Friday, December 29, 2006

tea partay

by far the best commercial of 2006 goes to smirnoff. this is actually a real commercial.

it closely resembles my years at the big h. the characters remind me of slim shady, nobf, and treves.

Thursday, December 28, 2006

unplugged


just got back from a week with the fam. very relaxing. mostly sleeping and eating chocolate. saw the good shepard. i think i understood it. but in a much greater cinematic event, caught a rerun of a childhood classic, the beastmaster. mrs w. and her bro didn't like (i'm not sure they understood it).

a few days of working from home and then headed to tampa for new year's weekend to hang w/ mrs. w's friends from home.

it's a good feeling to step off the plane in december and feel 75F and sunshine.

Friday, December 22, 2006

headed north...to FL



here's a great group shot from the wedding last weekend.
more to come...in the meantime, check out chief chick's flickr set here.

headed FL to visit mrs. wintermute's folks...and for once, that means heading north.

five days in the city of evil. relaxing. no work. lots of movies and boardgames.

Monday, December 18, 2006

great success (high five)

great but tiring weekend in ny. saturday night in the city was a bit on the quiet side. after great tapas dinner with the fam in tribeca, mrs. w and i simply ran out of steam before midnight. 6 flights between us this past week and recovering from various colds will do that to you.

going to the super duper tux place was a gigantic waste of time, but good bonding time. we ran borat lines from the minute the chief got off the train.

the wedding was great. selfishly, it's nice to have a wedding like this one after your own so you don't have the pressure to meet a new standard. this truly set the standard for opulence (but in a tasteful way). enjoyed my first orthodox wedding--a lot of cool traditions--bloodninja provided a nice little study guide. the chozin's tisch was very interesting--all the men gather in a room for prayer, signing of the wedding contract, heavy drinking, and then singing and dancing the groom out to meet the bride. bloodninja's dad was pissed at me because when he and bloodninja broke away beforehand to take a leak, i convinced the videographer to follow me into the bathroom to document this great father-son bonding moment on this holiest of days. bloodninjadad put squash to that one quick.

cab drivers in long island suck, btw.

a nice toast by bg. his opening salvo included a nice little jab at kenny that was borderline acceptable by most folks' standards (i.e. exactly right in my mind). nervous laughter from the parents, lots of laughter from our table. no mention of 'liquid explosion,' so we did not have to break out the slow clap. security did not drag him out on his heels. great success!

brutal travel day. woke up hungover. multiple shots of vodka will do that to you. booked it to jfk, and endured a long flight back to soflo. then mrs. w got in the car to go to work and i walked over to the next terminal and got another long flight to texas. just landed. now a 45 ride through dallas traffic to the hotel.

Saturday, December 16, 2006

bridge & tunnel

just landed at jkf. headed to long island to get the tuxes. mrs. wintermute already hopped on the train for ny.

reminds me of a funny, oft-repeated conversation from my emory days:

me: where are you from?
random long islander (i.e. every third student on my freshman dorm) "new york."
oh yeah? i have some family there. where from? the upper east?
"uhh, not manhattan."
oh yeah, dumb me, new york really means the five boroughs. my uncle lived in queens for a while. how about you?"
"well, err, kind of outside of the city."
like yonkers?
"actually, long island. dix hills."
i see.


dinner w/ the fam in tribeca, then meeting up with the crew. hopefully we won't end up at some bridge and tunnel bar in murray hill. it would be like young alumni of emory gathering.

Thursday, December 14, 2006

big up nobf!

congrats to nobf and dr. nobf. i just found out that she's expecting a little one (sounds like they are just beginning the 2nd trimester).

this is going to be a smart little wizard. i'm trying to imagine what the expectations will be for the offspring of a harvard-trained physician and harvard-trained business woman (and columbia undergrad for both of them, to boot). the thing is that nobf and dr. nobf are so humble and normal.

i've got some suggestions for baby names. unfortunately, i'm not sure nobf is as big of a star wars fan as i am.

big up.

Wednesday, December 13, 2006

a long time coming


just finished three exhausting weeks to get things wrapped up for our national sales force meeting. i think blogging about work is almost as boring as reading about it, so there's not much more to say. literally, as i was finishing up the conference today got word that the next gig is an acquisition in texas. am headed there on monday.

but before i get to visit the adopted homestate of the dixie chick's number one fan, i've got bloodninja's wedding in ny.

holy shit. can't believe bloodninja is getting married. it has been a long time coming. a little story that, in retrospect, was pretty revealing.

[this is roughly how i remember it]

beginning of senior year, the chief & chief chick, bloodninja and lou-who, and me and a soon-to-be-split chick went on a trip. we were looking ahead to post-graduation plans. someone said, "hey, who's living together next year?"

i looked at my chick and quickly said no. i don't think she knew that the only reason i hadn't canned her yet was that she was taking the GRE in a few weeks and i didn't want to wreck her chances for it.

the chief and chief chick quickly said yes.

bloodninja and lou-who spoke at the same time. "yes," nodded bloodninja while lou-who shook her head, "no."

what happened those these six fine folks?

in one of the best decisions of my life, i dropped my baggage of 1.5 years soon after the GRE.

the chief and chief chick indeed moved in together and then got married two years after college.

bloodninja and lou-who have endured several different cities, broke up and got back together roughly 43 different times. and now they're getting married this weekend.

