The Next Next Step

As my undergraduate career races toward its terminus (I love that word), I've begun doing quite a bit of thinking about the next step. Obviously the first LOGICAL step is a job. That's a given, and that will be taken care of (Lord willing) by December. But after that, there's the NEXT next step:

Grad school.

And of course this begs the obvious question: grad school WHERE? Much to the dismay of literally my entire family (they try their best to be excited for me, God bless 'em, but there's a reason no one in our family has ever gone into acting), I am more than slightly interested in pursuing graduate schools in Germany. Actually, "slightly interested" is a bit of an understatement.

"Hell-bent" might be more appropriate.

Yes, it's that time of life again: the frenzied application filling-out, the applying for scholarships, the essay writing, the interviews, the crazy research....it's going to be like applying for undergrad all over again. Only way more stressful. And with the added excitement/terror factor of a move to a foreign country. Again.

But darn it if that isn't what makes it one heckuva kick in the pants.

Your Tax Dollars at Work, Seattle.

After cooking a fabulous, tasty dinner of chicken alfredo with caesar salad and pouring myself a generous glass of chilled chardonnay, I sat down on the couch, plate balanced on my knees, and clicked on the television. I swished the dry, autumn wine around in my mouth, savoring the tingle on my gums, as the image of the government-sponsored Seattle Channel and a man at a podium lit up the screen.

I swallowed when I read the caption below the man speaking.

Christopher Hitchens, Author: God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything

I chewed salad slowly as I turned up the volume to listen.

"...and I quite nearly became a 'believer' recently," the man sneered, his British accent elevating the haughty tone of his voice, "when I was informed that the Good Lord had delivered me the death of Jerry Falwell this last month."

The audience roared with laughter. I stopped chewing.

"I was particularly overjoyed to find out," Hitchens continued with a smirk, "that Mr. Falwell was discovered sprawled on the floor of his office." More laughter. "And if I may take this moment to say what I really think of him, may I suggest that his family spare the expense and bury him in a f-cking shoebox." His mouth spread into a thin, triumphant grin.

My jaw fell open as the audience exploded in raucous applause, whistling, and cheering.

Such is the state of public television in America today. Such is the content which your tax dollars are directly funding. And such is the hatred, bigotry, and utterly stupefying hypocrisy that is not only condoned, but MADE POSSIBLE and BROADCAST by this City of Seattle - a city that supposedly celebrates "diversity."

And The Thesis Begins!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I HAVE A THESIS DIRECTOR!! I HAVE A THESIS DIRECTOR!!!! I HAVE A THESIS DIRECTOR!!!

I!!!
HAVE!!!!
A!!!
THESIS!!!!
DIRECTOR!!!!!!

I LOVE MY DIRECTOR AND MY TOPIC AND NOW I CAN START RESEARCH FOR REAL!!!!!!

*collapses into exhausted happiness*

After only being able to sleep 2 hours last night due to insomnia and slogging through a day at work, it SO FREAKIN' MAKES MY WEEK TO GET THIS NEWS!!!!

Mooooooooovies

Today I added six new DVDs to my collection for the great price of $25. One of my coworkers was selling off all of his DVDs and he had an unbelievably extensive selection. I bought:

Signs
The Family Man
U-571
Gettysburg
Men of Honor
Babel

I've never seen Babel, but for $4.25 a pop I'm willing to buy it before I see it - heck, it'd be more expensive to rent it. I'm trying to round out my collection a bit - I have waaaaaaay too many war movies. Obviously there are a couple there in the list, but hey, first of all, Gettysburg is part of American history. Second, I originally wanted Bruce Almighty instead of U-571 but it was already taken, so what the heck.

An Open Letter to the Christian Girls of the World from One of the Christian Guys of the World

Ladies,

I hope you know what it is we Christian Guys put up with while we're waiting for you. See, we Christian Guys believe firmly that you're worth it - which is why we're not out at the bars and clubs on Friday night chasing random girls. We believe you - and we - are better than that. We believe that real, worth-it relationships don't come easy and that they start with more than a couple of beers and cover charge for the night. We believe that we're more likely to find you sitting a few rows up in front of us at church or at the neighborhood coffee shop than we are out on the town. We're willing to wait, because we want to stay faithful to you, both now - before we've even met you - and in the future.

And I hope you know that believing those things comes at a huge cost for us. You have no idea what a humiliating price of pride we pay as men when we won't do those things that our culture tells us men ought to do. But like I said, we believe you're worth it.

We know it's tough on your end too. There's a lot of pressure for you to look a certain way, to put yourself out there a certain way, to conform to some vague concept of what society tells you a woman should be. We just want you to know: we like you the way you are. We think you're beautiful the way you are. And we want you to stay the way you are until we find you, because we know that we finally do find you there are going to be some serious fireworks, and we're dying to for it to happen. We know that anything the world could cook up for us can't compare to the fullness of what God has in store for those who wait long enough.

So ladies, hang in there. We're right there with you, and we hope you're right there with us. Be patient with us - because I promise you, we're well worth the wait, and so are you.

Summer Summarized

Alright folks, not a whole lot new to report here. Basically, to save us all some time, and all of you a lot of reading, here is a breakdown of my weekdays for the entire summer:

1. Get up. Wish that I could sleep longer.
2. Shower and get dressed.
3. Drive to work.
4. Work for 8-10 hours.
5. Drive home from work. Wave fist at idiot drivers from California mugging up the freeways.
6. Eat something.
7. Read, watch tv, go for a run, check email, blogs, etc, or hang out in coffee shop reading until 10:00. Wish I had more time to do other practical things like read the newspaper or work on my thesis.
8. Go to bed.
9. Rinse and repeat until Friday.

Saturdays and Sundays will consist largely of doing the things I didn't get to do on the weekdays, namely, catching up on pleasure reading and working on my thesis, as well as working on my summer reading and term paper (yes, I have a summer term paper, long story, and NO, I did NOT fail a class!).

So with that, like I said - not a whole lot new to report. The internship is going as well as I can reasonably expect it to with this being my 3rd week. I am looking forward to changing to a different project than the one I am working on right now, and anxious to learn some new stuff. You can only rework a process for so long before it slowly starts to drive you insane. Fellow SCM majors (if indeed there are any of you who read this), you know what I'm talking about.

What IS it with this Tully's?

I am sitting in Tully's Coffee in downtown Seattle on 4th & Union. At the table next to me are two Germans, chattering away about their weekend plans. This is the second time in as many visits to this location that I have heard Germans speaking German - and judging by the accent, they're from Schwabenland. And, for the second time in as many visits, I am way too chicken to say anything to them. What IS it with this Tully's and my stupid fear of speaking German in the United States?