Dave

cowbob @ 2009-11-16T20:42:00

2009-11-17T01:43:04Z

i realized that i have not updated this in almost a year. man, time sure goes by. so, as an update, i suppose i'll compile everything i've discovered over the past year:

1. i love politics as a journalist and an observer but hate it as a citizen. (having now followed the national scene under both a republican president and a democratic one, i've concluded not only that i would never consider myself a member of either party, but that the haters on each side are equally ridiculous.)
2. manual transmissions are the way to go. (i bought a badass new truck.)
3. i'm really a solitary person who prefers being alone. (which is fine, as long as you get out every now and then and don't let friends slip away because of it.)
4. drinking beer regularly is perfectly okay, so long as you never get particularly drunk. (and, as a side note, octoberfests are the best beers.)
5. my job is totally awesome. (even though it pays terribly, i get to go cool places and meet cool people regularly--i've sat through murder trials, rode around with a u.s. marshals fugitive task force, toured a power plant, conducted an interview at a jail and kind of covered a visit by the president since i started my job.)
6. on a related note to number 5, courtrooms are my favorite thing to cover.
7. i'll never read books like i used to when i was younger, when i read a few novels each week for years. (i don't have the attention span for it anymore--i just read news all the time and research everything on wikipedia.)
8. i am addicted to eating sickeningly sweet food much in the same way i'm addicted to drinking coffee in the morning and smoking cigarettes throughout the day. (but only late in the evening; i wake up too full to think about eating.)
9. aspects of the past can be dealt with and reconciled without fully getting over them. (enough said.)

that's really all. life is fine. i don't think i'll ever be a particularly happy or particularly unhappy person. but i never dread waking up for any day.

cowbob @ 2008-12-09T11:46:00

2008-12-09T16:46:50Z

i got a job a month ago as a reporter at the record in troy. i cover arrests and courtroom stuff and whatever they need me to do. i like it a lot. this is what i want to do for a living.

and i hope i'll be able to do that. this is not a vibrant industry. within the span of a day the tribune company, who owns the chicago tribune, la times, and others, filed for chapter 11 bankrupty, and the new york times, generally regarded as the most financially stable newspaper in the country, took out a big mortgage on their manhattan building to get some cash. and the miami herald is up for sale. somehow the herald has been able to sell their paper every day for a surprisingly low 35 cents. they should probably raise that. it's a good paper.

so yeah. hopefully newspapers exist in the future.

blah blah blah

2008-10-21T13:43:02Z

I'm a complete political news junkie who spends a lot of time reading a million different outlets and listening to talk radio, so I'm going to rant about taxes with my dad as a case study

I've got problems with this notion that the government owes anyone anything they didn't earn: that somehow our collective responsibility outweighs each of our own personal responsibilities.

We all know Obama is going to provide "tax relief" to 95 percent of working families. But the problem is that something like one-third of people who file with the IRS don't make enough money to pay federal income taxes. So it's not cutting taxes--they don't pay any taxes to cut. It will be handing over money from people that make a decent wage to those who do not. That's more than a safety net for those who fall upon hard times, which I believe in--it's indiscriminately handing one citizen's money to another who, for all government knows, doesn't make enough to pay taxes because he's an alcoholic and can't keep a job. Or dropped out of high school and is still working at McDonalds. The concept that those scenarios are somehow anyone's responsibility but that person's is ridiculous to me. I'm not trying to be condescending, but a lot of poor people are poor because they’ve never done anything to deserve making a lot of money. Keep in mind I'm pretty poor--even with my master's degree, the most I hope to make in a starting job as a newspaper reporter is $25,000. I don't hate poor people. I give a dollar to any homeless dude who asks because I am a sucker.

So, conversely, if you do manage to make yourself a success--which, as I gather, is the foundation of this country's economic system--you are going to be expected to hand over much of the money you make to the government for a plethora of things, some worthy and some not, among them giving "tax relief" to people less successful than you.
Take my dad, for example. He’s certainly not poor, but he's not Porsche-driving, country clubbing rich either. He works for himself almost seven days a week maintaining two apartment complexes. He's thought about selling them over the years, but under Obama’s plan he certainly wouldn't, because Obama wants to raise the capital gains tax to something like 35 percent. Capital gains taxes are really complicated, but basically, if he sold them he’d have to hand over to the government more than a third of the profit he'd make selling the properties he's worked practically everyday of the last twentysomething years to maintain (and then, in his personal income tax, pay taxes on it again). That money he'd make would be his retirement, his money for the rest of his life. Raising capital gains taxes with the economy as it currently stands is pointless, because it will discourage those sorts of financial transactions, thus stifling investment and actually decreasing government revenue. My father would be crazy to vote for raising that tax.

