The Agrinautica

The Journey Home
   I was up most of last night reading about people with names like Vercingetorix, Vortigern & Catigern. Then, since I've managed to accumulate some important tasks at the Courthouse I had to go into work. Finally I escaped from there, but had to AMPAC Governor-General Sameer for an hour on the phone about the conference we are in charge of putting together next April, which was all good and well but it was hellorz hot out and I really wanted to go home and take a nap. Then I got home only to find someone parked in my parking place. The office determined the offending vehicle belonged to the guy who should have the spot next to it. When maintenance man Modesto contacted him regarding this, the guy said with attitude "well someone was in MY spot," as if that justified it all (and I hope you all know that you are retarded if you think it solves anything by parking in the person's spot next to you when someone has parked in yours). Finally I made it into my apartment only to find two catsup smeared plates belonging to my flatmate Jason on the livingroom floor, where he seems to think they belong.
   This latter offense is in clear violation of the policy my roommates and I had agreed to unanimously, that dishes must remain in one's room if one cannot clean them immediately. I've decided my current policy for dealing with this is moving the dishes for him when he's not home ... onto his bed.
   Also the solution to the best way to confront him regarding the fact that he's in flagrant violation of something he just recently agreed to with minimum awkwardness came to me after some thought... next time he's home and I find him in a clear violation of policy, or if he asks me about my relocation of dishes to his room I think I'll ask him in an earnest manner if he thinks the policy is too draconian and needs to be changed. That way I will come across not as accusatory but compromising, while he'll be faced with either feeling like a complete flake by saying this simple policy is too difficult (which I really doubt he'll do), or reaffirming the policy in direct reference to his plate behaviour.
   Anyway, then I was finally able to take a nap, but in my delirium was unaware that I'd left my phone in my car so I missed a call I'd been waiting for regarding some stew. )=

30 in 30 III
   Anyway, the result of all this is that I'm not really feeling like a top-notch slinger of hilarity at the moment, so 30 in 30 III is off to an inconspicuous start for me this year.

   So far we have 30 in 30 posts by apoplecticfittz, otimus, pavel_lishin, roter_terror & shid. Best entry so far I think is roter_terror's: "Listen up, folks. 30 in 30 is here and I am not ready for it! THEREFORE YOU GET BABY ANIMALS... with a twist! Here are 16 of the best baby animals I could dig up at a moment's notice. Your job is to vote for the best."

   Anyway, you may all be relieved to to know that one of my goals for this 30 in 30 is to try to steamline my blogging by spending no less than 30 minutes per post (30 in 30.. IN 30?)

Meanwhile in the real world
   In other news, last friday we had the initiation party for the newest batch of Φ A Δ pledglings. On Sunday I went to recently-former Califorina Aggie Editor-in-Chief Matty Jojola's party. It was a very interesting mix of people, with four guys wearing Davis Players Society polos hanging out with Kalen Gallagher in one corner while from the opposite side of the political spectrum city council candidate Rob Roy campaigned in the kitchen wearing a suit & tie. I got a scandalous picture of him eating a watermelon rind with some girl, as well as another of him giving someone a classic politician handshake, I'll put them up when I get a chance. Also my fellow justice & reverend Tim Coady was there, marrying people at random and granting indulgences.

   On Tuesday most of the Court came to the Internal Affairs Commission to discuss their opinions on the Court. Also this day we were reinforced by an editorial in The Aggie advocating that our Court be strengthened rather than abrogated. IAC was unwilling to concede anything, but none of them would speak in support of any of their arguments (other than that ASUCD is a business), preferring rather to try repeatedly to end the whole conversation by saying there was no legislation regardnig the subject. Aside from the fact that the discussion the preceding week had ended with "we'll talk more about this next week," I've certainly been around long enough to know that there's always "no plans," until suddently there are, and the plans are never put forward until after the political maneouvering stage.
nbsp;  Also they made an obvious effort to put us off as long as possible, which I thought was kind of petty & desperate. Regarding ASUCD as a business, it went around a few times until Chairman Harms announced his revelation that "ASUCD is not a government OR a business, it is an association." To which I responded that that was great but "what we are specifically arguing about here is that Kai Savaree-Ruess said ASUCD is 'not a public institution ... but in fact a business,' and a Court has no place in a business. If you say we're not a business but an association, you're not backing Kai's argument that I am here to counter..." I believe 90% of arguments improperly lost are lost because one allowed the opponent to change what the argument was about.. never let them get away with this.

   Anyway, since then Paul Harms has ceased to be the Internal Affairs Commission Chairman...


Picture of the Day

Kristy and I at Rock It

Previously on Emosnail
   Three Years Ago Today: Jello Shot Night - What we all did before we had 30 in 30 to occupy ourselves: slosha's dorm-mates throw a party which shall live on in infamy as "jello shot night." ...Kristy is eventually determined to be missing and is then found wandering aimlessly three floors down outside... d=
   Two Years Ago Today: 30 in 30 I - Day 1 - mrkevincostner was actually first out of the blocks at 10:20am, followed by stephenl who at 12:56 posted the official call to action. apoplecticfittz began with a new version of his recent Frasky Awards; lerani started with an amusing story about a retarded lawyer that managed to exponentially exacerbate her own ethics violation; fragglerocker84 started out strong with a well composed entry apparently about people on her vollyball team (its very well done for its subject matter, but the subject isn't the most interesting to random bloggers); and feuders also vows for the course of 30 in 30 to drink no beer (except for a number of frequent exceptions), eat no fast food, and run five miles every day. Additionally, jdryznar declares he's going to make 30 posts in 30 days about politics, while incomple also just posts half baked ravings against conservatives (at least for the first five I checked today).
   Year Ago Today: 30 in 30 II - Day 1 - First day of the second annual 30 in 30. Best entry for this day has been identified as Professor David, with second place going to otimus (who has since deleted his all his 30 in 30 II entrie, because he does strange things like that)

   This weekend my friend Mara & I discovered a series of secret passageways, which led us to a helipad on the 13th floor of a building in downtown Los Angeles. Shortly thereafter, however, we were cornered by secret service.

   the AMPAC 2006 Model UN conference was held in the historic hoity toity Biltmore Hotel, where simulteniously a conference on "The War on Gangs" was taking place. In fact, this was taking place in the room immediately next to one in which Mara & I were presiding over the Economic Committee for Western Asia, & was attended by the mayor of LA, & the California Attorney-General. Consequently, the hotel was swarming with guys that looked exactly like the president's secret service: big guys in suits with earpeices. I'm not sure if they were the Mayor's or the A-G's. Having almost joined the Secretary of State's secret service, I knew that such agents can be differentiated from private security by little pins on their left lapels, so I checked & sure enough these agents had them, but I couldn't make out the emblem on the little pins.
   There was also a Governor's Ball one of the nights, and there are some reports that Laura Bush was sighted (amid more swarms of actual secret service).


   I have been appointed the Secretary-General for AMPAC 2007. I'd sworn I'd never do MUN secretariat again after being a Davis MUN Under-SecGen in 2003, but this position will encompass most of the areas of experience that I think the diplomatic security division was concerned I lacked, so I think it may be an invaluable addition to my resume.


   Once again this is only a cursory update in lieu of a lack of the time necessary to effectively report recent shenaniganry. I have yet to process most of my pictures from Vegas, or write an entry about those adventures, and there's more to say about this weekend.

Picture of the Day

"cats go here"
from the belated St Patrick's Day Party I missed this weekend