terrible lunch

I just got back from the A & W/Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet up in Brockton - oh god what a terrible lunch. I don't know why but I just had this terrible and sudden urge for a Cheeseburger - does that ever happen to you? It must at least be in part because I have been living with my brother and his family now for over a month and they are vegetarian. Plus, I am moving into a housing Co-op, who happens to be Vegan (at least for the shared meals), in about a week and that is an ever impending thought in my head. I'm not even a vegetarian, although I support their cause.

So anyways, I got in my car and drove the 10 miles to buy some shitty fast food, which I think, was mostly inspired by a "Harold and Kumar go to White Castle" like moment, in which I either made up a memory, or this actually happened, of some nostalgia involving winning a youth soccer game and our coach taking us to A & W afterwords. Result: Everything was predictably terrible and made me feel awful. I now return to my desk to work knowing that at least the whole meal was only $5 and knowing that there really isn't such a thing as good cheap food. Although the Root beer from the tap might have been my one saving grace.

You drive me crazy

Happy Thanksgiving everyone,

After the perennial all-you-can-eat fest that my family and countless others engaged in earlier today, I'm still feeling stuffed and it's midnight. By the way, did you know 25% of food is wasted every year at Thanksgiving? and like most facts, I made that one up - but I think I heard somewhere that the number is something like that. Anyways, it's been awhile since I've posted so I thought I'd give a quick update with time for a story maybe (I can't help myself can I?).

I've been kicked out of my house as a result of some personality clashes and ageism from my annoyingly elitist roommates who ended up sucking pretty hard in the end. They just came out at me at a house meeting with no pretext or any real reason but just a general dislike of me. I've never really had anything like this happen to me so it was pretty shocking and made me pretty angry. It basically all started with this art girl roommate of mine and some paintings falling (no this was actually not my fault at all this time she just chose me as a scape goat) and the rest of the story is not even worth recounting. The ironic part though is that she is now leaving (either on her own accord or not I'm not sure sure) and since there is no lease, my one friend in the house is leaving too since he is so upset about all of this bullshit.

After living with my brother for the past month and looking for a place to live, I am moving into a housing co-op December 15th. Unfortunately it's just a sublet but it should be an interesting experience; especially learning to be a vegan for the house meals. More to come on this...

I also got a promotion to senior executive sales strategist and a $20,000 raise. Ok, that parts not true, the raise was $2,000. Okay, fine, you got me, none of it is true -but just wanted to keep you on your feet. I did however find a girl that I am now seeing who's really cool and who I am having a great time with but unfortunately lives in Brooklyn. So I'm doing that whole thing now going from Boston to NYC every few weekends (or her coming here). Actually on my last trip to the city I was at this bar and this guy started staring me down. He eventually came over and flicked me on my forehead. I was so surprised that I didn't even know what to say. After he stared me down again a little later I went over to him and asked if I knew him or if there was something he wanted? He said no and offered no further explanation. Eventually he told me to come over where he was standing with this girl and he asked me if I could help him. I nervously asked in what way and told me to just relax and since this wasn't making any sense to me and I was starting to really not like where this was going, I just came out with it and asked if he was gay and told him I was not. He then replied that it was impossible that I wasn't gay and proceeded to move in on me as the girl next to him stepped in front of him and told me to fuck off and that he was her boy. Bewildered, I jumped away and started by for my girlfriend, who, this whole time, I don't know how he didn't see her as we were on the dance floor together.

I have no idea why things like this happen to me but this wasn't the first time. I apparently attract gay men (this was the second black dude too). The first one, I will never forget, told me as I just finished doing Karaoke at this bar in Minneapolis (don't ask me what song until I've had a few drinks - oh wait, better yet, don't do that cause then I might do Karaoke again), anyways, he said: "little Jewish Boy, you drive me caaaarazy." Surprise surprise I ended up running from this guy too. oh good times

Credit the Red Sox

Luckily it hasn't affected me much since I have no savings, no 401k, no investments really, and am glad that it's happening now and not later at least for me. On another note - I've been counting how much junk mail I get lately -like in the actual mail, and it really is incredible. But I actually decided to count how much I've been getting and in the last 5 months or so, I have over 35 letters from credit card companies trying to get me to get a new card. This probably isn't surprising since every body seems has experienced this at one point or another (or maybe I am just really attractive from a credit standpoint). After living in Cameroon and Guatemala and seeing the difficulty they have in getting credit, this is even more outstanding. Even trying to get a $100 loan in Cameroon was so difficult for so many of my friends and over here people are throwing credit at me trying to get me to go in to debt. Then today, at Best Buy with my brother, I discovered that Best Buy will give you an interest free 18 month loan when you spend over a few hundred dollars. And no wonder why people in this country live beyond their means.

