I should be at the top of my class....

I have had yet another epiphany. Law school tries to instill the same values in you that an Irish family does.

I mean, think about it. Irish families tend to drink a bit more than other families, mine does, when we get together it's 5 o'clock immediately following breakfast, which is immediately following church. You would think it would go breakfast and then church to pregame on the communion wine but alas years of whiskey have destroyed this sort of logical thinking. The Irish weddings I have gone to seem to focus more on the Jamesons than the vows. One of the first things I learned in law school is that there is always some sort of event in the building where you can obtain free booze, and I mean BOOZE, not just beer, because those judges and attorney's need their scotch. Granted none of this starts before late afternoon but the premise is the same.

Irish families, at least real Irish families, don't really talk about any estrogen based "feelings", dreams or anything else that psychologists like to pick apart. I like to call this the Dennis Leary factor.



We do however love to share our anger, especially when our favorite sports team is losing or getting bad calls from the refs. But in general there isn't much talking on a non-superficial level. Law school is similar, it condemns you for speaking your mind. Instead it prefers that you speak in such a way that you tell people what you think, but you also have to make them feel like you agree with them now matter how much you actually disagree with them. So, essentially, you have to speak but it would be more truthful and insightful if you don't. Probably why no one ever understands what lawyers are talking about, they are trying to be as obtuse as possible to not rub anyone the right way, incidentally this may be why almost all politicians are lawyers. I challenge you to find out one thing they actually think about anything. At least the Irish just stay mute on certain topics so they don't have to lie to one another.

I feel it's much better/healthier for an individual to talk about the happy things and have a beer than to use alcohol to repress their urge to speak their mind. Eventually they are going to snap. Seeing as I tend to use my friends as my sounding board and say the most idiotic and sometimes very inappropriate things to balance out my law school oppression no one has to worry about me exploding on them for a quite a while.

I'm Going to Need a New Hobby

This post is going to be about sports (my apologies in advance). Mere seconds ago, my New York Yankees were eliminated from playoff contention for the first time in 13 years. In reality, "13 years" is a misnomer: it's been 15 years (since 1993) since the Yankees were excluded from the postseason. Nobody made the playoffs in 1994, the strike-shortened season, and the season that I started watching baseball.

The 1998 Yankees were, statistically speaking, the second- or third-best team in the history of the sport. They won 125 games on dominant pitching (3 of their 5 starters had at least 125 ERA+) and solid and patient hitting (8 of the 9 players in their lineup had 100+ OPS+, and Bernie Williams had a ridiculous 160 OPS+).

On the other hand, the 2000 Yankees were, statistically speaking, the weakest or second-weakest World Series champion in the modern (i.e., steroids) era. Their hitting and pitching were average, and they won a pedestrian 87 games in the regular season. Both the 1998 and 2000 teams won the World Series, even though teams that fell somewhere in between these two (e.g., 2001, 2003, 2004) fell short. But at least each of these teams made the playoffs.

What to make of this, especially in the context of this year's Yankees squad not making the playoffs? The best and worst about baseball is that the sport is a giant crapshoot. As easily as it lends itself to miracles, it can lend itself to heartache. Injuries can happen (to the Yankees this year, lots of them), players can underperform for no apparent reason (the same), and other teams in the division can mature in a heartbeat (ditto). Waiting until mathematical elimination for this year's Yankees team was like waiting for your own execution -- you know it's going to happen for a while, and by the time it's imminent, the only feeling left is frustration. Just get it over with already!

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Needless to say, I've always penciled watching baseball into my schedule well into October, and it's going to take some getting used to this year. A good birthday for me involves good times, good food, and lots of fun -- a GREAT birthday also involves the Yankees still playing baseball. Although it's easy to speak gloom and doom under these circumstances, I'm not going to fret. No, instead I'm going to need some ways to divert myself. Here are some ideas:

First, I'm going to devote lots more time this October to my work. Grad school's been making me very busy lately (busy enough to shorten this post from 2,000 to 1,500 words), and I'd like to finish my second year thesis by the end of, ya know, my second year. Lately I've felt a lot like my senior year of college, which was the busiest time of my life. I took lots of classes, tutored some, and did an honors thesis. I worked like a dog, was rewarded handsomely for it, and experienced the happiest exhaustion a person could imagine. I want to feel that good again, and without baseball it could happen.

Second, I'm going to read more for leisure. Being a sports nut is stressful, especially during the postseason. On the other hand, I find quiet reading to be one of the most relaxing things I do. So, while lots of other people stress themselves into an early coronary this October, I'm going to relax and learn about something I've never bothered to study before. How Zen of me.

