September Rant Archives

Check it out! This is every single rant I posted in the month of September. There should be around thirty of them, since there's thirty days in September, but there's a chance I missed a day or two in there. Remember to read them starting from the bottom, since they won't make sense otherwise. If you want to look at another month, use the links below:

At Least I Didn't Ruin Llon's Holiday
September 30th, 2001 - 11:11 PM

In case you didn't catch my Haiku or the previous post, today is my birthday. Since I'm posting at 11 PM, it will no longer be my birthday by the time most of you read this. Feel free to send my presents late. I don't mind. Speaking of cards, I got three from my friends at college. Esor gave me a card that said, "You're the lone corn dog in a world of plain wieners." You must understand that corn dogs are among my favorite foods. And they're certainly my favorite food on a stick. Clearly this was the perfect card for me, and Esor deserves much respect for her excellent card choosing. Akira gave me a card that said, "Tell the sample ladies at the supermarket it's your birthday, and you'll really score on the spicy cheese!" This card is especially important, because earlier that day I was telling her of my love for cheese on Ritz crackers. A love of cheese is one thing the Bingo caller and I have in common, proving once and for all that we're made for each other. Man I'm weird. The third card I got was from Llon, and it had one of those really annoying dogs on the cover, the kind from the Taco Bell commericials. Inside it said, "It's your birthday. Couldn't you just pee from the excitement." But more important is the comment he added: "Happy Birthday! Thank God it didn't ruin my holiday this year." Now Llon is of the Jewish persuasion, and since Jewish holdays work off of a Lunar calendar, they seem to move around on the Gregorian calendar. Last year they fell in such a way that Rosh Hashana was on the same day as my birthday. As soon as I realised this, I chastized Llon because his stupid holiday was ruining my birthday. My reasoning is that since his holidays move around, but my birthday stays in the same place, I've got dibs. Llon thinks otherwise, and just says that I'm using the wrong calendar. This is obviously a conflict that will never be resolved. As an added bonus, Esor and Akira each gave me two Snickers Cruncher bars with their cards. I just finished eating one right now, and man are they good.

Snickers Cruncher Bars: The official candy bar of MVK, and they're nothing like Whatchamacallits. Yes... I'm well aware they're basicaly the same. If you're wondering, including this sentence and the Haiku title, the word "birthday" appears in this post 10 times.

Oops... Forgot to Update...
September 30th, 2001 - 3:40 AM

Um, yeah... I sort of forgot to update my site today (which I guess is yesterday now). I usually don't wake up until about noon on Saturdays, and by the time I have brunch, and play a little Planescape, it's already dinner. Note that this is entirely due to my relative definition of "a little." When referring to computer games, it's about 3-4 hours. When referring to homework, it's about 3-4 minutes. Anyway, after dinner I accompanied Neevred to the computer lab, where he printed an 80-page manual for some programming libraries he needs for something or other... I can't really remember. After the printing adventure, we played a little Gauntlet on my PlayStation 2. After beating the first two worlds, we needed a break. He went back to his room to program, and I sat in the same spot as before, this time playing Lunar 2 instead of Gauntlet. After about an hour of the coolest console RPG I've played in a while, Neevred came back, suggesting that we play Gauntlet again. But by this time, Esor and Akira had arrived with 10 Things I Hate About You. Since that's such a great movie, I abandoned all video game plans, went with Akira to the HUB for food, then headed over to the TV lounge to watch the video. Man that movie is funny... I can't really decide if I like the dad, the sidekick, or the English teacher the best. After the movie, I headed back to the "game room" behind the laundry room to play Lunar 2 again, because it has a smaller TV, so I'm not inconveniencing people who want to watch TV with their friends, and it's easier to reach the A/V connections in the back. I've been playing Lunar until about 15 minutes ago, which is why my "September 29th" post hasn't arrived until 4 AM on September 30th. Now I just have to think of a Haiku. I knew I'd regret this Daily Haiku thing someday... and it looks like today.

Incidentally, Happy Birthday to me.

I'm So Tired it Hurts
September 28th, 2001 - 5:16 PM

Good Lord I'm tired! I'm guessing it's because I didn't get to sleep last night until one, and the fact that I had a Stats exam tonight, but I can barely keep my eyes open. Good news about the Stats exam though. It turned out to be very easy. It was seven questions, but we only had to do five. By comparing notes with random people from the class, I got four of them totally right, and one totally wrong. I might be able to salvage some partial credit on that last one though, putting my target grade somewhere between an 80 and a 90. Not too bad, since my homework grade is a 90 as well. I am seriously too tired to play with little kids tonight, but I skipped Dudes last week because I was tired, so I can't really skip again this week. But the last thing I want to do right now is run around with kids on my shoulders... maybe it will wake me up though.

The Illuminati expansion that Neevred, LLon, Llahned and I ordered came today. It's got some really good cards, but it basically means we have to rethink all of our strategies... I'm looking forward to 3 hours of quality nerdy gaming tonight. It's been the only thing to look forward to all week, really. I mean, my birthday's coming up on Sunday, but I've already spent the money my parents will be sending me, so it's going straight to the bank anyway, to buy next semester's books. At least I'll be able to spend any money I get from random relatives. Of course, the only people I can count on for presents are grandparents, and they'll likely be the only ones to send me anything. And yes, I know it's horrible to evaluate who's sending what. But I'm a poor college student who quit his job. Where else am I going to get money?

I Can't Believe I Used to Like Statistics
September 27th, 2001 - 8:48 PM

When I took AP Stats my senior year, I actually enjoyed it. There was a lot of work, but it wasn't incredibly difficult, and as long as I took my time I was able to do well. I also got a 5 on the AP test, which is definitely a point in Stats' favor. Of course, that test score didn't really do me any good, since all it did was give me credit for two courses I never have to take anyway. But it was a good learning experience, I suppose. The class I'm taking this semester, Stat 318, is no fun at all. It started out relatively easy, but we quickly started doing stuff I'd never heard of before. One day we just started doing double integrations, something I hadn't even covered in my calculus classes yet. Luckily the double integrations we've had so far deal with pretty simple numbers, so I've been able to figure them out. I've got an exam in that class tomorrow, and I'm not looking forward to it. I got back from a study session with a friend of mine about an hour ago, but that's probably the only studying I'll be able to do tonight, since I have a Greek quiz tomorrow as well. Ah, the joys of being a college student.