Speaking of living beyond our means, I decided to go to the Red Sox play off game versus Tampa on Thursday night even though I didn't have a ticket or the money (seemingly) for a play off ticket at the most expensive stadium in baseball. I didn't have tickets and was driving (which is possibly the most stupid thing you can do near Fenway) and some how got a legitimately free parking spot right near it. I then proceeded, along with a friend, to get scalped tickets at $75 a piece (the face value was some thing like $120). Ridiculous really since I had tried to get tickets in the mlb.com lottery before and was unsuccessful. As any body knows who watched or read about this game - it was incredible. The Sox game back from 7 runs down after every body thought they were done in the 7th. I have never been in such an electric sports atmosphere - I didn't sleep that night. Now I'm listening in the 7th as they are down 2-1, oh wait, excuse me (f$#k) 3-1 (thank you Willy Aybar) in game 7 and even if they go on to lose will be happy to have witnessed what I did.

The Herb Files (part II)

After going to Fenway with my brother and father at yesterday's magnificent 7-5 Red Sox triumphant come back over Toronto I thought I would recount a humorous story about my father since it was back in one of my first post's that I wrote about him and I really could just devote this whole thing to him.


The story takes place about 10 years ago I believe. I should also preface this story by saying that my dad does not swear very much and does not take kindly to his sons or their friends cursing either (or at least back when we lived at home).

So my brother had his friend Kevin over and as was often the case my dad just happened to have a project that he wanted help with (on a side note - I know a lot of parents who do this - are they just saving the projects for when we have friends over since most of the time when you are a friend you have to be polite and helpful when you are at your friend's parent's house?) and not surprisingly it involved some heavy lifting. So they picked up this dresser and after moving it discovered a large pile of mouse feces. To every one's surprise (both the amount of poo and my dad's reaction) my dad proclaimed: "Wholly shit that's a lot of crap!" But Kevin was (is) a wise guy and couldn't hold back and so added: "You know, Mr. Kessel, you could have also said: 'Wholly crap that's a lot of shit!"

Even though I would have been rolling over laughing at this point my dad apparently reacted with stoicism and not even the slightest hint of a smile.

Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse

I know I write about cooking a lot but I just can't help it. I think it's because writing about my faults helps me get over my lack of common sense but maybe more importantly some times I think even I surprise myself.

Last night I was steaming (or attempting rather) to steam broccoli with a salad spinner and lid on top. I was using this because when I didn't see the pot with the wholes in it for steaming I just grabbed the next best thing (or so I thought) and put it on top of the boiling water pot. I then went upstairs to put on clothing (I was cooking just in my towel after my shower - I often go around like this delaying putting on clothing) and of course by the time I came back the spinner, made entirely of plastic, was melting through in several places. But to top it off I had been cooking potatoes in tin foil in the oven for more than an hour and since they were still hard I decided to put them in towels in to the microwave (at least I knew to take away the tin foil) so that I could have towel smelling potatoes which also did not soften. So finally I cut them in to small pieces and boiled them and an hour and 40 minutes (in total) later I had my two potatoes.

I think I also write about this because some day I think all of this could make a great T.V. show. Or maybe just a cooking show where I cooked dishes and actually called people in the audience with questions (sort of a reverse to the norm).

While after spending last week end in the Cape I'm off to spend another week end outside of this hell whole that is Boston (just kidding) in the great state of Vermont where Herb and a pile of squash he will be offering me await (even though he knows I don't like squash...I can already hear him now, "It's fresh from the garden")

Friends

I think one of the hardest things about moving to a new place is finding new friends. You either don't want to put the work in or just don't find too many people that you can actually hold a conversation with. So what I'm wondering is whether the majority of people can't hold conversations - and if this is true what do these people do when they are hanging out, or if it isn't true, how is that most people probably feel the same way? And I'm not talking about some stupid conversation about oil prices going up or trans-gender people being accepted in to society - I mean more like who people actually are.

I have made a few friends since coming to Boston. In fact, most of the people I hang out with are lesbians at least 4 years my senior - They call me their "lesbro" since I am the one dude. It's funny that I never got along with lesbians before this because it's great being able to talk about girls with girls. It just sucks that even besides this horde of people all of my friends are girls. It is kind of weird telling people right now that I really just want to meet a cool guy, you know have a wing man or what ever. But then what if I do meet a cool guy who could be a good friend, what do I do? Ask him for his number? That might come off wrong.

