Felocity

I decided to put a nice and solid hold on my NT/HT watching, because I had no desire today to send my mood downward like a rock in a pool. Maybe like late Friday night or late Monday night would be better. If for some reason, the series does get to me, it will be 10pm after 8 hours of class and I can fight it off with apathy and sleep.

I wish I could say today was awesome. Hell, I am going to say it anyway; today was awesome. It was as awesome as getting your right arm chopped off and being beat violently with it. Okay, yeah, limb beating is cool, so that is probably a bad analogy. Anyway, I had a few conversations today that pushed me the wrong way, and spent most of the afternoon trying to finish the NCWCA project. Apparently, even though I have some pretty large holes in the content, it should be hopefully going to press by the end of tomorrow. I didn't have anything planned from 8 am to 2 pm anyway, so I guess it isn't too bad. Apparently there is a "tech lunch" taking place after this, where we (the tech staff) get to go eat lunch and have a staff bonding moment. I wouldn't mind all that much if it wasn't at 2pm in the afternoon. Talk about a late lunch; my stomach may not take kindly to that.…

I'm feeling a bit drowned right now. My original plan was to go outside, stand on my porch, get some fresh air, and return to some chatting in Pants. Within moments of poking my head outside, it began to rain. I sort of just stood there, leaning on the balcony. I wasn't really sure how much time went by. It was quite a while though since now it is after midnight. It's also cold in our apartment, but I'll deal. As if me being cold and soaked wasn't bad enough, I found the new draft of our proposed logo. Be very afraid. I tried to be as nice as possible to Dave in my reply, but my first line summed it up: I find it creepy was how it began, and I really do; it's the eyes and the gloves that are hands and have no fingers. If I remember correctly, it was originally conceptualized as "cute". I will let you comment on that.

I then watched episode 1 of Now and Then, Here and There. I want to see more, but more of this really can't be healthy.…

I usually go to Experts Exchange for nearly any question programming related. I love the community, I can almost always find an example or an answer that I can use and adapt into a solution for my work. When I went to look and search for a specific topic, I was dismayed. I learned quickly that only members could search the site now. So with a sigh, I registered. It then told me that only PREMIUM members could seach the site, and for that I was very annoyed. They changed to their own personal search engine, sealed the Previously Asked Questions away, and now want $10 a month to get access to things that were typically enjoyed and used. Free membership gets you now jack squat. Actually, it gets you less than jack squat; sub-jack-squat if you will. Furthermore, there is absolutely no way to cancel your membership with them.

I used to reccomend them, now I'm not so sure anymore. It is much easier just to do a Google search for site:experts-exchange.com, but the results have now become much less precise. While I do not doubt that this information is wonderful for IT professionals, some of us used it simply as an alternative to the hundreds of pages making up the MSDN library. EE was cool, but it wasn't $10 a month cool.…

Yeah, shush. The "alternate formats" are up if you so kindly look to the right of this message. The fact I mirror most of this to LiveJournal may account for why there are rarely any comments posted here. Anyway, if you happen to be an LJ user, or if you like sleek and sexy XML, those alternates may very well be for you.

Now then, I noticed a long while ago that Orby got a new layout. Recently though, they did get a new server so you may want to go check them out. I refer mostly to the UCD crowd, but others are encouraged to check it out as well. Also around the web emma has a new design, and I forgot to mention Nessa's new design. So many people redoing their pages. It must be that time of the year or something.…

I haven't been sleeping well lately. Actually I haven't been sleeping much at all the past week or so. What 4 hours I seem to find a night gets shattered by sunlight, phone calls, or rolling over and slamming my funny bone against the wooden edge of my bed. I even made a point of last night going to bed at a decent hour in hopes of getting 6 hours of sleep. I was foiled by a really dark and not-so-happy dream. Based on this past week, I say screw the sleep and so I have been working. These work efforts are truly not in vain either! I finished the mock up of the BAAS Anime Festival, migrated my site templates to XHTML, and even did the update of the 'ole cam. I beat the forest temple, got to talk on the phone for a bit, got all homework done, and it is only 1:00 in the morning. I'm feeling pretty damn accomplished right now.