anyway, it's going to be a great weekend. getting up to ny saturday morning. then moe, the chief, bloodninja and i are going to get our tuxes. could he rent them from a normal chain (like every other groom in this fine country)? no. we're going to some boutique half way across long island. it's a freaking tux. it's black. everyone looks good in one. bloodninja's only defense was that they served really good cappucino.

i'm going to try hard not to needle him about this gigantic waste of time, considering he waited until a few hours before my wedding to pick up his tux, showed up 3 hours late to the pre-wedding get together, and then acted surprise that there was traffic in midtown and buckhead in atlanta. he got kind of riled up when i told him that i was going to wait until sunday to get my tux.

anyway, having dinner in ny with the fam (four cousins plus two cousin-in-laws), then meeting back up with the rest of the crew to hit the town. j-watt, moe, chief, chief chick, the general lee and his parental units. can't wait to see the general lee in a suit. this kid might steal the show.

finally, this posting is dedicated to lou-who. she takes patience to virtuous levels and i'm thrilled for her and bloodninja.

by the way, if anyone believes that bloodninja went to UT for its green architecture program and not for her, i've got a bridge to sell you.

here's to you, lou-who, soon to be mrs. bloodninja.

Sunday, December 10, 2006

next home?


just dropped off mrs. wintermute at hartsfield. quick weekend. she got in friday night. met up with jwatt, dined at mai li, across the street from the vermin-infested dump in which she and mrs. w used to live. then hit up a kind of random party (maybe the best kind). three dudes who are living the movie old school. two were rocking the dumb and dumber tuxes, complete with felt top hats that matched their powder blue and grapefruit orange suits. their house is like a grown up fraternity house complete with homebrew in the fridge, a Yeagermeister tap, and requisite keggerator (helps that one of them works for a liquor distributor--talk about a dream job). ran into some college friends there. apparently, everyone in atlanta plays kickball now and that's how they all know each other.

so mrs. w is in the air at the moment, headed to DC. interviewing for a post-doctoral research position at nimh. could be our next home. lots of friends there. could be sweet. stay tuned.

Thursday, December 07, 2006

working out

the new 99x is just ok. they're trying a bit too hard to be over the top

no idea what the story is behind the old dj's. fired or what?



anyway, occasionally they are actually funny. here's a clip from the mistle toe jam show last night:

Monday, December 04, 2006

emory is not in the south

not long ago, atilla, obi-wan, j-watt and i hit up a co-worker's party. she's a lot younger than all of us (just graduated from uga) and was having all of her sorority sisters (and their corresponding fraternity dudes) over for what was essentially a mixer. since this was my scene in college (along with j-watt and obi-wan), we figured it would be fun. i think atilla might have been in it for the scenery.

anyway, so we're hanging with sixty 23-year olds fresh from athens. there's moving on from college and there's moving on. they are the latter. and they dress EXACTY alike. the dudes have floppy hair, pink or yellow polo shirts with collars flipped up and tucked into their shorts (which reach only mid-thigh), braided belts, and absolutely, in no way, do they own socks. i don't mean like a few of them are wearing this uniform. all of them. these good old boys are both amusing and kind of pathetic.

while these dudes look like they just rolled out of bed, their chicks (who fawn over them) are dressed to the nines. heels, black skirts, pearls, done-up hair. similarly, they have their own uniform. housewives in training.

somewhere in this picture are some deeply embedded attitudes towards gender roles.


this is a backyard keg party, by the way.

having a had few (read: a bunch of) beers in me, i sauntered over to the lovely host and commented on the "uniform."

"it's a frat guy thing."
i'm a frat guy. i didn't wear it.
"well, it's a southern frat guy thing."
i went to college in the south.
"no you didn't. uga is in the south. emory is made up of people from ny and california who live in atlanta."


so there's the distinction. made matter-of-factly and pretty true, in my experience.

interestingly, in this cnn article two prototypical southern frat guys are suing 20th century fox over the appearance in borat's movie (which i saw on sunday). they rant extensively about how they don't respect women, how minorities have all the power, and how life would be better with slavery.

slavery?

yes, they were drunk. yes, they may have even been duped about what they were filming. but they knew they were being filmed. the mel gibson-i-was-drunk-i'm-not-an-anti-semite and kramer-i-don't-really-think-should-string-up-black-people-i-was-just-mad argument holds little water. you don't say that shit unless somewhere inside you have thought those things.

it pisses me off to no end when people (mostly white folks, but a surprising number of my fellow minorities) say we should "get past" race and that "racism is over, if minorities would just accept personal responsibility" and "move on."

i submit these two morons from the movie as exhibit A.

i wonder how many other of their clones at the party would agree with them, deep down inside.

Saturday, December 02, 2006

the rules

tonight we're headed to mrs. w's office party.

i'm meeting most of these folks for the first time. these occasions are the rare cases (like her 10 year high school reunion) where mrs. w lays down the rules:
  • minimize the sci fi talk
  • don't mention going to dragon con or wanting to name our kids anakin or luke
  • feel free to mention where i went to school
spent today enjoying the 76F and sunny weather at the beach. i love soflo.

Friday, December 01, 2006

big up

big up to anakin for passing the ny bar. this is a notoriously difficult state for the bar exam (about 76% of first time takers pass).

also, big up to bama boy for finishing the cpa exam.

almost time to board. headed to soflo for the weekend.