House of the dating pros

So tonight, I sat at home all night working on my qual.

It's kindof a beast. But not so much of a beast that it keeps me from blogging for the first time since October 28 last year. Basically, I'm supposed to read the supplementals to this article where researchers identified a gene that plays a role in hyperphospatasia mental retardation. And then I decide whether their model takes into account heterozygosity in mutation rate, recombination, and selection pressure, and come up with a model that does. And then there are a few other parts, but that's the gist of it.

Around 9:45, my first roommate arrived at home, announced his arrival, and proceeded to recommended to me the restaurant up the street. He said he went there with the "staff" (it turned out that I had misheard him), and that he shared a plate involving veal and alfredo noodles. He then proceeded to describe the way that he likes this girl, but doesn't see it going anywhere because they are "too similar". He said that they had been dating off and on for four years, and that they had had the chance to get together 9 or 10 times, but it had never really clicked. She's sure a champ for going out with him so often.

My favorite story about him and this girl is that once or twice (I swear it happened more than once) when my other roommates and I were in the kitchen eating ice cream (bachelor life rocks), he came in and explained that if you ever are going to break up with a girl, you should do it at Toscanini's because even though it is bad to break up, at least you can enjoy the ice cream.

"Oh? Did you break up with her there?"

 "Well, kindof.. We had been dating off and on for several months. But we decided we should just be friends."

 I guess they're still deciding that they should be friends. (Note: I talked to the girl, and she can't remember the Toscanini's break up, so maybe there is something to the ice cream break up after all).

 At 9:50, the next roommate got home, and recounted the story of going on a date with a beautiful woman who he asked out as part of his "Dating Mormon Women" project. This roommate is a very cautious and methodical person in his style of living as well as his style of driving. I have two cherished memories with this roommate.

The one is from the week after my third roommate just bought his V6 Jetta and we decided to go racing to establish apartment "alpha male" rights. So my Jetta roommate and his girl got into his Jetta, and I took my cautious roommate in my car, and we headed out into the drizzly 2:00am morning to put some rubber on the road. It was honestly one of the most awesome nights. We may have broken into the 3-digit mph's on route 2 toward Lexington. And the Saab smoked the Jetta. Meanwhile, my cautious roommate was holding on for dear life. When we returned home, he informed us that he had mentally prepared himself for prison time or death should anything have gone wrong.

The second memory is trying to teach him how to drive stick, like a decent male. We went around behind Shaw's, and practiced on the Saab until the check engine light came on after it had been killed so many times. After which I decided to take the wheel. Somehow, on the way home, I convinced him to try one more time on the open road. We made it through the first intersection, and everything was going fine until we came to the next stop sign. Stopping was easy. But then he stalled the engine, and noticed that a car was approaching from behind. He tried to get out of the car, but I suggested that he try again. He was sweating bullets. Killed it a second time. By this time, we had three people behind us. He had opened the door and was waving people around us, practically begging me to come bail him out.. At which point I felt bad for him, and drove us home. We haven't practiced driving stick since.

Anyway, my cautious roommate said that he left 40 minutes before the date, to make sure that he could get to her house on time. He said that it should have been a 7-minute drive across the river, but he barely got there at 7:05.. presumably five minutes late for his date. That must have been some really bad traffic. He parked in the garage next to her house because he didn't want to find parking (man.. this guy would probably see a car in a rorschach test before he would have seen a murderer). Unfortunately, he was informed that he needed to pay for parking before exiting the garage. As he told the story, he had gone to pay the ticket, but then somehow forgotten where he had left his car (Me:"Was she still in the car?" Him: "No. Thank goodness"), and then when he found his car again, he thought he was going out of the garage, but eventually found himself on the roof of the parking garage. He claims that it took him an hour and 15 minutes to get out of the garage. I'm trying to decide whether he was exaggerating.

Then they went to a Peruvian restaurant, and while he fumbled with what to order (he somehow ended up with an alcoholic dish -- a very awkward cultural experience for two Mormons on a date), his date spoke enough Spanish to help them out later during the meal. He didn't seem to be very impressed with her intellect.. Like a good date, she asked "What are you researching?" and he explained that he was studying something about the moral implications of committing a crime versus abstaining from action in a situation with the same measurable outcome. "Like is there a difference between stealing $10 from someone and not giving someone $10?" "I don't understand why that is important." And then toward the end of the date, he asked her "So, how do you think the date went?" "Because I really like this post-gaming talk.. I like to know how I'm doing." Atta rooommate.. post-gaming before the final whistle is blown. Tactfully, she said "I'm not sure what you mean."

By this time my third roommate had come home with his girlfriend who is leaving to Hawaii in a few weeks. Also a fairly amusing relationship about which I should probably not reveal details publicly at this point.

 And then there's me. Just got out of a relationship. Studying hyperphospatasia mental retardation. We rock.

Happy Halloween

I'm not sure whether the macabre headlines all over the front page of the Tech were correlated or caused by the upcoming holiday.

