Links
Archives
you can never have too much of my ranting, or so I would want you to believe...
Monday, January 12, 2004
So I am in the process of writing a paper for a soc stats class of mine...my body being fully saturated with coffee and the deadline approaching quickly here is a preview of the paper being written...
my paper's working title:
Crime in the Ivy: Princeton Students Prostitute Themselves for Mo' Money or
How a random sampling helped me successfully determine that assholes attend
Princeton University
the intro to my paper:
"Deviant behavior. It's bad."
Study design:
"Princeton students. They got a survey. Some responded."
Findings:
"After careful analysis it was determined that despite attending all
lectures, precepts and labs I still have not successfully mastered SPSS. I
am therefore an idiot and incapable of understanding the easiest of all
forms of statistics. Therefore, not having an understanding of chi squared,
lambda or cramer's V and offering the most sincere of apologies I ask you to
assume my study did in fact work and the hypotheses postulated earlier in
this piece of crap paper were in fact true. Also, the correlations were
exemplarary and worthy of publication."
Appendix:
include outline of my small hand done in red crayon
my paper's working title:
Crime in the Ivy: Princeton Students Prostitute Themselves for Mo' Money or
How a random sampling helped me successfully determine that assholes attend
Princeton University
the intro to my paper:
"Deviant behavior. It's bad."
Study design:
"Princeton students. They got a survey. Some responded."
Findings:
"After careful analysis it was determined that despite attending all
lectures, precepts and labs I still have not successfully mastered SPSS. I
am therefore an idiot and incapable of understanding the easiest of all
forms of statistics. Therefore, not having an understanding of chi squared,
lambda or cramer's V and offering the most sincere of apologies I ask you to
assume my study did in fact work and the hypotheses postulated earlier in
this piece of crap paper were in fact true. Also, the correlations were
exemplarary and worthy of publication."
Appendix:
include outline of my small hand done in red crayon
Monday, January 05, 2004
Whatever goofball uttered the phrase "silence is golden" never lived in West Texas.
Sure, after living a high-paced life complete with bad weather, (some) foul people and obnoxious deadlines hanging over your every movement threatening to bring about ulcers, panic attacks and premature graying (yes, at 21, much to my mother's dismay, I have some gray hair) it was nice to escape to dear old slow-paced west Texas where the people are nice and drawls don't exist (at least not among those I talk to)...but instead of listening to our radio stations which I have recently considered questionable at best and disgustingly slick--one (bad) song per fifteen Audio Express car stereo repair/Ford F-150 truck year end sale/Tres Mariposas (expensive old people clothing store) ads-- I thought it best to drive around listening to nothing but the breeze blowing through the back window that doesn't come all the way up. Dad never did fix that. Sure I taped a few of my WPRB shows but stopping to fast-forward my stupid chatter was annoying, I found myself uttering "Jesus, does that broad ever stop yapping?!" only to blush and cower over the wheel knowing full well that dumb kid on-air was me (thus new year resolution number one: stop the talk, play the rock or punk or pop whichever sounds better at the moment). This I hope to commit to heart until I chant like the protagonists in Animal Farm, "two minutes talk bad, four minutes rock good". Sure my time in Texas was nice; I read some David Sedaris (finally), learned to burn another traditional Mexican dish and I caught up on some TIME magazines--Saddam has an uncanny resemblance to my father on a bad day which, as my rightful American citizen duty, led me to interrogate him endlessly about his whereabouts these last few months, his bank account balance and finally, lacking the technology for a DNA analysis, I had to ask him to please eat his food with jalapenos and no water...having an alibi, a checking balance I was later told, nay ORDERED, not to touch and a willingness not only to eat jalapenos but asked to prepare in conjunction with tacos for him I decided that my dear old unsuspecting dad was no tyrant Iraqi dictator. That and I pitied the man who would want to eat something I cooked, punishment enough if the US government ever wants to hire me to torture Hussain in cruel and unusual ways with my own brand of horrid Mexican food. Plus, if dad ever had $750,000 in a hole he would not only have to fix my car window with something other than tape, he would have to buy and install a cd-playing car radio. Now had I listened to those Audio Express radio-land commercials I would have a price range and possible year end sale to work with. But my days in Texas were marked by uneventful and silent (again with the exception of the interstate "shhhuweee" and school zone "flop-floop-flop" noises, varying of course by speed) drives.
Enter college life. Leaving was sad yes, my props to mom's excellent home-cooked meals and family that never fails to tease/torment and ridicule (miss you!). A rainy welcome back in New York's LaGuardia airport was certainly depressing and what can I say about New Jersey Public Transit that hasn't been said before? But a large portion of college life is dominated by, well for me, sitting. Sitting in front of a cd player otherwise known as a computer (with relatively fast internet access as a cool accessory). Within minutes I had caught up on The Onion, indie music reviews, had bought not one but two tickets to shows in New York City (Les Savy Fav early February and then The Shins for V-day, what a treat!!). And of course there was the online broadcast of WPRB with a 103.3 frequency modulation. I love the awkward nervous college djs (otherwise known as my peeps) and the lack of ads not to mention the MUSIC-infused programs. Who would have thought RADIO STATIONS PLAYED MUSIC?! Good music to boot too. Now I know my ties to the station may make me biased but I strongly believe independent label music is wonderful--a prized and hidden gem many listeners never get a chance to discover. Unlike most mainstream radio, with the same song being played five times in the same hour until your body's defenses are down and you have to surrender to it like a malignant disease enveloping your being and in some cruel and incomprehensible way you are forced to believe it is good, independent radio strives to expose you to as many new and different artists as possible. That's right, we support and promote the underdog 24/7. In my head WPRB is the contemporary physical manifestation of the David vs. Goliath epic battle with every song/artist serving as a weapon and every new listener wounding (fatally so if it is a listener we keep) the evil monster that is mainstream radio. Yes I daydream and oversensationalize things in my head. No mom and dad I am not doing drugs. So that is why I love WPRB, I love not having a moment of silence in my life. I plan, dress and walk according to the music I am listening to every day. I get goosebumps and giddy in a way I cannot even begin to describe when I hear new music or buy concert tickets for $10. It's sad in a way to feel so happy, but that is a paradox I am willing to live with. So while I may sometimes yearn for my hometown and everything associated with it I do love the musically infused life I have chosen for myself in this small Jersey town. And maybe one day I can blow some unsuspecting El Paso kid away with the music she/he has so woefully been deprived of...yes, there will be a day of reckoning Goliath and what a glorious day that will be.
