Allyn’s Calculus Test

I’m sitting here in the Union with Allyn, and we’re studying for our various finals.  He showed me one of his calc tests that he took… more specifically, his answer for an extra credit question…

Extra Credit: some random calc problem Explain The Matrix

If you’ve ever seen the (second?) Matrix film where Neo gets to the Architect.  This is like that, kind of.  I, Neo, was always destined to suck at this test, and this class, until now.  You, the Architect, have seen this cycle a hundred times.  Some Neo eventually comes along, destined to be ‘The One’ and break the system thus achieving victory.  I will am can be the One, thus achieving the ultimate goal of a C+ or better.  But will the Architect let me turn in some late assignments?  I can defeat Smith, if only given one more chance!  Believe in Neo!

I think I pissed off some other students in the union from laughing so hard.

I Came, I Saw, iMac

iKnow… very creative.

My new 27″ iMac arrived today.  A full 5 days ahead of schedule.  I’m so unbelievably happy right now.

Old setup, w/ the 15" PowerBook G4

The old laptop actually gave out on me in the middle of the week, so this was absolutely perfect timing.  Mom was nice enough to let me have the computer now (she was going to hold onto it until after I was done with finals, but I really do need it in order to study… I can’t watch my physics lectures anywhere else), so I stopped over after my Macro test to pick it up.

Brought it back to the dorms, un-boxed it, tore down the laptop and got this thing set up…

New setup, with the new 27" iMac

Screenshot (I decided to keep with my mythical creatures theme and call this machine Titan... I find it appropriate)

I got everything pretty much to where I wanted it, though I’ll definitely need to tweak some things after I’m done with all my finals.

A couple of things that I’ve noticed/realized:

• A 27″ screen is rediculous.
• This computer takes up half of my desk.
• I used to think my external monitor was bright (compared to my PowerBook).  Now it looks like crap compared to this.  Apple Cinema Display, anyone?
• I was disappointed, because I borrowed my mom’s camera, but forgot to get the card reader.  Lo and behold, SD Card reader built right into the side of the computer.  Hot!
• The new Magic Mouse from Apple… oh my word.  I’m in love with this thing.

Oh, and the joke.  Laura (an RA in the building) poked her head into my room right after I got this set up, and practically yelled “Oh my God, that’s huge!”  5 neighbors from 3 separate rooms all responded at the same time, “That’s what she said.”  This is why I love college.

Dear Mr. President

I think you’re making a terrible mistake.

Look, I’m not into politics.  That’s not my thing.  I’m a self-declared left-leaning independent, as well as a registered Democrat as of this last election.  As a good American citizen, I support our president and our government at all times.  While I may not agree with everything we as a country have done in the past, I believe that we the people have the responsibility to initiate that desired change.

And so it was with great pride that I went and caucused for you, and subsequently voted for you when the elections came about.  I didn’t feel that electing another Republican to office would do our country much good, and I’m way too scared of what would happen to this country if Mrs. Clinton ever took the reins.  Not only were you (by default) the last choice, but you were (before any other eliminations), in my mind, the best choice for the job.  I approved wholeheartedly of your platform and what you planned to accomplish.  I went back to school because I felt that your economic platform, as well as what you planned on doing to help out students in terms of loans and such, made this the perfect timing for me to finish my education.

However, I am personally aware of 2 key points of your platform that are going to need a lot of work.

First, the one that I don’t know too much about.  You have made it clear that you intend to send 30,000 additional troops to the Middle East, which will bring the total US count of deploy troops in this “war” to over 100,000.  Democrats left and right, the very ones that supported bringing you into office, are screaming to high heaven that you’re making a huge mistake.  Republicans are cheering you on.

I realize that the whole presidency thing requires you to do things that some people don’t like.  I also realize that you are sometimes required to go against your own party in order to do what you think is best for our country.  But we the people voted you in, in large part because of the mistakes that we felt that George W. Bush and his posse were making.  I support our troops 100%, and wish them the best in their endevors and their missions.  However, I (and most of our country) are tired at watching our troops being sent overseas with hardly anything to show for it.  We got Saddam finally… great.  But there’s no WMDs.  No Osama.  Still around 100 high-ranking Al-Quida members hiding in caves (or so goes the report).  But I don’t see how bashing this mess with a bigger hammer is going to get any more results out of it.  And frankly, that’s what this is… a mess, pure and simple.

I realize that you felt that Mr. Bush ignored Afghanistan in order to focus on the war in Iraq.  I realize that you have a desire to focus more on the entire reason that we shipped over there in the first place.  I hope that my fears are misplaced, and that you really do know what you are doing.  I myself nearly joined the Marines a couple years back, and never did because I had absolutely no desire to be involved in this mess.  I’ll tell you straight up that I wish our troops would pull out of the Middle East right now.  Not only am I wanting our citizens to be safe, but I know the history of that region, as well as the tactics that they are all using.  Afghanistan is a trap.  It swallowed up the English, the Russians, and the Mongols throughout history*.  Let’s get in, get out, and get back to normal life.

