adrian is rad

There are very few things I can convince myself to do daily. Brushing my teeth, getting dressed, eating and showering are about it and those I notice very soon if I don’t.

Things that take a longer time to see the effects of, I’m not very good. Physical therapy I can do for a while but it’s hard to stick with. Exercise I can handle on the times per week basis, but not on the daily basis.

Starting today, I’m going to start two things (that may or may not help me in the long run) that take 90 days (at least) to see an effect: Glucosamine and Minoxidil.

Glucosamine is a supplement that’s been shown to help some portion of the population’s joints in rebuilding. Now, I don’t have joint problems because I’m not old (and only old people have joint problems), but if I did they’d be left ankle, right and left knees, and right elbow and to a lesser extent left elbow, right and left shoulders. The dose that’s been studied is 1.5g (1500mg). This is a very large pill.

Minoxidil is just for fun. Any problem that it treats that you might think I have is a figment of your imagination. This problem simple does not effect me.

My mom was telling me this weekend that my parents’ new house is quiet. This astounds me because this is compared to Candlewood[1]. I can’t imagine a quieter place. I remember going into the basement during a break from college and my ears and head hurt it was so quiet. I was so used to four or six or eight computers humming in any room, people yelling, laughing, chatting, arguing, snoring in deep sleep, the belabored breathing of a cold that just won’t go away, the music playing, someone drumming or singing or playing guitar, the street cleaners slowly making their way up the street, the shovels of the snowplows scraping along the street in winter, the garbage trucks coming to empty the dumpster, the cars whizzing past or honking if they weren’t, the drunken college kids yelling or laughing on their walk home from whatever bar or pub, the planes making their way out of Logan. I was so used to a constant din, a background of noise that this silence was shocking.

If Double Eagle[2] is quieter than that, I may have a hard time. I’ll be sure to bring my laptop and music to play.

[1],[2] Through lots of moving, business relationships, and a spread out set of relations, my family has need to refer to a number of different houses. We invariably choose the street name. “Which house was that?” “Smits Road”. “Where was it that Wolfgang visited?” “General Allen Lane”. An odd case of synecdoche. The Candlewood house was always just the “house” but now that my parents have moved away, it’s taking on ‘Candlewood”.

Our cars also had an odd nomenclature: their color. “We’ll take the green car.” “Which car can I take to Andy’s house?” “Take the red car. Mom needs the blue car.” Somehow every car we’ve purchased since the late 80s has been a mutually exclusive color to all that came before. My family is rife with synecdoche.

Reading today, I realized I had an opinion about something that most likely no one cares about…so of course I must blog about it.

For me, the ideal bookmark is a reasonable size, is a bit thicker than standard paper and is plentiful, as I often lose bookmarks.

4 good bookmarks:

1. business cards: I have a box of 500 and I give them out pretty rarely. They’ve got a nice thickness and if I lose the book it’s already labeled. the downside is that they’re a little small and can slide around on the page or fall out of the back cover (which is where I store my bookmarks when I read).
2. business reply cards from magazines: these things are annoying when they fall out of magazines, but they’re always around and they’re a good size and thickness for bookmarks.
3. receipts: I buy usually one book at a time and often keep the receipt in the back cover in case I want to return it, so this is often my default bookmark. they’re pretty thin and often too big so they get crinkled and folded.
4. ticket stubs: a great size and thickness. I go to enough shows, ball games, and movies that these are often around. I get a little nostalgia trip whenever I look at them too.

From metafilter:

5 seconds of pure fun!

[click for bigger version]

Gelatin? Really? That’s all I can get in this aisle? An entire aisle of gelatin?

And gelatin is a “frozen choice”?

It’s about as official as it can get without having tickets: I’ll be going to live/ work in Taiwan for the fall (early-mid September to mid-late December).

Generally I’m a more of a descriptive linguist, but I do have a couple language pet peeves, one of which is misuse of binary words.

Perfect, for example. Something is or it isn’t. It can’t be pretty perfect or very perfect. It can be almost perfect; that works.

Unique, is another example. Is it one of a kind? Then it’s unique.

I’m all for saying over or understating things for effect. Like “I’m pretty much very perfect”. Hilarious, but grammatical error is still not correct and such a statement should only be used for its humorous value!

Menlo Park is dead at 10pm on a Sunday.

[personal thoughts, ramblings after the jump]

(more…)

I saw Knocked Up on Friday night.

The basic plot is that a rather plain-looking slacker impregnates a beautiful go-getter during a one night stand. Hilarity ensues.

I thought it was really funny and worth seeing. Between all the laughs there is a bit of sappiness, but not bad sappiness. This is the least well-written review of anything ever. Sorry. I’m going to stop typing now.

Here’s my playlist from this week.

here’s the mp3 of the show which you can download and listen to if you wish (mp3).

Local folksy band Beatbeat Whisper appeared on the show and play a live set.

I went to quite a game between the A’s and the Red Sox last night. Mark Ellis hit for the cycle. The Red Sox made a comeback in the 9th to tie it and send it to extra innings. David Ortiz almost homered in the 10th and then Chavez hit a walk-off home run in the bottom of the 11th. Haren pitched really well (whereas Tavarez did not).

Pretty exciting stuff.

Update: Photos here.

I just deleted the “Bischoff” phone number on my phone as my parents moved out of my childhood home yesterday. Goodbye, Pittsburgh. It’s been good.