Wednesday, March 30, 2011

High School Yearbook

I was flipping through my old high school yearbook, and I thought I should share with you some actual excerpts from it. I think they illustrate well who I was in high school.

"Keep writing in that Xanga!"

"You [are] very smart & very talented Thankx [sic] so much 4 helpn [sic] me w/ math homework. Your [sic] so sweet."

"Not only do you have an IQ of 500000, but you can chop wood w/ ur hand."

"You will fall by my hand."

"You may be one of the least Japanese-looking Japanese guys I've met, but it's not your fault you're freakishly tall."

"Man, I'm gonna miss you. And not just cause you help me and let me take your food and could probably kill me w/ your bare hands."

"You are the coolest guy who knows karate party"

"Your [sic] such a P.I.M.P. and a real 'G'."

Those were the days.

Monday, March 28, 2011

I'm (kind of) Famous!

I was photographed by Isa of Chicago Looks!

http://vintageheavenchicago.blogspot.com/2011/03/march-big-sale.html (near the bottom of the page)

Pictured above: Doing some shopping at Chicago's Vintage Heaven.

(Thanks to Chicago Looks for thinking I looked interesting enough for a photo.)

Sunday, March 27, 2011

Tumultuous Travels to Topeka

Chicago's winter is overstaying its welcome. We all were happy to pull our scarves from our accessory closets and say the word "sleet" a lot back in January. We all enjoyed the playful little blizzard that dumped a caricaturical amount of snow on the hipsters' fixie bikes. But now it is late March, and since I have still not developed a thick layer of insulating blubber (despite my 2 sticks of butter per week minimum), I was forced to migrate south for Spring Break. Ah, the vast, scorching plains of Kansas will surely warm my frostbit heart.

Pictured above: Topeka rules!

Yes, I am back in Kansas. Home of the #1 ranked college basketball team and the #1 ranked anti-gay, military funeral picketers. This is my home. The state where I rose to fame and power at a public university, which I still defend was not just a few textbooks in a barn (there was also the Medical School barn).

Pictured above: You can almost hear the flowers saying, "I can't believe I went to a state school! What am I going to do with a bachelor's degree in Photosynthetic Theory?"

But enough for now. I should get back to enjoying the quiet dignity of returning to the home of my childhood.

Pictured above: Mom, I can't sleep here. I'm worried the fluffy cloud blanket and pink sheets may just be too masculine.

Sunday, March 20, 2011

Out With the New, In With the Old!

Shaving is a terrible, terrible ordeal. For the women out there reading my blog (Hello there, internet ladies...) who do not understand, I will help you. Every morning, a man must take a dull knife to his face and carve off the sharp bristles that grow from his jaw to his neck. It is a V3 trigeminal region of pain and suffering that every man must endure.

It serves as a constant reminder of the futility of life, the ubiquity of personal failure, and the fact that even your own body is trying to keep women at bay. Although this usually translates into my morning ritual of crying in the shower and singing along to REM's "Everybody Hurts", I've discovered a better way! And by better, I mean more archaic.

Pictured above: The tools of the "wet shave."

Yes, an old-timey boar-bristle brush and shaving mug. I got the idea from the fantastic men's style series Put This On. Instead of slathering Axe-brand man-child gel on your face, delicately applying warm shaving-soap hearkens back to a simpler time, when a shave and a haircut was two bits and for some reason there were two kinds of water fountains.

And I have also upgraded the upper part of my face! I braved the internet and ordered my first pair of glasses online.

Pictured above: No, these are TOTALLY different from my old ones. Also, why am I taking so many photos of my glasses all of a sudden?

At only $42, this will be the only way I buy glasses from now on. I used to just beat up random people on the street and steal their glasses, but I just could never find my prescription. I will miss it though; it was a great upper-body workout. [Idea: New fitness sensation called Violencercise, "Assault your way to a thinner you!"]

And to celebrate my new shave and spectacles, I went vintage shopping.

Pictured above: Oh, I hear they have very high quality mens at this store.

Saturday, March 12, 2011

All Your Medical School Dating Questions, Answered

[Below is a dating advice column I wrote for the Northwestern newsletter The Beat. The editors would like for me to re-affirm that the opinions found in The Beat are of the writers themselves and do not reflect upon those of the editors.]

As the resident Dating Expert for The Beat, I am well qualified to answer questions of romance. But despite this obvious superiority, few of my fellow students have actually approached me for advice. Thus, for your benefit, I have provided the answers to what I assume are frequent problems for my peers.

Q: I have been having a hard time balancing medical school and my relationship with my significant other. They keep telling me me that I should spend more time with them and not study so much. What should I do?

