Woody Cavenaugh

When the Lord of the Rings movies came out many of my friends went on a literary journey to Meca to worship the books that shaped their young reading lives. I was not one of them. I never read the books and to this day I am not particularly inspired to. The movies are good, and when I eventually saw them on DVD I enjoyed them, but I was not shaped by them.

Tonight I will be going on a literary journey to Meca to worship the books that shaped my young reading life. For me, this is The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. My only wish would be that Douglas Adams would be alive to see it finally happen.

Posted by at 5:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yeah! I got a job! I'm doing exactly what I have been doing for the past two years two months, eleven days in the exact same place for the exact same people, only now I am permenant!

And I got my first spiffy paycheck in my new permenant position! Yeah!!!!!

Hey...what the?

Wow, that's a huge paycut...

I think maybe I was better off being an illegal temporary worker.
Oh well, at least I get to work indoors with internet access.

You gotta look on the bright side of life
(Whistling tune)

Posted by at 4:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

The event was sponsored by the College Republicans and headed up by their president Melissa Westmoreland. I love naming names. That way if you google yourself and I've spoken about you, you won't be able to say I was talking behind your back anymore.

First off I want to congratulate them for a very successful Moral's week. As best as I can tell no one died, and no one got arrested, not even the socialist. But I can't in good conciousness say something nice about a repugnican without slapping them soundly across the head and neck with the other shoe. I can't let something like the other shoe just drop. But, to be fair to myself and the campus republicans, my beef isn't with them. I've got bigger fish to fry.

Moral Values. This term has been used for everything. Just this morning on NPR a listener said that the reason there were poor people was a lack of moral values. Moral Values means exactly nothing. The term now means less than the term food and air.

So a dance major, a Hari Krishna, myself, and a nutritionist walk into a grocery store and we are asked by a reporter to define "Food". Each of us is going to be absolutely certain that the other is completely out of their minds. Or at the very least very misguided, because each of us defined what "Food" meant to us. However we wouldn't walk away thinking less of one another. Though all of us were correct on what "food" was to us, one of the opinions was more based on a universal fact than the others.

A biologist, a chemist, and a priest walk into a bar. Ouch. So they all need glasses, now ask them what the definition of "Air" is. Better yet, do this here in Greensboro, in Mexico City, in Nepal, in Toyko, and in Borris, Co. Carlow. You will get not only different definitions but even different by city. The chemist could run test in each of those cities and each give you different answers, and all would be correct.

Now take John Rouse (of UNCG's College Republicans), myself, a Rabi, and a Hindi priest and ask us what Moral Values is. Just like above you would get very different answers. For instance, the Carolinian this week quotes John Rouse as saying about the 10 Commandments display in the EUC. "We are one country, one people, one set of beliefs" and another out of context sound bite. "We're not forcing a religion. You can't have safety without people having common creeds and beliefs." He says "One Country, one people, one set of beliefs", I say bologna.

This "One Country, one people one set of beliefs" doesn't exist. There have been attempts to create this, the most successful attempts of which are called North Korea, Cuba, and until recently Iraq.

Food and Air are tangable things that have concrete meaning, and those meanings change from person to person, place to place, culture to culture. "Moral Values" is intangable, it lacks definition, for this reason it is a perfect warcry for politics, but not for real life.

Sure you can try to throw religion at this argument, but religion splintered into a thousand thousand righteous things on legs a long time ago over this nebulous term "Moral Values". Why else would there be so many different religions and flavors of religions. Don't quote the bible at me until you tell me which version you are quoting from (There are seven popular ones and countless less popular versions). I want to know first if your edition of the bible supported women, or supported divorce. It is because no two people share or could possibly share the exact same moral values. Anyone who tells you different is lying to themselves.

Anyone who tries to force their moral values on you are taking away your rights and should be stopped. How you stop them depends on how you personally define Moral Values.

Posted by at 10:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

So in the NC state house right now sits a bill that would allow pharmacist who oppose abortion to refuse to fill those perscriptions. They call it the "Conscience Claus". They are actually debating this. What?

Pharmacist are the right hand of practitioners, practitioner says "give the patient this pill" you'd better good and well do it. I can't believe there is any debate here. Doctors don't get to pick and choose they have a legal responsibility. But some idiot is going to allow Pharmacist to choose.

(I can almost hear the pro-lifer's and pro-choicer's taking sides as I write this.)