Third, my new roommate brought his Wii with him at the start of the lease, and... um, yeah, I'm going to get on that. Mario Kart, here I come!

Fourth, and finally, I am going to divert my attention from games of luck (which I cannot control) to games of skill (which I can). That's right, it's getting to be time for another Atlantic City excursion. This one will be the weekend after my birthday, and will involve at least two hotel rooms, at least one bottle of Silver Patron, and lots and lots of blackjack and debauchery. I'm already looking forward to it, a month ahead of time. Waaaa hooooo!!!

Stay classy out there.

Greetings from Fishkill, New York

I promise that this post will have nothing to do with gambling or sports. I'm writing from my cousin Nick's house in upstate New York, on a 40-degree summer (!!) evening, having eaten chicken parm and drank more than one amaretto on the rocks. I complain about grad school a fair bit, but I love that it affords me the freedom to (every so often) skip out of town on Thursday night and spend a long weekend with family and friends.

Speaking of family, visiting my cousin is like giving a State of the Family address. When I'm here, I'm the emissary from New Jersey, and I actually take notes in advance so that I'm prepared to answer the questions I'm asked fairly and honestly. I need to know how EVERYONE is doing, from my Mom's neighbors to Murphy, my dog. To be honest, I enjoy this a lot.

My mom's side of the family is of the typical, hyper-extended Italian-American type. I have more cousins than I could name, and I wouldn't be able to pick 95% of them out of a lineup if I had to. Yes, we eat a lot of cold cuts. When I visit my cousins, I accept that I'm going to hear names that I've never heard before, and they will be somehow related to me. Sometimes -- and this is the most awkward -- they'll remember me and I'll have no clue who they are.

This will happen at any sort of social gathering, where some relative comes scampering up to me, telling me that they remembered when I was a baby or something similar to this (NOTE: Always, vaguely, like it's deserving of some sort of praise... what do I say, congratulations on fulfilling an average human life span? I'm never sure how to handle this.) I admit this flatters me, because I can't imagine my babyhood being a memorable event for anyone, except maybe my parents. So yeah, that's pretty cool, feeling important, you know.

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In my quarter century on this earth (25th birthday coming soon), I've come to the conclusion that the "typical American family life" -- Mom, Dad, two kids, a dog, and lots of white bread and peanut butter -- is pretty much horseshit. In any random group of people (and yes, families are random groups of people, with genetics playing only a faint supporting role), there are bound to be lots of fuck-ups, a few great individuals, but mostly just people who live their lives and make their livings. But even the fuck-ups make families fun, because who else better to make fun of? And what better thing to make fun of, in general, than your own family?

I haven't met too many families in my life that I'm in awe of. Even the Kennedys had a fucked-up sister who was lobotomized and thrown in an institution. And there are times that being in my family in particular pisses me off. But on nights like tonight, thick with laughter and good stories and jokes and smoke, everything is kinda OK.

All right, commence the making fun of me in the "Comments" section below. I'm looking forward to it, and in a sense I kinda deserve it. I'm such a little girl (except for when I'm writing about gambling or sports). Stay classy.

My Fantasy (Football) Life

I'm the proud commissioner of the Psych Department's fantasy football league, and by "proud" I actually mean "incompetent." I admit that I have absolutely no idea how to manage a fantasy football league. (For example, typically FFB leagues are set up "head-to-head", which means each week you play a different player's "team" in order to decide a winner. I mistakenly set up my league so that "points" determine who wins overall. This makes FFB 90% less fun, which is fitting because I am comfortably in 9th place out of ten teams in my league.) I took on the task only because nobody else wanted to do it, and I know it would never get done if I weren't doing it... so I did it.

I love it when friends ask each other for advice on their fantasy team. Nobody knows what they're doing when it comes to fantasy football -- so just pick the best players you can, from the best teams that you can. There are some stastical trends I've noticed, like the superiority of picking an OK player from a good team over a good player from a bad team. But besides that, it's a crapshoot. Who outside of Atlanta knew who Michael Turner was before he blew up for 304 yards in Week 1? I sure as hell didn't. I picked a fantasy team that would have been awesome in 2005.

