awkwardness

Hot Pants?

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Plastic Pants

Retailer TopShop is selling clear, plastic, jeans for a meager $100. I would argue that they are really selling clear, plastic, capri pants but whatever. TopShop says,

Think outside the box with these out-of-the-ordinary clear plastic jeans – guaranteed to get people talking. In a straight leg cut, they feature classic pockets detailing and are cropped at the ankle bone. Ideal as a statement piece for a festival or costume party, take the look to the extreme with a bikini and sequin jacket or dress down, layered under an oversized jumper or asymmetric hem dress.

If these are your style have a look at TopShop’s pink, vinyl, jamie jeans.

via Boing Boing

A Geek’s Journal From 1976

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I have recently been enjoying Steven Thompson’s new blog A Geek’s Journal 1976. Steven was a teenage geek in 1976 and he is blogging all of his old diary entries from that year. Each entry is from the current date – 35 years ago. Here’s an excerpt from today’s entry:

After school I took the bus straight over the river again. I picked up one great comic, one great magazine and two not bad comics…as well as finally giving in and buying HUSTLER. Tried to avoid that last one but guess I didn’t try hard enough. I did manage to avoid actually opening it or even flipping through it, though. Stuffed it right under the chair pillow unread. Maybe the more I learn about myself, the more I realize I don’t really need that kind of thing. I can do without it. Maybe I can hold out past my limit this time without any trouble. I hope so.

While I was over there, I ordered my very first triple from Wendy’s but when I got home I found dad had got my usual six coneys. So…I ate all of it!

In the midst of all the posturing, bravado, and “personal branding” in the blogosphere these days, it’s refreshing to see a project with this much heart. There’s a certain level of exposure and vulnerability to a project like this that I find appealing not only because of the often cringe worthy events recorded there in, but because of the both funny and sad way it is written.

Moist Panties

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A compendium to Wet Panties. Originally titled “A New Dynamic Clothing Model. Part 2: Parameters Of The Underclothing Microclimate”

Based on a new modeling, described in the first part of this paper, which takes into account the pumping effect under garments, the various parameters characterising the confined air, and managing its dry and latent losses, are determined. The mean temperature, calculated from heat exchanges with skin (or underwear) and with the garment, progresses exponentially as a function of the trapped time, until a limit. The mean humidity amount, determined from the energy of total evaporation, from the air layer renewal rate and from the water vapour diffusion through the fabric, increases linearly. Using a movable thermal manikin, walking at various speeds, and with a combined effect with wind, the intrinsic air speed and convection coefficient are defined. The intrinsic air speed combines the effects of external air and body motions. The intrinsic convection coefficient is a linear function of the square root of the inner air speed.

Wet Panties

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For further research: Impact Of Wet Underwear On Thermoregulatory Responses And Thermal Comfort In The Cold.

In the wet condition 175 g of water was distributed in the underwear prior to the experiment. The test was done on eight men (Ta = 10°C, RH = 85%, Va < 01 m/s), and comprised a 60min resting period. Skin temperature, rectal temperature, and weight loss were recorded during the test. Total changes in body and clothing weight were measured separately. Furthermore, subjective ratings on thermal comfort and sensation were collected. The tests demonstrated the significant cooling effect of wet underwear on thermoregulatory responses and thermal comfort. Further, the tests showed that textile construction of underwear in a two-layer clothing ensemble has an effect on the evaporation rate from clothing during rest in the cold resulting in a significant difference in mean skin temperature. The thickness of the underwear has more of an influence on the thermoregulatory responses and thermal comfort, than the types of fibres tested.

A Lifetime In 10 Weeks

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The last couple of months have been pretty crazy/amazing/profound. So much has happened that, I’ll probably never remember it all, and truthfully, that doesn’t bother me. In some ways I have a tinge of regret for not having taken the time to write it all down as it happened or shortly there after. If not just so I have it archived somewhere. But in reality, some of it I don’t know how to write about – i don’t have the words to fit the experience. Some of it I don’t care about. And some of it I simply don’t care to remember.

So instead I’m going to cop-out and make a list of some of the major and minor events of the past 10 weeks in no particular order and just leave it at that. I can only hope my life remains as eventful and that I take the time to write about it afterward.

I went to my first honky tonk.
I saw Built To Spill play again.
I’ve been to the hospital three times for three different individuals. Two of them in the emergency room. One fatal.
I met family members I have never met before and most likely will never meet again.
I spent a long weekend at my timeshare in Vail.
I went to a mini-family reunion and ski vacation in Breckenridge.
I suffered through a 150-hour work week.
I took a full week vacation.
A loved one died in my arms. It was probably one of the most weighty and profound experiences in my life to this point.
I did my time in the back of a cop car in Henryetta, Oklahoma.
I had the pleasure of staying in a giant mountain mansion with six bedrooms, four bathrooms, two hot tubs, and ski in ski out access.
My car was hit by a kid who had his drivers license for a measly two days. He ended up totaling his car a week later.
I Was invited over by complete strangers for a mardi gras party/steak dinner.
Somehow fit in about eight days of skiing.
Saw a friend who I haven’t seen since his wedding.
The kitchen remodel was completed.
Mom came to town for a visit.
A few birthday parties were celebrated.
I got fall down drunk with a co-worker.
And lots of other various sundriness and ephemera.

I Better Get Back To Work

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By my age:

    Based on a nightmarish dream, Robert Louis Stevenson wrote The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
    Russian ambassador Aleksandr Borosovich Kurakin introduced the practice of serving meals in courses.
    Frederic William Herschel, an English astronomer, invented the contact lens.
    American sprinter Evelyn Ashford won her final Olympic gold medal at age 35, old for a sprinter.
    Amedeo Avogadro developed Avogadro’s hypothesis.
    Law School professor Anita Hill charged that Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas made indecent remarks to her.
    Margie Profet proposed a new theory of menstruation which claims that menstruation protects against infection and won a MacArthur Foundation “genius” grant.
    Astronaut Buzz Aldrin achieved his life’s ambition at age 35 and wondered, what do you do after that?
    Mozart stopped composing and started, well, you know.

Devil May Care

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Mike’s entry on the Advocacy of the Devil is excellent. He brings up a great point:

Nothing is more infuriating that to be on the verge of an intellectual victory with a worthy opponent and then hear them say, “I was just playing Devil’s Advocate.” The correct usage of the Devil’s Advocate does not involve just the countering an argument. The advocate of the devil is there to sharpen an idea, and therefore is actually on the same side as her “opponent”. Additionally, the use of the Devil’s Advocate needs to be invoked before it is used. To invoke the Devil’s Advocate after it has been applied is to use it to cloak mean-spirited or useless argument.

I had never thought of this before. I have used the “oh, I was just playing devil’s advocate” excuse to back my way out of a losing argument tons of times and never realized how much of an asshole I was for doing so, until I read this.

I apologize to anyone I may have ever pulled this crap on.

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