kendrak’s attack

All in a row., originally uploaded by kendrak.

my deck garden isn’t dying. in fact, it’s thriving! i want tomatoes!

Segway Joe 2, originally uploaded by kendrak.

robojoe’s on a segway- he talks about segways all the time, but never rode one. he rode this one in a 2 foot circle and then stopped. does it count? it was at cal day.

celebration, originally uploaded by mardy1.

today is michael palin’s birthday, which is fitting that i should post about sheffield wednesday staying up in the championship, since he’s the reason i picked this forsaken team when i was 10. whatever, yesterday was brilliant and they showed some life. way to go, owls!

so i’m home tonight, taking care of business- doing homework, laundry, stocking up on allergy medication, and catching up on tv stuff. this weekend needs to be restorative and i feel like i need to wear my new/old chris waddle shirt tomorrow in hopes it will keep wednesday out of the relegation zone.

i’m finally re-watching mr. toad’s wild ride, which i’m about ot shut off. it’s rubbish. when this film came out, i think i liked it because it had so many former pythons. now i’m older and crankier, and i don’t much care for it. terry jones’ green-face is dumb and he’s playing the part of prince herbert from holy grail, only it’s not so funny. couple that with the fact that eric idle is rat, and well… it’s hard to sit through. despite a very young steve coogan playing mole, i can’t be bothered with this.

i should get back to reading about “rapid software development” and its testing metrics, or fold my waddle shirt.

geeze, john cleese is in this movie! it’s totally over now.

yesterday i had my poll worker training for upcoming june election. 2008 is a busy year, with three different elections in california. february was a statewide disaster, and the alameda county registrar of voters really seemed to have noticed. i noticed that the rules had changed somewhat, thanks to the secretary of state, but the acrov really improved the instructions so that we’ll have a better idea of what the rules are.

the thing is, most poll workers are still annoying and slow. i recognized a large portion of my class from my previous trainings- lots of regular berkeley types. older hippies/left wing radicals that still cling on to certain ideals but can’t pay attention to lots of things that matter- like what constitutes a provisional voter. the really frustrating thing is that many of these people think they know everything, and would constantly interrupt the instructors (who would of course point out that the person wasn’t correct). being right or wrong on election day is nerve-wracking. any mistake from the poll workers could hinder demcoracy. the inspector and judge are supposed to be the most competent people are the polling precinct, which sadly often isn’t the case. this is why i decided to become a poll worker (that and i hate the bottle neck of slow people working the street-index or signature roster). i was definitely the youngest person in the room.

one thing i took away from this is that the registrars of voters are in a tough position throughout california (and probably the rest of the country)- they have to follow the policies of the secretary of state, which are vague and not always practical. it’s sad, but i understand why the acrov people kept telling us to take our issues with the rules to the secretary of state- because they can’t do anything about it. i wish the secretary of state did a better job with voter education, but alas they make it as vague and confusing as most library applications. somebody lamented yesterday that voters don’t read the literature sent to them, but i can’t blame people for not reading long, dense, confusing packets giving them each possible option for voting. of course, the secretary of state’s webpage is terrible. way to promote voter literacy!

the funniest thing about the training was when we had to split into pairs to set up and take down the touch-screen and the scanner. my partner was a precinct coordinator from oakland who said, “you’re not too dumb for being from berkeley.” how’d she know i was from berkeley! “educated guess.” she then started insulting berkeley pollworkers for being soft and clueless, loud enough so that other people heard her. this milquetoast woman who looked like a librarian took offense and tried to talk about berkeley’s diversity, my parter laughed and told her to look around the room- all of the other precinct workers from berkeley, save for one, were white. i tried not to chuckle. one of the acrov workers said we were the most efficient pair, and let us leave early. the whole class went long though, and i was happy to go home and write an essay.

moral of the story- vote on june 3!

see more crazy cat pics

you all know chocolate rain from tay zonday, but did you know he went to IMSA! that explains everything.

i should be doing lots of different things right now- sleeping, working on software management homework, working on a digital collection project, or even playing smash brothers, but instead i’m looking for clips from later… with jools holland, featuring jools holland from squeeze as host and sometimes band leader. as far as music variety shows go, this is the best. not only does he have an interesting mix of artists on every week, he seems to have a really good attitude about it all. so… here are some of the video i’ve found:
kate nash - “foundations”.

she’s totally a guilty pleasure of mine, which a couple of my student workers have really taken to.

mika - “grace kelly”.

i first heard this song driving back from the manchester airport with neil and it was on radio 1 every other hour after that. another guilty favourite.

enough of the embeds, they take up space.

the view - “wasted little djs”. i first got hooked on this band during the same trip to the uk because “same jeans” seemed to be after “grace kelly” every hour. they’re really good, even if they’re from scotland.

of course, my obligatory plug for bands from sheffield:

• arctic monkeys - “505″
• moloko - “sing it back”
• human league - “these are the days”
• richard hawley - “tonight the streets are ours”
• reverand and the makers - “heavyweight”

and because he’s been on a billion times…
jarvis cocker - “don’t let him waste your time”
pulp - “dishes”
pulp - “sunrise”
and what mix of pulp would be complete without disco 2000?

which goes into the britpop…
blur - “the universal”
oasis - “cum on feel the noize”, er, i mean “wonderwall”.
james - “getting away with it all”.
radiohead - “the bends”..
supergrass - “moving”.
verve - “bittersweet symphony”.
boo radleys - “reaching out from here”.
super furry animals - “if you don’t want me to destroy you”.
manic street preachers - “everything must go”.
cataonia - “road rage”.
ash - “burn baby burn”.
divine comedy - “mother dear”.
cornershop - “brimful of asha”.

and lots of moz-
“last of the famous…”, “suedehead”, “boy racer”, and “first of the gang to die”.

and some other bitchy people:

• elton john - “the bitch is back”.
• robbie williams - “ghosts”.
• liza minnelli - “god bless the child”.

alright. i’m going to sleep.