It's cold outside, and I love it! It was a little too damp for my taste, but I suppose I can live with it, since Trenchie is good for wet weather as well. I love any sort of weather that allows me to wear Trenchie comfortably. I also enjoy a nice breeze so that my coat flaps in the wind. I made a complete ass out of my self one day by running down the street with my arms spread so that Trenchie flew out behind me. The sight amused my friends, so it was well worth the slight embarrassment I suffered from people I'll never see again. My Illuminati expansion arrived at New Stanton today at 3:45, so I'm hoping it can make it's way to State College by 5:00 tomorrow. After New Stanton, the packages head to the local UPS building, then over to my dorm room. If it doesn't get here tomorrow for some reason, they might as well keep it, because it doesn't do me any good arriving on Monday. In other news, I rocked my Digital Systems exam last night. It must have been the Ace of Base I listened to on the way over. Well, I've got to get started on that Greek... I hate school.

Two Exams are Twice the Fun!
September 26th, 2001 - 4:56 PM

I got my nap last night, and it was wonderful. I left the light on while I was sleeping, but it turns out that Leah would have let me turn it off, if I had asked. Well, it's not a big deal I suppose. I have two exams today, and I just got back from the first one. It was in Discrete Math, but I wasn't too worried, since we haven't gotten to proofs yet. I studied for about an hour before the test, which should have been plenty. But there were a few problems that gave me trouble. These would have been easy to solve, except that the directions demanded that we employ a particular method. The method we were forced to use was invariably the most confusing one, leaving me unsure about some of my answers. There isn't really any danger that I got worse than a B, and I might have even pulled of an A. So no worries there. My other exam is for Digital Systems, and it starts at 8:30. I shouldn't have to study for this one at all, and I'm almost certainly going to get an A. This class hasn't really gotten hard either, especially since most of the material is stuff I learned in my 11th grade programming class. I'll probably look a few things over before the test though.

I thought of something that I should have talked about yesterday, but I was too tired to type it up. I had meant to complain about Mendel, the arrogant, more-intelligent-than-thou guy who plagues my Artificial Intelligence class. He has an opinion for everything, and always manages to phrase his statements in the most obtuse and pompous way possible. And for some inexplicable reason, Schafer loves him. He's constantly calling on Mendel to answer questions, and doesn't seem to notice that half the class falls asleep as soon as Mendel opens his mouth. I don't how it happened, but we were talking about searching algorithms one minute, and Egyptian architecture the next. Apparently Mendel knows the secret of the pyramids! I'm thinking of bringing a pillow to class tomorrow, and whipping it out the second Mendel starts to say something. Perhaps a few dramatic yawns to stress my point. I would never have the never to do something like that, but I guarantee that most of the class would find it hilarious. Unfortunately, Schafer probably wouldn't. Well, I'm going to lie around for a while before my exam. Wish me luck.

I Need a Nap
September 25th, 2001 - 8:05 PM

Nothing really happed today, and even if something did, I'm far too tired to talk about it. I had my usual set of Tuesday classes, then I had lunch and headed over to my personal study lounge to crank out some Calculus and Greek homework. I don't know if you've ever had to draw objects in 3D space, but let me assure you, it sucks. If an equation has a "z" in it, stay away... trust me. Other than that, the only good news is that the Illuminati expansion I ordered was shipped last night. It should get here on Thursday or Friday, which means we'll be able to test it out in the five or six games we play every weekend. I can't wait. Well, like I said, nothing interesting happened today, so I'm going to go play Planescape. Or take a nap... yeah, that's the ticket.

Suprisingly Good Movie
September 24th, 2001 - 5:21 PM

My Sunday was slightly less boring than I implied in my last post because about an hour after I wrote it, Leah and I headed over to the HUB to watch Bridget Jones' Diary. He had read the book previously and seen the movie at least once, so he highly recommended it. Not that Leah' recommendations mean much to me anyway. But I knew in advance that I'd like the movie at least a little, because I usually enjoy "chick flicks." Well, after seeing the movie, I think it's safe to say that it's the best British movie I've ever seen. And this includes Monty Python. That Holy Grail movie has lots of great quotable lines, but I always fall asleep when I watch it, so that automatically makes it mediocre in my book.

It was raining today, and for some reason I decided not to wear Trenchie while walking between my classes. I got totally soaked of course, but that's only one of the reasons I hate rain. I also hate it when people have umbrellas that are bigger than my house. If your umbrella can fit fifteen people underneath, it's probably a little too big. I practically had to duck while walking past people, lest their monstrous umbrellas poke me in the eye. Another thing I hate is waiting for people to open or close their umbrellas before leaving or entering a building, respectively. It makes the ordinarily simple process of walking through a door into a lengthy process. At one point the line to leave the Willard Building was all the way up to the second floor, and a good deal into the hallway. Compared to these problems, getting wet from rain is a small inconvenience. I hope to add my webcomic browser today, but I'm not making any promises. If not today though, then very, very soon.

Sunday Bloody Sunday
September 23th, 2001 - 8:05 PM

Alright, so maybe today wasn't all that bloody, but it was very boring. For one thing I overslept, so when Esor called me to go to brunch, I was just getting up. Since it was already after noon, I didn't want to take the time to shower, so I just changed my clothes and headed over to the dining commons. As a result of this, I've felt slightly gross all day. At least I didn't have to leave the dorm much. As soon as I got back from brunch, it was time to do my tri-weekly dose of homework. I moved through it at a pretty good clip, though my Logic Systems class took longer than it should have, and my Artificial Intelligence reading was god-awful boring. After finishing my work, I went to dinner with Llon then messed around online for a while. And now I'm typing this.

