Sarcasm: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Job Search

Almost exactly one month ago I applied for a job that I would have really liked to have. The position was for a junior accountant (I was an accounting major if you don't know) at this sweet gym/club place in the city! The place had it all, a gym, personal trainers, exercise rooms/classes, racquetball courts, a spa, a restaurant, and a bar! And it's location was conveniently near a train stop. I managed to get a phone interview for this position which went quite well, or at least I thought it went well. At the end of the conversation I was told that on site interviews would be held the following week and they would call me regarding these interviews. So I was excited about the prospect of having a chance to get a job at a company that focuses on athletics, something I am very much into. I also thought that this would be a great step toward potentially continuing my  track career since I would have access to such an excellent facility and maybe even move to a spot closer by to where all the action is.

I was looking forward to the phone call all weekend and waited with great anticipation for my phone to ring while I was at work. Monday passed and nothing happened. Then Tuesday passed and nothing happened. Then Wednesday came and I thought that surely this has to be the day, but still nothing happened. Thursday and Friday passed without any word and I thought that maybe there had been some unforeseen business that week that caused a delay, so maybe they'll get back to me the next week. Well now it's a month later and I still have heard nothing. I probably should have made an effort to get in contact with the company myself, but for some reason that thought didn't cross my mind at the time. The phone interview had gone so well that I really thought they were going to have me come down. Maybe they were just being nice to me and actually deleted all my information right after the interview. If that's the case, then I'd rather they just tell me they're not going to interview me. Or at least tell me that if I don't hear back from them by a certain date that they aren't interested.

Other than that I haven't really found or applied to any jobs that I would really like to have. The false hope from that one particular job was shitty. Since I've graduated, I've applied to 28 jobs and I've heard back from 3, so not much has changed in that department. I get random emails and phone calls every once in a while from recruiters and companies about positions that I don't want. That's right Aflac, stop sending me emails about sales positions, I don't want to do that. I still think there's something wrong with the structure of work and getting a job out of college. So many undeserving pricks get set up with good jobs out of college that in my opinion, they don't deserve. I'm going to stop right there though instead of going on a humongous rant about how much some f**kin people really piss me off.

I've been saying it for years now, either since high school or at the very least since freshman year of college, I want to be in a position where I can make people suck my dick if I want to. I'm finally out of the academic prison that is college, where it is very possible that the curriculum is a cell block (Thanks RATM! And of course Mr. de la Rocha!), and now it's time to do it the real way. Make like Jack Donaghy and work your way to the top.

Also, I would like to point out that I was wrong back in late January/early February. In that post I mentioned that senior year was trending to be the best year of college, but it was not. Far from it, actually. Besides some people I met that I really liked, senior year blew. Before you judge me for being a negative bastard, let me explain myself. I did not enjoy my living situation, actually, that almost sums it up perfectly. I don't mind the people I lived with, but I had very, very little in common with them. So going back to my house was nothing to look forward too. As a result I spent most of the time there unhappy. I was hoping that out of all that shit I would at least get a good job, but that still hasn't happened yet.

You know what I think is an interesting concept? No one needs a college degree to do anything, you only need one because that's the way society has decided to do things. What do you think came first, the doctor or education? The accountant or education? The business man or education? Go ahead and make your own (like the butt doctor and education). Maybe one day you'll have to go to school to learn how to breathe. Outside of all the education, practice, theory, and plain bull shit, I just think there is something more important. Also, who the f**ck are these people to tell me I'm not good enough to do the job? I'm going to think of them as Karim Garcia.




Don't get me wrong, I don't think that I'm better than everyone else, I know I'm better than everyone else. There's a difference. Serious: that statement was sarcastic. Sarcastic: the readers definitely knew that. End Elcor speak here. I think I'll just take this all in stride. Time for positiveness! I'm going to wait for that phone call, it's only been a month, maybe it will come tomorrow! I have far too many gripes with just about everything, but at least they're usually dealing with the same old shit. I'm just not satisfied yet...

10 Spot for the World Record

First and foremost, I would like to give a big up to Aries Merritt for breaking the world record in the 110 meter high hurdles this past Friday in Brussels! The guy ran a 12.80! Absolutely insane! Not to mention the fastest time in the event ever, in the history of anything. Merritt has garnered massive respek with me (unfortunately the word respek has been removed from the dictionary). A gold medal at the Olympics and a world record, what a way to end the 2012 outdoor season. I hope he continues to get better in the years to come, so exciting to think what he could do next! I want to see the indoor hurdle record fall!




I'm a big supporter of track, partly because of the lack of recognition the sport gets, but mainly because I'm a runner myself and the sport has done a wonderful amount for me in my life. Track has been one of those unexpected surprises in my life. I never thought that I would find success in the sport or that it would have such a large impact on my life. The lack of attention the sport gets is absolutely absurd though, and it bothers the piss out of me sometimes. As I mentioned in my post on Penultimate Round Pick (check out our sports blog here!), Sportscenter put Merritt's world record setting performance number 10 on its top ten plays. Those guy's kiddin'? The fact that they put Merritt's performance number 10 is going to bother me for some time, if not forever, it's just one of those things that pisses me off. I don't like to be a bitter asshole, but sometimes, actually all the time that I'm bitter is the direct result of other people's stupidity or things that I cannot control.

Most of the things that bother and piss me off are the small things. Maybe I shouldn't sweat the small stuff, but I do. However, Merritt's snubbing is not a small matter, the guy broke a world record for Joe's sake! The small stuff I'm referring to for example are things like the backspace button on the our former keyboards at work. Holy shit were those backspace buttons way too small! Whenever I made an error and went to hit the backspace key to remove it from existence I would miss and hit the other keys near it and make an even bigger mistake! Now I would have to hold down the tiny backspace button for even longer to correct my latest, larger f**k up. Thank Joe we got new equipment including keyboards that have proper size backspace keys. Maybe they used to make the backspace key smaller to encourage people to make fewer mistakes. Or so that they could make people suffer for making mistakes, those bastards! They probably killed Kenny, too.

