now in stereo

Restarted my diet today, this is like the 15th time this summer. Hopefully this one will last and I'll switch to a more healthy food lifestyle like I had before I joined the military.

The goal is a daily calorie intake of about 1400-1500 calories, along with some form of cardiovascular exercize and weight training a few times a week. I might goto the W&M gym occasionally, but I have the equiptment at home so I will probably focus on doing it there. It cuts out the commute time and I can watch movies while I use the elliptical if I want.

I'm not specifiying where my calories come from, only the total range of 1400-1500 per day. Down the line I'll focus more on whole grains, higher proteins, fresh fruits and vegetables, etc.

The biggest problem I run into with this is that my schedule is erratic. I'm not home a lot to make good meals and it is difficult to cook for just one. We will see how it goes! I'd like to get back into the shape I was in before, I felt so much better and had more energy.

So I just got back from the Lavender Law Conference in NYC (Brooklyn specifically) and it was amazing. I'm already excited for next year when it will be held in South Beach (score!). Even though I should be working on like 100 things right now, I feel like summarizing a bit.

Took off from Newport News Airport Wed after my Molecular Genetics Lab. I didn't want to miss the lab, which I normally have on Thursdays, but I got permission to attend the one Wed instead. We were growing E. coli bacteria that we genetically engineered to be resistant to ampicillin...who would want to miss that? I met up with Mary who was also going up to the conference and we sat by each other on the short flight up to La Guardia.

Once we got there, I was mad lucky because Mary had everything planned out with how to use the public transportation system. Honestly, I've always been clueless about it, listlessly following whoever I was with and hoping not to end up in New Jersey or something. But I payed attention this time, which came in handy. We had to take one bus and then two subway trains to get to our Days Inn Hotel in Brooklyn.

Brooklyn amazes me about how much it is 'up and coming' or maybe more accurately already there, part of the city. I always remember Brooklyn being an 'eh' part. Of course I never really went to NYC too much, even though I grew up about 45 min from Manhattan. But it was quite a difference from what I remember and I would consider living in that part and not just Manhattan if I ever moved up to the City.

On the subway we ran into this older man who was an author. Not a well known author or anything, but he was very entertaining. I have his card, I'm going to pass it along to our English department at W&M and recommend they get him as a speaker at some point. He was really very engaging. His website is www.cjhenderson.com if you want to check out any of his work.

After we got to the hotel we decided just to turn into our rooms and goto bed as it was already 10 or 11 pm. My night was uneventful. I used the sloooow 'high speed' internet and watched President Obama's speech on healthcare reform replayed on BET. On a side note the speech was pretty good, but I wish he would have come out with a veto threat on anything that didn't include a robust public option. But that is neither here nor there I suppose. Mary's night at the hotel, on the other hand, was quite a bit more eventful than mine, although that is not so much my story to share. ;)

Anyway, in the morning we headed out for the Marriott Brooklyn which housed the job fair and the rest of the conference. We took two subway trains to get there and immediately once we were there ran into one of Mary's friends from Harvard, Andy, who was representing a firm that was sponsoring the conference. On a side note, we saw that they turned the bathrooms from Male and Female into Gender Neutral bathrooms. I think this was great, especially for, as Mary pointed out, people who are transgendered or just otherwise don't feel like they fit into either of the standard genders. We did this in college a lot, the people closes to the girls bathroom used that one and the people closest to the mens room used that one on the dorm hall. I will say though that it did make me a little uncomfortable even though it shouldn't have. I am glad now to know, however, that I need to confront and find a greater understanding of gender identity issues that some people face. I've always thought of myself as very progressive on transgender issues but I could be better.

The job fair itself was almost overwhelming. There were something like 140 firms represented, each at a table in various rows. I had researched many of them before hand, so I knew which ones I wanted to goto. I also went to a lot of interesting seeming ones and struck up some fun conversations - non law or application related - with some of the recruiters. I had a lot of fun with the two gentlemen who were recruiting for a prestigious firm in NYC that specializes in corporate law. Apparently, one of them had never heard of the octomom and John and Kate plus Eight. Being that I just recently learned of such people it made for an interesting and very loud (with laughing) conversation.