Both sides can go strait to heck holding hands. This has nothing to do with babies living or deceased. This has everything to do with discrimination. Let me say it again, with emphasis, discrimination.

The argument used to support it is "their moral or religious objection". This is my favorite. This kicks ass. It makes me want to go out and become a Pharmacist so I can refuse to fill any perscription to anyone who isn't Irish. That would be cool.

"Well, Mr. McCallahoon, I have your heart pills right here, but I'm afraid I can't give them to you because they we perscribed by a Dr. Putincamalliamalayison and that isn't an Irish name. You see I believe that the Irish are the perfect people and everyone else is morally inferior and unworthy. Infact I myself refuse to take any pain medications because my mother is half english."

It would be my right. Its my moral objection. Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

What a great piece of legislation we have here. Racist, sexist, any -ist, or -ism you can think of gets a free ticket to control the lives of people they disapprove of for whatever reason they choose, moral or religious. Screw the babies, we're just using that as a starting place to screw the entire nation! Yippi-yi-yo-yi-ay!

ATTENTION MORALLY OBJECTIONABLE PHARMACIST. If you can't fill the perscription, don't be a pharmacist. It is as simple as that. Its not like you were drafted into "Pill Corps.".

I can't even believe I am having to blog about this....

Posted by at 4:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

Back on April 12th I talked about the homeless problem around the downtown YWCA. Lots of people responded in a very positive way even though sadly there is no answer short of work camps, and of course this isn't an answer either.

Everyone predicted that crime would follow, and they were all of course correct.
Earlier in the week after hours someone used a cane to bust in a glass door on the playground side of the YWCA. From there they ransacked the front desk and discovered two locked drawers. With their impliment, they broke both front drawers off only to discover one was filled with the keys to the classrooms, supply closets, etc. The other just had forms in it. In the process they apparently cut themselves pretty good.

The next day the YWCA oepns to discover that the place had been broken into, nothing was taken and the thief left two things. A cane with the owner's name carved into it, and a bloody handprint left on a white hand sized receipt pad.

I am sure that by the time they find the owner of the cane and the handprint they will have the guilty party. (If they have not done so already) Who wants to lay odds that the criminal is one of the local homeless who have taken up residence in this area?

Surely someone somewhere knows something humane to do with a group of people, many of which are mentally ill, who live in the streets and live as best they can?

A meal and a bunk somewhere in exchange for some work? It would be cheeper to operate than a prison. No! Don't say Work Camp! Say....ummm....Outreach Camp....? They could make baskets, and get mental help...maybe dig something....compete with foreign sweat shops on our own soil....I don't know?

Hey, maybe we could relocate them to New York and set them up as cab drivers. You don't even have to know how to speak the language to be a cabbie in New York. No?

Military?

Cuban Military perhaps?

I got nothing, not even a drawer to keep the keys to the fencing jackets in.

Posted by at 12:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This is so interesting on so many levels that I am having real problems figuring out what I am going to title this entry.

This is the gist. Two girls go to see The Vagina Monologues. They are uplifted and enlightened by it and on the way out the door buy themselves an "I [heart] my vagina" pin. They wear it to school. School tells these honors students that there is no place in their educations for their vaginas. And the war begins.
Here's the news story

I don't even know where to begin this, let alone what to title it. Oh wait! I do know what to title this. (inserts historically inspired title into the title box).

I can only imagine that this school has one heck of a fine medieval studies departnent. How else could they behave in that way here in the 21st century. If you ever find yourself in a place where you end up saying to yourself, "Help! Help! I'm being oppressed!" Or worse yet ladies, "Help! Help! My vagina is being oppressed!" It is time to take a stand. And I think these girls are handling it in a pretty good way considering they are being "dicked" (couldn't resist) by such an archaic mindset.

Hey Winona Hich School officials, pussy out and stop being a dick to these fine upstanding enlightened honors students. (I think I just made a tripple entendre, and insulted both sides at the same time! Cool!)

And the school certainly can't use the "morals" arguement here, if anyone did try to use that argument it would only demonstrait that they are wrong, they know it, and they are grasping at straws for anything to keep them righteous and oppressive.

I applaud the girls for doing what they did.
I applaud the support they are getting from the community.
If it goes to court I will be applauding when they win against their oppressors.

