Name:Jonathan Country:United States State:Texas Metro:Arlington Gender:Male
Interests:If interests are defined as "topics I most frequently get into conversations about", then I would have to include politics, random observations, sports, movies, history, music, strange people I run across at work, theology, and Christianity, though not necessarily in that order. Expertise:Overanalyzing things. Remembering random and (mostly) insignificant facts, figures, names and events. Winning trivia games. Engaging in political discussion. Being a big brother. Recommending music to people that they almost always like. Going on all kinds of tangents during conversations. Filling out "about me" sections on blogs (ok, I made that one up).
1602 - Bartholomew Gosnold becomes the first European to see Cape Cod.
1756 - England declares war on France, which begins the French and Indian War.
1800 - England's King George III is the target of an assassination attempt, but he survives.
1817 - The United States' first private mental health hospital opens in Philadelphia.
1862 - President Abraham Lincoln signs a bill creating what would become the Department of Agriculture. 146 years later, Congress marks this anniversary by passing a pork-riddled and hideously expensive vote-buying series of measures disguised as a farm bill.
1905 - Las Vegas, Nevada is founded.
1911 - The U.S. Supreme Court declares Standard Oil to be a monopoly in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act and orders that the company be broken up.
1940 - McDonald's opens its first restaurant in San Bernadino, California.
1941 - Joe DiMaggio gets a base hit, beginning what would become a record 56 game hitting streak.
But most importantly...
1971 - Tommy Wells and Sue Green get married in Brownwood, Texas shortly after completing their studies at Howard Payne College. In the 80s they have 3 children: Jonathan, David, and Sarah. In 2006 they gained a son-in-law when they gave Sarah to be married to Daniel Warren. Today they celebrate their 37th anniversary. Happy Anniversary, Mom and Dad!
List of the Week: my favorite Sufjan Stevens videos
I'm all about lists, so here's one that combines two things I spend a lot of time doing: listening to Sufjan Stevens songs, and watching videos on YouTube. I've found my top ten favorite Sufjan videos and listed them here, but it wouldn't be one of my lists without some honorable mentions, so there's a few of those tacked on at the end in random order.
1. The Transfiguration
2. Majesty Snowbird
3. He Woke Me Up Again
4. The Lord God Bird Note: Sufjan precedes the song with a brief description of the title bird, although the story apparently is different every time he plays the song.
5. That Was the Worst Christmas Ever! Note: Sufjan spends the last bit of the song throwing inflated Santas into the crowd.
6. Concerning the UFO Sighting Near Highland, Illinios / The Black Hawk War... Note: Here he plays the first two tracks from his Illinois album, with one seguing into the other.
7. Chicago Note: Sufjan spends the first couple minutes awkwardly thanking the crowd and his band before they launch into a rousing version of the song at the around the 2:03 mark.
8. All the Trees of the Field Will Clap Their Hands Note: The video starts a few seconds into the song but doesn't miss anything major.
9. The Predatory Wasp Of The Palisades Is Out To Get Us!
10. For the Widows in Paradise, For the Fatherless in Ypsilanti
Honorable Mention
Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing Note: This is a traditional hymn that Sufjan and a friend played in New York a few years before he was a household name in the indie music world. He later released a recorded version of the song on his Songs for Christmas album in 2006.
The Tallest Man, The Broadest Shoulders
Casimir Pulaski Day
The Man of Metropolis Steals Our Hearts Note: Sufjan precedes the performance with a brief discussion about the tour's name and about Superman. His band plays the Superman theme before seguing into the song, while Sufjan throws inflatable Supermans into the crowd.
Detroit, Lift Up Your Weary Head! (Rebuild! Restore! Reconsider!)
I slept in my own bed at home each of the last two nights. I haven't done that in forever, and I'd forgotten how comfortable it was. There wasn't anything at home that I wanted for my breakfast this morning, so I got a breakfast croissant from Burger King, and stopped by Brookshire's on the way to get mom a rose for Mother's Day. This is the 26th Mother's Day of my lifetime and my mom has been there for all of them, but this was my first without a grandmother.
We drove down to Dublin this morning and went to the church service at my grandmother's old church. I've been there over a hundred times, but this was the first time I've gone since my grandmother's funeral in December. It was strange sitting in a spot we've never sat in, and not seeing Mimmaw on her normal row on the right side of the congregation. I got very tired during the sermon, which was about the power of the tongue. As far as sermons by that pastor go, it wasn't much better or much worse than his usual.