And now the thing I’m (at least a little more) knowledgeable about… your upcoming stimulus plan.

I’m very happy that you took the strides you did as quickly as you did in order to stimulate our economy just a few short months ago.  Reports are saying that you created/saved over a half-million US jobs.  That’s outstanding, and I thank you for that.  However, anyone who has taken even a basic college-level economics class (maybe even high school level… I forgot what I learned in that class) knows that you are treading on very very thin ice because of what you did.

A quick economics lesson for everyone.  The primary way that the Federal Reserve (the ones that actually control the money supply in the US) helps to influence our economy is by something called Open Market Operations.  Essentially, the buying and selling of bonds by the Fed is an easy way of increasing or decreasing the money supply, respectively.  It makes sense… the more bonds they buy back, the more money that’s in the economy, and thus the more stimulated the economy is.  Alongside that, the economy can be stimulated by lowering the Reserve Rate (the amount of money banks are required to hold onto when you make a deposit… the banks loan out the rest of that money in various forms) and lowering the Discount Rate (the rate the Federal Reserve charges banks when banks borrow money from the Fed).  This, in turn, will increase our money supply, lower interest, raise investment (since there’s more money), raise the Aggregate Demand of our economy (the sum of all demand in an economy: expenditure on consumer goods and services + government spending + investment + net exports), which all in turn will raise the employment level.  I think that’s what we are looking for in the long run, a more balanced economy and jobs for everyone, right?  <end term paper… sorta>

Basically, the entire method of the stimulus package is to skip over all the fluff.  No need to change the RR, DR, or buy back bonds.  Let’s just give more money to the economy directly, and see what happens.  A more hands-off approach by the government, but effective nonetheless (in theory).  However, if you overstimulate our economy, we’ll have more money than we know what to do with.  We’ll start spending more and more money, and firms will realize that they are able to charge more money for their products.  This, ladies and gentlemen, is called inflation.  The more we over-stimulate our economy, the more inflation we will have.  We’ll be right back in the same boat we were in towards the end of the Bush era, with prices climbing out of control.  Gas may potentially be up to new record levels, as well as other various goods and services.  Remember when gas was $4 a gallon?  I do too.  It sucked.

Now, maybe we haven’t stimulated the economy enough.  I really don’t know.  You know who does know?  No one.  Things like this take a lot longer than 9-10 months to show their true colors.  It might be a year, year and a half.  We have successfully stopped the bleeding of the recession.  We are still in the recession, mind you, but we have at least stopped dropping lower and lower.  We stopped the unemployment rate from hitting 11%.  We’ve increased our GDP (gross domestic product) by 1.2%.  Not as much of an increase as we’d like, but it’s a great start considering where we were.  But this… takes… time.  Plain and simple.

Mr. Obama, you are playing a guessing game right now.  The safe move right now is to sit tight, and see if we can get out of this mess we’re in with the help you’ve already given us.  I realize that this new stimulus package is directly targeting the high unemployment rate, by spending on new transportation systems and related infrastructure, helping poor state governments and thus preventing the laying off of police/teachers/other public employees, as well as a tax credit for companies that are hiring new businesses (source: Reuters), among other things.  Believe me, I am all for every single one of those.  But there’s a potential that we might be able to rectify all of those issues with the $787 billion package you shipped to us in February.  In fact… I don’t even think all of that money is out yet.

If you want to get this proposal approved, I’m fine with that.  But approve it, and then just chill.  Be ready for what you believe is the inevitable.  But listen to your economic advisors.  All of them.  They know much better than you what’s up.  Listen to the professors of the universities that have been teaching for years and years.  I know how bad of an idea this is, and I’ve taken 1 economics class… and it’s not even over yet!  When you’re messing with something like our economy, a “wait-and-see” or “a bit at a time” approach is the way to go.  Trying to swoop in and being our personal savior within your first year of presidency is just not smart.  Please, for your citizens that supported you (and even the ones that didn’t)… for the country you swore to uphold and protect… let’s try and make this a permanent fix, rather than just a temporary one that will cycle over and over again.  I like the value of my money to be a nice, flat road, rather than an up-and-down roller coaster.

I am behind you 100%, Mr. President.  Your intentions are great.  Your methods appear to be somewhat faulty.  Please don’t guess with things like this.  Make sure you know what’s up before pushing that big red button I’m sure you have installed on your desk (because, really, what president never wanted to make a huge decision by pushing a button??).

*For the record, I feel like a real skeeze for referencing Michael Moore for anything, but I did it.  I refuse to reference it.  Look it up on Digg… An Open Letter to the President or something like that.  God, I feel horrible.