Last night was much more interesting though. Neevred, Llahned, and I played our usual game of Illuminati, but this time we were joined by Llon and a friend of his for two games in a row. We had never played with five people before, and it's wonderful. Granted, I probably feel that way because I won the first game we played, but I like to pretend that I liked it because it was more fun. I ordered the first expansion pack for the game on Friday, which will double the number of cards we'll be playing with. Hopefully it gets here before Friday, because otherwise we have to wait until after fall break to play with the new cards. The other fun thing that happened last night was Bingo. Llahned and I went as usual, since we never miss a week, and we both won. I got a 10 pack of CD-Rs, and Llahned picked up a Crouching Tiger DVD. If you're wondering, I only won regular bingo, so I got to choose from a bunch of VHS movies, not DVD. Otherwise I never would have gotten the CD-Rs. Well, I haven't played any Planescape yet today, so I'd better get started on that.

We Are.... Stone Drunk!
September 22th, 2001 - 5:25 PM

Okay, not everybody who chants our school's increasingly annoying motto is drunk, but at three in the morning, most of them are. My dorm room faces the street, and since the stupid weather hasn't gotten cold enough to merit closing our window, we hear everything that goes on. So at about two or three, or whenever the bars kick everybody out, all the drunks mill about on the sidewalk, trying to remember what apartments they live in. Well, if a single one of them decides to yell out "We Are!” it's only a matter of time before twenty other drunks scream "Penn State!" This can repeat for a very long time, and usually does. Speaking of loud noises that keep me from sleeping, it seems that every car packed on College Avenue is equipped with a hypersensitive alarm that goes off whenever another car drives by. This means that people's alarms are constantly going off, and I've never once seen somebody go out and make sure it wasn't their car being stolen. This means that if somebody really was stealing little bobbing-head dolls out of peoples' cars, he'd get off easy because everybody would assume that somebody else's alarm was going off. And finally, the Pizza Place across the street thought it was a good idea to put some bizarre metal modern art formations up in front of their store. They're little pillar things that would be good for sitting on, if the tops weren't at sharp angles. So as far as I can tell, their only purpose is to provide Penn State's drunken population with something to drum on.

Well, that's enough bitching for now. We had another football game today, and in keeping with our high standards of excellence, we lost 18-6. I'm not a big fan of football, but I might watch it if I had a TV and there was absolutely nothing better on. Anyway, I'm not concerned if we have an awesome season or get into a good bowl game. I'd just like to see us win at least two games this season. This would give Joe Paterno all the wins he needs to be the winningest college football coach ever. That's a pretty good title to retire on, even if your last few seasons weren't that great. Anyway, to celebrate our loss, there one of Penn State's many bands is playing music across the street. This isn't nearly as bad as that radio station that was broadcasting last month, so I can deal with it. As long as it's not interrupting my efforts to do homework, I don't really mind.

1500 Reasons to Love Windows 2000
September 21th, 2001 - 11:59 AM

Just before I started to do my homework last night, I ran the Norton SystemWorks CD that Neevred lent me. It allows you to do two things right from the CD. One of them is a Hard Drive Scan, where it identifies and corrects problems on your hard drives. My computer passed that Scan without too much trouble. The other is a Windows Scan, where it looks through all of your Windows files and programs to fix any errors you might have. When I ran it on my system, Norton found 1497 errors! When Llon ran it, he found 333, and I used to think that was high. SystemWorks was able to correct all but 9 of my errors, which is a pretty darn good ratio. I restarted the computer after the scans, and everything seems to be working fine. I don't know if Norton really fixed anything, or if my system just seems better because of it. I still have trouble whenever a program tries to use OpenGL though.

So I called the TV Repair place today. I've been calling them once a week for about six weeks, and I don't know why I even bother anymore. I already know what they're going to tell me, but I continue the ritual out of blind hope. So when they told me the TV wasn't fixed yet today, I wasn't really surprised at all. I was surprised when I asked them how long they though it would be. Apparently, Sharp is telling them 2-3 weeks. This is the same estimate I got when I first took the TV in... 5 weeks ago! I might be crazy, but 7-8 weeks to get a single part in seems pretty long. But like I said before, it's not like I can blame the TV Repair people. The warranty says Sharp has to pay for the part, so I guess they're dragging their feet. At this point, I only have three options. I could pay for the part outright and forget about Sharp, but that would cost more than the TV is worth. I could take it to another repair place and have them wait 8 weeks for Sharp to deliver the part. Or I could give up on the whole thing and buy a $100 TV with the money I allotted for repairs. Since there is no way I'm going to settle for a small TV when I paid for a big one, I guess I'll just have to wait. For Sharp's sake, I hope the part gets here in less than two weeks. Gilmore Girls debuts a week from Tuesday, and I have a friend visiting two weekends from now. We probably wouldn't have watched too much TV anyway, and we could probably take over the TV Lounge if we really wanted to, but it really sucks to not have a TV around. I've wanted to play Lunar 2 since I got the darn game, but it looks like I'm stuck with Planescape for now. One thing's for sure... I'm never going to buy anything from Sharp again.

Rain is bad, but Trenchcoats are Good
September 20th, 2001 - 6:26 PM

I don't know what the sky was doing over where you live, but up here at State College, it was raining like nobody's business. I went into my Artificial Intelligence class today, only five minutes late, looking forward to my day because I only had two classes. When I got out, all my hopes of a good day were shattered by the water cycle. I'm cool with evaporation and condensation, but precipitation has to go. Luckily AI is held in a building that isn't far from my dorm, so I didn't get too wet. I got back to my room, read my webcomics, and then had my customary mid-morning nap. After I woke up, I decided it was time to break out my trenchcoat. Besides being an excellent fashion statement and a good way to scare little kids, Trenchie is very effective in the rain. When I have my coat and hat on, the rain can't touch me. My backpack still got a little damp, but that's a price I'll have to pay. After Calculus I grabbed some burgers at the HUB then proceeded to play Planescape until about 3:00. At three I headed over to the library to meet with a guy I know from my Statistics and Greek classes. We managed to do most of the homework, but there are still a few problems we're stuck on. I'm not too worried about it though, since the rest of my homeworks this semester have been pretty good. Well, I have a stupid Greek quiz to study for, so I've better be going if I expect to play some Planescape.

