Oriented Strand Board, National Broadcasting Corporation, and Slate's Political Gabfest.
With that out of the way, let me explain the probable form of this post. It might change half-way through. Or not. I'm not sure yet.
Today was my day at the Habitat site, working an 8 hour day, and having a lot of fun. A lot of what I did was putting up OSB, which, as I briefly explained, stands for Oriented Strand Board. Basically, little scraps of wood, all pointing in the same direction, which are pressurized, and more sturdy than plywood, while easier to nail into than some other of the treated and pressurized woods. What we were doing was taking big boards of this, (side note-These boards are about 1/4 of an inch thick. Half the size of a piece of toast.), and then putting them up on the outside of the framed walls. They were flush with the bottom, or mud sill, and nailed into the top plate, mudsill, and studs. Basically, we were nailing into the top, bottom, sides, and the lines between the top and bottom. But the wood isn't the easiest to nail, and is sometimes flopping around, and needs to be really pounded into the wood, particularly for the first few, we were using nail guns. Oh boy! Excitement! I was working with a team of 3 adults who were all willing to let me do more than a fair share of the nailing. My shoulder is pretty tired now. Air-powered, with some serious heft. These guns drive the nails right through the OSB, and solidly into the studs. That's a fair amount of wood. I enjoyed it for a while, but eventually, I got tired, and it got a little monotonous. All in all, it was still pretty interesting, and enjoyable. The most interesting part of the day was the weather. No joke. It must have been getting close to 70, which, if you notice the date, is not exactly the kind of weather we expect the 25th of February. My face has that borderline sunburned feeling. Good times.
Now NBC. The Olympics are still happening. I'm starting to get bored. I'm not an ice skating fan, and cross-country skiing is like watching a marathon. A snail marathon. On snow. So now I'm falling back to my default, mocking, sarcasm, and pointing out stupidity. Case in stupid point. We were watching the women's ice skating, and the commentators were talking about one of the skaters, Turkish lady. The female commentator remarked "She is a very exotic skater." She wasn't skating differently, she was just dark. She had darker skin, darker hair, nice brown eyes. She was still beautiful, a great skater, but I just found myself noticing that there aren't a lot of dark skaters. Why? And why did the commentator feel the need to say that?
Bob Costas. One of the main NBC guys working the Olympics, and he still can't get a tie that doesn't clash with his shirt and jacket. Why can't newscasters just look classy, and stop trying to be fashionable?
Mary Castillo continues to irritate and inform me through the Games. Yes, she is doing cool stuff, and telling people all the cool things about Canada, blah blah blah. But its like a commercial that NBC is paying for, and there isn't really any substance. I mean, how important is a blind sled dog? Seriously?
Some of the events don't really need an explanation. We can see what the figure skaters are doing, we don't need a explanation and parsing of every little triple this backwards that. It is like sports spam. Just be quiet! When you have something worthwhile saying, say it, otherwise, just be quiet! There are other events where we do need some explaination. I have no clue what is happening in curling, or ski jumping. Please, explain why that dude went farther, but snowboard cross needs no explaining. It is a race! They race, and what order you cross the finish line, that is the order of the medals, or advancements or whatever. The Olympics always have this cocktail of effects on me. And I always find myself a little surprised by it. Grr!
One final Olympic thought. Everyone is comparing Apolo Ono to Michael Phelps, but I think that is actually the wrong comparison. It should be Ono to Usein Bolt, the sprinter. Much more similar sports, still the same kind of movement, just different strategies.
All right, the Slate Political Gabfest. I am actually going to add to this, with a few other podcasts, but let me just say, if you are interested in understand the big political events, and don't mind some liberals having a good time, and being pretty irrevent on occasion, listen to this podcast. Slate has put up a nice little post about how to subscribe to podcasts, in all the variety of wats that it is possible. It's right here. http://www.slate.com/id/2244964/
That's all for now, but I am going to try and post some catching up stories.
Night!
Friday, February 26, 2010
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Guess Who's Back
Hello Dear Readers!
It has been far, far too long since I wrote something for you all. I would like to point out that I have still had the thoughts in my head, but I haven't had the time, or sometimes the equipment to actually get one those thoughts down. First the equipment. My computer broke, like, smoke smells broke, so that was a downer. Fortunately, one of the awesome families in my church had an extra laptop, which they very kindly gave to me. Thank you Myers family! Only in Silicon Valley do people have "extra" laptops. I have also been insanely busy since the roadtrip, and sick a couple of times, so it has taken me a while to get back into a somewhat regular life. But now, here we are. I'm sitting on the couch, watching the Olympics, still a little sweaty from playing some football. Good times!
So, I'm not sure if anyone has noticed, but there is this international sporting thing happening. Apparently it happens every four years. Whatever that is about. Anyway, I've been watching, and it is pretty interesting. Short track speedskating, snowboard cross, snowboarding, and some of the skiing sports are pretty interesting. The sport of games, the sport that is totally amazing, and really engaging....CURLING! I know, I know, that's so white. And geeky. But whatever. It is amazing! So stragetic. I was watching with Jack and Tama, the couple I sometimes stay with in Pacific Grove, and Jack and I were amazed. Tama was distracted, and she kept looking up curling related questions on her laptop. Jack and I alternated between amazement at the play, the accuracy, the teamwork, the stratagy, and frustration at the commentators. One had obviously lost the drawing, and was being forced to cover curling. He knew so little, he didn't even know what questions he needed to ask. The other was a curler, and had been for 50 years. He knew tons, and didn't do even close to enough explaining. He was using all these curling words, and going on about tactics, while the rest of us were still trying to figure out the scoring and who gets to go when. It was nuts. There have also been tons of stirring Olympics storylines. Married ice skaters, fathers and the redemptive qualities of their children, the motivational effect of handicapped brothers, etc, etc. This is why we love the Olympics.
