another self-portrait. im trying to get my moneys worth out of the camera. also, i dont know what to write about. if youre lucky, i’ll put up a self-portrait every week day. dont you feel lucky?

yesterday was my 26th birthday. i always dread birthdays. i’d have to say my number one fear, behind being trapped in a room full of uber-conservative right wing crazies playing Uno for eternity, would be getting old. but i hear acceptance is the key to happiness and there really isnt anything you can do about getting old so…i for one welcome my new 26th year overlord and all of the baggage that comes with it!

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hm. funny. i dont actually feel any happier. maybe it takes a few days…

anyway, i am celebrating my first official day as a 26 year old with a self-portrait. notice the jungle effect of the houseplant in my arm-pit.

a photo from 2 years ago, but i came across it on my computer today and thought i would post it. theres a building in the middle of the photo that was an empty warehouse then but is now a brand new (almost finished) luxury apartment complex called “domain”. its weird how quickly the views in baltimore change, even with the crash of the housing market.

my thoughts on the socio-economic implications of the current state of the economy…

when i bought my house in 2007, one of the reasons i chose to buy where i did was because it was so close to where i work (< 2 miles). i figured that, when the weather was good, i could easily bike to work. it should be noted, that i grew up in suburbia and, before this year, had never biked on roadways with actual cars before, so i have to admit i chickened out a little and avoided the biking for the first year. but when may rolled around, with gas prices quickly approaching $4 a gallon, i reconsidered the bike. so i pulled my ten year old, completely unmaintained mountain bike out of the basement, and, on a whim, rode to work one morning…on the sidewalks…because balitmore city drivers are cold, heartless beasts when it comes to bikers. since then i have reworked my route a little to include several largely untraveled roads and parking lots, allowing me to get off the sidewalk and into the road, which ive found to be much easier. ive been trying to bike to work at least twice a month. it doesnt seem like much, but i think its a good start. the issue i have run into is that im never going directly home after work and wherever im going requires a car to get there. the only day of the week where i am going directly home after work is fridays. so when the weather is good on a friday, i bike. now that its starting to get cooler out its definitely easier, but soon there will be a fine line between cool and absolutely not in the morning, so we’ll see how that goes.

the biking has been very educational. ive discovered i actually like biking in the city, even with the ridiculously bike-unfriendly streets, pot holes covering more square feet than my living room, and angry, spiteful drivers. you notice so many more things biking than you ever would driving and it forces you to discover different roads and areas that you normally would never visit. j even brought her bike over and biked with me to the fells point festival earlier this month to avoid the traffic and parking, which was really cool, (despite having to secure the bikes with three padlocks and a small, hungry monkey with an eye patch and a big stick).

i read somewhere this summer that baltimore would be getting a cyclovia for four sundays in october which they would be calling “Sunday Streets”. (I was going to link to what a cyclovia was here, but for some reason wordpress has decided not to close any tags. ) The idea of a cyclovia is to close off certain streets and areas for the majority of a day (usually sunday) and to encourage people to bike, walk, rollerblade, skateboard or anything else other than drive those streets. i thought it was a great idea and would probably be a great thing for vendors and shops (as people are more likely to shop when they are able to actually notice the places they drive by every day at 45mph and never even blink at), but i never heard anything more about it. i did a websearch earlier this week and saw that they were considering it for April, not October, so maybe it was delayed, but im kinda sad to see the delay. with gas prices as high as they were a lot of people went out this summer and bought a bike, and i think october would have been a perfect time to get out onto the streets before winter hit, but alas, it looks like i will have to wait for spring to see if anything comes of this.

So just a few thoughts on last nights vice presidential debate:

1. I appreciate that Palin reverted back to calling herself a “hockey mom” instead of “Joe Sixpack”. Most likely this was because Bidens name is Joe, but either way, I couldnt stand Joe Sixpack.

2. If Palin played rolled derby, what do you think her roller derby name would be?

3. its NU-CLE-AR. there is no Q in this word. anywhere.

4. “...her reward will be in heaven.” WTF?

5. Biden did start to bore me when he was talking Senate crap. But I think boring is necessary in order to come off as intelligent.

6. im hoping for a SNL skit involving scenes from “Top Gun”.

7. Biden won, but Palin definitely did a lot better than I expected. She clearly had no idea what to say about certain things, but she did a good job of avoiding her nonsensical rambling and stuck to the script.

8. im a little sad that neither candidate said something horribly wrong. i was hoping for some better comedic value.

for those of you older than 20, this will be a shake your head moment.

latest college fashion as seen this past week at the gym:

- for boys, white shin-high tube socks, sometimes worn all the way up, sometimes scrunched down around the ankle.

and

- for girls, oversized, off the shoulder shirts with bra and/or tank top strap of contrasting color showing.

i personally have begun to stock up on ripped jeans and flannel shirts for the return of grunge (which i am very excited about as that was the last time i was even remotely close to “stylish”).

i just got back last night from a long weekend with j in ocean city, md. the trip was planned, tropical storm hannah however was a surprise guest. surprisingly, with the exception of saturday, the weather was really nice. even the weather saturday was somewhat pleasant (under the circumstances). there was a heck of a lot of wind with occasional spits of rain throughout the morning but it was actually a good amount of fun watching the waves and the surf and the wind and such. i can see, however, how fun could easily turn into not even close to fun once tropical storm moved up to hurricane. we walked the boardwalk in the morning, enjoying a small taste of the power of mother nature and laughing at the ridiculous idiots being ushered away from the water by lifegaurds in full hurricane gear patrolling the beach and the stupid parents fighting to keep their strollers (the ones without children in them because they were of course carrying the children but pushing the stroller) upright despite the wind – then, in the afternoon, when the hard rain hit, we took a nap. and when we woke up – the sun was shining and the wind had died down significantly. so, while it seems crazy to head toward the coastline during a tropical storm, it actually turned out pretty. i even got a sunburn sunday…on my bum…

dear banana boat, please redefine the term “sweatproof”. i think we might be using different dictionaries…

we lost a good friend this week. j’s dog, winston, passed away on tuesday. he wasn’t exactly a well-behaved dog, he certainly wasnt pretty, or clean, and definitely not quiet – he snored like a hippo with a pinecone in each nostril – but he was a good companion, a sweet dog and ten times funnier than any reality tv show. he was loved greatly and will be missed.