The PLOG... All the Muck that's fit to Rake

KILL TO GET CRIMSON

2007-08-22T18:48:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "What can a man do when the blues keep followin him around?
Get him a half pint of good liquor and sit there and drink it down. The way I feel sometimes, well, i feel like drinkin gasoline, strikin a match and blow my fool self up in steam." Buddy Guy-"A Man And The Blues"
Current Music: Buddy Guy

I've been feeling blue lately, but I was sittin here with Buddy today and I got some great news... Mark Knopfler is releasing a new solo record next month, "Kill To Get Crimson." Worldwide tour to follow! Check out the youtube posting of the first single... Why and how it got on there, I don't know, but it is definately Mark.

In other music news, Robert Plant (Led-Zeppelin) and Alison Krauss (Union Station) are releasing a record in October... Couldn't say I saw that coming, but not terribly shocked. Record is titled "Raising Sand."

I am now a Simpson cartoon, complete with "V" for Villanova hat, Harmonica, Avett Brothers T-Shirt, Banjo, and Sweet Nike Airs.

Welp, summertime is just about over. Time flies in Annapolis with no-name girls who walk in jelly shoes.

The Dude Abides.

PLMB,
PAV

"DAMN RIGHT I'VE GOT THE BLUES"

2007-08-09T21:50:00.000-05:00

Quote Of the Moment: "Something there is about you that moves with style and grace, I was in a whirlwind, now I'm in some better place. My hand's on the sabre and you've picked up the baton. Somethin' there is about you that I can't quite put my finger on." (Dylan "Something There is About You)
Current Music: Dylan "Planet Waves"

I have forgotten how great this album is. There isn't one single huge hit on it, but as an album it coheres as well as any out there. The music and the lyrics seem to compliment each other better than any other Dylan album, perhaps... at least to my liking.

I have been extremely busy for the last week or so. Last week I was on family vacation in North Carolina until I left on Friday to drive 500 miles to North Jersey. Saturday I went to the wedding of Ian, one of my good friends. It was great to see him so happy. A real celebration.

Friday night we drove back down to Annapolis, and Sunday was the Chesapeake Bay Blues Festival. Though the festival has had problems with raising money, and hasn't been quite an annual event, it has been a perennial delight of my summers going back to high school. It goes on at Sandy Point State park, about 3 miles from my house, on the Chesapeake Bay, right under the bay bridge. I can still remember quite vividly my first time at the festival in 2001. I was a sophomore in high school, and I volunteered with the Special Olympics to get in. I sold hotdogs at a stand all day until they cut me loose to walk up as close to the stage as I could get. I saw the legend, Bo Diddley play for about 30 minutes before they called him off because of all the May rain.

After a good long intermission, George Thorogood and the Delaware Destroyers came on state in front of a largely diminished crowd. The rain didn't stop. The performance was outstanding, and I for the first time experienced the real power of good, live, driving blues. I remember standing soaked in the cold May rain on this Sunday night (a school night) as George blasted into a blues standard first recorded by Elmore James--"The Sky is Crying:"

The sky is crying,
Look at the tears roll down the street,
The sky is crying,
Look at the tears roll down the street,
I've been looking for my baby,
And I'm wonderin where can she be.

From that moment I've been hooked on the blues. George played a good long set, left, and came back for an encore. He just didn't stop. Actually, until they pulled the cord on him. Literally. Some point long after he was supposed to stop they turned the power off on him and he had to leave, mid song. Fantastic. Since then I've been back every chance I can get, and have seen Jimmy Thackery, Tab Benoit, Booker T and the MGs, James Cotton, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Pinetop Perkins, Dr. John, Mavis Staples, Canned Heat, Delbert McClinton, Bob Margolin, Lil Ed and the Blues Imperials, Double Trouble... and many others.

This year we saw Three Dog Night, Robert Randolph, Magic Dick, Deanna Bogart, Tommy Castro, and Buddy Guy. Now, Buddy Guy, to me, is the essence of the blues. He's one of the last great originators of the electric Blues left. With Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Stevie Ray Vaughan, and John Lee Hooker gone, I see it as B.B. King and Buddy Guy as the last Greats. And I prefer Buddy to B.B. Unfortunately, we again got blasted with rain a little while into Buddy's set. It was still a lot of fun.

A lot of people dont get the blues, but I dont think the recognize its importance as a part of American culture. Without the blues and it's white cousin and the roots of country, we've got nothing else in the way of musical heritage. Cats like Dylan, Jimmy Page, Brian Jones, Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Mick Jagger, John Lennon and Van Morrison (to name just a few) owe their careers to it. We owe it to ourselves to keep the blues alive.

Its like why we go to the beach, out to where THE PAVEMENT TURNS TO SAND. Back to nature. The blues is nature's music.

Fortunately, We've got dudes like this who probably won't give up the blues without a fight. Besides, with that Stevie Ray Vaughan tattoo taking up half his back, he's got an invested interest.

plmb,
Pav

LOVE and HATE

2007-07-26T21:20:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: The quality of mercy is not strained.
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.
Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown.
His scepter shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings.
But mercy is above this sceptered sway;
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings;
It is an attribute of God himself;
And earthly power doth then show like God's
When mercy seasons justice.
-Portia from The Merchant Of Venice William Shakespeare
Current Music: Bob Dylan "Time Out of Mind" (Officially "The Most PLOGged To Record of all Time")

Shakespeare aside, let's talk about the Avett Brothers... Specifically Seth Avett's song "The Ballad of Love and Hate" from their latest record, Emotionalism.

The song is a simple, solo acoustic guitar ballad (story told in song) which alternates from verse to verse in dramatic fashion between two personified emotions: the female, Love, and the male, Hate, who are apparently in some sort of serious romantic relationship (they're living together).

The debate on this song started as my Dad and I think this song to be one of hope, where, despite Hate's unfaithfulness and faults, Hate eventually returns and Love conquers all. Mom and others, however, come down harder on Hate, thinking Hate comes home too late, too drunk, too untrustworthy, and not really sorry.

The song opens with love on vacation, writing a letter to her lover:

Love writes a letter and sends it to hate.
“My vacations ending I’m coming home late.”
“The weather was fine and the ocean was great.”
“And I can’t wait to see you again.”

Immediately you get the feeling that there is distance... Now, Hate:

Hate reads the letter and throws it away.
“No one here cares if you go or you stay.”
“I barely even noticed that you were away.”
“I’ll see you or I won’t, whatever.”

Uh, Oh! That's cold, Mr. Hate. Lets see what happens next...

Love sings a song as she sails through the sky.
The water looks bluer through her pretty eyes.
And everyone knows it whenever she flies.
And also when she comes down.

Love's coming back, the perceived distance between them is getting smaller in the mind of the listener.

Hate keeps his head up and walks through the street.
Every stranger and drifter he greets.
And shakes hands with every loner he meets
with a serious look on his face.

Love arrives safely with suitcase in toe.
Carrying with her the good things we know.
A reason to live and a reason to grow
To trust, to hold, to care

Hate sits alone on the hood of his car
without much regard to the moon or the stars.
Lazily killing the last of a jar
of the strongest stuff you can drink.

Love takes a taxi, a young man drives
As soon he sees her hope fills his eyes.
But tears follow after at the end of the ride.
Cause he might never see her again.

Hate gets home lucky to still be alive.
He screams o'er the sidewalk and into the drive.
The clock in the kitchen says two fifty five
And the clock in the kitchen is slow.

Love has been waiting patient and kind.
Just wanting a phone call or some kind of sign.
That the one that she cares for who’s out of his mind
Will make it back safe to her arms.

Hate stumbles forward and leans in the door.
Weary head hung down, eyes to the floor
He says, “Love I’m sorry” and she says, “What for?”
“I’m yours and that’s it, whatever”
“I should not have been gone for so long”
“I’m yours and that’s it, forever”
“Your mine and that’s it, forever”

So, as Love and Hate get closer to meeting up again, the listener (or you, the reader) senses the tension in the relationship as Love continues to give with patience and kindness (even the cab driver sees it!), while Hate doesn't seem to want any part of it.

A friend, Sharon, and I came up with one possible understandings for Hate's character: Hate feels stuck in the relationship and/or Hate has decided for one reason or another that he doesn't want to love Love and that Love doesn't really love him.

This is, we may assume, ridiculous, because Love seems like a pretty groovy chick... "Everyone sees it whenever she flies and also when she comes down." A real knockout.

What I think is going on is that Hate has been in a rotten mood and that has turned what once was love into self pity. Perhaps he feels abandoned by Love because she left for a spell. In any event, everyone at some point or another feels sorry for themselves and thinks that they don't matter to other people and that other people don't matter to them. When that happens, you end up hurting the people who really do love you and when you realize it, you hope haven't burned too many bridges and that it isn't too late to salvage the relationship... That is Hate personified, to me.

The real crux of the ballad is in the last verse. The transcript I got from the lyrics is from online, so I'm not sure if the change in speaker from line to line is exactly as intended (I have an early copy of the CD minus liner notes, so I don't know if this is how Seth intends it)... but I think this is right. Pay attention:

Hate stumbles forward and leans in the door.
Weary head hung down, eyes to the floor

Shame, anyone?

He says, (HATE) “Love I’m sorry” and she says, (LOVE)“What for?”
(HATE)“I’m yours and that’s it, whatever”

Ah, there's the word... "whatever." I suggest that the meaning of this word determines the outcome of the song. As presented, Hate says "I'm yours and that's it, whatever." This could mean "whatever" as in the first usage in the first verse (as something like "who cares!?"... which would be not so good), or it means "whatever" as in "no matter what." Again, I have always heard it as the latter, putting a twist on the word from the original usage.

(LOVE) “I should not have been gone for so long”
(HATE) “I’m yours and that’s it, forever”
(LOVE) “Your mine and that’s it, forever"

So, in all this confusion of "who said what," there is little indication of what happens next. As presented above, Love says "What for?" and Hate responds "I'm yours and that's it, whatever." Maybe it is Love saying "What for? I'm yours and that's it, whatever." It is hard to tell. Seth changes the progression in the song, reverting back a few measures, but it is still not cut and dry just from a listen. Also, the song does not end on the key note, but rather, the "4th" chord, which is why the song leaves the listener with a sense that there has not been a resolution. (The Avett Brothers do the same thing on "Famous Flower Of Manhattan"... Listen to it and you will hear at then end that the song is not really over, it just stops. Essentially, you have to finish it in your head. A wonderful musical device.)

But STILL... In the end, Hate commits himself to Love forever, and Love accepts that commitment, also forever.

So that is it! Hate as an emotion is always looking for reasons not to love and not to be loved, while love is always trying to take such imperfection and work things through. It could not be the other way around: Love giving herself to Hate, and Hate accepting that, because that would only breed hate.

As my High School English teacher, Mrs. Nebbia, put it, "It is supposed to be contradictory and vague, that's what makes it good literature."

Remarkable, Seth. Nonetheless, Brothers, you've done it again.

Peace, Love, Monkey Business,
PAV

WHAT THEY DO

2007-07-22T21:54:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "That then is perfect Friendship which subsists between those who are good and whose similarity consists in their goodness: for these men (er... and women) wish one another's good in similar ways; insofar as they are (and good they are in themselves); and those are specially friends who wish GOOD to their friends for their sakes, because they feel thus toward them on their own account and not as a mere matter of result; so the Friendship between these men (er... and women) continues to SUBSIST so long as they are GOOD; and goodness, we know, has in it a principle of PERMANENCE" -Aristotle on TRUE FRIENDSHIP (with minor parenthetical editorial by yours truly)
Current Music: Old 97s

I feel blessed to have so many good and true friends... Thank you all... Drinks (and all other GOOD things) are always on me.

Harrison Ridley Jr has taught me a good deal about music. One distinction about music which he made clear to me has to do with categorizing music. I'm not talking about Genre... Words like jazz, blues, folk, rock, folk rock, punk rock, country rock, rockabilly rock, hard rock, grunge rock, rap, country, bluegrass, new age, alternative etc... these mean very little to me.

What he told me is that there are really only three kinds of music:
1. Folk- This doesn't mean Woodie Guthrie or Pete Seeger or anything, but, rather, music which grows organic from human experience. Folk music is the songs slaves made up in the fields years ago, the songs country boys would sing out west, spiritual songs, whatever those toothless people in the hills of Appalachia made up, or the songs kids make up and pass down while jumping rope in the streets. I think this is from where the FORM of songs develop. They're passed down from age to age and have a meaning to the people who hear and sing them because it is a part of their experience. Woodie and Pete are part of this tradition, but their music is more like...

2. Art- This is when musicians take the aforementioned "folk" forms described above and arrange them in a more perfect and musically more complicated fashion. Look at early blues... It grew out of the experience of blacks in the south and gave a crisp shape to the rhythms and traditions which go all the way back to Africa. Same thing with jazz and good rock. With the way the modern music industry works these days, and with the way recordings are made, the temptation is that such music becomes...

3. Pop- This is the music that is made for $. The distinction between art and pop is tricky to put your finger on, but the way I like to think of it has to do with first the intentions behind a certain recording. Anybody that says Britney Spears is making art needs to understand that her songs and videos are made for the sole purpose of making money, fame, and exposure. Since the process of this recording is consumer-oriented music, it gives up brilliance in favor of what will sell. Part of this problem is that those who own the record companies, who market, produce, and search for talent are generally not musicians or interested in the art at all, but are, rather, businessmen.

I'm not saying musicians shouldn't get paid. Everyone needs to eat, and it is a good thing when good musicians making good music also make a good living. The problem is that the end (keeping with the ancient understanding of the telos) of art should be the art itself.

The best thing for us to do when we flip on the radio or go to a show is to think of music in terms of its roots. "Where does this come from?" should be the question we ask. You can hear it in Robert Johnson, Louis Armstrong, Bob Dylan, the Beatles, Led-Zeppelin, Bruce Springsteen, The Avett Brothers, and even acts like Nirvana if you just listen... Are the bands on MTV working with something organic to make art (something new, exciting, but also grounded in a common cultural and religious experience and history), or money?

Bob Dylan said it: "I know there are groups at the top of the charts that are hailed as the saviours of rock'n'roll and all that, but they are amateurs. They don't know where the music comes from... I wouldn't even think about playing music if I was born in these times... I'd probably turn to something like mathematics. That would interest me. Architecture would interest me. Something like that."

Pretty condemning, I know.

Or how about Philly group The Roots, whose song "What they do" scalds the 90s hip-hop nation for their abandonment of originality in favor of flashy music videos and "hip-hop consumption."

This is their video for the song, one of the funniest, saddest, and best I've ever seen. "Keep it real?"...

Never do....what they do, what they do, what they do...Never do....what they do, what they do, what they do...

Yo, yo
Lost generation, fast paced nation
World population confront they frustration
The principles of true hip-hop have been forsaken
It's all contractual and about money makin
Pretend-to-be cats don't seem to know they limitation
Exact replication and false representation
You wanna be a man, then stand your own
To MC requires skills, I demand some shownI let the frauds keep frontin
And roam like a celluar phone far from home
Givin crowds what they wantin
Offical hip-hop consumption, the 5th thumpin
Keepin ya party jumpin with an original somethin
Yo, I dedicate this to the one dimension-al
No imagination, excuse for perpetration
My man came over and said, "Yo we thought we heard you"
Joke's on you; you heard a bitin-ass crew but um..

Never do....what they do, what they do, what they do...
Never do....what they do, what they do, what they do...

Thin is the line that run between love and hatred
The game is ill-natured, it's nothing sacred
Aiyyo, it's funny when I see some rap niggaz due to make it
A few'll blow up, or go as far as they can take it
My nine to five, is just to hit ya get the party live
I'm Black Thought, used to rap for sport
Now the rhymes sayin rent payin life support
I take it very serious-ly, within this in-dustry
It's various crews that try to touch me
But I come with the beautiful things, and I bless the track plushly

Around the world crowds love me, from doin tours
Recepient of applause from all of you and yours
Creator of original sounds to send to stores you take home, to absorb and sweat it out your pores
Now who can stop the music runnin through these veins
Infinitely go against the grain, that's why my motto's to..

Never do....what they do, what they do, what they do...
Never do....what they do, what they do, what they do

Livin the life of limos and lights
Airplanes and trains, short days and long nights
Keyboards and mics, bass chords and drum kicks
And my mental thick to hit my head like brick
As I embark on a mission welcomin to the dark
When I first spark the arts, when the listenin start
Open your head wide, and let the Thought inside
My style fortified by all of Philadel-phiI've dealt more stealth than all the wicked weal-thy
Mentality undetectable by the naked eye
Then I get paid when the record is played
To put it short "I want it made" like Ed, nuff said
Then after that, I'm puttin on my cousin Hamed
We let the ladies blend with the darkskin thoroughbredand discover, my level is that of no otherAnd Roots crew reign offical and true while I'm continuin to..

Never do....what they do, what they do, what they do...

Peace, Love, Monkey Business
PAV

BRIDGE

2007-07-17T19:07:00.001-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "There goes my baby, movin' on down the line, Wonder where, wonder where, wonder where she is bound? I broke her heart and made her cry, Now I'm alone, so all alone, What can I do, what can I do?" -"There Goes My Baby"
Current Music: The Drifters "Greatest Hits"

Every weekday during evening rush hour, traffic on Route 50 going east at exit 26... just stops. Sometimes for four or five miles.

It isn't because there is a volume of cars entering the highway, a speed trap, an accident... just because the road is aproaching the Severn River Bridge. (See the bridge in the distant background of the photo from the last PLOG post). People really like to take their time going over the bridge.

Probably 'cause they can see me down there havin' a ball.

Can you really blame them?

PLMB,
PAV

NAPTOWN

2007-07-15T20:39:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Wonder where the time went out drinking with your friends. We see a lot of beauty, some becomes ordinary; mountains, and canyons, and prairies, Sunset over Chesapeake Bay" -The Avett Brothers (Letter to a Pretty Girl)
Current Music: Bruce Springsteen "Darkness on the Edge of Town"

What a fantastic week. Marine Corporal John Miller, one of my best friends from high school (fellow Band Nerd, Wrestler, and Baseball Player and now, fellow Marine) is back from Fallujah for two weeks of leave at the middle of his year long tour in Iraq.

One of the things Johnny started with Phil, Alex and myself is what we like to call "Whiskey and S'mores." There really isn't much to it, but it works. No matter what time of year, how hot or how cold, rain or shine, we find time to meet at my house, go out on the back deck, make a little (or big) fire, drink whiskey, smoke, listen to Bruce or Bob or Tom or Neil or Mark or whatever, and roast a few marshmallows for our s'mores. All are welcome, and I think it is just about the best thing out there. The discussion ranges from TV, sports, girls, high school memories, religion, shoes... you name it. Its nice to be able to get away from all the lights, noise, cars, and people and just hang out in the dark with your best friends. I'm saying this because I think everyone should find something like this.

It's just healthy. I love going downtown, but there's nothing like just enjoying quiet company with some whiskey in the dark. Besides, the post-college age is a time when people are always coming and going, so it is good to keep ourselves from getting too wrapped up in the scene.

After whiskey and S'mores, we spent the weekend celebrating beautiful Annapolis July weather out on the Severn River. Crabs, Beer, Jetski, Swimming, Tubing, Boating... It is a wonderful life.

The dogs on Main Street howl
'cause they understand
If I could take one moment into my hands
Mister I ain't a boy, no I'm a man
And I believe in a promised land

This seems to make all the BS in life disappear.

Peace, Love, Monkey Business,
PAV

PLMB

2007-07-14T09:50:00.000-05:00

Email From Amy Woods (Sno White):

Hey you

I just wanted to send you a quick email and tell you something I noticed yesterday which made me think about you.

I was running on the ships tredmill and right in front of me was a valve and the tact sign below it that gives a description of what the part is read: “PLMB”

J can you believe that?! They have a whole valve filled with Peace Love and Monkey Business!!! I immediately opened it and tried to get the magic out…however all these alarms went off and so I had to hide from my boss and wipe my prints off it so no one will know it was me…
So I was just wondering if you could give me the code to accessing PLMB…I could use some as for I am homesick for you! J

Okay so the part about the alarm is a little lie… but I miss you
Let me know how you are doing.

Love, Amy.L aka Sno White.

Thank you, Amy!

PLMB,
PAV

GOOD WORK pt. 2

2007-06-25T23:56:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Yesterday everything was moving too fast, today its movin too slow"
Current Music: Bob Dylan "Time Out Of Mind"

Last night I danced with a stranger but she just reminded me you were the one.

The Avett Brothers, good friends of the PLOG, have been nominated for three Americana Music Awards: Best Album of the Year, Best Duo/Group of the Year, and Emerging Artists of the Year. It can't be a bad thing to be nominated along the side of Patty Griffin, Lucinda Williams, and Bob Dylan.

Picking up where I left off, though I am enjoying my summer off, I am excited about begining my career in the Marine Corps. Though I didn't have a clue when I applied for my NROTC scholarship in High School, and though I only have a small appreciation now, I think I am starting to realize how special the Marine Corps is.

I've been reading a book about Robert Nisbet, one of my favorite authors. Nisbet's theories of politics and sociology center around the idea of community, something I spend a lot of time thinking about. One of his main ideas is that the emergence and extent of centralized national power of the modern state has rendered intermediate associations-associations which are true communities- such as the family, church, etc... real "society." This devolution alienates the individual from the relationships which give him place and purpose.

This is not something too idealistic or romantic, either. There can be love and hate in communities, they are, however, bound together by concrete bonds of function in terms of a common goal, as well as psychological, spiritual, and dogmatic connections.

Nisbet lists a few of the characteristics of true community... Let's see how our relations measure up:

Function- Every community has a concrete objective (The University is for education for wisdom's sake, The Military for waging wars, the Family for child rearing)
Strong sense of purpose or dogma- a deeply held beleif that its function is something "good" (here's where it often gets tricky)
Characterized by authority, not power- legitimate authority which directs action and the means to accomplish common goals
Community is hierachical- there are roles within the community- student, teacher, mother, father, son, daughter, soldier, priest etc... Such relationships cannot be viewed in terms of "equality"
Sense of Honor- duty to the community. Pursuit of only material personal gains is to subordinate the community to individual interests.
Community needs to distinguish itself from other communities- sense that the outside world is somehow lacking the good things to be found in the community. This leads to a sense of superiority.

I think the Marine Corps is strong in all these aspects, making it a good, healthy, and natural Community to be a part of. I actually can't think of another place like it. What do you think?

Now that's GOOD WORK!

Peace, Love, Monkey Business,

Pav

GOOD WORK pt. 1

2007-06-24T23:42:00.002-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "If Whiskey don't kill me I don't know what will"

Current Music: Bob Dylan "Blood On The Tracks"

Summer in Annapolis is now in full swing, and has been since my last post. My dad, Keith "Red" retired after a 30 year career in the Marine Corps, 14 days after mine had begun.

I have settled nicely into a bit of a weekly routine here... Mondays are open mic on West Street with Phil and whoever else is around, Tuesdays are "Whiskey 'n' S'mores" nights, Wednesdays "Big Beer and Wings" at McGarvey's, Thursdays bowling, and Friday is the wildcard.

I work during the day at The Annapolis Area Christian School (I have added the "The" because I think it sounds better... a la THE George Washington University and THE Ohio State University) performing maintenance with a stellar crew of alumni and current students. I have been working my summers there for a few years, now, and despite my limited knowledge and expertise (I am quite clumsy and foolish), I am enjoying the work and company... Our mottos go something like this: "Measure once, Cut twice," "We've moved it once, we'll move it again," and "we don't improve things, we just maintain the status quo."

You know, say what you will about Marx, his idea of "worker alienation" makes sense to me.... his conclusions are all whack, but I'm not going there.

In short, Marx's idea was that capitalism leads to workers being alienated from human nature by the nature of their work... things like wage labor and division of labor. Like I said, though I don't agree with all of his conclusions, It makes sense to me because of experience.

Allow me to give two examples. First. I have written in past entries about the USS Olympia, an early 20th century navy Cruiser being restored for tours at Penn's Landing in Philadelphia. At Villanova NROTC, we raise money (for things like pizza and beer and other things sailors enjoy) by working weekends at a time on this ship. We are put in the hands of some of the most incompetent people in the world and told to do some pretty nasty tasks (like scrubbing 80 year old grease off of engines) all day long. We aren't given breaks and our supervisors are told to keep us moving at all costs (even if it means prolonging a task)... In fact, one time while painting, our paint rollers were taken away from us and we were given small paintbrushes just so we would be kept busy. That is ridiculous. Every single Midshipman hates this and will do just about anything to stay away from this Godforsaken ship... We even scheme about how we could place explosives on it to sink it to the bottom of the river.

At AACS Maintenance, however, our work experience is quite different. We perform a similar general function, but the nature of the work is quite different. We fit into a scheme. Our work has a meaning to us. We perform as part of a Christian Community and as such we have a purpose. Our work is meant not only to maximize profit of the school and ourselves, but also to enrich the lives of all involved in the community. Again, because of the way our Boss, John Nolan, runs things, our work is training... Yes, there is a right way to paint, to build, to change lightbulbs, and clean air conditioner filters... But there is more than that, we are Trained in how to lead safe, healthy, productive, and most importantly, happy, fruitful lives. If we need a day off, we take a day off. If we need a break, we take a break. If we need to work through lunch, we work through lunch. We work hard, and we play hard.

My point here is that purpose is important... "Ideas have consequences" said Richard Weaver. And the ideas of purpose mean something when it comes to what we do with our time. Though NROTC may need the money gained from days working at the Olympia, there is more to be gained than dollars and cents. As long as we address these things, we will be okay.

Now that's "Good Work!"

PLMB,

PAV

SCHOOL'S OUT

2007-05-22T19:16:00.001-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Hey, is that that dancer from the bar last night?!" -Britt's Dad
Current Music: Run-D.M.C.

Welp, College is over... Way I see it... one repesents an end, and one a begining. Friday was the commissioning ceremony for all the Navy Ensigns and Marine Lieutenants, and Sunday was college graduation. Friday night was open bar celebration at Brownies, Sunday was the drive home.

