Actually Useful Research from Academia

Current drug laws are 'arbitrary' in nature and the typically condoned vices of alcohol and tobacco are among the most harmful. I kind of knew this already, but I found it especially jarring to read that tobacco is responsible for 40% of hospital visits and alcohol is responsible for almost half of emergency room visits. Meanwhile, acid and E users just stare up at the pretty colors...

Cough abatement is a lousy hobby

I've come down with a nasty cough that I can't seem to shake. Although I recently finally managed to get my circadian rhythm aligned in a somewhat normal fashion (even despite the daylight savings switch), it's been ruined by a couple of awful nights tossing and turning in bed and coughing. The only thing that seems to quell the coughing is going to sleep with a Halls in my mouth. However, Halls are full of sugar, and I can feel them corroding my teeth, and thus it's not something I want in bed all night. Further, I'm paranoid that I'm going to choke on one as if I'm fortunate enough fall asleep. I've also tried the sugar-free Ricola, but they have no real "bite" as medicine. I wasn't planning on being sick for a while, but I might have to become a connoisseur of the cough-losenge inudstry in the near future. I'm looking for something uber-potent, yet sugar free...

In the last four hours I've chugged half a bottle of Robitussin and Robitussin Nighttime respectively (which would make for an entire bottle in total), in addition to four DayQuils and Four NyQuils (on opposite poles of the four hours of course), yet I'm still coughing. This cough is annoying enough that I''m resolving to become Howard Hughes-esque in my germ prevention in the near future, so I don't get sick ever again. On the bright side, I just began to feel a nice high from the cough syrup....

Hmmmm

Had a fun night watching NCAA tournament games with a couple friends. Amid the chit-chat, I started to gripe that China got the 2008 Olympics, despite its record of human rights abuses, and general awfulness. My friend responded "yeah, I guess you're right, but as an American, I really feel hypocritical calling anybody out on moral issues, given the things we're doing all over the world right now." It's a shame, but he has a point....

Worse than having your fly open in public, but less conspicious

So, I was walking home today, and noticed what felt like my sock becoming "extra raggedy." I look down to investigate, and I notice a pair of boxer shorts in the pant leg. Apparently, after I took my jeans out, I managed to put them on without noticing my boxer shorts becoming wedged against my sock and leg. I guess this happened with stuff mixing up with static electricity in my laundry hamper, and persisted because I have horrible sensory abilities and don't notice these things until it's too late. While this incident was funny and innocuous, I do worry that these sorts of faux pas might occur in a more sensitive/problematic scenario some day.

Is Stupid Advertising False Advertising?

The latest Gatorade commercial tries to entrench the profoundly embedded history of the product in athletic culture. It emphasizes that the product was synthesized because the Florida Gators' performance was suffering because they were dehydrated in the Florida heat. While that is true, aren't the teams that were beating Florida at the time playing under those conditions as well? It's not as if they got to play in a climate-controlled dome while the Florida players wilted...

Adventures in Market Signaling

Over the weekend, it appears that I may have managed to impress a pretty non-sociologist love interest. Of course, this was the result of a fun, platonic acquaintanceship we've had for a few months. While on the surface, this seems to be serendipitous and fantastic, there's a small problem. Her ex-boyfriend is a total scumbag who is reviled by pretty much all of the women in my department for his lecherous chauvinism. He's the type of guy who women with low self-esteem and/or mental issues gravitate towards (incidentally, he had a one-night-stand a couple years ago with the aforementioned stupid cunt). I was always puzzled in regards to why this really cool chick would be attracted to and want to invest in someone so shady. In turn, I have a hunch that her recent interest in me was propagated by the demise of their relationship.

Given the inbreeding in social circles, and that she was so recently linked with the "scumbag" recently, my worries about STD's and just the notion that this woman's decisions may be indicative to qualities "beneath the surface" that I should be very wary of, this unfortunately isn't something I think I can pursue.

On the other hand, I am reminded of Jerry's diatribe on the Seinfeld episode that spoofed their negotiations with NBC, where George's crazy ego compelled him to decline an offer that he should have eagerly and gratefully accepted (and I'm paraphrasing of course), "We have nothing and no other offers! You're insane not to take this deal!"