And even if the sale did make him certifiably rich (which it wouldn't, because there'd be mortgages to pay off and such), what is wrong with that? It's not like he won that money; he made an investment when he was 21 or 22--younger than I am now--and he's worked hard since then to make it profitable. He'd have to pay an extra amount of tax somewhere in the vicinity of $100,000 on top of what it'd already be at the current rate. And for what? So it can be handed to people who don't make enough money to even pay taxes? That is nothing short of the government restructuring the economic standing of individuals--"spreading the wealth around," as Obama calls it--and it's probably the driving force behind socialism. I don't know if it's a smart political move for McCain to call it "class warfare" or quasi-socialism, but I don't know a better way to describe it. It ideologically decreases each person's responsibility for their own personal welfare. Taxes are supposed to be what you return to government for what you receive. Aside from having roads to drive on and what not, the only thing my dad gets from the government is endless fees and complications when he simply wants to divide a lot of land he owns in half to build two houses on it. He can't even build on his own land without paying the government for permission. The government doesn't give him anything for free.

And he wouldn't want it that way. And neither would I. I don't want the government to provide me health care, or free money, or much else for that matter. I just want the government to do a small handful of things, among them: protect citizens' rights, keep them safe, be honest and accountable, and facilitate some of the paperwork bullshit. Most importantly, beyond that, I'd like the right to be able to take care of myself.

Because if I can't do that--if I cannot afford groceries, or rent, or a doctor--that problem is mine alone to deal with. It is not America's problem, or yours, or the President's, or any other taxpayer's. It's my problem. Just as I’d like to believe that I am capable of bringing success to my life, I can also recognize that I am equally capable of mismanaging that same life and falling into unfortunate circumstances.

I wouldn't want those outcomes in anyone else's hands but mine. I want that responsibility, and I would question the integrity of anyone who does not.

Feel free to disagree. For the record, I'm totally not a Republican. I'm pro-choice, pro-gay marriage, and I get sketched out every time a politician mentions God. I think Obama seems like he'll make a decent president. I hope so.

cowbob @ 2008-04-28T16:51:00

2008-04-28T21:00:53Z

the semester is about to end. my roommate's going back to california in two weeks. i won't be done for good 'til the end of june, when i will lose three-quarters of my friends and head home.
but i've met some awesome people. the other night we had our formal, which was a tremendously decadent affair with an open bar for an hour. hilarity, and stellar facebook pictures/videos, ensued.
on the plus side (and the only positive journalism-job-related news i've heard since i started grad school), the editor i had at the paper here, who had very nice things to say about me, happens to know the managing editor of the times union well. so if i could get hired there, that would be incredible. it's rare that they hire someone right out of school though, and it's also, you know, rare that newspapers actually hire people at all. otherwise the gazette, record, saratogian, or post-star will suffice, assuming i can get hired at one of them. a net loss of 2500 jobs in the newspaper industry last year does not make for an opportunity-filled future. but i'm a "world-class newsman in-the-making," according to my editor. she's awesome.

cowbob @ 2008-02-23T11:38:00

2008-02-23T16:44:38Z

i forget that livejournal exists, and i only remember to check it like once a month.
anyways, life is lame. i'm either really busy or completely bored; there seems to be no middle ground.
i moved into a new apartment at home. i like it, but i'm not there much. i don't have cable or internet there, so all i do when i'm home is drink stewart's coffee (which i miss out on here in syracuse) and play my synths.
i'm interning at the syracuse paper. i got to cover an appearance by the governor last week, so that was sweet. my best clip thus far. i like being a reporter, though i still get minor panic attacks having to interview people.
i'm like two-thirds done with grad school, which is totally weird. it's also totally weird to think that i'll never see my friends here again come june. since i never went away to undergrad or anything, that seems weird to me. coming to school here was the first time in my life i made friends easily. it'll be a good thing someday, though, to have people i know in the newspaper business scattered around the country.