Flies are another thing that are extremely annoying. I'm almost 100% positive that two flies landed on my shoulder that were doing it. They were definitely getting busy, I've never seen a fly on top of another doing scandalous things that I will not mention here. I love all of nature's creatures, that's why I love to kill 'em, but I couldn't this time. I could only merely shew them away. I also wish I could come up with my own funny phrases instead of stealing other people's great work. I do thank you, Monty Python. Now you probably expect me to say that I came to kick ass and chew bubble gum, but in fact I have not, but I do believe that we sleep while they live. Merging is another little thing that bothers me. I have probably already mentioned this about 4 times, but so many people are terrible at merging onto the highway.  Some people unnecessarily (I finally spelled that word right on the first try!) slow down when no one is coming, and sometimes even come to a complete stop! Although, I have to admit that getting on the highway from a dead stop is extremely fun! There are many complaints about driving, and even stopping, like how people don't know how to park.

I've actually strayed quite far away from the point that I was going to make, but I'm not surprised, this is where my scattered thoughts have lead me. I did mention my point earlier though. By nature I take life in stride and I'm generally happy and believe it or not, I think that most people are actually this way. But damn are there some things that just piss people off, and usually rightfully so. I'm not going to go into specifics and I'll just end there.

A great thing that's right around the corner is Fifa 13! I don't really play video games much anymore, but I can find some time to play the latest installment or a legendary franchise. Ultimate team is also one of the greatest sports video game innovations ever, too, so I will definitely want to do some of that. The Fifa 13 demo was just released today and I have to say that I liked the tuning they have done from the game play. The game actually made me realize that there is a difference among players, some actually seemed better than others in terms of controlling the ball. I think this will make for more balanced game play and make it less about pure pace. The defensive control was also much better, I could actually steal the ball away from high and low profile opposition!

This is one of my all time favorites! And I have Apple products.

I'm also excited because I was contacted by a former teammate of mine who is still running track now asking how I am doing if I have any plans on continuing my track career. He mentioned joining the club that he belongs to as a potential opportunity. I have mentioned that I don't think I'm quite done yet. I would like to have the chance to compete competitively while I still can and as of right now, I feel great physically! Enough about me, let's speak about you. Oh yeah, no one reads this, so never mind, I'll just continue going on and on about things that maybe two other people will read, three if I'm lucky. I think I lost one of my readers from all my social network bashing, but I'm straying away from that and I'll let her know. I'm going to focus on my take on certain experiences, completely biased views on sports, the occasional rant, and my stupid thoughts. When am I going to finish that post about life and Mario Party? I think I started that on December 5, 2011 or something. I was banging that shit out, but then I had to "study" for finals.

I just asked myself a question in my own blog. I'm going to end there, but I will leave you with this:

Damn, Grandma was Hot!

Online social networking currently holds my generation, and many others now, in an extremely tight brace. Most have a profile on Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Google+, Tumblr, and Pinterest (whatever that is), or some combination of the aforementioned. There's even a social networking site for "professionals," LinkedIn. With all these different mediums of social networking, I sometimes wonder how people decide which on to update. Do you update your status or post a tweet? Some people solve this problem by linking their Twitter account to their Facebook, so their tweet is essentially a status update. Ever since high school I have been growing up in the online social networking world and there are some interesting aspects to the development of social networks over that time period and what the future holds for them.

The first subject I want to address is Twitter. I don't like when people say that Twitter is stupid and unnecessary ( I don't like the word necessary either, why is it so hard to type?). I would actually go as far to say that Twitter was a brilliant idea. Twitter took one of the most popular features of online social networking, Facebook's status update, and built another social networking site out of it. Twitter is basically a series of status updates, no bullshit, just updates. Twitter can also be used as a great source for information about topics of personal interest, which is mainly what I use it for.

Hi friends!

 Twitter allows users to get information quickly and read more in depth if the user desires or can be used to see what your friends are up to, that is, if you have friends. Therefore, Twitter is not a stupid or bad idea, it just has a much simpler interface with less options. Recently Facebook went through another makeover and now is a "timeline" of users' lives. I think the Facebook people did this because they recognize that if the website didn't become something that encompassed users lives as a whole then the site would eventually lose popularity and end up like MySpace, a has been in the social networking world. However, increasing the longevity of social networking sites really makes me think about the role these sites will play in the future. Right now I would find it very strange if my grandmother had a Facebook profile, but in the future, if everything goes in Facebook's favor, grandmother's will have Facebook profiles. Imagine looking at pictures of your grandmother when she was in her teens and as a college student? You might sit there and think "damn, grandma was hot!" It's f**king weird. I don't know if it's a bad thing, but it sure is weird. There's another picture of grandma taking a shot of tequila. Oh, and here's a status update about her locking her keys in her room or something, one of those things that you should keep to yourself.

Now let's change perspectives, what about your grandfather? Here's your grandfather in college, he's participating in Edward 40-hands and there's a picture of him with the girl he was banging years before he met your mother. I really wonder what role social networks will have in the future. I could be wrong, but I honestly think social networks are going to create very different upbringings for the future generations. I don't think anyone's parents tell their children as much about their youth as social networks do. I realize there are privacy settings, but I'm not sold that these measures will keep future generations from looking back on their parents' youth. As a recent graduate of college I am well aware of the pictures that people post on Facebook and the information that is disclosed in social networking sites through posts and status updates. My main question and point of interest is how will online social networks be used in the future and what impact will that have on future generations? I don't know the answer to this question, nobody does, but I am sure interested to see what happens.

I've mentioned my dislike for social networks in the past admittedly in quite harsh words. However, my main grudge with social networking is its overuse. Social networking online is actually an incredibly great idea because it allows people to stay in touch through life even if distances get greater and greater (whether physical distance or friendships going in different directions). The overuse that I'm speaking of is quite simple, it involves pointless and meaningless status updates/tweets, too many pictures, and what I would call an addiction. The status part speaks for itself, I'm sure everyone has read statuses and tweets and thought "cool story, Hansel." So, I digress. If you are taking pictures of yourself in the mirror or just holding the camera out in front of you, there is a good chance you post too many pictures. I'm not singling out girls on this one either. Guys, I don't care about your new tattoo, I don't care where it is or what it says, so I don't need to see a picture of it. I could probably go on for another hour or so about pictures, but I'm not, I think you get the point. In general, people's addiction to online social networking is the main driver for the overuse. I actually have a difficult time blaming people for this, though, because most people like to interact with friends and the internet lets you do that at not so close distances. Also, some people are very social and speak a lot anyways, so it's really just their personality coming out. 

