Category: The Halcyon Days
-
Day 3, Sparta: Jason Goes to Church
This morning I went to the church my grandparents went to when they were kids. According to my grandmother, it hasn’t changed a bit. Excepting the lighting and the primitive sound system, I believe her. A stuccoed building with the traditional church-y front entrance and little bell tower on top and its exterior belies the…
-
Day 2, Athens: Lessons From Athenian Nightlife
1.) Young Greek people adhere to the “Jersey Shore” school of sartorialism. 1a.) See also: obscene sunglasses, tight white pants on both sexes, greasy hair, impeccably well-landscaped eyebrows, and hideous paisley “going out” shirts. 1b.) However, the scruffiness and rectilinearity of men’s faces peg them as European, as opposed to vulgar Italian-American faces still bearing…
-
Day 2, Athens Bus Terminal: Scenes from the Age of Austerity
Bus terminals are generally filthy places. There’s usually no incentive to “keep up appearances” of cleanliness or courteousness. This is the first foreign feeling place I’ve so far visited in Europe; the rest are some variation on the homogeneity of America’s tourist destinations: shops that stock the same trinkets, drinks, and packaged foodstuffs. I know…
-
Day 1, Athens: A Homeric Epic, Reified—Redux
I inadvertently copy-pasted the last post from Pages and absent-mindedly posted it. Here follows the intended “Homeric Epic, Reified”. ————— Out in the Greek countryside, I can see how old this place is. If I had to come up with a visual expression of the word “ancient” it’d be the craggy volcanic mountains here. On…
-
Day 1, Delphi: On Missed Opportunities
Traveling with my grandmother has been interesting so far. Already one who unabashedly makes small talk with total strangers in America. In Greece, it’s as if everybody’s family here. She talks with everyone, and squeezes at least 90 seconds of conversation out of everyone: waitstaff, the concierge at the hotel, cab drivers, a childhood schoolmate…
-
Photo From Delphi
A couple of photos taken today. More to be posted in 4-6 hours: I’ve got to catch a bus back to Athens.
-
MAT > (ACT = SAT)!
For the readers of this blog that know me personally, the following sentence will elicit a “Jason would do something like this,” response. Faced with the prospect of a 7-hour overnight flight from Toronto to London, I did what any logical individual might do; the previous day, I stopped by my local Barnes & Noble…
-
How The Snuggie Will Protect America
So, here I am in O’Hare international and going through security. This was a bit earlier than when this is finally posted, which is dependent on finding an unprotected wifi signal. So anyways, in accordance with the new, “more stringent” security measures implemented by the TSA, I’m having the inside of my upper right thigh…
-
On Social Networking and Personal Branding
I stopped tweeting last week. I did not, however, delete my Twitter account. What prompted me to do this was an interview on a two-way radio communication program, Fresh Air. Interviewed was a journalist who just won a Pulitzer prize for a series he did on distracted driving: how cell phones–talking, texting, and emailing–change the…
-
How To Get Hired at a Hedge Fund: A Résumé Dissection
My previous post, How To Get In To College, was obscenely successful. It was, however, somewhat simplistic in its execution, which is what likely lent to its popularity. I tried my hand at eviscerating yet another hackneyed variant on the application: the résumé.