The Road Not Taken (Yet)

…. winter distances.

It is 2:30AM, and I have just finished revising what might be the best writing I have ever done. Strangely enough this isn’t coming from a business class, a class on computers, a class on politics, or anything else one might associate me with. Rather, it is the product of a philosophy class, where I wrote a paper on Plato, and whether or not living the just life is a worth it. What did I have to say? Well, where do you think I fall on that issue?

Many of you may or may not know, I am staying in Seattle this summer. There are several reasons as to why I am doing this, some are good, some are bad. Simply put, I like Seattle, Seattle is far less dramatic than Vancouver. I have a place to stay, and friends to hang with, and a job that I enjoy. Why not stay in Seattle? To all at home: I will visit, or you can visit me. Trains are cheap, planes are reasonable, gas is absurd. Pick one, and we’ll work something out.

I find a sort of happy calm writing in the dead of night. Classes are gearing up to end, and papers are due left and right, but in this I have a chance to have a bit of fun in my education, and a bit a creativity. Tests and quizzes, lectures and readings, these don’t allow for any sort of expression, beyond a certain limit. Papers, essays, drafts, revisions, these all allow me to say what I think, right or wrong, and have it evaluated, considered, even loved, or perhaps loathed. When I enjoy a paper, when I take pride in my production (suck it Marx), I remember why I am putting myself in debt for college.

As for the year as a whole, I will have to give it a B-. There is nothing about the year that I hated, and nothing to complain about, but even though I trodded through it, enjoying the moments that presented themselves, there were instances of failure, and the average fell. Classes have been amazing so far. Before I sign up for classes, I ask around, I google, and I RateMyProfessor every possible class I might take. Nothing could make my money (or rather my parents money) more wastefully spent then a poor professor. English is a subject I have always had a love-hate relationship with. Some years she treated me well, and I her. Others she was full of spite. English 120 was and will forever be the last course I will take in that subject. I am glad it ended the way it did. The affair will be remembered mostly as a sweet fling, and I will always wonder where that woman (the English class) is, and how she is doing. This is thanks to my wonderful professor Tara Der-Ye……. I’ll look up the proper spelling later. Again, I entered into a class with a subject I had long held reservations on: Biology. This is a science that I, despite my previous aspirations of dino-digging glory. My professor made that class worthwhile, interesting, and was a good guy. Thanks Jack Vincent! Music History started well, middle-ed full of fear, and ended well. Thanks Quinton Morris, you made the class interesting, if not challenging. History, same story (Lizabeth Johnson). Math, math is an interesting story. Davis Doherty, you are responsible for making me remember everything, and doing it well. Dr. Alex Barchachat (That’s probably not spelled correctly), you are an interesting case. You are the only professor I took on with a negative rating about you. I’d have to say that I have no idea what anyone was talking about, you are a great professor, if not a little quirky:) You can present math in such a way, that anyone will get it, and your accent only makes everything better, and slightly hilarious. Thanks! I can continue to rant, but I think the point is clear, I came to SU because I wanted to know my professors, or at least have the opportunity to do so. I believe that SU has provided that to me. Thank you.

Life in Seattle is everything one would dream it to be. Fun, expensive, eccentric, crazy, progressive, caffeinated, and wet. I love Seattle, the quirks, the buildings, the attitude, everything. That is partially why I am staying. I have made friends here that I can count on, talk to, and have fun with. At the same time we can discuss politics, philosophy, economics, GTA, women, cars, computers, coffee, and even corn sex. That is friendship, and I do expect us to visit somehow this summer. What more can I ask Seattle provide? Seattle did provide me, briefly, with one girl. One interest. One little spark. I was thankful, and took note. In the end, it didn’t quite work out. It’s a shame in some ways; you never get tired of that nervous feeling that you get. The anxiousness that overcomes the way you talk and act, and that no matter how well you may speak, or how clam and adjusted you act, you lose to it, and act like a fool. Butterflies some call it, knots in the stomach, anxiety, nervousness, whatever name it goes by; of it I never tire. To feel like there is something about that person to learn, a mystery to solve, is something underrated. When you walk away from a person smiling, and into a room of others, who notice you smiling; that is when you had a good day. That is a crush. Even though it changed into a friendship, thanks, I think it best you exist in ambiguity, but you deserve some credit; it is always good to be reminded of how a crush feels, and to make a new friend.

