Strangulating Obscurity

Sorry, Folks.

2005-11-06T21:28:00.000-05:00

But I quit. Sad, I know. But no sense in letting you down easy, or stringing you along like I'll come back. Because you know it's not going to happen, and I won't insult your feelings or intelligence by pretending that it will.

Were the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to so kind and swift in their execution...

Adieu, ladies and gentlemen, adieu.

Cosmo's Guide To Softening Your Cynicism

2005-10-29T21:50:00.000-05:00

If you're like me, then you know how alienating your cynical world view can be. Women especially seem to find it repugnant that someone could be constantly unsure of the purity of human intent. Fear not, though, young doubter of Panglossian world views! I have devised a table for your betterment. On left column, I have written a common, cynical lament, and on the right, a positive, upbeat, version of it. This way, you can consider your inner consternation in a light that will make you better liked, and thus a better person.
GOVERNMENT
My hard-earned tax money is paying people to be unemployed.	I am proud my country supports all it's citizens.
Look, the president is lying. You can tell because his lips are moving.	I am fortunate not to be under the sort of pressure he faces each day.
High-level public officials rip off the system while stiffs like me pay the bill.	I enjoy the power to elect and remove officials.
EDUCATION
"It doesn't matter what you major in?" Yeah, right.	I am impressed at the life opportunities this college provides.
I don't really like any subject, and I need to declare by tomorrow. Guess I'll go with English.	An English major keeps my career options open.
My parents didn't drop 30,000 a year so I could say "Would you like fries with that?"	I have sufficient motivation to find a fulfilling job.
I hate being an English major.	"Would you like fries with that?"
EMPLOYMENT
My boss is a f-ing retard.	My job involves more leadership responsibility than I had anticipated.
Grad school and corporate recruiting are the only chances for success in life.	I look forward to overcoming adversity.
Man, how did all these morons get jobs?	Success is just around the corner.
RELATIONSHIPS
She's pretending to like me so I will take her to dinner/buy her stuff/do her homework.	I am thankful to be so preceptive.
She's dating who?	I respect her ability to find inner beauty.
Hey, that's great. You're cheating on me. Thanks for the heads up.	I am glad to be rid of an unfaithful partner.
Oh, great. Now she's going to cry for the next three hours.	I appreciate her emotional openness.
God, now I have to go through months of post-break-up drama.	I look forward to furthering my knowledge of the intricatcies of human emotion.
MISCELLANEOUS
This process is so moronic.	I enjoy the opportunity to brainstorm new solutions.
Sex and greed are the only things that motivate people.	I look forward to the challenge of improving my fellow man.
Why do I feel like you're totally screwing me on this?	I am happy to have this opportunity to test our interpersonal bond.
I f-ing hate the world.	I am secure wih the knowledge of my eventual death.

I Told Myself So

2005-10-20T14:50:00.000-05:00

But I promised I wouldn't be cynical about it, and I'm sticking to that.

I had my doubts when, after wrting down three specific things that I wanted to take away from my first visit to Career Services at my alma mater, the first thing Skip (the career counselor) asked me was "what do you want out of this visit?" But, hell, I told myself this is all part of the process, just play ball, kid, and everything will come out fine in the end. So I explained how I had been wandering a bit, and that now I was ready for a job that most people would consider a career, and how the areas of Law and Consulting seemed appealing to me. I should have, perhaps, been more clear that I wasn't really "looking for the right job," so much as a job, preferably one that was more intellectually engaging, and certainly better paying than the low-brow crap I so regularly settle for. Obviously, you can't just walk in there and say "fuck making a difference, I just wanna get paaaaaaaaaiiiiid," but I did write down "Gain any advantages Career Services could give me in the competitive job market," as one of my stated goals, which is fairly direct, I feel. But I guess not, so my bad; now I have learned for my next visit, no reason to be cynical about it.

But when the guy pulled out the stick figure diagram, it became really hard to stay upbeat. Here I am, following everyone's advice to not be such a self-reliant (and self-obsessed), freewheeling cynic, and coming to a Career Services office I had so brashly assumed could do nothing for me (really, you need to understand that for me, seeking advice from these people was like cutting my own balls off) and this gentleman, professionally employed, mind you, was handing me a piece of paper with a stick figure on it. The stick figure was a diagram to the job search process. No, I'm not joking. The head was "Job Needs," that is, things like salary, work environment, etc, the arms were "skills" and "interests" and the legs were "creative" and "construction." If that makes no sense to you, join the club; as far as I could tell, the legs were where you started (like, researching different jobs out there, maybe?), then the arms added, I guess, more options, and then the head was the criteria used to filter through your research.

Now, I could go off on a huge, cynical (and extremely funny) tirade about this, but I am not going to. Adding humor to this encounter would only serve to soften its offensivenss. Simply put, the entire encounter was unacceptable. I came to career services with a series of stated goals:

Learn about what I need to have on my resume and cover letter to best improve my chances at getting a legal or consulting job;
Acquire any knowledge or advantage that Career Services at Dartmouth could give to graduates of that college in the job search process;
Restore my faith in he job application process as a means of accurately selecting candidates for employment.