Maybe I am having a hard time because some one saw me the other day walking the dog when he dropped a deuce and I didn't pick it up because I thought no one was looking and then that person told every one else.

the pluses and the minuses

+ I thought Boston might kind of suck - it doesn't (for the most part). I biked to Boston Common this week end for a "Life is Good" festival (man that company can get annoying) and low-and-behold they had Melvin Sparks and Robert Randolph and the Family Band playing a completely random free show. That was sweet.
- I don't like spending too much time with co-workers outside of work and that is pretty much how I spent the majority of my week end
+ I went to Water Country in Portsmouth, NH and relived my childhood years at the water park.
- Water parks in general are filled with chlorine and god knows how many other chemicals as well as urine filled water and inappropriately dressed 14 year old girls. Water Country is no exception.
+ On the way back we got some surprisingly good Polynesian food at Kowloons - the most ridiculous restaurant (see above) - They had decadent fountains, weekly entertainment (I guess they have a sex hypnotist on Friday nights - don't ask me what he does), and menus the size of Shaquille O'Neill head. Additionally, the chicken on the pineapple (also pictured above but hard to tell) came out flaming - big +
- This restaurant is off of Route 1, just north of Boston, and if any body has ever driven there they know how disgusting this segment of the road is. Every other building is a completely over the top version of what ever chain exists in the country. The McDonald's arches are bigger than ever, there is some Tex Mex place with a ginormous cactus, seafood place with full sized boat, you get the picture - this type of stuff is no longer a novelty but just like the Mall of America in Minnesota, a disgusting representation of the extravagance of our waste in this country.
+ Every one should visit these waste sites from time to time when looking for inspiration in chanting: "U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!"
+ I just heard about some M.I.T. research being done for these cell phone chargers that will store energy from within a women's brassiere from the simple every day movement of their breasts.
- Men cannot participate (except fat man) and women with smaller breasts will not power their cellphones as quickly (or maybe at all unless shape might play a factor). More research will need to be done on this.

The mix was a little bit off that day

1.The title of this entry is supposed to refer to two previous recent incidents where the mix was a little bit off (esp. one of them) but just now coming back from Somerville I felt like it was a little off too. I decided to bike seeing as it was nice out and 20 miles in Boston by car can take just as long. It took me literally 10 minutes to get a stubborn pigeon, who for some reason, decided he didn't want to leave my bike's handlebars- I was brushing him with my hand and my bike lock and he still wouldn't fly away - so weird, I have never seen any thing like this. These city pigeons are just no longer afraid of any thing. Then I got a little off track and had to walk next to Storough drive with my bike on a one foot section of grass (major highway like road through Boston) for several miles to get back - this was incredibly scary as cars were flying by me at 60 Mphs. Why didn't I take a bike map you may ask? The answer is that I did but was too stubborn to use it.

2. A few nights ago I was hanging out with my new friend here who had applied for a job at Equal Exchange and I had invited another Equal Exchange person to join us. This person, who is new, actually ended up getting the same job that my friend had applied for but I had glossed over this minor detail when inviting everyone. While it was definitely awkward when I realized this when we went to hang out, it was not nearly as bad as what happened next. Us 3 went to a bar and just happened to run in to another Equal Exchange employee - but not just any one - it just so happened to be the woman who did both of their hirings - ouch, talk about awkward moment and a lot of silence...not a good mix.

3. What I really wanted to write about was my trip to the dentist a few weeks ago. I had to get fillings and I was already a little concerned with my new dentist here in Boston (seeing as they were completely random but only a few minutes from my house) but decided to give it a chance - BIG MISTAKE. I have never seen such shoddy and unprofessional work. The assistant was falling asleep during the procedure and when the dentist asked her for tools she gave him the wrong ones and when scolded replied: "It' Monday." These are my teeth we're talking about - I don't care what day it is! The real problem came later in the day when parts of the filling were coming off in my mouth. Doing sale's calls as silver bits and pieces came out of my mouth was not easy - I asked if this was a problem and they told me to come in. Turned out, luckily, my teeth are fine but the dentist did reply when asked if it was normal: "yeah, the mix was a little bit off that day."

Best Show East of the Mississippi

So this post has been a long time coming and obviously long over due. This picture is from my recent trip back to Burlington for my dad's surprise 60th Birthday. Some times it is scary when I think about how we are all getting older and then I remember that I am still 23, and that's pretty good. I met this street performer on Church Street during Jazz Fest who claimed, when I asked if his show was any good (I have this terrible problem that I inherited from my father if asking if things are good in situations where the answer is that they obviously have to be good), that it "is the best show East of the Mississippi" - well this claim was incredible enough that I had to ask to get my picture taken with him. Unfortunately I missed the show so I will never know if it was truly better than some of those shows just west of the Mississippi, like in Cape Girardeau Missouri.