After church we drove up the road to the old family house, which was originally built by I believe my great-great grandfather, but has been expanded several times and has grown into a fairly large house. It's where we have all our family meals during holidays like Mother's Day, Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. The meal included the usual wares, roast, chicken, mashed potatoes, green beans, corn, salad, carrots, rolls, and a few other dishes I didn't try. For dessert there was a great frozen strawberry margarita pie and a dish that was tastefully named Better Than Sex cake. Dad's cousin Steven makes it once or twice every year, one of those times usually being on Mother's Day, though I'm sure that's just a coincidence. I've never liked coconut and that cake has a lot of it, which I think means its name is invalidated.
During lunchtime conversation, dad's cousin Amy (who works for the Dallas County DA's office) mentioned all of the wrongly-convicted prisoners who have been set free recently after being exonerated by old DNA evidence. They were convicted because of overzealous prosecutors whose goal seemingly was more to just get a conviction than to make sure they convicted the right person. This lead to a discussion about corrupt prosecutors and District Attorneys, which culminated in this awkward exchange:
Steven (dad's cousin): Didn't that one prosecutor go to prison? Pat (old family friend): Yep, he did. He's having a gay old time in prison. Dad: Well, prison isn't a place where you have a "gay old time". [amused laughter around the table] Steven: Well many do, it just might not be by choice. [laughter, and assorted comments playing off that statement] Me (trying to change the subject): Hmm, anyways... I'm just gonna go back to my Better than Sex cake.
At the end of the meal all 5 of the women present got a series of gifts, since they were all mothers. Steven had wrapped packages for each of them. They each got a different scented lotion, scented candle, and air freshener. I couldn't help but be entertained by the way they all beamed at seeing their respective gifts and excitedly sniffed the scents of their lotions and candles and passed them around the table for all the other women to adore and take a sniff themselves. A scene like this has no true male equivalent.
A few of us spent part of the afternoon watching Raiders of the Lost Ark on USA Network. We'd all seen it before but not in several years. During the long chase scene where Indiana Jones catches up with and takes control of the truck transporting the Ark of the Covenant, I couldn't help but notice that while he was swerving across the road and running Nazis over cliffs and knocking them off the truck by driving near trees with low-hanging branches, he seemed to drive through about 3 different environments. He appeared to be in a jungle in one shot, then in a desert in the next, then back on a tree-lined road, then on a road overlooking high cliffs, then back to the desert, before he drives the truck into a city and the natives help hide it from the Nazis. I'd seen that chase scene before numerous times but hadn't noticed how it seemed to take place in about 3 or 4 different places. It's a fun movie, and one that requires much suspension of disbelief. I can't wait for the new Indiana Jones movie in two weeks!
We (me, my parents, and my brother) had dinner with my sister and her husband at Cotton Patch in Stephenville, which marked my second time to ever visit that restaurant (the first time was during my senior year of high school). I wasn't very hungry so I only had some mozzarella sticks. When we finally got home mom asked me to teach her how to take pictures with her cell phone, which was slightly less frustrating than teaching my grandmother how to use email. She'll get the hang of it after a while, but for never having done it before it was a process with a few too many steps to walk her through easily. I showed her how one would send a picture to another phone with bluetooth though I'm not sure how much of that she understood. She's pretty good with technology but has never used her cell phone for anything besides making calls. She did take one good picture with it though, which I decided to make my new Facebook profile picture.
Hope everyone had a great Mother's Day, and to all the mothers among my friends, hats off to you!
Currently Watching 24 - Season Four By Kiefer Sutherland, Carlos Bernard, Reiko Aylesworth, Kim Raver, Mary Lynn Rajskub see related
24, Lost, and MTV reality shows
I finally started watching the 4th season of 24 this week. I started watching the series on DVD about a year ago and went through the first two seasons fairly quickly. My brother borrowed them and got hooked on the show, and over the Thanksgiving weekend we took advantage of sale prices to buy seasons 3-5. I watched the third season late last year but left the fourth sitting on my shelf for several months before I finally opened it and plopped in disc 1 Sunday night. So far I'm six episodes in and it's an exciting season so far, much more fast-paced than any of the first three (season 1 didn't even begin to pick up steam until sometime between episodes 3 and 5). My only wish is that they would dispense with the whole pretense of having all the events in each season take place in a single 24 hour period, because that became pretty ridiculous after the first season.
After six episodes, I'd rate the season at least an 80 out of 100 on the implausibility scale. The Secretary of Defense is kidnapped and his secret service detail is killed, and within about 20 minutes the Islamic terrorists who have him have managed to leave Los Angeles and drive out to a secret compound outside the city. Even less likely, the very first episode begins at 7am and it still looks dark as night without even a hint of sunlight, by the time the episode ends at 8am, it's so bright it looks like it should be noon outside. Eventually the good guys find out where the Secretary of Defense is being held and Jack Bauer goes on a daring rescue mission alone to get him, because he is about to be executed for all the world to see on the internet and an incoming group of marines won't be able to get to the scene for 15-20 minutes we are told. They eventually do arrive on the scene, after Jack has almost single-handedly killed off a dozen or so of the terrorists around the compound, and less than 30 minutes later all the carnage and bodies at the scene have been neatly organized and Jack and the Secretary are back at CTU (Counter Terrorist Unit) headquarters in Los Angeles.
