Wowie!

So after almost 19 hours straight in the library, I've learned that staying this long in one place can make a person a little loopy. I've been doing alright all day long, however about a hour ago, I was standing talking to my brother when I, all of a sudden, felt really dizzy. I sat down and felt better, but I still have a bit of a headache (not unlike the headaches I get when I'm not getting enough sleep).

In any case, I'm well prepared for my test tomorrow as long as I can stay awake and focused for the thing. Luckily, I only need a 80 percent or so to get a good grade.

On your mark, Get set. . .

Library!

So today is the day of the library marathon. I arrived here at 7:00 this morning as they opened and I plan to stay all day till they close at 2am tonight. (Tomorrow morning?) I'm not sure what I will be doing all day yet, but I have a few ideas.

My first is to find some corner somewhere and sleep a little.

Poorly prepared

I'm about to go take a final that I haven't prepared for hardly at all. I'm feeling a bit better now because I woke up ridiculously early to study, and I think it was relatively effective, but we will see.

I also did laundry this morning.

And I have chocolate milk.

This hasn't been such a bad morning after all.

Thoroughly confused

This is Portia's level:



I think that something fishy is going on here.

Readability

So I was looking BranMuff's post about blog readability, and I says that a person would need to be a post-grad to interpret his blog while mine was just:



I was thinking it was because he uses bigger words, but I just checked the readability of Annie's blog:



I don't understand why it makes hers more difficult. Hmm.

Many ideas

It is occurring to me as people are responding to my blogging post that it perhaps wasn't wise to create a forum for people to give me ideas of other nasty things that I could do to people. I mean, I eat sandwiches all the time. What's to stop me one of these days in a moment of forgetfulness to paint my room mates' faces with them? Just today I said that someone was the sort of person that deserves to be pushed into a pool. . . or I referred to my final preparations as taking out small people with ballistic missiles.

I really should work on this whole pleasant thoughts thing.

Things I just never quite got down in my youth

Left vs. right
Cardinal directions
Telling time on a clock with hands
Alfredo vs. Marinara sauce
Writing with down- and not up-strokes
Multiplying by 7

Violence and me

So I was talking to my room mates the other day about how, sometimes when I'm just sitting and thinking, I have these strong urges to do mean things. For example, yesterday I was sitting listening to B-Rob play expertly on the piano while drinking a large cup and raspberry lemonade when all of a sudden, I really wanted to run up and dump the cup down his back. Perhaps it would've been funny for a little bit, but mostly it would've been mean.

It doesn't necessarily have to be me doing the mean things in my imagination though. Every Tuesday, a few friends and I do our econ homework on the balcony of the Terrace in the Wilk, and every week, they announce the Terrace is closing that everyone needs to leave. Without fail, there are always several people who have to be told several times and that they need to leave. Last Tuesday, I thought it would be a much more effecting technique to hire a squad of BB-gun snipers to encourage sluggish deserters to gather up their things a little quicker.

I don't think that I'm a very violent person. The only time I can remember losing control and hitting someone was once when I hit my younger brother after he dropped a really big book on my bare foot. (Sorry about that.) I don't even like violent movies (unless it's artistic choreographed violence, like West Side Story). The most violent game I played growing up was WarCraft, which really isn't that bad I think.

I used to think that it was normal; you know, one of the manly urges when you just gotta kill something, (fix things, cook outdoors, . . .) but after talking to my roommates, I'm beginning to think otherwise. They seem to have imaginations about what they would do if someone broke into the house or jumped them spontaneously (which is good that they exists when there are people like me who just might).

In any case, it turns out that I'm an awful person. Oh, well. As long as I don't actually do any of those things, I don't think anyone is allowed to throw me in jail.

"The goose is getting fat."

So my dad asked me a couple days ago what I wanted for Christmas. I didn't occur to me that any had even started thinking about Christmas shopping. I guess most people are a lot more responsible than I am. I often don't start thinking about Christmas presents until after finals week.

I should've seen it coming though. We started Christmas music in my choir about two weeks ago.

So I've decided that I'm going to stick a little wishlist on the side of my blog here. Then anyone who wants to access it can and I can edit it whenever and where ever I want. Genius!