Sunday morning I got in my car to drive to school for graduation. I turned on my XM radio and "School's Out" by Alice Cooper was on. I couldn't have planned it any better if I tried.

Well, we got no choice
All the girls and boys
Makin' all that noise'
Cause they found new toys
Well, we can't salute ya
Can't find a flag
If that don't suit ya
That's a drag

School's out for summer
School's out forever
School's been blown to pieces

No more pencils
No more books
No more teacher's dirty looks

Well, we got no class
And we got no principles
And we got no innocence
We can't even think of a word that rhymes

School's out for summer
School's out forever
School's been blown to pieces

No more pencils
No more books
No more teacher's dirty looks
Out for summer
Out 'til fall
We might not go back at all

School's out forever
School's out for summer
School's out with fever
School's out completely

Couldn't have said it better myself, Alice.

PLMB,
PAV

REAL EMO

2007-05-15T14:39:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "With Lucifer beneath you, and God above, if either one of 'em asks you what you're living of... say 'LOVE.' Say for me 'LOVE!" -Avett Bros. "Living Love"
Current Music: Avett Brothers "Emotionalism"

My Weekend:

FRIDAY...
5:30- I pick Fisher, Sal, and Capaldo up at St. Mary's to head into Philly; The rest of the Pavlischeks are driving to Philadelphia from Annapolis. The Avett Brothers are in New York City performing on a recording of Late Night with Conan O'brien.

6:15- We arrive at the intersection of Passyunk and Wharton for a Pat's Cheesesteak

7:45- We meet my dad at The Trocadero Theater; The Avett Brothers are driving south

800- Doors Open

900- Concert starts

10:45- Avett Brothers take the stage

12:30- Concert ends

1:15- We arrive back at Villanova... Just in time to catch Late Night with Conan O'brien.

The concert was great, the performance on Late Night was great... That is to be expected at this point. They don't let down. I remember I saw them about this time last year and Seth Avett was pretty sick, but he still put out a good performance.

"EMOTIONALISM," the new record from the Avett Brothers, comes out today... and it is fantastic. I got an advanced release last Friday, and this stuff is just good. The recordings are crisp and sharp, not overproduced, and convey the energy of a live performance without compromising the beauty of some fantastic song writing. I've told you before, it's all about affection!

As if that weren't enough, they are great guys to boot. I've seen them 7 times in the last year and talked to them several times. My dad has seen them so many times that they know him pretty well, especially since he wears the same hat to every show. We will see them at Ram's Head Tavern in Annapolis on Monday, where they have created an "Avett Bros.' Pizza" for the menu.

There's a type of music called "Emo," which is derived from the word "emotional" because the performers of said "modern indie punk rock music" whatever the hell you wanna call it were known to be extremely emotional on stage. Now, that stuff is shit... The Avett Brothers are great. They're the MOST emotional, passionate, and affectionate performers I have ever seen but that isn't where it stops. They play honest, good, American music. No one would ever call them "Emo" or classify them in that category... probably a good thing. In fact, you will fail at trying to classify them in ANY category of music, other than "American." This stuff is good.

There is actually a history behind this whole dilemma. The greatest innovators of music have always resented having their music labeled and I think I can see why. Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie and lots of other musicians refused to use the word "jazz" because "jazz" was a construct of the music business. Blacks in the 80's resented the term "rap" because it was made up by the media... Bob Dylan hated so much being called a "folk singer" or a "protest singer" and "poet" that he just about completely turned his back on the media. Check out the movie "Don't Look Back."

You can't pigeon-hole these people. Because once you do that, you make it commercial, something you can sell and own, which makes it easy. That's why I think most people wouldn't know genius if it slapped them in the face. The best art is vague and difficult, not lucid and easy. To appreciate good art you need to cultivate your ears, eyes, and heart. The Avett's and Dylan's music is something that everyone can enjoy, but to really appreciate it, you need to give them time. Dylan's albums are fun to listen to because they will reveal themselves to you over time, not at first listen. Some of my favorite songs of his I never really heard until years after I got the record... Songs like "Lonesome Day Blues," "Idiot Wind" or "Cold Irons Bound." I use American Music because it's what I know, but people say the same thing about Picasso, architecture, drama etc...

It's like Mrs. Nebbia taught us in English class senior year of Highschool: "Its supposed to be contradictory and vague, that's what makes it good literature." And these are the greats, the creators, from Dizzy, Bob Dylan, David Byrne, Run-DMC, the Avett Brothers...

This is real emotion and real art.

Peace, Love, and Monkey Business,
PAV

P.S. Buy All Their Records

THE ODYSSEY OF PAV AND HOMER

2007-05-06T20:37:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "I have stress... I have three kids and no money! Why can't I have no kids and three money?" -Homer Simpson
Current Music: Joe Satriani "One Big Rush"

Yesterday I had my first and last final exam of the semester which makes today the first day of summer. Nice.

I have only a fortnight until commencement... That's 14 days of play. Sunday, the 20th of May also happens to be the 400th episode of The Simpsons, my favorite TV show of all time. Coincidence? Yeah, most definitely.

But one has to wonder... After all, this is not the first time The Simpsons has Incorporated my experience into the show, whether subliminally, liminally, or super-liminally.
This screenshot comes from the famous "Beer Baron" episode, officially titled "Homer VS. The Eighteenth Amendment" which aired on 16 March 1997. This was the first episode to air after my 12th birthday... Those of you long-time PLOG readers know that 12 is my favorite number. In this episode, alcohol was banned in Springfield, so Homer takes to brewing his own hooch in bathtubs in his basement. At the end of the episode, home stands atop these kegs in front of the "PAV SHOP" and says one of the immortal lines from the entire series, proposing a toast in the final line of the episode: "To Alcohol- the cause of, and solution to all of life's problems."

Cheers, Homer, and thanks for the happy-birthday shoutout.

Here are some other Pav-related Simpsons quotes:

Bart: "I'm riding a unicycle with my pants down....this should be every boy's dream!"

It was then, and is now.

My experience in Highschool:
LISA: "Maybe I can't concentrate because of all your cooties!"
MILLHOUSE: "It's called 'lice' and it's nothing to be ashamed of!"

HOMER: "You're a rock star, you're supposed to be reckless and be celebrated for behavior that would land normal people in jail... rock stars are supposed to be all about drinking, and getting drunk, and boozing it up!" -To Tom Petty, Mick Jagger, and Keith Richards

PLMB,
PAV (Brought to you by the support of the "PAV SHOP" and by faithful readers like you)

God Bless America: "You must love this country more than I love a cold beer on a hot Christmas morning" -HOMER

LIVING LEGEND

2007-05-04T10:37:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "You ask me for my plan, just who are you expectin', Jesus Zimmerman?" -Christopher Guest (Bob Dylan Parody)
Current Music: Christopher Guest "Postively Wall St."

There are 2 main student newspapers at Villanova: The Villanovan and The Villanova Times. The former is the official paper and the latter the not-shitty one.

This week's Times featured, front page, above the fold, the story of Doug Petock... Headline: "THE MAN, THE MYTH, THE LEGEND: DOUG PETOCK GRADUATES FROM 'NOVA THIS YEAR."

Every university, I suppose, has its legend... its Van Wilder, Belushi, Frank "The Tank"

You know what I mean, that character who stands out above the rest... Ours is and has been for the last 7 years Doug Petock, or, as we all know him, Mendel Doug. (Mendel is the Science building and main field).
I walked out of John Barry hall (adjacent to Mendel) holding this paper. Doug was walking past with his cohort, Psyloch, so I asked he and her to sign it. He wrote "Unicycle Guy, May the cheese be with you. Obi-Wing, Doug Petock." Click the picture to get a better look at the article.

Here is a list of just some of Doug's antics.

Wears only shorts and sandals and T-Shirts (usually Jimi Buffet concert shirts) all year long. He has long blonde hair which he only cuts when he has to go to court.
Carry's a lightsaber at all times... He is a jedi knight defending the galaxy against any "challenger." If he perceives you to be a challenger, you must duel him on Mendel Field. Last year on Halloween, a kid dressed up as Darth Vader... Big Mistake!
A physics major, chemistry is evil and usually responsible for plans to destroy the universe... Doug attacked my chemistry lab sophomore year. He thanks one of his teachers, "Whoopi" for being "the first to warn me about the Chemistry Coalition of Evil." He continues: "It began in the future, the scientists turned to evil and a time machine called Trex... Now from the begining we found out that the Chemistry Coalition of Evil was evil. But, what we did not know is that there was somebody behind all the strings being pulled. The Mandrin, Mandrin the Merciless. So now with the help of Paul Phazen we are leading a rebellion to defeat this CCE and to bring Chemistry back to the days of justice..."
Doug has nicknames for everyone, including all professors in the Chemistry and Physics departments, usually from science fiction. One of his aliases is Obi-Wing because he competes in the annual Philadelphia Buffalo Wing Eating contest, the WING BOWL... He qualified this year by eating a 15 pound watermellon, rind and all.

Now that you may have an idea of the man, take a look...

Here's the Original... "VISCOSITY HO!"

There is a CHALLENGER!!!

Cracking the Code...

"Heros get remembered, kid, but legends never die"

Godspeed, Obi-Wing.

PLMB,
PAV

A THOUSAND WORDS

2007-05-02T11:29:00.000-05:00

Seeing the smiles on all their faces makes it all worth it...

...Approval can be a wonderful thing

OLD SCHOOL

2007-05-02T10:17:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Ah yes, life is truly a dream for many of us. And the frosh will get the opportunity to quietly and carefully study their "big brothers" so that they may gently assimilate the noble feelings of morale and esprit de corps of Whiskey Company in these weeks." -MIDN 2/C Bill Fallon (1966)
Current Music: Dire Straits "Making Movies"

NOTE: Far be it from me to criticize, but Good Ol' Bill is joking: "...carefully study their 'big brothers' so that they may gently assimilate..."

Different times.

I was where I belonged yesterday afternoon... in the NROTC wardroom of John Barry Hall (The NROTC building). To pass the time I picked up one of the many binders and photo albums and found one that was just too cool to not share. It was a photo album and scrap book of newspaper articles, letters, notes and such, from our beloved Whiskey Company. The oldest newspaper article is dated April 28, 1953.

There is a letter from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 1976 and a lot of great pictures. Click any of the Photos to see it full sized:
Here is a picture of Whiskey Company giving the ceremonial "present arms" in the traditional "V for Villanova" formation at half-time of the 1961 meeting between the Washington Redskins and the Philadelphia Eagles. Philly won the game, 14-7.

"Ripple Line" Circa 1963

Here is Whiskey Company Company Commander, senior Paul Pugh from about 1971... Pugh is known to us now as "Dean Pugh" or "Colonel Pugh." He was a Marine Colonel and was the Commanding Officer of Villanova NROTC before my time. Now he is Villanova's Dean of Students.

But here's where things got interesting. I found four newspaper articles written by college junior Bill Fallon from around 1966... Now, William J. Fallon is a four star Admiral and Commander of CENTCOM, making him just about the most powerful military commander in the world. These little articles are pretty funny.

Bill is all grown up... I think he's got a little more to worry about than Freshmen at Villanova, but it is nice to know he was once where I am now. And look at all that bling!

Manley: "Sir, were you in Whiskey Company?"
Fallon: "The Only Company!"

This stuff is too good to let slide by, so we're going to try to make some sort of visual online history of Whiskey Company.

...Well, I wasn't there, and we weren't able to do the same things they got away with back then, but I wear the same blue rope and these pictures and memories are ours in perpetuity.

Whiskey Once,
Pav

WANNA FIGHT?

2007-04-30T22:06:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: Fallon- "Honor and Fear were heaped upon his name"
Me- "...and his name was PAV"
Current Music: Tom Waits "Closing Time"

Its called "gravitas," people... This is the PLOG.

Edit on previous post... Also without "The Bible" in their "top books:"
Harvard
Yale
Cornell
University Of Pennsylvania
Dartmouth
Columbia
Brown
Princeton
Duke
Notre Dame

So Villanova is, once and for all, amongst the top schools in the nation.

At Ole Miss, Grove City the Bible was #1.

At Calvin and West Point The Bible was 2nd. (Note, West Point is the only college I checked out of a lot at which the #1 book was not Harry Potter, but is, rather "Gates of Fire")

Have any of you been watching Comedy Central lately? That channel is terrible. The commercials are at least four notches louder than the programs, and they are now running this commercial for hockey fights... 2 DVDs of Minor League Hockey Fights for just $19.99.

Reminds me of a classic from when Homer and Marge were going through some rough times:
Homer: Wait, you really think Marge is gonna fall for this guy?!? Even after I bought her that hockey fighttape?
Carl: I'd dump your ass!"
Lenny: "Me too!"

Only Homer and us Comedy Central fans would go for that...

Life's a garden, Dig It.

PLMB,
PAV

FIELD RESEARCH

2007-04-27T12:21:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Outside in the distance a WILDCAT did growl. Two riders were approaching and the wind began to howl" -Bob Dylan "All Along the Watchtower"
Current Music: Jimi Hendrix Experience "Electric Ladyland"

April Showers... April is the cruelest month, breeding...

Remember when Facebook.com first introduced the "newsfeed?" Everyone was pissed. I know some people ditched facebook. For those of you who aren't familiar with Facebook, its the "global community" of personal profiles, groups, and networks. Last year they introduced the "newsfeed" which updates you with any changes made on any of your friends' profiles, if they join or create a group, add pictures, post on someone's "wall" etc. etc. etc... Everyone was pretty creeped out by it when it first came out... It just seemed more stalkerish that any time someone adds "LOST" to their favorite TV shows we should all have that show up when we sign on. Or how about when someone's "Relationship Status" goes from "In a Relationship" to "Single." We've all seen that. There was a huge backlash, and groups of millions of students were created to protest the change. But the powers that be had decided, so we were left with the "newsfeed."

My point is, now we pretty much take the news feed for granted now. What made some of us once feel upset is just normal now. Thats all I have to say.

One thing I do like about Facebook is the stats. You can look at any network and see that network's most listed favorites: Top Books, Top Music, Top Interests, Top Movies, Top TV and so on. You can also see things like "poltical views" and "relationship status" for each school. Now, as you could imagine, most categories are widely homoginized accross the nation. Coldplay, U2, and Jack Johnson are on just about every list. Facebook used to list "Global Favorites" but I can no longer find that on the site.

Here are some of the University Networks I am most familiar with... I think it is a relatively fair sample of school types (in demographic and school "type," if not geografically)... Their TOP BOOKS:

James Madison University (Public University in Harrisonburg, VA, and home of some of my best friends from High School)
1. Harry Potter
2. Catcher in the Rye
3. Angels and Demons
4. The Bible
5. To Kill a Mockingbird
6. Great Gatsby
7. The Da Vinci Code
8. 1984

University of Maryland (HUGE Public University at College Park, MD... Also home of a bunch of my best friends)
1. Harry Potter
2. Catcher in the Rye
3. Angels and Demons
4. The Great Gatsby
5. 1984
6. The Da Vinci Code
8. Pride and Prejudice
9. The Bible

Wheaton College (Private Evangelical Protestant College in Wheaton, IL. Home of my sister)
1. The Bible
2. Harry Potter
3. Blue Like Jazz
4. Pride and Prejudice
5. Mere Christianity
6. To Kill a Mockingbird
7. Lord of the Rings
8. The Chronicles of Narnia
9. Jane Eyre

Anne Arundel Community College (Public Community College in Arnold, MD. Five miles from my house and where everyone else from my High School goes)
1. Harry Potter
2. The Bible
3. The Great Gatsby
4. Catcher in the Rye
5. Angels and Demons
6. 1984
7. The Outsiders
8. The Notebook
9. The Giver

Villanova University (Catholic and Augustinian University on the Main Line outside Philadelphia in Pennsylvania. Home of the WILDCATS and my home for the last four years)
1. Harry Potter
2. Catcher in the Rye
3. Angels and Demons
4. The Great Gatsby
5. To Kill a Mockingbird
6. The Da Vinci Code
8. Pride and Prejudice
9. The Kite Runner

If anyone asks you how to get from Maryland to Villanova in just two moves, here's how you do it: Substitute Harper Lee for George Orwell. Then take Afghan-American Author Khaled Hosseini and substitute his book for God's. Nice, 'Nova... I wonder where The Bible would actually be on the list, since they only give us to 9...

Reppin' It Catholic University Style. For Shame.

"Outside in the distance a WILDCAT did growl. Two riders were approaching and the wind began to howl"

I like to think of myself as the WILDCAT sometimes, and sometimes as one of the riders. What do you think?

PLMB,
P-to the-A-to the-V

ENDS AND BEGINNINGS

2007-04-25T10:22:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "I dont wanna grow up" -Janis
Current Music: Badly Drawn Boy "Hour of Bewilderbeast"

My friend Janis just got her orders to Naval Flight School at Pensacola, FLA today. She leaves on the first of June... Too soon.

The last week has been one of beginnings and ends. Last Monday there was snow on the ground. By this Monday, temperatures topped off at 83 degrees here. I wore my Navy uniform for the last time and marched in my last parade, got my orders to The Basic School, did my last drill routine for Whiskey Company, and had my last "Novafest." And yet, there's always something exciting and promising about spring. Hell, I don't need to tell you that.

You can imagine how hard it is to concentrate on school. I spend most of my time in my crappy theology class writing songs.

Novafest weekend is a spring tradition here. There isn't much to it, but it is basically just a campus wide celebration with some live music and food. I didn't go to the concert this year, which was the Goo Goo Dolls, but there was a big party on West Campus which I think is one of the best memories I will take from this place. It wasn't organized, it just happened. Hundreds of students went out on the field to hang out, cook out, and, oops, look out for the flying water-balloons we were launching over the crowds. Kudos to the students for doing it, and kudos to the Public Safety staff who let us. (Photos: Me, Roth, Treacy, Kellie, Janis, Fallon; West Campus)

Yesterday was the NROTC Spring Review. Last time. After the ceremony, a few alumni from Whiskey Company from the late 70s and early 80s came over to our house for a cookout. They were really great to us, bringing over burgers, hotdogs, beer, pop, chips... you name it. We have about 100 Cokes left over, so feel free to stop by for a bev. (Photo: Me and Amy)

Check out this performance of "Watching the River Flow" by Bob Dylan... Listen to the way he sings the last verse at about 2:00 left. What a kick!

Peace, Love, Monkey Business,
PAV

Time is a Jet Plane, it moves too fast,
Its a shame all we've shared can't last,
I can change, I swear,
See what you can do,
I can make it through,
You can make it, too.
-BD "You're a Big Girl Now"

PITCH A WANG-DANG-DOODLE

2007-04-20T10:38:00.001-05:00

Quote of the Moment: (In reference to the PLOG entry about Sharon) "Being in the PLOG, that's like a home-run!" -LAURA
Current Music: Janis Joplin "Absolute Janis"

Tonight is the Philadelphia NROTC consortium's senior Dining In, or Mess Night. All the seniors from Villanova, Temple, UPENN, and Drexel, both Marine and Navy, along with all the staff, will go out for a formal dinner and ceremony. Standby for Shenanigans.

"Except for the annual celebration of the Marine Corps Birthday, no social function associated with the smaller of America’s naval services is more enjoyed, admired and imitated than the mess night" -USMC COL Bartlett

We're gonna pitch a wang-dang-doodle all night long!

PARADE THE BEEF!

In further NROTC News: My company, WHISKEY COMPANY, won our third consecutive Field Meet, the semesterly competition between the unit's four companies. The competition is a series of physical events typically such as: pushups, situps, pullups (and other types of 'ups'), as well as rope climbs, foot races, the world famous "dizzy izzy," and culminating in the "Tug-Of-War." For the entire competition, Whiskey Company was playing catchup with Charlie company, and finally won it on the big tug, finishing with a score of 54 points (2 over Charlie). Thing about Whiskey Company is, we might not be the most talented, but we've got heart to the point of fault, and we don't like to lose.

Cheers, Whiskey.

I found this book review, by Nathaniel Fick (Author of "One Bullet Away"), on Frank Schaeffer's new book "AWOL." Read it:

Ghost Warriors
What happens to a country when its elite won't serve in the military?

Reviewed by Nathaniel Fick
Sunday, June 18, 2006; BW04

AWOL

The Unexcused Absence of America's Upper Classes From Military Service -- and How It Hurts Our Country

By Kathy Roth-Douquet and Frank Schaeffer

Collins. 241 pp. $24.95

In World War I, the United States imposed a military draft for a reason that seems strange today: to prevent too many of the nation's most privileged citizens from rushing toward the sound of the guns. A draft would spread sacrifice beyond the elite, went the argument, and ensure that the country didn't lose too many future leaders. Contrast this with the run-up to the Iraq War in 2003, when the New York Civil Liberties Union challenged a federal law allowing military recruiters to contact graduating seniors at public high schools. "Students," the organization's executive director said, "have a right to not be bothered by aggressive military recruiters."

How did we change from a nation where military service was a duty of citizenship -- akin to paying taxes or serving on a jury -- to one where simply being asked to consider time in uniform is an infringement of civil rights?

In their compelling and inspiring cri de coeur , Kathy Roth-Douquet and Frank Schaeffer trace this societal shift, arguing that the schism between America's military and its opinion-making class threatens the nation's welfare. Both authors qualify as opinion-makers, and both have personal connections to the military. Roth-Douquet, a self-described "former agitator, feminist, Ivy Leaguer, Clintonite," is married to a Marine pilot. Schaeffer, a novelist, painter and film-maker, saw his plans for his children -- "top college, good grades, smart jobs, wife/husband, Subaru/Volvo, membership at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, IRA started early, kids, college fund" -- derail when his youngest son enlisted in the Marines after high school.

That their stories are rare is a recent phenomenon. In 1956, 400 of Princeton's 750 graduates served in uniform. By 2004, only nine members of the university's graduating class entered the military. Harvard, Yale, Brown, Columbia and many other schools do not even allow ROTC on their campuses. The gulf is growing in Congress, too. In 1971, three-quarters of our representatives had military experience. Now, fewer than a third do, and that number drops with each passing year. Some citizens see no problem with this. We are indeed fortunate not to live in a militarized society, and our hyper-capable armed forces enjoy, at least superficially, broad support from the American people.

But Roth-Douquet and Schaeffer, who've written the book in alternating sections, unite to argue convincingly that there are at least three dangerous consequences of a civil-military divide. First, it hurts the nation's ability to make sound military choices. Uniformed service is not a prerequisite for individual expertise in the conduct of war. Abraham Lincoln -- arguably America's greatest wartime president -- never served in uniform (although he spent three months in an Illinois militia). In the aggregate, however, we benefit from having veterans in every corner of our decision-making apparatus: as presidential advisers, members of Congress and active citizens. Without them, our civilian leaders embody less and less of that visceral wisdom forged in harm's way, and the problem perpetuates itself: If young people don't serve today, then we won't have older veterans in leadership positions tomorrow.

Second, a schism between the military and the rest of us weakens the armed forces. Absent broad and deep ties throughout society, the military becomes "them" instead of "us." Roth-Douquet and Schaeffer fear that such a force "will be overused and underled and that support will run out fast for any project that becomes a political liability." Consider that Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill, unlike most political leaders today, both had children in uniform in the Second World War. Whether such personal connections actually affect policy is almost impossible to say, but common sense supports the authors' assertion that "the grunt on the ground is best equipped, best trained, and best served when the opinion makers have a personal stake in his or her well-being."

The greatest problem with an isolated military, however, is even less tangible. "When those who benefit most from living in a country contribute the least to its defense and those who benefit least are asked to pay the ultimate price, something happens to the soul of that country," write the authors. That argument makes for the most powerful reading in the book: "We are shortchanging a generation of smart, motivated Americans who have been prejudiced against service by parents and teachers. Their parents may think they are protecting their children. Their teachers may think they are enlightening them. But perhaps what these young people are being protected from is maturity, selflessness, and the kind of ownership of their country that can give it a better future."

In pointing the way to this better future, the authors place great value on the bully pulpits of public life. "Ask not what your country can do for you" is a long way from our government's post-9/11 exhortation "to live your lives." AWOL 's most heartening conclusion -- that today's young Americans would be willing to put service to country ahead of personal gain -- is also its most maddening, because they haven't been called. "I don't want to draft" young people, Roth-Douquet declares. "I'd like to do something even more radical. I'd like to ask them to serve." A good first step would be asking their parents and teachers to read this important book.

.....................................................................

I read the book Shaeffer wrote with his son, John Schaeffer, called "Keeping Faith." John is a Marine, so the dude's alright with me.

PLMB,
PAV

All you ever gonna need, dear, I wanna tell you right now
it's gonna feel just like those raindrops do
When they're falling down, honey, all around, all around you, yeah. -J.J.

PEYTON

2007-04-16T21:53:00.000-05:00

Peyton Manning United Way SNL Www.channelsurfing.net - The funniest home videos are here

KING IS GONE

2007-04-12T19:55:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "I see people in the park forgetting their troubles and woes, They're drinkin' and dancin' and wearin' bright colored clothes, All the men with their young women lookin' so good, Well, I'd trade places with any of 'em in a minute if I could"
-"Highlands"
Current Music: Bob Dylan "No Direction Home" Bootleg Series, Volume 7

Tommorow marks the begining of the Villanova NROTC Marine Platoon's culminating training in Quantico, VA. We will meet tomorrow, Friday, at 9:00 am and eventually head down to Qtico. We'll be there until Sunday afternoon, running around in the woods killing terrorists and such. It is always a good time unless it is raining. And it will be raining.

But I'm trying to not think too much about that. It will take care of itself.

What I am thinking about is this song by George Jones: "THE KING IS GONE (SO ARE YOU)." I've always liked song titles with parenthases in the title. Phil and I were digging on it while I was home last week, and I think it is one of those songs that just works... your woman left you and you just wanna drink bourbon with your imaginary friends. Who hasn't been there? After a while, you start a conversation. Mine are usually with Bob Dylan (surprised?) and the picture of Stephen Colbert on my wall above my desk... they eventually will talk back.