Can she (Seattle) provide a better life than current? She could pay better, but salaries go up, wages inflate, and people get promoted. Life goes on. I will be working part-time in Network Services, part time at the Help Desk. If you asked me at the right time in my life, I might say that this is my dream job; working on networking issues, messing with routers, learning subnets, using VLANs, filtering MACs. Now, it is just a hobby, but one for which I will get paid, no complaining there .

I have written a lot, and killed 30 minutes of sleep I had planned on taking, but my poor blog had been neglected far too long. Good Night!

#! /usr/bin/env python
# filename : blog.py

# Introduce variables
def time(x): None
def content(x): ‘Tons’ * int(x)
def work(x): x * wage;return x;
def updates(blog):

x = time(12)
y = content(5)
z = work(18)

Alright, jokes aside, the above summarizes my lack of regular content. I’ve been working the same amount as last quarter (about 18 hours), taking some classes that require a bit more reading than before, and generally being busy. Not to complain, all these things are good things, thus far, and my last quarter of Freshman (Sophomore.33 if you’re being technical), year looks like it will continue to be enjoyable.

As is pretty obvious with the above statement, I am working on learning python. I figured that it would be a good language to start with, being one that exists and runs on every platform known to man, is free, and is supposed to be simple, clean, and efficient, a notion I rather enjoy . I’m not super-master-programmer at the moment, but whatever, I’ll go as I please and have fun with it. I’ll move onto PHP and MySQL (JUST THE BASICS), and maybe play around with getting my website back up and running to do something useful; what I don’t know, but I’ll figure it out.

Life itself has been an interesting ride lately. My family, though I love ‘em, is one of the most dysfunctional, insane families around, and everything that happens is dramatic somewhere down the line. I do, however, have YANON (Yet Another Niece or Nephew; That’s the last computer joke, I promise), Shel(l)by. That makes me an uncle the (somewhere around) 14th time over! Hoorah! Celebration! I haven’t seen the baby yet, but Seattle University doesn’t seem to want to let anyone have any breaks during Spring Quarter; I’ll get to you when I can sis! The social has been going well; I’ve seen James more in the past few weeks than I have in a while. I probably have a roommate for next year too! Provided he doesn’t transfer (Read: Defect) to UW. Matt is cool, and he hates his current roommate; that of which I resemble very little, so all should be good. No women these days, but oh well.

Academically life isn’t bad. My Philosophy class is taught by Dr. Van Hollebeke, who does an excellent job of lecturing, discussing, and otherwise teaching a (what could be boring) topic early in the morning; I’ve yet to come close to falling asleep, rare in a class at 10AM. Business Calc (Don’t judge, math isn’t my thing), is going pretty well so far, I have Dr. Alex, same as last quarter. Although people say his tests are killer, I enjoy him, and think he is an excellent math professor. Sociology might be more interesting than I had expected, the professor knows what she is talking about, and has a sense of humor; more than welcome in a 2-hour class.

I moderated the World Trade Organization for WASMUN ‘08 Friday and today. My Chair Alex, was awesome, and very fun to work with. Our secretary Aledia was also very fun to work with, it’s too bad she had to leave us half-way through Saturday. Overall I’d say Alex chaired the committee very well, and the three of us (all being econ majors) had a good time. I’ll staff for WASMUN next year as well, and I will try to continue to be active in the SUMUN program here.

