Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in trumpeterplexi's LiveJournal:

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Wednesday, December 3rd, 2008
3:33 am	I stayed up reading Amy Hempel instead of doing work or sleeping. Been meaning to buy the book for 3 years, then bought it and been meaning to open it up for 1. Finally decided to go for it. Its an anthology of her work...her first collection is called "Reasons to Live"...it is in fact really depressing. There's a bit about chimpanzees and sign language and grief. And a bunch of car accidents, and a bunch of earthquakes, and a bunch of people dealing with dead family members. Short stories are quality. Good things to read instead of sleep...you don't need to worry about not keeping track of plot. Also, its nice reading something that's not awful pulp fantasy. My bed-crate right now is Sabriel, two George RR Martins, the crappy book about synesthetic vampires, the Illuminati book, and Neverwhere (Gaiman). That's all absurd fantasy. And now Amy Hempel. A nice change. I'm going to pretend to actually do some work before I go to sleep. I wonder if I will bother waking up to go into lab tomorrow morning. I didn't today. I don't deserve to ask butcher for a reccomendation. If I were him, I wouldn't give it to me. But I will ask anyway. Only 3 more days of this week left. (Comment on this)
Saturday, August 30th, 2008
3:11 am	Classes, Band, Senior Year, Life CLASSES There are very few of them, and they all will be good, I think sustainable energy systems is my "fun" class. 12 person class, really small. 75% of the final grade is a single project. zero exams. woot. also, field trips most wednsedays, odd. Biosensors wil be sweet. Prof. Baeumner is rerally cool. we get to play charades in class. Day 1 was just straight out of 260, but whateve. 401 will be a lot of work. and its not nearly as interesting as 302. Cellular is much more interesting to me than organs slash tissue systems. Plus, more HW assignments, harder HW assignments, and individual lab reports. but none of the labs conflict with band. yay. bioseparation processes...only 7 people in the class. the professor is a bit boring, but I get the feeling that it is a REALLY useful class to know. might be boring, but I hope it will be really applicable if I ever get to the real world. Intro Ice Hockey. Again. yay. Jeff is taking it too, that is amazing. I'm not gonna play sieve, i'm gonna learn to skate and shoot and such. Research. I spoke to prof butcher today. he is a cool dude. and i'm gonna get credit. and i'm doing decent work. I should do weekend workt hough. ugh. BAND ShowComm is hard work. Future Love was like the easiest it is ever going to be. Its really exciting when people appreciate it though. that will never happen again. band camp made me exhausted. and actually injured. temporomadibular joint, or something like that. look it up on wikipedia. I definitely screwed it up. Its been okish today, but I haven't played in 2 days. if playing tomorrow makes it hurt more...maybe I should go to gannett or something. but "practicing" over the summer has kept my chops decent-ish, and using lots of air support has done a lot to help too. I hope we get the trumpet freshmen to stick around. we need that. Its beginning to be a bit too much. there were days when the hurt jaw made me not looking forward to playing. right now, i'm not looking forward to tomorrow morning; I just want to sleep. stay in bed al day, not leave the room. but that is not an option. SENIOR YEAR Walking around campus today, I realized that I have some sort of memory from almost every single spot on campus. Everywhere I walk, it reminds me of something. Or many things. from any one of my years here. And even though my classes are more interesting than they ever have been, and less stress than they ever have been because there are only 12 credits, I still feel kind of done with the hwole concept of classes. though...becoming a real person is terrifying. Basically, I don't want to stay here, but I don't want to leave. Even when all of my classes are really interesting, and small classes, and awesome, I don't really want to be there. good thing i'm signing up for MEng, nothing like more classes. and then I need to find a job, have a real life. I say I want to work at a pharmaceutical...but that's basicallly a shot in the dark. I've never tried it before, I have no idea if I'll like it. If I could even get a job, I don't know how easy or hard that is nowadays. Plus, I don't know that they'd actually have me do what I want to be doing... LIFE Not gonna lie. Still upset. Pretty significantly. I was really happy, and walking around I am reminded of this, and of the absence of things that were not absent for a while. I should not care anymore. but clearly I do. clearly i'm alone in that position. and that's the worst part. I kind of wish things were the way they could have been, not the way they are. But I cannot control that. I should just stop whining. If only it were as easily done as said. In the mean time, my room is a mess. I'm way behind on chores, emails, obligations, sleep. I'm a bit of a mess. Plus I gotta figure out my future, and then actually make it happen, instead of sitting on my ass moping. Not everyone has their future plans fall into place so easily and with such conviction...that's what I need, conviction. Hockey is too far away. I've been reading hockey websites all summer. again. There's gotta be something more worthwhile to spend my days excited about. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Friday, May 30th, 2008