cowbob @ 2007-07-10T22:46:00

2007-07-11T02:53:14Z

so i'm at syracuse university now. i've been here about ten days.
it's weird, since i never went away for undergrad or anything. but it's significantly better than i expected it would be. i miss home, and sam, and pretty much every aspect of my regular life, but i'm reasonably busy so i don't have a lot of time to think about it. i'm in class from nine to five monday through friday, so then i get back, make something for dinner, do some schoolwork, play some video games, and by then it's time for bed. it goes by smoothly, although 9-5 in class is a very long day.
i've met way more people than i thought i would. my roommate's totally cool, as are some other people i've met. i've met people from california, washington state, kentucky, texas, ireland, taiwan, and all throughout the northeast...it's really pretty neat. at suny albany i really liked that i did everything alone, but that was different because i went home every afternoon. here, i'd be miserable if i had to eat lunch alone every day.
my life is totally routine: i wake up at 7:30, shower, make a sandwich to bring for lunch, make my mug of coffee, grab the newspaper we get delivered (we're quizzed on current events every day) and catch a bus at 8:24. i catch a bus back at 5:20 and am usually in bed around eleven.
they keep us really busy, though. but there's a sense of community, and we're all kind of in it together.

cowbob @ 2007-06-03T11:21:00

2007-06-03T16:23:09Z

only in louisiana for a couple more days. that's sad. the only thing i miss when we're here is my cat.

also, i cut almost all of my hair off.

cowbob @ 2007-05-08T13:14:00

2007-05-08T17:18:41Z

today is my last day at metroland. it's totally weird. i'm going to miss these people quite a bit--they are all cool and helpful, and i've gotten to do a lot of writing. i got to be around the inner workings of a paper i already liked, but now i go back to being completely detached from the whole thing. but i think this is the sort of thing i want to do for a living. people with this sort of mentality are the people i want to work around, anyways. i don't think i would like working for a daily paper though.
oh well. it's just sad and weird. sadder than leaving pizza hut after four and a half years and i've only been here for four months.

cowbob @ 2007-04-23T10:28:00

2007-04-23T14:29:09Z

spring decided to start a few days ago. it's going to be like 80 today.
i would like to sit on my porch all day and read and drink coffee. and do nothing else.

cowbob @ 2007-04-03T01:58:00

2007-04-03T06:01:26Z

i just had hours of good conversation with two good people. it made me realize how much i have in my life that i sometimes don't think about, which is a good thing to be reminded of.
and it makes me sad to think i'm going to leave for a year of grad school, which seems kind of insignificant when i realize how many interesting people i know. nostalgia and conversation makes it pretty clear to me that family and friends make for the best time i will ever spend.
but i guess it makes me want to work harder to shape a future that works.

it's snowing.

2007-02-15T03:06:27Z

wallace stevens - the snow man

one must have a mind of winter
to regard the frost and the boughs
of the pine-trees crusted with snow;

and have been cold a long time
to behold the junipers shagged with ice,
the spruces rough in the distant glitter

of the january sun; and not to think
of any misery in the sound of the wind,
in the sound of a few leaves,

which is the sound of the land
full of the same wind
that is blowing in the same bare place

for the listener, who listens in the snow,
and, nothing himself, beholds
nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

cowbob @ 2007-01-23T09:58:00

2007-01-23T14:58:28Z

so right now i'm in the metroland office sitting on the internet. i do that often. but i do real stuff as well. hardly anyone in the editorial room is here yet. in an hour, i get to walk downtown to the legislative office building and be a real journalist and cover an event and possibly talk to a state senator or assemblyman. i'm totally nervous. but i'll deal. this is what i want to do.
i have sufficient confidence in my writing abilities; it's my talking-to-people abilities that need work. but forcing myself to do stuff like this will help. plus, i'm going to be in the paper a week into my intership, which is pretty cool.

yeah, sounds like me

2006-12-12T03:46:55Z

Loser- INTP
6% Extraversion, 60% Intuition, 53% Thinking, 20% Judging

Talked to another human being lately? I'm serious. You value knowledge above ALL else. You love new ideas, and become very excited over abstractions and theories. The fact that nobody else cares still hasn't become apparent to you...

Nerd's a great word to describe you, and I seriously couldn't care less about the different definitions of the word and why you're actually more of a geek than a nerd. Don't pretend you weren't thinking that. You want every single miniscule fact and theory to be presented correctly.

Critical? Sarcastic? Cynical? Pessimistic? Just a few words to describe you when you're at your very best...*cough* Sorry, I mean worst. Picking up the dudes or dudettes isn't something you find easy, but don't worry too much about it. You can blame it on your personality type now.

On top of all this, you're shy. Nice one, wench. No wonder you're on OKCupid!
Now, quickly go and delete everything about "theoretical questions" from your profile page. As long as nobody tries to start a conversation with you, just MAYBE you'll now have a chance of picking up a date. But don't get your hopes up.

I am interested though. If a tree fell over in a forest, would it really make a sound?

*****************

If you want to learn more about your personality type in a slightly less negative way, check out this.

*****************

The other personality types are as follows...

