Monday, January 22, 2007

Sign of the Apocalypse #3: Peyton Manning puts curse on Pats clutch, region of New England has winter of discontent

Why are my guy friends coming to me about their broken, dysfunctional relationship problems? I'm currently finding my love life is only existant when I'm in Chicago, and I can't afford flying back all the time, what with the Redline prices going up thanks to rising gas prices.


Point is I guess I'm just been more lucky with my personal life so far than some of my friends. All I can suggest to you all my buddies is to pray to St. All-the-people-I-know-as-single-and desperate-as-me-are -my-other-friends for intervention.

On a seperate note, congrats to Da Bears, and those 2 weeks between the NFC championship and the Super Bowl means Bears fans have a lot more time to do crazy, half-ass stuff, like giving birth.

Sunday, January 21, 2007

Being Prepared


HERE LIES JOEL
LOVING SON, HUSBAND, FATHER

HE WAS JAKE BARNEY AND KEVIN TIRELLA'S
ONLY ROOMMATE TO BE FOUND
SLEEPING ON THE COUCH WEARING
BOXERS AND A FOOTBALL HELMET


This would be carved on my tombstone if my old roommates had their way. I suppose there are worse epitaphs, but sure as hell better ones.

Thursday, January 18, 2007

Irony of Ironies

And now for something completely different from waxing about philosophies on a train ride.

The Augusta Chronicle and every other media source is discussing how James Brown's last testament and will was drawn up before his last marriage in 2001 and thus excludes his wife and 5-year son. Yeah, I'm concerned about the legacy and familial problems this will create... but get this - James Brown (Godfather of Soul, singer of "Say It Loud -- I'm Black and I'm Proud," had Al Sharpton as a tour manager) had Strom Thurmond Jr. as his probate lawyer. Yes, the son of that Strom Thurmond. The one NNDB officially lists as a "Racist senator/closet miscegenator." The one who ran for president in 1948 on a platform of segregation and in 1957 filibustered the Civil Rights Act. The one who Trent Lott lost his job to complimenting him.

The really creepy thing is that Jr. was about 30 years old - when his 100-year old father died.

As I see it, either jail time really mellowed out Soul Brother Number #1, or Strom Jr. is really good at probate law.

Musings on a transcontinental trip on an Amtrak train

I will never again take a transcontinental trip on an Amtrak train. Damn you Lake Shore Limited! Luxurious Viewliner accomodations my ass!!!
There is something eternal about traveling through the Midwest on a winter night. Yeah, the images of a Norman Rockwell painting appear hokey and charmingly ancient and the image of early 20th century small town America is a whitewashed ideal that no one alive remembers firsthand. But the rural midwest I saw from my frosty train window are aware and savvy of how urban America has changed, and yet they adapt slow enough to retain their immediate charm. The single iron lamppost lightling the show gently falling on the tracks at the edge of the station. The small town main streets, selling cell phones and soy-based products from new stores, but still retaining their Victorian-style buildings as they intersect with the tracks. The lone silos and decaying barns out in a icy, fallow field. The Georgian-style farmhouses perserving their families' character and independence. The orchard trees decorated with laces of ice, like a forest of glass trees. Out here, you lose a sense of urgency, and with it, disposability. These structures carry with the the tradition of both grandeur and purpose; they were meant to withstand time and fashion. And long after I passed these small towns and independent farms, I wished that they would continue to persevere long after a string of presidents, appliances, and non-essential celebrities. Although I don't agree with all the thoughts and actions of rural America, I find one of their virtues - endurance - something we are always in short supply.

Perhaps Indiana and Ohio are only meant to be seen in the dark.

After witnessing what northern upstate New York - i.e Buffalo - looks like - broken machinery, disrepaired and abandoned factories and mills, burning tires, polluted rivers, I now realize why two of my closest friends are obsessed with post-apocalyptic dystopian futures. Thunderdome anyone?

I had breakfast in the dining car sharing a table with an electromagnetic physicist from Syracuse and his precocious 5-year old daughter (is there any other?) He seemed interested in how my progression into med school was going, and as someone who was an outside observer, appeared extremely critical of the entire process. His experience was with former students at Syracuse University, including one girl who took the most advanced physics and chemistry classes, but was passed over last year. His conclusion was that medical schools were not looking for the most challenged or the most intelligent candidates, but the most accomplished and best work-ethic (the ones with the best GPAs). If not for the MCATs, I would totally have agreed with him, and even then he made some convincing arguments. I went back over a speech my adviser gave from the outgoing AAMC President in 2005 about how the sorry state of medical admissions treated its American candidates, and realized, I wish that physicist guy would be on my admission board... and maybe my friends.

That's my trip on Amtrak. Never listening to you on transportation advice again, Kevin!

Monday, January 08, 2007

Previously on Joel's blog...

Joel had just finished his finals at Boston University and was looking forward to a relaxing end to 2006, when...


the Amish ecoterrorists escape with the mutant virus on their helicopter, but an intrepid Asian jumps from the rooftop to make their getaway more complicated...



Andy and Kevin's car chase across San Francisco ends in a fiery blaze, not knowing who survived...


the Scav Hunt team finally reaches Mordor with their ring of duct tape, closely followed by an army of orcs



Joel races to stop the colorblind technician from making the fatal mistake with cutting the blue wire...while in his room, temptation awaits....


and in a final disaster waiting to happen, someone brings a bottle of Johnny Walker to Joel's family.

To be continued 2007