*snicker*

I'm particularly tickled by the "sherpa in the Himalayas" simile. From an email sent to the UC Berkeley community yesterday morning:

Please Announce: UCMeP Selects UC Berkeley Spokesman Dan Mogulof as the Top Outstanding Oratorical Leader (TOOL) of the Year

Dear Mr. Mogulof,

...As the official spokesman of UC Berkeley, you have been there whenever our administrators, “fearing for their lives” were forced to hide in “undisclosed locations.” You have spoken courageously and eloquently on their behalf, waxing poetically on the value of autocracy during times of emergency...

Your words have been like a light in darkness, a sherpa in the Himalayas, guiding the UC community and the larger public to conclusions that we simply could not have arrived at without your help...

...For all of this and more, sir, UCMeP commends you and is pleased to name you the Top Outstanding Oratorical Leader (TOOL) of 2009. Your unflappable unashamedness, always-for-sale rhetorical talents, and wild imagination are to be applauded. You truly embody everything a TOOL stands for.

As UCMeP’s TOOL of the Year, we recognize that you are not simply an easily replaceable propagandist as some might claim (we’re looking at you, http://moguloflies.wordpress.com/). No, you are a first-rate (and highly paid) rhetorician who has studied the greats: Socrates and Shakespeare, Goebbels and Glenn Beck. You have mastered their secrets and clearly grasp that out of rhetoric’s holy trinity (ethos, logos, and pathos), the strategy of preying on populist emotion will always prevail. Who needs logic or ethics when you can mobilize fear to get your point across?

...UCMeP also commends you for your unwavering commitment to the welfare (sorry to use such an ugly word) of the University of California. Considering your paltry salary of $155,861.55 (http://ucpay.globl.org), it is clear that you cherish UC Berkeley more than the students you regularly vilify in the press. Of course, your love for the university runs deeper than that of the student with a 4.0 GPA (who plans to work for Teach for America after graduation) who you and Governor Schwarzenegger recently defamed as a terrorist.

...We encourage you to not take your award lightly. Being named UCMeP’s TOOL of the Year comes with high expectations. You have received it not only in recognition of your past achievements, but also your incredible potential. We encourage you to continue finding innovative ways to challenge the students at the University of California. Keep thinking of new words and phrases to defame a movement that so dangerously calls for democracy, equality, diversity, justice, and the end of police violence. We send our most heartfelt congratulations, and are most confident that you will live up to the high standards of being a TOOL.

Faithfully yours,

The UC Movement for Efficient Privatization (UCMeP)
www.privatizeUCnow.tumblr.com
Facebook: UC Movement for Efficient Privatization (UCMeP)

Dear Herringbone Messenger Purse

You were, in short, great. I think I bought you in the 7th grade, at Old Navy. I remember re-sewing the strap a couple times. I'm sorry I let the guys who robbed me take you away (and probably dump you somewhere, empty and alone), but there was a gun. I hope you understand.

Love,
Your friend in basic herringbone fashion

EDIT--

You have been recovered! Forlorn in a bush near the crime scene, a lovely officer brought you back at 2AM.

Dear Landlord With the Beige Jeep

You may have recently noticed, when backing into the middle parking space in front of our house, that you stopped. You probably thought this was due to your brakes, or hitting the curb, or some other such reasonable and responsible explanation.

Alas, no. In this instance you stopped because my car's pesky license plate jammed itself onto your trailer hitch. The rest of your SUV managed to avoid touching the top of my hood by mere millimeters, while you remained a casual 2 feet from the car in front of you. I'm sure there is a reasonable explanation for your careless parking job. Perhaps you were rushing inside to fix the problems in our apartment, like the busted doors or the backed-up sink or your child's tantrums (though I haven't seen the results yet...). Whatever the reason, please avoid parking so poorly in the future. It would really be great.

Sincerely,
The blue Civic with the square-dented license plate, owned by your patient tenant downstairs

On living beneath one's landlords

My room is probably the quietest in our apartment, being completely isolated from everything else and its walls being filled with sand, but it also tends to amplify the noises I can hear: those through the sandless door and above my head. Mostly generated by the landlords' 9-year-old daughter, The Child.

I have learned her routine so thoroughly that I only half-wake at 7:15 every morning when she begins clomping around and bouncing a ball. The only exception being The Child's thankfully less routine tantrums, which involve a great deal of door-slamming, stomping, screaming, and the occasional throwing of things. I am not a light sleeper (I slept through earthquakes and a massive oak tree falling in our front yard as a child) so it's a little jarring to wake up regularly to outside forces that aren't, you know, natural disasters. Which is probably why the dreams I've been having lately are about The Child, including one in which she falls through the ceiling and this morning's where she enters my room and wants to play.

Weird!

Negative Nancy

I feel like I should start blogging again, but I'm afraid that little I have to say these days would be positive, and I just feel like a broken record complaining about the same things.

Let's give it a shot.

The things I contemplate hourly:
-A 3BR apartment does NOT include "2 bedrooms and a partitioned living room." That's a 2BR with a partitioned living room.
-Why can't I pack until I get an apartment, and why can't I get an apartment until I get a job, and why can't I even get a job where my college degree is merely "preferred"?
-If you're merging in traffic, you still have to use a turn signal. It's like asking if I'm using the empty chair at my cafe table. I know you want it, but I'm less likely to let you have it if you don't ask.


...yeah, maybe I should stay on sabbatical until I have a regular income.

So done, I don't even feel like posting.

So there.

The cruel and bittersweet truth

I'm supposed to graduate in a couple hours, but I still have two large papers due tomorrow that I have barely started. LAME.