Alright, it's actually Memorial Day Weekend, but same difference, right? They should just call them End of Spring Holiday and End of Summer Holiday. That's really what they mean to everybody. It's not like I'm visiting the Grave of the Unknown Soldier this weekend, and it's not like on Labor Day I'm paying tribute to Eugene V. Debs. I'm just enjoying the Mondays off.
One of the nice things about having a standard 9-to-5 job is enjoying a long weekend. You can't really do it as a student, because it always comes mid-semester, and you end up using it more as a time to catch up on work than you do as a time of leisure. On the whole, you get more time off as a student because of the between-semester breaks, but for just the long weekend, it's better to have a typical job.
[Random shot of geese xing. Is snapping pics while driving illegal? The elephant looking guy on the dash is the Hindu god Ganesha.]
Although the long weekend does pose some problems for S and I, because we're very different in how we like to spend our free time. The difference is that she doesn't really like having free time, and I love it. For me, you do all the things you have to do, so that you can have some time to do the things you want to do. I have a lot of hobbies, S doesn't really have any. "You're my hobby," she says whenever I suggest she take something up, which is bad because I'm not a very interesting hobby. Programming a baseball simulator (my newest project) is fun, watching me program a baseball simulator is not so fun. Then, inevitably, so that she won't be bored, S will find something that we "have" to do, but it's not really something that we have to do, it's just something that we can do. For instance, assembling the dresser for the baby's room. She's not due until September, but that's on her agenda for this weekend. And it's not like I can say, "Hey, go for it, knock yourself out," because it requires some lifting, and S is good at a lot of things, but lifting certainly isn't one of them, and that's true even when she isn't with child.
[Another random shot of geese, this time with a chick. I didn't get too close. Geese are kinda assholes.]
I wish my job paid about triple what it pays now, then I'd have a better defense for my idleness, "I spend all week making money, at least I should get my weekends off!" But this doesn't work very well with what I make now, especially since she makes just as much (maybe even a little more) than I do. Oh well, when the baby comes, I'm sure this will all be moot, as then there will be no such thing as free time, at all.
In other news, beer league softball has started again. Our team won our first game and then got crushed the second game, although we were without some key guys that game, and couldn't field a competent defensive team (although, I must say, I was pretty damn good in center field, Griffey Jr.-esque, without the grotesquely swollen jaw). The other team weren't dicks or anything, but they did a few things that I think are pretty weak in beer league softball. For one, they took extra bases like it was Game 7 of the World Series even with a huge lead even. For two, they were trying to hit everything to right field because our right fielder couldn't catch very well (i.e., at all). Here's my thought on that. If you can legitimately drill the ball the other way, then by all means, go for it. But if you're taking a giant step off the plate and hitting an anemic popup to right that you get a "triple" on because our right fielder is a chick in rolled-up jeans, who's only playing because her friend is on the team and we needed another player to avoid forfeit, and who's not moving and just standing there with her glove extender and her eyes closed, well, then that's pretty stupid and cheap, in my opinion. For three, when said chick in rolled-up jeans came up to bat, they moved all their outfielders to the infield, because she didn't have the strength to hit it out of the infield. You're winning by 20 runs and you're going to completely eliminate the already miniscule chance this girl has of getting on base. Nice sportsmanship.
In news of things that actually matter, Dharun Ravi, the Rutgers webcam guy, whom I've written about before, was sentenced earlier this week. He received 30 days in jail and, also probation and mandatory counseling, I believe. It's a little harsh in my view. I think the probation and counseling (along with the infamy he'll endure for years to come) would have been enough. But on the flip side, he brought this all on himself, and I still don't think he believes he did anything wrong. He never said he's sorry, and he never owned up to his own actions. Instead of saying, "I messed up. I'm immature. I was weirded out by my roommate being gay and didn't handle it properly. I had no way of knowing what he was going through," he prevaricated and tried to cover up evidence of his most egregious misdeeds. The judge recognized this and punished him as he saw fit. It's tough for me to argue with this.
Staying in the courtroom, more is coming out with the George Zimmerman trial including the release of pictures showing closeups of his injuries. They're not inconsequential, but they're hardly proof of a life-and-death struggle. I mean, if the loser of every fistfight shot the winner, we'd have dead bodies piled up in the gutters. I find it very difficult to believe that Trayvon Martin was going to kill this man in the street with his bare hands and the only way he could be stopped was a bullet to the chest. But much more to the point, Zimmerman started the entire thing for no reason. He was in the wrong in stalking Trayvon, and he was especially in the wrong for confronting him in what was almost certainly a hostile manner. Zimmerman might deny that this is what happened, but his story of being blindsided by Trayvon doesn't cohere with the few established facts of the case, and it really doesn't pass the common sense smell test. I can understand keeping a watchful eye on somebody unfamiliar in your neighborhood, but unless he's doing something wrong, you have no right to take it further than this. If you do, and it turns into a fight then that's mostly on you, and if you shoot somebody who's unarmed during this fight then that's all on you, and you should pay the consequences. That's how I see it anyway.
Alright, I'm spent, until next time...
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