Anderson Cooper hosts CNN's "Puppy Debate"

Aww...I want an Anderson Cooper...

Princess Lampshade

Football's puppy Maggie got her na-na removed:



Aww...I wish I could wear a lampshade.

kitties

while (!puppies) {

videoPlayer myNP = new videoPlayer();

myNP.playVideo("An Engineer's Guide to Cats")'

}

The basic necessities the cats need are food and also water. Fortunately, like most engineers, cats are pretty much willing to eat the same things day after day after day. But since we all know variety is the spice of life, it is good to try something different from time to time. "Mmm...good toast". For this reason, I occasionally offer my cats something that they seem to love even than life itself: tuna. "Tuna is pretty much like...cocaine...for kitties."

AIBO + April

Mike thinks that this invention is like a cross between my past Robot Dog and my future mammal pet:



I doubt it will eat my new furniture, so I'm going to pass for now.

Susann's Amazing Puppy Plan

Susann and I discuss puppies:

theAlphaJohn: i want 4 puppies
Susann: get 3 girlfriends and that would be perfect
theAlphaJohn: i like the way you think
do you know 3 girls who wouldnt mind sharing me?
cause im pimp like that
Susann: im sure you could find some on craigslist
theAlphaJohn: i'm allergic to online dating in any form
Susann: how about online hooking up?
theAlphaJohn: that's different
i'm in a 12 step for that
esp M4T (where T == nubian tranny >= 300lbs)

Such a Thoughtful Puppy

George: Maggie wants to know why Uncle John didn't come see her? She made chili and cornbread and cookies!
theAlphaJohn: Uncle John has a stomach virus
George: Oh noes!! Need anything? Maggie says she'll come over & bite it
theAlphaJohn: That would be perfect
George: Let us know when.
George: She'd like to bring you a chili lunch tomorrow if you are home w/ thermometer in your mouth still
theAlphaJohn: Isn't she the sweetest?
George: Oh hell yes

This Post Contains 100% Pre and Post-Consumer Complaining

First I want to pat myself on the back: I completed 62 credits since Summer 2006, have three classes on my plate now, and just one more stands between me and graduation. There's no doubt I'll be done in Summer of 2008, perhaps forever.

School has wadded me up and thrown me in with the dirty laundry.

Working a new, full time job, and taking three classes at night (Mon/Wed/Thu), my schedule is pretty rigid. I'm pretty good at keeping track and getting everything done, but unexpected events throw me for a loop. As soon as I get a syllabus, I add any tests or assignment due-dates to my calendar.

My Monday class is led by a professor I had last semester. He's a bright guy, and he really wants his students to 'get it' (by 'it', I mean an STD), but he's very disorganized and a little scatter-brained in his examples. He tends to dribble out homework assignments, give an unrealistic due date, then change the due date. I would rather that he either (1) post assignments AND due dates at the beginning of the semester, or (2) at least post due dates at the beginning of the semester, so I can PLAN well in advance for an assignment. All our assignments are done in groups, and everyone in my group HAS A JOB. He handed out our first on February 11th, and we were certain it was due Wed, 2/27. In fact, it was due 2/20, and we found this out when he gave us an extension to 2/21. That gave us only one day to collaborate and pull this thing together.

P.S. -- the assignment itself: asinine.

Of course we pulled it off and submitted it before midnight, but here I am: instead of doing my job, paying attention in another class, or sleeping, I'm trying to half-ass some assignment he half-assed himself. I'm paying for the pleasure of your unpreparedness.

Wednesday night was Business Law, where our professor (who works for DOJ, and used to be a DOJ trial attorney) scolded us for the grades on our first exam, and suggested that the lower quintile might want to consider dropping his class. I originally had high hopes for this class, but aside from some small legal details (understanding citations like 497 F.3d 955), it's been American history. Judicial review 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137 (1803) gives you a boner: I get it. I'm comfortable with the Bill of Rights, not just because I paid attention in 8th grade social studies, but I go to George Mason University. Dude may have been 5 feet tall WASP, but he was all BOR all the time. Blah blah blah.

Thursday nights are my required Systems Analysis class. Forget that I took a 200-level Systems Analysis class as a CS major (which was more difficult), or that I've done this professionally for the past 10 years, there is no mechanism in SOM at GMU to let me waive or substitute it. My professor is an adjunct who works for Oracle, and everyone who works for Oracle is a sales person. This is the first class I've had where the professor will be getting all 0s on his evaluation. I like Oracle's tools, but I don't need a 3 hours sales demo every week.