Loner - Introverted Sensing Feeling Perceiving
Pushover - Introverted Sensing Feeling Judging
Criminal - Introverted Sensing Thinking Perceiving
Borefest - Introverted Sensing Thinking Judging
Almost Perfect - Introverted iNtuitive Feeling Perceiving
Freak - Introverted iNtuitive Feeling Judging
Crackpot - Introverted iNtuitive Thinking Judging
Clown - Extraverted Sensing Feeling Perceiving
Sap - Extraverted Sensing Feeling Judging
Commander - Extraverted Sensing Thinking Perceiving
Do Gooder - Extraverted Sensing Thinking Judging
Scumbag - Extraverted iNtuitive Feeling Perceiving
Busybody - Extraverted iNtuitive Feeling Judging
Prick - Extraverted iNtuitive Thinking Perceiving
Dictator - Extraverted iNtuitive Thinking Judging

My test tracked 4 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:

You scored higher than 99% on Extraversion

You scored higher than 99% on Intuition

You scored higher than 99% on Thinking

You scored higher than 99% on Judging

Link: The Brutally Honest Personality Test written by UltimateMaster on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

cowbob @ 2006-12-08T14:06:00

2006-12-08T18:06:15Z

i had an interview at metroland today for hopefully an internship there in the spring. i think it went reasonably well. i should have definately prepared a good answer for the obvious question "why do you want to do an intership at metroland?" because i should have known it would be asked, but i'm dumb.
and when i got home i locked my keys in my car so i had to jump up to our porch (we live on the second floor) and let myself in that way, and some guy drove by and probably thought i was breaking in.
now it's time to work on a damn essay. and eat a bagel rather soon.

oh. and we went to see deadsy in new york and new jersey. it was very enjoyable. i'm looking forward to their next tour.

cowbob @ 2006-12-04T11:09:00

2006-12-04T15:09:21Z

deadsy tomorrow in new york city. and then again wednesday in new jersey. so that's cool.
i have my 12-15 page research paper done (which ended up being 16) so that's good. it was surprisingly easy.
what is not easy is the 12 page english paper i have due a week from tomorrow. i'm trying to write it about the poet paul celan, and i have to use the stuff we read in class. has anyone ever tried reading jacques derrida's literary/philosophical interpretation? it's so impossible to make sense of. i'd enjoy the challenge if i wasn't being graded on it. not that i'm too concerned, because i don't even need this class for my english major. i don't even know why i took it.
i'm totally obsessed with starbucks at the moment. i need to drink as much christmas blend as possible before they get rid of it.

cowbob @ 2006-10-04T13:19:00

2006-10-04T17:23:14Z

so last night on my way home from work i saw an old ford bronco type vehicle with "luftwaffe" written in the back window. it was weird.

i think i'm obsessed with energy drinks. they don't give me much energy or anything, but they taste strong and powerful. energy drinks are to other soft drinks what beer is to light beer.

and it's amazing outside today; i was driving through lots of little roads and it was colorful and actually warm. i was singing along to bohemian rhapsody, then some zeppelin and some ozzy on the radio. and then deadsy, but that was not on the radio. it was nice.

cowbob @ 2006-09-24T16:38:00

2006-09-24T20:43:11Z

i've been trying to watch football this season. since hockey remains the only sport that will always entertain me, i kinda have to choose teams to like based on odd arbitrations...i decided on the vikings in the nfc because 1) minnesota is really cool because it's a bit like canada and they like hockey a lot there, and 2) i like vikings because i like iceland and the arctic and norse history. and i'm going with the patriots in the afc because i like new england a lot (though they are in the same division as the jets, whom i liked when i was younger and followed sports a lot, so that might be problematic). i just watched the vikings lose to chicago.
i'm quite looking forward to hockey season, because i understand hockey completely and can analyze it inside and out, unlike football, which i just watch for entertainment.

and this semester is really boring.

time to go to work.

cowbob @ 2006-08-10T01:14:00

2006-08-10T05:20:15Z

sam got a star named after me. how cuuuuute. i love her.
but that got me thinking: so, what if our sun -- which has, to us, always been "the sun" -- is, on some other planet, a dim star referred to by some certain name because some one/thing on that planet had it named after his or her significant other to be cute via their own star registry thing? i wonder what the lifeforms on planets orbiting this star with my name (if there are any) call their star. or how many names it's been given but however many advanced societies in our section of the galaxy. pretty crazy.

we go to maine in a week. yay.

hey, lady day, can you save my life this time?