Computers Suck!
September 19th, 2001 - 8:20 PM

That's right... at least for today, I'm pissed off at my computer. As you know, I got a bunch of computer games in the mail yesterday. I got the expansion for Baldur's Gate II, Icewind Dale with its expansion, and Planescape - Torment. Though these games are all quite similar, they're RPGs, so I won't be getting sick of them any time soon. And even if I do, I can play Lunar 2 on my PlayStation... assuming that my TV gets fixed in the next few years. Anyway, all of the games installed just fine except for the BGII expansion. It installed fine on Neevred's computer, but it just wouldn't work on mine. After getting new drivers for my DVD-ROM, I was able to copy the contents of the CD onto my harddrive. When I ran the install from there, it still didn't work right, but it let me know which files were corrupt and proceeded with the install anyway. Well, the install was successful, but I discovered that there were 14 files with 0 bytes in them. So the game would run, but any time it tried to access one of those files, it crashed. So I talked to Neevred and he agreed to send me the missing files over AIM. As of right now I have all but 1 file fixed, but the one I'm missing is 90 Megs. We gave up when it was about halfway done, because AIM was stalling all over the place. We're going to try again this weekend, and if we're lucky, the transfer will resume from where it left off. It's a good thing I have those other games to play before I get to the BGII expansion. Well, I'm off to do some gaming now. Shouldn't you be doing the same?

Yep... Still Sick
September 18th, 2001 - 1:47 PM

As you can see, I'm still sick today, but I'm not really much worse off than I was yesterday. My roommate Leah has it much worse though. He had to buy some medicine at McLanahan's today and is skipping most of his classes. I went with him to buy a card for my aunt's wedding and some adhesive squares to hang stuff up in my room. The trip was going well until I spied TAPGLOM behind a half-opened door. I'm still recovering from that horrific incident. I missed Calculus today because I was feeling sick and slept through it, but we just had a quiz on Thursday, so I didn't miss anything important. I checked my grades on the course website, and right now I'm averaging a 108% for homework and quizzes. So right now I'm only really worried about exams.

I don't have much to do today, except a little Discrete Math, and some reading for Artificial Intelligence. I'm going to do it in my private study room, so that Leah has a chance to listen to his new Tori Amos CD. Of course, my private study room is really a public study room, so I'm just hoping that nobody has decided to work in it. My package from Amazon.com got to State College today, but only time will tell if it gets to my dorm before 5:00. The package consists of a bunch of video games I bought as an advance birthday present. So now I just have to wait for the money my parents will surely send me for my birthday on September 30th. Just a friendly reminder, guys.

Being Sick Blows
September 17th, 2001 - 5:09 PM

I'm sick today, but I can at least be glad that I'm not as sick as some people. It must have been the abrupt change in weather from Friday to Saturday, but everybody and their mother is sick this week. I'm currently blaming Neevred for spreading the infection, but he insists it's because of some girl who supposedly sat next to him in one of his classes. A likely story. So I've been coughing fairly frequently and I've been subject to a series of very violent sneezes, but otherwise I'm alright. Classes were pretty easy today, especially Logic Design, since I slept through the first half of the class and still had no trouble doing the quiz we got. I don’t' like sleeping in the middle of classes, and haven't really done it much since high school, but it's really boring stuff that I already understand, I don't feel too bad. I've only got two classes tomorrow, because Greek is cancelled for Jewish New Year. I love that religion. :)

Same as Yesterday... with Homework!
September 17th, 2001 - 12:06 AM

Illuminati went according to plan yesterday, but Llon only stayed for one of our three games. We played the first game in an Atherton study lounge, but fled to the HUB when Mendel wandered in and expressed interest in the game. Mendel was the star of a previous Haiku if you remember, and since it's probably not even his name, he doesn't need an alias. We ended up heading back to my dorm for the third game, because the people working at Union Street (a burger place in the HUB) were anxious for us to leave the table. Llon won the only game he played in, and Neevred won the rest. He might not have won the second one, but I wasted my last turn attacking Llahned because he had screwed me over three turns in a row earlier that game. We're thinking of pooling our limited financial resources and ordering the expansion set, since it doubles the number of cards in the game. So if you haven't tried this game yet, go out to your nearest hobby store (if you know where it is) and demand that they sell you Illuminati!

After brunch today I played Baldur's Gate II for about two hours, then headed over to my customary study room. It smelled kind of funky, since nobody comes by to empty the trash on weekends, but it was well worth it for privacy. Of course, many other people had the same idea, and I was interrupted six or twelve times by people checking if the room was free. It wasn't, they apologized, and I got back to my Digital Systems, Discrete Math, or Greek, depending on what time it was. After that came dinner, more BGII and then laundry. I despise doing laundry. This is my week for doing four loads, and I actually had to wait for a fourth washer to be free. The real problem came when I was waiting for a dryer. When my clothes were done, there wasn't a single dryer available. There were a few where the cycle was finished, but the clothes were still damp, so I didn't want to move other people's clothes. I'm a jerk sometimes, but not that much of one. Eventually I found two dryers that were free, so I put two washer loads in each one. Since I was doubling the stuff I had to dry, I had to run two cycles, which added nearly two hours to my total washing time. But at least I can do other things while the dryer runs. It's the folding that really gets my goat. It's not as bad as it was last year, since I made a point to get 18 pairs of identical socks, but it's still not fun. But I suppose that 30 minutes of folding is a small price to pay for clean clothes.

