I have been keeping an online journal in some form or another now for 5 years. wow.

Looking back over past entries, I have noticed quite the change in my writing style, thought processes, and of course site content as the years have passed. Kind of a chart of self evolution if you will.

And yet, some things have not changed. I still fill out any survey that comes along. I still try and include at least a little humor in most posts. And various people still get pseudopnyms until I am ready to introduce my general readership to them.

What started out as a way for me to keep in touch with a few friends who were scattering about the globe as we grew up has now become a place where I vent, make travel plans, document my trials and tribulations, and a host of whole other activites.  Not just with old friends anymore, but also ones who i have met on the web and subsequently in real life, ones who exist only as words on a page that we trade back and forth and even people who apparently just stop by the site or subscribe b/c something about the way i write catches their attention, though i have no clue who they are. Its like the whole world is my pen pal.

And I just reached an average of 1500 hits a week. Life is pretty neat.

more funny posts coming for you people when i dont have to study for finals and have time to goof about on the internets.

-J

 
What if the bad or unfortunate things in our past were actually tangible? Man, if i did decide to run from my past, i would be in the best shape of my life. I prefer to think that i would stand and deliver against my past troubles however*

Dont get me wrong, I have not had a super troubled past compared to a LOT of people. But by the same token then, my troubles are my troubles to deal with, and all of them have come down to my past actions in one form or another. Once I finally began to accept that fact, things became a lot easier to deal with. After all, how can i stay mad at me? Some of you have known me for many a year, and i would think you could verify that i used to be a much more high strung and angry person. Now, while i still get irritated fairly easily, i would like to believe i recover my equilibrium nearly as fast. Improvement. good.

My apologies, loyal followers for not providing too much of the funny last couple days. I have not been in any kind of bad mood (quite the contrary, in fact-things are going quite well in all aspects for me) but i have been busy and reflective of how i ended up where i am, and since this is my little space on the internets, occasionally you will all just have to come here and deal with me being thoughtful. Thanks for reading anyway!

*I love that phrase, stand and deliver. Sounds so much more noble somehow. Like a old time highwayman. Way more articulate than the muggers and gangsters of today. Picture it. Your money or your life sir, stand and deliver. Born a couple hundred years too late, bummer.

-J

For all the stress about finals and boards we have at the moment, think about it. 3 years ago we didnt even know if we would make it INTO medical school

-J

They make Easter bunnies out of crispy chocolate now.

This is AWESOME. Now when you eat them you can pretend you're crunching down on their bones!

MWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

The older I get, I find myself getting more introspective, more pensive, more philosophical in nature.

I
was coming home the other day after studying, deep in thought like usual as i walked through the beaten down dirt path behind the woodlands. After dropping my backpack, I
proceeded to the washroom where I looked at myself in the mirror. I
mean really looked.

I thought about my life, who I am, where I
am and where I’m going. Why am I here? What should I do next? After a
time of self reflection, I was left with a single focused thought that
was more powerful then anything else running through my mind:

“How long has my fly been open for?”

A question for the ages, my friends. A question for the ages.

-J

Lately I have noticed a rash of tragic baby misnaming, from Kal El
Koppola to Apple Paltrow to Banjo Griffiths or even Elijah Bob
Patricius Guggi Q (Bono's son). This is not to mention names out there
like shaneequa, laquetia or latoya or any other made up syllables that
sound suitably ethnic.

This has got to stop. I suggest an Organization which will operate a
web site on which people will suggest stupid or offensive first names,
and then pledge money toward the first infant so christened. When a
parent proves that they have given their infant one of the handles on
the list (without adding a more serviceable middle name, which would be
cheating), the money which has accrued to that name goes into a trust
fund to help finance therapy for the child later in life, or for them
to blow on drugs, or to do whatever they feel might help

Because of the system of pledges, the worst names would bring the
greatest compensation--TheHulk or Kal-El might get a few hundred
dollars, Scrotum several thousand, and so on

There are numerous potential benefits to this scheme:

The parents themselves wont directly profit, and kids will have some
compensation for being called "Petal" or "Kansas"; Parents may still
choose silly names in order to fund their kid's education but this is
fine because

a) poorer parents will have a much stronger incentive to do so,
children may have a chance for university education who would not have
otherwise

b)on a larger scale, since wealthier people are more likely to
contribute money to a cause this frivoulous, it effects a
redistribution of wealth w/o any new taxes or revolutionary bloodbaths