Felocity is coming up on it's birthday, and while I have been doing the web site thing for quite some time, this domain will be happily one year old on the 9th. On the 9th I won't be doing a redesign, but I will be making a small change. I will probably be swapping out "features" with a section for alternate formats. Currently this journal exists on Felocity, has RSS and RDF feeds, has a Livejournal part, and may eventually be syndicated elsewhere if I can find the time to finish some of the cool planned things for the Dragon Fang Gang (cosplay group) page.…

Contrary to the e-mails I have been getting, no it hasn't been the Notwork keeping me off of the beautiful land of the Internet. It was actually C&C Generals and Battlefield 1942. This managed to consume late Friday night and most of Saturday, wrapping me up in exciting gaming bliss. I don't say it as a bad thing, as I enjoyed playing some games that I wouldn't get to otherwise. If it wasn't for everyone playing for example, I would probably have not tried BF 1942, especially after my previous FPS experience. I would like to retract statements said, and restate that while Natural Selection nearly killed my enjoyment of computer games, Battlefield 1942 has restored faith previously lost. I could run around and shoot, jump in a plane (or man the gunner slot), drive a tank, ride side saddle in a jeep, and even drive a gigantic aircraft carrier ashore. And this was all ON ONE MAP. When a game like this comes up, I don't really pay too much attention to it, simply because I am sure it will find its way around the net and then fade away. Not only has it managed to stay on the radar, but it may even be something I make the full investment in. Yes, before you ask, we were playing a cracked version for LAN play only. Even with only 6-8 people it was rather fun, and the map didn't feel to big. I imagine once you get 15-30 in there it gets pretty crazy, and if you ever have all 64 slots filled, you are going to be in for one hell of a match. But, all this gaming was for Saturday since Sunday would be a long day up north.

I spent 90% of my time Sunday working and doing BAAS stuff. Lots of web stuff to design. Got home, had a good phone call, called it a night. I had planned to go into more detail, but sleep won out.…

For a Friday, it sure seemed long. On the boring side was work. On the more interesting side, I argued with my boss a bit about frames and the "target" property of the A tag. I also ended up getting home and having to do a load of work since Marc's meeting shattered any concentration I had while in the middle of editing the NCWCA program. The Mac then handed me the infamous "error type 2", I handed the Mac an upturned middle finger, and set the whole damn thing on hold. There is nothing more annoying to me on a professional level beyond leaving something half done. I will probably work on it tomorrow and finish what I started (assuming my ZIP drive wants to work with me).

I plowed through OoT a few nights ago, in one very long, very exhausting, minimal item quest. It was done though, and that made me happy as I felt "right" about embarking on the Master Quest. I found it to be refreshing, and also frustrating as I just got used to doing all the puzzles one way, and now they were very different. I got through the Deku Tree, to the princess and had called it a night. That was two nights ago. Last night, with a good friend and Zelda fan at my ear, I came upon Jabu Jabu's belly. I will let you read her reaction to it, as it explains everything about it I want to say and can't. It is just wrong. After having all three stones and turning the world on end, I got Epona and called it a night. However, for some reason, it took several (4) tries to earn my horse. I tried not to dance too much when I finally crossed the finish line first in the second of the two races.…

Installing an OS and setting up a computer is something I have done since I have been 9 or so, and started playing with my own computer. When things aren't working, you fix them. If it is Microsoft Windows, any attempts to fix it will cause it to crash horribly and you end up reinstalling the operating system again. The more you do it, the more adept you get at it. I still have my Windows 95 and 98 CD Key's memorized. By now, installing an OS should be a simple, painless task. I just got back from this painless task, and yes, it really is 4:00 in the morning. Since all the details would be boring, here are the more amusing highlights.

