On Pocketknives: Greg from Manifold Destiny

As an addendum to my original post on pocketknives, I've asked some others to share their own knives and the stories behind them.

Greg has an excellent eye for design and style, as can be seen on his blog Manifold Destiny. It's now in Tumblr format, so if you're on Tumblr, be sure to follow him. Otherwise, look for updates in my blog roll to the right.

The Knives I Don't Carry

To paraphrase the inimitable Martin Short in Father of the Bride: every party has a pooper, that's why Trip invited me. Though it may horrify the Southern blogosphere, I do not carry a pocketknife on a daily basis. That's not to say I'm opposed to knives, quite the opposite actually: I've had access to sharp implements long before it would be even remotely prudent. I received a Swiss Army Recruit when I was 5 for serving as a ring bearer in my uncle's wedding. That carried me through many years of Cub and Boy Scouting, surviving trips to Bert Adams Scout Camp, and once spending 6-8 months rolled up inside a tent in our basement before being rescued the next spring. In high school I worked as a summer camp counselor and bought an elaborate Spyderco knife that managed to get lost at a lacrosse teammate's party in remarkably short time for such an expensive piece of cutlery. College often saw me without a knife, which was probably for the best from a public safety standpoint, but I did carry a Case Sodbuster during most of law school, which is most useful during a recession for opening rejection letters.

Nevertheless, I eventually secured employment in Washington, DC. Much like a spy behind enemy lines, I'm deep in foreign (Yankee) territory here, and dare not carry personal effects that would identify myself as a southerner. The bow ties and seersucker do that well enough. Our nation's capital has weapons laws that were presumably drafted by Gandhi himself, which I'm sure is quite comforting to the gentleman who was stabbed on my block a few weeks ago. Most of my day is spent in government buildings, and despite being a lawyer myself, I can't for the life of me decipher the regulations surrounding what kind of knives might or might not earn me a trip to federal prison. Someday I'll live again in an area where grown men can be trusted to carry pointy objects in public. Until then, my knives will be staying home.

District of Columbia

I leave for D.C. early tomorrow morning. I will be up there for a week trying to find a job and visiting friends. When I drive up there, I usually take I-85 to I-77 to I-81 to I-66. From what I understand, this is a little longer than taking I-85 to I-95, but I love looking at the mountains more than getting there quicker. It's all about the journey anyways, right?


I took this picture of my way back from D.C. in December

A Trip to D.C. (or: How Many Times Can I Use the Title of My Blog as the Basis for a Pithy Post Title?)

This is not my photo. It is a sweet HDR photo of the Capitol by a flickr user named NearDC

Having finished up my second to last semester of grad school yesterday, I set out early tomorrow morning for D.C. I am going to visit one of my best friends from college, as well as to try to see if I can't round up a job for when I graduate in May (or at least make some good contacts). I have a pretty decent itinerary shaping up, and I've got three meetings and a phone meeting scheduled with some D.C.-area real estate folks, so hopefully things should go well. I love D.C. around this time of year, so even if the job stuff doesn't pan out, it will be nice to be up there.

For the drive up I have a the past two episodes of This American Life which I haven't listened to yet. I also got audiobooks of When You Are Engulfed in Flames and Naked by David Sedaris from the Clemson Library (at least I am getting some of my tuition money's worth in terms of checking out books for pleasure reading, or listening, in this case).

While up in D.C. I also hope to maybe stop by Denim Bar. It's not like I have any money to spend on jeans (I am, in fact, now into my "cushion fund," which is slightly disconcerting), but I would be nice to finally pay a visit to that place.

Anyways, I'm not sure how many posts I'll make while up there (not that you, dear reader, have exactly come to expect new posts on a regular basis, for which I hope you will forgive me), but I will at least return with lots of good pictures.