Thursday, November 25, 2010

Turkey Day

As I have for the past 3 years, my brother and I returned to the Choirschool in New York for a night on the town. So what usually happens is that the younger alumni will come over for cocktails and dinner, play some basketball with the 8th graders, then try to see a movie. After banging on the dark windows of three or more theaters, we'd resort to hooving around Times Square.

However, this year is the first year in which the cinema was open past 11pm Wednesday before Thanksgiving. In years past, even in New York City, you couldn't catch a Thanksgiving overnight flick. As a group, we watched Harry Potter 7.1. It really wasn't my style; I'd have preferred the plot to take place at Hogwarts. There was a lot of action, noises, and shrieks in the film, which should've been unfriendly to peaceful sleep. I must have rolled through a whole sleep cycle during the film, because I didn't feel tired at all afterwards.

The GAP student was very cordial and overly generous; he lent out the living room of his 1BR apartment in the Choirschool to us graduates. It was cock-crow time when we came back from the food cart run,and almost dawn when we turned off the lights. I thought I'd pull an all-nighter, but by my usual school wake-up time of 6am, I was fast asleep and missed my alarm clock set for Sunday wakeup of 7:30am. That was the second time I slept through the alarm.

I made it to mass on time (11am), but it was such an adventure to cross After being engulfed in a mass of people, Gus and I were able to get into the empty-enough Subway and ride a loop-around trip to the church east of the parade. The service was brilliant; I had become unaccustomed to the acoustics of the grand church, St. Thomas Fifth Avenue. A meander through the wonders of Port Authority and Penn Station (with Tim Hortons!) preceded our departure by Megabus from the city. Too soon was it time to leave, and maybe next trip I'll allot more time to see the city.

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Early Onset Senioritis

I opened the mailbox and pulled out an envelope that I thought to be rather thin. I was pretty anxious when I realized it came from a "quick decision early action school". I peeked for a key word: either Congratulations!,or Regretfully,.../a dry Thank You. Then I saw the word "Congratulation" blazed in gold on the outside of the manila envelope. I suspected what was inside, but wasn't 100% certain (maybe they wanted more information). As it turns out, that day yesterday, I got an acceptance letter to U Pitt, Pittsburgh. Most of the content of fat envelopes has been moved online, as it appears from the "enclosed details". Pittsburgh is a school that I'd be very happy to attend come Fall 2011. As a result of my personal college ranking, I was able to cancel plans to do applications to several lesser picks of mine. It's not even Thanksgiving and I have a place to go. Early Action is wonderful.

"Why aren't you having a party?" asks Dad as I'm quietly doing homework. "Homework", I reply. No Senioritis for me, yet. Upon the insistence of those around me, I'm still applying to "high reach schools" in New England. Furthermore, the Honors College requires a maintenance of a 3.5 GPA (the SAT threshold was the easy part, right). Notwithstanding this, I have a Service Academy Nomination interview over Christmas Break (that's technically in second semester). Senioritis is not a legitimate condition to them.

Saturday, November 6, 2010

What Just Happened

Tomorrow will be one hour longer. As you set back your clocks (the ones that don't automatically reset), don't forget to check your smoke detectors as well.

As I am not a political pooh-bah,but rather a busy student, I did not have the luxury of time to wing around Downtown DC for Gray's celebration of victory* then up to Baltimore to hit up some political celebrations for both MD Governor contestants. First,I must ask, how much is it a victory party when you "win" 42% to 56%? Yes, you're the one with the 37%. Some issue concerning voter discouragement robocalls arose from a message along the lines of;"take it easy tonight" Your candidate won so you don't have to go to the polls". All or nothing shot, isn't it? Four days after the election, (formerly) incumbent candidate Gov. Ehrlich's Rockville, MD campaign office stood deserted save for a large poster in the window and some furniture and yard signs.

*over an unofficial campaign to write-in Fenty the incumbent. Fenty, a pro-charter school, pro-business democrat won the DC Republican nomination but declined the offer.

So, we didn't lose many incumbents in our area:
Local congressional politicians in a feedback loop

Decades ago, a pro-government candidate won the vote of a constituency of government employees.

The government hasn't left the area. No reason to shake things up politically.

The candidate is still in office, but very powerful now because he (or she in Mikulski's case) has seniority.

When you've got seniority,you bring home bacon. This means bringing more government money and people to the area.

You wouldn't want to vote against bacon, would you?