Fillet of Soul

Wow, unexpectedly cool weekend -- my thesis is, for all intents and purposes, finished. There are a few sections that may require tightening, extending, etc., but it's in a form that I feel ok handing out to my committee members for approval. Which is pretty much what finished means -- whatever suggestions they have will bring changes anyway, and it's certainly easier thorwing in new bits that they want than it is trying to second guess them. So, it's finished. Bring it on, eggheads!

And I found a Japanese restaurant that serves tuna onigiri, just like they make 'em in convenience stores in Takamatsu. Mmmmm -- tuna, rice, and seaweed. After completing the thesis, I guess simple pleasures sort of blow themselves out of proportion.

And today was the opener of the baseball season, as two teams I could care less about (Anaheim and Texas) battled before me as I scarfed down a spinach and artichoke calzone and a pint of Red Hook ESB at Old Chicago. And, eventually (a very applicable word in baseball), Texas, a team that sucks, trounced Anaheim, a team that won the World Series last year. When the Cardinals open their own season tomorrow afternoon, I'll start caring.

And I satisfied my curiosity about the Church of the Subgenious, an organization I'd heard something about over the years, had seen their half-sinister, half-ridiculous insignia (a fifties-era smiling male head smoking a pipe) here and there, and thought they might be interesting to investigate. I'd gotten the impression that they were an absurdist pseudo-religion pandering to those too intelligent for low-brow religious convention, and too hip to be Unitarians. I was wrong. What I saw was a George Carlin rant minus the humor, philosophizing endlessly, in much the same vein as those crazy Christian freaks that shout at students on university campuses until they find someone who'll shout back at them. Except the Subgenius guys didn't invite debate. Actually, they just didn't make any sense and said "bullshit" a lot. Being absurdist and low-brow is not endearing.

And got a call from Heather this evening, which is always good. Except when she's trying to convince me that the car I felt very clever for buying (a VW Jetta), what that's it's a VW and so well built and reliable and all, is a piece of crap and is just waiting to fall to pieces at any moment. She's got one (a model 2 years older, natch!), and it's the bane of her existence. Obviously, she did something very wrong to make it rebel as it has. I treat mine like a son. It's my Metro that I treat like crap, and it still loves me. Go get one o' those, I say.