Walter A. Brosco, esq.

The problem is that I have no confidence in anything that I'm writing and therefore I am already second-guessing words even before they are typed.

I was hoping to crank out another piece for my independent study and make some progress on my Comparative paper today. It's almost 2:00pm. Where did the day go? I'm totally screwed.

So I'm surfing Travelocity (because I'm supposed to be working on a 20 page paper comparing the role that federal entities have in encouraging the development of cyberinfrastructure in other developed nations) and I'm thinking to myself, "Hey Self, let's check out some flights to Germany."

So I do.

And my travel days are flexible, so I select that as the option. And they give me a few days in November when the cheap fare is available, and I select those dates, thinking that the price per ticket is going to be around $385 or close to it. Color me amazed when, after selecting my itinerary on days they claimed were the cheap fares, that my total price is half again as much as I thought it would be at $1,260 something. HUH?

So I click through, and Travelocity gives me this:

Review the price

(All prices are in US dollars.)
2 Adults: $768.40 ( $384.20 per person )
Taxes & Fees: $494.80
Total payment due: $1,263.20 *

Allow me to draw your attention to the Taxes & Fees section, which is $100 more than the price per ticket. WTF?

Looks like we'll wait another year to visit Andy and Kassie...

I Dream a Highway
by Gillian Welch, off the album Time (The Revelator) which is a phenomenal album, start to finish.

Oh I dream a highway back to you love
A winding ribbon with a band of gold
A silver vision come and rest my soul
I dream a highway back to you

John he's kicking out the footlights
The Grand Ole Opry's got a brand new band
Lord, let me die with a hammer in my hand
I dream a highway back to you.

I think I'll move down into Memphis
And thank the hatchet man who forked my tongue
I lie and wait until the wagons come
And dream a highway back to you.

The getaway kicking up cinders
An empty wagon full of rattling bones
Moon in the mirror on a three-hour jones,
I dream a highway back to you.

Oh I dream a highway back to you love
A winding ribbon with a band of gold
A silver vison come arrest my soul
I dream a highway back to you.

Which lover are you, Jack of Diamonds?
Now you be Emmylou and I'll be Gram
I send a letter, don't know who I am
I dream a highway back to you.

I'm an indisguisable shade of twilight
Any second now I'm gonna turn myself on
In the blue display of the cool cathode ray
I dream a highway back to you.

I wish you knew me, Jack of Diamonds
Fire-riding, wheeling when I lead em up
Drank whisky with my water, sugar in my tea
My sails in rags with the staggers and the jags
I dream a highway back to you.

Oh I dream a highway back to you love
A winding ribbon with a band of gold
A silver vision come molest my soul
I dream a highway back to you.

Now give me some of what you're having
I'll take you as a viper into my head
A knife into my bed, arsenic when I'm fed
I dream a highway back to you.

Hang overhead from all directions
Radiation from the porcelain light
Blind and blistered by the morning white
I dream a highway back to you.

Sunday morning at the diner
Hollywood trembles on the verge of tears
I watched the waitress for a thousand years
Saw a wheel within a wheel, heard a call within a call
I dreamed a highway back to you.

Oh I dream a highway back to you love
A winding ribbon with a band of gold
A silver vision come molest my soul
I dream a highway back to you.

Step into the light, poor Lazarus
Don't lie alone behind the window shade
Let me see the mark death made
I dream a highway back to you.
I dream a highway back to you.

What will sustain us through the winter?
Where did last years lessons go?
Walk me out into the rain and snow
I dream a highway back to you.

Oh I dream a highway back to you love
A winding ribbon with a band of gold
A silver vision come and bless my soul
I dream a highway back to you

I dream a highway back to you
Oh I dream a highway back to you love
A winding ribbon with a band of gold
A silver vision come and bless my sould
I dream a highway back to you.

Today is going to be a fun day, I've decided.

Today, at five after four pm and six seconds, I will be raising a glass to the 8th of July, 2009. You could be raising a glass, too. Today is 07/08/09. And I'll be toasting at 4:05:06 07/08/09.

It's a made-up holiday but the more I think about it the more excited I get about it. Perhaps I've lost part of my brain to graduate school. Who knows?

Why is six afraid of seven? Because Seven ate Nine.

Things are o.k.

I've been working on a couple of papers and I'm starting to feel the stress of my comparative paper, even though it isn't due for another oh, 17 days. It's supposed to be 15-20 pages long, so if I buckled down and started writing it, I'd only have to write one or two pages a day to get there. I should just do it and be done with it. I mean, it's the only outstanding requirement for the class. So if I wrote it, I'd be done. And I wouldn't be stressed about it anymore. Good luck with that.

