Short Update

Well, today was to begin the roundtable discussion but certain member(s) who shall remain nameless (at least for now) have missed the submission deadline so we'll be delayed on that.

Christy and I have a busy week ahead of us. First, I got us free tickets to see an advance screening of Get Smart tonight, so that should be fun. I am hoping for the best, while expecting the worst. Something tells me that when it's over I'll wish that I had stayed home and just watched the original show for those 2 hours instead. Don Adams was great! Even if you didn't remember him from Get Smart, anyone near my age would certainly remember him as the voice of Inspector Gadget.

Then on Thursday we are going to see Mike Doughty at Martyr's. Kind of cool because he was only scheduled to play at Taste of Randolph on the 20th but an e-mail went out to his fan club members letting them know that he was actually playing a "secret" gig the night before. Very cool because Martyr's is a really small venue and you rarely get a chance to see him in such a small place anymore. Should be a lot of fun. It's doubly good because on the 20th we already had tickets to see Willie Nelson at Ravinia and now we don't have to make a choice between the 2. I'm not a huge Willie Nelson fan (although Stardust is a phenomenal album) but I had opportunities to see Oscar Peterson and Johnny Cash and didn't and now that they are gone I regret it and who knows how much longer Willie will be around for?


Still no word on the CPA exam, and they haven't even updated their stupid little memo to tell me when they're expecting to receive the scores. From past experience, it's supposed to be ~3 weeks after the testing window ends, which would be this Friday/Saturday. Really hoping I find out then. I've been able to put it out of my mind the last couple weeks but now that the time is once again approaching the restlessness has returned in earnest.

Finally, I'd just like to join in with everyone else in expressing my sadness in learning about Tim Russert's passing. The first time I remember seeing him was on election night 2000 when he grabbed a small wipe board and said (at about 5:00 before any of the polls had closed) "I'm going to write down 3 keys to this election tonight" and when he turned it around it read "Florida, Florida, Florida." After taking a long break from politics I've only gotten really into it over the past 2 years or so. Over that time, though, one of the things I looked forward to every week was coming into work on Monday mornings and listening to the Meet the Press podcast. It's really common when someone passes to hear people say "he was one of the good guys" but here I just can't think of a better way to succinctly describe him. His love for politics and politicians came through in every interview he did, and politicians on both sides describe him the exact same way professionally: tough but fair. This primary season was extremely gruelling but now I'm a little happier that it went on so long because in addition to Mondays I got to hear from him on umpteen Tuesday nights too, in his element doing what he loved. Not only did he push his competitors on the Sunday morning talk circuit to be better journalists, he also pushed politicians to be better candidates. He wasn't out for the "gotcha" moment, but if you came on the show unprepared he would nail you for sure. In the words of comedian Dave Allen: "Good night, and may your god go with you."