Beardface

I grew out my facial hair for 2 and a half months and then decided to style a new beard for every day of finals. Survived finals one day one beard at a time. For your viewing pleasure:

Patriot Act

Someone had terrible gas in the airplane. Where's the patriot act when you need it?

Prepare the colon to return fire!

The whole plane sat on the tarmac for at least 15 minutes after we landed in Medford Oregon because the people in the Tower (a glorified term for the two drunks with binoculars in a hunting stand) on top of the airport (another 18 cent word I'm using to describe the shed the hunting stand was sitting on) had apparently smelled the fart on the plane and were otherwise too incapacitated to direct the pilot to one of the 3 available gates for de-boarding. The pilot, paralyzed by the open ended math problem facing him, decided the best course of action was to sit with all of the passengers and wait for the tower to wake up from their shit coma.

Plane A leaves Denver traveling west at 326 mph for 2 hours and 43 minutes, arrives with 59 normal passengers and 1 carrying a polluted payload. Plane A comes to a complete stand still at soon to be shit-stained airport. What is the difference between the captain's capacity for spatial reasoning and the passengers' perception of the passage of time as the limit of the passengers' tolerance for fecal math jokes approaches zero?

Shaking like a Rockstar

It's been 9 days since my last sip of a caffeinated drink. Prior to that (see my previous post) I was drinking a lot of coffee. Lots. Too much. I know that because my headache went away.

Today I was walking through Denver International Airport. My flight from Denver to SF was delayed an hour, which would have put me in a major crunch to get on my flight to Medford, OR. The airline gods are on my side today. 1 seat available on a direct flight to Medford? Check. After a satisfy interaction with the airplane guy behind the desk, I got to march a mile to the new gate. On my journey I stumbled across a ROCKSTAR energy drink.

It's hard to describe exactly how I felt about seeing this. I do not need energy to fly. In fact, I would rather drink a beer or two (or 6) and get on the plane and sleep for a couple hours. I'm not a particularly nervous flyer, but sometimes if I act that way I can get extra booze for free on the airplanes. Something different about today. The rockstar. I don't need any caffeine. I don't need energy, awareness, increase HR, shakes, or the diuretic effect of caffeine prior to boarding my flight.

It's calling my name. I bought it. Drank it. Now I'm sitting at my gate waiting (and now shaking). The feeling I got when I saw the drink (I'm bad at telling stories) was happiness. I know exactly what the physiological response to this drink is supposed to be. I know that I'm going to shake, and eventually crash. But all I can think, looking at the rockstar, is that drinking it is going to make me happy. Satisified? Thirst Quenched? Energetic? NAY. Looking at the Rockstar made me feel fucking euphoric.

Anyone know where I can score some cocaine?

Caffeine Pit Stains

It's the end of finals week. Strung out and tired for nearly 3 weeks of studying like a maniac. Bags under my eyes. Stacks of neglected laundry, mail, dirty dishes. Mountains of rewritten notes, drawings, textbooks, photocopies. A whole tree's worth of paper in the trash can. Pens and pencils stashed in every coat, pants, and backpack pocket of every pants, coat and backpack I own. Broke. Scraping by on what's left of ego waffles and campbell's soup. 1 more exam left. Functioning purely on instinct and caffeine. I'm practically sweating coffee. It's ridiculous but I'm here because I believe in what I'm doing. This is going to pay off. I'm here for a reason. One more exam.

Steve McQueen

I was thinking I wanted to get a model of a human skeleton. Probably not a full sized skeleton - I don't even want to think about shipping costs... A half sized skeleton would do just fine, but accurately proportioned and molded with all the appropriate bony landmarks so it could be used for studying should I ever feel so inclined. It's hard to say whether or not I would actually use it to study. The real reason I want a skeleton is so that I can name something and introduce it to people who come to visit my dungeon apartment. Steve McQueen. Ashlee suggested Boris Karloff. That is a good one too.

I'm putting this on my "Things I want for Christmas" list.

All I want for Christmas is hypertrophy of my rectus abdominus.

A cool article on Forecasting the cost of Healthcare in the US

http://www.american.com/archive/2009/september/forecasting-the-cost-of-u-s-healthcare

A good read if you get time. No conclusions drawn, but something worth thinking about.

@ Regis

Beginning of week 3 and already every time I am out of line of sight of my books I start to feel a lot of anxiety. I don't even have them open all the time, but if I'm not around I feel like I have a weight on my chest. This is unhealthy. My goal for Week 4 is to study hard and start creating balance. I need to start riding my bike again. Baby steps, I guess.

On a more positive note - I did spend this last weekend as the best man at a very good friend's wedding in Havre MT. It was a long way away from most of my books, but I brought enough homework help me forget any homework-related anxiety. I got to spend the rest of labor day weekend driving to Bozeman singing Flight of the Conchords songs and nursing hangovers. I needed the break after my first two full weeks of grad school, but I have a lot of catching up to do from missing Friday.

