dead laptop

so I'm up late, and my laptop has died. this normally wouldn't be a problem except for the following:

1. I'm trying to finish a term paper to turn in by Wednesday
2. It's the longest paper I've ever had to write, and it's almost finished
   
3. I drank 2 cups of Earl Grey Tea, enough to keep me awake till at least midnight to keep working
4. The laptop died at 10:30 pm

All of this adds up to being wide awake with words on the mind and only a hunk of plastic and wires to show for it, while slowly hearing the seconds tick away on the nearby clock. I can likely remedy the problem, but I'm not in the mood for a headache. . . at least not a bigger headache.

If all else fails, I providentially copied my file to a thumb drive before I broke for dinner. I can recover with that, and only lose about 2 hours of edits. At least, I hope that it hasn't died as well.

28

28 facts about the number 28:

1. Roman Numeral = XXVIII
2. Number of days in the shortest month, February
3. Years normally follow a 28 year cycle; the year 28 years ago should have the same calendar as this year (but this is broken by 2000)
4. Number of letters in the Danish, Swedish, Arabic, and Esperanto Alphabets
5. Part of several movie titles: 28 Days, 28 Days Later, and 28 Weeks Later
6. Number of Dominoes in a standard set
7. Number of Human Teeth (not including wisdom teeth)
8. Postal Code for Madrid, Spain
9. Number of Chapters in the Book of Acts
10. Length of time in years that a copyright would last in the early part of the 20th Century (pre-1964); could be renewed for another 28 years before a work would become public domain
11. Jersey Number worn by Seattle Mariner Raul Ibanez (formerly a player for the Kansas City Royals)
12. President: Woodrow Wilson
13. Vice President: Thomas R. Marshall
14. State to join the Union: Texas (1845)
15. Street in NYC has 3 local subway stations
16. Number of the next amendment to the US Constitution (none pending)
17. The number itself is a Perfect Number, where all of its divisors added together equal the number itself (1+2+4+7+14=28)
18. Atomic number of Nickel (Ni)
19. Number of years it approximately takes for the planet Saturn to revolve around the earth
20. Opus for Fredric Chopin's 24 Preludes
21. Name of a band located in Cape Cod, Mass.
22. Rank of Billy Joel's "My Life" on the Billboard Top 100 in 1979 (my birth year)
23. Rank of Otis Redding's song "(Sittin On) The Dock of the Bay" on Rolling Stone Magazine's 500 Greatest Songs List
24. Rank of The Who's album "Who's Next" on Rolling Stone Magazine's 500 Greatest Albums List
25. Rank of Britney Spears' album "...Baby One More Time" on the Best-selling Albums in the US List (14 times platinum)
26. Rank of the film "Apocalypse Now" on the AFI 100 Greatest American Movies List
27. Rank of the film "The Empire Strikes Back" on the All Time Top US Grossing Films List
28. Episode Number of The Office show titled "Casino Night", the second season finale

And one to grow on... Number of candles on my cake last week

$600/pound coffee?

I don't recommend serving this at your next party, unless it's a party of your enemies.

Indonesia's kopi luwak is a rare delicacy of peculiar provenance -- beans plucked from the droppings of wild civets.

Read more here.

umm, what can I say

I was on iTunes today, looking to see how popular the Clemson Presbyterian Podcast was. turns out that it's the first choice that comes up if you search "clemson" in the iTunes store.

but that's not the crazy part.

just looking to see who else we were competing with in the search, I found TIGEROAR, a men's a Capella group at Clemson University. they were on some "best of college a Capella" compilation the past few years doing vocal-only takes on modern pop songs. (side note: I can't say that I am fan of this style, but it is a fun tradition around these parts)

I was interested in seeing what songs constitute a "best of" in this category. turns out, amongst covers of Maroon 5, Sarah McLachlan, and Matchbox 20, was a cover of none other than the Christian folk all-star himself ... Derek Webb!

I can't tell you how it made me feel to hear "Somewhere North of Here" as performed by the Dartmouth Aires. why not go listen to it for yourself?

not much in the way of commentary on my part, but I will say that I never thought I'd hear a Derek Webb song receive this sort of arrangement.

"no, Derek, tell us how you really feel..."

massive youtube upload

in June, I spent a few weeks in Flat Rock, NC, as program manager for some youth conferences. among my duties, I made videos... a lot of videos... that were supposed to make sleepy middle schoolers laugh out loud at 9:00 in the morning... still unable to figure out how to do that, we came up with a series of spoofs of MTV Reality Shows, so at least the leaders could laugh at their childhood... here are links if you want to see them all, including a Chuck Norris training video, but here is our take on The Real World.