Maybe Phil and I have deep psychological problems. We're sharin a drink they call lonliness, but its better than drinking alone.

Here is the lyric:

Last night I broke the seal on a Jim Beam decanter
That looks like Elvis
I soaked the label off a Flintstone Jelly Bean jar
I cleared us off a place on that
One little table that you left us
And pulled me up a big ole piece of floor.

I pulled the head off Elvis
Filled Fred up to his pelvis
Yabba Dabba Doo, the King is gone
And so are you.

'Round about ten we all got to talking
'Bout Graceland, Bedrock and such
The conversation finally turned to women
But they said they didn't get around too much
Elvis said, "Find 'em young."
And Fred said, "Old Fashioned girls are fun."
Yabba Dabba Doo, the King is gone
And so are you.

Later on it finally hit me
That you wouldn't be 'a comin' home no more
'Cause this time I know you won't forgive me
Like all of them other times before
Then I broke Elvis's nose
Pouring the last drop from his toes
Yabba Dabba Doo, the King is gone
And so are you.
Yabba Dabba Doo, the King is gone
And so are you.

Last night I broke the seal on a Jim Beam decanter
That looks like Elvis
I soaked the label off a Flintstone Jelly Bean jar....

If any of you want to get me a present, EBAY.com has a few listings for Elvis Presley Jim Beam Decanters and Fred Flintstone Jars:

Bob Dylan is right in "Highlands." Sometimes we just can't be out on the scene. Not that we don't want to be there, our hearts just happen to be in the Highlands right now, please leave a message.

For the record: Bob's "Love and Theft" album is the best conversationalist.

peace, love, jim beam, elvis presley, fred flintstone, and monkey business,
pav

THEIRS SOMETHIN GOIN ON

2007-04-10T11:37:00.001-05:00

Quote of the Moment:
APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
Winter kept us warm, covering
Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.
Summer surprised us, coming over the Starnbergersee
With a shower of rain; we stopped in the colonnade,
And went on in sunlight, into the Hofgarten,
And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.
T.S. Elliot (From "The Wasteland")
Current Music: G Love and Special Sauce "Front Porch Loungin"

I'd like to introduce you to my friend: Sharon Nichols. As far as my friends go, Sharon and I go back about as far as anybody. She's the girl who once said to me when I told her I was making a mix CD of (I'm sure) remarkably quality selections: "You're making a cd for me! That's like getting to third base with you." She's the girl who a certain ex-girlfriend's drunk sister swears I had an affair with while I was with her sister... But that is neither here, there, nor true.

I wrote in a PLOG from two days from now, three years ago (April 12, 2004): "All Sharon Does is Judge Me, And nothing I ever do will ever satisfy her."

Prophetic, I know...

Now that we have gotten our introductions out of the way...to the business. Sharon has been working on a damn good Blog, thankyoumaam.blogspot.com, for some time. She also started a Facebook group, "I Judge You When You Use Poor Grammar" which has, to this moment, accrued a remarkable 130,591 global members... Up 60 members from last I checked (that was 6 hours ago). On the group has been posted 3,353 photos, 1,374 discussion topics, and 16,593 wall posts all based, as you may assume, on the ideal that we judge people when they (I/we) use poor grammar. The Facebook group has attracted many to her BLOG, and she now is selling T-Shirts based on the theme.

Enough flattery. After all, I need to save face. Besides, the "Admirers of Unicycle Man" Facebook group that my friend, Laura, started, has a strong 26 members, 2 discussion topics (1 started by me), and no wall posts.

If there are two things I can say about Sharon it would be that she calls her own shots and she's always been a deal more ambitious than me... "I want Keith to be a musician, then I'd be dating a musician. I wish you were a musician, then my best friend would be a musician. But I want to be a musician, then I wouldn't need anything."

Did I mention she plays guitar now? She don't need nothing or nobody no more.

Hope I didn't commit any grammatical sins in today's post.

Pax Out.

PLMB,
Pav

MY ADIDAS!

2007-04-05T18:58:00.000-05:00

There’s an old Native American proverb: “Before you criticize a man, walk a mile in his moccasins.” Billy Connelly put it another way: “Before you judge a man, walk a mile in his shoes; after that, who cares? He’s a mile away and you’ve got his shoes”

BOB DYLAN Said this a few weeks ago on his "Theme Time Radio Hour" XM Radio show. The theme of the show: Shoes...

"I remember buying this record when it came out down at Saint Mark’s records in New York, actually bought the 12 inch single, and it blew my mind. It was a powerful, exciting piece of music. Now when people listen to it they think it’s quaint and old fashioned. They’re already condescending to it, turning it into an oldie. That’s the problem. People don’t always realize how powerful the innovators are. Take someone like Chuck Berry… When his records came out they were dangerous, there was nothing like ‘em on the radio. They were like a stampede. Now all these bands just play it louder and faster and don’t really add anything to it. And so Chuck Berry, the creator, sounds quaint and old fashioned. They’re doing the same thing to Run DMC. Rap records have gotten louder, more camouflaged, faster dirtier, with a thousand samples. Those records are colorful, but that doesn’t mean that Run DMC, the innovator, should just be considered oldies. They’re important pieces of art. And art isn’t something that’s looked at as old or new… It’s something that moves ya. And here’s a record that moves me, “My Adidas,” by Run DMC…

This was actually the first song from Run DMC that ever caught my ear. I'm conflicted when it comes to hip hop. I do think that KRS ONE, Run DMC, and Snoop are pretty good, the innovators. But Kanye West just hates white people and I keep hearin about some guy named Acorn or something. We need to remember where the music comes from. Anyway, keep it real.

PLMB,
PAV

THE VIOLENCE OF A SUMMER'S DREAM

2007-04-04T15:22:00.001-05:00

QUOTE OF THE MOMENT: "Democracy don't rule the world, You'd better get that in your head. This world is ruled by violence, But I guess that's better left unsaid." -Bob Dylan "Union Sundown

A good comment was made on my last PLOG:

How does capitalism promise a future based on present "violence" Doesn't it do the opposite--promise a good future on the non-violent free exchange of goods. That may indeed be false promise, but why is it "violent?"

I don't think that capitalism, or the free market necessarily justifies good ends by violent means, just that it has. Global industrial capitalism in the 20th and 21st centuries, and the institutions which have directed it, have centralized control over production in the hands of a few at the expense of the many. In the 1990s the number of living in global poverty increased by over 100,000,000 at the same time that global income rose by an average 2.5% annualy.

People are disassociated with the forces which guide our economic lives and I think are less free because of it. There is order in this system, no doubt, but not so much creativity. It is a matter of scale. Economics today are mediated by too large, anti-democratic organizations such as the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and the European Union. Those organizations, though well intentioned, have become politicized to the point that their actions do not take into account the health of individuals, just the largest measures of wealth such as national GDP. Economists are "people who know the price of everything and the value of nothing." (Oscar Wilde). There has to be something more.

The 1988 (I think) revisions to the General Agreement on Tarrifs and Trade (GATT) forced the third world to open their agricultural industries to the "free" and global market. This forced the farmers to overproduce for the much needed export income and to develop technology. This lead to thousands of people who lived off the land to to uproot and to move to slums of disease ridden cities. This is violence.

Yes, we fortunate Americans have more money, more buying power, and more capital, but too many are not as fortunate. The poor have to fit the mold of these large corporations to make it. There's no freedom in that kind of community. We may have the option to be involved in small businesses which can both protect our liberty and creativity, as well as compete against and with large extranational corporations, but that is becoming increasingly tough given the amount of competition out there. Bob Dylan said "just 'cause you're free to move doesn't mean you're free."

Just because the market isn't as free as it says we are is the problem, I think. It is all to centralized. I agree with G.K. Chesterton: "Now I am one of those who believe that the cure for centralization is decentralization. It has been described as a paradox. There is apparently something elvish and fantastic about saying that when capital has come to be too much in the hand of the few, the right thing is to restore it into the hands of the many."

This does not mean that we need to be socialists! Hell no. Socialists centralized production even more into as few and as large organizations as possible. There is no freedom in that, either.

The answer is to decentralize. By decentralization of production and ownership, we allow for both the orderliness of order, and the creativity and affection which thrive when economics is placed on the human-sized scale. If we didn't have all this bigness all around us (or maybe "over us" would be more apropriate), I think we would be happier... even if we had to buy locally made shoes... How many shoes do we need, anyway?

Look at music, since that is one of my themes, here... The bigger the record company, the more overproduced and, well, bad the music is.... When I was in Beijing, my name, Justin, was associated with Justin Timberlake. That's just about as far from free I ever want to be.

How about beer, since that's one of my themes here... Budweiser and Miller own everything. It is cheap, but don't we all like drinking microbrews? There's no freedom in Budweiser... If my bar wants to make its own beer, however, the community can have a say... That is democracy and freedom.

Alexis De Tocqueville said it best: "In the Republic of Mediocrity, Genius is dangerous."

PLMB,
PAV

This is just too much Genius to leave outta here:

Bob Dylan, "UNION SUNDOWN"

Well, my shoes, they come from Singapore,
My flashlight's from Taiwan,
My tablecloth's from Malaysia,
My belt buckle's from the Amazon.
You know, this shirt I wear comes from the Philippines
And the car I drive is a Chevrolet,
It was put together down in Argentina
By a guy makin' thirty cents a day.

Well, it's sundown on the union
And what's made in the U.S.A.
Sure was a good idea
'Til greed got in the way.

Well, this silk dress is from Hong Kong
And the pearls are from Japan.
Well, the dog collar's from India
And the flower pot's from Pakistan.
All the furniture, it says "Made in Brazil"
Where a woman, she slaved for sure
Bringin' home thirty cents a day to a family of twelve,
You know, that's a lot of money to her.

Well, it's sundown on the union
And what's made in the U.S.A.
Sure was a good idea
'Til greed got in the way.

Well, you know, lots of people complainin' that there is no work.
I say, "Why you say that for
When nothin' you got is U.S.-made?"
They don't make nothin' here no more,
You know, capitalism is above the law.
It say, "It don't count 'less it sells."
When it costs too much to build it at home
You just build it cheaper someplace else.

Well, it's sundown on the union
And what's made in the U.S.A.
Sure was a good idea
'Til greed got in the way.

Well, the job that you used to have,
They gave it to somebody down in El Salvador.
The unions are big business, friend,
And they're goin' out like a dinosaur.
They used to grow food in Kansas
Now they want to grow it on the moon and eat it raw.
I can see the day coming when even your home garden
Is gonna be against the law.

Well, it's sundown on the union
And what's made in the U.S.A.
Sure was a good idea
'Til greed got in the way.

Democracy don't rule the world,
You'd better get that in your head.
This world is ruled by violence
But I guess that's better left unsaid.
From Broadway to the Milky Way,
That's a lot of territory indeed
And a man's gonna do what he has to do
When he's got a hungry mouth to feed.

Well, it's sundown on the union
And what's made in the U.S.A.
Sure was a good idea
'Til greed got in the way.

LOVE THATS PURE

2007-04-03T22:10:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Love is all, it gives all, and it takes all." -Soren Kierkegaard
Current Music: Dylan "Blood on the Tracks"

I must confess, there is another reason I have brought back the PLOG. About two weeks ago, I was eating lunch in one of the dining halls on campus, and my friend, Marcial came up to me. He was already running late to class, but he seemed excited to tell me something. A Catholic Nun he befriended during his conversion to Catholicism two years ago had approached him earlier that day. Remembering that he had been in NROTC, she asked him, "do you know Justin Pav?" She would then tell him to tell me to bring the PLOG back. The story is, she had been Googling the University's last president, Rev. Edmund Dobbin in some sort of research, and found in an old PLOG entry (from 10 February 2005) a mention I had made to something he had written. No need to reiterate what I had written in that PLOG (it wasn't too flattering), but apparently this nun fan of mine got into the habit of reading the PLOG, and enjoyed it. When Marcial told me this, I was ecstatic. So thank you, both of you.

I've been thinking a lot about love and affection. Everything, as Kierkegaard mentions, is love. Yes, it is a big topic. I have, as I mentioned before, been spending a lot of my time thinking about and working on my thesis, which is on globalization. What does globalization have to do with love? I'm not sure. To put it simply, I think globalization is the process by which we are, as individuals and communities, becoming increasingly connected to and in relation with people across the world. Are these bonds, which are mediated, it seems, primarily by the ties of the increasingly global market, mediated at the same time, by love? I'm not sure.

Our economic lives should, I think, be ones of affection. We must love ourselves, our families, our work, and our communities. It is hard to love someone you don't know, and, what I call "the idolatry of bigness" which pervades our economic system militates against this. Consumerism, a fetish in itself, coupled with advertisement, promises individuality and competition, and often walks over those of us who want something more lasting.

In the 20th century, this has been the devastating failure of both capitalism and communism: they both promise happiness in the future by justifying violent means in the present. The violence of the means, Wendell Berry points out, always puts the good just out of reach.

I've had some bad love, and I think part of the problem is that we're "looking for love in all the wrong places." We lower ourselves by grabbing at everything, and end up with nothing. We won't find love in the market alone. Having stuff is good, but that is always a secondary good. We cannot look at people the same way... Seth Avett sings, "so selfish when greed sets in. Possession, the king of sin."

We wont find it in the market, we will find it in art and beauty. I know that my bad loves have to do with this. This is why good art (music, in particular) is so important to me. I've learned more about life and love from music than I ever could have from TV or school. I mean that... "What I needed most was to love and to be loved, eager to be caught. Happily I wrapped those painful bonds around me; and sure enough, I would be lashed with the red-hot pokers or jealousy, by suspicions and fear, by burst of anger and quarrels." -St. Augustine.

Augustine, thank God, by the grace of God, found the right kind of love, in God. Dylan wrote (I mean, stole from 1 Corinthians... that's why it is so good!):

Love that's pure hopes all things,
Believes all things, won't pull no strings,
Won't sneak up into your room, tall, dark and handsome,
Capture your heart and hold it for ransom.

You don't want a love that's pure
You wanna drown love
You want a watered-down love

That's all I'm looking for... A love that's pure, I don't wanna drown love, I don't want a watered-down love. When I leave Villanova I want to be remembered as somebody who tried to love somebody.

They call me the seeker.

PLMB,
PAV

I ain't gone 'n' give up on love
Love won't give up on me
I ain't gone 'n' give up on love
Love ain't gone 'n' give up on me
Every tear that I've cried
Only washed away the fear inside
Now I, I ain't gone 'n' give up on love
-Stevie Ray Vaughan
Here's a great version by Eric Clapton at Double Trouble's reunion, years after Stevie's death.

WE CAME FOR SALVATION

2007-03-28T13:18:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "They may pay us off with fame but that is not why we came, and if it compromises truth then we will go... We came for salvation, we came for family, we came for all that's good that's how we'll walk away. we came to break the bad, we came to cheer the sad, we came to leave behind the world a better way." -The Avett Brothers "Salvation Song"
Current Music: Bruce Springsteen "Born in the U.S.A." Album

Last Saturday my unicycle was stolen. I forgot it at the NROTC building just inside the door. I have "forgotten" it there many times (sometimes for days). One night I actually forgot it outside the building leaning up against the wall next to the doors. I'm sure this seems weird. I guess it means I'm an optimist. Maybe I shouldn't trust people so much. Anyway, I came in on Sunday afternoon and it wasn't where I left it. I filed a report with public safety and got a call from them on Sunday morning. They said they had it down at their building. A public safety officer had picked it up on Saturday and brought it in, so I went down in the afternoon and picked it up.

Now to the point. I think the unicycle is part of my identity here, and I like it. I was already planning how I could not pay my rent for next month and buy a new one. Maybe sleep in the quad or something... Anyway, I didn't want to graduate without it. My last month at Villanova WILL be a month with my ride.

Now to the point. I more or less feel the same way about the PLOG. I know the PLOG got stale this year, and I haven't been able to write so much on account of "responsibilities." But my memory is weak, and I was reading some of my posts from April, Freshman year, 2004. Those were GREAT times. Reading them reminded me of how much I've done in my time in college, and how much I've matured and grown. The PLOG is my medium. I don't care if people don't read it... It is part of my identity here, and I like it. Anyway, I don't want to graduate without it. My last month at Villanova WILL be a month with the PLOG.

What is college about? It is about wisdom. As I wrote in a Testimonial for the Humanities Department (my major): "[University] will prepare you for success in any field if you are willing to ask for yourself with an open mind “What does it mean to be successful?” Aristotle said that the desired end of all human action is happiness. Let us, then, talk first about what it means to be happy. What could be more practical?!"

We came to University for salvation, for family, for all that's good and that's how we'll walk away. We came to break the bad, to cheer the sad, to leave behind the world a better way.

That's why we came, and that's how I'll walk away.

Peace, Love, and Monkey Business,
PAV

2007-02-03T00:06:00.001-05:00

Ontoblogology is dead

plmb,
pav

2006-12-13T18:01:00.000-05:00

THE BEST OF THE PLOG, REVISITED.

Posted On: 2 May 2004. 22:01:12
Current Music: Sex Pistols "Nevermind the Bullocks, here are the Sex Pistols"
Quote of the Moment: Me: "Merlini, you're a moron"
Merlini: "No one ever said a Weasle is smart"
Me: "No one even ever thought it"
Merini: "Touche, salesman"

I Know, it's only been 1 hour since my last post. But I have something to say.

I've been pissed off for at least the last four or five days. Considering that I'm already a pissed off wanker, downer, loser MO FO, Me saying I'm in a bad mood is a bad thing.

So why?

Its these EXAMS! So here's Pav, listening to the Sex Pistols, for Heaven's sake, Rothenberg is about to hang himself with his pogie, Fallon just asked me to come down and kill him, Rustico is eating weed, and I hate you. Exams are pure, concentrated evil, Just like the pink slime from GhostBusters II. Its feeding off all the bad vibes that have been building up in Villanova students all year. It's turning us all against each other and against ourselves. In fact, I was walking outside Simpson earlier and I couldnt believe my eyes, in the crack by our door I saw some of this evil creeping through the holes of the sidewalk....

Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid.

Luckily, I was able to contain some of this before it got too out of control...
So what do we do? The only solution is to download some Bob Marley, Leslie Gore and James Taylor, all hold hands, sing, pray and think happy thoughts. Also, chew some weed to help relax your nerves, if you feel so inclined. But above all this... Who We gonna call? ..... You Know it!

Good Luck on Exams.

Pav

TWO TURNTABLES AND A MICROPHONE

2006-11-16T00:16:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: “A pure democracy is a society consisting of a small number of citizens, who assemble and administer the government in person.”
Current Music: Flaming Lips “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots”
Current Wikipedia.com “Fact” of the Moment: “According to legend, if a virgin crosses the Arts Quad at midnight, the statues of Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White will walk off their pedestals, meet in the center of the Quad, and shake hands.” –Legend of Cornell University

It has been a while since my last post. Life has been challenging, but satisfying. Besides having lengthy debates over metaphysics with Fisher, the Marines have spent a week in the field, I’ve gotten over a rather terrible series of events concerning dental surgery, my car is once again in the shop, and Whiskey Company is getting ready to bring sexy back this weekend at Cornell University.

A few weeks ago, Fisher and I went to see Beck in concert in Upper Darby. The concert was surreal. Beck has a real flair for the absurd, while always producing moving and exciting music. In the center stage was a stage… Um, a puppet stage. The entire concert, 4 puppeteers used marionette puppets of the band to mimic the band as they played. They strummed their guitars, hit their puppet drums, and banged on keyboards in time with the actual performance. The huge projection screen behind the two stages showed the puppets for the entire concert, not the real performers. Beck came out in a full tuxedo with red cummerbund and an oversized red bowtie. For the encore, he came out in a full bear suit to rap the next two songs. For the acoustic set, the rest of the band sat down at a dinner table full set with dinnerware and played percussion on the classes and plates with knives and spoons. Remarkable.

I had a dream a while back that Neil Young and George Thorogood came to ‘Nova and played in our university’s center square. After the show I was the only one who was able to sneak back where their bus was. I had to hide my nunchucks under a set of stairs so they wouldn’t think I was coming to fight them. They were cooking hotdogs on a grill in the rain and they had all these terrible books about existentialism. I was trying, to no avail, to explain to George that he was responsible for my musical awakening and he was laughing at me. Neil asked me how many lines I just snorted and I said “none.” I think he was disappointed.

Last weekend was also the Marine Corps birthday. A good time.

PLMB,
PAV

2006-10-26T22:16:00.000-05:00

Beck-

NAVY ROCKS OUT

2006-10-21T09:15:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Villanova coach Jay Wright just got cooler in the eyes of his players and their classmates. That happened last night when he introduced G-Unit rappers into the Pavilion.

Hip-hop stars 50 Cent and Tony Yayo performed for fans as part of Hoops Mania.

Wright got bonus points for getting the "G-G-G-Unit" down before bringing Yayo onto the court.

The capacity crowd was equally impressed with the introduction of the players as the rappers. Not surprisingly, Curtis Sumpter stole the show.

Before he even descended through the student crowd to the floor, the fans were chanting his name. Sumpter spent all last season on the bench and in rehabilitation for a torn knee ligament, the second time he suffered the injury."

-Article from Today's Philadelphia Inquirer

Current Music: Neil Young "Silver and Gold"
Current Wikipedia.com "Fact" of the Moment: "The United States Navy has nearly 500,000 personnel, approximately a quarter of whom are in ready reserve. Of those on active duty, more than eighty percent are enlisted sailors while commissioned officers make up around fifteen percent; the rest are midshipmen of the Naval Academy."

Thanks a ton, Wikipedia, for leaving out the rest of us Midshipmen in NROTC. Poor form.

PLOG field reporter Karl Fisher sent me this article from The Onion. Enjoy:

Life In The Navy Rocks Even Harder Than The Commercial Implied

Issue 41•46

By CPO Dan Gazanski

After I graduated from high school, I was making good money painting houses, my girlfriend was cool with a rockin' little bod, and I partied almost every night. But after a year or so, I started to wonder: "If someone wrote a book about my life, would anyone want to read it?"

I wanted discipline and training, but I didn't want to give up my hard-rockin' lifestyle. Where, I wondered, could that elusive combination of rigid authoritarian structure and unbridled monster power chords be found? Then I saw a commercial for the U.S. Navy. That's when I knew what to do with my life.

And guess what? The U.S. Navy kicks ass, dude. From the time we're awoken at 06:00 by System Of A Down or Disturbed till we drift off to sleep to an instrumental guitar version of "Taps" performed by Zakk Wylde, it's a nonstop rock block.

How do I even begin to describe the constant barrage of adrenaline-fueled, over-the-top kick-assitude that is the U.S. Navy? Every day is like a rapid-fire montage sequence of high-tech action and thrill-ride imagery that makes your head spin.

One minute, I'm crouched on the deck of an aircraft carrier barking something into a helmet-mounted headset that you can't even friggin' hear because the music's so loud. Next, I'm dashing through the Mojave under the weight of a large pack and jumping out of a helicopter into the ocean wearing some kind of James Bond one-man submersible scuba suit. If I'm not roarin' down the high seas with the wind in my hair and 800 pounds of rad-ass Batman gear strapped to my uniform, I'm standing at perfect attention in my dress whites, whippin' a sword around like I'm a samurai master.

Even basic training was an edgy, quick-cut mosaic of running and climbing and shooting and learning and Pantera riffs. There was this rad obstacle course we did twice a day carrying sandbags, and when you did it, it was like you could feel yourself morph from an average guy into one of the sword-carrying knights of old. I may not have slain actual dragons, but when I came out, I looked just like Iron Man, and my father was very impressed with the changes that he saw in me.

Serving aboard the U.S.S. Abraham Linkin Park, which is just about the most hardcore carrier in the fleet, I spend the morning working on high-tech projects like blowing up long-range sea targets with giant artillery guns. In the afternoon, it's firing missiles, Tomahawks, and torpedoes into the sea. And my nights? Getting valuable intel off our way-advanced radar screens. That's when I don't dart off in a super-fast motorboat in full frogman gear to train in underwater demolition and special ops, emerging from the water at sunrise.

But there's also these quieter moments that really put things in perspective. Usually, it's when me and my multiethnic buddies are coming back from a long, kick-ass day, and we experience an unspoken moment of camaraderie. The music shifts to a power ballad, and we take a minute before the American flag to gaze in silence at the epic sunset. When I glance at my friends' chiseled faces and see their quiet pride and masculinity, I realize that I made the right choice. Sometimes, we're joined by a flying eagle, but the eagle isn't a pet of ours, it just kind of appears superimposed behind us like 50 feet tall when things get patriotic.

I gotta admit, though, as much as the Navy rocks out, I'm not sure if I'll be making a permanent career out of it. Sometimes, when I'm flying around in my F/A-18 Hornet, I imagine myself morphing out of my action gear into a three-piece suit heading up my own Fortune 500 company which I built on the skills the Navy taught me.

When I get shore leave and go home to visit my family and old friends, they can't hide their pride. As the background music slows to a stately march, my normally hard-as-nails dad salutes me and shakes my hand with tears in his eyes.

I'm sure glad that I didn't join the Marines. All those guys seem to do is climb sheer mountain faces with their bare hands.

PUT YOUR "V"s UP, NOVA NATION!

Peace, Love, Monkey Business,

PAV

I AINT SUPERSTITIOUS BUT A BLACK CAT JUST CROSSED MY TRAIL

2006-10-16T15:48:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "What we all know is that you can't hide on a dark street from the demon within" -Dylan
Current Music: Beck "Sea Change"
Current Wikipedia.com "Fact" of the Moment: "Since the 1880s, the color black has been associated with anarchism. The black cat, in an alert, fighting stance was later adopted as an anarchist symbol."