Sure, after living a high-paced life complete with bad weather, (some) foul people and obnoxious deadlines hanging over your every movement threatening to bring about ulcers, panic attacks and premature graying (yes, at 21, much to my mother's dismay, I have some gray hair) it was nice to escape to dear old slow-paced west Texas where the people are nice and drawls don't exist (at least not among those I talk to)...but instead of listening to our radio stations which I have recently considered questionable at best and disgustingly slick--one (bad) song per fifteen Audio Express car stereo repair/Ford F-150 truck year end sale/Tres Mariposas (expensive old people clothing store) ads-- I thought it best to drive around listening to nothing but the breeze blowing through the back window that doesn't come all the way up. Dad never did fix that. Sure I taped a few of my WPRB shows but stopping to fast-forward my stupid chatter was annoying, I found myself uttering "Jesus, does that broad ever stop yapping?!" only to blush and cower over the wheel knowing full well that dumb kid on-air was me (thus new year resolution number one: stop the talk, play the rock or punk or pop whichever sounds better at the moment). This I hope to commit to heart until I chant like the protagonists in Animal Farm, "two minutes talk bad, four minutes rock good". Sure my time in Texas was nice; I read some David Sedaris (finally), learned to burn another traditional Mexican dish and I caught up on some TIME magazines--Saddam has an uncanny resemblance to my father on a bad day which, as my rightful American citizen duty, led me to interrogate him endlessly about his whereabouts these last few months, his bank account balance and finally, lacking the technology for a DNA analysis, I had to ask him to please eat his food with jalapenos and no water...having an alibi, a checking balance I was later told, nay ORDERED, not to touch and a willingness not only to eat jalapenos but asked to prepare in conjunction with tacos for him I decided that my dear old unsuspecting dad was no tyrant Iraqi dictator. That and I pitied the man who would want to eat something I cooked, punishment enough if the US government ever wants to hire me to torture Hussain in cruel and unusual ways with my own brand of horrid Mexican food. Plus, if dad ever had $750,000 in a hole he would not only have to fix my car window with something other than tape, he would have to buy and install a cd-playing car radio. Now had I listened to those Audio Express radio-land commercials I would have a price range and possible year end sale to work with. But my days in Texas were marked by uneventful and silent (again with the exception of the interstate "shhhuweee" and school zone "flop-floop-flop" noises, varying of course by speed) drives.
Enter college life. Leaving was sad yes, my props to mom's excellent home-cooked meals and family that never fails to tease/torment and ridicule (miss you!). A rainy welcome back in New York's LaGuardia airport was certainly depressing and what can I say about New Jersey Public Transit that hasn't been said before? But a large portion of college life is dominated by, well for me, sitting. Sitting in front of a cd player otherwise known as a computer (with relatively fast internet access as a cool accessory). Within minutes I had caught up on The Onion, indie music reviews, had bought not one but two tickets to shows in New York City (Les Savy Fav early February and then The Shins for V-day, what a treat!!). And of course there was the online broadcast of WPRB with a 103.3 frequency modulation. I love the awkward nervous college djs (otherwise known as my peeps) and the lack of ads not to mention the MUSIC-infused programs. Who would have thought RADIO STATIONS PLAYED MUSIC?! Good music to boot too. Now I know my ties to the station may make me biased but I strongly believe independent label music is wonderful--a prized and hidden gem many listeners never get a chance to discover. Unlike most mainstream radio, with the same song being played five times in the same hour until your body's defenses are down and you have to surrender to it like a malignant disease enveloping your being and in some cruel and incomprehensible way you are forced to believe it is good, independent radio strives to expose you to as many new and different artists as possible. That's right, we support and promote the underdog 24/7. In my head WPRB is the contemporary physical manifestation of the David vs. Goliath epic battle with every song/artist serving as a weapon and every new listener wounding (fatally so if it is a listener we keep) the evil monster that is mainstream radio. Yes I daydream and oversensationalize things in my head. No mom and dad I am not doing drugs. So that is why I love WPRB, I love not having a moment of silence in my life. I plan, dress and walk according to the music I am listening to every day. I get goosebumps and giddy in a way I cannot even begin to describe when I hear new music or buy concert tickets for $10. It's sad in a way to feel so happy, but that is a paradox I am willing to live with. So while I may sometimes yearn for my hometown and everything associated with it I do love the musically infused life I have chosen for myself in this small Jersey town. And maybe one day I can blow some unsuspecting El Paso kid away with the music she/he has so woefully been deprived of...yes, there will be a day of reckoning Goliath and what a glorious day that will be.
