From one of those endlessly circulating e-mail forwards:

Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way, when you criticize them you’re a mile away, and you have their shoes.

Our car just went over 50,000 miles.

The George Washington Bridge at dusk. Pretty, eh?

I got my computer back today, and it works, but I promptly managed to break my Internet access, so I remain without a Web connection until I go back to Newington and retrieve my Windows 98 CD-ROM. Darn it… Anyway, here’s a nighttime photo from the roof.

I have a job interview at 3:00 PM (that’s just over an hour from now) with the woman who runs this website. I’m heading over to her office now… must leave myself plenty of time to get lost. :) Anyway, wish me luck.

UPDATE: My interview went well, but I decided I didn’t want the job. I just e-mailed my would-be boss to that effect (she had asked me to write her tonight to tell her whether, if offered the position, I would take it). There are a number of reasons I don’t want it: the pay is only $25K, the benefits are mediocre, and most importantly, in the end, I just don’t think I’d be happy working there, for a variety of reasons that I won’t go into here because, well, they’re sort of intangible and would be difficult to write out. But yeah.

I feel a bit sheepish turning down a potential job offer (she hadn’t offered it to me yet, and still had more interviews to do, but she seemed to like me quite a lot, and I think there’s a decent chance I would have gotten it) in the midst of such a crappy job market, especially in light of the plight of my incredible shrinking bank account, but I refuse to settle for something where I feel the likelihood is that I’ll be unhappy. So yeah. Onward and upward to the next interview (whenever that may be)…

Lakers star Kobe Bryant has been charged with sexual assault.

UPDATE: Er, uh, sorry, he hasn’t been formaly charged yet.

Irene Cho, the USC golfer who I tutored last semester and who flirted with the lead on Thursday at the U.S. Women’s Open, had a tough final day and finished 58th, 24 over par.

Still, even making the cut at the Open is a fantastic accomplishment for an 18-year-old amateur who just finished her freshman year of college. Something tells me we’ll be seeing her on that leaderboard again someday. Congratulations, Irene!

We’re back on shore. Here I am with the boat.

Here’s a shot of my mom and dad on deck.

Heading out into Long Island Sound.

We’re going sailing today with my aunt and uncle, Patty and John.

I didn’t get to post a birthday greeting for America in this space yesterday because the website was down, and I didn’t get to see fireworks last night because I was at a wedding reception last night.

Luckily, Hartford’s big fireworks show, Riverfest, was on July 5 instead of July 4 this year, so tonight I got to see fireworks… and now it’s time for those belated greetings:

Happy 227th Birthday, America!

The grand finale:

Note the Travelers Building, Hartford’s signature skyscraper, in the background of the photos.

Here are more fireworks photos from July 1 in Da Bronx.

I spent yesterday evening at the wedding reception of Mike Omiecinski and Kim Fahr, high-school sweethearts who graduated from Newington High in 1997 and 1998, respectively. At 10:40 PM, I attempted to make an audio blog post from the reception, but it didn’t show up on the website right away because the site was down. (It was inaccessible from around 7:30 PM yesterday until about half an hour ago. I don’t know why.) However, the MP3 file of my audio post did go online, and here it is:

audblog audio post

Irene Cho, a USC golfer and my former academic tutee (see below), ended up five strokes behind the leader through Round 1 of the U.S. Women’s Open, tied for ninth place out of 156.

Irene was tied for the lead at one point, and was only two strokes back when she finished her round, but ended the day further behind thanks to a late surge by Mhairi McKay of Scotland, who is 5-under-par and in first place.

Two players are tied for second place at 2-under-par, and five are tied for fourth at 1-under. Irene, at even-par, is tied with 12 others for ninth place. (Annika Sorenstam is 1-over, a stroke behind Irene. Heh.)

There has apparently been an explosion and fire at a nuclear plant in Japan.

UPDATE: The Associated Press reports:

A spokesman at the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said on condition of anonymity there was no danger of leaking radiation because the plant had not been generating power since March. It was shut down because of high operating costs.