I did get to do some cliff jumping with my friend Joey and that is always a blast despite my fear of heights-I will never jump the 76er but the 35 is still pretty high at Red Rocks - I highly suggest it (see below for random youtube video of random kids jumping off some unspecified height at Red Rocks - come on give me some credit, I'm trying to incorporate some more media in to this thing). Another highlight, I don't like to brag, but what the hell I will, was beating my older brother and father in golf - although it was his birthday so I kind of felt bad, but I played the round of my life and am now thoroughly addicted - it's a shame I chose one of the most pricy sports on the world to be addicted to. Yet another highlight would have been Free Cone Day at Friendly's (Friendly's is paying me hundreds of dollars to mention them in my prestigious blog) but sadly when we arrived minutes after the 5 pm deadline they wouldn't give us a free cone even though they were still selling cones. It's a small thing, but this type of customer service goes a long way and their whole generous free cone day thing comes off as kind of half ass this way too. What's even worse than this type of thing is when the video store is already closed when you get there 10 minutes before closing. My dad use to say that my grandfather would come back and open the store up again for people who would come even 30 minutes late to our family business: Lynn Lumber (does this make up for my link to Friendly's?) I sort of wish we operated on the same clock that they did in Cameroon when I was there - what ever you feel like and when ever. Although I guess this did create massive problems most of the time.

Hell's Kitchen

I watched the show Hell's Kitchen the other night - no I didn't actually watch it but my roommate rented some season on Net Flix and I got sucked in to watch 2 episodes. At first I was fascinated at how any one could watch this crap but then I realized that the ridiculous drama of these amateur cooks was kind of entertaining. I hate to write another blog entry relating to cooking but I could not hold back; especially after the real drama from my cooking class as of late.

Two classes ago we had a mentally handicapped kid who was supposed to come with his sister as an aid. Of course she doesn't show up and who ever dropped him off said he would be fine and he could use knives. Sure enough, a few minutes in to the class he cuts himself and starts bleeding everywhere. He doesn't go for help he just keeps cooking bleeding all over the ingredients. When the teacher finally gets him to bandage it, he decides he doesn't feel like wearing the bandage and takes it off a few minutes later and continues to bleed. As you can imagine, everyone was freaking out and things finally ended with this kid being kicked out of the class and the screaming aid threatening to sue for prejudice against the handicapped.

Also not surprisingly, the class size dropped dramatically for the last two classes even with this kid gone (I guess people didn't like the idea of blood in their food) but tonight we lost yet again another student. This time, a girl in the class who has constantly complained about how bad the instructor is (in all fairness she is pretty bad) got fed up with the teacher as the teacher kept grabbing her pan and cooking it the way she saw was best rather than instructing her how to cook differently. It happened three times to the same girl before she lost it and screamed: "YOU KNOW WHAT? I HATE THIS CLASS AND YOU ARE A TERRIBLE TEACHER AND I"VE HAD ENOUGH, I"M OUT!!!" IT was easily the most dramatic exit I've seen in awhile and it left every body else (all 5 of us) frozen not knowing what to say. It truly did seem like a scene from the show Hell's Kitchen.

On a side note, out of nowhere there finally appeared a hot girl but with all this drama she almost just seemed like a side show.

So I'm off for my second business trip. First, I'm going to D.C. for Memorial day week end to visit friends and from there to Phili. for a week of business. Until next time...

They can't fire me now - I'm on the map

These come up when you click on the states on the Equal Exchange website:

Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland & Delaware Sales Rep
Andrew Kessel
akessel@equalexchange.coop
Phone: 774-776-7387

Pennsylvania Sales Rep
Andrew Kessel
akessel@equalexchange.coop
Phone: 774-776-7387

I have major heart burn right now

My chest feels like it's about to explode. No seriously, not joking, it really does. Does any one have those random moments of intense pain where they feel like they might die or some thing and in reality they probably just need to drink some water? That's me right now, except I can't drink any water because I can't move...at least I can type and if you are going to be stuck in pain any where for a period of time what better place than at your keyboard with your blog, face book and nba.com as your tabs when you get distracted, and some good tunes.

I probably feel this way because I ate nothing but muffins for dinner and then came home and drank some beers - but this is not entirely my fault. Amongst other things since I have last blogged, I've joined a cooking class. I really am an active person when I'm not experiencing intense chest pain. The class was ridiculously expensive but my parents agreed to pay for it seeing as I eat rather poorly (mostly from laziness rather than lack of skill but a beginner cooking class couldn't hurt right?) Even though I failed cooking twice in high school, and by fail I mean dropped out, I decided to give it another chance thinking I might meet some new people in Boston. But sure enough, just like high school there are no interesting people, no lack of awkward people, and just because I know one of my readers will appreciate this (you know who you are) - a real lack of hot girls (I have determined that the hot girl perception of cooking class is obviously false at this point, or maybe this was just my perception) - although this is not why I joined. I do want to learn some real skills, but instead tonight we were taught how to make muffins. I cannot see anything less important than muffins. Even learning how to make a Indonesian salad (does this exist?) would have been better but instead I had 9 muffins and some beers for dinner and now feel awful. But enough about this nonsense - lot's of stuff has been going on for me.

