Category: Family

The Ten Worst Photos Of Me Ever Taken

In a twisted sense, this post is the height of narcissism, but at the same time I dare my fellow blog authors to duplicate it.

As such, I present the ten worst photos of me ever taken (with commentary from KLS).

Before I start though, I have to issue a disclaimer. I do not own every photo ever taken of me, and I don’t doubt there are some out there that would make this list. I specifically refer to a legendary image of me in yellow shorts and a yellow t-shirt with yellow hair taken during a sports festival during high school, which is known to be in the possession of SMC…

In order to fully enjoy this list, I suggest you not skip ahead, for the images are listed in order of least-worst first:

10.jpg < #10 (1993) RS: "The glasses, the hair, the leather jacket. Nothing about this photo is at all cool. If I saw this person in real life, I'd hit him." KLS: "It's all about the glasses!" 9.jpg < #9 (1995) RS: "I just hate it. It makes my skin crawl..." KLS: "You just look like such a dipshit!" 8.jpg < #8 (1999) RS: "The earliest digital photo on this list. Why didn't I delete it?" KLS: "You look like a crackhead with allergies." 7.JPG < #7 (2002) RS: "Taken during a hair-dyeing procedure (we bleached it before dyeing it red). Just awful..." KLS: "I don't really have to say anything, do I?" 6.jpg < #6 (1993) RS: "The oldest photo on this list, taken just days after arriving from Australia. Is this even me? I can't believe I ever thought those glasses looked good..." KLS: (just laughs out loud) 5.JPG < #5 (2005?) RS: "A self-portrait gone horribly, horribly wrong..." KLS: "The frogman cometh!" 4.JPG < #4 (2007) RS: "I actually like this photo. It makes me look strong!" KLS: "You look scary, and like you have a terminal disease!" 3.jpg < #3 (1999) RS: "I plead the fifth on defining the caption. What 'bandanna phase'?" KLS: "You look like a fat professional wrestler!" 2.jpg < #2 (1996?) RS: "Not the worst, but hands down the most embarassing. It was a monumental effort to actually upload and post this diabolically awful image of the antithesis of cool.”
KLS: “It’s the total package!”

1_1.JPG 1_2.JPG < #1, 2006 RS: "The story behind this pair of images is this: I was out one morning removing snow for hours. I came in, showered and proceeded to shave off the full beard I had at the time. As a bit of a joke I kept the mustache, and KLS was smart enough to snap these two images. They have become somewhat iconic, specifically the leftmost one, as not just the worst photo ever of me, but the worst ever possible photo that could ever be taken of me! Note the ‘lobotomy scar’, the sunken eyes, the offensive mustache and the rash on my neck. This photo is so incomparably bad, that in a certain way it is just sublime.”
KLS: “It looks like a photo of a mustache with some dude hiding behind it!”

Enjoy this post while you can, because even now as I am about to hit ‘publish’ I am debating deleting it…

I’m Teaching

The day after getting back from Australia I got a call from the department asking if I wanted to teach again this semester. My advisor was in an accident and badly broke her leg, which means she’ll be out for some time. That left two courses without an instructor and I agreed to teach one of them – Electronics. This is a course on the theory and design of electronic circuits, a sort of electrical engineering course with a physics bent. The course includes a hands-on lab component, and thankfully I have a TA to handle the lab (thanks Florence!)

So here we are, after one week of classes, which seem to have gone well.

After this and last semester I’m starting to feel more like a lecturer and less like a student…this doesn’t mean I don’t like it…but it’s certainly having an effect on my ability to get a lot of my own work done…

Last Word

So, in summary, I went to Australia for a few different reasons.

The primary reason was to catch up with family and friends:

Dsc009961.jpg Dsc009981.jpg Dsc00301.jpg Dsc00906.jpg

The second was to consume vast quantities of delicious Australian junk food:

Dsc01534.jpg

The third was to enjoy the weather, and the surroundings:

Dsc006861.jpg Dsc01211.jpg Dsc02031.jpg

And the last (but far from least) was to buy KLS a vast collection of belated Christmas gifts:

Dsc02260.jpg < 'Souvenirs' But if I were to summarize the trip in a single image, it would be this: Dsc013081.jpg < Australia 2008 In 3 weeks I drunk at least 54 cans and 5 1.5 litre bottles of Lift. This does not include food that came at a restaurant, at which I always chose Lift (or the inferior Pepsi equivalent, Solo), which would account for perhaps an additional 30 or more 600ml bottles. That's an average of about 1.8 litres a day (which is, I suspect, an underestimate) or about 1000 calories per day from Lift soda alone. (As a shocking aside, my calculations also estimate upwards of A$175 spent on Lift soda alone...) Needless to say, Lift was the fuel that kept me going through an entirely entertaining trip. Thanks to friends and family for letting me stay, and thanks very much to KLS for letting me go :)