Illuminati is the Coolest Card Game Ever!
September 15th, 2001 - 6:31 PM

As you can see by my title, I played Illuminati last night and it was wonderful. I played two games with Neevred and Llahned, and it took like 3 hours. I won the first one and Neevred won the second. We're all playing again tonight, but this time we'll be joined by Llon, which should make the game a lot more fun. Other than that, all I've done this weekend is play computer games. So Baldur's Gate and Illuminati... that's basically my weekend. And there's nothing wrong with that. I actually finished Baldur's Gate I this afternoon, so it's about time to start Baldur's Gate II. Sorry I don't have more to say, but I literally didn't do anything on interest. My apologies to my small group of dedicated readers. You are out there right?

Five Minutes of Silence
September 14th, 2001 - 12:43 PM

I just got back from a rally that was held in front of Old Main. As soon as the bells stopped ringing for noon, Graham Spanier spoke for a little while, after which we had five minutes of silence to honor the victims of Tuesday's tragedies. Then a Penn State musical group called Essence of Joy sang a couple of patriotic songs to get us in the mood. After that, the bells started ringing, and will continue to do so until 1:00PM, which will be a few minutes before I finish this post. I can't hear them from my room right now, but that's because I have some REM going on my computer. There's also a candlelight vigil tonight starting at 7:00, but I won't be able to make it, since I'll be at Big Dudes Little Dudes hanging out with little kids.

It started being cold today, and I love it! It's slightly too damp for my taste, and I don't like the fact that it looks like rain, but I love jacket weather. I wear pants all year round, so I'm most comfortable in the fall and spring. Summer is just a pain in the neck for me. Another reason I like jacket weather is because you're pretty much comfortable in whatever you wear. People wearing T-shirts and shorts aren't too cold, and people wearing long pants and a jacket aren't too warm. It's beautiful. I like trench coat weather even better than jacket weather though, because it means I get to wear my fedora. It's still a little too warm to break Trenchie out, but I'm anxiously awaiting the day.

Keep On Keepin' On
September 13th, 2001 - 5:23 PM

Today's Haiku is the way it is for two reasons. First, while I think it's very important to properly mourn all those lost on Tuesday, it's not good to dwell on our sadness. There is much work to be done, and very little of it can be accomplished by mourning. We should turn our attention to fixing the damage and preventing future attacks. As you know, I'm against massive retaliation, but something must be done to make sure this senseless violence never happens again. Life moves on, even though we're saddened, so we have to make the best of our time. The second reason for today's Haiku is that there's a ton of squirrels on the campus. That's about all for that one.

Classes today went pretty well. Though teachers are still being instructed to cover material at their discretion, all of mine elected to get on with the learning. And I can honestly say that I don't mind. It's good to focus my thoughts towards something else for a while. Not too much homework to do tonight, but that's mostly because three of my four classes are having a quiz tomorrow. I'm not worried about the quizzes in Intro to Digital Systems or Discrete Math, but I'm terrified of my Greek quiz. We have a "long quiz" tomorrow, which means more vocabulary words, more verb conjugations, and an entire sentence to translate from English into Greek. Translating isn't too bad when I have my book to refer to, but remembering the definition of every single word we've learned so far is a pretty daunting task. Well, it seems that way at least. The class is only going to get harder as we learn more words and more grammar. I still like it better than Latin though.

Slowly Returning to Normalcy
September 12th, 2001 - 5:05 PM

It should be noted that while things are slowly getting back to normal up here at Penn State, it's going to take ages for victims, their families, and friends. My heart goes out to all people affected by these horrible events, both directly and indirectly. At this point, we're pretty sure the attacks are due to the Al Qaeda, a group lead by Osama bin Laden, who is living in sanctuary in Afghanistan. The most obvious eye for an eye solution is to just bomb the heck of Afghanistan, taking one or more Afghani lives for each American life taken. I must say that this is possibly the worst thing we could do. Even doing nothing at all would be a far better solution. The terrorist attacks cost thousands of innocent lives, but what good will killing thousands more innocents do? Though it's obvious the terrorists don't care about American lives, who’s to say they care about Afghani lives any more? Killing their own people probably won't even make them feel any remorse. Any retaliation we extract should be limited to the people directly responsible for the attacks. And by retaliation, I mean some sort of life prison sentence, where the prisoners aren't even allowed to think of parole. I'm completely against the death penalty, as I'm against killing of any kind, but even I wouldn't feel too bad if those responsible were killed for their crimes. I don't even think we should kill the Afghani people who were cheering in the streets. Though their joy shows that they are among the worst kind of people alive, they hardly deserve to die for it. As it stands, it's probably going to be a long time before Afghanistan has good relations with a country that matters. There's no need to decimate their population.

Remember, we should be upset as people that people were killed, not as Americans that Americans were killed. Killing more people is hardly the solution.

No Witty Titles Today
September 11th, 2001 - 4:55 PM

I usually like to use titles that are slightly witty and have something to do with the day's rant. But there's nothing funny to say about the events that took place today, so I won't trivialize the tragedy with an attempt at humor. The World Trade Center bombing in 1993 was a horrible event, one of the largest recent terrorist attacks, until today. Today's terrorist attacks claimed many more lives, and weren't limited to just the Trade Center. Both towers collapsed after being hit by hijacked airplanes, a part of the Pentagon is in ruins, and another plane crashed somewhere in Pennsylvania. Now, I'm not going to attempt a summary of the tragedies, but if you'd like to read the latest news, visit cnn.com. Many schools and colleges cancelled classes today, though mine was not one of them. Our administration has elected to hold classes as normal, but encourages the faculty to spend time discussing the events and consoling those who lost friends or family to the attacks. Penn State is sponsoring an emergency blood drive to help the many victims, and many other schools and organizations have done the same. I unfortunately won't be donating blood, for what I'm afraid are mostly selfish reasons. I hope to start giving plasma at Sera-Tec next week, which also helps people, but I get paid for it. If I give blood, I wouldn't be able to give plasma for like 10 weeks. I feel bad, but I can be comforted in the fact that many other people are giving blood in my place.