The Computers, They’re Taking Over!!!

I promise, this isn’t just an excuse to get Ah-nold on my blog (first Fabio, now this?  Yeesh…).

First, the bad.  There are days that I really hate computers.  Today is one of those.  I got home from my classes to find my internet shut off by ResNet, the university’s internet provider.  They had gotten notice of a copyright infringement which claimed I was torrenting some file.  My first reaction… gawuh?!?

• The only torrent-ready program was one I had used back in my very very early World of Warcraft days (in order to download patches on patch day, you sometimes had to go to external sources… otherwise it was suuuuuuuuuuuuuper sloooooooooooooow).  My machine was completely incapable of running WoW at anywhere above 10 frames per second, so I used a crappy PC for all of that.
• I don’t torrent.  I’ve been burned by the university once previously for sharing stuff via Limewire, and I knew that any more infringements would get me shut down for a month (not something I’m really a fan of, especially around finals time).  I also stopped using Transmission before this occurred.

So that’s that… right?  Nope.

• Apparently, even though I never used Transmission, it was listed as a startup item on my computer, one that was hidden and listed as an “unknown” application type (very strange).
• I actually deleted the application from my computer this morning (doing a bit of spring cleaning… more on that in a bit), which actually makes me look guilty, but I stepped up and admitted that (not strange)…
• … but when I deleted the app, some related items went along with it.  Some of those were crash reports, dated about a month ago (previous to when my “file sharing tomfoolery” started), so obviously the application was running, and at some point, it stopped running.  (extremely strange, since I never was notified)
• I did a search on my computer, trying to find any files related to the application, torrents, or the torrent I was accused of downloading.  I also had a technician (and friend of mine) from ResNet make a pass.  Neither of us found anything (strange, considering the circumstances).
• My mother’s computer had this affliction at one point in time.  I worked at CFU (the local utility plant/internet provider), and we got a copyright infringement notice that stemmed from her IP address (when I was living at the dorms).  I stopped over and checked it (surprise, Mom), didn’t notice anything, restarted the computer, and never heard of these issues again (odd).

I just don’t really know what’s going on.  I get to meet with the Dean of Students tomorrow and try to get my ‘net turned back on.  Otherwise, I have nothing available to me except for computer lab access for the next 30 days.  This sucks, because I was planning on being around the dorms for the holiday break (moving home and back when I’m 2 miles away just seems dumb).

Also… I spoke with my parents over Thanksgiving, and they decided to help me in purchasing a new computer to replace my ancient PowerBook G4 (ancient by technology standards anyway…).  So… the Wednesday of finals week (right when I finish), my new 27″ iMac i7 2.8GHz quad-core computer should be arriving.

I can’t even begin to explain how excited I am.

For one, I’ll finally be included with the Intel crowd, since my PowerBook was the final series of Apple computers that featured PowerPC.  I’ll also be making a huge step up in my processing power, going from a 1.5GHz single core machine to a 2.8GHz quad-core… nearly 7.5 times the power.  Yum.  Also, 4GB of RAM (vs. the 2 I have now), a 1TB hard drive (instead of 80GB)… not to mention a massive screen (27″ vs. 15″).  It would suck pretty badly if I didn’t have internet for it.  I spent a couple hours doing some spring cleaning, figuring out what apps I would need to get on the new machine, getting rid of old/duplicate documents, etc… now I might not be able to utilize it fully… vunderbar.

Rawr.

It sucks too, cause this day was going so well.  I had to get up and work at 8, and had a test at 10.  Well, I did great on the test (18/20, which will end off translating into an A after the curve is applied), and then found out that I’m completely finished with all assignments in my Info Systems class (I thought that my HTML project was due the Friday before break… it’s due the last Friday of the semester… oops), and I only have to go on days where the teacher will be lecturing over the book (i.e. this Friday and next Wednesday), so I’m pretty thrilled about that.  Then I got back, and this happened.

Double rawr.

So tomorrow, I get to go meet with the Dean of Students and discuss all this.  I have no idea if he’s tech savvy or not… either I’ll be able to explain this exactly as is, or I’ll have to dumb it down for a non-computer guy.  I’m not sure which of those options I’m dreading more.

Simplicity

There truly is something to be said for simple, in every aspect of life.  It’s funny when I actually look at my life and examine where I’m succeeding and where I feel I’m failing, and actually analyzing how complex I’m making things.  (This was actually a revelation to me as I was writing this post, so bear with me.)  Like right now, I’m attempting to write this blog post, and I’ve got about 20 tabs open with different ideas that I want to incorporate into this post, and I didn’t know where to start.  So I just looked through them all, and cut it down to 4 tabs of things I need.  Simple, right?

