1. You met several times at the allergist's clinic before going on a date.
2. Your date is an ex-almost-pro football player who weighs three times more than you do and has a jealous girlfriend who weighs twice as much as you.
3. Your date (female) thinks that you (male) are a homosexual.
4. Your date brings you to a two hour long Hebrew service and you don't speak Hebrew.
5. At an ice-cream parlor, your date (female) orders two scoops of chocolate and you (male) order one small scoop of mango sorbet. She then stares at your sorbet and comments, "It's light and fruity, kind of like you."
6. Your date asks if you would ever consider dating someone twice your age... (See 7)
7. Your date asks you if it would bother you if you dated someone with kids your age.. (See 6)
8. You break the ice with facts about dieting before your date informs you that she used to be anorexic.
9. You're watching a movie with your date about the African-American experience (neither of you are African-American). Ten minutes into the movie, she turns to you and loudly asks you why everyone in the movie is black and all of the black people in the theater (everyone) turn around to look at both you.
10. Your date enthusiastically picks off all of the croutons in your salad without asking you first.
Saturday, March 24, 2007
Friday, March 23, 2007
Juicy's Quotes
Babel:
"I'd hate to be stuck in Afghanistan with a bullet."
March Madness:
"I'm not in the pool. I don't know anything about football."
TV:
"You watch Law and Order:SUV?"
Physics and Wheelchairs:
"Isn't Stephen Hawking that guy who used to play superman? I thought his name was Stephen Stocking."
Obesity:
"Poor people are genetically disposed to be fat."
Oregon:
"Are you going on the Oregon trail with those covered wagons and oxen? How are you going to cross the rivers with those oxen? And watch out for those indians. They'll shoot arrows at you."
Atheism:
"Does that mean you hate God?"
Crime:
"The guy got his wallet stolen and knocked up."
"I'd hate to be stuck in Afghanistan with a bullet."
March Madness:
"I'm not in the pool. I don't know anything about football."
TV:
"You watch Law and Order:SUV?"
Physics and Wheelchairs:
"Isn't Stephen Hawking that guy who used to play superman? I thought his name was Stephen Stocking."
Obesity:
"Poor people are genetically disposed to be fat."
Oregon:
"Are you going on the Oregon trail with those covered wagons and oxen? How are you going to cross the rivers with those oxen? And watch out for those indians. They'll shoot arrows at you."
Atheism:
"Does that mean you hate God?"
Crime:
"The guy got his wallet stolen and knocked up."
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
airing my dirty laundry frustrations
What a fraking awful day...it's not like today was going well by any stretch of the imagination anyway. Between the coffee rush and subsequent crash and general neurosis and paranoia, I remembered that today just happened to be the worst day of the month---laundry day. You'd think that sorting laundry, shoving it into the machine, pouring detergent over the mess, and inserting a couple of quarters would be brainless, but it's anything but in this crappy grad dorm that I live in.
First, there are about 20 washers, about 19 of which work on a regular basis, and 20 dryers, about 20 of which don't dry. I'm wondering if this might be a slight problem. In the beginning of the term, I decided just to wash my clothing and hang it up in my room to dry. That worked wonders. My damp clothing gave my room a definitive Amazon rainforest feel. Of course, I didn't have enough hangers for my underwear and socks, so I spread a sheet on the floor and waded through undergarments for several days. The end result of this little experiment is that all of my M sized shirts could now comfortably fit someone who's XL, and everything else is stiffer than cardboard and feels like cardboard when I wear it.
Everything that could possibly happen has happened when I try to do laundry. It's like running an obstacle course with a loaded laundry basket. So many of my quarters have gotten stuck in the machine and gone to the evil laundry gods. Once, I was so out of it that I starting washing a load, then pushed in another rack of quarters for no good reason. I dread doing laundry, so I only face extreme and intense pain once a month rather than spreading the pain over the month...I don't go for strong torture methods. I prefer a bullet to the water drop torture method.
So out of the 20 dryers, three semi-work. We define semi-work here as drying half a normal load successfully. All of the other dryers apparently can handle a max of five pairs of pants. Five cotton t-shirts are apparently too much and still come out damp. I have never in my life encountered more useless dryers. I could seriously stand in front of my clothing, blow vigorously, and they'd probably dry faster than turning in these monstrosities. It's probably not a good sign that you can see the beads of condensation trickling down the inside of the glass door.