3:52 am	So this thing hasn't existed in a while. I just checked, not since before this semester that just ended. Don't know why I feel like doing this now. Still think its kinda stupid. But here goes, my life at the moment. Apparently its now technically friday. I don't know how it got to be friday, I didn't know it was friday until I looked at the computer's calendar. I got back from school monday, almost 2 weeks ago by now. I've spent most of the past 2 weeks in the same seat that I am in now. I've played a bit of Civ 4, a lot of Warcraft 3. I finished the crappy fantasy Drizzt Do'Urden book. I read most of a nonfiction about a dude trying to literally follow the bible for a year. It was funny until he got to the part that I can't relate to. Turns out I'm just as obnoxious and ethnocentric as the people i've been making fun of. I started trying to clean my room, got nowhere, actually put the stuff back where i found it in a mess instead of trying to go further. I started working on a jigsaw puzzle, 1000 pieces. I have the full border, plus two horizontal lines across the middle. I started seriously arranging September, it has only 11 bars and that took me 2 days. I've tried muscle-memory-learning piano again. I practiced my trumpet not enough. Saw Indiana Jones, failed at seeing Bourne Identity, played ultimate, tossed a disc, and had lunch in white plains. I borrowed a book from Jesse, and watched my brother's jazz band concert. I've watched a lot of tv, both for real and on the internet. I played some hockey. 2 weeks, completely summed up in 250 words or less. That is depressing. I'm on this absurd sleep schedule. It makes it so that I can't do anything with my day. I'm entirely unproductive, and i've given up on full days' worht of plans because I didn't want to wake up early. That is not happy. I don't particularly like this not doing anything all day every day. I can't break the cycle though, and even if I did, there's nothing to do around here. I'm out of here soon. But I'm not looking forward to that either. Gotta put a room together from scratch, gotta start in the lab, gotta deal with people again. This semester was not good with dealing with people. I was angry far more often than I am comfortable with. I used to never get angry at people. Never. Now I'm 2 weeks separated from people, and I still get angry. I should cool off before I go back to being with people 24/7. I also need to become better at school. I'm always saying "next semester I'll study harder, get better grades". This may be my last chance to say that, as an undergrad at least. I need 8 credits to compete my degree, i'm signed up for 12. Then probably a MEng, and then that's it. No more doing better in school. No more deciding that not doing an assignment is worth it because its only worth 5%. Then its a real person. And that is terrifying. I'm on the other side of a coin. A position that I have put others into, I now stand in now. At least now I care. At least I haven't gone back to being a terrible person. In conclusion. I don't like being bored. I really like hockey, both playing it and watching it. I am convinced, watching the stanley cup finals, the Islanders do not have it in them. I've been deluding myself since the '01 playoffs, when they scored a penalty shot goal on the way to being knocked out in the first round. The penguins-red wings games have been brilliant hockey. Brillaint. Both sides. And I am now convinced that, with the players they currently have or are reasonably capable of obtaining, the islanders are about as likely as becoming a Cup-caliber team as Cornell is. Difference is, Cornell's kids are students, they're not supposed to be winning the cup, yet at least. Ricky is Playoff caliber. If Chris Osgood can still get shutouts in the finals, if MA Fleury can make it, then Ricky by far has the skill to win a Cup. He can't do it on his own though. And when he tries, he injures himself, takes himself out of play for the end of the year and the playoffs (if they were ever to exist). So...It aint gonna happen, i'll just have to enjoy watching the games as a fan of the sport, not a team. I need to finish September before I go back to Cornell, and it needs to be good. I want to finish this puzzle. I wish I were clever enough to invent things, not just talk about half-baked ideas that are either already done or useless. That would be a productive use of my time, instead of sitting here at 3:45 staring at the stupid computer. I kinda hate this website, but I know that within a week after I get back to ithaca, I will completely forget that these 3 weeks happened. I know this because I cannot remember the last time I was home. At least now there's record that I was. Insert reference to neurobio lectures on memory, insert reference to that book we read in 9th grade, yeah, whatever. Point is, I forget things, this way the internet will remember that they exist, even if I don't (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, January 17th, 2008