Mary and I thought we were the only ones to go from William and Mary Law School. As it turns out there were three other students (and I'm told a fourth one I didn't see) who were there. We all hung out through the day and got to know each other much more than we had at the law school. It was a lot of fun actually and many of the firms were giving out cool thing (with their logos on them) like USB drives, squishy red pepper dolls, etc.

Through Adam, I met Fadi who works at a different law firm but was also there at a table. I talked with them both a lot and we ended up hanging out later on, for dinner then out to a club. There was also messenger bag boy who I talked to. He is a 2L at Chicago Kent School of Law and reminded me of a cross between Mikey and Shane. We exchanged information so hopefully I'll make a friend in Chicago (I've never been!)

Mary left the job fair (she was not terribly interested in that part of the conference) to go back to the hotel and have dinner with a friend. Jen, Dave, Mike and I went to a private open bar/food party that a firm had invited Dave to (go Dave!). Jen and I stayed only for about an hour but It was a blast. We then came back to the dinner and reception at the conference. The food was amazing. I have a couple pictures (I think) that will be uploaded to the Lavender law album. Our group met up with the LGA group from UVA and planned some joint events tentatively. I hope it works out.

From there, I went to my third dinner with Adam, Fadi and Fadi's boyfriend Aaron. I'm not even sure what type of food it was, but it was like fondue at the Melting Pot restaurant but there was like a grill or something in the center of the table. I was full so I didn't eat much, just had a drink but it looked neat and the few pieces I tasted were good. We had an interesting conversation where I learned about this Burning Man even that happens out in Nevada which involved a naked sweat tent, pink fishnet bodysuits, and harnesses..oh and one key lime pie.

Adam and I then went to Splash while Fadi and Aaron went to bed. I put my stuff in Fadi's apartment (which was amazing) and then came back later to crash on his couch which saved me a ton of hotel money. Splash was fun, especially since I've really only seen Hampton Roads clubs in the past number of years. There were dancers and the people seemed nice. We met up with one of Adam's old friends who was in town from Argentina. We didn't stay long as we were both exhausted and back to Fadi's place for bedtime :)

Friday (today) was less exciting. I took the subway back to the conference were I was going to go to some of the workshops and also re-book a flight. I ended up not really getting to go to the workshops because of the timing issue, (if I would have known everything would be delayed because of bad weather in Philly I would have stayed at the conference) but I got practice using the Metro system. I managed, all by myself to get from the Marriott to La Guardia. I took two subways and one bus but didn't get lost or go the wrong way once! The US Airways people were very nice and helpful and I ended up switching planes all around. Next time I fly I'm going to try to fly with that airline again, it was a good experience. Even down to the flight attendant who got me a drink twice instead of the normal one time.

I had to take a flight to Norfolk where I just rented a car to get back up home. Robert is having a going away party but I have too much to do and we just hung out a few days ago since I wasn't expecting to be home in time for his party. Now I just have to get everything together for Jeremy's wedding tomorrow and start getting some work done!

It was a fun trip and well worth the time I missed at school.

I've been wanting to write an entry about the death of Ted Kennedy, but I'm not really sure what to say. He was an amazing legislator. He was able to stay true to his principles but also knew how to compromise to get support from those who were ideologically different from him. His fingerprints are on much of the major legislation that helped shape who were were as a people over the past almost 50 years. I do hope there is a legislator out there that can rise to Kennedy's prominence and abilities.

So there is a lot of information out there on the whole health care reform thing. I'm actually sick of hearing about it to be honest. I support a single payer system, which is not even anywhere close to what will be voted on and/or pass. The compromise is a public option. I can live with this one, as long as the public plan is robust and can negotiate lower prices from hospitals, doctors and drug companies (isn't that what economy of scale is supposed to do in the market!).

