Random Thoughts

So I woke up Saturday to a headline that hundreds of people were killed in Gaza because of Israeli bombing raids in Gaza. Apparently, F-16s are dropping shit from the sky at people on the ground. Nothing new here, those two (or maybe 3 now?) sides have been at it for a while now. Hamas sends rockets at border towns, Israel retaliates. Fair enough. But the response from the World's solely remaining super power is a but messed up if I may call it that. Here's what the outgoing Secretary of State had to say about the whole thing: "We strongly condemn the repeated rocket and mortar attacks against Israel and hold Hamas responsible for breaking the ceasefire and for the renewal of violence there. The ceasefire must be restored immediately and fully respected." How's that again madam Secretary? Hamas bombs Israel. Check. Israel retaliates. Check. Qassam rockets? Check. Big freaking bombs from F-16s that kill lots of people? Check. Well, how the hell does it make sense t...

It was a decently warm day today, around 15 degrees. I had been cooped up in the house for a couple of days now, so I decided to go out. I've been wanting to go to the new Lululemon store in DC (there are a few now apparently) to check out what they had... and I was feeling like I needed a hoodie and some pants to bum around the house in. So I went to their new store on P and 15th in NW DC. I ended up buying a couple of things (no hoodies unfortunately) and also ended up going to Whole Foods across the street. It also got me wondering about the clothes and fashion items out West that I was used to and to some degree, miss. It isn't that much of a stretch to say that the folks out West dress differently that the people out here. I used to go to work in t-shirts and shorts or jeans. To some degree, there are people dressed like that here too. But, I get the feeling that is in the minority. Every morning on the bus you see well dressed men and women heading to work here. I feel l...

I've railed about Christmas before ( here and here ) and what I think is wrong with the way it is celebrated in this part of the world... so let me try and explain what I would really like to do for Christmas this time around. Its Boxing Day already in DC and I don't have to go to work because of the generosity of our company (they said... no work this (and only this) December 26 for US employees... and that is awesome). If I could, some day, I would like to be in Bethlehem on Christmas. I would like to see what the modern day people of Bethlehem celebrate the birth of the son of god, a prophet, someone perhaps hundreds of millions believe in to be their lord and saviour, I would like to see how they celebrate that most blessed of events in the city where he is purported to have been born. I hope that they do not have to worry about sweaters for great-aunt Susan or diamonds for your wife because every kiss begins with the letter 'k' or why they should buy a car with a...

Now, this is a bit of a touchy subject for some. Before you ride roughshod , huff and puff yourself faint and tell me I am a terrible person for thinking this way, stop a minute. And then think. And remember this is my blog. I get to put down what I think here. My thoughts. So there. Feel free to express your opinion though. Just don't think any less of me... not that you don't already but whatever. So, my good buddy calls me today on skype. That's awesome in and of itself but, that's not what this post is about. We did the usual... what's the weather like, what did you do this weekend, and so on. My stories since I moved to DC have been very tame... no more stories about trips to the Emergency Room or giving rides to questionable people or hookers snorting powdery stuff in the car (that didn't happen to me... thank god... but it did happen to my friend). My stories are more along the lines of... I went to Giant or I went and watched a movie or something lik...

There seems to be something of a dearth of blog posts on my part. As one of my (probably 2 or 3) readers pointed out to me, I haven't blogged in a while. He's over 100 posts for the year so far. Van Damme as a coworker would say. There is a lot to write about and I am not really quite sure where to begin so I'll try and start with something simple... cool things I got used to in 2008. One of the coolest things I got introduced to and use a lot is pandora . Its a music service that attempts to play music it thinks you might like based on stuff you've listened to before. Its awesome. Unfortunately, it does not seem to work outside of the US due to various copyright restrictions etc. I like Pandora. I usually have it running on my desktop at home or at work... and for the few weeks that I had the iPod touch, I used pandora a lot to listen to music through it. I only wish there was a pandora application for my blackberry. Some day. In a similar vein, the next thing that I h...

Life has been a bit strange of late. I've gone from being incredibly happy to depressingly sad. I don't quite have the answers to why that is and I am not really sure I care to find out. I almost feel like its easier to give up than try and work towards some worthwhile conclusion to the problem. I love going on vacation. I hate coming back from there. Generally, when I get back from vacation, I go through a period of adjustment that starts with the lack of sleep (because I am usually not in the same time zone as my vacation destination was), self-pity and loathing at the state I left my place in, in my hurry to get out of here. It progresses to outright hatred of having to go back to work and dealing with the routine in general. I resolve to find better things to do in life, learn more, improve myself, lose weight etc etc. And eventually, I end up no further than where I was, where I've been for over 2 years. I can find any number of reasons and excuses to make this someone...