I got a feeling the great forces in the world have been playing a little game of "Job" on me the last few weeks. Three weeks ago was a very tough academic and ROTC week, with tests, papers to go along with aviation physicals and exams. The next week I missed due to a nice case of strep throat... the sickest I've been since sophomore or junior year of high school. Last week was fall break and I got my wisdom teeth out on Tuesday. I spent a day with a high fever and the swelling is just starting to go down now, 6 days after. I still can't chew and I've lost over 10 pounds. To make all that worse, the Steelers had lost three games in a row before yesterday. That is suffering.

But all that is changing now. Steelers blew out the Chefs 45-7 to go along nicely with losses from the Raisins and the Bungles, I have my health back, and I'm looking forward to eating solid foods.

To make this even better, Volkswagon has featured Nigel Tufnell, England's LOUDEST guitarist, in its latest ad campaign. Anyway, Fahrvergnugen!

Volkswagen Nigel Commercial

PLMB,
PAV

2006-10-05T01:57:00.000-05:00

Avett Brothers- Denouncing November Blue

EQUALITY

2006-09-30T18:07:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: Manley: "Sir, were you in Whiskey company?"Admiral William J. Fallon: "IT’S THE ONLY COMPANY!"
Current Music: Wilco "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot"
Current Wikipedia.com "Fact" of the Moment: Alexis de Tocqueville is quoted as saying "Americans are so enamoured of equality they would rather be equal in slavery than unequal in freedom."

My boy Alexis was right. Liberty, Dylan sang "is just equality in school. 'Equality,' I spoke the word as if a wedding vow, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now."

Being 21 this year, I've begun to enjoy the benefits of a full fledged "adult" here at Villanova... er, uh, I mean I can drink alcohol. These benefits have included going out to the bar with friends and family. One thing which has driven me nuts, though, has been the lack of quality of the musical entertainment. Disclaimer: I have been accused of being a musical snob on numerous occasions. That said, I think the masses are musically retarded. Bar bands play the songs which are expected from and accepted by the college crowd. I'm going to make a judgment claim that it is all crap. The musicians, no doubt, are very talented, but they show no attempt at doing at trying to play anything worth hearing. They all play the same setlist (Bon Jovi, Mellencamp, AC/DC songs) every week. It isn't that that music is bad, it just is too predictable. Why have a live band when a DJ would play the exact same thing?

It is all, may we say, equal? Equal in its lack of excellence, I may add. I don't think everyone should listen to the same things I do, but I think we’d do good to expect a little more than “living on a prayer” every time we go out. Music is too amazing to waste.

Maybe I’m just bitter because I don’t have as much talent as these performers. Lets face it, nothing clears the room here at the House than when I pick up the old banjo.
…
Last night, Karl Fisher and I went to Sellersville to see The Avett Brothers, one of my absolute favorites. When you first listen to them you are struck by their power and energy, but after a few listens, the beauty and brilliance of the songwriting shines through. They write some of the best lyrics I’ve ever heard. Beyond that, they are remarkably nice guys. I talked to Scott Avett before the show and he said “oh, the last time I saw you was at the New York show.” Thanks for remembering, Scott. He asked how my dad was doing, and I let him go to rock. Why do I ramble on about these guys? They are that good. After you see them you feel like you’re part of something special.

I have seen the Avetts 5 times this year, but this was my favorite show. The venue was nice, but had theatre style seating and all seats were assigned. Before the show Fish and I moved right up next to the stage. The crowd was patient and polite, but I would have liked to see more hair on more heads, and I don’t know how people can sit in comfy cushiony chairs for an Avett Brothers set. The group played for about 2 hours, but near the end of the set they dedicated “The Offering” to a young couple in the audience, after the song, the guy proposed. Nice.

Like I said, the crowd was relatively calm, except for “The Caveman.” Anyone at the show knows who I’m talking about. There was this guy in jeans and a white t-shirt with the sleeves cut off. He had more hair on his face than probably all the other guys in the audience had on their heads, combined. He was doing a fantastic job of dancing in front of the stage and giving Bob high-fives without spilling his beer. He is our leader.

For the encore the band closed with “Nothing Short of Thankful…” Funny, that’s just what I was feeling!

I may be 21 now, but...

Yes, my guard stood hard when abstract threats
Too noble to neglect
Deceived me into thinking
I had something to protect
Good and bad, I define these terms
Quite clear, no doubt, somehow.
Ah, but I was so much older then,
I'm younger than that now.

PeaceLoveMonkeyBusiness,
PAV

2006-09-21T20:17:00.001-05:00

Unicycling: Annapolis, MD pt. 1

2006-09-21T20:17:00.000-05:00

Unicycling: Annapolis, MD pt. 2

LEGENDS NEVER DIE

2006-09-17T20:53:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Remember kid, there's heroes and there's legends. Heroes get remembered but legends never die, follow your heart kid, and you'll never go wrong." -Babe Ruth (From "The Sandlot")
Current Music: Neil Young "Silver and Gold"
Current Wikipedia.com "Fact" of the Moment: Babe Ruth's Called Shot was the name given to a home run hit by Babe Ruth against the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field during the 1932 World Series. The home run gained fame when it was reported that Ruth, during an at bat in game 3 of the series, made a pointing gesture to the center field bleachers, an apparent declaration he would hit a home run to this direction. On the next pitch, Ruth hit a home run to the spot he had supposedly pointed towards, and a few reporters later wrote that Ruth had "called his shot".

"Let me tell you something kid; Everybody gets one chance to do something great. Most people never take the chance, either because they're too scared, or they don't recognize it when it spits on their shoes."

The Babe said that.

I had two such chances to do something great this weekend. I met Miss USA and made a blindfolded shot in Beer Pong last night. Sometimes we're called to greatness, and sometimes a man's just got to do what a man's got to do.

Peace, Love, Monkey Business,
Pav

READ IT AND WEEP, JARED

2006-09-13T20:12:00.001-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Stop eating all our steaks you fat lard! Go back to college and get a griflriend and eat her food!" -Jenna
Current Music: Merle Haggard "Workin Man Blues"
Current Wikipedia.com "Fact" of the Moment: Tara Elizabeth Conner (born on December 18, 1985) is a beauty queen who is Miss USA 2006 and has also competed at Miss Teen USA. Conner graduated from Russell County High School in 2004 and at the time of her Miss USA win was studying toward a degree in Business Administration from Somerset Community College. Apart from her role as Miss USA, Conner has been employed as a model and waitress. Conner represented the United States at the Miss Universe 2006 pageant on July 23, 2006 in Los Angeles, California and was named fourth runner-up.

This Friday, the Uniformed Service Organization is having a gala in Philadelphia to award Admiral William J. Fallon the Liberty Award. Fallon is a 'Nova grad and the commander of the Pacific Command. Villanova NROTC got a table and I jumped at the chance to attend... Free food, a good chance to hang out with Nova's new president, the Colonel, and the Admiral. And oh yes, Miss USA 2006, Tara Conner will be there. This is my chance to make my move.

I wonder if she'll wear the same thing on Friday...

I've been thinking in lists, so here's my Definitive Top Five Greatest Voices of Rock 'N' Roll (In no particular order):
Van Morrison- "Turn it up, turn it up, radio, little bit louder, radio, its got soul"... His voice is 'sweet as Tupelo Honey, just like honey from the bee.
Joe Cocker- "What would you do If I sang out of tune?"... I'd keep listening
Janis Joplin- "Work me LORD! Please don't you leave me, I feel so useless down here with no one to love though I've looked everwhere!" ... Your unhappy little girl blues just hits the spot
Paul McCartney- "Hey Judy Judy Judy Judy Judy!!!!"... I'm gonna tell Aunt Marry about Uncle John
Robert Plant- "baby baby baby baby baby baby baby baby I'm a-gonna leave you"... I scream, you scream, we all scream for that Led-Zeppelin thing.

Good list, I know.

And now, Part 3 of my series "The search for America's greatest Italian Hoagie Maker." Today: SUBWAY. First of all, when I went into the place to get my hoagie, I noticed the workers' aprons read "Sandwhich Artist." We'll see. I've never been a big Subway fan. And here's why: When I picture the Subway corporation, I picture some geek who has no love or understanding of the form or nature of the Hoagie sitting in his office in the basement of some tall building in New York or Chigago, calculating how slicing the meat 1/16 of an inch thinnner will same them a few million dollars. And sure enough, the Art of hoagie making is now a science. You can watch the workers as they pick and pull the meat to get just the prescribed amount. The outcome: a soulless sandwhich. A hoagie made from a mathematic formula and not love misses the whole point. They are cheap with the meat and give you a ton of lettuce to try to make up for it. A clever ploy, my friends, but don't be fooled. The bread is good, but beyond that, Subway, you're dead to me... I give you a D... Plus, I hate Jon Lovitz.... How can you not?

Nothing heavy tonight, baby.

Peace Out.

PLMB,
PAV

SITTIN' ON TOP OF THE WORLD

2006-09-11T15:11:00.000-05:00

Quote Of the Moment: "My philosophy of life is... if you can prove it then I don't give a shit about it." -Dr. Smith (Chair Of Villanova's Humanities and Augustinian Traditions department)
Current Music: U2 "ZOOROPA"
Current Wikipedia.com "Fact" of the Moment: "Modern Times has become Dylan's first #1 album in the US since 1976's Desire, thus making Dylan the oldest living person ever to have an album enter the Billboard charts at number one. [1] Modern Times sold 192,000 copies in its first week of release in the States. It also reached #1 in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Denmark, Norway and Switzerland, debuted #2 in Germany, Austria and Sweden. It reached #3 in the UK and The Netherlands."

What Professor Smith is getting at, I think, is something we all should consider. In an age in which science is hailed for its ability to describe our world, we tend to disregard anything "unprovable." Most of life, I would argue, is unprovable. Can you prove that there is a God? or that your mom loves you? or that the sun will rise tomorrow? I don't think so. But just because you can't prove them doesn't mean they aren't truths. It takes a certain faith to understand these things, but that doesn't imply ignorance. There has to be more to life than that which we can prove through the scientific method. Dr. Smith's point is that the things which cannot be proven are the things which matter the most... Love, God, Faith, Friendship, Life... Getting tied up with the simpler, material parts of life without regard to their relation to our higher being is distructive of our most "human" nature. Anyway, I don't give a shit about that, either.

And now the fun stuff. Several things:
1. Dylan's album, Modern Times, whch came out last Tuesday, is Billboard's NUMBER 1 album!!! This is Bob's first No. 1 in thirty years, since his 1976 release "Desire" and sold almost 200,000 copies in the first week. I like it, but will refrain from giving any real critique. Dylan's music has a way of slowly revealing itself to you. A lot of people would give this album a quick listen, be passively interested, and let it gain some dust on the shelf. But every time you give it a listen, it will make a new impression. Maybe in a few years I'll start to really appreciate it, which is what happened to me with his 2001 album "Love and Theft." No good thing comes easy, and Dylan appreciation is the same way. Dylan is, to use the words of Homer Simpson "Soft and yielding like a nerf ball, yet strong and powerful like a gorilla."

2. Maria Won the US Open Saturday in straight sets! She is so cute!

3. Football has started again, which means Steelers time, baby! Looking forward to a good season after a great opening week against the Dolphins.

Our house attack-dog, Jameson, finally got his first taste of blood. Unfortunately, it was mine:

Here's us at in less agressive moment... Jameson loves Neil Young. Notice Timothy Treadwell in the background:

It is a good time to be alive. Today is 5 years since September 11, 2001. Let's not forget.

PLMB,
PAV

TRUTHINESS REVISITED

2006-09-05T23:33:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Well, for me, there is no right and there is no left. There's truth and there's untruth, y'know? There's honesty and there's hypocrisy. Look in the Bible: you don't see nothing about right or left. I hate to keep beating people over the head with the Bible, but that's the only instrument I know, the only thing that stays true."-Dylan
Current Music: Neil Young
Current Wikipedia.com "Fact" of the Moment: Truthiness is a satirical term coined by Stephen Colbert in reference to the quality by which a person claims to know something intuitively, instinctively, or "from the gut" without regard to evidence, logic, intellectual examination, or actualfacts.

If knowledge were power, I'd be a fascist dictator, this is the PLOG.

I think Villanova has just about lost its soul. How many times have you been in a discussion about something important and just as things are starting to get good, someone in the group says "well, it's just a matter of personal belief, anyway." At that point, it's over. I just hang my head and mope on my way. Villanovans have no desire to investigate truth. Anything that is hard to figure out becomes nothing more than personal opinion to us. This is a damn shame. I don't claim to have all the answers, but I'm not afraid to engage in conversation with other people... especially regarding my faith. But Villanova students are afraid of the topic, and besides being absolutely generally and embarrassingly retarded when it comes to articulating their faith, they don't even seem to care to try. Perhaps this comes from a skeptic tradition of relying on science to explain our universe. Yet, the science of our time far too often describes what is happening in the material world, not why. Discussion of purpose and meaning become irrelevent, and therefore also my teleological view of the world. I'm an anachronism, a relic.

I digress. So, let's get this out of the way. Lets make REVOLUTIONARY assumption that there is truth and untruth, and that some theories of the world are more true than others. If you can't give me this, you have to stop making value judgments of other people's world views including, but not limited to Islamic extremism, atheism, Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, Marxism, conservativism, liberalism, Americanism... you get the idea.

Case in point. Last week's VILLANOVAN newspaper had an article in the "Opinion" section titled "Introducing Christopher Bellotti." Here are the first three paragraphs:

The Yankees are better than the Red Sox. The United States is the greatest country in the world. Villanova University is among a select few truly special schools in the nation. Shakira is better than Jessica Simpson and Kelly Clarkson. War and capital punishment are necessary in today's day and age even though they are completely unfortunate. "V for Vendetta" is the best movie of 2006. Regarding laws, the United States is currently backwards on the issues of abortion and gay marriage. Techno is the most underrated music genre in America. Voicing an opinion in any way, shape or form is one of the most important things a person can do.

For some, the above statements might look like a bunch of words written by a guy with a big enough ego to pollute the school newspaper with his own opinions. For others, they may have either validated personal beliefs or caused loathsome discomfort. No matter the reaction, it is the reason you are still reading. Words have power. To quote "V for Vendetta," "Words will always retain their power. Words offer the means to meaning, and for those who listen, the annunciation of truth."

If I know anything absolute about truth, it is that truth is relative. There are very few other absolutes in this world, and I'd prefer to let Saint Augustine handle them. As far as I am concerned, I know that there is more than one side to every argument, and I certainly understand that most opinions are based on acquired knowledge and experience. An opinion is a good thing for a number of different reasons-the most important being that it is a person's idea of the truth.

Alright, lets stop there... What a prick. No, Chris, your opinions neither "validated my personal beliefs," nor did they "cause loathsome discomfort." I'm more sorry for you than anything else. And just because words may offer the means to meaning, not just any words annunciate truth. Chris, How did you get into Villanova? And more fundamentally, what are you doing in College? Did you come here to inform your "opinions" so you can make a more comfortable truth for yourself? Because it sounds like you've got some really great opinions, er, uh, not. No, really, what the hell are you doing here!?... you clearly aren't here to find truth...

The last few paragraphs:
Never fear voicing your opinions. We are all human, and no opinion is more important than another. When you hold back, you aren't being honest, and the most valuable thing you can give to society is your honesty.

As for me, next week, I'll move away from the elusiveness of relativity and swing to another one of my opinions.

After all, as far as I am concerned, everything I said is the truth.

This is all bullshit... there, that's my opinion, Christopher. Be careful what you ask for, you just might get PLOGGED. If all this talk doesn't arouse a little passion in you, you might just be another victim of truthiness. The cure? You just got it.

I mean, if it was good enough for Socrates...

Peace, Love, and Monkey Business,
PAV

WHAT IS THIS CRAP DOING ON THE PLOG?

2006-08-29T23:48:00.000-05:00

In a Futile attempt to make the PLOG something meaningful, here's something I actually put thought into:

In the first chapters of Theodore Lowi’s The End of the Republican Era, there is presented a neat progression of political change in the role and reach of the federal government. Though both liberal and conservative philosophies are acknowledged for their place in the formation of an American public and political tradition, Lowi’s assertion that liberalism’s downfall lead to the emergence and “coming together of genuine conservative and radical right elements hitherto parochial and dispersed (p. 79)” is an inaccurate view of American history. Granted the seemingly unarguable position that the “quintessential liberalism,” which Lowi claims to be “precisely what the original Constitution embraced” (p. 9) no longer exists, I argue that such ideology never played the role in shaping American culture we are lead to believe.

The first three words of Lowi’s volume: “To John Locke.” Immediately associating John Lock with the American founding places America in a context we have become familiar with hearing: “Americans had marched out of the state of nature to the cadence of the social contract, just as John Lock had laid it all out (p. 3).” Yet, Lowi admits, Americans had “discovered the social contract forty-eight years before Locke” with the Mayflower Compact. Was this, as Lowi would lead us to believe, a remarkably advanced, philosophically motivated, and conscious effort to create a new kind of “liberated” society? Though politically convenient, a more historically accurate view is that of the American experience in terms of the creation of an ordered liberty. Though radically different than anything existing in Europe at the time, the early settlers of The New World were more interested in the freedom to practice their own civil religion than in creating a liberal and capitalist society. In actuality, early settlements and cultures in the Americas were strongly localized and diverse. Though the Quakers in Pennsylvania emphasized tolerance, they, along with the Puritans in New England and the Cavaliers in Virginia settlements had strong convictions about faith’s role in civic society. As Russell Kirk writes, “whether or not all human beings may be redeemed from sin in this life, Quaker principles could not fend off tomahawk and scalping-knife. So, their personal order not consisting with a tolerable public order, the knotty old problems of defense in the realm undid the Quakers as a possible leading force in American society[1].” The revolution and Constitution, conservatives argue, grew out of the natural tendency to protect the rights and practices of their fathers. American’s did not “come out of the state of nature” with the ratification of the Constitution, if they indeed did at all. Though the founders were undoubtedly aware of Locke, liberal ideology played a minimal role in the attempt to preserve the colonies’ cultures. \

Liberals, Lowi included, cite America’s creed (the rights to “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness”) as the very soul of the American Revolution and culture. If such liberal individualism was indeed the basis of early American sentiment, however, how can one reconcile the dominance of faith in the early Americas? Tocqueville writes of the diversity of American religion:

They all differ in respect to the worship which is due to the Creator; but they all agree in respect to the duties which are due from man to man. Each sect adores the Deity in its own peculiar manner, but all sects preach the same moral law in the name of God… Religion in America takes no direct part in the government of society, but it must be regarded as the first of their political institutions; for if it does not impart a taste for freedom, it facilitates the use of it.[2]

In light of this, the idea of American liberalism and individualism must be a phenomenon which took hold in the public mind some time after the founding. Lowi’s thesis that American culture started with and therefore must be defined by liberal capitalism, and the assertion that liberalism has fallen because of an encroaching moralism from both sides of the political spectrum overlook the fact that communal neutrality is inevitably instable and temporary. An ordered commitment to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” was already a part of the localized American cultures, and something the colonial aristocracy were willing to fight for. Lowi writes, “Liberalism was radicalized by its own movement through rights toward morality, followed by a fast descent toward uncontrollable fragmentation and collapse. Such is the nature of the tragedy that the best of liberalism was to be undone by a poor rendering into laws of its highest ideals (p. 78).” If this claim be true, then liberalism’s “highest ideals” were perhaps incompatible with the intended federalist system, if not human nature.

[1] Kirk, Russell. The Roots of American Order, 4th ed. Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2003. pp. 335-336
[2] Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America. ed. Phillips Bradley, New York: Knopf, 1948, Vol. 1. pp. 303

ON NOTICE

2006-08-25T17:44:00.000-05:00

Lets Check and See who has been put "ON NOTICE!"

Here to put the fire and brimstone back in the internet, this is the PLOG.

PLMB,
PAV

SHOES MATTER?

2006-08-24T21:01:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Fell like a broke down engine aint got no drivin wheel" -Dylan "Broke Down Engine
Current Music: The Avett Brothers "Minonette"
Current Wikipedia.com "Fact" of the Moment: "The Villanova University Grotto. This beautifully landscaped walkway between Corr Hall, Falvey Library, and Alumni Hall on the west side of Main Campus often hosts outdoor mass and other large gatherings, and is a charter stop on the walking tour of the university. The area boasts dozens of the varied tree species that help the entire campus earn its place as a certified arboretum. It is reportedly where Jim Croce wrote "Bad, Bad, Leroy Brown."

But if it's "Bad, Bad Justin Pav" it must be the PLOG!

School started up again yesterday, but not before a last minute ditch effort to suck up every last piece of freedom lingering in the warm August air.

On Saturday I saw the Bob Dylan show in Frederick, Maryland. On Sunday, Dad took us kids up to New York City to see the Avett Brothers on an exclusive boat cruise concert around Manhattan. Then yesterday I saw Dylan again in Reading, PA. At Frederick, we were in about the third row at the left corner of the stage, so in Reading I wanted to move back and toward the middle a bit, sacrificing a wee bit of the closeness for a different angle. The "Photostapo" were awful in Frederick, so I wasn't able to get any pictures, but I was able to get more in Reading, and a few video's too.

I had seen Dylan 3 times in the last two years, and have done extensive research on his past setlists. I read reviews of individual concerts from people who, like me, care about such details. But just when I thought I knew what was coming, notably, the opening tracks "Maggie's Farm" and "The Times They are A-Changin,'" Dylan comes out and mixes everything up. Here are the setlists:

Saturday:

1.	Maggie's Farm
2.	The Times They Are A-Changin'
3.	Lonesome Day Blues
4.	Positively 4th Street
5.	Stuck Inside Of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again
6.	'Til I Fell In Love With You
7.	To Ramona
8.	Cold Irons Bound
9.	Girl Of The North Country
10.	Highway 61 Revisited
11.	Sugar Baby
12.	Summer Days

	(encore)
13.	Like A Rolling Stone
14.	All Along The Watchtower

Wednesday:

1.	Cat's In The Well
2.	You Ain't Goin' Nowhere
3.	Tweedle Dee & Tweedle Dum
4.	Lay, Lady, Lay
5.	Watching The River Flow
6.	High Water (For Charley Patton)
7.	Not Dark Yet
8.	Tangled Up In Blue
9.	Make You Feel My Love
10.	Highway 61 Revisited
11.	Lenny Bruce
12.	Summer Days

	(encore)
13.	Like A Rolling Stone
14.	Rainy Day Women #12 & 35

Now, Dylan always keeps you guessing, but when he opens with "Cat's in the Well" and then follows it up with "You Aint Goin Nowhere"... you know you're in for a ride. So that was a blast. He didn't play one song from the first set in in the second until the 10th song with "Highway 61." What variety!

Here's one of those vids I was talking so much about:

Dylan- "Watching The River Flow" Harp Solo

But between the Dylan shows and while we were waiting for the Avett Brothers concert, my Dad, Sisters and I had a chance to walk around New York. Come Lunch time we enter a deli on Manhattan and I order the one thing I know and love most... Which brings me to Part 2 of my series "The search for America's greatest Italian Hoagie Maker." Today, New York City is on the grinder. I don't have the time or interest to go to every deli in New York, so I'm using this one deli to make sweeping generalizations about the whole city... Good Luck, New York.

The sandwhich I ordered, at first glance, looked solid. They chopped fresh lettuce and utilized a tapeless wrapping technique which shows the ingenuity you'd expect from a deli that calls New York its home That's fantastic, but on further inspection, this hoagie was flirting with disaster from the start. The hoagie maker lacked the sence of proper proportion which is essential to appreciating the full flavor of the integrated ingredients. Much like a symphony, the brilliance of an "A" grade Italian Hoagie rests fully upon the integration of the parts, which by themselves are inadequate. But when brought together properly, they create something more powerful and beautiful than one simple onion or violin could ever achieve alone. To keep the with the metaphore, the onions in this sandwhich were playing too loud, the meat was out of tune, and the peppers played with no passion.

New York City, you're dead to me.

Other than that, I've just been settlin in up in the boiler room at the Whiskey Factory with Steve Vrabel and helping train Treacy's dog, Jameson, how to kill bunnies/furbies. "Go for the Jugular, Ja-Mo!!!!"

...They're both mangy muts, if you ask me

Another thing happened to me this week which changed the way I look at the world. From talking with Kellie, I have learned that shoes matter for guys. There was a certain stud last year at Villanova who we all thought was the greatest guy ever. But apparently, girls weren't that into him because he had bad taste in shoes. This astounds me. I dont even know what to believe about life anymore. Now every morning when I wake up I'm sweating from the nightmares over which shoes are supposed to go with which outfit.

More on "Pav's Shoe Crisis of 2006" as details come out.

....

The PLOG: It's What Lincoln Would Have Read

PLMB,
DJ PAV

WIKIALITY

2006-08-10T17:13:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "PLUMB... Peace, Love, Uber Monkey Business... But people will just think I'm referencing a fruit" -Emily (Fallon's Girlfriend's Sister... Chaw Chaw)
Current Music: Jethro Tull Greatest Hits
Current Wikipedia.com "Fact" of the Moment: Elephants are increasingly threatened by human intrusion, with the African elephant population plummeting from 3 million in 1970 to roughly 600,000 in 1989, and then to 272,000 in 2000, Human-elephant conflicts kill 150 elephants and up to 100 people per year in Asia. The elephant is now a protected species worldwide, placing restrictions on capture, domestic use, and trade in products such as ivory.

It's official: "The man" is trying to contaminate, subvert, pervert, adulterate, scar, smudge, spoil, spot, stain, and sully the PLOG. Thats right. I've had my suspicions for years, now, but this is finally getting out of control. Just watch the news any time and you'll hear talking heads babbling on about the 'plogosphere' or the impact that Plogging has had on the way Americans get their news. Well let me tell you something, readers, they're all jumping on the proverbial bandwaggon. Just take a look at this:

"Exhibit A"
It Gets Worse:
"Exhibit B"

Amazon.com and Wikipedia are trying to put the Plog into a box, to define the undefinable, to contain the uncontainable and to market that which was endowed to all men by their creator. Resist "big internet" and we, the true PLOGGERS, will once again rise up and live out the true meaning of our creed...

