Running Rules of Etiquette

or things I ponder/fume about as I run along the increasingly packed Lakeshore Path:

Rule #1: Unless you're trying to lose it permanently, keep your junk in your trunk. In other words, space is at a premium and you should occupy as little as possible. No jogging with strollers. You're probably just giving Junior a sunburn. No rollerblades when it's crowded. They take up too much lateral space when you kick your ankles out. No unattended small children or pets. I will mercilessly crush them under my bike wheels if they dart in front of me. No Segways, motorized scooters, or Magic Wheels. Just...no.

Rule #2: If you pass someone, do it quickly to minimize the amount of time you're running side by side. It's bad enough that you're being passed; no need to draw out the encounter with the runner who is pwning you. Then build up a decent length between you and the other person, so that there's no chance they will try to overtake you. There's nothing worse than passive-aggressive leapfrogging on the crowded path. Speaking from experience, this can lead to tempers flaring, minor injuries and jammed derailleurs.

Rule #3: If you decide to follow someone, be a considerable distance behind them, so they don't feel like they're being hounded. The appropriate distance is far enough away such that they can't hear the pounding of your feet or your out-of-breath wheezing.

Having said all that, occasionally you do find someone who has hit the sweet spot in pacing, an inspiring equilibrium level that is challenging yet manageable. Tonight, as I leaned against a tree to stretch post-run, another woman huffed and puffed to a stop nearby. "Thank you!" she beamed. "YOU are the reason I've gotten here! I was behind you the whole time, keeping up with your pace. It's a good thing you didn't speed up!"

Wedding Pi

Congratulations are due to Heather, one of my friends from high school, who is getting married today. I didn't make it back to MA for the ceremony, but I did send a wedding gift. More specifically, I asked Black Sheep Deli & Bakery if they would deliver a pumpkin pie to Heather to celebrate the occasion. After all, it is Pi Day. The woman laughed and said, "That is so cute!"

This is the first wedding gift I've bought, so I figure it shouldn't be something uber lame like a bread basket or pillow cases or something. Plus, I am reasonably sure that no one else at this wedding will send her a pie, or even realize that it is Pi Day, with the possible exception of Brewer, with whom I typically have conversations on topics like lambda calculus.

Heather's response: Just wanted you to know we did get the pie and it is so cute and delicious. Pumpkin is Mark's favorite and he claims you're his new best friend for sending pie. I will be sure to tell Brewer that you sent me a pie for my pi day wedding, he will appreciate that. Now I just need steaks because it's also steak and bj day, lol.

Also, if you haven't already seen it on Facebook, check out Vance's dedication to pi--it's definitely irrational.

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In other wedding-related news, Emily has informed me that she's downsizing her wedding and will most likely have fewer/no bridesmaids. This probably means I'm off the hook for bridesmaid duties (yessss). So, is it bad form to go from being a bridesmaid to not attending the wedding...?

Update: Never mind, I just got a voicemail message from Emily saying that she's changed her mind about the previous dress, and now we're looking at something that is "two-piece" with "sheer" material. But the apple red is staying. Sigh.

Word Clouds

I started playing with Wordle this afternoon and decided to generate a few word clouds based on AIM log files between Dec 19, 2006 and Aug 22, 2007. (For a variety of reasons, this was the easiest period/client to generate.) A few words have been removed (e.g. "haha") to make the frequency distribution a little more uniform, but other than that, the text is unaltered. Prizes will be awarded if you can guess the identities of the following people:




I have a feeling that clouds generated on my gchat logs for the same people would look a lot different.

Finally, here is the word cloud for my blog:

Why Our Meetings Rock

"Is there a Super-Duper Senior?"

"Nationally, we're back to 2003-level home prices."

"That's so much better than the stock market!"

"So, this picture is telling me that I shouldn't be worried because my bank is well-capitalized?"

"Yeah, they're well-capitalized...by us."

"Instead of presenting the forecasts, why don't we just show the SNL skit on Geithner?"

On Commuting

Every day, I hop on my bike and trek the 3.1 miles to work. Head down against the merciless wind, eddies of traffic flowing around me, I pedal hard against the pavement, one small revolution at a time. Having traversed it hundreds of times, I know this route like the lyrics to RENT. I slip into an almost meditative state, which is probably not the frame of mind you should be in as UPS trucks bear down behind you. Still, I take the rumbles, the honking and the exhaust and incorporate them into an unorthodox urban reverie.

With almost equal reliability, I pass the grocery on the corner of 18th Street and hear a piercing whistle. You know the kind, the penetrating wolf-whistle that men are so naturally adept at. A high note, followed by a portmento to a lower pitch, then back up again. A curlique on the staff.

At first, my reaction was annoyance. What chauvinistic pig goes around whistling at women these days? Where does he think he is, Southern Europe? Then, I inevitably succumbed to the implicit flattery. Though I am bundled up in three layers of fleece, a scarf, an ungainly helmet and '80s style legwarmers, I am still attracting attention. Sweet, I can make heads turn! Or maybe it's recognition of the badassery of biking in traffic, faithfully braving the harsh winter. You go, girl, says the Incognito Whistler. Go out and stick it to the Man. On the silent, uninterrupted mornings that I pass by unheralded, I can't help feeling that something is amiss. I reluctantly dissolve back into solution.