A retort

Today I am sickly and therefore can reply to branmuff sickly post with a voice of experience.

Pros:

Jamba Juice: Although I didn't make it up to campus today to buy a Jamba Juice, I'm certain that I would've loved it. Instead I've been slurping up cup-fulls of 7-up. It actually works wonders for an upset stomach as it turns out. I threw up 3 times this morning between the hours of 4 and 7, but then I got some 7-up and I'm feeling much better. When my stomach starts to churn, I start sipping a very small cup-full and by the time I'm done with the cup, my stomach feels better. I'd highly recommend it. (Word of warning: I can imagine that drinking too much to quick though might actually make things worse. I claim no responsibility for a person who tries out this method and has rotten things happen to them.)

Naps: Again, I would've loved to take a nap, but I'm aching all over and have been unable to fall asleep. Oh well. I guess that the option was there.

People take care of you: I've had lots of people do lots of nice things for me, or at least offer to. I thought that it was really great of people to take care of me even if I might be really crabby.

Cons:

It's unpleasant: Here, here.

Throwing up: I'd have to say that this is where I disagree most with Branmuff. As much as I'd like to maintain my girlish figure, vomiting is painful. I think that it's the worse when there is nothing in your stomach and you vomit anyways. If I hadn't thought that it would be really messy and incredibly unsanitary, I probably would've just given up on the toilet and laid out flat on the bathroom floor. I was exhausted and sweaty and smelly and unhappy.

I'm happy to report though that I'm feeling a lot better now than I was this morning thanks to my loving family and a bottle of 7-up. I'm hoping to be on my feet again tomorrow.

"Are you serious?"

Another excerpt of a chat with Crolace:

Crolace: I am the queen of multiple choice.

me: I do really poorly on multiple choice
I much prefer short answer

Crolace: Unfortunately, it's not a useful skill once you leave school.

me: Unless you are on "The Price is Right"

Crolace: Or Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?

me: Yep
Maybe you should do that
I'm more of a Jeopardy sort of guy
Except that I'm no good at that either

Crolace: Jeopardy is short answer.
Short Question.

me: Short hard question

Crolace: Have you ever noticed that the questions never REALLY go with the answers?

me: I think they do a little bit

Crolace: Like, if I said to you, "Who is George Washington?"
Would you say, "This 18th century military leader had wooden teeth."?
I don't think you would.

me: If I didn't know anything else about him I might

Crolace: Would you say it in that way though?

me: Not so much

Crolace: They should phrase the clues more like, "He was the guy with the wooden teeth."

me: But then it could be Pinocchio

Crolace: Yeah, then they could accept either answer.

me: It would become a little more like family feud
except for no family

Crolace: Actually, if I asked someone, "Who is George Washington?"
They'd probably say, "Are you serious?"
They should have a jeopardy clue that just says, "Are you serious?"

me: Then it could still be Pinocchio

Crolace: And the person who says the most ridiculous question wins.
It would be for that round where everyone writes their answer on that blue thing.

me: I think it's a good idea

Children's rights

An exerpt from a chat with Crolace:

Crolace: I think he just needs to think about what he wants to do.
It might almost be a good thing for him to go on academic probation.
Maybe he could join the circus.

me: He is very small.

Crolace: Ask him if he wants to be a lion tamer.

me: He could probably hide in a bottle
or a carpet.

Crolace: Tell him if he doesn't start going to class, you'll wrap him in a carpet, stuff him in a bottle, and feed him to the lions.
That'll light a fire under him.
Not literally.

me: I think that that is the best plan yet
Perhaps the fire would be a good idea too though.

Crolace: Whatever it takes.

me: Children don't have the same rights as normal people do
I think that I could get away with it

Crolace: I think the laws are such that you can get away with less stuff with children than with adults.
Ask Portia, she the criminal defense lawyer.

me: Good idea

Crolace: Say, "Is it illegal to feed someone to a lion, even if they're just a minor?"
"What if you wrap them in a carpet first?"

me: I wonder if she ever came across any cases of Peer Mentors putting children into rugs and then bottles then feeding them to a lion and then lighting the lion on fire.
Do you think you'd get in more trouble for feeding the kid to a lion...
or lighting a lion on fire?

