Ideas

Good idea: Be prepared.

Bad idea: Doing this at home.

Atlas Shrugged

So all the junk going on with the markets the past few days/weeks got me thinking (in between massive study sessions for the Patent Bar, which I take again on Friday) about Atlas Shrugged.

The book is massive (1000 pages), but I very much encourage people to read it. The reason I bring it up is because I remain very much anti-entitlement. The debate tonight - I tuned in for about 30 seconds and they were talking about entitlements.

I don't think people, and in particular, most Americans, should be entitled to much at all. Veterans, yes. Other then them... I'm sure there are some that skip my mind at the moment, but very few people deserve something from the rest of us. And it ticks me off that the government is bailing out Wall Street, and just today bailed out a bunch of private companies...

Anyway, back to the book. In the book, people continue to say that they are entitled to stuff, and deserve this, and they deserve that. Countries, states, companies, need subsidies to continue operating. Kinda like California right now.

Believe it or not, I've softened in law school - I can actually see the value in some social programs. I think everyone deserves a chance at making a life for themselves. Hopefully this money problem will be abated and we can have some breathing room for 10-20 years. Eventually, I predict the truckers going on strike, and suddenly nobody has food, oil, coal (for 80% of all powerplants), or medicine.

How about this for an entitlement: "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."

Seriously: Read this book.

p.s. Ayn Rand was kinda crazy on some stuff, so don't take this as an absolutism on her.
p.p.s. There's a crazy 100 page oratory late in the book I recommend skimming.

Night Air

So my dad worked late nights as a cop for many many years. He once told me that he loved the night - that there was an energy that you could feel driving the streets at 3 AM, when they're empty, that's just incredible.

I love the empty streets, the crisp air, the quiet. Right when I got home from my mission I used to wake up every morning at 5ish and go running in Provo. The quiet was awesome. Especially when it snowed, and the world was completely silent except for the crunch of the snow under my feet.

Anyway, the reason I started writing this stuff is because the other day I was driving home at midnight, and I had forgotten how much I love the night. I loved the glow from the lights, the smell... it was very nice.

4 Bar K

So I think I just found my new favorite restaurant in Lubbock. It's called the 4 Bar K. It's a catering restaurant my buddy Mark had told me about last year, but it's only open on Fridays from 11-2, so its been a trick getting there.

Basically, it's all you can eat BarBQ & drink for $7, with some small dessert thrown in for fun. You get this tortilla from the boss man, who loads a bunch of delicious meat in it, and then you pick your sides - corn bread, coleslaw, chips & salsa... mmm... And there's live music. Today it was just some dude and his guitar - I don't know if its the same guy every week...

Anyway, if you're in Lubbock and you want some awesome grub, you should hit this place up. Of course, its sorta a word of mouth place... it doesn't even say on the website that they serve lunch. Oh, and it's sorta outside of town... Like in the countryside. Just head East on 82nd past highway 27 until you think 'Wow, there's no way Ryan wanted me to go this far' and keep going. You'll see a barn on the right - that's the place.

Sick of the library

I'm sick of always being in the library late. I know I'm not the last one out every night here at law school, but I was often the last one out in undergrad, and I've been pulling some pretty long days/late nights here in law school. Frankly, I'm sick of it.

But, hopefully it'll all pay off. Then I'll go on a vacation to Alaska, while all the people who watched Friends -instead of studying- sit on their couch... and watch Friends.

Or even better, maybe they can watch 'Everybody loves Ramon noodles'. What an awful show. Hate it.

Quick Trip

So I went out to San Jose for an interview - a really quick trip, and I really liked the San Jose area. But the travel to and from was rough. I'm pretty exhausted. Despite said exhaustion, here's a quick map of my travels over the past 2 days.


The biggest surprise of the trip? The size of El Paso. I had no idea it was so huge. A million people! I always thought it was this small little dusty town where nobody speaks English. Little did I know it's a huge dusty town where nobody speaks English!

We're jacked

So here's a couple of quick links leading me to the conclusion that we are definitely hosed as a country.

From 2004.
From last February.
From this week.

Plus this one... about oil futures.

Anyone who thinks this is going to get better anytime soon isn't looking at the money trail. The fact is, the Chinese already have been buying most of the bonds the U.S. sells to cover these debts. I'm not exactly sure how it all works, but I do know that U.S. citizens are not the ones buying the bonds. We're in the hole, big time.