And now a little light reading and some historical perspective for anyone who believes that these young ladies are wrong.

You go girls!

Posted by at 10:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I don't think Rep. John Graham Altman (South Carolina) is very bright.

It isn't about making cockfighting a felony. Any fool in government can do that, and we sure have a bunch of those. It isn't even about on the same day tableing a piece of legislation making domestic violence a felony.

It is about the belief that a woman who is abused by a man can in every case just walk away the first time it happens and never look back. But don't take my word for it. This article has an abundance of his ignorance in the form of quotes.

Here's an example of one of his gems of wisdom.
"It's not the woman's fault, it's not blaming the victim, but tell me what self respecting person is going back around someone who beats them?"

It was so amazingly shocking that I had to look around to make sure the news site wasn't a misinformation site.

I guess ignorance really is bliss.

Posted by at 10:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (13)

What? You mean what they did with me was illegal?

On January 6th 2003 I was hired by the Information Technology Department of UNCG to help startup a fledgeling Project Management Office. I was chosen because of my terrific reputation and the fact that I had been laid off November 11 due to a state budget crisis.

On March 11th I was finally hired on to do my job as permenant staff. (I found out about this April 8th.) So for two years two months and five days I worked for UNCG as a temp with no insurance, or benifits of any kind. I didn't complain much because I was just glad to have a job, and my job is even after all this time still very rewarding and fun.

I wake up to NPR this morning telling me that other's who have been in my shoes are putting together a class action lawsuit against the state because as it turns out working for that long as a temp is illegal by states rules. Sure enough, the N&O has this article that backs up NPR's story.

At this time I formally refuse to comment on this situation because I am at this moment under probationary status as a newly hired state employee.
Everyone knows you don't poop where you sleep.

Posted by at 10:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Walking through the EUC today on UNCG Campus I noticed what looked like a marble tomb stone with a purple cloth over it in the hallway. As it happens this great marble slab is a traveling exhibit. After the unveiling it was revealed that this grave sized stone tablet has the ten commandments carved on it. Not such a huge thing, then it is revealed that it is THE ten commandments removed from some court house in order to keep the church on one side and the state on the other. I was also bemused to learn that it was the Campus Repugnicans that brought this christian side show to campus. (I could tell, because the young woman smiling into the WXII camera was wearing a conservative republican uniform and used the word "conservative" in every sentence of her interview.

So before you click the old respond button, I'd better lay out exactly where I stand on this whole thing.

I support the 10 commandments. A society needs laws and the western world bases its law on those laws. No problem.

I support this exibit on campus in the EUC. Why? The state didn't pay for the EUC, the student's did. So its ok for the tibetan monks to make a mandalla, the christians to bring in the marble tablet, and the hari krishnas to beat the drum outside and offer free vegitarian meals.

I do not support conservative republicans. They say things like "No big government", yet they want to legislate what everyone believes, they created a whole huge new government department (office of homeland security), and they seem to really enjoy a good profitable war. It sounds too much like lying, and my mom always punished me when I lied.

I do not support the campus republicans because they tend to frown on tibetan monks, hari krishnas, and the like (who just hang out and never seem to approach anyone), yet they like the guys in the suits who twice a year blanket the campus and hand out little new testimates sort of like some sort of reverse pan handlers. It is impossible to avoid them. (Ok, its really difficult to avoid them, you have to walk through buildings and jay walk to do it.) It sounds too much like a double standard to me.

So, in the final analysis, I have no problem with the ten commandment display sitting temporarily in the EUC, and I hope anyone who wants to display jewish law, or islamic law will get the same respect and attention.

Fair is fair.

Oh yeah, I also support the removing of the ten commandments from government buildings. It won't change the fact that murder, adultry, stealing, and the like are still illegal. Good laws transcend religion.