When I arrived at Jessica's house and looked at the machine, she told me her second CD was disconnected because it wasn't working. The problem I quickly learned was that both drives were set to Master, causing the conflict. Apparently people had fought with this for hours in an attempt to get it to work. Five minutes and 4 screws later, it was back to trying to install the OS. And that was where the problem was. Installation of Windows 98 SE failed not once, not twice, but three times because the CD was having issues reading the CAB files. I grabbed the files it complained about off of another computer and placed them onto a 3.5. 18 files later, the problems with the two misbehaving CAB files were solved, and Windows was able to finish installing. By this time, it was beyond midnight, and mind you this doesn't include any other software, this is just the basic thing that lets the computer turn on without crashing.…

Cam update. Woo.

The Internet was rather quiet tonight, which wasn't all that bad. I used the time to work more on XHTML compliance and clean up old entries that have migrated between one too many online journals. While doing this, I chatted with H, Joel, and Kari which made the coding a little less boring. For as much as I like to work alone, for some reason there is a small little part of me that enjoys being social. The sites I visit were pretty much quiet (though MA.net has a new layout).…

After an Ethics class half as long as it should have been, and after a pizza-filled lunch backed by Bubble Bobble, and even after having no appointments my first hour at ASAP, I am still trying to grapple with the fact that our University seems to enjoy making additional steps for us to go through (us being the CSUMB Anime Club) in order to throw even a basic event. Last semester, we did something known as Saturday Anime POP, where we showed the first three episodes of Chobits and Hellsing. The event was pretty easy to set up, and had a decent turnout. Thanks to a massive amount of changes to policy, what took only 3 weeks to organize and set up now takes at least 8 weeks. Rights must be submitted for the showing at least two weeks before the event, flyers are due even before that (though you don't know what building / room you can get from the Uni), and this alone turns what was normally a small amount of work into almost more work than it is worth. And I don't even want to get into all the problems that are coming up with Fanime this year. Apparently, although we are all ariving seperately, every driver who will have a CSUMB student in the car may need to be Defensive Driver certified. Yes, that would mean even if you were the only one driving to Santa Clara, if you were going under the club, you could very well need your Def. Driver certification. This means 4-6 hours in a class that happens only once a month. The whole Def. Driver thing isn't actually solidified yet, but I wouldn't be surprised when it happens. It seems that the Uni has over the past 2 years introduced more and more requirements for Student Organizations to hold events. These requirements are getting more and more elaborate. As opposed to looking at the requirements, they work to "simplify the process". In simplifying the process, some other department introduces new requirements, new steps, and then we go right back to where we started. It's a big circle that keeps growing.

In other news, I am debating doing a bit more work on some Wolf's Rain wallpapers to keep me occupied until Ep 6 comes out. If I get them done before the weekend, I will post them up.…

There is nothing happier than walking in a bit early to work and being handed back your Pocket PC you shipped back to Toshiba only days before. I had Wizard with me the whole day, but because his battery was drained, I couldn't really use him. It was good to know he arrived safely back though. At some point while tutoring in the morning, it dawned on me that about 90% of the schools were probably not in. It then occurred to me that I must have been one of the "lucky" schools that ignores holidays. While there was still a happy mood present, I felt somewhat cheated out of a beautiful day as I sat in class for 8 hours. However, through this sitting in class, I learned two very important things. The first of these was that Adobe Photoshop and the University's Deep Freeze program mix about as well as oil and water. Deep Freeze works by creating a fake drive (mirror) of the data, from which the user works. This becomes very flawed when you break out Adobe Photoshop and have a very large scratch disk going. I managed to kill the operating system and get the BSOD 8 times across 3 machines using this method. The file was an 8x10 image, 300 DPI, and that was all it took for errors to come out of the woodwork. I finally gave up on the imaging and decided to pay attention in class. We were continuing our discussion of Big-O, and I couldn't get the Big O theme song out of my head.

