Tales from DC: A Student, a Homeless Guy, an Asshole

Now, I would not stoop to using a curse word in the title of a post unless it was absolutely necessary. For this story, ladies and gentlemen, it is absolutely necessary.

So one of the students from my first semester was a random guy. He's in Union Station one day and sees a stand of cookies. He thinks to himself, "Sweet! I totally need to get a cookie." So he turns to go get one and a homeless man steps into his path.

Man (furious): "Why you always in my asshole?"
(pause)
Student: "Sir, I'm not in your asshole, I really just want to get a cookie."
Man:"Why you always getting inside my asshole?"

The man punches my student in the face. My student gets pretty mad and gives him a shove back. Just then a police officer comes around the corner and separates the two of them.

Officer: "What seems to be the issue, here?"
Student: "This guy punched me in the face!"
Man: "He always getting in my asshole!"

The officer steps away and gets on her walkie. A few moments later, four or five other police officers appear. They huddle together and begin asking the original officer to explain the situation.

Officer: "Well, this man claims he got punched in the face by the other man. And that man claims that the first man keeps getting inside his asshole."

Man (shouting over the conversing officers): "This guy, he and his brother always inside my asshole!"

Student: "Look, I don't even have a brother. And I haven't been in anyone's asshole."

Eventually the police officers came to my student and, with a sort of repressed amusement asked, "So...do you think he's crazy? Like mentally deranged?"

Student: "Look, I don't know. All I wanted was a cookie."

The officers said they planned to keep the man overnight and let him go in the morning, which my students said was fine. As they took the man away, he continued to point at him and shout through Union Station, "That guy always inside my asshole!"

Students, welcome to Washington.

Tales from DC: Airport Security

Going through security at Washington Reagan National Airport. The TSA agent comes over while I'm in the midst of going preparing my bags for security, takes my digital camera and puts it in with my liquids and clothes.

Greg: "Shouldn't my digital camera go in it's own bin?"

TSA Agent: (sighing) "No. Only electronics need their own bin."

????

Alrighty then. Here's your sign.

100 Confessions: Work Problem

(44) I have a work problem. During the day, I tend to work until I can't work anymore. Even when I'm "relaxing," it's cover for more work. (ie. I read books and take notes for themes that might be helpful in my book. I play video games and take notes for an eventual paper I want to write on narratives in video games. I watch movies and television shows, waiting for a subject to blog on). I think the shower/bath is the only time of the day you are FORCED to relax. What can you really do in there? I guess you could read but you get the book wet. Only a fool takes their laptop/cellphone in there. (I actually did do that once with a cellphone. It led to a similar situation as this.)

100 Confessions: I'm a long shower guy

(43) I'm no longer afraid to admit it. I take obnoxiously long showers/baths. In high school, it was an embarrassing thing to share. But you know what? That's how I relax fool. To me, there's nothing better than laying down in a tub, enjoying the steam. This was especially problematic when we lived on the second story of a house in Mt. Pleasant. She had a jacuzzi tub. WHAT UP. I was in that thing every morning before work.

This is also emblematic of another problem I have (44).

100 Confessions: Husband/Wife Knick-knacks

(42) My wife has amassed a collection of different husband/wife knick-knacks that are spread across the house. However, accidents happen and from time to time, they break. What makes it creepy is that they all break the same way--with husband suffering some unspeakable fate. Usually the husband's head shatters or falls off. But today on a husband/wife Mickey/Minny jewelry box I gave her, Mickey lost his legs. Everything below the torso is still attached to the jewelry box while his ears, brains, heart and well, jewels, are not.

I keep trying to convince myself this isn't a sign of my eventual grizzly fate.

Batman: A Visual Analysis

Holy Sardines! How Batman has changed over the years! One of my colleagues at Georgetown did a digital media project in which he performed a content analysis on the covers of Batman comic books.

Here's the project. I know the text is hard to read, but this is the best resolution we've got.

H/T Gnovis Blog

Batman: A Visual Analysis from gnovis on Vimeo.

How Subway Saved 'Chuck'

It's no secret that I'm a TV geek. (Evidence: here, here, here, here and here.) But even those who aren't narrative nerds who love to watch serials in expectation of the next big plot twist have plenty of reasons to love Chuck.

For those who don't know Chuck, Chuck is the only quirky hour-long comedy about a Stanford flunky who works at a Geek Squad-style entity while solving top secret CIA investigations. Chuck is also unabashedly for the children of the '80s. Guest stars include Scott Bakula of Quantum Leap and Chevy Chase of the SNL and the Vacation franchise.

For those of you not obsessively following the story, Chuck was slated for the chopping block earlier this year. The niche television show faces the same conundrum that killed Arrested Development and has threatened both LOST and Gossip Girl--tons of web viewers, tons of iTunes downloads, low ratings in their broadcast slot.

What saved Chuck? Hint: Five Dollar, Foot-long. Yep, thanks to special sponsorship deal with Subway, Chuck will be getting another 13 episodes--not a full season, but hey it's still breathing. What could this sponsorship deal look like?

According to the New York Times:

Chuck’s girlfriend, Sarah, is a top CIA agent but she works undercover at the mall in different eateries. It is no leap to think she could be selling Subway sandwiches next season. An NBC executive said that discussions had been held about the specifics of the Subway tie-in and that the idea had been considered, though the terms were not formally decided yet.

NBC’s president of ad sales, Mike Pilot, said the deal validated what NBC had called its “infront,” process, in which it presented its lineup to ad executives two weeks before the other networks and sought ideas for tie-ins like the one developed with Subway.

What does this mean for the future of television? Well, NBC claims that Chuck will get more than 13-episodes if it improves it's ratings. This sponsorship deal leaves open the possibility of similar partnerships between advertisers and other television shows that lack ratings, but don't lack viewers. For advertisers, the right kind of product-placement in such shows could help prevent the death of niche shows. This sponsorship deal is dry run for such partnerships. Here's hoping that Subway will save Chuck.