I'm at the end of the road, and I will finish, but I am exhausted, and it's pointless. I don't care about my professors, I don't care about my course work, I don't even care about my grades as long as I pass. I want out.

And...I'm sad because I want a puppy, but it would be lonely and die with my schedule. Most week days, I leave the house by 9:00am, and I'm not home until after 10:00pm. I'd rather have a puppy than school. George's new puppy, Maggie, is cuter than words:

Tell me: would you rather have that sweet face, or a business law test?

I thought so.

Happy Birthday to Me

Frowny Face Events
1) Head cold
2) Business trip to Salt Lake City
3) No birthday puppy

Smiley Face Events
1) Everyone on Facebook wishing me Happy Birthday
2) Red velvet cupcakes
3) One more year before my warranty expires

What I _Did Not_ get for Crimmus

Lilly

I met Kim's puppy after my haircut today:




This calls for a video:



I am the only person I know without puppies. I must fix this.

Williamsburg, VA

Back when I was a Madrigal Singer in April of 1996, we performed at Bruton Parish Church in Colonial Williamsburg.



Since I couldn't get a hotel in NYC at the last minute I had not been there in years, I decided to spend Columbus Day Weekend there.

Friday

---

• Stayed at Crowne Plaza, which allows pets. Too bad I don't have a puppy.


• Dinner at The Trellis, one of the best meals I've ever eaten


• I sent text messages to all the former W&M alum I could think of to find out where the best night spot was in Williamsburg. Billy's answer: Paul's. Despite getting a Guinness in a plastic cup (and a single pour), this college bar provided lots of wonderful young flesh to gawk at.

Saturday

---

• Lunch at The Sportsman Grille. Service: D-, Food: D+


• Drank tasty Pumpkin Ale at The Tap House Grill At Ghent in Norfolk, VA


• Hooray bar-hopping trannies! Took photographs of Corey with said trannies

(Miss Angel on the left, Corey and his goatee in center, and Miss Diana on the right):


Sunday

---

• Breakfast at a random pancake house. Hit the spot.


• Went to Busch Gardens, which is running their Howl-o-Scream...whatever it is.



• While in line and being attacked from teenage werewolves, I see my new hero: Daddy Juice Pig:
  
  Daddy Juice Pig was there with his little (maybe 8 years old) son. Complete with b-acne and swollen forehead, he proved that it's never to early to show your children how important performance enhancing drugs can be.


• Dinner and drinks at Paul's (Yum!)

Monday

---

• Another pancake house breakfast


• Visited Jamestown, took pictures, and most-of-all: sweated. Everything there is basically a 100 year old recreation of its former, 400 year old self.

Restful, relaxing, and out of my system.

Best Hotel EVER!

Crowne Plaza in Williamsburg, VA not only lets you bring your dog, but gives you 1,000 extra Priority Club points for bringing her!

+1 Puppies (woof!)

My Two Favorite Ladies

My Cousin Joey, holding her boyfriend's new puppy.

I'm going to puppy-nap that little sweet-face.

::yawn::

Is it time to go back to bed yet?

What I have in common with little girls

Periodically, I find myself checking labpups.com to see if they have any new chocolates.

I saw a commercial for Real Housewives of Orange County last week where one of the little brats was shopping for ponies online. She picked one out, and her uber rich step father-to-be was like "I don't like that one".

So when I was browsing to look at puppies, it occurred to me that probably 90% of their website visits are little girls going omg look at the puppy!!! look at the cutsie widdle puppy!!!.

Call me what you want, but I think adorable little puppies bring out the little girl in all of us.

Happy Birthday To Me!

First, thanks to all the well-wishers. It's nice that so many people remember, especially when I always forget their birthdays.

Now, if you're wondering what to get me, here are some suggestions.

An all expenses paid foam rave in Ibiza:



An adorable squat mammal (chocolate lab):



Or, for my house to be done, and Joyce DeWitt and Suzanne Somers to be my new roommates:



Any of those three would be great.

If you'd like to join the festivities, Joey sent out one of her famous Evites yesterday.

Thanks =)

Borat on Puppies

This apparently never aired:

Borat: Could I train her?
Woman: Uhh...probably not to sniff out a Jew.
Borat: Why not?
Woman: Because Jews are Jesus' children. She probably love Jews.

Sacha Baron Cohen is a fucking maniac.