Their attempt to help me attain these goals was to draw me a stick figure, the sort of thing you got in 4th grade, to teach you long division. I can think of no professional interaction in which such a complete and utter side-stepping of services requested would meet with anything but immediate termination or a due-diligence lawsuit. If Dartmouth is one of the best schools in the nation, and they give you stick figures, then just how bad are career services at Fitchburg State? That might sound cynical, but it's not; just my honest and objective analysis based on the facts at hand.

Now, I, unwilling to be sent off with this crude diagram, a good handshake, and a grumpy little storm cloud over my head, continued to press Skip for actual measures by which I might improve my job chances. I matched his circumlocutions with my own, waltzing him elegantly into a corner, where I managed to get him to say that "certain areas are harder to penetrate than others," which (and, thanks to his lack of specificity, I am forced to merely assume) means that the jobs I want are hard to get. I pressed him further for facts, and eventually, I was given one: A 3.46 GPA is "worth putting on a resume." Now, if you'd asked me, I'd have told you that putting a "3.46 GPA" on a resume you expected to get you a career would be like putting "six-inch penis" on a resume you expected to get you a job as a porn star. So perhaps I did gain some of the information had wanted out of this interview, if only a passing scintilla.

On the whole, what I found the most disrespectful aspect of the interview was the lack of directness; like the way in which I was continually being steered toward non-profit and low-paying jobs. If this was his left-handed way of telling me I was fucked if I wanted a high-paying job, I would have appreciated a straight-forward, fact-based explication of that, rather than being forced to try and read the between the lines of his gentle and well-practiced euphemism. Again, perhaps I did not elicit such honesty from him because I was not forthcoming with it myself. Generally, I don't generally suffer from being overly oblique to people (in fact, quite the opposite), but perhaps in this environment, I need to just come out and say "Based on standardized test scores, I am very smart, and I want my workload and income to reflect that;" at the very least, I should have said "I want to make more money than I was making this summer in a bike shop."

So what I have really gained from this interview is experience for next time. Instead of keeping the assumption that I am smarter than most career services officials to myself, and remaining silent while they wax pleonastic on stick figures and antiquated job search software, I am going to cut them boldly off and explain directly that I want a job that pays well, that will make me work hard, and that will reflect how much money changed hands to get me my education. I'll say I have no qualms about working for anyone (oil, tobacco, insurance, you name it). And if they can't show me how write the best goddamn cover letter and resume that I can possibly have, or they can't introduce me to the most influential alums in that field, or that can't teach me the best inteview skills, then...

...well, actually, I have no apodosis for that conditional. As an alum, I most likely have less leverage than I would have as a student. I better hope that my next career counsellor will respect my honesty and directness, without being too put off by the insensitivity and pompousness that they imply.

I still haven't seen The Passion of the Christ

2005-10-17T23:32:00.000-05:00

Not that I have been meaning to. But it's the only one of the Top 25 highest grossing films of all time that I haven't seen. Not that list means anything - most of those "E.T." and "Star Wars: Episode IV" dollars are worth about twice as much as today's money, and still a pretty penny more than those 1997 "Titanic" dollars. F-ing inflation. Some economist help me out with this one; is it a rule that inflation has to decrease the value of money faster than interest rates can accrue more of it? I would love to fight inflation, but, as I currently am attempting to sell my soul to whoever will pay me the most money (still won't be very much, I feel) as quickly as humanly possible, I suppose I am not helping that situation. Ah well. Better to have cartloads of worthless specie in mutual funds magically increasing than small amounts ($5000) of worthless specie in the bank, getting more worthless.

I done f-ed up on the webpage today. All because I was trying to fruitlessly move it over to cyclocosm.com. My GD tech support team is just not coming through. Of course, they have things to do like "study" earning "degrees" that will "improve their marketability." It's at this point that you expect me to engage on some long cynical rant about the shortcomings of the job application process, higher education, me being pissed at the world in general. Not gonna happen this time, Shirley. Much like Christopher Moltisanti, and, a real life person Kirk Gibson I now utilize the technique of positive visualization.

Now I'm going to bed to visualize some more paychecks.

Pro Cycling News - Winningest Riders, Conti Tour, Old News

2005-10-17T10:41:00.000-05:00

In case you're hadn't noticed, I don't care much for the ProTour. But the previous system (and, no, not the World Cup or Super Pernod or all that other crap that came before it) of counting wins was really even worse. Take a look at this year's standings. Rocket Robbie and Ale-Jet looks awfully close, right? Only 4 wins apart? No. Petacchi has 3 non-UCI wins, and McEwen has 8. So more like 9 wins apart. "What's a non-UCI race, then?" you ask? Generally, though not always, these.

In the sport's second tier, which is horribly and almost completely seperated from its first (did I mention I don't like theProTour?) Brazillian hotshot Murilo Fisher walked away with the European Continental Tour title, by a margin of 748-503 margin over large-forheaded doping suspect Stephen VanDijk. Rounding out the top 3 was Dwars door Vlanderen (the name translates to something like "Diagonally Across Flanders" so I'm gonna leave it in Dutch) winner Nico Eeckhout. A strange revelation of the Continental Tour points tabulation was that Panaria, home to a disproportionate number of sprinters (Paride Grillo, Ruben Bongioro, Brett Lancaster, Graeme Brown), actually beat Ag2r for the Team Title by a small but significant margin. So why is Ag2r the only new candidate for next season's ProTour? Well, I guess money talks, mais il parle plus bruyant s'il parle le français.

