quirks of quantum electrodynamics,etc.

I have unfortunately gone down the bottomless worm hole of the casimir effect and need to stop reading articles about it. I heard about it while taking a study break last week and, checking out Discovery channel in the hopes that a shark show might be on, and instead stumbling on the show Ancient Aliens, where there was mention of the aforementioned casimir effect, I got obsessed.

Because that's what aspies do. 

I may figure out how to levitate. I think if I know how to levitate I would get invited to more parties. In fact, right as I started my research, I received an invite to a paradox sports party.

I bought the first two seasons of Ancient Aliens for my dad and we watched them a couple of thanksgivings ago. He thought it was a comedy. I didn't correct him. We laughed through both seasons.

But, discovery channel, really? Why clog the tv with that shit when you have all those good shark shows I want to see but can't except when I'm in a hotel because I don't have a tv? Next time I'll send you my schedule so you can plan accordingly.

I would also mention I have been reading about mereotopology for no good reason other than it has some relationship to meta models, which I love.

Today and tomorrow I have to catch up on my spanish class. I'm trying at the moment, even though I'm tired, to memorize the top five phrases I'll probably need to know: 

"Tienas una curita?" (do you have a band aid?) 
"Soy alergico a la miel y mariscos" (I'm allergic to honey and shellfish)
"Te gustan los tiberones?" (do you like sharks? (it's good to bond with people over common obsessions))
"Cuanto para el enano?" (how much for the midget?)
"Estoy bastante seguro de que se ha roto." (I'm pretty sure it's broken (thought I would keep that general, I break a lot of shit))

I've been in Texas too long. My brain is turning into refried beans or some other badly executed mexican dish.

I passed my iEAi exam on Friday (I missed one point on a rather bullshit question, the worst grade is 99 out of 100, that's like getting second place) and am now a certified international enterprise architect. Fucking yiiiippppeeeee. The exam took two hours. It sucked. I got the highest grade in the class and the company that teaches the class wants to certify me to teach it. As you can tell from the pic, the certification means so much to me that I got it all wrinkled within 10 minutes of receiving it. I put it in my suitcase next to all my dirty socks.

trust me, I'm internationally certified

Four people failed the final. I told them I would do some break out study sessions with them over the next month so they can retake the exam.

Flight from San Antonio was a disaster start to finish. The exam ended at 1:30 and my flight didn't leave until 745. Weather delay - check. Crying baby - check. Morbidly obese passenger seated next to me - check. Then when I landed in Denver it took me 5 minutes to find my keys (rookie error, I can tell I haven't been traveling much). I finally got home around 1130. My suit case smells like I packed the san antonio river in it. Which I guess I did, between my bathing suit and my shoes.

The oddest thing happened on Friday. After the exam I and the Texans who paid for me to get the certification went out to lunch. I never was invited to lunch with them because they said I wouldn't like the food they eat (true - and some true stories - they eat a product that's pork skin heated in the microwave - thankfully I'm a jew and could beg out of trying it - they also eat popcorn nonstop, and last Friday when I brought in cupcakes one guy took two cookies and mashed his cupcake between the cookies making a cookie cupcake sandwich - they're all going to have diabetes if they don't already).

I contributed to the problem - these cupcakes were ridiculous...

I found this great korean place near San Antonio called Seoul Garden. I had a bowl of yukgaejang which burned most of the skin inside my mouth off (it was temperature hot, not spicy hot). It was good. The Texans had ribs or the "korean" hamburger (the two american things on the menu - one did try some kimchee). Then we went back to the classroom and I met most of the Texans' spouses. They might as well have introduced me like "this is an alien named Franki, we believe she came from Mars". My pink hair was maybe a contributing factor.

But, they were also bragging about eating korean food. Expanded horizons are good. I hope they go back there. The food was great and the owner gave me a hug after earlier yelling at me when I inquired as to whether or not the yukgaejang had honey or shellfish in it. It was nice.

And since I hadn't eaten since lunch I had a bowl of granola cereal and a glass of red wine before finally going to bed at 1230. It's not as bad as it sounds.