Two week ends ago I got to go on my first business trip. We went to Chicago and had a pretty good time. I might write about this later but it really is it's own story and might require some thinking about appropriateness. But I went to Vermont this last week end and got to see a few friends, play golf, play paint ball - which was fun but also scares the shit out of me, celebrate mother's day, and renew an old tennis rivalry with a close friend. Just a quick note there, we both played awful, but at least I broke my strings before we even started playing and I played with two broken strings as an excuse--> Best quote from the match from my friend: "yeah. I'm definitely having a meltdown - but you're gonna ride this one out with me until the end" --> which I did as I nervously lost all faith in my swing with two strings down. Just like I would have in my college tennis meltdown days (and I still didn't come to net).

Favourite current phrases:
"Off the record..." --and then you can insert anything you want, the possibilities are limitless. What a great expression!
"Schlitzed/schlitzing" --as in the lower quality beer known as schlitz, or as I like to say: the "schlitz." It sounds like some Yidish word but to me seems like a funny way to say hammered - as in "Let's get schlitzed tonight...or: "last night I was schlitzing so hard." Take it or leave it I think it's great

Matzo: Not a grain to be found in JP

Already having missed the annual passover Seder this year as I was in Minnesota for the MAC alumni match, I felt some thing was lacking. I decided to buy some Matzo at Harvest Coop. a place with stuff for everyone and hippies. But guess what, they ran out of Matzah and said they would be getting some soon. Because I am trying to keep the tradition, didn't want to eat non-passover cereal, and didn't have any Matzah I skipped breakfast that day. I have been struggling ever since with out the patented staple of this holiday.

A brief interlude here: I did have Matzo pizza with pepperonis (cheese & meat + pork) and clam chowder (clams) during Passover earlier this year and while this may seem contradictory since, as you will see, I have gone to great lengths to get Matzo. I love many pork products and don't really see eye to eye with the oral tradition as opposed to here with the sacrifice of bread which is more the cultural tradition.

Anyways, where was I? Oh yeah, so I went to the Stop N Stop and they were all out too and told me that they didn't think this demographic existed here, it's more for Hispanics they tell me. This is a huge grocery store with just about everything! They tell me to check the Stop N Shop in Brooklyn. So I venture in to CVS not too far down the block, don't ask my what I was thinking, and I interupt a long line to ask the lady at the register, a young Latina women. She calls out over the inter-com and asks if they have any "Ma-s-o" (I even spelled it out and tried to describe it) as she calls it and then: "it's a brand of cracker." So now I am embarresed in front of this whole line of waiting people and of course they do not have "this" brand of cracker. After 3 days with no Matzo I go back to Harvest today and they still don't have any. "Funny you should ask the grocery person tells me, every one has been coming in here and there isn't any." Huh no wonder - there actually are Jews that exist in JP, or just a bunch of Hippie cracker eating mo fos. Also, usually when people want some thing at a grocery store and there are enough people asking for it, don't they get it right away??!! Any who,this lady tells me there will be more crackers in Friday and asks is there any other brand of cracker she could get me?

This type of thing never happened in Vermont where there are far fewer Jews. I really don't understand it. The annoying Stop N Shop lady was right, I should have prepared before the holliday - just never thought it would be a problem. Looks like I'm going to have to go to Brooklyn for a freaking piece of Matzo, or maybe I'll just get some crackers and forget about the whole thing.

The Organics Movement

One thing I have learned a little bit about at my job is the organics movement. It is an interesting parallel that has happened there with everything in this country, and really in the world, with consolidation. Check out this video if you get a chance:

http://www.msu.edu/~howardp/OrganicIndustry.mov

I have conflicted feelings about the movement. On the one hand, I can definitely see the value to eating fewer chemicals, decreasing health risks for producers and consumers, and a better quality product in general I think. I also think the price is too expensive for me to actually afford to start buying all organic foods. So I chose eggs for now. On the other hand, I think people may be overly obsessed with organics (see the blog "stuff white people like") in a crazy way that doesn't always make sense. Just because some thing's organic doesn't make it better and doesn't mean that the person producing it was a farmer in overalls wearing a classic yellow hat. People just associate organics with small producers, economic empowerment, healthy food, and other ideas which are not necessarily true (unless you are one of the thousands of yuppy soccer moms now shopping at Whole Foods). So many supporters come off as self righteous too and make it seem like this is the most important ethical decision one can make. Some times I feel like I'm not radical enough for this job.

A plug for E.E.

Equal Exchange's recent trip to Chiapas. I know this is some what self-promoting advertising, but I feel like this will give you a better idea of where I work.

Wings and Spaghetti

I've been learning a lot lately since moving to Boston and adjusting to full-time work and actually cooking more than Macaroni and Cheese. Two nights ago I learned that spaghetti, believe it or not, is actually flammable. Yeah, you probably already knew that, and I should have. I should probably say also that I haven't really upgraded that much from Mac & Cheese since that night I was making plain spaghetti and tomatoe sauce, come to think of it, that really is no upgrade so maybe I haven't really changed and I still suck at cooking. Anyways, I put half a box of spaghetti (which was way too much for just me) in, for no particular reason except laziness and lack of thinking, a tiny pot thinking I could just push it down after it got soft. Instead, a good amount of the spaghetti leaning over the edge cut on fire (I don't really pay attention when I'm waiting for things to boil). Needless to say burnt spaghetti is not a delicacy of any country that I know of. Just to further point out my ineptitude at cooking, I tried to steam challets the other night (don't ask how or why I got challets) and realized after 20 minutes of steaming that that didn't actually accomplish any thing.