With THAT being said, Chicago was awesome! The city was amazing, the people were amazing, the team was amazing, and the actual ChoMUN committee and conference was amazing. Being a Grand Duke of Russia was simply beautiful! The wars we caused, avoided, and instigated were more than enough to quench my thrist for Pre-WWI wars and colonial influence! I will rule the world someday , even if it IS only via a MUN function.

I’m going to sign out now, but before doing so, I will recommend that everyone take an hour to go outside and enjoy it. Even if it is raining, it’s still good to get out

Goodbye, World! (For tonight)

I’ve decided to be a better geek. This means I need to focus my energies one at at time.

This month I will be doing coding.

Next month I will work on a Mag Stripe reader.

Etc. Etc.

I am teaching myself python. I’ve gone too long without knowing a proper language (QBASIC doesn’t count), so I am learning python. Thanks to all the free documentation out there, and, here is my first program that does something:

# filename : area.py
def areasq(l, h):
global sqarea
sqarea = l * h
def areatri(l, h):
global triarea
triarea = .5 * l * h
while True:
shape = raw_input(‘Hello, what shape you do want to know the dimensions for?’)
if shape == ‘triangle’:
print ‘Oh, that’s nice’
l = int(raw_input(‘What is the length?’))
h = int(raw_input(‘What is the height?’))
areatri(l, h)
print triarea
elif shape == ’square’:
print ‘Oh, that’s nice’
l = int(raw_input(‘What is the length?’))
h = int(raw_input(‘What is the height?’))
areasq(l, h)
print sqarea
print ‘I am sorry, that is not a shape that I am familar with.’
else:
break

I was trying to use a while, if, break, and def statements, and I think I did alright. I’m sure the code could be cleaner, maybe by putting the input section into a function, but it works! I’ll keep the internet updated, if anyone wants to follow the process of a geek learning code

We all make promises we can’t keep. New Years Resolutions in vain, and Lenten pledges that we break on Sunday, Tuesday evenings, and whenever most convenient. I said I would update twice a week, and then life got busy. Once you miss one update, it gets worse from there. I haven’t been entirely dead, I have a few drafts that I started but didn’t feel that they warranted a full post. Regardless, I apologize…

Winter Quarter is better than Fall Quarter. I gave an overview of classes already. Music History is officially insane, but still cool. Math is going well, and Bio isn’t half bad. Grade-wise I feel even better about my classes, and next quarter I will finally be able to remove Philosophy and Math 130 from my evil schedule, hopefully. THEN, I will be nearly done with University core, and move onto Business core. Yay, right?!

Valentine’s Day came and went as it usually did. Nothing spectacular. I put something that (I thought) was cute together. I suppose she liked it, so that’s good. Other than that, it was just a day. I spent it aloneish wandering around, hanging with various people between their dinners, and grabbing some coffee. I will avoid the standard women rant, this time around.

This weekend, 3 days of awesome, was the weekend of OSUMUN. SUMUN attended, so be default, so did I. I represented Libya in the Security Council, and was the ‘Voice of Africa’. We eventually moved on to a topic of insane proportions, as I put in one of my speeches, the world was blowing on the embers of World War III. I wanted a war, and I got one . Libya also took the most Pro-Western stance it has ever taken. I didn’t win any awards this time ’round, but those who did deserved it, and frankly, it was the most fun I’ve had on SC. I think my AU experience may have been better, but it is close.

I will draw this to a close. My social life, minus women, is going well, academics are fine, and my car still works. Nothing to complian about! XOXO World!

Many many moons ago, I would sleep with the covers over my head. Always. I can’t explain why, but I felt safe, and I could not sleep without the feeling of something over my head. I can only sleep with my hear outside the covers if I’m with someone else. Not in the same bed, but the same room, tough I don’t mind same bed either.

Isn’t it funny how, no matter how old we get, or how much we change, that there are still things about ourselves that are a part of us. T’aint it funny that, I, 228 moons old still need to have a blanket/pillow over my head? Oh well. So it goes.