2) There will be more people with silly names in years to come, so that
being introduced to people will become more interesting and you will
have to pay attetion at parties instead of just calling everyone
"John", and people with silly names will feel less alone, and we all
can relax about the silly names issue

3) Finally, the thing will feed on itself as the shock quotient of
today's stupid names declines so that there must be continuous progress
in this area (today's Cynchea and Toblerone become tomorros Scrotus and
ZinZinnZoom). Furthermore the pool of "normal names" will become
diluted so Jennifer and Joshua begin to seem equally valid and no names
seem dull

-J

The Josh: Solving The World's Problems, one day at a time

Your Life Path Number is 5

Your purpose in life is to life freely and collect experiences. You love life - new adventures, new people, new ideas. You are very curious, and you crave novelty in all forms. You tend to make friends easily, and you enjoy the company of all types of people. In love, you are fun and even a bit intoxicating. But you won't stick around for long. You are impulsive and spontaneous - which sometimes leads you to do things you regret. Sometimes you can be overindulgent with food, sex, or drugs. You have many talents, so many that you are often scattered and unfocused.

Aside from the love thing, i would say this is pretty accurate...not bad for a random number generator, wouldnt you say?

Not only did this comic make me laugh, it also brought back a very
strange memory. My grandfather on my fathers side had donated his body
to medical science. And knowing what i do now, more power to him for
that. Anyway, what you may not know is when you donate your body to
science, they cremate it and return the remains to your next of kin.
When my family moved from New York to California, the literal day we
were pulling out of the street, the UPS guy (or whoever) pulls up and
gives us my grandfathers remains. Well, not knowing what else to do
with them, we took grandpa's ashes with us to california, figuring we
would bury him out there where we could visit him, rather than in New
York.

However, what with one thing and another, we never really got around
to burying him, so for about 15 years after we moved, he kinda sort
just sat in a filing cabinet in the garage for lack of anywhere else to
put him. The running joke in the family was that he was filed under "D"
for dead dad dworetzky, and that if successive deaths in the family got
cremated, we could have our own family mausoleum in the garage.

I know, we were a weird family. still are.

Our neighbor, after hearing this story, would not enter our garage for years. Actually, come to think of it, she still wont.

Anyway, when my grandmother died, we finally pulled grandpa out of
the cabinet and buried him and her together. They are currently share
the plot with my father, who i like to think would appreciate the irony
in the fact that modern cemetaries are getting so overcrowded, people
really are stacked together as if they were in a cabinet.

So that is what i thought of when i read the cartoon you have probably already forgotten i posted at the top of these words

Another good one. I think comics give us the best laugh when we can see
a bit of ourselves in the characters. I totally empathize with the pig,
cuz it really feels like I am that oblivious sometimes when it comes to
the opposite sex. Like there is some magical secret that will instantly
allow me to date whomever, wherever i want, nevermind personality
differences and what not. Other times, i definetly take on much more of
the egotistical slick persona, assuming that hey, what girls wouldnt
want me? Sadly for humanity, the second, more assholish approach seems
to be the one that works more often for attracting the opposite sex.
Girls may want to date nice guys, but its the jerks who they usually
turn to first.

Hmm...that last bit makes me sound bitter or as if i am currently
having issues. I'm not, no worries. just a personal observation i think
most males out there would agree with.

I'm not fat, i'm infected!
Not that this isnt fascinating research, but really, do americans need
any MORE excuses to be lazy. Maybe we would be all better off if people
actually took personal responsibility for their appearance and tried to
live a healthier lifestyle instead of just latching on to the newest
excuse for their condition.

News Flash! the government will give you money to research just about ANYTHING!
Now if we could deny some of these grants and maybe put that money to
use say, reforming the health care system, then we would be talking. Or
maybe my wet earwax is just clogging my thought process, and if i had
asian dry earwax, i could know why anyone cares about this aside from
the novelty of knowledge.

-J

The Josh once shot down a German fighter plane with his finger, by yelling, "Bang!"