The whole trick is to snatch the three semi-working dryers. Otherwise, it's entirely hopeless. Today I was unlucky and had to wait for one dryer...which also turned out not to work. On top of that, I got bitched out by the girl whose wet clothing I took out of the dryer two hours ago. So I had to resort to only using one of the semi-working dryers and a couple of the non-drying dryers. Honestly, it would probably have been a better use of my time and money if I had just sent everything to the dry-cleaners.
Laundry is not supposed to be painful. I don't understand how I can take something this simple and make it into such a huge deal. Life can't be as frightening and complex as I make it out to be.
First, there are about 20 washers, about 19 of which work on a regular basis, and 20 dryers, about 20 of which don't dry. I'm wondering if this might be a slight problem. In the beginning of the term, I decided just to wash my clothing and hang it up in my room to dry. That worked wonders. My damp clothing gave my room a definitive Amazon rainforest feel. Of course, I didn't have enough hangers for my underwear and socks, so I spread a sheet on the floor and waded through undergarments for several days. The end result of this little experiment is that all of my M sized shirts could now comfortably fit someone who's XL, and everything else is stiffer than cardboard and feels like cardboard when I wear it.
Everything that could possibly happen has happened when I try to do laundry. It's like running an obstacle course with a loaded laundry basket. So many of my quarters have gotten stuck in the machine and gone to the evil laundry gods. Once, I was so out of it that I starting washing a load, then pushed in another rack of quarters for no good reason. I dread doing laundry, so I only face extreme and intense pain once a month rather than spreading the pain over the month...I don't go for strong torture methods. I prefer a bullet to the water drop torture method.
So out of the 20 dryers, three semi-work. We define semi-work here as drying half a normal load successfully. All of the other dryers apparently can handle a max of five pairs of pants. Five cotton t-shirts are apparently too much and still come out damp. I have never in my life encountered more useless dryers. I could seriously stand in front of my clothing, blow vigorously, and they'd probably dry faster than turning in these monstrosities. It's probably not a good sign that you can see the beads of condensation trickling down the inside of the glass door.
The whole trick is to snatch the three semi-working dryers. Otherwise, it's entirely hopeless. Today I was unlucky and had to wait for one dryer...which also turned out not to work. On top of that, I got bitched out by the girl whose wet clothing I took out of the dryer two hours ago. So I had to resort to only using one of the semi-working dryers and a couple of the non-drying dryers. Honestly, it would probably have been a better use of my time and money if I had just sent everything to the dry-cleaners.
Laundry is not supposed to be painful. I don't understand how I can take something this simple and make it into such a huge deal. Life can't be as frightening and complex as I make it out to be.
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
ICA
The new ICA (Institute of Contemporary Art) in boston is rather small, but easy on the eyes. It's not the nicest building in Boston, but it's in a prime location by the waterfront. The views of the water from inside the museum is amazing.
If there's one part of contemporary art that I don't particularly care for, it's the AV stuff. I can do without the jerky camera movements and either meaningless objects falling on top of each other or ugly, earnest people puffed up in their own self-importance. Of course, there are entire movements of modern art devoted to Marcel Duchamp's canned excrement and porcelain urinals, but that's somewhat amusing...
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
frak it
I'm sick...and midterms are coming up. There's nothing to really worry about, since I've adopted the philosophy of refusing to panic until I panic. I'm more concerned that I somehow got sick by watching 15 straight hours of Battlestar Galactica and then some last week. I know it sounds ridiculous, but I ended up with a massive migraine, runny nose, and a deformed spinal cord. It's a tragic sign that I'm not as young as I used to be. I was whipping blithely through 24 marathons, pizza, and massive loads of sugar just a year ago. Then again, that's probably why I can't do it anymore, not to mention the coffee that's totally fraking up my sleep patterns and the alcohol that's fraking up my brain. Frak me.
I didn't know anything about Battlestar Galactica a week ago, then familiarized myself with everything about the show, and now I'm fraking sick of the show. Coining the word 'frak' is definitely the master stroke of this series...I'm ambivalent about the rest. For a sci-fi show, it's surprisingly gritty and pseudorealistic (dark and gloomy is always a plus on my scale). BG's a departure from the usual shows that I indulge in since I like the plot and hate the people. It's always the other way around.