Alright, I admit it

It's two weeks before the semester starts, and not only did I update my Facebook profile, but I'm poking girls who were born around the time I finished Grade 4.

[ed. Conversation with Mike following this post]

Mike: um, excuse me.....
theAlphaJohn: ?
Mike: exactly what girls are you poking?
theAlphaJohn: you just read my blog
theAlphaJohn: hot incoming freshman
theAlphaJohn: and sophomores
theAlphaJohn: residentential students
Mike: you wish
theAlphaJohn: my future ex-wife lives in president's park (freshman housing)
Mike: possibly true enough, but you made it sound like the current, not the future poking.
theAlphaJohn: it's a virtual poke
Mike: oh.
theAlphaJohn: i got my profile all ready for fall semester
theAlphaJohn: i added some pictures and changed out my interests
Mike: so you should get laid soon.
theAlphaJohn: probably any minute
Mike: As the alpha john, I'm sure you'll be ready.
theAlphaJohn: im always ready
Mike: at a moment's notice.
theAlphaJohn: as a former (albeit medicore) boy scout
theAlphaJohn: i failed at knots but excelled at pharmacopea
Mike: not surprising
theAlphaJohn: a facebook profile and a puppy, i'll have six stds by midterms

An Afternoon of Squat-Mammals

As George calls them.

Visited the Fairfax County and Loudon County shelters this morning and checked out some puppies. The shelter is kind of heart breaking, I'm sure I'm not the only person who things that. I think seeing all those puppies and kitties living like that makes anyone want to buy a 100 acre farm and adopt all of them.

The most hopeful candidate for Saturday was a boy named Howdy:


Howdy is adorable, already adopted, and a total spaz. I helped a volunteer get a leash on him (in that picture, it looks like he's being held, but he's actually being held down), and when he walked by the other cages every dog in the place barked at him. Not a single Howdy fan in the room.

The surprising favorite was a little girl named Charlene. She is a doberman-mix, but she's is the perfect light shade of brown with brown eyes. She has one of the most beautiful coats I've ever seen, and she was so low key and loving. Sadly, also adopted (and the picture doesn't do her justice):


If she wasn't adopted already I probably would have taken her home. What a little sweet-face.

Long Weekend, Long Hump Day

Above: two UPS trucks attempt their own kind of clandestine hump day activity

It's been a few days, and your feed burners have been quiet, so I guess I should post a little update before I get back to my workday (already in progress).

I attended a happy hour last Thursday for Lisa's last day at FELD as well as Jennifer's last days in Virginia. Lisa took a job at BAH and Jennifer and Justin are moving to their beautiful new home in NC.

I spent some time working on the house this weekend. I bought (what I think is) the rest of the molding for the living room and family room. Mike helped me put the handles on the french doors, so I guess they are officially done. We actually spent a fair amount of time together this weekend -- his wife is out of town for a few weeks, and we split time between working on his house (I hate painting) and my place. Since I've been talking about puppies for weeks, we made a few unsuccessful attempts to go look at puppies. One attempt was foiled by July 4th traffic, and two others (the Fairfax and Loudon shelters) turned out to be closed on Monday. I suspect the universe is keeping from me puppies for some reason (perhaps I am their messiah, or perhaps the entire puppy race is afraid of me?).



On Cory's recommendation, I checked out Urban Retreat in Reston this weekend. It doesn't look like much from the outside, but there may finally be furniture in my future. Now if I can just get my color samples, measurements, and favorite cousin to take a trip there with me we'll be all set. ;)

I got turned on to the Buzzlife Buzzcast from a handout I snagged leaving Starscape this year. Something from the Buzzlife archives is added every week, and so far I've been very impressed. From that, I have also started listening to DJ Jon Carpenter's podcast, which is a collection of older mixes he was involved in. The mix I'm listening to now (2Rip VS. Jon Carpenter @ Wednesday Night Mayhem) has everything from Sublime to DJ Icey in it.

School is definitely heading in the right direction, though not quite where I'd like it. There was an issue regarding admission to Mason and having to wait for my transcript from NVCC which had my degree posted to it which has been taken care of. Admissions has agreed to accept and re-eval my NVCC transcript once the degree is posted. I was hoping to get a time ticket to register for this last summer session (which started this morning), but apparently everyone in the Registrar's office is on vacation. I'm looking at a CLEP exam to get out of one class I need, if I can't get into summer session I may study for that and get it done before August.

Yesterday, freak weather swept through our area for about 10 minutes. Local trees still in shock, residents thoroughly apathetic: