I don't really know enough about CA and TX prices to help with that.

Should I ask my officemate if he can give me a ride out to the kosher supermarket so that I can buy Passover food? I need a ride, and he has a car and will probably be willing to drive me, but I'm not sure I can deal with having to explain what every item in the store is. I could take a Zipcar, but I'm a wimp about driving unfamiliar places without GPS. (Well, I'm a justifiable wimp about that -- I have no sense of direction, and once I'm off the grid system, if I turn onto an unfamiliar road, I pretty much just have to keep making random turns until I find a street I recognize. There are way too many roads between here and there for me to memorize the map.)

Hil, that's a tough choice. Do you think he will embarrass you in the shoppe? But then again, food is food. Does your phone have GPS? Or a laptop that is 3g enabled?

Oh man, Hil, that's tough. Because it would be a total field trip. Like the vampire tours in New Orleans. Washington Passover Tour! Would it help if you printed out google maps directions?

Heh. We seem to have run into a cultural miscommunication. Wallybee's father wanted to have a serious talk with her this morning. He's concerned about the amount of beer she's been drinking lately. He noticed there were several bottles in the recycling bin lately.

After she stopped laughing, she explained to him the concept of 'ginger beer'. Later that day, she found an empty bottle on his desk, along with an English-Chinese dictionary. She's still laughing about it.

Ask the officemate. Consider it as an anthropological experiment, only with him as the expermintee.

omnis, love, I have no idea what to say. In your shoes, I'd just wait for a sign or something, telling me to move.

I'm hungry and want to have lunch, but it's hot and there's stupid haze outside which makes it hard to breath. But I've been hungry for 20 minutes now, so I think I'll suck it up and go the 10 minutes back and forth to get myself sushied (following brilliant officemate suggestion).

And now, in the English Isn't My Native Tongue corner:

I currently have *no* in-roads

I have no idea what that means.

I think he means that he doesn't currently have any connections that would make it possible to break into academia, so this position would at least give him that access if he decides to go that route. But I'm sure Omnis will explain at a more reasonable hour.

I thought that's what he meant. But I have no idea what "in-roads" means.

"in-roads" are metaphorical ways into something. Generally, one "makes inroads", which is more or less the same as making progress. "Through advertising, country music radio has made inroads into the Hispanic community" (Huh. The online dictionary gives it a negative flavor, which isn't really my understanding.)

Hil, on the 250 word thing, I'd bet they're looking for some "philosophy of teaching" stuff. This kid had this issues, and I helped in this way, which is indicative of my general collaborative/direct/pop-tart-based teaching style"

Shir, making "in-roads" into something is making the first path into it, like the first person to carve out a jungle path with a machete.

Thank you, DebetEsse and WindSparrow. We don't have this expression in Hebrew.

And, IOI'm5yearoldN: Best (real!) name in Ancient Rome? Sextus Titius.

I had to force myself not to giggle in class.