Pretty much all the other news that's out there is old. Sure, there's stuff like Grillo breaking his wrist and Casero retiring (same link), or the London cycle show, or even Sheldon Brown's Interbike report (yeah, it's old, but no one else covered it), but mostly it's junk like DiLuca wins ProTour. I mean, come on, dude, we were pretty sure of it in May, we were definately sure of it after Zurich, but we had to hear about it again at Paris-Tours and again at Lombardy, and now, after the ProTour is done, it's still news? Get outta here. Then there's the "duh" stories, like "Sony-Ericsson riders need new jobs'. Well, duh. That's not news. "Sony Ericsson rider gets news job", that's news.

Who the fork is Daniel Craig

2005-10-14T14:57:00.000-05:00

And why the hell isn't he Jude Law?

Man, seriously.

(in case you didn't know)

but there's hope for mankind, still:

"I wouldn't know, Dude. I deal in publishing. Entertainment. Political advocacy."

"Oh yeah? And which one of those is 'Logjammin?'"

and

2005-10-11T22:35:00.000-05:00

by "apparently" i mean "officially"

oh yeah

2005-10-11T22:28:00.000-05:00

apparently, I am a Cat 3 now. Go team.

ho hum

2005-10-11T19:01:00.000-05:00

Yes, so I very often forget that I am supposed to use this page so people can keep up with me. Probably because keeping up with me at the moment is sensationally easy to do. I am still in Williamstown, waiting to see if my parnets need me to housesit. I am applying for jobs. The other blog is blowing up, but for some reason there's been no correlation between traffic and revenue. At least none that I can figure out. A Google AdSense report would make for a good case study in a Consulting interview because it at first glance makes no sense but surely has somevery real order to it. I was somewhat distressed today to find ads for the Livestrong HP Laptop. Todd Yezefski also expressed distress. I wonder if I can go "Hey, yo! Google! Stop advertizing that feces here!" I bet I can't.

I figured out today why I hate the job application process. It's like making the hookers actively seek out the johns. It's strange, really, that those women are called "streetwalkers" as if they walk the streets looking for someone to pork for money (I'm pretty sure the men come to them.) Actually, I shouldn't be suprised; if the hookers are the ones searching, it's no longer society's fault for supporting their existence. Anyway, today I was out looking for jobs, and I found this one particular company that's got a site bashing it pretty directly. I mean, I guess that's not too uncommon, but the company home page has a lower Google ranking than the page that bashes it. That company is in deep doo. Now, some of you might be thinking "damn, Cosmo, don't point out how your potential employers suck on the internet," because I guess good companies will Google their prospective hires. Well, I'm not worried. 1) I didn't apply there; and 2) if the company's hate page is so much better ranked than its home page, they can't be that familiar with Google to begin with.

So, the point I am wandering elliptically around here is that I should be weeding this company off of my potential list of employers. Clearly, these guys are pretty inept. And so you say "well, you have weeded them out." Yes, but I'm still applying for like a billion different jobs. I should have companies come to me and be like "damn, you're educated. We want to hire you," and then I should select from there. "Poppycock!" you harumph. "The company has business it needs to attend to. How are they to even know who you are? Your assertations are preposterous." Oh yeah, smart guy? So why do the allegedly "best" companies in the world, the Parthenons and the Vanguards and the Mckinsey's, the Banks of America and the CitiGroups, come to colleges such as my own alma mater to recruit students? Yes, the students still have to complete an application process, but the applicant pool is much tinier, and the companies are the ones making the first move, saying "students from this institution are better than most job applicants."

For some reason, I don't feel like anyone seeing my resume is thinking that. Now, I'm not saying that Ivy League grads are, by default, any more qualified than other college grads for jobs. One of the reasons I didn't go through corporate recuiting is because I don't believe that's true (the other reason is that I had no idea when and where it was going on until months after I graduated). But, again, these companies are allegedly the greatest around, so maybe they're onto something, here, with this unique employment approach. I mean, if I am the one whoring my intellect out for money (and not very much money, I might ad), shouldn't I be the one selecting who I do and don't go to bed with?

eh.

2005-10-09T13:05:00.000-05:00

This one time, I went to Spain...

2005-10-03T15:23:00.000-05:00

Madrid is a wonderful place. As wonderful as a place can be without speaking English and having free, high-speed wireless internet for all. And being absoltely impossible to traverse on bike (though it makes up for that by being well-designed enough that bike travel is not necessary). And I guess without also having any free water. Always agua sin gas. Rat bastards. I kept trying to convince everyone I was with that you could order agua del griffo (tap water) but apparently this is a no-no. So 2,50 E (how exactly does one make a Euro symbol with a US keypad, anyhow?) blown immediately at each sit-down meal outside of Burger King (to which we paid far too many visits).