I like the idea of banning insurance companies from dropping sick people or denying coverage for those with pre-existing conditions. I don't really like the mandate idea, but I can stomach it as long as there is a strong public plan.

I'm slightly baffled by the argument that the government can't do anything right and will be wasteful, but yet somehow will defeat private insurance in free enterprise and run them out of business. If the government program is inefficient and wasteful, then the private insurers will have better and cheaper plans which everyone will goto! Besides, Medicare is run by the government and has some of the lowest administrative costs and highest approval ratings of insurances. If the private insurance industry doesn't think it can compete in an open and level market (i.e. banning of these various anti-competitive contract clauses with hospitals and businesses) then they need to set up shop in a different country that doesn't support capitalism.

The way I see it now, private insurance acts as a defacto monopoly. Think about it, when you were last employed, how many different insurance companies did you have to pick from? Many companies only offer one and even if they offer more than one, they are different type of insurance products (HMO vs. PPO) which are in essence catering toward different segments of the market - splitting the market in some sense. Since you would loose your employer subsidy if you went to a third party insurer, people are in essence forced into picking what their employer had decided which may or may not be the best for their individual situation. The insurance companies then have little incentive to make sure that the covered are happy since basically the insurance company's clients are the businesses that don't require any medical care! So a person dissatisfied with their insurance coverage for whatever reason has to fight through their employer for any meaningful change which shifts some of the transactional costs to the employer. This is, in my opinion, a sort of market failure set up by our insurance regulatory scheme (encouraging labor based insurance) in this country.

One final observation that I have had (an many before me) is that insurance makes little sense. An insurance company makes its money by promising the most broad coverage at the best prices to reach a critical mass of customers and then denying as many of the claims as possible in order to maximize profits. In this case, the maximization of profits is in direct contradiction to the service that these companies are supposed to be affording society.

These are just some random poorly articulated thoughts running through my head while I procrastinate working on my dissertation. There are lots of valid viewpoints on this and it is a touchy issue for a lot of people. So if you have a different viewpoint, by all means post your own journal entry, but I'm not planning on responding to comments on the substance of this here. :)

I got my Wphoto card (Walgreen's gift card essentially) today from MyCokeRewards. Can't wait to spend it at work tonight ha ha. I'll probably print off some of the pictures I took this weekend while I was in Pennsylvania visiting family. My dad and I went sailing and my brother and I went to Ringing Rocks park where the rocks make a bell noise if you hit them since they are made with a mixture of iron ore of some type.

My public gallery is here if anyone wants to see the pictures. I also have them on my Facebook as well as some videos I took over the weekend.

School starts next Monday. I have Patent Law, Economic Analysis of the Law, Advanced Biochemistry, Legal Skills III, Molecular Genetics, Molecular Genetics Lab, and I have the externship with Refugee and Immigration Services in Hampton. I also have to take the language exam for the Ph.D. and prepare for the Ph.D. comprehensive exams in January. I wasn't able to take them this month because of poor scheduling. But all is for the better since I wasn't able to prepare at all. When I have some downtime during the semester I need to work on my dissertation and get that done by Feb too! Oh, and job hunt for a summer position for next summer (lots of places are taking applications/ interviewing now for next summer) and figure out if I can get an externship for next spring. But at least I got some of the reading done for one of my classes last night lol. I have a big white board on my wall with my 'To Do' list on it. I can't wait to start getting more things checked off it.

Point from John Avarosis in his post here.

I'd go one step further. I don't care if Obama is a progressive, a communist, or a Martian. And I suspect most of the left is already convinced that the man is no progressive - or if he is in his heart, his heart clearly does not dictate his actions. Rather than worrying about labels, I want him, and expect him, to keep his promises and advance the interests and values (both, not just one) of our party. What's repeatedly upsetting me, and others, I think, is that Obama appears to spend a lot of time worrying about being liked, and not nearly as much on substance. And if he doesn't care about substance, if he doesn't really care either way as to how every policy debate ends, so long as he can claim victory regardless, then his promises on this, and every other bit of policy making, are meaningless.

