Notes from Lexington, MA

I'm back in Mass, y'all. I returned to the east coast on Wednesday night. Pretty uneventful travelling, which was just fine for me. Yesterday, I spent most of the day in the hospital, waiting for my sister to get out of surgery. She had a bike accident last week and broke her collarbone. That's the "clavicle" to you, Neil. God, I hate you!!!!!.............can we still go bowling?

Anyway, yeah fell off her bike while biking home from her company's Christmas party. She's a bike messenger in Philadelphia, and the company had the party at a bar, free drinks for all. You wouldn't think that biking after drinking would be dangerous, but then again, you would. It's surprising we don't hear more "Don't drink and bike" ads. So yeah, she doesn't remember falling off, since she got knocked out, and apparently someone found her and called 911 and even put her bike in the ambulance with her. But Kate has no idea who it was. Somewhere out there is one wicked awesome person.

Anyway, she was in surgery and me and my mom stayed there most of the day. It's amazing how much coffee you can drink if there's very little else to do. By the end, I was ready to go in there and perform the surgery myself. I mean, how hard could repairing a fractured clavicle be, anyway? Luckily, at that point we were told we could go up to see her in her room. I was fine in the waiting room, but for some reason I just get kind of weirded out in hospitals. I sort of started feeling lightheaded, but I was ok. After a while, we left and got Chinese food and watched "Napoleon Dynamite". I have now officially introduced my parents to it. I have done my good deed for the day.

And today is Christmas eve. And I wrapped my presents and put them under the tree. You know, when you put them all together like that, they really don't seem very significant, like they don't properly symbolize the blood, sweat, and tears that went into thinking of and getting them. But that's not really the reason for the season is it? No, no it's not. And before I get too sappy, I'll stop.

What does Google (TM) think of YOU?

I stumbled across Googlism, which allows you to look yourself (or anyone else) up, except not in the typical way that you would Google someone. You enter a name and it spits out what it thinks it knows about you. For example:

neil gray is a business consultant with over 15 years of experience in banking and financial institutions
neil gray is responsible for the order cycle messages
neil gray is standing

Amazing. Somehow, Google knows that Neil Gray is standing. It's an incredible world we live in.

And the top three searches? "Bill Gates," "George Bush," and "sex." In that order. I've gotta share some of the George Bush ones with you. They're just too good:

george bush is a monkey
george bush is an american
george bush is a coward
george bush is demanding to be heard
george bush is torn about tax
george bush is clearly not up to the job
george bush is pretty
george bush is not a christian

And my favorite:

george bush is pregnant erratic policy behavior result of massive hormone surge washington

This is the best thing EVER.

Ok, I need to show some of the sex ones too.

sex is dead
sex is your brain?
sex is worth the wait
sex is positive
sex is better than religion
sex is here to stay
sex is popular
sex is poetry
sex is cool
sex is great too
sex is a brain thing
sex is your guinea pig?

Unfortunately, when I enter my name, it says that Google does not know enough about Aaron Bonner-Jackson yet. And in a way, I hope it stays that way.
http://www.googlism.com/who_is/

Crumbs off the floor of life, man

Hey, it's finals time. Not that I really have any, but I've had stuff to do. So I submit to you stuff that's been rolling around in my head without a real central theme:

-Pedro. I feel as though I should be sad or crushed that he's leaving Boston, but since he's going to the Mets, all I can really feel is pity. Sorry Petey, sad to see you go. Maybe I'll catch you and Nomah when you guys come to town to play the Cardinals. Plus, all the new guys make me feel tingly in my special spot.

-Scruff (Melissa) has a blog. She did this quietly, and didn't tell anyone. Or at least she didn't tell me. But I found it! Apparently, Noah threw up next to her car the other night. Once again I ask: Noah, why don't you have a blog, so you could describe the event too??

-Someone interviewing for a junior faculty position in the psych department recently looked a hell of a lot like Neil Gray, except it was Neil with the pony tail and glasses. So I ask you: Neil Gray, did you interview for a position in the Wash U psych department recently? If so, did you happen to grow back the circa-1997 ponytail?

-I REALLY enjoy internet whiffle ball these days. So...am I some sort of freako? I think I'm just in dire need of another video game system in my life. This is the first time in a while when I haven't had access to one, even if it wasn't mine. I did ok for a while, but it's finally catching up with me. I've dropped some unsubtle hints to Kia. Let's see if they pay off...

The ABJ effect

Sitting here, working on a grant for class (a grant is not fun, BTW, especially when you don't actually get money from it), I decided that I want to have an effect named after me. The Stroop Effect. The Doppler Effect. The Butterfly Effect. These are all good effects, except for that last one. Any effect starring Ashton Kutcher is no effect for me. But I just thought it would be cool if, one day far in the future, something were to happen, and someone would say, "Hey, that's the Bonner-Jackson effect." Now just what that would be, I don't know. I suppose I have to discover something. Maybe it could be the effect of smooth jazz on the sleeping patterns of college sophomores.

How does it feeeeeel? To be on your own, with no direction home....

Rolling Stone called "Like a Rolling Stone" the best rock song ever written, although it was apparently almost not released. At number 2, they put "Satisfaction," by the Rolling Stones. Are we seeing a pattern here? Anyway, interesting story:

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/03/opinion/03considine.html