Occasionally, I turn my cheek and take a quick glance to the side. This usually elicits additional whoops and shouts. I imagine high fives, fist pumps and terrorist fist jabs in the parking lot. I never have time to actually see anything beyond a brief glimpse of warehouse, then I right myself and pedal faster to beat the yellow light. There is work to be done after all.

Yet, my thoughts linger on. Who is the Incogito Whistler? Is he a grizzled, old man, fully-bearded, cantankerous and impervious to the forces of political correctness? A dapper poetic soul, who relishes the whimsy of anonymous encounters? A fellow cyclist? A pipe-smoking Russian ice skater? For the last year and a half, have I been callously passing up the love of my life? Should I do something?

Missed Connections - Whistler's Other -w4m - 23 (18th & Canal)

Every morning, I bike past the Richwell Market and you whistle at me. Normally, I brush this aside like clingy lint and continue on my merry way with nary a second thought, but lately I've been wondering--do you like orange juice with pulp? Have you ever pondered how they get the middle bun on a Big Mac? We've never seen each other face to face, much less met, but we still have a connection ripe for exploration. Let me know if you want to break the 4th wall or stroll down the street singing "Les Champs-Élysées." Sure, I realize that simply stopping would be a much more efficient way than Craig's List to accomplish this, but that would ruin the enigmatic appeal of this exchange. Please reply with the colors of my headband and backpack; your pic gets mine.

A sudden thought strikes me: what if the Incognito Whistler is a woman?

Words of Advice for Young People

While reading a tangentially-related blog post on the Stanford Ponzi scheme, I stumbled across a reference to William S. Burroughs' "Words of Advice for Young People." Burroughs was a writer and member of the Beat generation, and is most famous for authoring Naked Lunch. Curious, I looked up the piece in its entirety and was wholly amused by his words: sometimes profound, often crude and always sassy.

I am not following at least two pieces of this advice. You can enjoy the dramatic reading here.

William S. Burroughs' "Words of Advice for Young People"

People often ask me if I have any words of advice for young people.
Well here are a few simple admonitions for young and old.
Never interfere in a boy-and-girl fight.
Beware of whores who say they don't want money.
The hell they don't.
What they mean is they want more money. Much more.
If you're doing business with a religious son-of-a-bitch,
Get it in writing.
His word isn't worth shit.
Not with the good lord telling him how to fuck you on the deal.

Avoid fuck-ups.
We all know the type.
Anything they have anything to do with,
No matter how good it sounds,
Turns into a disaster.
Do not offer sympathy to the mentally ill.
Tell them firmly:
I am not paid to listen to this drivel.
You are a terminal fool.

Now some of you may encounter the Devil's Bargain,
If you get that far.
Any old soul is worth saving,
At least to a priest,
But not every soul is worth buying.
So you can take the offer as a compliment.
He tries the easy ones first.
You know like money,
All the money there is.
But who wants to be the richest guy in some cemetery?
Money won't buy.
Not much left to spend it on, eh gramps?
Getting too old to cut the mustard.

How's a young body grab you?
Like three card monte, like pea under the shell,
Now you see it, now you don't.
Haven't you forgotten something, gramps?
In order to feel something,
You've got to be there.
You have to be eighteen.
You're not eighteen.
You are seventy-eight.
Old fool sold his soul for a strap-on.

Well they always try the easiest ones first.
How about an honorable bargain?
You always wanted to be a doctor,
Well now's your chance.
Why don't you become a great healer
And benefit humanity?
What's wrong with that?
Just about everything.
There are no honorable bargains
Involving exchange
Of qualitative merchandise
Like souls
For quantitative merchandise
Like time and money.
So piss off Satan
And don't take me for dumber than I look.

An old junk pusher told me -
Watch whose money you pick up.

Deal of the Day

Either the economy is just that bad, or someone made a terrible mistake, because I just purchased a $120 peacoat for the low, low price of $6. My decision making process went something like this:

Me: But I don't need a coat. I don't even like peacoats!

Alex: Dude, six bucks. My lunch cost more than that.

Me: Excellent point. Dammit, I really wanted brownie. Quick, tomato or sunflower?

Alex: Red. Yellow looks bad on Asians.

Me: Fine, it's in the cart. Wait, do I really want this coat? Much less a tomato one?

Alex: But how can you pass something like this up? It's 95% off, almost free!

Me: Shipping is $5 so I am spending $11 that I otherwise wouldn't have today. Yeah, that's like free.

[For the next 20 minutes, I valiantly attempt to check out and encounter error after error as Tulle's servers are swamped by traffic from cheap bastards like myself. The endowment effect and loss aversion kicks in...]

Me (hyperventilating): Noooo! Why won't my order go through?? Wait, that worked! YES.

As with any arbitrage opportunity, the window with which you can take advantage of it is quite small. By the time I managed to check out, it appeared that there were no coats left in stock.

I figure if I don't actually want to wear it, I can always resell the coat for way more than its purchase price.