Random interjection, I just thought of another reason why Twitter is a great invention. When situations get awkward or you're at a party and you don't know what to do, many people pretend to look at their phone like they have something to do such as answer a text. Well, Twitter makes pulling this move off so much easier and better because you can actually amuse yourself by reading tweets rather than pretend to text no one. Maybe it is just about the same thing, but at least it's another excuse to look at your phone, which brings me to anther point. Isn't it funny how much people look at their phones now? I've been in situations where the person I'm eating with or just having a conversation with spends more time looking at their phone than at me. At least in these situations you can judge how important you are. But it really is amazing how much people look at their phones now. People are looking at them walking down the street, while they're eating, while they're taking a crap, while they're driving, and the list goes on and on. I think a lot of phone looking can be attributed to social media since it can be accessed from phones now. 

One of the things I dislike most about the overuse of social media is the "I saw that on Facebook Effect," that's what I'm going to call it. The "I saw it on Facebook Effect" can be used for Twitter, too, but Facebook definitely deserves to have its name in the official label. I'm sure we've all been in the situation where someone asks you if you know about something to which you or the person you are speaking with declares that they saw it on Facebook. That is the "I saw it on Facebook Effect." I think that online social networks have created some sort of transparency on our lives. People get too much information from sites like Facebook and Twitter. When I see my friends, especially those I haven't seen for a while, I like to have things to discuss with them. But if they post everything in their life on Facebook and I've seen it, then it makes conversation boring and stale. I like gleaning information from the source, from the person who actually wants to tell me something. Personally I've gotten away from checking Facebook very often, a process that I started probably about midway through sophomore year of college, so luckily I don't have to deal with the "I saw it on Facebook Effect" very often.

Well, let's see where online social networking goes. I'll sure be watching with great interest.

Paper Jam

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Machines: A Recipe for Success

Most portrayals of the future draw a dark, unfair, and bleak image of what society and the world will be. Maybe this is done for entertainment value, but maybe the use of technology and machines isn't a bad thing. Yes, technology and machines are taking jobs off the market, the opposite effect that politicians like to be associated with, but maybe eliminating jobs is the right direction. I don't know about you, but from my point of view, people would usually prefer to spend their time doing other things besides work. I might be wrong, but that's why vacation exists. What would be better than vacation all day, everyday? You might say you would get bored, but I beg to differ, because in a world where no one works, everybody needs something to do. Therefore, granted you have friends, you should find some people to do what you like, whether that be playing sports, acting, discussing books, getting drunk, getting high, satisfying your preversions, playing video games, watching movies, dancing, etc. However, you might ask yourself "how the f**k is that possible?" It's simple, we kill the Batman. Actually, no, we continue with the development of technology and machines until we, the people, are no longer necessary to perform any job whatsoever.

Once we hit the point where machines can carry on all the necessary tasks and duties that humans do, then we the people, no longer work and money is thrown out the window. You might ask yourself who's going to take care of the machines by performing maintenance and checking up on them in general. Again, it's simple, there are machines to check on the machines and machines to check on the machines that check on machines. In this model, machines run the world while people are free to do as they like. You can go to a restaurant and order food that is brought to you by a machine that was prepared by a machine and the ingredients were farmed and processed by a machine in a different department. In reality, this world would function exactly as the one we are in now, but there would be no currencies and machines would do all the work. This model works because machines do not crave monetary value like humans. Machines would work because that's what they are programmed to do.

All the machines should have personalities like WALL-E!

Of course people will quickly look to find flaws with this model, such as crime. These people will say that crime would become a huge issue, but I say nay. Crime would probably exist to some extent, but when there is no money, there is no monetary value. Everyone would have access to the same goods, same amenities, same weed. Why steal any of these things when you could just get it from a machine for no cost? Boom, problem solved again. On to the next problem, disease. People will keep fu*king so new people will continue to arrive and machines are immune to the common cold as well as diseases such as AIDS,  HIV, lime disease, other STDs, or malicious viruses carried by birds or mosquitoes. I realize machines can get computer viruses, but I don't know how they'll get them because people can't look at porn on the machines that would be serving us and there wouldn't be much of any incentive to load a virus onto any of them since money is not an issue. In the off chance that some deviant prevert does put a virus on a machine, then the machines responsible for maintenance work can take care of that.

While I do enjoy the tales told in various forms of entertainment such as The Terminator, The Matrix, I-Robot, 12 Monkeys, Dark City, 1984, and Brave New World, I do prefer to envision a futuristic world in which people can frolic in freedom doing whatever their hearts desire. No need for money or work, after all, the real reason people work is to obtain money. Leave work to the machines that people's hard work in science create so we can spend the rest of human existence having a good time.

This could be everyday!

 Well, that's my incredibly strange vision of what a sweet future would be like. This all came to me when I found out that the MBTA just introduced a new pay-for-parking system where people who park their cars at the station now pay a machine. I went on to jokingly ask if that was creating more jobs, at which point the aforementioned idea developed inside my small brain. In other completely unrelated news (I think I'm going to start referring to my thoughts as news on this blog), the Olympics came to an end yesterday and I was thinking about my favorite moments from the 2012 games. The first two things that came into my mind were Usain Bolt's continued domination, he has definitely achieved legendary status, and how delighted I was when two Americans took first and second in the 110 meter high hurdles. Both of these highlights stand out in my mind, but there was a third that I think will go unnoticed unfortunately, and that moment belongs to American 400 meter runner Tony McQuay.

The USA's second place finish to the Bahamas in the 4x400 relay has definitely overshadowed McQuay's absolutely beast third leg of the race. When McQuay got the baton he was trailing Bahama's third runner. McQuay hauled ass like crazy to take the lead and hand the baton off to the anchor leg, Angelo Taylor, in first place. I was hoping Angelo Taylor, a 400 meter hurdler, would be able to hold the lead, but the Bahama's anchor was able to overtake him. However, McQuay's split was something absolutely ridiculous, like a 43. something low! That's a boss leg and I think the guy should get some recognition for that. McQuay ran only 45.31 (I wish I could run anywhere near that because that's still really fast!) in the open 400 and didn't qualify for the final, but he sure did put it all together in the relay. His leg was one of my favorite parts of the Olympics this year and he deserves some major respect.

I'll get you the lead

McQuay is only 22 and I'm looking forward to following the rest of his career with great interest. You can count me in as a fan. I also cannot forget to mention that another one of my favorite people was in the news today, that would be Jose "The Special One" Mourinho. Man do I really like this guy! He knows how to win and he knows how to hit people where it hurts the most. I still enjoy thinking about the time that Arsenal coach Arsene Wenger took a shot at Mourinho. I don't recall exactly why he was calling out Mourinho, but I loved Mourinho's response, "Where are all his trophies?" No fooling around, right to the jugular. Anyways, with Mourinho's Real Madrid winning La Liga this past season, The Special One has now won the English Premier League, the Italian Serie A, and La Liga, not to mention the Portuguese League, too. He is the only coach to win those three leagues, arguably the three best leagues in the world. He then went on to say that maybe people should start calling him the "Only One." I need say no more. Click here for a short article about it.

