Planet Utah

Guy liner and manscaping

In the last few weeks I have used the phrases "guy liner" (a reference to eye liner worn by men, such as Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day) and "manscaping" (a reference to trimming one's bodily hair, if one is a man) to general acclaim. I had thought these were part of the common parlance, but apparently they are not. If you use them, you will be considered clever--at least that's been my experience. So, enjoy.

Footnote: this article, by way of contrast, is a gateway to a number of phrases that you should NOT be using. If you look carefully in the comments section, you'll find my recommendations for the "no longer clever" list...

Austin update

One of the things I was worried about when I moved here was the weather. I mean, 95 degrees with a dew point temperature of 65 can be pretty unpleasant. Here's what I've concluded, though: the weather is fine as long as you don't exert yourself outdoors. If you want to have a picnic, or fish, or go for a leisurely ride, or sit outside and have a drink, no problem. But if you want to jog, or play volleyball, or hoop it up, forget it. (And God help you if you pour concrete slabs for a living. I did that in Phoenix one summer, and the combination of the heat and the rush to get the "mud" level before it dried damn near killed me.)

Austin isn't nearly as spread out as Phoenix, so I find myself making a lot of fairly short trips that don't really require a four-door sedan. Couple that with the recent run-up in gas prices, and you know what I'm thinking. That's right: unicycle. Actually, I've been thinking bike, scooter, electric bike, Seque, motorcycle, whatever. With some help from Michelle, who emailed me this article, I think I've got the basic parameters down. A scooter would work best for me, but for any kind of decent model, you can expect to pay at least $2500. If you hope to recoup that in gas savings, your scooter will have to be your primary mode of transport for at least a few years. But you'll have a lot of fun while you're at it, and you'll be spewing a lot less gunk into the environment.

Finally, I expect the next few weeks to be big for my Austin bucket list. I'm hoping to: a) attend bartending school; b) take a motorcycle safety course and get my motorcycle license (no decisions on buying a scooter yet, but I want to be preapred just in case); and c) do my concealed weapon permit training. There will probably be a little down time in August (though I may try to learn the Dvorak typing system then), but in September I'll ramp back up again with my first Krav Maga belt test.

Stay tuned...

I'm a sexy, sexy man (for now)

I have some weird eye condition going on. It's either: a) a blockage of the oil glands in my eyelids; or b) a blockage of the oil glands in my eyelids PLUS pinkeye. (The doctor isn't sure.) So for now, my eyes are swollen, red, and goopy. Also, because of the eye irritation, my nose is running like a broken faucet. And I'm extremely sensitive to light, AND I go from being able to see a little to not being able to see at all.

This is all supposed to clear up somewhere in the neighborhood of three to ten days. In the meantime, I'll blog when I can...if I can...

This time it was a dude

Some of you may remember the late-night visit I had a couple of months back from the drunk girl with a bottle of Chianti. Well tonight I had a visit from a drunk guy without a bottle of Chianti. He knocked on my door at 3:30 a.m. because he saw my light on. My light was on because I was working. I was working because I did Krav Maga today, after which I was so wiped out that I had to take a nap. That means I'm going to be up half the night.

So, anyway, the guy's name was Tim. Tim stopped by just to see what I was doing, wanted me to know that he was gay, wanted to say "hi" because we'd never met before, wanted me to know that he was in Unit #3 and that I could stop by some time if I felt like it.

If all of this had come from a straight guy, I would have said to myself, "Nice guy. Very thoughtful." Because it came from a gay guy, though, I thought, "Nice guy. Very thoughtful. Wants to see me naked."

Footnote: I don't know why, but the time stamp on my posts is still set to Mountain Time. I'm on Central Time now, though, and it's coming up on 4:00 a.m.

Life at a stand-up work station

When I moved to Austin, I decided I was done sitting down for work. So, I set up a stand-up workstation. (I'm standing right now, even as I type.) How is it, you ask? Not bad, really. I wouldn't recommend it for extended periods of uninterrupted typing (say, more than an hour), but it's fine aside from that. You have to shift your weight a lot, and occasionally you find yourself slumping or slouching, but I prefer it to popping up and down all day.

Footnote: I'm sure I'll get gangrene in my feet or something, but whatever. I get tired of clipping my toenails anyway.

Anybody ever quit drinking?

I've thought about this from time to time...just giving up booze. Anybody out there done that? Care to share your experience? (Or a similar one...maybe, for example, giving up smoking.)