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Disaster

I recently became acquainted with an avid promoter of Procter and Gamble products. My financial inhibitions keep me from following all of her advice, but when I was perusing the consumer products section of my local Star Market, I noticed that large bottles of Crest Pro Health Plus mouthwash were on sale for 50% off.

So I picked a bottle up with my purchases.

After arriving home following shopping adventures, I decided to try out my newest adoption from the Procter and Gamble family.

I took a little swig, and did a little swish.

When I was a little kid, I was taught to gargle mouthwash to cleanse the back of the mouth.

So I tried a little gargle.

Unfortunately, I was putting the rest of my groceries away in the kitchen, and was caught off guard when my gargling caused a massive bubbly explosion in my mouth. As I ran to the sink, the frothy fluid cascaded down my face, onto my shirt. Embarrassed, I tried to clean up the excess mouthwash before I headed down to a car of friends.

When I got to the car, one of my friends remarked that I smelled really fresh.

"Like mouthwash?"

"Yeah."

Although I have mixed feelings about the gargleability of Crest Pro Health Plus, at least it smells minty fresh. Either in your mouth, or on you shirt.

And I was lucky. The large bottles for 50% off held enough mouthwash to thoroughly wash every mouth of a 10-mouth family twice a day for at least 10 years... I wasn't in danger of running out of minty fresh odor anytime soon.

A visit to Santarpios removed any minty fresh residue from my mouth, but filled my tummy with amazing pizza and home-made sausage. It was amazing.

After Pizza, we drove out to Walden Pond for a night swim.

I think in the last couple of weeks, I have received at least ten invitations from my Mormon friends to go swimming. I began to think that it was an activity that especially loved by Mormons. And it made sense.. While others may find temporary relief from the humid Boston Summer with a quick drink, Mormons are forced to be more creative. So we do stuff like.. go swimming in Walden Pond.

I think some of my favorite memories this summer have been floating on my back in the middle of Walden Pond, watching falling stars in complete silence. The woods are thick and wrap all the way around the pond, shielding the water from any artificial light source except for the hourly commuter rail train which quickly passes by on the opposite shore. As it rushes along through the trees, the lighted windows look like the Polar Express train. The water is the perfect temperature, and the night air is warm. It is a great place to float and think.

Mormons like that kind of stuff.

Walden Pond is mostly empty at night. However, during our swim that night, a small party of night swimmers passed by on the shore, presumably making their way back to their car.

On the car trip over, I had shared my suspicion that night swimming at Walden was a uniquely Mormon activity.

So as the nightswimmers passed, one of our group called out,

"Hey, are you guys Mormon?"

"Uh... no. Are you guys?"

It would have been the perfect missionary opportunity, but we were all laughing too hard to respond with any degree of spirituality. It was a potentially embarrassing encounter, but the darkness that separated us hid our identities. We could only hope that they would be encouraged to go home and look up more about the church.

Eventually, the night swimming came to an end.

We swam back to shore.

The midnight air was refreshing.

I put on my shirt.

I still smelled like mint.

Sailing

I think it's even a goal in the back of my journal. I'm not positive, though.

I've wanted to learn how to sail for a long time. At least since last fall, when I missed my opportunity to learn because of a sailing-prohibitory condition they call "Frozen Charles River" which is a side-effect of the happiness-prohibitory time of the year known as "Boston Winter".



MIT has this great sailing pavilion that is open to students and affiliated members. I've heard they built the sailing program in 1967 under the direction of MIT President Julius Stratton who was convinced that the academic rigor of the Institution could be increased by the addition of the boat dock on the Charles River and several small dinghies. Legend has it that Stratton predicted that the tightened budget due to the boat dock construction would result in denying allocation of repair funds for the boats the following year. This denial of funds would produce holey dinghies, which, when used by students who were unwilling to hit the books 24/7, would lead to a gradual increase in the intellectual standard over time. According to Stratton, the introductory required math course 18.001 (which, like all MIT courses is known only by a number, concealing the real class content from all but the most creative of cryptographers) and the holey dinghies should weed out most of the less-intelligent and less-motivated students by the sophomore year. The motivation behind Stratton's quest for scholastic excellence may have stemmed from his growing impatience at the inability of inventors to create that put-your-pants-on-for-you-in-the-morning-when-you-get-out-of-bed apparatus he had been dreaming of ever since he was a child.

Unfortunately, Stratton passed away three months after completion of the boat dock, and funds for repairing the dinghies the next year were inadvertently allocated by the university treasurer who felt justified in budget increases to any category with "dinghy" in the name.

18.001 still continues to be a life-threatening challenge.

At least I think the above is correct.

At any rate, the boat dock is still alive and well.

And offering sailing lessons to students.

