Potpurri
- Ross: "It's ok, Monica's gonna make POTPURRI"

- My sister is thinking about getting a dog. I think she wants one like the kind Jessica Simpson wanted in that one episode of Newlyweds (Maltese?).

- I was thinking about how some people (girls) criticize others (guys) who are only attracted to those based on physical appearance. But when any of us visit to a pet store, do we pick the ones who we think are the most "loyal" or have the best "personality"? Admit it, you go for the ones who are cutest. And how is that any different from when guys are naturally drawn to the girls with pretty faces/hot bodies? Yeah, people are different from animals, but still. Does an ugly puppy or kitty deserve less attention or love than a cute puppy/kitty, in the same way ugly people get less attention and love in this world? I'm not going to say yes or no to that question, since I know it's there's more to it than yes or no. All I'm saying is, I think a lot of you people who say "Guys are shallow because they care so much about looks" might be guilty of the same shallowness, only in another way.

- Jessica Simpson might have exploded in popularity and exposure thanks to her show, but it's also made it that much harder to take anything she does seriously. When I hear any of her songs on the radio, all I can think about is her talking about "dropping the kids off at the pool", or picturing her trying to do laundry. It was especially weird recently to hear her remake of "Angels", a song I actually liked back in the day. With that said, they better release some "Newlyweds" seasons on DVD soon. I think that might be the one show I actually miss the most since we cancelled our cable a few months ago. Such quality entertainment.

- It's that time again: fantasy football season is approaching. In case anyone out there is planning any events that might involve me, don't choose Sunday, 8/29. That is this year's Mcnown League draft date. Mark it down on your calendars now!

- I'm sure everyone heard about Mike Ditka being considered to take Jack Ryan's place in the Senate race as the Republican candidate. I don't know what I think about that, but one thing I found very interesting was that the whole reason Jack Ryan had to quit was because his ex-wife released embarrassing information about his past. Well, that's not the interesting part, the interesting part is that I heard his ex-wife was Jeri Ryan. The actress who used to play some hot alien chick on Star Trek, and was also a teacher on Boston Public. Not that I was a fan of hers or anything, but still interesting.

- The letters in SKABERFAT can be rearranged to form the word BREAKFAST. No I didn't come up with that myself, I see that on a cereal box every morning. Not even my own cereal box, I keep seeing it one of my roommates' boxes of Cocoa Puffs as I go to put back my own box of Cheerios. Just thought I'd share that fact because I keep thinking about it for some reason.

- Sometimes I feel like the longer I work here as an electrical engineer, the more I start to lose touch with the other parts of life. One way it is definitely affecting me is in language - the way I interpret certain words and phrases these days makes me realize how much of a loser nerd I'm becoming.

For example, "coax" used to be a verb pronounced COKES, like a synonym for "persuade" or "cajole". Now when I see the word, I hear it pronounced in my head as "co-Ax", as in the type of cable. Also, normal people hear the word "puff" and think of things like cocoa puffs, cream puffs, Puff Daddy, etc. Enginerds like me think of puff as the abbreviation for picofarad (pF, unit of capacitance). Same with "mic" as the abbreviation for microfarad. So when I hear Nas rapping about "all I need is one mic", I picture him talking to one of the techs in our lab, asking for a 1.0uF Tantalum capacitor. Then when I hear Nelly's song "E.I.", I think about Ei, sometimes used as the symbol for input voltage. Pretty sad.

- If it's not enginerd stuff, it's sports stuff. When I read or watch regular news, I forget that UK refers "United Kingdom", not "University of Kensucky". Or that "colon" is a kind of cancer, pronounced like COLE-on, nothing to do with fat greasy pitchers and not pronounced co-LONE.