**redacted a long section about my new boss**

We got our summer tax bill and it sucks. I'm torn: I know that everywhere is experiencing hard times, and we currently have the means to pay the tax bill without too much grumbliness (we don't have the taxes in escrow, so we get the lump sum bill in the summer and a smaller one in the winter). But I also know that our house is not worth as much as they've assessed it, because we recently had the bank appraise it when we were thinking about converting the attic into living space. So I'm tempted to challenge the bill, but I don't know that the outcome would be that much of a reduction, and I don't really want to spend any time going through that. I'm already busy enough! So, we'll probably pay the tax bill as they mailed it to us.

I think my nose got sunburned again. I really like the Spartan visor that I bought, but it isn't nearly long enough to provide ample coverage to my gigantic nose, apparently. And that's disappointing for so many reasons.

Tomorrow is 07/08/2009, otherwise known as SEVEN ATE NINE. Why Seven ate Nine, nobody knows! But I do know that I will be knocking off work early and heading over to a patio to sip on some tasty beverages while fretting that I only have 16 more days to write my 20 page paper. w00t!



ALSO!!! BREAKING NEWS!!! OMG!!! Did anyone else hear that Michael Jackson died?

Here's the thing (we started out friends): I don't really like the 4th of July.

I don't like the crowds. I don't like the neighborhood fireworks. I don't like the crazy people who insist that the United States was shat out from the ass of God Himself and so therefore is above reproach and/or deserving of a Hardees AND a McDonalds on every corner.

Right now it sounds like our house is being shelled.

I think my worst 4th of July was in DC when I went down to the Mall for the festivities and the fireworks. I thought, "I live here. I should go. Everyone should experience this." It seemed like everyone was. All right up in my face. I swear about 25 people were almost killed in the metro station on the way home that night. It was rough.

Anyway, I'm as patriotic as the next person--maybe even moreso--but the 4th of July doesn't really resonate with me. I think it lost some of its something when CNN.com reported a few years ago that the 4th of July was when the United States achieved its independence from the British. If CNN.com doesn't know our nation's history, well...we're in sad shape.

I tried to look up and see how many times the 4th of July has occurred on a Saturday, but I got distracted and I still don't know. So I can't tell you. But Chicago has to be smiling at itself every time it happens.

This morning Drew and I went for coffee. We walked through the neighborhood and saw no one but the speedwalking ladies who were carrying their coffee. Good times. Our favorite barista, Jocelyn, was there and Drew was cute and shy about ordering his hot chocolate. The ladies love that. After walking home, we ate our bagels, a muffin, and sipped our tasty beverages.

A little later we went downtown Lansing for the parade. It was an interesting cross section of humanity, and I never cease to be amazed at people. The parade itself was fun. There were bands, and motorcycle cops and a fire engine and elementary schools and sports teams, and crazy "RE-DECLARE OUR INDEPENDENCE" groups represented in kind. There were also a lot of cars. I guess we're in Michigan, after all. And the flag still stands for freedom, and they can't take that away. Hey.

Right now, Seaves and Drew are still napping. I've been working on two separate papers for class. One is a book review of Christine Borgman's Scholarship in the Digital Age, you know, the one that I was supposed to have finished about four weeks ago. The second paper is a "cyberinfrastructure primer" that is talking about all the technical stuff associated with The Series of Tubes in a not-too-technical way in order to make it a little easier to understand for the mind of an academic. (See what I did there?)

I haven't started on my 20 page paper for my comparative and international research class yet. If I put it off a little longer, it will start writing itself, right?

It's still dreary here. And cool. It hasn't yet reached 70 degrees today. It's supposed to be warmer tomorrow, but I will believe it when I see it.

Happy Independence Day, America!

Things I did at lunch:

Biked home.
Changed into running gear.
Ran. (2.53 miles in around 21 minutes.)
Showered.
Got dressed again.
Emptied the dishwasher.
Threw some leftover pizza and some grapes in a ziploc.
Biked back to work.

Rock out at work, people. The weekend is almost here. Yay, drunken rabble rousers of the late 1700's!



(or here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGqUYuMuGPQ)




(or here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yH0RbHjD4vw)




(or here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yq-aNkBc2_M)




(or here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=df91aCyNMPo)

The setting: July 1, 1997. It was a Tuesday. Baltimore, MD. Whiff and I drive up from DC to meet up with my friends Holly and Ceila, and Holly's friends Jodi and Claire, who are on vacation together, traveling up the East Coast, stopping to see Holly's friends and do fun things.

