elliptical v. yoga

a friend (read his blog) recently contacted me at work to discuss a very important issue...generally he sends me information on politics, world news, or societal concerns....and this time it was serious. he asked the age-old question,

"what is gayer...a guy in a yoga class, or a guy on an elliptical machine?"

my first instinct was to say yoga, no question. but then i thought, why be so hasty to stereotype someone who is interested in a legitimate form of exercise? yoga is actually quite difficult, so it's not a matter of a guy wimping out and doing something easy. that said, however, an elliptical machine can be difficult too (if you crank up the resistance, and make the incline a full 90 degrees...it's hard as shit). so what is the answer?

i informed my friend aaron of what i see as situational circumstances that can affect the answer. in isolation, a guy on an elliptical machine is not gay. but give him US weekly and a headband, and there's a solid chance he is. likewise, a guy in a yoga class is not gay just by being there. if he shows up in spandex, then - again - there's a chance.

i'd like to get some opinions from outsiders here...so cast your votes and let me know what you think.

dear today show,



i have enjoyed you for a long time...years at this point. you help me get out of bed with your weather and news. i watch you while i fix my hair, while i put on my makeup, even while i eat my breakfast. you bring me al roker (that funny guy) and matt lauer (even though you are going bald) and up-to-date news i could get anywhere else. i didn't even stop watching you when you let katie couric go. i stayed with you, and learned to tolerate meredith veira.

but this morning, today show, you tried my patience. i don't know if i can forgive having this girl on your show. i blame fox for putting her on camera, i blame sanjaya for being a creeper and hugging her, and i blame YOU for making me relive the entire experience over my frosted flakes. i can put up with tom cruise and his antics with lauer, i can put up with you clowns standing in the street telling bad jokes, and i can even put up with you sticking ann curry behind a desk. but this i cannot look past.

i'm not sure that you know it, but you ARE a news show. you are really supposed to talk about news. and though i do enjoy the occasional martha stewart visit or celeb gos, this demented little girl is not news. it is a ploy, and i'm not convinced she wasn't on drugs.

get your act together - or i'll move on to good morning america, and i'll never look back.

yours,

erin

what are the odds

i would like to give a shout-out to my alma mater, for playing a great game of basketball on friday. they totally could have won - and i'm a little nervous that i put oregon in my final four, after beating a 14 seed by only 2 points.

after watching lots of games all weekend, and checking my bracket semi-neurotically, i began to wonder, "what are the odds of picking the perfect bracket?" so i did some research.

this article was a good place to start. it's from '06, but the math stands true since the tournament holds the same number of teams. if every game is a toss-up, you have a one in 9 million trillion chance of picking every win correctly. that's 9,000,000,000,000,000,000, or as webwire calls it, 9 quintillion. one article said you are more likely to get struck by lightning while watching one of the games than you are to pick a perfect bracket. now that's funny.

just minutes into my research, i came across some surprising news. on friday, the three contestants on jeopardy tied. that's right, a three-way tie in final jeopardy. apparently mathematicians say the odds of this happening are one in 25 million. better odds than the ncaa tourney, but still, that's crazy.

now i'm interested. the odds of something or other happening is just simple math, but it takes the time of finding the numbers and calculating them. so i've compiled a few fun odds for you to enjoy....

Odds of...
...getting hemorrhoids: 25 to 1 (apparently they are fairly common)
...being on plane with a drunken pilot: 117 to 1 (um...scary)
...being audited by the IRS: 175 to 1
...getting a royal flush in poker on first five cards dealt: 649,740 to 1
...becoming a saint: 20,000,000 to 1
...a meteor landing on your house: 182,138,880,000,000 to 1 (that's a relief)
...catching a ball at a major league ballgame: 563 to 1
...striking it rich on Antiques Roadshow: 60,000 to 1 (i love that show)
...injury from shaving: 6,585 to 1

and my personal favorite...

