Ever since the news broke two years ago about the dog-fighting charges against Vick, I haven’t really known what, if anything, to say about it.  The cruelty of his actions are beyond comprehension.

Watching Vick in the National Championship game in 2000 is one of my favorite sports moments.   He dodged, weaved, and made even Bowden blush in appreciation for his skills.   He then proceeded to the NFL where he made every opposing team adapt their defense.  He made football exciting.

Yet, I’m also a pet-lover of the highest degree – just ask Argo or Beta about their Twitter accounts.  Trying to resolve Vick the superstar with Vick the dog-murderer is a challenge.  I think I know now how some people felt about OJ Simpson.  I remember wondering at the time how people could possibly think he was anything other than a murderer.  I don’t need to wonder anymore.

The justice system says Vick has served his sentence.  So be it.   I guess if we’re not going to allow people to reform, why release them from prison at all?  It’s time for him to start-over.  Let’s see if he can make amends.

When I buy clothes, I plan on wearing them in rotation for the rest of my life or they fall off me in threads, whichever comes later.  I’m sure this is particularly galling to Christina, a fashionista of the 9th degree, as it’s highly likely the clothes I’m buying now are already several years “out of style”.   I don’t enjoy clothes shopping.  I don’t have any hopes of impressing people with my wardrobe choices.  I only buy new clothes when absolutely necessary.  As a result, a not-insignificant portion of my clothes has been with me more than 1/2 my life.

The steady stream of clothing catalogs that started arriving in the mail about the time Christina and I moved in together should have been my first clue that things were going to be a bit different.  But hey, I spend money on games and movies, she can spend money on clothes… seems like a reasonable trade-off.  Each of us will spend money on things that can provide long-lasting value for our dollar.

Or so I thought.  As I “learned”, clothing is disposable.  Nothing wrong with wearing it once and out it goes.  This is particularly acute for special events and vacations.  “Every girl needs a new dress for a wedding… you can’t expect a girl to wear a dress she wore before”.  If you plan a vacation, she of course needs new clothes as the clothes she currently has are only for the 10 mile radius we reside in.  Apparently, there are whole store brands that are designed for cheap, throwaway-able clothes.  My sister Erin takes the idea to the highest level when it comes to shoes.  She is adamant that her shoes are clean or they get thrown away.  I don’t know about you but I have never been able to wear shoes without letting them touch the so-called dirty ground at least once.  Dirt on the shoes leads to shoes in the trash.  All of this is mind-boggling to me.

When I get an invite to a wedding, there is no doubt what I’m going to wear: my suit.  My only suit.  Vacation?  My shorts.  The same shorts I’ve own for years.  I don’t care if the left leg is ripped and falling off.  My shoes only get replaced when Christina complains that she can see my toes through them.

I’m not sure if this is a local thing or not but there are suddenly these clothing collection bins in every parking lot in Northern Virginia.  These are (I’m assuming) well-intentioned, charitable organizations that take this old clothing and does who knows what with it.  More power to them and I hope they do some good but I’m more impressed with their insight into this whole disposable clothing phenomena.

At least they get it… I’m still completely dumbfounded by the whole concept.

Luckily for me, my mother-in-law is a VIP in the hospital world so she let me know that it was actually swine flu I should be freaking out about.

This afternoon, I betrayed Subway and ran to Quiznos for lunch.   It wasn’t particularly busy with only a few customers.  Only 1 person fell into line after me.  Or rather, on me, as he seemed curiously interested in being right up on me.  Everytime I, nonchalantly, adjusted to put a few inches between us, he would edge closer again.  More than once, I felt he was about to wrap me in a big hug.  His weird activity didn’t halt there as he started whispering gibberish.  Since he was so close, it was as if he was blowing into my ear.  I’m sure it was amusing for anyone watching to see me slowly try to inch away, putting some separation between us, and then him adjusting to pull up close again, with the process than repeating itself all the way down the 15ft of the Quiznos line.  Definitely the most bizarre Quiznos experience I’ve ever had.

At least my sandwich was delicious.

On a side note, I’ve never quite understood the depths of laziness one must achieve to not be able to put a shopping cart in a cart rack or take it back to the store.  Maybe I’m just that much more conscientious than the next person — which I hope isn’t true — but I know I wouldn’t want to block a parking spot for someone or, worse, have my cart sail across the parking lot into someone’s car.

watching psych w/ christina

After starting twitter way back on Feb 8, 2007 with the profound tweet above*, giving it up for awhile, and then starting back up last May, I’ve more or less kept up regularly.