I Secondhand Smoke Three Packs a Day
September 10th, 2001 - 4:59 PM

As I'm sure you can guess from my title and today's Haiku, I don't like it when people in front of me are smoking up a storm. Luckily I'm not asthmatic or anything, or it would be a life-threatening thing, and not just a minor inconvenience. I don't mind the cigarette smoke when I'm at the arcade, because that's a conscious choice I make when I enter the establishment. When I'm walking around campus between classes, I'd like a little bit of fresh air. But since the campus has already banned smoking indoors, I guess they can't go too much further, or lose a large portion of their cancer-embracing population. And cigarettes are far better than cigars or pipes, so I suppose things could be much, much worse.

Classes were pretty interesting today, and I only fell asleep in one of them. This happened to be Greek, and the teacher happened to catch me. She didn't come out and say it, but she called on me to wake me up (I was only out for a few seconds) and asked me a few simple questions about the sentence we were currently translating. I answered them pretty well, with only a little bit of stalling, but I'm sure she was chuckling to herself. I took a nap as soon as I got back to my room, by the way. Anyway, the real topic of interest today is the class that is held right before my Discrete Math class. It must be some sort of female anatomy or sex education course, because in the past few weeks, there have been notes on the board about menstrual cycles and the like, but today it might as well have been HPW 101 (How to Please a Woman). There were all sorts of tips on the board on how to have good sex, what areas you should pay attention to, and advice on the proper hip motions. If this weren't enough, some of the more enterprising students elected to "forget" their notes on the desks, so that Discrete Math students can learn helpful tidbits like: "We want you to know how bad cramps are", "It's not as big as we say it is", and "Foreplay is good." This is the typical stuff you hear everywhere, and I fail to see how you can justify making a course about getting laid. But to be fair, it's hardly the main portion of the course, and college students in general do have a lot of sex. It's just an odd contrast with set theory.

Why do on Sunday what you can do on Tuesday?
September 9th, 2001 - 4:35 PM

After I had brunch today, I headed to my customary study room to take care of a few assignments. I had just finished my Discrete Math, and I was about to start my calculus when it hit me: The Calculus assignment isn't due until Thursday, so why the heck am I doing it today? Since I didn't have a good reason to continue working ahead, I went back to my room and started playing Baldur's Gate. Bet you didn't see that one coming. Speaking of Baldur's Gate, I installed the sequel on Llahned's computer last night. I've sworn off computer game piracy myself, but I'm always willing to help a friend in need. We were considering playing multiplayer for a while, but I decided that it might be better if we played through the game ourselves first, to get a good feel for it. Then, if we both like the game, we can play multiplayer next year or something.

Llahned, Neevred, Esor and I saw Shrek at the HUB last night. It was the second time for me, but the first time for the rest of them. Shrek was one of the best movies I saw this summer, and the computer animation definitely helped. I'm not really sure what sort of animation style I like the most, but it's safe to say that I enjoy them all. Except of course whatever style they used in Osmosis Jones. I actually never saw that "movie", but the previews alone gave me enough reason to shun it for life. After Llahned and I went back to my room to hang out for a while, while Neevred and Esor went to see a concert. Llahned and I went back to the HUB later, where I lost three chess games in a row. I'm pretty sure I didn't used to suck that much. Of course, I was it my high school chess club for a few weeks, but after a 10 game losing streak, I stopped showing up.

PlayStation 2 Party!
September 8th, 2001 - 5:07 PM

That's right, I'm going to a PlayStation 2 party tonight, featuring Gran Turismo 3. The PS2 party is part of an Uncommonly Fun Option, or UFO, taking place at Louie's tonight. If you're wondering, Louie's is a subsidiary of Redifer, one of the gods of the PSU Trinity. Louie's offers take out food, most of which doesn't even approach healthy. They'll be offering free nachos and frozen yogurt tonight, so I'm there. As for Gran Turismo 3, I really prefer Need for Speed, but that's because I'm a weenie who can't handle an overly realistic racing game. The only fault I can really find with GT3 is that the cars don't take damage. I personally think that's really lame. But they do have an insane amount of upgrades and turbo kits and such, so you can still have a really awesome car.

Bingo was mediocre last night... Llahned and I stayed for all 13 regular games, and didn't win a thing. We came close a few times though, so we figure we're due. After the regular bingo, they had special "Survivor Bingo", where all of the patterns you have to make on the board are Survivor themed. Of course, it's hard to make good patterns when you only have 25 squares to work with, so they were things like tidal waves and worms. The prizes for Survivor Bingo were a VHS, a bag of candy, and a bandana. Llahned and I ended up leaving early, since we don't watch VHS, we didn't really need any candy, and we sure as heck weren't going to wear a bandana.

Well, That Didn't Last Long
September 7th, 2001 - 7:07 PM

I had another post here earlier today, so if any of you read that one, you get a bonus rant today. Anyway, I quit my job after dinner. I called up the Findlay Dining Commons office and told them that I don't think I'm going to be able to juggle 18 credits and 12 hours of work each week. The girl I talked to was very cool about the whole thing, since people apparently quit for that reason all the time. Quitting the job is no big deal, since I really didn't need the income for anything besides spending money. My birthday's coming up, and my textbooks next semester should be really cheap, so I'm in good shape for buying video games. It just looks like my DVD and Science Fiction purchases will have to be on hold for a while. But just as a last resort, I'm going to head over to Sera-Tec Biological tomorrow. They'll pay me $45 a week to give plasma, which I'm more than willing to do. The only problem is that the last few times I've given blood to be tested, they said I had too high a concentration of some beta protein thing... I don't know what it is, or how to lower my levels, but I'm going to give it a try anyway. If that doesn't work, I'll be a stereotypical poor college student all over again. Well, I've got to go play Bingo soon. My life is just so darn exciting.