On a completely different note, I went out the other night with my new friend who's a lesbian. We were going bowling (every thing's candle stick around here) and couldn't get a lane so we went to get drinks instead. She recognized some one and then two other girls came who knew the first girl. All the sudden it was just me a four lesbians and I was serving as wing man to my friend. It was very awkward also considering I just met this friend. How do I get myself in these situations? Maybe more importantly, why do I blog about these embarrassing things? I'm not sure if it makes me feel better to get it out or to know that at least I might be giving a few laughs to some friends.

Check Engine Light is on

This might not be interesting to any body but me but I feel like raving about my car for a minute. I am so pissed off at Wendy (I never should have named my Corolla either or any car for that matter- for people who do this - it is stupid), today this tomorrow that. Let me give you a short 1-2 year history of my luck (rather dismal luck) with my car which by the way is only 8 years old, which for the following summary, is remarkable.

-Two days ago I was driving and parking my car when I either ran over some glass or hit the curb going very slowly and my wheel just popped (lost all air) completely. I almost put the rescue donut on without professional help but couldn't get the tire off because of the rust. Triple A comes and taps it with a big log and the problem is fixed at a discount of $25 (the tow would have been terrible). On a side note, maybe I should start carrying one of those big logs around except it would get annoying when each of my passengers asks: "what's the big log for?"

-That wasn't actually so bad. What was, was driving home from Minnesota this past summer and having a deer run in to my car at 2 in the morning in Michigan after a 12 hour drive. I'm not sure but I think the deer was more destroyed than my $2000 damaged car whose door who would no longer close and whose shell was sprayed with deer blood and hair.

-Two windows smashed and two stereos systems jacked while at school

-Pebble or some small rock hitting my windshield while I was driving creating a small whole that I ignore for several weeks until the crack spreads across my entire wind shield and I am forced to pay for a pricey replacement.

-Sitting in a car line waiting to get tickets to skiing last winter in Minnesota and the car in front of me backs right in to me for no particular reason as I lay on the horn wondering what the hell he's thinking. Another big damage but luckily he took responsibility.

-Driving down 94 last year when my car hood decides it wants to suddenly shoot up, completely bend in to the frame of the car, and blind 99% of my vision while driving 70 on a highway. Not only was this terrifying but it also cost another $1000 in repairs.

-Every trip I've taken since school (New York, Boston, Pitt.) I've had some repair some minor (serpentine belt) and some major (new clutch - even though I only had 65,000k) and basically my dad, whose anger is renewed each time these things happen, thinks I am entirely to blame. I also have gotten two parking tickets and one towing since moving to Boston - this is probably mostly my fault except that they are crazy here about that stuff.

Now the lesson here is that I probably shouldn't be driving. But I disagree - I'm not a bad driver and I'm not causing accidents but at the same time, could all of this stuff really happen to one person in the period of less than two years? Besides some other things that I think I am forgetting and an equally scary array of things from the previous period of two years, having my "check engine light" go off today might be one of the last straws. I don't even care if the light is just screwed up (like my E-brake which for some reason is always on now).

There are pills in my fish

I was watching the news tonight (some thing I do rarely now that I don't have a t.v.) and to my horror I discovered that there's been a recall of Gortons frozen fish. Apparently some one in Pennsylvania found pills of some sort in their fish. Coincidentally, I had 6 frozen Gorton fish earlier this week and actually became very ill that night with a sore throat, irregular heart beat, and excessive sweating. I haven't felt good all week and it all made sense...until I realized that the 1,000 recalled frozen fish cases weighed 4 ounces less than the ones I got and the UPC code of mine was one digit off: narrowly escaped a bullet and coincidental got sick or is there some thing fishy going on with GORTONS?!!! (sorry, I couldn't resist the pun)