I remember back in the day when I used to mess with my computers all the time.  I’ve always been a guy that’s enjoyed having as much information as possible accessible to me at a glance.  I remember playing World of Warcraft, and having my interface set up for my healing paladin… I would show people my UI, and they’d always say “Holy crap, there’s so much stuff!”.  But for me, it worked perfectly… any info that I would need during a given session would be available, right at my fingertips.  I look at that now, and think “holy crap… that really is a lot of stuff”.  I’m sure I could’ve made do with so much less, but there’s no way in hell I’m going back and playing that soul-consuming game again.  Anyway… I was the same way back in the early college days of having my Mac.  I wanted everything available, and I wanted it *now*.  I’m still the same way now, but I’ve been able to find less space-clogging and more eye-appealing ways of displaying all my info.  My “then and now” screenshots are below… click to get the big pictures (see what I did there?).

Then and Now

As you can see, things have gotten more… elegant?  Clean?  I guess if I was really going for the minimal/simplistic look, I’d put up a wallpaper that didn’t dazzle me every time I looked at it.  Even with me simplifying everything, I still try to make things look as good as possible… if I’m going to use something every day, then it has to look good (that’s my feeling, anyway).  I still have every piece of info that I need on a constant basis right there at my fingertips, tucked away up in the menu bar.  I can launch any application or open any document, song, or folder with just a few short keypresses (thanks to Quicksilver).  Everything is blended all pretty and nice.  My applications are even more “streamlined” now.  I would rather have 1 application do something extremely well rather than doing a bunch of things just so-so.  If I need to jot something down, I’ll just open Stickies (though now, I use Evernote a lot more, since it’s got a lot of very handy features, as well as internet backups).

I did the same thing with music as well.  I’ve always loved to have all sorts of different toys and effects available to me, and I’ve always been in awe and drooled over massive pedalboards.  A couple weeks ago, I stripped my setup down to about as simple as I could possibly go… a distortion pedal and a delay pedal, running through a Hot Rod Deluxe.  That was probably the most fun I’ve had playing guitar in a long long time.  You can’t hide behind the bells and whistles, and suddenly that forces you to be more thoughtful, more creative, more productive.

The simplest answer is usually just that obvious.

There really is a lot of benefit to making things simple in your everyday life.  Why take a laptop to class when you have a pencil and paper?  Previous generations pulled it off just fine, and I find that I learn better when I’m forced to write neatly so I can read it later, rather than just type it out.  I mean, I can sit here and write this blog post as I watch The Food Network… I’ve read and re-read a lot of what I’ve written and had to modify it, since some of it just rambles on and on and on and on and… oops.  Why do I need all these fancy gadgets and bags and clothes, when the simple things do their job just fine?  (Don’t even get me started with fashion… clothes are meant to protect us and keep us warm.  If you want to wear the most low-cut, tight, or revealing clothes, just go naked and save everyone the trouble and yourself a lot of money.)  Why do you need all the effects pedals in the world when your guitar playing can’t shine through?  Why do you need that super fancy phone when this one makes phone calls and texts just fine?  (Sue me, I do want an iPhone.)  Keep it simple, stupid.

I think we as a society should really take that to heart.  Keep it simple.  Maybe I should’ve shortened this blog post in tribute… damn thing took me over 2 hours to write.

On an slightly related note… the band Weaver at the Loom has developed into one of my favorite bands ever since I got their album.  I’m truly amazed at some of the music that my generation has been able to make.  While I can’t look at anything that we’ve done and define it as iconic (like Zeppelin, Floyd, Sabbath, Clapton, or some of the bands that my dad grew up listening to), I can still see brilliance from all of these bands in many different ways.  WatL (surprise, surprise) keeps things extremely simple and stripped down, layering sounds on top of one another to achieve a sound that’s indescribable.  You really just have to listen to the video (and watch the pretty pictures as they go by).

Lately I’ve been staring at the clouds, alive with beauty.
Reflecting all that I live, and I can’t help but wonder,
When will they fade away?
Fearing the dark may come my way, turning day back into dreary night, where clouds I’ll never see.
I will stare ’til I can see no more. With dark approaching,
I’m longing for answers to these questions that I pose.
When will they fade away?
Fearing the dark may come my way, turning day back into dreary night, where clouds I’ll never see.
(my favorite part) Though outside it’s dark and toxic, I’ll try not to be afraid.
Cuz the stars burn brightly with the hope you give my love.
Their bright lights shine like beacons in the sky, guiding me far from this place.
Glowing knives cut right through this darkened sky, ’til all that’s good refills my gaze

Frustration

Let me be frank for just a minute here.

I’m extremely nervous, worried, and frustrated.

I’m back at school, working towards a degree in Management Information Systems.  That, in and of itself, isn’t frustrating.  In fact, I love school.  I’ve been learning new things left and right throughout the year, and (as I’ve stated previously) for the first time ever, I am actually enjoying school.  It’s great.  I’m just getting frustrated as I hear about all my friends with potential interviews, job offers, yadda yadda.  Shawn heads off to Principal in January.  Drew has so many interviews nationwide, I don’t even know what he’s doing.  And it goes on and on from there.