The least efficient part of Madrid (by far) is the airport. If Sin City had an airport, and it were in color, and had fewer hookers (there were a lot of hookers in Sin City, and I imagine the airport would be no different), that, my friends, would be Aeropeurto Internacional de Madrid/Barajas. It just had that crowded desperation to it, despite being lively and bright, and surrounded by hills that do, in fact, look like white elephants. Plus it's got army dudes in it, like some sketchball South American banana republic. I tried to take a picture in the Duty-Free store, but bald solider man was like "What the fuck are you doing?" Well, actually, all he did was shake his finger, but apparently, you can't take pictures of shit. Good thing he didn't see me snap one of the Camel® Brand "Smokers Oasis™" in earlier in the terminal. Anyway, all this 'no pictures' business, plus having like 90% of the traffic check in at like 2 gates really gums up the works.

On the way in, we got off the plane and waited on the tarmac for the stupid Iberian Airways bus to pick us up, then we waited once we were loaded onto the bus, then we waited to get off the bus, then we waited for-freakin'-ever at passport control, stuck in the hideous wind but out of the friendly sun, and were occasionally crushed by sensor activated doors that must have been programmed to close after 5 minutes, even if their sensors were telling them to remain activated. Immediately, I am upset because British Airways has lost our luggage. This was anticipated, however, as our changeover had been fast tracked across London Heathrow's terrifying left-lane driving 80kph tarmac, getting us off one jet and onto another in under 25 minutes. Apparently our luggage did not recieve the same red carpet treatment.

Fortunately, Jenna speaks Spanish and the Iberian air representative speaks English, and I somehow can understand both of them. Forms are filled out, receipts are printed and then it's off to snag a cab (which is no trouble at all in Madrid; it like 90% cab). We get a sweet, well-kept Skoda with an LCD GPS thingamagig and a driver who speaks English like I speak spanish. Jenna talks, driver talks, I listen, gathering pretty well what is going on. So long as these strange natives speak slowly enough, I can understand them fine. Not like those sneaky Mexicans, who speak slowly but use vocabularies consisting entirely of words not found in Spanish/English dictionaries.

Hostel, unpack (which consists of taking my iPod out of my carry-on and plugging it in), and then its out on the town to buy some goddamned pants. No one wears shorts in Europe. They wear pants. Nice and tight ones. I mean, over there its hotter, stuffier, more humid with less frequent baths; why the hell would anyone dress accordingly? Stop to shop at Springfield, which is like some sick amalgamation of Abercrombie and the Gap, which sells all the largely nonsensical English Language T-Shirts Euros wear ("The Judge Of" in big flowery acid 70's letters, purple on robin's egg blue; "University of Milwaukee State" in true college style, brown on dark orange). Pants are 30 Euros, and a nice shirt is 30 more, but at least people are looking at me as though I am a human being again. The shoes, I'll admit, busted old Nikes, were sub par, especially as no Euro not sponsored to wears the Swoosh, but the silver trim made them just del moda enough to get by.

Madrid, as I have said before, is a rollicking paean to the very concept of efficiency. It's not stupid over-engineered German efficiency, that makes you say "oooh, how efficient" when you see it, it's "goddamn, it's hot, let's do this ASAP" Spanish efficiency, with low activation energy infrastructure. Madrid has two main streets - the Gran Via (E/W) and the "Paseo" (it changes names every block or two as it runs N/S) these two roads are invariably busy. But the rest of the town is pretty much deserted until 7pm. At precisely 6:54pm, the city goes from lazy inactivity to vomiting cars, metros busses, taxis, motoscooter drivers and pedestrians from every orifice (riding a bike in Madrid would be both suicidal and unnecessary) and continues to vomit until 8 or so. To improve visibility during rush hour, Spain sets its clocks as far forward as the bounds of Lunacy will permit, making sunset sometime around 9. I'm told that 6am is also pretty busy, as the people leaving from a night of revelry become entangled with those poor souls just getting up to go to work.

To save up the necessary energy for these rotating bouts of intensity, Spaniards generally awake later in the day (9-10) eat a breakfast that invariably consists of coffee and two of the following: eggs, ham, bacon. Then they do stuff until around 2 or 3, the time that we pale-skinned gringos, based on the angle and intensity of the sunbeams boring into our retinas, would call "noon." Then they eat an even heavier meal, consisting of a main dish and all sorts of random snacks that are sent out from the kitchen as often as humanly possible, plus beer, wine or sangria. Then they sleep until 6 or 7 to as not miss the second bout of intensity, then (I'm assuming) they do some other stuff. If you're lucky, you'll run across some Spaniards who run a restaurant that serves a good late dinner (10pm). If you want to go out drinking immediately, head to an Irish pub and watch Texas A&M football games over Beemish Stout; if not, wait two more hours (the waiters at most restaurants will give you this sort of indolent leeway anyhow) and go to any bar or club with the name "bruja" in the title. It will be awesome. Prepare to leave by 3 if you want to get to bed by 6. Metro closes at 1:30, so don't count on leaving the same way you came.