Crolace: If there isn't any precedent, then I think anything goes.
I think you get in the most trouble for doing stuff to kids.
Animals come next,
then regular people,
then criminals.

me: Even if it helps the lion?

Crolace: Doesn't matter if it helps the lion,
Kids are at the top of the totem pole.
Again, not literally.

me: If they were, probably someone would get it trouble

Crolace: So true.

me: but not as much trouble if they had put a lion on the totem pole

Crolace: No, more trouble with the kid.
That's what I'm saying.

me: I should've written "as if"
the other way sounds like it's OK to put the kid up there if there is a lion there too

Crolace: Nothing could be further from the truth.
It's bad to put a kid up there,
but it's worse if you leave him up there with a lion.
If you're going to put someone on the top of a literal totem pole, it should be a criminal, because they are at the bottom of the figurative totem pole.

Registration

So here we are again at registration time, and the next 5 months of my life are planned out. I guess I shouldn't be so set in what I've laid out. Currently, my schedule puts me in class from 12:00 to 6:30 on Mondays and Wednesdays, but from 4-5 on Tuesday and Thursday's and from 3:00 to 5:00 on Fridays. It would make for a really odd life I think, but in principle, I could sleep in till 2:30 pm once a week.

If only I felt like I could survive those Mondays.

The meaning

This week I wrote a paper on how teachers can find the right level of sternness in there teaching to be effective. After I had printed it our and was walking to class, I realized that the topic of my paper was then in fact:

the means of finding the mean of meanness.

I thought it was just great.

Scadalous Comments

So this afternoon I was so excited to notice that many people have commented on my blog. Full of anticipation, I clicked on the link to read the comments on all the interesting people who wanted to say interesting things about me.

Unfortunately, by filter blocked your comments. As it turns out, one of you used the words "free" and "sex" in the same paragraph. I managed to eventually bypass the filter and add my blog to the list of exceptions. It turns out that the perpetrator was mlh who said:

Not that this has anything to do with impressing members of the opposite sex, but do you want to come be in the test audience for DC? It's free and on Wednesday.

Scandalous! It's a good thing my filter protects me from such risqué comments.

Look, a poll

You too can participate in Xisters's research by adding your input to this poll I just added. It's simple and economical. (I'm actually not so sure about the simple thing. I just added it.)

Much data

So I've officially started the hair gel experiment (see ORCA ideas) and we have been receiveing a wealth of positive data. Before I started wearing gel, I received no comments about my looks. Since I've started it last Friday, I've received the following:

"Are you doing your hair differently?"
"You look really good today."
And the best one, referring to my new do, "It looks really hot."

To another girl, I was explaining my current experiment and mentioned that eventually no girl will be able to keep her hands off of me, and she said "I'm already struggling," and then she stroked my shoulder. (I think though that this data point might be a bit biased since I brought it up myself, so I can't include it with the other 3.)

This has been going so well that I've decided to start working out too and I'll see how that goes for me. I went jogging on Tuesday and played racquetball today. Oh, the things we do to secure a woman.

More info coming later. . .

Our irrational fears

Yesterday I left the JKB exactly on the hour. I know this because as I opened the door to leave, a bell started sounding. I think that the bells in the JKB should sound a little less like fire/burglary alarms. It really made me jump.

It doesn't help that I have in intense fear of alarms and the things that set them off. This especially applies to those detector things that you walk through. Every time I enter the library, I pretty much have to close my eyes and run through the sensors if I intend to get past the security guards. It's worse when I know I'm carrying around a pocket knife or something (I know they are not metal detectors, but just the same. . .) If I'm leaving a building and one of the doors has written on it that after hours, an alarm will sound, I'll use the other door. Even in the middle of day. Even if I saw someone walk out the door a second before. I think that I would probably never fly if I thought there was a reasonable alternative.

I think that this stems from an early childhood experience at the library where I unknowingly passed through one of these sensors into an area that seemingly had no exit. The alarm screamed for a few seconds and then stopped, and then I found myself stuck with my contraband library book in an abandoned hallway. I didn't know what to do. If I walked through the passage, the alarm would sound again, but there was no way out. Eventually, a kind librarian showed up and rescued me, and now I find myself terrified of setting off alarms at every moment.

