Gluttons for Pun-ishment

Pikachu, I choose you! (Math puns are the first sine of madness.)

This is what happens when you start a pun war with two dogged wordmongers. Stop reading if you aren't interested in Terrible.

me: Phil keeps making puns about my shirt

R: you should stop shirting the issue

me: I hate you all.

R: don't try to shirt the blame for your own shortcomings
me: if I had collar id, I'd weed all of these jokes out
R: my off-the-cuff remarks are pretty clever
me: actually, I'm yawning because they're putting me to sleeve
R: that's just because your personality is a little too buttoned down
me: I guess it's just not tailored for this setting
R: I'm surprised you’re not pleating with me to stop
me: it takes more than idle threads to stop me
R: this conversation is just giving me a pocket full of wisdom
me: well, I just hope we won't be permanently embroidered in dispute
R: it's really tearing at the fabric of my being
me: well I hope you're addressing the issue, don't just hem and haw
R: i have faith that my long struggle with lead me to the land of silk and honey
me: I'm glad that this conversation isn't full of banal plaiditudes
R: it's going seamlessly, in fact
me: in fact, I think we're helping elevate the English language to striping new heights
R: we're going to be on the front lines of a velvet revolution
me: have you got a leader yet? if not, argyle take charge
R: my opposition is bound to fold
me: I'll draw up a laundry list of goals to achieve
R: your ambition is creases to amaze me
me: we'll iron out the details later
R: later? you're hanging me out to dry
me: it's like there was suddenly a sock in your face
R: despite any setbacks, my strength of twill shall overcome all
me: fear not, though one door may clothes, another has just opened
R: the sources of your optimism are growing like tweeds
me: yes, I find it apparelous to wallow in depression
R: you're overwhelmed by dis-cotten-tment
me: that's why I like to quilt while I'm ahead
R: I feel as though I've invested every fiber of my being in this
me: well after being called a spinster at lunch, it's good to feel productive
R: it's spindellabely true
me: admittedly, my level of productivity on work-related projects is rather unseamly
R: you have to make sure everything is documented before you weave
me: I'll work on getting my affairs in suitable condition
R: you have to pastel your replacement about everything you did
me: hopefully the atmosphere at the lunch table won't be too polo-rizing for her
R: I don't think her economist will boss her around like some overlord & taylor
me: yeah, Doug is cool, it's not as though she'll be losing hair and e-Macy-ated
R: if he puts her to work on currency markets, she'll have to be knowledgeable of Feiline's deBasement
me: I must say, this has been quite the epic Pun-ic War
R: a pun is its own reword
me: it is certainly a handy reference material
R: i didn't realize our supply of witticisms would be this elastic
me: I do think some of these remarks have been a stretch
R: most of yours were downright clothful
me: well I think I've learned my lace-son for the day - sparring with you will leave you in stitches
R: you don't have to needle me directly. I didn't think personal remarks were looming.
me: oh I'm not trying to make this an ad homonym attack
R: crochet it ain't so
me: I try my best not to operate in that fashion
R: as this exchange becomes more and more cryptic, I feel the pressure to come up with good puns is getting pintense
me: it's like this data that I'm sifting through in notepad - if only I understood what's in the textile
R: is that your way of asciing me for help with your project?
me: no that's fine, the time I have available for this project is practically delimited
R: as long as you're keeping tabs on what you're doing
me: I generally Excel at organization
R: now you're just giving me SAS
me: sometimes I like to opt for sophistication, other times I go for the low-TeX solution
R: I suppose it doesn't matter as long as the problem doesn't have you Lyx-ed
me: right, and I am quite font of open-source solutions
R: it's a bold point that you've underscored many times
me: one that is fully justified

At this point, it was past 5 and we'd been cracking puns for 2+ hours, so a truce was called. I need to take a nap now.

Akihabara or Geekdom, Ground Zero

Faced with the dismal failure of my quest for soba noodles, I thought, "F that, I'm going to Akihabara." For those of you unfamiliar with Akihabara, it is known as Tokyo's center for electronics and the focal point for otaku (nerd) culture. This is the place to go if you are looking for the latest digital cameras, video games or anime releases.

On the way there, I spotted a Mister Donut, a donut chain that Steph had raved about on the plane. Since my stomach had just been denied soba, I stepped in and began translating the katakana on the display labels. Chocolate, honey, curry...whoa, curry? There comes a point in every man's life when he should consider eating a curry donut, and for me, that point was now. I ordered it. It was indeed filled with a savory curry, with a crunchy panko coating on the outside of the donut.