The second thing learned was more of a reaffirmation than anything else. Thomas asked me to talk about the material in our database class, so I explained intersect tables and relationships to the class. Since nobody really cared about Mountain View Community Hospital, we had some fun with it. We came up with silly criteria (for example: patients needed to have an id number, first and last name, and an animal of some kind). This pointless randomness seemed to help spawn creativity, and what would have otherwise been a very boring database to practice on become somewhat amusing, and most people seemed to get the information. And I had heaps and scads of fun. Yes, it was so much fun that it was worthy of the title "heaps and scads". It was a good reminder of why I was wanting to go all the way through the school hoops and come full circle to teach at a University. It was fun, they had fun, and they were learning something because they wanted to. The actual concept of people (my peers) wanting to come to class and learn still amazes me. It is fun to be casual, be informative, be helpful, and see people get the concept. Aspiring to be the Computer Science teacher that people actively want as their professor is why I am doing all this to begin with; it feels damn good. Now for those who know me or have read this for a while, teaching is something that tends to stick around in my family. The exception to this, however, is I don't really care for kids all that much. While I know University students are still kids in a lot of ways, they aren't the kind of kids that run up and wipe their nose on your jeans or things like that.…

It feels like one of those "Switch Commercials". I got fed up with load times for LiveJournal, and decided to finally finish the install of Movable Type I had begun almost 8 months ago. Since there was a new version, I completely scrapped the old one, effectively freezing the CAC page (good excuse to redesign it), and installed and configured like a code monkey whore.

The last of my ~600 entries were put in place less than half an hour ago. I had to do a lot of it by hand from CSV files, and I am kind of thankful I did it now instead of waiting before there were even more files. If I haven't told you about TextPad, then chances are you haven't heard me go "geek" on you yet. It is free (but well worth the money), does syntax highlighting for most major text-based code, and it has what I feel is the most important thing that even high end IDEs like Visual Studio and CodeWarrior lack. You can do REGEX expressions inside of the program! Yes, that's right. You can create and execute complex regular expressions inside of your text editor. It makes standard search / replace look pretty lame. Thanks to this, going from CSV to the MT format was beyond easy. I would actually say it was rather painless, almost enjoyable. And now the site goes faster, and commenting is handled through my own server, reducing load time that much more. So now, to date, I have made use of the following "blog" software:…

Dave Weiner (an entertaining read if you don't have this on your list yet) has been discussing the buying of Pyra Labs (makers of Blogger) by Google. He has a lot of the same things to say that crossed my mind. I do think this could be a very good thing, especially since it seems that there isn't any "melding" or whatever buzzword you want to slap on it. I am hoping that Google did this to help make Blogger a better thing. So far, that is about the extent of it, and it seems likely that Google really just wanted Blogger content.

In other news, I have been toying with PHP / ASP greatly for kicks. If I actually am willing stupid enough to waste hours inventing something that someone else has undoubtedly done, I'll let ya know.…

The weekend started out simple. Fry's for Saturday morning, and I was the one driving. When we got there, I sort of stood outside the store in a strange awe as a few words managed to leave my mouth. "It's...themed?" I muttered softly as I tried to grasp the concept that this giant electronics store had an Egypt theme. Sure enough, as we walked in past the palm trees, past the stone counters, and into the store itself, it became apparent that somebody invested far too much money into decorating the place. I wandered aimlessly, looking for nothing in particular, yet being preyed on by a salesman every 3 minutes or so. You could have probably kept time by it too. I think I was able to look at something for only a few moments. The instant I looked interested, someone was offering me information on the device, and the information they were offering was the exact same stuff on the computers themselves. Telling them "I'm okay, I'm just looking" won't suffice apparently, as they continued to pester me, telling me things that I could clearly read on the computers and the signs themselves. Since it was obvious they weren't going to leave me alone, I decided I would have some fun. Asking about the iBook brought a strange look to their face, as ALL their laptops were some breed of Windows. I followed this up by asking about benchmark comparisons, and they slowly stopped pestering me. This also reaffirmed my suspicion that they were salesmen first, knowledgeable second (or eighth). However, this trip was not in vain for me, as I have discovered Suzuka, and she shall clearly not be found at Fry's Electronics. Now, this process of getting a laptop is not something easy, and probably won't happen for more than a year. But, it is a nice thought all the same.

