At Home In The Wasteland Travel Blog

In 30 years, when I’m the CEO of BP or Chevron or Shell or better yet, ExxonBPChevronocoPhillipShell – the modern day incarnation of Standard Oil – will I still have a blog? Will I post photos of my Mediterranean vacation while lounging on the deck of my yet to be named yacht? (Don’t worry, I’m [...]

Saw this article on MSNBC last night and had to laugh: Got problems? Blame the Californians Apparently, Californians are to blame for all the ills that plague our neighbors in the Western United States: “California has a negative influence on our society,” he said, glancing around as cigarette smoke fills the stuffy place. “They should [...]

While the rest of America drools over the Spiderman 3 and Simpsons trailers (whatev), I’ve been tracking the progress of P.T. Anderson’s (Boogie Nights, Punch Drunk Love) latest film, “There Will Be Blood.” Slated to open in October/November 2007 (gawwdaaamn so far away), “There Will Be Blood” is loosely adapted from Upton Sinclair’s 1927 novel, [...]

It had to be said. Can you truthfully say that this quarter represents the Great State of California?! All we got here is an effin’ condor attacking some old bearded dude with a cane. Oh, wait, that’s John Muir. Granted, Yosemite is a rather important part of California, but where are the palm trees, beaches, [...]

Temperature was a pleasant 77 degrees and sunny on Thursday. Wore my flip-flops, left the coat at home, threw the winter gear in the corner of my room. “Ah,” I thought to myself, “spring is finally here. Life is good.” And then Thursday it started pouring rain, continued all day Friday, and even SNOWED. W…T…F? [...]

Here’s a few more recently upped photos of LSE friends – some from my dorm (Bankside represent) and others from my Russian & Post-Soviet Studies (RPSS) program. The theme for this week is drinking, or whatever. This is a pic of Omar from the Bankside boat party held at the beginning of term. Possibly the [...]

This was a lazy weekend. The laziest of the lazy, except for two hours of soccer practice in which we (my soccer team) found ourselves strenuously running up and down the National Mall, doing our best to avoid the tourists that dared wander onto our field. The weather was perfect (mid 60s). True, it could [...]

Well, it was hard to keep this list to just five, but here are a few songs that “hit” me (i.e., actually make you think, reminisce, identify with the lyrics, whatever) in no particular order: Ben Folds – Landed If you wrote me off I’d understand it Cause I’ve been on Some other planet So [...]

Despite having left London in September 2005, I still have yet to upload all the photos from the year I spent there. Here’s a few from the popular London tourist attraction, Madame Tussauds wax museum, otherwise known as the most famous “tourist trap” in the city. Crystal and I went there one late summer afternoon [...]

Height restrictions WTF? This has been in the Russian papers for the past year, but a few weeks ago, the Washington Post ran an interesting article about the development of “Gazprom City”, a large office complex situated on the banks of the Neva River in St. Petersburg: Twisting as it rises 77 stories, the planned [...]