J.R. Ewing lives

Just now I went to the supermarket and stopped at a red light behind a BMW X5. The X5's license plate bares a reference to my favorite TV show.

Dave, don't let the door slam you on your way out ...

I liked working at AOL but the thing I hated the most about the company is the arrogance on the part of those in upper management. Employees go to all hands meetings, where executive honchos get up and deliver a giant "pat on the back" speech, enriching all of us with minute details of their personal lives.

David Gang is the most typical example of this type of executives. I still remember the day back in May when he announced his departure from the company. Employee were treated to a seven-paragraph email from him listing all his accomplishments over the past ten years. Today's his last day at the company. It will be interesting to see how long he lasts over at WebMD, I'd be sure to avoid the stock like the plague.

Another cheating scandal at UVA?

This time involving graduate students in the economics department. Apparently a "large fraction" of this past year's class of 30 first year graduate students used the textbook's online answer key to do their homework. If this incident results in a large number of graduate students getting expelled or volunteering to withdraw from the program, it could possibly affect the number of teaching assistants available to teach undergraduate students. Economics is the largest undergraduate major at UVA and the department is already understaffed as it is.

Becoming a total TV addict

This began back in February. After watching the first season of Dallas via DVD from Netflix, I decided to get digital cable so I can catch the other tweleve seasons on Soapnet. Then about a month ago, Soapnet began running Dynasty from the beginning and I added a second hour to my daily afternoon viewing.

Earlier today I called my cable company to cancel the STARZ package because I was sick of paying $5 per month (special intro rate) for five channels that I don't watch. The rep processed the cancellation and informed me that she has a current promo, also $5 per month, for HBO. So I called with the intentions of cancelling five channels that I didn't watch, and ended up walking away with 11 channels of TV that I do watch.

Now you know where my time goes.

Free ice cream this week

Today at Starbucks and Saturday at Cold Stone Creamery. 

Ken Elzinga in the news

A local Charlottesville newsweekly had an interview with one of my favorite professors at UVA. Ken Elzinga teaches intro to microeconomics and an upper level class on antitrust policy. He is regarded as one of the premier economist in the field of antitrust and consulted for Microsoft during its antitrust case.

Ken's (students who have taken his upper level course are allowed to address him by his first name) most unusual talent is as a mystery writer. Him and a fellow economist have written three mystery novels under the pen name Marshall Jevons. These novels feature Henry Spearman, a fictional character who teaches economics at Harvard University. In each novel, Spearman finds himself in the middle of a situation where he uses principles of economics to unravel the mystery.

One thing I won't miss about this area

I have lived in this area for seven years now and this is the one thing I like the least about it, it is the way working professionals identify themselves (and others) by their jobs. Sometimes when I go to meetings, parties, etc. I play a little game where I would introduce myself to someone or a group of people and try to count how many conversations we have before someone asks me the inevitable "so what do you do for a living?" I find this attitude to be quite arrogant. I know a couple of people my age who have nice jobs for big name companies and they never give up the opportunity to brag about their jobs. They gloat about it just so that others would know how successful they (or/and their employers) are. I don't know if this phenomenon is unique to this area, unique to big cities, or nationwide (although I doubt it).

When I was on the plane to Miami on June 17, I read an article in the local major newspaper. It talked about how rising real estate prices have driven a divide in the office between co-workers who own their own homes and those who rent. It quoted a local clinical psychologist who said that "in hard-charging cities such as (city where I live), known for its high-achieving careerists, people traditionally have been very much defined by their jobs." 

It goes to show that some people are just pathetic and need to get a life.