Selling hot chocolate

Some of my friends described my new job to other people as selling hot chocolate. The truth is that that's not exactly right. Here is a run down from today:
-Get up at 7 (eeg), actually no, try to get up at 7, get up at 7:23 with difficulty, 45 minute commute to work in West Bridgewater, MA.
-Check email/read some fair trade/international articles sent to me
-Not feel too bad about using Outlook (very annoying program) and having to organize in a program called CRM (this is where all of our customer's info. is held)
-Prospect - we look for grocery stores (mostly) who would carry our bulk coffee, since this is where the real $ is at. Hot chocolate is really not so important, at least as much as it is delicious. On a side note, we just came out with a drinking chocolate that's $9 that is most the premium hot chocolate drinking experience I have ever had-it is like drinking pure goodness.
-Cold call = try to talk to this guy Stepan Yang at Mulberry Market in Philadelphia (this is where we are concentrating right now) and here for the 6th time in a heavy accent that he is not in...explain to other people that fair trade is not the same as free trade and ask if their customers care (about organics, fair trade, etc.) which most of the time they don't
-Informational session on the nature of worker-owner coop. and what it means to be a worker-owner (this happens in your 2nd year) but is central to the company, or coop rather
-Observe boring board meeting
-Return to van for long commute home
The good: this was kind of a boring day but some days we have Brew Crew where we learn how to do coffee cuppings (like wine tastings), or go visit accounts, or talk to the hippies at Whole Foods, or do competition analysis. This is not just another office job with the same thing every day. The people are also cool.
The bad: Even though I am trying to promote some thing good; namely, small farmers from poor 3rd world countries and an alternative trade model, I have to reconcile with the fact that I am a sale's man (or sale's person if you want to be PC about it). It's not really a bad thing except I get the feeling people look at sale's people like lawyers, except on a less prestigious level. Luckily, I'm not selling stupid retail, tchotkes, or selling cars and saying: "I've got a deal for you! Just today, because I like you, I'm going to give you my special price. For just 10 easy installments..."

The Northern Racoon Eclipse

I don't know why but I threw together a couple of interesting things I saw tonight for my blog. The picture of the eclipse here is current and cool but I did not expect the weirdness level when I went outside into the chilly Boston night that I saw. There was the eclipse, but there was also a tree with a raccoon sneaking around (I actually have seen another urban dweller in the last two days -a skunk) and peering over at me as brief faded northern lights streaked across the sky. It was surreal. Besides that, I was sent an interesting political art page here that people might want to check out:
http://www.brazilianartists.net/home/flags/

Beer Map

Feeling Young Again

I've just started my new job at Equal Exchange, 45 minutes south of Boston. This is how I've felt most of the time (see above -clueless, inexperienced, and ridiculous). When the secretary at EE first saw me she said: "Who's the new 10 year-old?"
I'm trying not to be too self-conscience of my appearance or reveal to the 40/50 + year olds working next to me that I am 22 (and yes, probably look younger). But I guess this is normal in a lot of work places.

It's just weird that at the end of college you feel sort of grown up and matured and then you enter the real world and you are the youngest again; like being a freshman in high school but worse. To add to that, my house mates are 32, 30, 28, and 26, which isn't really a big deal, except that they ask to see my I.D. when I drink a beer.

So other than that, the move has been pretty smooth so far. My new house is good, the roommates are cool, and the job seems pleasant - more on this to come as well as some pictures hopefully of my new place.

Leaving Vermont Never Easy

I spent my last night in Vermont taking advantage of the icy conditions with some skates at Shelburne pond; a small pond a few minutes from my house. I went with friends in the middle of the night and although there wasn't too much moonlight, the stars were out and it was beautiful. Even though I skied earlier in the week, it was nice to do one last thing that will be more difficult to do in Boston (at least at night while listening to the coyotes) and nuanced creeks and cracks of the ice. Only one word really to describe the experience: liberating.

I Missed my Virtual Tee-Time

Any one who knows me knows that I am not so great at being on time. Being in a van pool at work will make me more punctual like being a tennis captain did but I have some work to do. Yesterday, I went to play golf at an indoor facility that had HD virtual golf screens. Yeah, I know, it's pathetic; I'm addicted to golf and needed my fix. But anyways, my friend Joey told me we needed to be on time for our 4:00 tee-time since they were booked all day (and apparently almost every day). I mistakenly played tennis with my dad from 2:30-3:30 thinking I had enough time. And I would have except that I refused to leave at 3:30 with the match still going on (I needed to put my dad away). So much to my friend's dismay we showed up 10 minutes late to Gonzos (the golf place). We proceeded to walk in anyways with our full set of golf clubs.

You wouldn't think virtual golf clubs would be like the real ones but apparently since we had booked an hour and we were late we would have to pay for the full hour. We asked if we could just play and pay for half an hour since that was a normal option there but they said, "No. You booked a full hour. We have a tight schedule and don't want any gaps." Considering it was going to take 10 minutes to set the thing up and they were charging other people extra who were still playing on "our" course, we decided to leave as my friend said: "and now you have a gap in your schedule." End of the story: half hour drive for nothing and my tardiness making some one angry once again. At least I won the tennis match.