1:36 am	Damn, break is over way too quickly. Hopefully I'm leaving in under 12 hours. And nothing got done I'm not packed yet. I didn't clean my room at home. I didn't get rid of all the junk on my computer desktop I didn't finish any marching band/pep band arrangements I didn't find something to do for the summer I didn't figure out my schedule for this semester I didn't read the music theory book I didn't read the java book. I didn't practice my trumpet. I didn't invent a miracle device to patent and make lots of money. I didn't cook anything. I didn't hang out with many home people. I didn't do much of anything useful. Not looking forward to the semester starting. If things work out right, I'll only have 2 semesters yet as fully undergrad. I'm not ready to be so close to being finished. I hate leaving places. Damn pep band and ninja percussion for trying to find ways to dampen their awesomeness. They will be the hilight of the semester. They better be. (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, January 7th, 2008
3:12 am	Oh man! I conducted a hockey game!!! it was amazing! Conducting is so much more fun than I could have even imagined. Though I couldn't follow the hockey as much, and I am so sore today, still, so awesome! The band sounded so good! and so different from the front. we sound good! And cameron was playing sax with us, and my parents sat in section O. Plus, the team won! no point weekend (heh, silly elynah people, we get 0 points for non-conference). And...I say something and it happens! Though...inside of the elbow, outside upper arm, front of the shoulders, back of the shoulders, sides...all hate me for it. but worth it! happy 2008. guns n roses is so awesome. turns out my gnr phase has not run out yet. I've spent a few hours tonight on youtube watching videos of them live. Slash, crazy dude (Comment on this)
Friday, November 30th, 2007
4:05 am	2 hours of practicing, but I got my 4 slides to between 3 and 4 minutes. Wake up in precisely 3 hours and 40 minutes. Go up to CTB, get me some strong caffiene, get to class. Hope that I didn't forget everything I did today, rock out on these presentations. Go to fluids, celebrate fall slope day with Leeann, probably while finishing the heat/mass transfer PSet. Go to heat/mass transfer, probably while finishing the heat/mass transfer pset. Meet Brian TUBA at the statler to talk about conducting. Go to Biochem study center to finish unit 12. Dinner 5.30 on West, Hockey 6:00 or something. Hockey game, back to Dewitt. Holy crap. Holy holy crap. two full hours for 4 slides. I hope I don't screw this up. I hope the rest of my group does not screw this up (Comment on this)
Wednesday, November 28th, 2007
3:47 am	Its 3.45 in the morning. I have a crapton to do. busy day for the next two weeks. I should be sleeping. What am I doing instead? Composing. fanfare, brass quintet. Don't know why. Just am. (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, November 16th, 2007
6:18 am	Its 6:15. AM. About to go to sleep 2 hours of sleep, wake up, 1 class, 4 hours of sleep, Penn trip. yuck. I like more sleep than that 2nd time in 2 weeks I've been up this late. After never pulling an all-nighter in nearly 20 years. Holy crap, 2 decades. I feel like a terrible person. But what am I supposed to do? Politics sucks [politics suck? politic sucks?] (Comment on this)
Monday, October 22nd, 2007
2:27 am	The His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman tried reading the Golden Compass as a kid, thought it was a crappy fantasy novel. Started rereading Golden Compass over the summer, thought it was a really good children's fantasy novel. Just over this weekend finished the Amber Spyglass (3rd in the series)...a great trilogy, i am no longer surprised that it is a classic. This series has a lot of stuff in it. The first one is almost entirely just a fantasy story. Girl wants to rescue her friend, goes on an adventure, we don't really know the back-story or anything, its cool, they have weird animals with a letter/character that doesn't exist in the normal english alphabet (ae, except combined). Then, somewhere about halfway through the subtle knife, there's a switch flipped, and all of a sudden we are talking about the nature of religion, the deterimental affects of the Church on religion, allegories on religion, the interplay between religion and science, all sorts of crazy stuff. Not so much kids stuff at all. And then, ever so slowly, he starts defining and developing love, but oh ever so slowly, until the very end of the last book when he drops all pretenses and throws it at you. And then [spoiler alert, by the way], in case we still thought this was a happy-ending children's book, he goes and breaks it! And then he ends the book without anyone really knowing what was going to happen next. Though, it definitely leaves even real people with something to think about. The religion stuff is really weird. At the same time, he credits it and discredits it. He clearly has a negative view on the Church, they are the villians pretty much throughout. But then he boosts science, but then