The metro, BTW, is awesome. You can buy multitrip tickets, which really blew my mind, and most of the trains are in excellent shape. The 7 line kinda blows ass, but other than that, it's cool. I like the 10 and 8 lines because there's no doors between cars; as you ride along you can watch as the cars in front of you disappear around turns. Sweet. The 1 Train is my favorite just based on character. What I really love about the Metro is how people travel in the stations when go to a train, from a train, or between lines. You hit an escalator and immediately everyone goes to the right. On the unoccupied left of the escalator, people who are in a legit hurry haul ass by. Some people walk quickly, but for the most part, they full-on run. Yes, the fat people, too. It's inspirational. My last night in town, I made a great run from the 10 line to the 1 line (that's up like 3 sets of escalators) to just snare the 1 line as it pulled out. And there's no signs anywhere telling people to do this. You just either know it, or catch on, or look like an asshole in front of everyone. God bless efficiency.

People were always telling me "Oh, go to Madrid first because if you go to Barcelona first you will be totally disappointed by Madrid." These people are full of simpleminded shit. I will elaborate on this point further at a later date.

motherfocker...

2005-09-26T23:10:00.000-05:00

British Airways is like this really hot chick who's good at doing the dishes, cooking and cleaning the bathroom, plus has like a 600k a year job so you don't have to work but is just terrible in bed or at anything even remotely related to sex, so you have to dump her.

Why?

Because they are by far the best airline I've been on (even in lowly coach). Sweet TVs stuck in the seat, superfriendly people at all levels of he business, decidedly palatable meals and drinks at no added charge; the whole package, really. But for some reason they feel compelled to lose my luggage every time I entrust it to them. They lost it on the way through London on the way to Spain, and now, they've lost it on the way back. Un-real.

That luggage, by the way, had my car keys in it. And pretty much all the clothes I own. Which means I am stuck now in Hanover for the time being. With one (dirty) set of clothes.

Oh, and worst of all, my bike is locked in my car.

Yes, that is the worst part.

De España

2005-09-19T13:02:00.000-05:00

Spanish keyboards are f-ed up. There´s a key that does just "ñ" and to do quotes you have to hit shift-2. The "@" is a confusing and senseless ctrlalt2. Its whack. believe me. HTML is especially rough as <> are the same key, just with shift. And there are confusing accent marks where you expect good honest kesy to be. bad news

ok so here' whats up

2005-09-16T14:01:00.000-05:00

I have left colorado and am on a bus to boston. from there to london, from there to madrid, from there to barcelona, and then back in exactly taht order. see you in oct.

wow

2005-09-13T17:38:00.000-05:00

25 spams. within minutes of each other. all purportedly from women and loving my blog.

Sadly, 25 spams is too many. now I must turn word verification on.

sweet, escorts

2005-09-12T19:08:00.000-05:00

You know you blew up when your blog gets escort service spam.

I wonder what keywords I used to trigger that...

I am a skilled waster of time

2005-09-12T16:15:00.000-05:00

God bless the internet, as Mr. Finch would say.

"Ennui" is a nice little word. It comes from the French verb "to annoy.' It really just means "bored." Very insightful of the Frogs to think of boredom as the state of being annoyed at life. Still, having both the time and sensitivity to ponder such things is probably why they've haven't won any wars since 1848 (unless you count driving tanks over a bunch of friendly North Africans. I don't. And don't even give me that 'they won WWI' crap. They absorbed shelling until countries that were serious about this war business bailed them out). What happened in 1848, you ask? Germany, that's what. Not Prussia, not Bavaria, none more of this Holy Roman Empire crap. Full-on Germany. You know how you say "bored" in German? "Gelangweilt." As far as I can tell, that means "Because succeeded." Yeah. I think that says it all right there.

"Malaise" is another Frenchy frou-frou word. It means "bad comfort." Doctors use it as a technical term meaning bad-feeling. Crooks and charlatains in turn use it to lure people into thinking they have all sorts of disesases overlooked by modern medicine. Then they try to sell you something. I'm sure you already know this, but kids, if someone wants to sell you somehting, they're lying to you. Especially if they have to use words like 'malaise." I just don't use it at all. Plain old "bored" (of good, honest, Germanic roots) suits me just fine, thanks. I am enjoying my "because succeeded" plenty.

Hmm, equating "Germanic" with goodness and honesty, occasionally critical of Israel; I might as well just shave my head and buy some queer/black/jew/"other"-stomping boots right now. Come to think of it, I could use a haircut...but, no. There are very few neo-Nazis out there who were led to their current lifestyles by reason alone. Much like proponents of Intelligent Design and Irreducable Complexity, the few neo-Nazis smart enough to examine their own philosophies have taken facts and use them to prop up a theory, rather than first concieving a theory and testing it against facts. Plus, I don't like Skinhead music. It's so loud and angry. To be sure, there's a time and a place for loud and angry, but you gotta have some Ballardeering mixed in there, too. Maybe when the Skinhead Elton John comes out with a Skinhead Goodbye Yellow Brick Road I'll consider it.

No, I still won't.

It's a good thing he's dead

2005-09-09T09:17:00.000-05:00

Seriously. He in private, he may have been a witty, delightful person, with strongly held ideals and principles, but to see him on paper, the man was a fascist, pure and simple. The concept of the rights of the individual were utterly alien to him, and he stared at cases that concerned them with the cocked head, perked ear and bemused smile of a dog that sees another dog on TV. The oft-admired efficiency with which he ran an entire branch of the government is to be all the more detested because of the ends to which he turned its power. "He made the trains run on time," someone said on NPR a few days ago.