That's all I have for now, but before I go, imagine a man that was a combination of Jose Mourinho and Jack Donaghy.

Discovering the Greatness: Limericks

After recently playing the game Quelf for the first time, I discovered just how incredibly great limericks are. Limericks are a type of poem, short and quick to the point, and of a comedic nature. They don't have to be funny, but for the most part limericks are jokes. When used in serious tones they tend to suck ass. A limerick consists of five lines that follow the rhyme pattern AABBA. Sometimes they follow an anapestic or amphibrachic meter, but I looked these up and don't really understand them, nor do I care to take the time to understand them. I decided to hell with those meters, I just want to have some fun with words. Also, the fact that limericks are sometimes referred to as nonsense makes them even more appealing to me. If you have read some of my posts then you know how random my thoughts are and how often they drift. I happen to think that my random thoughts are a great source for creating limericks of wonderful variety. They probably suck, but I'll let you judge that. All that matters to me is that I had a fantastic time coming up with these. So without further ado...

I know nothing of anapestic meter
But that should not make this poem teeter.
     Rather I'd like to create entertaining content
     Like imagining myself forcing sex without consent.
I hope to accomplish this goal like a relentless wife beater.

Yo, my name is Jack Bauer,
I possess a tremendous amount of power.
     Interrogating baddies is incredibly fun
     while I neutralize terrorist threats with only my gun.
And I did it all in just 24 hours.

There one was a man from Nantuckett,
He sat down on a spiky bucket.
    Excruciating pain shot down his spine,
    All his thoughts ran out of line
So he raised his hands and said "f**k it"

Zack de la Rocha sat smiling like the Joker
Contemplating his next political poster.
     Sifting through a pocket full of shells,
     His mind filling with loud yells
Until he pulled the trigger on his super soaker.

He has smiled in his life

There one was a man named Pat,
He had a lot of trouble with his fat.
     The folds of his rapidly expanding belly
     Produced odors oh so smelly
But no one could move him from where he sat.

Timmy went to the gym to get buff
In an effort to score all the muff.
     He lifted the bar with all his might
     But it collapsed on his chest without a fight.
Who knew getting a girl would be so tough?

I'm sure you've heard of this thing called religion.
It has people eating from its hand like pigeons.
     You have the freedom to choose what dogma to believe in,
     Or else risk being considered a heathen.
So tell me, what will be your decision?

John Terry isn't very kind to every race,
But he should be careful because he lacks their pace.
     Better go hide your wife
     Or else he's going to ruin your life.
Hard to say he's not a disgrace.

Alec Baldwin plays the best business man.
Anyone else should be considered a backup plan.
     Reaganing as Jack Donaghy on 30 Rock,
     Who wouldn't want to be in his socks?
I can honestly say I'm a big fan.

So there are some of my pathetic efforts to make limericks. Maybe I'll come up with more some other time, maybe I won't, but you can't say I never gave you any poetry on Sycophantic Laughter. On an unrelated note, I apologize to anyone who may have read any of my postings from June until around this point because some of them might have been somewhat depressing, pessimistic, and sort of unhappy. I think everyone goes through those types of phases in life, though. No need to fear though,  I'm clearly back as evidenced by my previous post about the Olympics where I mentioned things that irk me. And since I brought that up, let's talk about how South Africa's 4x400 relay team was allowed to get into the finals despite not even finishing half of the race. I'll tell you why this happened, because that guy they refer to as "Blade Runner," or "replicant" (as I like to refer to his not so human self), is on the team. That's all I'm going to say about that. The good news is that Usain Bolt has won both the 100m and 200m sprints for the second consecutive Olympics, a feat he stands alone to have accomplished. My favorite quote from the 2012 Olympics also belongs to Bolt who said "I'm here to cement my legend status." Well done, Usain, you have accomplished that goal.

I don't know how anyone can dislike Usain Bolt. He has become one of my favorite athletes since I first found out who he was during the 2008 Olympics. From his mannerisms to the way he speaks and how he dominates when he competes, I think he's likable guy. Maybe only Carl Lewis is the only one who's not a huge fan, but I think he's just envious of how good Mr. Bolt is. Bolt is a legend and he knows it, yet I don't think he flaunts his greatness in a disrespectful manner. He carries himself in a way I've never seen, he's definitely cocky, but only because he does know that he's the best. No one has run the 100m or 200m faster than him, so I think he has earned the right to celebrate the way he does and say that he is going to win.

I can't get enough of this guy!

I'm glad track has such an exciting and fun person. Every sport could use a Usain Bolt. He easily makes my list of favorite people. Maybe that's a good idea for a future post, I'll make a list of my favorite people, famous people that is. I am not getting into this with people I know personally, it would be like the MySpace top friends all over again. I'll begin doing some brainstorming on that topic, and maybe one day there will be a post about it that no one will read. Back to the Olympics, though. Since swimming has so many events, like I was referring to in the post before this one, I think that 100m walk like Bernie race should be included, along with other events such as the hot dog eating contest, tether ball (thanks 30 Rock!), and wiffle ball. There are probably some other events that should be added, too, but I don't feel like taking the time to think about that right now. Mainly the walk like Bernie race should be an Olympic event and why not, synchronized diving is already there.

I hope you enjoyed my terrible poetry, and no, beer pong should not be an Olympic sport nor would you win the gold medal.

Olympic Screams... See What I Did There?

I declare that it has been far too long since I've gone on a rant or bitched to a great extent about something. To remedy this I'll speak about the 2012 Olympics that are currently going on in London. When watching the Olympics I can't help but think about how many athletes will have their medals stripped years from now for testing positive for banned substances. The Olympics used to seem like such a big deal to me, but now that I'm older I honestly could care less about the overwhelming majority of the events that make up the Olympics. I'm biased, but I only care about the track events. While I like soccer, Olympic soccer is not allowed to be great because all the players have to be under 23, with 3 exceptions. That rule definitely doesn't exist just to keep the spotlight on the World Cup. Think about it, if all the players from a country were allowed to participate in the Olympics then how would that competition be any different from the World Cup? Not to sound like a total ass clown, but I belittle the Olympics with the exception of the track portion.