makes Angels real and "the Authority" just be a once-powerful angel who did not actually create anything, but took power over the other angels, and since then gotten old and ultimately disintegrated into nothing. And then he has this Dust, which still leaves me very confused trying to think about it, and what it is, and what it means. And he talks about the afterlife, and ghosts, and which parts of your body or soul do or do not persist into the afterlife. The most interesting religion analogy, however, and the one that he leaves the most understated is, that the opposite of religion is love. In the prophesized parallels with the biblical story, Lyra is said to be Eve, and it is slowly revealed that the temptation that caused Eve's expulsion is in the form of the scientist Dr Mallone. However, at the very end, the only temptation that Dr Mallone does is explain love to Lyra. It doesn't explain how this affects the war between Lord Asriel and The Authority at all, which was where it seemed to be going at the beginning, because the plot sort of gets preoccupied with Lyra. But, thanks to storytime with Dr Mallone, Lyra discoveres love, and then they part ways, so that must be the temptation, the fall from the Authority's good side, love. Why does that make sense? This same then also changes her interaction with Dust in ways that do not make sense. she loses her innate understanding of the Alethiometer, and her daemon suddenly takes on its final form. The daemon is supposed to be some aspect of the soul or something...when somebody else touches your soul for the first time, a part of you never changes ever again? Not gonna lie, this "children's book" actually brings up a bunch of points worth thinking about. So yeah. My vote is thumbs up. The ending, I think its hard for anyone to read it and not get sentimental (I got all sentimental, and that certainly contributed to post-4AM bedtimes 2 nights in a row, with pre-8:30 wakeups those following mornings...). Makes you think about things. Next in queue, finishing A Soldier of the Great War. Also sleep, and trying to not fail BME301. This is the first time that i'm seriously worried about failing a real class. Below the mean on the first 2 (out of 4) homework assignments, at mean for the first (of 3) lab reports, we forgot a whole chunk of the 2nd lab report (not graded yet, but expected to be bad), and I left 60/135 points either blank or 100% BSed on the first exam (of 2, also not returned yet, but I cannot forsee that being good). nearly 9 hours of working on biochemistry today, really glad I skipped hockey. Good night (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Wednesday, September 26th, 2007
2:01 am	Turns out I can now hit the E fairly regularly.  Don't know when this happened, but I hit it in Espana in pep band last week, and I hit it in Conquistador on the field today.  Its weird...I kinda just hear in my head where the note is supposed to be...and then it appears.  Its still not loud or solid, but it exists, and that's a start.  I really like Espana.  Sightreading Conquistador...its hard, I won't be able to learn it just by sightreading.  I missed music rehearsal last week, missing it again this week.  yeesh. Turns out I had forgotten that prelims are tough.  that's unfortunate.  two more, both thursday.  0 motivation for studying.  0 energy left It appears where I cut my thumb has healed, but has not healed closed, if that makes sense.  It seems as though it is opened, and will remain that way.  That is also unfortunate.  I am not made happy by this. (Comment on this)
Friday, September 14th, 2007
2:08 am	Trivia is awesome. a portion of $100 for knowing what country Alladin was from, or how much monopoly money you start out with. Et C. Things that are not awesome also do exist. Among said things are: certain facets of living in Dewitt; most facets of homework and my state of perpetual tardiness in completing assignments; the fact that I am still awake at this hour. However, this is not an exhaustive list. (Comment on this)
Sunday, August 19th, 2007
12:46 am	Just saying...its kinda weird to be trying to meet and get to know people who I am certain will become among the most important people in my life within the next 3 weeks. This seems strange. Also awesome. I like new people. First night will be amazing. As a side note, Jack partied harder tonight than he ever has before in his entire life. Must've been at least 15 people playing with him and holding him at once. He was having a blast (either that, or he was terrified, he was moving a lot...bu he always does when he's out of the cage). Now I am watching him eat. he is the most awesome hamster ever in the history of hamsters. (Comment on this)
Tuesday, August 7th, 2007