I walk in. I am struck by lightning. I can't speak, I can't breathe. I think to myself: "Self, you are in big trouble right now." I am so smooth that I do not hear whether Claire's name is Claire or Jodi. I only hear every part of me confirming that I am smitten.

The introductions happened right around this time, 12 years ago. Can that even be right? TWELVE YEARS?

We pile into a station wagon to drive from Ceila's house in Towson to the bars by the harbor. I ride with Holly in the way back. Claire gets the Wrong Idea about my intentions with Holly. I want to know from Holly if the brown-haired girl I am in love with is named Claire or Jodi. Holly laughs at me and won't tell me for a few minutes. Suffer. Suffer. Suffer. Her name is Claire. Bliss.

"I knew that you guys would really like each other," said Holly to Claire later, a couple of days before our wedding. Holly was right. She's a good friend.

I wore Doc Martens with no socks, cargo shorts, and a beat up Phish t-shirt. I always aim to make a good first impression.

Claire changed clothes before we went out. I can't remember what she had on when I was introduced, but later she wore khaki shorts, and a yellow top, and tennis shoes.

We didn't speak for some time after we got to the scene. In that time, I confided in Whiff that I was a wreck and was having trouble forming sentences. "Sweet!" Whiff said. "I'm going to go talk to her." That pretty much spurred me into action and the rest, as they say, is history.

We didn't even smootch that night. "Because I'm a nice girl," said Claire, moments ago snuggled on the couch. I couldn't agree more.

Happy Meeting You Anniversary!



10 year anniversary picture? Nope. That's from the Night We Met.

I really meant to sit down and write a long post about what I've been up to (class, studying, reading, playing with Drew, hanging out, drinking too much, reading more, studying more, going to class more, and work). And I worked out today at lunchtime.

Instead, I watched Cobra Starship videos. Which led to Hellogoodbye videos, which led to the Asteroid Galaxy Tour videos.

And I sipped some port.

SO, while it wasn't the "productive" evening that I was planning, it was not altogether lost, either.

But alas, a charming and in-depth analysis of my fragile psyche will have to wait another day. Alas.

Tomorrow is my boss' last day at work. He's retiring after 37 years at MSU. Thirty Seven Years.

I've come up with 100 awesome names for bands, mostly derivative of Mary Poppins dialogue. For example, "Fair Queue of Nannies."

Oh yeah? Well...your ideas are silly, too.

• 08:23 Hey yogurt! If you're so cultured, how come I never see you at the opera? #

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• 16:33 Speeches went well. Retirement reception complete. Retirement party commencing. Harper's in East Lansing. Come toast Scott McMillan! #
• 22:12 is waiting for you. All my sins, yeah, I said that I would pay for them if I could come back to you. #
• 14:25 today: up early. Coffee. Swim lessons. Bought more goldfish and minnows. Mowed the lawn. Read some CI stuff. Considering a haircut. #

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• 22:19 is wondering if anybody heard any news about anything or something? #
• 22:24 If you want to make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make that change. #
• 09:41 DAY FIVE. Presenting today on the UK and South African systems of higher ed. If you're reading this, you are still alive. Make it matter. #

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I've been busy. Last night I thought about posting some thoughts and catching up with what's going on this week, but I wound up going through some old pictures instead. Such is life.

Class has been interested and not entirely exhausting, although I wouldn't recommend the format of 9-5 classes for five consecutive days. Today wasn't too bad as we worked in groups on two comparative research questions. Not to exaggerate, but these are questions that people have written disserations about and/or crafted entire careers around studying. And we hammered them out in a morning session and an afternoon session. Take that, career researchers!

I'm off to a Lansing Lugnuts (deez Lugnutz?) game this evening. I'm going to bike down to Oldsmobile Park (3.3 miles from my house) in 90 degree weather with severe strong storms threatening. Good idea? *shakes Magic 8 Ball* "Future uncertain, ask again later."

• 08:32 about to head out to class again. Lunch with my boss, then Thirsty Thursday at the Lugnuts game tonight, courtesy of SASS (thanks Jim!). #

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• 08:50 is off to DAY THREE (of five) of Comparative Higher Ed stuff. The Ministry of Education would like to have a word with you... #
• 12:09 's Bologna Process has a first name, it's "increased mobility." #
• 14:37 Erasmus Mundus: European scholarship program or Hogwarts professor? #

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• 08:47 is heading back to Erickson for DAY TWO of Comparative and International Education. 'cause you see, in Finland, they do it like this... #

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