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Who is Matthew Martin?

It is wordpress! It is actively updated! It answers burning questions! (At least one!)

Wind up the online dating experament

I've used up my LavaLife Credits (dumb company rips you off and won't let you spend the last 5)

Match.com account dies in a few weeks.

Emode.com account is dead already, I think.

I have my own social site now at SuburbanDestiny.com. Subvert the system!

Girlfriend Stealing

I found this website, dedicated to promoting and refining the techniques of find girlfriend by searching among the 'taken'. Interestingly, the guy who wrote it said it was morally OK, but only if it was 'hilarious.' Quite a few morally questionable, but hilarious, acts are OK by this standard.

I understand this guy's genes have a evolutionary duty to survive by breeding as much as possible, but I'm not sure this is the evolutionarily optimal strategy. Cuckolded humans tend to get very violent, except when their girlfriend is running around with another girl, then they are just bemused. The later story about a guy, his wife and her live-in mistress was in the Washington Post today, (paper version, no link) It made me wonder:

Have relatinships always been this unusual and only today do we have the technology to publish the stories as they happen?

Also, today I ordered my personal calling cards, with the SuburbanDestiny.com URL on them. I read somewhere that if you give a girl a calling card, it means, "Hey, I'm professional enough to have a calling card, so I'm probably not an ax murder." Unless your card says, 'Ax murder'. In that case, you are better off not handing out your calling card.

Exercise Goals

Goals
- Prevent pain. Particularly back and joint pain from having to move something heavy once a year or those random wild cat back muscle strikes
- Tone, a rock hard body. I don't really want to add inches to my legs or biceps, all that would mean is that I'd need new cloths. In anycase, building bulk requires eating a ton more, and I'm just not interested in doing that much cooking & eating.
- Bone density. I just wish I had a way to measure this
- Weight maintenance. I keep losing weight. I'm not sure where it was the last time it was when I saw it.
- Milestone date: 1 year after signing up at Gold's Gym.

Method
- Sign up at Gold's Gym
- Shoot for 3 cardio exercises a week, expect 2.5, duration of 1 hour or what ever I can manage
- Shoot for 3 weight lifing sessions a week, expect 2.5, 1 hour with 10 minute cardio warm up

- Fallbacks
Cardio at home when no time for gym
Take 10lb dumb-bells and leg weigth with me on trips out of town.

Social Angle
I've read 'exercise buddies' are a good thing. But what are they? What is the script?

A exercise buddy program should:
* Draw on a pool of people- so that when one exercise buddy is out of the program, another one can step in.
* Have a renewal date- it should be easier to get people to join an exercise buddy program if it was only to be for a year and not with the expectation that it will be forever. Also, when you ask for a specific time commitment, you are less likely to end up with someone dropping out after two weeks.
* Agree on exertion levels in advance (What, you want to stay at the gym for 2 hours?)
* Agree on # of times to call up other person before giving up (What, you want to skip gym again?)

Mugging Sequelae

Yes, I am more adverse to going walking at night alone in Woodbridge. Haven't decided what to say to son. Obvious emotional impact has been limited to being self conscious about having a black eye and fat lip.

Rest of mind busy trying to figure out how to finish suburbandestiny.com, the pretty chick at the office, (Can't say more, thanks to Leah, I've learned writing about unrequited office crushes is not a good idea, unless it gets requited, like Tara's.) and my sister who is having a rough time (it's depressing, you don't want details). Oh, and the other 80% of my mind wants to know why my computer keeps crashing when I try to install SP2 on XP Home.

Lessons Learned

1. A black eye hurts worse on the 2nd and 3rd day. And a black eye is really purple and black, not black and blue. I should look up the Hex color codes but I'm lazy.

2. Take two wallets in areas with mugging problems, one with cash, one with all the worthless cards that are a pain to replace like library cards, credit cards, etc. On the other hand, I don't like carrying cash, I tend to spend it and I don't get a cash rebate like I do on my credit cards.

3. Gratuitous cute item for the list: My bengal cat fetches mice if you throw them for him. His favorite toys are: mice, vertical blinds, plastic bags (not my idea, his), cords (again, not my idea). He prefers to walk on anything except the ground. He will scratch his post if I scratch the post (which is pretty remarkale, since you don't see cats immitate very often).

4. Jumbled ranted inserted for no reason: Three strikes is too many for mugging, we need one strike your out laws. People who mug are not economically rational, they should be doing some more profitable crime, so they are not in it for the money, they are in it for the violence. If I f#$ke up my cat, I'll raise a hostile, unsocialized cat, suitable for euthenizing. The same thing is happening to inner cities with single parent mom's letting their kids get raised by the TV and other children on the streets. The state should be doing more to lock up these failed people before they have a chance to lash out. More to the point, why don't we just jail everyone that buys Mad Dog 20/20 or Malt Liqour? And graphitti artists and people who play their stereo too loud, (so called quality of life crimes). These are all the same people that are going to be mugging someone soon. Man, I'm ready to move to Singapore. I got a nosy department of homeland security quicky removing my freedom to do stuff and still I don't have freedom from violent street crime. And while I'm not the topic, muggers should be sentenced until they are about 35 or 45, so when they get out jail, they're too old to harass society, none of this arbitrary 5 year to life stuff. I am all for the ownership of guns, just so long as they are only in the hands of astigmatic 60 year old NRA nut jobs.