1:19 am	Booklist version X.n Trying hard to avoid the "can't deal with things ending and change and stuff" rant, so instead, the books i've read over the summer. Don't know if I can remember all of them, I kept forgetting to make the list Everything is Illuminated. Double Cross Blind Boomsday Fight Club A Tale of Two Cities Apathy Everything is Illuminated, Jonathan Safran Foer, I think this time through I finally understood the ending, at least more than I did before. Although, of course, since that list was in order, I don't remember what it was (that's why I should keep this list more updated, so I know my thoughts). I do know that it was one of those things that reminds me that there can never be too many holocaust stories. It is something that must be remembered. And it kind of terrifies me that the last of the primary witnesses are dying out, that its down to 3rd generation like Foer to tell the story. Who will tell the story next generation? who will remember? 3rd is already pretty far removed. Double Cross Blind, don't remember who its by, I got it out of the library. I saw it, it had a swastica superimposed on a union jack on the cover, i thought it would be interesting. Thoroughly mediocre, I would not reccomend it. a surprisingly short story about a double agent for the nazis and england. the twist at the end wasn't all that clever, and the writing leading up to it was not all that good. Boomsday, Christopher Buckley. a Hilarious book. The plot: tax incentives to commit suicide at the age of 70. Its a political satire on the current state of the national healthcare system, specifically benefits to the elderly. its A Modest Proposal in novel form, and about the old instead of the young. I strongly recommend it, especially if you think you are political. Fight Club, Chuck Palahunic or something liek that. I finally got around to reading the book. its surprisingly similar to the movie. the narration style is very...narrative, the movie emulated it well. The book sort of bashed you over the head more...its not often that a movie is more subtle, but fight club was. the book made it pretty obvious from the beginning that [SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER]. Also, it reminded me a lot of The Wave (that 7th grade book about fascism and how it can take over) in that the biggest takeaway message I got was "sometimes you'll start something, and it will fly out of your control, and even though you started it, you can't control it anymore, and that is bad news". A decent read, makes you think a little bit, not too much. A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens. I just wanted to finish it, because I never had before. I don't know. I think I'd put it in with Great Gatsby, in that you sort of tolerate the beginning because the end is so moving. the diference is, Gatsby's beginning is 100pages long, while a tale of two cities beginning is 500 pages long. I think it would be more effective, the ending would be more moving, if Sydney Carton was more a character in the beginning, so that his transformation was more profound. Overall, not bad though, a decent story. Apathy. Paul Neilan. Kind of awkwardly-told story, about a guy who is incredibly apathetic, and his life. Well written in the sense that its told in the first person, and the narrator seems bored with narrating even. It is amusing. I don't know if i'd call it funny, but it is defintely amusing. A nice quick short little story about how insanely apathetic one can get. Coming soon: I'm in the middle of Blink, a book about "rapid cognition" i think they call it, thinking spontaneously as opposed to slowly and analytically and rationally. its a nonfiction book that i'm enjoying, rare (written very similarly to Freakonomics). I also just got from the library Something Wicked This Way Comes on audiocd, as well as a nonfiction book about the origin of HIV, Anthem by Rand, a random book that looked interesting, and this year's freshman summer reading book, because it looked better than Things Fall Apart. Reading a lot, being near books, always makes me wish I could make something. I resigned myself to the fact that its not going to happen the other day. perhaps the first time ever i've reached this conclusion. but today the delusions of grandeur were back as big as ever. Maybe a distopia, similar to Idiocracy, where people are imprisoned, not by the fascist government, but by their own stupidity and cultural devices. Its probably been done already, and I don't have the abilities to make it go, but I can think about it. (Comment on this)
Monday, July 23rd, 2007
4:03 am	4:03 AM. Finished. 7:45 to 4:05 straight, with another half hour before hand. And class in 3 hours. But worth it, methinks (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, June 6th, 2007
11:08 am	Best week of islanders news i've heard in a while. Mad Mike is gone. Islanders GM for 9 years, you could literally make an all-star team out of the players he has traded away for crap (no hyperbole at all, I have seen lists, all positions covered, there are enough players who are now superstars, league-wide allstars who used to be islanders who are no longer because of him). Last season he "stepped down as GM" but remained pulling strings in the front office. He's gone for good, quit his front office job. Alexsei Yashin, one of Mad Mike's decisions. Isles got him, gave him the largest contract in the entire NHL. You'd think the guy making the most money out of anyone in the league should be the best? nope. top 5 at least? nope. top 25? Mad Mike Milbury wouldn't do something like that. Since he's been on long island, he's been around 50th league-wide in scoring. I've read articles blaming the lockout on him