They really like their buildings big and tall over here.

And they're not really ones for subtlety.

I was warned beforehand that Akihabara can be rather intense, but I shooed that aside. I mean, how bad can it possibly be? As it turns out, Akihabara is the munincipal equivalent of LSD in terms of sensory overload (not that I would know). The streets are filled with neon signs, blaring loudspeakers, flashing displays, music cranked to the highest decibel and girls in French maid outfits. Wait, what? Yes, somewhere along the way, Japan decided that it was a) obsessed with Paris and b) obsessed with servility in women and the two have happily combined in the French Maid Cafe phenomenon. At a number of fine establishments in Akihabara, you can indulge in your wildest fantasy of being served and pampered with French maids. They will greet you as master or mistress, cater to your whims and serve you overpriced coffee. I thought about going into one, then decided that it wasn't worth waiting in the line spilling out the door.

I'd been expecting more cosplayers, but instead there were French maids on every corner.

The sign is hard to read, but these girls (and a dude??) are advertising an opportunity to eat at the same table that the Backstreet Boys used for their music video "Bigger" (released on November 2).

Aside from French maid cafes, Akihabara is filled with electronics stores, vendors hawking duty-free items (some specialize in overseas models that will work abroad), and anime and manga media shops. My neurons were overloading. Ceramic knives! Rewritable Blu-Ray discs! Gorgeous, phenomenally crisp 60" TVs with resolutions better than my eyes (for the low, low price of ¥648,000)! Monitor cleaners shaped like a hamburger! Arcades filled with adolescent boys who looked like they hadn't showered in some time!

A capsule pod in an arcade, there is a list of machines that you can fight as.

I was really amused by this taiko drumming video game.

All right, focus Crystal, you don't really need a WiMax router. Or a USB key with a figurine attached that does crunches.

Akihabara's raunchier side also made its presence known from time to time. On more than one occasion, I would be browsing a perfectly respectable manga store, then go downstairs and suddenly notice that all the covers feature scantily clad, big-breasted women and that I was conspicuously the only female in the room. Or, I'd be drawn into a shop by a display of short skirts (I figure I can augment my collection of one). Then the next floor up would feature lingerie and vibrators, and the next floor up would feature clamps and dildos, then the next floor up would feature dolls...

Anyway, I was on a mission with this trip. After a lot of searching, I managed to find a copy of the first Cowboy Bebop album. It took me a while to realize CDs were being sorted alphabetically in hiragana, and even then, the first couple stores I tried didn't carry it. Then, I did some monster hunting for the Tokyo Anime Center, which turned out not to be on the main drag of Soto-Kanda. The Tokyo Anime Center is worth a short sidetrip though; I thought their selection of trinkets and paraphernalia was well-thought out compared to the average jam-packed store.

Several hours of browsing later, I was drained and ready to move elsewhere. Next up, the Asakusa Temple.

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.

---

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:

Pork and Beans

Weezer just released their latest single from their upcoming album, titled "Pork and Beans," and although you will probably not be hearing it on the radio any time soon, it is already a smashing hit. By what metric do I draw this conclusion? Well, since its publication just 2 days ago, the YouTube video has already garnered a staggering 2.2 million hits.

As a card-carrying member of Generation 'Net, I will be the first to admit that our tastes are fickle, unpredictable, and often illogical. How on earth do you explain the popularity of the dramatic prairie dog? Or the Rick Roll, a bait-and-switch tactic where unsuspecting users are linked to a Rick Astley video? Who comes up with these memes anyway? I'm sure the music and film industries are dying to crack the formula.

If there is a rule of thumb for success though, it is that netizens love obscure references that they can recognize, and above all, obscure references to internet phenomena. A clever allusion or satire signals a) you are leet, one of us, and a part of the "underground" community, and b) it allows me to feel culturally-educated, in the know, and perhaps, a little superior to everyone else who didn't "get it." Hence, the popularity of this t-shirt, which references a video game though this would be invisible to all those unfamiliar with Portal.

Weezer taps into this psyche by incorporating several YouTube "stars" in their latest video. In short order, I saw references to the Diet Coke and Mentos guys, the sobbing Britney defender, Miss South Carolina, the Evolution of Dance, Chocolate Rain, Daft Hands and Daft Bodies, Kelly from "Shoes," and lots of light sabers.

