It's the Final Countdown

Go Green!
Go White!
MSU to the Final Four Baby!

She Thinks She's the Passionate One

Congratulations to the MSU men's and women's basketball teams. Both teams managed to survive the first two rounds of their respective NCAA tournaments and make it into the Sweet Sixteen. Next up the men will try to avenge an earlier season loss to Duke (and their Dookies) and get into the Eleite Eight; that game is 7:30 friday night. Oh the bars shall be packed! The women take on the Lady Commodores of Vanderbilt sunday at one of my favorite times of the day, TBA. That means if the men win friday night then sunday will be one heck of a basketball day around these parts. Too bad I got lots of work to do this weekend. And if you can ID that lyric you'll realize it was sung by the underappreciated Sweet, and connect the dots to today's theme.

In other happenings, Monday was quite the exciting day for me. For starters my blue iPod Mini arrived and I've been having way too much fun with that. I also received notice that I've been hired as a Community Coordinator for next school year. Since I'm in the grad dorm we don't have conventional RAs -- there are not a whole lot of grad students that 1) you have to worry about underage drinking with and 2) do stupid things at odd hours of the day. The responsibility lies in helping to fostor community growth, togetherness, synergy, and other BS terms of the sort. I'm looking foward to it. I think it should be a fun time. I'll get to put on events, make bulletin boards, and who knows, I may even have a bowlful of condoms for my residents. I get a full size double to myself, my housing paid for, and an unlimited account at the cafe. Good times will be had.

I ordered both the iPod and a new pair of running shoes (thank you IRS) about the same time. As I've been looking foward to each item I diligently check my mail and online tracking numbers several times a day to see when they come in. The shoes were apparently in Ann Arbor on saturday and better be in when I check my mail later. Like everyone, I like getting stuff in the mail, especially non-mail items like shoes, food, and music.

Who Needs Sleep?

Quick story from yesterday:

My roommate left on a trip to Montana at like 5 am thursday morning. For whatever reason he felt the need to stay up the whole night with the light on. Whatever. I prefer it to be dark when I sleep, so needless to say I didn't get much sleep. I got out of class yesterday afternoon, came back to my room, laid down on the bed, and watched some March Madness. Well I fell asleep (which was the point). It was a good sleep. So good in fact that I awoke about 20 minutes later totally incoherent. I had no idea what day it was. My mind quickly processed the relavant information: its light outside...you're still in your clothes from thursday....dammit you fell asleep and its now friday morning and you are late for work. I panicked. This has never happened to me before. I must've been more tired then I thought. Then I looked at the clock and read "4:15." It was still thursday afternoon. Wow.
I did manage to get a decent amount of sleep last night.

The Spartan men tonight play at 9:30. Hopefully they win. The popular pick is for them to be a victim of the always representing 12 over 5 seed.
The Sparan women play tomorrow at 2:30. They should win. Easily.

He's Going the Distance

So I've figured it out. For those that know me, I was a relatively successful swimmer for 13 years. I say relatively because I was able to compete at the NCAA Division III level for 4 years. Other then that, nothing remarkable except at one point I had the 5th fastest time in the 1650 in Case history. Although I can't fathom where I'm at now on that list. I did distance events and it seemed the longer I went the better I was. I've since retired from the sport (it was an emotional ceremony) and moved onto running. Marathons specifically. After running two of them it seems that I am probably a better runner then I was a swimmer. Oh well. I wouldn't give back all those years of swimming. Having done 2 marathons and finding the distance not terribly difficult I've been thinking "what's next?"

