Wherever that old post is where Yggles says there are no good bagels in DC, I'd like to add my sample size of one to the mounting evidence. More of a meh-gel, really.

Random state stereotype I just overheard: "Oh, you don't want to date someone in Alaska. Everyone there is running from something."

With nothing else to post about, I'm content to muse about plausible versions for other places.

Is it:

a) irrelevant
b) self-absorbed, or
c) helpful

for me to mention that I'll be out of town till Tuesday and so posting will be light? None of the other active posters ever mention it when they leave. At least mentioning it helps me with the Not Posting Guilt, which sounds ridiculous, but no more ridiculous than your face.

I'm going to assert that the human body can't really acclimate to temperatures over 100 °/38 C.

From time to time, even the steadfastest of vegetarians may find him- or herself facing a backyard replete with ravenous omnivores. Such was the position into which I was thrust this past weekend, whereupon I set out to prepare for my guests a classic North American summer treat: hamburgers.

The first order of business was the acquisition of the cow pieces, which task soon found me furrowing my brow at the sheer variety of ground meats available to the modern-day consumer. Which one to choose? A question I decided best-answered by fat content, my inclination being to choose the fattiest option based on some hand-wavy reasoning related to grill temperature and likely perceived deliciousness (by others, of course; I had no designs on eating this dreck).

Now returned from my supply-gathering mission, I set upon preparing the patties, with no small amount of guidance from interested onlookers. A simple collection of seasoning was suggested, including salt, pepper, garlic powder, and several splashes of Worcestershire sauce. Mixed by hand along with a healthy portion of diced white onion, the concoction soon found itself formed tightly into patties. (This last bit, I hasten to add, was done by two gracious volunteers—not because I was unwilling, but I'm not sorry I missed out on the hands-on experience.)

It was at precisely this moment that I realized someone ought to be pre-heating the grill, only to discover that, indeed, one of the increasingly rambunctious backyard inhabitants had already rose risen to the occasion and with alacrity, for the grill's meager thermometer was straining against its own physical limit and well past the 600°mark. (Needless to say, I brought down the temperature just a bit prior to cooking.)

From there proceeded the fiery spectacle of grilling the tightly packed bundles, the hungry masses now salivating as even the highly competitive ongoing yard games paused in anticipation of the forthcoming feast.

And apparently the burgers were really good, and no one died of food poisoning.

I'm ecstatic about my cell-phone provider in almost every way—great phone, great coverage, reasonably priced plan that meets my needs, and even a delight the few times I've had to call them.

What on earth they accomplish with the random phone calls to me at 1:30pm on a Wednesday to tell me about the wonderful benefits for which I qualify, however, remains a mystery.

Smearcase passes along this article, "8 Ways Young Americans' Resistance to Domination Has Been Subdued"

As Smearcase correctly notes, the first reason is the interesting one. (IMO, the rest are things that aren't starkly different now then they've been for decades. Schools aren't any more authoritarian now then they were when the counterculture generation was in school, #3 and #4. I don't think there is an increased fear of surveillance, #6. I agree that "Fundamentalist consumerism also promotes self-absorption, which makes it difficult for the solidarity necessary for democratic movements", #8, but I don't think that is a recent development.)

Anyway, #1:

Student-Loan Debt: Large debt--and the fear it creates--is a pacifying force. There was no tuition at the City University of New York when I attended one of its colleges in the 1970s, a time when tuition at many U.S. public universities was so affordable that it was easy to get a B.A. and even a graduate degree without accruing any student-loan debt. While those days are gone in the United States, public universities continue to be free in the Arab world and are either free or with very low fees in many countries throughout the world. The millions of young Iranians who risked getting shot to protest their disputed 2009 presidential election, the millions of young Egyptians who risked their lives earlier this year to eliminate Mubarak, and the millions of young Americans who demonstrated against the Vietnam War all had in common the absence of pacifying huge student-loan debt. Today in the United States, two-thirds of graduating seniors at four-year colleges have student-loan debt, including over 62 percent of public university graduates. While average undergraduate debt is close to $25,000, I increasingly talk to college graduates with closer to $100,000 in student-loan debt. During the time in one's life when it should be easiest to resist authority because one does not yet have family responsibilities, many young people worry about the cost of bucking authority, losing their job, and being unable to pay an ever-increasing debt. In a vicious cycle, student debt has a subduing effect on activism, and political passivity makes it more likely that students will accept such debt as a natural part of life.