Odds of dying from contact with hot tap water: 5,005,564 to 1 (how can you die from contact with hot tap water?)

it's friday

as the announcer said, "he is the fourth person bleeding during this game." duke loses, and all is right with the world.
this is why march madness is so awesome - just when you think you've got it figured out, some team you've never heard of comes out of nowhere and beats the team. not that duke was going to win, that's for sure.

definitely the best game so far (not counting miami of ohio's win to get into the tournament - go redhawks) and i'm sure there will be more. definitely in store for a fun weekend of basketball, beer and shamrocks.

happy st. pat's day everyone - you can find me tomorrow with a beer in my right hand and a corned beef sandwich in my left.

jordan catalano

last night, i went to the pageant to see 30 seconds to mars, jared leto's band. first off, the pageant is awesome - if you haven't been to a show there, you really should. it's big enough to feel like a good turnout (last night was sold out), but small enough to feel home-y. the definite plus is that 21 and overs can go upstairs, where there is much less crowd (aka less annoying 18-year-olds trying to start a mosh pit), so the bar is easier to get to. we decided to buy general admission tix, rather than reserved seating. luckily, we got there early enough to snag a couple of first-come-first-serve chairs that circle around the reserved seating area. if you can get these, you really have it made. no climbing over people next to you to get a drink and easy access to the bathrooms.

we hit the halo bar (located in the pageant) beforehand to have a few drinks, which was equally as nice. feels like a quirky bar where musicians and eccentrics hang out, but is clean, comfortable and right next door to the concert. they won't let you access the concert from inside the bar (this may have had something to do with the large number of underage attendees), but it was no problem.

being a big fan of my so-called life, i was pumped to see jordan catalano in the flesh. i had the biggest crush on him in my flannel-plaid-shirt/hiking boots/grunge phase of 1995. he was dreamy. now, he is very skinny, wears very tight pants, and mildly resembles a girl from a distance. their music is good though...it's not exactly my style, but it was a good concert. a bit short (they played for less than an hour), but good.

the best part of the pageant, though, was that amidst a sea of smokers (even in the bathroom), i barely smelled a hint of cigarettes on me afterward. they must have had 8 industrial exhaust fans pumping air out of that place to keep it fresh...and it was amazing. so if you are sensitive to smokiness, you won't have any problem there.

all in all, a great night...i'll definitely be heading back for another show.

and i think i might try to buy my so-called life on dvd. what a great series.

bathroom talk

the closest bathroom to my desk at my office is a very small bathroom with two stalls. it is so small, that it should probably only have one toilet and a lock on the outside door...but it doesn't. i'm not over-paranoid about being in the bathroom at the same time as someone else in most situations, but something about how small this one is makes me very uncomfortable. so, if i see someone walk in, and i have to pee, i'll wait a few minutes until they are done.

there have been a few times however, when someone has walked in right behind me. and i can't just walk out - that would be too obvious. but more than once, the person walking in behind me is my boss. in this instance, i most definitely can't just walk out and wait for her to be done, i just have to tough it out.

my boss is the type of person that decides to strike up a conversation while you are on the toilet. i realize that we are sitting less than 3 feet from each other, but do we really need to chat while we're taking care of business? but again, she's my boss, so i can't exactly ignore her. we talked recently in the bathroom about some very important work matters...but i can't help but think, "can't this WAIT until i'm done?"

the point here is this: if you are a bathroom talker (and i think this goes for guys and girls - i'm pretty sure you don't want to talk to your neighbor when you're standing at a urinal), respect your fellow public restroomers' right to pee in peace. it's just the polite thing to do.

slutbags on tv

since i'm such a huge american idol fan - and i stayed up after getting home from DC late last night just to watch this weeks episodes - i can't help but bring up antonella barba. first of all, if you haven't checked out the pictures of her online, you have to. they are actually kind of funny. she is obviously taking pictures to give to a boyfriend or something, and is in all of these poses with a white sheet as a makeshift backdrop...quite hilarious. the best one is of her imitating the jessica simpson-rolling stone cover, red high heels and all. she looks like a little girl (a little slutty girl, mind you) playing dress up. i just can't stop thinking about who she got to take the pictures. if i asked one of my friends to take pictures of my in my underwear so i could make a calendar for my boyfriend, i'm pretty sure that all of them would laugh in my face.

so anyways, the other thing you have to note is that she is 20 years old. i realize that i am only 24, but i still feel like 20 is pretty young to be stripping and documenting it. and the best part is that they interviewed her friend who auditioned with her...and she said "antonella is the least slutty person i know." does that mean that her other friends are super-mega-sluts? because last time i checked, putting on lingerie and posing for a camera is pretty slutty.

hopefully she goes home tonight...she sucks at singing on top of everything. but she has a $250,000 contract with girls gone wild waiting for her, so her career is just beginning.

so then, i was watching a few minutes of the new pussy cat dolls show. it's pretty dumb, which is to be expected. however, one of the girls who made it through, she's 18 and was talking about how she will be able to tell her daughter about this. um...what? i know that 18-year-olds can get pregnant, and they can have kids and they can be mothers...but on national television? i think that might be sending the wrong message.

sluts will be sluts...i guess that will never change, whether it's on tv or not.