For some reason the appeal of these things goes up exponentially the more I try to get into study mode. And for the record, I love the American version, and I'd probably like the British version if I could figure out what the fuck they're saying even occasionally...

the Wit (57% dark, 38% spontaneous, 15% vulgar)

your humor style: CLEAN | COMPLEX | DARK You like things edgy, subtle, and smart. I guess that means you're probably an intellectual, but don't take that to mean pretentious. You realize 'dumb' can be witty--after all isn't that the Simpsons' philosophy?--but rudeness for its own sake, 'gross-out' humor and most other things found in a fraternity leave you totally flat. I guess you just have a more cerebral approach than most. You have the perfect mindset for a joke writer or staff writer. Your sense of humor takes the most thought to appreciate, but it's also the best, in my opinion. You probably loved the Office. If you don't know what I'm talking about, check it out here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/theoffice/. PEOPLE LIKE YOU: Jon Stewart - Woody Allen - Ricky Gervais The 3-Variable Funny Test! - it rules - If you're interested, try my latest: The Terrorism Test

My test tracked 3 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender: You scored higher than 62% on darkness You scored higher than 30% on spontaneity You scored higher than 5% on vulgarity

Link: The 3 Variable Funny Test written by jason_bateman on Ok Cupid, home of the 32-Type Dating Test

I'm headed into Detroit tonight with my friends Pennie and Tara to see The Editors and Stellastarr*, two bands I don't know much about, at The Magic Stick. This indicates at least two things about me:

1. I am not sufficiently into finals panic mode.
2. Cute girls who I have no chance with can talk me into just about anything.

This is counter-proof to the maxim "you are what you love," since it's pretty much the only way I don't drink the stuff:

You are a Black Coffee

At your best, you are: low maintenance, friendly, and adaptable At your worst, you are: cheap and angsty You drink coffee when: you can get your hands on it Your caffeine addiction level: high

What Kind of Coffee Are You?

Well, my month and a half-long obsession with finding summer housing (or, as I'd taken to calling it: Playing Russian Sublette) again seems to be over, as I have (as the sports agents say) accepted in principle an apartment in Koreatown. The major plusses are that I know that part of town, I'll be a 5-minute walk from two kick-ass bars, the place will be cheaper than I was expecting (by a bunch), and I was able to have a friend take a look to make sure it was an ok place. (And here I'd be remiss in not thanking Tom O'Donnell; if you go here and click on "About TIAA-CREF," "View our TV commercials," and "Professor," you can see his national TV debut. He's the student.) The minuses are that I don't get to try out life on the Westside, where I'll probably live permanently, and it's going to be a little farther from work than I'd like--but I should have a nice straight shot down Olympic Boulevard.

Mostly, right now, I'm just glad to be done with the goddamn process, so that I can get back to not doing my school work.

One morning about five years ago I sat blot upright at about 6:30 a.m. with this super-scary pain running through the left-middle of my body. Was I having a heart attack? Something equally bad? I had no idea. When I realized I was basically OK other than the pain, I calmed down, waited, and went to student health when they opened. They told me I either had a pulled muscle in my chest or back, or maybe I had a pinched nerve in there somewhere. The bottom line was that regardless of what was wrong, they were just going to tell me to rest it and take some ibuprofen, so it was pointless to do any tests.

Over the past several days I've had the exact same pain. I know it's nothing worse, largely because I was able to do the treadmill as usual yesterday with nothing out of the ordinary. Or, rather, I know intellectually it's nothing worse; the deviously paranoid part of me brain cannot stop thinking heart attack, even though to my understanding heart-attack-type pain doesn't go on as a dull throb for 5 days, doesn't allow you to do cardio, doesn't occasionally shoot across to your opposite shoulder, etc.

The practical upshot of this is particularly annoying--I'm fine all day, but when I lay down to sleep my mind races. I can probably count 10 nights in my entire life where I've had the legitimate , up half the night for no good reason kind of insomnia; unfortunately, four nights ago that estimate would be seven. So if you encounter me in the next several days, the odds that I'm going to be cranky and/or distance are exponentially higher than usual. Fair warning.

OK, most of you probably knew this three years ago (most of you with iPods anyway), but I discovered last week how to listen to samples on iTunes. I then spent a shockingly high number of hours listening to playlists called things like, "250 [actually 239] songs from 1988, about 125 [actually 119.5] of which you haven't heard since then," and realizing that if I browsed after a few beers I might accidentally download the entire list. OK, since I've never given the fine people of Apple any credit card info, that won't happen. But I do keep getting these free downloads from my Lexis-Nexis account, and I suspect that one day I'll wake up to find "Heart and Soul" by T'Pau, "No More Lies" by Michel'le, and something by Me'shell NdegéOcello on my hard drive, alongside who knows how many other artists whose names contain an apostrophe but no letter "s".