The Colbert Report - 2006.07.31 - The Word

WIKIALITY

PLUMB,
DJ PAVY PAV (MIXING IT UP)

ROLLIN'

2006-08-09T22:49:00.000-05:00

QUOTE OF THE MOMENT: "Who was the coolest person in the ancient world?... Jesus, because he was soooo RIGHTEOUS!" -Phil
CURRENT MUSIC: G LOVE "LEMONADE"... Fresh and Philly Made
CURRENT WIKIPEDIA.COM "FACT" OF THE MOMENT: "Chuck Norris is currently ranked 7th in a poll for naming a new bridge in Budapest, Hungary."

I spent last week at a conference as a fellow for the Intercollegiate Studies Institute honors program in Big Sky, Montana. We stayed at a Skiing resort up in the mountains and had a few hours of seminars every day. But I have to say, it was hard not being distracted by all the bears which would try to eat us, the Snakes on the Plane, and Shark Week on the Discovery channel. It was an educational experience, and I learned a boatload, but the hotel we were in didn't have Comedy Central, so I had to resort to watching FOXNEWS, CBSNEWS, MSNBC, and CNN to get the news. A step down in journalistic integrity, no doubt.

ISI is a conservative intellectual non-profit organization and book club which is involved with bringing the conservative tradition back to academia. The honors program is for undergraduates, where ISI makes " conservative students smart, and smart students conservative." I found out early on that I fit more appropriately as a member of the former descriptive catagory. But that isn't all ISI is about... Besides the lectures, we managed to have pretty full days. The good thing about this going to these conferences is the food. They put you in this little room with just about everything you would want to eat or drink. And number one I wasn't hungry, but thirsty, and number two they were free, I musta drank me about 15 Miller Genuine Drafts.

We also got an afternoon off to go explore the area. We tried to climb the mountain and got stuck in a suddent hail and snow storm at about 11,000 feet. The hike really wasn't that hard, but once lightning started rolling in all around us, we sat down by the side of the mountain and waited for the storm to roll past. Wild.

Speaking of rolling, last night I was downtown with T.J. and a few of his lady friends. I was riding the unicycle around and then sat down. This kid came up to me, stone trippin' on Ecstacy. He sat down next to me on the seawall and said "man, I'm rollin... and you're riding a unicycle... thats crazy." I said "What you up to, man?" and he replied "I just took three pills. I'll be rolling all night." I had no idea that you "roll" on ecstacy, but I then decided that I'm going to use my Unicycle skills as my anti-drug campaign... "ROLL WITH PAV, NOT WITH XTC"... Something like that.

I'm back to working Maintenance at AACS during the days, where our motto is "We've moved it once, we'll probably move it again," or "measure once, cut twice." I havent worked there since last August, but I just showed up on Tuesday morning without any notice and clocked in as if I had never left. We spend the days debating meaningless things and trying to figure ways to make money selling the school's desks or music stands or such on EBAY.com.

I have an American mind, a Protestant heart, and a Catholic Liver.

Peace, Love, Monkey Business,
PAV

LAST THOUGHTS ON WOODIE GUTHRIE

2006-07-31T11:58:00.000-05:00

When yer head gets twisted and yer mind grows numb
When you think you're too old, too young, too smart or too dumb
When yer laggin' behind an' losin' yer pace
In a slow-motion crawl of life's busy race
No matter what yer doing if you start givin' up
If the wine don't come to the top of yer cup
If the wind's got you sideways with with one hand holdin' on
And the other starts slipping and the feeling is gone
And yer train engine fire needs a new spark to catch it
And the wood's easy findin' but yer lazy to fetch it
And yer sidewalk starts curlin' and the street gets too long
And you start walkin' backwards though you know its wrong
And lonesome comes up as down goes the day
And tomorrow's mornin' seems so far away
And you feel the reins from yer pony are slippin'
And yer rope is a-slidin' 'cause yer hands are a-drippin'
And yer sun-decked desert and evergreen valleys
Turn to broken down slums and trash-can alleys
And yer sky cries water and yer drain pipe's a-pourin'
And the lightnin's a-flashing and the thunder's a-crashin'
And the windows are rattlin' and breakin' and the roof tops a-shakin'
And yer whole world's a-slammin' and bangin'
And yer minutes of sun turn to hours of storm
And to yourself you sometimes say
"I never knew it was gonna be this way
Why didn't they tell me the day I was born"
And you start gettin' chills and yer jumping from sweat
And you're lookin' for somethin' you ain't quite found yet
And yer knee-deep in the dark water with yer hands in the air
And the whole world's a-watchin' with a window peek stare
And yer good gal leaves and she's long gone a-flying
And yer heart feels sick like fish when they're fryin'
And yer jackhammer falls from yer hand to yer feet
And you need it badly but it lays on the street
And yer bell's bangin' loudly but you can't hear its beat
And you think yer ears might a been hurt
Or yer eyes've turned filthy from the sight-blindin' dirt
And you figured you failed in yesterdays rush
When you were faked out an' fooled white facing a four flush
And all the time you were holdin' three queens
And it's makin you mad, it's makin' you mean
Like in the middle of Life magazine
Bouncin' around a pinball machine
And there's something on yer mind you wanna be saying
That somebody someplace oughta be hearin'
But it's trapped on yer tongue and sealed in yer head
And it bothers you badly when your layin' in bed
And no matter how you try you just can't say it
And yer scared to yer soul you just might forget it
And yer eyes get swimmy from the tears in yer head
And yer pillows of feathers turn to blankets of lead
And the lion's mouth opens and yer staring at his teeth
And his jaws start closin with you underneath
And yer flat on your belly with yer hands tied behind
And you wish you'd never taken that last detour sign
And you say to yourself just what am I doin'
On this road I'm walkin', on this trail I'm turnin'
On this curve I'm hanging
On this pathway I'm strolling, in the space I'm taking
In this air I'm inhaling
Am I mixed up too much, am I mixed up too hard
Why am I walking, where am I running
What am I saying, what am I knowing
On this guitar I'm playing, on this banjo I'm frailin'
On this mandolin I'm strummin', in the song I'm singin'
In the tune I'm hummin', in the words I'm writin'
In the words that I'm thinkin'
In this ocean of hours I'm all the time drinkin'
Who am I helping, what am I breaking
What am I giving, what am I taking
But you try with your whole soul best
Never to think these thoughts and never to let
Them kind of thoughts gain ground
Or make yer heart pound
But then again you know why they're around
Just waiting for a chance to slip and drop down
"Cause sometimes you hear'em when the night times comes creeping
And you fear that they might catch you a-sleeping
And you jump from yer bed, from yer last chapter of dreamin'
And you can't remember for the best of yer thinking
If that was you in the dream that was screaming
And you know that it's something special you're needin'
And you know that there's no drug that'll do for the healin'
And no liquor in the land to stop yer brain from bleeding
And you need something special
Yeah, you need something special all right
You need a fast flyin' train on a tornado track
To shoot you someplace and shoot you back
You need a cyclone wind on a stream engine howler
That's been banging and booming and blowing forever
That knows yer troubles a hundred times over
You need a Greyhound bus that don't bar no race
That won't laugh at yer looks
Your voice or your face
And by any number of bets in the book
Will be rollin' long after the bubblegum craze
You need something to open up a new door
To show you something you seen before
But overlooked a hundred times or more
You need something to open your eyes
You need something to make it known
That it's you and no one else that owns
That spot that yer standing, that space that you're sitting
That the world ain't got you beat
That it ain't got you licked
It can't get you crazy no matter how many
Times you might get kicked
You need something special all right
You need something special to give you hope
But hope's just a word
That maybe you said or maybe you heard
On some windy corner 'round a wide-angled curve

But that's what you need man, and you need it bad
And yer trouble is you know it too good
"Cause you look an' you start getting the chills

"Cause you can't find it on a dollar bill
And it ain't on Macy's window sill
And it ain't on no rich kid's road map
And it ain't in no fat kid's fraternity house
And it ain't made in no Hollywood wheat germ
And it ain't on that dimlit stage
With that half-wit comedian on it
Ranting and raving and taking yer money
And you thinks it's funny
No you can't find it in no night club or no yacht club
And it ain't in the seats of a supper club
And sure as hell you're bound to tell
That no matter how hard you rub
You just ain't a-gonna find it on yer ticket stub
No, and it ain't in the rumors people're tellin' you
And it ain't in the pimple-lotion people are sellin' you
And it ain't in no cardboard-box house
Or down any movie star's blouse
And you can't find it on the golf course
And Uncle Remus can't tell you and neither can Santa Claus
And it ain't in the cream puff hair-do or cotton candy clothes
And it ain't in the dime store dummies or bubblegum goons
And it ain't in the marshmallow noises of the chocolate cake voices
That come knockin' and tappin' in Christmas wrappin'
Sayin' ain't I pretty and ain't I cute and look at my skin
Look at my skin shine, look at my skin glow
Look at my skin laugh, look at my skin cry
When you can't even sense if they got any insides
These people so pretty in their ribbons and bows
No you'll not now or no other day
Find it on the doorsteps made out-a paper mache´
And inside it the people made of molasses
That every other day buy a new pair of sunglasses
And it ain't in the fifty-star generals and flipped-out phonies
Who'd turn yuh in for a tenth of a penny
Who breathe and burp and bend and crack
And before you can count from one to ten
Do it all over again but this time behind yer back
My friend
The ones that wheel and deal and whirl and twirl
And play games with each other in their sand-box world
And you can't find it either in the no-talent fools
That run around gallant
And make all rules for the ones that got talent
And it ain't in the ones that ain't got any talent but think they do
And think they're foolin' you
The ones who jump on the wagon
Just for a while 'cause they know it's in style
To get their kicks, get out of it quick
And make all kinds of money and chicks
And you yell to yourself and you throw down yer hat
Sayin', "Christ do I gotta be like that
Ain't there no one here that knows where I'm at
Ain't there no one here that knows how I feel
Good God Almighty
THAT STUFF AIN'T REAL"

No but that ain't yer game, it ain't even yer race
You can't hear yer name, you can't see yer face
You gotta look some other place
And where do you look for this hope that yer seekin'
Where do you look for this lamp that's a-burnin'
Where do you look for this oil well gushin'
Where do you look for this candle that's glowin'
Where do you look for this hope that you know is there
And out there somewhere
And your feet can only walk down two kinds of roads
Your eyes can only look through two kinds of windows
Your nose can only smell two kinds of hallways
You can touch and twist
And turn two kinds of doorknobs
You can either go to the church of your choice
Or you can go to Brooklyn State Hospital
You'll find God in the church of your choice
You'll find Woody Guthrie in Brooklyn State Hospital

And though it's only my opinion
I may be right or wrong
You'll find them both
In the Grand Canyon
At sundown

-Bob Dylan

AVETTS

2006-07-30T15:36:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "I dont know if i should salute or bow and say 'Vive la France!'" -Manley
Current Music: KRS ONE
Current Wikipedia.com "fact" of the Moment: In 1964, at age 60, Jack LaLanne swam from alcatraz Island to Fisherman's Wharf handcuffed, shackled and towing a 1,000 pound boat.

Good job, Jack.

I'd like to introduce you all to a band: The Avett Brothers. The Avett Brothers are a three piece unit, consisting of Bob Crawford on a standup bass, Scott Avett on 5 string banjo, and Seth Avett on the acoustic guitar. They're from Charolette, North Carolina, and play a rocked up folk/country/gospel style which you really can't find anywhere. Behind their energy and enthusiasm are remarkably well written and amusing lyrics. On top of all that, they are very friendly guys and appreciative of their fans. Dig it.

Avett Brothers- At the Beach (Wine In The Woods)

New Feature to the PLOG: "Videos By Pav." This is "At the Beach" By the Avett Brothers from the Wine in the Woods Festival in Columbia, Maryland. Props to Jenna for recording the show.

"WE ARE LAUGHIN, BREAKIN UP JUST LIKE THE WAVES (AND THE BANJOS)"... AND THE GUITARS TOO.

Three broken strings on one song and it still comes off very well.

PLMB,
PAV

DANDY

2006-07-29T12:24:00.001-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "I'm just dandy. I got a bowl of chocolate pudding in my underpants." -Chris Farley (Black Sheep)
Current Music: Tom Petty "Highway Companion"
Random Wikipedia.com "fact" of the Moment: The only son of Cadmus and Harmonia, Polydorus was a king of Thebes. Upon his father's death, Pentheus, the son of his sister Agave and Echion, one of the Spartoi, ruled Thebes for a short time. Pentheus, however, ruled only for a short time, before Dionysus caused his mother to tear him apart. Polydorus succeeded him, marrying Nycteis, the daughter of Nycteus. When their son Labdacus was still young, Polydorus died of unknown causes, leaving Nycteus as his regent.

Time moves so slowly these days. No complaints there. My Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays are all Fridays, my Tuesdays Thursdays and Saturdays are Saturdays, and Sundays are Sundays. Every day is the weekend for this soldier of the sun. My days are spent frittering and wasting the hours (between reruns of The Colbert Report with Stephen Colbert on Comedy central @ 10:30; 2:30; 8:30 all in anticipation of the new episode at 11:30) in an offhand way, or kicking around on a piece of ground in my hometown. But no, this isnt too dull, not yet... for my evenings are filled with the fancifull jolliness of which only the youth will understand.

Monday was a bowling extravaganza the likes of which you've never seen, Tuesday Janis and Ryan were in Annapolis to hang out, Wednesday Phil, Ian, Geoff and I were hanging out downtown playing music and some guy asked us to go play a few songs in Griffins, thursday was nightlife detox, and last night was an encore presentation of Grizzly man following S'mores on the deck.

Straight Gangsta in Downtown Annapolis: Myself, Geoff and Phil

I'm proud to introduce Part 1 of my multi-part series, "The search for America's greatest Italian Hoagie Maker." The series will be conducted thusly: I will travel around the world, stopping at various chains and other delis in search of the best italian hoagie. I will rate the quality of their product and report to you, the heroes and readers of the PLOG. You're heroes because you read the PLOG, so keep it up, America.

Today I start with WaWa. WaWa is a good place to start because you can find them just about everywhere and they have a pretty standard system. They use the touch screen which allows you to pick your sandwhich, size, toppings, and so on. This is good for speed of service and mistakes don't usually happen. The problem is that you never look your hoagie maker in the eye. When I push the button for "extra mayo" I'm not so sure they know that I mean "EXTRA MAYO, Baby!" Because sometimes they dont understand the passion that you can see in a man's face when he orders onions and you can just see that he wants them loaded on. WaWa does a good job at giving you enough meat and toppings, and usually the hoagie is falling appart as soon as you open the wrapper, which is a good thing. The bread is satisfactory, average. Everything else is fresh and flavorfull. I give WaWa an A-.

Subway, You're on deck, prepare to get PLOGGED... hard.

I wrote a poem during OCS which I'd like to share with you. It pretty much speaks for itself, but only the navy/marine types will probably comprehend the subtleties of the boot campesque experience, if not the poetic brilliance:

"The Night Before Inspection"
By Candidate Pav, Justin K., 4th Plt. Echo Company, Officer Candidates School

T'was the night before inspection and all through the house
Not a Candidate was stirring not even the 'house mouse'
When then from the duty hut there arose such a clatter
I sprung from my rack to see what was the matter.

When then I saw a Staff Sergeant with a gleam in his eye
Middle finger up, pointing at I
Foot locker dumped, it was left unsecure
My squared away gear squared away no more.

Inksticks, hygiene gear, shirts, shorts all a mess
Spread across the deck and under racks they would rest
Staff Sergeant said that's an essay and chit
"Importance of gear security" I thought "that's bull#%&$."

And just when I thought things couldnt get worse
My PT shirt on backwards as they started to curse
"Eyeballs! Lock it up! Get your body on line!
Too slow, another essay!" Today that makes nine.

On to PT for another failing time
Nobody's score is lower than mine
"I guarantee it, I'll have you sent home soon"
Said the company staff and commander of the Platoon.

Hot chow once again, same thing every day
"This aint burger king, can't have it your way"
On to inspection, five thousand IPs
At attention for hours, sore back and bad knees.

Then comes a class in Yeckle Hall
But soon I feel sleepy and I'm starting to fall
Class was too long but can't remember what about
Slept through the whole thing and got ratted out.

On Cornell on Clark on Ray and on Li!
On Driscol on Culligan, on Allen and Dupree!
The next board is coming and they're looking at me!

When the Colonel looks up and into my eye
Raises his right arm to wave 'goodbye'
I plead for mercy but he just says 'no!'
Just like my staff said, "boy, you gotta go!"

but then I awake it was all a bad dream
I'm still here more lean and more mean
I throw on my camis of tan black and green
Because now I am a U.S. Marine.

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT: The PLOG will be starting a new series shortly: "ASK KARL." During this segment, Karl will answer any of your questions about love, ladies, or life. Just add a comment on any PLOG post at any time and Karl will do his best to answer them on the PLOG. Keep in mind that high demand and site traffic will not allow every question to be answered... The server can only take so much.

Until next time, America, It's been emotional

PLMB
PAV

DROPPIN' Gs

2006-07-23T18:52:00.001-05:00

Quote of the Moment: Emily: "Did you ever see 'Kate and Leopold.'"
Me: "No, and I'm not gay if that's what you're asking."
Current Music: Creedence Clearwater Revival
Random Wikipedia.com "fact" of the Moment: Macaroni: Macaroni is a corruption of the Italian word maccherone and its plural maccheroni. Its etymology is debatable. Some scholars think it's related to Greek makaria, a kind of barley broth. Others think it comes from Italian maccare, "to bruise or crush" (referring to the crushing of the wheat to make the pasta), which comes, in turn, from Latin macerare.

Its like Shakespeare always said, "there is nothin cooler than droppin the "g"s off thine gerrunds."

A lot has happened since the last PLOG and I've got to say, It feels GOOD to be back.

I spent six weeks at the United States Marine Corps Officer Candidate's School in Quantico, VA. That was delightful... No, it sucked. It was the worst six weeks of my life, and that includes that week that I broke the seat on my unicycle... and trust me, ridin a unicycle without a seat has its complications.

Justin Trowbridge, a member of my OCS platoon had this to say:
"When asked to describe my experience at OCS, I simply replied: 'They melvined me.'"

Fallon was also in my platoon, but after livin in Simpson Hall with him freshman year and being his roomate sophomore year, and hanging out all Junior year, I was already sick of him. Just playin, fool. But he was gettin letters from his girlfriend and I was noticably jealous, so then I just started to get letters from Emily, Fallon's girlfriend's' sister. (Take that Apostraphe Protection Society!!!) So now I have a new penpal and Facebook friend for life (FBFFL). The worst and most regrettable part of OCS, however, was that I missed six weeks of "The Colbert Report with Stephen Colbert." But from what I can gather all that I missed in the news was North Korea was throwing something at Japan... er, or somethin. But enough about OCS. I'm sure more will creep out in time. Thanks to Vrabel and Janis who came down to graduation... Especially Janis who gave me a bottle of Jameson Irish Whiskey!

Since being back, I have been to an Avett Brothers show up in Philly, watched the "Pirates" movie with Fisher, and had a week vacation to the Outter Banks of North Carolina with my family and that of my uncle's. That's about it.

I was talkin with Fisher earlier today, and we decided we'd design and market a stationary workout unicycle. Why do workout bikes need the front half? They don't. Its completely uncecessary to have something to put your hands on... to lean on. Thats just laziness, people. Look for the infomercials staring Karl Fisher, Justin Pav, and Maria Sharapova in the near future.

Also in the PLOG's future. Karl Fisher has been officially signed to the PLOG staff, and will soon be contributing as the PLOG's resident "Ladies Expert" and field reporter. Welcome aboard!

Peace, Love, Monkey Business,
PAV

(Feel free to explore the links)

DON PAVLIONI

2006-05-19T15:48:00.000-05:00

QUOTE OF THE MOMENT: " It frightens me, the awful truth of how sweet life can be, But she ain't a-gonna make me move, I guess it must be up to me." Dylan "Up To Me"
CURRENT MUSIC: Dylan Bootleg Series 3
WIKIPEDIA.COM FACT OF THE MOMENT: On this day in 1536, Anne Boleyn, the second wife of Henry VII of England, was beheaded for adultery

Since coming home I spend my entire day sitting at home watching "The Sopranos." Yeah, I work out just about every day, but that's just about it. I think I'm turning into a Mafioso. I sit around all day, not thinking about much, not doing much, and this show has just been sinking in. Besides picking up some random Italian words, I feel like I 'm part of the show. If some guy in the store is blocking my way, or if someone cuts me off on the road, I feel like I should take them out behind the supermarket and beat them to a pulp. Don't mess with me these days, I'm very dangerous.

I mean, hey, Here's how it would work... I mean, how it will work:
I'm the Boss, I give the family directions, but I keep my hands pretty clean. I have several Capos who are my captains... I devide up the responsibilities among them. For example, Joe Coleman would run the Broadneck Peninsula, focusing on Anne Arrundle Community College. Then each Capo would have a handful of soldiers who do all the dirty work, collecting fees, giving protection, and taking out the trash, when necessary.

---Patent Pending--- On another, unrelated note, Ben Philon, Geoff Ward, Joe Coleman, and I came up with the best idea ever. Now, Ben Philon is going to get engaged one of these days, and we're going to have a reality T.V. show to determine the best man... Show title: May the Best Man Win... 10 of his friends will live in a house for a few weeks and go through a series of tests... athletic, academic, general charm, and so on. It will be brutal competition, an endless series of physical and mental hoops to jump through for the honor of being Best Man. Its Big Brother, Survivor, Average Joe, and the Real World, all rolled into one. FOX will buy it, and you will watch it... You'll see. ---Patent Pending---

Peace, Love, Monkey Business,
PAV

TICKS ME OFF

2006-05-10T11:07:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Why do you want to see Snowflake? Do you know him? Does he call you at home? Do you have a dorsal fin!?" -Ace Ventura
Current Music: Allman Brothers
Random Wikipedia.com Fact of the Moment: John Smoltz is a member of the Presbyterian Church In America

New plan for the house: Rabbits with lazer beams attached to their heads. In our back yard, we have a ton of Rabbits, squirrels, deer, foxes, and siberian tigers that just love to hop around and eat our crops. Well, we dont have crops, but they do hop around. So Pants and I were thinking, we should catch these rabbits and make either a rabbit stew (I hear they're terrific), or we could train them to be watch rabbits. We have Manley design a trap and a pen, we catch them alive, Merlini breeds with them, and the rest of us train them over several generations of Rabbits to be killers. From the day they are born we will feed them raw meat, and will eventually graduate them to having mind-controlled lazer beams to keep our landlords away.

Be very very quiet, I'm hunting wabbits.

This really ticks me off... In the last month I've found two ticks on my body. At quantico a while ago I had a female dog tick feast on my ass:

Last week I went for a run and pulled a female lone-star tick off my knee:

Neither species are known to be carriers of Lyme disease, but both are known to carry Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever. As cool as that sounds, its not the way I prefer to tap the rockies:

Peace, Love, Monkey Business,
PAV

THE RIGHT WAY

2006-05-06T19:30:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "The B-52 was nicknamed 'BUFF' for: Big Ugly Fat Fellow" -History Channel
"Yeah, I'm sure that last 'F' is for 'Fellow.'" -Benjamin Rothman Institute
Current Music: Yes "Long Disntance Runaround"
Random Wikipedia.com Fact of the Day: Rob Nowell of the Rock band Sublime died from heroin overdose on May 25 1996. For people of my generation, er, I mean, those of us at or around the College age now, Sublime was pretty big in those important formative years of our middle/high school time. I suppose this is the Nirvana story that those 5 or 6 years older than us would have had. Anyway, its been 11 years... I feel old.

So, I'm adding a new section to the PLOG. Yes, Wikipedia is pretty important for us college kids. Some of my classmates say that instead of doing the reading, they look it up on Wikipedia and get ALL the right answers. So in that spirit, I'm going to make sure I get you a wikipedia fact every time I grace you with my presence on the world wide web.

I'm pretty ticked off right now. Its Saturday and I had an exam for one of my humanities classes at 4:15. We started, all essays, and I finished at 6:55. That is too long to be writing. It really doens't test your knowlege of the material, it just tests your endurance and ability to write quickly. Also, its partisan to women because they have better handwriting. And I would argue that a professor will be predisposed to give a better grade to an essay more prettily written. The world is against me.

But that isn't even half as bad as what happened after. I went to Second Storey to get my dinner. I ordered up an Italian Hoagie and the man behind the counter absolutely murdered my sandwich. Here's what he did:

Short Roll, though I had ordered the long
Mayo
Cappicola
Lettuce
Tomato
Sweet Peppers
Onions
Cheese
Solami
Ham
Oil and Vinegar

This is an absolute disgrace. I don't know how someone gets a job at a place making hoagies with that philosophy of sandwich building. This is a time-honored art, dating back to the days of World War I Philidelphia, where Italian workers of Hog Island district invented the masterpiece. The specifics are hotly debated, but thats what you need to know for now... and this Jabroni does this to their legacy.

Here is the apropriate way to make the Italian Hoagie:

Italian roll, sliced horizontally
Spray some oil and vinegar on the roll
Mayo spread accross both sides
Then the meat: Cappicola, Genola Solami, and Ham
Cheese (Provolone is standard, though the adventurous type may substitute with Pepperjack)
Shredded Lettuce
Tomatto
Chopped Onions
Oregano
Another spray of the extra virgin olive oil on top to bring it all together.

It is, of course, important to spread the toppings evenly. Optional toppings include: Sweet or Hot Peppers, or pickles, though these should be used sparingly, as they tend to clash with each other. Lastly, the hoagie should be eatten no sooner than 45 minutes after being made. This allows for the flavors of the oil and mayo to soak into the bread and the toppings and onions to mesh together nicely.