So it goes…. So it goes….. That’s a wonderful phrase. And the first to know where it comes from, wins a prize. Maybe. But yes, so life goes. Classes are well I am currently (not) reading for Bio, so I can be semi-prepared for class tomorrow. My roommate just came in too. I plan on going to sleep before 3:00 this time, napping before math tomorrow, and then napping after work, doing some HW early, and making Sunday the lazies day ever. Good plan no?

Classes are good, after a week at least. Pro and Con list following:

• Biology
  • Class is only 50 minutes
  • My only class on Thursday
  • Prof is funny
  • Not too much reading
• Math
  • Prof is hilarious
  • Class isn’t too long
  • all girls (mostly)
• Music History
  • Crazy Prof
  • Hilarious Prof
  • Cool subject
  • Free symphony tickets

I must win at class-picking or something. Work is also good. Changed my hours to be less crazy-long, but I work all but Wednesday now. Oh well, trade off. Money is always good, ya know what I’m sayin’?

I need to beat Cult of Personality. Or else. Must. Win. Guitar. Hero. I.I.I ! I will ONLY beat this game on expert, and nothing else. I promise.

Good night for now.

I awoke to the all-too-familiar sensation of being late. Fuck. First day? Good job boyo. Glancing at the cellphone-turned-alarm, I say that I had an hour left of sleep. Damn, getting up early sucks.

At 8:30, I woke up again, dressed, and headed down to Stumptown. Now that I have time to do this in the morning, I plan on being a bit more of a regular. I grabbed a mocha, two Baristas I know where there, so I said a quick morning, and left for biology.

Jack Vincent. Jack reminds me of a friend from MUN, it’s disturbing. But that’s a good thing. One of the first things he said; This class isn’t for Bio majors, so we’re going to talk about what you want to talk about. He seemed like a good prof so far, and I scored the book for 40 bucks from a friend, making the class even better.

After Bio, which got out early, I scampered around to kill the time, and then ran to Music History, which I have with Bryan and Kelli, and Liz, actually. We all sat in/around/near each other, with me choosing (somewhat unwisely) front-center. At exactly 10:00 our prof strolls in. This is where the story begins. Quinton Morris, a young, black, handsome-type man, confident, funny, and very articulate, began his lecture. “I’m young”, “I keep it real.” He went over the syllabus, and I was reminded how ‘band’ or music people, are demanding, on task, and unforgiving about latelyness, sloppiness, or other -ness’ . But as the class wore on, I realized Prof. Morris is probably the most hilarious man I have ever had teach me. He introduced beat (about 7 people can’t read music, so he broke it down for everyone, which was cool) with the following: “Ladies, you KNOW what I mean. You are dancin’ with a guy, and he’s so cute, but damn, he has NO rhythm. Yeah, you know. Cute, but can’t dance.” The ladies, of course, knew exactly what he meant. He then asked the class “Who hasn’t been in love?” A lone student raised his hand, and Prof. M stared. “Man, come see me after class. You’re missin’ out”.

Class continued on, we learned about some notes, and how quarter notes work. Then we listened to some choice music. Prof was describing a piece, being quiet and creepy, and then jumps towards me, and palms me, right in the chest shouting “OR SCARE YOU”. I have never been more “WTF?” in a class before. Yet, it was amazing. So, here’s a tip for my future Professors. Want to impress me? Punch me on the first day of class.

Math was a pleasant suprise. I’ve heard Dr. Alex is a good prof, so I’m excited, I’ve lucked out with math teachers so far. Also, I have the class with Faith, Charline, Alle, and apparently Emily. Who knew? Everyone is in 118 this quarter.

It looks like I’m going to be in for a good quarter.

Also, Eric is one of the most hilarious writers I’ve read in the last 36 hours .

Sorry this is technically on Tuesday, deal.