Yes. But then again, so did Hitler.

(yes, I dislike this guy so much that I'm linking Dershowitz.)

Let's just limit ourselves to a brief review of his career:

1954 - As a Supreme Court clerk, writes memo against Brown v. Board of Ed. Later denies it during confirmation hearings, admits it later. Lesser men might have acknowledged this as an act of perjury and resigned.

1964 - While working for Barry Goldwater, is alleged to have made it difficult for certain darker skinned individuals to vote as a poll watcher. (Curiously, Goldwater's most famous statement was "Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice;" he and the subject of this diatribe must have had rather different opinions about exactly what "liberty" is.)

1971 - Supreme Court.

1984 - Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc.. The famous Betamax case. In a 5/4 case, the Supreme Court rules it is ok to tape TV shows for personal use. Guess who dissented?

1995 - Vernonia School District v. Acton - Drug tests can be performed randomly on atheletes in public schools, because the conditions of collection do not compromise privacy, as they are similar to "public restrooms." Funny, no one ever took home a cup of my urine from a public restroom, nor does the guy in the urinal next to mine inspect my my penis to make sure it isn't one of these.

2000 - Bush v. Gore. "I demand a recount!" Well, actually, turns out that you can't. And involving the Supreme Court gives the appearance of transparency lacking from the Tilden/Hayes settlement.

2001 - Atwater v. City of Lago Vista. Think an officer can't arrest you for driving without your seatbelt? Or jaywalking? Or littering? Or riding your bike on the sidewalk? Think again. "Unreasonable seizure" is now limited being yanked off the street because the officer doesn't like your face.

2002 - Board of Ed. v. Earls - Students in all extracurricular programs are now subject to random drug tests, due to "communal undress." Right. Even in the Chess Club.

2005 - Kelo v. New London - Think that piece of property you own belongs to you? Not if a private organization wants to increase tax revenues with it!

So why all this? Why now? Because my opinion of people doesn't change because they're dead. If someone's fighting AIDS or cancer, I'll lay off, because I imagine that is tough business. But being dead is easy. And I'm sick of hearing what a great guy someone was just because they're dead. So let this be a little reminder to you, lest the pain of public mourning tint your memories rose; this gentleman ruled like a fascist, consistently and without fail.

My bike rules

2005-09-07T20:59:00.000-05:00

That's rules as in the noun, not the intransitive verb.

I thought it would be a good idea to codify my rules for what is and is not acceptable to put on a bicycle. The inspiration for this comes from looking at lots of other people's bikes and being like "what the fuck were you smoking?" These are rules, no laws, so there's no real fuss over interpretation. If you break them, it's not criminal, merely cheating, and like all forms of cheating, entirely acceptable if carried out skillfully and with guile.

Now then, let's begin:

1) Bike should have as few parts as possible. THIS IS UNIVERSAL. If you run XT shifters and a seperate XT brake lever I will punch you in the balls. Same with your Deda Dog Fang, clip-on reflectors, handlebar streamers, spoke-e-dokes etc.

a) This does not mean all bikes more complex than a Penny-Farthing
are bad. It just means that you should strive for maximum simplicity at all times.
b) Unless your ass has been shuttling from hostel to hostel for the past 18 months, those panniers have got to go.

2) Your bike may have two brakes, or no brakes, but under no circumstances is it to have one brake. Ok, if it's a cruiser bike and you are riding it ironically or in a situation where it totally does not belong, it can have one (coaster) brake, but no more.

a) Telling anyone that riding a fixed-gear with no brakes is stupid, unsafe, irresponsable etc is an automatic punch in the nuts.
b) Riding a non-off-road fixed gear with two brakes means you're feeble but I will refrain from punching you in the nuts.
c) I have a jar in my kitchen cabinet filled with formaldahyde and the testes of people who rode one-brake fixies with two brake levers on the bars. You have been warned...

3) Use weird parts whenever possible. The goal is to get people who know things about bikes to be like "what the fuck is that?" whenever possible. Like many of these rules, this does not extend to racing bikes, which are put under massive amounts of unaesthetic pressure. Mismatched wheelsets are acceptable under this rule only if part of one wheel is too weird to find two of (and the rims must still be the same color.)

4) Badmouthing/praising a bike or part based entirely on its material (even if it's plastic) is free punches for everyone else in your nuts (or uterus) for life. Seriously. That having been said, carbon fiber and titanium should be avoided insofar as is possible merely because rich potbellied wankers who couldn't get their asses up Alpe d'Huez with pulleys and a rope have the easiest access to it.

5) Always ride it like you stole it. Actually stealing it makes this much easier. Continuing in this vein; cheap is good, free is better.

6) Riding a freeride or downhill bike on pavement means it will be very hard for you to get away when I come after you winding up for a big old punch in the nuts. In fact, riding a freeride or a downhill bike on singletrack, or in any situation where a regular old hardtail will do just fine, is a nut-punchable offense as well. Riding knobbies on pavement is asking for it; take advantage of the fact that people can't seem to even give old semi-slicks away and use those instead.

7) You will be punched in the nuts for using the term "old school" where simply "old" is warranted. You will be kicked in the nuts if you spell it "skool." (Clarification: Brooks Saddle = "old school;" indicates change in the ideas, concepts of philisophies behind the bike part. Older Mavic Ksyriums, without the machined rims, NOT OLD SCHOOL.)