The dew point and relative humidity, demystified (see what I did there?)

As some of you know, I am a keen watcher of the dew point. Having grown up in bone-dry Phoenix, I was worried about moving to Austin--and other humid places--in part because of the high average dew point during the warmer months. Once the dew point (or, more correctly, the dew point temperature) gets above 60 or so, I start to notice. Above 65, I get uncomfortable. Above 70, I cry.

But it isn't just me. Those same basic benchmarks hold for most of the population. Dew points below 60 are considered comfortable; in the 60s things get increasingly humid and unpleasant; in the 70s or higher they are downright miserable.

Periodically, as I talk about the dew point in public--as I often do, which undoubtedly contributes to my bachelor status--people ask me what, exactly, the dew point temperature is. What does it measure?

The answer is that it measures the temperature to which the air would have to be cooled (holding pressure and moisture constant) in order for it to be saturated (that is, unable to hold any more water vapor). You see the problem with this definition: intuitively speaking, it doesn't mean a whole lot. You just have to go by the "comfort guidelines" I gave up above. For example, right now in Austin it's 94 degress, with a dew point temperature of 59 degrees. It's quite pleasant if you're standing around outside, even in the sun. But if you begin to exert yourself, it becomes a touch unpleasant. In Phoenix, by contrast, it's currently 91 degrees, with a dew point of 20 degrees. Sounds delightful. Lucky bastards.

Because dew point is not an intuitive measure, why do we bother with it, especially when we've got a perfectly good, perfectly intuitive measure called relative humidity? Actually, relative humidity isn't all that intuitive. Most people think of it as, roughly, the percentage of moisture (or water vapor) in the air. In fact, it's the amount of water vapor in the air relative to the maximum amount of water vapor that could be in the air at the current temperature. So, right now in Austin, the relative humidity is only 31 percent. That means that the air has only 31 percent as much water vapor in it as it could hold at 94 degrees. That's why it's pleasant outside.

The problem with relative humidity as a measure is that warmer air can hold more moisture. If, therefore, you have a relative humidity of 65 percent at 110 degrees and 95 degrees, respectively, the former case represents much less moisture in the air than the latter. In other words, relative humidity is a relative measure; it's relative to temperature. Dew point temperature, on the other hand, is an absolute measure.

That, as you no doubt have guessed by now, is why I am a keen watcher of dew points rather than relative humidities.

Austin update

I know you didn't ask, but my stepbrother did. Here's what I told him (via e-mail):

I’ve settled into a normal life here now, so it’s not all that much different from things in Phoenix: working, working out, watching basketball, etc. I’d say the main differences that matter to me are: the proximity of very good nightlife, if/when you need it; a big, accessible body of water in the middle of town; lots of running/biking trails away from traffic; more affordable housing in parts of town I’d actually consider living in; the presence of a good friend from college who is single and likes to go out; and everything is close to everything else, e.g., capitol, university, and downtown bars/clubs are all walking distance from each other.

Bad stuff: downtown parking is a bitch, and the main north-south interstate is almost always congested; there are times that I really would like to meet with people I’m doing work for but cannot (cuz they’re in Phoenix); the social life in the town seems to be dominated by college kids, which is nice if you’re a college kid, but not so nice if you’re an old man; the humidity can make outdoor activities pretty unpleasant; and, I don’t have friends and family here, which sucks on its own, but which also cuts way back on opportunities to socialize, unless you’re willing to socialize alone.

Footnote: is "socialize alone" a form of oxymoron?

Austin bucket list update

Another thing on my Austin to-do list was to kick my caffeine habit. In my heyday, I would regularly drink two or three 16-ounce bottles of Diet Pepsi each day. On a bad day, that number could go as high as five or six. Even on a good day, though, it was always at least one.

Well, yesterday I had no caffeine and no withdrawal headache. That's the first day since I've been in Austin that I can say that. I'm going to consider my habit kicked.

Footnote: next up are artificially sweetened, caffeine-free beverages. Gotta go. That pretty much leaves water. Not very exciting. I'm trying not to think of it as just water, though. When I'm about to crack open a bottle I think, "Ah yes--cool, refreshing water. It's nature's candy. Mmmmmm..."

Google ruins everything

Last night I put one of my dress shoes in the freezer. I was going to have a little fun with that...do a post and see if anyone could guess WHY my shoe was in the freezer. Then I said to myself, "I'll bet if you go to Google, type in the words 'shoe' and 'freezer,' the answer will pop right up." And so it did.