Notes to Myself

Good news first, is that on my first test on Bureaucracy I got a 93. I dropped some points because I didn't feel the need to include an example of administrative tunnel vision, but naturally I won't do that again. The example he was looking for was the FHA's tunnel vision on foreclosure rates, and how that contributed to suburban expansion and may have even exacerbated the racial divide. Fair enough - this teacher gets examples, even if he doesn't ask for them.

Haven't got the results of my American Policymaking test back yet, but it was pretty straight- forward and I'm pretty unconcerned about it. It was multiple-choice, which means two things: it caters to the lowest form of knowledge (recognition), and the speed with which you can complete one generally drives the absolute number of questions up, which of course drives the cost of making a mistake down. I'm sure I did well.

Energy and the Environment test is today, in about an hour. I'm totally unconcerned about this one too, because it's really a 10th grade physics class masquerading as a college course. No sweat. I might even enjoy it.

One of these days I'm going to take some pictures of this place, so I can do a photoblog about a typical Friday up here. The same eight anti-war protesters occupy the same bus stop with the same signs every Friday as I ride downtown to work. I usually wave because we're all regulars here, might just as well be friendly. At least they're a quiet bunch, no annoying chants or anything. There's not enough of them for that.

I'll be heading back to Madison this weekend to get winter stuff, because it looks to be coming in fast up here. Maybe I'll get some antennae for my TV so I can watch the news, if they're still there.

I also hope to have a pretty decent review of the last presidential debate, or at least one important and revealing exchange, up within a day or so. I realize that the economy is in full panic mode, but that doesn't change that there are other important things out there. I fully agree with Politico that it was an awful, horrendously uninspiring debate on both sides when neither candidate has any excuse for being uninspiring. We're making history on all fronts right now, and both men came across as canned. But canned in a way that's been left out overnight so that there's not even fizz; just the lukewarm vanilla flavor of day-old root beer and shame.

There's no energy in either of these guys. One wonders if over a year of campaigning hasn't taken the fire out of them. First guy to get a second wind earns himself a point swing, how does that sound for incentive?