The people on this show are so...human. It totally blows that all of the characters have an assortment of flaws. We're not even talking about stupidity or selfishness or something equally insipid. Instead, we have genocide-supporting, pill-popping, religious maniacs on board. Even I don't have such a grim view on humanity. I find it amazing that these people were the ones left after 99.9995% of the purported human race were destroyed by the machines. I can't sympathize with shows that don't have a moral center...BG does have a moral center, but no one's following it.
To me, the part of the show worth watching is how it addresses the question: What constitutes being human? BG embraces Descartes' "I think, therefore I am." Although the machines were responsible for the human massacre at the beginning, we are shown repeatedly that the people behave no better than their machine counterparts. In fact, the most interesting concept is machines trying to emulate people. We see that machines want to experience love and community, and what happens in their quest to become more like us.
Of course, I also appreciate that the not so subtle hints toward Iraq, religious fanaticism, and other heavy political issues are addressed directly. Battlestar Galactica does not shy away from anything. If only I could get over my absolute hatred of the schoolteacher-turned -president, I would enjoy the show so much more. Honestly, sometimes I think she should be shoved out of a fraking airlock. There's nothing worse than a combination of self-righteousness, weakness, religious fanaticism, and totalitarianism.
In all, Battlestar Galactica's a good show, though not fraking good. The ship sailed to another galaxy a few hours ago.
I didn't know anything about Battlestar Galactica a week ago, then familiarized myself with everything about the show, and now I'm fraking sick of the show. Coining the word 'frak' is definitely the master stroke of this series...I'm ambivalent about the rest. For a sci-fi show, it's surprisingly gritty and pseudorealistic (dark and gloomy is always a plus on my scale). BG's a departure from the usual shows that I indulge in since I like the plot and hate the people. It's always the other way around.
The people on this show are so...human. It totally blows that all of the characters have an assortment of flaws. We're not even talking about stupidity or selfishness or something equally insipid. Instead, we have genocide-supporting, pill-popping, religious maniacs on board. Even I don't have such a grim view on humanity. I find it amazing that these people were the ones left after 99.9995% of the purported human race were destroyed by the machines. I can't sympathize with shows that don't have a moral center...BG does have a moral center, but no one's following it.
To me, the part of the show worth watching is how it addresses the question: What constitutes being human? BG embraces Descartes' "I think, therefore I am." Although the machines were responsible for the human massacre at the beginning, we are shown repeatedly that the people behave no better than their machine counterparts. In fact, the most interesting concept is machines trying to emulate people. We see that machines want to experience love and community, and what happens in their quest to become more like us.
Of course, I also appreciate that the not so subtle hints toward Iraq, religious fanaticism, and other heavy political issues are addressed directly. Battlestar Galactica does not shy away from anything. If only I could get over my absolute hatred of the schoolteacher-turned -president, I would enjoy the show so much more. Honestly, sometimes I think she should be shoved out of a fraking airlock. There's nothing worse than a combination of self-righteousness, weakness, religious fanaticism, and totalitarianism.
In all, Battlestar Galactica's a good show, though not fraking good. The ship sailed to another galaxy a few hours ago.
Saturday, February 10, 2007
settling down
It's the first weekend in a long time that I haven't gone out...and I admit that it's not a bad feeling. I'm not spending loads of money and I'm not getting trashed. Instead, I've been doing some hefty programming in matlab and using my head for once. Now I'm amused because I'm not actually bad at programming. Considering how much pain CS has dealt me in the past, it's ironic and surprising. Today, I got a real kick out of programming 4-D matrices, though it was impossible to get any intuition from them and I had to downgrade to 3-D.
I guess I actually could enjoy learning if I somehow get past my mile-high roadblocks. But it's so difficult to learn something new very quickly...like matlab. I place too much emphasis on natural talent and not enough on hard work. It's not that natural talent doesn't go a long way, but I only have so much of that and moaning about the lack of it is not going to get me any further. I also haven't been working hard for a long long time now, which could explain why I feel like I don't know anything.
Making intuitive leaps is difficult, made more difficult by the fact that I always feel like I need to come up with such a leap and usually not being so lucky. It could just be the lack of knowledge or whatever. Or maybe thinking about making leaps stunts the part of the brain that's supposed to be making leaps. It's just a massive heap of delusional overexpectations, too much introspection, ...in general, too much thinking.