I really like the idea of pushing my body and seeing how far I can take it. I know at somepoint before I die (hey I could go tomorrow for all we know) I want to do an Ironman Triathalon. 12+ hours or so of swimming, biking, and running in the Hawaiian sun should be enough, right? Well before I do that (cause I have no idea when it'll actually happen) I'd like to do an ultramarathon in the next 2 years. Ultramarathons are defined as an distance longer then the marathon (26.2 miles). Really I'd want to do a 50 or 100 miler. Just to do it. See how the body responds to all the physical and emotional ups and downs associated with running for crazy amounts of time. And then I read this article today in the NY Times. Read the article (you may have to login) and you'll read briefly about the Badwater 135 mile race from Death Valley to Mount Whitney. Wow. I'm hooked and I can't stop starin'. I certainly see myself doing that before an Ironman. Oh yeah, Dean Karnazes, the guy from that article was on David Letterman tonight. I was studying downstairs and came up to the room. My roommate was doing laundry and left the TV on. As soon as I walked in, Dave intro'd him. Talk about perfect timing. He set a record for running 262 miles in a single shot. His speed obviously varied during the run but his last mile was like 6 min. now that's CRAZY MAN!

I'm becoming a night owl. I find myself staying up increasingly later watching mindless TV. Currently I've been catching up on Real World: Back to New York on MTVU. Gotta love Mike "The Miz" from good ol' Parma, Ohio. I really don't think you can stereotype Parma any better then him on that series (not considering his subsequent RW/RR challenges). What always gives me chills and a sense of...rememberance is the shots of the WTC Towers in that show. It seems every time I see them I'm reminded of the attack and that there are still battles to be fought and that we are always at risk. I diverge. I'm staying up later and later while getting up at the same time. Hey, that's what caffeine is for, right? Tonight my roommate tells me he's making a run for the border. I eat this crap a few (uh..2-3) times a year, so why not tonight? I just had a soft taco, and it was mmmm mmmm tasty.

Time for bed. Hopefully the TBell doesn't due me in in the morning.

Oh yeah by now it is offically St. Patrick's Day. Raise a pint of Guinness, have a shot of Jameson, and drink to the luck of the Irish. Erin Go Bragh!

There's Always Something Happening

Beware the Ides of March!
Hopefully nothing that bad happens to me today.

It is the wonderful month of March and if you realized today's lyric comes from the song "Our House" by Madness you will make the loose connection of March Madness. See I'm witty like that. Yes yes, that staple of spring-time collegiate sports is upon us -- the NCAA Mens (and Womens) basketball tourneys. Being on the campus of one Michigan State University (men's champs 2000), it is quite a big deal. The men have a 5 seed in the Austin bracket. If they win their first round game that means a second round match-up with Syracuse. That'll be tough. I'm not expecting them to make it past round 2.

The women, however, are another beast altogether. They are both the regular season and tournament champions of the Big Ten. They were rewarded for their work with a #1 seed in the Kansas City bracket. The only problem is that the #1 team in the country the Stanford Cardinal is the number 2 seed in that bracket (yeah there is some controversy there). If the seeds hold true then that'll be the match-up in the elite eight. If they lady Spartans do get past Stanford, then I give them a good as chance as anyone else to win the tourney.

Spring break was last week and yesterday I realized I have a whole lot of work to do the second half of the semester. I'm expecting some late nights.

And If They Should Bar Wars

Disclaimer: The author of this here blog is by no means a Star Wars fanatic/geek/insert your own derogatory term here. He does appreciate the movies for their entertainment value and cultural/social impact.

I happened to catch the trailer to the third Star Wars movie, Revenge of the Sith and all I can say is WOW! This looks like quite a promising film. We all know what is going to happen with Anakin going to the Darkside and becoming Darth Vader. It is the whole process of him going over and his struggle with the "good" of the Jedis and the "bad" of Palpatine. It isn't going to end on a positive note but it will complete the story. The Empire Strikes Back is widely regarded as the best movie in the series. This is probably due to the character development, the reveal at the end that Vader is Luke's father, and how the movie ends with the Empire in control of things. I'm am VERY excited for this movie. I really liked how the trailer ended with the classic (because thats what it is) breathing noise of Vader. Oh yeah I also saw a few screen shots and there is a shot of an army of Wookies. Niiice.

Hey, whats with Victoria's Secret's (btw is that grammatically correct?) new bra? The commercial says it has been in development for 2 years with a patent pending? 2 years? For a bra? I don't know much about bras, well except how to occasionally take one off and which ones look good, but it seems to me that bra technology has really reached its peak. I mean if you're going to spend two years developing something...how about some new-fangled technological break-through? Who knows, maybe by some off-chance of fate I may actually experience one of these things first hand (pun intended) and see what all the hullabaloo is about.