I couldn't agree with him more. There seems to be a strange fascination with bipartisanship. This is completely confusing to me. If people from different parties can hash out a deal that addresses all of their concerns than that is great. But that doesn't mean it is the best bill possible. Bipartisanship is playing politics. I want the best health insurance bill to come out of the government and I don't care if it is the bill put forward by the liberals, the conservatives, or the girls scouts of america that does it.

Lets look at what parts need to be addressed. What parts of the system need to be reformed and start from there. All people then can throw out their ideas about how such and such a problem can be fixed. The problem with this mold is that it requires everyone to want what is best for the country - the best legislation to past. Assuming we could get over that hump, we would then have a 'bipartisan' bill that would address many of the problems being brought up.

The fiasco before us, well, we don't' have that. We have a handful of media-hogs who care little about the substance of the bill. The presidents team doesn't seem to mind what is actually in the health care bill, maybe a public option, maybe single payer, maybe insurance company tax breaks, heck, maybe even extra money to fight off Godzilla if he attacks. Regardless of what is in there, Obamacons will claim it as a victory. Sadly, they are not our allies on this, their bar for success is so low.

This whole debate is all show. It is all the splendor of politics. But hey guys, politics aside, this bill has to do something in order to make it a better solution instead of being just A solution.

Classes are done at ODU, woohoo. Just have to finish my dissertation and take a couple tests. Hopefully everything will be all done by January/Feb, but we'll see.

Two more years of law school, though. Can't wait for classes to start next week. I also have an externship helping refugees navigate the legal waters here to apply for asylum. Should be interesting.

One cannot simultaneously "uphold" and "wipe their ass" with the Constitution.

Gandhi replied, "Oh, I don't reject your Christ. I love your Christ. It's just that so many of you Christians are so unlike your Christ."

We must defeat them over there, or they'll follow us home ... hide under our beds ... and grab us by the ankles when we get up to pee.

A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who....never learned how to walk forward.  -FDR

First off, a good advertisement hitting Senator "Keep the troops in Iraq" Collins (R-ME):



Second, my roomates are back from NTC which means no more barracks to myself. ::sigh:: But on the bright side, my paperwork came back from the PEB (Physical Evaluation Board) today, although I haven't seen it yet. I should be getting a call tomorrow from my PEBLO (Physical Evaluation Board Liaison Officer) tomorrow and hopefully I can see him tomorrow about the packet. I should find out then what percentage the army is discharging me with (not expecting more than 10% honestly). And it will just be waiting on my orders to get printed, which can take 1 to 30 days, typically about a week. So cross your fingers for me!

Ok, lots to update, I guess. I started dating someone, Shane. I think at least lol. Long story short, we met almost a month ago on the basis of just friendship since he was dating someone. In fact, I was supposed to hang out with them both. But the boyfriend and him apparently were going through problems and all (I don't really know specifics) and the boyfriend became kinda violent and so the relationship ended. We were, and sorta still are, in limbo about if we are dating or not. There is this sorta unspoken fear between us about moving too fast and all since he is just out of a relationship. But I think, for all intents and purposes we can be counted as dating.

I do feel bad for the ex-boyfriend, but whether or not I would have ever shown up the relationship would have ended thanks to what happened. And prior to it ending between them there was nothing between Shane and I.

The Army still sucks, if anyone is wondering. I'm kinda hoping I get discharged. I have an appointment for my back again on Wed., the first one I could get since I get to Ft Hood in January. I think I'm going to ask for, and accept if offered, a medical discharge. I've had two tried on me, but I sorta fought them both and of course won. Not that this is a feat, they will keep you in especially if you are willing, and even if you are not sometimes. If she doesn't decide to Med Board me and they keep dragging their feet about my back I'll be quite pissed. Basically, if they want me to stay in then they gotta fix me, or if they don't wanna, or can't, fix me then they need to kick me out. I don't even care about any type of disability pay...I can live with my back injury but over the past three months it has been getting worse and worse.