I called up a friend last Wednesday, and we met for the sailing class. It was a beautiful day and the sun was shining. A breeze was blowing, which is why they decided to let us take the boats out on our first day. When only a breeze is blowing, it's hard to do bad things in a sailboat... it's like letting someone learn to drive on your riding lawnmower. (Before you think that's a bad analogy, you should ask the sailing staff about what happens if you leave your centerboard and you run over a cat or a small child...)

So today, my friend texted me, asking whether I was planning on going sailing. It was raining at the time, but I replied that I would definitely be there, hoping that the rain would stop in the next 5 hours.

When the class time rolled around, it was still pouring. I headed down to the boat dock, intending only to pick up my sailing card. I was surprised to see that the dock was well-staffed, and the lady at the front desk asked if I was here for classes. I told her that I was, but that I assumed they were cancelled.

"They're never cancelled."

I probably should have gone home.

I had luckily brought my gym bag, so I put on some shorts and a stinky tshirt, and went out to practice tacking. After every few tacks, we had to pause and bail out the boat. Except that it's hard to pause in a sailboat...

Needless to say, I was drenched by the end of the lesson. Not just a little.

But I guess there are worse things than being completely soaked to the bone. Like not having one of those put-your-pants-on-for-you-in-the-morning-when-you-get-out-of-bed apparatus..

Roomie Background Check

So, I'm moving starting now.. I am paying two rental contracts for the month of April, which wouldn't be so bad, except that the government wants to tax my graduate student stipend and is collecting on that this month too...

But I'm getting a new roommate. For privacy purposes, I won't mention his full name.

Because that could be awkward.

And lead to further potential embarrassment.

Which might compound the existing potential sympathetic embarrassment one might feel after a quick google of his name in association with BYU.

I felt that if I was going to be roommates with this guy, I was at least allowed to do a quick background check with some assistance from google.

There are no results for his name and "serial rapist".

And although a search for his name and "serial killer boston" did return a recent post in HFTM (Help Find the Missing), I don't think that my future roommate is the 74-year-old man with dementia who went missing on December 30, 2009. Although I guess anything is possible.

However, with regards to his undergraduate alma mater, the first few links were respectable links to articles acknowledging his winning of "the premier undergraduate award of its type" - the Goldwater scholarship.

The next links were interesting.

One was to a page with his name and this video:



And another was a link to this video:



My future roommate and I are both on the heterosexual marriage track, which predispositions our roommateship to be one of brevity. However, when the time come for us to part ways, I hope I will be able to agree with the male person who was caught on video wearing a red tshirt sitting in a hot tub full of otherwise unclothed boys and soda.

"It was life-changing."

Lack

For lack of funny things to say, here are some pictures that have been accumulating on my phone.

This lack of communication ability was found in a stairwell at MIT.. I would describe this as "Nonconfrontational aggressive" tagging. I guess the funny thing was that the light switch was down, but the light was on. And there seemed to be a lot of discussion about whether it should be left on or off. Also note the reference to "Jack Florey".. a fictional MIT legend.


I was walking to school this morning in balmy 32 degree weather, and felt sorry for the people who own this yard. Day after day, they avoided having to go out and walk the dog during the many Boston blizzards, but with spring approaching, their laziness is beginning to catch up to them. I postulate that the exposed dung represents the careless period between January 17 and February 23. As the snow continues to melt, the fruits of the rest of January and December will be exposed. There will be no lack of manure to get this lawn green.


A lack of tactfulness resulted in this very effective advertisement for the new Fedora 14 Linux system at the Washington DC airport.


And lastly, this startling anonymous poll left in lobby 10 during MLK week revealed several startling hotspots for discrimination across the MIT campus. Green thumbtacks represent places where people have experienced equality, and red ones represent places where people have experienced discrimination. Although buildings W1, W2, and W4 appear to have been the site of many discriminatory incidents, there appears to be a lack of consensus of the levels of tolerance or discrimination in the Charles River.

Excise Tax

Boston has a long history of freedom and revolt against unfair taxation.

So I was very saddened when I received mail from the City of Somerville today with an excise tax for having a car.

What? I would have expected that after the success resulting from the stamp tax revolts, Bostonians to have gotten rid of the motor vehicle and trailer excise tax next.

I guess the thing that really riles me up is that Boston is definitely the worst place I have ever driven in my life. And it's not just the traffic. There are potholes all over the place. I practically need a 4-wheel drive car to navigate the roads here.

So the way that excise tax here in Massachusetts works is that every year, you have to pay a certain percentage of the original value as determined by the manufacturer. Any cars over four years old are charged a tax equal to .25% of the original cost. Every year. At least I don't have to pay the 2.25% tax for new cars.

So if I get a new Porsche 911 GT2 RS for $245,000 (I'm saving up for it...) this year, I pay $5512 in taxes that first year, and then 20 years later, I am still paying $612 every year to drive on terrible roads with awful traffic.

Basically, after 23 years of having a car, I have paid 10% of the original price as excise tax.

That makes me sick.

I think it's time to throw some excise tax collectors into the harbor.

Who's with me?