the human condition

On a horizontally challenged roommate:
YJJ: She doesn't like vegetables and only eats fruits, chicken, and turkey.
ME: That sounds pretty healthy to me.
YJJ: I had some blueberries and peaches that I needed to get rid of before this trip, so I offered them to her. She said that she only ate fruit in muffins or tarts.
ME: It all makes sense now.

YJJ: Last week, our apartment got hit by lightening.
YJJ: The only thing that got hit was the TiVo, which got fried. My roommate spent a whole day in front of the TV trying to reprogram it. It's my first time using TiVo, but apparently it records 20 hours on high quality.
YJJ: I was like, "That's pretty great." My roommate freaked out and told me that 20 hours was less than two days worth of TV watching for her. She told me to please use the lower quality option so she could get 80 hours.
ME: ...

A conversation with my physically young but old-at-heart friend who staunchfastly refuses to be labelled as a pessimist and insists on being called Uncle Sam at the tender age of 20. I'm afraid I can't do that, son.

PT: I just realized that you came to Austin after your sophmore year, right?
ME: Yes.
PT: Ah blast. Now I'm old and probably jaded like you too. This is miserable.
ME: Thanks for that lovely picture of myself. If it makes you feel any better, you were always old and slightly jaded.
PT: What?! Bollox.
I was young and filled with ambitious wonderment.
I was like that one song.
I was like yesterday in that beatles song.

PT: I'm trying to figure out if lunch with a co-worker might be kind of strange.
ME: Why?
PT: Well, I don't think I want to engage in small talk right now, but serious business may not reflect well on me. Er...as in talk about what's on my mind right now, which is pretty much politics and school and tie colors.
ME: tie colors?
PT: Yeah, that isn't really on my mind. But it's a cool line.

ME: Tell your mom I said hi.
PT: No, you can tell her yourself.
ME: I want to post some of this on my blog.
PT: Solid.
ME: My god, you sound like a cross between a beatle, king arthur, and a surfer dude.
PT: The crustacean?
Or the British rock group?
Are beatles crustacean?
ME: Um.
PT: Don't think so.

ME: I love how you bash the Olympics because I loved them.
PT: Yeah, the Olympics really bothered me this time around, like inordinately bothered me. Even when I wasn't thinking about them. I hardly watched any as a result. China sucks a nut.
ME: Dude.
PT: I really hope they forfeit the gymnastics gold.
ME: There's no way in hell they're going to forfeit the gold. Plus, no one really gives a crap anymore except you.
PT: ...and the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th place teams? It's just the temerity of it. The whole thing is just a propoganda fest. Sure, that's most Olympics.
ME: Well, yeah.
PT: But this is just egregious.
ME: that's the point.
PT: ...
ME: Or would you prefer something like Athens?
PT: Some place where the Olympics are less an end than a means. This competition just felt like let's make a big show, let's get golds and everything nice on paper.
ME: But it made people watch and appreciate sport. That I do admire the Chinese for.
PT: Seriously, without Michael Phelps, this would have been a sham. Michael Phelps made the Olympics. Him and basketball, I guess.
ME: Yeah.
PT: Michael Phelps got relegated to a pargraph on page 19 of Chinese newspapers.
ME: Well, the Chinese have huge issues with swimming. If it were up to them, they wouldn't even include swimming in the Olympics.
PT: Haha. Or any track aside from hurdles. And even then, they might have found some reason to cancel them.
ME: They'd just have diving, gymnastics, ping pong, and weight lifting.
PT: Weight lifting is just cruel. The way they go to farm villages, pick some plumpy girl out.
ME: You're such a purist.
PT: I'm telling you.
ME: Damn, I would have been picked if I were in China.
PT: I'm not jaded, I'm disappointed.
ME: I don't know why you keep on denying the fact that you're a pessimist.
PT: I'm not a pessimist! I think London is going to be cool.
ME: You appreciate minimalism.
PT: Already they're using the Olympics as an opportunity to uplift some of the slum areas.
ME: Don't worry. The Brits will be toned down.
PT: It's not just the ostentatiousness.
I love big, I love grand.
It's the callousness.
It's the brazen, we're host, so we can pull shit and you can sit down and shut up.
ME: But people didn't shut up.
PT: Yeah they did, the protesters?
ME: There were a lot of articles about the gymnasts and crap.
PT: That's horrific.
ME: It's China.
PT: News articles won't amount to anything. Indeed it is.
ME: How can you expect them to do anything different?
PT: I'm not a pessimist. Hah. Anyway, my mom's stomach grumbles.
ME: You should go. tell her I said HI. PLEASE?
PT: Sure, why not. Call me Uncle Sam in your blog.
ME: Ok.
PT: Deal. Shake and I'm out.
ME: Shake. Man hug. Shoulder slap.
PT: PELVIC THRUST!
gone