The Axis of Evil

Israel and Iran edged out the United States for the ignominious distinction of being the country with the largest perception of "negative influence" in the world. However, even North Korea doesn't have as bad as a perception (or at least the degree of belief in "negative influence" as the Yankees do right now.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6421597.stm?ls

This administration is so bad it continues to astound me repeatedly, even when I think I've become numb to its evil incompetence. I hope Bush Jr. and his legacy are vilified a million times worse than the benign Jimmy Carter's.

The Last Great Music Video

Thinking about how ancient I've suddenly become, I was wondering why I don't get into more new music these days. I don't have a radio, and since there aren't videos on MTV anymore, it's really tricky for me to be exposed to new bands now. I do attend a bar where the uber-hip DJ plays what sounds like modern indie rock, which I always enjoy, but never know the artists, albums or songs being played. I guess I haven't plugged into the MySpace networks that I presume most fringe artists use to promote and diffuse their work now.

I was thinking that the last "new" band that I got exposed to and enjoyed was Queens of the Stone Age. While their Songs for the Deaf album was hugely overhyped, it did produce what I think was the last great high budget music video entitled "Go with the Flow." With an awesome, rockin' song and psychadelic vivid, burning colors, this video oozes sex, drugs and rock and roll like few artistic works ever have.

Patience Monty, Climb the ladder...

I'm slightly stuck with my dissertation right now. I'm not hugely concerned at this point, since this was the first day that I realized I was stuck. I suppose a logical antidote might be to talk to one's advisor, but my current stalemate is largely due to an excellent two hour session with the advisor, where I as presented with difficult, but pressing questions I need to resolve before progerssing further. However, I'm keen to get to work and start knocking stuff off, yet my brain has yet to provide clear answers or plans of action in regards to how to deal with the stalemate.

Perhaps I should just start drinking at 10AM tomorrow and write Friday off, and let my subconscious sort things out?

Satisficing for Success

Today, I had the rare fortunate break of running into an attractive (presumably single) woman that I met at a party last weekend. On the campus of a large research university, the opportunity to have iterated social encounters with anyone outside of your department and still on the "acquaintance" level is really difficult. Grateful for the opportunity, I of course tried my hardest to convey my personality and friendliness as best I could. Of course, I probably was trying a bit too hard, as I began to stutter as my mind worked feverishly to improve every thought I was expressing, trying to make it funnier, more vivid, more creative and so forth. All of the quality control on the fly ended up harming, as opposed to helping things. On the bright side, there was a subtle market signal that the woman might be a head-case, so perhaps screwing up isn't the end of the world with this one.

The moral of the story seems to be that if you really want something, you have to convince yourself that you don't really want it so you can act accordingly. Unfortunately, the emotions of humans tend to be imperfectly and partially controlled by the rational mind. So, you get stuck with feelings and dispositions you don't really want...

You don't need rock & roll to 'rock'

I went to a violin concert the other day by some virtuouso (my friend is a classical musician, so she told me how incredible the opportunity to watch this person play, so I took her word for it), and was totally blown away. First, I kind of giggled at the notion that someone as uncultured as me (I think the Pixies were the highest-brow band I ever listened to) partaking in classical music, but as it turns out, the concert involved all of the intensity and passion of any rock concert, with even more astounding virtuosity that even the likes of Eddie Van Halen brought to the masses. The performance was absolutely vicious with her violin, yet the sounds were mellifluous and flowing. As my friend mentioned during the encore "it's so ironic that something that sounds so cheerful and fast is so painfully difficult to play." Now, apparently she's making me a CD to explore if this classical music thing is something I'll really get hooked on. I'm horribly unhip and have stopped listening to music in the early 21st Century, so perhaps I need to look back a couple of centuries to get some fresh melodies flowing in my head....