I guess it may seem irrational, but someday when I walk our of some grocery store with a forgotten pack of gum in the bottom of my cart, and as the alarm is set off, I get tackled and dragged off to prison, they perhaps you will understand. Meanwhile, I'll keep running through the entrance of the library.

Enlightening quote

"A man is scarcely happy if he is very ugly to look at."

Aristotle
The Nicomachean Ethics

Look, I read too

So I noticed how cool some of the things are that Crolace puts on her sidebar of her blog and so I decided to try and figure out how too. I seems like it was successful. Now people will know that I read and if they don't know me, they might think that I read smart stuff.

Perhaps I should put some more things on my list. If I read the first page of several lengthy Russian novels, that might add to my growing reputation.

ORCA ideas

I've been thinking that the idea of getting someone to pay me lots of money for thinking of other great research ideas is a great idea in and of itself. I've been thinking about all sorts of good ideas. I think I will keep a big list of them:

What sorts of applesauces mold the fastest?
Why don't people eat lungs?
Women over 60 on the crusades.
Frequency and causes of in/near-bed fatalities.
The effect of hair gel on social life.

Bran Muffin Goodness

No, this is not about home cookin'. It's dedicated to my roommates blog branmuff.blogspot.com. Any of you reading this one should immediately go look at his. It's much more amusing and interesting.

Thank you and good night.

Sing, sing, sing

This post is to inform you all of my choir concert next week, Sept. 28 and 29. It's the BYU Choral Showcase and I think that all the choirs will be singing. If I can manage to memorize all of my music before then, it's likely to be really good.

Dancing and destruction

So I really like dances. More than normal people. I perhaps shouldn't as much. If any of you have been to a dance with me, you know how I really get into it. I have no idea what I'm doing, but I figure I kinda swing my arms (and my whole body) around in time to the music.

In any case, I was perhaps a little too aggressive last night. I managed to shatter the face of my watch and slice my arm open. Oddly enough, I don't know how I did either of them or if they are related. I was just standing there and felt that there was a crack on the front of my watch, and all of a sudden the whole face crumbled into my fingers.

I didn't even notice that I was injured until I got home and saw blood trickling down my arm. I guess that makes it sound more violent than it in fact was; there was only a little bit, but I like that fact that I have battle wounds from the dance floor.

Perhaps I should be more careful.

Here it comes

So my birthday is really soon. I have no idea what I will do or what I want even. I need a few things, but I think that birthday presents in general should be things that a person wouldn't ever buy themselves if they could. One problem that I have is that recently I buy the things that I want. If it's less than 15 or 20 dollars, I just go and get it. That means that the sorts of things that I want that I don't have are all over 20 bucks, and I feel bad asking for anything over 5. Hmm.

I guess the good thing about all of this is that I have no expectations. I'll be happy with pretty much anything.

Oh, the bitter irony

So any of you that may be reading this may probably already know that I recently broke up with my girlfriend. Most of you don't know the many circumstances surrounding this break-up.

I had been considering calling things off for a while before it actually happened. I was enjoying myself, but I was also realizing that it wasn't really going anywhere. In the long-term, it just wouldn't have worked out.

In any case, last Sunday my roommate came home thoroughly depressed. He had been dating a certain girl for a while who he was relatively sure he wanted to marry, and she had broken up with him. I felt bad for the chap and offered to take him out to dinner that week. It actually turned out to be Tuesday's lunch, and as he thanked me for buying his food, I said mostly in jest, "Don't worry. My girlfriend will probably break up with me tonight and you can buy me lunch sometime."

A few hours later, I was walking home with her, and she turned to me and said "There's something that I need to talk to you about." Really not that surprised, I responded "I know." More surprised than me I suppose, she said "You do?" And a few minutes later, we were no more.

At the time, it didn't really have an effect on me. It's only be recently that I've been looking back and noticing how attached I was even though I didn't really realize it. The biggest sign of any sort of abnormality is that I've been doing more things on whims and especially buying things. I've had some lonely times, but I sure that I'll be relieved and back to normal pretty quick.

Meanwhile, I'm sitting here alone on a quiet Saturday night.

Oh where, oh where has my sister's bike gone...

You know what's great about running in circles? You find things that you lost along the way.