So really the series has long since past the point where it should be called 36 or maybe 48 because it would take much more than 6 hours for the events that have happened so far to take place.
Also, episode six ends with the revelation that a certain character is a traitor working with the enemy (unless later events show this is not the case). At the time I was thinking, "Come on! Who didn't see that coming?" Especially with the way the character was introduced and shown to be as duplicitous as anyone who's shown up in that season. That, and anyone who watched all of season 1 shouldn't be surprised at the possibility of someone at CTU being a mole. Who is doing background checks on these people for CTU? From what we've seen in the first four seasons, we can conclude that CTU's background checks are only slightly better than the ones the Texas Board of Nursing conducts on prospective nurses, but worse than the ones Hogwarts conducts on potential Defense Against the Dark Arts professors.
With season 7 being bumped to next January because of the writers' strike, I've got plenty of time to catch up with the 2 3/4 seasons between where I am now and where that one starts.
------
Lost just gets stranger and stranger. By next week we'll supposedly get to see how some of the survivors made it off the island, or at least we'll see the flashforward of them landing back on American soil. Jack's dad I think has now surpassed Ethan in the pantheon of dead characters who just keep on showing up, although Ethan was alive for much of the first season, while Jack's dad died before the plane crash that began the series and has only been seen in flashbacks when he hasn't appeared as a ghost or hallucination, or whatever he is at this point. Characters seem to have a hard time dying on that island. Season four has been confusing and mysterious, but I've enjoyed watching it, even though it's gotten to the point that with so many characters on the show, Jack, Kate, Juliet, Sawyer, Hurley, or Sayid will sometimes go multiple episodes without making an appearance. This is atypical of past seasons, where they, along with a few others who have since died, were the heart and soul of the series.
Only three episodes left in the season now, with the last two being parts of a 2-hour season finale in three weeks. I honestly can't wait. It's been fun getting to keep up with the show while it airs for the first time, instead of watching it on DVD years after its first seasons originally appeared.
------
I went through a period last year where I got into a few MTV reality series. I watch that network only occasionally and had never watched an entire season of anything it produced until I randomly tuned to the premiere episode of the 19th season of The Real World. I ended up watching every episode of that season. The characters were mostly annoying and shallow, but it was all edited and put together in such a way that made it oddly absorbing. The same goes for The Hills, which I caught a handful of episodes of but never followed regularly. Then there was A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila, which featured lots of people who not only had no concept of love, but who also, apparently, didn't have a real shot at it, at least not with the titular character. Why anyone would actually want a shot at love with a girl as ugly inside and out as Tila Tequila is anyone's guess. She claims she broke up with the "winner" of the show because her hectic schedule prevented them from spending much time together, although he claimed in a (very gramatically-challenged) blog post that she never called him after the show and that nobody would give him her number, which combined with a number of factors lead to allegations that the whole show had been a sham.
Well now there's a second season airing, which is only a few episodes old and reportedly was in pre-production before the first season had even ended. I was taken in by the train wreck aspect of it and watched more of the first season than I'd like to admit, but have only seen a few minutes of either the first or second episode in the current one. That was enough for me. Sham or not, this is quite possibly the most morally bankrupt TV series I have ever seen. I'll just leave it at that.
The current season of The Real World started 3 weeks ago, and I have better things to do than try and catch up with it, so I'll probably be tuning out MTV for the foreseeable future.
Currently Watching 24 - Season Four By Kiefer Sutherland, Carlos Bernard, Reiko Aylesworth, Kim Raver, Mary Lynn Rajskub see related
nuts at the library
I don't doubt that government buildings and offices have a way of attracting some of the crazier elements of the citizenry, and from what I've seen this seems to also be true of libraries. Granted, the library I work at isn't a normal public library where you go and check out books or have summer reading clubs for the kids or invite authors to discuss their latest tome. The law library is open to the public but is not a lending library, and most of the people who visit are either lawyers, various Dallas County employees, or people who need to make copies of various legal forms. What these forms are depend on which library they are visiting. One goes to the civil law library for forms relating to divorce, name change, suit affecting parent-child relationship (SAPCR), annulment, modification of child support, etc. One goes to the criminal law library for forms relating to occupational drivers licenses, or expunction and nondisclosure, which are two common procedures for clearing one's criminal record.
