ardenstone

I don’t obsessively check out search strings that lead random strangers to my site, but I do look at them occasionally. Every once in a while you get a great one, like last Monday’s, “Is it ok to drink bourbon while studying for a test”.

As someone who just graduated from a rather intense MBA program, let me assure you that yes it is ok to drink during studying. In part because, depending on the program, you may not have any time where you’re not studying. Also, the professor is probably going to be drinking while grading your test or paper. Wine if you’re lucky, whiskey if you’re not. If you go to a larger university and there are TA’s grading your paper, well duh. They’re wasted. So it helps to be on the same wavelength.

Finally, might I also recommend bringing alcohol to class. Only to celebrate particular occasions, such as finishing your team project, completing the final or because it’s Wednesday, and don’t be all wussy about it. Buy a stack of disposable shot glasses and bring a bottle of something that can be served at room temperature (scotch, I’m looking at you). Then, preferably near the end of class, but earlier if you think it will fly, break it open. Don’t forget to invite the professor, depending on who it is they may or may not accept, but really it’s good form.

Also note that, if you’re an undergraduate student, you should probably ignore that last paragraph.

Good luck in your studies!

That’s right, folks: it’s that time of the year again. December 5th is Repeal Day! Hoist a drink at 21:00 to celebrate the 21st amendment, which repealed the 18th and allowed the fine citizens (and everyone else whose 21 years or older) to legally drink again.

Thanks for all the thoughts. We’re doing fine, for a little satellite explanation of the situation, see below:

It’s been a strange, horrible day. We’re safe and watching our city burn through the eyes of local news coverage. They’ve reported 300,000 people evacuated so far and the fires aren’t the least bit contained. San Diego is burning. My school is closed and will remain so at least through Tuesday (it’s Monday night, technically Tuesday morning as I write this) and Christy was off today as well. She compared it to a snow day: you don’t have to go to work but you also can’t really do anything. Our part of the city is remarkably normal; just quieter than usual as we all hunker down, stay off the highways, and avoid using cell phones while we watch TV. A short, twenty or thirty minute drive away, the Witch Creek fire blazes on. People are evacuating to Qualcomm Stadium, just down the road from us. The TV tells us the chaos is everywhere but other than the smell of smoke in the air most of today was just a normal, beautiful (if hazy) San Diego day. Only in the past few minutes have I seen the fire crest over mountains in the distance. At first it seemed a bright orange sunrise lighting up the horizon six hours too soon. Now it looks like lava coming down from a volcano or beacon fires lit in desperation.
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I normally avoid posting whilst inebriated, but we opened an old bottle of rose wine for dinner and throughout the evening I’ve managed to drink all but a glass of it. In addition, I’m reading William Gibson’s latest novel, Spook Country. It is, of course, entrancing but it’s also getting a bit stuck in my craw.

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So we’re planning a trip to Barcelona and I’m wondering about the feasibility of bicycling around the city. The buses and metro are supposed to be ubiquitous, and we’re all about walking, so it may not make much sense to bother renting some bikes. That being said, in my research I found some advice from the Barcelona City Council’s get around Barcelona by bike: Safety page.

However, for the majority of age groups (those between 18 and 50), it has been statistically proved that cars represent a much larger overall risk than bicycles and that the positive effects of cycling on health and quality of life greatly exceed the years of life lost in accidents.

I have to wonder if the last bit is considerably less startling in Spanish.

So we went to the Spring Sale of the San Diego Potters’ Guild today. It’s hosted in Balboa Park’s Spanish Village, and there was a lot of fun pieces of art. We decided part way through that we’d shell out for a fruit bowl, something we’ve needed for some time. We had one picked out that we both liked although it was $45, which is a lot on our current budget. Then we noticed the following bowl in the Seconds (something wrong) table:

We both really liked the design on the bottom, and while it’s not as nice as the original one we’d picked out, and it has a big crack in it, it was priced at an astounding one dollar! So we nabbed it and happily put the other one back. After tax it was a whole $1.08, which is totally worth it. A detailed picture of it as well as a shot of it in use on our now-much-nicer counter are below.

The sale continues tomorrow (Sunday, the 10th) so if you’re in San Diego and looking for some great hand made mugs, bowls, dishes and a few sculptures, it’s well worth your time to check out.

So I posted an article about the delectable negroni a while back. It’s a ridiculously tasty way to consume Campari. Betsy mentioned their print ad involving a devil, and ever since then I get about a hit a day from google with people searching for that thing. This post isn’t going to help that trend, but since Campari is one of my favorite things I’ll do them a favor and tell you folks how to find a picture of the poster.

The advertisement you’re looking for is probably Matthew Rolston’s 2005 “Il Buono e il Brutto”. CampariUSA has a copy of it on their website, and I’d link to that copy, but in a fit of style-over-brains the site is entirely in flash which is why google can’t search it and I can’t link to it. So you’ll need to do the following:

1. Go to CompariUSA. It will resize your browser window because it’s an annoying flash-based site and it knows what you want better than you do.
2. Enter in your birth date and click “Enter”.
3. In the upper-left corner, click on Menu, then Culture, then Posters.
4. See those squares in bottom of your screen, under the poster? Those are miniature pictures helpfully made so small that you probably can’t actually use them to find the right one. Click on the 4th square from the right and you should see the angel and devil.

There’s another copy of the poster on the same site, but instead of talking about the photographer, it accompanies the poster with:

“Il Buono e Il Brutto” expresses the bold sensuality of classic Italian style while embodying the sinfully provocative taste.

Isn’t it remarkably vapid and annoying? Really, you’re better off ignoring all of the above and getting yourself a nice Campari based drink.