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I'm not going to debate politics on this blog, but I picked up the 2001 edition of David Halberstam's "The Best and Brightest" yesterday at the library, because I've never read anything about the Vietnam War and, you know, I deserve some light bedtime reading. Anyway, if you get the chance, you should pick up this book, both for its contents and also for the introduction by Sen. John McCain. It's amazing how the past 7 years - and the necessity to pander to the conservative right - have completely changed his views on war. You should read it before you decide who to vote for (if you haven't decided yet). I really liked the pre-2008 John McCain.

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Hey Brainpan, what do you think of the new Metallica CD? I haven't heard it yet...

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Finally, consistent readers know that I like working on a college campus because, although I get a year older each September, the freshmen stay the same age. (NOTE: Giggity. Also, kind of annoying, because freshmen are really immature and behave like total retards most of the time.) But I now think that the provocative clothing by females has gone too far. Seriously, when did it become acceptable to wear only a towel around campus? I'm not complaining about thisper se, but if that were my 18-year-old daughter, she'd be chained to a radiator and fed gruel twice a week. In my modest opinion, ridiculously provocative clothing worn by females should be kept to either (a) the beach, or (b) situations where the immediate result is getting laid (e.g., a bar, a party, filming an adult video). College campuses aren't appropriate for this. Just saying.

Fantasy??? More like a second job...

So it’s been a while but I finally have something substantial to say. FOOTBALL! More specifically fantasy football. Like Gollem I love and hate the game. It consumes my entire life during the fall semester and during law school that is a very dangerous. Seriously I spend so much time checking my fantasy page that if it continues into my career someone’s constitutional rights may be at stake.

The first such obsession was the draft was when I saw Tom Brady available after all the popular running backs were taken. Of course I drafted the guy. Then of course, Murphy, that rat bastard, and his stupid law had to interfere. 5 minutes into the first game he goes and gets a season ending injury. GOOD FREAKING JOB. So now I’m last in my league, because I got 3 points from Brady instead of 33, and frantically changing my teams, instead of learning about federal income taxation exemptions.

In short, to the man that invented fantasy football die a terrible terrible death, and you should have a monument dedicated to your glory. But if I get sued for malpractice because some guy ended up in prison I’m citing you as the reason why.

The One-Track Sense of Humor

Greetings from the coffee table in my living room in Watertown, MA. It's been 9 days since the semester started, and already I've crunched 2 data sets, attended 2 classes, bought 2 high-def TV's (one was too small, and was returned), and had 2 too many heart-to-heart discussions that leave me wondering who I am and what I get wrong all the time. But that's not the point of this blog post, so let's move on.

Today was "Welcome-Back Reception" day in the Psychology department. This year's reception was nicer than last year's. The food was better (it was catered!), there was sparkling water and cheesecake, and every graduate student received a free poster case for all the conferences we're supposed to attend. (BTW, one of the things I really miss about having a real job is all the free stuff. Seriously, my girlfriend averages $100 per week in freebies at her job, and that's on top of an actual, you know, salary. But I digress.)

Later in the meeting, we all went around the meeting room and introduced ourselves to the entire department. Now, most of things I have to do in my daily life (e.g., shower, brush my teeth, drink anything except coffee and beer, not smoke cigarettes) are a giant pain in the ass. But you know what's a GIANT pain in the ass? Standing up in front of 60 people, clearing your throat, introducing yourself and explaining your research interests... every week.

A lot of things have gotten easier for me since I moved up here, 13 months ago. It's easier for me to handle being apart from my family and friends, et al. It's easier for me to tolerate the cold. But it's never gotten any easier for me to speak in public. I speed through talks at a breakneck speed, and I stammer when I have to say even the most rudimentary thing in front of a strange group. It's something I have to work on, and it reminds me -- as grad school does so well -- that I have a lot to learn.

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But, that's not the point of this blog post, either. My point is that, if you were to attend this reception, you'd think you were watching the late George Carlin or some other brilliant stand-up comic. Literally every other thing that people said led to uproarious laughter, even though very few of the things people were saying were actually funny. And this brings me to my point: I'm starting to get sick and tired with how funny people think awkwardness is.

Of course, I blame TV for our infatuation with uncomfortable comedy. Specifically, I blame "The Office", the award-winning TV sitcom that epitomizes the phenomenon by making it so accessible that tens of millions of people think they can pull it off (but they can't). "The Office" is a very good show. It employs a staff of brilliant writers to create its episodes; one of the head writers is a Harvard grad who also moonlights as the chief blogger of Fire Joe Morgan, which was one of my favorite baseball blogs before the humor became too annoying for me to read it anymore.