After lunch, we made the drive back to Monterey. With the campus Notwork being much as it was before, we got a hold of Kryn and Scribbles, and did some more C&C Generals. Because there were so many people, we decided to do a 4 on 3 match. Ten minutes into the game I remember why I dislike playing RTS against other people, especially those I live with. The teams were Matt, Lisa, Scribbs, and myself v Kryn, Jake, and Eric. I had to take the spot closest to them, and so I knew I had only one actual purpose: keep relentlessly attacking one of them to buy everyone more time. Jake happened to be closest, so for 1/2 an hour I pounded him with everything I had. Eventually Kryn showed up, and so I called to Lisa, my closest ally for help. I was rewarded with 0 units coming my way. She had shot up the Tech tree, and while the 4 Particle Cannons were threatening, Kryn and Jake almost amusingly rolled through her once they were done with me. I had moved my command center deep into Matt's base at this point, and continued to call artillery strikes every chance I could. Scribs was scattered but not defeated as well, and by the time Jake and Kryn turned their attention to Matt, he had over half the map and a ton of missiles landed on Jake / Kryn's tanks. Over the next block of time, Matt, being the only person capable of doing anything more on our side was victorious. It was then time to break for dinner. (Yes, the game took almost 2 1/2 hours.)…

Either my computer is against me, or someone was jiggling wires and left me without a connection for the later part of the day. Being netless, I did as best I could. With C&C Generals, OoT, and assorted LAN goodness, I was able to keep my mind off of things. There was some sort of 14th thing I mentioned before, and it seemed the notice seemed to work. Only one person managed to annoy me, and it was because he brought his date to the appartment while LAN gaming was taking place. I can't tell for sure, but I think he was annoyed at those of us who were gaming, being nerds, and making it hard for him to have a quiet dinner and stuff. (Then again, we DID say we were gaming, so I am not sure where I stand on this issue.) Eventually Matt joined the forray, and later Kryn.

Current Record: 2/3 on hardest difficulty, which isn't saying too much since the odds were 2 on 1 and 3 on 2. If it was a "fair" fight, I am almost certain I would be 0/3. But enough of the gaming update (for now).…

So much for not being bitter.

"Have you gone in the tutor area yet?"

I just sort of started blankly at her. "Huh," was about all I got out.…

Sounds like something you would find on FF.net, but this is anything but fiction. It is a sad reality of how dependent on my Pocket PC (named Wizard) I really was. I haven't been late or missed a meeting or anything like that. But what I have done is not been able to keep a decent to-do list for some time now. Now I need to "do" everything I forgot about. Paper gets lost so easily anymore, it's a wonder half of my notes make it back to near my computer where all the work seems to get done. And yes, I named my computers. Still lack a name for my car though.

Last night was Jello Biafra, and I was rather amused by it all. Maybe it was the limitless supply of Bush jokes, or maybe it was a lot of the anti-war stuff, or perhaps it was even the fact Tony and I picked out two undercover cops in the audience (in addition to the two uniformed police officers in the back). I'm not really sure what they were expecting, but a ration of 1 cop per 100 people still amuses me greatly. There was also a guy going around taking pictures of audience members, probably so they can be put on a big computer somewhere. He wasn't press, that much was obvious, and he left about halfway through only to be replaced by the same man, only in different clothes. Outside of a pretty good political speech, there were enough antics to keep me amused for the full three hours. The University Center stayed packed the entire time, which I am certain made Tony feel good. He even got singled out by Biafra towards the end with a playful ribbing and applause from all the people. (He must have enjoyed it,)…

Supply, Demand, and Value. I suppose by doing these private things less, it somehow would increase the value (assuming demand remained a constant). Anyway, for those that were privy to Welch, who loved to draw the S, the D, and the $ charts, you know how it all works. I have been working hard to keep my journal much lighter, especially the part that is visible to the public. So after I do a little dance and act silly, I shall continue this entry.

Okay, there.…

For as excited as I was about the Zelda bonus disc, I sure haven't had much time to play it. Yesterday, I took my Gamecube over to 208, and was able to play OoT on a very large, very high resolution HDTV. I only got up through the great Deku Tree, but the state of bliss I was in come Anime Club was well worth it. Rumor has it I had some sort of dopey grin on my face during the meeting. I also couldn't tell you for the life of me what happened in the Anime we were watching. Additionally, I was able to send my poor precious PocketPC off to Toshiba so that it could be fixed. Losing everything data related is not a very good feeling.

