It's sad that this is what it takes to break 6 months of Livejournal silence, but then again, this may be the funniest thing I've seen on the internet in 6 months.

How to pose

omg! Laura and I just saw Evil Dead: The Musical!!!

I went to the beach this last weekend to go surfing and on the way picked up my sister in Baltimore. The trip out was normal enough, but on the way back, we got a taste of why the city has such a bad reputation. When we pulled up to Kat's apartment building (the entrance to which is in a dark alley full of dumpsters and graffiti), there were two bums waiting for us. So I stayed with the car while the girls carried in Kat's stuff. Eventually a couple of other people came by and were talking outside the entrance. I guess the alleyway got too crowded for the bums because they left and walked down an even narrower, darker alley.

Then, as we were driving away, we were passed by a gang on dirt bikes and four-wheelers. There were about 12 of them and they all ran the red light we were stopped at while revving their engines and popping wheelies (one guy popped a wheelie in his 4-wheeler!) Then for a while we were behind a car that had a piece of cardboard bolted on instead of a license plate. The cardboard said, "Tag stolen! Temp number is: ..." Also, the whole time we're driving around, we are noticing these flashing blue lights at the top of telephone poles on pretty much every block. The poles have a police emblem on them and say "BELIEVE". Turns out these are surveillance cameras. Awesome.

Two nights, two Spoons. Perhaps just a happy coincidence, we like to think of this weekend as the cosmos aligning to apologize for all the times the bus was leaving just as we approached the stop. First Spoon played a great set at the Cut as part of Carnival. But we prefered the more intimate setting of Ruy's basement, where Spoons and company played a rockin' set as No One Has To Know. Some had alternate personas, like Jane (aka Heather), spikey haired Chris, and shady Spoons. Others, like Jason and Frank, were their typically awesome selves. The band played two 30 minute sets of 80s favorites and n1h2k originals. The standout was definitely their unique take on Mad World. But the whole collection was impressive, including Riding on the Metro, and a movingly dedicated There Is A Light. The band is on tour for one month only, so your first chance to see them may be your last. Don't pass it up!

--Stephen and Laura

Okay, so I've been back from England for a whole semester now, you'd think my first post in all that time would be about something else. But this article in the Telegraph was just too funny not to post.

Okay, besides the exchange rate... they have a picture of Charles Darwin on the 10 pound note. How cool is that? And we can't even agree on whether Darwin was right!

There is no reason for buses to be in the city centre in Cambridge. The diameter of the "centre" area is only 1.5 miles at its widest point. Do you really need a bus to carry you 1.5 miles? You can walk that in 30 minutes. I can't imagine the bus ride is much shorter. And pretty much everyone cycles anyway. A used bike costs 20 pounds. That's the same as a handful of rides on the bus. My proposal is that the buses go only to the surrounding villages and circle around Ring Road, but never go inside. I can't imagine this would really inconvenience anyone. The people who work downtown and don't bike can take the bus to the closest point on Ring Road and then walk the 10 minutes to their destination.

I saw two cows in the road on my way to work yesterday. One was blocking the road and one was chewing grass on the side. Neither cow seemed very interested in moving.

Cambridge is a bike city, there are bikes everywhere and there are people walking everywhere and as I was speeding down this cobblestone street with people all around me going every which way I couldn't help but think, "This is crazy! What am I doing? I haven't ridden a bike in 10 years. I'm a danger to myself and others." But yet, so far so good.

Cambridge has many, many green spaces. Most of the city is green. Just look at the satellite map. This is awesome and I can't wait to go running around here. There are parks everywhere and then you run for like two miles and you're out in the countryside.

Cambridge has drunk dicks who piss themselves. I know this because I saw someone piss themself and then I saw someone call that person a dick.

Cambridge has little kids who wear giant soccer-style goalie gloves and come up to you on the sidewalk and push on you and say "stop" and then ask where you're going and you say "that way" and then they say, "what's there" and you say, "home" and they say "okay, go ahead" and then you say "bye" and the whole thing is incredibly cute.

I finally found a place to stay for the summer in Cambridge. Since Sunday night I have been staying in Bed and Breakfasts. That adds up quickly. 30 the first night 45 the second and 30 tonight. Plus I had the added hastle of moving my bags around. But starting tomorrow night I will be staying with two Spanish girls in a house here. It's close to the city centre (British spelling!) and also close to Mill Street, which is, according to Byron, "the closest thing to a 'hip' area in Cambridge." But it's far enough from Mill street that it doesn't get the noise. It's actually on a very quiet street. And there is a nice little garden out back where I can park my bike and a bike path leading almost straight to work that passes through the city centre and a park and passes some of the colleges. It should be a nice commute.

I'm currently watching BRAzil versus CROatia in the World Cup, which is much more interesting than listening to the radio broadcast of BRAzil versus CROatia in the World Cup, which is what I was doing while eating dinner. Soccer announcing is very difficult since not much really happens. They basically turn up the audience volume and count on the cheering of the fans to get everyone interested. Other than that it's a lot of "so-and-so has the ball" and "so-and-so coming up the far side" and so forth. At least in football you can keep track of their progress down the field. But then the entertainment value of a radio broadcast shouldn't be the determining factor in how a sport is judged. But really, soccer is very boring.

It all started on Wednesday at 1:00, when my 6:30 flight to Newark was canceled. I immediately called the airline, Continental, to switch my ticket. They said it was a Virgin ticket and they would have to switch it. Call Virgin and they say Continental has to make the change. One more call to Continental, one more call to Virgin. I get a little short with the Virgin rep and demand her supervisor, who explains that what I really need to do is call Orbitz. Call Orbitz who then calls Continental and Virgin then tells me I should go to the airport and talk to one of the agents there. I say there's no way I'm dragging my bags all the way to the airport just to get the runaround in person. They call Virgin again and after over an hour of them arguing with Virgin, they finally get them to change the ticket. I thank the Orbitz rep for being the most tenacious person ever and go to sleep thinking I will leave the next day.

The next day my flight is delayed. Just a little, then a little more, then I've missed my connection, then the plane finally gets there but it has a mechanical problem, so then the flight maybe isn't even going out at all. I leave the airport at 10:30 after having been there for 6 hours. The flight does eventually leave and gets into Newark at 1:30 (versus the planned arrival time of 8:00).

The next day they have put me on a US Air flight because at this point Continental has a huge backlog of people needing to get to Newark and they have realized they suck. The US Air flight is oversold and since I was put there by another airline and they didn't even have me in the system anyway for some reason, I get bumped. They put me on a later flight, which has already been delayed even though it doesn't leave for 3 hours. But it will still get me there in time for my connection. Except then they cancel it. So now I'm fucked. There are no more flight to Newark that will get me there in time. Plus now Continental and US Air can't agree on who is responsible for re-booking my ticket. So after a few trips to the US Air gate agent, a trip to the Continental gate agent, and a trip back out to ticketing because the Continental gate agent was an idiot, I finally found a way to get to Newark that night and got my international ticket delayed yet another day.

I got to Newark by flying US Air to La Guardia and then taking a cab to Newark (US Air paid for the cab). Ryan happened to be driving up to NJ that night (he actually made better time than me) and so the next day we went to the beach. After some body surfing and fresh seafood I went back to the airport (I have spent over 16 hours in airports at this point). The Virgin Atlantic flight to the UK actually boards and, well, okay so it's delayed an hour, but at least it takes off!

And now: yay, I'm in England!