Will a cyberspace video translate into meat-space sales? I've been a long-time fan of Weezer, and their indie nerd credibility was cemented for me when I realized they were singing about Dungeons and Dragons in "In the Garage." However, I confess that I haven't legally bought an album in years. After watching the video 3-4 times though, I must say, I am more aware of when this album is getting released than where my debit card is. There's a $15 iTunes gift card sitting on my desk; I just may have found something worthwhile to use it on.

Dungeons & Dragons, session 1

First, an admission. For all its connotations of pale, nerdy guys huddled in a basement, arguing over how to slay a dragon and severely disconnected from reality, Dungeons & Dragons is actually a beautiful metaphorical representation of life.

Sure, it's formulated in a fantastic world, and I would never need to battle a goblin in real life, but the underlying premises are the same. You have to work in groups with teammates who each have personal talents and flaws. You need to accomplish particular tasks, and your success (or failure) depends on how skilled you are, with some allowances for random luck or misfortune. Solutions are not always clear-cut, and the consequences of your actions are not immediately apparent. In fact, when you think about it, DnD, like economics, transforms everyday interactions into quantifiable mathematical equations. However, there is still plenty of room for open-ended creativity.Hence, the inherent appeal for us Feddies.

Phil started us off on an adventure titled "The Sunless Citadel," which is supposed to help ease newbies into the game. There were 5 of us who were new role-players, plus Amber, who knew what she was doing, and saved our asses on several occasions by dutifully checking for snares and traps. Right off the bat, I could see how people get caught up in ludicrous, hour-long debates over how to cross a bridge. We were told that there was an ancient citadel which was ripe for exploration, but Phineas (Erik) wanted to try helping the dying wife of a villager instead, which I deemed to be a waste of time. (We're all level 1 characters, so Phineas' healing powers consist of healing "minor wounds.") Meanwhile, Yocxjufyabiu (Nate wrote a random name generator) the sorcerer was bent on casting spells left and right, and decided to "animate a rope" to be very stiff and sturdy while we climbed down into a ravine. Combat rounds were taking an hour to resolve, in part because no one knew how to add up points and modifiers, so Phil had to help us do all the math. I did roll a 20 during combat (the highest point value), though I didn't get the critical hit. After killing a few dire rats and undead goblins, we began arguing over where to set up camp for the night, and Nygavok the sensitive fighter (Chris) tried to seduce me while we were supposed to be keeping watch.

After playing for a few hours, we had to catch the train back to the city. I tend to view everything through a rational economist perspective, but I started to catch myself thinking in DnD terms. We weren't sure which direction the train was coming from, so we decided to ask a passing pedestrian. Mentally, I thought, "A stranger approaches. Does he appear trustworthy? Should we send the member of our party with the highest charisma, or the person most able to intimidate him into giving us directions?"

I also have to confess that certain web comics have become a lot funnier.

This is how we roll

I threw my first dinner party last night. According to "Stuff White People Like," the dinner party is definitely an adult milestone. And although I put everyone to work making their own dinner, it was still a substantial amount of preparation. Music was played, sake was swigged, and Trivial Pursuit was broken out (see SWPL post, paragraph 6).

Over the last few months, I've been learning to roll my own sushi and bringing it in for lunch. It's quite simple (and much cheaper) to do it yourself, so to demonstrate the process, I invited people over for a sushi-rolling gathering. Miso soup and salad with ginger dressing were provided. Then, I set out bowls of rice, sushi filling ingredients, nori sheets and bamboo mats, and put people to work. Everyone had a great time, and more or less successfully made their own sushi.

My first planning dilemma was figuring out what to do with the vegetarians. After all, isn't the point of sushi is to showcase fresh seafood? I ended up soaking wedges of fried tofu in a soy and orange juice marinade, then slicing them thinly. At this point, they almost looked like slices of mushroom, and tasted quite meaty as well. My second dilemma was trying to predict how much rice we would need. Depending on how much of the soup and salad everyone consumed, we would need an inversely proportional amount of rice. I prepared a large bowl of sushi rice, but sure enough, the rice disappeared much faster than predicted. (People were using too much rice in their rolls, a common novice mistake.) In the end, I made about 12 cups of rice, and this was enough to make leftover sushi for Monday.

Cleaning the sushi mats was the most painstaking part of the night. Rather than spending 20 minutes scraping off chunks of dried rice, next time I plan to wrap the entire mat in saran wrap.