personally (he got the ridiculous contract as a mediocre player, all of a sudden good players feel they deserve to make more than mediocre players, and teams can't afford that, and there's the lockout). He's notorious for doing NOTHING in the playoffs, this year getting himself, the captain, kicked from 1st line down to 4th line, where he amassed a whopping ten minutes of ice time per game (the Ducks, who are about to win the cup, their captain is averaging around 30). And with the new salary cap, he was gutting the team. he was getting somewhere around 7.5 mil a year, which because of the cap could not be spent acquiring good players (ryan smyth, jason blake both need to be kept around, there are talks of chris drury). Noone would trade for him because nobody wanted to eat his ridiculous contract and deal with the subpar player. The islanders bought out his contract yesterday. Meaning he is off the team, and instead of taking up 7mil of cap space, he takess up 2 (the penalty for buying out a contract or whatever). Meaning he doesn't take up a spot on the roster, he doesn't break a line's chemistry by not pushing 100%. [MIRANDA READ THIS I know you are going to say "how do I know he doens't put 100%, hockey is a hard sport, I just watch, bla bla bla. Ryan Smyth openly criticized yashin after the playoffs, for not putting it all out there. He was scathing. Ryan smyth knows how hard hockey is, he went to the finals last year. He knows what its like, he knows when you can give it your all, and he can tell when someone, especially a captain, especially someone earning nearly 8 million dollars a year, is not pulling his weight]. Now the islanders have a promising GM, still getting used to the business, but showing lots of talent so far, and salary cap space to bring in good players. A good coach in Ted Nolan (holy crap, I don't think I can remember the last time the islanders had one coach for two seasons in a row). All they need is a little more young talent, I think. Tambellini will be an NHL player, and Okposo is a few years away. Campoli and Gervais were the defensive stars of the prospects, but they both earned solid spots on the team, so the islanders (I think) need to acquire some younger talent who can be called on if needed, and who can develop into legitimate assets a few years down the line. I'm now excited for hockey again. (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, May 29th, 2007
1:43 am	aaaaand...back to ithaca. not nearly long enough with my friends in white plains (and edgemont i suppose). Orgo will be...an experience...We'll see how it goes. Gotta limit myself on how much I bring back up. we'll see how that goes too. I discovered that uportal has job listings...actually a fairly significant amount of job listings. I'll look into that. I should have some time in Haus...if I can have internet. For pep band for the summer, if I am motivated, I think i'm gonna try [in this order, and assuming I can find recordings to listen to of the latter two]: finish More Than a Feeling, then In The Mood, then Zoot Suit Riot (though I might have to use grapefruit diet as my model). And somewhere in there finish the Pirates cheer sheet, in honor of the 3rd movie... Speaking of pirates 3rd movie...eh. A bit long, a bit not witty enough, a bit of a thick plot. Sleep time. I've never driven such a long way by myself before. I've always had someone in the car withme. It will be odd. a new experience. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, May 24th, 2007
2:12 am	More writing about books when I finish them. I've finished 2 recently. Catch 22, Joseph Heller I really like this book. It uses such literal logic, which really amuses me. And it starts out so light, and the war is just sort of a thing...and then it slowly gets darker and grimmer, and all of a sudden there are people dying all the time. not gonna lie, I don't really understand the ending, though I think its good. all of a sudden at the end it starts getting surreal, with nately's whore being able to teleport everywhere...unless yossarian is actually becoming crazy...but he really did get stabbed, he ended up in the hospital...I think if Orr really did get to Norway, then it opens the door to all sorts of possibilities of things. Zig Zag, Josa Carlos Somoza I picked this up in the store the other day, it looked interesting. Its a thriller novel whose plot revolves around theoretical physics. These physicists open up a portal that allows them to see the past, and in the process they release an evil being. Eh. I never was really into thrillers, so I don't have a point to compare to. but...eh. So much foreshadowing, of the worst, most obnoxious possible kind. But the plot is amusing at least, and the physics is interesting to think about, even if its entirely wrong. and the twist at the end is unpredictable up until a few pages before they reveal it....but artificially so, because it relies on a bit of "physics" that they don't reveal until a few pages before the twist. I started rereading Everything Is Illuminated. All I can say is, if I ever have twin girls, I really want to name them Hannah and Chana. that is hilarious. Unrelatedly, it was really really odd. while typing this, I had two flashbacks of sorts. this has never happened to me before. I blinked, and for a second I saw the street we walked to get back to our hotel in Chicago for nationals. I can't even remember what it looks like now. then a bit later, I blinked and saw the spot where the french woods bus picked us up. odd. Also unrelatedly. A week ago I didn't want to leave ithaca. Now I don't want to go back (not yet at least). 8AM orgo, and no research, no job, how could anybody look forward to that? (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, May 18th, 2007