In other news, me, Vrabel, and Fallon are going to open up a bar after we get out of the Marine Corps. It will be called the "Whiskey House" or effectionately, the "Dub House" for the locals. We will serve steak, baked potatos, shrimp, baked beans, and I will make Italian Hoagies. Fallon will be in charge of security, Vrabel the booze, and Me the entertainment. So come on down to "The Dub House" and get yourself a "Dub Sour" or a "Dub on the rocks" or a "Dub and Coke."... and an Italian Hoagie.

Peace, Love, Monkey Business
DJ Pavy Pav

P.S. I wrote this PLOG during the interim period between the making and eating of the hoagie. I'm now in the "eating and supposed to be enjoying" phase of the hoagie process, and, as I could have imagined, the meat is falling out all over the place. This is terrible.

SPACE-INTRUDERS

2006-05-05T20:25:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Less than 5% of the cosmos is composed of the matter that makes up human life" -Mark Wahlberg from I Heart Huckabees
Current Music: Stevie Ray Vaughan "Live at the El Mocambo"

As usual, I was right. Treacy and Kellie have left my life forever and I may never see them again.

You know what I hate? I can't stand "space-intruders." You know what I'm talking about. If you sit down at the dining hall or around a table and the guy/gal on your left/right has those intruding elbows. They force you to commit yourself by leaning back or forward. Always conscious of the guy/gal on your other side, you try with extra care to not force yourself on them, and so you relegate yourself to indure great personal suffering. Today I went into the bathroom in the Connely Center... It's a three-unirinal settup. There was a guy at the middle one... a faux in itself. Not only did he take up the middle urinal, which is intended to be used only in cases of emergency, but he also had this wide stance, as if he were a sumo wrestler:
Due to this, I was forced to choose between the two end urinals, part of which each were blocked by Mr. Widestance's obtrusive body. As Aristotle writes, "We deliberate about things that are up to us and are matter of action, and these are the ones that are left. For the causes responsible for things seem to be nature, necessity, and chance, and also intelligence and everything that is due to a human behing. And among human beings, each sort deliberates about the things to be done by its own acts" (Ethics III. 3). My Choices were limited by this one man's ignorance and I was forced to choose between options which would lower my existence and experience of virtue as happinesss in a flourishing life.

"In the Spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love." Alfred, Lord Tennyson wrote that. Tomorrow starts finals, three weeks from now starts "the worst six weeks of my life," and my coincidence is meaningless... So, sorry, Lord, my fancy is not turning lightly to love, but rather, to the chaos of the world, no thanks to "space-intruders." Lets riot.

When I get a tattoo, I want a Penguin playing a guitar, riding a unicycle. Then I'm going to get this:

How cool is that!?!

Anyway, I can't get that out of my head.... Its just so...
So...
Cool.

Peace, Love, Monkey Business,
PAV

MORAL HIGH GROUND

2006-05-04T13:42:00.000-05:00

"I dont like anything with the prefix "bi"... Bi-sexual, bi-lingual, bi-cycle... They reak of moral weakness. You wanna take a moral stand? Make love to a person of the opposite sex, while speaking english, on a unicycle. It's harder than you think." - Stephen Colbert (3/5/06)

You got it, Steve-O.

The Colbert-Pav Connection.

PLMB,
PAV

FRIENDLY

2006-05-03T18:22:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "I heard there's a lot more homosexuals in China" -Darr
"Yeah, that was Pav's contribution" -Lt. King
Good one, Sir... Submariners can talk trash.
Current Music: Mark Knopfler "Ragpicker's Dream"

Prepare to suck on the teat of truth, this is The Plog...

I went in to get a haircut today. Now, since freshman year, the barber shop on campus has been a fairly important place on campus. The ROTC Marines get cuts every week (every two at the most), so we spend some quality time in that corner of Dougherty hall. Until this semester, the barbers have been "Speedy" (Anthony) and "Friendly" (Vince). Speedy was famous for his fast cuts and agressive style, while Friendly is slow, deliberate, and doesn't stop talking. Both give a decent cut, if you ask me. Everyone has their own opinion, but I was always a Speedy man, myself. Yeah, he may cut a corner here or there, but I want to get in, get the job done, and get out. Now, over Christmas the two Villanova Barbers had a falling out and Speedy got fired. It was a long story, and Friendly made sure we all heard it. So, this semester there is only one barber at villanova, and he happens to be the slowest barber in the world. I sat in there for over an hour today while he cut two guys' hair before he got to me. Then, while he was cutting my hair, he called a barber shop from down the road who was putting up advertisements around the Villanova campus. He is territorial about his hair cuts.

In other news, Villanova sophomore point guard Kyle Lowry put his name in the bidding for the NBA draft last week. Now, he still has the option to pull out of the draft in the next two weeks, but today we got some bad news. I was crossing the street in front of the Library and he sped up to the speedbump where I was crossing... in a brand spankin new BMW convertable. That can only mean one thing: he intends to join the draft and make a few mil. to pay off the car. Allan Ray and Randy Foye also have also gotten brand news luxury cars, but they're seniors and shoe-ins for the first round. Lowry is shorer, younger, and needs to develop his shot... Now, that reporting you wont find on ESPN.com. I want him to stay. Oh well, Good Luck, Kyle, Good Luck.

Everyone that I love is leaving me. Kellie only hung out at the house because she doesn't like her roomates, but she just got a new apartment, so she won't be around any more. Vrabel only hung around the house because he doesn't have anywhere else to be, but now that Kellie got her own place, he'll be there all the time. And Roth (Pants) is moving out next year. I'm so alone.

Check Out My Video (Its a Two-Parter):
PART 1

Part 2:
PART 2

Peace, Love, and Monkey Business,
Pav

Big and I'm bad
And I want you to know
I hand around
Where the grass is greener
Totally naked, baby
Totally nude
'Cause if I want to
Who's gonna stop me?
I'm absolutely free
Living in the trees
The birdies and the bees
'Cause I'm a nature boy

LITTLE BROTHER

2006-04-27T15:56:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Music is very limited... I can do just about anything." -BOB
Current Music: DYLAN Live and in charge

Well, I aint gonna work on Maggie's farm no more. I mean, I try my best to be just like I am, but everybody wants me to be just like them, they say 'sing while you slave,' and I get bored.

We're nearing the end of the semester, and this one is going to be a tough finish. I've been thinking a lot about education, and I think the system sets us all up for failure. Not in the worldy sense, but in a deeper existential way. It tells you that if you do everything right, you'll be happy. If you're someone like me, an upper middle class, very well educated person, you're supposed to have the most oportunity and potential in life. We're all going to have responsibility, power, and money. But if we can't answer the basic questions about our life and humanity, we're bound to never find satisfaction in any of those things. Meaningful relationships which direct our minds and actions towards God have taken a back seat to reductions in modern definitions of the body and soul. Education is the reason. If there isn't an integrated way to look at education, knowing science or philosophy or literature is vain. There's a lot of people suffering tonight from the disease of conceit. It is truly hard to find one rich man in ten with a satisfied mind.

That said, life goes on. Today was my "Evolution of Warfare" final. We've been talking a lot about the state of the modern world and the modern threats. Karl Fisher made a good point today. Here is his philosophy about the third world and terrorism: The third world is the little brother. He's tired of being the little brother. He's always nagging at you and trying to get on your back. He hits you first and you smack him back just to get him away. If you hit him, mom (the UN) yells at you. He just wants attention from mom, and mom is always harder on you.

Keep Pickin'

Peace, Love, & Monkey Business
PAV

SHOP-THERAPY

2006-04-22T12:42:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Mike NARDI!" -Woods
Current Music: Mark Knopfler "Golden Heart"

Yesterday was a rough day. I missed my 9:30 class to go to the dentist. I dont like missing class, and I hate dentists. To make it worse, they said I have to get my wisdom teeth out in the next month before OCS. I'm going to fight it.

So what have I done to try to console myself:
1. Sleep- I slept yesterday from about 11-4. Effectiveness: 5
2. Music- I played guitar from about 4-8. Effectiveness: 8
3. Drinking- I met some of my friends at the bar, and Woods kept screaming for Mike Nardi. I bought him a Miller. Effectiveness: 7
3. Bowling: My worst bowling performance, perhaps ever. I hate Devon lanes. Effectiveness: 2
4. Watched "Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey" last night. Effectiveness: 7
5. Shop Therapy: I just spent over $100 on Amazon.com. Effectiveness: 6

All in all, that puts me back at just about neutral. It is rainy outside, and I have a lot of work to get done, but there's plenty more sleep to be slept, music to be played, beers to be drank, balls to be bowled, movies to be watched, and CDs to be bought.

"My Recommendations" on Amazon.com:
1. "Stages on Life's Way" by Soren Kierkegaard
2. "The Kingdowm Of God Is Within You" by Leo Tolstoy
3. "Presence" By Led-Zeppelin.

I thought it was funny, anyway.

Peace, Love, and Anti-Dentites,
Pavy

TRUTHINESS

2006-04-19T23:05:00.000-05:00

QUOTE OF THE MOMENT: "The truth hurts. Fortunately for America, I'm a masochist." -Stephen Colbert
CURRENT MUSIC: The Avett Bros. "A Carolina Jubilee"

There's something that needs to be said. Many people have come up to me in the last few months saying, "Pav, I can't believe Stephen Colbert is stealing all your truth!" Well let me tell you something, Plogheads, I've been offering up hot skillets of truth for over two years now, and the "Colbert Report" has only been doing it since October 2005. So I'm going on record right now, giving a "Tip of My Hat" to Stephen Colbert for having the guts to join me in the crushing of the liberal left. This PLOG is not about me. This program is dedicated to you, the heroes... the people who read the PLOG. You get it, and you come from a long line of it-getters.

Truth. Get some, America.

Well, the internet is working again in the house, and now I can give you all my undivided attention. All semester I've been participating in a research project funded by the department of defense to uncover the true history of warfare, from the ancient greeks up to the 2006 NCAA March Madness tournament. My findings have been remarkable. I have found that Unicycle Archers, as light infantry have, since the dawn of history, had a profound impact on the way wars have been fought. Excerpts from my report follow, tracing the usage of the unicycle in historical battle senerios. Click on the image for full size.

The U.S. employes the Unicycle against Pirates in the Western Pacific

Unicycle Archer VS. Mao Zedong

Unicycle Archer VS. French Spies

Greek Diplomacy

Religious Wars Terrorize Europe

Carl Krauser of Pittsburgh University gets a rude awakening after poking Villanova's Allan Ray's eye in the Big East Tournament

Sorry, Robert E. Lost

Japanese in WWII

Berlin, Germany. 1944

Enjoy the truth, America.

P,L,MB,
PAV

DAUGHTERS AND MOTHERS AND SUCH

2006-04-16T23:35:00.000-05:00

QUOTE OF THE MOMENT: "You're like the wheat that blows the chaff" -JOE
CURRENT MUSIC: Talking Heads

I know I havent posted for a good while, but my reasons are three in number:
1. School has been very busy lately. With ROTC the last two weekends have been shot by the Drill Meet and the Marine yearly trip to Quantico, Virginia. Drill Meet went well. Whiskey company held their own, while Garcia and I ran the "Recon Challenge" and took second (behind only Murphy and Smythe). Last week I had three papers due, with plenty to come.
2. The internet has been down at the house. For some reason, it just stopped working. While this was at first a critical disaster, it turned out to be a blessing in disguise. It is a pain not being able to check my email, but the internet is really more of a distraction than anything else. Of the time spent on the internet per day, I'd say about 15 of them are actually productive ones. Spending hours chatting on IM or stalking girls on facebook.com dont really count as worth-while endeavors. I'm not a snob, and I do wish Weasel would fix the damn thing, but, really, its probably better to spend my time practicing an art than googling old WWF wrestlers.
3. Currently I'm home for Easter Break. Its been fun seeing the guys and going downtown with the great weather we've been having, and I really havent felt like spending time blogging. But tonight I got home at 12:30, the earliest of the week, and don't really feel like going to bed yet. Actually, I've spent a lot of time that I should have been running drinking beer. I'll pay for that later.

Last night Ian, Steve, and Phil came over. We were planning on playing poker, but no one else was able to come. But as fate would have it, they all just happened to bring their instruments. I spent most of the night switching back and forth between Banjo and Guitar, Phil on mandolin and guitar, and steve and Ian hit the strings, too. We practiced some bluegrassed versons of some rock songs, making some interesting arrangements. Nothing sounded quite as good as the Dylan songs we played, though.

I've been thinking. I've never considered myself shy, but there are certain social situtations which are more or less intimidating than others, and some which I try to avoid alltogether. For instance, In the last month, I have personally met and talked to two Marine Corps legends. 1. General Anthony Zinni, who was commander of Central Command, has written books on the War in Iraq and one with Tom Clancy, was on "Meet The Press," and "The Daily Show" last week, and 2. Wesley Fox, Marine Colonel who spent 43 years in the Marine Corps and won a Medal of Honor... I had no problem talking to them. While they have political power, influence, and fame, 21 year old college girls are infinitely more intimidating... Scary, even. Maybe you're the same, maybe not. Like I said, I'm not shy... not afraid of attention, or public speaking, like most people are. So what is it that makes one-on-one interaction so intimidating? I've read that Johnny Carson is the same way. There's something about the way our society is structured that makes relatioships outside of established roles and relationships difficult. Example 2: I can talk to professors about just about anything, but again, other students can be difficult to get to know. I'm reminded of Seinfeld:

George: "I'm better with the mothers than I am with the daughters."
Jerry: "Maybe you should date the mothers."
Goerge: "If I could talk to the mothers and have sex with the daughters, then I'd really have something going."

As screwed up as it sounds, that just about sums up my predicament.

PLMB,
PAVY

BIG BOTTOM

2006-04-16T23:34:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: “Welcome to spring… Shut up Nebraska, God hates you and you know it” –Cartoon Network

Current Music: G Love and Special Sauce “In The King’s Court”

Villanova’s run is over. At Sunday’s loss to Florida, the Wildcats got knocked out of the NCAA tournament. It was sad not making it into the final four this year, but I feel for this year’s seniors. Allan Ray and Randy Foye are absolutely incredible performers, and it didn’t hit me until a few hours after the game that I will never see them play again. There is nothing like being in the Pavilion and seeing the two of them coming down the court, Foye driving to the hoop, breaking defenders’ ankles, and making some impossible shots… or Ray pulling up for deep three after three after three. It really is a thing of beauty, a real and rare excellence which is hard to find. Seniors, you will be sorely missed.

Sunday night Roth and I drove back to campus to welcome the team’s bus back to school. We mobbed the buss and gave the team our best support, even though by the looks on their faces they were feeling pretty down. Jay Wright stood above us and spoke to the students in a moment I will never forget.

Monday had a feeling of a new beginning. It was sunny and warm, and there is a relief in being able to start life afresh… After all baseball is right around the corner. But, of course, it isn’t officially spring until “skirt day;” the first day of the year when all the girls decide in unison to get rid of pants for good. They day is coming!

I bought a banjo Sunday, and hopefully I will be able to expand my musical horizons. I saw on Megan’s PLOG JR. (http://www.xanga.com/megpav) a sort of musical survey. You put all your songs on random and use them to answer the following questions. I have a 60 CD changer, and I didn’t change or add any CDs to the mix, to keep it as random as possible. I did limit the Dylan songs to 2, since he clearly dominates my collection. The results are as follows:

1 How does the world see me?

"Big Bottom" By SPINAL TAP (I can't believe that!)

2. will i have a happy life?

"Shooting Star" By Bob Dylan (In other words, "no, not really"... I let a shooting star slip away... 'listen to the engine, listen to the bell as the last fire truck from hell goes rolling by the last radio is playin')

3. What do my friends really think of me?:

"Burnt By the Sun" By David Byrne (when dogs make love they dont look at themselves, they check each other out by the way they smell...Burnt by the sun havin way too much fun)

4. Do people secretly lust after me?

"Bethlehem Steel” By Victory Twin

5. How can I make myself happy?:

"Ballad of a Thin Man" By Bob Dylan (nobody has any respect, Anyway they already expect you to just give a check to tax-deductible charity organizations)

6. What should I do with my life?:

"Judy is a punk" by The RAMONES (go down to berlin, join the ice capades. And oh, I don’t know why oh, I don’t know why, Perhaps they’ll die, oh yeah perhaps they’ll die, oh yeah)

7. Will I ever have children?:

"Lodi” By CCR

8. What is some good advice for me?:

"Enter Sandman" by Metalica (So i should start haunting your dreams?)

9. How will I be remembered?:

"Song for Sonny Liston" By Mark Knopfler (black cadillac, alligator boots, money in the pockets, of his sharkskin suits, some say the bear took a flop, they couldn’t believe it

when they saw him drop)

10. What is my signature dancing song?:

"Wild West End" By Dire Straits (A nice slow one... "i wanna marry you")

11. What do I think my current theme song is?:

Bruce Springsteen "Dancin In the Dark" (Shoulda been the last one.... But "I get up in the evenin and i aint got nothin to say, i come home in the mornin go to bed feelin the same old way, i aint nothin but tired, and i'm just tired and bored with myself")

12. What does everyone else think my current theme song is?:

"Southern Man" By Neil Young

13. What song will play at my funeral?:

"Satisfied Mind" By Bob Dylan (Once I was waitin' In fortune and fame, Everything that I dreamed for to get a start in life's game... Then suddenly it happened, I lost every dime

But I'm richer by far with a satisfied mind... Nice. Too bad it isn't "The Spirit in the Sky")

14. What type of men/women do you like?:

"Supertaster" By They Might Be Giants (Nothin tastes the same to a supertaster, when she tastes a pear its like a hundred pears)

15. What is my day going to be like?

“Give it Up” By AC/DC (“Well there be no words of fighting around here cause nothin' don't matter 'cause it ain't clear, well it could be on a Monday or it could be even Sunday, so if you can't stand the distance you better disappear, do I make myself clear? I'm ready to rock I'm gonna rip it, Ready to rock yeah I'm gonna stick it!)

16. Will I ever have love again?

“Lying in a park” By G Love and Special Sauce (“See that young girl with the flower dress, well soon I’m goin’ bye. Now I just might move on lookin for the park, lyin down in the park, I’ll be there, I’ll meet you there, oh yeah baby”)

While this might seem pretty silly, it probably is… I mean, the music you listen to does actually say something about who you are, though, right? Megan’s survey answers certainly have a different tone, though, I’m sure you can notice, even though there certainly is some overlap… Anyway, I do have a thing for supertasters. Sometimes life does imitate art.

Peace, Love, and Monkey Business,

PAV

MR. WRIGHT

2006-03-23T17:59:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Hey Jay, watch out for BC's (Boston College's) flex offense" -Halleran to Villanova head coach Jay Wright
Current Music: David Byrne "Look Into the Eyeball"

The last two weeks or so have been a period that I like to call an existential rollercoaster. Let me start on the morning of March 10th. I woke up a year older... 21 to be exact. I went to the MVA to get my driver's lisence renewed and got a phone message from my bank, Wachovia. Long story short, someone in the previous week had taken over my account, had changed the address and phone numbers of the checking account and the cherry on the top: they charged over, $2,000 on breaks in Rhode Island. That sucked.

Later in the evening my parents took me and some of my best friends out to a nice dinner at a fondue restarante in Annapolis. That was great.

After a long dinner the guys all went downtown to the bars for a few hours. Also a good time.

Earlier in the week I bowled a solid 188.

Villanova lost in the second round of the Big East tournament the same night, and Allan Ray was injured. That was a drag.

Came back to school the next week ready to get back to learning. Still havent completely resolved the bank issue, but Villanova Basketball is back on track.

Last Tuesday I woke up, took a piss, and went to school for PT. But it wasn't PT, it was the semesterly ROTC drug test. Since I had emptied my bladder bofore leaving the house, I had to refill it for the next hour as I waited in line. Boy that was fun.

Tuesday I had the biggest, most delicious hoagie I've ever had. Almost reduced me to tears how beautiful that was. That was great.

Yesterday I got a cheese burger, but when I tried to get ketchup, it exploded all over my jeans.

After PT yesterday morning, me and some of the Marines went to play some basketball, and at 8:30 the basketball team was leaving villanova to go to Minneapolis for the sweet 16. FOX, ABC, NBC, CBS, and Comcast were all there to cover the event. Halleran, Murphy, and I were out there giving it our all, and when Jay Wright came up to give us all high-fives, Hal was sure to let Jay know to watch out for "BC's flex offense." Jay started laughing pretty good.... The Philadelphia Inquirer caught the moment:

Click the Photo for full size (Left To Wright: Jay Wright, Dennis Halleran, Dan Murphy, and Pav)

Last night I stayed up until 1:30 doing readings, writing a paper and preparing a presentation for the Marines. Today I had to turn in the paper, take a test, and give the presentation to the Marine Platoon. So I slept 4 hours, woke up for PT, and slumped through it.

Then I saw the news paper. Classic moment.

Its thursday afternoon, and tomorrow is finally the Villanova Vs. BC game.

I've watched the movie "I Heart Huckabees" two times in the last week.

Coincidences?

Deconstruct your mind into the blackness. Just accept it for what it is... nothing.

There's glass between us. You can't handle my infinite nature, can you?

Peace, Love, and Monkey Business
PAV

SYRA-LOSE

2006-03-06T20:29:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Pav, your unique brand of comedy cannot be described as hilarity" -Hal
Current Music: Talking Heads

"No one ever called me cool"

Home in Annapolis for spring break. Though a much needed break from the tipsy turvy world of academic studies, I'll be busy for most of this week. Tonight is bowling night, wednesday is Penguins Vs. Capitals Hockey, Thursday is the Maryland Senior Wrestling Classic Tournament, friday is my anneversary, and Wednesday through Saturday is the NCAA Big East Tournament, and one of those days (thursday through saturday) I'll be going to the AACS high school talent show featuring Jenna.

Yesterday Villanova beat Syracuse up at the Carrier dome. The home crowd broke the NCAA record for attendence, but weren't able to get past the cats. Just to rub it in, I've been using facebook.com to get at the players. You know, a little pregame 'poke' to Eric Devendorf couldn't hurt. So join in... lets attack the Big East together.

Last night was movie night, and it featured a much anticipated showing of "Grizzly Man." "Grizzly Man" is about a Timothy Treadwell: ameature bear expert; professional dumbass. Timothy is a treehugger of sorts. But instead of being satisfied hugging bark, Tim loves the grizzly bears of the Alaskan wilderness. For thirteen years he spent his summers camping with the bears... protecting them. That is, of course, until he got eatten in the summer of 2003. He gives them names like "Sgt. Brown" "Melissa" "Downy" and "Tabitha," prays for their rain, and video tapes it all. You HAVE to watch this movie. I give it an A+ and would recommend it to anyone.

...
In this post modern age in which we live, the youth in our culture are becoming increasingly influenced by relativist thought. One result, and, in my opinion, the most tragic consequence of relativism, is the subjectivication of 'cool.' Cool is not 'being who you are' or 'staying in school.' Whatever happened to the Johnny Cashes and Mick Jaggers of the world? Thats why you have me. Thats why I give you the Plog...

The reobjectivication of Cool.

Its bowling time.

PLMB,
PAV

ALL-AMERICAN

2006-02-26T13:58:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment:
FROM THE MARYLAND 'CAPITAL' NEWSPAPER:
AACS WRESTLING: Annapolis Area Christian School had two wrestlers earn All-American status at the National Prep Tournament. Pat McMahon, who won first place in last weekend's state tournament, took fourth place and Adam Palumbo took eighth.

As a team, AACS placed 23rd in a field of 119 private school wrestling teams from around the country.
Current Music: "Never Mind the Bollocks. Here's the" SEX PISTOLS

Congrats to PAT and ADAM, AACS wrestlers who have completed amazing seasons, both capturing the milestone of All-American this last weekend at the National Prep Tournament at Lehigh.

For the second year in a row, Bryn Holmes has won the tournament and captured the tournament's outstanding wrestler. Congrats to Bryn, 3 state Championships, 2 National Championships, 2 national Outstanding Wrestler awards, but only 3 MIAA Championships.

NOVA Vs UCONN Revisited Today.

GOOOOOOOO VILL-A-NOOOOO-VA!!

PEACE, LOVE, MONKEY BUSINESS
PAV

UBERMENSCH

2006-02-23T22:27:00.002-05:00

Quote of the Moment: Gunny: "Nice boxers, Merlini"
Merlini: "Its Scooby Do, Gunnery Sgt."
Gunny: "F'n Cartoons"
Currently Watching: Villanova dumping on Cincinnati

Most of you Plogheads know that I spent the semester studying abroad in China, but this semester is Rich Treacy and Laura's turn. Laura is in Paris, France, and Treacy is down under. For those of you who aren't into geography, France is that Western European country which has taught us what not to do in war, and Australia is the place Bart Simpson went to find out if the toilets really do spin the wrong way.

Laura is having a good time.
...

There is a form of Psychology which looks at connections between physical appearance and intelligence. There is a way in which by looking at a person's physical attributes one can make judgements about their potential and capabilities. Lets face it, some people are better to look at than others, and there is a genetic determinism which allows some to perform tasks better than others. Look at jet pilots for instance. They have to be a certain height and intellegence, and have a certain predisposition for risk taking and, well, a "Need for Speed." In the theory of natural selection, genetically intellegent and attractive people are drawn to each other and are more likely to mate with one another. One paper reads:

"Women prefer more intelligent men, as has been repeatedly confirmed by research. Most men place physical attractiveness as their highest valued feature in women. So it follows that if there are genes for attractiveness and intelligence, over time these will tend to cluster in the products of liaisons between the good-looking and the intelligent.

Cross-culturally, there is considerable agreement in the judgment of beauty among a host of racial and national groups, including those as widely separated as the Ache of Paraguay and the Chinese. In none of this research does the degree of exposure to western media have any influence on people's perception of beauty. This consensus appears to exist because it is possible to derive a mathematical formula that predicts how attractive a face or body is according to key proportions. The essential point is that attractiveness seems to be rooted in symmetry.