Post-sushi-rolling, we trekked out to the 'burbs for Phil's birthday party. Now, I consider myself a pretty good cook, but this party was the most impressive food feat I've seen in years. As we know, Phil is a huge gamer, and Amber (Phil's wife) had made sure that all the food was video-game-themed. Zomg! There were red mushroom cupcakes, green ice cream cone pipes, a Pac-man cheddar cheese wheel, a fire flower made of red and yellow peppers with a cucumber and broccoli stem, a Zelda Triforce cheesecake, and finally, a Katamari ball rice crispie cake, with all kinds of candies (lego sweet tarts, gummy worms) stuck on the surface. It was probably the leetest party I've ever been to, and proof that we should all rest easy; clearly there is someone out there for everyone.

It's too bad we couldn't get the entire table in one panoramic shot, but these pictures convey the general idea.

Dungeons & Dragons

Well, I never thought I'd say this, but the line has been crossed and left far behind in the dust, so I may as well announce: I am playing Dungeons and Dragons. Somehow, the idea sprang up at the lunch table, and so, Phil is guiding a few of us neophytes through the process of playing a role-playing game.

At this point, some of you are cheering wildly and mentally upping my nerd score, while everyone else is inwardly grimacing or scratching their head. DnD, isn't that the game played by those kids in high school who carried around bags of dice and wore dragon necklaces and drew fairies in notebooks and claimed they were Wiccan? Yeah, that game.

As it turns out, DnD is not really a game in the traditional sense, but more like collective story-telling. Each person assumes the role of a character, and that character interacts with a fictional world and other members of that world. Furthermore, this world includes plenty of fantastic powers (spell casting, exotic weapons) and mythological threats (dragons, orcs) to keep things interesting. It's much more creative than I had imagined, and frankly, I'm surprised that more girls never got around to playing. (Isn't this what we're supposed to be good at? Playing make-believe?)

Over the last few weeks, we've gradually been schooled in the process of character generation, coming up with various personality traits and numeric statistics. For the final bit, I came up with the following back story for my character. After all this effort, let's hope I don't die when we get together in Phil's basement next weekend.

---

Daevon Nimvirrea Ansatz, 178, was born to a moderately wealthy family of spice merchants in Waterdeep. Her mother died at an early age, and as an only child, Daevon grew up strong-willed and independent. Noting her interest in nature and wildlife, her father tried to channel this energy into horsemanship and gardening. This backfired when local authorities discovered that the garden plot was filled with poppy plants. For her part, Daevon insisted upon her innocence and said that she had simply wanted a field full of crimson blooms. One summer, a band of gypsies set up camp on the outskirts of town. Daevon became fast friends with the children and adopted Mama Mirela as her own. When fall approached and the gypsies were readying for the winter move, Daevon opted to skip school and leave with the gypsies. Over the next few years, she roamed much of the High Forest, and the gypsy elders taught her how to purify water, track and hunt animals, identify edible plants and the like. With her nimble fingers, she became an expert archer, and those who crossed her might see their hats whisked away by arrows.

When Mama Mirela died, Daevon silently mourned her passing as the mother she’d never had. Then, she opted to leave dry land for a spell at sea, working a stint as a deckhand on a crab fishing schooner. Though she spent most of her time cleaning and sorting the catch, she had a stellar eye for navigation and learned to track the movements of the constellations. After two seasons in the Sea of Moving ice, Daevon decided she’d had enough of laboring 24-hour shifts in wet, freezing conditions, and at the next port, she took off with her trunk over her shoulder.

Currently, Daevon works as a sherpa at the base of the Nether mountains. The pay is high, but the work is mundane and she is itching to travel again. Occasionally, she does meet interesting travelers, who bring her news from the coasts. Last week, a druid by the name of Phineas Crumplebeard passed through, en route to Icewind Dale. Though she paid little attention as he babbled about his exploits, Daevon was duly impressed when he successfully healed a sprained ankle of hers.

Pi/Dragon/St. Patrick's Day

(with apologies to Don McLean)

Pi, pi, what's the value of pi?
Starts 3 . 1 4 1 5 9
Them good ol' boys gave it a try
But the decimal never dies, the decimal never dies...

It's March 14th, and we all know what that means - time to celebrate Pi Day! Much like Talk Like A Pirate Day or Towel Day, Pi Day is part of that pantheon of holidays that, well, take a special someone to appreciate.

At 1:59 pm sharp, Phil brought in a splendiferous assortment of pi(e)s: peach, apple, cherry and pumpkin. Considering there were only about a dozen AEs, it was quite a lot of pie to go around. (Note: actual pies consumed differed a bit from the ones displayed above.) Next year, I think we should have a pie with the pi symbol on it, and a second pi with the digits of e on it (2.71828...) so that all together, we have a complete pie.