Another thing I think should not be used in Olympic competition are sports that are judged. I like competition that's straight forward. You know if a team or competitor won if they got to the finish line first or scored more points than the opponent. I don't like the subjective scoring of events like gymnastics. I'm not claiming that the judged sports aren't incredibly difficult, because they are, but who is to say if one person is better than someone else? I think there's far too much grey area here. One set of judges might determine three people to take gold, silver, and bronze while a different set of judges could possibly choose three other athletes. I just think it's way too subjective. And the point deductions, how the hell do they come up with those? There's probably some method that I don't care enough to look up, but no two people are going to screw up in the exact same way, there are unlimited possibilities.




I've also been very annoyed about all the talk surrounding "Blade Runner," or Oscar Pistorius. There has been great debate about him using prosthetic legs to compete in the Olympics. I side with the people who thinks he should NOT be allowed to complete. Mostly because I'm an asshole, but more because he IS getting an unfair advantage. Some moron on the radio said he wasn't getting an advantage because he didn't win anything, he only made it to the semifinal. So does that mean it's ok to use performance enhancing drugs as long as you don't actually win anything? I call bullshit, he does get an unfair advantage. You want to know why? Take those prosthetic legs away from him and then let's see if he can qualify for the Olympics. I'm not an expert in anything, but I'm rather certain he would not make it. If you don't have legs, then you can't run. It's as simple as that. I have nothing against the guy, I'm glad he makes the effort to be an incredible athlete, but it's just not fair. Why not just use science to make the best athletes possible then? And by the way, Blade Runner is not a complement. However, Pistorius should be nicknamed "Replicant," not Blade Runner. Blade Runners are normal people, to the best of my knowledge, and in the movie Blade Runner they are hunting down Replicants, which are bio engineered or biorobitic beings. Meaning that these replicants are not all human, a people enhanced by science. If that's fair, then anyone competing in the Olympics should be allowed to use steroids or HGH.

Also, can I point out how poorly NBC has planned to broadcast some interesting events? As a track runner I'm very interested in the running events, but unless I watch them live on the computer, because apparently I can't watch them live on t.v., then I have to wait until nearly midnight to watch some great races. I wouldn't mind this so much if they were on near midnight on Fridays and Saturdays, but NBC is using this scheduling program on Sundays and Mondays. Hell they'll probably do it all week. What they do is start coverage at about 7 or 8 p.m. and show an interview with Michael Phelps that had already been aired. Speaking of Phelps, my Joe do they like to stroke his dong. I'm not done with Phelps, he's the subject of my next paragraph. So they start coverage at about 7 or 8 and have interviews and stories I could care less about. Then they show like diving or some event that I could also care less about. I want to see the men's 100m final! Oh wait, I can't because I want to go to bed so I can get a decent amount of sleep. Joe damn it NBC, you should have let Jack Donaghey do the television scheduling for the Olympics.

It's because I'm a replicant isn't it?

So back to Phelps now. Like Pistorius, I have nothing against Phelps. He is a tremendous athlete competing within the limits of his sport, swimming. I'm not going to argue that he isn't the greatest swimmer of all time, but I don't like when he's referred to as the greatest Olympian of all time. Yes, he does have a tremendous amount of medals, I think 18 gold, which is absolutely absurd. However, I think you have to be a swimmer to garner that many medals. I can't think of any other sport where an athlete would be able to get so many medals. Then you look at sports like soccer and basketball. These sports have a tournament system in the Olympics and there are only 3 medals for the entire tournament! I also would not include track and field as a sport where you can win that many medals. The only way I think that would be possible is if they made more events, like having the 100m sprint as normal, the 100m sprint backwards, the 100m  wheelbarrow race, the 100m skip, and so on. Only then would a runner have a chance to capture so many medals. I think the nature of the swimming sport allows there to be far more medals that are reachable by the same athlete. Not to take anything away from what Phelps, or any other swimmer has accomplished, because they are great athletes, especially Phelps.

Writing this post was incredibly fun. There's something about ranting and/or writing posts in an angry fashion, they just come out so smoothly. There you have it, some of my views on the Olympics, take them or leave them, I'm apathetic so it doesn't bother me.

We could have organized this better

Working Thoughts

Serving as the low man at work, with little experience, I am handed all the menial, mundane tasks that don't warrant anyone else's time or that no one else wants to do. When performing mindless, or at least mostly mindless, work, I have plenty of time to think. My mind drifts to various different topics, sometimes even amassing to somewhat complete thoughts. I at least try to amuse myself and I've been thinking about how I could be a devious scumbag/little asshole. For the last few days I've felt like Enron's auditor given the number of documents I have shredded. Except that I'm shredding documents to comply with law, which states that documents containing social security numbers cannot simply get placed in the trash, these documents must be shredded. How could a devious scumbag turn this operation in their favor? Well, that's quite easy. If I wanted to be a huge clown and scumbag I could take the social security numbers and sell them to identity thieves! I bet I could actually make a decent amount of money doing that. Of course I would never do that, but it sure makes for an entertaining thought. I would also probably get caught and face multiple life sentences in jail or one 200 year sentence, because either of those are definitely possible to serve to the fullest extent.

Continued efforts to keep from getting bored out of my mind at work also have me thinking of alter egos. If I had an alter ego I would definitely choose the personality of a person who thinks everything is a government conspiracy. I wouldn't act any differently than I do, but I would be suspicious of everything. Dinosaur bones, they were planted beneath the Earth's surface to make people think that dinosaurs once existed. Natural disasters, the government controls those, too, and that's why the Patriots won the Superbowl following the 9/11 (sorry Brady tuck rule, the government was behind the victory) attacks and why the New Orleans Saints won the Superbowl after Hurricane Katrina. The over-hyping of sports is a government conspiracy to give the people a false sense of togetherness within the nation, but also pits fans of different teams against one another to distract them from what's actually going on in the country. The government doesn't help the poor so the middle class continues to work to avoid the same fate. I think it would be funny to have a conspiracy theory for everything that happens in the country and world, someone must be behind everything...

