This is what you get...

A few (or 10) random observations...

1) When I'm in the car trying to make a turn and there are pedestrians who have the "OK" signal, I'm always cursing under my breath and slowly inching to run them over because they all seem to take their sweet time. But I noticed today that when I'm the ped and I have the walk signal, I am totally in my own world and not paying a damn bit of attention to the cars who are trying to turn. Not at all! Very occasionally I might do the speed walk if they look like they're gonna run me over, but most of the time I think I just stroll. So this is me as a pedestrian apologizing to the cars, and me as a driver understanding the slow pedestrians. All better now.

2) Let's talk for a moment about the homeless man who wants to squeegee my windshield. Once I was about third in line at a light when I noticed him squeegeeing the first car in line. I thought to myself, "Now why did you let him start squeegeeing halfway through the light cycle? You're gonna hold up the line and people are gonna get pissed!" But then a few weeks later I was first in line and I realized how it happens. You're just there, stopped, and the guy just walks right over and starts up with his squeegee on your windshield. It kind of freaks you out for a minute. You have the panic about what you'll do if/when the light turns green, and at the same time you scramble for your wallet because you gotta give him a tip, right? Now I don't mean for this to sound condescending or whatever, I'm just trying to seriously address this dilemma. What if you were caught without any cash? The guy would probably think you're an ungrateful and rude a-hole. It does seem a bit forward to just approach someone's vehicle and start spraying water all over it while they're en route, though. So anyway, when this happened to me, the guy walks over to the window and I give him some cash, but he still has half the window to wipe down when the light turns green! EEEEE. People behind me are getting antsy, I'm slowly trying to inch away but he walks in front of the car to finish the job, and I'm somehow trying to indicate, "It's ok!! Just go!" Finally he gets it and I drive away, but one of my windshield wipers is still propped up! Man, I'm stressed out. I drive a little ways wondering if it will somehow fall down by itself (clearly there's no way), and eventually I have to pull over and put it down myself. I respect this guy for wanting to earn his spare change instead of shaking a cup on the corner, but we have to work on the green light/windshield problem. Make the lights longer?

3) There's a random little Vietnamese restaurant downtown on L street. I guess it serves Pho and some other things. It claimed to serve authentic Vietnamese "cousin" (as opposed to cuisine) which I'll actually take as a good sign because if you can't get the English on the sign right, chances are the food is decent. I really thought I only saw this around Eden or actually in VN, but sure enough, right in the heart of the city there are folks who make the same mistakes. Gotta love it.

4) Did W dye his hair for the State of the Union or was it just the bad lighting on my TV?

5) Very excited about potential warm(er) weather as I'll be able to resume some outdoor runs. Who's comin' with me?

6) Huan sent this bizarro link to me. Somehow they are able to "read your mind" (by asking a trillion questions) and guess which dictator of sitcom character you are thinking of. Not too amazing, but still worth a few clicks if you're bored.

7) I just noticed that the same guy is in the Capital One ("Marco, Po-No"), Jetta, and Enterprise commercial. Weird, huh. "Commercial" actors are very strange. You usually associate them with their one gig, but for this guy I guess he's trying to advertise for everything. I'm sure that'll come back to bite him in the butt when he becomes a big time actor and they show these old embarassing films of his career start. Or maybe not since he's making good moolah. Just did some googling and found this article about him. Turns out he's done about a dozen more. Crazy.

8) "Million Dollar Baby" is probably the worst title for a movie that exists in my brain's movie database.

9) Did "Finding Neverland" really get nominated for Best Picture? I haven't even seen it, but come on now...The best? Take this bullet point with a grain of salt, because apparently I have an aversion to Peter Pan-themed experiences which I only recently discovered.

10) Vietnamese TV (I'm sure that's the technical name) was here tonight filming my gramps in the living room. It was kinda cool. I wonder if they wanted his autograph or what. Apparently he was doing a little "Happy New Year" greeting since Têt is coming up. Gotta love the VN celebs.


Current Music: Karma Police, by Radiohead
Current Mood: content