My whole reasoning for going back to school stemmed from my time at John Deere.  I worked for a subcontractor while I was there, doing IT work and deploying computers out to users throughout the Waterloo plants and offices.  I loved the job, I loved my work… but I hated the management.  I can’t come up with enough big words to describe my loathing for how TechTeam (the company I was a part of) was managed (or mismanaged, as I saw it).  My whole thought process when I left that wretched hell-hole was “hey, maybe I can be the one that manages a company like this someday”.  Mostly I wanted to be the “good guy”, correcting all the crappiness in a job like that and making Company X an organization people enjoyed working for… but I’d be alright with just being a little higher on the “shit flows downhill” food chain and making more than just entry-level money as well.

But now, as I sit here, it’s November 25th.  Tomorrow is Thanksgiving.  3 weeks, and I’ll be done with this semester.  A month from now, Christmas.  And then spring semester, followed by summer.  (Duh.)  My issue is, I have absolutely *no* clue what I’m doing this summer yet.  I need a job, but I’m tired of getting crappy temporary jobs like I’ve had practically all my life up to this point.  Deere was something that could’ve potentially turned into a career, had it not been for the tumbling economy (which, in turn, led to my noticing of the garbage management practices).  Otherwise, it’s been a plethora of jobs at Northern Iowa, Hy-Vee, GameStop, detasseling, and so on.

I realize that I’m currently sitting with practically no schooling that relates towards my intended career, and my work experience is also limited.  I also have absolutely no clue what to look for when it comes to possible jobs, especially around the Waterloo/Cedar Falls area.  I’ve had a couple interviews, but one job was volunteer only, and another calls me back tomorrow to let me know (though I’ve heard that the company is a little shady in multiple ways, so who knows…).  I know that once I graduate and have my degree, that I could find a job somewhere, but unfortunately I’m unable to focus on the “good” things that are down the road, and rather am forced to stay focused on the “hopefully good” things that are on my immediate horizon.  I.  Need.  Money.  I’m sure if push comes to shove, that I can probably find something to do around CF this summer, though whether I’ll be able to break that elusive $10/hour barrier is a question yet to be answered.  More than likely, this means that my desire to make it out to Seattle/Washington state is probably going to go down the tube… but I’ve got my priorities.  Money money money.

It’s frustrating, having some of the more expensive hobbies out there.  I love video games, Apple computers (though I really would like to build my own PC from scratch), photography, and guitars.  I have a nasty habit of spending money, whether or not I actually have it (though I have gotten much better about not spending everything).  I desperately need a new computer, since my PowerBook G4 is getting ready to choke on me.  I have a strong desire to redo my entire guitar rig (amp and pedals), which is going to cost a pretty penny.  I would absolutely love to acquire a nice DSLR camera and start doing more photography again.  And Lord knows there are a ton of good video games coming out that I would love to get my hands on (Assassin’s Creed 2, MAG, the new Final Fantasy, Gran Turismo 5, and many many more), now that good games are finally coming out for the PS3.  I need some sort of boring, inexpensive hobby, like Yoga or something… blech.

I’m also extremely frustrated and annoyed because it appears as though my tendonitis is spreading.  (Before you say anything, no Mom, I have not picked up my medication yet.)  Starting last weekend, I noticed an extremely nasty pain in my left shoulder.  After my lecture on Tuesday, I decided to visit the doctor, where I learned that it was just a simple case of the tendonitis that has afflicted the right side of my body spreading over to my left shoulder as well.  Thankfully, its not something that really limits a majority of what I do on a day-to-day basis, but it’s obnoxious enough that I whine about it occasionally.