I am trying to figure out what is going on this weekend, as there is seriously too much I am trying to do at once, and it all seems to want to happen on Saturday. Food not Bombs, DunDra Con, some programming, gaming and planning all are waiting for me. Of course, there is a show this weekend (seems there always is around here), but I don't really think I will be going. Especially after last time. (As much fun as bowling was, I still think some greater thing wants me to wait on going to a show.) By the end of tonight, I will have my intro for my Ethics paper written, and I will be at least up to Jabu Jabu's belly.…

It is here in my hands

Zelda Preorder…

I finally sat down, cracked open Textpad, and yes, for those that read this via webpage and not LJ backend, that link called "expressions" page is now up. While it currently holds only two wallpapers I made, the structure and folder stuff is in place so I can actually add things. The hardest part (as is my usual task of adding to the site) is sitting down and actually making the initial batch of work. From there, it is much easier to just update. I will eventually put my resume into HTML form, but the need isn't quite there yet. All that leaves is my cosplay section, which I have worked on a bit, but have been too lazy to fully complete, and so the link doesn't work. All in good time though I suppose. Enough of the housekeeping. Onto the interesting thing: classroom oppression example.

My Tech Tutor class runs from 6p to 10p every Monday night, and for those unfortunate enough to know my PPC AOL Instant Messenger name have no doubt read my angsting over the class. Reasons range from the inability of the two instructors to teach to my general questioning of the Service Learning process. But, I digress; tonight was an in class activity. In order to fully understand the activity, I must deviate briefly to explain. The class is divided into two sections. The Alphas and the Betans. The Alphas went to one room while the Betans went to another. Here in the room, you were told you had a culture you were supposed to act the part of. Here is a short list for example purposes.…

Dell's 'dude' gets arrested. [msnbc]

This amuses me greatly for no major reason. We are writing class definitions (yay?) and essentially working at our own pace. Since mine is compiled and done, I wandered the web since I lack a functioning Pocket PC.…

I feel better knowing my homework is done and I don't have to go dredging up forgotten math skills for at least another week or so. Times like this make me wish I had paid better attention to Calc classes back in High School. You know back when Sigma, area under the curve, and the fancy Integral sign all made sense and we pretended they had immediate application in our lives. Suddenly, as I analyze my programs for efficiency, all the stuff I ignored (or well... ignored) became really fucking important. For some odd reason I had HS work with me in my closet, and was very grateful that I took some kind of notes that jogged my memory. Eventually, it was conquered, and I transitioned from "what the heck is an Inductive Proof" to "I will N-1 you! HA!" or something equally nerdy but appropriate. Backing up this C++ bundle of joy were some essays on Gandhi, sex, and community service.

I have also decided that the more obscure and pointless I make my essays, the more the professors are just writing it off as an A and leaving me be in my Technology Tutors class. Next week I get to address "Politically Correct or Socially Corrupt?" I am looking forward to playing with this and seeing what radical spin I can put on this, simply to make the analysis more amusing (and in turn, the work more enjoyable).…

February 14-17, 2003 I told the BAAS group I might not be doing it. Maybe I should call Rob so I have a place to stay and change my status to "working the con". ^_^ Gaming Con! YAY! BAAS is doing an Anime Room at the convention, as we usually do. It would also give me a chance to talk with Jason Ebner and work on the ReccaCon stuff. Besides, I haven't been to San Ramon. Maybe also finally get the server info so I can put the page online.

