Running Commentary of Three Old Men

Three old men are sitting next to me in a coffee shop discussing life, politics and faith. One looks like my grandad in a crazy print hawaiian shirt and has an second generation ipad. One looks like Benjamin Button when he was born and is reading Zombie Economics. One is wearing a nice Ralph Lauren button-up with a aged baseball cap and has an old IBM laptop.

Benjamin Button just told the other two that if he was Catholic he would still be saying Hail Marys for voting for George Bush in 2004.

Baseball Cap just completed a monologue about Speaker Boehner, every time mispronouncing his name as "Boner."

Granddad just gestured towards Benjamin Button, "You know this guy has been drinking by himself. I worry about about people drinking by themselves, at home..." but before he could finish Benjamin Button jumps in, "Not at home, I go to Panera. I like the stuff they brew there."

Santa Barbara Solstice

A few weeks ago I spent my final weekend in Santa Barbara. I went up there to move the rest of my stuff out of my old apartment, help the guys clean, hopefully get the better portion of our security deposit back, and, in general, say goodbye. It just so happened that the weekend of our departure from Santa Barbara was the weekend of the Summer Solstice Parade.

The parade is in many ways, underwhelming. All of the floats are homemade. About an eighth of the parade is made up of groups with choreographed performances. The rest are a hodgepodge of people who just thought it would be cool to dress up and be in a parade, many of whom, we suspected, were hippies who live in the hills and have tons of spare strips of fabric.

This guy (above) is a great example of the home-made costume. He is a jellyfish, or more accurately, the tentacles of a jellyfish. He achieved this taping a couple hundred fake flowers to his body. The problem came when he was making the body of the jellyfish, which is a giant net filled with balloons attached to a hula hoop. He got halfway done filling up balloons with helium and thought "Forget it, I hate balloons now and am going to use trash bags."

The parade organizers (kind of like the IOC of Santa Barbara) tried to give this year's parade some type of cohesiveness with a theme. We couldn't quite figure what that theme was but my best guess is "Late 18th Century Jungle Where White People of Confused Religious Background Celebrate the Sun." 

It is by far the most pagan thing I have ever seen.

Giant half-a-watermelon float. Why not? Seriously though.

This guy. THIS GUY. He kept poking people with his giant stick and as if that were not enough, as if the green horns and orange feathers are not enough, those furry purple pants...

are not pants but ass-less chaps. He and his girlfriend had on purple fur ass-less chaps.

It ended with a giant inflatable watermelon with spikes, a tail and baby watermelon nipples. Inside were two aerial dancers who were dying of heat stroke and instead of dancing on the ropes, were just lying on the floor as two dozen people pushed this monster up State Street.

What a great afternoon.

GTBKOC: Henry Samueli School of Engineering

I am taking one course right now, CEE 150 Mechanics of Materials. It meets twice a week on Tuesday and Thursday between 5pm and 7pm. From my front door takes me about sixteen minutes to walk to class but I can cut that down to six minutes on my skateboard. Above is the "Engineering Gateway." Behind that is Engineering Quad, arguably one of the nicest sections of campus, albeit not one of coolest.

Donald Bren Hall is where my summer course meets and is my final destination. It is going fairly well too. With my new job I can only devote so much time to the class but I do seem to be keeping up.

Translation is the Art of Failure

Picture of the Day

What is the difference between these two books? They are both called Mechanics of Materials and both by some fellow named R.C. Hibbeler. If you were to say one is a dirty yellow and the other a steely blue, you would be right but that is not the answer I am looking for. If you were to say one is the 7th edition and the other is the 8th edition, you would also be right, but again that is not what I am looking for.

The difference between these two books is one hundred and thirty dollars.

I found out that it didn't matter which edition we had and that night came back, printed a return label for the 8th edition and ordered the 7th.

Story of the Day

I have two roommates. One named Rafa, from Spain, and the other named Shaowei, from Hong Kong. Recently Shaowei's wife received a visa to come to the United States and after one year of being married, long distance, they finally get to live in the same place.

I just happen to share that space. And this is my story.

Shaowei is a PhD candidate in advanced physics and as such, is in the lab almost all day. K_____, his wife, just got to the United States and has no occupation that I know of. From what I can tell she is their room all day and only comes out at meal times to make food (side note: have you ever seen Chinese bread?). I don't know what she does with her time but since I work from home, it is just the two of us in the apartment for most of the day. Still, I only see her at meal times.