(I'm lying)

How the FUCK did I ever fly every week? I feel emotionally crippled from a 2 1/2 hour (plus 30 minute delay due to weather) flight.

Oh yeah, I had status back then. And free drink tickets.

I woke up at 530 this morning and couldn't fall back to sleep so I got up and got all my shit done (laundry, ironing, food shopping, work out, etc.). 

Now it's only 3 PM and I'm le tired and ready for bed...

los idiomas

In preparation to potentially buy a place in Spain, near surfing, because their real estate market is in a downturn, I'm taking a Spanish class on edX.

Hard to believe I was at one time fairly fluent in Spanish...I suck at it now...

I've just finished my first lesson. What I learned is there's this guy Nacho who's a lawyer. He tells EVERYONE he's a lawyer. Nacho, congratu-fucking-lations on passing the bar. You must think you're the only guy ever to be a lawyer.

He has a friend Virginia who talks really fast. I think that might be because she likes Nacho. But there's this other woman Queque that hangs out with Nacho too, and I think he likes her better because he keeps inviting her for ice cream. Though, Virginia is a bit overweight and perhaps has diabetes so he doesn't want to risk her having an insulin issues which she probably would if she ate ice cream.

If he asks Virginia to do his laundry I would say affirmatively he likes Queque and is just using Virginia.

There's also this woman Maria Jesus that everyone keeps talking about, but I haven't seen her yet. She's an architect. I'm glad they didn't make her a waitress. I would guess they wouldn't make her a waitress because Spain is pretty religious and it's one thing for him, Jesus, to be a blue collar fisherman or carpenter and quite another for him to be a waitress sweeping crumbs off tables and explaining the evening's specials.

He'd probably be good at recommending wine I would think.

When I took spanish in Managua I had to, as a class assignment, write a poem. My poem was:

Me gusta tocar la guitarra y cantar 
me gusta nadar en el mar 
pero no tengo brazos 
y mi boca está llena de arena

I like to play the guitar and sing 
I like to swim in the sea 
but I have no arms 
and my mouth is full of sand

I got an A for effort.

texan weekend

Saturday was pretty much a funny disaster start to finish. I got up at the crack of dawn to head down to Corpus Christi with the goal of either surfing or paddle boarding. Bu the red tide moved in so all the beaches were closed. I went to mustang island and started coughing uncontrollably because of the red tide and then I started having problems breathing. Then I decided to go to the aquarium but it was so packed there was no place to park in the parking lot. So then I decided to rent a bike but it turns out there was some bike ride going on and no one had any bikes to rent.

I headed to Padre Island north beach but that was also shut down due to the red tide. I ran an errand for one of the guys in my boot camp who has family on Padre Island (dropped some stuff off at the family's house - it was kind of weird). When I finally headed home I got caught in a huge rainstorm that was so bad I had to pull off on an exit (car was hydroplaning all over the place even though I was only going 20 MPH - I'm in a little chevy spark which generally sucks but did get up to almost 100 MPH on an empty stretch of highway but then it felt like it was going to fall apart so I slowed down).

Saturday evening I headed out for go carts but the place was jam packed and there was a huge wait to ride so I left. I was surprised so many people would go go carting on a saturday evening...guess I'm not the only one who never gets invited to parties...anyway, I spent a few hours at the San Antonio jazz fest and then headed back to the hotel.

Sunday morning I went to espada park for my kayak trip. The guide said the trip I signed up for would be too boring and recommended another trip but said I would have to do it solo. It was cool. There were at least 20 drops, the last one was 15 feet (at an angle, not vertical) which was really fun once I did it (I admit I was scared to go down it, especially because I couldn't see the whole drop so I had to figure out where to go to not hit rocks as I was dropping which is not the way you're supposed to do it). Yard sale averted, somehow.

 Also, I got caught in a current which took me under a tree that was in the water. It was like branch fireworks. When I arrived at the take out I took off my life vest and a huge branch fell out of the back of my vest.

I had to do 3 carries, which sucked because they were at the end of the paddle and I had a lot of water in my kayak. But, I made it.

Today in class someone said I smelled weird and I realized it was my shoes and my hair, from the river. I'm washing both tonight.