Barack Obama: Inspiration AND Experience

Signs With No Name or Date

Dear _______,

Please be advised that your signs annoy me. I don't know who you are, but you sure leave a lot of signs around campus. Big signs, little signs. Signs requesting that I go out of my way to please you - whoever you are. Your signs seem to last forever, too, since they never expire. I'm sure that not slamming the door will be, for the next 10 years, the most important thing I can do at 2:00 AM in the morning when nobody's around but myself, and that glaringly red-and-white sign with no date.

I'd shake my fist at you, but I don't know which direction to shake it in.

People - if you make a sign, put your name on it! Put your contact information on it! Put a date on it, for God's sake! It's not that difficult. I swear. If you made it to grad school, if you're using a $1,000,000+ piece of equpment, I'm pretty sure you can write your own name!

Please. Do this for me. Or I'll remorselessly rip down your sign.

Thanks,

~Mark Knight

"Tom"

Over the past several years I've been compared to Tom Cruise multiple times. This comparison has, fortunately, not been extended to our differing ideologies. During college this comparison became so widespread that an entire clique of girls started referring to me as "Tom," rather than my usual "Hey you!" When I moved to Texas the comparisons continued, except now the comments were from people I'd never met. 

These off-the-cuff remarks usually me little to do but shrug, sip my beverage, and agree that I probably should have been an action star instead of a physicist. Today, however, I got something different: two photos to compare along with the usual, "Were you separated from Tom Cruise at birth?"

I've put them side-by-side below so you can judge for yourself:

Do you have a better photo comparison? Should I change my name? Leave a comment!