Vic-tor-eeeeee!!!!
Oct. 21st, 2004 01:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trinityvixenSo, yeah, I can navigate the tunnels now. Like Barnard, the Medical School was built with the common human revulsion to bright lights, loud noises, and cold weather in the winter, in mind. Read: they have tunnels. Since I started, I've been consciously avoiding them as I constantly get lost. They have signs that are, as I've discovered, no help at all (and even the new ones are hopeless, seeing as the brand new ones managed to spell 'floor' in Spanish incorrectly ::smacks forehead::). I was brought around the tunnels for the first time by the lady whom I replaced, a nice woman to be sure, but her English wasn't good enough to answer my questions, not that I'm sure she had the answers anyway. She took me through the tunnels one time and only one time but kept going between buildings by going outside because it was summer at the time.
Well, long story short, I have to get between my lab and the mice facillity, and I've been avoiding taking the tunnels there *forever* (aka since June). I have taken roundabout routes through the tunnel, but never the short, direct, get-in-this-elevator, make-these-turns, take-that-elevator route that takes me from one animal service elevator in my lab's building to the animal transport elevators in the facility's building. I've walked through the lobby of the Eye Institute (where the animal facility is) more times than I should have gotten away with. It's weird to take mice through a nice carpeted area with people waiting for their eye exams. I've taken the wrong elevator in the building next to my lab, I've wandered around trying to find the connection from the basement tunnels to the elevator in the Eye Institute and ended up in the middle of people with new eyeglasses and waiting for appointments everytime.
TODAY WAS DIFFERENT. At least, the way back was. I got lost going there, or, rather, I took the way I knew how to end up in the same building as I wanted to be and walked through the lobby (thankfully sans cage of mice). On the way up to the lobby, I talked to a facilites worker, and he said just to take the Eye Institute's animal elevator to the basement. I'd tried this on previous attempts to avoid dragging mice through a no-animal zone, but the basement level on the animal elevators led out to a nicely linoleum'd floor, with an EXIT sign directly ahead and an Eye Clinic to the left as my only options. Today, I figured, what the hell, crack the EXIT door, see how many alarms I set off, see how cold it is outside, duck back in and talk my circuitous route again.
Surprise.
The EXIT actually leads out to the tunnels. Directly. Walking slowly to the nearest intersection of the tunnels, I found myself at the fork in the tunnels that I usually turn left--following the signs, mind--because it purports to lead me to the Eye Institute. The door I exited at came from the right fork, the one claiming to go nowhere near the place I wanted. Carefully backtracking from there, I found my way back to my building's elevator, and voila! She is home!
In other news, William Safire is a BASTARD BASTARD BASTARD. Yesterday, his column in The New York Times pissed me off enough to make me write them a letter for the first time ever. Most of the time, I read the first paragraph of his column then skim the rest for outrageable things, then move on to better ones. This time, however, he went too far. He not only lambasted Kerry for launching a campaign of fear to win the Presidential election (thus proving that Safire, like Dick Cheney, was clearly in some sort of bunker ever since 9/11 and missed the color-coded alert system courtesy of Ashcroft and the Bushies), but he tacked on to his article a mention of how terror is leading to the erosion of liberties, heavily implying, though not out-right saying it, that Kerry and his cronies are to blame. The case he cited was this poor Times reporter who's been sent to jail in contempt for refusing to name her sources (a fact made worse for the fact she never wrote the article that generated the witch-hunt for a leak in the government).
I was flabbergasted. Safire loathes the DA in Chicago or wherever for doing this, says he, too, will uphold his journalistic integrity and never reveal a confidential source if asked, forgetting that his, being an opinion column, counts far less than the average writer's does. He equates his own journalism to this case and brings it back around again to the terror thing, saying that if there wasn't this paranoia running rampant in the country, honest journalists wouldn't have to worry. Oh, and, duh, like the average Times reader isn't going to make the parallel he draws? He only EVER mentions John Kerry as the wager of a campaign of terror, a 'fearmonger.' So, naturally, who is to blame for paranoia ruining journalistic freedom? John Kerry, of course, because clearly a senator in the minority party has complete control over First Ammendment rights, whereas the poor President and his fucking cronies have no say whatsoever and never, ever scare people into voting for them?
When it comes down to it, which is worse? Being scared into believing that Social Security might vanish (which isn't a possibility, it's an eventuality with the current system) or being told that terrorists are planning to strike America somewhere, sometime, for some reason and to fear and report anyone who has a vaguely Arab look to him or her? Which is worse? Telling people that Bush is going to re-instate the draft (which he's partially done already--believe the hype, people, a 'back-door draft' is very much in effect, so the line from that to a draft is blurred and poked full of holes) or telling people that if you don't vote a certain way you are going to be blown up?
I'll let people know if I hear back from the Times about the letter. I'd love to tear Safire a new one. I ought to just e-mail him directly. Kill kill kill...