Some other random thoughts/notes/blatherings…

- I wish I could sing better.  Guys that can play guitar are nice… guys that can play guitar and sing get all the ladies.  No, that’s not my motivation, it’s just an added perk.  Maybe I’ll have to take some lessons sometime.
- I can’t believe 4 days of my break are already gone.  It’s kinda sad.  I need to wake up earlier so I can enjoy my days a little more, but at the same time, that means I have to go to bed sooner.  Then I couldn’t be productive and write long blog posts.  Decisions, decisions.
- I have officially read the first two books of the Twilight series.  Yes, I’m a straight male.  I’m not really sure what I think about them… they’re much better than the movies, and I’m looking forward to Justin getting back on Saturday so I can borrow/read the last 2 of the books, but I’m still trying to decide if I really like them or not.
- I have officially beaten the entire single player mode of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.  This includes playing through the game on the hardest difficulty level, as well as finding all of the “enemy intel” that are scattered throughout all the levels… that was a pain.
- I have yet to touch any of my studies, and figure that I will do that starting on Friday.  I may as well enjoy my break to the fullest, right?
- I missed working out on Monday, but I did go today.  Hopefully I’ll go tomorrow as well.
- My room is not cleaned yet.  Thus, I can’t properly write my blog about being organized.  This needs to be remedied soon.  Maybe tomorrow?
- I get to go to Tennessee over the Christmas break this year.  I’m really excited about this.  Lots to do there, as well as people to visit.
- Really angry with myself that I did not participate in NaNoWriMo this year… or more specifically, really angry that all my ideas have decided to show up now, the week of my vacation.  Rawrgityblargh.
- I have nearly 2 months worth of songs, and I continue to acquire more.  And I love it.  Most have been listened to at least once, many of these more.  I don’t acquire crappy music, and if I do, it goes in the trash.  If you’ve got ideas of good music, throw it my way.
- I got a new phone.  I finally got tired of my Rumor freezing up on me, so I strong-armed Sprint into giving me a Rumor2 for free.  Not sure what I think of this phone yet… it does some really dumb things at really weird times.  They obviously need better programmers.

Thanksgiving Break

Ah, sweet sweet vacation-y bliss.  The downside to school is that it’s nonstop for nearly 16 weeks.  The upside is that we get a week break right near the end, just in time for a recharge.  And yet, at the same time, I’ve got enough stuff to do to keep me busy.

- Read.  I’m going to find books, and read for fun.  I haven’t done that in a long, long time.
- Video games.  The new Call of Duty has been spinning in my PS3 for about 2 weeks now, and I’m going to play the hell out of that over break.
- Listen to music.  I put together a playlist with about 10 days worth of music, and it’s been playing non-stop since last night.  I plan on keeping this trend going.  Adding a little atmosphere to this crappy 14×10 dorm room can’t hurt.
- Guitar.  Lots of guitar.  Gotta practice.
- Studying.  I have a test the Monday after break (Macro Econ), a paper due Tuesday (Humanities), and some general reading to do (Info Systems and Physics), plus an old lecture to watch (Physics).  Mostly for my sake rather than yours, but that’s my study list for the week.
- Sleep.  I have been neglecting that a bit lately, but I’m going to attempt to catch up.  However, I hate wasting my days, so waking up at 2pm today really sucked.  11am will be fine.
- Clean my room.  I’ll write about this more in depth later in the week (no, not about cleaning my room… you’ll understand).
- Blog.  I’d like to get about 4 or 5 posts up this week, on a couple different subjects.  My sports blog has been feeling lonely lately too, so maybe I’ll try and get something up on there as well.
- Work out.  Attempting to hit up the WRC on Mon-Wed, before it closes for the remainder of break, will make me feel a little better about myself.  I keep dropping weight (in a healthy way, thank you), but I’m still not satisfied.

Not really sure what else.  Maybe that’s it.  That is quite a bit, I guess.  I’ll probably still complain that I’m bored, since the few friends that are still around UNI are leaving either tomorrow or Monday.

Yes, I Am In A Music Video

So this evening, thanks to my buddy Bennett, I discovered that I have, in fact, made it big time.  Ladies and gentlemen… I’m in a music video.

The band: Relient K
The song: Devastation and Reform
The venue: OneFest 2006
The video:

URGH!  Stupid YouTube not allowing me to embed the video on the site.  Here’s the link… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_w8FVBr5M-s

If you’re impatient, scroll to about the 1:27 mark of the video (if you pause it, then move the slider, you’ll find it easier).  Look in the lower left hand of the video, and you’ll see a guy with short brown hair holding something in front of his face.  That’s me, and that’s my camera.  Also, at the 2:53 mark, I’m the face in the bottom right corner.

Want proof?  Here are some of the shots I took while I was there.

Clicking on any of the pictures will shoot you to my DeviantArt gallery (that hasn’t been updated in a long time, but hey, I do what I can).

This makes me extremely happy.  That was the first of 2 times that I’ve seen Relient K in concert, and both were excellent shows.  OneFest in general was just epic.

Ok, enough happiness.  Bedtime.

I Can’t Believe, I Don’t Believe

I don’t believe a lot of things.  That’s just how I roll.  Whether it’s from life experience or lack thereof, from my own opinions, whatever.  I think or believe some things, but obviously I don’t believe many others.

- I can’t believe I was alive to witness some of the greatest sporting events ever.  Some that come to mind… Ripkin’s record setting start.  Jordan’s everything.  Tiger Woods.  A perfect NFL regular season.  The Syracuse/UConn 6OT thriller last spring.  A Red Sox World Series victory (not once, but twice!).  And I’m only 22.  I (hopefully) have years and years to go.  It’s hard to fathom what I’ve already witnessed, and what I may see here in the future.