Shedding Light on Mugging in Prince William County

Ah, the internet is great. While listening to a Beautiful Mind, (not the theme to Rocky, although my face looks like it), that beautiful music that makes it seem like it soon will all make sense, I come accross these facts:

I was the typical mugging. Young black male(s) mugging an older white guy, with less than $100 at stake. Odds are they were either addicts or alcoholics, because they were not armed. More people are in jail for mugging that any other reason. There was an 8% chance that I would be killed. There was only a 30% chance I would be injured at all, since a trained robber would use a lethal threat to get money from the victim. It makes sense, most people will hand over $63 rather than die.

It seems the guys (or another pair with the same modus operandi) that attacked me have been working recently in my area.

"LONGVIEW DR., 2200 block, 11:15 p.m. Aug. 24. Two men punched a pedestrian, 12, and robbed him of a cell phone."

Don't know why anyone would want to steal a cell phone from a 12 year old. You can get them for free and they stop working right after you steal them. (Just for clarification, that wasn't me, read below to see how I was mugged. I'll try to post the police blotter version once it is on the web.)

From the earlier, source, I found out that robbers usually will only commute about 2 miles to do their work, so I was essentially mugged by neighbors.

Too bad muggers don't use the internet, where they could have found out that peaceful larceny has a pay of five times greater than mugging, and probably a vastly lower chance of going to jail. Residential burglarly pays double that of larceny. This probably explains why most crime in Prince William County is residential burglary.

I wanted to write my represenative to say we ought to put these muggers away for life, but apparently, the judges already can:

§ 18.2-58. How punished.

If any person commit robbery by ... by striking or beating, or by other violence to the person, or by assault or otherwise putting a person in fear of serious bodily harm, or by the threat or presenting of firearms, or other deadly weapon or instrumentality whatsoever, he shall be guilty of a felony and shall be punished by confinement in a state correctional facility for life or any term not less than five years.

(Code 1950, § 18.1-91; 1960, c. 358; 1966, c. 361; 1975, cc. 14, 15, 605; 1978, c. 608.)

Can't these young black men that mugged me just sign up to go to jail instead of having to mug a bunch of people to get into the system?

More research shows that Virginia in general is just average for robbery among the 50 states, but a low crime state for most other types of crime. This reminds me of a lecture I heard in economics. When the economy is doing good and in places where the economy is doing good, property crime goes down, but violent crime doesn't care about the economy as much. Like I've already said, this mugging wasn't economically rational. This was two fatherless kids who were never taught a trade and were probably raised in an evironment of anger and deprivation. Let us hope that they are institutionalized humanely and without loss of life when their time comes.

I got mugged on Old Bridge Road in Prince William County

Who'd of thunk that living in the suburbs was so dangerous? Two jackasses hit me on the head with a bottle, jumped on me, knocked me over, hit me with their fists a few times, demanded money and ran off when I was slow to hand it over and didn't flinch when they hit me. Fortunate for me, they were poorly trained and unarmed. I got away with broken headphones, a fat lip, and a finger with a possibly stress factured bone.

There was a witness and I called on my cell phone 911. The police were nice, but disappointed that I couldn't give them a detailed description (my glasses got knocked off and I wasn't up on the mugging script, so I wasn't doing what I was 'supposed to do')

I'm trying to feel compassionate towards these dudes, and I think that the most compassionate thing would be to lock them up, apart from society. If you have to jump people to get $63, you really shouldn't be on the street at all, because clearly you are not going to survive. It takes more that $63 to pay rent, pay for the car, pay for food. You can't mug enough people to even pay for illegal drugs. Once these young black men are in jail, society will take care of them, they sure won't ever be able to do it themselves. Jail is the ultimate in welfare.

What the world needs is a cashless society. I'm calling on everyone who carry cash to stop it immediately. Cash causes mugging. As soon as people stop carrying cash entirely, there won't be much incentive to mug. The cop tried to say I was partly to blame for walking in the evening with headphones. I say that you, dear readers and all your neighbors are also to blame for continuing to carry around cash and equivallents. (And of course existentially speaking, everyone and everything is entirely to blame for everything, but this isn't the time for philosophy.)

In the meanwhile, assume that the suburbs are a dangerous place. Muggers can't afford to live in the city anymore. They've come to suburbia.