So returning to o hare airport there were many delays...how many you ask?

well, the flight bahram and i were on was supposed to leave at 12:15 pm and ACTUALLY left at about 4:30pm

then when we got to chicago, they lost bahram's luggage which as of
this point he still has not recovered so we didnt get home til
midnight, and didnt finish unpacking til about 1:30

and then of course i got insomnia...lucky me, so i didnt fall asleep until about 4 and woke at 7 to go to a 8am class

YAY DISCPLINE!

The reason i am telling you all this is because the sheer tiredness
caused me to randomly fall asleep in class for like 20 minutes today,
and during this sleep i went straight into REM and managed to have a
wonderfully odd dream that i feel it is a moral imperative to share
with you all

So you all know what the baggage claims look like at the airport? with
the circular conveyor belts that drop your luggage and then disappear
behind rubber flaps until they come out for another round?

i have always wondered what is behind those flaps, and in my dream i
climbed up onto one of the belts lookinf for bahrams luggage and the
belt took me behind the flap, and what do you think i saw?

a willy wonka-esque wonderland, replete with oompa loompa baggage handlers, who were singing :

where in the world did your luggage get lost?
we do not know because the bags we toss
you may be here, but your suitcase is there
and now you have no un-der-wear
you'll have to go commando!

and then my friend woke me up, and i will never know how the dream
ended...and even worse, i will no longer fight falling asleep in class,
because, dude, i want to see oompa loompas!

Something you probably did not need to know about me...

supermn272: did you know when you were 3 years old you used the toiled all day for the very first time.
coffeeweasel: why do you know this?
supermn272: mom told me
coffeeweasel: what, randomly?
supermn272: july 25, 1984
supermn272: yes
supermn272: poopy pants
coffeeweasel: haha
supermn272: so it seems you started living in the bathroom about 21 years ago
coffeeweasel: good to know

-J

The Josh likes to overshare

At some point in everyone's life, especially in med school for those of
us to whom debt is not only a fact of life but  a lover and a
friend, the dollar store has been a lifesaver. It could have been when you were in college and needed a cheap
place to buy soap, shampoo or ramen. It could have been when you were
out of a job and needed to stretch your money. Or it could have been the
time you were being a skinflinty bastard and decided that $3.50 for a
Mother's Day card was just too damn high. Face it: If it weren't for dollar
stores, we would be hungry, dirty wretches whose guts our mothers would
hate.

But guess what folks!The dollar store or 99 cent store
or whatever the one near you is has more than just soap and ramen.
There's quite a range of things you obtain, from batteries to party
supplies to kitchen gadgets. The quality of the items ranges quite a
bit but everything is pretty much the same price.

Since most dollar stores sell some form of food as well,
can the same thing be said about their edibles? Can a person actually
make a reasonable meal out of food bought at a dollar store?

Well folks with that in mind, I bring you the next in the series of How to Become more like The Josh and present

How to Eat at the dollar store

Now I have plenty of loan money for groceries, but in
order to prepare for when i am eventually an indentured servant (pardon
me i meant to say "resident") I decided to see if it would be possible
to make a  halfway decent meal from ingredients purchased only at
my local (relatively) cheapie stores. Turns out i wont die of
malnutrition or scurvy, if i am careful. So follow these tips, and you
too can have an adequate meal on a budget that stretches further than
Mr. Fantastic.

#1. Go To More Than One Store.

One of the reasons why dollar stores have the ability to sell things
so cheaply is that they buy manufacturer over-runs and discontinued
items, usually in large quantities. So this means that if a particular
store finds a large quantity of, say, unsold pickled baboon hearts,
there's a 90 percent chance the store is going to snap them up,
figuring that someone will buy them eventually. Of course, this means
that different dollar stores (or 99-cent stores,or dollar trees or
chain supermarket dumpsters, if you are in the mood to shave off even
more pennies) find different lots of merchandise. So, if you're in the
mood for something and one store doesn't have it, look at another store.

#2. Don't Be Afraid To Buy In Bulk

Just as different stores will have different products, the same can
be said of the selection in the same store over time; the roster of
brands and products is not static. So, if you've been liking a
particular type of juice or canned soup that you've been seeing at your
local dollar store, snap up a few of them, since they may not be there
next time. It's not like you're spending five bucks a can, Scrooge
McDuck.

#3. Don't Expect To Regularly See Name Brands.