On a brighter note I'm going to go and get the Cingular 8125 phone today and get put on my Dad's family plan account. I'll then pay like 30 or 40 dollars less than I pay for Verizon but have a better phone and more features. Although I will have less minutes, my parents have accumulated a bunch of roll over ones. So I'll use those up ;)

Thats it for now, been very busy recently (especially with those trips to Austin to see Shane!). Oh and by the way, Austin is an amazing city, somewhere I would live even though it is in *gulp* Texas. It reminds me of a cross between New York City and Rochester but with nicer weather and a more artsy/environmentally conscious crowd. Def. a must if you are looking at a new city to move to. If you ever wanna come visit it let me know, we'll figure out something :)

Sorta a lot to update, but want to see where things fall in place first.

Been crazy busy at work pulling med records and working at the range for the M9 pistol today and tomorrow. Going to go to Austin for the weekend to stay with a friend. Can't wait. :) ;)

You Are Destined to Rule the World

You have the makings of a very evil dictator... Which is both kind of cool and kind of scary! Will you rule the world? Maybe. Maybe not. But at least you know that you could.

The 60 minutes piece I was invited to be on but couldn't because the Army is the devil will be on CBS at 7pm on Sunday. A very nice showtime. I wonder if it turned out ok? I don't have TV so if anyone sees it, let me know :)

Watch this flash cartoon. The ending about Dick Cheney is the funniest thing ever.

http://www.toostupidtobepresident.com/shockwave/mcclellan.htm

My back is getting worse, so I've been put back on profile and I have an appointment with the Doctor on the 26th. I think it is from busting my ass trying to pass the PT test on Monday. I'm not sure what the next step is, I think surgery, but it is possible he could refer me to medical board. I'm not holding my breath though, I get the impression from him that he'd rather string a soldier around for three years trying bullshit things in case they miraculously work.

At the Vietnam Memorial, just down the hill from the Capitol and a short walk through the snow that fell on Washington yesterday, Iraq vet, Congressman Patrick Murphy (D-Pennsylvania) said,

"Half the soldiers listed on that wall died after our leaders knew it could not be won."

Happy Darwin's Day! This is the day we celebrate the birthday of the founder of evolution and natural selection.

'Of course I'm obligated by the state of Kansas to present the Church's alternative to the theory of evolutions:'



Enjoy your thumb!

Well update on my quest to go to Law School. Apparently I pass the requirements in AR 16-2, and in AR 145, but there is another regulation, CCR 145-1 which apparently (and I can't find this, but it is what Cadet Command [CC] is telling me) states that for graduate school you can only go for a max of 20 months, waiverable only up to 24 months. This applies, according to CC, even if it is the non-scholarship option. That is, the army will only let you out of the army for up to 20[24] months for graduate school, even if they are not paying for any of it. Now keep in mind you get a commitment to be an officer after you complete this schooling, or if you fail out or stop, you have to come back in and finish your enlisted contract. So if they let you go for say, 36 months, like what is required for law school, they still don't loose you or anything like that. And, on top of it all, they let you go for up to 48 months for undergraduate, which makes no sense why they would cap graduate at LESS than that.

So basically I meet the AR 16-2 and AR 145 requirement for school being AT LEAST 24 months left, but don't meet the CCR 145-1 requirement that I have NO MORE than 20 months left.

If you figure out how you can meet both of those requirements simultaneously, and not with a time machine, please let me know. :)

I'm still going to try to push ahead with the paperwork, who knows maybe I'll get lucky. But it looks like Iraq for me!

Went to the little event thing but didn't get to schmooze with the Battalion Commander, so drats. Was OK, nice area, have some pictures of the park I'll eventually post and the food was OK. Didn't end up staying too long.