On the surface, it makes sense that awkward humor is successful humor. It doesn't offend anyone per se, because it's harmless to the people who don't get it. It's sufficiently post-modern and meta, because the people who do get it can roll around in laughter and self-importance. (It just now dawned on me that nearly everyone who loves "The Office" is white -- this makes sense, because white people love thinking about the things they know that other people don't.)

My main problem with awkward humor is that it doesn't take risks -- in not being directly offensive, vulgar, or disgusting, it's so safe and predictable that it actually becomes not-quite-funny. In the game of humor craps, awkward humor is the "Pass" line.

Now, I realize that network TV and academic meetings are both constrained by the laws of common decency -- if someone were to try to do justice to the "Aristocrats" joke, for instance, in either situation, they'd be immediately fired. I also admit to liking shows like "The Office," where the awkward humor is particularly well done. But most people need to realize that (a) they're not funny, and (b) half the people who laugh at the stupid things they say are just trying to be polite. I don't even try to be polite -- I'll sit there stone-faced if I don't think something's funny. You have to earn my laughter, goddamnit.

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Some of us on the Damaged, Inc. team went camping in the Adirondacks last month. We ate cheeseburgers for breakfast, lunch, and dinner; we drank Labatt Blue and then went boating; and we smoked delicious cigars. We decided we'd chip in together and buy a house up there one day. (NOTE: Dudes, it's totally possible. I did a Google search for "Adirondacks real estate", and we can buy a really nice log cabin for about $100,000. We only need 10 percent for a down payment. Let's make this happen.) But because we "camped" in high style, we had cable TV and spent one 45-degree August night inside watching the Bob Saget roast on Comedy Central.

Gilbert Gottfried -- who, by the way, does a fantastic "Aristocrats" joke (N-even close to being-SFW) -- had a excellent and elegant joke, which simply consisted of him making references to Bob Saget not raping and murdering a teenager in 1990. Part of it was the delivery, part of it was that Gilbert Gottfried is just plain ridiculous. But essentially, it was good humor. Like having a taste for good Scotch, good cigars, or good women, it's an acquired taste, and you pretty much have to have the taste in order to understand it.

In short, most people do not have good taste, and are therefore losers who suck at life. (*NOTE: Yes, I am arguing that people who laugh at (good) jokes about raping and murdering teenagers have good taste. I am absolutely, 100% convinced this is the case. People who don't laugh at any good joke - regardless of content - need to get the stick out of their ass.) If these losers were more like the people who blog here, the world would be a much better place. Stay classy.

Giddy as a Schoolgirl

Excerpts from the table of contents to The Handbook of Zombie Emotions:
Chapter 1: Mm Braaaaaaaiiinnnsss
Chapter 2: Are you going to finish those brains?
Chapter 3: Dealing with feelings of remorse when eating family members

And so on. For the watchful blog reader, you may have noticed that I am a different blogger than the usual crew, and also female (not that it's unreasonable for any of these fine gentlemen to be giddy as a schoolgirl at any given time). I am extremely honored to be contributing as a guest, and can vouch for the Damaged, Inc. team as being one fine group of smart, quirky men who are utterly tolerable in many social situations. I am slightly partial to Freducate, being his girlfriend, but don't let that color your opinion.

I thought I would take this opportunity to share something that I recently imparted upon my current class of trainees. I am employed as a corporate sales trainer for a software reseller you've never heard of, and I take my duties quite seriously. Hehehe..."duty". Anyway, following a rant that I gave on the importance of taking lunch breaks, I proceeded to go on about why they should be grateful for the jobs they have. On an aside, for those people who "forget" to take lunch--I don't get those people. There are only about three good reasons I can think of for skipping lunch, including arson or plague, but being too busy is not one of them. So, back to the job pep talk, I thought I would share here a short list of reasons why your job, whatever it may be, probably doesn't suck nearly as much as you suspect.

1. Unless you work in some kind of landscaping or animal herding capacity, chances are you come in each day to a relatively climate-controlled, air-conditioned office. It may seem unnatural to be surrounded by flourescent lighting and small, strange walls serving to distinguish your area of desk, family photos, and useless chotchkes from the next guy's, but at the very least you are comfortable.

2. Think about the last time you complained about your job. Was it because your scroogish boss wouldn't let you leave for Christmas, or the felt in the hats you work with is making you insane, or that pesky King George just won't leave you honest-working colonists alone? No, it was probably something along the lines of "they don't pay me or appreciate me enough, and I'm not fulfilled in a spiritual way". Just the mere fact that we can complain about not being "fulfilled" is a privelege. It is indeed a luxury to not have to worry about putting food on the table, or a roof over our heads, or an XBox in every house and a reasonably priced sub-compact in our garages. So think about that the next time you sip coffee and allow yourself to stare wistfully out the window of the break room, dreaming of the day that you can finally take the time to write your novel/album/porno script. Heck, this is America--every red-blooded male, female, or other is entitled to that dream, but should remember that even having a dream is a luxury.