So the law libraries, by nature, will attract lots of people with instability in their lives, or worse yet, their brains. At the civil law library, we have nicknames for several of the regulars who have come in over the years. One of my co-workers even went through the trouble to make a roster of all the nicknames the staff members have come up with, almost all of which pre-date the 14 months I've worked there.
Thankfully most of these only visit the civil branch, where I am half my work day, but that is usually spent doing behind-the-scenes work and not working at the front desk, meaning I rarely have up close encounters with the crazier ones unless someone is sick and I have to fill in up front. I spend the other half of my work day at the criminal branch, and though appearances of crazies is rare there, it is certainly not unheard of.
My least favorite of those came by this afternoon. This was the third time I had seen him. The first time was several months back when I had to work a whole day solo at the criminal branch (it's a small library and there are never more than two workers there at a time). This person was an old, ragged-looking man, probably in his 40s. The most distinctive thing about him was that he would laugh uncontrollably at absolutely nothing. He'd talk in words that made little sense, when they were discernible at all.
The first time I saw him come into the criminal library, he was carrying a mess of papers, sucking on a lollipop, and periodically chomping on an apple and splattering little bits of juice everywhere. He smelled awful, spoke nonsense, and laughed every few seconds, for reasons known only to him. He'd walk around the room, talk to himself, laugh at the air, walk some more, laugh some more, repeat. He asked me for help finding something, though I was never sure if it was a book or article he was after, he only said it was called "George W. Bush and the Bible". Even is such a book exists, it's not the kind that the law library would have, so I told him we didn't have it and that I'd never heard of it. "Oh, it's out. They've got it", he said, "they", meaning bookstores I guess. He looked on the internet and printed out a page of something and came to get what he'd copied. I told him copies were 20 cents per page, he pulled out a nickel and a few pennies out of his pocket and asked if it would be enough. I figured, anything that would get him out of there would be okay, and since I had some coin change of my own with me, I told him he could take his copy.
That was disturbing and disgusting. It was the kind of encounter that makes you want to take a shower afterwards. After he left I called a co-worker at the civil branch, who was a lot more amused by my story than I was. I didn't see the guy again for a few months. The next time he came was in the morning on another day when I happened to be spending a full day at the criminal branch. He came in the door and said, "Hey, I know you!" He was carrying a bunch of papers, several large paper envelopes that one usually gets at a post office, a Bible, and a small plastic basket that looked like the kind one would put their keys and cell phone into when going through the metal detectors inside the public entrance of the building. He retreated into one of the public telephone rooms and was there for a while, doing who knows what. I had a chance to walk over to the table he'd left his stuff, and when I took a look at the Bible I saw that it had the name of a local hospital stamped on the inside of it. He eventually left without incident and without addressing me or anyone else in the library, although he left all the envelopes and the plastic basket, and when he hadn't returned a few hours later I trashed them.
This afternoon when I was delivering a book to another office I saw him walking through the main lobby of the building, except by "saw", I mean "heard his crazed laugh and knew immediately who it was". I was hoping against hope that he had a legitimate reason for being in the building and wouldn't find his way to the law library, but those hopes were dashed when I got back from my delivery run. Once again, he'd brought a bunch of large envelopes with him, and he was laughing at the air a lot. I was in my "office" (really just a room where I stash my stuff when I'm at that library, and where I process any books that I deal with) when he went into one of the phone rooms. I poked my head out and saw one of the public computers had a wikipedia page up, with an image I was sure I recognized, even from 40 feet away. I went to the computer to get a better look, and sure enough, the man had pulled up George W. Bush's wikipedia page! He is nothing if not a creature of habit.
After he came out of the phone room he stood near one of the copy machines and talked (or pretended to talk) loudly on a cell phone, occasionally laughing. My co-worker Chris told him he needed to talk outside the library, and the man ignored him at first. Then Chris asked him if he was here to do legal research, which he undoubtedly was not. He left soon afterwards. Chris said asking that question might get him to leave sooner. After he left, I got some sanitizing wipes and wiped down the table he had sat at and the telephone in the phone room he'd gone into, as well as the door knobs. His presence had lent an odoriferous quality to that area of the library, so I also took a can of odor neutralizer and sprayed a couple times in the phone room. I was just thankful he didn't bring an apple with him this time.
I would guess he is either insane or otherwise chemically imbalanced, though whether that is caused naturally or synthetically is anyone's guess. I'm sure he'll be back eventually, I just hope it's not when I'm there. As we say about some of the regular crazies who visit the civil branch, how miserable must one's life be when, out of everything they could be doing with their day, they choose on a regular basis to go to a government building and haunt the county law library. Why us? Why can't they go bother the purchasing department or the county auditor?