If you haven't noticed by now, or read Chase's latest post, you'll know that most of my posts are incredibly random. This is a result of my extremely fragmented thought process, I think about a lot of different things, but only to a limited extent. In other words, I think about a large variety of things in little depth. So that's why the topic is changing so quickly again, however I am going back to writing about work. I really enjoyed writing about my experiences working at a minimum wage job last summer, if you haven't seen these and have any interest then just click on the "Summer Job Chronicles" tab to the right. Unfortunately I did not cover many great experiences since I did not have this blog until about midway through junior year of college, which gave me only one summer sample size to cover my minimum wage job. One of my favorite parts of that job at the movie theater was all the contact with the general public. The general public always makes me laugh for various different reasons.

One of my favorite interactions with the general public occurred before the existence of this blog during the summer of 2009 I believe, right before I began sophomore year of college. I was working the door, which means I was ripping tickets and telling people where to go. Usually people didn't listen to me and then I would see them walking around the lobby unable to find the correct theater despite the huge numbers on the doors, one of which matched the number on their ticket. But this one guy came in and gave me his ticket. I ripped it and was about to give it back and tell him where to go when he looked at me expressionless and said "this looks like a hard job." I was caught off guard by that, but later realized the hilarity of the statement. I definitely couldn't do whatever that guy did for a living! The best part about it is that is my type of humor exactly, sarcastic remarks. The guy's face and delivery were dead on, like Alec Baldwin's performances as Jack Donaghy, simply flawless. That's what I miss from that job, but I got lucky today when I got to deal with a truck driver who was delivering something to the company.

While we were waiting for the confirmation that the cargo could be delivered, the truck driver started asking me if I drank milk and if I had ever been to an animal farm or something like that. Then he started asking me if I ever thought about how everything we eat gets shit on. He used fish in the sea as an example because they shit in the water they live in. I was having such a good time listening to the guy that I was disappointed when he had to go continue to the next stage of the delivery. But before that he got one last good remark in. He told me he wished he had brought his phone in with him because he had this funny picture. The picture was of a "colored" boy saying to a white adult, "wow, you have so much clean water that you even shit in it."

I really enjoyed speaking with that truck driver, he was a funny dude. I also really enjoy listening to people who have unique things to say and are adamant about they are right. I don't know if everything we eat is really shit on, but it was sure a good time listening to this guy tell me that was true. Annnnd we're going to switch gears again, but you shouldn't be surprised. I finally saw The Dark Knight Rises, and as a huge fan of Batman, he's only my favorite hero of all time, I was surprised by the ending of the film. The ending was not bad by any stretch, but it was quite elaborate in my opinion. I liked the movie, though I still think The Dark Knight was the best of the series, but then again, that movie was simply amazing. The Dark Knight is definitely one of my all time favorite movies. I'll tell you my biggest complaint with The Dark Knight Rises, but I warn you, if you haven't seen it, this could be a SPOILER, so consider yourself warned. So on we go. My biggest complaint was the actress they chose to play Talia Al Ghul. The person they chose does not look like the person that could (here's what might be a spoiler) make that leap of fate in that jail place. Not only that, but she wasn't the sexy, sophisticated symbol I really like from Batman the Animated Series. The only other complaint I have is that Bane didn't have his sweet accent from the Animated Series either. Given those two somewhat minor details are my gripes with the movie, it was good. However, I do see Chase's side as well, at least in one way. I can understand if people think that Christopher Nolan (the director, in case you didn't know) sacrificed some of the Batman lore for the sake of the story that he wanted to tell. I understand if people did not like that Bane was not his traditional jacked up on venom self, but I really wanted the accent.



The Dark Knight Rises was an enjoyable experience to me. One of the best signs of this was that I didn't feel like I had been sitting in the theater for three hours when the movie was over, but I had. Oh yeah, I also got in for free because some of my friends/former coworkers were working! In general, I have to say that since I have started working I've been so much happier. I have things to do during the day, like work, and then on the weekends and some nights I go do things with friends. So far this routine is working out very well and I'm still able to meet my insatiable desire to stay in good physical shape. I don't know if I'm done with you yet, track. I'm going to keep this post short because I should probably go to bed soon, remember that means watch 30 Rock on Netflix, or Arrested Development because that show is great, too. I'll post more crap in the near future, so hope you read and enjoy it! But first, this is the Talia I wanted in the movie. And by one last thing I mean two. Listen to Foster the People's album, it is fantastic and I cannot stop listening to it.

And So It Begins

Normally only a few occurrences prevent posting: I'm busy, severe apathy,  I don't have anything to bitch about. I think that's an accurate list, and this time I've been busy. Also, only about ten days have gone by since the last post, that is not extremely long, but I've been preoccupied with a job and an excellent weekend. I have acquired a temporary position, in an accounting role, to gain some much needed experience. Each day that passes I pick up a little more responsibility and more independence. All the people at work are nice and I really like that they trust me despite my very short time with the company. However, I'm glad that this position is temporary because it's in a rural area and I would like to work permanently in an area that I wouldn't describe as a wasteland for young adults. I do like the area of the state where I've spent the last twelve years (wow, it has really been that long, that's the longest I have lived anywhere ever!) of my life, but I don't think it is a place to go through the prime of a young adult's life. Ideally I would like to work in or around a city and get an apartment or something with friends. That way we could work during the day and go do things and meet people at night and on weekends. Over the past three summers I have noticed the great decline in things to do in my hometown, honestly it's a boring place for people in their twenties. Recently I've been contemplating the future quite often given the events that have taken place in my life just in the past couple months. Most of these thoughts dwell on a career because that is the next step in defining my life, at least I think it is at least.

While I don't know exactly what I want to do with my career at this point, I do know how I would like to carry it out. My interest in people extends beyond individuals' idiosyncrasies, stretching to how certain groups of people act. In this case I'm looking at the world of business pertaining to my career. I realize at this point I have to start at the bottom and work my way up because I'm not a genius and I won't have any power simply handed to me. I'm at the beginning, but one day I would like a position of power. I just think it would be amazing to conduct business like Jack Donaghy, the Vice President of East Coast Television and Microwave Oven Programming for General Electric on the fantastic television show 30 Rock. The following video sums up why I would absolutely enjoy the stature of a Jack Donaghy position.




Spoken like a true elitist businessman. I enjoy the modern portrayal of bosses in media because I think these portrayals are more accurate than most people would believe. I commend Tina Fey for creating the masterpiece that is 30 Rock, but there must have been some inspiration for the Donaghy character, and the rest of the characters on the show. Donaghy is the boss man who is all about business, who will do anything to succeed and has his sights set on the CEO position. I think aspiring business professionals can learn a lot from him, so take note.