A few quick hits as I enjoy my newfound access to Watusi Rodeo...

• I've been out of commission from the gym for the last several days, and in a fair amount of intermittent pain to boot, since injuring my neck while doing crunches on Wednesday. The details are not important, but here's the thing--I've been receiving regular emails from my former gym for a couple of years with fitness, nutrition, and safety tips, and they never have useful information along the lines of: if you're in the stretching room doing crunches and out of the corner of your eye you see a super-hot undergrad doing something that looks more like a simulated sex act than an actual exercise, you need to either stop what you're doing or wait until you complete your current set before turning your head to stare, rather than doing it mid-rep.
• I don't know how long it will be up, but for now you can go to the Indie 103.1 homepage and download "Start Wearing Purple" by Gogol Bordello for free. If you've ever wondered what the crazed intersection of punk and gypsy music would sound like, I daresay this is your opportunity to find out.
• I love Ben Howland for what he did for Pitt's basketball team, and even though rooting for UCLA goes against everything I believe in (as a USC fan and a dynasty-hater), I genuinely wish him and his program well. Especially since they won me my pool.
• For the first time in my life I have completely given up on going to a particular class, which is getting the pass-fail treatment. The professor is part of it, and the time slot is part of it. Another part, though, is this weird phenomenon where it seems easier to meet your obligations when you have more of them. Ever since my accelerated class ended I've had a lot more time, and yet I can't get as much done for the 12 leisurely credits I have now than I did when they were accompanied by 2 more very intense credits in January. I don't understand why, but it seems to be inevitable for me. Odd.
• Another reason I haven't made it there lately is that I've picked up this bad habit of staying out until very late on Monday nights. There's a bar I really like that has a Monday night karaoke night I really like, and I can't resist it. Yes, this is the townie adventure bar I wrote about a while back, and I continue to enjoy my Mondays away from the law quad. Relatedly, any success I have with the opposite sex seems to happen there, and if anything really good happens on that front between now and the end of school, I expect it will start there. For that reason among others, I'm not going to stop going, Tuesday morning class be damned.
• Oh, and last Monday I finally found a karaoke song I can actually sing (as opposed to rap, which I can pull off ironically) half-decently: Add It Up by the Violent Femmes.
  
• I have most of May off after finals and before starting my job, and I'm starting to think that I should spend 7-10 days of it in Mississippi or Louisiana volunteering. But I'm worried about heading into the disaster area with my car full of my stuff as I move across country for the summer. Anyone have any suggestions for what I should do (with stuff, time, etc.)?
  

My happy discovery of the night is that iTunes broadcasts my favorite L.A. radio station, Indie 103.1. If you like any or all forms of indie rock, you should check it out. I particularly recommend the Sunday alt-country show Watusi Rodeo and the insane daily ramblings on Jonesy's Jukebox.

I'm currently tied for 5th place in the my tournament pool, but the quirk given this year's results is that only 4 teams in the entire pool have any Final Four teams--and no one has more than one. The 4th place entry and mine are the only two that can win. I have UCLA in the final game, and she has LSU; whoever's right wins the thing, and whoever's wrong finishes out of the money. The 1-3 teams are guaranteed spots 2-4. Let's just say that if LSU wins on Saturday, I'm finally going to have to invest in one of these.

Attempting to kick start the recently-sluggish blog meme-etically...

The meme is this: "Recount a one-line anecdote for each state you have visited [and then demand that others do the same]."

This may take a while, as you can see here:



