david-s.net - David Schlosnagle's Words, Photos, and Links

Last weekend I was going to go home to Pittsburgh to visit family and friends, but a little hurricane got in my way. Ivan dumped 6 inches of rain on the Burgh in a matter of 24 hours, and this a week after over 3 and a half inches in another 24 hour span. I think I’ve finally convinced my mom that all it does in Pittsburgh is rain. Bushy had his chance for a pre-emptive nuclear (or nucular if you’re into metathesis) strike to take out Ivan while it was in the Atlantic. Maybe he was hoping that nuke they found off the coast of Georgia might spontaneously explode and save Florida, Louisiana, and the rest of the East coast.

Via Mark, some amazing pictures of the flooding and damage in Pittsburgh.

Time is flying by faster and faster everyday. Four years ago, I was dropped off in the middle of Pennsylvania, along with about 8,000 other freshmen to begin the greatest time of our lives. It’s a weird feeling to not be returning, buying books, and heading to class. There will be no more syllabus days, boring lectures from indecipherable professors, grueling projects, eighteen credit semesters, or final exams. Instead, these have all been replaced by the daily routine of shower, work, workout, sleep, rinse, and repeat. My time for relaxation has been confined to weekday evenings and the weekend. Now I just have to decide whether I should visit PSU this coming weekend for the first home game and Labor Day weekend. If anyone out there wants to hook me up with a student ticket, let me know.

Yeah, I think I’m still here, I’ve just been busy driving around visiting people. Two weekends ago I had to go clean out my PSU apartment, which my roommates had managed to completely destroy in the 3 months I’ve been gone. We did a pretty good job cleaning, I’m just waiting on the security deposit to see how bad they rip us off. It was nice being back in State College for a couple days, its hard to believe I won’t be going back for the fall semester.

Last weekend I ventured back up 70W, beyond the “Welcome to Pennsylvania: home of gray skies, non-stop rain, and miles of pointless orange barrels” and through the cattle chutes of the unpaved, newly jacked up prices Turnpike. At the end of that wonderful journey, I arrived at my house, and stayed in the new guestroom (a.k.a. my old bedroom, my parents didn’t waste any time getting rid of me). Saturday, my friends and I went down to the Pirate game, which was sold out thanks to fireworks night, but we managed to get standing room only tickets. We stood on the lower level right behind home plate, not bad for $8. The Pirates even managed to surprise me and beat the Rockies 6-1. After the game and fireworks, we headed over to Tequila Willies to celebrate Mike’s bday. Sunday was family day; we went over to the Shadyside arts festival to check out the works of art. I have to say, the Penn State Arts Festival was much nicer and more open than Shadyside, but we did manage to find a photo for in my old bedroom. I’m still trying to find something for the walls in my new apartment. I’ve found some I like, but I haven’t bought any yet. Monday, I took a vacation day and went dahn ta Primanti Brudders for lunch with Diane and Dave. I still can’t believe they don’t have Heinz ketchup there, and they consider themselves a Pittsburgh institution. In the evening, I began my trek back south below the Mason-Dixon line. Mike’s family was visiting D.C., so I met up with him on Tuesday night in Clarendon. Wednesday I got a call from Pooch saying he was crossing through VA on his way to surf the Carolina coast with a couple of his old roommates, and we hung out and played pool in Arlington. The rest of the week was pretty much the usual work week with no more visitors.

This past weekend was mostly spent relaxing by the pool and reading. I just finished White Noise by Don DeLillo, now onto Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. I’m not sure how much I’ll enjoy this, but The Fountainhead is one of my favorites, mixing architecture, ethics, and idealism in one.

I did see one interesting thing while at the Tyson’s Corner mall, an Aston Martin Vanquish in Bloomingdales. I can’t say I’ve ever seen a quarter of a million dollar car just sitting in a department store being used as a slide for little kids. It was amazing seeing one up close, but I could never spend that much money on a car, besides, that would buy five different M3s, or a mixture of M3s, M5s, and Porsches, or something a little more reasonable like a house.

All four of you out there might have noticed that I haven’t been posting lately, and there is an obvious reason (excuse) for that, I have been super busy these past few weeks. I’ve been traveling (Penn State) and entertaining. Last weekend my parents came down to visit on their way to Virginia Beach. I took them to the new Smithsonian Air & Space Museum by Dulles. It is very cool place, and I wish I had more time to explore. I forgot to take my camera, but luckily I borrowed my Dad’s to take some pics of the SR-71 Blackbird and Enola Gay in five megapixel glory. As soon as my parents manage to figure out how to email pictures, I will have to post a few here. We also went out to dinner (mmm, Maryland crab) with my Aunt and Uncle, who I hadn’t seen in forever.

This past weekend John and Tom drove down, and Andy stopped on his way back from Myrtle Beach to visit for a couple days. Friday night was just a chill and play cards night after John and Tom showed up. Saturday was a big day of exploring D.C. We took the Metro in around 3 p.m. and went on a massive sightseeing tour starting out at the National Mall. In all we saw:

• Capitol Building
• Washington Monument
• Rubble of construction that is Pennsylvania Avenue
• Front of the White House
• Back of the White House
• Reflecting Pond
• Lincoln Memorial
• The little bit of the Vietnam Memorial that wasn’t fenced off
• Korean War Memorial
• The new World War II memorial
• The liquor store across the street from the American Bar Association (how fitting?)
• The 2 miles of sidewalk between downtown and Georgetown
• Old Glory Restaurant
• More sidewalk up and down M Street NW
• The Third Edition Restaurant (where Erin and some of her friends met up with us)
• Rhino Bar

Needless to say, we were all exhausted by the end of the night, so we slept in ’til noon, had a steak dinner with pototoes and green beans, and my friends were on their way back to PA.

Somewhere in between those two weekends, I did a little work to put food on the plate.

I guess it’s about time I post again. Life has been keeping me busy. Today was the first day of work in over a month that I didn’t have to spend in front of a computer monitor for eight hours, so I decided now was a good time to update.

Instead, I had the first day of a three day training seminar for the project I am working on. It was a whirlwind of accrual and cash based accounting, appropriations and apportionments, credits and debits, internal and external offsets, JFMIP certification (we’re one of only six out there), and many other fun federal financial topics. I learned a lot about how the various government departments and agencies allocate their funds, and the ways our software makes their lives easier.

This past weekend was Artsfest at Penn State, and I already miss the place. It felt really weird driving back into town being an alumni now, but at the same time it felt just like home. I had a great time seeing most of my old friends, going out, walking around the town to see all the booths. As my old roommate Dave said while we were all walking around artsfest:

“I’m an artist, I just haven’t found my medium yet.”

Aren’t we all?