Meanwhile, spring break has kicked off at Cornell, which means it's time for the annual architecture bacchanal, otherwise known as Dragon Day. Since I never managed to go anywhere exciting for spring break, I was almost always in town to watch the Dragon Day parade and pyre. So, those of us who hadn't jetted to Cancun were treated to the sight of sleep-deprived, festively costumed archies burning an elaborate dragon in the middle of the Arts Quad. As I recall, the weather varied wildly from cold rain to warmth & clear skies to thick snow last year. And it appears that the engineers finally got their act together and constructed a competing phoenix this year.


This morning, as I was waiting in the dentist's office, Coldplay's "Clocks" began playing on the radio. All of the sudden, I was flooded with memories of playing Clocks on chimes, hearing Clocks on marimba, jogging around campus as Clocks emanated from the clocktower as the sun set. It has been almost a year now since I last chimed regularly; would I still be able to play the (notoriously difficult) piece today? Would I be able to sprint up the 9 flights of stairs like I used to? And forget chiming, it's been years since I stopped playing piano regularly, and even longer since I dropped violin. What was the point of all those lessons again? It was a sobering reminder of the passage of time.

Anyway, back to the present. Dragon Day has always coincided with the weekend of St. Patrick's Day, and curious about a possible linkage, I sat down to investigate the origins of the former. As it turns out, Dragon Day began as a celebration of Architecture School pride by Willard Straight, and he chose St. Patrick's Day, who legendarily drove the serpents out of Ireland. Ergo, the burning of our dragon every year actually has some throwbacks to Catholicism. Who would've thought?

Chicago historically has had a large Irish Catholic population, though I suppose many other cities also claim to be Irish-friendly, since it's much more in vogue than being say, Iranian-friendly. However, unlike many other cities, we have perfected the art of dyeing our river shamrock green for St. Patrick's Day. The dye solution has been tested to be eco-friendly, but it looks like the exact composition is a city secret. The fountains at Daley Plaza, which were spouting orange back in Oct, are now bubbling green as well.

Just your average Fed party...

Chris threw a sake (bombing) party Sat night, and I ventured out for it, even though it was something like -3 degrees outside with 15-20 mph winds. Why? 3 words: Phil was coming.

Phil works at the Fed, and might be one of my all-time favorite people. At the very least, he tops the list of people I'd consider "characters." He's pretty dorky, plays a lot of WoW, and says things like "My new year's resolution is 1024 x 768."

Alas, Phil is 26ish, married, and lives in the suburbs, so it's a hard sell to get him to come party with the rest of us. (His penchant for Warcraft usually ensures that he doesn't leave the house all weekend.) So, his presence at this party was a bit of a watershed event. Plus, we were all morbidly curious about what Amber (his wife) was like.

The man did not disappoint. Even before showing up, he called Chris, and demanded to know where the nearest Taco Bell was. Apparently, Amber was insisting on getting food, since they'd spent all day playing WoW.

A few shots of warm sake later, somehow Chris and Phil decided to have a gay-off. The contest was over who had the gayest song on their ipod, and each person had 3 picks. Chris started off with some generic riverdance-esque music, which was gay but nothing particularly flaming. Phil responded with "Sweet Transvestite" from Rocky Horror. He knew all the lyrics. There was hip thrusting. I almost peed in my pants.

Chris then ups the ante with N Sync. He doesn't quite know all the words, but that's ok because Alex does, and they perform an loosely choreographed routine that would bring tears to your eyes (for better or worse). Phil replies with another girly favorite: "My Heart Will Go On." He doesn't know the words either, but I am shocked that this is even on his ipod. Chris - 1, Phil - 1.

For the last round, Phil goes first, and reminds us that the contest was originally over who had the gayest song, not necessarily the gayest performance. With that in mind, he plays Fred Schneider's (of the B-52's) "Monster (in my Pants)" I'd never heard this song before, but suffice it to say, the lyrics are highly special. Finally, Chris pulls out a song "in honor of his nickname," ABBA's "Dancing Queen." I'm laughing so hard that my face hurts.

At this point, Phil brings out the song I thought should have been his trump card all along: Electric Six's "Gay Bar." Really, you can't get more gay than that. We decide it might be a draw between the two of them.

Phil: "Come on, when I saw that Chris had all 5 seasons of 'Queer as Folk' on DVD, I knew that I was finished."