Well, long story short, I have to get between my lab and the mice facillity, and I've been avoiding taking the tunnels there *forever* (aka since June). I have taken roundabout routes through the tunnel, but never the short, direct, get-in-this-elevator, make-these-turns, take-that-elevator route that takes me from one animal service elevator in my lab's building to the animal transport elevators in the facility's building. I've walked through the lobby of the Eye Institute (where the animal facility is) more times than I should have gotten away with. It's weird to take mice through a nice carpeted area with people waiting for their eye exams. I've taken the wrong elevator in the building next to my lab, I've wandered around trying to find the connection from the basement tunnels to the elevator in the Eye Institute and ended up in the middle of people with new eyeglasses and waiting for appointments everytime.
TODAY WAS DIFFERENT. At least, the way back was. I got lost going there, or, rather, I took the way I knew how to end up in the same building as I wanted to be and walked through the lobby (thankfully sans cage of mice). On the way up to the lobby, I talked to a facilites worker, and he said just to take the Eye Institute's animal elevator to the basement. I'd tried this on previous attempts to avoid dragging mice through a no-animal zone, but the basement level on the animal elevators led out to a nicely linoleum'd floor, with an EXIT sign directly ahead and an Eye Clinic to the left as my only options. Today, I figured, what the hell, crack the EXIT door, see how many alarms I set off, see how cold it is outside, duck back in and talk my circuitous route again.
Surprise.
The EXIT actually leads out to the tunnels. Directly. Walking slowly to the nearest intersection of the tunnels, I found myself at the fork in the tunnels that I usually turn left--following the signs, mind--because it purports to lead me to the Eye Institute. The door I exited at came from the right fork, the one claiming to go nowhere near the place I wanted. Carefully backtracking from there, I found my way back to my building's elevator, and voila! She is home!
In other news, William Safire is a BASTARD BASTARD BASTARD. Yesterday, his column in The New York Times pissed me off enough to make me write them a letter for the first time ever. Most of the time, I read the first paragraph of his column then skim the rest for outrageable things, then move on to better ones. This time, however, he went too far. He not only lambasted Kerry for launching a campaign of fear to win the Presidential election (thus proving that Safire, like Dick Cheney, was clearly in some sort of bunker ever since 9/11 and missed the color-coded alert system courtesy of Ashcroft and the Bushies), but he tacked on to his article a mention of how terror is leading to the erosion of liberties, heavily implying, though not out-right saying it, that Kerry and his cronies are to blame. The case he cited was this poor Times reporter who's been sent to jail in contempt for refusing to name her sources (a fact made worse for the fact she never wrote the article that generated the witch-hunt for a leak in the government).
I was flabbergasted. Safire loathes the DA in Chicago or wherever for doing this, says he, too, will uphold his journalistic integrity and never reveal a confidential source if asked, forgetting that his, being an opinion column, counts far less than the average writer's does. He equates his own journalism to this case and brings it back around again to the terror thing, saying that if there wasn't this paranoia running rampant in the country, honest journalists wouldn't have to worry. Oh, and, duh, like the average Times reader isn't going to make the parallel he draws? He only EVER mentions John Kerry as the wager of a campaign of terror, a 'fearmonger.' So, naturally, who is to blame for paranoia ruining journalistic freedom? John Kerry, of course, because clearly a senator in the minority party has complete control over First Ammendment rights, whereas the poor President and his fucking cronies have no say whatsoever and never, ever scare people into voting for them?
When it comes down to it, which is worse? Being scared into believing that Social Security might vanish (which isn't a possibility, it's an eventuality with the current system) or being told that terrorists are planning to strike America somewhere, sometime, for some reason and to fear and report anyone who has a vaguely Arab look to him or her? Which is worse? Telling people that Bush is going to re-instate the draft (which he's partially done already--believe the hype, people, a 'back-door draft' is very much in effect, so the line from that to a draft is blurred and poked full of holes) or telling people that if you don't vote a certain way you are going to be blown up?
I'll let people know if I hear back from the Times about the letter. I'd love to tear Safire a new one. I ought to just e-mail him directly. Kill kill kill...
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no subject
Date: 2004-10-21 10:50 am (UTC)Congrats on successful navigation though.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-21 10:59 am (UTC)The weather is considered mild in melbourne, so most students just walk in the rain.
congrats on writing a letter to the editor - it may sell more papers in the short term, but hopefully they'll print your letter and let a voice of reason be heard.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-21 11:08 am (UTC)PS: whatcha doing tonight? I might be in the city after all. I was planning to stay home and sulk but I may have gotten some news.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-21 01:40 pm (UTC)Call my cell! I'll call you if you don't! Oh, wait, that's only a threat if Kelly's saying it, ha ha.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-21 02:19 pm (UTC)Re: Safire's babbling
Date: 2004-10-21 12:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-21 01:23 pm (UTC)