It just occured to me that this is slightly long-winded, so I'm going to cut it short. I'm sure I have other reasons for jobs not sucking to share, as well as plenty of reasons why it probably is awful and soul-draining, but those will have to wait for another day.

A heartfelt thanks to the Damanged, Inc. boys for letting me say my piece, and I hope everyone has a good weekend!

Love and ranting,
ARoll

On Grad School Life

I post about a lot of random stuff, and I realize that I almost never post about the thing that I spend the most of my time doing: being a grad student. I'm in my thirteenth month of graduate school now (NOTE: although, to be fair, I spent one month on a series of white-kid vacations), and I feel like I've learned enough about my work to run my electronic mouth a little bit. While you read what I have to say, I suggest that you listen to the new Metallica song "Cyanide," available streaming on their website here. Seriously, it's awesome, click on it.

The first thing I've learned is that graduate school brings together a bunch of large personalities belonging to very intelligent people. The second thing - closely related to the first - is that it's mostly impossible for large groups of intelligent people to get along with each other. Intelligent people are just too damned weird, and they care way too much about the quality of how they think. You know what happens when you start believing that you think the truth? You become a zealot, an evangelist, and an asshole. I think of my brain as a sensitive, but mostly stupid, instrument. When I get something right, I'm genuinely surprised. (*NOTE: Some of you might be thinking that I'm refuting my own argument by trying to get you to agree that the way I think is right. Doesn't that make me a zealot? Nope - I actually think what I just typed is wrong, and you shouldn't agree with me. So, there.)

The third thing I've learned is that I'm amazed at how little expertise really exists out there. I've worked with a group of really smart people over the past year, and it seems (to my uncultured mind) that what separates the most brilliant from the merely intelligent is not their speed of finding answers, but instead how quickly they shuffle through questions, seeming to have separated the bullshit from the real point in milliseconds. I cannot do this (yet), and it remains a sight to see. My undergraduate adviser once referred to academia as "intellectual sport," and if that is true, I am a poor man's Wilson Betemit.

The fourth thing is that I expected grad school to help me illuminate where I stand with respect to the rest of the (non-academic) world, but this hasn't really happened yet. If anything, I feel like I've fallen behind my actual money-making compadres in the "real world." Graduate school really makes me think about graduate school is about, and I'm not sure I have the answer yet. I think that it helps that grad school is a highly-controlled environment; I can make a lot of mistakes here that would get me fired from a real job. I think that it shows the world that I'm willing to put off reward in order to obtain a goal. But I'm not certain yet why it's necessary. I'm not sure why it's sufficient.

A week before flying to Albuquerque, New Mexico, this February for my first major academic conference, my adviser sat with me and we discussed what I would expect at the conference. She told me that if I noticed anyone "whose work I admired," I should ask her first if she knew them and get the OK, before I went up to them and... I imagine I would get down on my knees and "idolize" them? I don't know what I would do, and this is a very important aspect of who I am, I think. It's not that I don't admire certain people's work -- in fact, I do. And it's not that I have a problem with approaching people. I may not be the type to walk up to the hottest girl in the bar (which is OK, because I presently date the hottest girl in the bar), but in professional situations I can be very personable.

It's the interaction between the two that gets me. It's that I could never see myself going up to a strange researcher and talking shop for 30-45 minutes. What would be the point? As I mentioned earlier in this post, most academics are absolutely no fun to talk to. They're awkward, self-possessed, and incredibly elitist (one mistakenly thought I was a waiter and asked me to pour him a glass of champagne at a cocktail party). And as I mentioned in an earlier post, I'm terrible at small talk, and I do think that talking about research is "small talk." If a person can't figure out 99.9% of what they need to know from reading a researcher's journal articles, either the researcher sucks at writing or the reader sucks at reading.

And this, my friends, is why I would make a terrible academic.

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If reactions are positive, I'll write more posts in the months to come about how grad school life goes. I do think it's an interesting chapter of my life, even if my average day consists of driving to an office, sitting at a computer, eating a Lean Cuisine, reading Deadspin and chatting on Facebook in between running analyses in SPSS and reading for class. Stay classy out there.