2:06 am	Home Home Home. It is so weird being home. Its weird moving out of Casca, I spent the majority of the past 10 months in that tiny little nook, and in about an hour and a half we entirely dismantled it and it is never again to exist. There is no scandinavian death metal pouring through my walls at all hours of the day (though I will still share a wall with b-rob next year...), no horde of people to hang out with at any hour of the day or night within a 15 minute walk. I hate leaving places. In other news, seems like this guy is pretty dumb. "come to my office, I have a project in mind that I would like to discuss with you." so I show up at his office "well, I don't have any projects at the moment...and even if I did, i know you haven't taken fluids or heat and mass transfer yet, so you wouldn't be able to do any of it. sorry". ugh. back to no summer plans, except for 8AM orgo, and trying to put dewitt apt 5 together. my clock says 202. 202 sucked. That final did not go over so well at all. I'm most dissapointed in how I took the test. My calculator stopped working...instead of dealing with it or moving on, I paniced and got all flustered, and every thing i know about taking a test went out the window. At least its over. (Comment on this)
Saturday, May 5th, 2007
2:16 am	Slope day is a very very awesome thing. I was not on the slope for very long, just long enough for Catch-22. They were pretty decent. I think one of the reasons why I like ska is that there's no reason why I can't do it. These guys were slightly overweight guys with glasses and balding/shaved [you can't really tell from far away] head with moderate musical instrument abilities and poor singing voices, yet they are enough of a real band to get paid to perform at Slope Day. So, I'm already a strange-looking white guy, I can definitely trumpet at least as well as their trumpeter, and probably better...and I took music 151/152, i should have rudimentary singing abilities, at the very least as harmony[yeah...they didn't harmonise vocally so much...]...so Dennis and I are working on that. I got schooled in the art of the barbecue. by a girl. not gonan lie, i'm embarassed. emasculated. I really like the feeling of releif and lack of responsibility accompanying the end of classes. I know there is exams...but whatever. Summer plans are still uncertain...but whatever. Today was slope day, I hung out with my friends and listend to music from 9 AM to 1AM. the whole time. amazing. such a long day though, to end a long week. I was ready to go to sleep at 6...but instead I went to lacrosse...13-0 on the season is pretty impressive. I participated in a flash mob the other day. it involved being a pirate. I like pirates. Bring me that horizon! ...and really bad eggs... Drink up, me hearties, yo ho! [5 points for movie, 10 for movie + actor, 15 for movie + actor+ scene, 20 for the lyrics to the entire song] (6 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, April 13th, 2007
2:17 am	The man known as Kurt Vonnegut is no longer alive. I don't know why this is really bothering me. He wrote fun books. totally crazy, but fun. And he went to Cornell. He wrote some poetry, special for the Daily Sun, last year for their 125th anniversary. Apparently the only thing he liked about Cornell was the Daily Sun. I'm being abnormally affected by the death of a guy I never met. Also [barely relatedly], I think the firing of Don Imus is pretty ridiculous. I started reading a webcomic. This was a poor choice. This has contributed to the fact that I have not gotten as much sleep as I require any night since sunday. I guess its good, if its plot line is addicting enough to keep me reading for a week. Its character development might be better than the character development of Catch-22, which is my current "real" reading, just because catch-22 is so disjointed. The plot is ... more like a crappy fiction novel than any webcomic i've ever read before. Whatever. The sun has been having adds for "write an opinion column"...I would consider it, except the "audition" is two sample columns. I wouldn't know what to write about. I'll need something to do...at the moment i'm signed up for 12 credits of class...that's near nothing. One less, and I would be a part-time student. This worries me. Whatever. I'm gonna stop before this turns into a rambling exhaustion-driven nonsense. But before I do: Islanders lost tonight in game 1 of the playoffs. Not gonna lie, they lost pretty miserably. Even in my "real" bracket, i thought the series would go 6. This was looking unlikely...although DiPietro is cleared to start...that could help...but the rest of the team needs to come up huge. (6 Comments |Comment on this)