Date: December 30th, 2005 12:22 PM Author: Alcoholic roommate house
As in, his sports coat and pants are LITERALLY COVERED WITH QUESTION MARKS. He's an old grey-haired man with glasses, wearing a corduroy jacket & pants that have big red question marks sewn all over them. Were he wearing something normal he would look like rich old money.
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:35 PM Author: lavender tattoo den
ah (I see you posted this below).
QO would have been my home school, but I went to a prep school (partly because QO sucks).
I'll keep mum on which one though. If I keep on releasing all of my personal info in snippets, outtage will happen soon. (not that it matters because im probably the least memorable poster ever, which is fine by me).
It's kind of boring around here isn't it? I kinda can't wait for school to start again...
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:42 PM Author: Alcoholic roommate house
Some uber-nerdy, mostly very normal albeit much smarter than average. Quite a few attractive girls. The IB was the best thing could have ever happened to me in high school. One teacher in particular turned me from a completely academically indifferent kid into someone who loved learning, and especially history.
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:48 PM Author: lavender tattoo den
You know, I have to wait until LS until I can verify this, but I find that the more prestigious of a school/program you go to, the more you find that the poeple don't really work any harder, they are just naturally smarter.
None of my college roomates or I work particularly hard, just about average for college students. I kind of think at some level you have it or you don't.
Date: December 30th, 2005 12:47 PM Author: Alcoholic roommate house
Turns out it wasn't the Riddler. It was indeed Lesko. Got some interesting advice on tax avoidance. Even more hilarious, other people approached him at random right after I was done, totally familiar-like, as in "Hey man, I've got some questions for you!"
Surreal day.
EDIT: Turns out his KIDS went to high school with me! I always WONDERED why that van covered in question marks was often parked in the parking lot...
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:04 PM Author: glassy state
i was going to say something along the lines of the riddler. But now I know who he's talking about, a fellow poster (who shall remain nameless) actually knows that guy...
Date: December 30th, 2005 12:57 PM Author: Iridescent Dead School
well I just thought it was pretty obvious it wasn't true because his responses were really weird. I guess it was good in the sense that it tricked people.
Date: December 30th, 2005 1:14 PM Author: Alcoholic roommate house
I promise you on my life it's not fucking flame. People have known me as a poster around here long enough to know that I don't do flame. He's still sitting next to me, typing on his laptop. We're in the Starbucks next to/inside of Barnes & Noble on Rockville Pike in Montgomery Co., MD.
I honestly had no idea who this guy was, or that he was anyone at all, until you all posted that he was some minor celebrity. I don't watch any TV at all except football/basketball/baseball games, and I've never seen this dude's ads, or whatever he's known for. But since there were so many "sitting next to a hot Asian chick in Starbucks" threads this week, I figured, "well I've gotta post this, don't I?"
AHAHA - he's clearly getting pissed at some loud-talking people behind us. He keeps giving them peevish looks.
Details: he's wearing pink slipper-shoes (no laces) with red socks, a white turtleneck sweater under the corduroy "?" jacket. Jacket itself is off-white with bright red/magenta question marks. Jacket has three buttons on each cuff --- HOLY SHIT. He changed socks! His socks were red before he went to the bathroom, they're yellow now. I am *not making this shit up*.
EDIT: Okay, I'm wrong, he DIDN'T change socks. Get this: his left sock is yellow, his right sock is red. That's why I was confused. This is funny stuff.
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:10 PM Author: crystalline haunted graveyard
Is this a separate part of the school? At my school you could do certificates, the diploma, or both, but the courses were all your typical AP courses. You just did a little extra outside of class to get the IB stuff.
Out of curiosity, did you do the diploma? If so, did you think it was worthwhile?
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:19 PM Author: crystalline haunted graveyard
Interesting. I only did a couple of certificates (lit, spanish)--and I did have great fortune with both in the AP department (thank god I got to skip my foreign language requirement and the freshman writing class)--because the diploma seemed a little too intense.
I wasn't the best student in hs. I figure getting through hs school is more about surviving the psychological trauma of it all than anything else. Thank god for Bono. ;-D
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:36 PM Author: Alcoholic roommate house
Not even close. I pay for every single dime of law school myself. Parents cut me off completely. I'll be in debt forever, especially because I got no money at my school - ~$150,000 in loans, baby.
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:55 PM Author: Stirring transparent space
i'd imagine there are about 150 thousand reasons.
health care isn't free - you'd be amazed at how much money you can burn through with at-home medical care. you could put a freebaser to shame on an hourly basis.
Date: December 30th, 2005 5:28 PM Author: lavender tattoo den
hey.
I'm curious on your opinion of the whole HYS v. CCN with $$ thing. Which do you think is a better move...
Assuming I get rejected from Yale (pretty safe), but get into Stanford and get money from one of CCN, what course of action would you reccomend.
In terms of pure happiness, I'd want to go to Stanford. I want something new and I *really* don't like cold weather. But there isn't that large of a gap between Columbia and Stanford, so why would I pay full price at Stanford when I could get money from Columbia. But then as long as I'm going to choose a school based on rep/finance, I should just go to Harvard and get it over with...
ack.
of course, I should probably wait until Stanford and Columbia offer me this lovely dilemma (already in at H), but still. Life is confusing.
Date: December 31st, 2005 1:03 AM Author: Alcoholic roommate house
Unless CLS gives you a full ride or something similarly huge, take Stanford, even with no money: the difference in prestige IS somewhat noticeable, the difference in your QoL will be EXTREMELY noticeable. Assuming you don't want to work as a public defender for the rest of your life, your salary coming out of SLS will make paying off any loans quite easy (and besides, that's not exactly 'bad' debt to have if you're proactive enough to leverage it by investing). You'd have less to pay at CLS if they gave you $$$, but the difference probably isn't enough for you to sacrifice three years of greater happiness PLUS the "HYS" prestige, if that's what you want.