- I don’t believe everyone gets a second chance.  America is the Land of Opportunity, but it’s also the Land of Hard Work, Perseverance, and Luck.

- I don’t believe women are evil.  I may outwardly express this sentiment occasionally, but I don’t believe it.

- I can’t believe how dumb women can be sometimes.  I’m sure women feel the same way about men sometimes too, but for now, I’m being selfish and just talking about me.  (I’m almost done writing the post, but I just had to get this quote in here somehow… from I, Robot… “Mother damn, she just shot at you with her eyes closed!”  “HEY!  Did you just shoot at me with your eyes closed?!?”  “Well, it worked didn’t it???”)

- I *DO* believe “Once a cheater, always a cheater.”

- I can’t believe I’ve been single for a year and a half.  Long time…

- I can’t believe it’s been nearly 8 months since my dog died.  I am not looking forward to spending time at home over Thanksgiving.  I have a nasty habit for letting things get too close to my heart and my true emotions, and when they disappear I get crushed pretty easily.  I’m still waiting to hear barking when I walk in my front door, and I can’t wander into my kitchen without looking to where my pooch’s dog basket used to sit.

- I can’t believe that I used to be suicidal.  I’m glad I was smart about things in high school and actually opened up to the right people.  I just read a couple of stories that I wrote during my senior year when I was struggling with things that brought back a lot of memories, which is actually why I wrote this post in the first place.

- I don’t believe life should be easy for anyone.  Experiences are what makes you who you are.  Getting handed the keys to life cheapens what time we have here on Earth.

- I can’t believe it’s almost Thanksgiving break.  Starting week 13 of this semester.  Holy wow, where did all those days go?

- I refuse to believe that I just added a picture to my blog that had Fabio in it.  I will choose to believe that the picture includes an extremely ugly woman.

- I can’t believe that the Colts beat the Patriots tonight.  I picked them to win in our pick’em this week, but the mistakes made by the Pats today were just foolish.

- I don’t believe I’m cut out to teach.  This is part of why I got out of the music education program (the other part being my surgery).  I’ve though about getting a business teaching major/minor, but I really don’t think I’d be happy enough with it to make it worth my while.

- I don’t believe in fate.  I believe that while everyone on Earth has a purpose and a mission to their life, every human being has their own decisions to make in order to get them from point A to point B.  Some of us (raises hand) take some very roundabout paths at getting there, and still have no clue what exactly point B entails.  Others figure out what they want to do very early on, put their foot down, get there, and have the remainder of their life to reap the benefits of what they have done.

- I don’t believe that human beings are “good” by nature.  I’ve seen way too much shit go down in life to believe this anymore.  Human beings are nasty, cutthroat, greedy, selfish bastards.  Many people only do “good” things because it’s the proper thing to do in our society.  There are some “good” people in this world, and most of the time I would consider myself in this category.  Sometimes, though, I can be a downright nasty person myself, and it’s not necessarily something that I’m totally thrilled about.

- I can’t believe I’ve been up till 1:30 every night this past week.

- I can’t believe how many current Iowa Hawkeyes are in the NFL.  To name a handful that I remember watching play for the Hawks… Jonathan Babineaux, Ladell Betts, Scott Chandler, Dallas Clark, Colin Cole, Sean Considine, Jared DeVries, Robert Gallery, Charles Godfrey, Chad Greenway, Abdul Hodge, Mike Humpal, Ken Iwebema, CJ Jones, Nate Kaeding, Aaron Kampman, Marcus Paschal, Derrick Robinson, Matt Roth, and Bob Sanders.  Yikes.

- I can’t believe that my alcoholic drink of choice is Southern Comfort on the rocks.  Definitely wouldn’t have pegged myself on that when I started drinking.

- Along the same lines… I refuse to believe I’m such a lightweight.  I drank a bit on Saturday for the first time in nearly 2 months, and was pretty much gone after 1.5 drinks.

- I refuse to believe that my opportunity to be a professional musician has passed me by.  I’m slowly giving up hope, but I keep my eyes and ears open and keep praying that I’ll get my shot.

- I can’t believe that I can’t play the piano anymore.  I’m going to go hunt around my house sometime in the next few weeks to find some music to play.  I haven’t played with any sort of structure since my junior year of high school playing with the Jazz Band, since I’d quit taking lessons my sophomore year.

- I can’t believe that Creed is back.  On a related note, I refuse to believe that their music is good… though I’ll probably get their CD and add it to my secret stash of music I pretend I don’t/didn’t listen to.  Hanson, the Spice Girls, older Creed, and the Backstreet Boys are part of this list.  Britney Spears was hot, so I don’t care.

I refuse to tag everything in this post.  It’s almost 1:45, and I don’t care that much.  Therefore, I’m tagging my basic categories and calling it good.