2006-06-16T21:22:07Z

it's summer-like. i'm excited about that. and it's super nice out, except it's supposed to be in the 90s on sunday and our apartment gets waaay too hot at night, so we're going to go get an air conditioner tomorrow hopefully.

we spent two weeks in louisiana. i love it there; it's a nice change of pace to go somewhere else that i like and spend the days relaxing and hanging out with cool people. i don't get to go too many places so i enjoy even the simple things, like learning my way around streets somewhere else. we brought some community coffee back, and i got a raising cane's shirt, and i brought a bunch of tony chachere's boxed food stuff for my stepdad because he loves that stuff. i wish he could have some crawfish, because he'd love that. i like it as well. i like a lot of things now i would have never tried a few years ago.

i've been watching the stanley cup finals. i was absolutely in love with hockey from early childhood until a few years ago. i admit that i had a long-running boyhood hope of playing in the nhl. i started watching the playoffs when we were in louisiana, and i've really been enjoying it again; hopefully i'm still into it in the fall when next season starts.

we got a gas grill. i enjoy grilling on our back porch very much. it's very manly, haha.

future sister-in-law katarina will be here on wednesday to stay for quite a long time, so i'm excited about that. my mom is having back surgery next week also, which isn't as cool. i will have to help her out because she won't be able to do much for while.

i'm going to go clean. i love having a clean apartment.

cowbob @ 2006-05-04T12:10:00

2006-05-04T16:11:22Z

goodbye, music shack. i will miss you.

cowbob @ 2006-03-11T14:31:00

2006-03-11T19:32:57Z

the weather is amazing. it's 55 degrees and sunny out. i think winter is pretty much done. this has been the warmest winter i can remember. it's the only winter i can remember when we didn't get any real storm and no school closings or anything due to snow. crazy.

and my school is going to the ncaa tournament for the first time. they won the america east championship today against vermont. woohoo.

cowbob @ 2006-02-23T13:26:00

2006-02-23T18:30:19Z

i've spent much of today cleaning. sam's father, grandmother, and sister will be in later this afternoon/evening. i'm really excited to see katarina, and while i'm looking forward to seeing her dad and her grandmother i'm a little scared because i've never been around them for any extended period of time; i've only stopped to visit them, when it's appropriate to talk a bit and smile and be nice. but they're going to be in our apartment for a few days. i hope they don't hate me.

i enjoy cleaning sometimes. it's nice because you can actually see the progress you are making.

tomorrow is mah baby's birthday.

cowbob @ 2006-02-07T12:54:00

2006-02-07T17:58:15Z

sam got me the coooolest valentine's day present out of nowhere; i got home from school and she was excited and ending up giving it to me early because she couldn't wait. she went to walmart to get steak and ending up getting a basket and filling it with candy, two movies, a mug, a stuffed animal, tons of little hearts stuck all around it and in it with cute things written on them, a big fluffy rose, and colorful things made out of those pipecleaners we used to use in elementary school sticking out of it. it was sooo cute and colorful. she's awesome. the cutest part was how excited she was.
just thought i'd share.

cowbob @ 2006-01-31T12:34:00

2006-01-31T17:38:31Z

so some other post worker killed seven co-workers...you know you come from an odd breed when it would be horribly clichéd for you to come to work and start shooting people. it has lost its originality now.

cowbob @ 2006-01-25T12:34:00

2006-01-25T18:02:34Z

i started school on monday. it's crazy how little school i have left: assuming i take a class over the summer, i'll graduate in december. i might do a journalism internship over the summer instead (i HAVE to do one sometime; i don't have any experience or clubs or anything to put on a job application some day. i didn't write for my school newspaper or anything). anyways, this semester i'm taking romantic british poetry, intro to philosophy, intro to logic, alternative press (taught by the publisher/editor of the publication i love and want to do an internship for, metroland), and a class in 20th century fiction. this semester will be waaay easier than last semester, a lot less writing...which is good because i am lazy but not so good because i have more faith in my ability to do well on writing assignments than on tests. but i shall manage. since i've fulfilled my english major with those two english classes, i'm happy i got the opportunity to take two philosophy classes because they sound interesting instead of taking solely english and journalism classes. i think i'll still take another writing class before i graduate, though.
sam also started school, and i feel bad because she doesn't like it much. i get the impression business classes would be very high school-like, and that what she says. but she's smart, and she will do fine. and i'd be proud of her no matter what she did.

i've been playing guitar a lot. sam started school before me, and i only have school two days a week (and a night class), so i spend a lot of time home alone. i even get up early, at seven every weekday when sam gets up, even when i don't have school. i spend a lot of time sitting at the computer, researching things, playing guitar, listening to music...i've been listening to a lot of black metal (darkthrone!), and i'd like to play in a black metal band eventually. but i always get these little ideas that i get over quickly.