And if you're choosing SLS v. HLS well, if you can get past the prestige-whore value of putting "Harvard" on your resume (and realize that SLS and HLS aren't going to have much difference in terms of placement), I'd take SLS unless you're dead set on going into politics or something. It just seems like a happier place.
Of course, if this were me, it'd all be moot. I'd take Chicago over any of these schools; its particular ethos appeals so strongly to me that the only school I think I'd take over it is Yale. (Though to be fair I never bothered applying to HYS b/c I assumed my numbers made me auto-ding material...so maybe my principles would wilt in the face of opportunism. I did get into CLS, though.)
Date: December 30th, 2005 1:38 PM Author: Alcoholic roommate house
It's a different color. It's purple. But it's there, indeed, question marks and all. Same-looking make and model, too. Maybe he has a couple of cars.
As I said above, I'd seen this car parked in the parking lot of my high school quite a lot when I was there (this was 1994-1998). I was always like "WTF???" Now I realize why: his daughter went to school there.
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:16 PM Author: Gold plaza
Free advertising, sure ... but wearing the getup while having coffee at a Starbucks? As for his kids, can you imagine a self-conscious teenager getting picked up at school in a car spotted with question marks?
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:27 PM Author: Alcoholic roommate house
Apparently this is exactly the case. I remember asking my friend "WTF is that car doing in the school parking lot?" (this must've been back in 1997) and she replied, "oh, it's [X]'s dad's," (name meant nothing to me), "she's pretty embarrassed by it."
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:15 PM Author: Alcoholic roommate house
Honestly, I wasn't even paying that much attention. Something about avoiding extra hidden taxes in your state returns. I was just trying to have a conversation with him so I could say I did.
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:30 PM Author: cheese-eating affirmative action ceo
Name doesn't ring a bell, you say. Maybe this will help: You're watching cable television, probably late at night, a commercial comes on, and there's a "grown-up" man wearing big eyeglasses, a black suit emblazoned with lime green question marks, and a lime green bow-tie emblazoned with lime green question marks, and while he's prancing around in front of the Capitol building in Washington, he's shouting in a high-pitched voice about all the "free money" the government has… just for you!
Want $100,000 to start a business in your own house? Lesko tells you how to get it. How about $75,000 to remodel that house? You say you always wanted to open a bookstore? The government's got $140,000 for you, and Matthew Lesko will help you get your grubby little hands on it. And, of course, there's all that "free money to pay your bills."
Right, that Matthew Lesko! The sort of embarrassing doofus you pray your daughter will never bring home and introduce as her fiancé. So, no, as evil goes, he's not exactly in the same league as Osama bin Laden.
Yet this character, who has devoted what passes for his adult life to peddling his books and CDs on how to get "free college money" and "free stuff for moms" and "free money to change your life" does stand for something disheartening that's happened to this country in recent years. Once, it was understood by almost everyone that there is no free lunch and that you got yours, as the old commercial had it, "the old-fashioned way"—you earned it! But now, this joker caters to a mindset that believes there's not only free lunch, but free dinner, and free midnight snacks, and a takeout bag if you're still hungry later on. Matthew Lesko is the Pied Piper for way too many Americans who are interested only in themselves.
Because, of course, the "free money" Lesko is talking about isn't really free at all. It's "tax money," which, in his way of thinking, is "everybody's money," otherwise known as "nobody's money."
A lot of us would argue that it's bad enough that slimy politicians take our money in the first place so they can hand it out as "free money" to somebody who wants to open a pizza parlor in Akron. But do we really need Matthew Lesko making himself the go-between, the conduit, between our money and the pizzeria?
And then, in December 2004, the New York State Consumer Protection Board issued a report suggesting that Mr. Lesko may have been —oh, let's be generous —exaggerating in his commercials.
For example: Lesko once claimed that a researcher was given $500,000 by the government "to travel the world." Turns out, the researcher was a physicist from Georgetown who won a grant from the National Science Foundation.
For another example: Lesko has said his books tell you how to get free car repairs. Actually he was talking about an automobile recall by the manufacturer.
And then there was the pitch about how you could get $400 a week if you were out of work. True enough. It's called "unemployment insurance."
"Lesko is now promoting a new book… by claiming that the federal government has more than $350 billion in hidden money that ordinary people can use to pay their credit-card bills and get out of debt," said Teresa Santiago, the chairwoman of the Consumer Protection Board. "That claim is simply not true."
On his Web site, Lesko shot back: "I provide my customers with legitimate sources of government money for business, education, housing and, yes, to pay bills."
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:34 PM Author: Alcoholic roommate house
AHAHAHA, I've just had a brush with a conman.
He's still here, by the way. If I really had balls I'd ask him this on the way out. It would be a stab in the back considering my previously friendly conversation with him.
Date: December 30th, 2005 2:51 PM Author: Alcoholic roommate house
Because class is on the 2nd and we were given a 30pg assignment by a notorious hardass of a Professor. It's either do it now or do it on New Year's Eve/New Year's Day. I know what I prefer.
Date: December 30th, 2005 4:46 PM Author: Apoplectic resort
I just told one of my DC-based friends about this and he said that he used to have to run this guy off of National Parks grounds back when he was a ranger cause he kept trying to film his infomercials on the property illegally. What a funny image!