Random post is random

1. This is awesome/hysterical/t3h shit, as the kids say these days. (Well, they did back in 2005. Probably it's something new at this point.)

2. On my way to one of my favorite coffee shops on Pokrovka Street I always pass this aweosme store that sells huge statues that somehow manage to be both kitsch and vulgar. My favorite has been the model of blind Justice, greater-than-human-size (picture what V blows up on top of the Ol' Bailey). Today Justice was gone! I don't know if she was merely moved to the back, or if someone bought her. I hope the latter.

3. I get disproportionately angry when there's a log jam at the head of set of escalators. Rule of the road is stand to the right, pass to the left. But when there's a log jam, everyone walks as far forward on the left as they can, and then try to merge back into the standing lane -- so it's like when there's a traffic jam and there's someone who passes everyone in the breakdown lane and then tries to cut back in at the next bridge. NO. No one should let that person back in. I get mad at those kind-hearted individuals (I'm looking at YOU, Mom) who do.

Kipling: I used to have really bad road rage.

Icarus: What's made you change?

Kipling: The second accident. I decided life was worth living.

4. I was out at a metro stop I never go to [to which I never go...anyway] today and noticed a huge church. I got excited. I had my camera. Pictures will be forthcoming - I haven't uploaded them to my computer yet. I went inside the church to take more pictures and was blown away by the number of people praying. And then I got embarrassed and didn't take any pictures.

5. Yesterday I meant to go a round-table discussion on contemporary architectural trends because The Professor and other leading architects & critics were participating. The Professor invited me over to meet and talk "for about an hour" at 4 - which I figured would mean he wanted to see me quickly (we hadn't caught up since before I went to England) and then get ready. Then we ended up comparing vacation stories (he took his wife to Berlin for a week for "Commie Women's Day," as Pigion calls it) until 6. I got up to leave.

The Professor: Alright, I should get to working on my new article on Byzantine churches.

Icarus: Wait, what? Aren't you going to the round table?"

The Professor [laughing]: Don't you know me? - If you do go, you didn't see me.

The Professor is Batman.