Lord of the Salad Bar
September 6th, 2001 - 1:14 PM

I work again today, and my job is supposed to be working the salad bar. I imagine this just consists of making sure all of the little bins of salad accessories are near full at all times. This doesn't seem like a job that will require my full attention for three hours, so I'll likely be a sort of free agent, helping out whoever needs a hand at the time. As long as the time goes fast, I'm alright. I really don't want to work, but thanks to a combination of expensive books and my suicidal television, I won't have any spending money if I don't. And I have many, many games to buy. Of course, two of these games aren't out yet, and three of them are Black Island studio games, so they'll be similar to each other, but they are all important nonetheless. So if I have to suffer through three hours of work 3 or 4 nights a week in order to get these games, I guess I'm willing. I won't be happy about it though.

My two classes were pretty easy tonight, especially since I slept well. We saw about a minute of "War Games" in AI, which was more of a tease than anything else. Neevred tells me that we saw a lot more of it on Tuesday, but I wouldn't know, since I was sleeping. After class I had some breakfast, then headed back to my room for a nap. Naps are a great way to fill small intervals between classes. I usually don't like to start playing Baldur's Gate unless I'll be playing for a couple hours. Plus I was tired. After my nap I headed to Calculus, and I actually stayed awake. We got our first homework back, on which I scored 12/10. Combined with my first quiz grade of 9/10, I'm still at 110% right now. Too bad a single exam is worth as much as all the homework and quizzes put together. Well, I have to be at work in like 3 hours, so I'm either going to play Baldur's Gate or take a nap. I haven't decided yet.

Delivery for Mr. Mecherath
September 5th, 2001 - 5:14 PM

I got a package from my mom today. Inside were the two shirts that I asked her to send from home, and nothing more. Even though she claims she sent me a $20 check the day before, it hasn't gotten here yet. Well, luckily I have a job to bring in some extra earning potential. Otherwise I might have had trouble doing laundry. Speaking of my job, it was decent last night. I got to work at Checker's, which is a 50's themed eatery inside the dining commons. I was working the serving line, and basically just grabbed whatever the customer told me too. The only thing I really hated was the hot cheese sauce. No matter how careful I was, I always managed to spill some of it my hand. Besides that, I dropped a hot dog and a grilled cheese sandwich, but everybody makes mistakes. Cleanup was much worse than the actual job though. My student trainer volunteered me to "clean out the line," which means I have to dump all of the excess food into the garbage disposal. This is easy for things like chicken fingers or mozzarella sticks, but it's really hard for sauces of any kind, including cheese sauce, my archnemesis. I had to spray the containers with a high-pressure stream of hot water, though I usually hit the wrong corner and ended up spraying myself. Well, I guess there are worse things to spill than hot water. All in all, this job is a small price to pay for some spending money. One of the things I'm doing with this newfound money is seeing "Rent" with my floor. I figure it's got to be decent, because it's one of the few musicals whose songs don't bother me excessively. Well, I've got to go eat dinner now. And yes, my eye is still twitching.

Let the Fun Begin
September 4th, 2001 - 10:35 PM

I start my new job at the dining commons today, and lets just say that I'm less than excited. I'm working at the same place where Neevred used to work, and he tells me that it's not too awful, except for a few crappy jobs like Silverware Cleaning. There's quite a few different jobs to do, so as long as I get a good amount of variety, things shouldn't get too boring today. I've got to leave here a little before 4:00 to get there in time to eat before I punch in at 4:48. Why 4:48? Because the school pays in six minute intervals, rather than ten or fifteen, like most places do. There will be hell to pay if I punch in at 4:47, and slightly less hell if I punch in at 4:49. I think I'm up to the challenge though.

I overslept for Artificial Intelligence again today. I'm going to have to more my alarm clock farther away from my bed tonight. I woke up at 8:30, and the class started at 8:00. Rather than run in there hungry and dirty like I did on Thursday, I just took a shower and had breakfast at my leisure, skipping class. This would have been alright, since I have Neevred to tell me whatever I missed. Well, it turns out that I missed a quiz. They weren't even mentioned on the syllabus, as far as I know, but I missed one. It figures. I'm also having some major problems with course scheduling, but those should be cleared up on Thursday.

Three Days of Lounging
September 3rd, 2001 - 10:35 PM

Though I hate to repeat the topic of my last post, I also did pretty much nothing today. I worked on a little bit of homework after lunch, and I bought one of those click eraser things from McLananhans, but that's about it. Thankfully, TAPGLOM wasn't in Her domain today, as that would have ruined a perfectly good afternoon. One of the few significant accomplishments I made today was finishing all of my homework that is due Wednesday. Now the only real thing I have to worry about this week is my statistics assignment due on Friday. And if the first one is any indication, I'll be hitting my head against the wall inside an hour. Of course, I have no reason to complain about impossible homework. Llon is an Electrical Engineering major, and he often spends several hours a night "Conquering the forces of EEvil," as he likes to say.

I start work at Findlay commons tomorrow. My last class ends at 12:15, after which I grab an early lunch and head back to my room for a few hours. I've got to make my way over to the dining commons at about 4:00, so that I have 25 minutes or so to eat before my shift starts. I hope it doesn't suck, because it's very difficult for a job to have just enough work to do. If there's too much work, the time goes fast, but I get tired as hell. If there's too little work, time drags by, and I have a good chance of falling asleep. Ideally I'd want a happy medium where I'm not working impossibly fast, but I'm not standing around doing nothing too much either. I don't know what my job is for Tuesday dinner, but I know I'm working the salad bar on Thursday. I can't wait.