create your own visited states map

AL: Mailed a postcard in a town that had recently had a large mining disaster
AK: Helicoptered onto a glacier
AZ: Attended the second-worst attended NFL game of the 2003 season
AR: Completed my first 1000-mile driving day in Memphis in order to avoid sleeping here
CA: Won both academic and pop-culture trivia tournaments the same weekend playing with this meme's author
CO: Drove through Denver on I-70 at rush hour and expected death at any moment for about 2 hours on the steep grades
CT: Bowed with reverance at Stamford's Titan Tower, world HQ of the then-WWF
DE: Learned that the University of Delaware was founded in Pennsylvania
DC: Wandered into quiet residential neighborhood in failed quest to find Mauratanian embassy
FL: Went to Indian casino miles from civilization with no working ATMs on a Friday night
GA: First saw humans actually utilizing a Segway, in Hartsfield Airport
ID: Passed an entirely unmemorable night in a Pocatello motel
IL: Saw a concert at Chicago Blues at the not-quite-legal age of 20
IN: Got freaked at by the sight of a busload of Mennonite teenagers eating at Steak and Shake
IA: Ran 360 feet for possibly the only time in the last 10 years at Field of Dreams
KS: Visited Museum of American Fan Collectors, the finest museum I have ever attended of those located in the lobby of a corporate headquarters
KY: Stopped at Mammoth Cave purely to use the facilities, not the cave-related ones either
ME: Drove a convertible for the first and only time on the way back to NH from a Portland Sea Dogs game
MD: Attended the first home game in the (brief) history of the Washington Warthogs of the Continental Indoor Soccer League (the once and future MISL)
MA: Was very disappointed by what can more accurately be described as Plymouth Pebble
MI: Saw Damion Easley hit for the cycle
MN: Drove I-94 across the entire state without seeing any twine at all
MO: Bowled a game at the International Bowling Museum
MT: Converted "$"10 Canadian into $6 at a Kalispell bank
NE: Nothing interesting has ever happened to anyone in Nebraska
NV: Drank 75-cent margaritas at 12:45 p.m. on a weekday in Laughlin
NH: Purchased liquor at a highway rest stop
NJ: Went to Barnegat Lighthouse and the surrounding beaches
NM: Drove an hour out of the way to ride on U.S. 666, with our extra reward being discovering a Sonic
NY: Dropped a penny off the Empire State Building; fatalities inconclusive
NC: Drove to a gas station from Myrtle Beach and bought a soda, just so I could add NC to the list
ND: Saw both the Roger Maris and Maury Wills shrines in Fargo
OH: Saw an actual Cinerama movie in Dayton
OK: Attended two minor league baseball games at Bricktown Ballpark two years apart
PA: Almost swooned upon seeing and walking into Zipperhead, for perhaps non-obvious reasons relating to my favorite song ever
RI: Drove across the state without stopping, listening to the CD "Ska Third-Wave Vol. 1" the entire time (~45 minutes)
SC: On consecutive days, went miniature golfing and Minotaur Goffing
SD: Was served ice cream and ice water by friendly Belorussian teens at Wall Drug
TN: Won trash tournament in Nashville after (arguably because of) a crazed 13-hour overnight trip (nay, pilgrimage) to Graceland
TX: Ate a 5 ounce steak at The Big Texan in Amarillo, a mere 67 ounces smaller than the house specialty
UT: Was told by a contemptuous Denny's waitress, "There is no smoking in Utah."
VT: Spent a New Year's Eve playing Apples to Apples with 60somethings I did not know in White River Junction
VA: Went outlet browsing at a huge mall that turned out to be entirely devoid of big and tall clothing
WA: Rode a bus from Seattle airport to Canadian border, and that's it
WV: Saw Demolition regain the WWF tag team titles from the Brain Busters in Wheeling, and 15 years later saw minor league arena football in the same building
WI: Drove 50 miles out of our way to return to a particular Starbucks in downtown Milwaukee, my favorite Starbucks in the world
WY: Listened to the most in-depth analysis of the California gubernatorial election that I ever heard on Wyoming Public Radio in Rawlins

And while I'm at it:

British Columbia: Fell in love with Vancouver in the exactly two hours I spent driving through and waiting to board a cruise ship
Alberta: Spent a night in Medicine Hat and yet completely failed to acquire any merchandise bearing the name "Medicine Hat"
Saskatchewan: Got my only speeding ticket ever, ironically just outside of Swift Current
Manitoba: Ate McDonald's fries with white vinegar packet for the first time
Ontario: Attended the finals of the inter-provincial under-19 Canadian football championships
Quebec: Watched DEK eat 13 meats at one meal, the same meal where I finally completed a longtime quest to drink rye whiskey

Poland: Shared a train with hundreds of heavy metal fan teens traveling to "Polish Woodstock"
Germany: Got a very embarrassing giggling fit at Checkpoint Charlie museum
Denmark: Went to Elsinore Castle in Helsingor
Norway: Ate Mongolian barbecue for the first time, in Oslo of course
Sweden: Was very confused by the presence of several August Strindberg paintings at the National Museum
Finland: Saw Jackie Brown in Finnish with English and Swedish subtitles