First of all, you are not studying enough. Clearly, you have an excess of free time, wasting it having useless “conversations” about “spending more time” with your partner. Instead of “talking” with your partner, you should really focus get back to memorizing the branches off the subclavian artery.

But this doesn't mean that you have choose either medicine and love. You can do both! The next time you go out to a fancy dinner, take turns reading excerpts from Grant's Dissector in a sexy voice. Bonus points if you can cut apart your steak with a scalpel and tweezers.

Q: I have been having trouble meeting new people in medical school. Sure, I know my classmates, but how do I date someone not in my class?

People not in medical school (so called “real people”) are a tricky bunch to date. Most of them have paying jobs, clear responsibilities, and a natural maturity that makes them unable to identify with the typically disheveled, disorganized shell of a person that medical school creates.

But there is good news! You can always employ deception! Lie about having a normal job with normal hours, and be sure to go on dates in locations far from your apartment or the medical school. Buy plenty of disposal cell phones and re-route your IP address in order to keep up the mystery. Then, when your significant other demands to know the truth, you can divert the lie by making an even bigger one: that you are married and having an affair. This is more likely to work successfully than actually admitting you have massive debt and a fascination with cutting apart cadavers.

Q: I'm really not that into dating right now. I'm so busy studying for medical school, I just don't think I have time to date. Why should I even bother?

The answer, of course, is evolution. We are much like our mammalian brothers and sisters; we live in groups defined by the interactions of the sexes and look for joy in forming meaningful relationships with others. If you want to achieve a successful career in medicine, you can't just get good grades. You have to become a social silverback, spreading your genes through fear and intimidation.

First, you need to find yourself a mate. If you are a female, prepare to date like a bird. Observe the males from afar and make judgments based on their upper-body strength and plume coloration. Take note of their elaborate mating rituals and dances; percent hip-movement at a dance club is an excellent correlate to fertility. And, if you are lucky, you can even make them duel for a chance to mate with you.

If you are a male, prepare to date like an elephant seal. Since you are reading this dating advice column, I will assume that you already have some experience tricking women into dating you. Therefore, you will benefit by playing the numbers. Gather together a harem of women and keep them around by providing plenty of shelter and herring. If another male approaches, ward him off with loud bleating and barking. If a polar bear attacks, head for the water.

Q: I find your column offensive. It reinforces the stereotypical dichotomy of sexuality, alienating gay and bisexual students in the class. You propagate a culture of insensitivity, ignorance, and ostracization against those of non-heterosexual orientation.

A. Yes, and I also don't trust minorities.

Q: There is this REALLY handsome guy in my class. He has short brownish-black hair and glasses, and he sits at the front of the lecture every day. He always dresses up for class, even when he doesn't have to. I have a severe crush on him, but I am intimidated by his rugged good-looks. What should I do?

What a great question. I assume he is also very fashionable, mysterious, debonaire, and surprisingly muscular. Here's how you get his attention: you and the rest of the ladies in your medical school class should devise a gladiator-style tournament to compete for his love. Preferably, this should be a fight to the death. This man should preside over the competition, judging the winner of this battle royal and declaring himself King over the entire medical school.

Note: This may have just been a malaria-induced fever dream I had last night.

Sunday, March 6, 2011

Tales from the Library

Those close to me know that I don't study in the library. It is populated with many of my "classmates," who tend to want to distract with human interactions and conversations upon seeing me. I prefer to study in the homemade sensory deprivation chamber in my apartment, where the audio-notes are continuously pumped in over Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries".

But this weekend, I got this urge to join my peers in this ritualistic practice of learning in the library. I braved the last throes of Chicago winter and entered this temple of books. I wandered upstairs and began to study on one of the many comfortable couches by the windows. But...sometime was wrong.

Pictured above: I took off my glasses to show everyone around me how intense I was studying. Also, it's fun to take off glasses dramatically.

Sure, I was learning the three R's of medical school (Reading, 'Riting, and R'Anatomy), but I found it difficult to concentrate in this corner of the library.

Pictured above: My "vintage laptop", which is just a stack of printed notes. More portable than my peers' conventional laptops and just as wireless.

I found that the excess of natural light and sunny disposition of my classmates was distracting me from my studying. So I ventured down into the catacombs of the library in search of the ideal study spot. Despite the etchings of warnings on the walls, I continued down into its depths. After literally minutes of searching, I finally arrived in the abandoned basement of Galter.

Pictured above: No minotaur, but the mobile shelves can crush a man just as easily.

It was everything I had dreamed of. Exposed pipes and wires. Low ceiling and poor lighting. The sense of impending doom. I had finally found my perfect study sanctuary.

Pictured above: Paradise.