Sometimes I wonder if I actually would have liked academia in another life. I admit that I do feel comfortable in the environment. I get along swimmingly with my co-students. It's gratifying to find people whose sense of humor complement mine (or maybe it's just because graduate students tend to be nicer than people in the real world). However, there's some part of me that's not quite satisfied. I have a strong suspicion that it's not the actual thing but all of the baggage that comes along with it.
I guess I actually could enjoy learning if I somehow get past my mile-high roadblocks. But it's so difficult to learn something new very quickly...like matlab. I place too much emphasis on natural talent and not enough on hard work. It's not that natural talent doesn't go a long way, but I only have so much of that and moaning about the lack of it is not going to get me any further. I also haven't been working hard for a long long time now, which could explain why I feel like I don't know anything.
Making intuitive leaps is difficult, made more difficult by the fact that I always feel like I need to come up with such a leap and usually not being so lucky. It could just be the lack of knowledge or whatever. Or maybe thinking about making leaps stunts the part of the brain that's supposed to be making leaps. It's just a massive heap of delusional overexpectations, too much introspection, ...in general, too much thinking.
Sometimes I wonder if I actually would have liked academia in another life. I admit that I do feel comfortable in the environment. I get along swimmingly with my co-students. It's gratifying to find people whose sense of humor complement mine (or maybe it's just because graduate students tend to be nicer than people in the real world). However, there's some part of me that's not quite satisfied. I have a strong suspicion that it's not the actual thing but all of the baggage that comes along with it.
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
monochrome delirious
I wanna kick the machine
That made you piss away your dreams
And tear at your defenses
Until there's nothing left but me.
That made you piss away your dreams
And tear at your defenses
Until there's nothing left but me.
- Goo Goo Dolls, Dizzy -
I'm riding on a minor second wind. While I wouldn't describe myself as motivated by any stretch of the imagination, I'm not kicking and screaming every step of the way anymore. That was a fucking waste. Just one word: acceptance. At some point, I switched to jaded without actually experiencing anything worth noting. I almost feel like I've given up. I don't even remember what my dreams were and what I wanted out of my life. A long time ago, I always wondered why people weren't happy and why they couldn't do what they wanted. Well, we all have to work to live, eat, sleep, etc. It's ridiculously simple.
Honestly, life was so much better when I was seventeen and stupid. I had self-confidence, dreams, happiness...then some evil fairy called life came and waved her crooked wand, and *presto*, here I am. That's the other thing, wallowing in self-pity because taking responsibility is too hard. It's so easy to assign blame to anything and everything and just say: I'm irrevecablly fucked up and I can't ever climb out of this hole.
Surprisingly, I'm on some sort of a local peak because I've had a pseudo-social life for the last few weeks and everything else is hiccuping along relatively smoothly. But I know I'll blink and I'll hit the next plateau or trough (probably ~midterms). What happens happens. I know that something snapped, and I can't pinpoint when it happened and I can't fix it.
It's ironic when I consider that my life is so much better than almost everyone else's. The fourth best college in the country. The third best doctoral program in the country. And I can't fucking live my life. Forgive me, I'm just tired and old and bitter at the moment.
Honestly, life was so much better when I was seventeen and stupid. I had self-confidence, dreams, happiness...then some evil fairy called life came and waved her crooked wand, and *presto*, here I am. That's the other thing, wallowing in self-pity because taking responsibility is too hard. It's so easy to assign blame to anything and everything and just say: I'm irrevecablly fucked up and I can't ever climb out of this hole.
Surprisingly, I'm on some sort of a local peak because I've had a pseudo-social life for the last few weeks and everything else is hiccuping along relatively smoothly. But I know I'll blink and I'll hit the next plateau or trough (probably ~midterms). What happens happens. I know that something snapped, and I can't pinpoint when it happened and I can't fix it.
It's ironic when I consider that my life is so much better than almost everyone else's. The fourth best college in the country. The third best doctoral program in the country. And I can't fucking live my life. Forgive me, I'm just tired and old and bitter at the moment.