Walk With Me Suzy Lee

So I finally saw Napolean Dynamite tonight. Any movie that opens with the White Stripes and includes the A-Team theme is alright in my book. I'll say it was a funny movie. I don't know if it was all-that-and-a-bag-of-chips like everyone seems to claim, but it was enjoyable. It was definitely not your run-of-the-mill comedy. Of course the highlight was the dance number at the end. I also liked the Kip meeting his internet girlfriend angle. I didn't 1) expect her to be black, 2) expect her to be attractive, 3) expect them to work out, and 4) all of the above. That was a welcomed twist. Thanks to one of the most mind-wasting, yet informative websites out there The Internet Movie Database I found out that Jon Heder was born in 1978 just like me. I thought he looked a bit old for a high-schooler. A side note on MTV for a second. Yes it is always fun to rip the original network for the fact that it doesn't actually play videos anymore and how it caters to teenagers who have no taste in music (elitest hipster comment), but their film division has put out some quality films that are atypical (in a good way) movies. Napolean Dynamite certainly fits under this category as done one of the highly underrated 1999 outing Election. If you haven't seen that , go rent it. It is a wonderful social satire on high school life in general and our larger democratic election process. Quite a delight.

What's with the newfound friendship of ex-presidents Bush and Clinton? They seem to be everywhere these days. I trace it back to the opening of Clinton's library last fall. Bush spoke highly of Clinton and shortly after the election they are all buddy-buddy. They're doing PSA's for Tsunami relief...they were out golfing the other day prior to Clinton's surgery. With the break-up of Brand and Jen I'd like to nominate them as the next celebrity couple. We could call them Buston or Clinsh...ok neither of those really have that zing like Bennifer, but you get the idea. Actually I like these two together. After the sour aftertaste that many of us had after Indecision '04, we need this "reaching across to the other side." Of course when you are an ex-president you really have no other political goals so its easier to do these things without the party heads getting all mad at you and stuff. Side note: everyone (aside from crazy right-wingers) loves Clinton, but 2 elections have passed in this P.C. (post-Clinton) era and the Democratic party is still living under his shadow. Until they manage to have another candidate as dynamic as him I don't give them much of a chance.

OK I went in a political direction there. I don't want this to be one of those blogs, but every once in awhile I'll touch on something I feel is important.

Brother Ray Can Sing My Song

Now Playing: Wilco -- Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

Well I saw Ray tonight. Wow, what a good movie. I'm no movie buff and this would be the first (and only?) movie I've seen that was nominated for a bunch of Oscars. I think Jamie Foxx did a wonderful job and was certainly deserving of the Oscar. I think it is really hard when a famous actor depicts a famous person. Very few actors have been able to transcend the role to where the audience stops thinking it as "oh look its so-and-so on the screen" as opposed to the character. Throughout the film I had to keep reminding myself that it was Jamie Foxx up there acting. Jim Carrey did a delightful job a couple years back as Andy Kauffman, but I really feel that Foxx took it to a higher level. It was a long movie (nearly 2.5 hours) but I don't mind a long movie as long as there is substance there. There was plenty of substance in this movie. Add in all the great songs from the Ray Charles catalog and you get a pretty special movie. I reccommend it if you have yet to see it.

And if you haven't seen me in awhile (nice segue, eh?) I'll be in the great Cleveland area for a few days. Yes yes, that yearly tradition of collegiate students heading south for a week of drinking, sun, and debauchery (one of my favorite words) has begun -- Spring Break! Technically I will be heading south, I will be drinking, the sun...the jury is out on that one, and hopefully debauchery. 2 with a possibility of 3 out of 4 is pretty good I must say. Of course I am done with classes for the week but I do have to endure 8 hours of work tomorrow. Oh well, it's a workin' man's world. And to top it all off there's nothing like going to bed when you still have stuff to pack in the morning.