If you haven't seen 30 Rock, then I recommend giving it a view, preferably from the beginning since the show has good continuity and builds well off the characters if you watch it in order. I just absolutely enjoy the what I will refer to as the "Jack Donaghy Approach." He's in charge, he knows it, and he gets things to work while utilizing unconventional measures. Just a side note, I think anyone making a movie with business people in it should cast Alec Baldwin as the main business man because he is superb at that role. There is no one better. Anther great portrayal of a boss in entertainment is Less Grossman in Tropic Thunder, one of my favorite movies, pure comedic genius. I don't understand why so many people say Ben Stiller's movies are terrible. Zoolander and Tropic Thunder, both Ben Stiller films, are two of my favorite movies and Meet the Parents is damn good, too. I couldn't stop laughing when I saw Tropic Thunder in the theater with my friends, probably the best movie going experience of my life. The summer of 2008 was such a good summer for moives with Tropic Thunder, The Dark Knight, and WALL-E. If you haven't seen WALL-E, then go see it now!

Back to my point, though. Less Grossman, played by Tom Cruise, in Tropic Thunder is another boss man that people in charge should aspire to. He's such a dick, but he does his job with authority and power. And trust me, a nutless monkey could not do his job. While I will probably never be a Less Grossman, maybe even for the better, or a Jack Donaghy, I'm still young so why not aspire to obtain a powerful position. But seriously, I think people can learn a lot from watching business unfold on the television through 30 Rock and in motion pictures such as Tropic Thunder. While both are comedies, the majority of what I watch, there is truth in them.

Besides attaining boss-level status, there are some jobs that would be great to have. A really cool job would be working for the CIA. The appeal of working for the CIA, or any secretive intelligence agency, is the secret nature of the work. I wouldn't have to talk to people about my job because that could jeopardize everything! The even better part is that no one would really know what I do, so I would always have this secret aura about me, no one would really know what I am up to. They should also make a new position that eliminates bad drivers, I think I would be good at that one. All you would need is James Bond's car, one with lots and lots of fire power. Then when you see a bad driver, you eliminate them. The subjectivity involved really appeals to me. Unfortunately this job will never exist because it would disturb many people...

So, yeah, this is the beginning of my career. My career isn't much of anything now, but I'll make an attempt to document my path on this blog. I haven't thought about how long I'll keep this blog going and I'm not going to think about that now. I'll blog until I don't want to anymore. Keep it nice and simple. I'm very happy with the development of the summer. Unfortunately the summer started very lame and disappointing, with the exception of the family vacation we took out west to see my sister and her boyfriend. Other than that I was unhappy for a few different reasons and I felt useless with no job and the lack of anything to do. I miss the days when people would actually do things. I'm still waiting to responses to texts from a month ago and I find it very challenging to get anyone to do anything. However, I have a job now and this past weekend was great!

I spent practically the whole weekend with some friends; Chase and I had a good race, too! We'll have to do that again when we're both in running attire, but I hope he enjoyed his head start! And while I'm writing about Chase, I still want a copy of that limerick I wrote for Quelf, buddy. Chase, one other friend, and I managed to get ourselves involved in a pickup soccer game with Hispanics on Sunday to cap off a wonderful weekend where I scored the first goal, assisted by Chase! There's something about soccer that captivates me. I don't regret my decision to not play soccer in high school, thus ending my soccer career, because I just didn't want to at the time. I lost my enjoyment for the game until I went to college and met Seanahue, who rekindled my strong liking for the sport. I've played intramural soccer and some random pickup games, but I've yet to explore my full potential in the sport. I've always been involved in the sport for fun, so I've never tried giving it my absolute all. I hope to have the chance to do that someday, just to see if any good at the game I enjoy so much.



One thing I really like about soccer is the unpredictability involved in the sport. You can do what you like with and without the ball, allowing each player to have a certain freestyle to their game. No one plays soccer the same as anyone else. That's one thing I dislike about track, the sport I'm involved in. Once the gun goes off you attempt to get to the finish line before everyone else. I'm fine with that, track is a great sport, but there's no unpredictability there. Everyone knows what you are going to do, or try to do, it doesn't always work out, cue my last high hurdle race in college. Whereas in soccer you can use your body to fake out opponents and hone your dribbling skills to avoid losing the ball. I just like unpredictability, it gives players the chance to use creativity to beat opponents (watch videos of Ronaldinho at Barcelona to see what I mean). Or you could be like Il Fenomeno and haul ass at opponents daring them to stop you. I just love the way he played.

Now that I've completely changed directions, I will digress. I'm extremely tired right now, I felt like going to sleep at the desk at work this morning. So I'm going to go to bed, and by that I mean watch 30 Rock on Netflix. Going to bed and watching Netflix are synonymous. Now there's just one more thing to settle in my life.... besides finding a sweet job that is. One last thing before I sign off: don't ever bad mouth synergy.

The Many Names of Toninho

Reading Chase's Interactions with People post made me remember how much I didn't like him when I first met him, but not really. Having known him for the past five and a half years or so, I enjoyed reading about some of his awkward interactions, after all, awkwardness makes for some good stories. What I really found entertaining was the mention of his former place of employment, Market Basket (The MB). When I was looking for a summer job a few years ago, the MB was the place that all my friends told me to avoid at all costs. So I did and it worked out well for me because the MB is a silly place. I was in the MB with JQ and Clydesdale Johannis (another good friend of mine who is currently employed by the MB, though he was not working at this particular instance) at the beginning of the summer. We went in to purchase a gallon of water at the tantalizing low MB price of one half dollar, or fifty cents, or $0.50. Still in the aisle, JQ and Clydesdale began tossing the gallon of water back and forth. I stood and watched. Clydesdale dropped one of the return tosses and the container hit the floor and broke open, thus getting the gallon of water all over the aisle. Some random kid was walking by the aisle when it happened and assured us he would get help, but the way he said it you would think a somewhat severe emergency need taking care of.

We weren't about to wait for that random kid, so we summoned a nearby MB employee who told us he would take care of the spill. So we walked back down the aisle and picked up another gallon of water to replace the now broken and empty one. What happened next I thought, and still think, was very funny. The MB employee who told us he would take care of the incident came to the aisle with a mop and bucket. He proceeded to clean up the water spill with more water. Maybe it's just me, but isn't that exacerbating the problem? There's a water spill on the floor, so let's put more water there and increase the slipping hazard! He probably put one of those "piso mojado" signs in the aisle afterward, too, but I didn't think to check. Couldn't they have just put one of those signs there in the first place? But that's the MB, I'm glad I took the advice all those years ago.