Technorati Tags: jools holland, youtube, britpop

Oakland, originally uploaded by kendrak.

yesterday was oakland’s domestic opening day. it was my first ever opening day for baseball after years of being passed over for giants tickets when i was a kid. it wasn’t super special, but i got there really early to make sure i could hang out in my preferred seat. the whole right field bleacher crew was there and they were happy to see me.

the game itself was ho-hum. neither team was amazing but it was nice to watch all the same. i forgot how much i hate red sox fans. the ones in the bay area tend to be wealthy, white, and totally clueless. every so often, one can take a joke, but for the most part they seem shocked that fans in oakland of all places would be loud and obnoxious. i guess i could see this if we were all sitting in nice, field level seat, but these were the bleachers! they’re cheap and known for being a little rowdy. it’s why i sit there. you’d think if they can afford to drive their bmw suv from santa clara or orinda, they can afford not ot sit by me. one asked us why we had to be like that, and i asked him and his lady friend if they’d ever been to a baseball game before. she hadn’t, he’d been to a few.

one of my friends said she won’t sit with me in the bleachers any more because she said the bleacher people were too distracting. she also said it’s nothing she’d bring her mom to. it’s funny because i wouldn’t want to sit in the bleachers with anybody else’s parents, but i wouldn’t mind being there with my own. yeah, i’d tone it down a little, but i’d still let the opposing right field know he sucks.

my plants, originally uploaded by kendrak.

these are two of my house plants and they are nice. they haven’t died yet, so i consider this a good thing.

i’m not talking about that big four, but rather this big four. this morning on espn first take they had america’s leading football commentator, tommy smyth, on to discuss the premier league and how it’s different than american sports. first of all- smyth is an idiot and despised by most football/soccer fans. the segment only discussed the big four since they all met up this weekend. the only highlights they showed where from this weekends match ups between arsenal and chelsea and manchester utd. and liverpool. (it’s always nice to liverpool play terribly.) then they just showed the standing of the top four teams without points, which makes it look like liverpool’s hanging with the other three. of course, being a pseudo-toffee, i was miffed because looking at the standings, the kopshite are 8 points behind arsenal and only 2 points ahead everton- their place at fourth is less than assured. (it’s also remarkable how arsenal has tumbled.) did smyth say anything about that? no. he made it seem like liverpool were on par with chelsea and arsenal and that manchester utd. was just like the yankees- better than god and no pitch outside of old trafford is worthy of them. it’s crap, really.

he also tried to explain the concept of promotion and relegation, which mystified jay crawford. if american sports had that system, the kansas city royals would be gone, and probably the knicks as well. relegation is nasty- just look at sheffield wednesday.

moral of the story- tommy smyth is an big fat moron, and everton are better than liverpool.

Technorati Tags: english premiers league, tommy smyth, espn first take, liverpool, everton

P1020797, originally uploaded by kendrak.

see that? i took it yesterday to show off my new cardigan. i’m soon to be a librarian, so i need more cardigans. it also shows how non-straight my hair is. ugh.

today i’m not at work. i’m home, after spending two hours getting my boobs touched up- i mean reconstructed. i was awake through the whole thing and we listened to kalw. today’s world have your say was about tibet, which caused my plastic surgeon to randomly say, “free tibet!” every so often. i don’t know how it looks, but it felt like a lot of tugging and twisting. i could feel them pulling the ports (to the implants) out, which was an odd sensation, but overall i felt fine at the end. i bet i could have driven home, but luckily my friend j.t. did. my right side’s a little sore now, so i think i’ll go take some aspirin and then work on a midterm.

i’m almost ready to call the cancer year over. mastectomy- check. chemo- check. clean blood test- check. reconstruction- check. huzzah!

stunna shades, originally uploaded by kendrak.

robojoe, almost ph.d., was looking mighty cool this morning as he left for his first day work. no more walking to work and wearing hoodies! congrats, man!

here’s another gem from sf gate. did you hear about the new ruling about home schooling in california? the court of appeals said people who home school need credentials.

Michael Smith, president of the Home School Legal Defense Association, said the ruling would effectively ban homeschooling in the state.

“California is now on the path to being the only state to deny the vast majority of homeschooling parents their fundamental right to teach their own children at home,” he said in a statement.

But Leslie Heimov, executive director of the Children’s Law Center of Los Angeles, which represented the Longs’ two children in the case, said the ruling did not change the law.

“They just affirmed that the current California law, which has been unchanged since the last time it was ruled on in the 1950s, is that children have to be educated in a public school, an accredited private school, or with an accredited tutor,” she said. “If they want to send them to a private Christian school, they can, but they have to actually go to the school and be taught by teachers.”

Heimov said her organization’s chief concern was not the quality of the children’s education, but their “being in a place daily where they would be observed by people who had a duty to ensure their ongoing safety.”

my opinion? i actually don’t really care. i think there needs to be some mechanism to enforce standards for home schooling, but that’s not to say that all kids who are being taught at home are being neglected or anything like that. it’s a choice, and if parents take it seriously and do a good job, more power to them. (i am a proud graduate of the california public school system from k-12, and my university degree.) the only reason i posted this, is because once again, the comments at “the gate” are amusing. this time the home school zealots come out to to rally the troops. it sort of a snoozefest, and makes me sort of dislike their cause, but i guess i just like reading personal accounts.