If you think McCain is going to lead us out of this, you're wrong. He wants to cut taxes even further. Exactly how does that make sense? We owe TONS of money. Unfathomable amounts of money, and we're going to tax, i.e. 'make', less money. That's a brilliant idea.

If you think Obama and his 'change' platform will fix this, you're wrong. While Clinton had the right idea and lead to some very good fiscal policies, Obama's platform is currently to increase social programs in the U.S. You know, because we're not already paying for enough junk.

By the way, this bailout that Bernanke and the others are promoting. Twice the cost of the Iraq War, once the pork is added in. But at least a lot of Americans have affordable housing - now my tax dollars can subsidize those loans.

Go America.

Ladyluck Speedway

So on Friday I went to the Ladyluck Speedway here in Lubbock. It was Awesome. Many years ago I was on the BYU electric racecar team, which was super fun. So I had had some experience with racing - but never dirt racing. This was sweet. They had stock cars and they had sprints. Saw some sweet crashes and pushing and thankfully everyone came out healthy.

One thing that's super fun about any racetrack are the people. Lots of interesting characters. I've told a few people, but one thing I learned is that the family that smokes together stays together, as evidenced by a mother passing her smoke on to her son, who then took a drag. That's the Mom above - she had another son (maybe 19?) that she passed her smoke to. Another thing I learned was that it's OK to induce permanent hearing loss in infants, as evidenced by this babyseat at the race.
But overall, I really liked the race. Unfortunately it was the last race of the season - next year I'll be sure to catch a few more.

Red Lobster

In my opinion, the best Mexican food in Provo is Diego's Taco Shack. It's delicious. I almost always get a double, or triple order of carnitas. Pulled pork on a small tortilla, with some chopped onions, lime, and salsa.... mmm...

But alas, I'm not in Provo anymore, and I think its time to find some new restaurants that I can say are my favorites... Today I'm trying out Tom and Bingo’s Hickory Pit Bar-b-que. Sounds like my kinda place.

Not on my list - Red Lobster. First of all, let me start by saying that until this past summer I had never been to Red Lobster. If it were up to me, I'd probably never go again. I'm not a big seafood guy, but Red Lobster is overpriced and a little on the gross side. OK, a lot on the gross side. I simply fail to see the allure of this restaurant. I've been there 3-4 times now, and walk away disappointed every time. I don't foresee me going back unless pressured to do so.

Sunday Nights

Sunday nights are the worst. I mess up my sleep habits every Friday and Saturday, and can't fall asleep before 11:30 or midnight on Sunday. Almost ever. I purposefully try to wake up early on Sunday, but not having church until 2:30 makes it tough to be so motivated. I keep telling myself to wake up early and go for a walk... but its usually easier to sleep. And so, today I'm a sleep deprived wreck. Ya! At least I got ~ 4 hours!

Lance Armstrong

Following Michael Jordan, Brett Farve, and many others, another athlete has decided they shouldn't have retired - Lance Armstrong. Now, I loved watching the Tour when Lance was in it. And the truth is, I'll be rooting him on again. Frankly, it's stunk the past year or two - especially once Landis was found to be doping (which I still kinda doubt, but whatever).

However, what does bug me a little is that he's claiming that its to raise Cancer awareness.

Wait wait, Now I get it!
- Winning 7 times after cancer didn't do enough for cancer awareness.
- Selling a ga-gillion yellow bracelets didn't do enough for cancer awareness.
- Running the New York marathon in 3 hours didn't do enough for cancer awareness.
- Being on TV almost everyday doesn't do enough for cancer awareness.
- Dating Sheryl Crow, then dumping her for one of the Olson twins didn't do enough for cancer awareness.

But winning a race you already won 7 times in a row will do it. Yup.

Weekend Update

After going to NYC last weekend, and not doing any homework during that weekend, plus having some HUGE tasks due the following Wed. and Thurs., this week turned out to be a real pain. Some late nights and a lot of stress later, and I was burnt out.

In contrast to a rough week, I spent the weekend watching BYU and Texas Tech win their respective football games, catching up on other things that needed doing, and just relaxing. It was super nice, especially in contrast to the crazy week, to just sit back and relax. While I'm sure this week will have its own challenges, I feel refreshed and ready to go again.