Mention of the MB just reminded me of the wet floor debacle. Chase's post focused on the awkward interactions he has had with various people and I'm going to play off of that idea. I'm not going to take his idea and reflect on my awkward situations, rather I will discuss my ability to keep a straight face. Generally I can keep a straight face even if I'm saying something that is either completely untrue or partially untrue. If you know me too well then I probably won't be able to get away with it, but I like to have a little fun sometimes. To present my point I will take you back to the summer between freshman and sophomore year of college, one of my all time favorite summers! At this point my whole direct family, with the exception of me, were living in California. My friends knew this, but only the friends I hung out with and talked to all the time knew my living situation for the summer. One day we went down to a local field to have some sporting fun. One of my friends, I'll call him Jimbo, was there. Jimbo was a friend of mine, but I only saw/spoke with him on occasion. He asked me where I was living for the summer. I guess I was in the mood to have a little fun so I lied about it. Now here's the key, I told him something absolutely unbelievable, that I was living in a cardboard box. Now obviously that's not true. So I shook it off and told him smoothly that I was just kidding, I'm living in my car. He just looked at me, I don't remember exactly what he said, but the whole situation greatly amused me. I don't know if he really believed me, but eventually I told him that I was living at my grandma's house for the summer. I actually lived there for that summer and the majority of the next, what an experience that was. Maybe another potential blogging topic, but who knows. I should have seen how long I could keep the "I'm living in my car" joke going. I call it a joke, but I guess some people would call it a lie.

Actually, when I come to think of it, I probably pulled off an even better one senior year of high school when I told two of my friends that I was gay. I already recounted that story on our largely unsuccessful conjoined friend blog, Retentive Gibberish (I didn't think I would ever mention that again), but feel free to read the story by clicking here. The short version goes like this. Senior year of high school I had gym class with two friends, Chase was one of them, and the rest of the class was vastly Puerto Ricans. So the three of us usually had sweet conversations during class. One gym class we were talking about girlfriends, actually it was mainly the other two, I was mostly listening at the time. Then they asked me if I had ever had a girlfriend to which I replied, "Nah, I'm pretty gay." The presentation was flawless, Chase can back me up on this, too. I let it sink in for a few moments before I laughed and told them I was just kidding. I really should see what happens if I carry out something like this, see how far I can go with it. I'll have to get presented with the right opportunity, but maybe one day. Sometimes when I tell people the truth, but the answer wasn't what they expected, they aren't sure if I'm joking or not. I've had extensive experience with those types of situations.

This should have been my next play

I even got to put my straight-facing skill to use in school! Sophomore year of college my marketing group and I were making a commercial for a project we were doing on AT&T. For some reason when we wrote the script for it we decided to make it one huge sexual innuendo. I have no idea why we stuck with that idea either. I cannot recall exactly the content of the commercial, but there we had two roles, one was an AT&T person, or at least someone who was an AT&T customer who was recommending signing up with AT&T. The other was the person who had the issue, which was related to phones in some way, but we made it seem like this guy had erectile dysfunction. I was nominated to play the latter role because the group thought I could keep a straight face saying the lines. So I accepted and we made that commercial. I really wish I had a copy of it for viewing pleasure. I still remember when we showed the commercial in class, the class and the professor definitely recognized what we did there, and the professor was smirking. What a great year sophomore year was.

Going back to Retentive Gibberish to find the post I wrote about a great day in gym class back in high school made me curious. I haven't looked at Retentive Gibberish since last December when I finished the article about getting to know me, Toninho, better. That was an excellent post idea, all credit given to Chase who had the idea and penned the questions for me to answer. I went on to peruse Retentive Gibberish since it has been months and I came across Chase's article about his name. Now it's my turn, why I use the name Toninho on blogger. My name is Anthony and I've typically gone by this name throughout the course of my life. When I was a little guy growing up I still went by Anthony because of my dad. My father's name is Antonio, so he was always Tony. Two Tonys in the same house all the time could cause some confusion (Is your name not Tony? That's going to cause some confusion). But as I have gotten older I have come to know people from different activities, situations, etc. I find it interesting and amusing that you can probably accurately guess how people know me just by the name they use for me.

I almost always introduce myself as Anthony, but not everyone calls me that. The people that call me Anthony are people I know from the collegiate track team I was on, coworkers, and adults for the most part. High school was when some of my closer friends started calling me Tony, which I have no problem with. Junior year of high school, my English teacher (another of my favorite teachers of all time), gave me the nickname A-Train. He came up with the name because he didn't like the nickname of T-Bone that one of my other friends in the class gave to me. Only an exclusive group of people refer to me as the A-Train, including the man who came up with it and a very small group of other people. Or you could be like Chase and call me the Gay-Train. I liked making the horrible joke that the nickname A-Train made sense because I was on track (get it, on the track team!).




Through the high school track team, our upper class teammates began calling me by my last name. This stuck and to this day people who I ran track with in high school, or that I met through people I knew on the track team, call me by my last name. I distinctly remember one day at work a few years ago when one of my former teammates came in and called me by my last name. After they continued on with their business my coworker looked at me and said "what did they just call you?" So if someone calls me by my last name, you would probably be right if you guessed that I ran track with them in high school. Most of my friends from college, except for my track team friends, call me Tony. So depending on where I am and/or who I'm with I get called Anthony, Tony, or A-Train. I have gotten accustomed to responding to all three. I think it's kind of funny that you can usually accurately tell how I know someone just by the name they use for me.

I chose the name Toninho as an alias for this blog mainly thanks to Seanahue. When Seanahue was signing our intramural soccer team up Sophomore year of college, he entered my name on the roster as Tondinho. My favorite soccer player of all time is Ronaldo, formerly known as Ronaldinho (before the Ronaldinho that played for Barcelona in the mid 2000s), which stands for little Ronaldo because he was very young when he was coming up the ranks in soccer. I took out the "d" since there is no "d" in Tony like there is in Ronaldo, but I did like the name and it also makes sense for me. I'm technically "Little Tony" and I really like Brazilian soccer players. So intramural soccer and Seanahue deserve the credit for the name Toninho. Maybe people will start calling me that, making four different names for me. Only time will tell.

Since Retentive Gibberish has, for the most part, died (it's mostly dead, I got the diagnosis), there's one more thing I'm going to share from that blog: my two rules of success.

Two Rules of Success

1. Never tell everything you know
2.