Yesterday was one of those busy days where you wake up and don't stop running until you go to bed at 12:30 or thereabouts. In the midst of this whirlwind, I had a voice lesson. It's a good 20 minutes away on foot, so I planned on biking there which is about 5 to 10 minutes away. Unfortunately, when I arrived at the bike rack where I park my bike, I could not find it. To make matters worse, it is not actually my bike but the bike of my sister that I am borrow for the summer while she is away.

I looked around for the remains of the lock that perhaps had been cut through and abandonned. It would've taken some heafty clippers because I had locked it up with a heafty U-lock. Finding no trace, I started racing to my voice teacher's home and called my dad to see if he had a car on campus that I could borrow. He didn't, but he had his bike and kindly let me borrow it. I sped to my lesson arriving only 5 minutes late.

Afterwards, I had my dance class and so rather than return the bike right away, I took to my class and locked it up in the racks there. As I gathered my stuff together after locking the bike up again, I noticed something not so far away: I saw my sister's bike locked up and forgotten from last week when I road my bike to my lesson and dance class, and then didn't think about it again till yesterday.

right vs. wrong vs. ...

So at what age do you think that a child begins to understand the idea that there is more to life than just right and wrong, true and false, and good and evil?

What prompted this question was a conversation with a friend about whether it's appropriate to teach kids physics that we know is false even if it relatively accurately describes how things are. She is convinced that it should be laid out as it is from the start, but I'm not so sure. I don't think that young kids can really grasp the idea of several rights or answers that are close enough to the truth that they are useful.

The fact is that there are very few absolute truths in the world, but children don't yet have the tools or experience to really grasp that. Neither do many adults though. Hmm.

Food glorious food

This week I've reaffirmed my awful eating habits. Especially with my current schedule. I think perhaps deep down inside I feel like I can't be a true college student unless I'm a starving college student. Most students though fall into this catagory by default because they don't have any money. Financially, I'm doing alright though. I probably even have the time eat and stuff, but I'm incredibly lazy.

My classes start early in the morning, so to avoid waking up earlier than necessary, I eat just a little really quickly. I was unkind to myself this term, and I usually am in classes or meetings straight until 3 or 4 in the afternoon. If I remember, I bring a nectarine with me and eat it between classes, but in the end, it happens about 50% of the time. Last semester I was alright though because I was part of a dinner group. I could at least be sure of getting one good meal a day. Last week due to finals week, all dinner groups were canceled. Because many people moved out of the complex, they haven't started back up yet. I try to eat something in the evening, but proabably three quarters of the time that I make anything at all, I just make chips and cheese.

I do drink lots of chocolate milk though.

"It fits!" "It fits?"

So I bought some amazing shoes today. They are black and shiny and comfortable. They also have leather soles which is the best part because I got them principally for my dance class.

I started this quest at DI trying to find something cheap but made for dancing. As one might expect, there wasn't anything particullarly helpful there. I decided that rather than spend a bunch of money on dance shoes that I might never use again, I'd spend lots of money of dress shoes that I could use for my class and then for special occasions after that.

Something I've learned: shoes are pricey! Especially dress shoes with leather soles. I wandered around a few department and shoe stores not really finding anything, but then I saw Mr Mac and decided to try it out. The Shoe Man was busy helping some prospective missionary so I mosied a bit looking at what they had. There were a few that looked nice, but at similar prices to what I had seen before. After a few minutes, I noticed a clearance table and wondered if there was anything interesting.

Kinda tucked into the middle of everything there, I saw a pair that was my size and that looked nice. I tried them on and they even fit well. (This is particularly amazing, because very few shoes actually fit comfortably.) I decided to discretely practice some of the Fox Trot moves that I had learned and at one point as I brought my feet together, there was a sharp clack. I can click my heels with these new shoes! And it's not just a wimpy click; it's a hearty, bright click. I was immediately sold and now they are sitting here in front of me at home. It was a pretty exciting moment.

I odd thing that I'm realizing now though is that I have more pairs of shoes that I have pairs of pants. I don't think that I have an excess of shoes because they are all for very practical purposes, but maybe I have too few pairs of pants. Or perhaps I've never really considered the pants/shoes ratio and in fact it about right. Hmm.