Time to Start Weight Lifting Again

I lift weights because if I don't my knees and back hurt. Now I recently moved and my 'Dad Duty' is over for the summer, so I'm ready to join a gym. I get to pick from: Prince William County, Gold's Gym, Bally's. Bally's has a reputation for really ripping people off and being a good place to socialize, Gold's Gym is just expensive and is the place for people who are super serious about pumping iron.

My idea gym has:
A price I can understand. Expensive is OK. A blank check is not.
Quiet enough to listen to my audiobooks. Damn it I don't want to watch your f!@#ing TV show!
Super close to my house.

The apartment building has a rinky dink weight lifting center, which is good for about a half dozen or dozen exercises. Unfortunately, there is a TV there, so I can't trust it to always be quiet. Also, the fact that 2/3 of the machines parts are broken is something of a drawback.

Chin Regional Recreation Center. 1.1 miles. Has a swimming pool. Can go on a daily basis. Membership transferable to one other Rec Center. Classes cost extra. Doesn't have a reputation for ripping of anyone, since it's run by the government.

Gold's Gym. Not especially close. I'll have to see if I can run there in a reasonable time. (Its's 1.2 miles) No swimming pool. One and two year contracts are standard. Membership sort of transferable. Includes classes, I think.

Bally's. Oh man, I can only take so many stories of people who grossly misunderstood their contract and were not able to cancel before I chicken out. Three year contracts. The staff and customers don't understand the complicated system of fees, dues, and penalties. I'd have to drive there. It is not uncommon for Bally's to stain your credit report should you attempt to move away from the area. (On top of all that, they are 3 miles away from where I am now)

(Results vary from place to place, since Gold's is a franchise and I'm not sure about Bally's, but even they probably have different results depending on the local manager or lack of one)

Match.com Advice to Women

Advice: Manage expectations. Date early, don't waste time exchanging 150 emails. Be cautious, but don't make the poor guy feel like he needs to prove he's not an axe murderer- unless this is what you normally do with an in person new relationship. Don't waste your and strangers time by posting a crappy post. Tell the reader what you want. Don't mention what you don't want in a man, it makes you sound unfriendly and no one says, "Darn, she doesn't like liars and cheaters, I better not write." Get a good picture. No picture is not attractive to people who don't care about looks, it means the account is inactive. The profile should include lots of 'writing starers' If you write, "My friends think I'm nice." I have no idea how to respond to that. Always ask questions in emails or the email conversation will die. Follow societies trends: Stop looking only at men older, richer and more educated than you. On the other hand if you are older, rich or more educated, buck the trend and send emails--by quirk of how databases work, you might be getting filtered out of viable candidates search queries. 1/2 of modern in person relationships are formed with the women being richer, more educated and older.

Vacation over, bought cat.

I bought a bengal cat, from Hilltop Bengals! They are in Toronto, Ohio, and are very professional breeders. The extra I paid was well worth it, as the cat so far is very social.

The cat is a marble coated cat originally called 'Sid Delicious', but I am going to call him Marbles for short. That way if I ever lose him, I can go around saying, "I've lost my Marbles!"

Things learned:

Walmart does have the cheapest robotic kitty litter changer, but the Arm & Hammer baking soda kitty litter stinks, I'll have to find the odorless kind. The cat almost used the bean bag chair, but quick recognition of the cat's intentions saved the day. Now the cat has used the robotic box twice. The robotic box demands clumping litter, but clumping litter is controversial, since cats get sick if they are dumb enough to eat it when it sticks to feet. Problem solved by trying to teach cat to jump into the water to wash its feet. (see below)

Cats do not like to drive. (I already knew that, but Marbles reminded me for about 6 hours at 3 second intervals that he didn't like to drive.)

Some cats get separation anxiety. This one starts meowing every time I leave the room.

Bengal cats will play fetch, but it takes some training.

Bengal cats will get in the water, but it takes training to get them really used to it. Conventional cats won't tolerate water at all.

Cats are expensive, but not as expensive as dogs. So far I am out $650 for the cat, $150 for assorted cat equipment, food and supplies and soon I will be out a vet bill and a pile of money for the landlord.

More news will be posted as I attempt to teach cat to wear a harness and leash. Once that's done, it should be a snap to teach it to balance the checkbook and take out the trash.

Blog Reviews

What makes for a good blog to read? (Which is different from a good blog to write. A writer can write their grocery list in their blog and this may be a very worthwhile activity for the writer. But to read, you really need a picture of the inside of the fridge and some commentary about the fridge.)

Elements
Open to comments
Honest, but not so honest that your employer firewalls your blog (like happened to Leah)
Short entries (Blog readers are sifting through a lot of crap, so mega entries don't get read, but again, can be very profitable for the writer)
Updated enough that the storyline doesn't get lost

Http://warmair.blogspot.com
http://taraincalgary.blogspot.com
http://herowninvention.blogspot.com/
http://ferncanyon.blogspot.com/

Not a very random sample, I tend to read the blogs of people who post comments to my blog, the blogs of people who post comments to other blogs I read and so on.