I am also going to maintain this blog a little more faithfully. This is partially in case anybody actually reads, and every once in a while to keep myself in check and to make sure I'm doing the things I set out to do. It's like a journal - but not as private, and I might get to crack some good jokes and rant about something every once in a while. -d

Removing the Northstar Engine on a 97 Cadillac Deville Concours.

It's like legos but I swear a lot more...

So I said to myself "Self, what you need is something complicated to do for the next couple months. You should buy this second car and sell chunks of it to people and keep what you need for your own car."

This was a bear of a job that took me a few days less than I thought it would. Still, no easy task here. The broken engine came out and a man bought it for $300. Success!

This is what it looks like before you start pulling all the stuff off. There is NOT a lot of room to work with here. There are 2 ways to remove the engine, lifting it out of the car, or lifting the car off of the engine. The second option is the preferred way to do it. Guess what way I'm NOT doing it...

Air intake has to come off with lots of ground wires and the ignition core, spark plug wires, and lots of other junk. Mostly this is to access the starter, whic his in the CENTER OF THE FREAKING ENGINE BLOCK. What drunk asshole engineer at GM thought that would be a good idea?

Zero clearence. It's a tight freaking job - and nobody should have to do it.

The starter goes in that big hole in the middle.

With the starter gone, I could disconnect the flywheel from the transmission, and then eventually the transmission from the engine.

There is a bracket that connects to this son of a bitchin' thing to the transmission that I had NO IDEA existed. Imagine my suprise when I finally started lifting the engine and the whole car started going into the air. Anyway, don't forget this little guy.

Aaannnnnndddd PRESTO! You too, can remove the Northstar from your cadillac using some simple hand tools, a freaking crane, foul language, and some kinves. After that, you might consider putting easter eggs in it, or lighting it on fire. I hate this engine. Enjoy.

Questions, comments, concerns?

Denver for Denver

My Decision (drum roll)...........................................................

in DENVER!

Don't worry, this doesn't mean I'm going to start acting Catholic...

As of August 24, 2009, Denver P. Lancaster (me!) begins his last scholastic push to get more letters behind his name. And, he's doing it in Denver. DPL, DPT, BS. I don't know if the order of that is right or not. I'm sure they're going to tell me when I get to school. They'd better, for the 100K it's going to cost me to attend their private school. Regis University is where I plan on attending school for 33 months beginning in August, and ending in my eventual burn out. It should be a lot of fun... When I am finished, I plan on making my lisence plate DPL-DPT, getting rich, and running for office in Denver with the slogan "Denver for Denver!" I can't lose. You can start donating to my campaign now by sending money via paypal to denver.like.the.state@gmail.com. More on my campaign to come but for now, pictures of my trip to Denver.

The St. Regis, the patron saint of social workers for helping poor people and prostitutes. My dad is going to be so pround of me.

This is where I will attend Sunday Mass.

Shortly after my interview, I met some Canadians. I told them a Canada joke they didn't think was funny, but they were nice enough so we all got drunk and I forgot a bunch of stuff. Good times.

BONUS:

Campaign Slogan Contest!!!!!!! Post your own ideas for posters/lawn signs/slogans for my campaign for mayor for Denver, CO as a comment to this post. The person whose comment I believe is the best fit for my campaign will recieve a picture of ME, autographed and printed (black and white) from my HP Deskjet printer.

I am Denver Lancaster, and I approve this message.

In my travels, I witnessed many remarkably dull things.

Goal #1 Revisited...

Applications went out in November and December for 6 physical therapy graduate schools. They are as follows: Columbia University, The Mayo Clinic, Regis University, University of Washington, University of Montana, and University of Puget Sound. Thank god for the PTCAS. It is a centralized application service for physical therapy school applicants. It made the whole application process extremely easy, as long as you mail your transcripts in early.

A few weeks later I heard from most of the schools (except for UW and UM). I was offeredinterviews at 3 of the schools in this order: Columbia (NY), Regis (CO), and Mayo (MN). Shortly after receiving interview confirmations, I drove to Havre, MT on a tip from my friend Jacob that I could have a suit tailored for half the cost of buying one in Bozeman. He was right. I bought a pretty slick suit, shoes, ties, pants, and a belt. This was expensive, but still slightly cheaper than the same package in Bozeman, even with gas for a 10 hour round trip commute. A few different people told me I look like Big in that photo - but I watch the movie and I assure you, I look WAY less creepy. I would really like to see that same in some creepy B Horror movie. I think it would be a great fit.

Next came the inverviews which I have described below. There are some pictures for your viewing entertainment.

Columbia University, New York, NY - Rejected

Dr. Dr. Dr. K: "Lets go ahead and start this interview."

Denver: "Okay!"

Dr. Dr. Dr. K: "I'm reading through your application here and your GRE scores appear to be very low, especially your writing score. Lets talk about that. I mean, tell me about that."