I know I am just putting off my HW, but dayum these essays are boring. :)…

Sure, my AIM says I am doing HW. I suppose I could really right now call this writing a desperate plea to stay distracted. It probably is because I am writing on the same "Service Learning" articles I did a year ago in Henrik's lower division equivalent. It was a boring task, and the second time isn't much better. Of course, if I get enough done, Kari and I can watch Gravi and maybe later in the evening I can get a hold of Tony or someone from last night and see if they want to do something. I finished all my C++ reading, though a lot of it surely bounced off. Hopefully Tao will give a good lecture, although apparently we are doing a C++ review this week. How peculiar. Maybe I can get out of that class and get a break for food on Monday. ^_^

bile in the back of the throat…

I never really have seen myself as someone who goes to shows. I suppose that might be because while I like the music, I would be the person at the back soaking in the atmosphere and not getting stomped on. Tony invited me to a house party where there were some bands playing. It was broken up within 10 minutes of us being there. I have still yet to actually go see a show. Some devious machination of fate must be out there insuring I don't see music live unless it is with the proper people. Because of this, the entry cannot be about the show.

Instead of the show, since things were cancelled, Tony, Allie, Julie, Rocky, and I went bowling with the people from Los Dryheavers. It was pretty casual, and Tony and I started just screwing around. We started a bucket brigade where the ball would change hands 4-5 times before being sent down the lane, we did trick strikes that were neither tricky nor strikes, and we had the occasional serious attempt now and again. Despite all the screwing around, I still managed to pull out a 112, which made me rather happy. The second game went much more as it should for screwing around, and after upgrading to a 14 lb ball for 5 frames, the 6 lb ball was much lighter. My arm is a bit sore from this, though it felt good to send the ball really fast down the lane for kicks. Oh, the score of my second game was 64, which is more what I expected from the first. Two games were more than enough for us, and we retired to Del Taco in Watsonville for food. Since I covered for Allie at the bowling alley, she paid for my food, and we sat down and chowed down. Since all I had for the day was a cup of ramen, anything food related sounded good. Rocky snagged a bunch of napkins (they were free after all) , and we went outside. Somehow, the conversation drifted while we were waiting in the cold, and Allie got the name "Micro Machine". It fits rather well. We set out back for Monterey, where we attacked the Walgreens' dumpster. Since I didn't really grab anything, I was simply amazed at what they were throwing away. A lot of the things they pulled out really had nothing wrong with them. These things could either go to fill a landfill or could be put to use in the apartment. The find of the night: a PUR water filter, all packaging intact, the baby sippy cup broken.…

What I feel like: int jakob () { double self; // insert day here return self; }

The translation to all this? I feel as if even though I had a pretty full day, but the end of the day, part of me was missing. Like the int that truncates a double, leaving the decimal off, I spent the night playing video games and programming, but it wasn't quite as satisfying as I expected it to be. Usually I am really proud of solving programming quirks. Instead, when I got my archive script working and integrated properly, I felt only a small tingle of joy. Instead of the usual routine of showing everyone who might care in the slightest, I made a point to save the code, mention it later, and then proceeded to wonder just how much catching up I will have to do tomorrow since I didn't do any homework tonight. Three essays by Sunday night, about 150 pages of reading, but it will get done at some point.…

I'm feeling a bit tired for the hour, which may or may not be a good thing. I have found that when I go to sleep at what would usually be early for me, I am up, moving, and (alarmingly) awake early as well. This early is also known as 6 am or so. Unable to roll over and go back to sleep, I just sort of laid lazily in my bed until my alarm clock finally went off, reminding me of class. A few minutes later, my radio kicked in, and if KDON wasn't going to make me get up, I may as well be dead. ^^ So I got up, checked e-mail and web sites, and was out the door to my Ethics class.

The entire first hour was spent on our scrapbooks, which are collections of Ethics related articles found on the web that relate to technology. He took volunteers, and since we all have to present eventually, I decided to suck it up and go up there. After basically bsing my way around the RIAA and Verizon issue, the class discussion took off and I had to do little to keep it going. In a small amount of time, the discussion was over, and I was nothing more than a bit bored. The rest of the class was spent talking to the people around me, making fun of a 107.9 The End keychain, and swapping high school stories. While I can't say I liked my HS experience, there were still several amusing stories that came out of it. For the Oakmont affluent, Bartley comes to mind, as does Yearbook's "Gabe Memorial Page". Class got out quite early, and so I spent the time talking to Isaac about PERL, Macs, and Tao's C++ class. I grabbed some lunch, settled into work, and was shocked at how quickly the time went by. Due to the budget slashing, hours at ASAP have been cut back on both ends of the day, but being done with work at only 5 pm on a Thursday felt odd. It was still light out!…

