Joanna L. Castillo

June 28, 2008

I drove out to Bastrop today ('had a great time out there!) and had to fill up before heading east. And, noticed the following:

[9999]

Hmmm...9,999 miles in 10 months. That's darned close to 1,000 a month, eh? If I drive out to NM in August, I'm gonna bust that average up, eh? By the way, I'm averaging about 36 mpg these days. I'm still very happy with my new car.

June 16, 2008

From today's Campus Watch crime report:

Student Services Building (100 W. Dean Keeton)
Assault: A UT staff member was slapped in the face by a UT student after the student passed by the staff member while walking along Dean Keeton Street. The student felt the staff member should have moved out of his way as he passed her. The incident was witnesses by two other staff members who came to the victim's aid and reported the incident to the UT Police Department. Occurred on 06/13/08 at 8:05 a.m.

Wow. I'm frequently amazed when I walk around campus at the attitude of a certain segment of the student population. You better watch out or they will knock you down as they walk down the street. If there are three or four of them walking along, they'll block the entire sidewalk and expect everyone in their path to step off the sidewalk to accomodate them. I don't step off the sidewalk. I'm usually walking along one edge or the other but if not, I'll move to the edge and then I will stop and let them go around me if I think they'll run into me. And, they look at me like I'm insane for not jumping into the bushes or the gutter to let them pass. If they acknowledge my presense at all. I wish I could say I was surprised at the report above but, sadly, I'm not. I'm just saddened.

June 10, 2008

Read this: The politics of oil shale. Politicians. What a bunch of jack asses. Claiming to care about the little guy...the guy who's struggling to get by with gas going for $4 a gallon...and then blocking all attempts to put cheaper gasoline at the pumps. They hold hearings demanding that the oil companies do something about the price of energy and then block all attempts to meet those demands. No oil shale. No new refineries. But, also: no wind farms and no new nuclear power plants. Jack asses.

June 5, 2008

My grandparents' generation. On my mom's side of the family, her parents and all of their siblings are long gone from this world. Her dad was born in 1900...her mom in 1905. My Mom's father died when I was in high school; her mom died when I was in college. I have many fond memories of visiting them in the summers of my childhood. They were ranchers. It was a different life.

What brought this all to mind? The last of my father's paternal aunts passed away this weekend. She was 96. On my dad's side, there's one person left from his parents' generation: his mom. His father passed away when I was a baby. I don't remember him. I've seen photos of him and it looks like I inherited his teeth. He had a gap between his two front teeth. I used to have a gap between mine. But, in 9th grade, one of my front teeth was knocked out in a stupid floor hockey accident. So, when I got a new tooth, the gap disappeared. I talk to my grandmother 4 or 5 times a week and visit her once a year. She lives in New Mexico. She turned 91 in December. And, she lived on her own into her 90th year. She's a little bitty thing. She's something fierce, though. Nobody's ever gotten away with anything when she was around.

Ah well. Here's the obituary for my great-aunt Maria:

Aragon, NM -- Maria C. Aragon, 96, a resident of Albuquerque passed away on May 31, 2008, at home with her loving family at her side. Mrs. Aragon is survived by her children, Patricio Aragon and wife, Rosie, Victor Aragon and wife, Virginia, Alberto Aragon and wife, Alicia, Emma Montoya and husband, Valentin, Theresa Sanchez and husband, Patricio, Tobias Vicente Aragon and wife, Katherine, Amalia Mora and husband, George, Grace Price and husband, Robert, Benito Aragon and wife, Paula; a very dear friend, John Paul Stein; her sisters-in-law, Frances Castillo and Severa Aragon; 44 grandchildren; 73 great-grandchildren; five great-great-grandchildren; many nieces, nephews, cousins and friends. Mrs. Aragon was preceded in death by her husband of 49 years, Vicente Aragon; her daughter, Bertha Aragon; and many other loving family members; Mrs. Aragon was a member of the Catholic Church, St. Edwin Catholic Church, the Sacred Heart Society, the Legion of Mary and the Miraculas Medal Society. Visitation will be Tuesday evening, June 3, 2008 from 6:30 p.m. until 7:00 p.m. at St. Edwin Catholic Church, 2105 Barcelona SW with a Rosary to be recited at 7:00 p.m. by Father Bill Sanchez. Final visitation will be Wednesday at the Church from 8:30 a.m. until 9:00 a.m. with Mass of Christian Burial to be celebrated at 9:00 a.m., Father Bill Sanchez, presider. Interment will follow at Mt. Calvary Cemetery. Pallbearers will be Bernadette Gutierrez, Richard Aragon, Aileen Aragon, Val Montoya, Mark Villegas, Vicent Aragon, Steven Mora, Vicent Price, and Loretta Aragon.

May 23, 2008

A couple of musical notes...

I was sitting here listening to my iPod and "You Call Everybody Darling" by K.T. Oslin came on and it made me smile. Which made me think of Grey's Anatomy last night.

In the closing minutes of the show, they played a couple of songs. The second-to-last song really caught my attention. I was sure it was Amy Winehouse but it wasn't a song I immediately recognized. So, I fired up iTunes to see if I had it and make sure to give it a 5-star rating (which would throw it into my main playlist). And, none of the Amy Winehouse songs in my library matched the Grey's tune. I only have one Amy Winehouse CD (thanks, Larry!) though. So, I went to the iTunes store, thinking it was likely a new song. But, no. None of those songs matched either. The next step in my search: I went looking for matching lyrics. And, nothing. I gave up.