8) Brooks saddles: if you ride one, you better fucking mean it. None of this "just 'cuz it looks old" crap. I will pummel your sack 'til it bleeds, you mustache-bar toting wanker.

9) Toe-straps are a no-no. Clipless pedals do everythign they do, but better. You have no excuse and I bet by now you can guess the penalty.

10) Handlebars: Drops are the best. For all applications. You're a wanker if you use bullhorns, but they look cool. Flat bars are acceptable for offroad, huge sweeping cruiser bars for cruisers, maybe riser bars are ok so long as you kick ass. Anything else and MAN, you better back it up by having a huge beard or LeMond-era Oakleys or something.

11) If you have vintage parts that aren't scuffed, faded or in someway obviously used, you had better own a cup.

And thats it. Perhaps ammendments will follow.

I got no time

2005-09-07T10:18:00.000-05:00

None at all. Especially not for this sleeping in I keept doing. I got 13 hours of sleep yesterday (I was tired, man. Bike racing.) Now I need to get a hair cut, clean my room, get an oil change, probably get new tires on the car, too, maybe go for a ride (maybe take another day off, too), man, so much crap and all day to do it but it never gets done.

sheeeeeeeeit man

2005-09-01T23:18:00.000-05:00

did you see that latest bit o spam, on my post from earlier today? Someone got paid to come up with that. Anderson Cooper? PUH-leese. Like anyone would use content-oriented spam protection. Until they make web-bugs that can read .jpgs, no reason to use anything but word verification (I have it turned off on strobs on account of I don't give a shit...)

Strange how topical it was, tho... maybe some English major out there is getting paid to spam blogs. probably found the job on craigslist. I should look for one of those...

...futher gratuitous ellipses...

...

Here's a lofty claim...

2005-09-01T19:18:00.000-05:00

"Between 1945 and the late 1970s, the West and Japan consumed more oil and minerals than had been used in all previous recorded history."

It's from wikipedia, in the article on the 1973 oil crisis. It's one of those things that I really want to believe, but I am just not certain of. If only the dickhead who wrote it had cited his sources as well.

So, why was I looking up the 1973 oil crisis? Walk down to your local gas station and you tell me.

I feel like post-WWII, rather than working to "free" nations by installing friendly dictators, the US should have simply absorbed all their satellite states, awarded friendly locals full US citizenship and jailed, killed, enslaved or otherwise marginallized the less friendly inhabitants. This worked fairly well for Rome, which managed, in a time much more difficult for empire building, to last nearly a millenia. Only a few groups (Scots, Picts, Jews, Parthans) consistently resisted.

Anyway, if we'd just splooged all these little mini-US's all over the map, we could have avoided shit like OPEC, the Persian Gulf war etc, etc, and shit like Vietnam and Korea would have never happened - you think the USSR ever even considered invading Alaska, despite the mere 12 mile gap? Ho Chi Mihn was a ballsy dude, but he never would have invaded South Vietnam if Saigon's name had been changed to "New Pittsburg."

Plus, the Israelis, the Palestinans, they'd all be US citizens, with sweet digital satellite packages and SUVs. "Hertzl, did you dump your leaves in my backyard again? Don't make me go out the shed and dust off my explosive-filled vest." "Oh Khaleeb, you card, I was just trying to give a little mulch for that brown patch you've been working on." Hell, Saddam Hussien would have been a Governor or Senator or something, just like Ted Kennedy. Sure, a few malcontents would still blow stuff up, but hey, it's no different than it is now, right? I mean, we already have domestic terrorism, what with Oklahoma City and all.

It would be totally sweet. Plus, like 49 out of 50 of these post-1945 states would be Blue. I mean, look, the whole world from Nevada to Virigina (going West) hates the guy; even with the comforts and ammenities of the modern American life, I can't imagine all these neo-Americans being cowed into thinking some foreign threat required them to vote Republican. (I guess this is only a compelling arguement if you prefer a more liberal America.)

So what's the deal with this half-ass imperialism? I say no more. Why create bajillions of human rights violations, terrorist building grounds, and seething, diseased undernourished, undereducated, underemployed (did I mention seething) America-hating masses in the name of Independence and Self-Determination? If everyone lived under the American flag, we wouldn't have to kill so many of these morons so we can bring them their own freedom!

Do you think the CNN's amry of pundits and talking head would be flapping jowls about the dissatisfied Sunni faction if Iraq had already been annexed and made the 51st state? (Try making a flag for THAT!) hell NO. All the Sunnis would be jammed into minivans on their way to the Denny's drive through, sitting at home watching "CSI" or online drafting fantasy football teams, and wieners over at CNN would, well, be out of a job.

Plus, we'd have cheaper gas...

So GET OFF YOUR ASSES and WRITE YOUR CONGRESSMEN or LOCAL HOMELAND SECURITY OFFICE. Tell him that your brother-in-law's a towelhead, and he says all the Weapons of Mass Destruction got moved to Qatar, and that the Vizer there is postively itching for a fight.

Dude spam!

2005-09-01T00:39:00.000-05:00

spammed. bogus. oh well. at least its a hit.