Sunday, February 04, 2007
total eclipse of the heart
Hallelujah Jeff Buckley
Chasing Cars Snow Patrol
Running up that hill Placebo
Trouble Coldplay
Superman Five for Fighting
Hot Blooded Foreigner
Chasing Cars Snow Patrol
Running up that hill Placebo
Trouble Coldplay
Superman Five for Fighting
Hot Blooded Foreigner
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Saturday, January 06, 2007
Without a Life
Over the past few days, I've been watching the first season of Without a Trace. Well...I also redecorated my dorm room and did six loads of laundry, but I wouldn't exactly qualify the latter as noteworthy.
WaT exhibits rather strong CBSish tendencies and is pretty much by the Bruckheimer. That's not to say that it's a bad show. In fact, considering how long it takes most shows to settle in, the first season is put together amazingly well. The storylines and characters are strong and cohesive, including in the pilot. The show immediately settles in without the rough patches that almost all new shows go through as a rite of passage, not to mention those that perpetually stumble along in a disjointed and half-hearted manner.
As with almost all CBS shows, the casting is excellent, with the requisite older male authority figure, complete with the broody air and dark past and the two men (preferably handsome) and two women (preferably gorgeous) with sparkling and vibrant personalities that complete the team. It's essential that the people are good looking and cheery, since WaT is so heavy at times that I was certain that it would choke itself on self-inflicted gravitas and drama.
WaT feeds heavily on human emotions (as opposed to say...elephant emotions). Each episode recreates a person from the inside out, learning about the tragedy in his/her life (Usually abuse or drugs or any of the other depravities that CBS relishes in showing). We don't see any body parts or the omniprescent morgue that's the bread and butter of the Eye, but it's creepier, like dissecting someone's soul or mind.
The screenwriting is pretty damn good for a TV show, and the dialogue is snappy, sharp, and clever. Overall, WaT almost feels too clinical. Everything is clear cut and you just get the feeling that every element was thought over, thought over again, and fitted precisely into place. Predictability does stifle creativity, but why care when each episode is as solid as a slab of concrete.
Ultimately, I only go for the shows where the cinematography is beyond criticism and the characters are strongly appealing. That's probably why Law and Order and its billions of spin-offs have always turned me off and why CBS, with its camerawork and over-the-top humane saviors of humanity, is my bread and butter. As one critic stated, "Without a Trace is about beautiful people all sleeping with each other". Well...I believe that if they spend all day saving the world and since they're all beautiful, there's nothing wrong with a little fun thrown in the mix. It's all in a day's work.
WaT exhibits rather strong CBSish tendencies and is pretty much by the Bruckheimer. That's not to say that it's a bad show. In fact, considering how long it takes most shows to settle in, the first season is put together amazingly well. The storylines and characters are strong and cohesive, including in the pilot. The show immediately settles in without the rough patches that almost all new shows go through as a rite of passage, not to mention those that perpetually stumble along in a disjointed and half-hearted manner.
As with almost all CBS shows, the casting is excellent, with the requisite older male authority figure, complete with the broody air and dark past and the two men (preferably handsome) and two women (preferably gorgeous) with sparkling and vibrant personalities that complete the team. It's essential that the people are good looking and cheery, since WaT is so heavy at times that I was certain that it would choke itself on self-inflicted gravitas and drama.
WaT feeds heavily on human emotions (as opposed to say...elephant emotions). Each episode recreates a person from the inside out, learning about the tragedy in his/her life (Usually abuse or drugs or any of the other depravities that CBS relishes in showing). We don't see any body parts or the omniprescent morgue that's the bread and butter of the Eye, but it's creepier, like dissecting someone's soul or mind.
The screenwriting is pretty damn good for a TV show, and the dialogue is snappy, sharp, and clever. Overall, WaT almost feels too clinical. Everything is clear cut and you just get the feeling that every element was thought over, thought over again, and fitted precisely into place. Predictability does stifle creativity, but why care when each episode is as solid as a slab of concrete.
Ultimately, I only go for the shows where the cinematography is beyond criticism and the characters are strongly appealing. That's probably why Law and Order and its billions of spin-offs have always turned me off and why CBS, with its camerawork and over-the-top humane saviors of humanity, is my bread and butter. As one critic stated, "Without a Trace is about beautiful people all sleeping with each other". Well...I believe that if they spend all day saving the world and since they're all beautiful, there's nothing wrong with a little fun thrown in the mix. It's all in a day's work.
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