Posted by at 5:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)

I found myself standing next to a young lady that seemed very familiar to me, though I couldn't immediately place her. There was something about her smile that was all too familiar and I thought I had lost my mind somewhere along the way. Then I realized it. Her name is Sada Jacobson, we have a picture of her hanging on the club bulletin board with a Bronze Olympic medal hanging around her neck. Oh yeah, her. So here I am stading within arms distance of an olympic medalist wearing warm up pants and a simple white tank top. What do I do? I look her over really closely. I want to know what muscles on a saber fencer of her level are most used and developed. This way I can go back to my club and make my fencers do exercises that will develop those same muscles. Easy right? If the Doc hadn't been standing right next to me I would've missed it. There was nothing that I could see above the waist that indicated she even fenced at all. Her shoulders, back, chest, bicepts, looked perfectly typical of anyone her age and build. She looked healthy, but I had seen more overall "fit" bodies" in the college student rec center. Then the Doc saw what I missed. I noticed that the bicept wasn't developed at all. What I missed was the fact that her bicepts and her tricepts were the same size! Holy crap, that's a whole bunch of pushing power on her saber! Her actions were so pure that only what was necessary was used and developed. Wow... And you're probably wondering why I haven't mentioned anything about her below the waist. This is because below the waist she was exactly like every other elite fencer. Her legs were like tree trunks and her hips were to die for. Nothing new there.

Later in the morning I watched her fence for first place at Nationals. Her opponent was very active, very aggressive, and screamed after each touch like a wild cat. In fact I think she must have learned her scream from watching discovery channel. Everyone watching the bout, and there were so many packed so tight that if you didn't know WHO was fencing, you would thing there had been a medical emergency on that strip. Anyway she would scream, Sada would be completely unaffected by it and the crowd would quietly mock the screamer.
The score was something like 8-4 against Sada, when she opened up a can of whupass and won the bout something like 15-7. We are not sure why she started slow and then kicked butt. The Doc suspects it might have been that Sada took a few touches to figure out how the referee was calling what, and then delievered exactly what the referee wanted to see.

After Saber we caught up with Carlos Bruno a former fencer of ours who has gone on to do great things. He entered the tournament at around 136 out of 147 fencers. After the first round of pools he was seeded 33. This was an amazing jump of 103 places. Now was a single elimination 15 touch direct elimination round to make the field of 32. If you make the round of 32 they had repechage so in a nutshell you had to lose twice to be eliminated. Sadly Carlos was eliminated before the top 32. It wasn't his skill or his execution, it was sadly in his head. The one aspect of competition that he hasn't developed yet is a good sports psych attitude where you can let each touch go, let your competitor's antics go, let your equipment problems go, and just focus wholey on the next touch. When we reached the round of eight everyone who did not have this mindset had been eliminated.

So as you can see from my rambling, this trip was extremely educational and I am looking forward to getting what I know drilled in to the young and impressionable minds of our shining students. Anyone can succeed if they are given the tools necessary to win and instilled with the desire to win. The rest is just time.

Posted by at 8:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I'm live from Chatanooga Tennessee. I am on my second glass of Tennessee Red and I am a little sleepy. The ride down here was smooth and the fencing I saw was even smoother.

I got to see the round of 8 to the finals of Men's foil. Let me tell you something. Foil down at my level looks NOTHING like foil at this level. These guys even hold the weapons differently. Rather than hold the foil with their thumb and index finger, they hold it with their thumb and other three fingers. The index finger runs down the side of the grip. In effect they are literally pointing at whatever they want to hit. The downside to this is that their index knuckle is sticking out from behind the bell.

Other stuff....They move blindingly quick up and down the strip. We plod like bovines. They are actively controling their opponent's actions. We react like Pavlov's dog (Look it up). They attack equally from anywhere four O'clock to eleven O'clock. We attack from the single place our tip happens to be at the time.

They are on the world team, we are beginners. We will learn, they will just grow old. :D (Wine talking there).

Tomorrow we will be doing research and cheering Carlos Bruno to victory or bust. He'd like that.

Posted by at 10:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My wife and some friends went a couple of weeks ago to Rioja! A Wine Bar located on 1603-D Battleground Ave. Greensboro across from Rock Ola Grill. They spoke of the experience in excited whispers. It was like evesdropping on a group of tween girls talking about the flavor of the minute boy star. These women were using words and expressions I thought they reserved for talking about sex and other people's husbands. They were smitten.

But I am not so easily impressed. For one, I don't know wine. I was 26 before I had my first taste of alcohol and that was African vodka. I learned enough about hard liquer to know that Scotch was sexual assalt in a glass. Wiskey was better than vodka, and bad tiquila was better than top shelf gin. Next I experimented in beer. I prefer reds, like Killians, and Red Oak. My best experiences in wine (I tasted my first wine about two years ago) were from Duplin Cellars, and my dad's homemade wine. I do not know wine, I can't pronounce most of them. But at least I know what I like, even if I can't always ask for it by name.

