Already Week 5?

Wow...before you know it I will actually have to think about finals or something. And then the summer. But it's hard to think about the summer when it hurts to walk outside. Nice arctic weather we are having, and even I must complain. We've got to get back into the 20's during the day. On the bright side, I did not see any beggers on high street today. If you are out in this weather you deserve money.

Oesterle's class today was great to kick off the week of classes. He described why the double-tax system the US imposes on corporations and their investors is just plain nuts. After taking tax myself, I have to say he is correct. If you want to tax the wealthy it would be much simpler to just do it directly on personal income taxes with obsenely high marginal rates for the top income brackets. He then opened the floor for people to challenge him and defend the US system. The kid who always asks a question said with our budgetary concerns we shouldn't be dropping taxes and Oesterle deflected this easily. Then some "tree-hugging, dolphin-loving, Oesterle-hating" liberal student asks if this all means he is against the progressive income tax system entirely, which is a not-so-nice barbed question trying to make Oesterle out as a crazy conservative. Well I was surprised with the tact of Oesterle's answer, but this was definitely a highlight. He left us as usual with a moral of life...

If you can sum up a political argument on a placard or sign (cutting taxes on the rich is wrong) and the other side (Oesterle in the double tax scenario) has to spend 3 paragraphs explaning why the other side is wrong, the sign always wins. Plain and simple.

Bowling last week went very well, as we were in a three way tie for first in the division at 6-3 and had both of those teams on our schedule for the next 2 weeks. We dispatched the first team (Bart's team, or Avonte's team, or Jen's team depending on your point of view) by 11 the first game and 10 the second. Christie did not show up, and that penalizes you 10 pins a game. Could've made a big difference, so thank you Ms. Bolsen :-)

The other team tied with us went 2-1 last week, so the standings in our eight team division should have us at 9-3, our opponents this week at 8-4, Judas's (Abbie's) team at 7-5, and everyone else at 6-6 or worse. If we manage to 3-0 or 2-1 this week, I think the division lead will be insurmountable and we'll be a lock for the playoffs for the third time out of four. Now of course we'll probably lose in the playoffs, but at least we keep making it somehow. I'm bowling terrible during our win streak also, dropped AVG all the way to 135. Yuck. At least I will carry the team if I turn it around soon. I'm pretty sure I figured out the problem Friday night bowling for fun with Kelley. I was really heaving the strike ball down the lanes and it finally caught up to me as I grew very inconsistent. I figured out that I should be rolling the strike ball slowly in order to be consistent and get my spin to grip a little bit more, but I should keep throwing the spare ball with a lot of force to keep it on-line. We'll see if this works out.

School appears to be firing up this week. We get the topic for Crim Pro Moot Court this week, and then that will be hanging around until the end of March. Writing both of my seminar papers in the next month or so, finishing my note, and classes heating up as well. Fun times. Speaking of school, I think I will know Wednesday or perhaps even tomorrow night what position I have received on the JDR board for next year. If it's notable, I'll blog.

Stay warm Columbus. Or at least stay classy.