Today, after my required eight hours of work. I had hardly moved from my desk and was in desperate need to stretch my legs. It was about 5:30PM and as such, K_____ was in the kitchen making dinner for herself and Shaowei.

As I was on my way out I stopped and said "Hi." The conversation that followed went like this:

K_: Hi John. Where are you going?

Me: I am going for a walk.

K_: Oh a wa... what?

Me: A WalK.

(Pause)

K_: Oh a walk.

          Have fun on your walk.

Me: Thank you I will. I like your dress by the way.

(she was wearing a summery dress with flowers and a lot of ruffles, it was a cute dress but this compliment was my first mistake)

K_: Oh. Sorry, what?

Me: I like your Dress.

K_: Sorry, I don't understand.

Me: Your Dress. What you are wearing. 

(I fan my hands out and pull them across my body)

Me: Your Dress.

(pause)

K_: Oh, I see.

              You like my chest.

Me: (crap)

GTBKOC: Palo Verde Graduate Housing

So it is nine o'clock and let's face it. I am not going anywhere else tonight. It is has been a long day. Full of eight hours of work and two hours of class.  Anyways, now seems like a good time to give you a tour of my current living situation.

So here it is! That is the door to my apartment. Inside are mysteries I'll save for a later date. In the meantime, there it is. That plant looks sad and dead and well, it is. Still, I like the austerity and it is something unique to stop me from entering the wrong apartment.

That is my building on the right. Our apartment is on the top floor and if you look carefully, between the branches you can the window to my room. You can't tell from this shot but I can actually see all the way to Costa Mesa from up there.

Palo Verde houses exclusively graduate students and their families but it is massive and, at the right angles, would have made Piranesi gasp.

Still, at other angles it is quite nice.

 

It even has its own garden area where willing residents can sign up for plots.

 

Also, I now live in the land of baby trees.

And here it is in all its splendor, adorning the very edge of UCI's campus.

This was fun, was it not?

ItsTtoBloggin: New Job!

The Richman Group Company Headquarters in Connecticut

Quite a bit has happened recently but I'll start with the most exciting news. I am employed again!

The Hamilton, a Richman Group development in New York

About two weeks ago I received an email from the Cornell AAP (Architecture Art and Planning) career services about a full time summer position working for a development company. I probably get an email from them about once a month with job opportunities but they are normally located in New York or Chicago. However, this job would be in Yorba Linda, California, or about halfway in between Irvine and Loma Linda. Convenient.

I whipped up a great cover letter and sent that off with my resume. A few hours later I had an interview lined up for the following Monday. The catch came on Sunday when I got a second email requesting that I bring a pro forma along with me. I had to look up what a pro forma was and even then, had to call my good friend Tanner to have him explain it to me.

I emailed back and explained that if they were looking for an analyst I don't have any experience as such. Luckily, they emailed back and said they were still interested in meeting.

The interview took place at a Starbucks in Yorba Linda. Even though the Richman Group has some ten billion dollars worth of real estate holdings, they do not yet have an office in California. Pam, the woman who was interviewing me, came out to California to start TRG Pacific Development (TRG stands for The Richman Group) three years ago and has been so busy with proposals and construction that finding an office hasn't been a priority until now. Anyways, the interview went great and a few days later I was hired!

 Not a Richman Group holding, "the Michelson"

I have been telling everyone this but, it turns out a Cornell connection is worth more than any actual experience or knowledge.

Oh and I work mostly from home, more on that later, but every once in a while I get to go out. Yesterday I attended a reception for the Urban Land Initiative on the roof garden of the newest and tallest building in Orange County.

Sky Garden on top of the Michelson, my apartment is right where the railing meets the far wall

Kari and I are engaged!

and I couldn't be happier.

I also am now living in Irvine, CA. I know, I know. This is a lot for one blog post. I just want to say that I am entering a new phase of my life (Engagement and Grad School Part II) and for those of you who still occasionally glance this way, I am planning on keeping up this blog as a way of sharing my new experiences. So, in the first stages, keep an eye out for two new types of posts: ItsTtoBloggin (It is Time to Blog Again) and GTBKOC (Get to Better Know Orange County).