NYC

So I flew up to New York City for the Labor Day weekend. It went by quickly and was a lot of fun.

I'd never really spent any meaningful time in New York City before, so this was kinda different. What I discovered is that
A) Lubbock and New York are about as polar as it comes within the United States
B) That New York actually reminds me a lot of Argentina, the way the traffic works and just the feel of the city
C) If you ever want to see something strange, NYC is the place to go.

The two funniest things I saw there: A dude walking around with a live cat sitting on his head, and this post-it-note on the suggestion board at Governor's Island.

A lot of people say that New York is a place that's fun to visit, but they'd never want to live there. I don't think that's me. I think it'd be fun, but very different. The idea of living without a car is disconcerting. Lots of walking.

Anyway, now back to school. I'm retaking the patent bar on the 10th of October, so time is now pressing.

Todays Dilbert

Yet another Lawyer joke...

*Update: My brother put up the same post, which I hadn't seen before posting this... kinda creepy.

Lawyer Joke

Here's a joke by B.J.Novak, who plays Ryan on 'The Office.' Oddly, the women at my law school didn't think it was as funny!

Battered women?

Sounds delicious...but that doesn't make it right.

USA finances

Someday I'll get around to writing more on how bad a situation I think America is in Financially. In the meantime, I really want to see this movie. I.O.U.S.A.

in Texas...

Yet another way to know you're in Texas is when you're sitting in Church and you hear,

" 'Cause he knew he was fixin'ta die"

from the pulpit.

Back to Lubbock

So I'm back in Lubbock - without internet until next Tuesday, so I'm up at the Law School right now, checking upon my assignments that are due the first day of class, checking emails and posting this.

Anyway, on my way back out to Lubbock on Monday I saw two really cool things:

1) A house on fire in Seymour, TX. It was surreal, just right off the road. Everybody was stopping and watching for about 30 seconds, then driving on. It was pretty crazy. Did I ever see any sign of firefighters? No.

2) Aurora, TX - and the cemetery where they buried a space alien. I'm not kidding.

Greenville, TX

So I finished up my summer at L-3 Greenville. I'm guess I'm ready to head back to Lubbock, since I'm doing so on Monday. But I couldn't leave without a small tour of Greenville.

First of all, its not pronounced 'Greenville', its pronounced 'Green-vul.' It helps if you add a pinch of hick and a pinch of twang to it.

This definitely is a nice addition to my list of crappy towns. What makes it crappy? Primarily that they don't take care of the place. It just looks like a dump. Poor traffic patterns certainly adds to the crappiness. But here's a few interesting things about the town.

1) They once upon a time had a decent baseball team that beat the Yankees.









But of course they didn't take care of it and now its a parking lot for electrical transformers. Neato.


2) This is downtown. It's pretty dilapidated, but I hear they have a really good costume shop.

3) This is where the 'Modern' crappy shops are. The fast food, the mini-malls, etc. I think it looks like crap because the electrical lines are all above ground. If they were to bury the electrical lines, the property value in Greenville would probably double overnight. It just looks like crap.

Also here's two great shots:
Check out this sweet house... and since when is corn brown?!?

Chicago

Chicago was sweet. I had some good interviews and my ol' buddy Powell (Aaron) came out from Spokane to interview as well. He and I met this crazy dude in the EL terminal, got some deep dish Chicago pizza, then went swimming at the hotel. It was pretty sweet.

The true vacation took place after the interviews were over. Powell took off and Jenn Wheeler came in town. She wore me out walking all around downtown Chicago. We took an architectural tour, walked the lake shore, went to the Field Museum, ate at some sweet restaurants, went to the Art Museum, listened to Lalapalooza, saw Wrigley Field, and saw the LDS temple. Here's a few of my favorite shots from the weekend:










This is Chicago. Beautiful town - when the weather's good. When the weather's poor, not fun.










This is the Ghost and the Darkness. They were some killer lions in Africa many moons ago, and the only thing I really wanted to see in Chicago. I was super happy we found them. This other thing is the Big Bean.

This was an incredible poster explaining leadership among native Americans... Jenn really liked the tshirt...










And this is Jenn looking cute, with my face covered. I think its funny...