Denver: "-------"

All right, motherfucker, lets do this. I can only describe the 20 minutes following Dr. Dr. Dr. K's opening question/comment/concern as an academic sodomy. It was bad. The whole interivew was more of an inquisition into my academic inadequacy as a candidate for their program. 3 months later, I received a letter in the mail that said "Thank you.....we regret to inform you that our admission committee has failed to act favorably on your application to our physical therapy program." FAIL. But I got some neat pictures, I think.

New york was fun, and big. The only people who seemed to communicate with strangers or one another were the dogs and the cabs. Dogs barked and cabs honked their horns. I would venture to predict that judging the relative importance and general hierarchy of lifeforms in NYC can be based on 2 criteria: (1)the number of parts contacting the ground and, (2) the relative size to other lifeforms. Cars, being the largest lifeforms and with 4 contacts, are clearly the dominant species. This is evident by observing their high speed and blatant disregard for ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING in their paths. Right below that is dogs who also make 4 contacts to the ground, but are clearly smaller than most humans. The exception to the height predictor comes from observation. Dogs lead humans around the city by leashes, deficate and urinate wherever they please while it is the human's job to clean up, and bark at any god damn thing they please, without fear of reprisal. Next down the list is humans, and below that is pigeons. Somewhat harder to classify are the cyclists - who appear to be going through an identity crisis. They are not humans, or vehicles, yet travel on both paths and are loathed by both humans and vehicles.

This lady on the left is standing in the water with an arm on fire. This person on the right is taking a picture of an ugly round thing surrounded by grass. I felt it would make me MORE of a tourist to take a picture of a tourist taking a picture of something obscure in NYC. I am the king tourist. I own that look.

And to your left, there is a statue of a bird with tall buildings behind it. Also pictured, next to the bird, is another tall building. I'm sure it has a name, I just don't care what it is.

This picture was taken in TIMES SQUARE!!!1woot1!11one!!! Right after I took this picture, a complete fucking stranger walked by and hit me in the ear. I shit you not, I got deliberately HIT in the FUCKING EAR! This is bullshit.

ihateny

The Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN - Waitlisted

The mayo clinic was by far the most impressive "campus" I have ever been on. Their facilities are incredible, their fitness center was like something out of a utopia movie. The interview to get into their school was very hard. It was strictly behavioral in its approach. The idea behind behavorial interviews is that the best predictor of future performance is past performance, so all of the questions are situationally specific. To prepare for this, I read through several of my resumes, and spent a considerable amount of time thinking about past jobs and stressful situations I had been in. This helped a little bit with my thought processes, but did not prepare me for any of the questions specifically. The interviewers said hello, told me their names, explained that I was going to get 5 questions, asked me 5 questions, then thanked me for my time and sent me away.

While I was in Rochester, and NY for that matter, I used a website called Couchsurfing.com to seek out accomidations for my travels. When I describe it, people think it sounds shady, but I assure you it isn't. It's a hospitality network, of sorts, with an feedback and reporting system so you can see who has and hasn't hosted guests, and how they were as a host or guest. Very cool. The two people directly to my right hosted me in Rochester and were more than accomidating. We went gambling togehter! Good times... My host in NYC was also very good, as well, and showed me around downtown NY (i think that's where I was). The picture on the left is of the front doors of The Mayo Clinic. The whole thing is amazing.

University of Puget Sound, Tacoma, WA - Accepted!

There isn't any really cool story here except when I flew to Seattle I forgot my debit and credit cards, and only had $40 on hand after I arrived in the city. Oops. I was rescued by friends though, and thanks anyone who talked to me while I was in the airport bored and alone. Edwin saved my life the first night, we had nachos, beers, and visited chopsticks - a sweet ass bar with "dualing" pianos" (Picture 1). That was probably the coolest thing. I got a little bit drunk and ate too many spicy things. The next day, I visited U of Puget Sound. There was no interview - I appliced and got a letter a 2 months later letting me know I had been accepted to their school. The purpose of this visit was for me to assess my own interest in attending. BEAUTIFUL campus (Picture 2), except the PT school. Everyone was very friendly, and it was a comfortable setting, but something - I can't put my finger on it exactly - told me this wasn't the place for me. I have to go with my gut on this one.

I spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around a few blocks away from UPS in search of US Bank. I found one, acquired money to fund the next 3 days, and took my life in my own hands riding Tacoma's public transportation system: Sound Transit. Bullshit. The whole thing. I was on busses for 4 hours trying to get 25 miles. The busses run stupid routs and stupid times and stop running early, and I didn't really know where I was or where I was going. I got back to Edwin's place, but hated the stench of Tacoma too much. I spent the rest of the weekend with Craig rooting for the Sounders, Michigan, and Arrested Development. Good times.

Chopsticks on the left, University of Puget Sound on the right.

I found this guy while I was wandering around looking for a US Bank. I liked his hat, and asked if he would be my friend. We shook hands and the rest is history.

Columbia University - Rejected

University of Washington - Waitlisted

University of Montana - Waitlisted

The Mayo Clinic - Waitlisted

Regis University - Accepted

University of Puget Sound - Accepted