Last night was date night, and after dinner we went over to Rioja! so I could see what the fuss was about. The decor was relaxing even if the chair nearly put my tubby butt in a panic when I thought I was going to tumble over backwards. (They did have normal four point chairs and I was ok after switching.) The manager (Jason Hedgecock) strolls over and asks us what we wanted in a very warm and welcoming way. So I leveled with him. I told him what I just told you, I don't know wines, and my favorite wines are sweet wines like scuppernogs and muscadines. I also told him I was ready for any ridacule he might be ready to send my way since I didn't go for the fancy pants dry stuff that the snobs went for by the bottle. Rather than be thrown out for being a wine simpleton he put me at ease and in a minute had two wines for me to try, the first was a riesling that tasted to me like an amusement park ride, I found it exciting and a little scary. The next one was a red desert wine from Italy, he neglected initially to tell me it was carbonated. It was the best wine I think I could possibly have in public and with my cloths on.

When the dust settled I was bring home two bottles of wine and a very positive outlook about wine and the wine scene in general. I look forward to hanging out there again with friends real soon.

If you like wine and good company in a relaxing atmosphere you have to check out Rioja! If you don't know wine (like me), come to Rioja! and tell them you're new to wine, you won't be disappointed by the experience.

I also just found a GoTriad Article about it here. So if you can't take my word for it listen to the other guy. I personally find it hysterical that we both used the phrase "fancy pants", even if we did use to to describe two entirely different things (though enjoyed by the exact same type of people).

Posted by at 4:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (1)

Since I have no real answer to Greensboro's homeless problem I would normally behave like anyone else and keep quiet and pretend it didn't exist, however more and more the problem is being forcibly driven into my life and it is time for me to speak out.

I am at the downtown YWCA three nights a week teaching fencing. Each night upwards of 20 students, parents, and coaches wander out of the Y into the night at 9pm. It used to be that we could stand in the parking lot and talk, then we started getting panhandled in the parking lot. Now we have to have a plan of where to meet in advance make sure that each fencer has been picked up and is gone before we scamper to our vehicles and go quickly to avoid the sob story.

Recently even this is not enough. The other night a parent with a fencer was walking out to their vehicle and they were ambushed by a homeless person. This was bad enough. It gets worse. The parent said, "No, I am not going to give you anything, and I think you had better look behind you." And here's where I feel a tear of pride comming on. My little fencer had flanked him silently and flawlessly and was waiting saber in hand in a perfect enguard position. The homeless guy gets the "Animie eyes" and suddenly remembers he has an important appointment someplace else. My kids rule.

The thing that makes my butt clench is what if this had gone another way. What if the homeless dude chose not to flee but to attack. We've got a 12 year old with a piece of sporting goods suddenly being set upon by one of America's Forgotten Citizens. Its a no win senerio. My fencer is quick enough to scamper away and whip the bejezus out of the modern day oliver twist. This is bad as now my 12 year old fencer has committed assalt. But lets say that the stray cat gets the jump on junior. We have an adult assalting a child, and don't forget that proud parent is still standing there. Nothing good can come from this.

This isn't about a kid prepaired to protect his parent by the way.

This is about homeless people in Greensboro hanging around ambushing unsuspecting citizens. Lets not forget that this is the same block that contains the children's museum, the cultural arts center, the library, and Cafe Europa. So we have desprite hungry sharks swimming in a pool filled with children and families.

How long before something bad happens? How long before a purse is snatched, a car is broken into, or someone is mugged, beaten or killed?

Me, I've got no easy answer. I've got nothing but pie in the sky ideas like most dreamers. For instance, my most conservative and realistic answer is to give the homeless a job in the military. Having just written these words I can hear Bush thinking about what a novel and good idea it is while the military, and the civil liberties folks are laying golden eggs of righteous outrage.

So I am back to my question, who is going to have to be hurt first before something gets done.

I don't expect an answer.
But I sure do wish someone had one.

Posted by at 5:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Every once in a great while something aligns the planets for me and I gain real insight into my life. This weekend was one of those times. This is what I learned about me.

1. Time is money, and it has value even if it isn't in the form of a paycheck. I volunteer at the Downtown Fencing Club. Were I getting paid, a coach of my level could expect a certain level of pay. If I were a better coach, I could expect more. That time has value and should never be ignored or encroached upon. I have a valuable service to perform.

2. Of all of the stuff I have collected over the years I only use about 20% of it. The rest of it is just junk taking up space. It is time for me ditch all that junk and find out where I am in the here and now. Looks like I'll be opening up an ebay account, and taking some books over to Ed Mcays.

3. I am not writing the book I am supposed to be writing right now. I should write it because it is there, but I have something else I need to write first. Once the useless 80% of my stuff is out of my life there will be more room in my life for the pages that are trying to get out. But there is a deadline.

Now that I have this new insight I am committed to make good on it. Its my choice.

Posted by at 10:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

My wife Sara, (who rocks) is the project manager of a couple of high dollar high visibility projects. She knows a great deal about how Project Management gets done at the "G", and is a pretty good IT generalist. These projects require lots of specialist who know a great deal about their specialities that she doesn't know, nor really needs to know. The PM doesn't do it, the PM gets it done.

The problems is that often geeks often look down on people less geekier than themselves. In the wireless project she is the least technical person in the group so she sometimes feels out of her league because occasionally the network guys have to explain something to her in small words. They probably don't think any less of her, but she feels like they might.

Today she was in a lunch meeting with these high level big money network gurus. Right in the middle of this meeting she discovers a rogue access point on campus and casually reports it to proper authorities who happened to be sitting to her left at the table.

Technically this was no great feat. Her tablet is wireless and it is always looking for connections. But noticing the rogue point before the table full of high level big money network gurus was priceless.

I love it when the right thing happens in the right place at the right time. I especially love it when it happens to Sara.

Posted by at 4:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

One of our adult fencers brought up the very valid point that we can tell them that they are doing something but if they can't see it, they might not believe us. Then when they go to a tournament and the referee sees it the way we do, the student has a bad day and might not fully understand why.

They wanted video of their bouts so we could show them their mistakes and they could see video proof that it was happening. This is a terrific idea and we used to use video all the time at UNCG in fencing. However, I am but a poor blogger and have never in my life owned a video camera of any kind.

This requires thinking outside of the box. I can do that! What I came up with was a odd contraption that consisted of my NEC Versa Litepad, and a Logitech Quickcam 3000. So imagine if you will, the tablet in my left arm, and the "all seeing eye" held in my right hand with eight feet of cable draped around my neck. I've always wondered what my fingers could see if they had eyes. (But not too much, when I imagined it, I kept poking myself in my eyes everytime I tried to pick something up.)

With the Logitech software I could either take stills or video, which was what I wanted. The difficulty was that I didn't have the necessary third hand which would hold the stylus and click "start" and "stop" on the tablet.

The outcome of my test is here, taken during some group drills in our saber class. (29.3MB, avi format, 640X480 resolution, 176kbps, 2:14 minutes long)

What I learned was that though it "could" be done, the webcam I had didn't have a fast enough frame rate so when actions approached fencing speed, what you got was a blur in a strobe.

Yes, I suppose I could go out and buy a bluetooth clip on camera that can take video at over 30 frames a second, but in the end all we really need is a camcorder and surely someone in the club has one they would be willing to bring to class each lesson.

Posted by at 9:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday Sara and I went to a restaurant we had never been to before. It was out of the way for us, however we had a $25.00 gift card. That made it too attractive to us to ignore.

We looked over the menue carefully. Sara went with a cajun shrimp and pasta dish. I went with a burger. I didn't exactly want the burger, but I had to have this one particular burger. I was unable to resist its Siren's song. This was the Super Ultimate burger. A pound of meat.

Sara was extremely unhappy. The women of IT are overall dealing with a sharp rise in the number of husbands with heart trouble and this sandwhich came with a Surgeon General's warning.

What was I thinking? Why did I do it? Do I have a deathwish?
Nothing. Because it was there. I don't know.

But I do know this. The Guiness book is filled with people who did things just to see if they could. Over a thousand people have made it to the summit of Everest and back. Just under 200 lost their lives trying. They did it because it was there. They had no choice.

In the history of the Cavenaugh family going back to Ireland, there were brave warriors who faught hard to be kings of a kingdom. They faught hard to keep it, and they faught hard when they lost it during the Jaccobien war. My ancestors were murdered, sold as slaves and chased all the way to the shores of America where my branch stopped running and settled in Duplin County NC in 1800.