I've also been spending a fair amount of time working at the Habitat site, which has been a lot of fun. My hammering skills have gotten a heck of a lot better, and I'm starting to pick up the lingo. Last time I was out there, I got to put a header in for one of the garages. For those of you who don't know what a header is, it is a very big piece of wood, and it is the primary load-bearer for any opening. Because any opening doesn't have the studs in place that are needed, the header takes that weight, and transfers it to the studs that are next to it. Doors, windows, openings, they all get headers. Anyway, I'm learning some good stuff, and some of the guys have been teaching me some really helpful stuff. I have my own hardhat, and I'm looking for some stickers to put on it. If you have a sticker you would care to donate to the Chris Hardhat Project, let me know!
That has been a fair amount of my life recently, but I am going to do my best to stay up on things now.
One other thing that happened recently was my 18th birthday two days ago. Guess that is kind of significant. I have heard from a few of you about how absurd my lackluster celebration was. It is one day. A difference of one day, and now my country and society sees me as an "adult" while the day before I was similar in pretty much every way. Physically, mentally, emotionally, there were minuscule, if any changes over the course of that night. Its not that I don't like celebrating, getting presents, etc. I really enjoyed getting congratulated, and getting raspberry tart for dessert, and having corn dogs and tater tots for dinner, but I don't think the clear line between adulthood was actually meaningful. Its not like there was some kind of rite of passage, some test of manhood, and all the privileges that I now have that I didn't before were all granted to me by my government or society. People that know me aren't really going to change how they treat me because I am a day older. Or two days older.
Enough ranting. I'm going to bed now.
Its good to be back!
It has been far, far too long since I wrote something for you all. I would like to point out that I have still had the thoughts in my head, but I haven't had the time, or sometimes the equipment to actually get one those thoughts down. First the equipment. My computer broke, like, smoke smells broke, so that was a downer. Fortunately, one of the awesome families in my church had an extra laptop, which they very kindly gave to me. Thank you Myers family! Only in Silicon Valley do people have "extra" laptops. I have also been insanely busy since the roadtrip, and sick a couple of times, so it has taken me a while to get back into a somewhat regular life. But now, here we are. I'm sitting on the couch, watching the Olympics, still a little sweaty from playing some football. Good times!
So, I'm not sure if anyone has noticed, but there is this international sporting thing happening. Apparently it happens every four years. Whatever that is about. Anyway, I've been watching, and it is pretty interesting. Short track speedskating, snowboard cross, snowboarding, and some of the skiing sports are pretty interesting. The sport of games, the sport that is totally amazing, and really engaging....CURLING! I know, I know, that's so white. And geeky. But whatever. It is amazing! So stragetic. I was watching with Jack and Tama, the couple I sometimes stay with in Pacific Grove, and Jack and I were amazed. Tama was distracted, and she kept looking up curling related questions on her laptop. Jack and I alternated between amazement at the play, the accuracy, the teamwork, the stratagy, and frustration at the commentators. One had obviously lost the drawing, and was being forced to cover curling. He knew so little, he didn't even know what questions he needed to ask. The other was a curler, and had been for 50 years. He knew tons, and didn't do even close to enough explaining. He was using all these curling words, and going on about tactics, while the rest of us were still trying to figure out the scoring and who gets to go when. It was nuts. There have also been tons of stirring Olympics storylines. Married ice skaters, fathers and the redemptive qualities of their children, the motivational effect of handicapped brothers, etc, etc. This is why we love the Olympics.
I've also been spending a fair amount of time working at the Habitat site, which has been a lot of fun. My hammering skills have gotten a heck of a lot better, and I'm starting to pick up the lingo. Last time I was out there, I got to put a header in for one of the garages. For those of you who don't know what a header is, it is a very big piece of wood, and it is the primary load-bearer for any opening. Because any opening doesn't have the studs in place that are needed, the header takes that weight, and transfers it to the studs that are next to it. Doors, windows, openings, they all get headers. Anyway, I'm learning some good stuff, and some of the guys have been teaching me some really helpful stuff. I have my own hardhat, and I'm looking for some stickers to put on it. If you have a sticker you would care to donate to the Chris Hardhat Project, let me know!
That has been a fair amount of my life recently, but I am going to do my best to stay up on things now.
One other thing that happened recently was my 18th birthday two days ago. Guess that is kind of significant. I have heard from a few of you about how absurd my lackluster celebration was. It is one day. A difference of one day, and now my country and society sees me as an "adult" while the day before I was similar in pretty much every way. Physically, mentally, emotionally, there were minuscule, if any changes over the course of that night. Its not that I don't like celebrating, getting presents, etc. I really enjoyed getting congratulated, and getting raspberry tart for dessert, and having corn dogs and tater tots for dinner, but I don't think the clear line between adulthood was actually meaningful. Its not like there was some kind of rite of passage, some test of manhood, and all the privileges that I now have that I didn't before were all granted to me by my government or society. People that know me aren't really going to change how they treat me because I am a day older. Or two days older.
Enough ranting. I'm going to bed now.
Its good to be back!
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