Attractive faces are more symmetrical than unattractive ones. The symmetry of your body and face also appears to be associated with how genetically fit you are and how many developmental setbacks you suffered in the womb and while growing up. Resistance to parasites and other pathogens has been shown to be related to how symmetrical bodies are."

...

Symmetry?

Whether we like it or not, physically attractive people are more inclined to certain tasks. The Luke Palumbos, Garner Smythes, and Jay Wrights (see below) of this world are just different. I may not be a genetic Ubermensch, but I wonder what nature intends for me. Perhaps I am genetically predisposed to ride a unicycle. I found out at a young age nature didn't want me to play basketball, so I will continue to live through my honed skills of ballance and vicariously through Villanova's Guards.

We'll see if I'm able to find a parter who will give me male heirs who will be the genetic superhumans that I am not.

On the other hand, girls love guys with skills, per Napolean Dynamite's dictum..."You know, like nunchuck skills, bowhunting skills, computer hacking skills. Girls only want boyfriends who have great skills." Maybe nature intended for me to be a rockstar. As is my theory, there must be a genetic connection between a lack of physical attractiveness and the ability to rock. I'll let the pictures do the talking:

Neil Young

Mark Knopfler

Jimmy Page

Bob

You had not yet sought yourselves; and you found me.
Thus do all believers; therefore all faith amounts to so little.
Now I bid you lose me and find yourselves;
And only when you have all denied me will I return to you.

Peace, Love, and Nature over Nurture,
PAV

PHILLY STYLIN

2006-02-19T21:26:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: Bart: “Mom, who is Neil Young?”
Marge: “He was a singer in the 60s like the Archies and the Banana Splits.”
Current Music: G Love and Special Sauce

Last night senior Pat McMahon of Annapolis Area Christian School won a Maryland State wrestling title at the 130 pound weight class against McDonough’s Curtis Holmes. Last week at the MIAA tournament Pat lost to Curtis, but came back this week to win the biggest match of his life. Pat is only the second wrestler in our school’s history to win states, and it is hard to understand how much work it takes to get to that level. Pat broke his back and didn’t wrestle sophomore year, but still managed to get over 100 career wins and deserves all the respect in the world… Plus, Senior year I upset (now national champion) Bryn Holmes, Curtis Holme’s big brother… Looks like us small Christian school boys are thorns in the sides of those McDonough boys. Congrats Pat.

PAT'S THE HEADLINER

2006 has been good to me. Great to me, so far. Pittsburgh Steelers, Nova Wildcats, and Pat have given me a lot to be pumped about. Today I didn’t have a ticket to the ‘Nova V. Georgetown game. Since GT has been pretty hot, I thought the team needed me. I put on one of my ROTC uniforms and headed over to school. I usually wait in the students line and get in when they open the doors an hour before tipoff. But today I was early and feeling cocky, so I walked around back and went in the players’ entrance. The guy at the door said "color guard, come on in?" I was the first student into the Pavilion and didn’t even have a ticket. Money. The game was great, and everyone said I had a closeup on ESPN.

After the game I went to the Connelly Center for a Cheese Steak and after ROTC I got myself an Italian Hoagie…. Nova Ball, Cheese Steak, and The Italian Hog… Philly Stylin.

I just found out MTV has a new show to corespond to a new Axe ad campaign: The Game Killers. It is about those guys and girls who always pop up to ruin your chances with girls. The ad I saw was “The One-Upper.” He’s the guy who takes everything you say or do and makes sure your girl knows he has done it better. He is hard to get around. Unless the girl realizes that he is just full of himself, things can get out of hand quickly. I don’t see myself as a “one-upper” at all. I typically don’t like talking about myself, though I will make sure I put it in your face if you say you’re an Eagles fan or something… “You just got a new bike? Really?... I just got a new unicycle!”

I’ll be sure to follow this ad campaign closely. You can join in the quest to Kill the Game Killers at: THE GAME KILLERS

Why is unicycling funny? Because it follows the Aristotle’s dictum… it pleases.

PLMB,
SPECIAL J

PROFESSIONALISM

2006-02-18T02:16:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "I'm not just the coolest, not just the best, I'm JUSTIN CREDIBLE!"
Current Music: Dylan "Bootleg Series Vol. 7"

Karl Fisher (I mean Tommy Dreamer) and I have come up with pro wrestling personalities to correspond (perfectly) with the Marines at Villanova, from the top on down. Lets get ready to RUMBLLLLLLLLLLLLE!!!!!!

"Hacksaw" Stephen Vrabel... USA USA!

Jason "Cactus Jack" Liebler

Little Spike Dudley (LSD) Leblanc

Leslie "THE BIG SHOW" Harkness

THE BIG BOSSMAN

TAZ

Kevin Manley (Kevin Nash)

The Major (Vince McMahon)

Mulcahy (The Sandman w/ beer in hand)

Stone Cold MarkPeters

Dink the Clown Merlini

Elena Darr

Garner Smythe AKA "The Heart Break Kid"

Pav

Vinny Giordano (Konnan)

A true American Hero: Dan Murphy (Kurt Angle)

Gunny

John Kearby (Triple H)

The Inovator of Violence: Karl Fisher (Tommy Dreamer)

Fallon

THE NATUREBOY: Colonel Wagoner (Rick Flair)

Marical Garcia (GOLDDUST)

PLMB
PAV

UNI-WRIGHT

2006-02-17T14:58:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: Hot Girl: "How do you know Mikey?"
Me: "We went to High School together... we were on the football team together"
Hot Girl: "Really?"
Mikey: "Actually, Marching Band"
Current Music: Elvis Costello "My Aim Is True"

Just a couple of lists for this one:

Top 5 reasons to ride unicycle:
1. You can't be sad and riding a Uni at the same time. For instance, yesterday I was having one of those crappy mornings. PT wore me out, I got a haircut and NOBODY noticed, and I had 2 and a half hours of intense classes. But as soon as I left the class building and started riding around, everything was great.
2. Believe it or not, it is actually quite practical... more so than a bike. I get to class 4 times as fast as by walking, it isnt as big as a bike, so It can be carried up stairs easily, and it can fit in those small spaces. Plus, who is going to steal a unicycle? I mean, I don't think they'd get too far.
3. I love listening to people talk around me. They're engaged in normal conversation, they spot me, and they kind of start fumbling through their sentences. They forget what they're saying. Then, when I pass, they start wispering to each other. Thats the best.
4. The "PLOG Theory of International Relations:" No two countries which use the Unicycle as the primary form of travel have gone to war with each other. Thats a fact.
5. The Unicycle is the next step in the Evolution of Warfare. It is fast and agile. Enemies can be spotted and shot from untold ranges and the shock will paralize the enemy.

........................

Why Jay Wright, Villanova's Basketball Coach is the most important person in my life right now:
1. Jay Wright has a suit for every day of the year, when the year isover, he throws them away and buys new ones.
2. When Jay Wright was in prep school, all the students wore uniforms.Jay Wright was still voted best dressed.
3. If Jay Wright wants to get a girl pregnant, he just stares at herand loosens his tie.
4. A bum asked Jay Wright for some change, but he gave him one of hisold sports jackets instead. Now that bum is known as Donald Trump.
5. It's been predicted that if Jay Wright ever spilled anything on oneof his suits, stains would be "in" for 200 years.
6. Jay Wright didn't get an extension until 2013. The year 2013 signed with Jay. 7. At least 12 photographers have been institutionalized from tryingto find Jay Wright's best side.
8. Jay Wright doesn't own a mirror. He can see it in your face thathe looks good.
9. When Jay Wright showers, the soap gets cleaned.

Peace, Love, and Monkey Business,
PAV

CELL SWIMMING

2006-02-16T17:07:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: Gunny: "Offensive Combat is about destroying people"
Current Music: Victory Twin "Somewhere between the street and the sky"

In a time of corruption and confusion... Clarity. THE PLOG. Talent, on loan from God.
"Just because I stand on the side of something doesn't mean I'm political." -BD

Three weeks ago at PT, the Marines had a few runs and then hit the pool. We swim with camis on, and after 20 minutes of swimming, I got out of the pool and felt something in my pocket. Cell Phone. After all that time in the Villanova pool, it was thoroughly soaked and still smells of chlorine. The battery was broke, and the new one I ordered finally came today. It actually works better than before, and looks quite clean.

I had the best Valentine's Day ever this year. I started off by having PT from 630-730, then I had class from 10-1. ROTC class from 1-215, ROTC LAB from 3-5, and ROTC Drill Practice from 9-10. Then I came home and had a romantic evening in the living room. Just me and my guitar, wasting the night away. Give me an L, Give me an O, Give me an S, Give me an E, give me an R. Whats that spell? PAV! Whats that spell? PAV!

My finger is on the pulse.

The snow is already melting here, and it feels like April already. Still plenty of snow for people to throw at me while I ride my unicycle, though.

It has been a long time since I've posted any pictures, so here's just a few to get caught up.

THE NOVA NATION AT THE WACHOVIA CENTER

MARIA SHARAPOVA WILL BE IN THIS YEARS SPORTS ILLUSTRATED SWIMSUIT EDITION

CHENEY'S GOT A GUN!

Peace, Love, and Monkey Business
PAV

P.S. From the Annapolis City Code:

12.48.020 Non-motorized wheeled vehicles in nonresidential areas.

A. A person may not ride on or use any non-motorized wheeled vehicle in a negligent manner on any public street, alley, sidewalk or way in the City of Annapolis. For purposes of this section, a person is guilty of negligent riding or using a non-motorized wheeled vehicle if the person rides or uses the non-motorized wheeled vehicle in a careless or imprudent manner that endangers any property or the life, safety or person of any individual.

B. For the purpose of this section, non-motorized wheeled vehicle shall mean skateboards, in-line skates, rollerblades, bicycles, unicycles and any other vehicle with one or more wheel(s) that is propelled by human power. (Ord. O-25-96 § 1: prior code § 17-21.1)

We'll see. We shall see.

UCONN, UCAN'T

2006-02-14T22:35:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Cheney's got a gun" (to the tune of Aerosmith's "Janie's Got a Gun")
Current Music: Mark Knopfler "Sailing to Philadelphia"

Nova Beats UCONN!!!

Last night was the most exciting basketball game I've ever seen. Villanova used a full lineup to come back from a 13 point defecit to topple the nation's #1 team at the Wachovia center. Nick hooked me up with a ride to Philly again (God Bless Him), and we got there 2 and a half hours before the game. We waited in line and when the gates were open, we sprinted down the halls and down to claim seats. Its like running with the bulls, minus the bulls... but we got the running down and we got set up with seats 7 rows behind the basket. What a great game. Defense was fantastic, forcing turnovers and converting when it mattered most. Nardi was quiet, but hit a HUGE clutch 3 and Will Sheridan knocked down 3 baskets before slamming the game home with a dunk right infront of us.

This morning after PT I went to the PIT for breakfast. Outside of the Pit I went to the newspaper rack, saw a grand Nova picture on the front of the Philadelphia Inquirer, and said "man, i got to get me one of those." I opened it up and the guy right next to me said, "yeah, me too." It was Will Sheridan. I held it open and said "take them all, man!" ... "thanks"... "no, will, THANK YOU," I replied. The headline read "Sheridan Shocker: Forward Takes Over." We went down to get our food, he got a cheese omlet, I teased him about how he isn't supposed to shoot, and we went our separate ways.

Will Sheridan celebrates with Nova fans while Conneticut's Rudy Gay (from Annapolis, MD) sulks

So, VP Dick Cheney shot a dude. Thats fun... Owen Wilson: "I don't even know what the F%#^ a quail is! "
Vince Vaughan: "I know. Why do I have to be in camouflage? Is the big bad quail gonna see me?"
...
Sack: "I hunt quail, Jeremy. They're overpopulated in this region and they're decimating the grubworm population. You got a f#%*ing problem with that?"
Vince Vaughan: "Not as much as I do with your attire, or just your general point of view toward everybody here. But hey, lets go kill some birds. I'm psyched."

I would be honored if the Vice President shot me with a buckshot. I'd never have to buy myself a drink again.

Peace, Love, and Quail Hunting,
PAV

USMC VALENTINE

2006-02-14T17:17:00.000-05:00

Little Melissa comes home from first grade and tells her father that they learned about the history of Valentine's Day. Since Valentine's Day is named after a Christian saint and we're Jewish," she asks, "will God get mad at me for giving someone a valentine?

Melissa's father thinks a bit, then says "No, I don't think God would get mad. Who do you want to give a valentine to?"

"Osama Bin Laden," she says.

"Why Osama Bin Laden?", her father asks in shock.

"Well," she says, "I thought that if a little American Jewish girl could have enough love to give Osama a valentine, he might start to think that maybe we're not all bad, and maybe start loving people a little bit. And if other kids saw what I did and sent valentines to Osama, he'd love everyone a lot. And then he'd start going all over the place to tell everyone how much he loved them and how he didn't hate anyone anymore."

Her father's heart swells and he looks at his daughter with newfound pride. "Melissa, that's the most wonderful thing I've ever heard."

"I know," Melissa says, "and once that gets him out in the open, the Marines could blow the shit out! of him."

P,LOVE&MB
PAV

PS. Thanks Fallon

MARY ELLEN UP!

2006-02-11T13:48:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Mary Ellen up and get back in the game!!!"
Current Music: Neil Young "Ragged Glory"

Guess whos back!

First things first... HERE WE GO STEELERS, HERE WE GO!

FINALLY GOT ONE FOR THE THUMB, ON FOR THE CHIN, AND ONE FOR THE BUS.

I know it has been a long time, and I owe an explaination. Ever since coming back from China I've been going through an intensive introspective inspection of myself and my role in the Blog world. The Plog had gotten stale, not funny. I was holding on too tight... lost my edge. Tomorrow will be the two year anneversary of the PLOG. At that time I was listening to Neil Young and I gave a brief self description...

"Some assumptions you can make about myself:
1. I am 50% Black, 50% Chinese, and 50% Native American
2. I am male
3. I am 18 Years old
4. I am an American
5. I am single
and Finally 6. I have experienced significant time travel "

... Not much has changed... Now I'm slightly more Chinese, Slightly More Black, and Slightly more Indian, I'm 20 years old. Other than that, same old PAV.

Now, on to the new stuff.

Steelers won the Super Bowl! To be honest, part of the reason I haven't Plogged lately is because I've been fucusing my energies on the Steelers, and didn't want to disrupt the mojo which had been working since I got home. I watched every game since being coming back in December with my family.

Why the Steelers are worth cheering for: There is a certain integrity to the Steelers organization. The Rooney family as owners are about as old school as it gets, and they have sticked with Bill Cowher through thick and thin. He's the longest tenure coach in the league, and is still relatively young. In a time where money rules sports, Hines Ward overcame a contract dispute to stay in Pittsburgh and only asked for what he was worth as a player. He played this year as the Steelers MVP, and personifies Steelers football. He isn't tall, not particularly fast, but he's the toughtest and best all around wide receiver in the NFL. And then there's that famous interview after the AFC championship game last year where he cried because they didn't get Bettis into the Super Bowl. And the Bus, he got it done this year. Not as our most dominant player, but as a leader. We'll miss you, Buss. Plus, the Steelers havent had the personell problems, drug or criminal charges like the Cowboys and Ravens have had. As if that wasn't enough, the Steelers fans are the best in the nation. Just look at the away games. Terrible towels a-blazin.

So now I'm living here in the Whiskey house with Merlini the Weasel, Vrabel the Station Wagon King, Roth the Jew, and Manley the Niggard. They all have girlfriends, and, though I do not, they have been willing to share. Besides their presence of beauty, Cali Kellie and Midge have hooked me up with Nova Basketball tickets, so I don't mind having them around.

I don't need to talk about all the Villanova Basketball excitement that has been around, but I will say it has been incredible. The team is hot, getting a lot of national attention, and the student body is pretty excited. The most fun game I went to was against St. Joes in Philadelphia. for this rivalry (and it is a huge one), the game is a home game for both teams. A college student's section is a living organism... it breathes, cheers, lives and dies together. For these Philly rivalries, both schools bring huge students sections to get in on the action, and cheers and jeers are exchanged from long before the game begins until the final buzzer. We got there more than 90 minutes early, and were there before the team even showed up.... It was in the first half. Nova was getting beat, bad. Everything was going wrong. I was in the third row and saw a cheerleader dropped from 10 feet in the air, right in front of me. She hit the ground hard. I heard it... no, I felt it. But then something happened. She got up, faced the court, and never once looked back at the fans. I could tell she was hurt, but she never showed weakness to the students. It inspired me. And just like she bounced back, the student body and most importantly the team came back. After going into halftime down 12, Villanova won by 13... That Cheerleader's name is Mary Ellen.

I salute you, Mary Ellen!

Elvis Freed Your Body
Dylan Freed Your Mind
The PLOG will free your Soul.

And just like that, Pav is back. Never Give Up, Never Give In.

Peace, Love, and Monkey Business,
Pav

MAO POSTERS

2006-01-09T10:50:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "MY HOUSE, MY HOUSE" -IAN
Current Music: Neil Young "Old Ways"

I know I havent been writing much these days, and I just don't feel like it. But I want to get this dream down before I forget.

I dreamed that I was back in China, visiting, but China was actually downtown Annapolis. I was down by the water buying large poster prints of Chairman Mao for souvenirs when I ran into someone I knew from while I was in China. He said he was sepparated from the group and told me to go find one of our teachers, Bing, who was supposedly somewhere around State Circle. So I told them I'd go get him. So I set off running in red shorts and my Steelers sweatshirt, listening to my XM Radio, up Main Street of Annapolis, Maryland. I finally meet up with him and a group of people, some of whom I knew, and some I did not. They were going to a class where they would learn how to meditate with monks. I was jealous because I was no longer a part of that group.

I am one deranged kid.

PLMB
PAV

ROBOTS

2006-01-03T19:15:00.000-05:00

There's nothing worse than the look on a boy's face when he says 'Dad, I don't think you can build a fully functional robot.'.
-Homer

EH

2005-12-28T18:00:00.000-05:00

I'm tired of the PLOG. I'm putting it down for a while. Need to re-evaluate my role in the blog-o-sphere, as they say on TV.

BRAKES

2005-12-06T10:17:00.000-05:00

Her gray, sun-strained eyes stared straight ahead, but she had deliberately shifted our relations, and for a moment I thought I loved her. But I am slow-thinking and full of interior rules that act as brakes on my desires, and I knew that first I had to get myself definitely out of that tangle back home. I’d been writing letters once a week and signing them: “Love, Justin,” and all I could think of was how, when that certain girl played tennis, a faint mustache of perspiration appeared on her upper lip. Nevertheless there was a vague understanding that had to be tactfully broken off before I was free.

Every one suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known.

MY BRAIN IS A RADIO

2005-12-06T05:35:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "I think 'LIVE MUSIC IS BETTER' bumper stickers should be issued" -Neil Young "Union Man"
Current Music: NEIL

The end is near.

For my stay in China, at least.

Today we had our final exam, and tomorrow is the oral test, which is actually only 10 minutes... But before we celebrate, let me tell you that its ten minutes, one room, and three Chinese teachers.

The last few days have been awkward. Yesterday I went to class and didn't realize until about 7pm that I hadn't eatten anything all day. I had two small apples, and thats it. I wasn't hungry, just had that nervous feeling which kind of makes you not even think about food. It was terrible for studying, and I just couldn't relax or learn any more. HanXu walked up to campus and we went to the coffee bar near campus and I had a salad to keep me alive. Today, however, Hanxu came over after my test and cooked me some lunch! All the other guys in the dorm were jealous, and I can't say I didn't show her off a little bit.

My mistake of the day: Letting her talk to Ann and Laura on SKYPE. I could understand almost all of what Hanxu was saying, but she was laughing too much for me to be able to trust whatever Ann was telling her... Funny, though.

So now I think about getting those last things I need to buy before coming back, how I'm going to get my DVDs past customs, and how I'm going get that receiver inside my head, like a radiohead.

Anyway, not enough time for PLOGGIN

PLMB
PAVY

BRUSHING

2005-12-04T10:49:00.000-05:00

You know when you're in the bathroom and you're brushing your teeth... if you start brushing at the same time as someone else, you dont want to be the first one to spit the tootpaste out. Its like a brush-off. A battle of wills. You don't want to be that guy who brushes for 12 seconds and everyone else in the bathroom is still brushing and thinking secretely thinking, "that guy only brushed for 12 seconds, he's inferior." You want to be that guy who, after everyone else spits out their toothpaste, you're still there brushing away, going over every tooth that extra time, getting some gum and tongue action, too.

i hate that

UH-OH

2005-12-04T10:13:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: Me: Peace, Love, Monkey Business
Vrabel: War, Hate, Human Fun
Current Music: The Avett Brothers

This is a clarification PLOG.

I just checked my email and it said I had a comment on the previous PLOG. I set it up so comments would be sent directly to my email, since I can't access the PLOG itself, thanks to, you know, communism, and all.

The comment, from "anonymous" was " Not a good idea to criticize anyone in your chain of command on a public forum. Might be better to take it off. Take this as a bit of advice from a wise and knowledgable stalker."

Well, my heart kind of stopped for a second and my roomate, ChenZheng had to admister some ancient Chinese herbs to revive me. To be honest, I dont really want to know who posted that... Whether its Rich Treacy or Lt. King... Either way I look like a jackass.

So to clarify, and because I am scared for my life, I publicly submitt and plege allegiance to the powers that be and am and always have been a big fan of Bill Goldberg.

And for the record, If the Colonel (or any other member of my chain of command for that matter) wrestled Hulk Hogan, I'd cheer for the Colonel.

That probably came off wrong, didn't it?

Dammit.

PLMB
PAVY

PS. RANDY FOYE dropping 32 in the win against OK. Huge game boys. Well done.

FEAR THE SPEAR!

2005-12-03T03:13:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: Me: "Ladies love me because I'm so popular"
Current Music: Pink Floyd

I was talking to Maura and she was telling me more of the great things that have been going on at Nova. It seems more have been kicked out of ROTC this semester than I originally though... By my count 7 MIA midshipmen, and two more apear to be on the ropes.

Do you remember when Bill GOLDBERG first came into the WCW? He was awesome... He'd just get these chumps in the ring and in about 2 minutes he'd have them down for the count. Fear the SPEAR!!!!

Well, thats what the new Colonel must be like. I mean, he's really working his way to the world heavyweight championship faster than everyone else. I just can't wait til he challenges the Hollywood Hulk Hogan. That will be great... Hogan Vs. Colonel Wagner.

Villanova ROTC, you gotta be tough to survive.

They're handing out PRBs (Performance Review Boards) like candy!

And I hear there's a transfer student who will have a billet next semester... The new guy. He better not be cute, or take any Villanova girls, and he better not like UCONN, the New York Yankees, The Ravens, the Democrats, Communists, or the "Pearl Harbor" movie.

Tomorrow is a big day, though, and bad Karma will be overcome!
GO NAVY! BEAT ARMY!

GO NOVA BEAT OKLAHOMA!!!!!!!

Peace, Love, and I hope the ROTC staff doesn't read the PLOG
PAVY

KFC

2005-12-02T08:40:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: integritous: boooooing!
sheNoVA17: booing?
integritous: no... its "Boing!"
sheNoVA17: hahahah
sheNoVA17: got it!
integritous: its onomonopia
Current Music: Led-Zeppelin "Houses of the Holy"

Two days ago I went to meet Xiao Feng for tutoring on the other side of campus. At 9pm I was on my way back and stopped while crossing the street when I noticed a guy selling books on the side. I went over and spotted a Bible... I snatched it up and gave the guy his money and went back to my room. This was the second time I bought a Bible from this guy, and I must give mad props to my main man, God, for hooking me up with these... I'm sure they'll go a long way here.

Anyway I got back to my room at 9:30 and my roomate was sleeping. I kind of gave one of those "you're shitting me?" Responses and went into our study lounge to get some reading done. The next morning I left and went to class at 8am with him still asleep. I came back at 10 to pick up my guitar to write a chinese song in class, only to find him still sleeping... I then returned at 11:30, and he was up. I went to eat a lunch cooked by my teacher, Huo Lao Shi, in the other dorm with my classmates and tutors... I love those tutors.... Anyway, then I had another class and came back at 4 to find my roomate napping. He soon got up and later went to Tai Kuan Do classes, and an hour later returned. I asked him how it was, and he said, "good... but I am very tired." Again a "you're shitting me" reaction as I grabbed my books to go to the study lounge.

I know what you're thinking, and what struck you most from that paragraph was probably "pav, you were reading and studying!?!?" And the answer is simply, "yes." I've got, as of 5 hours ago, less than a week in China. Its one of the hardest things I can remember... juggling the two (rather large) papers which are yet to be completed, the two days of testing on Tuesday and Wednesday next week, and the most pressing, the need to make time for my friends here.

So now as I sit in the study lounge, alone, I am accomplishing none of the above.

Today I went out with some of my Chinese friends to the Tiananmen area. We walked around, shopped a bit, and went into a KFC to warm up a bit. We sat down, drank some tea, and talked for a few hours, mostly about cultural and social diferences between our two countries as we tried to define "love."

Yesterday Yun Fei came into my room as I was listening to Radiohead, and hearing the opening of "Everything in its right place" he asked me "what is this? Is this for worship?"

No, Yun Fei, Radiohead is not what I'd call "spiritual" music.... Now, had he asked the same question about Bob, I might have responded diferently, depending on the particular piece of work.

Wednesday afternoon YangYi came in my room and told me to go with him, XuHaoFeng, and Smart to go to see the new Harry Potter movie. I went.

So what! I'm still gangsta!

PLMB
PAVY

2005-11-29T22:58:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "For them that must obey authority
That they do not respect in any degree
Who despise their jobs, their destinies
Speak jealously of them that are free
Cultivate their flowers to be
Nothing more than something
They invest in."
Current Music: Mark Knopfler "The Ragpickers Dream"

FAMILY... Whiskey Once, Whiskey Forever... Return to Glory...

Just a few examples of what some friends have in their IM profiles.

(Whiskey Company is my company in Naval ROTC at Villanova University, and the Drill team which participates in rifle drill performances at several points during the year.)

