Nothing quite like a form letter

I interviewed with The Motley Fool yesterday. Or, rather, I took an editing test at their primary colored offices. I did O.K., just not O.K. enough.

I was actually surprised to get a chance at all. In the past, I had applied to a number of places through their website's online submission forms and never received a response. Though it took the Fool two months, they did get back to me.

I'll probably apply again in six months if still not happily employed.

Cold water

My old and now, for the week, current roommate came back Thursday night mostly blacked out. In the process of trying to remove something particularly nasty from him mattress, he forgot to turn off the faucet. The hot water probably ran for the first hour or so, then stopped.

We figured this out today. Yesterday’s shower was a terrifying experience. The end result was a patchy cleaning, an accelerated heart rate, and a feeling of, if not actually being, dirtiness. I’ve taken cold showers before, but only cold in the sense of the absence of heat.

When I was in the Bahamas and Jamaica doing mission work, we had no heated water, but the result was more slightly under room temperature. This was almost painful, and not something I plan to try again.

Interview one

I had an interview with the Punxsutawney Spirit yesterday. I hope it went well; I have no ability to judge that sort of thing.

Afterwards, I drove to Penn State instead of home. I'll be here for a few days lounging and waiting for calls from my last two interviews.

Traffic court part one

I get to fight the man today!

So maybe it's just a traffic ticket. I'm pretty firm in my belief that no one should be pulled over for going 36 miles per hour. I think that's something most people can rally behind.

I'm going for a misjudgment of facts or failure to read a sign. You know, rather than the far-more-true-but-less-apt-to-work defense of bullshit 25 mph speed limits on straight, wide roads.

Though that did work for my dad once...

Revisiting high school cafs

It's really no wonder America's children are growing out faster than they're growing up. As a poor, lowly TA these past too many months, I spent quite a few meals reliving the high school lunch experience.

I usually got the main meal. It was a entree, fruit and vegetable and some kind of side. Sometimes they'd give me a bun. It was all edible, but not much more than that. Though I didn't eat with the students, I did go through the line with them. Very few went for the same thing I did.

I only went for the main meal because it was healthier than the alternatives. The alternatives to my mushy broccoli, hard bananas (seriously...) under-fried shrimp poppers and healthy whole wheat bun were soft pretzels, fries, pizza, cheese sticks, s'mores and all manner of convenience store sub-dollar snacks. All alternatives were far more popular despite their greater expense.

The food in our schools should probably be better. Not that I'd expect even meals made from better-than-army-surplus stock to fare much better against the junky alternatives, but it would be a start. The problem is that schools have to go with the lowest bidder. So, currently, the kids are stuffing themselves with shit regardless of what they buy from the school.

I don't see anything changing.

When I have kids, they're taking bagged lunches.