Modern Warfare, Part Deux

I’ve determined that I would really like to have a text editor attached to my brain somehow.  If someone comes out with the technology to make this possible, I will be first in line to get it.

There’s a good reason for this too.  I often get some very profound and awesome ideas in my head about subject matter, but this is usually when I’m in a place where I’m completely segregated from any sort of technology (be it a laptop or even a pencil/paper) that I am unable to jot the idea down.  Coupled with my terrible short term memory, this means that 95% of these amazing ideas go unwritten and unnoticed.  Thankfully, the thoughts that I had for this blog post, while being over 24 hours old, had a good enough analogy attached to them that I was able to remember it after a bit of thinking.

So, for those that don’t know, yesterday was the release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (CoD or MW2 for short).  This was easily one of the most anticipated games in the history of video games, with GameStop actually setting a new record for the most number of preorders for a game (can’t remember the figure, but I remember the article).  For those of you that are familiar with College Square Mall here in town, the line went from the GameStop down the stairs to the west end of the mall.  If I had to guess, I’d say 500 people were there, but I think this is an extreme low-ball estimate.

The most recent midnight releases that I have participated in before this were the World of Warcraft expansion (yes, I played.  No, I don’t play anymore) and Halo 3.  Usually, I would go home, play the game until about 3 or 4, go to bed, and be tired the whole next day.  A small price to pay, I thought, for enjoying the games.

This time, I went a little bit of a different avenue.  Picked up the game, and home by 12:20.  I was into the MW2 campaign (on Hardened, or 2nd highest difficulty) by 12:24.  Watching every cutscene, paying attention to everything that was said, I finished the game at 6:36am… just a little over 6 hours and 10 minutes.  The game is not short by any means… there’s quite a bit to the game itself (more on that later).  I’m planning on it taking me quite a while to go through on Veteran, which is why I plan on giving that a shot over Thanksgiving break.

Here’s about how my day went…

0000 – Pick up game.
0024 – start playing game
0636 – finish on Hardened
0637 – do a little dance of elation (very little)
0637:05 – sign on to multiplayer
0800 – 20 minute break to shower
1145 – log off, go eat lunch
1215 – decide to take a nap, since I was a little tired
1330 – wake up from nap
1400 – class
1530 – Personal Wellness extracurricular lecture
1730 – wake up

Oops.  That was with 2 alarms set, and someone banging on my door at 1:30… apparently, I shut off both alarms and told Justin “yeah, I’m up” before falling back asleep… don’t remember it at all.

Anyway, after I completed the campaign and played a bit of multiplayer, I decided to take a shower since I was planning on going to my class and lecture, and didn’t want to make it apparent to the average person that I had not slept.  I was thinking through the campaign that I had just played, and the incredible story that it had told.  Seriously, I feel that this game in particular (and possibly even CoD4, the predecessor to MW2) should be made into a movie/movies.  There’s action to keep the younger generation enthralled, and enough mystery and plot twists that make good movies incredible (see: The Prestige).  There were literally moments during this game that I was thinking to myself “holy s***, what if this actually happened” or having actual emotions being evoked by a video game.  For the general population of video gamers, I’m guessing this hasn’t happened before.  The analogy I made when I was thinking about this was that it was like the new Daniel Craig Bond movies (Casino Royale, with its edginess and emotional reactions), plus the Pierce Brosnan Bond movies (ACTION!!!!), and you multiply the number of protagonists by 20 and the number of bad guys by 200 (probably 2,000, but you can have some actors play multiple roles).  Then you throw in a sprinkling of suspense and about 4 or 5 hard plot turns and twists, and you have the story put out by this game.

SPOILER ALERT: IF YOU HAVEN’T PLAYED THE “CONTROVERSIAL” LEVEL YET, SKIP THIS PARAGRAPH!!!! Infinity Ward (the developer of MW2) has always been notorious about trying to get some sort of emotional reaction out of its players when they play their games, and particularly in the CoD franchise.  About 2 weeks ago, a level of the game was leaked to the media somehow, showing an optional level that allows you to to take control of a terrorist as you go through an airport, using machine guns and grenade launchers to kill innocent civilians and the police force that eventually arrives.  What you didn’t see in that leaked video was the fact that you were in control of an American soldier (who you controlled for the first couple of levels) that was recruited by the CIA to infiltrate the Russian terrorist organization you were in the airport with.  It also didn’t show the fact that the leader of the group knew who you were, and at the end of the level, shoots you and leaves you for dead.  Talk about a bit of “what the hell just happened?!?” END OF SPOILER!!!

There are always moments of “wow, that really shouldn’t have been made into a movie” (see: Hitman, Final Fantasy [though I actually like the FF movie], Eragon, Twilight, etc.), but with the right people working on this, a Modern Warfare movie could turn out to be absolutely epic.  Odds of it actually happening? Probably slim to none.  Oh well, that’s why we dream, right?