Sunday Morning

So here I am again. Today I however I chose Santa Barbara Roasting Co, which used to be one of my favorites. It used to be one of my favorites because it is now overrun by the most peculiar people. It is an otherwise very enjoyable environment and they do have great coffee.

Yesterday was Westmont's Commencement. The Class of 2011 is leaving Westmont forever and this is significant because the Class of 2011 is the class of my residents from when I was a freshmen RA. I was entering my third year when they were entering their first. I was a senior when they were sophomores and I was in New York when they were juniors. I say this because yesterday was filled with das Unheimliche. I left for one year and returned to find that three had passed, just like a real life twin paradox.

Evan was working commencement so Matt and I rode up with him (to take advantage of his parking pass) but then were left to fend for ourselves. This is what Matt looks like:

I am very proud of all my S&Q men. Earlier in the week I stumbled across this year's yearbook and found that all of the guy senior standouts (full page bios) were from my section. I went, yearbook in hand, to anyone in the office who would listen and pointed this out. That is why I was not surprised that both of the awards given to outstanding seniors were given to guys from my section.

Dan Sargent (above) was given the Dean's Award, for superior academic achievement and significant contribution to an intercollegiate team. Dan has started for the soccer team since he was in my section. On top of that, Dan managed to graduate with 3.91 GPA. In the award, his coach was quoted saying that Dan was the best scholar athlete he has had in twenty years. He is going to graduate school at Columbia next year and still manages to be one of the most humble guys I know. When he first showed up at Westmont his suite mates learned of his high school exploits not from him, but from a facebook group people in his high school had started, devoted solely to him. Still not convinced of how awesome Dan is? What if I told you his middle name is Van Dam? No joke, his full name is Daniel Van Dam Sargent.

 Felix Huang was given the Kenneth Monroe award and had similar distinctions. He was student body president by the end of his sophomore year and things only got better from there. Felix lived in my suite when I was an RA. I witnessed how he would take the cares of all Westmont on his shoulder.

As strange as it was, I was very proud and it was great to see how far they had all come.

Saturday Morning

I don't mean to wake up early on the weekends but it always seems to happen anyways. Today however, instead of bringing a blanket out to the living room and reading or, more likely, playing video games, I was forced to shower and go out in search of breakfast elsewhere. We had a house guest in our living room and very few people have the same problem I do of sleeping in.

So I am at Starbucks. I set up my computer in a corner and have been sitting, stunned by the amount of people passing through. At any given point this morning every chair is filled, there are ten to fifteen people in line and a similar number standing at the bar, waiting for drinks. Granted, it is the morning of Westmont's graduation, it is still impressive the volume of customers.

The Adventures of Evan and John: Part II

Saturday:

The first thing we (mom, dad, Evan, and I) did on Saturday was drive out to Alpine for breakfast at Janet's cafe. I had a fruit, yogurt, and granola bowl that 10% yogurt, 7% granola, 80% fruit and 3% lettuce.

The second thing we did was search for nylon strapping to attach the new pool cover to the roller. We went to two hardware stores in Alpine and finally to Leslie's Pool Supply.

By this time it was around noon and we had nothing planned until dinner. Evan and I decided to go on an adventure downtown to the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCASD). We arrived at the downtown location, there is another branch in La Jolla, we discovered that there were only three exhibits open. Undeterred, we threw on our visitor stickers, a white, circular sticker with an obese orange 'x' in the middle, and made our way into the galleries.

Exhibit A - Video artist. Subject: North American southwest, post-pre-colonialism.
Walking into a darkened gallery, the first video a visitor is presented with depicts the artist, walking on all fours, wearing a coyote mask on the top of her head. Subsequent displays: artist in a field, artist in a rocking chair with a dog. All video footage of the artist is done against a changing backdrop, representative I guess, of the milieu of contemporary contradictions in the southwest.

Exhibit B - Mixed media sculptor. Subject: Itself.

Exhibit C - Video artist. Subject: Nuclear reactions and Madame Curie.

The whole experience took about twenty minutes. However, we still had time on our parking meter so we decided to walk around for a bit. A few blocks to the north and we stumbled upon an urban farmer's market running through little Italy. We strolled through and still had enough time to get back before the meter was up.

The afternoon was filled with poolside languor and the kind of movies that are only fit to watch in the afternoon. We concluded the night with burgers at Station Tavern in my new favorite part of San Diego, South Park.