It seems that the Villanova NROTC unit is cracking down rather hard on Whiskey Company, and is threatening to disband it, on grounds of the "hazing" which takes place. The hazing first called into question is the tradition of having freshmen trainees, termed "WERMZ" (We Eat Raw Meat Z), write limmericks about all the members of the company... It is their "mission" as we call it, to search through the unit and university to uncover "dirt" on the elder company members. For example, last year's freshmen made fun of me for being nicknamed "little spoon" and for my unprecidented love of Maria Sharapova... Anyway, every year at the Marine-Navy Birthday Ball, after the dinner and speach, Whiskey Company sneaks into a hall or an empty room with their dates and the WERMZ present their limmericks. As you can imagine, it's more nerve racking for the upperclassmen, who are in the position to be absolutely exposed in front of their dates. It is actually one of the first chances the WERMZ get to relax a bit and take a shot at their trainers... hardly hazing.

Also, A limmerick is only 5 lines, and isnt exactly a shakespearian sonnet as far as difficulty to write.

There Wonce was a company called WHISKEY
The Colonel thought we were too risky
He shook us around
Tried to bring us down
But he can't kill us, we're too friskey

I diverge. The point isn't about limmericks or sonnets or Shakespeare, or the difference between Dr. Pepper and Diet Dr. Pepper, it's about the Company and what it really is.

Whiskey company I can say is the best thing I've done since coming to Villanova. Why? Not because of drill, but because its method of instruction creates an atmosphere which is unique and special to this company only. It conains both Naval and Marine Corps midshipmen, and the WERM class from which you graduated defines you for the rest of your time in college. They become more than good friends or fellow midshipmen, they're family.

So for the unit to take away Whiskey company, or even to severely limit its method of instruction is to kill the spirit which we have worked for. I'm not going to lie, my class did some ridiculous things while we were WERMZ to reach where we are now, but I can see now that every one of them was worth it, and they remain as the best memories from my freshman year. Moreover, to crush the spirit of Whiskey Company will result in the death of the drill team. None of us will be willing to put forth the effort necessary to learn, teach, train, practice, and perform drill if the ROTC unit will not give us support.

I would hate to say that the dream is over, but if things continue as they are, it will only be the family I have now which will remain, and further generations will miss out on the best part of Villanvoa... WHISKEY COMPANY.

Peace, Love, And WHISKEY WONCE
PAV

2005-11-28T05:40:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "If 13 is an ulucky number, than so should "B" be, because "B" is just a scrunched together 13."
Current Music: Neil Young

Today's class was good... for a Monday. Class went pretty smooth and while I was sitting there in my Nova game T-shirt and Sweatshirt, while during the second break my friend brought me down a package... I thought there had to be a mistake... But no, it was indeed for me, from none other than Nick Ferry-Ole! I was pretty pumped. He send me the Villanovan and the Villanova Times basketball previews, and a whole magazine of NCAA basketball preview. I was pumped, especially since one photo in the paper prominantly displayed this guy from in the stands at the NOVA V. BC game last year. Bring it on.

"Hate" is a strong word.

Things I hate:
1. UCONN
2. The ACC
3. The Baltimore Raisins
4. France
5. The AOL Instant Messenger Pop-ups
6. Communism
7. The New York Yankees
8. Weasels
9. When you buy a pen and it only works for about two words

I'll think of more later.

Peace, Love, Monkey Business.
The P-A-V

2005-11-27T04:18:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "When you feel in your gut what you are and then dynamically pursue it - don't back down and don't give up - then you're going to mystify a lot of folks." -Bob Dylan
Current Music: THE DOORS

We want the world and we want it NOW.

I forgot, but last night after Bela solo'd a bit, he leaned into the microphone and said "I studied hard when I was a grasshopper." A reference to the 1970's TV series "Kung Fu" staring David Caradine, in which he plays the half-chinese, half-american Kung Fu master and Shaolin monk Kuai Chang Caine.

You know what I hate? That thing that pops up when you sign on to AOL Instant Messenger. It always has some ridiculous news headline or pop or gay culture tidbit, and it just always bugs me... one of those things I think is actually being used by The Man to make us dumberer. Like today it says "He's DEAD sexy... but he's still alive to us"... with "dead" in a larger font than the rest. Next to the letters is a picture of Jim Morrison.... Does that bother anyone else? Thats not clever. Thats just weird. I shudder to think of what happens if you click the link.

Oh well, some people feel the rain. Others just get wet.

Today I went to church and played ping pong. Stephanie was cold and asked if she could borrow one of my jackets to play ping pong... I let her wear my Steelers sweatshirt... It kind of turns me on.

So what!?

I watched the Southpark movie today... does this make me a bad person?

Some day I want to stand of a box of soap and preach... I think it would just be soo literal.

PLMB
Special J

2005-11-26T10:03:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: Ashley (about reparations for slavery in her great town of Atlanta): "I'm all for it! I mean, my family should get some money. I mean, if it wasn't for abolition, right now my family would be making bank!!!!"
Current Music: Knopfler "Our Shangri-La"

I think I'm one of the nicest guys I know.

Well, another week has passed, and now I have this awkward, uncomfortable feeling. I return to America in less than two weeks now, and I my emotions at this point are pretty much all mixed up. I can't wait to get home to see my family and friends, play my electric guitar, play poker, bowl, unicycle, and all those things which make me a loser. On the other hand, I am going to miss some of the people here intensely, and I don't know how long it will be until I get over it. Those things, plus the added stress of procrastination and finals lurks around the bend just as does the ominous air of winter.

I just got back from seeing Bela Fleck! For those of you who are entirely culturally ignorant, Bela Fleck is the world's premire banjo player, and a virtuoso in every sense of the word. He's the Eddie Van Halen of the banjo. It was one of those moments when he started playing I just laughed. Its only happened to me a few times, but when you see something that amazing, something mastered to the point of perfection, it can be overwhelming. Thats how I felt the last time I heard Dylan playing "Like a Rolling Stone," or when you see Randy Johnson's fastball in person, or when Hines Ward makes an acrobatic catch on 3rd and 8. Its an epiphanic experience when it happens. Maybe truth and beauty are in the eye of the beholder.

Last night I went out (after a long and frustrating day) with Stephanie, Abel, Ben, and three of our favorite Chinese guys... YangYi, XuHaoFeng, and Smart. I showed up, bought the boys a round of drinks and just enjoyed the night. We taught them how to play fooseball, which they'd never seen before. At the bar one of my teachers, Brian, gave Abel a call looking for me and told me that he had an extra ticket for Bela. I was in.

Earlier in the day yesterday I had met some friends (who showed up 30 minutes late) and went to get clothes taylored. Then for dinner again everyone was late, and I wound up walking around with Gordon trying to find a restaurante which I'm convinced doesn't exist.... God has blessed me plenty, but I'm lacking in some departments:
1. Patience- I have no patience, especially for people who are late. If you arent where we're meeting 3 minutes early, I'm frustrated. If you're 3 minutes late, I'm pacing back and forth, cursing you and your family.
2. Good Looks- I better make a lot of money with whatever I do in my life, because my mojo aint working
3. A voice worth listening to- Self explainatory
4. What you might call "focus"- I realize more and more that I'm quite the bum. I sit around a lot and listen to music or play guitar... both frivolous. I sit on the computer typing this useless junk for Dan and Megan to read, and am not what you'd call a "Carpe Diem dude"
5. Conversation ability- I'm just pretty awkward unless we're talking about Dylan or Neil Young or something... and if we're talking about that, you're probably awkward too.

Thursday was Thanksgiving. Being that it isnt exactly huge here, we had to go out of our way to find a good dinner. It was good, though. And thats all I have to say about that.

Anyway, A dream you dream alone is just a dream, a dream you dream together is reality.

John Lennon said that. I'll let you be in my dream if I can be in yours.

I said that.

PLMB
SPECIAL J

PS. Nice guys finish last

2005-11-19T20:09:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "duty blows man" -Fallon on RA duty
Current Music: Red Hot Chillie Peppers (Greatest Hits)

Its been a week since I got back from Tibet, and its been the Beijing thing ever since. Not too much to report... George Dubs is here in Beijing now. I was going to go to the church he was going to this morning, but, you know, I didn't want to wake up at 6 and fight traffic and security and all that stuff, just to follow George like a groopie, to church, no less.

The day after I got back I took my friend Fred's advice and went to this street where he said I could get some good DVDs. It happened to be a street with tons of music stores. Some beautiful guitars and other instruments. I went in about 5 stores, tried their guitars out, and left... just like the freeloading hippie that I am. In every store there was one or two people (probably workers) ripping on guitar. Impressive. One guy started going into some Stevie Ray Vaughan. I expressed my gratitude to him and left again.

Accross the street I loaded up on some quality DVDs and CDs. It was like an early christmas. (CDs $1.50, Dvds $.90... no joke)

I bought the John Lennon "Acoustic" CD. I can't help it. It is so incredible. He is absolutely amazing. An absolute moron when it comes to talking or singing about politics or philosophy, but God could he sing. For the record, I feel the same way about Sublime, Neil Young, Bruce Springsteen, G Love, and Radiohead. You know what I mean... I know you do.

Last night I invited Stephanie to go with me and my friends to get some pizza and go to the bars... That was a risk... would she like it? would she like my (very) American friends? would she think she'd be home by 10pm? Anyway, it turned out alright. We went to this bar called the DEN, which is actually a Rugby bar. There were dozens of Irish guys there watching some soccer game. It got pretty nuts when the Celtics scored a goal. Fun, anyway. Then we left for the clubs and, you know, got "cronk in da club" as 50 would say.

A good time was had by all.

Anyway, I can't stop dreaming about basketball. I had another one where I went to the first game of the season and there were some guys at a table who were giving out jersies. He asked me what number I wanted. I said (you guessed it), "12." He said he already had it, but gave it to me right off his back. What a nice guy.

When I move back to Nova I'm planning on moving into share a room with Steve Vrabel. I love Steve like a brother, but he has a Queen Size bed. Thats ridiculous. Why does he need a queen size in our room? Anyway, I know how important public pressure is, so I'm asking you as readers of the PLOG to email him at stephen.vrabel@villanova.edu, telling him that this kind of agression will not stand, man. Plus, being (second) cousin of Mike Vrabel, he's a pretty devoted Patriots fan... Good thing they suck this year. Ha.

I had a revelation the other day. My name is Justin. From this Gordon Gave me the superhero/nickname Special J (which people actually call me, usually). My Chinese name is Zhou Jie. The second part is pronounced "J." My Tibetan name is Panba, which means "saturday." The Zhou in my chinese name is half the word for weekend. Jie means great, or, well, "special." Read that 3 times and tell me it doesnt blow your mind.

Last week in Lhasa I had a few beers which went right to my head, as it does at that high altitude... I proceded to list the entire Villanova Basketball team, Coach K, and all the Mao Zedongs as Facebook friends. Does this make me a bad person?

Peace, Love, and Monkey Business,
Special J

2005-11-15T00:37:00.001-05:00

Where the Pavement Turns To Sand

2005-11-15T00:37:00.000-05:00

A picture

2005-11-15T00:36:00.001-05:00

Reppin

2005-11-15T00:36:00.000-05:00

Monk-e see, monk-e do

2005-11-14T23:27:00.000-05:00

Friends, the following are the “TIBETAN PLOGS.” I wrote them in a journal and have typed them into one PLOG entry. The originals are in my journal and will be sold as cultural artifacts upon my return to the USA. The posts have been edited for length and content, and some posts may not be suitable for persons under 18 years of age. Enjoy.

Quote of the Moment: “This tastes like a Temple!”

Current Music: Dire Straits “Brothers in Arms”

I’ve been busy like woah the last few days, and haven’t taken the time to write down my thoughts. Problem with being a blog writer is that I’m always sitting around thinking of things to write. If I think of something I have to find a pen to write it down so I don’t forget it. If I cant find a pen I have to convince myself that whatever I was thinking was not worth remembering. This is a problem.

I got a “do not disturb” sign on my hotel door. Its time we go with “don’t disturb.” Its been “do not” for too long. Its time we embrace the contraction. “Do not” psyches you out. “DO… alright I get to disturb this guy... NOT… damn! I need to read faster”

Anyway, we spent the last two nights in Gyantse, a tiny little town, teaching the kids there how to play baseball. It was fun, something I’ll never forget.

From Gyantse we went to a lake to camp for the next two nights. That was fun, too, singing and dancing around a fire made of dried yak shit.

The second day we drove to the peak of a nearby mountain, hopped on some mountain bikes, and rode down. That was fast! So wild. But when we got to the bottom we were supposed to ride back to the campsite. But my rear brake was locked, so pedaling was hard, and the front wheel was warbling. So I sat on the side of the road for a while, until Gordon, bless his heart offered to hang out and wait with my bike for the truck while I took his. So off I went… for about 3 minutes before I broke the chain on his bike. That was it for me. I figure it was just meant to be. I should stick to one-wheelers anyway… they don’t have breaks or chains.

Later in the day we rode horses around the lake and sang around the crap fire again.

Then we did Karaoke back in Lhasa last night, and now I’m on the bus, chewing my “SPIDER MON” gum, which comes with WCW tattoos. Right now I’m rocking the HULKSTER on my right hand.

Cool.

PLMB,

PAVY

10:44:12pm 11 October 2005

Quote of the Moment: Me: “Whats the penalty for bringing an extra bag on the plane?”

Cassandra: “I don’t know. If you fly business class they just look over it”

Gordon: “Yeah, well, some of us have to fly coach.”

Cass: “Coach? Whats coach? Isn’t that a bag?”

Current Music: Radiohead “KID A”

Today was the midpoint of our Tibet trip. We’re in Shigatse now. It’s a quiet and empty city. Has a weird feeling after being in the crowded Beijing city for so long. So peaceful.

We’ve seen a lot of Buddhas and stuff, and have been talking to the monks, trying to find enlightenment and stuff.

My group here isn’t too bad, though there are a few I’d like to send to Siberia for the rest of the semester. There are two identical twin chinese girls in my group and though they aren’t mean or anything, they still creep me out. They’re never apart, they always wear the exact same clothes, and together don’t have as much personality as my left arm.

Does anyone else notice that Judge Alito is Rocky? “Yo… teddy kenedy, I dun’t here no bell!!”

Ha.

I’ve had wild dreams lately. In one the Dalai Lama died and I was selected to be the new one, but our group leader, Brian, found out and was trying to kill me. In another I was in Tibet and couldn’t find the score of the Steelers and Nova Bball games. That was a nightmare. And last night I drempt that the Nova womens Bball won the Big East. Of course I don’t care about womens basketball, but I think my mind just combined two things which it loves… Nova Ball and girls. Its actually a dangerous and scary thing, and tonight I’m worried I’ll dream about Sharapova joining the marines.

That would be weird.

PLMB

SPECIAL J

P.S. Today I bought a soviet AK-47 bayonet at a market here. Why and how it got here I haven’t a clue, but now I have one.

P.P.S. I got emails from Kellie G. and Woodsy in the last two days. That makes me happy. I love you ladies.

9:38:12pm 2 November 2005

Quote of the Moment: “…Maybe in the Sylvia Plath, Tibetan Philosophy sense of the word…” –Jack

Current Music: “SUBLIME”

Last night was rough. I wasn’t feeling well, and the Yak meat lasagna at dinner didn’t exactly stay down. I wasn’t able to sleep and had a terrible headache and an exploding digestive system. I wasn’t able to sleep and every time I closed my eyes I felt like I was climbing a mountain surrounded by Tibetan women trying to sell me things. Its like I couldn’t convince myself that I was actually in bed. One of those nights you think will never end.

I feel better now, and today we went to see the Poltala palace. I’ll bet you’ve never seen it.

Its cold here.

PLMB

PAV

9:16:12pm 31 October 2005

Quote of the Moment: “I just breathe through the mouth and think of pandas” –Freya (on using Tibetan bathrooms)

Current Music: “Shangri-La” by Mark Knopfler

Yesterday we left Beijing at 6:30am for the Beijing airport. By about 3pm we landed in Lhasa, the capital of Tibet. My first night in Tibet in many ways compares to my first day at Mountain Warfare school this summer, or my first night in Beijing, for that mater…. Kind of Sucked. A little overwhelming, perhaps. Like MWTC, last night was a sudden change in physical atmosphere. Lhasa is at about 11,000 ft elevation, which can be pretty rough on the body, even one as hard and tight as mine. Byt now, 24 horus later, I feel a lot better.

I didn’t know much at all about Tibet before coming here, but it definitely has some powerful images to be beheld.

The people eat so much Yak it makes me crazy already. Its hard to grow food at this altitude, so they live largely off Yak, barley, and have to rely on imported fruits and veggies for food.

Today we went to the central Temple of Tibetan Buddhism here in Lhasa, and other stuff too.

Anyway, its all rocking my world. So I’m just sitting here listening to Mark’s “ShangriLa” album, living in the real Shangrila, which is the Tibetan world for the perfect society. And tonight at dinner they were playing Nirvana.

When life imitates art…

PLMB

PAVY

2005-11-03T08:22:00.000-05:00

Quote: "I just breathe through the mouth and think about pandas." -Freya (on using Tibetan "bathrooms")

still in tibet.

Oh, and How about them Penguins

2005-10-29T08:42:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "I'm a WHISKEY rock-a- roller, thats what I am, Women, WHISKEY, and miles of travelin' is all I understand" -LYNYRD SKYNYRD
Current Music: Lynyrd Skynyrd of course

This is going to be a little Ying a little Yang of a PLOG... You'll see.

I do not consider this one of my shining moments. Not the typical PLOG of old. Not the sitting on top of the world, trash talking, jive walking, women stalking, and whiskey rocking you're used to. This is the "Behind Blue Eyes" to the usual "Won't Get Fooled Again" (to use a THE WHO analogy) PLOG. This is the field goal which beats your footaball team in the final seconds of play.

So I warn you now, if you want to skip to the more uplifting part of this PLOG, go now to the "..." Its like a Hardy Boys novel.

Such has been the last hour.

To set the stage, its 11O'clock on a Saturday, the regular roomate shuffles in. I'm completely sober this time, not making love to any tonic and gin. In fact, (enough billy, already), I'm sitting at my computer writing an email to my parents. Its a good email. A solid, concise, yet very emotionally gripping email, if I do say so myself. So my roomate goes to bed and in a few minutes starts, as the military folk might say, "going ape shit on me."

Long story short, about three weeks ago he confronts me about his terrible problem of not being able to sleep well. He tells me I'm too loud and he can't sleep. So what do I do, I resolve to go to bed before 12 and only that late if I'm studying, not listening to music or watching a movie (even not with headphones). I manage to do this. And yet, he, as Megan might say, "flips out on me" for being awake and typing on my laptop at 11 on a Saturday night. So I left the room to calm down and wandered into the computer lab.

I'm very upset right now, if you couldn't tell. For those of you just joining us, he's a freshman, which I wasn't too excited about to start, I'll admitt. This is his first time living with someone, and that was just a bad idea all around. So I'd like to give a big "insert vulgar gesture here" to the following people:
1. The university- for giving me a freshman roomate. Moron move.
2. The government- for instituting the one child policy. if he had had brothers or sisters, he might not be such a wuss.
3. Him- just for being so tired all the damn time

....
Everything is great. Today Megan told me that she met Ben Folds in Chicago. We're damn good. As I commented on "THE PLOG JR." :
I have taught you so well. So between you, me, and Red we've met 1. Toby Keith 2. G Love 3. David Byrne 4. Bono and 5. Ben Folds. All we need is Dylan and Neil Young and we're good for life

China's been good too. I'm doing well in class and have been relatively healthy (knock on wood). Yesterday I went with HanXu to a mountain outside of beijing. It was nice to get out of the city for a while. She really is a special girl to me, and I can say I haven't met a girl who I like as much as her for as long as I can remember. The sad part about this is that 1. its impossible to tell how a girl is thinking. No matter how hard I try, I will never know what is going on in their heads. and 2. I have to come back to America and leave her. Its like every song on the AVETT BROTHERS last album. Its like how you cant win with a losing hand. There's no bluffing in this one. So, nonetheless, I want to make sure I enjoy every minute that I can be with her after I get back.

Which brings me to tomorrow.

Tibet, baby. The world's rooftop. Tomorrow I'll be in Lhasa, Tibet's capital, at 14,00 feet, twice as high as Denver and as high as the highest peak in the US. I'll try to not get too high, if you know what I mean.

I will be grosely out of touch for the next two weeks though, so I'll say it now... GO STEELERS.

And, as was my moto, and as I used to tell the student body in high school... "Cheer up ya buggas, pretend its Chris'mas!"

PLMB,
PAVY

Crooked as ever... I mean my smile, not China, which is also crooked, though not "as ever"

2005-10-29T08:40:00.001-05:00

Beijing From Xiang Shan

2005-10-29T08:40:00.000-05:00

Crooked as ever...

2005-10-20T22:40:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Logan Stormwell: then i asked if any of them knew a hanson song
Logan Stormwell: and one of them said mmmbop
Logan Stormwell: so the next logical step was for them to sing it
integritous: of course!
Logan Stormwell: which they did
Logan Stormwell: then vrabes called roth about something and at the end told the wermz to sing it in the phone to him
Logan Stormwell: which they did poorly
Logan Stormwell: so at the end of practice they had to do mmbop pushups
Logan Stormwell: 1 mmm bop
Logan Stormwell: 2mm bop..."
Current Music: Van Halen

Logan, and the Freshmen WERM trainers, keep up the good work.... Get those WERMZ to spin me some SILK.

When minds weave symphonies...

Yesterday put me in a not-so-great mood. As always, we had class from 8-12. From 1:30-4:30 we were on a fieldtrip for my Chinese Anthropology class. We went to a Catholic Cathedral in Beijing. Now, I was excited about talking to some Christians, and trying to get to some answers to hard questions. But we drove there for an hour, had a rather boring talk, and had another hour drive home. My questions were not answered directly, and I think it was a waste of time... Althought he Father gave a shout out to my main man, St. Augustine.

Right after getting back, I went to meet with Xiao Fang, grabbed some meat on a stick, and went to a meeting at 7:30. Now, I was kind of hoping to go out to the bar last night, but that was shot to shit by 2 hours of a terribly run meeting. That kind of thing really bothers me. Really. Maybe its the military in me, but I just wanted to stand up and yell "you're freakin done talking!" to all the students who wouldn't shut the hell up while the teachers were trying to give some equally meaningless talk. I was trapped in a seat in the middle of the aisle, and my frustrated attitude turned into a real disdain for my classmates.

Now, we've been together for over two weeks, everyone is pretty comfortable with each other, and cliques have formed. Thats fine, it just happens. I just can't stand the way people talk. People hang out in groups of 4 to 8, talking about useless shit, never getting anywhere, and really just speak to hear themselves talk. Even if they have nothing to add, they talk so that they aren't marginalized from the conversation. People often say that I'm "quiet." Maybe its because I've paid attention to how people talk, and would rather not waste my breath. Yeah, it has social consequences (not playing the game), but as long as I'm holdin on to the solid rock, its all good. After all, I dont care about economy, I dont care about astronomy, but it sure does bother me to see loved ones turning into puppets.

But anyway. Next week we're going to Tibet. From what I hear, Tibettan monks are the coolest people on earth, and some mountain called "Everest" is supposedly pretty high. I mean, we'll be hanging out at 10,000 ft for two weeks. Good thing the Marines hooked me up.

Wisdom asks "are you ready for this?" Experience says "You know the kid can't miss."

Yeah well.

PLMB,
PAVY

2005-10-19T01:32:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Moment: "Pav, where have you been!? I thought you ate too much white rice and exploded!!!" -Laura
Current Music: Sigur Ros "Von"

My roomate doesn't particularly like my music. He has, however, taken a liking to Sigur Ros, of all things.

My life has been pretty good these last few days. I'm trying to not get stuck in that routine rut you usually get into at school. Its always there, but I just think it would be too much of a shame to waste time in China with a boring existence. So every day I try to do something different, just to mix things up. However, when you have the same class every day for four hours, there is a tendency to waste a lot of time.

Over fall break, one of the more excentric members of our group, and the worst student in my class, Gordon, certainly gets the star sticker for his entertainment value. A Mississippian, he is rather charasmatic, suthern, conservative, big boned, and loud. He knows the words to every song ever written, and is not afraid to sing them, even at the most inapropriate of times, and above all others, he loves food and the south. On our trip he decided to start a group of superheros among us. I am Special J, and have bowstaff skills, Abel is "Rock Garden" and can shoot rocks out of his hands, Eric is "E Train" and runs over the enemy, Ben is "Big Lense Ben" because he can freeze people with his camera, Michelle is "Flashdance," Cassandra is "The drunken sailor," and Jessica is the Tea Queen, who can brew three mysterious teas... one which renders you blind, one deaf, and one mute.

Other than fighting chinese crime with the other special forces, I spend most of the day staring at the computer screen, hoping Dan and Megan will post another Blog or Plog, respectively, or going out to eat with my friends.

Still haven't found a woman yet. But I'm working on it.... What can I say? I have the "yellow fever." I'm just looking for the cure. Problem is, every time I meet Chinese people and go out with them, it takes them about 10 minutes to notice that I'm "quiet." They don't really understand the conjugation of the word, so they often say I'm "boring," meaning that I look bored. Thats okay.

Still doing the whole "learning Chinese thing," though it definately seems that I've reached a plateau where I can get along well with the day to day things, and my conversational progress has slowed a bit. It seems more and more I'm not remembering what I learned in class, and only picking up curse words and street talk from my friends... the stuff I actually commit myself to remembering.

I really have nothing to say... Ｉ just thought Laura's quote was worth posting. Sorry for wasting your time.

PLMB,
陈周孑

Actually, maybe you diserve another quote too:
"Big Lense" Ben: "我比他们说中文好"
我："但是我比他们好看！"
服务员："不！"

Translation
Ben: "I speak chinese better than them"
Me: "But I'm better looking than them"
Server: "NO!"