It's not that the store doesn't ever have name brands. In the past I have seen Bumble-Bee Chicken Salad and a bottle
of Hunt's BBQ sauce (a squeeze bottle, no less!). When I cruised through
my local store, I also saw Heinz ketchup! But, for
the most part, you're not going to see many recognizable names on the
products you're perusing.

 It's not quite the same as in Repo Man,
when everything Emilio Estevez and Harry Dean Stanton consumed had a plain
white label that simply stated the contents inside ("Beer",
"Potato Chips", etc.), but it's pretty damn close. Looking for
some Hamburger Helper? You'll get "Hamburger Dinner." Craving
some Chicken of the Sea? You'll get "Tuna from the Ocean." Whoever Chef Karlin is, he needs to fire his PR people,
because Emeril, Sylvia and Wolfgang Puck are all kicking his ass.

#4. Not Every $1 Item Is A Bargain.

Think about it for a second. If you can get name brand tuna
for 69 cents at the supermarket, why the hell would you want to buy "Tuna from the Ocean"
for a buck? Same goes with pasta; Barilla, some of the best dried pasta
out there, often goes on sale at your local supermarket for a dollar.
If you're buying "Bob's Vermicelli" at the dollar store for
a full dollar, you're getting ripped off big time.

In cases like these, look for signs that say "2 for $1" or,
better yet, "20 for $1." At least that way, you're assured that
you're getting something for less than you would if you just shopped at
the local supermarket.

#5. Embrace The Vegetarian Lifestyle.

Your edible meat choices at the dollar store pretty much come down to
tuna, tuna and tuna. Sure, there are other options, but they consist of
meat whose origin, both with regards to location on the planet and on
the animal itself, is questionable.

What should you not buy? Anything like the pic above. Knowing how crummy the meat is in a homemade
beef stew (it's supposed to be tough, cheap meat that softens up over
the hours it's simmering in the stew), I can't imagine what kind of chicken
meat is of such low quality that it only is suitable for canned stew. I can only wonder what kind of unpleasantness
lurks just under that lid.

Make sure you have a lot of water handy; none of this
food could be so well preserved without tons and tons of salt. The canned
chicken stew alone provides over 2,000 mg of sodium -- more than 80 percent
of your daily requirement -- over two fairly small servings So watch your canned food intake unless youI can afford
the increased medical coverage needed to eat it.

So there you have it...a few well planned out trips and you can
have lots of salads, occasional stews and if your dollar store has soy
sauce you can have every poor students easy nutrition meal: stir fry

Hopefully that helps... and this how to guide wasn't too bad...anyone
out there, feel free to comment with other things you may want to know
how to do, and I will do my best to come up with a handy list

-J

My Nickname

I like to think I am one of those people who can adapt to any situation, and for the most part, I find it to be true. Having just moved to North Chicago in the last 3 weeks, I have managed to get my study habits back to habits, discover/create a local circle of friends, and even begin to learn my way around the city in terms of food and entertainment (insofar as I can entertain myself for the 5 minutes a day when I dont have to study.)

One of the major factors in this ability is my tendency to create personas for myself. Now I don't mean a fake mask to show to people to hide who I am. I simply mean who I am changes in certain situations, and my personality is any given context is a function of the others who define it, with some creamy nougat core that makes up what I consider to be me. Before you judge take a moment to think...do you act exactly the same around everyone you know...say are you the same person with your grandparents that you are with your friends or your employer? No, little pieces of you get expressed differently in different situations. Perhaps this is because I always enjoyed acting in my formative years, and never really gave up that joy of creating and getting to know a character

...

or perhaps I am just a giant whore for attention. I don't know, could go either way. Regardless, I have 2 main personas out here. One is Josh. That is what I think of mostly as my Cali-core, the things I brought with me over here, with the addition of my almost magnetizing drive to succeed in med school.

The other is a persona that others have created for me. That persona is J.D. Now I have gone by this name once or twice when I did stand up, but that was a creation I made for myself. Here, I put my initials down when we went out for bowling one night, and have been known by the group I went with by J.D. ever since...as well as anyone who meets me in connection with them. I am not really sure what J.D. is like yet, but I have been answering to both that and Josh, and it ought to interesting to find out who has the stronger personality at the end of the year

Sometimes the only way to look at yourself is through another's eyes. Hopefully, you like what you see. If you don't, you can only hope you haven't burned too many bridges behind you

-J

"Abre sus ojos"