In my blood is the blood of kings, my ancestors conquered lands, all I can manage to conquer is a big cheeseburger. But I have to do it anyway, because the cheeseburger is there, and I have a biological compulsion to conquer that has been watered down over the course of several hundred years.

I think back fondly on other conquest I have made. My first whole pizza, my first whole chicken, my first dish served to me on a 20 gallon trash can lid, my first two pound steak, my first trip to the donuts on top of Pikes Peak, Hardee's Monster Burger, and now this burger.

It isn't a kingdom, but to be fair there isn't much land left to be conquered in this old world. Maybe I could conquer a salad instead of meat. Probably not. There just isn't much fight in a one pound salad.

And I have my ancestors to think about.

Posted by at 10:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

First of all I have to say that after going to bed at 7pm last night and waking up at 5:30am this morning, I feel much more recovered from Divisionals.

I was only aware that there was basketball being played because the Carolina fencers were making such a big deal about it. A couple even said that if they were fencing when the game started they would forfit their bouts to see the game. Chapel Hill has a very strong very evolved fan habitat. On the way to work this morning I remarked to Sara that the championships were last night and I only had a mild curiousity of the outcome, and that mainly because of the conversations that would be held around my coffee pot. I also mentioned that I happened to see on the news late Saturday night that I saw live footage of Franklin street and it was absolute pandamonium. To their credit I only saw a few small fires and nothing that looked from the helicopter's view like looting. I wondered why UNCG didn't have this kind of fan mentality. Sara answered quickly, "UNCG doesn't go around winning national championships. Well, there's soccar, but America really doesn't care about soccar."

Point Sara!

Low and behold I get to my office and Kimi tells me that she heard from one of her live journal connections that a handful (something less than a hundred) of UNCG students attempted to riot on College avenue, however because of their small size it looked more like a Saturday Night Live sketch. I can confirm from first hand evidence that an innocent bush was damaged by high heat and at least one fire extinguisher was emptied in front of North Spencer dorm.

The exact formula of what makes a "fan school" is still a mystery.

Posted by at 11:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well. Its Monday again. I can understand being tired, I just wish I wasn't so sore. The Downtown Fencing Club hosted the NC Division's largest event April 2nd and 3rd. It went without a hitch though we did learn some valuable lessons.

1. North Carolina has a lot of fencers in it.

2. Everyone who was qualified to fence in Divisionals did, even though the Division II Nationals' tournament they were competing to qualify in is in California this year.

3. 1/3 of all fencers will choose to register at the door rather than preregister on line even though it cost more to wait.

4. Sara and I do not share fencing as a common interest.

In other fencing news, The elections went well and though we had to say goodbye to an incredible bunch of officers we got in their place another terrific group of folks. I was nominated to a committee. I am excited about the work and I look forward to serving the division in this capacity.

Setup for the event at the Greensboro Holiday Inn Airport went well and I was in bed by 11:30pm. I was up by 5:30, worked in the armory under Kathy Walters all day. We had the division meeting, repaired and restored the room and made it back to the room by 1:30am, where I had to set the clocks ahead to 2:30am. I don't have to tell you how hard that was to face. The next day started before 6am and the fencing continued, followed by packing up and leaving. I got to bed at 11:30 last night.

I need a vacation. A day off would do. Maybe a weekend. Well. Its Monday again. I can understand being tired, I just wish I wasn't so sore.

Posted by at 9:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Yeah, I know its April first and we are all expected to go with the April Fools Joke. This was a good plan back before the internet, but now thanks to the internet we can get our fill of hoax, satire, humor, and tin-foil-hat stuff every day all the time. So I see no need to go out of my way to create some gag for today.

That said, I want to talk about something real and good, and that would be the world of eating opportunities that Tate Street has to offer. Where else in the city of Greensboro can you find vegitarian, soup, Mexican, Latin, Carbibean, Greek, Italian, Tai, Chinese, Japanese, Indian, pizza(2), sandwhiches(3), and good coffee all within walking distance of each other. Heck, if you're a vampire you can even get a snack on one of the many goths that skulk about after hours. The only downside to this world buffet is the lack of obvious parking. Its there, you just have to know to look behind things, and often then parking is restricted to a specific restaurant. Still, if you don't know what you want to eat, Tate Street is the place to go to figure it out.

Posted by at 8:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)