Besides trying to explain the point of it, the most popular discussion related to Twitter is if it would ever break out into the mainstream.  Slowly and steadily, it has slowly started to accumulate more and more non-tech-related celebrities, for better or worse.  John Cleese, M.C. Hammer, Dave Matthews, and Lance Armstrong  were some of the more tech-savvy celebs who were fairly early adopters of Twitter.

Recently, the biggest name to hop on the Twitter bandwagon is a celebrity most Americans have never heard of but is absolutely huge in the UK, Stephen Fry.  He quickly shot way up the charts and is, as I write this, #2 on the list of most popular Twitterers, passing many of the well-known tech alumni who have dominated the charts since it’s inception.

Other “pop-culture” celebs who are on Twitter include Britney Spears (or rather, her PR person), trucker cap Ashtun Kushter, trucker hat lover Demi Moore, Harry Potter girl Emma Watson, the surprisingly NOT hot Mischa Barton, High School musical girl Vanessa Hudgens, the Guber-nator, and the Guber-nator’s wife.  I don’t see the point of following any of the above but other people will.  The draw of Twitter is increased exponentially the more people there are on there to follow so despite my misgivings of the pop-culturalization of Twitter, I suppose it’s better for all in the long run.

• Famous Twitterers - http://mashable.com/2008/10/20/25-celebrity-twitter-users/
• Celebrity Twitterers - http://allieiswired.com/archives/2009/01/celebrities-who-twitter/
• Top Twitters - http://twitterholic.com/

* For what it’s worth, Christina and I are still watching Psych and it’s a must watch.  Great show!

No, Christina, I don’t care who <insert random athlete here> is engaged to.  But you don’t care about that amazing play he made last week either so why don’t we agree not to discuss either one?  

– if only it was that easy…

One of the areas where we have been able to come to some sort of agreement is on our regular board game nights.   I feel board games are usually more suited toward guys who appreciate “defeating” his opponent in a match of sorts but the games we tend to settle on are more crowd-pleasing, party-oriented games than the ones I would have otherwise chosen.   I think this perpetual effort to get girls involved in board games, and thus something guys will enjoy as well, is what led to the creation of Battle of the Sexes.

If the goal of any game was to put guys “in their place” and pump up girls interest in gaming, this was the game.  Battle of the Sexes is the most ridiculously unbalanced game I’ve ever come across.   The nature of the game is simply that guys must answer questions about “girlie” things while girls answer questions about “guy” things.  However the disparity between the difficulty and details of the questions is absurd.  Guys simply do not stand a chance but if they’re looking for something to play that will make their significant other feel better, this is the game.

“What player would be the most annoyed on Valentines Day?”

Game night with my friends led to the above question during a round of Imaginiff.  We’ve been trying to have a regular get-together and it usually revolves around some combination of Cranium, Taboo, and what other board games we can come up.  In Imaginiff, each player picks the player they think the question most corresponds to and if you have the same answer as the majority, you score a point.  4 “Shawns” and 3 “Christinas” later, the above question illustrated the commonly held belief that I’m not a romantic.

I made a comment to Christina that despite what everyone thinks, I am certainly one of the more considerate “significant others” out there.  She didn’t disagree but made the comment that I’m probably the least romantic person — not she has a problem with that — and am not one to, for example, give flowers unsolicited.  I reminded her that I had done that at least once but I just didn’t want to spoil her.  :)

I continued that I just don’t want to give a gift without a reason.  Christina pointedly told me that being romantic means doing EXACTLY THAT: Giving gifts for no reason.  To which I responded: Doing things without reason leads to anarchy.  

Oh, and I won the game of Imagiff.

Halloween is the one night a year when girls can dress like a total slut…

– Cady, Mean Girls

It seems to me that Halloween is less and less a holiday for kids.  While I personally am not the biggest fan of dressing up (probably due to my lack of creativity) it seems that Halloween parties for adults is a growing trend.  A trip to one of those temporary Halloween stores in the mall a few weeks ago seemed to reaffirm my impression.  A good 75% of the store was devoted to costumes for adults, with the vast majority of those being for girls looking to “slut” it up.  Not that I’m complaining…