This morning, I started my search again. I found a site that lists all the music used in each episode of the show. And, I started looking up each of the songs in the iTunes store. I liked most of 'em but none of 'em were the song. Sigh. There was one song, though, that was not available via iTunes. So, I did a YouTube search for it. And, lo: The Quest by Bryn Christopher. Not Amy Winehouse at all. But, it does sound like her. And, judging by the comments on that YouTube page, I'm not the only one who thinks so!

By the way, it looks like "The Quest" is set to be released as a single on June 8th. Maybe it'll show up in the iTunes store then.

May 18, 2008

Making biofuels from algae. Very cool. And, more.

May 17, 2008

I went into the office today for a couple of hours. As I pulled into the garage, I noticed a couple of posted signs:

[Signs]

A close-up:

[Free parking]

I'm thinking that maybe you didn't have to pay to park in the garage today. What say you? Heh heh.

April 30, 2008

I haven't posted any of these in a long time. Two reports in today's Campus Watch struck my fancy for some reason. And, so...

From today's Campus Watch crime report:

Burglary of Motor Vehicle (Trinity Parking Garage, 1815 Trinity Ave.)
Burglary of Motor Vehicle: The passenger side window of a black Ford Mustang was discovered shattered and glass was seen lying on the ground beside the vehicle. During the investigation, the officer contacted the registered owner and learned the following property had been stolen from the vehicle: Radar detector, Mustang cologne, cellular telephone charger, and an auxiliary cell phone cord. Loss value: $200.00. Occurred on: 4-29-08, between 4:50 PM and 10:27 PM.

The owner of a Ford Mustang uses (apparently) Mustang Cologne? Heh heh. I'd never even heard of Mustang Cologne. I have now, though! (Late to the party as usual; that link is dated May 8th, 2007...nearly a year late to the party.) And, I'm inspired by the owner's brand loyalty. I'll have to see if I can find some xD deodorant. Or something.

And, the second report:

Criminal Trespass Warning (Union Building, #4 West Mall)
A non-UT subject was seen by a UT staff member stopping students and asking them for money. The officers located the subject and were informed by the suspect that she only spoke Spanish. When the officers started their interview in Spanish, the subject then told the officers that she did not understand Spanish since she was from Romania. During the investigation, the officers issued the subject a written Criminal Trespass Warning and escorted her from the campus area. Occurred on: 4-29-08, at 5:10 PM.

Heh heh heh. "I no speak English." ... "Yo no hablo Español." ... "Ummm...me Romanian????" 'Gotta love the tenacity, eh?

March 3, 2008

Story time. I was not feeling well last night and tossed and turned and generally couldn't breathe for much of the night. But, at some point I had a very vivid dream in which I was fired from my job for referring to one of our sponsors as an asshole in an email message...a message that was perhaps copied to that person. My boss didn't really want to fire me but he didn't really have much of a choice. I'm not very clear on the specifics. Vivid as the dream was, the details are a bit hazy now. At any rate, I wasn't really too concerned about it in my dream. "Oh well," my thinking seemed to go, "I'm sick and tired of that job anyway."

When it was time to get up this morning, I still felt awful so got up and sent a note to my bosses with a CC to Esther saying I'd be in late. I went back to bed and then thought something along the lines of: "Wait. I didn't have to send them a message. They fired me." And, then I started wondering if I'd been fired from all of my job...or just part of it. I'm paid out of three different pots of money by three different professors. Did they all fire me? And, then I drifted off. A bit later, I came out of my haze long enough to realize that I had not been fired at all. And, I eventually went in to work. Where, it would seem, I did not send any inflammatory email messages to anyone. Sigh...

And, just to be clear: I would never send an email message like that out. I might think something like that about someone (I don't think I ever have thought that about a sponsor but it could happen). But I'd never actually articulate it to anyone else at work via email. I do like how la-dee-da I was about the whole situation in my dream. Heh.

February 10, 2008

I just spent too much time playing Guess-the-google so it's only fair that you do the same!

February 6, 2008

Food for thought: Exxon's 2007 Tax Bill: $30 Billion.

PS: Happy Birthday, Larry!!!!!

February 4, 2008

The state of Texas is getting ready to make-over (maybe) the design of our license plates. These are the proposed designs:

[Texas license plate designs]

I'm torn. I like aspects of each one. Typical, eh? Which one do you like best? The last one is basically the same as what we've got now. Note that they're going to 7 characters...moving on up from 6. You can vote for your favorite at the Texas License Plate e-Vote site. (Voting ends at noon on Monday, February 11th.)

More stuff like this has been archived for no good reason.

By the by, I live in Austin and work at The University of Texas. Feel free to read all about it. Oh yeah...I wrote a bio for this page about a million years ago. I haven't felt compelled to update it since then so...read with a grain of salt. Actually, not much has changed.

If that's not enough for you, you really should check out my mom's home page. Go on, now. Shoo!

joanna@joanna.org
Last updated: June 28, 2008