Apparently once we met out community "partner" we were done with class, so I returned home. I am paired with a group known as Neighborhood Networx (yes, apparently with an X, as it much cooler). And what will I be doing at this place? Well, since this class is required, I am paying for the ability to do community service. Not only that, but it is the same things I get paid for on a day to day basis at ASAP. That's right, I am tutoring. I am paying my tuition (just recently raised another $72 this January) so I can do something I get paid to do. Service Learning is truly something special.

Having been up since 7 in the morning and not even stopping for lunch, I was tired and quite hungry. A Vanilla Coke solved that problem. Now I'm just really tired becuase I have had an hour or so to settle and let my brain unwind. Monday's are so long.…

This amuses me. In tech tutor class, and currently many groups are trying to sell themselves to us. "We have the best kids", "we have experiences that nobody can match." I am not sure how I feel about that. The administration that has come to us throwing buzzwords around like softballs. I don't think I have heard someone say their kids in sixth grade need to learn flash and make websites. All the people here are from schools, one from a public library. All the programs are working with kids. I don't want to work with kids... There has to be something that is not kids. I feel as if I will be an ASAP tutor working with little kids. This does not strike me as something I enjoy. More updates as the night goes on.

Sunlight came streaming through my window at 8 am. I ignored it and woke up about 10 or so, since I had plans for the day. And what a beautiful day to have plans for! I had talked with Jessica the night before about seeing some bands play over on Wilderness Ct, and since I was determined to have some fun, I told her to give me a call, which she did (and a good thing too). I spent the morning until she called working on a DJ set that I had in my head for a few days, perfecting a few of the transitions I wanted to use. I lost track of time, and had she not called, I could very well have missed it. Due to the joys of cell phones, weekend minutes, and a short traveling distance, I was across the apartments and at her door in a few minutes. From there, it was across the street to Wilderness Ct. where there was a band exhibition. Playing today was the 58 cent band, Red Herrings, Horacho, and a few others. It was Jessica, her roommate, a few others, and I, chilling in the afternoon sun with assorted people from the apartments, enjoying the free food, the sun, and listening to music. Sundy and Michael came over part way through, and we all raced through the blow up obstacle course. The afternoon was very good. Although, by the time I got back I think I was a bit too giddy from the sun, fun, etc.

Upon getting home, I got a call from Sherylen, asking me to go pick her up in Salinas. Getting to the Amtrak station proved to be an adventure in hating Yahoo! Maps. I still have no clue where "Clark Street" is. I am beginning to think it doesn't exist, and was invented by Yahoo! in an attempt to make you drive through Salinas several times hopelessly lost. Patience, the use of hwy 101, and some exasperated yowling finally landed me at the Amtrak, and from there it was back to Seaside for dinner at Papa Chanos. Filled with food, the sun gone, and midnight now a reasonable distance away, I got back to the apartment, sat down, and hammered out a lame essay for my Service Learning class. Style analysis slowly came back to me, although at first it felt so hard to be creative. The essay got easier when I just slapped everything into the typical AP cookie-cutter essay. All the way down to what sentences to use and when in the essay. For those attuned to my HS, I did diction, detail, and organization. I planned on syntax, but I knew the challenge of that would be lost on my non-English professor. As it is, I will probably get zinged for pointing out Ram Dass' argument relied on an emotional foundation. Unfortunately for Dass, I was seriously jaded after my lame SL 200 class, where I began to feel on the corner of my mind a rising question to the ethics of required service. I feel as if this semester will really have me look at "service as a requirement". Right now, I see this required community service as nothing more than free help the university will provide to local groups in order to build solid relationships. Wrap it all up in a blanket of nobility, label it an "important experience" and serve to students for 4 units.…