Bait and Switch

I just got off the phone with my uncle Rich (Herb's brother) who had a message for my dad: (in very strong Boston accent) "Tell your fathah that I have an issue that needs to be settled: I know a girl who wants to get in to Saint Mike's and she needs your fathah to show her around. Now here's the thing: academically she's mediocre, but you should see her. She makes it up in looks and personality." My uncle Rich networks and uses connections better than anyway one else I know. He wasn't asking my dad for a favor but he's smart to use these connections anyways. He even went through the people-who-like-coffee-networks in my family for when I start selling coffee next month: "your uncle Glenn, yeah, he would like free coffee, and you uncle David, he could use a free cup, and I'm at Starbucks 365 days a year, every day. You don't believe it's possible but it is." Even though using connections could have helped me get my potential job, I'm sort of proud that I got it on my own. Looking back on my job search, one thing stands out that I've wanted to write about for awhile.

As difficult and annoying as the job search process can be, the worst part is that not only are there tons of crappy jobs out there to sift through, there are also the pyramid and ponzi schemes to watch out for. I had one such encounter with an entry level "no experience needed" job at Nova Marketing. This is Barbara Ehrenreich's classic "Bait and Switch." Perhaps I should have been warned by the job description:

[All openings are FULL-TIME and need to be filled A.S.A.P.!!
There is no experience necessary. If you are a new graduate, or someone who is aggressively pursuing a change in careers, please APPLY! ]

No experience? Should I be a good guy? How bout a team player? In fact, there was no job description, the base pay was "n/a," and the amazingly poor website playing techno music should have tipped me off that there was nothing of substance here. What does Nova marketing do, who are they? Of course it is just some random marketing company in Woburn, MA with a nice name like NOVA. Fortunately at the top of a google search on the company I found two people complaining about them. I decided to go the interview (getting one the day after I sent my resume in - with no cover letter) anyways just to see for myself and to make things interesting. Sure enough, I got there and while I waited, about 20 other people must have been called in with the receptionists: "well, the sooner you can come the better. We have lots of openings." Surprisingly, I did not get a group interview but got to meet the president herself: Kate Malone. Kate talked a mile a minute while her fingers snapped on keywords like: "We work with DARE (snap), 100 other national (snap) businesses, etc." After only 10 minutes of speaking with perhaps one of the most fake people I have ever met and not being asked a single question about my past or who I really was she asked me when I would be ready to start. But first, it was my turn. I asked how much the salary was and she said that we would talk about that in the second round interview (the one where you work an entire day for them for free). I then said that I was a poor college graduate and needed to have an idea of how I would live my life working for NOVA. She said that most people make about $30,000 their first year but the second they can, not all the time, jump up to $65k! "Wow," I said, "that's great." But unfortunately when I asked about the base salary she said we can't discuss that at this time and then asked with a frown whether I had a problem with working on commission?

I suppose all of my questioning didn't get me called back for the second round but it was an experience to remember and I'm glad I went. I still don't know how this job got on career builder.com

Apartment Hunting

...is like looking for a job but a whole lot more fun. People also need me as much as I need them so the game is a little more even. I'd like to find some cool roommates but is that likely when every one you meet is random? A few more days in Boston than back to VT to study for the GRE's because even though it's the last thing I want to do, taking them at some point was inevitable and I don't start work until the 11th of February.

New Year's Resolution: No more cheeseburgers?

After a short hiatus from blogging I am back. I just came back from L.A. where I saw some MAC friends and went to a Jewish retreat about an hour and a half north of L.A.. I know what people are thinking: I went to some brainwashing weird religious thing. But it wasn't like that. Besides it being a really good vacation (although California wasn't very warm), I learned a lot and had a good time. We played paint ball and did some rope's course stuff, which I'm into, and then we had some good discussions about religion. While I was not brought up religious, I decided I needed to learn some more and figure out what I want to do with it in life. We talked about more academic discussion topics like Jewish history, the decline in our numbers, intermarriage, etc. and we also talked about more religious things like latkes and dreidels, no not really, but things like why Judaism is different, living ethically, how you should judge some one (actually: how to be a mench), why being more observant can bring meaning to your life, and how exactly people who eat cheeseburgers can go cold turkey. While I am not going to become orthodox or anything now, I think celebrating the Shabbas (even if that means just lighting candels and eating dinner with family) once a week might be nice and maybe I should try dating a Jewish girl for once.

I finally got a job after 3 1/2 months of frustration. I am going to be selling natural food products at a fair trade company called Equal Exchange. It is a little bit outside Boston but I am planning on moving there in the next few weeks to start in February. It was such a relief to finally get some thing interesting with a useful purpose. More on this later...

Lastly, I spent a weird New Years bouncing around the city (N.Y.C.). I was trying to make it to a party right when the ball was dropping but didn't realize that you can't move within a 10 mile radius of Time Square. Now normally I would never do any thing as stupid as go to Time Square to see the ball drop on New Years but this was even more idiotic. I spent the precise moment of 2007 becoming 2008 looking up at some scaffolding squeezed between a few million people I didn't know joking about no of us could move. At least it seemed like a fitting ending to a year that I was all too excited to end.