OH. AWESOME. NO. REALLY. Part 2 - June 30, 2010

OH WOW. OK. GREAT. AWWWWWWWWWWEEEEESOME.

Let me tell you a story. A story filled with intense emotion. It may only be one emotion. BUT THERE WILL BE LOTS OF IT.

So there was no internet yesterday. Let me rephrase. There is internet, but our usernames and passwords don’t work.

Skip forward to today.

It was going to be a great day… right?

I woke up at 7:30am and checked the internet. Still broken. I showered, and made a lunch. I gathered the troops to head to campus at 8:30am.

We had a lab tour on the UM campus at 9am, and we were told not to be late. Luca and I were driving and were given one-day parking passes for Lot B. Corrie told us to park across from the Chemistry building. We figured out where the geology building was and the parking lot. I drove into the parking garage and looked around for section B. I found two signs on two columns that said Lot B, and I parked on the ramp in between them. Luca parked next to me. We both had our parking passes hanging from our rearview mirrors.

We went to the geology building and met the professor. Two long and boring hours later, we decided to head to the IT building to get our internet back, but first Mickey needed his paycheck.  After I held his hand through the process of getting it because no one was in the designated office, we went to the IT building. We went in, and the three boys immediately went to the computers to check their email and facebooks. I talked with the woman at length, she got her boss, and ultimately we were told that the Guest Services director only gave us internet guest passes for a month (from May 28 to June 28), and so we would need our program coordinator (Corrie) to get in touch with him.

AWESOME.

Emily and I yelled to the boys that we were leaving. Then they asked what the deal was. I told them, “Oh, don’t worry sweetie. Mommy will take care of everything.” They went back to sucking their thumbs and as we walked to the car, I checked their diapers for poopies.

No poopies! Good boys!

But we had another surprise waiting for us when we got back to the cars. Luca and I both had tickets on our cars. FOR $300 EACH.

I looked up to the sky and yelled, “REALLY?!?!?”

Since the Parking Administration office was in the parking garage, we went straight there. The ticket says: “Location: Lot B.” The parking pass has a huge “B” on it. The woman was like, “Dang, sucks, man.” Luca and I both had to file an appeal by writing “like we were talking to a judge” about the situation. We should hear back in 2 to 4 weeks. NEATO GANG.

At this point, we headed to work. I had emailed Geronimo before I left the previous day and sent him the document I finished. I had checked my email on my phone this morning (once in the dorm and once on the UM campus) for an email that I had a package. No package, but I had received an email from Geronimo that I should drop by his office…

I think it would be neat if the other mentors knew when we had mandatory mentor lab tours so that they didn’t think I skipped out on work. But you know, don’t want to ask too much here.

So we get to Goddard at around 11:40am. Emily and I went to talk to Corrie about the parking tickets and the internet. Corrie said she was glad she didn’t go to the lab tour today because she would have gotten a ticket too. [Sidenote: Also found out that one of the reasons we aren’t talking a field trip to Green Bank like we were told we would is because we would have had to stay overnight in the bunkhouse and ‘Corrie is too old for that.’] We also told Corrie about the internet and she said, “Oh, I’ll contact Matt.”

Yeah, take your time. It’s not like my life is hanging in the balance or anything… JUST MY SANITY.

Which I had very little of to begin with.

Since it was 11:45am by this point, I went straight to Geronimo. I told him that we just got here because we had a lab tour and then got parking tickets. He laughed at my simple, intern misfortune. We sat for an hour going over the document I wrote (basically, I read this 3000-line IDL code he wrote for reducing spectra of Mars, and I wrote up a 16-ish page document that… documents… the user inputs ‘n junk… awesome). He wanted me to re-number things, which wasn’t an easy task, but I went to it. I adjusted the document and met with him again. We finished going through all the code, which brought us to 5pm. Tomorrow we begin working with data! Wow! Only 19 days into the program! GREAT!

Time to leave. Emily got sidetracked for 20 fucking minutes but an old dude who likes to talk. AWESOME. Then Mickey needed to go to Target to get a Scooby Doo sleeping bag because he sleeps better when Scooby is protecting him. All the previous times we have gone shopping together, when someone is done, they wait up at the front of the store. Both Emily and Mickey bought things and so, Sean and I wandered for about 10 minutes, then went up to the front of the store. We waited another ten minutes, I called Mickey and he didn’t answer. Emily and Mickey were waiting at the car. UGH.

At least we sang some Whitney Houston (pre-crack) to feel a little better.

When we got to the dorms, Emily and I decided to see if the internet worked. GOOD JOKE. We went to McDonald’s because they have free wifi. DID IT WORK?!?!?!?

HAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAAAHAHAAHAHAAHAHAAHA

Of course not.

Then Emily and I decided to GPS some restaurants that might have free wifi. Like your favorite neighborhood IHOP. There weren’t any signs blaring “FREE WIFI” so I ran in to check. The host had no idea if they did or not. He said he’d ask his manager. The manager came over, he was… I don’t know… something weird. He spoke in some sort of halted Amuriken and said that “he’s seen people in here with computers but he doesn’t charge them.” I left as fast as I could. But not before he asked if I wanted him to charge me. Long story short, pancakes are delicious.

After I left, Emily and I decided to hit the Starbucks across the street. But could I get there in a simple, non-roundabout way?

HAHHAAHAHAhAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAAHAH

So I drove around and we passed this monster IKEA. Emily heard that they had like jumbo jets, particle accelerators and a complete working model of Big Ben to scale, so we were like, “Wifi? Wi not?

HAHHAAHAHAhAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAAHAH

They didn’t have wifi. But I DID try to drive up on the sidewalk.

We decided to try that Starbucks again… for the first time. We got there. I checked my email. Wrote that post about writing a post. And then Emily and I decided to try using an Ethernet cord to plug into the wall… Because Starbucks wasn’t exactly conducive to our needs… I’m not talking about porn… something… worse.

So we came back to the dorm. We plugged in to the outlet in the common area. No dice. We decided to try the outlet in her room… SUCCESS.

Or so we thought.

I opened up Firefox and it had three options: Student, Commuter Student or Faculty/Staff. I tried them all. You need a student id to sign in.

Emily and I sat in the common room and cried. And yelled (see yelling post, up soon).

Then I started writing this post.

And that brings us to now.

Sometimes I hate the world and everyone and every thing in it.

But a savior from above!

Emily has a friend that lives upstairs, Andy. He let us use his phone to connect to the internet on our computers.

But Emily and I are watching… something… on Netflix. So RIGHT AFTER I WILL POST THIS!!!! 

I also made this: 

It's a photo-montage of me. For your viewing pleasure.