There is really a sense of "I owe my soul to the company store" amongst graduates, except they can't put their finger on the company store. There's an indoctrination that you're lucky to have this opportunity, and it was the sole result of individual decisions, free from any possible systemic forces. I hope you have all learned the value of docility and keeping your desk tidy.

I just realised that plenty of mainstream US Democrats, having spent the last however long castigating people to the left of them for perceiving some progressive tendencies in the government of Fidel Castro, are now reduced to supporting the re-election of a President who imprisons people without human rights in Cuba, but who has made excellent advances in the field of bringing healthcare to the poor.

If possible, I'd like the comment thread to be devoted to rude comments about how difficult it is to get owl droppings off a decent shirt.

We watched Rock Star on Sunday, starring Marky Mark and Jennifer Aniston. He is the lead singer of a cover band, and boy is he excited when the real band contacts him and says they need him to step up to the plate.

It's all 80s hair metal scene, and the movie was made in 2001, which makes it a prime candidate for one of my very favorite pastimes: critiquing old period movies for the ways in which the year they were filmed shows up in the year they're trying to recreate.

For example, Rock Star's dramaturge really just raided the wardrobe of Buffy and then busted out the hair spray. Movies made in the 80s that are set in Victorian or Medieval times are also hilariously ripe. Or Happy Days. Anyway, if the people I'm with are into the movie, I have to remove myself because I want so bad to just keep harping on all the ways they got it wrong, wrong, wrong.

I have pretty much deliberately sat out this whole debt ceiling business because 1) obviously no deal would be reached until the last possible dastardly moment, for maximum theatre, and 2) Obama and the Democrats actively extended the Bush tax cuts last year.

Last December, tons of pundits were making some insane connection about how extending the tax cuts would pay off in bargaining power, because the Republicans were planning on fighting the debt ceiling over the coming summer. Or at least they were claiming that was the strategy. It sounded equal parts dumb and insane then, and shockingly did not translate into any leverage whatsoever.

All this is to say that I agree that Obama isn't blundering. He wants drastic spending cuts. Just like last year, he wanted to extend the Bush tax cuts, and that's what happened. Not because he fumbled the negotiations.

I'm sure this was linked in the thread below. Like I said, I've been sitting it out so that I don't blow a gasket in my brain.

Heroes save forty teens during the Norway massacre. (Should you emphasize the fact that the heroes are lesbians or not? What's the lesbian equivalent of 'clean and articulate'?)

Via chris y

Every construction project must have its frustrating delays. JRoth arrives tomorrow, and he'll be saddened to learn that the marmoleum tile and the doorknobs have not yet arrived. So there will still be one more post where I roll out the final photos.

I heard once that most jailbreaks occur in the last month of sentences. I never bothered to verify it because it fits so neatly into my worldview - the last bit of waiting is always the most excruciating. We totally have senioritis with this construction project.

Anyway. Last November, JRoth flew down to meet all the potential contractors and to explain the project to them, and helped us navigate the bids and select someone competent. Construction began in the last week of January. We moved into reduced quarters in March.

Everything has gone smoothly but my grandmother's "multiply time estimates by 3" rule still applies. We can't wait to be done.

JRoth is a great architect and you should hire him, and email me at heebie dot geebie at gmail if you'd like his contact info.

I went swimming in Peconic Bay last night -- the first time I've been swimming at night in a long time. Peconic Bay is absolutely full of little clear non-stinging jellyfish; during the day, you don't notice they're there at all unless you're looking for them, at which point they look like invisible watermelons (clear ellipsoids with very faint ribs). At night, though, when you brush against them, they light up bright green.

Swimming, your arms and legs are outlined in flashes of green light. It's weird and lovely.

I can't remember going swimming at night anyplace else (other than skinnydipping in Concord Pond once. We had to climb the fence, but I don't think Thoreau would have minded). Are there jellyfish like that everywhere in the ocean, or is Peconic Bay unusually thick with them?