Also wanted to go see Bridges of Teribethia at 3pm, but of course it was packed. They were showing it for free at the little tiny ass theater on post. And naturally, anything that MWR(the group that does recreation stuff) does, always underestimates the turnout by about 90%. They act as if the base of 58,000 people were a small village of about 800. I think they just do a couple things just to say they do X, Y, and Z. Doesn't matter that hardly anyone can participate in anything. The army if fucking lame.

As of Feb 15th Verizon is canceling my broadband internet. They say I use too much bandwith and even though it is unlimited it is really not. Doesn't make much sense, but I won't have to pay the 175 termination fee, so I can get a cheaper and faster cable internet which would work just as well for me right now since I'm pseudo-stable. So I won't fight it. I did look around the internet and apparently lots of people have gotten burnt by them. Turns out it is against their terms of service to use the internet to stream music or video, play games, or file share or any such thing. Therefore, if you use a lot of bandwith, they automatically assume you are doing things against their ToS. Like I said, I'm not going to fight it since it actually solves a problem I've had, which was how to get out of my contract without paying 175 dollars. So it is a blessing in disguise, but I have to find another service that is land based and cheaper.

This will also allow me to switch more easily to Cingular once the iPhone comes out hopefully soon :).

Don't really know what I'll do with the rest of the weekend, but I did finally buy a pair of Heely shoes! Yay. It is much harder than it looks to skate on them! So I should probably practice.

Ganked from here in its entirety because of its importance. Remember this story the next time you argue that I don't care about marriage rights/who cares about these gay marriage amendments.

-------------

The Wages of Bigotry
by Trapper John
Fri Feb 02, 2007 at 01:10:07 PM PST
When they're trying to get you to vote for that referendum that bans same-sex marriage*, they tell you that it's all about The Sanctity of Marriage, and Protecting Religious Freedom, and that of course it's not about Screwing Over Gay People. It's not going to disenfranchise anyone, they say -- it's about setting some common-sense limits.

Actions have consequences, though, and the people of Michigan are about to realize that their 2004 vote to prohibit same-sex marriage did, in fact, relegate an entire class of citizens to permanent second-class status. Because the Michigan Court of Appeals held today that the gay marriage ban also bans same-sex domestic partner benefits.

"The marriage amendment's plain language prohibits public employers from recognizing same-sex unions for any purpose," the court wrote.

A constitutional amendment passed by Michigan voters in November 2004 made the union between a man and a woman the only agreement recognized as a marriage "or similar union for any purpose." Those six words led to the court fight over benefits for gay couples. Gay couples and others had argued that the public intended to ban gay marriage but not block benefits for unmarried opposite sex or same-sex domestic partners.

The appeals court agreed with the Michigan attorney general, Republican Mike Cox, who said in a March 2005 opinion that same-sex benefits are not allowed in a state that does not recognize same-sex unions.

So even a quasi-autonomous public entity like the University of Michigan is now prohibited from offering some of its top employees domestic partner benefits. Unmarried opposite-sex partners, of course, can continue to enjoy the benefits. But gay employees and their families are SOL, even if they've been receiving family benefits for years. Is that what Michiganders expected when they passed their marriage ban? Who knows. But regardless of what they expected, this is what you actually get when you vote for a feel-good "protection of marriage" referendum. No matter what its purveyors tell you, if you read it closely enough, somewhere buried in the fine print, you'll find the wages of bigotry. Today, we're reminded that they eventually come due.
_________

*andawholelotofotherstuffthattheydon'twantyoutoknowabout

It looks like King George will be sending more like 35,000 to 48,000. According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), Bush's 21,500 proposal does not include all of the support troops that would be sent. So the actual number of new deployed troops will likely reach in the 40 thousands.

I already know several people who were taken by the 'back door draft' i.e. forced to return to duty even after their contract was up. One of them was outside of the 8 year window (which includes the Inactive Reserves time) but the Supreme Court is willing to allow the president to just draft whoever he wants without any congressional oversight as long as he says it is for national security.

MyDD has the excerpts from the CBO here along with the link to the CBO PDF file.