  The only thing that could possibly keep these two completely opposite people together is love.  Love is understanding — understanding that this other person came from an entirely different background than you did; and so you adapt and change yourself so that you two can make your own background for two boys: a somewhat strict but fair, always loving and accepting and encouraging background.

It’s a funny thing, love.

Kakorrhaphiophobia

Do you know how hard it is to be in the honors program and be stupid? Well believe you me, it is.

When I was in high school, I had views and opinions and all that jazz–or at least I thought I did.  However, came to college and found out that I don’t know anything that college people know.  I can’t have debates with my friends here, because I don’t know stats and shit off the top of my head about subjects I at least knew about; not to mention that I don’t have that logical part in my brain that somehow knows the form a debate is supposed to take (apparently calling one’s opponent gay doesn’t automatically make one the winner–my how things have changed since high school!).

My ultimate goal is to be a writer.  In high school, I was one of the best writers.  It took me a whole year of writing college papers to figure out that I have nothing worth writing about.  It’s taken me eight blogs to realize that I’m not even a very good writer to begin with.  I used to make fun of people who had a blog (they are pretty pointless), but now I’d do about anything to write a decent blog.

Is this really what I’ve been reduced to?  Desperate to entertain and impress the thousands of faceless blog readers 2 faceless blog readers (2 might also be a bit of an exaggeration), just so that I may feel an ounce of worth and accomplishment for the first time in over a year?

Yes, that is exactly where I’m at right now.

Sloth Day

Hey everybody, I just wanted to let you know that November 19th is tied for the most important day of your life. This is because this Thursday is Sloth Day.  Technically it is National Sloth Day.  The other day that is tied for the best day of your life is International Sloth Day–but that is in the Spring; and let’s not get ahead of ourselves, that’s not how sloths roll.

So how does one celebrate Sloth Day you might ask?  Well, you ignorant slut, you go about celebrating Sloth Day by not doing much of anything at all.  If you have to do something, you should move extremely slowly and only use your middle three fingers.  You CAN eat on Sloth Day…..a lot!!  You may also climb a tree and sit, and perhaps sleep, in it for hours on end.  But if you do this, be careful–sloths often fall out of trees because they are so inept that they have been known to grab their own arm, mistaking it for a tree branch, and try to climb.  If anyone hassles you on Sloth Day, just ignore them and continue slothing no matter what: the number one defense of sloths is being a sloth.  Predators usually don’t notice sloths because they move so slow that they think they’re either dead or an inanimate object.

So do your research (mainly by watching youtube videos of sloths) and study how sloths act, so you can be fully prepared when November 19th comes dragging by.  Oh, and not to intimidate you, but no other animal has a deadly sin named after it (so don’t screw this holiday up).

Finally, don’t celebrate Sloth Day too heavily, or you’ll defeat the purpose of Sloth Day.

Here’s a quote from a drunken Isaac Brock

How many political idealists does it take to change a lightbulb?

Answer: Political Idealists can’t change shit.

The Literary Dale Ernhart

I started a paper that had to be 900 words tonight at 6:00 and it is due tomorrow.  I finished with 1,089 words and submitted it on blackboard early at 7:30 tonight.

….Damn I’m good

Nobel What Prize?

So I don’t really have a problem with Obama, but then again I don’t really follow politics very closely at all.  I do, however, have a problem with the Nobel Peace Prize, which I just heard was awarded to President Obama.  How can someone get a PEACE prize when he just put more troops in Afghanistan?  How can that person even be nominated?  Shouldn’t the N.P.P. go to someone who stopped violence and not encouraged it?  This supposed-to-be-honored award has obviously just become a political popularity contest.

Also, I was looking at the qualifications of Nobel Peace Prize nominators, and one of the qualifications (#4) says that they must be “persons who have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.”  So that means that the charade of this now-mock award can only continue to be awarded to powerfully popular leaders, while those making an actual effort towards a more peaceful world are yet again pushed farther away from the public eye.

…But the more I think about it, the more it begins to make sense.  I mean after all, Nobel was the one who invented dynamite.  So it must be that kind of “peace” prize.  Just like our country’s in a time of “peace” right now, and not a time of war.  It must be one of those “violent-peace” prizes.

Weekends.

There are two types of people here at UIS: people that go home on the weekends and people that don’t.  Last year, I quickly learned that the few people that actually did stay here on the weekends form strong bonds with each other.  It’s hard to explain, but it’s true.  So many more inside jokes are made and friendships are taken to new heights.  I’ve met most of my friends here at college through weekend activities (and the rest I met at orientation).  And I’m not talking strictly drinking.  You can do other stuff too probably.  It’s just about getting college experiences.  And although these experiences make excellent stories to the people that go home most weekends or every weekend, they do not understand what it’s really like.  Almost everyone that complains that this campus is too small and boring and nothing fun happens here are most likely people that go home every weekend.  They don’t understand that you have to stay and make something fun happen and you can’t be lazy and wait for something to happen to you.

So the “weekend people” make this place awesome, but as I said before these people are few and far between.  But not to worry, I’ve a solution.  I don’t know how familiar you guys are with the rules Resident Assistants have to follow, but one rule is that RAs can only leave 2 weekends a month.  I propose that we extend that rule to everyone living on campus.  It’s a shame that it has to come to this, but I guess it’s the way it has to be.  (Hopefully you won’t have more than 2 family emergencies a month.  If so, you’ll just have to ask yourself who really is important.)  But I’m sure the real “weekend people” won’t even care.

Now, get out there, meet some new people, and make some memories that you will cherish when you’re out in the real world.  A few suggestions to get you started: attend a few parties (if you drink, be sure to take a camera or a DD if you want those “lasting memories”), launch fruit, or even throw a shopping cart off the PAC (twice).  Sidenote: I believe that all of those activities are now illegal at UIS (but I’ll have to ask about the drinking to make sure).

(Rule of Thumb for Weekend Activities: if you do something, and then UIS makes a rule specifically against what you did after you did it, then you can only go home once a month….because you are now awesome!!)

Moral of the story: you can be one of two types of people living here at UIS– you can complain that nothing exciting ever happens here and go home every weekend because you’ve made no attempt to make new friends at college; or you can make something exciting happen and understand that class is merely a cover for what college is really all about.