Anyway...

http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=68826&d=22&m=8&y=2005

This is horrible. And to think, if it were run on "The Onion" it would be funny.

BUT...

Is this better or worse than the Supreme Court's recent eminant domain decision? Since I am beginning to develop a taste for unpopular positions (and everyone thinks I'm an anti-Semite, anyway), I will go with better. Saudis, having been brainwashed since birth to hate Israel and love living under quite possibly the richest, most oppresive and most sucked-up-to totalitarian regeme in post-Colonial history, couldn't possibly know any better. David Souter, on the other hand, is one of the most well-educated men on the planet.

WHAT WOULD REALLY make me happy would be if an Israeli drug company developed a medicine that cured whatever the hell diseases you get from growing fat and lazy off underground oil deposits that happened to lie under your great-great-great-grandfather pile of sand. Oil deposits that you never would have been able to extract, nor even would have known existed, until some Limey came along and dug them up for you. Anyway, if Israel developed a sweet drug that cured whatever scourges haunt Saudi Arabia, would they still moan about Israeli products in their hospitals?

I got laid off today

2005-08-26T21:21:00.000-05:00

from a bike shop job. How the hell do you get laid off from a bike shop job?("Management was restructuring" "Yeah, restructuring the amount of retahds that work for them") Actually, it's pretty simple: manager says "things are slow. we need to save money. Cosmo, you can have today instead of tomorrow be your last day." Losing 108 dollars in exchange for another day off? The puritan in me says no, but the lazy, disaffected youth says yes. I spent it well, remaining in bed until roughtly noon before ordering Hostel reservations, doing my internet thing, taking a brief bike ride (got the ticker up to 180 today - new record) and generally getting little errands done. Race tomorrow should be fun (if it happens).

I was looking for a 'cross fork today. That and a set of rubber is all I need to complete my rig (Converted Kona Lava Dome). A good project for fall; hopefully I can get it done in time to race a bit. I stopped by Nashbar for the first time in a while today. Their 'cross fork is too much and too heavy for me to be interested, but they do have I job I could do well. It seems to entail answering emails and phone calls all day about what bike parts go with what, which is what I do anyway in my spare time, as I confabulate solutions to weird bike problems like converting a Kona Lava Dome to a cyclocross bike and a broken Orbea Onix into a fixed gear. THe job has full benefits and everything, plus rides at lunch. If only it were in Medford instead of Canfield OH. I also briefly thought about signing my cycling blog up for their affiliate program, but nah. I thought it would be even funnier if I signed up strobs for it, but they'd never take it due to my pottymouth.

Man, this internet is slow. I've seen urine trickle out of a syphilitic man's dick faster than information comes into this machine. (pottymouth?). Seriously. Tom Temple once tested to see if he could tap binary out on the wall faster than the 18es Greemwave one time (he couldn't - but just barely - beat the 40 bytes/sec mark our wireless was setting). Aww shit, see, wikipedia wouldn't load fast enough to tell me that painful urination is not a sign of syphilis. How about "I've seen urine trickle faster out of a clap-stricken vulva faster than information comes into this machine?" yes, that's much better.

Customer Service

2005-08-26T01:23:00.000-05:00

So I've been running through the info at SiteMeter and more and more hits on this page are coming from search engines. That's good, because it means a)I can put "Search Engine Optimization Skills" on my resume and b)random folks looking for a cycling blog could concievably find Cyclocosm.

However, lots of the search strings that land people here aren't specifically satiated by the information on this page. In an effort to increase return viewership, I will now attempt to address some of the recent searches I have recieved:

"orbea orca bike reviews" (google)
The Orca is a sweet bike. Feathery ride, super-stiff, especially around the bottom bracket. Slice-and-dice handling without the "chuck-you-over-the-bars" sensation of similarly quick bikes. I've logged about 40 miles (30 of them racing) on one, and dang, it's nice. I haven't reviewed it because I cannot afford it.

"highest hematocrit riis pantani" (google)
If it's a comparison, I gotta go with Riis on that one. I've heard now from several different sources that the famously bald Dane was known as "Mr. 60%" back before the UCI instated it's hematocrit limits. Anyone who's seen him simply abuse the peloton on the way up Sestriere in '96 will agree with me.

"nashbar jersey uncool" (google)
Whoa. You are totally wrong on that one. Nashbar is by far my favorite mail-order retailer, and a great alternative for anyone who's had a falling out with the local shop. Sure, their jersies aren't the most stylish, but if you rock one, people will be like "damn, that dude is secure." Trust me.

"road bike review Versailles lemond" (yahoo)
Have I ever used the word "Versailles" on this page? Obviously, this was a not a Google referral. Oh, and the bike is gonna be way laid back (unlike Lemond himself, who seems to be way agro these days).

"raphael palmiero steroids (MSN)
Dude, you searched with MSN? You deserved to land on this page.

"ritchey crankset" (dogpile)
That crank is so god-awful, coming here may have saved your life.

"cycling hour record" (yahoo)
Yeah, you'd have to get a search engine to find any news on the new hour record that was set this summer. The links I supplied no doubt referred him to what he was looking for. Chalk up another victory for the blogosphere and search engine optimization.