The Golden Age is Over

As a devoted youtube user, I've noticed that many of my favorite clips (mostly bootlegs of rock bands that I enjoy) are no longer available. The same goes for the much beloved cache of Beavis and Butthead episodes that were wonderful diversions in the middle of otherwise productive days for myself and colleagues alike (MTV manages to retroactively suck by taking out B & B and music/concert programming from when it was actually occasionally good). In a huge oversimplification, I will simply state that the profit motive managed to appropriate this wonderful public resource, and now via Google video, I now have to purchase those formerly free episodes for $1.99 (my beloved clip of the Pixies appearance on 120 Minutes has yet to be catalogued and priced, I suppose).

Anyhow, this is all turning out like Napster did. There was this golden age where you could find just about anything and everything your heart desired, no matter how obscure. Alas, I guess one does not get money for nothing and clips for free in the 2000's. *sigh*

As a consolation, enjoy this fantastic R.E.M. performance on Letterman in the early 1980's that CBS hasn't gotten its grubby hands on yet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KA57Pafq_NU

Going 'Deflem' on Fuchs-Epstein

Sociologists embarrass me sometimes. I just received a pretentious letter from past ASA president Cynthia Fuchs-Epstein personally inviting me to spend more than a quarter of my yearly stipend for what appears to be an utterly pointless and self-congratulatory quasi-"public sociology" endeavor to India in the middle of the upcoming November.

This wouldn't be so irksome if the form letter wasn't littered with bullshit intended to make the recipient feel special. The letter writes "Invitations for this project are being sent only to select members of the American Sociological Association" and "I believe you would contribute valued expertise to the mission[.]" Considering I've never met Ms. Fuchs-Epstein in my life, and I have nary a publication in my young career for her to know me from (further, little does she know that I have no "expertise"), this strikes me as a bit insincere. Somehow I think having a pulse and/or being on the ASA mailing list were the lofty benchmarks chosen to help select the fortunate "chosen invites." The "Immediate Past President" may be mad with power and going wild with the ASA mailing list.

Better yet, the letter promises forthcoming missives with additional sign-up information (does signing up for ASA membership entitle you to this kind of wonderful unsolicited sociological junkmail? I'm so glad I checked whatever the relevant box was that ensured I received stuff like this). Needless to say, I'm going to save the 39 cents on the stamp to mail my RSVP that I will regretfully decline participation on this trip.

However, if I had $4995.00 plus bus fare to Newark, NJ, I'd be much more inclined to donate that money directly to the many poor people in India than use it to help bad sociology diffuse between the upper-middle-classes in both societies.

AutoComplete is Evil

Internet Explorer has a well-meaning feature called Auto-Complete that summons similar words and phrases you've recently typed, with the idea that it might save you a few seconds of time by letting you scroll down, hit return and get the entire phrase. However, it has the unintended consequence of immortalizing things you've typed that you'd rather not see again, and I'm not just talking about the time that I accidentally typed in an incorrect email address, which then became my "default" every time I typed in the first few letters of my login. I'm not even thinking of the time that I saw "Anna Nicole Smith naked" on my Uncle's laptop when I was visiting last year and Googling something starting with 'A.'

Today, as I was googling something starting with 's' on one of the communal grad student computers today, AutoCorrect brought up the usual suspects (and I'm paraphrasing here), and then something scandalous and/or disconcerting.

sociology survey research
sociology survey gender research
sociology survey campus attitudes
std test

After cringing and feeling a bit uncomfortable to have seen that, I couldn't resist speculating as to who would be googling 'std test' in my department. Based on the other terms on the AutoCorrect (which certainly could have been written by anyone, although I think the AutoCorrect on those computers gets cleared regularly), I'm pretty sure that it's one of the female "gender conformists" in my department (well, a specific one of them). I'm no expert when it comes to people, love or relationships, but I have a hunch that if you aren't responsible enough to do "better than frat boy" with casual intimate relationships (or at least invest a few bucks in some Trojans), you're also prone to be googling 'std test' on public computers. I hope it was an "innocuous googling", and I can't be totally sure the person I think queried it is who I think it is. Regardless, I didn't think graduate students were the type of people that have to learn with backwards induction based on experience with these types of things...

No, I'm not dead...

....I've just lived an especially boring life lately. I'll be chock-full of scintillating content soon. Until then, visit Jeremy's blog for scandalous blog content.