I Did Nothing Today
September 2nd, 2001 - 10:35 PM

Yep, absolutely nothing. I went to bed early lastnight, because I'm sick, without even playing any Baldur's gate. I woke up, I only had enough time to read my webcomics, take a shower, and head to breakfast. After that, I played Baldur's Gate for a few hours, to make up for last night, did a little bit of reading for Artificial Intelligence, and went to dinner. After dinner I finished up my AI reading in Neevred's room, then watched Futurama, King of the Hill, and The Simpsons with Llon. Then I went back to my room and played Neopets for a while, until Esor called me up to her room to play Taboo. I was paired with Neevred, and Esor was paired with Akira. We lost miserably. When the game was over, Esor and Akira started playing Word Whomp, a game at Excite.com, that they claim is highly addictive. I've never been a huge fan of word games, so it just bores me. So now I'm back in my room typing this. When I'm done here, I'm going to do my laundry and start some homework that's due on Friday. Oh Boy!

On a side note, I've been feeling funky for the last few days. I don't actually have any of the symptoms described in Monday's Haiku, but the main idea of the poem is correct. Being sick is alright when I can just lay around in my room, but it will suck if I'm feeling ill during work on Tuesday.

UPDATE: I have a headache now... stupid self-fufilling prophecies...

Dinner with Grandparents
September 1st, 2001 - 10:45 PM

Yes, I had dinner with my grandparents today before the Miami game. They come up to Penn State every year, to see the first home game of the season, and to visit with their friends, the Leher's. The Leher's have an abundance of tickets to every game, so they often sell them to people they know, and invite them to stay at their house for the night. So before the game, we all met at the Leher's house to have some dinner. With the exception of my grandparents, I didn't really know anybody over there, though I had met most of them last year, when we had dinner after the game. I had to answer a lot of the same questions over and over again, but I was expecting this. My major is computer science... I like it a lot up here... Yes, my classes are pretty hard... No, I wasn't involved in any of those football riots. Well, maybe only one person asked me that last question. This year was different from last year though, because we were joined by a Nigerian named Tunji, who is finishing up his PhD up here. His field of study involves helping and caring for the disabled, a field which the Nigerian government couldn't care less about, apparently. Since the university he went to over there is run by the state, they refused to fund his research. So he came over here to finish up his degree. He ended up being really cool, and he also wasn't going to the game.

Dinner was pretty good, and with the exception of an overly sweet orange Jello dessert, I liked all of the food. Of course, I would have eaten it all even if I hated it, since I wouldn't want to be rude. We finished with dinner at about 6:00, after which my grandparents and their friends headed over to the game. Tunji and I walked back to the campus, which took about 45 minutes. It was really nice out though, and we had some good conversation, so it wasn't bad at all. I happened to mention that the HUB plays free movies every week, so the two of use caught the 7:00 showing of "Along Came a Spider," starring Morgan Freeman. I wasn't planning to see it originally, but there wasn't much else I could do with Tunji, so I figured it was worth a shot. It turned out to be a really cool movie, and I sincerely recommend it. It had a really cool story line with lots of twists and turns. After the movie, I took Tunji back to my dorm so he could check his mail in the Atherton computer lab. It turns out that he had a lot of mail to respond to, and to top it off, his typing style is of the hunt-and-peck variety. I ended up sitting there with him for over an hour, but I had my book with me, so it was cool. We exchanged e-mail addresses when he left, and hopefully I'll get a cool little correspondence going with him. Do you know anybody from Nigeria?

All I Need Now is a Haircut
September 1st, 2001 - 12:15 AM

Yes, this title implies that I did indeed get a real job. I had my interview at Findlay at 5:30 today, and actually showed up for this one. As is the case in most interviews, I was practically hired before I got there, and all I had to do was let them know what shifts I'd like to work. As of right now, I'm working the dinner shift on Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays, and Sundays. It's going to be like 12-13 hours a week, which is enough money to buy something cool for every paycheck. I don't work on any day where I have classes past noon, so there's no danger of not getting to work on time. The only problem is that my aforementioned plan to do only do homework two nights a week is ruined. Well, as long as I get a few hours of solid free time every day, I suppose I'll be fine. I got a free T-shirt for working at Findlay, which I have to wear every time I work. I only have one right now, but as soon as I get there on Tuesday they'll give me another. Such good incentive for working. They're going to pay me $6.30 an hour, but I get an increased wage of $8.00 until September 21st, which I don't understand, but have no complaints about.

The rest of my day went pretty well. I woke up this morning thinking that I had three quizzes to take today, but in reality, I only had two. My quiz in Digital Systems was a joke, and I'm pretty darn sure I aced it. We haven't learned anything I didn't know before yet, but I'm sure that will change soon. The Greek quiz didn't go so well. Even though I knew every vocabulary word like the back of my hand, I managed to make a few stupid mistakes on the quiz, which will probably land me a C at best. Well, it's the first real quiz out of like 10, so I'm not too worried on that front. Stats was cool today, because the quiz I was expecting didn't exist. Apparently there are no quizzes in that class... I was just very confused when I wrote my assignment down. We're going over conditional probability right now, which I understand pretty well. I'm sure the homework will be impossible though. And finally, Discrete Math was wonderful today, because I aced the quiz we took on Wednesday. I rock! Hopefully I can keep this up, since Stats will likely be bringing my grade down.

I had an incredibly exciting Friday evening, as usual. Llon, Neevred and I watched "The Last Dragon" in a mutual friend's room, which is an 80's Kung Fu movie. It's the story of Bruce Leroy, and it represents everything bad about the whole decade. The main character did wear a lot of cool hats though. After that we hooked up with Akira and Esor and watched "The Last Unicorn" in the TV lounge of Atherton. TLU was way better than TLD, for two reasons. It was animated, which is always a plus, and almost all of the songs in it were sung by America, creators of "Horse with No Name," one of my favorite older songs. TLU is also good because of three totally awesome characters. Two of them are the Pirate Cat from Lord Haggard's Castle, and a Musical Butterfly from the Unicorn's Forest. And the best character of all is Schmendrick, an aspiring wizard whose biggest claim to fame is ordering his magic to do what it will. Anyway, if you haven't seen "The Last Unicorn" yet, I encourage you to do so now. If you haven't seen "The Last Dragon"... no major loss.